Classic Mode

Music Trade Review

Issue: 1917 Vol. 64 N. 7

Music Trade Review -- © mbsi.org, arcade-museum.com -- digitized with support from namm.org
THE MUSIC TRADE
REVIEW
PUBLISHED BY EDWARD LYMAN BILL, Inc.
President, C. L. Bill, 373 Fourth Ave., New York; Vice-President, J. B. Spillane,
373 Fourth Ave., New York; Second Vice-President, J. Raymond Bill, 373 Fourth Ave.,
New York; Secretary and Treasurer, August J. Timpe, 373 Fourth Ave., New York.
J. B. SPILLANE, Editor
J. RAYMOND BILL, Associate Editor
AUGUST J. TIMPE
Business Manager
Executive and Reportorial Staff :
B. BRITTAIN WILSON, CARLETON CHACF, I*. M. ROBINSON, WILSON D. BUSH, V. D. WALSH,
WM. BRAID WHITE (Technical Editor), E. B. MUNCH, A. J. NICKLIN, L. E. BOWERS
BOSTON OFFICE:
CHICAGO OFFICE
JOHN H. WILSON, 324 Washington St.
E. P. VAN HARLINGEN, Consumers' Building,
Telephone, Main 69S0.
220 So. State Street. Telephone, Wabash 5774.
HENRY S. KINGWILL, Associate.
LONDON, ENGLAND: 1 Gresham Buildings. Basinghall St., D. C.
NEWS SERVICE IS SUPPLIED WEEKLY BY OUR CORRESPONDENTS
LOCATED IN THE LEADING CITIES THROUGHOUT AMERICA.
Published Every Saturday at 373 Fourth Avenue, New York
Entered at the New York Post Office as Second Class Matter.
SUBSCRIPTION (including postage), United States and Mexico, $2.00 per year;
Canada, $3.50; all other countries, $5.00.
ADVERTISEMENTS, $4.50 per inch single column, per insertion On quarterly or
yearly contracts a special discount is allowed. Advertising pages, $130.
REMITTANCES, in other than currency forms, should be made payable to Edward
Lyman Bill, Inc,.
Anil
Departments conducted by an expert wherein all ques-
auu
tions of a technical nature relating to the tuning, regu-
n<*n9Plitlonk
lating and repairing of pianos and player-pianos are
I a i
l i e | ) d l I l l l t U l d . d e a ] t w i t h W1 *i| b e found in another section of this
paper. We also publish a number of reliable technical works, information concerning
which will be cheerfully given upon request.
Exposition Honors Won by The Review
Grand Prix
Paris Exposition, 1900 Silver Medal.. .Charleston Exposition, 1902
Diploma ...Pan-American Exposition, 1901 Gold Medal
St. Louis Exposition, 1904
Gold Medal. ..Lewis-Clark Exposition, 1905
LONG DISTANCE TELEPHONES—NUMBERS 6982—6983 MADISON SQ.
Connecting a" Departments
Cable address: "Elblll, New York."
NEW YORK* FEBRUARY 17, 1917
EDITORIAL
HIS week there was started a country-wide campaign among
T
piano merchants to secure financial support for the National
Bureau for the Advancement of Music. Up to the present time
the work of the Bureau has been carried on through the gener-
osity of piano manufacturers alone. At the Chicago meeting a
number of leading piano merchants endorsed the work the Bureau
has been doing and incidentally over one hundred representative
piano retailers in various sections of the country have agreed to
act as local representatives for the Bureau in carrying out the
"Music in the Home" propaganda through the medium of their
local newspapers and by other means.
The fact remains that the many good results accomplished
by the Bureau must of necessity revert to the piano retailer, for
he must supply any demand for musical instruments brought
about through an increased appreciation and demand for music
itself. It is but fair, therefore, that the piano merchant should
do his share in supporting the Bureau, for with financial interest
in the movement he will be inclined to take more active part in
the campaign.
The Bureau is not in any sense self supporting. It has no
means for creating a revenue except through voluntary contri-
butions. Its work necessitates constant expense without corre-
sponding income. Piano merchants, therefore, should view the
proposition from the right angle and lend such assistance as is
commensurate with their standing and their interest in the work.
view of the grave possibility that still exists that the United
I in N the States
may find itself engaged to a more or less serious extent
great European conflict, although the hope of every earnest
American is that the nation will not be called upon to bear arms
in defense of what the Government believes are the rights of its
citizens, it is interesting to note the effect of war conditions on
the music trade of the belligerent nations. In England, for
instance, despite the drain of men and money, it is reported that
REVIEW
one prominent piano house was able to declare a dividend for
1916 representing a 10 per cent, increase over the dividend for
preceding years. Other concerns have also found prosperity
during war times.
Of course, there has been the difficulty of getting supplies
of material and labor, and of getting official sanction to use sup-
plies already on hand, but from the standpoint of supply and
demand the British piano and music houses have really accom-
plished good results.
War brings with it a certain stimulation of industry. The
demand for supplies of all sorts created a tremendous demand for
labor, and in the natural order of things brought with it much
larger wages. To the average mortal a bigger income means the
purchase of luxuries, and the business done where munition
works are located in the ^United States thoroughly illustrates this
fact. When insurance adjusters visited the towns of New Jersey
which suffered damaged recently from munition explosions, it
was found that a very large percentage of homes, even the most
humble, were equipped with some sort of musical instrument.
We don't want war, but if war does come, the manufacturers
of musical instruments will probably find themselves about as
well off as those engaged in other industries, even though they
be confined to the production of what may be termed the neces-
sities of life.
T
HE importance of the trade paper and its value as an edu-
cator and business developer are not always correctly esti-
mated.
The late Elbert Hubbard, that brilliant mind which was
snuffed out in the Lusitania disaster, had become in his later
years a great admirer of the trade paper, and in a number of
his contributions paid tribute to its worth in his usually brilliant
style.
The special articles he wrote for The Review a couple of
years ago cannot be forgotten, because their logic and sparkle
invite second reading. As he pointed out, the trade paper re-
flects the trend of the age—that imagination, fancy, gift of vision-
ing, spell success—that the dreamers are the workers.
He pointed out that the printing press, the talking machine,
the movies, the player-piano are the modern developments—the
outcome of the eternal query "Why?"—the result of imagina-
tion, interrogation, investigation and work. They are the edu-
cators.
"The trade paper is probably more alive to the exigencies
of education, and the gratification of the mental needs of its
readers, than any other press production," remarked Mr. Hub-
bard. "It asks, absorbs, gives.
"Take up a trade paper; note the quality and texture of the
paper, the clearness of the type, the beauty of its arrangement,
the logic of its arguments, the well-expressed opinions of its
contributors.
"Then tell me if it isn't an education—beautiful, inspiring, *
strengthening.
"Thousands of trade paper subscribers are receiving mental
uplift and renewing their courage by its means.
"The trade paper is the leader of the literary world.
"It applies chiropractic methods to managerial meningitis,
the numerical neuritis of the cashier, or the comatose business
man.
"As a spinal adjuster the trade paper is a necessity. With-
out it there is great danger that the Glooms will get you.
"It manipulates the dislocated vertebrae of declining busi-
ness, until the spinal irritation walks its chalks, trundles its hoop,
and you climb into your buzz-wagon again, and let 'er zip Gal-
lagher !
"The trade paper keeps the red corpuscles turkey-trotting
and prevents pseudo-anginalitis or imitation heart disease.
"It helps you push your business, thereby obviating nerv.
pros. For nervous prostration is never occasioned by you push-
ing your business; it only happens when your business pushes
you. The trade paper is the Pathe Weekly of the subscriber.
"It gives vivid character sketches of the passing great. It
takes extensive tours over the fields of science, business and in-
vention. It teaches by living, moving word-pictures the reasons
for the failures and the causes of success.
"Sarcasm and caricature turn many a trick.
Music Trade Review -- © mbsi.org, arcade-museum.com -- digitized with support from namm.org
THE MUSIC TRADE REVIEW
"The business of religion is now giving place to the religion
of business; and'the trade paper is the evangel of the true broth-
erhood of co-operation and self-respect.
"Show me the company a man keeps and I will tell you what
he is.
"Show me a man who subscribes to and reads his trade paper
and you will show me a man who will 'show me'—a man alive,
alert, ambitious, educated, successful. He has learned to ask, to
seek, and to find."
manufacturers and merchants have not risen to
A MERICAN
their opportunity to capture the import trade of neutral
countries, despite the handicap of war against European export-
ers, according to O. P. Austin, of the foreign trade department
of the National City Bank. Addressing the New York chapter
of the American Institute of Banking recently, he said:
"We have showp a moderate increase in our exports to all
the neutral sections and most of the neutral countries, but the
growth has been little more than normal.
"V$ry little of this increase in our exports to the neutral
European countries can be expected to be permanent, and as for
neutral countries in other parts of the world, we have evidence
that every country now at war will at the return of peace enter
upon an active campaign to regain any part of their foreign trade
which we may have absorbed.
"It must be admitted that our manufacturers have not risen
to the opportunity offered by conditions in the neutral countries
during the last two years. They have devoted their attention
to the momentary opportunity offered by the war demands of
Europe, rather than to plodding, persistent effort to obtain for
themselves a proper proportion of the neutral markets opened
to them by the war."
There is considerable basis for this arraignment of our manu-
facturers by Mr. Austin. We are not doing as much as we might
in connection with the development of foreign trade—we mean
legitimate trade, not war needs.
Despite the terrible catastrophe in Europe, it will be noted
that Germany, England and France have not neglected prepara-
tions for a larger trade with foreign countries. As a matter of
fact, despite the war, England has made a showing in legiti-
mate exports of goods, other than war necessities, that empha-
sizes how indifferent our manufacturers have been to the great
opportunities that present themselves in the matter of foreign
trade.
It is true we have made a tremendous showing in exports
of war materials, but we are not doing as much new business
in legitimate merchandise as we ought to with those countries
hitherto so largely supplied by Germany and England. An oppon-
tunity that will never rise again has presented itself to the
manufacturers of this country, and up to date they have not
taken advantage of it as they should. It is not yet too late to
get busy—but it will be too late when the war in Europe ends.
Of course, this situation may be attributed in a large degree
to increased domestic activities, due to the increased prosperity
of this country.
The purchasing public has kept our factories busy, and
manufacturers have had little time to accumulate a surplus to
provide for foreign needs. But if we intend to play a part in
the world's commerce, provision should be made now, for the
time will come when we will need foreign markets, and when
that time arrives, we may find that we are shut out.
URING the winter months with their variable temperature,
D
there is always more or less complaining on the part of dealers
that pianos are not received in proper condition—that the varnish has
lost its lustre, or is checked; in fact, complaints of this nature are
numerous. This is particularly and especially true of fine case work,
and it is pretty difficult to adjust matters of this kind in a satisfactory
manner.
A piano merchant in a Western state recently wrote The
Review that a shipment of pianos had reached him from the East
which, when opened up, were actually perspiring. The moisture
on them looked as the dew on the grass on a summer morning. The
cases had been frozen, with the result that the finish of the instru-
ments was in bad shape when opened up after a long period on
the road, delayed, moreover, through congested freight conditions.
Pianos are manufactured and finished in factories where the
temperature ranges from seventy-two to seventy-five Fahrenheit.
They are absolutely perfect in finish when shipped, but they are
packed in railroad cars which oftentimes take from two to four
weeks in reaching their destination. They may leave New York
when the temperature is around the fifties, and reach a Western
city when the temperature is below zero.
Now in a matter of this kind dealers must use common sense.
Instead of placing these instruments in moderately heated quarters to
undergo the thawing process, they mostly always remove them into
warerooms where the temperature is that of summer heat. The
pianos naturally begin to thaw and perspire, the varnish suffers,
and dealers begin to complain. Now complaints along these lines
are entirely without reason. Piano manufacturers can do a great
many things, but they have not as yet found out any way in which
they can regulate the climate of the various states through which
piano shipments pass during the winter months.
It might be possible to remove the source of these complaints if
there were enough, steam-heated cars to go round, but there are not,
and dealers should use extreme caution in removing pianos from
ice-cold cars to warm rooms. Better let them stand for a few days
in a cold, or moderately cold storage room adjoining the wareroom
so that they may become seasoned gradually. The sudden moving
from a cold car to a hot room would ruin the finest finish in the world.
GETTING DOWN TO PLAIN PLAYER FACTS
The education of ihe public along player lines is a necessity for the expansion of the player business.
There is no doubt of that; and education of the piano merchants and salesmen is also a vital necessity,
because through them will come a powerful force in the education of the public; and right here we wish to
remark that we have produced a line of books upon the player-piano which comprehensively covers the
entire player situation.
In this respect this trade newspaper stands alone, for it has been the principal source from which player
information has been available for piano merchants and salesmen for a period of years. Our latest book,
"The Player-Piano Up to Date"
is the best of the series. It contains upwards of 220 pages of matter bearing directly upon the player.
Every piano merchant and piano salesman should have a copy of this book within easy reach. It
gives to readers a fund of information not obtainable elsewhere.
It contains a series of original drawings and a vast amount of instructive and educational matter, as
well as a detailed description of some of the principal player mechanisms.
It costs $1.50 to have this book delivered to any address in the United States, and your money will be
refunded if you are not satisfied with the book after examination. No one yet has availed himself of this
opportunity. Foreign countries, 15c. to cover extra postage, should be added.
Estate of EDWARD LYMAN BILL, Publisher
373 Fourth Ave., New York
y

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