Music Trade Review

Music Trade Review -- © mbsi.org, arcade-museum.com -- digitized with support from namm.org
MUSIC TMDE,
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PLAYER SECTION
NEW YORK, OCTOBER 28, 1922
Standardizing the Player Action
The Player Action Industry Is Confronted With the Necessity of Standardizing Its Processes and Its Product if It Is
to Compete Successfully With Other Industries in an Effort to Hold Its Full Quota of Workers
and Also to Assure Those Interested in It the Financial Stability They Desire
The surprising fact that, despite the not
wholly satisfactory economic position of the
country at this time, there is actually coming
a seasonal shortarge, of pianos and player-pianos,
which can only be checked by prompt action
on the part of merchants to assure manufac-
turers that they may safely make unusual efforts
to reorganize their personnel and speed up their
production schedules, leads to considerations of
the possible effect of the situation upon the
player action industry. The underlying causes
of the shortage are of such a nature that they
must be regarded most seriously by all who have
at heart the best interests of the music indus-
tries. These causes, unhappily, are not to be
found in an enormous demand overpowering a
normal or more than normal supply capacity.
They are rather due to a demand, better than
it has recently been, yet actually still below
normal, overpowering a supply which is abnor-
mal only by being abnormally poor. It is be-
cause the situation as to the production of
pianos must of necessity be reflected in the
prosperity of the player business that we have
to consider how the one affects the other.
Piano Factory Situation Affects Player Trade
The trouble with the piano manufacturing
business at the moment is simply that the long
spell of abnormal conditions, beginning with
the war-time restrictions and ending only with
the recent gradual lifting of the clouds of in-
dustrial and economic depression, has brought
with it a gradual disintegration of piano factory
personnel, together with a disorganization of
production schedules, to such a degree that it
is now very difficult for piano manufacturers to
start the wheels of production speeding again.
Already much progress to this end has, indeed,
been made; but the task is rendered more dif-
ficult by the simple fact that piano factory
labor is hard to get. It is hard to get because
during the depression period it has been at-
tracted elsewhere, and has found that piano
making in all its branches is a craft which is
less prosperous than other crafts which require
at least no more skill than it does. Piano manu-
facturers therefore are having a good deal of
difficulty in getting back to old-time schedules
and are seriously considering such a drastic
reorganization of their methods as will enable
them to get on to the same level of tech-
nological efficiency as has been reached by other
manufacturing industries, in respect of the ma-
chine process, at least.
, Now, the player action end of the player
industry is, technically speaking, in relation to
1me piano manufacturer, an industry of supply.
Any cause or causes which affect the prosperity
4r the numerical output of the piano factories
ifftTt"rrr fararrd the output and the prosperity
of the player factories. Morally, therefore, the
player action manufacturer has every reason to
be deeply concerned in the state of affairs now
ruling in the piano-making industry. But his
interest, though immediate, is indirect. He has,
however, a direct interest in the problem, which
is, perhaps, not quite apparent, but which must
become more apparent as time goes on.
The Disease of "No-standard"
That is to say, the player action factory suf-
fers from a mild form of the same disease which
has for so long afflicted the body of the piano
manufacturing business. This may be described
by calling it, in a word, "non-standardization."
Let us for a moment analyze this statement.
The term "standardization," as applied to
modern manufacturing processes, or rather to
what may more generally be called the machine
technology of the age, implies the reduction of
all manufacturing processes to a state of con-
tinuous duplication. This implies in turn that
the total process of manufacture shall have
been classified into a number of distinct proc-
esses, each of which is separate from the others
in the sense that it can be carried on alone, but
dependent on them in the sense that it has
no special value without their existence. Parts
are then always and everywhere interchange-
able. Any two finished machines may be taken
down and their constituent parts mixed up, with
the certainty that they can be reassembled
without any difficulty. That is what is meant
by standardization in manufacturing. Towards
that ideal all industries are rapidly tending.
Some of them have already reached it. All
are trying to reach it. None which does not
at least attempt to reach it can possibly long
survive.
Need of Following Modern Tendency
The piano factory shows, of course, a far
more acute case of the disease of non-standiza-
tion than does the player action factory. But
the player action cannot be completely stand-
ardized until the piano has been standardized.
It is perfectly true that the player action, like
the piano action, can be produced, so far as
regards its constituent parts, by the process of
constant duplication; but the crux of the whole
matter is the assembly, in which each batch of
actions has to be put together in some in-
dividual way to accommodate the individual
peculiarities of some piano. Many of the advan-
tages which accrue from the adoption of ma-
chine processes in the preliminary fabrication
are lost in the assembly.
Under modern methods the worker can only
earn a due reward for his labor by acquiring the
modern machine technique, which is based upon
standard patterns, exact measurements and the
ceaseless duplication of the same part. The
assembly processes in modern manufacturing
are likewise quite as much a matter of standards
and duplication. Only under these conditions
can the modern worker earn appropriate re-
wards. Industries where these conditions are
most thoroughly developed boast the most pros-
perous workers, generally speaking. Now, the
piano factory is suffering from difficulty in re-
cruiting its war-disorganized personnel, because
it is out of line with the modern machine tech-
nology. The player action business generally
is suffering, though in a milder form, from the
same difficulty. For the modern worker is going
where the money is best.
Type of Worker Changing
Again, unfortunately, the modern worker in
the factory as a class no longer represents the
old skilled mechanic type, as he used to. The
modern worker is not only a machine worker,
but he neither possesses nor has need to use in
his work the individual intelligence which the
older mechanics were proud to exhibit and to
utilize. The majority of factory labor is of a
lower type than it was twenty years ago and
that is why the modern machine processes are
being forced willy-nilly upon manufacturers; for
with them the matter of the workers' intelli-
gence is of secondary importance.
What Is to Be Done Now?
The player action business, then, must con-
sider carefully the implications of this fact. The
danger is not, perhaps, immediate, but it is
already pressing hard upon the piano manufac-
turer. He indeed suffers mainly because he has
to attempt to fit an individualistic craft on to
the demands of machine technology; but the
player action manufacturer is himself not im-
mune from the tendencies of the age, for he
himself is not by any means in a standardized
position. Unless, therefore, he wishes to have
to go through the painful process of reorganiza-
tion sooner or later, he should bear in mind
that the time is now ripe to agitate for such a
standardization of piano dimensions and parts
as shall enable all supply makers to design and
build interchangeably. This at present they
cannot do; yet just this is what they all want
to do.
The process of agitation will not be too easy.
The piano trade is a conservative, a very con-
servative, trade. It resists innovation almost
to the death. But the time is favorable for
action along the lines indicated herewith.
This is no wild goose chase we advocate.
We merely take a longer view and look a short
distance into the future. Those who to-day
begin getting in order their house of manufac-
turing processes and adapting it to modern ten-
dencies in industry will have reason within five
years to be glad of their foresight.