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THE!
of the latest popular music in enormous quanti-
ties, nor does the appetite ever appear to suffer
any feeling of satiety. There are reasons for
this, of course. Perhaps we can find some of
them. Whether the discovery will or can lead
to any specially practical results is a question that
need hardly be answered here. Possibly, how-
ever, we may be able to suggest some lines of
thought that will assist manufacturers of music
foils in the task of clearing their shelves of good
music which at present is practically unsalable.
If anything of this sort can be done, this Heart-
to-Heart Talk will certainly have a value all its
own.
People are affected profoundly by their en-
vironment. If one lives in an atmosphere sug-
gestive of beauty, one comes unconsciously to seek
beauty; whether in architecture, in the furnishing
of a home, or in the hearing of music. If, how-
ever, one's life is not itself a beautiful thing-, it
is 'impossible that one should have an inherent
seeking after the beautiful, unless, indeed, this
has been inborn. Now, the American people of
to-day are going through a period of intense
ugliness 'in all their national life. On the one
hand, they still cling, with appalling persistency,
to a Puritanical religiosity which damns as un-
clean everything which savors of joy. On the
other hand, they combine with their theoretic
fatalism and mental melanism a practical morality
utterly opposed to the realization of the beauty
that is in life. Just at present the American
people are going through a period of self-exami-
nation that 'is revealing to them clearly the fear-
ful slough of hypocrisy and false Puritanism in
which they have so long and So complacently wal-
lowed. The self-satisfied belief in "Christian
America" has received a nasty set-back. In con-
sequence we are going to see one of two things:
either a relapse into an even deeper, because more
sincere, fanaticism in religion, in business and in
practical morality, or else a saner view, a more
joyous understanding and a deeper feeling for
beauty. The first will be worse, and the last bet-
ter by far, than the present state.
Now, if the first state supervenes we may ex-
pect nothing for the cause of good music, or of
good art in any sort, from the people of this
country. Happily, however, all the chances are
enormously against any such dreadful possibility.
The world at large now affects American life and
feeling as never before. And the world every-
where is seeking joy. American life must inevi-
tably become more natural, more joyous. The
elements of reaction will prevail for a time per-
haps. But they cannot always prevail. And once
overthrown they shall never have a resurrection.
With the coming of better things, of a finer and
saner ideal of life, of the recognition that beauty
is the aim and object of all right living, and that
truth and beauty inevitably accompany each other,
will come the birth of a public understanding as to
what Music is, what it may be made to mean in
li#e. And when that time comes public taste will
be good.
Popular taste will run toward the trashy in
music just so long as the art-understanding is
absent. That understanding will never be a pub-
lic possession until life has become saner and
more beautiful. For the mission of good music
is to uplift. The function of the popular com-
position is to tickle the ear, to kill time, to do
any and everything except make us think. And
when one considers the utter dreariness of the
average existence, the monotony, the soul-grind-
ing drabness, one cannot wonder at the desire for
amusements which, when they take the form of
music, are themselves sadder exemplars even than
those who take part in their enjoyment.
Let us make people joyful and they will then
desire beauty with all their hearts. And what
they desire they shall have. But let us not, mean-
while, forget that to the mind of the great masses
their own enjoyments are as good as those of any-
body else. The man who wants nothing but rag-
time may be a successful business man. Never-
theless, he is a rhythmic pervert. Yet if he know
it not, what is the harm ? Should that man, how-
ever, have been equipped with the sort of educa-
MU3IC TRADE
REVIEW
tion which gives him something to think of outside
of his office walls, should he have some sort of
literary or scientific or other mental hobby, then
surely in time shall he seek for beauty. And to
the earnest seeker beauty is ever accessible.
Education and again education! Here is the
only possible solution of the problems involved in
public taste. The American people are intelligent.
They are not only intelligent passively but actively.
Their search for culture may sometimes have a
touch of the comic in its very ferocity. But though
the false idea that an art understanding is some-
thing that can be bought in capsule form and swal-
lowed, still prevails, the way begins even now to
open up. People will enjoy beautiful music when
they can understand it. They can understand it—
not scientifically, for that is unnecessary, when it
is presented to them sanely and rightly. The art
of Music can only be brought home to public ap-
preciation by continual playing and explanation.
See what great task here is found for the player
piano! Educate, explain, demonstrate! There is
the whole secret of improving public taste and
making the common people lovers of the beautiful
in music.
And let us not forget that the artist record roll
is at this moment the one best bet as a means in
that direction!
NEW AEOLIAN CO. WHOLESALE MAN.
Alfred Nicolobius, formerly connected with the
accounting department of the Aeolian Co., has
been transferred to the wholesale department of
the company and will begin his first work on the
road this fall. Mr. Nicolobius is a young man of
great business ability and wide experience.
M. R. Lindholm, a blind piano tuner, will short-
ly open a piano store in Salina, Kan.
If you desire a man for any department of
your service, either for your factory or for
your selling department, forward your adver-
tisement to us and it will be inserted free of
charge.
Practical Painters on the Player Proposition
By GULBRANSEN-DICKINSON
NUMBER SIX.
The tale of Big Essentials in Player Construction is long. The
more one looks, the more one finds of significant, vital points that
must be known if player Tightness is to be had. We look for such
points, find them, and master them. Here is another. We call it
BIG ESSENTIAL NUMBER SIX—CLEANNESS OF DESIGN.
What do we look for in a thoroughbred, be this horse, dog or
man? We look for clean lines, absence of superfluous and ineffi-
cient traits; in a word, economy of build and utmost efficiency.
But above all, we look for CLEAN LINES.
The same holds good in mechanisms. The best test of thor-
oughness on the designer's part is his ability to work out his idea
ECONOMICALLY. Only when he knows his business so thor-
oughly that he is its absolute master can he work out a mechanism
in which no part shall be superfluous and every feature shall be in
perfect harmony with every other.
Cleanness of Design is the hall-mark of this superiority. Sim-
ple lines, economy in size of parts, apparent simplicity masking the
perfection within, show the work of the master. Look for sim-
plicity and cleanness if you would see the efficient machine.
GULBRANSEN PIANO PLAYING MECHANISMS
excel all others in these pre-eminent qualities. The wonderful
non-leaking Gulbransen construction, the economical but im-
mensely powerful and marvellously delicate bellows-system, the
efficient and harmonious simplicity of the unit pneumatic and valve
design, the power-augmenting lever pedals, all combined into the
simplest and least complicated of existing piano playing mechan-
isms, give the Gulbransen a position of mechanical, musical and
commercial efficiency hitherto unequalled.
Whenever you find all these desirable qualities united in one
piano playing mechanism there also you find a Gulbransen.
"We Can Prove /*"
GULBRANSEN - DICKINSON COMPANY
Makers of Good Piano Playing Mechanisms Only.
312-316 Union Park Ct.
CHICAGO
440 W. 42d Street
NEW YORK