July, 1930
P R E S T O-TI M E S
YEARS AGO IN THE PRESTO
(From The Presto, July 19, 1900.)
This issue of The Presto contains a good special
advertisement of a specially good piano. For particu-
lars see the page devoted to "McPhail."
And still they come. The latest self-playing attach-
ment is the "lyraphone," to produce which a million
dollar company has been organized in Baltimore, as
per a paragraph elsewhere.
In the town of Steger, 111., the patriotic people pro-
pose to add one more to the list of holidays. It is
to be known as "Steger Day." With hundreds of
live piano dealers throughout the country, every day
is "Steger" day.
The salesman who thinks he can learn to sell pianos
by listening to other salesmen tell how they do it
will make slow progress.
Max Tonk, of the Tonk Manufacturing Co., the
well-known Chicago piano stool, bench and scarf
house, and Charles Tonk, of William Tonk & Bro.,
New York, are up at Boyne City, Mich., this week
on a fishmg trip and general outing excursion.
Leo Heerwagen, who has long been the Chicago
representative of the Hook & Hastings organ, is soon
to move to Boston, where he will have charge of the
sales department at the factory. Mr. Heerwagen is
one of the genuinely popular young men of the trade,
and his success has been due to his skill and to hard
work, for that he is a worker all who know him will
attest.
Arrangements have been completed whereby Carlin
& Lennox take the Everett piano at Indianapolis, Ind.
This important transaction is one upon which both
the Indianapolis firm and the Everett Piano Co. may
be congratulated.
Mr. Nahum Stetson, of Steinway & Sons, is taking
a pleasure trip to Alaska.
The Jesse French Piano & Organ Co. report a good
trade in the city and an increasing demand from their
country agents, particularly their Jefferson City, Mo.,
branch, which is booming.
It should not be necessary to use much argument
to convince the progressive and energetic dealer that
he can add much to his income by cultivating the
field for the self-playing attachments for the piano and
organ. It is in every home that music can be played.
The head of the family who loves music, and has the
means, is quite willing to gratify his musical instinct
by buying a self-playing attachment, for it is as per-
fect in its work as an expert pianist. The amount of
pleasure that it will bring into the home circle cannot
be defined. No more artistic piano player can be
found than the Apollo, manufactured by the Melville
Clark Piano Co., 399-405 West Madison street, Chi-
cago.
There are some very interesting items—and sug-
gestive of Americanism abroad—in Mr. Abbott's Paris
review this week. It becomes more and more clear
that such of the American manufacturers as had the
temerity to enter the French Exposition will reap
ample reward for their enterprise.
The Schiller Piano Co., of Oregon, 111., is planning
to double the output of its plant in that city and to
that end recently built a large addition to the factory.
The following items are from Paris correspondence
of The Presto of July 19, most of which had appeared
in The Presto supplement of "Le Monde Musicale"
for July, 1900:
The Class 17 of Jury awards of the Exposition now
use the jury room and hall daily for their delibera-
tions. The members of the jury give well-nigh all
their time to examinations of instruments, and are
closeted in their hall, known as "salle d' audition."
Here are eight or nine men on the jury, most of them
heads of prominent Paris industries, giving all their
time to the work of the jury; to the best interests of
their exposition of which they are very proud. How
would Mr. Conway, or Mr. Cable, or Mr. Pease, or
Mr. Story, or any other busy men of the American
piano trade, take to an appointment on a jury requir-
ing close attention like Class 17 of the Paris Expo-
sition?
Sousa's band are in Paris for several days during
the second and third weeks in July. They have been
engaged to furnish music for several grand and "swell"
receptions.
B. G. Keefe, superintendent of The Cable Co. fac-
tories, Chicago, who had been in Paris since the first
week in June, is just about departing from England
for New York. Mr. Keefe left this city on the 24th
ult. for London. He has employed his time to good
advantage on this side of the water, and will, no
doubt, utilize many of his observations to advantage
in the immense factories under his care.
Mr. Aug. Wagner, the founder of the house of
A. Wagner & Levien, Sues., Mexico City, is residing
in Paris this summer, at No. 12 rue du Longchamp.
It is probable that Mr. Otto Wagner, the director of
the house at Mexico City, will not visit the exposition;
at least he will not be here before October, should
he come at all.
Mr. William Thomson, of Glasgow, and a personal
friend of Charlie Wagner, the European representa-
tive of Story & Clark, arrived in Paris on the 10th
of July. Mr. Thomson is a warm admirer of Ameri-
can organs and other American musical instruments
and sells large quantities of American made goods.
Mr. and Mrs. Clarence Eddy, of Chicago, and W.
L. Blumenschein, Dayton, Ohio, are in Paris.. Mr.
Louis Lombard, formerly head of the Utica Conserv-
atory of Music, and Mrs. Lombard have also been
here for two weeks.
There was, too, an event of special interest in the
afternoon of the 3rd—I mean to the readers of The
Presto especially. I refer to the reception given by
Mrs. Lucien Wulsin, 12 rue de Saint-Peres, a very
pleasant affair and quite a fashionable one. There
were a number of prominent persons present and the
following program was presented—but there was much
more on this program; that is, five or six additional
numbers were given:
1. Trio (Op. 110) pour piano, violon et violoncello
M. et Mme. Breitner et M. Liegeois.
2. Suite, pour piano et violon
Schut
M. et Mme. Breitner.
3. (a) Adagio
Godard
(b) Tarantelle
Godard
Mme. Breitner et Liegeois.
The occasion was one purely social, and it would be
intolerable to "talk shop" in connection with it. But
in a trade journal, and addressing a class of readers
whose paramount interest must be associated with
the things and articles of music rather than the music
itself, I cannot resist the temptation to refer to the
instrument which took part in this program just
printed. The piano was a parlor grand Baldwin, in
mahogany veneer; and the instrument surpassed all
expectations. It is an instrument of unusually fine
qualities; of great volume of tone, purity and sweet-
ness and of thorough construction. Breitner, who is
one of the leading players here, went through the
entire gamut of styles and kinds of playing with the
particular motif, it would appear, of testing the power
and capacity of the instrument, its singing qualities
and finer tonal effect. He hammered the instrument,
at times, but it held up firm to every requirement
and proved, to my mind, to be perfectly adapted tc
the most exacting demands of artistic performers. In
fact, it was something of a revelation to all present,
I am certain.
An interesting event of this reception was the
appearance of Madame Marchesi. She came very
quietly and entirely unostentatiously into the music
room and was first observed getting up close to the
piano;—right up to its side and seeming to look into
the instrument and on its strings. Finally she turned
around to the guests in the room with a stern, com-
manding look, repeating "sch, sch," until the room was
at complete silence. By this time it became known
that the odd and almost domineering little lady was
the famous Madame Marchesi, teacher and mentor
of "the greatest opera singers of the world. When
she had become comfortably settled in her chair and
the guests were still, a "song without words" was
played: an effective displaying of the important sing-
ing quality of the piano, to which the Madame lis-
tened intently, with eyes closed, and enjoyed very
much the music, and the piano which brought it forth.
GROUP OF THE NATIONAL PIANO MANUFACTURERS ASSOCIATION OF AMERICA.—Picture was taken in front of the Art Institute, Chicago, May 10, 1900.
This convention was pronounced by a humorist of
the trade press as "a corker." Among those recog-
nizable to old-timers are C. A. Smith, who was a
member of the entertainment committee; Myron A.
Decker, G. G. Jones, A. H. Fischer, Joseph Shonin-
ger, Paul G. Mehlin, Edward Lyman Bill, O. L. Fox,
Otto Scliulz, A. S. Bond, C. S. Jones, George P.
Bent, Col. E. S. Conway, C. N. Kimball, Adam
Schaaf, Julius Bauer, Charles Newman, William M.
Bauer, Col. Edward S. Payson, Charlie Ament, E. H.
Story, George J. Dowling, and T. E. Dougherty.
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