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THE
REVIEW
flUJIC TIRADE
VOL.
LXVII. No. 8
Published Every Saturday by Edward Lyman Bill, Inc., at 373 4th Ave., New York.
August 24, 1918
Single* Copies 10 Centi
S2.00 Per Year
The Tuner's Importance in the Trade
T
HERE would be neither profit nor wisdom in pretending that the piano trade has exhibited, in the
past, due acuteness in dealing with the very important business of piano tuning, or with the indis-
pensable practitioner of that art, the piano tuner.
It would be as little wise to suppose that the piano tuner has always shown himself either wise
or fair in his dealings with the wholesale and retail branches of the trade.
Yet, on the whole, it is necessary to confess that the tuner has the weight of evidence on his side and
that he can say, with no great exaggeration, that he deserves better of the trade than the trade has seen fit,
in past days, to recognize.
No change that has come over the spirit of the entire industry, however, is more pleasing or more
encouraging for the future than that which is being so plainly exhibited in-the attitude of all concerned
towards the legitimate tuners, as represented by their organized body, the National Association of Piano
Tuners. It is a sign of progress at once encouraging and practical.
The National Association of Piano Tuners has existed now for nearly nine years. It has become a
member of the Music Industries Chamber of Commerce. It has slowly but surely settled itself into various
centers of the piano industry, always with beneficent—never with evil—effects for manufacturer, merchant
and the public, Its slogan is Efficiency, Harmony, Brotherhood. It stands to build up, not to pull down.
It asks recognition because its own aim is to do good to all. No one can be hurt by its operations; all must
be benefited by them.
The great problem of securing an adequate number of good tuners must be tackled and must be solved.
As A. M. Wright, of the Mason & Hamlin Co., has recently said, in a letter to a member of the Tuners'
Association: "To build a fine piano and have it fall into the hands of an indifferent or incompetent tuner is
a tragedy." It is even more; it is fatal. The piano industry has suffered constantly and will continue to
suffer until it has co-operated with the legitimate tuners to put upon a legitimate and firm basis the whole
matter of training and employing tuners, and of supplying the public with competent men to perform the
enormously important work of maintaining the piano and the player-piano in the home.
The Music Trade Review is fortunate in having among its representatives men who have been prac-
tically trained in the tuner's art, and who can speak from first-hand knowledge of conditions. It is not
saying too much to state that, throughout the country at large, the standard of efficiency among tuners is
deplorably low.- It is this terrible evil which is secretly, but none the less seriously, hurting the industry
every day in a vital part of its organization, it is this concealed weakness that the Tuners' Association is doing
its best to combat, to conquer and finally to destroy. In this endeavor it merits the most hearty assistance
from every wholesale and retail member of the trade.
The painstaking and expensive efforts which have been made, and are being made, by many manufac-
turers of player-pianos to instruct tuners in the pneumatic mechanism of these instruments show how the
necessity for better education and better general technical equipment on the part of the tuner is being recog-
nized. The wholesalers, indeed, may be credited with some understanding of the problem, with sympathy
in the tuner's cause and with desire to help themselves by helping him. The negligence lies more, much
more', with the retailers.
No one can deny that the rank and file of the dealers, through ignorance of the tuner's work, through
ignorance of his influence, and through a mistaken belief that money spent on maintenance is merely a
necessary evil, t<> be minimized however possible, have encouraged the cheap and incompetent while discour-
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