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WESTERN COMMENT
RF.VIKW O F F K I ; , RK PUBLIC RCILDINC;, OIK/ACO, I I I . , JUNI: 2,
ask for a piano in the home? Obviously there must be a good man)
di fife rent motives, but all of them finally come down to one single
motive. That fundamental motive is musical. The father, mothei,
son or daughter, fundamentally, and ultimately, wants a piano be
cause he or she is directly or indirectly interested in piano music,
in the sound of piano playing and (to some extent certainly) in
piano tone. Fundamentally that is the motive, and whether it be a
cottage upright, a reproducing baby grand, an upright player or -a
magnificent parlor grand for the music room of an accomplished
amateur pianist, it is one and the same principle which operates.
If there is to be any large expansion of piano sales in this country
during the next few years that expansion must be built upon this
one fundamental motive.
192b
is said to be easier than foresight, but foresight is better
than hindsight. The truth of the saying may perhaps be taken for
granted, but it is hard to assign any fair judg-
Harder
ment for the case where foresight means simply
Than It
guessing
what will have happened by the time
Looks
the terms of the prediction have been published.
In other words, the task of guessing whether the piano manufactur-
ers of the United States, or so many of them as belong to the Na-
tional Association, in convention assembled, will or will not, by the
time these words come before their readers, have entered into a
combination for the purpose of telling the world that its neglect of
the piano is shameful and should at once be put aside, is a task-
neither especially easy nor especially grateful. For almost any guess
one makes is likely to be more or less gaudily wrong. Wherefore
it apparently would be good policy not to try guessing at all. On
the other hand, there is no law forbidding one to give a personal
opinion on the subject, saying what one would do about it if one
were among the manufacturers and had to decide one's own atti-
tude. There can be no harm in this and there may be some good;
for it is evident that, whatever the manufacturers do on the question
of a national piano advertising campaign, the thing^will almost cer-
tainly not work out as any one individual will expect. Other indus-
tries have tried, and some are continuing to try, the same remedy
for slow sales. Notable among those who have tried have been the
lumber men. Every reader of the magazines who pays close atten-
tion to the advertisements—and that means every reader—is
aware that for the last five years or so associations of cypress, pine,
Douglas fir and other lumber men have been telling the world, in
their corporate capacity, the tale of the virtues of the woods they
severally cut out and prepare for market. The readers of magazines
know by this time, assuredly ought to know, that each of the woods
enumerated has a number of outstanding virtues, that one should
build one's house of these woods, and of no other. The copy has
been in general very well prepared and often extremely interesting.
Yet only the other day representatives of the lumber associations,
meeting in Chicago to discuss trade extension, came to the conclu-
sion that they had been wasting a lot of money. It was not that the
idea of advertising the virtues of wood was not a good idea. It was
rather that the public mind was becoming hopelessly mixed. After
reading half a dozen artistic preachments on the virtues of as many
species of wood, the lay mind was in a worse state of ignorance
than before, being now completely misinformed, which is far worse
than being not informed at all. And the lumber men concluded
that they nvust either just unitedly talk about wood in general to the
public, or not talk at all.
HINDSIGHT
AND that is simply another way of saying that what has to be done
is to promote the love of piano playing, of piano music and of piano
tone among the millions who are in danger of
The
forgetting all about these things. It may seem
One
the
veriest insanity for men like ourselves, who
Foundation
have grown up with the piano industry, even to
try to imagine a generation to whom the piano is passe and a back
number; but the actual truth can easily be stretched to look very
much like that, despite the undoubted vastly enlarged interest in
everything musical, despite the fact that music schools have more
piano pupils than ever. For it is true that the masses of our hun-
dred and ten millions have a number of things to entertain and dis-
tract them which their fathers and mothers had not and could not
have, so that the piano does not bulk so large to them as to the last
generation it certainly did. Our aim is to bring back the piano to
the center of the stage or at least to some point not far removed
from the center. In so doing w r e shall have on our side the un-
doubted boom in house building, the movement for better furnish-
ings and the unquestionable existence of a sort of reaction from the
wild goings-on which for some years have occupied so much of the
time of both old and young alike. Nevertheless, all this must come
to nothing unless we clearly recognize that the basic fact about the
piano is its being a musical instrument, a medium for the production
of musical sound. Moreover, this principle has also to comprehend
the very definite fact that the piano is not only a musical instrument
but a large and costly one; so that it is necessary to envisage some-
thing like real desire for piano music as against violin or ukulele or
jewsharp music. In a word, we come back to the point from which
we started. We come back to promoting piano playing; and from
that ihe more general love of piano music, which brings men and
women to spend the price of a very good car for a reproducing
grand piano. Rut piano playing is fundamental; and fundamental
both as to the little boy or girl just learning to play a tune in two
octaves and as to the talented youth or maiden hesitating on the
threshold of a musical career.
T H E parallel is not indeed complete, but it is sufficiently close to be
worth pretty careful consideration. In point of fact, the very first
thing which must come up for consideration
when national piano advertising of a general na-
ture is discussed is what particular point is to be
advertised; or is it merely to be advertising so
very broad that it will have no definite point at all ? An advertising
agency considering this problem would, of course, take the view
that nothing must be said which would tend to pull the desire of the
public towards any one make of piano. The caution would be sound
enough, of course, but in practice it would probably lead to a lot of
pretty pictures of pretty girls entertaining young handsome heroes
at home by playing upon vaguely outlined pianos, the illustrations
in question being backed up by pretty phrases and altogether making
very nice high-class and expensive publicity. Rut would it do any
good? That, after all, is the only point of the least importance. If
it would induce young ladies to ask their fathers for money to buy
pianos then it would do good and be worth what it cost. Rut would
it do this? Would it in fact do anything at all? What is it, after
all, which induces men and women to spend money for pianos,
player-pianos or reproducing pianos ? What induces children to
AND SO we come back to consider this matter of national piano
advertising promotion with certain principles clearly in our minds.
It is surely evident that we must point our ad-
On
vertising in some definite direction. Two direc-
Rock
tions are open to us. One is by way of piano
Bottom
playing, the other by way of piano tone. On the
one hand every dollar spent in helping a child to learn to play the
piano is a dollar which certainly will be returned in short order
through the sale of a piano. On the other hand, every dollar spent
in really scientifically telling the story of piano tone, in building up
a desire for piano music and in showing how the piano is actually
the very foundation of all the present art of music, from the latest
futurism to the latest iazz, is a dollar which will return likewise.
Roth reproducing and player-piano sales certainly will be helped by
everything that goes to make people love piano music; but even more
fundamental than mere love of music is ability to play a tune.
"Teach the children, all the children, to play a tune." That should
finally and ultimately be our principle.
OCCIDENS.
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