33
PRESTO
May 31, 1924.
SHEET MUSIC TRADE
N.A. OF S.M.D. CONVENTION
National Association of Sheet Music Dealers
to Hold Annual Meeting June 9 at
Waldorf-Astoria, When Large
Attendance Is Expected.
The 1924 convention of the National Association of
Sheet Music Dealers will begin on June 9th at the
Waldorf-Astoria Hotel, New York. Those mem-
bers from a distance who will have secured railroad
certificates on or after May 28th on account of the
National Music Industries Convention, and who will
arrive in New York not later than June 4th will be
entitled to a return railroad ticket over the same
route at one-half the regular fare.
The half-rate return tickets will be good until mid-
night, standard time, Wednesday June 11th. Cer-
tificates will be validated at convention headquarters,
the Waldorf-Astoria Hotel, June 3rd and 4th. Mem-
bers coining from the Pacific Coast can get round
trip tickets cheaper at the regular summer excursion
rate. Members from intermediate points who fail to
secure certificates within the time limit can purchase
excursion tickets to Atlantic City at reduced rates.
The following are the officers elected at the con-
vention of 1923;
President—Edward P. Little.
Vice-President—E. Grant Ege.
Secretary and Treasurer—Thomas J. Donlan.
Directors—T. F. Delaney, J. Elmer Harvey, Charles
W. Homeyer, Tolmes R. Maddock, S. Ernest Phil-
pitt, W. Deane Preston, Jr., Joseph M. Priaulx, J.
Edgar Robinson, Paul A. Schmitt, M. E. Tompkins,
W. H. Witt, Harvey J. Woods, Sam Levis, Laurence
Sundquist and Leslie Miller.
Letter from President.
"It seems difficult for most sheet music dealers to
realize that all music publications will be sold at the
actual printed prices after June 1st. The music pub-
lishers agreed unanimously that this is the best
method of pricing music and music books. The
Federal Trade Commission signified its approval to
the adoption of the method by issuing a formal or-
der," says President E. P. Little in a letter to mem-
bers this week.
"The music publishers are now asking, 'Why do
not the retailers tell us what they want?' Our presi-
dent and directors have endeavored to point out to
the entire sheet music trade the desirability of an ade-
quate margin of profit from the new retail selling
prices of copyright sheet music. The present oppor-
tunity is the best one that the publishers have ever
had to indicate which of their publications they would
like to have featured most by the retailers. Our as-
sociation cannot act for its members in the matter of
selling prices and wholesale discounts. That is a
problem for the individual dealer and publisher.
Phases of Business.
"There are many phases of the new method of
merchandising that will be discussed at the conven-
tion. In former years, when music was sold at its
actual printed prices, the sheet music business, both
wholesale and retail, was carried on profitably. A re-
turn to the old system seems logical."
Other subjects that will be considered at the con-
vention are the following:
1. The establishing of a clearing house or general
supply and information bureau for the sheet music
trade.
2. The establishment of a retail credit rating and
collection bureau. No more than one member of this
association need ever be the loser by extending credit
to a customer who does not pay his accounts. A
credit bureau will tend to decrease the amounts of
dealers' losses from bad accounts on the one hand and
to increase the amounts of cash and C.O.D. sales on
the other.
Sheet Music Advertising.
3. The advertising of sheet music and books in
publications of general circulation, including news-
papers, as well as in the music trade press and in
music periodicals. It is the advertised article that
sells and the advertised store that does the business.
4. Better co-operation by the sheet music trade in
the activities of the Music Industries Chamber of
Commerce and the National Bureau for the Advance-
ment of Music—promotion of music in the home. Na-
tional Music Week, Better Homes Week, exposure of
the song-poem swindle, etc.
Edmund A. Whittier, secretary of the American
Fair Trade League, will address the association on
the subject of "price standardization."
The Federal Trade Commission has allowed until
June 1st for the putting into effect of the new price
system. The 1924 convention will mark the begin-
ning of a new era in the sheet music industry. The
chief obstacle to the harmonious relations of music
publishers and dealers, fictitious or false process and
discounts, will have been entirely eliminated. The
result will be the shifting of distribution to the logi-
cal distributors, the retailers. Distribution is the
biggest problem that confronts modern business.
SUCCESSFUL COMPOSER DIES
Victor Herbert, to Whose Credit Are Many Popular
Operettas, Succumbs at Lambs Club.
Victor Herbert, composer of more than forty
operas, operettas and revues, died suddenly in New
York on Monday of this week as he was ascending
the stairs at the Lambs Club to visit his doctor.
The popular musician was born in Dublin, Ireland,
in 1859, and was on his mother's side the grandson
of Samuel Lover, the novelist and poet. He married
Therese Forster, a German singer, and came to the
United States with her. She, a son, and two daugh-
ters survive.
By any measure, Victor Herbert was at once the
most talented and the most successful of American
composers of light opera. Like every other man or
woman who has made a success in that field, he was
aflame with ambition to write in the "big manner"
of the < tragic and romantic composers, and to have
his name take its place in alignment with Verdi's,
Wagner's, and the other immortals of music-drama.
He died with at least one such work to his credit—
"Natoma," written for and produced by the Chicago
Grand Opera Company, in 1911. Despite the handi-
cap of a libretto just a little worse than is customary
in the lyric theater, "Natoma" was a success in Chi-
cago and wherever it was sung.
But it was for his fecund gift in pure operetta that
Herbert will live in memory and in history—for that
and for some lovely matter he wrote for the modern
symphony orchestra.
His successful operettas are ''The Wizard of the
Nile." "The Serenade," Mdlle. Modiste," "Babes in
Toyland," "The Red Mill," "It Happened in Nord-
land" and "Algeria."
Another of Herbert's talents had to do with the
'cello: he was one of the world's three or four virtuoso
players; and still another was his flair for conducting.
A REMICK PLUGGER.
Monty Austin, plugger for Remick hits, has re-
turned to Portland, Ore., from California, where he
spent the winter in the employ of the Rendezvous
Ball Room at Crystal Beach of Ocean Park and is to
be found at his old stand at Council Crest, Oregon's
resort and mecca for all tourists who visit the city.
Here he is plugging for "Where the Lazy Daisies
Grow," "Hulu, Hulu Dream Girl," "There's Yes, Yes
in Your Eyes," "I Wonder Who's Dancing with You
Tonight." "Some Day You'll Know," "Not Yet,
Suzette," and other kindred Remick songs.
Estimates
9est
ANY PUBLISHER x
OUR REFERENCE
BAYNEE, DALHEIM & Co.
yon Anything in Music
^-^
WORK DONE BY
ALL PROCESSES
2654-2060 W.Lake St., Chicago, 111.
THE GENERAL CATALOG
Chas. W. Homeyer, Director of National
Association of Sheet Music Dealers,
Discusses Vital Question.
As the general catalog for the use of sheet music
dealers is a topic to be discussed at the forthcoming
convention, the following remarks by Chas. W.
Howcyer, a director of the National Association of
Sheet Music Dealers, should prove interesting:
A complete list of American publications to me
would be far more valuable and useful and more prac-
tical than attempting to get up a general catalogue.
By a general catalogue I mean the foreign things which
one of Schirmer's men also included a year or two
ago when he went into detail on the subject. It might
be wise to limit it to American copyrights but even if
the reprints were included it would not be so tre-
mendous. Besides, we had a suggestion that a cata-
logue of this type omitting Schirmer's and Ditson's
who have large catalogues of their own, would cover
the ground. It would give us merely three good
catalogues instead of forty or fifty with which we
must be familiar at the present time.
The chances of selling enough copies is another
feature which we must think of because where a good
many firms might be willing to use quite a number
of a small catalogue they could not afford to use a
number of catalogues which would be so large when
it includes European publications.
A credit bureau might include the teachers, or at
least a listing of the teachers who are N. G. and
do not pay their bills. It might be simpler to handle
from this standpoint rather than from the standpoint
from those who are good. If we had a list of the
teachers in each locality who are poor credit it would
be far shorter and easy to handle.
With the approval of the Federal Trade Com-
mission of the net marking of sheet music, all who
have an interest in the selling of sheet music will be
interested in the working out of this problem.
While we all hope that this change in marking
music will be a great boon to the industry, one never-
theless cannot help wondering what will happen to
the firm that doesn't maintain these prices. What is
the penalty? As our government has always objected
to anything savoring of price maintenance what is
to happen to the firm that gives a discount of 10%?
If this is to be considered legitimate for Mr. Jones
to give 10% why is it not also legitimate for Mr.
Smith to give 20% and if Mr. Smith can give 20%
why cannot Mr. Brown give 33}/}% and mark his
music high enough to do this?
We simply get back to where we were before. Are
all books and octavo music also to be marked net?
There is no question in my mind but what the av-
erage store in the sheet music business is increasing
in efficiency. Ten years ago the knowledge that the
small stores had of how to purchase their merchan-
dise to the best advantage was lamentable but this is
gradually improving with the greater demand for
good music and with the larger profit than existed
at that time. Another factor which helps small stores
is the placing of men in charge of that portion of the
business. While there are a few exceptionally able
young ladies in charge of stores, most of them stay
but a comparatively short time or get married and the
business suffers until some other young lady takes
charge with inevitably the same result.
As to the possibility of a Clearing-House, this is a
big complicated subject. An exceptionally able per-
son would have to be in charge at a good salary.
The salary could be met by the assessing of possibly
five cents for every order turned over to a publishing
house or a 10% allowance on the total order. An-
other source of revenue could be the selling of all
novelty complimentary copies that would be on file.
REMICK SONG HITS
Where the Lazy Daisies Grow
I Wonder Who's Dancing with You
Tonight
There's Yes Yes in Your Eyes
Hula Hula Dream Girl
It Had to Be You
Mandalay
Bring Back the Old Fashioned Waltz
Until Tomorrow
Twilight Rose
Watchin' the Moonrise *
Counting the Days
Not Yet Susette
Arizona Stars
If You'll Come Back
Land of Broken Dreams
J. H. REMICK & CO.
New York
Chicago
Detrvit
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