Music Trade Review

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THE MUSIC TRADE REVIEW
, ;.. »EDWARD LYMAN BILL i •< .
Editor and Proprietor
PUBLISHED EVERY SATURDAY
3 East 14th St., New York
SUBSCRIPTION (including postage), United States,
Mexico and Canada, $200 per year ; all other countries,
I300.
ADVERTISEHENTS, $2.00 per inch, single column, per
insertion. On quarterly or yearly contracts a special dis-
count is allowed. Advertising Pages $50.00, opposite read-
ing matter $75.00.
REMITTANCES, in other than currency form, should
be made payable to Edward Lyman Bill.
Entered at the Ifew York Post Office as Second Clast Matter.
NEW YORK, DECEMBER 3, 1898.
TELEPHONE NUMBER, 1745—EIGHTEENTH STREET.
NEW YEAR REFLECTIONS.
'
-_ promises to be a year of extensive
/ / business operations. In our own
trade some important changes will unques-
tionably take place. When we take a re-
trospective glance over trade history we
find that while perhaps there have been
no abrupt changes the entire trade has
undergone a complete metamorphosis
during the past few years. We are not,
however, in sympathy with the class of
men who say that the trade has deterior-
ated.
It has changed and adjusted itself
partially to the changed conditions of the
times, but that there are other changes
which will occur no one who is a close
student of the trend of affairs can deny.
Some claim that the trust idea, with the
resistless force of a glacier, is absorbing
the trade.
Forcible arguments may be made in
favor of that, but prejudices will incline
the trade as a whole to prefer individual
independence rather than trust solidity.
That there are elements in this trade which
can be successfully welded cannot be
denied, and arguments, preferences and
prejudices are equally powerless to stop
the inrolling tide of centralization which is
going on in everything. But the wave
has not as yet reached the piano industry,
nor will it for some time to come.
Manufacturers who have not been enjoy-
ing satisfactory business conditions will
re-organize their individual force. They
will make strong endeavors to turn out
reliable instruments at less cost, little leak-
ages will be stopped, and business abuses
which have crept in will be remedied.
During the next year, too, there will be
some radical changes in piano case archi-
tecture. During the last we have made
notable advances, as no one who observes
the piano cases of to-day can fail to ac-
| knowledge that they have surpassed all of
their predecessors in artistic lines. The
development of case architecture, however,
has not as yet reached the high watermark.
There will be some radical changes. One
we have in mind is the new grand invented
by J. Frank Conover. This grand affords a
scheme for case development which will
attract others.
We will have more inventive minds in
this special field with a result that there
will be more artistic pianos, for where
there is healthy rivalry and investigation
there are always results, which are, to a
large degree, satisfactory.
Take the matter of piano plates.
Some argue that there will be a radical
change in plate manufacturing. They say
aluminum will supersede iron as a princi-
pal element in plate casting.
That there are changes going on in the
metal world is evidenced in the fact that
ordinary bar iron will shortly have com-
pletely disappeared from the trade. Steel
is now supplanting all forms of wrought
iron.
BETRAYING CONFIDENCES.
CREQUENTLY, and at times, we think
too frequently, we observe a trade ed-
itor rushing into print with some news of
startling importance concerning a deal
which still remains to be consummated. His
anxiety to print the news before some of
his competitors overrides his good judg-
ment and causes him to betray the confi-
fidences which are reposed in him.
This condition of affairs is somewhat un-
fortunate but it gives the trade ample
opportunity to judge in whom they may
place confidence with safety. A man who
will print that which is told him confiden-
tially is not qualified to sit in an editor's
chair, for it is at this juncture that the real
abilities of an editor are displayed. He
must first of all be a man of judgment to
sift the wheat of reliable information from
the chaff of rumor. He must also have
strength of character enough to hold confi-
dences strictly inviolate which are reposed
in him. It is true that he is exposed con-
stantly to great temptation because at
times the instincts of a newspaper man
threaten to dominate the recipient of con-
fidential news.
A trade editor, no matter how much he
may wish to remove himself from person-
alities can never completely escape them.
Dealing with a class necessarily limited he
must always to a certain extent deal in
personalities. He must, too, if he pub-
lishes a paper of strength and character,
hold the confidence of his constituency.
This confidence is gained not always by
writing bright or descriptive articles, but
largely by the fact that those in whose par-
ticular trade his interests lie, have found
that they could, to a certainty, rely upon
his judgment in a variety of matters, and
still know that their secrets would be kept
as safe as a physician holds those of a
strictly family nature.
The conduct of trade papers is becoming
tinged more and more with certain pro-
fessional coloring. It assumes oftentimes
somewhat of a legal aspect, and why not?
A successful trade paper editor should
be an authority upon all the intimate
questions underlying the trade struct-
ure. He should be well qualified by ex-
perience, by observation and by education
to give an intelligent and comprehensive
answer to any question that may be pro-
pounded.
The trade editor who rushes into print
with a previous announcement which often-
times destroys a projected deal which was
confidentially told him is over smart. He
has mistaken his calling. He would fit in
better as a pettitfogging lawyer than as a
trade editor.
The managing and editing of a trade
paper, if one views it correctly, is full of
responsibilities and cares which oftentimes
one feels desirous of shirking. But one
cannot, and cares and responsibilities only
serve to broaden one's mental stature and
qualify one more thoroughly for the ser-
ious work of life.
Trade paper editors too are subjected
oftentimes to unfair criticism, just the
same as a manufacturer may be criticised
for such and such an action, but the fact
remains that the trade editor who is work-
ing for trade good is quickly discovered,
for it does not take people long to find out
an element which is working for their
benefit rather than for their degradation.
It does not take long, cither, to discover
an element which is working toward trade
demoralization and which, to a large ex-
tent, has subjected upright principles to
selfish, greedy aggrandizement.
In the music trade, for instance, we have
had a man who has striven for years with
unswerving persistence to destroy as far as
his selfish powers permitted, the rights of
individuals and denied the members of the
trade the privilege to act independently
without first paying tribute to his insatia-
ble demands.
It cannot be said that all of the men who
kneeled in tribute were weak men, for they
were not. They may have had weak spots
in their armor which were known to their
opponent, but that they have knuckled is
history.
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