Presto

Issue: 1927 2134

MUSICAL
TIMES
PRESTO
Established
1881
Established
1884
THE AMERICAN MUSIC TRADE WEEKLY
10 Cents a Copy
CHICAGO, SATURDAY, JUNE 25, 1927
PIANO TOURNAMENT
MADE PERMANENT
Important Action to Hold an Annual Piano
Playing Contest in Chicago Taken This
Week at Special Dinner of Spon-
sors and Active Boosters.
C. E. BYRNE HONORED
Vice-President of Steger & Sons Piano Mfg. Com-
pany, Who Created Contest Idea, Presented
With Clock by Contest Supporters.
The Greater Chicago Children's Piano Playing
Tournament, which was such a stirring closing event
of the recent convention of the music trade at the
Stevens Hotel, Chicago, is to be made an annual
event. That important decision was made at a meet-
ing of the promoters and sponsors this week.
"To celebrate the tremendous success of the An-
nual Greater Chicago Children's Piano Playing
could be materially cut in another year's running of
a contest. Mr. Gerber and Mr. Pratt of the Herald
and Examiner made interesting remarks, and Peter
Meyer, full of enthusiasm for the next tournament,
said that if the same eighteen men who had worked
for the contest this time would be asked to repeat the
work he would guarantee they would "make things
howl another year."
Presentation to Mr. Byrne.
Henry Weisert spoke on the development of the
contest proposition and led up to the presentation to
Mr. Byrne of the gift from the committee and
sponsors. "We have with us the man who started
the contest movement and we ought to do something
with him," said Mr. Weisert. "What shall it be?
Frank Bayley has offered the suggestion to 'crown
him'." Mr. Byrne was then presented with the clock,
and in acknowledgement gave a talk which was
listened to with interest.
Other Talks.
The toastmaster then called on Henry Hewitt,
Walter Kiehn, Chris. G. Steger, Mr. Dowd of the
Cable Co., Roger O'Connor, Gordon Laughead, G. R.
Brownell, M. Moist, Harry Bibb, Clayton F. Summy,
Lathrop Resseguie, Ralph B. Waite, Donald Steger,
G. R. McLaughlin, David Kimball and the trade
paper representatives present, Messrs. Koch, Nealy,
McNab, Meyer and Abbott.
Before the meeting closed it was proposed to make
a move toward a permanent Piano Playing Tourna-
ment; to either incorporate or do something to make
the tournament started this year a permanent, an-
nual event. This will undoubtedly be accomplished
in the near future.
FRED MUEHLHAUSER
DIES IN CLEVELAND, 0.
Treasurer of Muehlhauser Bros. Piano Co.
Had Been Ailing for Considerable Time—
W. G. Agnew Also Dies.
CHARLES E. BYRNE.
Tournament and to honor those to whom honor is
due," the supervising committee of the recent Greater
Chicago Children's Piano Playing Tournament gave
a dinner on Monday evening, June 20, at the Chicago
Athletic Club.
Fifty Guests Present.
There were upwards of fifty persons present, seated
at the long table extending through a suite of two
rooms. The wording of the invitation did not give
much clue as to just what would be done in paying
tribute to any particular person or persons, but when
Charles E. Byrne was given the place of honor at the
table and later on when he was presented with a
beautiful chronometrical clock it was evident that he
was the gentleman to be honored by the supporters
of the playing contest.
At the opposite end of the table was H. H. Fleer,
president of Lyon & Healy, who was toastmaster.
Mr. Fleer's interesting words of introduction de-
veloped into quite a little speech, and he showed a
marked ability as a toastmaster in being able to get
practically every man at the tables on his feet for a
talk of some length before the dinner was over.
Talks From Everybody.
Mr. Fleer introduced C. H. De Acres, the vice-
president of Lyon & Healy, who gave a brief and
cheerful talk. Then in turn the members of the
committee were called on. Eugene Whalen glow-
ingly commented on the tangible success of the con-
test and expressed the desire that it be made
permanent. James Bristol spoke on the financial
aspect of the work and gave something of a financial
report. He expressed the idea that many expenses
The many friends of Fred W. Muehlhauser, treas-
urer of the Muehlhauser Bros. Piano Co., Cleveland,
Ohio, will learn with regret that he passed away on
June 18. He had been ailing for a considerable time,
but it seemed that he was going to recover his health,
for he was enabled to come down to the store in the
spring and resume his duties.
Mr. Muehlhauser was active in the trade associa-
tion, both local and state, and was a man highly re-
spected for his ideals. He was a member of the
Kiwanis Club, the Knights of Pythias and the
Masonic order. He was fifty years of age at the
time of his death, and is survived by his widow and
two children, Ada and Carl, and his two brothers,
Adolph G. Muehlhauser and Otto C. Muehlhauser,
president and secretary respectively of the firm. The
funeral was held from the residence on Tuesday
afternoon of this week, which was attended by a
large number of men of the trade.
Death of Veteran Piano Man.
The second death in the music business this week
was that of W. G. Agnew, a veteran piano man, who
passed away suddenly on Friday. He was with the
May Company's piano department at the time of his
demise. He had been connected with the Hallet &
D*avis store and Dreher Piano Company before going
to the May Company about twelve years ago, and
had been in the piano business for over a quarter of
a century. He was a member of the Cleveland Music
Trades Association. Burial was on Monday, June 20.
Mr. Agnew was sixty-seven years of age and is sur-
vived by his widow and two daughters.
DETROIT TO BE HOST.
The members of the Cleveland Music Trades Asso-
ciation are to be the guests of the Detroit Music
Dealers' Association some time about the middle of
July. The latter has extended the invitation and the
Cleveland members have accepted it. Frank Bailey
and Roy Maypole of Detroit will head the welcoming
Detroiters and members of both organizations will go
on a private yacht to an island up the Lakes, where
the day will be spent. A business session is on the
program, at which the piano playing contest that is
to be put on this fall will be discussed.
$2 The Year
ANNOUNCE PLANS •
FOR DETROIT MEET
Tentative Program of Activities Includes
Talks by Experts in Construction, Sales
and Publicity and Grand Finale Will
Be Closing E v e n t s of Contest
CITY INTERESTED
FopuJance, to Distinguish Piano, Honor Playing
Champion and Do it Joyfully in a Two-
Night Celebration.
The third annual convention of the Michigan Music
Merchants Association will be held in the Book-
Cadillac Hotel, Detroit, Monday, Tuesday, Wednes-
day and Thursday, August 15, 16, 17, 18.
Suggestions for program are being considered,
among which are demonstrations of group school
piano instruction, a piano-player contest under the
direction of A. K. Gutsohn of The Standard Pneu-
matic Action Co., New York, who also is president
of the National Association of Piano Technicians,
who will be assisted by the local tuners' association.
The "carrying charge" will be explained and demon-
strated by competent authorities on the subject.
President Roberts Invited.
President C. J. Roberts of the National Association
of Music Merchants has been invited to attend and
officiate from the "Presidents' Suite" as guest of
honor. The Cleveland Music Trades Association has
been formally invited and members are expected to
attend in a body together with other members of
Ohio State Music Merchants Association. Edward
C. Boykin, executive secretary of Manufacturers' Pro-
motion Committee, has been invited and has accepted
a place upon the program, as also has C. H. Tremaine
of the National Bureau for the Advancement of
Music. It is intended that all plans current for the
promotion and extension of the use of the piano shall
form a part of the program.
Publicity will, of course, be an important feature
of the event, and enough activity will be created to
provide "news" for the piano that will be far-reaching.
Invites to Canada.
Incidentally, entertainment features for the dele-
gates will be sufficient to satisfy the most critical.
The Windsor Board of Commerce has extended a
formal invitation to the convention. A trip to Canada,
however, will be quite unnecessary, since the news
of the prohibition amendment has not yet reached
Detroit.
It may be interesting and novel for a music trade
convention to have the opportunity to join with the
populace of a great city in celebrating the piano and
honoring the little girl piano champion as a great
local heroine for a two-night celebration in the center
of town, and to be offered reduced railroad fare for
the event.
Everybody Welcome.
Detroit extends a most cordial invitation, not only
to Michigan piano merchants but to those of the
whole nation to come and witness the climax of a
publicity campaign to popularize and promote the
piano, based upon the activity of a piano playing con-
test conducted in the complete school systems of the
fourth city of the nation and sponsored by the leading
newspaper. Detroit is planning on two celebrations
this summer, one over Lindbergh and the other and
more important locally over the little girl champion
piano player.
"BUD"
FISHER, PIANO MAN.
"Bud" Fisher, creator of the "Mutt and Jeff" comic
strip, had associations with the piano trade in his
pre-newspaper days. His father was for a long time
connected in the music trade in Chicago. He did
special outside work, often assisted by "Bud," for the
W. W. Kimball Co., and some of his work and trade
experiences have not been forgotten by the older
men of the trade in Chicago.
Enhanced content © 2008-2009 and presented by MBSI - The Musical Box Society International (www.mbsi.org) and the International Arcade Museum (www.arcade-museum.com).
All Rights Reserved. Digitized from the archives of the MBSI with support from NAMM - The International Music Products Association (www.namm.org).
Additional enhancement, optimization, and distribution by the International Arcade Museum. An extensive collection of Presto can be found online at http://www.arcade-museum.com/library/
PRESTO-TIMES
MASON & HAMLIN FOR COLLEGE
June 25, 1927.
TO NAME SPECIAL
PIANO COMMITTEE
Music Supervisors' National Conference Now
Authorized to Appoint a Special Group
Composed of Three Persons to Pro-
mote Piano Class in Schools.
VICTORY FOR C. M. TREMAINE
Director of National Bureau for Advancement of
Music Achieves Purpose for Which He Has
Actively Worked for Years.
C. M. Tremaine, director of the National Bureau
for the Advancement of Music, recently received a
telegram, of the greatest importance to the piano
manufacturer and merchant, announcing that a spe-
cial committee on piano study had been authorized
and would be appointed by the Music Supervisors'
National Conference. The sender of the wire was
Joseph E. Maddy, chairman of the Committee on In-
strumental Affairs of the Conference, and under whose
general leadership the new committee will function.
The Bureau has been working for the establishment
of a piano committee by the music supervisors for
several months, Mr. Tremaine taking the first definite
steps toward that end on his visit to the meeting of
the Department of Superintendence of the Naitional
Education Association at Dallas, Texas, in March.
The Committee on Instrumental Affairs was present
and held a meeting at that time.
Composed of Three.
The special committee on the piano will consist of
WEI.LS COLLEGE, AURORA, WHICH HAS JL'ST ADDED THE MASON & HAMLIN AMP1CO GRAND TO three persons, and their assignment will be to study
ITS MUSIC DEPARTMENT.
INSETS: WINIFRED MAC BRIDE (LEFT). SCOTCH PIANIST, WHOSE HUS-
the question of the piano as a part of school music
BAND MR CHRISTOPHER J. THOMAS (RIGHT), IS DIRECTOR OF MUSIC AT WELLS COLLEGE.
training and to promote piano classes in the schools
Prof. Christopher J. Thomas, director of music at technical comments as are desirable later on. This of the country. Its members will be specialists in
Wells College, selected a Mason & Hamlin Ampico the Ampico achieves through its uncanny interpre- their field, just as the members of the Committee on
grand from the Clark Music Company at Syracuse, tative fidelity to the many excellent pianists who Instrumental Affairs are specialists in band and or-
chestra. When the latter committee was appointed there
N. Y., for the music department of the famous educa- record for it.
"I feel that the many educational uses to which
tional institution of which he is director. Mr. Thomas this instrument can he put makes it indispensable to was no thought of including the piano among the
instruments the study of which it was to develop,
recently expressed keen satisfaction with the Ampico, the music department of any institution."
nor indeed that piano playing was a subject to be
the latest piece of equipment added to his music
Mr. Thomas' wife is Winifred MacBride, the Scotch taught in the schools.
department.
pianist. She has just made for the Ampico a superb
Recognition of Piano Study.
"In the teaching of the appreciation of music," said recording of the '"John Ireland Sonata" for piano.
The very fact therefore that the scope of this com-
Mr. Thomas, "I believe it to be a cardinal principle
Miss MacBride's performance of the sonata at a
that a work to be studied shall first of all be presented London recital was heard by the composer, and she is mittee has been enlarged to include piano playing,
in as perfect a manner as humanly possible, so that
in receipt of an eloquent letter from him in praise of and that a sub-committee of experts is to be appoint-
the initial experience of the student shall be unbiased
her beautiful interpretation. Miss MacBride's record- ed to promote piano study in the schools, is a great
achievement. li marks the formal recognition of
and unencumbered with such facts, opinions and ing will be released in the earlv autumn.
piano s*udy as a legitimate school subject, in itself a
long step forward. However, only the surface has
of the piano, and it is doubtful if anything ever will. been scratched as yet, and the real significance of the
A Denver newspaper printed this a few days ago: appointment of the committee is the opportunity it
"Columbus, O —To finance a concert career, Faye offers to get piano classes introduced in the entire
Ferguson, a pianist of Ironton. has incorporate:! her- school system.
Froves Effectiveness
self under the laws of Ohio. She lacked funds to
In the lew years of its existence the Committee on
Noted Teachers and Artists Have Supervision hnish her musical training, so she became Faye Fer-
guson, Inc , and sold stock to her friends.
Instrumental Affairs has been able to do much for
of Courses for Which Young and Old
"A board of directors will govern and declare divi- the development of lands and orchestras in the
Are Signing Up.
dends on her. She has appeared already in Xew York schools. Not only has its work led to the establish-
and Philadelphia as a soloist with the Cincinnati sym- ment of many new instrumental ensembles and im-
By J. B. DILLOX.
phony orchestra and although only .10. has given 300 provement of others already in existence, but it has
The Rocky Mountain News of Denver, Colorado, concerts.""
liberalized the attitude of many school superintend-
offers an absolutely free course of lessons on the pi-
A Possibility
ents previously apathetic or opposed. If the special
ano and has organized a club called the "Melody
While congratulat'ng the youn^ lady upon her re- committee on the piano can do as much for this in-
Way Club." One need not subscribe, solicit subscrip-
strument—and there is every reason to believe this
tions nor anything else in the line of canvassing to sourcefulness and artistic ability, it may occur to a will be the case—there will be a large increase in
possible
investor
in
the
s'ock
of
Faye
Ferguson,
Inc.,
quality for the club, but merely clip a coupon from the
school piano classes in all parts of the country and a
News, sign your name, address, state whether you that some young man might purchase the controlling favorable attitude toward them everywhere.
stock
and
then
propose
matrimony.
Could
he
fore-
ever took piano lessons, give your age, and if a school
close and claim the "company"?
Mr. Tremaine, who is secretry of the Committee en
child state the grade you are in.
Several investment bankers of Denver are offering Instrumental Affairs, will also undoubtedly be secre-
There are classes for children and the grown-ups,
and you need not buy a piano to get the lessons. The part of a seven million dollar issue of common stock tarv of the new committee.
of the American Piano Company.
course is supervised by John C. Kendel, head of
John C. Wilcox, music editor of the Denver Morn-
music education in Denver's public schools, the ing Post, was elected to membership in the American
EXPENSES OF A FRENCH OFFICE.
classes to meet in the Denver College of Music, the Academy of Teachers and Singers.
A foreign company which maintains a permanent
Denver Conservatory of Music, the Lamont School
purchasing ofhee in France is regarded as doing bus-
of Music, and the Blanche Dingley-Matthews School
WHILE LINDY FLEW OVERHEAD.
iness there and is required to register not only in the
of Piano Work. Coupled with its announcement, the
E. A. Kieselhorst, of the Kieselhorst Piano Com- Commercial Register, kept in the clerk's office of the
Xews mentions the name of a Denver traffic officer
pany, 1007 Olive street, St. Louis, in finishing a letter Tribunal de Commerce, but also with the Bureau de
who learned to play in ten weeks.
to a friend in the Chicago trade recently, added I'Enregistremeii't, for the purpose of paying a divi-
The Reasons
dend tax of 18 per cent. The company must name a
Why such a generous offer? What is back of it? this postscript: "3:15 p. m., 'Lindy' just flew over responsible agent, usually a bank, which is acceptable
our
store
and
the
'loop'
of
our
city,
and
the
town
is
The News and the Post, competitive newspapers,
wild. We will see him at the ball game tomorrow to the Enregistrement and which undertakes to pay
have been giving the Denverites "all kinds of good
and at the theater in the evening, after which a taxes due in case the foreign company defaults.
things" and each is trying to outdo the other, hence
banquet
at the Hotel Chase." The next day, Sunday.
it is that when the Scripps-Howard newspaper hit
Mr. and Mrs. Kieselhorst left for the East to visit
upon the free course in piano teaching, it selected
NEW INCORPORATIONS.
their sons at Yale University, New Haven, and to
what newspaper men call a "scoop" and lends great
get
ready
for
their
trip
to
Europe,
for
which
they
The Peerless Musical Instrument Co., Inc., of Pas-
weight to the high plane upon which they look upon
saic, N. J., $75,000; to manufacture musical instru-
the value of any person being able to play the piano. sailed today (June 25).
ments.
The moral for all piano men to get from this item is:
The Wood Brothers Music Co.. El Dorado, Ark.,
A promising array of musical talent has been as-
It is an achievement that stands out as praiseworthy,
sembled in the reorganization of the Amboy, Ind., $10,000, Horace A. Wood, E. Newlin and J. A. Carr.
to be able to play the piano and lends zest to the fact
The Jordan-Holmes Piano Co.. Greenwood, Miss.,
that regardless of what great changes have come over band., which has engaged Prof. Elliott of Marion as
$10,000; D. B. Holmes and E. E. Wilkins.
us in the few years past, nothing has taken the place instructor.
DENVER NEWSPAPER
HAS MELODY WAY CLUB
Enhanced content © 2008-2009 and presented by MBSI - The Musical Box Society International (www.mbsi.org) and the International Arcade Museum (www.arcade-museum.com).
All Rights Reserved. Digitized from the archives of the MBSI with support from NAMM - The International Music Products Association (www.namm.org).
Additional enhancement, optimization, and distribution by the International Arcade Museum. An extensive collection of Presto can be found online at http://www.arcade-museum.com/library/

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