P R E S T O-T I M E S
April 21, 1928
MUSIC SUPERVISORS
MEET AT STEVENS HOTEL
Over 5,000 Delegates Assemble From All Parts
of the Country to Take Part in Important
National Conference.
THINGS SAID OR SUGGESTED
THE BAIT-AD ARTIST
While others pass the venomed slam,
Or, jocosely inclined,
Hand out the knocking jibe to damn:
To stencil merit blind.
For him it is the fervent task,
Serene to take the stand
And talk upon—if you should ask—
The Bumalino grand.
He loves to write in luscious words
Of charms that don't exist,
Frame his thoughts as come-alongs,
Whose guile is always missed.
Nor cares a hoot for Ethics' claims
Veracious facts he skimps,
Arrays his wheezes in black type
And sets his bait for simps.
With unctious verbs that cloy the mouth
Greased adjectives of praise,
His theme invites no slushless drouth,
For him, the buttered ways.
The sentences are dipped in oil,
With flattery full geared;
A glocose-gladdened joyous toil
With rich flapdoodle smeared.
* * *
The magnanimous thing about the man who is his
own worst enemy is that he is always ready to forgive
himself.
* * *
TOO BAD! A. IV. 0. L
The poet didn't stretch our belief when he said
there were sermons in stones and eloquent pointers
in running brooks, shrinking violets and other sim-
ple geological, floral and faunal objects. Every in-
cident provides the text for a lesson one may lay
to heart.
But to see the sermon and profit by it is the de-
sirable thing; to be the goat of the incident from
which the more fortunate observers may pick the
sermon is the distressing one.
So, don't disappear mysteriously.
For while the police and the newspaper reporters
may fail to discover you, they are absolutely sure to
discover a lot of things about you that you prudently
keep under the bushel of concealment.
About six months ago the manager of a branch
piano store in Missouri rode on the train to an adja-
cent village to close a piano deal. He finished his
business satisfactorily and left the customers' house
in excellent spirit. After he passed the postofnee on
his way to the village inn all traces of him were lost.
When he failed to return next day his co-workers
in the store were perturbed. When three days
elapsed his wife became worried and consulted the
chief of police, who made some entries on his blotter
and, marshalling a force of the finest, told the sleuths
to get busy and locate the missing manager.
The reporters of the two local papers, however,
were seventeen aeroplane laps ahead of the police
when the latter began sleuthing. The first day the
gumshoe boys of the newspapers discovered that the
manager had seven hard drinks in a soft drink parlor
before disappearing in the village. The next day one
of the papers got out an "extra" to tell how the
manager lost $316 in a poker game in his home town
the evening before he departed for the village. The
account contained a minute description of the man
and his clothes. It was a scoop.
The next day, as a comeback, the rival paper not
only published the number of his watch, but the
price he paid for the near-pearl brooch he bought for
a woman not his wife. What the following days
might bring forth v,as the eager question when the
manager returned.
His explanation was simple and true. In the vil-
lage he had encountered an old friend on his way to
the Ozark mountains to fish. The friend craved com-
panionship. In his equipment were a new steel rod
he was about to try and his old and tried bamboo rod.
It was a sore temptation for the manager, especially
after seven drinks of allegedly pre-war corn whisky.
He jumped into the purring Chrysler and w T ent. It
was his purpose to return next day, but during the
night a sudden fall flood turned the camp loca-
tion into an island from which he found no way to
escape.
While his accounts and the firm's money were
found all square and right his job was declared va-
cant by the boss who arrived from headquarters.
That poker game was a determining factor in his
dismissal. The newspapers lost interest in him when
they published the wife's application for divorce.
* * *
It is well to make a good start in the music busi-
ness, but it is the subsequent proceedings that really
count.
* * *
GOT MUCKLE MAD ABOOT IT
At a recent meeting of the Scottish Music Mer-
chants' Association an irate member took exception
to the use of the words, "An Englishman's home is
his castle," in an advertisement of the British Piano-
forte Publicity Committee, in a Scottish newspaper.
Fortunately the secretary was able to assure the pro-
testing Scot that in deference to Caledonian suscepti-
bilities, the quotation has been altered to "a Scots-
man's home is his castle." Congratulations are in
order from Mayor Thompson of Chicago to the sturdy
Scot. Bannockburn was fought for less than that.
* * *
The piano wareroom cynic says an old bachelor is
a man who has refrained from making some woman
unhappy.
The Music Supervisors' National Conference, which
opened at the Stevens Hotel, Chicago, on Sunday,
April 15, with 5,000 delegates from all parts of the
country in attendance, took on a national aspect, not
from the standpoint of name, but in the fact that
every state was capably represented and the wide
scope of subjects discussed were important to the
entire music industry.
The importance of music in the school was the
foremost topic under discussion during the Tuesday
executive sessions. How to get music into the regu-
lar high school curriculum as a required subject
was outlined by Merle Prunty, principal of the Tulsa
central high school. The plan is to put all high
schools on a laboratory period basis, to have all the
work done by the student in school time and to give
lull credit to such non-preparation requirement sub-
jects as band, orchestra, glee club, chorus, voice and
music appreciation.
A Notable Showing
The grand event of the Public School Music Super-
visors' Convention this week was the concert of the
National High School Orchestra at the Auditorium,
and broadcast over KYW Wednesday night. This
orchestra is made up of players in school bands and
orchestras from thirty-nine states. There were by
actual count at roll call 311 participants ranging in
ages from 13 to 20 years of age in concert Wednes-
day night, one of the largest company of instrument-
alists ever assembled for a concert, as the radio an-
nouncer stated, probably the largest orchestral con-
cert ever broadcast. Frederick Stock was conductor.
In this great orchestra of over 300 performers there
were upwards of a hundred violins, twenty violas and
'cellos, twenty-eight bass viols, fourteen flutes, twelve
oboes, sixteen clarinets, fourteen trombones, twelve
harps, ten french horns, and a corresponding com-
plement of saxophones and other brass, wood-wind
and instruments of percussion.
The Auditorium was packed and Congress street to
around on Michigan boulevard was lined with per-
sons listening to the entertainment broadcasting to
megaphone reproducers on the streets.
The concert showed the advance of musical interest
in the schools and was an event of encouragement to
the sponsers.
THE EXHIBITS.
A good list of exhibitors showed their latest in
pianos, band instruments and music. The exhibits
were classified and divided into eight sections, which
included the following: Section 1, band instruments;
section 2, phonograph manufacturers; section 3, piano
class instruction; section 4, piano manufacturers; sec-
tion 5, music publishers;'Section 6, schools, conserva-
tories and special courses; section 7, visual instruction
material; section 8, miscellaneous. Some of the ex-
hibits in alphabetical order were:
The Aeolian Company, New York; Ampico Cor-
poration, New York; Bevitt Piano Class System, San
Francisco, Calif.; C. C. Birchard & Co., Boston, Mass.;
Brunswick-Balke-Collender Company, Chicago; Cable
Piano Company, Chicago; The Century Company,
(Continued on page 16)
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