Classic Mode

Music Trade Review

Issue: 1928 Vol. 87 N. 26

Music Trade Review -- © mbsi.org, arcade-museum.com -- digitized with support from namm.org
WESTERN COMMENT
About Believing in Ourselves
REVIEW OFFICE, CHICAGO, I I I . , DECEMBER 26,
1928.
1 am sure, never really liked her role. To have to pre-
dict disaster is bad enough without one's having any obligation to
feel happy over the position of prognosticator.
An
No one likes the job, least of all he who sees, or
Unhappy
believes that he sees long before others, the ap-
Job
proach of inevitable difficulties, obstacles and
dangers to some group of friends and associates with whom it has
been long his pleasure to work in amity. Thus, then, no trade paper
observer can have felt happy over the fulfilment of predictions
which some among his group had long made in private and to
which*a few of them had had the temerity to give public utterance.
Nevertheless, it is the manifest duty of a trade paper to make public
whatever it sees or learns apparently useful to its constituency. The
painful duty must be done; but at least there is the consolation of
knowing that a statement of truth is in itself a stepping-stone to
present remedy and future renaissance, for it definitely clarifies
the situation if nothing more.
CASSANDRA,
T H E end of 1928 has come and most of us must feel rather glad
that the calendar is about to change its annual number. And at
the end of it the duty comes to every conscientious
'
observer, the rather strong temptation to say what
_,
'
he thinks to be the principal feature of the past
Gloomest
.
..
. ,
, •
twelve months, to moralize somewhat upon his
findings and to predict, if he can, the directions of future progress.
In the present case, the duties of the trade prophet, as of the trade
seer, have been very much those of that unhappy lady whose name
forms the first word of the first sentence in this Comment. In a
word it has been a case of recording Gloom, registering Gloom, and
predicting causes for more Gloom. None of this sort of thing is
cheering, but at least it is much better to admit that the skies are
dark and to take one's measures accordingly, than to refuse to look
at them at all. For in truth the policy of looking steadily at the
trade skies, even when they have been darkest, may now be said to
have justified itself; for every observer who has pursued, in spite
of all temptation to the contrary, this healthy policy, is now saying
with a certain quiet assurance that the blackness shows signs of
a red glow around the edges, that the first faint streaks of light,
which herald the coming of the rising sun, are plainly to be dis-
cerned. In a word, it is the general and almost unanimous belief
that the piano industry has seen the worst, has touched bottom.
The darkest hour, the hour just before dawn, has been reached
and is rapidly passing. Such is the general belief to-day among
those whose opinions are most worth recording arid who have
studied the facts of the situation.
IT is not that these observers believe the industry to be on the way
immediately to a great era of prosperity. On the contrary, it is
pretty generally held that bad merchandising,
Past
apathy in technical development and all the rest
and
of the train of ills to which the industry has so
Future
long been a victim, will continue for some time
yet to come to practice their malignant wizardries. An industry
does not pass from sickness to complete health in a moment. On
the other hand, what is most clearly meant by those whose opinions
on the state of the trade are worth most, is that the period of de-
pression as such, of the temptation to believe that the piano has
seen its .days, of despair over the possibility of rebuilding the
broken merchandising structure, has passed and is gone. The trade
as a whole finds its collective head again above water, finds itself
in a position from which it can see both what has happened and
what is rnost likely to happen. It is no longer necessary to keep
silence lest one gives vent to opinions which a few days' events
will probably show to have been absurd. It is now possible, as I
said, to see both what has happened and what is going to happen;
and to see these things with some clearness, some assurance, even
with some certitude, this being the first step in solving the prob-
lems that are presented.
W H A T has happened should no longer form the subject of con-
troversy. The facts are surely plain enough. It was what always
rp.
happens to an industry which becomes more or
p. .
less dormant. Every industry which fails to keep
p
itself abreast of the developments going on in
other lines of effort sooner or later has cause to
regret its apathy. Ask the textile people: they know. But no indus-
try which has a real significance, which produces something needed
by society ever is obliged to remain prone, even though it has slipped
and fallen. When an industry which has gone to sleep wakes to
discover that it has fallen out of the industrial joy-riding car and
is now lying in the road ten miles from anywhere, its first effort
must be to collect its senses. Its second effort must be to find out
how it stands, whether its pockets have been picked and what the
chances are of getting a lift to the nearest town. The piano indus-
try can have no great difficulty in answering' all these question?.
And in answer to the first one, which naturally is "what has hap-
pened," it is only necessary to say that in the present state of the
business world, resting quietly is a dangerous pastime. The piano
industry has refused to improve the piano to any radical extent.
It has said that the public does not buy pianos for musical instru-
ments but for furniture in all too many cases. It has said, in effect,
that it really does not believe in its own stuff. And the public,
beguiled by a thousand and one formidably competing, new and
aggressive industries, has turned from an industry which does not
nelieve in itself to industries which most certainly and clamantly
believe in themselves, in their own present and in their own future,
and which consistently and steadily take the public into their con-
fidence upon that point.
IN SO stating, baldly and cruelly but perfectly truly, the fact of
what has happened, the fact as to what may be brought to happen,
given the will and the skill, conies clearly to view.
The
The piano industry, then, ought to take for its
New
1929 motto, "Let us believe in ourselves." Nothing
Slogan
is more important than this apparently abstract
idea. The piano industry must once more begin to believe in itself.
And to do that, to accomplish that mental feat, it must first of all
improve its own product. A new and an improved piano, a piano
tonally and mechanically better, much better, is the first great and
needed attainment. I do not say that all this can be managed in
the course of a year. I say only that it must be managed in due
course; which means that it should be set about now. And I say
further that a much better piano is actually, here and now, a prac-
tical possibility, involving neither vast expense nor revolutionary
changes in form. A new and improved piano, then, must be backed
up by new and improved merchandising. Now the backbone, the
base, of any such merchandising must be the recognition that the
piano is a musical instrument which has to be played. Consequently
the construction of a merchandising policy to fit the new times in-
volves necessarily the formation of a musical basis. The new mer-
chandising must be built on music, on piano music, piano instruc-
tion, piano playing. Thus let the piano industry once more begin
to believe in itself, (n that sign it shall again conquer and never
in any other.
—W. B. W,
Music Trade Review -- © mbsi.org, arcade-museum.com -- digitized with support from namm.org
CHICAGO AND THE MIDDLE WEST
Frank W. Kirk, Manager, 333 North Michigan Avenue, Chicago
Chicago Music School
Holds Student Tourney
CHICAGO, I I I . , December 26.—-The news that one
of Chicago's music schools has conducted a
music tournament in its community as an en-
couragement to the children will no doubt be
of interest to the trade in planning and conduct-
ing piano contests.
The Erdal Musical College, located at 6969
Grand avenue, held a tournament for young
musicians who competed not only in piano play-
ing, but also voice and violin. Medals were
given the winners, and the finals were played
at the Rutherford-Sayre Field House on a Gul-
bransen grand piano.
This competition naturally stirred up a good
deal of interest in the Montclair district, and
two days after its close an artists' recital was
given at the Rutherford-Sayre Field House by
the Erdal institution. The Gulbransen piano
was also used during the recital.
Lombardo Full-Page
in Chicago American
A recent full page of press stories and
pictures, accompanied by nineteen dealer tie-up
advertisements, appeared in the Chicago Amer-
ican for Guy Lombardo and His Royal
Canadians, Columbia artists.
The stories reviewed the phenomenal rise of
the Lombardo orchestra from its origin in
London, Ont., to its first American success in
Cleveland and its prominence in Chicago at
present. Due credit was also given to the dozen
or more Columbia record selections of this
artist, which have been reported by Columbia
dealers for some time past as being among
their big sellers.
New Edison Lines for
Lyon & Healy, Chicago
Lyon & Healy, recognized as one of the fore-
most retail music houses in the country, has
announced that the new line of Edison radio
and radio-phonograph combinations has been
taken on for all the company's Chicago stores,
which will feature strongly the instruments
presented by Thomas A. Edison, Inc.
Although the quantity of Edison merchandise
available up to the present time has been
particularly limited owing to the nation-wide
demand that has developed for this new radio
product, a considerable volume of business in
Chicago has already been reported.
J. P. Seeburg, president of the J. P. Seeburg
Piano Co., Chicago, manufacturer of automatic
musical instruments, left last week for his home
at Palm Beach, Florida to spend the winter.
F. F. Story, vice-president of the Story &
Clark Piano Co., accompanied by Mrs. Story,
left for Pasadena, Cal., to spend the holidays
with E. H. Story, president of the company,
who resides in Pasadena.
L U
D
Chicago Survey Shows Piano Business
Improving and Outlook Is Promising
Report Made by W. Wallace Kerr, of the Cable Co., Reveals Steady Betterment Over
Last Six Months and Bright Prospects for Future
^
,
ILL., December 26.—A highly in-
teresting report on the piano business by
W. VVallo.ce Kerr of the Cable Co. is carried in
the Chicago Commerce, which made a survey of
industry in and around Chicago through the
eyes of credit executives.
Mr. Kerr is vice-president of the Chicago
Association of Credit Men, and director of the
National Association of Credit Men and reports
Schulz Co. Employes
Visited by Santa Claus
CHICAGO, 111., December 26.—-The Christmas
spirit is always manifested at the plant of the
M. Schulz Co., Chicago, for following a practice
of some twenty years' standing, inaugurated by
I'resident Otto Schulz, Sr., the company pre-
sents each employe with a, Christmas basket
containing the major provisions for the Christ-
mas dinner. Distribution of the baskets begins
at an early hour on December 24 and the
Schulz workers can be seen leaving the factory
in a parade of Christmas baskets on this date.
Not only are the Schulz employes remem-
bered at Christmas time, but also the many
trade friends of Otto Schulz, who, following a
custom of many years, presents a holiday re-
membrance in the form of a specially selected
book. The gift this year is "Franz Schubert,
The Man and His Circle," by Newman Flower.
As this is the Schubert centennial year which
lias been widely celebrated by the trade, the
book is of particular interest. It is the author-
itative life-story of the great composer, not a
technical book about music, but a picture of a
man, stressing all the little intimate details
which show us just what that man is like.
The research for this book has been in
progress on the Continent for two years. As a
result, a mass of new letters has been dis-
covered and the private diaries of Schubert's
friends, the majority of which have never be-
fore been used in a biography, it is said. It is
notably illustrated with photographs.
Kimball Recitals Announced
CHICAGO, JI.I.., December 2o.—The W. W. Kim-
ball Co., Chicago, has arranged an interesting
series of recitals to be held in Kimball Hall
during the month of January. The recitals will
be held each Friday noon and the following
artists will appear on the following dates: Janu
ary 4th, Ethel Heide, contralto; January 11th,
Alvena Reckzeh and Kathryn Anderson; Janu-
ary 18lh, Clara Taylor, dramatic soprano; Janu-
ary 25th, William H. Barnes, in organ recital.
I n addition both Allen W. Bogen and Edward
I Benedict will render organ programs.
W I G
Grands—Uprights—Player Pianos—Reproducing Pianos
of the Highest Quality in Straight and Period Models
Ludwig & Co*, 136th St. and Willow Ave-, New York
11
a feeling of optimism for the next year. He
says:
"While the piano business as a whole has not
been good for the year past, there has been a
very decided improvement within the last si\
months, and from all indications there is every
reason to feel optimistic over the future.
"There may be further changes in the way of
combinations or otherwise, but if so they will
but tend to strengthen the ability of the manu-
facturer to better serve the public.
"Music, latent in many of us, is becoming
brought out and developed more and more, and
is coming to be regarded as a fundamental in
the education of a child. The piano, the best
of instruments for musical self-expression, must
and will necessarily find its place in the ad-
vancement of pure human instincts and the de-
velopment of culture.
"There can be no fear, but that the future
holds for the manufacturer willing to keep in
step with the new ways of business a safe and
satisfactory answer."
In summing up the survey made of the various
industries the report states that business for
1928 has been good, and that the prospects for
ilie succeeding year are favorable.
New Brinkerhoff Line
to Be Introduced Soon
Excellent Assortment of Styles in Modern Sizes
and Casings to Be Ready Soon After First of
Year
A new line of pianos which the Brinkerhoff
I'iano Co., Chicago, bas been working on for
some time will be ready for the trade the first
of the year. The new models are thoroughly
m keeping with modern ideas in size, design
and finish and will offer to the Brinkerhoff
dealers an exceptional line for increased busi-
ness.
The line will include the diminutive uprights
and small grands. One instrument of especial
interest is the new miniature reproducing
;.;raiid. The grands are three feet, eight inches
in length and are designed for use in the apart-
ment or home where space is limited. In addi-
tion to being a real musical instrument it is a
decorative addition to the furnishings of the
living room.
Col. Willard F. Wallace
Dies Suddenly in Chicago
Col. Willard F. Wallace, who was associated
with the Q R S Co. for many years, died sud-
denly from a heart attack on Saturday, Decem-
ber 22. Funeral services were held Monday,
December 24, at St. Luke's Church, River
Forest, 111.
Col. Wallace was a representative of the
0 R S Co. for over ten years, and retired about
;i year ago. He took an active part in trade
activities and was one of the founders of the
Illinois Music Merchants' Association.
He is survived by his widow, Mrs. Helen B.
Wallace, and two daughters, Mrs. Homer J.
1 >vick 1 cy and Mrs, Alfred J. Wilhelm.

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