Music Trade Review
Issue: 1923 Vol. 76 N. 20 - Page 11
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MAY
19, 1923
THE
MUSIC TRADE
11
REVIEW
The Music Room Is a Home Essential
Speaker Before the Annual Meeting of the Texas Music Merchants* Association Points Out the Place Which
Music and Musical Instruments Occupy in the Modern Home—Some Pointed and Valuable
Criticism Regarding the Piano Selling Literature Used by the Industry
"Next to the lady of the house comes the
piano as an essential article of furniture," Mrs.
Mamie Folsom Wynne told Texas music deal-
ers in convention at Dallas recently.
Mrs. Wynne advocates a music-room in
every home and said the day is coming when
the music-room of a home will be the com-
munity center.
Her address on "Musical Backgrounds"
follows:
"The history of the development and prog-
ress of music does not entirely rest with per-
formers, whom we are wont to style musicians,
but equally upon the inventors and perfectors
of the means of making good music.
"To say that a man is 'master of an instrument'
means much or little, according to whether or
not he has a good or bad instrument. We
think of Bach, Chopin and Rubinstein as su-
preme 'masters,' and so they were, of the lim-
ited instruments of their time. To-day thou-
sands of musicians achieve more splendid ef-
fects, not because they play better, but because
they have better instruments upon which to
play.
Ahead of Production
"Musical invention is still ahead of musical
production. We are yet to hear all that a
great pipe organ can say to the soul, or that
a magnificent piano can suggest to the-imagina-
tion, while the talking machine, with a radio
attachment, may yet win the world for music.
"Back of the pianist's skill must be the ade-
quate, well-tuned, properly placed, conveniently
adjusted piano. The violinist must have an
instrument worthy of his genius. A master
organist needs a superlative organ from which
to evoke grand and subtle harmonies. Even
the village band plays better on better instru-
ments.
The Real Living Room
"The instrument is the real background, as
well as backbone, of music. Dr. Frank Crane
says that a well-furnished room needs only a
grand piano at one end and a talking machine
at the other. We would suggest an easy chair
or two, in order to fully appreciate the other
furnishings. Still, the house which contains a
well-furnished music-room is apt to be the sort
of home where refinement and good taste ob-
tain throughout.
"Such furnishings make a room not only a
true living-room, but a community center. Wise
are the parents who realize this need for musi-
cal backgrounds, to develop and encourage a
taste for cultural joy. Good music makes for
good morals. If you doubt this, note the in-
fluence of jazz upon the young and restless
age.
"Architecture has long made allowance for
organ-lofts in churches, and now the modern
home demands similar consideration. The in-
stallation of a pipe-organ within the four walls
of home is no longer a novelty, so soon it will
be considered a necessary background in the
furnishing of a music-room.
"On the concert stage the grand piano must
be depended upon to furnish the entire musical
background, since a bare stage is preferred by
all except the vaudevillians, who dress up both
stage and piano, perhaps in order to appeal as
much to the eye as to the ear of the audience.
See Nothing
"We who sit staring at the great piano really
see nothing at all, for the psychology of the
performance is to focus attention upon the
artist rather than upon his instrument. For a
long time we merely guessed at the make of the
piano. If it were extraordinarily battered and
chipped we knew it was a Steinway, this veteran
in the field of instruments.
"As the Mason & Hamlin, the Steinway,
the Knabe, the Weber, the Baldwin and other
fine instruments became popular with concert
performers, a rivalry developed in making the
piano slightly less inconspicuous. This was
done by a gold-lettered sign hung over the
side, or a line at the foot of the program.
However, we challenge you to deny that the
public is still in the dark as to what make
of piano an artist prefers. The instrument has
been too long a mere background.
"The average piano catalog thrills no one
except the manufacturer and dealer. This is
due to the method of illustration, which places
a meaningless cut against a dead white or
tinted background. There the piano has no
setting at all. Some wise dealers, however,
are waking up to the correct methods of show-
ing pianos, and we find windows and booklets,
reproducing instruments in appropriate settings,
showing a corner of the music or living room,
or perhaps the entire floor space and walls.
"Next to the lady of the house comes the
piano as an essential article of furniture. And,
like the wife, it should be the best one can
find, not makeshift, cheap and showy stock.
The piano and talking machine are sentient
objects, affected by heat, cold, care and neglect,
quite as human beings are.
Suffer From Ignorance
"Like many wives, the majority of musical
instruments suffer from the ignorance of those
about them. The dealer fortunate enough to
obtain an order for an instrument should be
able to give an expert opinion as to the placing,
the proportions of the room and even the qual-
ity and design of the other furnishings. It does
not hurt a dealer to know whether a piano re-
sponds better when placed on a Chinese rug or
left upon the bare floor. The clash of woods
used in floor, beam-ceilings, chairs and other
features should be his concern. Even the posi-
tion of the room enters into his decision as
to where the piano shall rest and why should
an architect be the one authority consulted in
the placing of windows and alcoves in the room
dedicated to harmonies?
"We shall yet live to see community kitchens,
doing away with the family stove and ice-box.
Maybe we shall have dormitories for sleeping
purposes. But never, as long as people respond
to that voice of music which becomes eloquent
when words end, shall we abandon the instru-
ments which, now the backgrounds of sweet
concord, will take their place in the foreground
of human possessions, cherished alike for what
they are in themselves as well as for what they
hold within, of inspiration and exceeding great
joy."
PREMIER GRAND TO EXHIBIT
Important Announcement Will Also Be Made
at the Convention—Representatives of East
and West to Be There
The Premier Grand Piano Corp., New York,
is planning an elaborate exhibit during conven-
tion week in Chicago at the Hotel Drake. This
exhibit will be held in Suite 711-714 and will
comprise nine different and distinctive styles of
I'remier products.
In accordance with its usual custom the cor-
poration will make an important announcement
at the convention regarding the addition to its
already extensive line of several new models.
The exhibit will be in charge of W. C. Hep-
perla, president of the company, who will be
assisted by Charles Grundy, Middle Western
representative, and Charles V. Boothe, Pac'fic
Coast representative.
REHMER MUSIC CO. OPENS
MISSOULA, MONT., May 15.—A new music house
called the Schaefer-Rehmer Music Co. has been
opened here at 130 Higgins avenue, in the build-
ing formerly occupied by the Rowland Co.
The strongest endorsement ever given a piano action was
that given the
STRAUCH BROS.
Grand and Upright
Piano Actions
by the Judges at Chicago in 1893.
They declared:
"The Piano Actions Manufactured by Strauch Bros,
deserve the Highest Commendation and are First Class
in Every Respect."
These actions have possessed this high reputation for
quality nearly sixty years.
Strauch Bros., Inc.
327-347 Walnut Avenue, at East 141st Street,
New York.
MAY
19, 1923
THE
MUSIC TRADE
11
REVIEW
The Music Room Is a Home Essential
Speaker Before the Annual Meeting of the Texas Music Merchants* Association Points Out the Place Which
Music and Musical Instruments Occupy in the Modern Home—Some Pointed and Valuable
Criticism Regarding the Piano Selling Literature Used by the Industry
"Next to the lady of the house comes the
piano as an essential article of furniture," Mrs.
Mamie Folsom Wynne told Texas music deal-
ers in convention at Dallas recently.
Mrs. Wynne advocates a music-room in
every home and said the day is coming when
the music-room of a home will be the com-
munity center.
Her address on "Musical Backgrounds"
follows:
"The history of the development and prog-
ress of music does not entirely rest with per-
formers, whom we are wont to style musicians,
but equally upon the inventors and perfectors
of the means of making good music.
"To say that a man is 'master of an instrument'
means much or little, according to whether or
not he has a good or bad instrument. We
think of Bach, Chopin and Rubinstein as su-
preme 'masters,' and so they were, of the lim-
ited instruments of their time. To-day thou-
sands of musicians achieve more splendid ef-
fects, not because they play better, but because
they have better instruments upon which to
play.
Ahead of Production
"Musical invention is still ahead of musical
production. We are yet to hear all that a
great pipe organ can say to the soul, or that
a magnificent piano can suggest to the-imagina-
tion, while the talking machine, with a radio
attachment, may yet win the world for music.
"Back of the pianist's skill must be the ade-
quate, well-tuned, properly placed, conveniently
adjusted piano. The violinist must have an
instrument worthy of his genius. A master
organist needs a superlative organ from which
to evoke grand and subtle harmonies. Even
the village band plays better on better instru-
ments.
The Real Living Room
"The instrument is the real background, as
well as backbone, of music. Dr. Frank Crane
says that a well-furnished room needs only a
grand piano at one end and a talking machine
at the other. We would suggest an easy chair
or two, in order to fully appreciate the other
furnishings. Still, the house which contains a
well-furnished music-room is apt to be the sort
of home where refinement and good taste ob-
tain throughout.
"Such furnishings make a room not only a
true living-room, but a community center. Wise
are the parents who realize this need for musi-
cal backgrounds, to develop and encourage a
taste for cultural joy. Good music makes for
good morals. If you doubt this, note the in-
fluence of jazz upon the young and restless
age.
"Architecture has long made allowance for
organ-lofts in churches, and now the modern
home demands similar consideration. The in-
stallation of a pipe-organ within the four walls
of home is no longer a novelty, so soon it will
be considered a necessary background in the
furnishing of a music-room.
"On the concert stage the grand piano must
be depended upon to furnish the entire musical
background, since a bare stage is preferred by
all except the vaudevillians, who dress up both
stage and piano, perhaps in order to appeal as
much to the eye as to the ear of the audience.
See Nothing
"We who sit staring at the great piano really
see nothing at all, for the psychology of the
performance is to focus attention upon the
artist rather than upon his instrument. For a
long time we merely guessed at the make of the
piano. If it were extraordinarily battered and
chipped we knew it was a Steinway, this veteran
in the field of instruments.
"As the Mason & Hamlin, the Steinway,
the Knabe, the Weber, the Baldwin and other
fine instruments became popular with concert
performers, a rivalry developed in making the
piano slightly less inconspicuous. This was
done by a gold-lettered sign hung over the
side, or a line at the foot of the program.
However, we challenge you to deny that the
public is still in the dark as to what make
of piano an artist prefers. The instrument has
been too long a mere background.
"The average piano catalog thrills no one
except the manufacturer and dealer. This is
due to the method of illustration, which places
a meaningless cut against a dead white or
tinted background. There the piano has no
setting at all. Some wise dealers, however,
are waking up to the correct methods of show-
ing pianos, and we find windows and booklets,
reproducing instruments in appropriate settings,
showing a corner of the music or living room,
or perhaps the entire floor space and walls.
"Next to the lady of the house comes the
piano as an essential article of furniture. And,
like the wife, it should be the best one can
find, not makeshift, cheap and showy stock.
The piano and talking machine are sentient
objects, affected by heat, cold, care and neglect,
quite as human beings are.
Suffer From Ignorance
"Like many wives, the majority of musical
instruments suffer from the ignorance of those
about them. The dealer fortunate enough to
obtain an order for an instrument should be
able to give an expert opinion as to the placing,
the proportions of the room and even the qual-
ity and design of the other furnishings. It does
not hurt a dealer to know whether a piano re-
sponds better when placed on a Chinese rug or
left upon the bare floor. The clash of woods
used in floor, beam-ceilings, chairs and other
features should be his concern. Even the posi-
tion of the room enters into his decision as
to where the piano shall rest and why should
an architect be the one authority consulted in
the placing of windows and alcoves in the room
dedicated to harmonies?
"We shall yet live to see community kitchens,
doing away with the family stove and ice-box.
Maybe we shall have dormitories for sleeping
purposes. But never, as long as people respond
to that voice of music which becomes eloquent
when words end, shall we abandon the instru-
ments which, now the backgrounds of sweet
concord, will take their place in the foreground
of human possessions, cherished alike for what
they are in themselves as well as for what they
hold within, of inspiration and exceeding great
joy."
PREMIER GRAND TO EXHIBIT
Important Announcement Will Also Be Made
at the Convention—Representatives of East
and West to Be There
The Premier Grand Piano Corp., New York,
is planning an elaborate exhibit during conven-
tion week in Chicago at the Hotel Drake. This
exhibit will be held in Suite 711-714 and will
comprise nine different and distinctive styles of
I'remier products.
In accordance with its usual custom the cor-
poration will make an important announcement
at the convention regarding the addition to its
already extensive line of several new models.
The exhibit will be in charge of W. C. Hep-
perla, president of the company, who will be
assisted by Charles Grundy, Middle Western
representative, and Charles V. Boothe, Pac'fic
Coast representative.
REHMER MUSIC CO. OPENS
MISSOULA, MONT., May 15.—A new music house
called the Schaefer-Rehmer Music Co. has been
opened here at 130 Higgins avenue, in the build-
ing formerly occupied by the Rowland Co.
The strongest endorsement ever given a piano action was
that given the
STRAUCH BROS.
Grand and Upright
Piano Actions
by the Judges at Chicago in 1893.
They declared:
"The Piano Actions Manufactured by Strauch Bros,
deserve the Highest Commendation and are First Class
in Every Respect."
These actions have possessed this high reputation for
quality nearly sixty years.
Strauch Bros., Inc.
327-347 Walnut Avenue, at East 141st Street,
New York.
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