Presto

PRESTO-TIMES
The American Music Trade Weekly
Published Every Saturday at 417 South Dearborn
Street, Chicago, Illinois.
PRESTO P U B L I S H I N G CO., Publishers.
F R A N K D. A B B O T T
- - - - - - - - -
Editor
(C. A. DAN I ELL—1904-1927.)
J. FERGUS O'RYAN
_ _ _ _ _ Managing Editor
Telephones, Local and Long Distance, Harrison 0234.
Private Phones to all Departments. Cable Address (Com-
mercial Cable Co.'s Code), " P R E S T O , " Chicago.
Entered as second-class matter Jan. 29, 1896, at the
Post Office, Chicago, 111., under Act of March 3, 1879.
Subscription, $2 a year; 6 months, $1.25; Foreign, $4.
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 correspondents, and
their assistance is invited.
Payment is not accepted for matter printed in the edi-
torial or news columns of Presto-Times.
Where half-tones are made the actual cost of produc-
tion will be charged if-of commercial character or other
than strictly news interest.
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quested that their subjects and senders be carefully indi-
cated.
Forms close at noon on Thursday. Late news matter
should be in not later than 11 o'clock on that day. Ad-
vertising copy should be in hand before Tuesday, 5 p. m.,
to insure preferred position. Pull page display copy
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day. Want advertisements for current week, to insure
classification, should be in by Wednesday noon.
Address all communications for the editorial or business
departments to PRESTO PUBLISHING CO., 417 South
Dearborn Street, Chicago, III.
SATURDAY, MARCH 10, 1928.
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
i ban Wednesday noon of each week.
ness, invariably there are one or more who
inactively await the spontaneous coming of
the piano customers. They live in a past day
when it was comparatively easy to find piano
prospects and convert them into customers.
It is a kind of injustice that most of their in-
frequent sales are due to the advertising and
stimulation generally of the dealers who re-
alize that this is a new day and one demanding-
extremely spirited action in the pursuit of
sales.
The fact is that the fatuous piano dealer is
a foremost problem in the trade. He may be
proud of the piano and consider it a distinc-
tion to sell such a commodity. But analyzed,
his attitude is one of self-complacency which
invites futility. He is unmoved by the promo-
tional spirit that actuates his competitors,
ignores the suggestions towards achieving
sales contributed by the manufacturers, while,
at the same time leaving- their effective ad-
vertising aids unused.
The problem may be solved in one way for
the manufacturers by simply dropping the
inert dealer from their scheme of piano dis-
tribution. Or it may be solved in a more de-
sirable way for the manufacturers, and so
for the trade generally, by making special ef-
forts to make the inactive dealer realize the
exigencies of the piano situation and to con-
form to the necessitous activities of piano sales
success today. The prospects are there. Find-
ing them and selling them means the salva-
tion of the piano business.
March 10, 192&
throughout the country. He considers that in
the pedagogical side of music there is no phase
so important, at the present time, as to pro-
vide much more extensive instruction in all
branches of music in high schools.
The election of Dr. Erskine as president of
the Juilliard School of Music showed keen
discernment by the directors. Dr. Erskine is
a real personage. Last year while professor
of English in Columbia University, he wrote
"The Private Life of Helen of Troy" and "Gal-
ahad," the two best sellers in fiction. But his
triumphs were not limited to one field. He
recently appeared as a piano soloist of the first
rank with the New York Symphony Orchestra.
Recently, too, he has taken an active part in
the affairs of the Juilliard Foundation, the
Juilliard Graduate School and the Institute of
Musical Art. It will be remembered that Pro-
fessor Erskine, in company with Ernest Urchs
and Olin Downes, gave some extraordinarily
interesting recitals for three pianos last season
in Steinway Hall, New York.
In commenting on Prof. Erskine's with-
drawal from Columbia University, to take the
Juilliard School presidency, President Nicholas
Murray Butler said: "The Juilliard Founda-
tion offers perhaps the most notable oppor-
tunity that has yet developed in the United
States for the study, the appreciation, and the
• wide understanding of music. Professor Er-
skine's rare combination of intellectual gifts
and accomplishments make him the ideal ex-
ecutive to set so important an undertaking on
the right path."
ORGANIZATION HIS THEME
The supreme value of organization in the
music trade was impressed upon his auditors
at the meeting at the Hotel Breslin, New
York, last week by Hermann Irion, president
(if the Music Industries Chamber of Com-
merce. Organization in the piano factory, for
FAITH IN THE PIANO BUSINESS instance, is made effective when there follows
It is a fact that too many piano dealers fail organization in distribution and in the meth-
to recognize the necessity of the present time ods of ultimate sales. Organization, he said,
in the piano business—an unremittingly active was the expression of the vital force in any in-
presentation of their pianos. They seem in- dustry.
"It is by organization the optimist makes
different, too, to the requirements in such a
his
progressive visions come to pass. Optimism,
case.
at
its best, is the ability to observe keenly,
The things the piano dealer should do to
to
look
ahead with the judgment gained In-
bring attention to his pianos and effect sales
experience.
That the music industry is capable
naturally occur to the live man. They involve
of
growing
is
plain to all of us who note the
a tasteful store providing suitable surround-
causes
that
influence
the public in the favor
ings for the instruments, a sales force ade-
of
music.
Organization
is developing the
quate to the possibilities, persistent advertis-
movement
for
more
music
study in schools.
ing of a strong and dignified kind and an
optimistic attitude concerning the piano busi- What its effect will be on the music trade of
ness in his conversations with those he comes the future is an optimistic thought."
Mr. Irion's presence at the meeting and din-
in contact with in the community.
ner
of the New York Piano Merchants' As-
The hope of the piano trade is in the live
sociation
naturally suggested the spirit of or-
men who clearly understand the circumstances
ganization
in the Chamber of which he is the
in the piano business and also what is required
active
president.
Not only has the Music In-
by the duty to themselves and the pianos they
dustries
Chamber
of
Commerce given evidence
represent. They are the energetic men who
of
organized
methods
for the good of the va-
co-operate with the piano promotional schemes
rious
phases
of
the
music
trade, but it also
and who make consistent uses of the adver-
has
been
an
incentive
to
individuals
in the
tising and other selling aids provided by pro-
music
field
to
value
organization.
gressive piano manufacturers. In short, the
hope of the piano business is in the men who
strive for results and get them.
HELPS MUSIC CAUSE
But clogs to the progress of the piano busi-
"The piano is the basis of all music educa-
ness are the dealers whose days are unpro- tion and should be taught generally in the
ductive and whose future is one of hope in the public schools of the country," said Prof. John
spontaneous return of the old days of numer- Erskine, who retired from Columbia Uni-
ous unsolicited sales ; the fatuity of expecting versity to become president of the Juilliard
profit returns without advertising and can- School of Music. The purpose of the Juilliard
vassing effort.
School will be to very largely increase its
In every city, while the dealers for the most activities in the direction of .preparing music
part may be active in the creation of busi- teachers to fill positions in the high schools
Leaders of community life, school boards
and other influences in Canada are actively
promoting piano classes in schools as a help-
ful means for promoting culture among the
school children. Of course, they are aided by
the music merchants. Instruction in music
along these lines has been proceeding in the
schools of Toronto for about a year. Mon-
treal fell into line some six months later, and
under the aegis of its famous McGill Uni-
versity's Conservatoire of Music, two half-
hour lessons per w r eek were arranged for all
that city's elementary and secondary schools.
To this end, education boards everywhere, of
course, had to relax their rule against even a
nominal charge for public instruction. A
course of ten Saturday lectures per term for
training teachers in piano group-instruction is
another feature of a movement, the success
of which is causing great encouragement to
all concerned with the advance of music
throughout the Dominion.
* * *
A fear in the British music trade is that
Chancellor Churchill is considering a tax on
gramophone records for his next budget. A
tax of three-pence per disc on the sixty mil-
lion or so records annually consumed in that
country would mean three-quarters of a mil-
lion of money for the exchequer. The rumor
has brought indignant protests from various
heads of the gramophone trade, who see,
among other evils, a sixpenny rise in the price
of records, and a transference of record fac-
tories abroad, with consequent increased un-
employment at home.
* * *
The Federation of British Music Industries
is sponsoring the movement to change the
pitch of British military band instruments and
the matter is one that interests band instru-
ment exporters in this country.
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