Music Trade Review

Music Trade Review -- © mbsi.org, arcade-museum.com -- digitized with support from namm.org
THE MUSIC TRADE REVIEW
NOVEMBER 27, 1920
TNE NEW FOXTROT NIT
low t h e «Wrrters
^BUBBLES
LONESOME:
THE POINT OF VIEW
(Continued from page 7)
tokens called money has in some way or another
been remedied. It only needs a little nerve on
the part of retail salesmen everywhere. When
these gentlemen realize that the people are really
interested in pianos and player-pianos, but have
come to regard them as articles which can al-
ways be bought at a bargain if one is wise, there
will be some improvement in their methods, per-
haps. At present the one big thought in every
merchant's mind should be that now, if ever, he
must advertise music, music, and again music.
No Play, No Sell
Yet how, one may cautiously inquire, is the
merchant to sell player-pianos on the basis of
music unless he can persuade the prospective
purchaser that the player-piano is really a worth-
while producer of the kind of music the prospect
considers all right? And how, in turn, is this
persuasion to be made possible unless the sales-
man can actually show the prospective purchaser
how to play the player-piano in a manner which
shall satisfy that prospect's sense of the fitness
of things? There is every sign that the wild
craze for overjazzed music is dying out and
that we are in for a reaction. Along with this
reaction it surely will be possible to bring
salesmen to see that when an abnormal craving
like that is killed the tastes which survive will
have to be satisfied in a much sounder fashion.
There is not the least sense in arguing that
the prospect usually does not understand music.
That statement may be perfectly true, but it
is also perfectly true that the prospect buys a
foot-played player-piano (the vastly greater
number of player-pianos are foot-played) be-
cause he or she wants what he or she believes
to be suitable music' To teach that prospect
how to produce that music should be the aim
of the salesman. It is because we have neglected
this sort of salesmanship that we find the pub-
lic willing to look aside from us whenever there
is a flurry in their course of thinking, as now
is the case. If we build on the strong founda-
tion of music, of the personal production of
music, we cannot possibly i>o wrong. It is
only if we try to treat the player-piano as a
mere piece of goods, costing a lot of money, and
to be sold on some easy-payment persuasion,
that we find ourselves building on the sands.
We have the rock in front of us and can begin
to build on it now. Houses built on rocks do
not fall when the storms beat on them. Not
only so, but business houses built that way do
not have to wait years for their reward. There
is now at this moment just as big a public wait-
nniiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiii
The highest class player
actions in the world
"The valve unit that made the player famous"
The new "Amthion Accessible Action" is the last word in scientific player
achievement.
It has the complete valve action assembled in a "Demountable
Unit'' giving instant accessibility.
AMPHlONfmCTIONS
SYRACUSE j(
—Your Guarantee ^
NEW YORK.
ing for clean home entertainment as there ever
was. ]n fact, that public, tired with the excite-
ments of the last six years, is bigger than ever.
The world certainly wants quiet and calm, and
this Christmas it wants it worse than ever. A
word to the wise is- sufficient.
NEWSPAPER CRITIC PRAISES AMPICO
Jas. Davies, in Minneapolis Sunday Tribune,
Pays High Tribute to Performance of That
Instrument in Recital in That City
The Ampico comparison recital given recently
in Minneapolis evidently made a strong impres-
sion upon the musical critics of the various
newspapers in that city, judging from the favor-
able comments written by them.
James Davies, for instance, reviewing the musi-
cal events of the week in the Minneapolis Sun-
day Tribune, wrote regarding the performance
of the Ampico:
"It is impossible to think of the recent con-
cert given at the Auditorium by Godowsky,
Copeland, Mirovitch and Marguerite Namara
without feeling a sensation of wonder and awe
that the mind of man could conceive and create
an instrument like the Ampico, that would abso-
lutely reproduce the interpretations of the
greatest masters of the piano. Three great
pianists participated in the concert and one great
vocalist. The audience heard the masters per-
form and then, as if invisible hands were manipu-
lating the keyboard, heard the same selections,
with reduplication of every tone nuance with the
same shading of tone, the same delicate turn of
phrase. It was uncanny, and in some respects
is one of the most startling things that the world
of music has ever experienced. In one instance,
when Godowsky played the Chopin 'Scherzo,'
the reproduction was immeasurably superior to
the artist's interpretation. There were certain
extraneous circumstances that in a measure ac-
count for the apparent discrepancy, particularly
a degree of nervous tension on account of a re-
calcitrant key, but the fact remains that the re-
production in its full completeness overshadowed
the artist's performance on the stage.
"The creation of this instrument, or whatever
it is called, opens up a vista of possibilities in
many directions, chiefly of a pedagogical char-
acter, for embraced in its potentialities is the
fact that it can be installed in every music school
in the country and by the mere touch of a tin-
gi-r the performances of the greatest artists down
to the smallest detail become subjects for the
intimate study either of a class or an individual.
"The possibilities are illimitable, leaving but
one source of regret, and that is that such a crea-
tion did not come into the musical world a half-
century earlier when we of to-day could have
learned something of the personality of past
great players through this medium, for in reality
it does seem to possess an individuality, appeal-
ing alike to the understanding and to the emo-
tions."
••