Presto

PRESTO-TIMES
The American Miuic 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 Cable Co.'s Code), "PRESTO," Chicago.
Entered as Second-class matter Jan. 29. 1896, at the
Post Office, Chicago. IllTnols. under Act of March 3, 1879.
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SATURDAY, MAY 14. 1927.
The last form of Presto-Times goes to press
at 11 a. m. Thursday. Any news transpiring
after that hour cannot be expected in the cur-
rent issue. Nothing received at the office that
is not strictly news of importance can have
attention after 9 a. m. on Thursday. If they
concern the interests of manufacturers or
dealers such items will appear the week follow-
ing. Copy for advertising designed for the
current issue must reach the office not later
than Wednesday noon of each week.
MUST FIGHT FOR IT
The successful piano salesman must fight for
it. In that is the force of the unusual call
which has been extended to the trade in be-
half of the June convention in Chicago. We
believe that the call referred to contained the
first printed suggestion that the peaceful pur-
suit of the piano business is a battle.
But so it is. And as things now are in bus-
iness there is no way to win save in fight. It
is all very well to demand that more attention
be given to music in the schools and elsewhere.
It is fine to invent easy ways to musical un-
derstanding in the young people. And all other
means and methods suggestive of a royal road
to learning are inspiring and, to a degree, use-
ful. But after all is said and done, the way to
win success in piano selling, in this distracting
day, is to fight for it.
The piano dealer who waits for the parents
to hear their boys and girls cry for music be-
cause of paste-board keyboards in the school
room will wait till the drumming of dooms-
day. Music is as great a fighter as sword and
gun when conditions demand. It is at the fore-
front when the tocsin of war spreads alarm.
The name of music may not suggest it, but
within it is every sentiment, every emotion and
all possibilities. Notwithstanding that music
is essentially the language and soul of peace,
as Tuckerman says "martial strain will urge
a man into the front rank of battle sooner
than any argument."
And it is the aggressive man, who is sure of
May 14, 1927.
his lighting qualities, that wins the sales. From writing, there is so much in music that de-
the first it has been by hard work, by persist- pends upon subtlety of expression that the
ent fighting for sales, that the piano business piano man, a plain merchandising fellow, per-
has been built up and extended. And in a day haps, may feel secure in the instruments he
when, as the convention announcement said, handles only when he knows how reliable the
"each industry is lined up against the music factory is that produces them. If he is a be-
merchant," it is absolutely necessary for the ginner, after he has made one sale he will find
dealers to get back to first principles and actu- that the loneliness has gone out of his world.
ally sell pianos.
His spring fever will then become a psychic
There are places and times when the plan compulsion to go out and sell another piano.
H* H^ ^
of depending upon local advertising and pub-
licity schemes may do the business. But too
Men who can not be narrowed down very
much of the scheme idea is bad for any busi- long at a time, to wanting things for them-
ness. In the large cities such broad systems selves alone, are studied as good piano pros-
as that of Mr. Frank Bayley and such compre- pects by wise dealers. When the dealer is sure
hensive educational enterprises as Mr. Otto that he has found such a man he sends one of
Meissner's "Melody Way" are possible of re- his canvassers to make a call on the prospect's
sults, in fact are already large contributors to wife. This is more than applied imagination;,
musical progress.
it belongs in the category of selling science.
And yet it remains true that in most com- Any dealer can profit by seeing more in peo-
munities the individual piano dealers must de- ple than they see in themselves.
pend upon themselves for whatever success
* * *
they may win. The must fight for it. They
Mr. A. G. (iiilbransen gives emphasis this,
must show even more fight than the workers
week to his plan for correcting the notion that
in the newer and more fascinating, because
old age and much use and abuse of the piano
lazier, lines of trade.
improves its tone and quality. His sugges-
The piano merchant of a generation back tion of a suitable topic of discussion at the
made' his way by hard knocks, by persistent coming convention seems to be timely and
solicitation and prospect seeking. It is a mis- possible of good results to the trade, as well
take to suppose it is a matter of present day as the young people's musical understanding.
lack of public music desire that makes piano
* * *
selling "harder" than before. It is more often
In all the plans for the best convention yet
because the men who should sell pianos are
the Piano Playing Contest stands conspicu-
softer.
ously forth. It is regarded as one of the most
promising features because of its potential
JESSE FRENCH
effects upon greater sales. In fact, the gen-
eral
spread of the contest idea, in the large'
Rapidly the pioneer builders of the Ameri-
cities,
is an evidence of the kind of music in-
can piano industry are passing. And in the
terest
that
must bear fruit for the workers in
latest to go there is cause for greater regret,
and a deeper sense of the loss than time's the piano trade.
changes usually bring. For in the death of
* * *
Jesse French, Sr., the blow seems many-sided
This is the rumor season in New York. Were
and touches the manifold aspects of the trade, we to publish a report which came from our
with the still deeper pang that a friend has eastern representative this week the trade
gone whose contributions reached into almost would be stirred by stories of changes in great
every branch of human interest.
piano industries which would be excitingly in-
Jesse French was a larger man even than teresting but largely, we have reason to think,
that of an industrial leader or a great mer- not true. Consequently we won't print till
chant. He was not only a pioneer in his de- verified.
* * *
partment of activities, but he was equally an
independent thinker and one capable of force-
It is worthy of note that the first practical
ful expression. His mind was creative and he test of Mr. Gulbransen's proposition that old
loved to delve into science and literature to the trade-ins be burned, has been made by a re-
point where the inscrutab'.e intelligence places tail piano house in a comparatively small city
a bar upon finite research.
in Delaware. If every dealer in the country
would
follow suit what a demand for new in-
Mr. French presented a case of the success-
struments
might result!
ful man of affairs, and builder of business, who
was equally endowed with the gift of poetic
* * *
vision and love of art. As a poet he was far
More and more we realize the value as a
above mediocrity and, but for his modesty, piano sales stimulator of Mr. W. Otto Miess-
his name would be as well known in the realm ner's system of music teaching in the schools.
of literature as it is as the maker of fine A prominent piano manufacturer recently said
pianos. He had shared in the production of that he could actually trace piano demands to
books in which his delicate verbal expression Mr. Miessner's Melody W^ay.
was made apparent and, if he has fulfilled his
purpose, as expressed to a Presto-Times rep-
GET BEHIND IT.
resentative not very long ago, he has also left
It's easy if you think you can,
an autobiography which will prove both en-
And put yourself behind it,
tertaining and instructive, especially to his as-
And know you have the grit to do
Whatever 'tis you would put through
sociates and contemporaries in the piano
To catch your game and bind it.
world.
The piano dealer has no ground for fears of
what is to be from a capricious futurity; nor
need he fear that he will be compelled to un-
learn all that he has already acquired. What
difference can it make to him whether the
study of music is electic or electric? Like good
The will to do is half the fight,
The weak-kneed man's defeated
Before he fairly starts the fray.
For nothing that spells "can't" today
Will see the task.completed.
The stone that rolls so swiftly down
The upward climb refuses,
Unless you get behind and show
You have the strength to make it go,
With pluck that never loses.
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