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JULY 25, 1925
THE
MUSIC TRADE
REVIEW
Uniformity of Player Terms Essential
to This Field's Advancement
Authoritative Compilation of Technical Terms Used in the Pneumatic Art and Applying to the Various
Forms of the Player-Piano Would Eliminate Much of the Confusion Which Now Exists in This
Branch of the Industry—The Need Denned and What the Tuners Can Do
H E forthcoming annual meeting of the
National Association of Piano Tuners
lends point to a suggestion which has
more than once been made, but which has never
gone beyond the point of verbal statement.
That is, that there is much need for an authori-
tative compilation of technical terms used in the
pneumatic art, and applying to the various
forms of the player-piano.
It has been suggested that the initial impetus
to this work might be given by the Tuners' As-
sociation, which has gained an enviable repu-
tation for energy and public spirit in the inter-
ests of the industry at large. On the other hand
it seems clear that a question of this sort can-
not properly be turned over for sole disposal
to an association which represents only one of
the two technical branches of the industry.
For this reason, and because too the matter
is highly important, some discussion of it is held
here.
The player art has reached a point of relative-
ly high organization and now accounts for more
than one-half of the aggregated number of the
items produced annually in the piano industry.
As time goes on, the complexity of the art of
pneumatic player mechanism constantly in-
creases. New technical terms are almost daily
coming into use, owing to the increasing variety
of the technical ideas to which invention is con-
stantly giving birth. Naturally, all this increase
in complexity is leading to an increase of par-
allel intensity in confusion and misunderstand-
ing. Technical terms used to describe various
parts of the player mechanism are invented by
individual workers in the art and so far there
has been very little attempt to co-ordinate and
codify these into anything approaching standard
forms.
The Need Defined
One only has to read a dozen technical man-
uals on the care of player-pianos, as issued by
various manufacturers, to see how wide are
the varieties of the terminology in use. The
same part is described indifferently by any one
of half a dozen names. Very often the names
given convey an actually incorrect notion of the
functions of the part named. On all sides
tuners and technical men, both within and
without the factories, are asking that some
term be put to this absurd state of affairs.
The situation is very simple. What is need-
ed is that a body of men competent to the
task should be convened at some convenient
time and should be authorized and directed to
draw up a list of descriptive technical terms
which thereafter, upon their acceptance by the
association most nearly involved, should be pro-
claimed the standards and be published as such.
In almost every other technical industry it has
been found necessary to do something like this.
In the railway industry the Master Car Builders
Associations and the American Society of Me-
chanical Engineers have evolved standard lists
of technical terms. In the automotive industry
the Automobile Chamber of Commerce has
worked out its own complete set of terms which
are now regarded as standard and have been
very generally adopted. Similar action has been
taken in other technical industries, always with
results well up to the best expectations of those
who first proposed the reforms.
A Chamber of Commerce Job
The Music Industries Chamber of Commerce
exists for the purpose of co-ordinating the ac-
T
tivities of the member associations. It alone
has the prestige, the authority in fact, enabling
it to direct any large inter-association move-
ment. In the present case the need is to obtain
the action of the interests involved; and of all
of them. It is obvious that those who are im-
mediately involved are (a) the makers of pneu-
matic actions for the trade; (b) the makers of
pneumatic actions who are also piano manufac-
turers; (c) the manufacturers of pianos who
install player actions made by the first group;
(d) the factory technicians, including within
that description the superintendents, the player
foremen and the research men; (e) the outside
technicians, who are mostly tuners. The task
is to obtain the co-operation and help of all
these.
To this end it ought to be possible to or-
ganize a joint committee drawn from (a) the
National Piano Manufacturers' Association, (b)
the Musical Supply Association, (c) the Na-
tional Piano Technicians' Association and (d)
the National Association of Piano Tuners. All
these are member associations of the Music
Industries Chamber of Commerce and are rep-
resented upon its Board of Directors. Any ar-
rangement of the kind contemplated, which
might be adopted by this Board, would then be
well on the way to obtaining direct acceptance
by the associations, with their genuine co-opera-
tion and good will.
What the Tuners Can Do
Of course the matter must be put forward in
some legitimate way, and now that the tuners
are about to assemble for their annual meeting
it seems to the present writer that nothing they
might do during their deliberations could be
more valuable or useful than to study this ques-
tion, and pass resolutions directing their rep-
resentative on the Board of Directors of the
Chamber of Commerce to request his colleagues
to set about the appointment of a Joint Com-
mittee on Technical Nomenclature. It is quite
likely that if this is done there will be raised
the question of including within the terms
of reference the whole matter of the termi-
nology of piano construction. To such an ex-
tension of the original idea there could, one
thinks, be no valid objection for the second
subject matter is by no means so complicated as
the first and there is much more of an approach
to harmony and standardization in this old and
parent branch of the industry. As a matter of
fact the committee could easily be selected with
a view to the double duty, since to-day the
piano and the player industries are so closely
intermingled that the men who would decide the
first set of questions would almost to a man be
the men who would obviously be selected to
decide the other.
One should not put aside with a mere ges-
ture of agreement, or with a mere act of mental
assent, the suggestions here set forth. Our in-
dustries are each day becoming more closely
intertwined and more thoroughly interdependent.
It is more and more necessary day by day to
bring into these industries the principles of
technical organization. There is still among us
far too much individualism run wild and far too
little recognition of the essential solidarity of
our interests. If it be true, as it is, that com-
mercially we are competitors, it is equally true
that technically we are virtually all on the
same plane. No man, no house, can help itself
by deception, or by lying about others' achieve-
ments. What each one of us needs is more
knowledge; and that can only come to each of
us by intra-trade co-operation. No better way
of realizing the ideals so set forth can be
imagined than this, of making a beginning at
a technical dictionary of the pneumatic player
art, authorative, correct and acceptable to all.
Creditors Get Small Slice
AUBURN, N. Y., July 20.—At a recent meeting
of the creditors of John Darcangelo, bankrupt,
formerly the proprietor of the Starr Music Shop
here, a dividend of three per cent was declared.
Proceedings held in Bankruptcy Court, before
Referee Irving Bacon, disclosed a considerable
list of creditors. However, as all of the bank-
rupt's assets have not been liquidated, the exact
situation with regard to creditors' prospects has
still to be established.
Consult the Universal Want Directory of
The Review. In it advertisements are inserted
free of charge for men who desire positions.
Pratt Read
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