WASHINGTON UNIVERSITY Department of Music Dissertation Examination Committee: Craig Alan Monson, Chair Fatemeh Keshavarz Hugh Macdonald Dolores Pesce Jeff Smith Robert Snarrenberg ‘THE GUITAR IN AMERICA AS REFLECTED IN TOPICAL PERIODICALS, 1882 - 1933 by Jeffrey James Noonan Volume I A dissertation presented to the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences of Washington University in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy May 2004 St. Louis, MissouriUMI Number: 3139863 Copyright 2004 by Noonan, Jeffrey James Alll rights reserved, INFORMATION TO USERS The quality of this reproduction is dependent upon the quality of the copy submitted. Broken or indistinct print, colored or poor quality illustrations and photographs, print bleed-through, substandard margins, and improper alignment can adversely affect reproduction. In the unlikely event that the author did not send a complete manuscript and there are missing pages, these will be noted. Also, if unauthorized ‘copyright material had to be removed, a note will indicate the deletion. UMI UMI Microform 3139863 Copyright 2004 by ProQuest Information and Learning Company. All rights reserved. This microform edition is protected against unauthorized copying under Title 17, United States Code. ProQuest Information and Learning Company 300 North Zeeb Road P.O. Box 1346, ‘Ann Arbor, MI 48106-1346© Copyright by Jeffrey James Noonan 2004Acknowledgements In the four years consumed by this project, numerous institutions and individuals have provided me with assistance, support, and encouragement, I welcome the ‘opportunity to recognize them. In the early stages, the staff of the Music Division of the Library of Congress responded quickly and generously to my requests for information about and reproductions of the periodicals that have been my primary sources. The staff of Washington University’s Gaylord Music Library helped me identify relevant source and support materials, fetching it (numerous times) without complaint when it was in the Gaylord collection and reeling it in from other sources when it was not. While all of the staff offered me such assistance, I especially thank Music Librarian Bradley Short, Music Cataloger Mark Scharff, and Music Library Assistant Paul Hahn. Thave also drawn on the collections of other institutions, and thank them for sharing their expertise and their holdings. These include Kent ‘ary of Southeast Missox State University; the Newberry Library; the New York Public Library for the Performing Arts; Special Collections of Skillman & Kirby Libraries of Lafayette College; Boston University College of Music ibrary; and the Rare Book, Manuscript, and Special Collections Library of Duke University. I also thank Donald Sauter, of Washington, D.C., for his assistance in identifying and locating several pieces of music. My colleagues at Southeast Missouri State University monitored the progress of this work, offering me a good balance of support, empathy, and badgering. Dean Martin Jones of the College of Liberal Arts, and Drs. Robert Fruehwald and Gary Miller, iichairpersons of the Music Department, fully supported my work and tolerated my occasional absences from campus to read, write, and think, In the Music Department, my good friends Drs, Brandon Christensen and Sterling Cossaboom, and Steven Hendricks offered me support, good humor, and the occasional drink. 1 owe Dr. Mare Strauss, of the Department of Theater and Dance at Southeast, thanks for the sincere interest and badgering encouragement he provided at our weekly dinner meetings. As | formulated this project, Drs. Peter Danner and Thomas Heck, the leading scholars of the classical guitar in America, offered me suggestions and encouragement. I thank Dr. Danner, as well, for access to his unpublished paper on the nineteenth-century American guitar. Dr. Steven Ehrlich, a fine guitarist and Assistant Dean of Washington University’s University College, offered enthusiastic support of and pertinent questions about this project. 1 enjoyed an afternoon of mandolins and conversation with Paul Ruppa, director of the Milwaukee Mandolin Orchestra, and thank him for his insights, ideas, and hospitality. Dr. Brian Torosian of Northen Illinois University and I used some of the same primary sources in our concurrent research and I thank him for sharing ideas and data, As I neared the end of this project, Tim Brookes engaged me in an on- going e-mail dialogue about the guitar in America. His stimulating questions about my work forced me to reconsider, rethink, and rewrite. I owe a great debt to my former student, Robert Ferguson of Fort Wayne, IN., who has become, in the many years since we worked together, a true scholar of the guitar in America, Besides graciously sharing results and ideas from his own research, Bob read much of this document in early drafts. He has spared me publi embarrassment by identifying mistakes, inaccuracies, and iii‘weaknesses in those early drafts My committee of patient and talented scholars at Washington University has offered me the benefit of their extensive experience. I thank Drs. Fatemeh Keshavarz. and Jeff Smith, my non-departmental readers, for their insightful questions and commentary. Readers from Washington University’s Department of Musie—Professors Craig Monson, Dolores Pesce, Hugh Macdonald, and Robert Snarrenberg—provided valuable insights, pointed criticism, appreciated encouragement, and professional example. I thank Professor Pesce especially for her close readings, scholarly queries, and sound critiques of my text. As chairperson of the Music Department, Dr. Snarrenberg has been an advocate to the Graduate School for me as well as a sounding board on various professional and musical issues. 1 gratefully thank him for his good humor, professional respect, and advocacy. As principal reader on this committee, Dr. Craig Monson has served as a role model, prod, critic, and occasional cheer-leader, His editorial eye and ear demand excellence and his critical evaluations brook no intellectual laziness. I could not have asked for better critiques, editorial suggestions, and professional encouragement. He has my sincere respect and thanks. This project has dominated much of my life for four years, controlling conversations, dictating my social life, and demanding almost undivided attention. My wife, Nancy Bristol, has tolerated my late hours, stacks of books and papers, and distracted demeanor with unstinting good humor and heartfelt support. She will be glad to know that | am, in fact, finally done with this thing and that I have dedicated it to her. ivTABLE OF CONTENTS Page Acknowledgements... Table of Contents. List of Tables. Vii List of Figures... viii List of Musical Examples... Chapter 1. Introduction. 2. Music, Magazines, and Commerce to 1880... 9 The American Music Periodical to 1880. 12 Advertising, Mass Production and the BMG Magazines +23 3. The Guitar in America to 1880.. 4. Organological Development of the Guitar in BMG Periodicals. 5. Guitar Technique in the BMG magazines... Seating Position and Support of the Guitar... Left-Hand Fingering and Shifting..... Right-Hand Position and Fingerings.... 11S, 6. Music for the Amateur. 136 Ensemble Musi 157 Guitar Solos. 165 Theme and Variation Sets... 2174Solos from Europe’s Nineteenth-Century Masters. 7. Music for the Professional in the BMG Magazines... 8. Depictions of the Guitar in the BMG magazines. Representing the Guitar, Troubadours and Serenaders... 241 Latin Lovers... 257 The Song of Love. 273 Promotion of BMG Ideals. 275 9. Women and the Guitar in the BMG Magazines. 286 Early Women Guitarists in the Magazines... Female Stereotypes in the BMG Literature......... +004 289 ‘A New Generation of Women Players. 298 Cadenza's Hudson Girls....... Vahdah Olcott-Bickford as Hudson Girl... 10. Late Influences: Jazz and Spain. 11. SS. Stewart's Banjo & Guitar Journal... 12. Gatcomb's Musical Gazette.. 13. The New York Musical Era. 14, The Elite Banjoist and The Chicago Trio........ 15, The Cadenza 16. The F.0.G. Mandolin, Banjo and Guitar Journal and The American Music Journal. 17. The Crescendo... vi18. Summary and conelusions......... Appendices: A. Guitar Music Published in the BMG Periodicals, 639 B, Professional & Semi-profé jional Guitar Repertoire Documented in the BMG Periodicals. Bibliography. TB4 viiTables Table Page 11.1. Music for Guitar Published in S.S. Stewart's Journal. . 406 Figures Unless otherwise noted, figures have been taken from periodical held in The Music Division, Library of Congress. Figure Page 4.1. Full-page advertisement for J.E. Henning Guitars Chicago Trio 1 (October-November 1897): 21... 64 4.2. Full-page advertisement for F.0.G. Guitar F.0.G. Journal 4/2 (January-February 1904): 19. 4.3. Full-page advertisement for Bauer Guitar Stewart's Journal 16/3 (August-September 1899): 32... 4.4. Full-page advertisement for Gibson instruments Crescendo 2/7 (January 1910): 1 4.5. Half-page advertisement for Gibson instruments Crescendo 1/6 (December 1908): 1..... 4.6. Quarter-page advertisement for Dyer Harp Guitars Cadenza 11/11 (July 1905): 6. .77 4.7. Full-page advertisement for Gibson Harp Guitars Cadenza 15/1 (July 1908): 10. 4.8. Quarter-page advertisement for Dyer Harp Guitars Crescendo 2/11 (May 1910): 26........-eees 85 4.9, Full-page advertisement for F.O.G instruments F.0.G. Journal 4/3 (March-April 1904): inside back cover. 4.10. Quarter-page advertisement for Meyer’s Contra-Bass Guitar Cadenza 22/2 (August 1915): 41 viii4.11. De Main Wood and his Orchestral Guitar Cadenza 12/7 (March 1906): 30. 5.1, “Manner of Holding the Guitar,” from Carcassi’s Complete Edition for the Guitar ([Philadelphia]. W.F. Shaw, 1884), 11 5.2. Illustration for “How to Hold the Guitar” by J. W. Freeman Cadenza 2/5 (May-June 1896): 101 5.3, Bthel Lucretia Olcott American Music Journal 5/11 (Sune 1906): 29. 105 5.4, William Foden demonstrating seating position Foden's Grand Method for Guitar, Book 1, (New York. Wm. J. Smith Music Company, 1920), frontispiece.........108 5.5, Scale exercises from C.F-E. Fiset, “A System of Technique for the Guitar,” “Stewart's 16/3 (August-September 1899): 16..... 113 8.1, Cover, Stewart's 2/11 (August-September 1884)... 233 8.2. Table of musical contents page Stewart's 8/5 (December 1891-January 1892)...........0000. 234 8.3. Advertisement for John E. Henning Stewart's 3/3 (April-May 1885): 5 236 8.4, Pull-page advertisement for Bauer Guitar Stewart's 11/5 (December 1894 January 1895): 31... 237 8.5. Full-page advertisement for F.0.G. Guitar F.0.G. ll (November-December 1903): 19... 1238 8.6. Full-page advertisement for Gibson instruments Cadenza 17/7 (January 1911): 2. 242 8.7. Full-page advertisement for Gibson Guitar Crescendo 14/3 (September 1921): 19. 8.8. Full-page advertisement for Gibson Gui Crescendo 18/2 (August 1925): 19. 244 8.9. Quarter-page advertisement for Dyer Harp-guitar Crescendo 2/11 (May 1910): 26. 245 ix8.10, 8.11 8.12, 8.13. 8.14, 8.15, 8.16. 8.17, 8.18. 8.19, 8.20. 821. 8.22. 8.23. 8.24. 8.25. 8.26. 8.27. Quarter-page advertisement for Martin Guitar Crescendo 14/11 (May 1922): 21. 246 Full-page advertisement for Vega Guitar Crescendo 18/5 (November 1925): 1......+++» 247 3/4.page advertisement for Washburn instruments Chicago Trio 1/1 (October-November 1897): back cover... E251 Cover, Cadenza 12/11 (October 1905)... Cover, Crescendo 20/6 (December 1927)........+ 2252 Full-page advertisement for “Troubadours Overture” Cadenza 6/4 (March-April 1900): 36. Header for “The Serenaders”..........+ Crescendo 8/6 (December 1915) “Nicolai Bruno,” illustration for “Carrara and His Guitarra” Cadenza 5/6 (July-August 1899): 16. 267 “Angelo Carrara,” illustration for “Carrara and His Guitarra” Cadenza 5/6 (July-August 1899): 17. +268 Cover, Cadenza 12/4 (December 1905)...... 270 Cover, Cadenza 12/10 (June 1906), Cover, Cadenza 13/8 (April 1907). 1272 Full-page advertisement for Gibson instruments Cadenza 27/11 (December 1920): 16..... 276 Cover, Crescendo 1/1 (July 1908)..... 1.278 Cover, Crescendo 19/4 (October 1926). 2279 Cover, Crescendo 20/8 (February 1928), n.280 Cover, Cadenza 19/8 (February 1913). 2281 Cover, Cadenza 21/7 (January 1915)...csssssseseeeeeeeeennene 2839.1. “Ladies’ Euterpean Club of Cleveland, 0.” Cadenza 4/3 (Sanuary-February 1898): 13 291 9.2. Quarter-page advertisement for C.L. Partee Music Cadenza 5/4 (March-April 1899): 39. 1.292 9.3. Half-page advertisement for Howe-Orme instruments Cadenza Vol. 4/1. (September-October 1897): 17. 305 9.4. Half-page advertisement for music by F.I. Newell F.0.G., 2/5 (July-August 1902): 11 306 9.5: Charles Dana Gibson, detail from “On Dry Land,” from The Education of Mr. Pipp, By Charles Dana Gibson (New York: R.H. Russell, 1899). oe 9.6. Cover, Cadenza 7/10 (Sune 1901)....+-.000 ee 310) 9.7. Cover, Cadenza 7/12 (August 1901)... 3H 9.8, Cover, Cadenza 7/11 (July 1901). e312 9.9. Cover, Cadenza 8/1 (September 1901)......se:ssssesssssecsereecesseeseneeee 315 9.10. Cover; Cadenza 8/3 (November 1901).....-..+++ 9.11. Cover; Cadenza 8/4 (December 1901).. 9.12. Cover; Cadenza 9/1 (September 1902).. 9.13. Cover, Cadenza 11/1 (September 1904)... 9.14. Cover; Cadenza 9/12 (August 1903). +322 9.15. Cover; Cadenza 10/3 (November 1903)..... 323 9.16. Cover; Cadenza 9/4 (December 1902)...... 2324 9.17. Cover; Cadenza 10/4 (December 1903)...... +325 9.18. Cover; Cadenza 12/1 (September 1905):.. 9.19. Portrait, Ethel Lucretia Olcott American Music Journal 5/11 (Sune 1906): 29.9.20. 9.21. 10.1 13.1, 16.1. Vat Biographical sketch, “Mrs. Vahdah Olcott-Bickford Cadenza 24/1 (January 1917): 15 336 Naney Palmer as a Christy Gi 1337 Account of Andres Segovia’s American debut, Crescendo 20/8 (February 1928), 1 seceeceeeeee 1355 Full-page advertisement for C. Edgar Dobson New York Musical Era 1/8 (November 1890). 426 Cover, F.0.G. Mandolin, Banjo and Guitar Journal 2/1 (November-December 1901).. fora 546 Cover, Crescendo 23/4 (December 1930). 624 xiiMusical Examples Music Example 6.1 he Delight Waltz” by E.H. Frey, Excerpt (mss, 1-20) Stewart's 7/2 (Sune-July 1890): 14-15. cee 6.2. “Song to the Evening Star from Tannhauser” by Richard Wagner, arr. by HLF, Odell, Crescendo 24/4 (December 1931): 5-7, 10-11 6.3. “Mistletoe Waltz” by J.C. Folwell (excerpts) Crescendo 4/10 (April 1912): 18...... 6.4. “Old Black Joe” by Stephen Foster, arr. R.E. Hildreth Cadenza 24/5 (May 1917): 31.. 6.5. “Drink to Me Only with Thine Eyes” arr. R.E. Hildreth Cadenza 30/7 (July 1923): 32... Page 161 164 168 AN ATL 6.6. “The Celebrated ‘Miserere,” II Trovatore" by G. Verdi, arr. W.F. Bischoff Elite Banjoist \/2 (January-February 1901): 11 6.7. Theme: “Believe Me If All Those Endearing Young Charms” by Thomas Moore, arr. Clarence Parte Cadenza 3/6 (July-August 1893): 20-22. 6.8. Variation I: “Believe Me If All Those Endearing Young Charms” by Thomas Moore, arr. Clarence Partee Cadenza 3/6 (July-August 1893): 20-22. 6.9. Variation II: “Believe Me If All Those Endearing Young Charms” by Thomas Moore, arr. by Clarence Partee Cadenza 3/6 (July-August 1893):20-22. 6.10. Finale: “Believe Me If All Those Endearing Young Charms” by Thomas Moore, arr. Clarence Partee Cadenza 3, 6 (July-August 1893): 20-22... 6.11. “Valse, op. 18/1” by Fernando Sor New York Musical Era 1/7 (October 1890): xiii wal 73 180 182 182 +183 1876.12, Excerpt: “Andante, from Op. 11” by Fernando Sor “Revised and fingered by Arling Shaeffer” Crescendo 11/1 (Suly 1918): 15. 189 6.13. Excerpt: “Russian Zigeunerlied (Chant Bohémien), Op. 88” by J.K. Mertz Cadenza 17/3 (September 1910): 24-25. 2194 6.14. Excerpt: “Russian Zigeunerlied (Chant Bohémien), Op. 88” Be Mertz Cadenza 17/3 (September 1910): 24-25. an 194 6.15. Excerpt: “Russian Zigeunerlied (Chant Bohémien), Op. 88” by J.K. Mertz Cadenza 17/3 (September 1910): 24-25... 195 6.16. Excerpt: “Russian Zigeunerlied (Chant Bohémien), Op. 88” by J.K. Mertz Cadenza 17/3 (September 1910): 24-25. 195 6.17. Excerpt, original piano version: “Barcarole” by J.K, Metz ........csss0s197 6.17 (continued): Solo guitar version: “Barearole” by LK. Mertz, transcribed by Charles Dorn Crescendo 16/5 (November 1923): 16-17. 198 7.1. Guitar transcription and original piano solo: “Consolation, Song without Words No. 9” by Felix Mendelssohn, arr. by CH. Stickles; New York Musical Era 2/2 (February 1891): 7.2. Guitar transcription and original piano solo: “Confidence, Song without Words No. 4” by Felix Mendelssohn, arr. by CH. Stickles; New York Musical Era 2/1 (January 1891): 7... 7.3. Excerpt, original cello and C.F.E. Fiset guitar transcription: javotte II from Cello Suite #6,” BWV 1012 by J.S. Bach SS. Stewart’s 14/6 (February-March 1898): [14.15].......-+ 2209 7.4. Excerpt, original cello and C.F, Fiset guitar transcription: “Gavotte II from Cello Suite #6,” BWV 1012 by J.S. Bach SS. Stewart's 14/6 (February-March 1898): [14.15] 210 ccerpt, original cello and C.F.E. Fiset guitar transcription: votte II from Cello Suite #6,” BWV 1012 by J.S. Bach SS. Stewart's 14/6 (February-March 1898): [14.15] 2M 7.6. Introduction: “Alice, Where Art Thou arr. William Foden .. by Joseph Ascher, cane7.7. Theme: “Alice, Where Art Thou?” 2) Joseph Ascher, art. William Foden... 222 7.8. Excerpt: “Alice, Where Art Thou?” by Joseph Asc Vocal/piano version from Heart Songs (1909)... 222 7.9. Theme: “Alice, Where Art Thou?” by Joseph Ascher, arr. William Foden. 7.10. Variation III: “Alice, Where Art Thot arr. William Foden. 7.11. Finale: “Alice, Where Art Thou?” by Joseph Ascher, arr. William Foden.. xvChapter 1 Introduction The end of the nineteenth century and the early years of the twentieth witnessed a burgeoning popularity of the banjo, the guita ; and the mandolin, Professional virtuosi and tyro plunkers played the instruments on the stage, in the home, and in the concert hall as soloists and in ensembles. Between 1880 and 1910, a number of periodicals devoted to these plucked instruments—visible and vibrant manifestations of their popularity sprang up, primarily on the east coast and in the upper Midwest. ‘The moving forces behind these magazines included teachers, instrument manufacturers, music publishers, and distributors of musical accessories, using them to promote their instruction, their instruments, their sheet music, and other musical necessities. Even a quick glance at most of these periodicals confirms that they were created primarily to market products to American consumers. Concurrently, other magazines prided themselves on educating, enlightening, and uplifting their readers rather than selling products. Music educators, music critics, and performers of Victorian America promoted music as an art and science that elevated performing amateurs as well as their audiences. The editors of magazines devoted to plucked instruments professed the banjo, guitar, and mandolin to be as culturally significant as the orchestral and solo instruments of the European mainstream. They used their publications to legitimize and promote not just the instruments, but the role these instruments could play in America’s refined musical culture, Richard Crawford observed that “in the absence of settings of the kind that the church, the court, and the state have traditionally provided in Europe, music in the UnitedStates has depended chiefly on the success musicians have had in finding customers and serving their needs.”! The intersection of the popular magazine with music and music- making in America graphically demonstrates how some musicians sought success as performers, teachers, publishers, and businessmen as well as how some businessmen utilized music to foster their own version of success. Music was sold in magazines— sheet music to be sure, but more than that, too. Musie was marketed as a social skill, as a factor in a happy marriage and home, as a powerful civilizing force, and more, Music sold magazines, as well. Articles about musical performances, personalities, and events appeared in general interest and literary magazines, as did printed music, included as an inducement to the potential reader. The American desire and need to promote and to sell thus intersected with the art of music and music-making in the popular periodical and magazine in Vietorian America A cursory reading of selections from nineteenth-century periodicals devoted to the banjo, guitar, and mandolin could lead to the conclusion that the only common ground these editors and their publications shared was their subject matter, a desire to sell, and a general antipathy for each other. A closer look reveals, however, that these publications | Richard Crawford, The American Musical Landscape. The Business of Musicianship from Billings to Gershwin, (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1993), 41. Michael Broyles observes that this mix of the commercial and artistic is not an historical construct applied to the period by later historians: “Institutions capable of nurturing and promoting art music, convincing the public of its value, and making it accessible nationwide, had to be consistent with American society... Americans had to find a mix of private and civic support that was both worthy of the new reverence for art and consistent with cherished principles of democracy... Many musicians and patrons [in the nineteenth century] were keenly and consciously aware of the problem and the opposing, at times contradictory viewpoints.” Michael Broyles, “Art Music from 1860 to 1920,” in The Cambridge History of American Music, David Nicholls, ed. (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998), 216. bwere similar in a number of significant ways, not least of which is the fact that each reflected changes occurring at the intersections of music, commerce, and popular culture in America, These changes include 1) developments in the performance, semination, and reception of both popular and refined musics; 2) new approaches to magazine publication and distribution; 3) the establishment of advertising as an industry; 4) broad- based applications of mass production; and 5) the creation of a new culture of American consumerism. While this study considers these aspects of America’s late Victorian musical life, it focuses especially on how the magazines devoted to the banjo, mandolin, and guitar depicted the guitar in America’s musical culture, Several serious studies of the mandolin and banjo offer important information about the organological developments, playing techniques, and cultural significance of these instruments.” Each of these previous studies has touched on the association of the three instruments in the magazines and in the banjo and mandolin orchestras of the late nineteenth century, yet none questions the underlying causes or motives which united the banjo, mandolin, and guitar on the journal on the other hand, delve into the social and musical contexts of the two instruments and remain the best sources for mandolin and banjo in Victorian America: Scott Hambly, Mandolins in the United States Since 1880; An Industrial and Sociological History of Form, Ph. D. diss., University of Pennsylvania, 1977 (Ann Arbor, Mich.: UML, 1977); Phillip Gura and James F. Bollman, America’s Instrument: The Banjo in the Nineteenth Century (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1999) and Karen Linn, That Half-Barbaric Twang: The Banjo in American Popular Culture (Urbana & Chicago: University of Ilinois Press, 1994). A more recent study of the mandolin, while more circumscribed than Hambly’s, provides a helpful introduction to the mandolin orchestra. See, Paul Ruppa, The Mandolin in America Afier 1880 and The History of Mandolin Orchestras in Milwaukee, Wisconsin (M.Mus. thesis, University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, 1988),pages and in formal performance ensembles. This study also focuses on only one of the “trio instruments”, but unlike previous studies, it does not assume that the close association of the banjo, mandolin, and guitar in America in the late nineteenth century ‘was merely coincidental or a natural outgrowth of the instruments themselves. The argument of this dissertation rests on four points. First, the magazines of Victorian America which promoted the banjo, guitar, and mandolin did so by blending a view of music as a sacred, sublime art with an approach to America as a nation of| consumers, eager to enjoy the fruits of mass production, susceptible to the blandishments of new advertising tools, and searching for the means both to entertain and to better themselves. Second, prior to the final decades of the nineteenth century, the association of the guitar with the banjo and mandolin had been more coincidental than deliberate, In the late nineteenth century, however, publishers, editors, contributors, and advertisers consciously united the guitar with the banjo and mandolin on the pages of Banjo, Mandolin & Guitar (BMG) magazines. They went so far as to invent new instruments and create new ensembles that brought the three plectral instruments together. Third, apologists for the banjo and mandolin linked their instruments to the guitar in an attempt to counteract the association of those instruments with musically unsophisticated lower class populations. ‘The guitar—a refined, elevated instrument with a rationalized technique, a demanding and cultivated repertoire, and a venerable history associated with the royalty and nobility of Europe—offered the banjo and mandolin a cachet of upper- * Contributors to these magazines regularly lumped the banjo, mandolin, and guitar together as cither the “trio instruments” or the “plectral instruments.” These two terms will be used interchangeably throughout this study to describe this generic grouping of the three instruments.class sophistication. Last, the iconic associations of the guitar with Spain and Italy, sensuality and sexuality, love and lust, and other non-Victorian, anti-modernist themes, allowed contributors to and readers of the BMG magazines to dally with these low themes. At the same time, since most BMG advocates chose to play the banjo or ‘mandolin, the movement understood itself to be upholding the tenets of Victorian respectability This study begins with two introductory chapters. The first describes the development and proliferation of American music periodicals from the late eighteenth century up the 1880s, when the first BMG magazines appeared. This chapter offers an historical context for the BMG magazines, establishing some of their ties to America’s ‘magazine publishing industry as well as linking them to new developments in the industry which arose at the end of the ineteenth century. The next chapter, an historical survey of the guitar in America, describes the instrument's physical characteristics and its role in America’s musical life up to the 1880s. To date, no detailed history of the guitar, its repertoire, and its players in nineteenth-century America has been produced, and this chapter unites some of the disparate sources to create a context for the changes that occurred to the instrument in America from the 1880s into the 1930s. The study continues with chapters summarizing the magazines’ accounts of the guitar's physical development, its technique, and its music, as well as chapters devoted to visual and literary depictions of the guitar in the BMG magazines. The remaining chapters are devoted to more detailed examinations of individual magazines. The temporal parameters of this study have been dictated by two considerations, one strictly bibliographic and the other a combination of bibliographical, historical,organological, and cultural factors. Although music for the guitar and related instruments occasionally appeared in general interest magazines throughout the nineteenth century, the earliest extant periodicals dealing specifically and/or exclusively with plucked instruments were published only in the last twenty years of the century. Beginning in 1882, a number of periodicals—all products of music instrument manufacturers or distributors, publishers of print music, music teachers, or a combination of all three appeared with some frequency. Most were short-lived but several had very successful, extended runs. 1882, then, marks the first appearance of the core data supporting this study. The last two of the most suecessful periodicals directed to players of guitars, banjos, and mandolins had runs that extended to 1924 and 1933, respectively. Though other later American journals dealt with similar subject matter, these periodicals appear as a last vestige of an approach to and appreciation of these instruments that looks back to an earlier era. The closing date for this study corresponds to the demise of the last significant BMG magazine in 1933.4 As important as the final publication date of the last BMG magazine, however, two developments of the 1920s and 1930s signaled a sea-change in America’s guitar world. First, in January 1928, the young Spanish guitar virtuoso, Andres Segovia, made New York debut. The impact of this recital appearance and subsequent tours on the playing and teaching of the classical guitar in this country can hardly be overestimated “ Several journals of the later 1930s and 1940s continued the mission of the BMG movement, but they neither promoted the guitar in the same manner as the earlier magazines had nor did they achieve the wide-spread distribution of magazines like Stewart's, Cadenza, and Crescendo,Despite a lukewarm reception in some markets, the repertoire, the technique, the venues, and the audience for the guitar changed radically as the young Segovia came to be heard by guitarists and non-guitarists across the continent.> At approximately the same time, a major organological/technological development changed how music was made on and for the guitar. As early as the mid- 1920s, guitar designers such as Lloyd Loar of the Gibson company experimented with electronic amplification of the guitar.° And in the early 1930s, at least two commercially- produced amplified or “electric” guitars were offered to the American public.’ The electric guitar, one of the most American of American instruments, quickly changed the technique, repertoire, and popular perception of the instrument. Even before 1940, jazz. musicians were performing and recording with the electric guitar as players such as Charlie Chi broke new ground in American music.* * For a survey of early reactions to Segovia’s debut in America, see Guy Horn, “January 8", 1928: The Moment of Truth for the Classic Guitar in the United States.” Soundboard 20/3 (1994): 17-18; Peter Danner, .... “Segovia: A Postscript,” Soundboard 20/3 (1994): 19; and Ronald C. Purcell, “Letters From the Past: Segovia Perceived: The American Reaction of Segovia’s Arrival,” Soundboard 20/3 (1994): 20-24. © Tom and Mary Anne Evans, Guitars: Music, History, Construction and Players From the Renaissance to Rock (New York: Paddington Press, 1977), 338ff. 7 Ibid. See also, Steve Waksman, Instruments of Desire: The Electric Guitar and the Shaping of Musical Experience (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1999), 18ff. * Although not the first to record with an electric guitar, Christian is generally recognized as the player who defined how the new instrument would be used. See, Frank Tirro, Jazz: A History (New York: Norton, 1977), 242-245; and Waksman. Christian’s brief, but influential, recording career (1939 — 1941) was spent primarily with Benny Goodman’s small bands. Much of Christian's work can be heard on Charlie Christian, The Complete Studio Recordings, (Definitive Classics, 2001), compact disk 11176. 7These two events—Segovia’s impact on American guitar playing and pedagogy, and the development and promotion of an electric version of the instrument—pointed to new paradigms and new roles for the guitar in this country. Both were reported in Crescendo, the last of the great BMG magazines. Its demise in 1933, coupled with these important developments, signaled the end of a golden age for America’s BMG commun ry and serves as an appropriate marker for the end of this study.Chapter 2 Music, Magazines and Commerce in America to 1880 A student of American music magazines and periodicals published over the past two centuries is immediately struck by the small number of music periodicals relative to the immense number of general interest and literary publications from this period. The American Grove's article “Periodicals” lists just over 1100 items published between 1820 and 1984.' In his five-volume study of American periodicals, Frank L, Mott estimated, however, that between 1825 and 1850 some four to five thousand magazines—mostly general interest and literary periodicals—saw the light of day.’ If Mott’s figures were extended to other periods, the American musical journal clearly represents only a tiny corner of periodical publishing in this country. Musical journals and general interest magazines presented music to the American public in a variety of ways from as early as the last two decades of the eighteenth ' The New Grove Dictionary of American Music (NGDAM), 1986, s.v. “periodical,” by Imogne Fellinger and John Shepard. Period-specific studies bear out these numbers. Vera Flandort's 1952 study examines just under 600 American musical publications from the late eighteenth to the mid-twentieth century, Charles Wunderlich’s 1962 dissertation catalogs sixty-six American music periodicals published between 1782 1852, and ten years later, Mary Davison’s study of the years between 1853 ~ 1899 tumed up nearly 300 musical magazines. Vera S. Flandorf, Music periodicals in the United States; a survey of their history and content (M.A. Thesis, University of Chicago, 1952); Charles Edward Wunderlich, A History and Bibliography of Early American Musical Periodicals, 1782-1852 (Ph. D. diss., University of Michigan, 1962); Mary Veronica Davison, American Music Periodicals: 1853 ~ 1899 (Ph.D. diss., University of Minnesota, 1973). ? Frank Luther Mott, A History of American Magazines, 174] — 1885, 5 vols. (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1957), 1: 342. 9century.” As the use and promotion of music in magazines proliferated through the nineteenth century, three general approaches to observing and commenting on music developed. First, general interest magazines presented music as one of many popular arts and activities of the day, offering musical articles and reports of musical events as news or as fads, fashions, or styles. The editors of these magazines consciously appealed to a large, general readership and saw music as one means of reaching their target audiences. Second, an elite group of literary magazines dealt with music on a regular basis because their editors recognized music as something more than a popular art, They used their publications to promote this more elevated music in American culture as a moral fixative, edifying and uplifting to players and listeners alike. And last, a body of musical magazines dealt specifically, and to some extent exclusively, with musical topies. This last group encompassed a variety of styles and approaches, ranging from unabashed advertising sheets for the music trades to technical and theoretical musical instruction. ‘The BMG periodicals examined in this study clearly fit into this final category In 1915, Myron Bickford offered Cadenza’s readers a survey of BMG magazines, documenting fifteen American BMG periodicals as well as a number of others from European countries, principally England.’ A survey of bibliographies and Library of pean, * Wunderlich, 23ff. 4 Myron A. Bickford, “The Problem Prober—B.M.G. Magazines,” Cadenza 22/3 (September 1915): 42-43. In addition to the nine journals listed above, Bickford’s list includes the following American BMG journals: Mandolin and Guitar (Baltimore), Stanton's Magazine (Philadelphia), The Enterprise (Philadelphia), The Musical Tempo (Philadelphia), The Reveille (San Francisco), The Major (Saginaw, MI), The Concerto (Dwight, IL) which became The Allegro, Ye Banjoist (Philadelphia), and The Banjoist (New London, CT). The Serenader (Sioux City, IA) appeared in the 1930s but only two 10Congress listings conducted for this study uncovered approximately a dozen extant American periodicals dealing with the guitar, banjo, and mandolin published between 1880 and the early 1930s, Further investigation narrowed the field to nine BMG journals of any consequence in terms of content and/or longevity, which serve as the primary materials for this study. These periodicals are: SS. Stewart's Banjo & Guitar Journal (January 1882-April 1901) Philadelphia, PA. Gatcomb’s Banjo & Guitar Gazette (September 1887-July 1899) Boston, MA. The New York Musical Era (April 1890-October 1891) New York City, NY. The Elite Banjoist (October 1890-February 1891) Chicago, IL. The Cadenza (September 1894-February 1924) Kansas City, MO; New York, NY; and Boston, MA. The Chicago Trio (October 1897-May 1898) Chicago, IL. The F.O.G. Journal (2 1900-June 1904) Cleveland, OH. The American Music Journal (September 1905-November 1907) Cleveland, OH. The Crescendo (July 1908-December 1933) Boston, MA and Hartford, CT. ‘These nine periodicals, held in the Library of Congress, survive there in varying states of completeness, ranging from a limited selection of numbers of Gatcomb's to virtually numbers from its run appear to have survived. They are located in the New York Public Library. ucomplete runs of Cadenza and Crescendo. In each case, however, the surviving numbers are complete enough to offer a comprehensive view of each magazine’s character and contents. Each is examined in detail in a separate chapter. The Amer Music Periodical to 1880 ‘The earliest description of an American musical periodical appeared in 1782, when William Selby published an advertisement in the Boston Evening Post outlining his plans for a monthly music journal, The New Minstrel. Besides promising an original work each month for keyboard instruments and the transverse flute, Selby projected that his new publication would include new compositions for “guittar” as well.’ Selby’s advertisement stands as the first American citation of the guitar in association with a periodical or journal. Unfortunately, nothing indicates that Selby’s publishing venture ever came to fruition. The first American musical periodical actually produced, The American Musical Magazine (1786-1787), appeared in New Haven, Connecticut as a series of twelve numbers, each a collection of American or English musical works. In general, serial music publications of the late eighteenth and the early nineteenth centuries consist solely of such collections of pieces. Most early musical magazines emanated from New England’s urban centers and served the numerous singing schools, offering sacred vocal ‘works for performance in the home, in singing schools, or in churches. * Quoted in full in Wunderlich, 321ff. Selby may well have been referring to the “English guitar” in this advertisement, a wire-strung instrument resembling a cittem, See Chapter 3 below for a discussion of the “English” and “Spanish” guitars of the late nineteenth century ° Wunderlich, 324-326. 12Aside from a brief essay in The Musical Magazine (1792), letterpress commentary on music did not appear in any of America’s earliest music periodicals.” By 1820, however, a number of publications attempted to cover developments in the “science of music” as it grew in the United States. Mott describes the contents of most American periodicals of this period as eclectic selections, much borrowed from English sources. Variety of subject matter was valued in musical periodicals as much as it was in the general magazines of the day. In practical terms, this musical reporting translated into notices of local musical events and articles—many lifted without ascription from European sources—about a variety of musical topics.* Biographical sketches figured prominently in many periodicals, most also taken directly from European sources. Original writing consisted of book or music reviews, editorials, and local news items. Three important and long-lasting developments occurred in the publication of American musical periodicals in the 1840s. First, musical magazines became an integral part of America’s mercantile world, John Rowe Parker’s The Euterpeiad: or, Musical Intelligencer, published in Boston from 1819 — 1823, represents the beginnings of American musical periodicals’ close associations with commercial sales, manufacturing, and publishing ventures. Parker’s publication was only one facet of his musical activities, for besides writing about music, he also ran the Franklin Music Warehouse, one of the most important sources of music published by American and foreign houses. "Di 7 * Mott, 1: 39ff. ° Ibid., 634f.The Euterpeiad offered musical news to readers, but as importantly, it promoted a commercial musical venture which included Parker’s authorized publication of works held by British publishers (including a subscription edition of Handel oratorios from ‘Novello’s music plates) and the first American musical catalog to list instrument and 0 print music holdings."” A recent history of American music business asserts that all (or nearly all) journals into the early 1850s were “trade journals,” issued by music publishers to promote their print musie trade: With space rates at about fifteen cents a line, major music houses found advertising, with the attendant promotion of new songs and piano music in the editorial columns, a most effective sales tool. ... Few of these publications managed to remain in business for more than a few years until the trade’s prosperity and the journals’ self-vaunted power over the music-buying public combined to attract industry support." Some journals claimed the cultural high ground and eschewed advertising, yet most eventually included it as a regular part of the publication and clearly depended on it for fiscal stability. Second, reviews, editorials, and articles in American antebellum magazines reflected a desire on the part of editors and publishers to lift the musical tastes and perceptions of the country to the level of Europe’s. For example, H. Theodor Hach, a German immigrant and editor of Boston’s Musical Magazine (1839 ~ 1842), articulated the attitudes of many educated persons of the nineteenth century when he argued that music is not mere entertainment but a science, based in the eternal verities of philosophy. '° Russell Sanjek, American Popular Music and Its Business. The First Four Hundred Years, 3 vols. (New York: Oxford University Press, 1988), 1: 100ff. "'Tbid., 2: 66.Performers—professional and amateur—should be at the service of the art. And the critic or commentator (or magazine editor) has a role every bit as lofty as that of the performer. The art [of music] is infinite, and our conception of it will ever soar higher than our earthly means of representation will enable us to bring before the outward senses. Itis the critic’s office to grasp at the highest conception of what the art can accomplish; he must have art, pure art alone in view, as the ultimate object of what falls under his notice.!* Hach acknowledged that the musical tastes and abilities of America’s developing culture were in their infancy. Like many writers and publishers associated with America’s musical magazines, he saw himself as a guide and a prod, keeping the American musical public on the correct path. Despite American publishers’ aspirations to European tastes and performance levels and their claims of interest in national and international music- making, their periodicals continued to focus on local or regional personalities and events, Henry C. Watson’s New York Musical Chronicle and Advertiser (1843 ~ 1847) demonstrates the third trend in nineteenth-century American musical journals, A number of prominent piano manufacturers actively supported Watson's magazine, identi -d forty years later as “the first musical journal that directly bridged over the line between the pianoforte manufacturers and the musical and artistic world.”'> Watson, a musical polymath, worked as editor, music critic, composer of vocal and instrumental works, public lecturer, librettist, and impresario. His professional reputation was beyond reproach and his publishing links to the music trade were, it appears, based on a sincere "? Musical Magazine, | (Oct. 24, 1840): 365. Quoted at length in Wunderlich, 190-192. ' Daniel Spillane, History of the American Pianoforte; lis Technical Development and the Trade (New York: D. Spillane. 1890; reprint, New York: Da Capo Press, 1969), 348-349, 15desire to promote the art of music. In 1890, Daniel Spillane, author of the first history of the American piano, commended Watson’s ties to piano manufacturers: “Not for selfish or pecuniary reasons, however, was this union effected, but to benefit both sides, by showing that the progress of musical art and that of the pianoforte as a musical instrument were linked indissolubly.”" Spillane endorsed what he clearly saw as a positive relationship between Watson and his advertisers, a relationship based on an understanding of advertising as primarily educational, not promotional. Spillane, whose writing led him to work for American music magazines and the music industry, reflected the values of a publishing industry and growing advertising industry which held that, “advertising itself would be valuable to the reader ...because the reader and advertisers had interests in common.”!* While the appearance of serious musical criticism developed slowly in American ‘music periodicals, musical supplements remained an integral part of them. By the middle of the nineteenth century, the music periodical that did not offer its readers some sort of print music was the exception to the rule. Ten years after Theodor Hach shuttered his Musical Review and returned to Germany, the most prominent American musical journal of the nineteenth century began publication in Boston. Subtitled A Paper of Art and Literature, Dwight's Musical ' Ibid. Rita Benton’s “Introduction,” VI-VII, to the reprint of Spillane’s history. offers a brief biographical sketch of the author. Spillane (1860 — 1893) worked as a piano technician, but devoted himself to writing following the publication of his book in 1890. Shortly before his death he became an associate editor at The Music Trade Review and editor of The Keynote. '5 Richard Ohmann, Politics of Letters (Middletown, CT: Wesleyan, 1987), 12. 16Journal (1852 ~ 1881) helped shape the musical tastes of a generation of educated and moneyed Americans. Dwight, a graduate of Harvard Divinity School, abandoned his interest in the ministry while living at the Brook Farm community in the 1840s and wrote about music for a variety of journals. By 1850, Dwight was a well-known musical commentator and critic in New England, associated personally and in print with Boston’s leading intellectual lights. He blended his theological training with his devotion to the art of music, and preached music as a universal language, accessible to all mankind, and necessary for the edification and refinement of the human spirit.'° Compared with those of rary and non-music general interest magazines, Dwight’s circulation numbers were modest, yet it had an out-sized influence on musical life in America.!” Dwight used the pages of his Journal to promote music and musicians who met his technical, musical, intellectual, and spiritual standards and to excoriate those who did not. His critical ear was tuned to much of what played in the concert halls of New England in the mid- "6 See William Beasley, The Organ in America, as Portrayed in Dwight's Journal of Music (Ph.D. diss, University of Southern California, 1971), 1-20 for a concise biography of Dwight and his musical training. A more extensive biography is George Willis Cooke, John Sullivan Dwight: Brook-Farmer, Editor, and Critic of Music. A Biography (Hartford: Transcendetal Books, 1973), For the development of Dwight's musical tastes and role as a music critic, see Ora Frishberg Saloman, Beerhoven’s Symphonies and JS. Dwight: The Birth of American Music Criticism (Boston: Northeastern University Press, 1995). A contemporaneous view of Dwight and his magazine appears in F.O. Jones, A Handbook of American Music and Musicians (Canaserga, NY: F.O. Jones, 1886; reprint New York: Da Capo Press, 1971), 50-51 ” Mott suggests that Dwight’s peak circulation was approximately 2,500 in 1865; Mott, 3: 196. See also NGDAM, 1986, s.v. “Dwight, John Sullivan,” by Walter Fertig, which suggests “an eventual nationwide circulation of over 1500.” A recent overview of Dwight’s work proposes 1000 as a top number; see Irving Sablosky, What They Heard. Music in America, 1852 ~ 1881 from Dwight’s Journal of Music (Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 1986), 6. 7nineteenth century, and he wrote on a variety of musical subjects, ranging from the arias of the visiting Italian diva Adelina Patti to Stephen Foster's “Old Folks At Home.”!*® ‘The musical status and the musical well-being of America were Dwight’s concem. A contemporary noted that “his writings on music have exercised a powerful influence, and always on the side of truth and nobility.”"? His publication promoted “the conception of a sacralized art: an art that makes no compromises with the ‘temporal’ ‘world; an art that remains spiritually pure and never becomes secondary to the performer or to the audience; an art that is uncompromising in its devotion to cultural perfection.””” Yet even Dwight, who attempted to stay above the commercial fray, entered a partnership with Oliver Ditson Company, one of America’s largest music publishers. [Dwight’s Journal of Music] afforded a platform for expressing the company’s attitudes toward developments in American musie, as well as providing a convenient medium for advertising. Because it was regarded by Europeans as the country’s most important voice for its national music, the Journal spread Oliver Ditson’s reputation around the world. This secured for him the American agency of many foreign publishers.” '* For Dwight on Stephen Foster, see for example “Who wrote the Negro songs,” Dwight's 10/25 (March 21, 1857): 196; and “The late Stephen C. Foster: his musical career—The funeral ceremonies,” Dwight’s 23/23 (February 6, 1864): 180-81. Citations regarding Adelina Patti run to nearly 200 items in the RIPM catalogs dedicated to Dwight's, See Sablosky for a well-rounded anthology of articles from Dwight's on a variety of matters, including Foster and Patti. Jones, 51. * Lawrence W. Levine, Highbrow Lowbrow: The Emergence of Cultural Hierarchy in America (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1988), 120. 18John Sullivan Dwight’s influence on America’s musical tastes and culture outlived his magazine. Although the periodical had a limited appeal and market, other periodicals took up his cause and carried it on in the pages of general interest literary magazines. Four of these periodicals— Atlantic Monthly (1857), Harper's New Monthly Magazine (1850—_), Century Illustrated Monthly Magazine (1870 ~ 1930), and Scribner's Magazine (1887 — 1939)— identified as “The Quality Monthlies,"? incorporated articles about music into their general formats, which were directed to “the thoughtful classes of the United States.””* With subscription bases perhaps as much as a hhundred times that of Dwight’s Journal, these magazines promoted his message far more widely and successfully." These journals, especially in the last thirty years of the nineteenth century, endorsed the integration of the arts into the cultural life of America, But the arts, and especially music, demanded more than subjective perception guided by emotional and sensual responses. Music was first and foremost an intellectual construct and could only be appreciated fully as such. It possessed powers that could improve and reinforce the moral life of the enlightened individual and could ameliorate the crude Sanjek, 2: 109ff. See Cooke, 47ff. for a discussion of Dwight’s arrangement with Ditson. This twenty-year partnership foundered in 1878 when Ditson attempted to popularize the journal and tie it more closely to their business interests, See Cooke, 58, ® Joseph A. Mussulman, Music in the Cultured Generation. A Social History of Music in America, 1870 — 1900 (Evanston, IL: Northwestern University Press, 1971), 8. * “The Organization of Culture,” Nation, (June 18, 1868), 487; cited in Mussulman, 24. * For example, within six month’s of its appearance in 1850, Harper's circulation was 50,000 and neared 200,000 at the start of the Civil War. Mott, 2: 391. When Scribner's appeared in 1887, Harper’s claimed a circulation of 185,000 and Century Illustrated 222,000. Figures taken from Mott, 4: 717. 19(moral) sensibilities of the masses, setting them on the road to moral enlightenment. The enlightened few had a responsibility to bring the finest music (or at least the finest that could be appreciated) to the unwashed. These journals echoed Dwight and brought his message into the twentieth century, preaching music—cultured music—as a civilizing agent that spoke directly to the refined intellect even as it washed sensuously over the unaware, In the years following the Civil War, several trends emerged in music journals. First, as exemplified in Dwight’s Journal, interest grew in erudite (if not scholarly) vriting on music, directed at an elite or written to help create an elite, These were not professional journals, aimed at professional performers. Rather, these journals strove to establish m ic as a significant aesthetic and spiritual element in the culture, Second, other music magazines consciously appealed to a broader group of readers who, while posse jing some education and a sincere interest in the art of music, turned to their pages principally for information and entertainment. While the focus of these magazines remained music, they dealt with other popular arts and activities, too. The editors of these journals promoted their work as neither scholarly nor for the professional, but as accessible and clearly for the amateur. They often took pains to dissociate their magazines from the music trade and its magazines, taking the higher road of musical art. Yet, they also asserted that these same periodicals were not beyond the interest and capabilities of the enlightened general public. Print music remained a staple of music journals during and after the Civil War. Even Dwight’s (under the influence of its production partner, the Oliver Ditson 20Company) offered music in its pages for a short time.”* Additionally, non-music, general interest magazines would include the occasional song or piano solo, “suitable for the amateur,” in their issues.”* Prior to the Civil War, magazines had depended primarily on paid subscribers for survival. Advert 1g had played a role in the support of magazines, but it had been a circumscribed role. Following the war, however, advertisements appeared with greater frequency. Although promoted as periodicals, many publications were little more than ad sheets, designed to “puff” the music or instruments of a publisher or manufacturer. Musical inserts—sometimes just a few bars or sometimes tantalizingly incomplete— functioned as promotions of works available only from the publisher. Other journals promoted instruments for manufacturers. For example, The Silver Tongue and Organists’ Repertory (1869 ~ 1871) promoted not just organ-playing and organ music, but also the products of New York organ manufacturer E.P, Needham and Son, including, their Silver Tongue line of instruments.”” 25 Cooke observes about the music in Dwight’s: “One new feature was the addition of music to each number. This was printed by itself, and had no distinct connection with the paper. In selecting this music, Dwight exercised his superior taste, so far as possible, and sent out nothing which was not of the highest merit. During the first year the selections were taken from Mendelssohn, Schubert, Bach, Bellini, Wagner, Gluck, Donizetti, Mozart, and Alfred Jaell.” Cooke, 47-48. * See Paul Fatout, “Threnodies of the Ladies’ Books,” Musical Quarterly 31 (1945): 464-478. Although condescending, Fatout cites works from eight general interest magazines, describing the repertorie as “a galaxy of native song.” Mussulman, 176-77, notes that even several of “The Quality Monthlies” published musical works “in an effort to boost lagging circulation.” 77 Davison, 42. 21The trends of the 1860s—conscious appeals to a literate but unrefined readership and significantly closer association of publications with commercial interests and advertising —extended into the next decade. While Dwight continued to bear the standard for music as a sublime art, more and more publishers brought musical products to the American public through the pages of their magazines. New York, Boston, and Chicago still produced most musical journals in the 1870s, but new magazines appeared in the South (Savannah and Kentucky) and further West (Utah, Kansas, and San Fra isco), providing local and regional musical news. And while forty-two musical magazines had appeared between 1860 — 69, eighty were created between 1870 — 79," During the 1870s, an increasing number of periodicals focused on very specialized musical areas. While magazines promoting church music remained popular, others featured more secular topics. The Organists’ Quarterly Journal and Review (1874 —77) of Boston, although associated with liturgical music, also directed its attention to instrumental works and technical problems of the instrument. The Voice (1879 — 1902), Daniel F. Beatty's Illustrated Piano and Organ Advertiser (1876 — 77), J.W. Pepper's Musical Times and Band Journal (1877 — 1916) and The Zither Player (1879 — 1881) all promoted, with varying degrees of expertise, the particular instrument or ensemble with which they identified.” By the early 1880s, music had become an integral part of the general interest and elite literary magazines as well as the subject of numerous specialty periodicals. Music 22appeared in general interest magazines in letterpress as the subject of news reports and in musical notation as artistic and cultural addenda for readers. In magazines addressed to America’s cultured elite, articles promoted music as a portal to a life of spiritual enlightenment and aesthetic refinement, an especially effective means of lifting the rest of America up by its cultural bootstraps, Journals and periodicals that took music as their specific subject matter ranged from the considered and refined Dwight’s to sheets produced with no other object than the promotion of the music, services, or products of the commercial concern acting as publisher. These publishers aimed their promotional journals at a specific segment of the magazine-reading, music-making public. Claims of objectivity by disinterested publishers notwithstanding, many musical publications from the1880s represented music publishing houses, manufacturers of instruments and accessories, and owners of music stores.” Advertising, Mass Production, and the BMG Magazines ‘The BMG journals appeared in this publishing world as part of the boom of industrial mass-production, newly invented advertising techniques, and a magazine publishing industry seeking a massed readership. The BMG periodicals used music and ‘music-making to promote many of the same ideological concerns shared with late nineteenth-century magazines generally. Magazines told people how to live and helped create a “bulwark of middle-class values against the dangerous classes (blacks and *" For a contemporaneous evaluation of America’s musical periodical: G. Sonneck, “A Survey of Music in America” (1913) in Suu Cuique: Essays (New York: G. Schirmer, 1916; reprint Freeport, NY: Books for Libraries Press, 1969): 121-154. See, especially, pp. 132-134. 23immigrants) on one side and decadent classes on the other.” Magazines also “helped readers understand how things worked,” offering rational and scientific explanations of the natural world and newly invented products. Lastly, magazines explained how society worked, providing “readers a sense of athomeness in the distanced and puzzling world that capitalism had made.”*" BMG magazines—using stories, illustrations and advertisements—offered their readers just such a world peopled by white, middle-class men and women who used new, scientific musical products in comprehensible and comfortable social relationships. ‘These new magazines presented this new world to their readers in four ways. First, they offered readers a “regularly repeated experience” as predictable “formulas that simplify, regularize, and smooth out the contradictions of social existence.” Second, these periodicals reinforced the life experiences of individuals and families by showing “people how to live as individuals and families.” Third, the magazines simultaneously projected anxiety and hope to readers—anxiety driven by needs or inabilities and hope created by solutions to these inadequacies. Lastly, by operating in the space between advertisers and a mass public, these magazines shaped and identified a specific group that has value to advertisers and introduced this group to products of interest or need.” ‘The first of the BMG magazines, S.S. Stewart’s Banjo & Guitar Journal, was created to promote a company that utilized mass production technologies to manufacture musical i truments, musical accessories, and sheet music. A native of Philadelphia, *! Ohman, Politics of Letters,149-50. * Tid, 151. 24Samuel Swain Stewart (1855 ~ 1898) began his musical career as a banjo teacher, but, quickly became America’s most visible proponent of the banjo as a refined instrument for the middle and upper classes. Stewart employed new techniques of advertising and promotion in his venture, and his success depended first on his identification and manipulation of a market for [the banjo] among middle-class Americans now eager to purchase consumer goods, and then on his refinement of its manufacture so that he could produce it in a variety of grades and thus offer it at a range of prices without sacrifice of quality Like other successful businessmen of the era, Stewart rationalized his manufacturing, promotion, and distribution systems to unite them under one roof. All other BMG Publishers emulated Stewart in responding to the new consumer culture created by increasingly sophisticated mass production, new advertising methodologies, and new He describes several periods of popularity for the guitar in the century, the first between 1835-1850, and concludes that this popularity derived from the guitar’s role in the lower middle-class parlors of men and (especially) women aspiring to better things: [T]he place of the guitar in 19" century American life was not among the itinerant workers or the rural poor; nor was it an instrument of upper-class society. Rather the guitar was to be found within the middle class, particularly among those who could not yet afford a piano (the true symbol of Victorian propriety), or who were just beyond the pioneer stage and not yet settled enough to make one practical.** Young women in freed and middle-class African-American families also utilized the guitar, like the piano, in social events in the home: Itis rarely that the Visitor in the different families where there are 2 or 3 ladies will not find one or more of them competent to perform on the pianoforte, guitar, or some other appropriate musical instrument; and these, with singing and conversation ... constitute the amusements of their evenings at home.*” ** For example, see “The Guitar,” in Gatcomb'y 1/1 (September 1887): 1; or Dominga Lynch’s account of her imported guitar’s demise in Stewart's 11/6 (February- March 1895): 5. ° Peter Danner, “The Meaning of American Parlor Music,” unpublished paper, 1996. See also, Danner’s foreword to Antonio Lopes, Instruction for the Guitar, Faesimile Edition (Menlo Park, CA: Instrumenta Antiqua, 1983), iii-v. °* Danner, “The Guitar in 19century America,” 294. * Joseph Willson, Sketches of the Higher Classes of Colored Society in Philadelphia (1841), quoted in Eileen Souther, The Music of Black Americans (New York: Norton, 1997), 101. 45‘The guitar’s repertoire at this time, like that for piano, consisted primarily of simple solos or songs, many based on or derived from popular Italian opera tunes." Music publishers offered this repertoire to pianists and guitarists in printed reductions and arrangements for home performance. Publishers often offered the same songs with different accompaniments, one with piano and another with guitar. A number of Stephen Foster's songs, for example, were published in this manner.” And, as Richard Crawford demonstrates, although such a repertoire achieved notoriety in theatre or operatic, performance, it achieved currency as printed sheet music purchased for home performance.”” In addition to the burst of publishing activity and consequent parlor performances, the same period witnessed a significant increase in professional guitar activity in the Us cd States. Recent research documents an upsurge in concert appearances of ‘uropean and South American visitors and immigrants before the Civil War, many ** Danner, “The Guitar in 19"-century America,” 293. While ante-bellum American guitar solos exist in considerable numbers, few appear in modern editions Most remain available only in original editions in libraries or private collections. While some recent publications feature later nineteenth-century guitar solos by American composers like Justin Holland, William Foden, Charles De Janon and others, Peter Danner’s 1978 anthology remains the best source for examples of earlier American solos: Peter Danner, ed., The Guitar in America. A Historical Collection of Classical Guitar Music in Facsimile (Melville, NY: Belwin Mills, 1978). * See The Music of Stephen Foster, 2 vols. Steven Saunders and Deane L. Root, ed., (Washington and London: Smithsonian Institution Press, 1990) for facsimile reproductions of his works with guitar accompaniment, Although many of Foster’s songs were initially heard on the minstrel stage, none of the early publications of his songs— even his “Ethiopian” or “plantation” songs—were offered with a banjo accompaniment, “Crawford, America’s Musical Life, 221 ff. 46patterning their touring and performances on those of successful European stars like Jenny Lind and Ole Bull.*' As expected, early accounts of professional concert appearances by guitarists identified them as European, Foremost among these was the Spaniard A.P. Huerta (1804 ~ 1875), who first performed in New York in the 1820s The concerts featuring professional touring guitarists like Huerta paralleled those of other touring virtuosi, offering a variety of solo and ensemble instrumental and vocal numbers. The touring soloist largely presented his own compositions and arrangements, allowing him to display a highly-developed technique. Besides the Spaniard Huerta, other prominent performers included John B. Coupa, Leopold de Janon, and James Dorm (1809 — after 1859)."* While their New York concert appearances appear to have caused little stir, each of these men had some influence on the later history of the guitar in America. Coupa became a business partner to the immigrant luthier C.F. Martin: de Janon may have been related to the American guitarist Charles de Janon (1834 ~ 1911); and Dorn was the uncle of the American “' Douglas Back, “Guitar on the New York Concert Stage, 1816-1890 as chronicled by George C.D. Odell and George Templeton Strong.” Soundboard 25/4 (1999): 11-18, " Back, “Guitar on the New York...” See Bone, The Guitar and Mandolin, \71- 173 for a biography of Huerta. * Back, “Guitar on the New York...” See Bone, The Guitar and Mandolin, 99- 101 for a biography of James Dorn, “* See Back, “Guitar on the New York...” See Longworth, 2, and Gura, C.F. Martin,67-68 and 74-78, for discussions of the business relationship between Martin and Coupa. Based on archival documentation, Gura suggests that Coupa probably died in 1850; Gura, C.F. Martin, 79. a7guitarist Charles Dom (1839 - 1909). The younger Dorm and de Janon appear later in the century on the pages of the BMG magazines. The popularity of the guitar waned in America from the 1850s until about 1880."° A similar decline in the use of the guitar, as well as the harp, in home music-making in England has been credited in part to popular music’s increasing chromaticism in the mid- nineteenth century.“ The most popular American songs of the same era—Stephen Foster's plantation melodies, for example—displayed little in the way of unplayable chromaticism. More likely, the drop in the guitar’s popularity in America resulted from a growing interest in the banjo, an interest clearly linked to the near-universal popularity of the minstrel show.*” This change from guitar to banjo was, however, more than the replacement of one popular plucked instrument with another. The choice of the banjo over the guitar reflected the development of a new and different type of entertainment that flourished in the public sphere. Guitar performance in early nineteenth-century America centered on the parlor, featuring popular works in “private” music-making. Such private popular music “treasured reserve and sentiment, was without ostentation, and could be performed * Danner, “The Guitar in 19"-century America,” and Back, “Guitar on the New York...” describe this waning in the private and public spheres respectively. Gura notes a downturn in guitar production at the Martin factory beginning in the early 1870s: “Not until 1882 would the company return to more normal production;” Gura, C.F. Martin 187. “° Derek Scott, The Singing Bourgeois. Songs of the Victorian Drawing Room and Parlour (Milton Keynes: Open University Press, 1989), 50. See Gura and Bollman, America’s Instrument; Linn; and Cecelia Conway, African Banjo Echoes in Appalachia: A Study of Folk Traditions (Knoxville: University of Tennessee Press, 1997). 48by the competent amateur.” This was the sphere of the guitar. On the other hand, the banjo’s popularity grew directly out of its use in an eminently public sphere, the theatre. Public music of this era featured “noise, excess, unrestrained emotionalism, and showy professionalism,” all inappropriate for the refined entertainments of the sequestered world of the middle-class nuclear family.“? The banjo came to white, middle-class America from the black slave, through the rough world of itinerant white entertainers.°° While minstrel and plantation songs eventually found their way into print and into the parlor (most often with piano or guitar accompaniment, seldom with banjo accompaniment), banjo music remained an oral legacy for many years. And, in time, the banjo adopted a similar notational system and repertoire as well as the guitar’s right-hand technique, fretting system, and performance locale. By the 1850s, the technical level of the players had improved to the point that professional banjo players engaged in public * Dale Cockerell, “Nineteenth-century popular music” in The Cambridge History of American Music, ed, David Nicholls, (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998), 159, * Ibid. * The minstrel show has been the subject of many studies, especially in the last decades of the twentieth century, and all touch on the history of the banjo to one degree or another. Significant book-length studies include: William J. Mahar, Behind the Burnt Cork Mask: Early Blackface Minstrelsy and Antebellum American Popular Culture (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1999); Dale Cockrell, Demons of Disorder: The Early Blackface Minstrels and their World (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1997); Annemarie Bean, James V. Hatch and Brooks McNamara, eds, Inside the Minsirel Mask: Readings in Nineteenth-Century Blackface Minstrelsy (Hanover, NH: Wesleyan University Press. 1996); Eric Lott, Love and Theft: Blackface Minstrelsy and the American Working Class (New York: Oxford University Press, 1995); and Carl F. Wittke, Tambo and Bones: A History of the American Minstrel Stage (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 1930). 49tournaments with instruments and cash as prizes.®! Certainly, these public performances inspired non-professionals to learn th istrument and perform in their homes and led to satisfying teaching careers for some performers. Nonetheless, until the late decades of the nineteenth century, the banjo maintained stronger associations with the public stage than with the home parlor. In the early 1880s, the guitar entered another period of popularity, this time in the company of the banjo and, eventually, the mandolin, Although some of the books and articles ed in this chapter note this late-century union, none has clarified the connection between the guitar’s refined image and formal use in the early and mit ineteenth century, and its later use with the banjo and mandolin. Most studies of the guitar in America in the final decades of the nineteenth century turn from its refined traditions to its use among the folk—rural southerners and cowboys. Such a populist approach to the guitar's history in America simply ignores the gui s previous history as an instrument of higher culture and anachronistically presents an ensemble such as the early twentieth- century hillbilly string band as the only logical result of nineteenth-century musical practices involving the guitar, banjo and mandolin. The pages of the BMG magazines offer some of the most compelling evidence of a late-century resuscitation of the guitar. To appreciate how the magazines’ editors and contributors understood the guitar and how they presented it to their readers, one must *! Early contests usually pitted soloists against each other. See Stewart's 2/1, (May 1883): 2 and Stewart's 4/8, (February-March 1888); 2 for accounts of a contest in New York in 1883. Stewart described this particular event as a “farce” designed to unfairly promote members of the banjo-playing Dobson family who not only put on the contest but won all the prizes. Stewart himself later sponsored contests for banjo and mandolin clubs or orchestras. 50recognize not only the similarities between the three “plectral instruments,” but also the clear dit ferences between their respective repertoires, techniques, pedagogical bases, and performance locales. As the preceding historical survey demonstrates, the guitar remained a serious instrument in America with formal European traditions of pedagogy, notation, and repertoire throughout the nineteenth century. The BMG periodicals’ late nineteenth-century promotion of the guitar—in partnership and in contrast with the banjo and mandolin—remained grounded in the guitar’s history in America as a refined and elevate 51Chapter 4 The Organological Development of the Guitar in BMG Periodicals By the first decades of the nineteenth century, the guitar had achieved its characteristic waisted, hour-glass shape, and typically carried six single, gut strings. While this configuration remained the norm throughout the century, both European and American luthiers and manufacturers experimented with guitar design, most often in hope of expanding its power and/or range. Other instruments underwent design changes in this, century, too, often in response to the nineteenth-century development of public concerts, whose larger audiences and performance venues created a demand for more powerful instruments. ‘The pianoforte’s development, including its increased size, stands as an especially graphic demonstration of both instrument manufacturers’ response to calls by players and audiences for greater power and the momentum of change brought about with rationalized production of musical instruments.’ Althoug! too, became a product of modern mass-manufacturing, the guitar—always compared to the piano because of its ability to convey both melody and harmony—proved more difficult to up-date. As a ' For an overview of the physical development of the piano, see The New Grove Dictionary of Musical Instruments, 1984 ed., s.v. “Pianoforte—I. History of the instrument,” by Edwin Ripin. Book-length studies documenting how design, technique, promotion, and manufacturing contributed to the development of the modern piano include Rosamond E.M. Harding, The Piano-forte: Its History Traced to the Great Exhibition of 1851 (Cambridge: 1933: reprint, New York: Da Capo, 1973); David S. Grover, The Piano: Its Story from Zither to Grand (New York: Scribners, 1976); Arthur Loesser, Men, Women and Pianos: A Social History (London: Victor Gollanzez, 1955); and Edwin M. Good, Giraffes, Black Dragons, and Other Pianos (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 2001). 52result, with only a few mid-nineteenth-century exceptions, the guitar remained an intimate instrument more suited to the salon or the parlor than the concert hall. Numerous book-length studies document the guitar’s various configurations as well as experiments in guitar design by nineteenth-century builders.’ Among the European builders active through that century, Antonio Torres (1817 — 1892) remains the most significant, credited with the creation of the modem classical guitar.’ Recent evaluations recognize Torres less as a pioneer responsible for innovative construction techniques and more as a synthesizer who refined earlier experiments. Sophisticated fan- bracing, larger bodies, and domed or arched soundboards—sigi int features of the Torres” guitar—had all appeared earlier in the century in guitars by other Spanish builders, but Torres was the first to unite them in his instruments.’ His designs were emulated by many Spanish luthiers, most famously by the Ramirez family workshop, which produced several instruments for Andres Segovia, including the guitar he played in many of his most important debut concerts in Europe and North and South America.® * Notes to Chapter 3 cite many of the most important books documenting the development of the guitar in America and Europe. * For an authoritative and comprehensive examination of Torres, see José L. Romanillos, Antonio de Torres: Guitar Maker—His Life & Work (Shaftsbury: Element Books, 1987), rev. 1995. “See John Huber, The Development of the Modern Guitar (Westport, CT: Bold Strummer, 1991), especially his chapter titled “From Torres to Segovia: How We Got Where We Are Today,” 9-21. For a graphic demonstration of the development of the European classical guitar from the late eighteenth century through the first half of the twentieth, see La Guitarra Espafola/The Spanish Guitar (Madrid: Opera Tres, 1993), the lavishly illustrated exhibition catalog from the Museo Municipal in Madrid and New York’s Metropolitan Museum of Art, 53American guitar builders and manufacturers followed different paths in their quest for more powerful instruments, paths partially documented in articles, serial columns, and advertisements in the American BMG magazines. ‘The most important American organological experiments to appear in these periodicals were the use of wire rather than gut or silk strings, the development of hybrid guitars, and the production and promotion of larger instruments with more strings, culminating in massive harp-guitars with as many as twenty strings. Precise information about their introduction and early use on guitars in North America remains sketchy, but by the last two decades of the nineteenth century, steel ngs appeared regularly on guitar: America.® While no firm figures of usage can be determined from extant sources, several contributors and correspondents to the BMG ‘magazines observed that steel strings were far more popular than gut, especially among beginning players.” In an attempt to squelch the flood of letters and les about the subject, C.L. Partee, editor of Cadenza, concluded in 1896: The great majority of guitarists, amateur and professional, use and recommend steel strings, while all the best artists use and recommend gut strings. These facts should enable any one to choose intelligently, so we are resolved to “let it go at that.” * For an idiosyneratic look at the Ramirez dynasty and tradition, see Jose Ramirez IIL, Things About the Guitar (Madrid: Soneto, 1993). ° Peter Danner has suggested that steel strings entered the United States as a result of the Mexican War of 1846; Danner, “The Guitar in Nineteenth Century America,” 294, "Q “Steel Strings on the Guitar,” Cadenza 2/1 (September-October 1895): 8, ® “Special Notice,” Cadenza 2/4 (March-April 1896):14. 54Of course, that was not the end of the discussion in Cadenza or other BMG magazines. The gut vs. steel string debate raged in the BMG magazines almost from their earliest issues, eliciting numerous letters from readers as well as articles from contributors. While some BMG publishers attempted to remain above this debate, most endorsed the use of gut strings. An editorial reply to a reader's inquiry in Gatcomb’s was typical: [W]e will state that in all our practice and teaching we have always discountenanced the use of wire strings for the guitar, though we admit that an occasional selection may be played with pleasing effect, but their continued use proves to be an injury to both instrument and fingers, and the guitar looses [sic] its identity and becomes merely an imitation of the zither, and a poor one at that. We recommend the Roman gut strings for the first, second and third, and the silver wound Japanese silk for the remaining.” Nonetheless, many of the BMG publishers who sold musical merchandise marketed both gut and stee! strings for the guitar side-by-side in their magazines. For example, S.S. Stewart, who supported the use of gut on both banjo and guitar, regularly promoted his guitar string sets in the same box advertisement, offering gut for cighty cents and steel sets for a nickel less. Peter Danner cites an 1888 guitar tutor for his earliest reference to steel strings, but Stewart's Journal ran advertisements for steel st 1gs at least five years earlier.'” Curiously, neither contributors nor corresponding readers ever noted the incongruity of publisher/merchants like Stewart strenuously endorsing gut strings while ° Gatcomb’s, 1/3 (January 1888): 3. '® Danner notes in “The Guitar in Nineteenth-Century America,” 294 that “the earliest reference to [steel strings] have found appears in Charles Henlein’s Complete Modern School for the Guitar (1888).” An advertisement in Stewart's 2/1 (May 1883): 4 predates Henlein’s book by five years. The earliest letterpress reference to steel strings the BMG journals (a warning against them) appeared in Stewart's 3/9 (April-May 1886) 5. Timothy Brookes alerted me to a description of women winding steel guitar strings in a Connecticut string factory in the 1860s; Virginia Penny, The Employments of Women: A Cyclopaedia of Woman's Work (Boston: Walker, Wise & Co.,1863), 463-64, 35marketing steel strings, As in nearly all aspects of the BMG magazines, business interests remained as significant an influence as aesthetics in the promotion of gut and More important than the advertisements, however, were the many inches of letterpress devoted to this debate. Throughout the BMG era, no other subject concerning the guitar generated such impassioned prose. Supporters of steel strings cited their greater volume, more dependable tuning, and greater durability, among other points.'' Stewart's advertisement cited above confirms another popular argument for steel strings: their affordability. Although the retail prices of steel and gut sets might have differed by only a few cents, steel strings were a bargain, since they lasted far longer than gut strings. While steel-stringers often presented calm, reasoned arguments, the gut players just as often responded with vitriolic attacks and hysterical warnings that lumped steel strings with simplified (tablature) notational systems, alternative open tunings, and music of questionable value played by American minorities. ‘The publishers [of a recent simplified method] are making a strong appeal to favor, and I have no doubt, will do considerable toward elevating the instrument on the downward journey, especially among that class of plunkers whose ideal guitarist is a negro armed with a steel-strung jangle-trap, tuned more or less Spanish, and which he manipulates with the second finger of his left hand, and a mandolin pick. I have three reasons for writing this: First, I am disgusted; Second, I love the guitar; Third, I despise fakirs.!? "' See, for example, S.H.Voyles’ letter which offers a point-by-point argument for using steel strings: Stewart's 9/4 (October-November, 1892); 8, Emma S. Scott offered the same sort of argument in “Steel vs. Gut Strings for the Guitar,” Cadenza 2/3 (anuary-February 1896): 10-11 ” Stewart's 14/1 (April-May, 1897): 30. 56Official representatives of the BMG community generally stood together on this point. Experts on the BMG orchestras discouraged steel-strung guitars in their ensembles, noting that their metallic sound did not blend well, especially with the gut-strung banjo.'> In fact, a proposed resolution in 1903 to the by-laws of the American Guild of Banjoists, Mandolinists and Guitarists banned steel strings on guitars in BMG ensembles, concluding that “guitar soloists may do what they please, but a club guitarist should be deposed if he or she uses a wire string.” Even the serial columnists who wrote about the guitar resorted to insult when speaking out against stecl-strings. With some few exceptions, this class of players [who use steel strings] will be found to be made up of those who endeavor to vie with a brass band, in a club, drowning out all the other players, and hardly ever attempting anything in the way of solos... The uses of wire strings, as a class, tally very closely with that class of violinists who, no doubt, partly from motives of economy and partly from the inability to distinguish pure musical tones from noise, string their fiddles, atleast partly, with wire.” While other contributors held steel strings in the same low regard, in the mid-1890s, several argued for gut-strung guitars from the other end of the musical/cultural spectrum, citing gut-strung violins and harps as refined models for the guitarist to follow.'® '3 For example, Thomas J. Armstrong, “Banjo Orchestra Music. A Few Hints to Arrangers and Leaders of Banjo Clubs, Chapter III,” Stewart's 7, no 5 (December 1890- January 1891): 2. “8 Cadenza 917 (March 1903): 32. 'S Myron A. Bickford, “Hints on Guitar Study,” Cadenza 11/10 (June 1905): 32. 'S See, for example, the following articles: J. Earl Rabe, “Steel Strings on the Guitar,” Cadenza 2/2 (November-December 1895): 4; A.C. Douglas, “Which? Why?” Cadenza 2/5 (May-June 1896): 8-9; or Anna Jacobi, “Again, Steel Strings on the Guitar, Cadenza 2/5 (May-June 1896): 7-8. 37William Foden, America’s best-known guitar virtuoso, dismissed steel strings in 1917, calling on historical precedent, tone, and playability to support the use of gut strings: ‘The question, which is better for solo work on the guitar, is one that has been thrashed out a number of times in the last twenty-five years or more, but every little while it bobs up again. If we review the history of the masters from the time of Carulli to that of Romero, we find all used gut strings, and for the best of reasons—tonal quality and ease of action. Personally, I have never used anything, else. Several BMG writers argued that the construction of many guitars, especially the better and more refined instruments, could not sustain the tension of steel strings. In 1892, S.S. Stewart actually documented an experiment in which he measured the different tensions put on the instrument by gut and steel strings, concluding that ‘we learn from these experiments that the strain of the wire strings is far in excess of that of the silk wrapped strings, and why itis that guitar manufacturers will not ‘warrant their instruments to stand the strain forced on them in stringing with steel at strings. Ina later issue he noted that the popular instrument produced by the respected C.F. Martin Guitar Company “is a light built Guitar and will not stand being knocked about, or strung with steel wire strings.” In fact, according to Stewart, many professional guitarists of the day, including the acclaimed Luis T. Romero, would not even tune their gut-strung instruments up to concert pitch, for fear of the strain on the guitar.” "" William Foden, “Guitarists Round Table—Scale Practicing and Alternating Fingers,” Crescendo 9/8 (February 1917): 19. ' “Guitar Notes,” Stewart's 9, no.1 (April-May 1892): 3. ' “Guitar Notes,” Stewart's 9/4 (October-November 1892): 8. ?° “Guitar Notes,” Stewart's 9, no.1 (April-May 1892): 3. The author of an article reprinted from the English periodical The ‘Jo recommends, “do not tune the guitar 58While most apologists for gut cited the beautiful, round tone of the gut-strung guitar, several reached into the realm of late nineteenth-century psychology to argue the point. In 1896, Richard M. Tyrrell, a contributor to both Cadenza and F.0.G., argued against wire strings because of the affect of the guitar's tuning: Brilliancy of tone is not and never was supposed or intended to be an attribute of the guitar. You ask why? Because the instrument is tuned in the minor mode (E minor). Hayden [sic], in giving the tone color of the different keys, says: “E minot—persuasive, soft and tender.” The guitar is the soul of everything that is, sentimental, pathetic and tender. In the olden times it was the instrument of the troubadour and of the inspired lover who sang of his passion under the casement of his mistress. Would you destroy this beautiful character, which no other instrument possesses in such a marked degree? Would you play “persuasive, soft and tender” chords with “brilliant” steel strings...? For the quiet, thoughtful, retiring, disposition, for those who are sentimental, who have a pathetic side to their nature, who would soothe sorrow or comfort in affliction, the quiet, soft- toned guitar.”" E.W. Pyne supported gut strings, noting the same year that ‘The guitar and harp strung with gut strings are almost the only instruments that do not jar upon or excite the nerves. The piano, violin and other instruments that produce brilliant, loud, or shrill music excite the nerves and enliven the imagination, while the guitar or harp with gut strings, played softly, as only such ruments with gut strings can be played, soothes the nerves, and puts us in a to concert pitch, especially in solo playing. ‘The string vibrates much better if tuned to French pitch, i.e.: about half a tone below concert.” A Lover of the Guitar, “Good Guitars and How to Know Them,” Cadenza 1/5 (May-June 1895): 5. A Kansas guitarist opined, “The guitar is naturally a low pitch instrument, and must never be tuned high to play easy or sound well... Ido not believe there is a guitar of any manufacturer that will retain its trueness in tone in all positions if kept tuned to concert pitch (high), The instrument is not made sufficiently strong to bear it.” Jesse J. Hamilton, “The Guitar and Its Tuning,” FOG 3/2 (January-February 1903): 3. *' Richard M. Tyrrell, “The Guitar. The Reason Why It Should Be Strung With Gut Strings,” Cadenza 2/4 (March-April 1896): 9-10. Tyrrell is probably citing the Boston guitarist Winslow L. Hayden, author of Hayden's Modern School for the Guitar (1870). A regular advertiser in Stewart’s, Hayden “arranged and composed for the guitar nearly nine hundred pieces.” See his obituary in Stewart's 3/12 (October-November 1886): 23, as well as Danner, The Guitar in America, 11 59dreamy mood. The gut string guitar is the only instrument that can be played for any one suffering from extreme nervous prostration, with satisfaction to the hearer. Take off the gut strings and you take away that soft, soothing tone, that distinguishes the guitar from all other instruments.” Tyrrell and Pyne both argued for the healthful, restorative nature of the gut-strung guitar, identifying its abi to calm and soothe jangled nerves. These assertions of music’s healing balm arose from a wide-spread “therapeutic ethos” which developed in fin de siécle America. “Nervous prostration” or neurasthenia— debilitating depressions generally characterized by extreme lassitude—struck America’s urban bourgeoi unprecedented numbers in the late Victorian era.”* Since, as Jackson Lears argues, many Americans tured to new religious experiences, physical fitness regimens, psychology, psychiatry, or new patterns of shopping and consuming, it should come as no surprise that musicians of the era asserted the same curative powers for their instrument—strung, of course, with the correct strings. While Myron Bickford stood four-square against steel strings in some of his early “Problem Prober” articles for Cadenza, by the mid-teens, he and his wife, Vahdah Oleott- Bickford, seemed more tolerant of their limited use on the guitar. Their change of heart grew from the example of concert violinists who made a gradual transition to steel strings in the early years of the twentieth century. Ina column from 1914, Bickford observed » EW. Pyne, “Steel vs. Gut Strings,” Cadenza 2/5 (May-June 1896): 5. ® See TJ. Jackson Lears. No Place of Grace: Antimodernism and the Transformation of American Culture 1880-1920 (New York: Pantheon, 1981), especially 47-58, “A Psychie Crisis: Neurasthenia and the Emergence of a Therapeutic World View.” For a sketch of his argument, see Lears’ “From Salvation to Self-Realization: Advertising and the Therapeutic Roots of the Consumer Culture, 1880-1930,” in Richard Wrightman Fox and T.J. Jackson Lears, ed., The Culture of Consumption: Critical Essays in American History 1880-1980 (New York: Pantheon, 1983), 1-38, 60that while the inexperienced player usually cannot create a quality tone on steel strings, “wire strings possess qualities of durability and certain temper smoothing attributes which are entirely lacking in the gut strings.”** He then noted that the well-known American violinist Maude Powell “invariably uses a wire E string.” Not quite five years later, Vahdah Olcott-Bickford endorsed steel for the guitar’s highest E string in several of her columns, citing the example of violinists Jacques Thibaud, Fritz Kreisler, Eftem Zimbalist, and Jascha Heifetz, among others.”> She quoted extensively from an interview with Thibaud in Etude magazine, who had turned to a steel E string in part because of the lack of suitable gut during the First World War. Oleott-Bickford echoed Thibaud’s complaint and recommended not just steel for the first (E) string, but also wrapped silk strings for both the second (B) and third (G) strings, imitating the violinist who used overspun strings with a gut core for his lower strings. Olcott-Bickford’s calls for steel strings stood earlier arguments against them on their heads, She identified steel strings with refined music and musicians (European violinists), dismissed the threat of their physically damaging guitars, and asserted that wire strings do, in fact, have greater sustain and more power than gut strings. While admitting that unschooled or beginning * Myron A. Bickford, “The Problem Prober,” Cadenza 21/6 (December 1914): 37. Bickford echoed these same ideas in another column in Cadenza 23/1 (July 1916): 45-46. Ina 1916 advertisement, the Wm. J. Stahl Company in Milwaukee, WI hinted at racial/political influences on the choice of gut or steel: “Germanic Culture and Latin Culture are the forces back of the violin’s supremacy—and both Teuton and Latin and Anglo-Saxon are getting weaker—in numbers and influence—every day. The music of the future won't be the caterwauling of gut. It will be the virile pulsing of the plucked steel string;” Crescendo 9/2 (August 1916): 2. * See Vahdah Olcott-Bickford, “The Guitarist—Concerning Strings,” Cadenza 26/4 (April 1919): 25-26 and Cadenza 26/5 (May 1919): 24-26 and “The Guitarist— Again The Problem of Strings,” Cadenza 28/12 (December 1921): 42-43. 61players have difficulty producing a quality sound on steel strings, Oleott-Bickford even rejected the most common complaint about stee! strings—their unpleasant, jangling, and nerve-racking sound. In fact, her endorsement of steel-stringing for the guitar reads, at times, almost like an indictment of gut strings: ‘The guitarist who is careless of tone production... should remember, however, that the fault is with himself and not in the strings, then practice faithfully for the things which are lacking in tone production, Gut strings tend to make even a g00d player careless about certain important features of technic or tone production—points that are never noticed until the player starts to play on steel strings. Then, if he has tonal discrimination, he is suddenly cured of all admiration for his playing, providing he has smugly admired it before. It takes practice on steel strings to be able to secure the velvety tone of which they are capable.”* Even in the late 1920s, after America’s guitar community had been exposed to Spanish virtuosi led by Andres Segovia, correspondents still questioned BMG apologists about the suitability of gut and steel strings, Sophocles Papas, whose column in Crescendo also addressed questions about the steel-strung Hawaiian guitar, repeatedly encouraged players to avoid steel strings for solo guitar work, In 1929, he noted that a guitarist might use all steel strings on a guitar, if “one uses the guitar to accompany for long periods, such as three hours for dancing... as quality of tone would not be the first 6 Vahdah Oleott-Bickford, “The Guitarist—Concerning Strings,” Cadenza 26/5 (May 1919): 26. See also her response to a correspondent’s inquiry about steel strings in “The Guitarist,” Cadenza 26/10 (October 1919): 4. Unknown to American guitarists and guitar pedagogues, the Paraguayan guitarist Augustin Mangore Barrios (1885 ~ 1944) performed regularly with steel strings from the early years of the twentieth century. While reports deseribe Barrios using anywhere from one to six metal strings, Rico Stover, a Barrios biographer, suggests that he used “metal strings for the trebles and ‘wrapped silk basses.” Stover also documents Barrios’ use of small rubber grommets (“rubber sordinas”) on them to diminish the twang associated with steel strings. See Rico Stover. Six Silver Moonbeams: The Life and Times of Agustin Barrios Mangore (San Juan, Puerto Rico: Querico Publications, 1992), 43-47. 62consideration.” As almost an aside, Papas observed that “Segovia, as well as all the European guitarists, uses gut and silk strings.””” Despite his concession to dance band guitarists, Papas, the last of the BMG commentators to discuss the steel/gut divide, unequivocally promoted the use of gut for the guitar soloist: Silk and gut are the only strings which should be used for solo work. Although wire strings are capable of producing considerable noise, with gut strings a truly musical tone and volume can be obtained with alittle effort and practise [sic]... We strongly advise all guitarists to use silk and gut strings if they wish to impress the public with the fact that they are playing an instrument capable of great beauty of tone and nuance.”* As later experts have noted, the use of steel strings did, in fact lead to a different kind of American guitar, braced to withstand greater tensions. By and large, however, advertisements for guitars in the BMG magazines seldom mentioned stringing, focusing more on price, quality of materials in the instrument, and quality of sound. By the late nineteenth century, the American guitar’s most obvious development was its increased size. Ithad developed a larger lower bout, with a more pronounced waist. American manufacturers usually offered their customers a selection of sized guitars as well as choice in decorative embellishment. A typical advertisement (Fig. 4.1), a full-page spread for the “Henning Solo and Club Guitars,” appeared in The Chicago Trio” Like ‘most guitar promotions, the page features a large line drawing of the instrument, statements touting its playability and sound, and a catalog of its components. The 7 Sophocles Papas, “The Guitar and Steel Guitar Round Table,” Crescendo 21/11 (May 1929): 17, 20. ? Sophocles Papas, “The Guitar and Steel Guitar Round Table,” Crescendo 21/9 (March 1929): 26. ® Chicago Trio 1/1 (October-November 1897): 21 63Figure 4.1, Full page advertisement for J.E. Henning Guitars Chicago Trio 1/1 (October-November 1897): 21 ~«J, E, Henning Solo and Club GUITARS Patented 64Henning instruments all featured a steel-reinforced neck and this advertisement atypically claims for this instrument the ability to carry wire strings. Aside from incidental claims of this sort by individual manufacturers, the presentation of the guitar in BMG advertisements closely matched Henning’s. Intemal modifications to the guitar- differently configured or stiffer bracing, for example—while more significant than cosmetic changes, proved more difficult to depict or describe in the pages of magazines. Asa result, illustrated advertisements for guitars remained remarkably consistent throughout the fifty-year BMG era (Fig. 4.2 and 4.3).” Manufacturers may well have welcomed the usual depiction of the guitar as unchanging. The gui s history and associations with refined society and famous composers, as well as its significant technical demands and highly-developed musical literature, lent it a gravity neither the mandolin nor the banjo could claim. An unchanging image of the guitar offered banjo and mandolin advocates an association with ahistory and repertoire weighted toward elite and sophisticated players and teachers, At the same time, BMG publishers clearly preferred the banjo or mandolin to the guitar. jioned—an out- Unchanging representations of the guitar helped depict it as old-fas moded foil to the progressive banjo and newly configured mandolin, Leaders of the BMG movement considered their activities to be in the service of “progress” and regularly described instruments, techniques, ensembles, and performers as “progressive.” While later historians have associated this term with specific political agendas or movements, BMG apologists used it more broadly. They brandished it as a * See Chapter 7 below for a discussion of such generic advertising images. 65Figure 4.2. Full-page advertisement for F.O.G. Guitar F.0.G. Journal 4/2 (January-February 1904): 19. THE F.0.G. JOURNAL. 19 The New F. 0..G. Mahogany Guitar. ‘The Best Instrument on the Market, Very Powerful in Tone, Reasonable in Pric Sevte. Ladies’ size, mahogany body, mahogany neck, ebony fingerboard, ger- man silver frets and tail pioco, pearl position dots, sound hole’ and edges Bound with celluloid and inlaid with colored woods, bone nut on fingerboard and bridge, bone énd pin, bone bridge pins inlaid with poarl, fancy inlaid strip of fancy woods on back, nickel, Ameri- can machine head, finely finished and powerful in tone. Price $12. Style 2, Stand- ard size, otherwise the same as style. 1. Price $12. Style 8. Concert sizo, + otherwise the same as style } 2. Price $14. L Style 4. Grand concert sizo, otherwise the samo as style 8. Price $16. This size makes an ele- ‘gant club guitar. ‘These Guitars are warranted not to warp ot check in any climate, and have a perfect fingerboard. Each Instrument is Guaranteed. saree for Dacsnnia fom tne Preset «FO, GUTMAN, Cleveland; 0,Figure 4.3. Full-page advertisement for Bauer Guitar Stewart’s Journal 16/3 (August-September 1899): 32 __8.8 STEWART DAWG AND GUITAR JOURRAL, ‘Mo, 100 ~Stdard sie; vc, dark rosewood body. with ich pee ilaying ad ivory Binding around Godt edge and! ewe wget eames et neon back and tree er get ry re oy ead ep hts nrc terug Sa abr, ier Se ‘0.09 | 0, ee, La ice Si, =" Correspondence solicited on Guitars at $125.00, $150.00 and upwards snl pf che te pe rte 3H Ines op of fend roma 6 vf oe baky if Incr ng oe ‘ama tty) et eg eral 7 oe 16 Chestnut Street: ‘San Francisco,” MILADELPHIA Pacific Coast Agents 67promotional term confirming up-to-the-minute fashion, but more significantly, they used it to communicate a scientific and philosophical point-of-view. This point-of-view rested on a middle-class appreciation of the values of industrial capitalism, The doctrine of progress, the confidence in the beneficial possibilities of science and technology, the concern with time (a measurable time, a time that can be bought and sold and therefore has, like any other commodity, a calculable equivalent in money), the cult of reason, and the ideal of freedom defined within the framework of an abstract humanism, but also the orientation toward pragmatism and the cult of action and suecess—all have been associated in various degrees with the battle for the modern and were kept alive and promoted as key values in the triumphant civilization established by the middle class.”" For these musical businessmen and manufacturers, as for many Americans of the time, progress was a universal phenomenon, validated by the science of Charles Darwin and explicated by the writings of Herbert Spenser. For Americans, evolution provided scientific proof, taken from the evidence of a physical universe, of the purpose, mission, and meaning of America, Evolution was proof of progress—unceasing, inevitable progress. And America was and is, as all Americans believe, the living, national embodiment of progress. It was but a short step from this point-of-view for banjo promoters, who regularly touted it as “America’s instrument,” to understand recent developments in banjo design and its elevation into higher American society as evidence of a musical manifest destiny. BMG *! Matei Calinescu, Five Faces of Modernity: Modernity, Avant-Garde, Decadence, Kitsch, Postmodernism (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 1987), 46. * James Oliver Robertson, American Myth, American Reality (New York: Hill & Wang, 1980), 288. For a discussion of America’s late-nineteenth-century industrial growth and its links to the theories of Darwin and Spenser, see Vincent P. DeSantis, The Shaping of Modern America: 1877-1920 (Arlington Heights, IL: Forum Press, 1989), 81. A concise overview of the era, which considers the social, economic, and political activities of the period can be found in the opening chapters of Steven J. Diner, A Very Different Age: Americans of the Progressive Era (New York: & Wang, 1998), 3-29. 68apologists used the term “progressive” regularly and freely, linking their movement, products, and personalities to the cutting edge of American science and manufacturing. As a result, the physical changes in guitar design and manufacturing noted and promoted most vigorously in the BMG magazines were those that drew the guitar closer to the banjo or the mandolin. Early on, the apparent goal of such hybrids was to induce guitarists to play a newer, progressive instrument that more closely resembled the banjo in timbre. The earliest guitar hybrid promoted in the BMG magazines emanated from S.S. Stewart's factory in Philadelphia, and its endorsers all had links to Stewart and his enterprise. S.S. Stewart’s “Guitar Neck Banjo” had a banjo body with a resonating skin- head and a fretted guitar neck carrying six strings. It stands as the earliest manifestation of attempts by banjo advocates to convert guitarists to the more progressive banjo. In an 1884 advertisement, Stewart touted his “Six String Banjo,” assuring guitarists that [t]hese Banjos are intended for Guitar Players who want to finger a Banjo precisely the same as the Guitar... These Banjos can be fingered at once by any Guitar Player, as the finger-board is the same as that of a medium size guitar.” Ina later article, Stewart advised ladies to abandon the unseemly guitar for the banjo, intimating that they could retain proper decorum by purchasing Stewart's own “Guitar Neck Banjo,” playing guitar studies on it with no fingering changes.” While the guitar often appeared in illustrations of and in recital programs for Banjo Orchestras, experts ‘who wrote articles about these ensembles for Stewart's Journal sometimes called for the hybrid Guitar Neck Banjo rather than a guitar to provide a harmonie underpinning. In *5 Stewart's 2/11 (August-September 1884): 12. * = te recgnon or year tng eagle Wile yee ity te open so at > (teal bomen ae Weise sep cee meet ‘any busts of em at pring "to tee Mae (Sir ta Mani cn td Use thy ie ary are ‘Sal at das ele ers pease cinta trong te hs oe ein S tenay ‘Sense peor ods, Oh Teacher, Syms se Pree litre tse tprumes ated Soe sehr Seadoo : Srnec ies Ehemerars Soee see Seana Sietebriwn uly thesGin Bens x melo eye a tone, popet vale Told he “Cer Gand The "Chen Viircenaton stig Oe Bae "Fe wt you Feocoathe anita Macora”A putt on Book New. tay demonevamary he BFigure 4.5. Half-page advertisement for Gibson instruments Crescendo 1/6 (December 1908): 1. “uohy ‘oozemeyey - ‘o0ujd eBuvyoxy go} <—_ BowWL¥> DNRUS aNY DISAW AOS ALUM squsanjandmooon snqap-deerr io “opwano> A e ‘09. avaino NIOGN YE NOSdID sop sok wioyewwy “ano Aes OU PHY AT oom MON “panssy aug “aga é - ANOWTILVIN ONINAGISNOO ‘opusrsaa5 ou, 4held flat on the player’s legs and whose steel strings were played with a metal bar or slide. In hindsight, the popularity of the Hawaiian steel guitar and its smaller partner, the ukulele, appears to have been an insubstantial fad, but professional musicians as well as amateurs enthusiastically embraced these instruments and their exotic music when they 4% first appeared in the early teens." While some manufacturers eventually produced instruments set up for this sort of playing, many guitarists reconfigured their existing guitars with devices marketed in the magazines.“ Despite snubs of these hybrids by * See George T. Noe and Daniel L. Most, Chris J. Knutsen: From Harp Guitars 10 the New Hawaiian Family—History and Development of the Hawaiian Steel Guitar (Everett, WA: Noe Enterprises, 1999) for a survey of this instrument's development. Noe and Most date the Hawaiian craze to Seattle’s 1909 Alaska-Yukon-Pacitfic Exposition, which featured an Hawaiian Building with performing musicians. Charles de Lano, a BMG teacher from Los Angeles, became one of the strongest proponents for the Hawaiian instruments, incorporating them into performances by his Mandolin Orchestra. While the fad peaked in the late teens and early 1920s, de Lano had begun teaching Hawaiian instruments as early as 1912. His advertisements for mail-order instruction in the steel guitar and ukulele appeared regularly in Cadenza and Crescendo, and he eventually involved himself in the production of steel guitars. See Noe and Most, 45ff. Although neither took up the steel guitar, classical guitar soloists Jennie Durkee and Vahdah Olcott-Bickford appeared in recitals and concerts playing the ukulele. Durkee, in fact, developed an “American way” of playing the ukulele and performed regularly as a ukulele soloist, playing not only chestnuts like “Alice Where Art Thou” but also arrangements of classics like the “Sextet from Lucia.” See, “Editorial,” Crescendo 10/10 (April 1918): 8. Both she and Olcott-Bickford published ukulele method books in the teens. Neither Olcott-Bickford nor Durkee are mentioned in it, but Jim Beloff’s The Ukulele: A Visual History (San Francisco: Miller Freeman, 1997) offers a concise and entertaining overview of the instrument's history. “* See, for example, Crescendo 7/5 (November 1914): 6, for an advertisement promoting an Hawaiian guitar method which included the “Johnstone Steel Guitar Adjustor,” a device which converted a standard guitar to a slide configuration. A later advertisement offers a picture of the “Kamiki Guitar Readjustor;” Crescendo 10/8 (February 1918): 21. 15Olcott-Bickford and others, both Cadenza and Crescendo offered historical and instructional articles promoting the steel guitar and the ukulele.‘* While Olcott-Bickford called for banning most hy! is, many other guitarists accepted and regularly used the magnificent harp-guitar, a late-century hybrid manufactured by Gibson and others.*® While numerous variations were produced, the most common harp-guitar was comprised of an oversized guitar body with a standard neck carrying six fretted strings, augmented by a bank of unfretted bass strings. These additional basses (sometimes as many as twelve tuned chromatically) ran between an expanded bridge and an extended secondary neck or head-stock (see Fig. 4.6 and 4.7) Most collectors and historians of the harp-guitar describe it simply as an extended guitar, rather than call ita hybrid. BMG manufacturers and apologists, on the other hand, promoted its orchestral associations (calling them “Symphony Harp-Guitars”, for example—Fig. 4.6) and touted it as an economical replacement for the refined harp, an ** For example, F.L. Littig, “The Hawaiian Steel Guitar and Ukelele.” Crescendo 7/12 (June 1915): 4; S.de Vekey, “The Steel Guitar,” Cadenza 28/9 (September 1921): 10-11; Myron Bickford, “The Problem Prober,” Cadenza 28/11 (November 1921): 37; L.M. Gill, “The Steel Guitar,” Cadenza 29/10 (October 1922): 12, 44; and James F. Roach, “What is the Future of the Steel Guitar?” Cadenza 30/8 (August 1923): 8-9. In October 1916, Crescendo began a regular column, “Hawaiian Round Table,” offering technical advice and answered readers’ questions about the steel-guitar and ukulele. Despite her objections, Olcott-Bickford performed a ukulele and steel guitar duet in 1915; “Programs of Concerts and Recitals,” Crescendo 10/5 (November 1917): 17. 46 Olcott-Bickford strenuously objected to the harp-guitar as a solo instrument, citing its bulk and undampered basses as major impediments; “Guitarists Round Table ‘The Guitar vs. the Harp-Guitar As a Solo Instrument,” Crescendo 9/5 (November 1916): 19, 21 and Crescendo 9/6 (December 1916), 19. She did not appear to object to its use in accompaniments, especially in Mandolin Orchestras. 16Figure 4.6. Quarter-page advertisement for Dyer Harp Guitars Cadenza 11/11 (Suly 1905): 6 OUND ‘LIKE we HARP ore eonstructed on an entirely, nee principle, not at. all awkward t handle. Easy to play as any six- stringed: instrument. For Solo. or Orchestral Work, UL, W. DEUKER, Richmond, Ind., writes: “The Symphony Harp Guitar that I purchased of you several months ago’gives the best of eatisfaction and is often mistaken for|an Italian harp.” Hundreds of other satisfied customers. Write for éatalegue No. 248 W. Je DYER & BRO. . St. Paul, ieee } When, writing .to. advertisers ‘ple 7Figure 4.7. Full-page advertisement for Gibson Harp Guitars Cadenza 15/1 (Suly 1908): 10 0 THE CADENZA Place Wastingtoo, D.C. : i ‘Time American Guild Convention of Mandolinists, Guitarists and Banjoiss sa To incidentally arn the relative mers ofthe best of the ld tonsruction, Occasion Grice with the sisting "Gibson Se a ——_—C—CE Conditions OM 2s Se", per wm of he soe poeslon sf ‘Aoerca ho could’ wot sen, but eon dotoaly hear the instruments aa played, Pett, Ussinous*Ginon®veret Marked coast” “Bigger Tose” More tte esult jiant treble” “Greater carrying power.” “More compact body of tone.” “A. wonderful usb” Desdedly grester wll” Treble sounds lke harp” © Tone is more round and ful et nas te empty wate gen md cots comity ele ng, Te te mie ny ma ee gud bane) Observe o one could en th Keeger(isGiton” praference war here Siertonn sad TaSny greater pessiioe {ther Guar bade speneble eres deere 1 cxtening the econ i bee sth souiogsand to Hat end ‘ol body and by + comerpending relfrement n pponte se. C soluti & ‘Long sub-basses 0 The leverage Iignes ofthe foundation tones, Veloty of at Guta with lel bridge td ridge pint : fear fs wrong, be Seared hy 4 abort oe meat | teal teh in psa ig Increaedwrig pee, stele ver Aleal prenture, so that's isher Sandon ay Be Lely pa ‘ated and ha igestone eared Ingsear ove intel gradatel, Iaegiodia! tne an ch bg oe Itheslcatring Guar ineaough or you the soening board ite baton e Incivant yu ta hraw*asugh io much fren beyond the sounds Bach c ‘when somthing Date and eae ex be bd Pendclcy wt roughed ope / reaned | {eu prestige reset pone conren- fence inatrnging Fusing, fsa | (Sesting dette tbe ft cad fr {hrowehthe tin head a ee sell. Territory assigned, protected and worked by our Stil Hunt” We pay the advertising? you pay for goods sven old. Returh goods if ot sold, Send (our satistactory ‘business gn an, ad Wl ti Mea te lm yo ea ( 2at" drop us a card for catalogue; ete. Set al GIBSON MANDOLIN GUITAR C Cc z 100 EXCHANGE PLACE 90, MICH (eis stage oa enon at THE GIOERED mtd wn ang sa Binstrument popular in mid-century parlors and mentioned regularly in the early BMG journals as an appropriate accompaniment to the banjo or mandolin: The harp is a beautiful instrument, and adds much to the strength of a mandolin club, but harps are very expensive. Now, for a comparatively small outlay of funds you ean buy a splendid Symphony Harp Guitar, The clubs that are using them are enthusiastic in praise of their tone.” Additionally, full-page advertisements for Gibson’s harp-guitar echo promotions of their arch-top guitar, pointing to a break with the guitar’s past by touting design innovations inspired by vi in (Fig. 4.7). Harp- and lyre-guitars had been played in the mid-nineteenth century by some of Europe’s best-known guitar soloists" but only achieved popularity in the United States in the early years of the twentieth century. Despite its European pedigree, Walter A. Boehm, a contributor to The American Music Journal, Cadenza and Crescendo, all but *” Cadenza 15/8 (February 1909): 43. ** According to Simon Wynberg, Johann Kaspar Mertz played a ten-string guitar, Giulio Regondi and Luigi Legnani eight-string guitars, Napoleon Coste a seven-string, and Fernando Carulli a ten-string instrument called the Decachorde. See “Mertz’s Guitars” in the introduction to Johann Kaspar Mertz, Guitar Works, Vol. 1, ed. Simon Wynberg (Heidelbeg: Chanterelle Verlag, 1985), np. See also, Joscelyn [sic] Godwin, “Eccentric Forms of the Guitar, 1770-1850,” Journal of the Lute Society of America, 7 (1974): 90-102. Bone, The Guitar and Mandolin, 28, credits S. Ritter von Beniezki with the invention of the harp-guitar in the first half of the nineteenth century. Despite her earlier attribution of the harp guitar to Regondi (“Guitarists Round Table—Questions and Answers,” Crescendo 7/5 (November 1914): 19), Vahdah Oleott-Bickford cites Bone and suggests that the late-century American harp guitar was “patterned after [Beniezki’s] idea;” “Guitarists Round Table—Some Facts about the Evolution of the Guitar, Crescendo 8/3 (September 1915): 19. BMG contributors regularly stated that Fernando Sor and Mauro Giuliani played extended guitars, but neither of their recent biographies documents either of them doing so. See, for example, Carl Jansen, “Crescendo Scrap Book—The Harp Guitar,” Crescendo 10/9 (March 1918): 7, Gura offers a photograph of “the only known harp guitar made by C.F. Martin,” dated c. 1850; Gura, C.F. Martin, plate 5-i. 79claimed to have invented the harp-guitar in 1897 in a search for “the perfect solo oe? instrument.” Bochm was not the only American experimenting with extended guitars in America in the late 1890s, but he was an indefatigable proselytizer for the instrument, promoting it through his teaching and performing as well as in the pages of the BMG magazines.*' His assertions and pronouncements often read like P.T. Barnum’s, but no ‘one could doubt his enthusiastic appreciation of both the instrument and the ‘manufacturers’ role in bringing this progressive instrument to progressive musicians: ° Walter A. Boehm, “The Harp Guitar,” Crescendo 1/1 (July 1908): 5. *° 4 short announcement in 1897 in Cadenza noted the production of a harp- guitar by Biehl: “Trade Notes,” Cadenza 4/2 (November-December 1897): 18, Noe and Most document an extant nine-string guitar (perhaps a prototype) by Chris J. Knutsen of Portland, OR dated 1898 as well numerous sophisticated harp-guitars by Knutsen from 1900 on. Late-century European luthiers also experimented with guitars carrying extra strings, though few appear to have taken on the fantastical designs and shapes of the American harp guitars. See Romanillos, 35, and La Guitarra Espafiola, 154, for a photograph and brief discussion of Torres” eleven-string guitars, The earliest extended article about the harp-guitar ina BMG journal is Lewis A. Williams, “The Harp-Guitar,” American Music Journal 519 (April 1906): 34, 36-37, 40. Williams” article is apparently a reprint from a publication from the Gibson Mandolin Guitar Company. J. Hopkins Flinn was another early experimenter with less wood-working finesse: he devised a primitive harp-guitar by nailing a block of wood to his six-string guitar; “Prominent Teachers and Players—J. Hopkins Flinn,” Crescendo 10/2 (August 1917): 7. *' Boehm contributed several pieces, most duets for mandolin and guitar, to Cadenza beginning in 1906. His first prose offering about the instrument—“The Harp Guitar,” American Music Journal 6/6 (January 1907): 44~46—was followed by “The Harp Guitar,” Crescendo 1/1 (July 1908): 5 and, two years later, “The Modern Harp- Guitar,” Cadenza 17/2 (August 1910): 12-13. He contributed harp-guitar solos as well as a bombastic serial article, “Harp-Guitar Ideality,” to Crescendo for several years in the teens. One of these articles offers an extended technical analysis of Boehm’s setting of “Absence Makes The Heart Grow Fonder;” see “Harp-Guitar Ideality,” Crescendo 8/11 (May 1916): 4, 7. Boehm also hosted the 1909 convention of the American Guild of Banjoists, Mandolinists and Guitarists in Buffalo, NY where he featured exhibitions and recitals involving the harp-guitar. 80The splendid improvement made during recent years in Harp-Guitar construction is one of the strong evidences that progress is the watch-word that impels the player and manufacturer to work hand in hand toward establishing a higher order of things than has existed in the past. In other words, that which has been, does not satisfy the progressive teacher Now. He calls on the manufacturer for something better right along.” While it flourished only briefly in the BMG arena, the harp-guitar stands as a graphic demonstration of many of the values of the BMG community. It had an historical foundation and high-art European link in the earlier use of extended guitars by Johann Kaspar Mertz, and others, as well as a connection to the orchestral harp through its name and function in BMG ensembles. Like the evolving piano or the high-rise skyscraper, the harp-guitar demonstrated a tendency in American design and technology to solve problems by building bigger. The harp-guitar was an ideal “progressive” instrument, in its melding of an earlier, classic form (the basic guitar shape carr six principal strings) with current technology and science (an enhanced and complex superstructure). Nay-sayers who preferred only six strings were chided for an anti-progre ye stance, shamed with the example of J.S. Bach who preferred the antique harpsichord to the new piano: A “past master” of the Guitar with habits of technic established still used the little six-string old-construction instrument, for “It is light, sweet-toned, sensitive, and requires no readjustment of technic to manipulate.” “The Harp Guitar,” Crescendo 1/1 (July 1908): 5 5 Only one American BMG writer, William Foden, noted the parallels between the modern harp-guitar and the Baroque theorbo and archlute; “Guitarists Round Table— Brief History of the Guitar,” Crescendo 9/7 (January 1917): 19. A later German contributor noted the same connection in his article about the lute; see Alfred Sprissler, “The Lute Today,” Crescendo 25/1 (November 1932): 3. 81All these dally with time, with progress themselves. Reader, do you?... The mighty Bach and his contemporaries could not be persuaded to leave the harpsichord with its inferior capacity and power of expression for the piano, yet where is the harpsichord today? Death alone saved Bach from the ridicule of the then rising generation, for time and the piano proved Bach’s satisfaction, and joys were but cheats that held him within narrow limits and belitled his gratifications by hedging his musical aspiration and inspiration with an instrument of dwarfed compensation. Then it was the harpsichord versus piano; now it is Guitar versus Harp-guitar. Bach’s antiquated instrument is today but a museum curiosity and would remain such even if the mighty Bach were here to play it... Listen, oh Teacher or Guitarist. To remain the same while years and instruments advance is not becoming. It does not even excuse Bach; itis but acting the part of still water growing stagnant, To defend such by excuses is only to tell why you allow or prefer (?) [sic] the green scum of a delusive satisfaction to cover and stupefy thee rather than to reanimate thyself and remove it... Despite the progressive talk surrounding the instrument, the harp-guitar reinforced the position of the guitar and its players within the BMG community. Like its six-string version, the harp-guitar was generally recognized as far too complex for the average guitarist to play well, yet manufacturers and commentators claimed that the rudiments of both instruments were simple enough for almost anyone to play acceptable accompaniments. As a result, while some advanced performers attempted solo work on it,°* most harp-guitarists were encouraged to play elementary bass-chord accompaniments for mandolins and/or banjos, never really utilizing the potential of the instruments, extended range. Harp-guitar solos and accompaniments published in the BMG. magazines differed in no way from works for the standard guitar, since the only “harp % Cadenza 24/9 (September 191 : 16 and Crescendo 2/10 (April 1910): 1. ** C.W.F, Jansen played a harp-guitar with five extra bass strings as a solo instrument. He endorsed it as a solo instrument in “Crescendo Scrap Book—The Harp Guitar,” Crescendo 10/9 (March 1918): 7. See also Vahdah Oleott-Bickford’s argument against the solo harp-guitar; “Guitarists Round Table—The Guitar vs. the Harp-Guitar As a Solo Instrument,” Crescendo 9/5 (November 1916): 19, 21 and Crescendo 9/6 (December 1916): 19. 82effects” were bass notes transposed down an octave.** An anthology of solos for the harp-guitar appeared in 1918, but it could hardly have offered an innovative use of its additional bass strings, since all the solos fit on the six-string guitar, as well.°7 While promotions for harp-guitars appeared in the BMG magazines as early as 1897,% it did not reach its peak of popularity until after 1910. Photographs of ensembles, advertisements, and articles featuring harp-guitars increased significantly in the journals through the second decade of the twentieth century. For many ensemble directors, the harp-guitar became the ideal accompaniment instrument for a plucked-string ensemble, Even prior to its period of greatest popularity, Cadenza’s editors published a promotional photo of an ensemble noting that as will be generally acknowledged, the above cut of the Potter Gibson Quintet shows the ideal mandolin club instrumentation, consisting as it does of 1* mandolin, 2" mandolin, tenor mandola, mando-cello and harp-guitar.” ** For example, see Waltet Bochm’s arrangement of “Absence Makes The Heart Grow Ponder” and his accompanying article explaining the harp-guitar techniques utilized in it; “Harp-Guitar [deality,” Crescendo 8/11 (May 1916): 4, 7. * See the advertisement for J.A. Witter’s Book of Solos for the Harp-Guitar in Crescendo 11/5 (November 1918): 7 as well as an editorial endorsement of the anthology on the following page. Trade Notes,” Cadenza 4/2 (November-December 1897): 18. ® Cadenza 16/4 (October 1909), 9-10. Plucked-string ensembles very often took on the name of their favorite instrument manufacturer. “Gibson” clubs and orchestras especially appeared regularly in Cadenza and Crescendo in promotional pieces and in Gibson Company advertisements. Gibson, like so many companies in this period, aggressively promoted brand and name recognition, going so far as to identify their customers biblically as “Gibsonites.” Many clubs were directed by teachers who ‘marketed instruments to their students and the moniker of a club reflected a business relationship between a manufacturer and a club or orchestra director. In fact, while Gibson’s promotions in the magazines appear directed to the retail customer, most of them closed with appeals to teachers and dealers, including inducements like financing 83‘Advertisements for harp-guitars in the BMG magazines indicate that several ‘manufacturers dominated the market. While the Gibson Mandolin Guitar Company (Kalamazoo, MI) manufactured its own instruments, William Stahl (Milwaukee, WI), and W.J. Dyer & Brothers (St. Paul, MN) marketed harp guitars built by the Larson brothers of Chicago.” Their instruments, modeled on designs by Chris J. Knutsen, a west-coast luthier, incorporated an additional resonating chamber into the extended neck (Fig. 4.6 and 4,8).°! The Gibson Company eventually incorporated some aspects of its mandolin designs, including the Florentine swirls and a tail-piece, into their harp-guitars. Gibson's advertisements for their harp-guitar emphasized their violin-inspired body design, tying it directly to their innovative and progressive mandolin.” BMG magazines promoted other guitaristic instruments—some legitimate, some incredible concoctions— besides harp-guitars (Fig. 4.9 and 4.10). Among the former, the terz guitar appeared regularly in the hands of Jennie Durkee, C.W.F. Jansen, and Vahdah Olcott-Bickford. The terz guitar corresponds to the standard guitar in the same way the Violin does to the viola; s a smaller, higher-pitched instrument, but played exactly like arrangements for authorized Gibson representatives. See “A Wonderful Opportunity is Open to You,” the concluding portion of a full-page Gibson advertisement: “The Gibson opportunity is your opportunity if you can qualify as a teacher. We furnish the capital and give the benefit of our experience in all branches of the Gibsonizing plan—teaching advertising, selling, accounting, etc.” Crescendo 13/9 (March 1921): 19. © See Hartman, 20-21 for brief biographies of W.J. Dyer and Wm. C. Stahl, as well as a history of the Larson brothers’ operation and instruments, ° Noe and Most, 41ff, suggest that the business agreement between Knutsen and Dyer lasted only a year or two, beginning around 1906. © Cadenza 15/1 (July 1908): 10. 84Figure 4.8. Quarter-page advertisement for Dyer Harp Guitars Crescendo 2/11 (May 1910): 26. “SYMPHONY” HARP GUITAR ‘Messrs. W. J. Dyer & Bro., St. Paul, Minn, Dear Sirs:- Let me express my appreciation of the good } you have done “guitarists in the manufacture of your Symphony Harp Guitar. The guitar with its added basses, its excellent tone and far reaching quality, should prove to be quitea boon to all having the advancement of the instrumentat heart. Very truly yours, VALENTINE ABT.” The “Sym phony” has no rival in combined pow= er and quality of tone. Sold on Easy Payments. Write for Free Catalog. W. J. DYER & BRO. Dept. 85, ST. PAUL, MINN. 85Figure 4.9. Full-page advertisement for F.0.G instruments F.0.G. Journal 4/3 (March-April 1904): inside back cover. ea Bal poet wt satire ne Sa. Tp pare Eanes, =o Sar Eee position dots, En Sena Seer teue sou rhe os i jaicay So pat for og Ene [oe 6. manta saropny ty (sr sap, sore hea he west nncsa Phe ‘The F. 0G. Mandols. Rosewood body aameas Mandocello (guitar shape). Price $22, 2 BiF 0.6 unde, ahogsy iy gers), ahr ore oe voltae Sha Ter O10 bio ws, (muah. nikpy ad ye me, i satnn och, pctol Spend Fr pata ae Ean ecg | sedi inelae nlefie y alee” mcs i } F 0.6, Mandola, style 2. Rosewood, 17 rie, white aripe tetween, mubogeny neck, roserood fingesboard, part postions olald soundhole and edges inlaid gearipate, Aicicts ‘machine, nickel tal-pece, Snely Galahed, French polish. Pre faq F.0.6. Mandola, arte 5, Same as ext, with Vestisn covered machine, and pear inlld send oles otherwise ms Ko. Price le ar Wite for Discos trom these Prices J 86Cadenza 22/2 (August 1915): 41. Figure 4.10. Quarter-page advertisement for Meyer’s Contra-Bass Guitar TIT “oseorqg “sara Wii urany SUAAAW A" H SYACVNAUES AHL qeqiny) sseg-e1}U07) JO ~ aqneg oq $3240H TH . ‘VZNGQV) HL. 87the standard guitar. The Italian virtuoso, Mauro Giuliani, had published a number of ‘works for the terz guitar in the early years of the nineteenth century and contributors to the BMG journals consistently credit him with its invention. Durkee’s father, George B. Durkee, an instrument designer and builder for Lyon & Healy in Chicago, constructed his daughter's terz guitar and promoted the instrument for use by soloists and ensemble players in the magazines.” Besides performing solos and duets on the terz guitar, Olcott- Bickford wrote about it in her columns, encouraging its use in ensembles with standard guitars and harp-guitars.*° C.W.F. Jansen, performed regularly on the terz guitar and featured it at the 1912 C ‘ago convention of the American Guild of Banjoists, Mandolinists and Guitarists, playing a quintet by a mandolin ensemble standing in for the bowed instruments.°° ® See, Vahdah Oleott-Bickford’s “The Guitarist,” in Cadenza 26/10 (October 1919): 4-6 and Cadenza 28/1 (January 1921): 43-44, Giuliani's biographer, Thomas Heck, notes that Giuliani arrived in Vienna shortly before Leonhard de Call published a quartet including a terz or capoed guitar; Heck, 51. Bone, 139, credits Giuliani with introducing the smaller instrument into his Viennese concerts after 1812. «Jennie M. Durkee,” Cadenza 11/9 (May 1905): 31 and George B. Durkee, “A Practical Treatise on the Guitar and Kindred Instruments,” Crescendo 2/10 (April 1910) 21. A biographical sketch of Jennie Durkee features an illustration of her elaborately decorated terz guitar: Cadenza 15/5 (November 1908): 35-36. © For example, “The Guitarist,” Cadenza 28/1 (January 1921): 43-44; “The Guitarist—Concerning Strings,” Cadenza 26/4 (April 1919): 25-26. Oleott-Bickford recognized Jansen’s daughter, Elsa, as well as Durkee as important American players of the terz guitar; “Guitarists Round Table—Some Facts about the Evolution of the Guitar,” Crescendo 8/3 (September 1915): 19. © See “Convention Cozy Comer,” Cadenza 18/9 (March 1912): 10, for a promotional article about Jansen’s performance. The issue also includes a photograph of Jansen with his accompanying ensemble of mandolinists. 88While harp guitars built by the Gibson company, Chris Knutsen, or the Larson brothers might on occasion have pushed the limits of design, structural int ty, and musical viability, few of them compare to the most bizarre instrument to grace the pages of the BMG magazines (Fig. 4.11). De Main Wood, a guitarist and inventor from Rochester, NY, presented his “Orchestral Guitar” at a Guild Convention in 1906, performing the “Pilgrim’s Chorus” from Wagner’s Tannhduser.©” Starting with a conventional six-string guitar, Wood added to it “six wonderful attachments invented and perfected ... during the past twenty years.” These attachments included a bank of bass strings plucked by the left-hand thumb, a clockwork mechanism that plucked the instrument's first string in a mandolin tremolo, and another clockwork device which hammered bass strings to create a cello effect. Additionally, Wood added a moveable arm that not only fretted the highest string but also produced (according to a reviewer) a “good i itation of the voice” by means of a miniature bellows. This arm and bellows were connected to a mouth-piece manipulated by Wood’s teeth and tongue. Amazingly, the steel/gut controversy spilled over to the evaluation of this extreme contraption and, according to Cadenza, the necessary use of steel strings compromised “the musical value” of this unique instrument. Nonetheless, the Cadenza reviewer enthused that “" Cadenza 12/7 (March 1906): 16. ® See Cadenza 12/6 (February 1906) and “The Orchestral Guitar,” Cadenza 12/9 (May 1906): 18-19. This second article is reproduced with commentary by Peter Danner as “The Most Remarkable Instrument We Have Ever Seen,” Soundboard 26/2 (1999): 55. Press notices and a photo appeared in. Wood’s instrument had been reported nine years earlier than the Cadenza notices in a news article from the Philadelphia Times (June 16, 1897). See “A Musical Wonder. The Remarkable Combination Instrument Made by an Indiana Professor,” Cadenza 3/6 (July-August 1897): 19. 89Figure 4.11. De Main Wood and his Orchestral Guitar Cadenza 12/7 (March 1906): 30.Mr. Wood's guitar is the only one of its kind, and it is not likely that another will be manufactured... [I]ts invention and perfection by Mr. Wood is nothing short of marvelous... The combined effects produced are really remarkable and probably nothing just the same will ever be produced on any other instrument.” While Wood's instrument was not the last experiment with guitar design, it probably stands as the most extreme attempt at expanding the range, volume, and timbre of the conventional guitar.”° In carrying the progressive ideals of mechanization and hybridization very near the breaking point, Wood created a parody of the guitar rather than a practical instrument. By the close of the BMG era, the guitar family in America had divided according to function and corresponding design. Steel-strung instruments—arch-tops as well as stiffly-braced flat-tops—protiferated and were taken up by urban jazz. and pop musi ians who desired more powerful instruments for live performance as well as for recording. Black and white rural players appear to have been drawn to steel-strung guitars, too, probably for their durability and low cost. American manufacturers continued to produce gut-strung guitars, but Andres Segovia’s 1928 American debut marked the beginning of © “The Orchestral Guitar,” Cadenza 12/9 (May 1906): 18-19. 7 Another experiment to appear in the late teens was the Tonaharp Guitar, an Hawaiian auto-harp, played like a steel or Hawaiian guitar, but also fitted with push- button chording device. See the Tonaharp advertisement in Crescendo 10/9 (March 1918): 22 as well as an editorial blurb about it Crescendo 10/10 (April 1918): 8. William Foden devoted two of his Crescendo columns to guitar curiosities, describing some one- of-a-kind designs, an early elongated harp-guitar, and an enharmonic guitar. See, William Foden, “Guitarists Round Table—Eccentric Shapes in Guitars,” Crescendo 11/5 (November 1918): 19 and Crescendo 11/6 (December 1918): 19, Foden notes at the end of his second article: “In all these inventions we can readily see a desire to improve the tone, power and detail of the guitar, and in general the inventors are to be commended for their efforts, but so far as my observation goes, no real and substantial improvement has been made in many years.” o1the end for the gut-strung American guitar. His powerful sound, clear tone, and Spanish- tinged repertory—all enhanced by his Spanish-made guitar—led American players gradually to abandon their prejudice against foreign, especially Spanish, instruments.” While American manufacturers continued to produce some gut-strung models, for the ‘most part they focused on the stee!-string, gradually abandoning the classical guitar market to European factories and workshops,” ”' References to foreign guitars nearly always pointed to their rapid deterioration in America’s more rigorous climate. A typical comment observed that, “[t]he guitars, when I first knew them, were practically all imported and, no matter what the grade might be, were pretty sure to crack.” TH. Rollinson, “Three Characteristic Instruments,” Crescendo 12/4 (October 1919): 4. By the early 1930s, however, European guitars had become more appealing to American players. See advertisements for guitars by Manuel Velasco and Herman Hauser in Crescendo 25/10 (October 1933): 23 and Crescendo 24/11 (September 1932): 13, respectively. ” The last two decades of the twentieth century witnessed a resurgence in classical guitar construction in the United States. These remain principally one-person shops, producing a small number of top-quality instruments. Guitars by Thomas Humphrey, John Gilbert, Robert Ruck, Michael Thames, Eric Sahlin, and Paul Jacobson, among others, have become highly prized by players and collectors alike 92Chapter 5 Guitar Technique in the BMG Periodicals Players and teachers of the early nineteenth century laid the foundations of the classical guitar’s technique, much of which remains relevant to players nearly two hundred years later. Guitar tutors and studies by Femando Sor, Mauro Giuliani, Matteo Careassi, and Dionisio Aguado continue to exert significant influence on classical guitarists throughout the world. And despite claims of ground-breaking innovations in their tutors, nineteenth-century American guitarists by and large modeled their books and exercises on the methods and studies of thei European predecessors. This modeling sometimes included acknowledgement of earlier sources but just as often led to unascribed borrowings and unnecessary or unwarranted revisions to appeal to a more contemporary clientele." As in the histories of the guitar and in the repertoire documented in the BMG journals, the same early- and mid-century European guitarists regularly recur in BMG articles about method books and technical studies. In some cases, however, contributors demonstrated only passing acquaintance with the specific European pedagogical and technical works they unquestioningly endorsed. Regardless of steady appeals to Sor, Giuliani, and Carcassi in technical articles in the BMG journals, no early-century studies or exercises were published as musical selections in the magazines,” In fact, aside from ' See Chapter 2 for a brief discussion of some of the more prominent European and American tutors. Cox, Classic Guitar Technique, remains the best source for information about the early classical guitar tutors and methodologies. 93advertisements for numerous editions of Carcassi’s Method, few other European studies or tutors were promoted in BMG advertisements.> Publishers and teachers promoted their various editions of Carcassi’s Method, often touting them as “newly edited” or “newly revised.” In 1902, Richard Tyrrell remarked on the proliferation of these revised editions, chiding his peers: Don’t lay claim to a superior knowledge than the writer ofa standard work, by Putting your possibly unknown name to its “revision.” We have methods by {the mandolin pedagogue Giuseppe] Branzoli, every selecti which is revised and refingered by John Doe or some other self-elected authority. Guitar methods in which every exercise taken from Aguado, Carcassi or Mertz has been corrected and refingered by John Smith, who, of course, had better ideas of fingering than the authority whom he cited. Some years ago a music firm in New York employed a well-known guitarist to revise Carcassi, with the result that when published its sale did not pay for the expense incurred. Being a fine guitarist himself, he seemed to have forgotten the difficulty of the instrument to the general run of beginners. He cut out all the progressive, easily-fingered little pieces in the keys of C, G and D, replacing them with much more difficult arrangements of his own, thus destroying the very feature which makes the work so popular.’ Some BMG publishers offered their own methods for the plectral instruments, like Clarence Partee’s American Conservatory System, which featured a tutor for each * A “Valse” by Sor and several works by Mertz are the only early and mid- century pieces to have appeared in the BMG magazines. While not studies or exercises, these compositions were certainly aimed at the student guitarist. See Chapter 6 for an examination of these works. * Tanno, 30-31, lists seven American editions of Carcassi's Complete Method which appeared between 1853. Besides Carcassi’s Method, only one collection of studies by Sor and one by Giuliani were advertised in the magazines. George C. Krick published studies by Sor (Op. 6, 29, 31, 35) as well as concert solos by Mertz and Sor; see his advertisement in Cadenza 28/1 (January 1921): 35. Giuliani's Op. 48 Studies were published in Germany by F. Sprenziner and advertised in Crescendo 3/6 (December 1910): 3, “Richard M. Tyrrell, “A Few Don'ts with Supplementary Remarks,” FOG 2/5 (uly-August 1902): 3. 94instrument.* Despite incessant promotion of such methods, few appear to have had much success. Aside from advertisements or letterpress blurbs for them, these late-century American tutors for guitar were never recommended in technical articles or columns in the BMG magazines. In general, technical subject matter appeared in BMG periodicals in one of two ways. First, several of the larger, long-running magazines offered extended serialized treatises on guitar technique by one or several authors. These articles ranged from simple scale or chord exercises with limited explanation to in-depth discussions of technical points with examples from the concert literature. Such essays appeared in both S.S. Stewart's Banjo and Guitar Journal and Cadenza and, as would be expected, the publishing firms behind each magazine collected and promoted these serialized articles as short books or tutors. Second, specific technical matters sometimes appeared in freestanding articles and letters from readers and correspondents. In some cases, these submissions were direct responses to previously published articles or letters, but in others no precipitating influence was indicated. ‘The guitar’s technical demands are many and minutely detailed, but late Victorian American tutors and especially the BGM magazines dealt with the issue of technique in rather broad strokes. The most-discussed techniques in the periodicals fall into three general areas: 1) seating position and support of the guitar, 2) left hand fingerings and shifting, and 3) right hand articulations and patterns. ‘These categories subsume nearly all technical discussions in the BMG magazines. * Partee first announced the imminent publication of his American Conservatory Method for Guitar in Cadenza 4/6 (July-August, 1898): 17. 95ating Position and Support of the Guitar Throughout the nineteenth century, players and pedagogues offered various suggestions about how a trained player should support and hold the guitar. Early in the century, these included Fernando Sor’s balancing the guitar's upper bout against a table- top as well as Dionisio Aguado’s “tripodium’” or “Aguado Device,” which gripped the guitar at a proper angle for either the standing or seated guitarist. American guitar tutors also offered a variety of solutions to this technical challenge,’ but by the last quarter of the nineteenth century, most followed Matteo Carcassi’s lead, recommending a low stool under the left foot and the guitar resting on the left thigh. The American BMG magazines, which first appeared in the 1880s, also recognized the “Carcassi” position as the norm (Fig. 5.1). For example, C. Edgar Dobson's New York Musical Era featured this brief technical item in its second number: To hold the guitar well it is necessary to sit on a seat a little higher than those in common use, the left foot to rest on a stool of a height proportional to the seat Throw out the right leg, drawing back the foot a litte, the left leg to preserve its natural position, the weight of the body of the instrument to rest principally on the left thigh. Being thus seated, the guitar is placed transversely on the left thigh. “ See Fernando Sor, Method for the Spanish Guitar, translated from the original ‘by A. Merrick (London: 1850; reprint, New York: Da Capo, nd), 10-11 and Dionisio Aguado, New Guitar Method (Madrid: 1843), tr. By Louise Bigwood and ed. by Brian Jeffery (London: Tecla,1981), 6-7. Savino offers an overview of this technical problem. 7 These included Otto Torp’s endorsement of Philadelphia luthier J.N. Scherr’s “Harp guitar,” which had a body extension that rested on the floor to the player’s right ide. Otto Torp, New and Improved Method for the Spanish Guitar (New York: Torp & Viereck, 1834), 4-5. Gura reproduces the illustration of this guitar from Torp’s metho Gura, C.F, Martin, 32. William Foden described this guitar, linking it to “an old music firm of [New York] long out of existence.” See, “Guitarists Round Table—Eccentric Shapes in Guitars,” Crescendo 11/6 (December 1918): 19. 96Figure 5.1. “Manner of Holding the Guitar,” from Carcassi’s Complete Edition for the Guitar ({Philadelphia}: W.F. Shaw, 1884), 11his position is preferable to all others, because it offers three points of support to the instrument and balances it so as not to require the support of the handle. Dobson lifted this paragraph nearly verbatim from its source—Matteo Carcassi’s method—but failed to ascribe it.’ Nonetheless, Dobson had offered a strong endorsement of Carcassi in his first number: “For thorough instruction on the guitar we would recommend the Carcassi Book.”"” Many of Dobson’s peers shared the same enthusiasm for this venerable tutor. While most guitar pedagogues of the period endorsed Carcassi’s sitting position, . Stewart cited it in his attacks on the guitar. The guitar, as a ladies’ instrument, when compared with the banjo, is decidedly vulgar. The position of holding the guitar (its manner of construction compelling its rest upon the left leg) covering the pelvis, when compared with the graceful picture of a young lady holding the banjo upon the right thigh is decidedly constrastive, [sic] and the contrast is all in favor of the banjo. There is nothing graceful about a young lady playing a guitar.'" ‘Some illustrations depict banjo players with crossed legs, but the refined banjo technique endorsed by Stewart required players of either sex to keep both feet on the floor. In the * The New York Musical Era 1/2, (May 1890): 5. * Matteo Carcassi, Methode Complette pour la Guitare (Paris: Troupenas, n.d.), 7. This excerpt is translated in Cox, Classic Guitar Technique, 75-76. Cox, 181, lists Carcassi among the player/teachers who “provided the basis for modem playing techniques.” "° The New York Musical Era, V/\ (April 1890): 1 "' Stewart's 3/1 (December and January, 1885): 1. ” See Gura and Bollman, America’s Instrument, for numerous illustrations from the nineteenth century of banjoists sitting both cross-legged and flat-footed. While even minstrel musicians often played with both feet on the floor, they were often depicted in unseemly, slouching positions; see Gura and Bollman, America’s Instrument, 33, for 98last years of the century, outward appearance in performance, especially amateur performance, conveyed the moral, aesthetic, and intellectual state of the performer."? A relaxed, elegant sitting position for the banjo bolstered Stewart's argument for its refined nature and cultured use in the parlor or on the concert platform, He did not suggest, however, an alternative to the standard sitting position for ladies playing the guitar. ‘Never an enthusiastic supporter of the guitar and its mi Stewart preferred abandoning the instrument altogether in favor of his beloved banjo. Curiously, the only other serious discussion in BGM periodicals of how players physically supported the guitar evolved from the manner in which banjoists held their instrument. An excerpt from Denver's Rocky Mountain News, quoted at length in Stewart's Journal, alludes vaguely to a new sitting position more appropriate for ladies: By the way, have you noticed that performers on the guitar do not hold the instrument now as formerly? The latest and by far the best method is for the performer to sit erect and rest the guitar on his lap, the neck of the instrument extending to the left, above the left shoulder. This is a great advantage over the awkward position which has been taught in the past and is especially graceful for ladies,'* example. A famous example of Stewart's no-holds-barred attacks on unrefined technique are the back-to-back illustrations of an unkempt, ill-mannered blacked-up minstrel player and the refined Alfred Farland and his sister sitting in a proper Victorian parlor, he holding a Stewart banjo, she at an upright piano. Stewart titled these illustrations, respectively, “The Banjo As It Used To Be” and “A Chaste Picture—The Banjo of 1894.” Stewart's 10/5 (December 1893 and January 1894): 14-15. See Linn, 19-21 for a discussion of this comparison, including reproductions of the pages from Stewart's. 8 While not considering the performing musician, Kenneth Ames offers an overview of nineteenth-century interpretations of body language. See, Kenneth Ames, Death in the Dining Room and Other Tales of Victorian Culture (Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 1992), especially his chapter entitled “Posture and Power,” 185-232. * Stewart's 12/1 (April and May 1895) 6. 99‘The following year, an article with an illustration appeared in Cadenza, clarifying this new sitting position.'* J.W. Freeman, identified simply as “Guitarist, Denver, Colo.”, acknowledged banjoists as the models for this new, “correct” manner of holding the guitar. Both feet rest on the floor, the lower bout of the guitar rests on the right thigh and the player holds the guitar steeply angled with its neck pulled back toward the left shoulder. (Fig. 5.2) The right arm secures the guitar by exerting downward pres: re, Like a cellist, the guitarist in this position holds his left hand quite high, nearly even with his face. Freeman argued his point, as so many of his contemporaries argued theirs, by blanket assertions and appeals to “common knowledge” and common sense.'* His strongest argument for this new position arose not from physiology, but from his (apparently self-evident) assertion that “Every person acknowledges the power of the ‘human eye.” He contended that the new sitting position prevented the player from ooking at his left hand on the fingerboard of the guitar, freeing him to engage the gaze of his audience: “The ideal position, then, is one which enables the performer to keep his eye on his audience.” Freeman asserted that the benefits of this new manner of holding the guitar were abundant—but listed none. He concluded his article by clai ing that the 'S IW. Freeman, “How to Hold the Guitar,” Cadenza 2/5 (May-June 1896): 4-5. 'S Lears notes that even when confronted with knotty philosophical questions, many late nineteenth-century thinkers “typically solved difficult philosophical problems by bland assertion..., referring all disputed matters to the ‘common sense” of mankind;” No Place of Grace, 20. Many BMG apologists followed this mode of argument, proving their point by merely stating it and dismissing their opposition. 100Figure 5.2. Illustration for “How to Hold the Guitar” by J. W. Freeman Cadenza 2/5 (May-June 1896): 4 method of holding the guitar—that ‘all others: detract from the pleasure of both the listener and the performer, and in many instances make it simply impossible for the Guitarist to reflect credit upon one of the most effective of all musical instruments? To go astep further, how many lovers of ,the guitar are aware that the awkward position assumed in playing by 999 per- formers out of 1,000,’and the apparently. 101 assist Ppositic | panyir such frets ¢ play» Did guitar the pe his le violini while Wh be ab: attem finger Th enab] his av the pi yout fixed succe euitanew technique is “the only really graceful position,” the only one that allowed the player to realize the full “capabilities of the instrument” and has been “especially adapted for the use of ladies.” ‘The publishers, editors, and writers for the BGM magazines served primarily as apologists for the banjo, promoting it as a refined, classical instrument. The guitar's technique and repertoire often served as models for banjoists hoping their instrument might match the guitar in status. Here, the influence has been reversed. ‘The banjo—a modern, American, and “progressive” instrument—contributed a significant technique to the development of the guitar—a refined, European, and ancient instrument. While Freeman clearly had the best interests of the guitar and its players at heart, he offered the supporters of the banjo the opportunity to assert its equality (if not superiority) to the guitar as a more progressive (or more highly evolved) instrument eminently suitable for refined ladies, While Stewart had responded to the Rocky Mountain News article cited above with nothing but scom and derision, C.L. Parte, editor of Cadenza, enthusiastically embraced this new ing position, agreeing on all counts with Freeman, In fact, Parte dedicated more than two full columns to this technical advance, asserting the unsubstantiated but impressive “fact” that it increased the playing ability of a guitarist by a full fifty percent, for the very good reason that he needs put forth half the exertion to accomplish the same result, and the same amount of effort expended would enable him to execute twice as rapidly and well as by the old method.!” "" CLL. Parte, “A Few Remarks and Other Things,” Cadenza 6/3 (January- February 1900): 2. 102Partee continued his argument along similarly tortured lines, asserting that although it improved the players’ overall competency, this sitting position primarily benefited the listening public. It allowed a guitarist to come before his public making a “presentable appearance” rather than a twisted, humped-over image.'* More significantly, while Partee appealed to the “progressive” nature of this sitting position, unlike other BMG apologists, he attacked the European technical tradition, Later in the same article, he asserted that Sor, Careassi, and others “were among the greatest guitarists the world has ever seen” but dismissed them as at least fifty years out of date and not “infallible.”!” While American guitar pedagogues never supplanted Sor and his contemporaries as technical touchstones, Partee’s assertion—supported by the new American sitting position—was a bold declaration of independence from European influences, This sive discussion persisted for years, especially in the pages of the idenza. While some guitarists spoke against it, most endorsed the new sitting position, citing its progressive nature and its gracefuul appearance. One of the more reasonable discussions of this technique appears in a long article by Agnes S. Gramm of Oberlin, OH? Gramm compared the Carcassi position with the newer one and found them nearly identical in terms of the angle at which the guitar is held and the angles at which the player’s hands address the guitar. Citing the established techniques of viol s, she argued for evaluating the guitar’s techniques from a physiological vantage. In the end, "Did, 3. " Ibid. * Agnes S. Gramm, “Some Reasons Why,” Cadenza 8/7 (March 1902): 12-14, 103she, too, endorsed the new approach, but her argument stood head and shoulders above nearly all others for her clear-eyed observations and step-by-step evaluations. Among other guitarists who endorsed the new sitting position, Vahdah Oleott- Bickford was probably the most important. She apparently adopted this technique early in the debate, since her first photographs in the BMG magazines in 1906 show her supporting her instrument in the “banjo position” (Fig. 5.3).?' Fourteen years later, Olcott-Bickford offered readers of her Cadenza column a pragmatic argument for its use. In response to a reader's question, she asserted that this position “is the only one which leaves both hands entirely free and relaxed for their work, and at the same time affording the greatest control of the instrument with the least exertion. Almost as importantly, Olcott-Bickford argued against the old-fashioned use of a footstool, first, because the “stool” is not in the least necessary and militates against a graceful appearance by the performer. Second, it is both an inconvenience and a habit; an inconvenient bore to carry around a stool, and once the player has formed the habit it becomes next to impossible to play without the stool or to use one of a height different from that to which he is accustomed.” Ina follow-up article, Oleott- ickford offered a photograph of herself holding a guitar at the correct angle, on the right thigh.”* While admitting that the higher position of the left arm might cause the beginning student some fatigue, Olcott-Bickford contended that this *' Olcott appeared first in American Music Journal 5/11 (June 1906); 29 and later ‘the same year in Cadenza 13/2 (October 1906): 9. ® Vahdah Olcott-Bickford, “The Guitarist,” Cadenza 26/7 (July 1919): 22. * Ibid. * Vahdah Olcott-Bickford, “The Guitarist,” Cadenza 27/2 (February 1920): 38. 104Figure 5.3. Ethel Lucretia Olcott American Music Journal 5/11 (Sune 1906): 29 ETHEL LUCRETIA OLCOTT, LOS ANGELES, CAL, 105should prove only a temporary inconvenience, readily overcome with time and practice. In the end, even her arguments read like a rationale rather than hard-nosed evaluation. Richard M. Tyrrell, a regular contributor to Cadenza in the late 1890s, argued against the banjo position, basing his objections on the physical differences between the two instruments. He supported his argument with citations from not only Carcassi, but two contemporary German pedagogues and several European and American methods.”* This debate carried on well into the twentieth century. More than fifteen years after Freeman first described it, William Foden, recognized within the BMG community as America’s foremost guitarist, noted in the first of his columns for Cadenza that holding the guitar is “of the first and greatest importance.”* He acknowledged the existence of other systems, but he used and endorsed the standard position with a footstool, arguing that Thave found none so good, and none so secure, as that adopted by the old masters, ie., that of resting it on the thigh, and there balancing it with the right forearm. Such holding requires neither aid nor support from the left hand, which latter must be left free... After a lifetime devoted to its playing, and the trying of many different positions of holding, | find myself always reverting to first principles.”” Foden—a resolutely conservative and practical musician—based his argument on the ‘mechanics of guitar playing and decades of performing and teaching experience. His columns about the guitar and its music seldom strayed far from technical matters and he 25 RM. Tyrrell, “Some Suggestions as to a Proper Method of Studying the Guitar,” Cadenza 3/1 (September-October 1896): 12-13. * William Foden, “The Guitarist,” Cadenza 18/6 (December 1911): 40. ”” Ibid. 106had little use for techniques based on vaguely “progressive” ideals, amateur performers’ concerns with how they looked while playing, or a desire to establish eye-contact with his. audience. He promoted the traditional manner of supporting the guitar and advertisements for his “Grand Method for Guitar” noted that its “frontispiece is a halftone portrait of the author showing the correct manner of holding the instrument and ‘the proper position of hands and fingers” (Fig. 5.4).’* This debate carried on into the 1920s, George Krick, Foden’s most illustrious student, allowed that early lutenists used the “upright position” to accommodate the instrument's shape, but cited eminent European and American guitarists who used a footstool. In addition to the earliest generation of classical guitarists, Krick lists Manuel Ferrer, Adam Darr, and Franciso Tarrega as well as the contemporary masters Emilio Pujol, figuel Llobet, Luis Mozzani, Heinrich Albert, and his own teacher, William Foden.” Ina follow-up comment on Krick’s article, Foden noted that “[I] practiced the upright position for years, but failed to see its advantage over the old way of holding the instrument.” 5 See, for example Foden’s full-page advertisement in Cadenza 27/9 (October 1920): 36. ® William Foden, “Guitarists Round Table—Holding the Guitar by George C. Krick,” Crescendo 14/11 (May 1922): 22. Vahdah Olcott-Bickford continued to endorse the “progressive” position, waming a former student in 1927 to be wary of the techniques. including the use of footstool. promoted by the new school of European guitarists led by Andres Segovia and Miguel Llobet; Ronald C. Purcell, “Letters From the Past: Segovia Perceived: The American Reaction of Segovia’s Arrival,” Soundboard 20/3 (1994): 21 *° William Foden, “Guitarists Round Table—Holding the Guitar by George C. Kick,” Crescendo 14/11 (May 1922): 22 107Figure 5.4. William Foden demonstrating seating position Foden's Grand Method for Guitar, Book 1, (New York. Wm. J. Smith Music Company, 1920), frontispiece WILLIAM FODEN 108Despite its active use in the United States for at least twenty years, the “progressive” sitting position endorsed by Bickford, Gramm, Partee, and others attracted no adherents outside of America. Although it enjoyed some popularity in England and Australia, the banjo remained an American instrument, having little appeal for most European or South American musicians. As a result, a new guitar technique derived from playing the banjo had little resonance with non-Americans. Such European and South American gt ists, as Segovia and Oyanguren who dominated the North American classical guitar world in the 1930s and 1940s, traced their technical roots back to Cares and performed with a footstool. The banjo-inspired, progressive sitting position has virtually disappeared while the footstool remains a standard tool for the classical guitarist in America and the rest of the world into the twenty-first century.*! Left-hand Fingerings and Shifting In 1886, Fred Oehler, a guitarist teaching in Mount Vernon, NY, offered the following advice to guitar and banjo students: It is an established fact, that a piece of music will not sound so good or make an effect, unless it is played in the right tempo. To play in the right tempo, it is necessary to play it in the right positions, or in other words, to use correct, fingerings. *! In the final decade of the twentieth century, some classical guitarists began experimenting with devices—pillows, wire-frame supports, etc —that allowed them to keep both feet flat on the floor as they played. Although such supports place a player in a more “decorous” position (at least by BMG standards): late-century players were actually searching for a way to offset the uncomfortable twisting in the lower back caused by the footstool. Despite some success at reducing back tension, these devices remain much less popular among players than the traditional footstool. 109It would therefore be advisable for a student trying to learn a composition, to pay attention to the fingering if itis marked, or if not, to try and find the correct, positions in which to play the different runs, etc., before laying it aside...” ‘As Ochler implies, published composi ns for guitar and banjo often appeared without fingerings, leaving student and amateur players to discover their own solution to left- hand problems. Throughout the fifty-year BMG era, pedagogues and players offered magazine readers a variety of approaches to left-hand fingerings for the guitar. While many contributors claimed unique methodologies, most shared a common approach. Many banjo, mandolin, and guitar teachers regarded the guitar as the most difficult of the three instruments, identifying its left-hand techniques as its greatest. challenge. Even those who encouraged students to play it often sounded discouragingly defeatist when describing the guitarist’s left hand. In 1893, Clarence Partee, publisher of Cadenza, projected his own predilection for the smaller banjo or mandolin in his discussion of the guitar: ‘The fingering of the guitar in properly stopping the strings and holding the various chords is necessarily both complicated and difficult, not to say awkward, on account of the width of the fingerboard, the tuning, number and thickness of the strings, the considerable distance between the frets and the great compass of the guitar, (three and one-half octaves, without counting harmonics.) besides the difficulty of holding the instrument. All these peculiarities, and numerous technical difficulties not specially mentioned, combine to make the guitar one of the most difficult of instruments to master.”? Partee authored not only two long articles about left-hand fingerings on the guitar, but also a gi ‘ar method. Like most writers whose principal instrument was not the guitar, * Stewart's 3/9 (April-May 1886): 5. * Clarence L. Partee, “Practical Hints On Modern Guitar Playing. Chapter IT. Left-Hand Fingering,” Cadenza 4/2 (November-December 1897): 2-5. 110however, Partee devoted most of tention to the fingering of chord shapes rather than scalar o contrapuntal passages. By and large, non-guitarists who offered technical advice about the instrument ignored the guitar’s potential as a solo instrument, focusing instead on its role in accompaniment, Several years after Partee’s discussion of the guitarist’s left hand, two of America’s more prominent guitar soloists presented their comments to readers of ‘Stewart's Journal and Cadenza. In 1899, C.D. Schettler, the German-trained player from Utah, offered some general guidelines, urging guitarists to place their fretting fingers accurately and to abandon the outmoded technique of fretting bass notes with the left- hand thumb.** That same year, C.F.E. Fiset produced a series of columns for Stewart's titled “A System of Technique for the Guitar.” Fiset’s series included one article, supplemented by extensive musical examples, which focused on his system of left-hand fingering.** He claims a new scale system when he presents upper position scale exercises that encompass the full gamut of the scale.** Fiset encouraged their use by guitarists to improve pitch recognition in the upper reaches of the fingerboard and to develop increased facility. He also proposed that guitarists limit their movement in shifting up the fingerboard, making as few jumps as possible. Fiset suggested that if ** C.D. Schettler, “A Few Remarks on Artistic Performin; April 1899): 4-5. .” Cadenza 5/4 (March- * CFE. Fiset, “A System of Technique for the Guitar, Article III” Stewart's 16/3 (August-September 1899): 5-6. Musical examples appear on 13-16, © Fiset aimed these criticisms at Matteo Carcassi’s Method, in which upper position scale exercises often begin and end on a pitch other than the tonic. Schettler, while not recognizing Fiset’s “System” by name, also noted this problem with Carcassi: “The Art of Guitar Performing,” Cadenza 7/1 (September 1900): 12-13. 11guitarists needed to shift up the fingerboard (toward the guitar's body, playing higher- pitched notes), they do so once, making a large leap, using open strings to cover the movement. Unlike Schettler, Fiset offered fingered diatonic scales as well as demanding examples from concert repertoire, including solo works by Ferranti and Regondi, as well as an excerpt from Mendelssohn’s “Violin Concerto.” Fiset’s fingerings—especially those for the scales—often had the guitarist playing at the extremes of the fingerboard, but avoiding the middle positions. (Fig. 5.5) A slightly later series of articles by Schettler followed Fiset's general precepts for left-hand shifts, although Schettler employed midrange positions more frequently.” Myron A. Bickford offered his advice on guitar technique in a number of columns in Cadenza. Bickford never suggested the kinds of detailed fingerings that Fiset and Schettler did, but as a performing violinist/violist, he provided sound advice about sequential use of the fingers and vibrato."* Bickford consistently praised the guitar's expressive qualities, often contrasting it with the percussive piano and citing the guitar's portamento or “glide” as one of its most important technical features. Vahdah Oleott- Bickford also addressed the guitarist’s left hand in her Cadenza column, but rather than examine specific fingerings, she offered a set of “General Rules for Guitar Fingering.” * CD. Schettler, “The Art of Guitar Performing, Chapter Ill,” Cadenza 7/3 (September 1900): 4. He offers examples of extended major and minor scales on 6-7. ** Myron A. Bickford, “Hints on Guitar Study,” Cadenza 11/4 (December 1904): 17. See also Bickford’s later article with the same title, Cadenza 12/1 (September 1905): 15-16, *° Vahdah Olcott-Bickford, “The Guitarist—A Few General Rules for Fingering, Cadenza 27/3 (March 1920): 40-42. 112