Music Trade Review
Issue: 1896 Vol. 23 N. 19 - Page 8
Music Trade Review -- © mbsi.org, arcade-museum.com -- digitized with support from namm.org
THE MUSIC TRADE REVIEW
|BE¥1EI
L\MAN
Editor and Proprietor.
PUBLISHED
EVERY
SATURDAY
3 East 14th St., New York
SUBSCRIPTION (including postage) United States and
Canada, $3.00 per year; Foreign Countries, $4.00.
ADVERTISEMENTS, $2.00 per inch, single column, per
Insertion.
ertion. On quarterly
q
or yearly contracts..- special dis-
count is allowec
REMITTANCES, in other than currency form, should
be made payable to Edward Lyman Bill.
Entered at ths New York Post Office as Second- &a\s Mmtter.
NEW YORK, NOVEMBER 28, 1896.
TELEPHONE NUMBER 1745. — EIGHTEENTH STREKT.
"THE BUSINESS MAN'S PAPER."
;.
t
For IU ni r . ^ . a ! s?6«3 rcsista:
For t k fctLr* 15 "v
Slid UtB good ftal « e caif
OO many trade papers.
Possibly, from the vantage ground
of some there are.
Likewise too many pianoforte builders
to make the business one of unalloyed hap-
piness for all engaged in manufacturing
musical wares. The fact is, in this busy
work-a-day world of ours, there is all sorts
of competition, good, bad, but not always
indifferent, which harasses and annoys, and
some fail to understand just why things
are not nearer to their own particular lik-
ing. Naturally they think that this and
that man brings to bear, in the furtherance
of his own plans for commercial success,
methods which they do not approve or en-
dorse.
During the past few years we have wit-
nessed radical changes in this trade. Un-
known firms have forged to the front,
while old concerns which years ago occu-
pied high niches in the trade temple, have
gone to ruin, so to speak. Their efforts
T
have been enfeebled and they have grad-
ually become less distinct in the trade
horizon, until their location is hardly dis-
cernible by reason of the haze which sur-
rounds them.
They sit and occasionally you can hear
half intelligible phrases from their lips
which interpreted mean—''too many piano
makers—such competition can't, be met—
surely their instruments can't have the
merits of ours—they are not piano makers
—the pianos that they make will not stand
—our trade will come back."
But does the trade "come back?"
They forget also that the recent phenome-
nal development of our musico-industrial
affairs has demonstrated one fact beyond
peradventure, and that, that the manufac-
ture of pianos is not confined to any par-
ticular geographical location, or to any par-
ticular set of individuals. There is no
longer any mystery surrounding the manu-
facture of pianos. Time was when it
was believed that the art of making pianos
was hidden in the brain of the few—that
the maker of pianos held a secret as great
as did Stradivarius, the violin maker.
Time and a cold commercial age has dissi-
pated all that, and among intelligent men
to-day there are two necessary requisites
to build pianos and market them.
What are those requisites?
First money—second brains. With those
in generous proportions, the occultism
which surrounded early piano making dis-
appears. There isn't even a wreath of
mist remaining to mark the location
where it existed.
And still we have dreamers in this trade
who fondly hug the hope that the good old
days will return again—and they go totter-
ing on. Preposterous—we may as well
return to the days of the stage coach and
flint lock musket. Those days are gone,
and with them the days when merchants
came to market and clambered over each
other in their haste to get certain products.
The men who sit and wait for them are the
ones over whose doors the moss and the
lichen is taking a firm rooting.
The great minds in this trade saw the
trend of affairs and sought to entrench
themselves so in the hearts of the trade and
the public that their position would be al-
most impregnable.
In line with the progress in manufacture,
came the progress in journalism. The
people, as a whole, became omnivorous
readers. It became necessary that each
trade should have its exponents. While
the daily press gave columns descriptive oi
prize fights, and publicly washed all the
soiled linen of the divorce courts in view of
its readers, it gave a meagre two lines to
some advance in science, art, or mechanics
whereby thousands were benefited, and
the world moved ahead a pace or two
towards a higher civilization. ,,;,; '•'.7~£ l
Arts, sciences, mechanics were neglected
while sensationalism and vulgarism were
paraded in the public print. There was a
necessity for trade journalism and to the
honor of the trade press as whole be it said
that it has disseminated not alone valuable
information, but it has kept its skirts free
and clear from the demoralizing influ-
ences so openly flaunted in the daily press.
It is true too, that trade journalism has
across its escutcheon the bar sinister.
But that is not the fault of trade journal-
ism. Because its fair fame has been black-
ened by men who have been alike devoid
of honor and conscience, trade journalism
should not be blamed.
A profession should not be charged with
the misdeeds of an individual—any more
than piano making should be charged with
all the crimes which have been committed
by men who have worn the trade badge.
What is sauce for the goose should like-
wise be served to the gander.
Music trade journalism has been for years
staggering along under the blight placed
upon it by the men who sought to make the
entire trade subservient to their exorbitant
demands. These men, under the conveni-
ent cloak of trade journalism, plied their
nefarious task, in which it would have been
more fitting to have brought the highway-
man's weapons. Instead of posing in the
garb of trade journalism, they should have
better arrayed themselves in cloak and
mask, then armed with a bludgeon they
would have been appropriately attired.
Music trade journalism has had to suffer
much abuse by reason of the stand and de-
liver methods inaugurated by adventurers
who stood in its protecting shadow.
But it has survived, and the healing in-
fluences of time is being cast about repen-
tant sinners who, full of years and with
empty pockets, have returned to the fold.
Too many trade papers.
Just the same number that existed six
years ago, while the ranks of piano manu-
facturers in the meanwhile has become won-
derfully augmented.
Of course, some of the papers should die
—but, Lord bless you, they refuse to do
this. They should combine, and where
there are six papers there should be but
three. Oil and water mixeth not. The
same may be fittingly said of trade editors.
Then the trade should combine and make
one great big paper, starve out the little
fellows.
Would that work with satisfactory re-
sults?
THE MUSIC TRADE REVIEW
|BE¥1EI
L\MAN
Editor and Proprietor.
PUBLISHED
EVERY
SATURDAY
3 East 14th St., New York
SUBSCRIPTION (including postage) United States and
Canada, $3.00 per year; Foreign Countries, $4.00.
ADVERTISEMENTS, $2.00 per inch, single column, per
Insertion.
ertion. On quarterly
q
or yearly contracts..- special dis-
count is allowec
REMITTANCES, in other than currency form, should
be made payable to Edward Lyman Bill.
Entered at ths New York Post Office as Second- &a\s Mmtter.
NEW YORK, NOVEMBER 28, 1896.
TELEPHONE NUMBER 1745. — EIGHTEENTH STREKT.
"THE BUSINESS MAN'S PAPER."
;.
t
For IU ni r . ^ . a ! s?6«3 rcsista:
For t k fctLr* 15 "v
Slid UtB good ftal « e caif
OO many trade papers.
Possibly, from the vantage ground
of some there are.
Likewise too many pianoforte builders
to make the business one of unalloyed hap-
piness for all engaged in manufacturing
musical wares. The fact is, in this busy
work-a-day world of ours, there is all sorts
of competition, good, bad, but not always
indifferent, which harasses and annoys, and
some fail to understand just why things
are not nearer to their own particular lik-
ing. Naturally they think that this and
that man brings to bear, in the furtherance
of his own plans for commercial success,
methods which they do not approve or en-
dorse.
During the past few years we have wit-
nessed radical changes in this trade. Un-
known firms have forged to the front,
while old concerns which years ago occu-
pied high niches in the trade temple, have
gone to ruin, so to speak. Their efforts
T
have been enfeebled and they have grad-
ually become less distinct in the trade
horizon, until their location is hardly dis-
cernible by reason of the haze which sur-
rounds them.
They sit and occasionally you can hear
half intelligible phrases from their lips
which interpreted mean—''too many piano
makers—such competition can't, be met—
surely their instruments can't have the
merits of ours—they are not piano makers
—the pianos that they make will not stand
—our trade will come back."
But does the trade "come back?"
They forget also that the recent phenome-
nal development of our musico-industrial
affairs has demonstrated one fact beyond
peradventure, and that, that the manufac-
ture of pianos is not confined to any par-
ticular geographical location, or to any par-
ticular set of individuals. There is no
longer any mystery surrounding the manu-
facture of pianos. Time was when it
was believed that the art of making pianos
was hidden in the brain of the few—that
the maker of pianos held a secret as great
as did Stradivarius, the violin maker.
Time and a cold commercial age has dissi-
pated all that, and among intelligent men
to-day there are two necessary requisites
to build pianos and market them.
What are those requisites?
First money—second brains. With those
in generous proportions, the occultism
which surrounded early piano making dis-
appears. There isn't even a wreath of
mist remaining to mark the location
where it existed.
And still we have dreamers in this trade
who fondly hug the hope that the good old
days will return again—and they go totter-
ing on. Preposterous—we may as well
return to the days of the stage coach and
flint lock musket. Those days are gone,
and with them the days when merchants
came to market and clambered over each
other in their haste to get certain products.
The men who sit and wait for them are the
ones over whose doors the moss and the
lichen is taking a firm rooting.
The great minds in this trade saw the
trend of affairs and sought to entrench
themselves so in the hearts of the trade and
the public that their position would be al-
most impregnable.
In line with the progress in manufacture,
came the progress in journalism. The
people, as a whole, became omnivorous
readers. It became necessary that each
trade should have its exponents. While
the daily press gave columns descriptive oi
prize fights, and publicly washed all the
soiled linen of the divorce courts in view of
its readers, it gave a meagre two lines to
some advance in science, art, or mechanics
whereby thousands were benefited, and
the world moved ahead a pace or two
towards a higher civilization. ,,;,; '•'.7~£ l
Arts, sciences, mechanics were neglected
while sensationalism and vulgarism were
paraded in the public print. There was a
necessity for trade journalism and to the
honor of the trade press as whole be it said
that it has disseminated not alone valuable
information, but it has kept its skirts free
and clear from the demoralizing influ-
ences so openly flaunted in the daily press.
It is true too, that trade journalism has
across its escutcheon the bar sinister.
But that is not the fault of trade journal-
ism. Because its fair fame has been black-
ened by men who have been alike devoid
of honor and conscience, trade journalism
should not be blamed.
A profession should not be charged with
the misdeeds of an individual—any more
than piano making should be charged with
all the crimes which have been committed
by men who have worn the trade badge.
What is sauce for the goose should like-
wise be served to the gander.
Music trade journalism has been for years
staggering along under the blight placed
upon it by the men who sought to make the
entire trade subservient to their exorbitant
demands. These men, under the conveni-
ent cloak of trade journalism, plied their
nefarious task, in which it would have been
more fitting to have brought the highway-
man's weapons. Instead of posing in the
garb of trade journalism, they should have
better arrayed themselves in cloak and
mask, then armed with a bludgeon they
would have been appropriately attired.
Music trade journalism has had to suffer
much abuse by reason of the stand and de-
liver methods inaugurated by adventurers
who stood in its protecting shadow.
But it has survived, and the healing in-
fluences of time is being cast about repen-
tant sinners who, full of years and with
empty pockets, have returned to the fold.
Too many trade papers.
Just the same number that existed six
years ago, while the ranks of piano manu-
facturers in the meanwhile has become won-
derfully augmented.
Of course, some of the papers should die
—but, Lord bless you, they refuse to do
this. They should combine, and where
there are six papers there should be but
three. Oil and water mixeth not. The
same may be fittingly said of trade editors.
Then the trade should combine and make
one great big paper, starve out the little
fellows.
Would that work with satisfactory re-
sults?
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