Presto

PRESTO
presto
THE AMERICAN MUSIC TRADE WEEKLY.
Published Every Saturday at 417 South Dearborn
Street, Chicago, Illinois.
C. A. DANIELL and FRANK D. ABBOTT
- Editors
Telephones, Local and Long Distance, Harrison 234
Private Phones to all Departments. Cable Address (Com-
mercial Came Co.'s Code), "PRESTO," Chicago.
Entered as second-class matter Jan. 29, 1896, at the
Post Office, Chicago, Illinois, under Act of March 3, 1879.
Subscription, $2 a year; 6 months, $1; Foreign, f4.
Payable in advance, No extra charge In United States
possessions, Cuba and Mexico, Rates for advertising on
application.
Items of news and other matter are solicited and if
of general interest to the music trade will be paid for
at space rates. Usually piano merchants or salesmen
in the smaller cities .are the best occasional corre-
spondents, and their assistance is invited.
Forms close at noon every Thursday. News mat-
ter should be in not later than eleven o'clock on the
same day. Advertising copy should be in hand before
Tuesday, five p. m., to insure preferred position. Full
page display copy should be in hand by Monday noon
preceding publication day. Want advs. for current
week, to insure classification, must not be later than
Wednesday noon.
Address all communications for the editorial or business
departments to PRESTO PUBLISHING CO., 417 South
Dearborn Street, Chicago, III.
SATURDAY, JUNE 20, 1925.
A CHEERFUL CONVENTION
It was a cheerful convention. It is good
cheer that overcomes the world.
Musical instrument manufacturers and deal-
ers as a class substitute help for hindrance.
They regard any fight for freedom as their
fight, too. They have the gift of sympathy.
The color of their thoughts is tone color. They
recognize the need for tolerance, the power of
idealism, the reality of imagination, the mo-
tives that cause revolt from routine.
At last week's convention were some ex-
cellent talkers, clear thinkers, ready debaters,
and, doubtless, several competent doers.
PLANS AND PLACES
A topic of discussion with not a few piano
men in Chicago last week had to do with the
present convention plan of alternating head-
quarters at New York and Chicago. There
seems to be a feeling with some that the older
way of choosing a different city every year is
better.
Of course, there may be reason in this.
Some manufacturers in other places may
think that their comrades of the two large
cities have an advantage in the gathering of
so many dealers who naturally make of the
annual meeting an opportunity to investigate
local industries and so may become attached
to the instruments made in one or both the
convention cities, with little reference to the
products of other factories. It may be a small
matter and the many displays at the Drake
last week show that the industries outside of
Chicago do not suffer much because their
sources" of production are not accessible.
But it is an expense not insignificant to make
the annual displays, far from home, for a pe-
riod of only a few days. If the conventions,
were, as formerly, movable, the other piano-
making centers might have their innings also.
Boston, Cincinnati, Buffalo, Milwaukee — all
piano producing cities—would like a conven-
tion, probably. They have said so. And per-
haps the dealers sometimes get the idea that,
having become familiar with Broadway and
Michigan boulevard, they would just as soon
"take a shot" at Main street and the other
busy places of some smaller cities and towns
where, even with less to see, they might have
a change and be close to still other factories,
for study and investigation.
This is not a suggestion at all. It is only an
echo of what might have been heard during
the week's big meeting in and around the
Drake in Chicago. Nor is it probable that
many would consider any retrogressive steps,
nor does Presto see enough advantages to the
smaller-city industries to commend any change
from the present plan.
HOW PRESTO HELPS ALL
In its long career of usefulness (watch our
blushes), Presto has encouraged many a be-
ginner to keep up heart through his darkest
days. We have been with them as they were
pushing a policy of pluck to the utmost; ad-
vised with them as they held aloof from pre-
mature action; recognized in them men who
had the future in their hearts; helped them to
avoid the pitfalls of misguided enthusiasts.
Later we have had satisfaction in watching
their achievements that called not for gold or
brawn, but for infinite tact, finesse, patience,
far-sightedness, judgment and poise. In most
cases such friends became friends, staunch
ones. A few of them paid us chiefly in pretty
compliments. They are all all right.
A MUSIC BUILDING
The notion that "advertising music" might
stimulate the sale of musical instruments,
especially pianos, has faded out. Naturally,
music is the greatest of advertisers. In it-
self it has been advertising everything worth
having, or worth doing, from the dawn of the
well-known morning stars that sang together.
When Adam discovered shrinking Eve in the
vernal framework of Eden he broke into song.
At least that is the way Milton pictures the
scene and, in Rubinstein's wonderful "Paradise
Lost" the composer causes the first man to
sing out aloud, in unconventional questioning:
"What is it?" And the reply comes quickly,
also according to Milton, "Eve! O most glori-
ous work of nature!"
But that music advertises all things, and is
therefore a force beyond power of measure-
ment, no one will question. Even the word
itself standing alone suggests sweet sounds.
In Chicago there is a shoemaker whose name
is Music, and also a tailor whose sign an-
nounces that Mr. Musick attends to rents and
tears within. No one can go to those shops
without thinking in some way of the joys of
life—at least one of them that permeates all
things and every place. And that makes it
interesting to know that other cities than New
York are to have Music Buildings.
The eastern city, we believe, has already a
Music Building, and a good one. The proposi-
tion was described in the press a long time
back and, presumably, New York's Music
Building is by this time a busy and melodious
city center. So, too, Chicago is preparing to
have the same kind of a treasure-house—a
big building wherein artists will perform, and
teachers will teach, and music dealers will
deal, and music trade papers, and other liter-
ature of ennobling order, will be written.
We have the assurance from a gentleman
active in affairs of art that Chicago's new
Music Building will soon become a reality. In
fact it is so far along, on paper, that tenants
June 20, 1925.
have been asked to consider signing leases.
Happy, too, the landlord, for he is working
along the correct real estate lines.
The trade everywhere will be interested in
the announcement of a book by Mr. William
Tonk, head and founder of the fine New York
piano industry that bears his name. Mr. Tonk
has been engaged in the music business from
boyhood, and no one will doubt that his writ-
ings will shed light upon many points of prog-
ress in the work with which he is so familiar.
Of course, all live paino men will want a copy
of the book.
* * *
There is a suspicion that Mr. Frank Bill-
ings, inventor of the famous brass flange, has
another piano improvement with which to sur-
prise the trade. He can tell how he knows
that music is better than dewdrops with
which to bathe the morning glories. Mr. Bill-
ings did, in short, demonstrate at the June
convention the blooming effect of fine tuning
upon spring flowers.
* * *
In the radio field of disputed invention, Mr.
Lee De Forest seems to be paralleling the late
John McTammany's fight for recognition. Mr.
De Forest is having almost as hard a time
trying to prove that he discovered the regen-
erative principle in radio reception as McTam-
many did to show that he made the first pneu-
matic player action.
* * *
Never stop to worry if the prospect gets
away. Just watch for the next one to turn the
corner, for in trade, as elsewhere, they come
in pairs.
30 YEARS AGO IN THE TRADE
From the Files of Presto
(June 20, 1895.)
A well-known Boston piano manufacturer will in-
troduce still another novel stringing device for next
winter's trade.
Speculation will soon give place to actual facts re-
garding the forthcoming Story & Clark piano as with-
in a short time the instrument will be ready for the
public and for critical examination.
Happened to call at Hardman, Peck & Co.'s just
as Mr. W. D. Dutton was looking over the orders on
Saturday. Among them was one from "Darkest
Africa" for two "Hardman" and three "Standard"
pianos. At that rate it will not long be very dark in
Africa.
Mr. J. F. Bowers, of the firm of Lyon & Healy,
who has recently been elected president of the Music
Publishers' Association of the United States, is in
some respects one of the most prominent music trade
men in the country. Mr. Bowers is one of the oldest
and most valued employes of the world-renowned
Lyon & Healy house; he entered that establishment
as an errand boy about a week after the fire.
20 YEARS AGO THIS WEEK
(From Presto, June 22, 1905.)
There was a refreshing sense of trade paper ap-
preciation evinced in the Put-In-Bay convention
speeches. Now is the time to subscribe.
The fourth annual convention of the National Pi-
ano Dealers of America at Put-In-Bay this week was
marked by an enthusiasm unusual even in the piano
dealers' convention.
In the death of Henry Behning, Sr., the piano trade
of New York has lost one of its oldest and most hon-
ored members. Although he retired from active busi-
ness about ten or eleven years ago he considered him-
self to his death a member of the great guild of which
for years he was such a foremost figure.
Certain citizens of Atlantic City, N. J., who pleaded
and clamored for one of the square pianos holocausted
at the big bonfire of the convention of the joint asso-
ciation last year would be perplexed if they read a
certain item in the city newspapers last week. The
action was an announcement of piano purchases by
the Board of Education of Greater New York which
recorded $6,250 as the price paid for twenty-five
square pianos.
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