Presto

PRESTO
Presto
T H E AMERICAN MUSIC TRADE WEEKLY.
Published Every Saturday at 417 South Dearborn
Street, Chicago, Illinois.
C. A. D A N I E L L and F R A N K D. ABBOTT -
Editors
Telephones. Local and Long Distance, Harrison 234
Private Phones to all Departments. Cable Address (Com-
mercial Cable Co.'s Cede), " P R E S T O , " Chicago.
Kntered as second-class matter Jan. 29, 189G, at the
I'osi Office, Chicago. Illinois, under Act of March 3, 1879.
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Payable in advance. No extra charge in United States
possessions. Cuba and Mexico. Ra,tes for advertising on
application.
best to serve as a center to be surrounded by
other and younger instruments. Later the
Chickering capitulated and the McPhail con-
tinued along its independent way.
The Chickering is old enough without any
exaggeration. Its career has been remark-
able in many ways. In a full century's con-
tinuous existence it has run upon financial
shoals but once. The Chickerings themselves
—all now passed away—were of the highest
type of Americans, and not long before his
death Mr. C. Frank Chickering is known to
have told an importunate creditor that in all
the years since his house was established it
had never been sued for debt, nor had it until
then even so much as been threatened with
suit.
So that the old piano which took prominent
part in the opening of New York's latest
music temple has a many-sided significance.
It symbolizes the long-lived character of the
piano business, as well as the vitality of the
industry and instrument itself. Perhaps, still
r- „_,. „-„,,„ q t r\rr- n every Thursday. News mat-
ter shorl 1 be in not later than eleven o'clock on the more, it proved that with all the changes and
sarm day A '.vertiring copy should be in hand before
TifsJay five p. m., to insure preferred position. Full improvements which have marked the piano's
p?pe d srlay copy fhcu'd be in hand by Monday noon development during a hundred years, the prin-
prfe.ii-g r-uHicrt'cn day Want advs. frr current
/ eek to n~ure classification, must not be later than ciples of its construction remain practically
\» ~^~ crt-f n^rn.
untouched and the character of its manufac-
Address all communicRtions for the editorial or business
ture as good at the beginning as it is today.
departments to PRESTO PUBLISHING CO., 417 South
Items cf news and other matter are solicited and if
r{ icre-a interest to the : mus'c trade will be paid for
at space rates. Usually p ano merchants or salesmen
in the smaller cites ere the best occasional corre-
spondents, and their assistance is invited.
Dearborn Street, Chicago, III.
SATURDAY, OCTOBER 18, 1924.
THE "FIRST" PIANO
The opening of New York's new Chicker-
ing Hall, on 57th street, was one of last
week's events. Architecturally, as in other re-
spects, the new building' bears not the least
resemblance to the Checkering Hall which
long ago adorned Fifth Avenue at Seventeenth
Street.
Naturally the inauguration of the new piano
structure prompted some good newspaper
advertising, with the century-old Boston in-
dustry as the centerpiece. Equally natural,
perhaps, that the enthusiasm of the publicity
department led to some exaggeration. For
instance, the story of the opening, as printed,
said that the "First piano made in America"
took part in the baptism of the new building.
It is always easy to start history, of any
kind, on a detour from the truth. The old
instrument displayed in the new Chickering
Hall is not the first piano made in this country.
Not by a good many. And, lest all piano his-
tory become distorted for future generations,
it may be well to make the correction now,
Not even the most enthusiastic Chickering
admirer would say that the Boston industry
had any existence back of 1823. When Cap-
tain Mackay took an interest in- the struggle
of Jonas Chickering to establish a piano indus-
try, the first instrument bearing the name
appeared. No doubt it is the one now exhibit-
ed in New York. But nearly a quarter century
before that instrument was made, pianos had
been built in a little shop in Milton, Mass.
Benjamin Crehove was busily at work, as the
forerunner of his piano, years before Jonas
Chickering moved from New Hampshire to
Boston. And a number of others had estab-
lished themselves as piano makers in other
places, notably Philadelphia.
It is interesting, in this connection, to re-
member that when Mr. George Foster had
perfected his plan of a great combination of
piano industries be started at Boston and the
Chickering. Repulsed at first, he approached
the owners of the McPhail piano, as the next
THE KILLER
A newspaper feature writer says that the
automobile has "killed many a piano sale"
because it affords instantaneous enjoyment for
the whole family, whereas the musical instru-
ment can be really entertaining only "after
long and often painful study." But up to this
time no space-writer, or automobile booster
has contrasted the number of piano sales
"killed" with the number of possible piano
buyers killed by his motor car.
But even then this subject has only a very
superficial and inadequate consideration. From
the first the contrasting of the piano and the
motor car has had but little sense or reason.
They are no more alike than the workshop
and the school, the boiler factory and the
university, or the dish pan and the diamond.
All are essentials to human comfort and
decency. But in such contrasts the real basis
of the piano's worth, its best mission and its
place in life, are overlooked. Even the piano
'dealers and the salesmen have seemingly for-
gotten that the piano is an important part of
the educational equipment. In times past it
was the custom to talk about the close rela-
tionship of music and mathematics. Of the
immeasurable help of piano' playing in the
general education of youth. Of the refining
influences of the piano in home life.
And these points are as true today as ever
they were. Even more so, for the age is more
reckless of the more refined side of existence,
and more heedless even of life itself. The
rapid multiplicity of the great engines that
roar through the city streets has lessened re-
gard for personal safety, and both youth and
old age contribute about evenly to the toll
exacted by the modern delight that kills
piano sales.
Naturally the question arises: Wouldn't it
be a good idea if piano salesmen returned
to the argument in favor of the piano as an
adjunct to education and refinement? It must
seem that the best influences accorded to
mankind are better, as arguments, than any
other arguments that go to prove that by
killing—whether of piano sales or little chil-
October 18, 1924.
dren—the world is made to advance by adding
to the delights of the killers.
* * *
A good letter will stimulate the desire for a
musical instrument. A poorly worded, badly
typed letter will have the opposite effect.
* * :|:
In many piano stores the old "prospect"
book has been accumulating dust through mis-
use. Now is the time to blow away the dust
and copy the names and get out after the
doubtful fellow citizens who want something
vital to their happiness and don't seem to know
it.
*
*
*
The Department of Commerce at Washing-
ton is trying to make manufacturers realize
that the production of seldom-used varieties
of "everyday commodities" represents waste.
The suggestion is not at all novel in the piano
industry, although there are still too many
styles turned out by some of the manufac-
turers.
•\-
*
+
In Indianapolis one retailer advertised
grands for $350, and a competitor advertised
"a better grand" for $675. The latter sold
more than the other one. How? He adver-
tised a few "damaged in transit grands" for
$210.'' There were two of them in the store.
Neither would make a sound. "No," said the
salesman, "we can't put them into condition.
We pell them just as they are, and we really
don't know whether the internal mechanism is
damaged or not. But"—with the usual sigh
of relief—"over here are our better grands."
And, as usual, the "better grands" win the
day.
30 YEARS AGO IN THE TRADE
From the Files of Presto
(October 18, 1894.)
Mr. and Mrs. W. W. Kimball are expected to
arrive in Chicago to-day (Thursday).
Mr. G. W. Tewkesbury, treasurer of the Chicago
Cottage Organ Co., will probably leave for Europe
in November.
One of the Lyon & Hcaly harps exhibited at the
Antwerp Exposition was sold by Mr. James E.
Healy to the harpist of the Court of Saxony.
One of the most glorious combinations of the
piano maker's art and the artist's brush, is the hand-
painted baby grand piano now on exhibition in the
warerooms of Steinway & Sons.
Considering that we are as yet only in the "vesti-
bule of winter," and the opening of the trade revival,
the enormous demand for high grade pianos is very
significant. The American factories alone of the
S einway
piano shipped 117 instruments last week,
and o ( these forty-four were grands.
20 YEARS AGO THIS WEEK
(From Presto, October 20, 1904.)
W. W. Kimball's condition has been reported dur-
ing the last week as "just the same." Which means
that the distingu shed piano manufacturer's health is
no better thru it was last week.
Bernard Kroeger celebrated his eighty-fifth birth-
day on Friday of last week. He ce'ebrated it as he
has the majority of his birthdays—in a piano factory.
Of course it was the Kroeger factory and the activ-
ity of this octogenarian piano maker would put to
shame many men of an age sufficiently tender to
qualify them as his grandchildren.
The Strich & Zeidler Diminutive Grand is taking
very well in the territory through which Mr. Strich
has been traveling, as well as in all other places
where it is known. "This Diminutive Grand is a
winner," is the way Mr. Strich expressed himself
concerning the piano in question while talking to a
representative of Presto.
Of the thirty year, and longer, associates, who still
re-nain with Mr. P. J. Healy are Robert Gregory,
C. N. Post and several others. Mr. Jefferson came
in a little later, as did Messrs. Byrne and Bowers.
Chas. Bobzin, now traveler for the house, was also
with Mr. Healy in the olden days. But most of even
the "old heads" of the house today have joined since
the old time of the music hall music store at Wash-
ington and Clark streets.
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