Small things huddle together in bundles, herds, packages; the great walk lonely. It is strange to see a school of whales, a troop of tigers; stranger still to see a congress of pianos. Yet, on the r.tage of the Metropolitan Opera House, Manhattan, were marshaled 18 of these great, suave, sable instruments, in neat rows. Most remarkable of all—before each sat a famed player, before each a face which alone might have been enough to bring to the hall the notable company that filled it on that evening. The company had assembled, the pianos trundled into line, all to get money for the Association for Improving the Condition of the Poor. Walter Damrosch*, famed conductor, waved his baton; the thunderous regiment as one voice responded.
Thus were the 18 famed players ranked with their 18 pianos:
Left row—Guy Maier, Krnest Schelling, Lee Pattison, Sigismund Stojowski and Guiomar Novaës.
Left center—Josef Lhévinne, Alexander Brailowsky, Ethel Leginska and Myra Hess.
Right center — Ossip Gabrilowitch, Harold Bauer, Germaine Schnitzer and Yolanda Méro.
Right—Mischa Levitzki, Karl Friedberg, Ernest Hutcheson, Alexander Siloti and Elly Ney.
Eyeing the hand of Conductor Damrosch, the entire congress began to play, with sonorous tutti, Saint-Saens’ Variations on a Theme by Beethoven. Then Mines. Hess, Leginska and Mérë sat jowl to jowl at one piano, played Boieldieu’s overture to La Dame Blanche. Laughter and applause. Mr. Brailowsky opened the preamble of Schummann’s Carnaval, passed it on to Mr. Gabrilowitch, and so the music leaped from instrument to instrument “till all marched against the Philistines.”
This mountebankery over, Dwight W. Morrow, Chairman of the Association and famed J. P. Morgan partner, rose. There was something to be done, he said. The Knabe-Ampico Piano Co. had given a piano to be auctioned off. Who would beat the gavel ? “Oh, there you are!” said Mr. Morrow, spying Joseph P. Day, famed amateur auctioneer. Up got Mr. Day.
“Two thousand,” said he. “Who’ll give me two thousand?”
“Two thousand,” yelled a voice.
“Piker!” said Mr. Day, “Come higher !”
“Three thousand,” yelled a voice.
“Who’s going to bid for this piano?” asked Mr. Day.
Doctors, lawyers, merchant chiefs—they were going to bid for the piano. Cunningly, Mr. Day conducted an orchestra of instruments subtler than those of Mr. Damrosch’s. Up and up went the bidders. At last only three were left: William C. Potter, President of the Guaranty Trust Co.; Charles E. Mitchell, President of the National City Bank; Thomas Cochran, of J. P. Morgan & Co.
“Twenty-one thousand nine hundred dollars,” said Mr. Mitchell.
“Who’ll give me twenty-two?” asked Mr. Day.
“I,” said Mr. Cochran.
“Sold!” said Mr. Day.
Thus hearty Mr. Cochran, generous with dollars, jokes, and rich in both, came to own the piano. Immediately he presented it to the Association. Then the 18 artists played We Won’t Go Home Till Morning. They improvised chopsticks; the tune was recorded on a player-piano role, auctioned by Mr. Damrosch to Cornelius N. Bliss for $2,000.
*Walter Damrosch was born in Breslau, Silesia, came to the U. S. when he was nine. His father, also a conductor, was a friend of Liszt, Wagner, von Billow, Auer, Rubinstein; he led an orchestra in which Walter made his first public appearance—as a cymbal player. The youth was so nervous that he could not lift the cymbals. Later he played in his father’s orchestra with the second violins to learn how instrument players follow the conductor’s beat. Recently he owned the largest private music library in the world, presented it to the New York Symphony Society. Called “Dean of American Conductors,” he, now 63, has directed the New York Symphony for 39 years.
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