MUSICAL
TIMES
PRESTO
Established
1881
Established
1884
THE AMERICAN MUSIC TRADE WEEKLY
10 Cents a Copy
CHICAGO, SATURDAY, JANUARY 15, 1927
PIANO PLAYING
CONTEST IN SPRING
Plans Are Announced for Chicago's City-Wide
Tournament Sponsored by Music Trade Gen-
erally, Local Newspaper, Piano and Organ
Assn. and Other Responsible Contributors.
WILL BE GREAT EVENT
About the Middle of March the Events Already
Scheduled Will Stir Piano Lovers and Help to
Discover the Best Youthful Talent.
Finally the plans for carrying on the Piano Playing
Contest spoken of more of less fully in the trade
papers are given out this week through the Herald-
Examiner and other Chicago newspapers.
The trade papers have not exploited the contest
and program because the committee had expressed a
desire that the announcement be delayed until it
could be made by all classes of local publications at
one time. The piano playing tournament as is under-
stood, is sponsored by the Chicago Piano and Organ
Association and most of the local music houses have
contributed to insure the success of the undertaking.
The city-wide piano playing contest will be known
as the Annual Greater Chicago Children's Piano
Playing Tournament, and while the particulars have
been known to Presto-Times the first announcements
were made by the Herald-Examiner in its issue of
January 9, which said that any child attending a
public, parochial or private school in Chicago or its
suburbs, or the pupil of anj' individual teacher, is
eligible to take part in the tournament.
The Cash Awards.
"Five thousand dollars in cash awards will be made
to the boys or girls who emerge successfully from
the grand finals. It will not be a test to see who can
play the longest or who can play the loudest, but
rather an elimination tournament to find the child
who, according to the judgment of some of the coun-
try's best piano critics, can play the best.
"This city-wide piano playing tournament is being
sponsored by practically every large musical organ-
ization in the country, including the National Bureau
for the Advancement of Music, New York; the
Apollo Club. Chicago; the Mendelssohn Club, Chi-
cago; the Chicago Singverein and The Chicago Her-
ald and Examiner."
Public Spirited Promoters.
In addition to Chicago's Mayor Dever, and Gov-
ernor Small, the following prominent men are named
in a list of those endorsing the plan:
Dr. Max Mason, president of University of Chi-
cago; Frederick Stock, conductor Chicago Symphony
Orchestra; Herman Devries, music critic of The Chi-
cago Evening American; Mrs. J. Hamilton Lewis,
wife of ex-Senator Lewis; Glenn Dillard Gunn, presi-
dent of the Gunn School of Music and music critic
of The Herald and Examiner; Dr. Walter Dill Scott,
president of -the Northwestern University; Ralph
Van Vechten, president of the State Bank of Chi-
cago; Dr. Herman Bundesen, health commissioner of
Chicago; D. F. Kelly, president of The Fair; Bishop
Edwin Hold Hughes of the Chicago Temple; George
W. Dixon, president of the Dixon Transfer Com-
pany; Dr. John Thompson of the Chicago Temple;
former Mayor William Hale Thompson.
The contestants are to be divided into three divi-
sions, classifications arranged as follows: Elemen-
tary, first to sixth grades, inclusive; Intermediate,
seventh, eighth and ninth grades, inclusive; High,
tenth, eleventh and twelfth grades, inclusive.
Begins in March.
According to the present plans, which are subject
to revision, the preliminary tests for all children will
be held during the months of March and April, 1927.
District tests will be held the first two weeks of
May and the semi-finals either the third or fourth
week in May. The grand finals will take place early
in June.
There will be a first, second and third cash prize
for each group of classifications as follows: First
prize of $50!) in cash for each of ihe three divisions.
Second prize of $,100 in cas'.i for each of the three
divisions. Tlrrd prize of $200 in cash for each of
the three divisions.
Special Cash Award.
"The pianist who, in the opinion of the judges, is
the best of the three divis ; on winners, will 1 be given
an additional cash award of $1,000 and the title of
"Champion Amateur Junior Pianist of Greater Chi-
cago and Grand Prize Winner of the Annual Greater
Chicago Children's Piano Playing Tournament.'
Other cash prize awards will be announced later,"
continues the announcement.
"Certificates will be given to every child participat-
ing in the tournament and there will be many other
valuable prizes, including badges, and silver, gold
and diamond rings for preliminary, district and semi-
final tests.
"Preliminary and district judges will be chosen
from among Chicago's professional piano teachers,
while many famous pianists, both in and outside of
Chicago, will serve as judges for the finals and semi-
finals."
ITEMS IN THIS WEEK'S
INDIANAPOLIS TRADE
Indiana Music Merchants Meet; Local Trade
Is Good, with Many Knabe Sales;
Other Notes.
The second meeting of the Indiana Music Mer-
chants' Association directors will be held on Wednes-
day, January 12, at the Indianapolis Athletic Club.
Geo. Stewart, secretary, and Joel B. Ryde, president,
will attend the meeting of the National Board of
Directors to be held in Chicago on the 22nd.
Christena-Teague Piano Company report the
largest week's business for the first week in January
in the history of the company. In commenting on
the business Mr. Teague said: "We have had the
biggest and best first week in the year since the in-
ception of the company, and the volume was high
class instruments. One of the outstanding sales was
a Chickering & Sons Ampico, Style 58, in mahogany.
Public School 45 has purchased a Style "B" Knabe,
in mahogany, from Rap & Lennox Piano Company.
The Parent Teachers' Association, after considering-
several instruments, selected by the Knabe.
Geo. Mansfield, of the Kurtzman Piano Company
of Buffalo, was a visitor at Pearson House during
the past week.
W. N. VAN MATRE STARTS
ON TRIP TO HONOLULU
Chairman of Schumann Piano Co. Will Put in Some
Time in Hawaiian Capital.
W. N. Van Matre, Sr., of the Schumann Piano Co.,
Rockford, 111., but whose home is at Lake Bluff, a
suburb of Chicago, has gone to Hawaii and will
spend a short time in Honolulu, where he will revel
in his love of change and enjoy the balmy winter
season there. He will, also, and naturally, make ob-
servances as to piano prospects wherever he may
visit.
At one time Mr. Van Matre was one of the most
tireless piano travelers, although at present, or since
W. N. Jr. took charge of the industry at Rockford,
he has been content to watch the business grow. He
is a travel-lover and sees things as he goes along.
GEO. W. ARMSTRONG GOES SOUTH.
$2 The Year
DEATH OF J. W. STEVENS
CAUSES DEEP REGRET
Loyal Friend and Faithful Worker in Mathu-
shek Piano Co.'s Interests, Died
Suddenly on Saturday Last.
In the ra;her sudden death of John W. Stevens,
secretary and general manager of the Mathushek
Piano Mfg. Co., New York, one of the best liked
and most popular men of the present day has passed
away. Mr. Stevens, after his return from a recent
trip to Florida, developed a cold which turned into
pneumonia, and he died on Saturday evening, Jan-
uary 8.
For over thirty years Mr. Stevens had been closely
allied with the Jacob Bros, industries. About four-
teen years ago he was placed in charge of the re-
organized Mathushek Piano Mfg. Co., of which he
was secretary, and the success of that company has
been his main effort since that time. Prior to his
connection with the Jacob Bros, industries he was
employed as general manager of Peek & Son, who
made the Opera piano.
The funeral, under .Masonic rites, was held on
Tue'sday last at the Congregational Church, Mt. Ver-
iKin, N. ^ . 1 here was a large delegation of piano
men present.
Chas. Jacob, president of the Mathushek Piano
Mfg. Co., in expressing the grief of himself and his
colleagues, said that Mr. Stevens was one of those
men of whom it could be said that he was always
loyal, always industrious, entirely dependable and
a family man with the finest instincts of American
home life. For a number of years he served as an
alderman in Mt. Vernon and later as water commis-
sioner of that city. He took an active part in all of
its community life. He was, at his death, a governor
of the Westchester County Wheelmen's Club, of Mt.
Vernon; active in the Masonic lodge there, and a
member of the Congregational Church of Mt. Vernon.
Mr. Stevens has made for himself a reputation and
a name in the piano trade that will not be forgotten.
He was an ex-president of the New York Piano
Manufacturers' Association, and of the New York
Piano Club. lie recently started a piano school in
the Matbushek factory and had brought it to a high
state of efficiency, with over four hundred children
being taught the rudiments of piano-playing through
the generosity of his undertaking.
Mr. Stevens was a scholarly man. He loved the
poets, and could aptly quote them; he was a good
public speaker, and he was a thorough piano man in
every sense of the word.
He had the faculty of making and retaining
friends. His loss will be deplored throughout the
trade and his acquaintances among the dealers ex-
tended from coast to coast. He was 66 years old and
is survived by his wife, Mrs. Mary Thompson
Stevens, and by two sons, John and Ernest, and one
daughter, Ethel.
E. C. BOYKIN'S ASSISTANT.
Joseph S. Vila, the new assistant to Edward C.
Boykin, executive secretary of the National Piano
Promotion Plan, is well qualified for the work. He
is a clever pianist and student of music. His news-
paper experience, too, should prove helpful. Mr. Vila
is the son of the sports editor on the New York
Evening Sun, and his work for the National Piano
Promotion Plan will be cooperating with Mr. Boy-
kin in the preparation of stories, dealer helps and the
arrangement of piano contest details.
CONVENTION IN SAN FRANCISCO.
President G. W. Armstrong, Jr., of the Baldwin
Piano Co., Cincinnati, is in Miami, Florida, for a
short stay before proceeding to Havana. He had
found Cincinnati too cold for comfort and left there
on December 3. He found things in Florida even
more depressed than common report has made it.
The number of people expected did not come, and
Floridians are disappointed, with plenty of room in
the hotels, from Jacksonville south.
The Hotel St. Francis, San Francisco, has been
selected as headquarters for the annual convention
of the Western Music Trade Association which will
be held in that city from July 12 to 15. The details
of the program will soon be published by the com-
mittees appointed by Philip T. Clay, president of the
association, who also has appointed Shirley Walker
as his chief aid in arranging plans for the important
gathering of the western music trade.
The Noll Piano Co., Milwaukee, recently celebrated
the fifth anniversary of its occupation of the store
at 1015 Muskego avenue.
The building at 112 West Third street, Grand
Island, Neb., has been occupied by the Jones Music
Co., formerly located at 210 West Second street.
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