Phonograph Monthly Review, Vol. 4, No. 4 (1930-01)

The Phonograph Monthly Review 115 January, 1930 The United States Marine Band, with John Phillip Sousa as its Conductor, was then, as now, one of the best known military bands in the country. Mr. Sousa was approached on the sub- ject of having a section of the band make some records for Columbia. Apparently he was more amused than impressed by the suggestion; but he graciously consented to permit one of his assistant conductors to undertake the job and reap the reward It was impossible at that time to record a full band or orchestra but on a phono- graph cylinder ten or twelve instruments care- fully selected and properly placed produced a very good imitation of a full band and in com- parison with the wheezy band records then in vogue, the effect was startling realistic. United States Marine Band records had instant popular success and in a very short time they were in demand all over the United States and in prac- tically every foreign country where the phono- graph had been introduced. To a very large extent they were responsible for the rapid growth of the,Columbia Company and for the still more interesting fact that it is the only survivor of the original group of phonograph companies of that early date. It was a natural step as “Columbia Records” became more widely known and used, for the Company to reach outside of local musical circles for its talent and to bring artists from New York, Chicago and other larger musical centers to Washington to make records. Jules Levy, then billed as “the world’s greatest cornet virtuoso” was one of the first musicians of international reputation who made a special trip to Washington to record for Columbia. Billy Golden, a negro minstrel entertainer of relative obscurity became nationally known as the result of his Columbia records—“Turkey in the Straw” and “Rabbit Hash” being two of his specialties which were enormously popular for many years on disc records long after the cylinder record had passed into the discard. The oral announcement at the beginning of each cylinder—such as “Washington Post March, played by the United States Marine Band, re- corded by the Columbia Phonograph Company of Washington I). C.” (the identification of “New York and Paris” being a later substitution) — had much to do with popularizing Columbia re- cords ; the sound of a human voice issuing from a machine apparently being just as attractive to listeners as the music itself. After the art of reproduction from a master record (or “duplicating” as it was then called) was developed, and later succeeded by the process of plating the master and molding replicas, the fees paid to vocalists and musicians to make re- cordings were greatly increased, but the cost of producing the commercial record was considera- bly reduced the selling price was correspondingly reduced and for many years Columbia’s factories in the United States, England and France were taxed to their capacity to meet the demand. With the adoption of the engraving (or “graphophone”) principle to recording on discs, the latter form of record steadily increased in public favor and eventually pushed the cylinder record so completely into the back ground that it ceased to be a profitable article of merchandise. Columbia issued its last monthly list of cylinder records in January 1909, and in the latter part of the sam!e year it entirely discontinued manufac- ture of cylinder records, dismantled its cylinder manufacturing equipment and used the space thus released for the enlargement of its disc record making facilities. Columbia cylinder records after twenty years of world-wide renown, passed into history twenty years ago; and Mr. Walsh’s inquiry marks the fortieth anniversary of “Columbia Records.” Some Russian Records By ROBERT DONALDSON DARRELL I N THE concert music repertory of a half- century ago the Russian element was inconspicuous if not actually non-existent. But the seeds planted by Glinka and Dargominsky in the incredibly fecund sub-soil of Russian folk lore and encouraged by pioneer European spirits as John Field, Berlioz, and Liszt, flowered sud- denly and magnificently. Balikirew and his little group set feverish, reckless hands to paper and almost without serious musical training opened up amazing new vistas. Tchaikowsky and the more Germanized school dabbled more cautiously in pure Russianism, but even they could not escape the spirit in the air. To the Western world this new and exotic music was a revelation and concert audiences were enchanted with Rimlsky's magical kaleidoscope, Scheherazade, Tchaikowsky's apotheoses of emotion, and the myriad works that followed them so closely. The wholesale absorption of everything labelled “Made in Russia” for a time threatened to put Tchaikowsky above Beethoven and Wagner; it certainly resulted in reducing the Volga Boat- men's song to the national anthem of the movie emporiums. Tin Pan Alley eventually made the rapturous “discovery” of this easily accesible wealth of material and has tilled it indefatigably ever since. But not all the music-hearing public was in the class of the New Yorker who, hearing White- man's jazzed version of the Song of India and