Music Trade Review

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THE MUSIC TRADE REVIEW
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TWENTY-FIRST YEAR.
J* EDWARD LYMAN BILL** <* J*
Editor and Proprietor.
PUBLISHED EVERY SATURDAY
3 East Nth St., New York
SUBSCRIPTION (including postage). United States, Mexico
and Canada, $2.00 per year ; all other countries, $4.00.
ADVERTISEMENTS, $2.00 per inch, single column, per
insertion. On quarterly or yearly contracts a special discount
is allowed. Advertising Pages $50.00, opposite reading matter
$75.00.
REMITTANCES, in other than currency form, should be
made payable to Edward Lyman Bill.
Entered at the New York Post Office as Second Class Matter.
NEW YORK, JUNE 23, 1900.
TELEPHONE NUMBER, I745--EIQHTEENTH STREET.
THE KEYNOTE.
The first week of each month The Review
oontains a supplement embodying the literary
and musical features which have heretofore
appeared in The Keynote. The amalgamation
is effected without in any way trespassing on
our regular news service. The Review con-
tinues to remain, as before, essentially a trade
paper.
THE VALUE OF ORGANIZATION.
T H E recent convention of the Piano
Manufacturers' National Association,
was followed last week by the annual re-
union in this city of the Music Publishers'
Association of the United States when
many important subjects were brought up
for consideration and discussion and much
that tended to the betterment of the inter-
ests of music publishers consummated.
In this connection the recent address made
by Adolpho H. Fischer at the Piano Man-
ufacturers meeting in Chicago was intro-
duced by President Bowers as "one of the
clearest and most forceful statements" of
the value of organization and association.
A well merited compliment. There is no
mistaking that the trade convention is be-
coming more and more a feature in modern
industrial life. Societies of all kinds and
of all degrees of efficiency and value are
continually multiplying. They include
every profession and art, from those of
the highest scientific interest to the crudest
and commonest forms of labor. These
amalgams, whatever their constituency or
atomatie make-up, not only demonstrate
the value of association, but are equally in
evidence of a clearer conception of what
intelligent fraternity can do in advancing
knowledge and bettering existing condi-
tions.
can only be determined by the experiences
of practical men. To sift the chaff from
the wheat, to separate the practical from
the theoretical, and that which is best
from what is not so, is one of the objects
of professional and trade conventions. It
is this eminently practical character that
gives them their importance.
In the interchange of opinion and a
comparison of experiences much is gained
by association that otherwise would be ex-
clusive and of a piece-meal and fragmen-
tary character. Progress would be a
matter of spurts and private switches,
with the slower going and less informed
moving up and down the spiked rails
of the old tramway. Nor is it to be
forgotten that the social spirit fostered and
encouraged by direct personal association
is an admirable remedy for trade fiction,
prejudice and business hostilities. Many
of these are directly due to ignorance and
misconception, which, when removed,
leave the horizon clear, with phantoms and
bugaboos disappearing as men know each
other better. The bogie has played great
havoc with business interests and harmony.
It is doing so still. Men whose interests
are identical are often at swords' points
from mere prejudice and imaginary wrongs.
Explanation and personal intercourse rub
out many of these old wrinkles and remove
the green goggles that pervert the vision
and misrepresent actual facts. So that on
the fraternal, as on the business, side of
life the synods of the trades are among the
vital factors of prosperity and harmony.
At this season of the year such associated
affiliations are in constant evidence. They
are to be found everywhere, and the reports
of their conferences are among the advanced
literature both of science and industry.
Thanks to modern methods of travel and
communication, distance practically counts
for nothing in the assembling of men from
all points of the compass. A group of
men, be they piano makers, publishers,
foundrymen, ironworkers, civil or mechan-
ical engineers, can muster in a short time,
and at comparatively little cost, at any
chosen point in the various states of the
Union. They can be cosmopolitan as well
as national. Insular prejudice as well as
racial antagonisms get considerable pumice
stone rubbed over their angularities, and
thus in a world-wide as well' as a local
sense the modern trade convention does
some long-needed missionary work. Their
existence is a matter of congratulation,
and their encouragement a public duty.
When practical men get together, with
a common object in view, and their own
special interests are involved in their con-
ferences, the outcome cannot fail of good
results. This is an age of constant change,
and of a series of successive phases in
•which theories and new ideas, methods
DEMAND FOR PIANO PLAYERS.
and plans are being constantly evolved. P R O M present indications it would seem
These have their relative importance in
that the ranks of the piano playing
scientific and industrial progress, which attachments would be materially aug-
mented during the next few months. At
the present rate of increase it will be pos-
sible within the near future to keep in
sight of the demand for the players.
How the demand for self-playing instru-
ments has increased during the past few
years, and we cannot forget that the ^Eo-
lian institution by its superb educational
work overcame public prejudices wlrch
existed for many years towards all auto-
matic productions. This concern blazed the
way and made it comparatively easy for
others to follow. This superb system of
advertising, both in brochure and maga-
zine form has not been eclipsed in point of
artistic beauty and intelligent display by
any other advertiser in any line of busi-
ness. The success of that institution de-
monstrates that progressive and aesthetic
methods of advertising return satisfactory
profits for the investment.
PERSONALITY AND CREDIT.
r^ REDIT is the rock that is strewn with
broken business reputations, and the
successful business man has to be strenu-
ously careful in regard to the persons to
whom he extends credit. The ideal credit
man must be an exceptional judge of human
nature, as capable of discounting sanguine-
ness as his confreres of the sales depart-
ment are in discounting pianos, organs or
any instrument of the "small goods" fam-
ily. He must have a thorough knowl-
edge of general business conditions, coup-
led with that of the especial condition
which affects each individual applicant for
credit. He must be able to differentiate
business men on short acquaintance.
The conservative merchant is all right,
but the careless, the slovenly, and the hope-
lessly timid dealer, to all of whom it is sui-
cidal to grant extended credit, have many
points that superficially would place them
as painstaking and conservative dealers.
An A No. 1 credit man cannot lay down a
hard and fast line in his dealings with
customers of the house. If he does his
action in every exceptional case that arises
will prove a blunder. He must know
when to accept a chance, for you can count
on the fingers of one.hand all the business
successes in your list of acquaintances who
never took a chance. Many a house has
embittered one who otherwise would be a
good customer by shutting off credit per-
emptorily from the man of small capital
who, by virtue of his business ability, his
energy, his resourcefulness and integrity
was likely to work out a success.
Take the head of the firm in the whole-
sale field: If he sits at his desk and ex-
tends credit in conformity with fixed rules
and commercial agency reports he will
make mistakes far more frequently than