Music Trade Review

Music Trade Review -- © mbsi.org, arcade-museum.com -- digitized with support from namm.org
8
THE: MUSIC TRADE:
REVIEW
THE PLAYER-PIANISTS' DEPARTMENT
Lit is in every way eminently desirable that a publication
which undertakes to give so much space and so authoritative
a treatment to the great player industry, as does The .Re-
view, should not neglect what is after all the real excuse
for the player's existence, namely, the music that is evoked
irom it. Recognizing the extraordinary importance of do-
ing everything possible to spread more widely appreciation
and love for music among player-pianists, The .Review's
i'layer Section for the present month contains below, and
will in future regularly contain, a department devoted to
the musical interests ot player-pianists and of the player-
piano. Each month one musical article of general interest
will appear, together with useful hints, notes and comments.
This is in addition to the regular sub-section of the Player
Section, which analyzes the monthly issues of music rolls.
Professional demonstrators, salesmen and player-pianists of
every degree will find each month on the '"Player-Pianist's"
page of the Player Section much valuable information. And
the Editor of the Player Section will at all times be glad
to answer inquiries on any and all musical player matters.]
CLUBS AND THE PLAYER=P1ANO.
Foresighted members of the piano trade who are
on the lookout for new ideas might do worse than
consider the relation that may be brought to sub-
sist between the player-piano and the various or-
ganizations scattered everywhere, which exist for
mutual musical culture. Not speaking at all of clubs
devoted to the interest of professional musicians,
there are in this country hundreds of organizations
made up of gifted and enthusiastic amateurs, who
meet at stated intervals for the purpose not only
of social intercourse but of serious musical study.
The National Federation of Musical Clubs spreads
its branches over the whole country and its mem-
bership increases annually.
Now, it would seem to be plain enough that if
the musical clubs and other similar organizations,
as such, could be brought into sympathetic contact
with the player-piano, the results could not but be
favorable to both. The player-piano is, as we of
the trade know or ought to know, an instrument
just as useful to the trained as to the untrained
music lover. To the former its greatest value
comes as an aid in the comparative study of music,
in practical musical appreciation, and in the analysis
of scores. It would by no means be either sensible
or practical to suggest that the player-piano could
take among trained music lovers the place of key-
board technic. But it is perfectly proper to point
out that in the directions suggested the player is
without a rival.
Need it be said that a growing appreciation of
the value of the player-piano, if manifested by
these musical organizations, would be of the utmost
advantage to the trade?
Need it be said that the musical position of the
player-piano would be vastly improved in this way,
and that it would be closer to coming into its own
than has ever yet seemed possible?
Perhaps no better way could be found to intro-
duce the matter to those who would be benefited
by better acquaintance with it than to explain
shortly some of the practical uses of the player-
piano to an organization of music lovers who are
striving to perfect their knowledge and under-
standing of the art. We have already spoken of
same of these. Let us develop the idea a little.
The comparative study of music is immensely
valuable to the sincere music lover. It is only by
comparative study that we can thoroughly trace
the gradual development of the art from its earliest
beginnings. Only by comparative study can we
distinguish the extraordinary and essential differ-
ences in principle which render the music of Orient
and Occident mutually unintelligible. Only in the
same way can we gain some approximately correct
notion as to the true position of music among the
people of all times and of to-day.
Now, the comparative study of music requires
the ability to perform at any time any amount of
musical material that may be brought forward.
The average amateur, no matter how gifted, is
unable to devote the immense amount of time that
is necessarily required to the task of mastering
this material. Here the player-piano comes for-
ward and offers its unlimited technic freely, solv-
ing the problem at once.
Again, another necessary study is that of musical
appreciation. This means the cultivation of the
faculty of critical understanding, whereby listening
becomes more than merely passive, and whereby
the negative receptivity of the mind is replaced by
an active critical participation; the hearer being
able to understand what is going on, to form a
conception of the structure of a musical work, to
realize the relations of the various parts as these
successively appear, and to read the composer's
message while understanding his methods, in or-
der to cultivate the faculty of appreciation, it is
necessary that the music lover should be thoroughly
acquainted with every branch of musical form.
He must know to what type a certain construction
belongs, to what period it adheres and what are the
principles of its fashioning. He must not only like
a symphony, but must like it because it is made as
it is. He must be able to know whether a given
symphony is a good expression of the symphonic
form. He must know why he approves, not merely
that he does approve.
The cultivation of this splendid faculty, involv-
ing as it does a critical knowledge of musical form
and of the history of music, requires that the music
lover should be familiar with an immense amount
of orchestral and other music. Not only so, but
the understanding should be intimate. A sym-
phony, for instance, is never thoroughly understood
until the score has been studied. Yet the art of
playing from score is exceedingly difficult. Few
professional and still fewer amateur musicians
possess it. Merely to play two and four-hand ar-
rangements for piano is not enough. Here the
player-piano again shows its usefulness. It enables
the student to keep the full score before his eyes
while reproducing it through the medium of a four
or eight-hand arrangement. Or, if necessary, the
music roll can be cut direct from the full score,
thus giving a faithful picture of the work without
alteration or editing.
The analysis of scores is a necessary accompani-
ment to the study of musical appreciation. It is
a work which must be prosecuted under vast diffi-
culties, unless the services of a tonal translator,
as it were, are ever at hand. Here again, just as
was remarked above, the player-piano is not only
willing, but would seem to be almost indispensable.
In order that the ideas here suggested should be
brought effectively before the people to whom they
are to appeal, it is necessary that the prejudice
against the alleged musical shortcomings of the
player-piano should he combatted. Music lovers
of the more serious sort do not take kindly to the
player-piano, simply because their unmusical neigh-
bors, who have generally monopolized its use, have
soured their stomachs to it. Still, a little clever
demonstration is worth tons of talk and theory,
and it will be found that whenever the attention
of musical organizations is brought towards the
player-piano by persons capable of exhibiting
worthily its capacities, criticism is stilled. In mak-
ing such attempts, however, it is well to keep in
mind the possibility of claiming too much and then
failing to substantiate the claim. Persons who
know music are not to be expected to swallow any-
thing that may be given them. It is well, in fact,
expressly to disclaim any expectation of competing
with the ordinary piano, while calling attention
to the fact that the player-piano has its own field
to cover and covers it in a way which no other
instrument can make possible. This is true; and
the best of it is that it can be proved.
The musical activities of the country as ex*
pressed by its multitude of clever amateurs need
the player-piano. Will the wise men of the player
business see and recognize their duty?
A HEART TO HEART TALK
Artists become absorbed in their work to an ex-
tent sometimes unintelligible to those who do not,
or cannot, share their feelings. In the case of the
musician the necessity for public performance in-
duces a certain stage presence, as it were, which
in many cases becomes distorted by ungainly man-
nerisms. Painful self-consciousness is a cause of
many such mannerisms, while on the other hand
the peculiar nature of the musical art renders al-
most inevitable a certain amount of extrudent
.gesture and pose. Nevertheless, we always find
that the great masters of the musical art do by
no means extrude their personality upon their
audiences. Kreisler at the violin is as quiet as
Hoffman at the piano. The personality indeed
works its way, but subjectively, not objectively.
It is always the "gifted amateur," the second-rate
professional and people of that sort who think it
necessary to distort their faces, limbs and bodies
when playing music. This is sad, but true. We all
have seen and suffered from exhibitions of this
kind.
Now, it is a curious fact, yet not entirely inex-
plicable, that persons who play upon the player-
piano grow into habits of attitudinizing quite as
absurd, and perhaps less defensible from the spec-
tator's point of view. The piano trade has often
laughed over the attitudinizing salesman who finds
that he can play the instrument pretty well and
proceeds to act as if he were a great artist, or as
if he were as he thinks a great artist would be.
(This is English, not Cubism, although it looks
involved enough to be the latter.) But it is a fact
that player-pianists do get into the bad habit of
performing acrobatic feats at the instrument, to
The Master Player-Piano
is now equipped with an
AUTOMATIC TRACKING DEVICE
Which guarantees absolutely correct tracking of even the most imperfect music rolls
W I N T E R & CO., 220 Southern Boulevard, New York City