My favorite part of the Music Page Indicator from March 1916 is a two-page advertisement by Steinway & Sons, which is prefaced with, “Not only is Steinway & Sons’ advertising of the highly artistic character which reflects the reputation of the Steinway Piano, but it also furnishes an example of splendid ideals.”[1] Steinway then displays three advertisements for which the company is most proud. These advertisements are fascinating, because they evince the values of Victorian Society.
The first advertisement pictures a female singer in concert with a male accompanist. The ad reads, “To support the singer’s voice with reassuring strength and unfaltering truth, to inspire it to new efforts, to ecstatic heights and stirring depths…”[2] In short, this ad features a Steinway as a superior accompaniment, as if using a Steinway somehow transforms the singer into a true artist. In their writing I have found that Victorians use extremities to portray a positive opinion. I have also learned the enthusiasm of the Victorians for virtuosic players and singers. Steinway clearly plays on the trend.
The second advertisement portrays a mother peering from behind a drape at her daughter practicing the piano. This image illuminates the cult of domesticity, an ideal that was exceedingly popular in the Victorian Era. The ad begins, “Start the small traveler on life’s journey with the most helpful equipment. A knowledge of the best in music means an uplift all the way.”[3] This advertisement does not necessarily promise that one’s child will be a virtuoso pianist, but it does promise that one’s child will have impeccable taste, a trait that Victorians would value.
The final advertisement pictures a teenage woman at the piano and her female piano teacher looking over her shoulder. “To the fine soul in search of expression, the Steinway comes with an untold wealth of treasure…In the Steinway’s tonal range each note of the human voice finds its perfect complement, sustaining it with sympathetic sweetness and flawless purity.”[4] In this advertisement the piano is presented as a kind of therapist, a personified object that through its tonal capacities will meet a woman’s desires and needs. This advertisement in its entirely has certainly given me much food for thought. Perhaps I can use this two-page spread as the base structure of my paper, and use each advertisement as a means from which to expand.
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