MUSICAL
TIMES
PRESTO
Established
1881
Established
1884
THE AMERICAN MUSIC TRADE WEEKLY
10 Cents a Copy
CHICAGO, SATURDAY, JANUARY 21, 1928
WAYS TO MAKE
AMERICA MUSICAL
Its Position Today as a Musical Nation Is
Vastly Superior to That of Ten Years
Ago in Its Realization of the
Requirements.
THREE NECESSITIES
To Make Music Itself It Takes Three Things of
Equally Great Importance—The Composer,
the Performer and the Listener.
By FRANKLIN DUNHAM.
Educational Director of the Aeolian Company.
It is fitting and appropriate that in beginning a
celebration of National Music Week we take account
of our musical stock to find where we stand. Fre-
quently it is claimed that Americans are very sure of
themselves, but it is admitted quite generally, I be-
lieve, that an American makes a splendid companion
on a world cruise or adventure. We were not quite
so sure of ourselves in music, however, and when
we made a world tour in music circles, we frequently
used to find ourselves quite out of the conversational
picture.
Things have been changing; we are not in quite the
same position as we were even ten years ago. Amer-
ica was the first to realize probably that it takes three
to make music—the composer, the performer, and ^ e
listener.
What We Lacked.
Because we had comparatively few composers, we
recognized the fact and adopted the composers of
the whole world. Because we had comparatively
few distinguished performers we recognized this and
gave our patronage to the great artists of the world,
with the thought that they would come and impart to
our children their methods, their technique and
thereby train our talent to become recognized lead-
ers in the world. We also went to Europe and the
result has been splendid American artists of first
rank—Sembrich, Homer, Farrar, Werrenrath, Charles
and Arthur Hackett, John Charles Thomas, Law-
rence Tibbets, to mention only a few in the operatic
field, and outstanding figures like Spalding and Pow-
ell in the respective violin and piano fields.
But in the listener we placed our hopes and they
have surely been justified. What country today can
boast of such great and intelligent audiences with
the inherent love for music constructively built into
knowledge through constant hearing of master-
pieces? Concerts, recitals, phonograph, radio and
the marvelous reproducing piano contribute their re-
spective forces to musical intelligence. To this latter
force I have personally contributed my own thought,
and I should like to voice my appreciation here to
those men who have labored toward the perfection of
the mechanism, its recordings and to the artists who
have left their indelible impression on that paper
parchment magically made music at a moment's
notice.
The American Composer
But we must begin at the source of the brook to
follow its meanderings, so we must begin with the
American composer. Picture, if you will, the Puritan
church of the early New England settlers. Pick up
the Old Bay State Psalm Book and let us gather
'round and sing "Old China" or the famous "One
Hundred" in unison without even a halting organ
accompaniment. It was not until 1740 that an organ
was even permitted in one of these churches of our
ancestors! Let us go to the Lord Calvert Colony
in Maryland and to the old Virginia with its Cavalier
tunes, dance the stately court dances and the country
The personality of the piano salesman is a much
larger factor than in general merchandising, and
therefore the greater need for the house to play
on that personality for its own benefit.—E. H.
Story, Pres. Story & Clark Piano Co.
dances of England, or attend a ball given to Peter
Stuyvesant in New York, with the Dutch flavor of
French Court mannerisms.
These are past. What became of this heritage?
Very little: Lowell Mason in Boston built a hymnol-
ogy out of the old Psalm Books. Today composers
like Albert Stoessel and Eastwood Lane-are. using
the old Colonial heritage for a new expression of
these early days.
Other Important Influences.
But two influences, not Colonial, have had more
power in American music than others—the Indian
and the negro. From the Indian come flute melodies
and strange rythms in five-four time with tom-tom
accompaniment.
From the negro, the spirituals,
breathing of their very natures and sincere in their
devotion to religion to the God all powerful who
reigns above. Lieurance, Cadman, Troyer, Skelton
are a few who have used these sources for American
music—"Minnetonka," "Sky-Blue Waters," "Invoca-
tion to the Sun-God," "Sioux Flute Serenade" are
some of the outstanding examples. Stephen Foster,
James Bland and our own John Powell have used
the negro sources. "My Old Kentucky Home,"
"Carry Me Back to Old Virginny" and the famous
"At the Fair" suite are examples. Dvorak, who
taught here only twenty-five years ago supplied ex-
amples in his New World Symphony and his equally
significant American Quartet.
Parker, Kelley, Foote, Converse are representative
of the group of highly trained cultured composers
who have battled mightily for the establishment of
the American classic. Herbert, DeKoven, Cadman,
Patterson, Midenburg, Stearns de Leone and now
Taylor represent us in opera. Lane, Powell, Car-
penter, Mowrey, Griffes Withorne are names to con-
jure with in the adoption of the new cacaphonous
idiom. Berlin, Confrey and the new master, Gersh-
win, win us in their expression of American jazz.
American Music.
Is there an American art of music? To be
sure, there is. Is it written for a certain public?
Yes, a diversified public engaged in a thousand pur-
suits and with as many different tastes.
Schools of artistic thought have not affected us
very much. Name a single impressionistic Amer-
ican composer. There are none. We are struggling
to express ourselves. I do not believe that we are
hypocritical in our attitudes. We are frank to say
whether we like or do not like a certain piece of
music. Our judgment depends on so many factors
of heredity, training and frequently performance that
we cannot be card-catalogued.
We are that mystery of nations—an enigma often
to outsiders, a ready companion to the whole world
in art, letters and music—Pan piping in the sylvan
glade, the bloom of perennial youth—America.
M. L. GLAYPOOL VISITS CHICAGO.
M. L. Claypool, piano dealer at Crawfordsville,
Ind., spent part of Monday of this week at the
Schiller Piano Company's Chicago headquarters and
left a substantial order for Schillers, a make that he
has sold for many years in his locality and thinks
highly of besides. Mr. Claypool said the corn borer
had not yet reached as far as Crawfordsville in its
wide sweep of destruction, so the corn prosperity
of that great corn section had not been interrupted.
Business had not been quite as large as he would
like to have seen it during 1927, but the new year
gave promise of better times. Anyway, he said, in
small towns what business one gets is solid business,
not the fly-by-night sales, such as sometimes curse
the large cities.
OATES TRAVELS FOR WEAVER.
R. X. Oates, head of the Period Drapery & Mfg.
Co., New Albany, Ind., has joined the forces of the
Weaver Piano Company, York, Pa., for some special
work on the road for a time, leaving the New Albany
business in the hands of his son, W. A. Oates, who
is amply qualified by experience to take care of it
during the temporary absence of the senior Mr.
Oates.
ANNUAL DINNER ANNOUNCED.
The Chicago Piano and Organ Association will
hold its twenty-ninth annual dinner on Thursday eve-
ning, January 26, at the Union League Club. Recep-
tion will be at six o'clock. The dinner is informal.
$2 The Year
RECENT TRADE EVENTS
IN PORTLAND, ORE., FIELD
G. F. Johnson Continues Active in Campaign
to Promote and Encourage More Indus-
tries for City—Other News.
G. F. Johnson of the G. F. Johnson Piano Co. of
Portland, Ore., and president of the Oregon Music
Trades Association, continued his campaign for a
$375,000 tax for the promotion of more industries
for Portland, addressing the East Side Business
Men's Club, a prominent organization of the city,
and receiving their endorsement of the plan.
The Portland Music Company of 227 Sixth street,
Portland, Ore., has filed a voluntary petition in bank-
ruptcy, no schedule of liabilities or assets being
listed. The stock of pianos has been moved to a
store on Fourth street, next to the Seibering, Lucas
Music Company, where it is announced a "Big fac-
tory sale of a $35,000 piano stock is to be disposed of
at slashed prices for the benefit of creditors."
A twenty-piano ensemble with forty of Portland's
prominent musicians under the direction of Willetn
van Hoogstraten, conductor of the Portland Sym-
phony Orchestra, will give a concert the latter part
of January, sponsored by the Oregon Federation of
Music Clubs to raise funds for federation work in
young students and artists' contests. The twenty-
pianos to be used will be furnished by the Sherman,
Clay & Co., and will be Steinway grands.
The Tom Thumb piano, the new creation of the
Milton Piano Co. was featured the first week in
January at the Pantages Theater by Sherman, Clay
& Co. through the cooperation of the theater manage-
ment. The piano was placed in the stage and played
with the big Wurlitzer organ, and to say the least,
the piano held its own and was heard above the "big
organ even when turned on at full blast. A placard
announced that further demonstration of the little
instrument could be had by those interested at the
Sherman, Clay & Co. store.
HERMAN H. FLEER VISITS
STEINWAY & SONS, NEW YORK
Manager of the Piano Division of Lyon & Healy
Plans Trip to Pacific Coast.
Herman H. Fleer, secretary of the National Asso-
ciation of Music Merchants and president of the Illi-
nois Music Merchants' Association, was in New York
three days last week. This was Mr. Fleer's annual
January visit to Steinway & Sons and The Aeolian
Company, whose products are handled in large quan-
tity by Lyon & Healy, Inc., of which Mr. Fleer is
vice-president and manager of the piano division.
Mr. Fleer also spent some time at the executive
offices of the National Association of Music Mer-
chants to discuss association matters with the execu-
tive secretary. Mr. Fleer will be unable to attend
the midyear meetings of the board of control as he
is leaving shortly for the Pacific Coast.
WILLIAM K. COWAN DIES.
William K. Cowan, who at one time some years
ago was a shareholder in the Bissell-Cowan Com-
pany as a partner of Arthur Bissell, now of the
Bissell-Weisert Company, Chicago, died on Wednes-
day of last week at his home, 837 Briar place, Chi-
cago, after a long illness. He was 57 years old. In
the furniture business he made a specialty of import-
ing antiques and he disposed of approximately
$1,000,000 worth of merchandise in the years between
1894 and 1919.
No matter Jimv lovely the tone or how perfect
the construction of the instrument, you knozv that
appearance is more often the deciding factor in
the piano sale. Why not make it easier for your
salesmen to sellF—S. R. Overtoil, South Haven,
Mich.
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