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THE MUSIC TRADE REVIEW.
The Migration of the Piano.
RENTED MUSICAL
THE SEASON
INSTRUMENTS MOVE WITH
TWKNTV-TWO THOUSAND PI-
ANOS WILL HE ON THE WAY OR AT THE
WARKROOMS MY THE 1ST OF JULY
GROW-
INO POPULARITY OF THE HIRE SYS-
TEM IN CONNECTION WITH PIANOS.
M
UCH the greater part of the piano
work and pleasure of this country is
carried on in the cooler months. Every
year the custom of spending the summer
away from home grows stronger, and as no
one wants to pay for the hiring of a piano
that no one but a caretaker or a summer
burglar would use, the pianos leave the
houses on or before the going of the family.
Consequently, when the players go away,
the pianos go home; and when the players
come back the pianos come out of their
summer seclusion and go forth to earn their
share of the income of the firm that owns
them. The outflow of pianos follows close-
ly the returning of the summer people in
October, and that month and November
sees a rushing outgo, which extends into
December; but by the close of the year the
trade has settled back into comparatively
narrow limits, while the practicing and
playing are well started on a fast and furi-
ous winter career. This keeps up through
the spring and well into June, and a late,
cool spring means a warm and busy time
for the rented pianos till, perhaps, the end
of June, when the homing of the piano is
practically over and the players and stu-
dents are on their way to the mountains
and the seashore.
This piano home-coming is a mammoth
affair. Consider that there are probably
25,000 rented pianos in New York city
alone; then guess, if you can, at the number
in the whole country. Of New York's 25,-
000 that are scattered throughout the city
in the winter, nearly seven-eighths are back
in the stores and warerooms by the 1st of
July. Twenty-two thousand pianos carried
downstairs and out, and then rolled and
pushed into their summer quarters! Once
in the warehouse, a genuine summer clean-
ing, polishing and tuning begins, to get
the instrument ready against the time when
the public will look them over and choose
again.
People are getting more musical every
year, and consequently rent more pianos.
Then the reaction against the installment
plan has in many places done much to in-
crease the number of rented instruments.
This is because so many people prefer to
have the use of a new piano each year rather
than have to be content with one that may
be unsatisfactory after the wear and tear of
two or three seasons. Then the induce-
ments to rent pianos have been made very
strong.
The quality of the rented piano is
generally very, fair; it has to be, for those
who rent grow more and more discrimina-
ting every year. Rents are lower than they
ever were. The business used to be such
a gold mine that the rushing in of new
firms and the consequent competition
he Pease Piano Co. will be compelled to
couldn't help but make matters easier for give increased attention to the manufacture
the renter. The gain from the standpoint of baby grands during the present year.
of the customer is greater even than would
There is room, in fact there is a demand
appear from the actual rent reduction, for for a good instrument of this character at a
new firms and manufacturers in the struggle reasonable price—a price that will com-
to introduce their brand give special privi- mend itself to music lovers. In the scale
leges, such as free cartage both ways, dat- of this instrument, as well as in thorough-
ing bills ahead, plenty of tuning, etc. ness of finish and reliability of manufac-
The day may come when some enterprising ture, the Pease Piano Co. display that at-
.firm will, throw in a course of piano lesions tention to detail which has enabled their
uprights to be so aptly designated the
with every piano rented.
The rents are fitted to the means of any- ' Popular Pease Pianos."
body who can afford a piano at all. Three
dollars a month is about the lowest regular
The Martin Piano Co. F
rent asked, but some pianos are rented for
even less. From that figure the scale runs '"THE factory of the Martin Piano Co., in
up to $8 and $10 for the best new uprights,
£
Rochester, N. Y., was closed by
and $10, $13 and even $15 for the different Sheriff Hannan last Saturday morning upon
grades and styles of grand and the favorite two judgments secured in the Municipal
baby grand pianos. Most of the serviceable Court and docketed in the County Clerk's
instruments are hired for about $5 per office; one in favor of Edward Hayes and
month. The uprights are in a tremendous Frank H. Falls for $134.02, and the other in
majority, for the reason that they take up favor of the Commercial Bank for $756.73.
so little room; and room is money in most
The first judgment was obtained on a
of the big cities of the country. The square note made by Smith & Nixon, of Cincin-
piano is almost a relic of the past, and they nati, and indorsed by the local company,
are getting scarcer, more unpopular and while the Hayes & Falls judgment was ob-
cheaper every year.
Fairly good ones tained for merchandise supplied and plumb-
have been sold for $25 and $30. If they ing work done. Messrs. Atwater and Arm-
get much cheaper, one might follow the strong, of the firm of Atwater, Armstrong
example of James Lick, the careful Cali- & Clarke, the lumber firm which failed last
fornian, who gave California and the world week, were large stockholders in the Martin
the famous Lick Observatory. The old Piano Co., and in fact the lumber failure
gentleman was thrifty—people who give was precipitated by the piano company's
away observatories and things after they are connection with the Cincinnati concern,
dead have generally held on to whnt c->me whose paper it is said to hold in the sum
of $75,000. Grave fears were held when
within reach while they were in the L.i.u of
the living. But one day, in a most unac- Atwater, Armstrong & Clarke failed, that
countable fit of extravagance, he bought a the Martin Piano Co. would be compelled
fine square piano. Remorse came home to succumb, and although it has survived
with the piano; and the man who could the financial gale for a week, the pressure
have bought a factory full of the same kind brought to bear by anxious creditors pro
was so overcome with the recklessness of duced the crisis of Saturday.
the purchase that he had his bed made up
Another judgment has been obtained by
on it, and slept thereon regularly. History the Fourth National Bank of New York
doesn't say whether or not he took the top against Atwater, Armstrong & Clarke for
off and used the strings for a wire mattress, $784.77, representing a draft of Smith &
or slept on the hardwood cover as a penance Nixon, which the lumber firm agreed to ac-
cept, and which was not paid when due.
for his wild extravagance.
The rented pianos generally get a very
fair treatment. Now and then one falls in-
Duty on Piano Wire.
to the hands of a would-be Paderewski, and
comes out a little the worse for wear; but
N the appeal of Richard Ran ft against
in most cases the players—and invariably
the decision of Collector of Customs of
the neighbors—cry quits long before the this city relative to his decision as to the
well-built American piano makes more of rate of duty chargeable on piano wire, the
complaint than the buzz of a broken string TJ. S. General Appraisers have decided that
or two.
the wire in dispute is not tinsel wire as
claimed, nor is it so commercially known,
and is the same as the wire used principally
Something About the Pease.
in pianoforte actions. The Collector as-
sessed duty on the merchandise at 35 per
N inspection of the pianos, both grand cent, ad valorem under the provision of
and upright, which are being placed paragraph 147 for articles or wares com-
on the market by the Pease Piano Co., will posed wholly of metal. The appellant
convince the most skeptical that here are claims that the wire is entitled free entry
instruments fully worthy the marked favor under the provision of paragraph 634 for
bestowed on them by musicians and the tinsel wire. The appeal was overruled and
trade at large.
the Collector's decision sustained.
The Pease baby grand, especially, is win-
ning its way into the esteem of the trade
A NKW piano and organ store has been
wherever it has been tested. East and
opened in Lincoln, Neb., by John Nelson.
West it is much admired, and it looks as if
I
A