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WESTERN COMMENT
One More Link With Music
REVIEW OFFICE, CHICAGO, I I I . , AUGUST 13,
of advertising for which the American Piano Co. has recently be-
come responsible, the aim of which is to bring back to the public a
clear understanding of what (in this special case) the Ampico is,
and what it means as giver of music and as an element in the
civilized life of to-day's cultivated minority. The reproducing piano
possesses, in effect, within the limits of its individual instrumental
voice, powers comparable to those of the phonograph, and it is a
matter of regret, tempered by astonishment, that these powers have
been comparatively so slightly developed. Now, however, that
there is a more general disposition to look into the causes of events
and to look fundamentally instead of superficially, there is reason
to expect that the reproducing piano may come once more to the
front and take again its rightful place.
1928.
all it is not very astonishing that piano men should con-
stantly be turning, with a sort of admiration, towards the
achievements of the phonograph industry. When
*
we consider how, five years ago, the wiseacres
Reluctant
and the smart-alecks were assuring us confidently
Admiration
ihat radio had killed the phonograph, and how
for a moment it seemed that they might be right, one can only
admire the extraordinary power and apparently irresistible march
of that industry since that time; of how overnight, as it were, the
new machines and the new records succeeded in converting bore-
dom and neglect into interest and even enthusiasm, of how a new
spirit came over the apparently dead and new life was kindled in
the veins through which the blood had almost ceased to flow. The
miracle did take place, the impossible did happen, and the phono-
graph industry may now look back with something like amusement
to those fading memories of defeat and despair. It is not, I say,
astonishing that the piano industry, itself going through a period
of transition during which the prophets of disaster are numerous
and very vocal, should turn hopeful eyes towards the sister in-
dustry of the phonograph, seeking to find in its recent history some
guide for the future, some indication of a certain and a safe road.
And although most of the parallels are false and most of the
analogies misleading, there is an underlying similarity which enables
the judicious analyst to see lines of policy which might well be
taken over from the one industry to the other. True, one must not
overpress similarities. The phonograph has the enormous ad-
vantage of presenting musical performance complete, instrument,
artist and all, demanding no more from its possessor than the
capacity to enjoy. It is this very property which enables the phono-
graph industry to take advantage of such an event as the Schubert
Anniversary and to feel justly assured that great commercial results
will flow from their active participation in it. It is the apparent
absence of this property which renders so much more difficult the
task of the piano industry in rebuilding its sales. Yet there is a
ray, a bright ray, of hope in this situation even for the piano in-
dustry. It is worth our while to examine the nature of this ray,
observe its wave length and discover what sort of illumination it
may furnish to a path more than sufficiently obscure.
AFTER
THE phonograph has the advantage, to repeat the phrase, of pre-
senting musical performance complete, instrument, artist and .all.
True: but has the piano no similar or parallel
Its
advantage? Of a certainty it has. For thirty
Rightful
years
the player-piano has been on the market,
Place
for fifteen years we have had, in one form or
another, what is now generally called the reproducing piano. These
instruments at one time were of so great importance as to be fur-
nishing actually over one-half of the annual output of the piano
industry. The whole of their selling value lay in the fact that
they furnished the ability to play along with the instrument to be
played. The player-piano indeed called, and calls, for a human
performer, but his duty is already half done for him before the
performance begins. The reproducing piano presents the complete
performance, instrument artist and all, and we need not remind
ourselves that during the last nine or ten years the success of the
reproducing piano has been very great indeed. There have indeed
been the usual causes for regret. The reproducing piano has been
to no slight extent degraded by the unreasonable demands of some
dealers for a cheap imitation of the genuine article; but it is certain
that recent experience has done a great deal to demonstrate that
cheap imitations furnish no solution to pressing sales problems.
The best proof of this is to be found in the elaborate campaigns
I SAID that the phonograph possesses properties which enable it to
take advantage of events like the Schubert centenary. Precisely
the same properties, in a more limited sense, and
His
with a smaller range of effectiveness, belong to
Own
the
reproducing piano. Consider the facts.
Piano
Schubert was a writer of songs, and a composer
of music for the piano, at least as much as he was a writer for
orchestra and ensemble. His songs number about six hundred all
told, of which at least one hundred are well known and one-half
of that number constantly "sung. His piano music remains the
treasury of what is almost his most spontaneous and characteristic
expression. The piano was his favorite personal instrument and
indeed the only one he played well. Although his orchestral works
are more sensational and exciting, the smaller writings for piano,
and for voice with piano, comprise a golden treasury of lovely
music which can hardly be matched anywhere; so that evidently
there could not be the slightest difficulty in drawing up a catalog
of Schubert music which would not be inferior, in point of interest,
fascination and familiarity, to the great list of orchestral and en-
semble works which have already appeared in the bulletins of
phonograph records during this year. In a word, is there any good
reason for the piano industry, through the very important branch
of it which is concerned with the reproducing instrument, not tak-
ing advantage of the Schubert centenary?
To ask the question is to answer it. There is no reason for refrain-
ing, but every reason for actively taking part. Why, then, is
nothing being done? Only one answer can here
Why
be ventured. It may be supposed that the fallacy
Don't
still persists which holds that success in the mu-
We?
sical instrument business is something apart from
contact with music. It may be supposed that those who have the
responsibility for policy still imagine that there is a magic in ad-
vertising copy or in sales talks which will persuade and make sales
in the absence of any living relation between the instrument and
what it does. Yet it ought by this time to be plain that the repro-
ducing piano will no longer of itself create a vast and profitable
following, and that henceforth it must be directly connected with
the musical life of the nation, so far as that life may be said to
be active and self-conscious. To put it all very plainly, there has
been an excess of bunk and an absence of reality. Verbal magic
may be worked to some, and sometimes to a great, extent, through
expensive advertising; but more attention to developing instruments
and music-rolls to a level with the claims made for them, more
living knowledge and active enthusiasm on the part of dealers for
the musical powers of the instrument, are needed to transform the
situation. That is why the present opportunity to connect the re-
producing piano with the timely occasion of the Schubert anni-
versary should not be lost.
.
—W. B. W.
14