Music Trade Review -- © mbsi.org, arcade-museum.com -- digitized with support from namm.org
THE
MUSIC TRADE
PLAYER SECTON
NEW YORK, FEBRUARY 26, 1921
BB^it^^tli^ajyjliiajjlti^tlj^tl^aia^B^
^iwH^^
The Opening of a School for Player Owners by Lyon & Healy in Chicago Is
a Move That Should Meet With the Active Support of All Members of the
Industry — Education the Paramount Factor in Maintaining Player Prestige
The player trade has, of course, been inter-
ested in the announcement that Lyon & Healy,
the great Chicago music house, have opened a
"School for Player-Piano Owners." The Chi-
cago daily newspapers have contained at short
intervals for some weeks past neat display ad-
vertisements calling the attention of the public
to this new departure, and informing them that
a free service is at the disposal of all owners
of player-pianos who feel dissatisfied with the
musical results they are getting and desire to
learn how to do better.
Surprised as Well as Interested
We say that the trade has been interested. We
might almost better say that it has been sur-
prised. The trade, in fact, has been taken by
surprise. For years the idea has been talked
over, theoretically, by many persons. It has
bten generally recognized by thinkers in this in-
dustry that while the enormously larger num-
ber of player-pianos is of the foot-driven type,
personally controlled, the owners of these have
scarcely ever been trained in the use of their
instruments. The ordinary owner of an ordi-
nary player-piano is a well-meaning person who
would like to get the best music which he or
she understands and appreciates, and would cer-
tainly like to get it out of his or her player-
piano. But that person is also a person who
has never (in most cases) even heard a player-
piano well played and is wholly unable to con-
ceive that any one save a specially trained 1 ex-
pert can ever play it well.
A Bad Name
When that is the sort of reputation the player-
piano has, even among its owners, how can it
be expected that it should have any better repu-
tation with the outside world? When, in fact,
even the makers, the merchants and the sales-
men are just as poorly informed regarding the
player-piano, how can it be expected that there
should be wild enthusiasm for the player-piano?
In fact, there is no wild enthusiasm for this in-
strument. This is a large country, with a very
large and active population. A few manufac-
turers of player-pianos may be able, inside that
large population, to attain to an output of some
considerable size. A few makers of music rolls
may gleefully announce that they have large
calls for this or that popular hit from time to
time. But the fact remains that a permanent
business cannot be built on this basis. The
popular demand is slack and until it has been
revivified the player industry will not come into
its own.
The basis of all such revivification is, to be
candid about it, the interest and enthusiasm of
the present body of owners. To the extent that
player-piano owners can be induced to take an
interest in their own instruments the player
industry will prosper in the future.
For Salesmen, Too
The same is true, of course, as respects the
selling organizations of our industry.
Any
school for owners ought to be also a school for
salesmen. A short time ago one of the most
successful salesmen of pianos and player-pianos
publicly stated that demonstration is not needed
in selling players. He went so far as to say
that he does not believe in demonstration and
does not want any of it. He says that the dem-
onstrator-salesman usually gives the idea to the
prospect that playing the player-piano is a ter-
ribly difficult task, involving hard muscular
work and much attitudinizing. He says, in fact,
that the prospect is likely to be frightened away
from the player-piano by this process.
The gentleman is largely, but not entirely,
right. If it were true that all player-piano play-
ing must be carried on in the way he speaks of
there would be no answer to his objections. It
is true that most player-piano experts do sue-.
cced in making the job look very difficult. It
is also true, however, that this need not be the
case for a moment. Player-pianos can be played
without serious muscular effort and entirely
without gymnastics and contortions. The trick
is simple, easy and fascinating. Every person
who once learns that trick takes a vital interest
in the player-piano and in music. This is the
universal opinion among those who are in a
position to know.
Where the Roll Comes In
And there is another side to it. The whole
question of selling rolls, more and better rolls,
is a question of keeping the player-piano owner
satisfied. If that owner is not taught how to
get some personal control over his or her player-
piano that owner will not be a steady buyer of
rolls. That is just what, at this moment, is the
matter with the player business. Most owners
of player-pianos do not buy rolls in respectable
quantities. Restore interest in the player-piano
among those who have bought these instru-
ments and one restores interest in the music roll,
produces the business for the music roll man
and opens up an inexhaustible field of future
prospects through the enthusiastic boosting of
those who have already bought. The old say-
ing that a satisfied customer is the best adver-
tisement is not strictly accurate, but a satisfied
customer is certainly one of the best advertise-
ments. And in our case the satisfied customer is
an essential to the future of the player-piano.
That is why the Lyon & Healy experiment is
so very interesting and so very valuable. If
thfs house is willing to put time, energy and!
money into a fair trial of a scheme for bring-
ing to the owner of the player-piano, without
any charge, opportunity for learning how to
piay well, how to choose music wisely and how,
in fact, to make his investment in the player-
piano a source of constant and growing pleas-
ure, why, then, this same house ought to have
the good wishes and the active support of every
honest man in the trade.
The Idea Must Be Sold
It is not at all impossible that some time
will elapse before Lyon & Healy can find that
their idea is catching on with the public. They
must, however, have patience. If they persist
they will sell the idea to the people so success-
fully that their available space will not be suf-
ficient to hold the applicants for instruction. It
is all a matter of bringing to the people the
knowledge of the facts. Once the public catches
on there will be no trouble about interest and
even enthusiasm.
Tt is also even possible that some envious and
stupid men in the trad'e may oppose the idea
on the ground that the only way to sell player-
pianos is to sell them on the basis of the wholly
untrue statement that they do not need to be
played well. Such a statement about a reproduc-
ing piano is true enough. It is true of an or-
chestrion. But it is not true of a foot-pumped
player-piano, nor can all the nonsense in the
world make it true. It is the old story. "How
many legs has a horse?" "Four." "But if you
counted the tail as a leg how many would the
horse have?" "Five." Then comes the crushing
reply: "No, for calling the tail a leg does not
make it one." Exactly. The player-piano has
to be played, and the person who believes other-
wise is simply calling a tail a leg. No such
person ought to make or sell player-pianos.
Lyon & Healy are on the right track. They
are doing a far-sighted and splendid work. They
ought to have the moral support of every wise
man in the music industries. Indeed, they ought
to have the active support of all such persons,
for they are putting the industry under a debt
of gratitude.
NEW INCORPORATION
The Organola Sales Co. has been granted a
charter at Dover, Del., to deal in musical instru-
ments. The capital is given as $5,000,000 and
the incorporators are: C. T. Cohee, C. B. Outten
and S. L. Mackey, Wilmington.