Reference John Tuttle's remarks about the "Howe Collection" at IPAM
(International Piano Archive at Maryland) in MMD 01.02.08.

First of all, I am the founder of the organization, although you'd
never know it in terms of their credits in publications.  In 1965 in
Cleveland, Ohio, I, having acquired a Steinway Duo-Art "M" (completely
rebuilt) and over time a collection of some 1,000 Duo-Art rolls,
decided that something should be done to preserve this remarkable
treasure trove of classical recordings.  Together with a young
associate of mine, Gregor Benko, we formed the IPL (International Piano
Library) and it was decided almost at once to move it to New York, as
support in Cleveland was lacking.

In 1966, I followed Benko to upper Broadway where we established the
archive in the basement of one of the large apartment buildings there.
Unable to stand New York from a variety of standpoints, I returned to
Cleveland in 1967, leaving my piano and roll collection with Benko.
I resigned my position as Vice President at the time.  He continued
building the collection until 1977, when negotiations with the
University of Maryland resulted in their acquiring the archive.  By
that time it had grown to some 40,000 artifacts, including every piano
recording (78 rpm), LP, tape, sheet music, books on music, etc. etc.,
that could be located.

The University appointed a curator under the general supervision of
the Music Librarian and the Executive Director of the Library.  Both
men left in a few years (the Music Librarian died) and a new team was
appointed.  They are Bruce Wilson and the now-curator, Donald Manildi.

Benko was retained as consultant, but I, having resigned my position,
was not consulted on any matters pertinent to the development of the
archive.  I had reclaimed my piano in the early years, but left my
Duo-Art collection with them.  Further, with $5,000 raised in
Cleveland, we had purchased the so-called "Woods Collection" -- the
master rolls retained by the one-time editor, W. Creary Woods, and
that group of some 500 rolls was added to the lot.  Further, and more
recently, Richard J. Howe of Texas donated his collection of all the
printed matter issued by the roll recording companies, and this is the
stash to which John Tuttle refers.

When I visited in 1997, it was still in the original boxes and no
attempt had been made to assess it at that time.  (John's remark
suggests that it _still_ hasn't been examined.)  Prior to this, the
Harry Anderson collection of some 8,000 78-rpm recordings of every
known piano performance had been received.  During the years of Benko's
stewardship, he did augment the collection of Duo-Art rolls with
others, notably Welte and a few Ampicos.

So far, so good?  Not on your tracker bar!  Their attitude to the rolls
is that of bare tolerance, based in part on a bad experience they had
with the failed NPR (National Public Radio) project.

The author of the book "The Steinway Saga," Don Fostle, had convinced
NPR to mount a 13-week hour-long series devoted to the great performers
contained on the Duo-Art rolls.  Harold Schonberg, long time reviewer
for the New York Times was "sucked in" to act as host and commentator.
I use those words in terms of my feelings that Harold (whom I know
reasonably well) was sorry he had agreed to lend his name to the
project, as it was in every way compromised.  The Steinway "D" with
Duo-Art utilized was not properly adjusted, particularly in terms of
the fact that Aeolian had edited the rolls for the average Duo-Art
grand, up to the 7-foot "B".  There were very few concert grands (9')
produced during the life of the company.

As a result, everything was both too loud and too fast, resulting in
some cases as a real travesty of the performance.  The radio station
for which I work declined to air them, but I obtained the
Busoni/Grainger edition, and was able to comment as above on the basis
of hearing that.  NPR, by the way, created a 2-CD set derived from the
complete series.  It was so bad that it included (I'm not kidding!) the
words, spoken by the producer, "Never mind... keep the tape rolling."
This became included in the produced set offered at $19.95 to NPR
members.

To conclude this lengthy tale, the NPR folk never supplied IPAM with
tape copies of the sessions (as they had agreed) and were negligent
with the rolls in some cases and dilatory in returning them.  As a
result IPAM established a non-co-operative role, which has been
maintained to the present.  Manildi told me that were they to agree to
lend rolls, they would have to charge a fee, and require a $500.00 bond
for the use.

As is clear from the above, they are simply going to house the
rolls until they deteriorate in coming years.  They have never had
a reproducing piano that worked properly, and never one which could
reproduce the Duo-Arts.  Recently I offered to contribute $2,000 of
my personal money towards the $10,000 asking price for Tom Steuer's
fabulous all-purpose Vorsetzer.

"Just think," said I, "you could place your existing reproducing pianos
(they have four) on eBay and the proceeds could be used (at least in
part, anyway) to pay the difference of $8,000.  You could finally
reproduce all the Duo-Art, Ampico and Welte rolls in your collection."

They pretended to deliberate over a period of three weeks, but had no
real intention of acquiring the instrument.  Finally, I received a
two-line letter from Manildi, addressed to "Mr. Petrak" (although we
were colleagues in years past) stating that "we have decided not to
pursue this matter."

The lesson to be learned is that co-operation relative to matters
relating to the rolls will be unproductive.  IPAM owns, as a matter of
fact, one of Wayne Stahnke's remarkable SE-290 Boesendorfer "Imperial"
concert grands, but it gets little use, and is certainly not regarded
as central to the operation, with intent to systematically create an
archive of performance by present-day artists.  Oh, if one happens to
visit, he or she may be asked to record, but there is little emphasis
placed upon it.

In conclusion, let me state that every effort I've made to co-operate
with them, to develop programs to make use of the collection, to
establish there the cyberspace archive of scanned rolls I am attempting
with the RPRF, has been ignored.  It's a real dog-in-the-manger
operation, believe me.  You want information from them, or desire
copies of their treasures or any service they might render relative to
your needs?  Forget it.  Come here and we'll see if we can be of any
help, but if you are in California, or Dallas, Chicago, Cleveland for
that matter, or anyplace else -- lotsa luck.

With considerable regret I make these statements.  I had envisioned an
archive that would freely disseminate any and every article that might
be copied to anyone who desired it.

In short, it has become a museum.  You may look, but don't touch.

With considerable bitterness, I'm

Albert M. Petrak, Founder
The Reproducing Piano Roll Foundation