Hello MMD readers,  Recent issues of the MMD (and some web sites)
attribute a business decline in pianos, players and/or rolls to the
current economy and the war going on in Iraq.  I received a letter from
my friend, Henry Z. Steinway, who recently returned from a trade show
on the West Coast, and he said that the Steinway & Sons enterprise is
in the black, albeit slightly down from a year ago.

In the case of Artcraft Music Rolls, I'm still dealing with backorders,
and new mail-order customers continue to arrive on a regular basis.
It's my opinion that a "shaking out" is going on in the music field.
Products which are of the top quality will continue to attract new
people.  Middle-of-the-road or shoddy offerings might fall by the
wayside and experience a dwindling of sales.

This happened to other fields some time ago.  The "Estabrook",
"Wearever" and other 'dime store' fountain pens of my youth have
vanished, to be replaced with "BIC", "Flair" and other disposable
ballpoint equivalents.  However, fine writing instruments (as
expensive pens are now called) continue to be offered all the time,
and with special editions: "Pelikan", "Montblanc", "Schaeffer" and many
others, in the 3- to 4-digit range.  The fountain pen, once an essential,
is now an upscale product, but it has a loyal and growing pool of
enthusiasts.

Let's face it -- in music rolls "sheet music transfers" are like warm
milk in the evening, after you've heard a series of several of them
back to back.  I'm happy that I began perforating for the performance
aspect back in the 'Fifties, instead of remaining glued to an
arranging formula or going through the motions of converting sheet
music notation standards to a linear format.  Leabarjan perforator
manuals and demonstration rolls merely detailed how to 'lay out' sheet
music notation, but I never used my equipment for that purpose.

I'm aware of the present battle and especially the economic effect it
could have in the future, including with my niche enterprise, now in
its 21st year under the Artcraft label. (Fifty-one years, total, to
date, mark my involvement in the roll field, actually.)  Some experts
in military costs have estimated $800 billion/year for our bombardment
of Iraq, and that $75 billion recently requested was merely a
down payment for a "Cakewalk" that would last only a few weeks,
according to Kenneth Adelman, who kept applying that syncopated dance
music word to the invasion when it was being proposed.

What will happen to our cities, like New Haven, if this drags on, one
can only guess while cringing.  Certainly all musical enterprises,
including mine, will be affected when the big costs begin arriving.

I did see the handwriting on the wall last December, and so cancelled
our third season of Pianola concerts up in Searsport in order to spend
more hours in my studio and not spread myself so thin at this
particular time.  As it turns out, I've been involved in weekly peace
vigils on Maine bridges (Bridges for Peace), armed with a candle for
the evening ones, and a sign for the Sunday protests at Noon.  There
are 25 bridges involved, with peace advocates standing for an hour's
time, primarily on U.S. 1, our coastal route.  Each weekend people in
about 2/3 to 3/4 of the passing vehicles honk horns and wave their
approval.

Maine is, of course, the State of Margaret Chase Smith, an honest and
stalwart politician with genuine integrity.  She alone stood up to the
McCarthy witch hunts of the 'Fifties, breaking from her Republican
ranks.  I have the feeling that were she alive today she'd be on a
bridge in Skowhegan.

Meanwhile, let the "quality" music, play on!

Regards,
Douglas Henderson
http://www.wiscasset.net/artcraft/