Topic: Music Trade Review 1880-1954

[uncle bud]

Don't think this one has been mentioned here before. Someone has scanned a helluva lot of issues of Music Trade Review and Presto, two historical music trade weeklies, and put them online in PDF format. They are music industry trade publications which have a lot of information on old instruments. If you're looking for background info on your weirdly named and dubious instrument(s) from the first half of the 20th century, this may be a useful resource. Or if you're looking for a dead tenor banjo teacher, ads for piano rolls or folding organs, or info about talking machines, this is for you. I think Todd's new Fraulini ad would have fit right in.

http://www.arcade-museum.com/

For some reason, it's online at a coin-operated arcade machine history website.

[dj]

if you're looking for a dead tenor banjo teacher

How did you know?   

[onewent]

oh man, there goes another 100 hrs of my life 

[onewent]

..well, already lost about 2 hrs scanning the journals, but I discovered that weenie's own Mr. O. Muck in was in pretty heady company back in the day!  check this list from the MTR 

C. F. MARTIN & CO., INC., Nazareth, Pa.
620. Exhibit of Martin guitars and other string
instruments. In charge: C. Frederick Martin. In
attendance: John J. Shea.
MAYBERG CO., INC., 1860 Broadway, New York.
709. Musical instrument insurance.
MUCK & SONS, INC., J. R., 125 E. 126th St., New
York.
745. Band instrument accessories.
NATIONAL DOBRO CORP., 400 S. Peoria, Chicago,
111.
701-702. The Dobro line of guitars and mandolins.
In charge of Harry Gerstin. Sales Mgr.

[Cambio]

God Bless you Uncle Bud. 
T

[Mr.OMuck]

Yes back in the day, actually maybe only as far back as twenty years ago there was a small obscure shop dealing in old and oddball instruments called Rudy Muck. I believe it was on 46th or 47th street. Its last incarnation was on 57th St. in a second or third floor space in a building hard by the Steinway piano showroom. Its most memorable association for me was when my schoolmate at the High School of Music & Art, Eric Bibb showed up at school one day with an ancient huge voiced Stella or Stella like Twelve string or twelve string harp guitar contraption which filled me with awe and deep green envy. I of course asked where he'd found such a beast, in the vain hope that perhaps there was another one lying around. The answer delivered like an edict of lost forever guitar longing was, RUDY MUCK! Come to think of it it was right around the time that my stage moniker Grungie O'Muck was rolled out for a one week trial. If it didn't produce the desired effect, the next week I intended to appear as Blind Charlie Hingemoan.
I hope i'm remembering the details of this correctly. An alternate scenario gnawing at my brainstem has me playing the guitar at Muck's and finding out in discussing it with him later that Eric had snatched it up. Well forty years is a long time so it was something like one or both of those.

[danielus]

Dear members,

Im Daniel Vissi, music researcher. Im looking for this reference:

Post, Charles N. "The Origin and Growth of the Guitar, Mandolin and Banjo
Industry in America." Music Trades v. 26, n. 24 p.77, 1903.

I understand the name of periodical is "Music Trade Review". Im searching on service http://www.arcade-museum.com/library/search-music/
But I have any result. Could you help to me?

Thanks!!!
Dani

[Rivers]

You've probably already seen this Dani but I found an obituary piece for Charles N. Post, former head of Lyon & Healy, dated 1923:

http://presto.arcade-museum.com/PRESTO-1923-1937/PRESTO-1923-1937-03.pdf

It's not the piece you are seeking but sometimes 'things' lead you to other things.

And welcome to Weenie Campbell.

[Stuart]

Hi Dani:

It looks like it's archived at:

http://www.mbsi.org/mtr/

However, the Volume, Number and year don't seem to match.

I'll poke around later when I have more time.

"The Music Trades" is a different publication, cf:

http://www.worldcat.org/search?q=ti%3AThe+Music+Trades&qt=advanced&dblist=638

But the Volume, Number and Year still don't line up with what you're after.

Welcome to WC!

[Rivers]

I love browsing through those MTR editions. Clearly they were totally fixated on shifting pianos though.
It's a real shame non-keyboard instruments were not given equal weight, From that I guess we can deduce where the big profits were.

Dani, if you find out anything please let us know, sounds like a very interesting article that personally I would love to read.

[Stuart]

Hi Dani:

After exploring a bit further, I think that the article was published in "The Music Trades" and not in "The Music Trade Review." The citation for the article appears in several bibliographies and unless we're dealing with a mistake copied and then repeated,  my guess is that the periodical, "The Music Trades," is where you want to look.

A couple of years ago I checked on an early music industry publication for an acquaintance who also does research in this area. The librarian with whom I spoke told me that while many trade publications have been donated to libraries over the years, they tend to sit in storage and remain uncatalogued, due to both lack of demand and to limited resources. She said that  this is changing, however. My advice would be to ask a reference or research librarian at a library system that has a music library. He or she may be able to access resources that are unavailable to us mere mortals and assist you with your search for the article, possibly through inter-library borrowing or other services.

BTW, I ran across this in my meanderings:

https://www.areditions.com/books/IB035.html

It's by Jeffrey Noonan who's other book has been discussed here before, IIRC:

http://www.amazon.com/Guitar-America-Victorian-American-Music/dp/1604738545


You could also contact Jeff Noonan and ask him about the article.

[mr mando]

Dani, you could also try and contact Karen Linn through the Manuscript Division of the Library of Congress. She has cited tha article in question in her great book: "That Half-Barbaric Twang - The Banjo in American Popular Culture". Alternatively you could try to contact her through her publisher (University of Illinois Press).

[Stuart]

FYI, it appears that "The Music Trades" is still publishing--never stopped, for that matter. Here's the link:

http://www.musictrades.com/

http://www.musictrades.com/about.html


They probably don't have every issue ever published lying around, but they might know where to find them.

[Rivers]

One post from Dani and he's gone, perhaps never to return. You get that sometimes! 

Still we accumulated some useful research as a result,and added some tags.

[Stuart]

Yeah--He was probably looking for one specific answer or piece of information. For some of us, however, there's just no cure for curiosity. (--Paraphrasing Dorothy Parker, IIRC.)