Chicago Gramophone Society

This page presents an account of the Chicago Gramophone Society.

It is part of the site Classical 'Society' Records by Nick Morgan.

Documented from late 1926 until early 1928, the Chicago Gramophone Society was both an organization and a record label.

It was one of several North American groups modelled on the gramophone societies of Great Britain.

Little noticed, and absent from most histories and reference works, the Society appears to have been the first publisher of records financed and sold by subscription in the U.S.A.

It issued just four 78 rpm discs, all but unknown today, yet of considerable musical and historical value. For the Society's discography, see Chicago Gramophone Society discography.

The brainchild of a few ardent enthusiasts, the Chicago Gramophone Society was small and seems not to have survived its founder's disenchantment with his hobby.

For dates of creation and latest update, please see 'Page information' in left sidebar.

Antecedents

Societies for the communal enjoyment, study and comparison of talking machine equipment and records were formed early. These are still poorly documented; a preliminary account is attempted elsewhere on this site. Given the paucity of research in this field, one should beware sweeping statements, but it appears that the first purely amateur talking machine societies were founded in Britain in the first decade of the twentieth century. After a faltering start, the second decade saw solid growth. By the mid-1920s, other English-speaking countries were showing an interest in such societies, although mentions in the US press seem extremely uncommon.

The seed for this international growth was the first British record magazine aimed not at the trade but at consumers. Launched in April 1923, The Gramophone soon had subscribers in the British Empire and North America. The magazine's advocacy of gramophone societies, and detailed coverage of the British scene, inspired the formation of imitators abroad, notably in Japan. The Boston Gramophone Society appears to have been the first in North America, formed in the autumn of 1925; its use of the term 'gramophone' instead of the American 'phonograph' was surely a nod to British models, although the Society had reverted to local usage by the end of 1926. By then, Boston could boast a home-grown magazine, The Phonograph Monthly Review. Clearly modelled on The Gramophone, and determined to aid and abet the formation of similar societies across the US, it shared some personnel with its local group. Meanwhile, a society had been formed in Minneapolis in the spring of 1926, and another in Philadelphia in October.

It was into this seemingly receptive environment that the Chicago Gramophone Society emerged in late 1926, after a gestation of a year or so; it was soon followed by a second in the same city (see below). In one respect, though, the Society had no known antecedent or peers in the USA: it was the only such group to publish records, and the first US label to finance its issues by subscription. Previous American publishers of small-circulation recordings of classical repertoire operated either on a fully commercial, retail basis (e.g. Gianni Bettini) or as private, non-commercial (and sometimes unauthorized) documentary recordists (e.g. Lionel Mapleson).

The Society did have an apparent antecedent abroad: the National Gramophonic Society (N.G.S.) of Great Britain. Despite its name, the N.G.S. was not an offshoot of the gramophone society movement, but rather an attempt on the part of an impulsive, entrepreneurial outsider, the novelist and founding editor of The Gramophone, Compton Mackenzie, to circumvent what he perceived as the limitations of the commercial record market. In late 1923, Mackenzie took a step without known precedent in the gramophone business: he began soliciting subscriptions with a view to financing premiere recordings of complete works, to be issued to future members in limited editions. In late 1924, his bold plan came to fruition as the N.G.S. distributed its first discs. As a subsidiary activity of Mackenzie's magazine, the Society was well publicized in its pages, carrying the news of its formation and activities across the English-speaking world. In Chicago, one talking machine journalist took this as evidence of 'A Great Movement', agitated for a US equivalent, and soon founded a phonograph society.

But it would fall to outsiders, again, to transplant Mackenzie's idea onto American soil.

Beginnings

The first known mention of the Society was published in October 1926, in the inaugural issue of The Phonograph Monthly Review. To judge from the report's content and title, 'Chicago Phonograph Society', the name had not yet been finalised. The author, Vories Fisher, who was introduced elsewhere in the magazine, briefly described

'a small group of friends who, because of their interest in music and, because of their devotion to and interest in recorded music have fallen together into a very natural society where they have discussed new records – new machines [sic] in a most informal way. But their greatest activity has been the giving of concerts to each other in a "mock" formal way. Programs have been fashioned after the manner of the large Symphony Orchestras of the country. They have given recitals devoted to a particular artist – they have given concerts devoted to Beethoven, to Wagner, to Debussy and to Moussorgsky. These concerts have not only been a great pleasure in the actual enjoyment they offered but, in connection with the regular concerts of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, have added greatly to the enjoyment and understanding of that organization.'

One of these concerts was the subject of a second report, written this time by Dorothy B. Fisher, wife of Vories, and published a month later. Chatty and perhaps lightly fictionalised, it radiates a warmth and informality rare in such accounts:

'During the past winter we have been giving concerts on the phonograph that have proved very interesting, not only to ourselves, but also to those whom we had room enough to invite. [...] Whom shall we invite to the concert? Let me see. There is Mr. Green, who is inclined to favor the classics more than the moderns. A Beethoven symphony, perhaps? There is an excellent Odeon recording of the Second. What say? But we must consider how many record [sic] it takes, for we must not make the concert too long. There must be time for encores; sixteen faces [i.e. sides] will be about right. The Beethoven Second in eight faces. That will be fine. But Harry and Bob will be there, too, and they favor the modern, the more unusual. What shall we have to please them? How would it be if we opened the concert with that little record of the Strawinsky Fireworks made by Victor? Good. [...] But then what? Aunt Marion, Uncle Will and Julian will want to hear some Wagner. Why not make the whole second half Wagnerian? We could give the very fine new records from Parsival [sic] made by Columbia, conducted by Bruno Walter and the Fire Music and Siegfried's Journey to the Rhine that Victor has just put out. That should please them, and make the concert just about the right length. [...] Do you think that will do? Good.'

The presence of family members - 'Aunt Marion, Uncle Will' - suggests small, intimate gatherings. The works listed above made up the 'First Program' of the 'Dorothy and Vories Fisher Symphony Concert', appended to the report and dated 22 October. The phrase 'the past winter' implies October 1925; if so, the Chicago group was as old as the Boston Gramophone Society, although not formally constituted until a year later. The venue, alluded to above but not named, was probably 4928 Blackstone Avenue, the Fishers' Chicago home.

Shortly after Mrs. Fisher's report was published, the Chicago musical retailer Lyon & Healy made its city-centre premises available for the first open meeting of the Chicago Gramophone Society proper, held on 9 November 1926 (see below).

The following sections examine in more detail the Society's constitution and activities, including all its documented meetings.

Officers

At the first open meeting of the Chicago Gramophone Society, held on 9 November 1926, the following Officers were elected, reportedly 'to serve for a short period of time and until the society was in good working order and the members better acquainted with each other':

• President: Vories Fisher
• Vice-President: W.P. Roche
• Secretary-Treasurer: L.J. Harris

As far as is known, these Officers remained in post throughout the Society's short existence.

Vories Fisher

Fisher's duties as President were never publicly defined. He was undoubtedly the Society's prime mover, as well as its co-founder: he addressed all but one of its open meetings, promoted it in The Phonograph Monthly Review, liaised with sister societies, and underwrote its two issues together with Robert Pollak. Yet, despite Fisher's high profile and brief but prolific spate of gramophone journalism, his exact share of the Society's administrative and production work remains unclear. His contributions to The Phonograph Monthly Review are examined on the biographical page devoted to him; his known and conjectured roles within the Society are discussed on this page.

Walter P. Roche

When elected Vice-President, Roche was head of the talking machine and radio departments of Lyon & Healy. Born in 1891 in Elma, Iowa, Roche had joined the firm as an errand boy in the first decade of the twentieth century, and over two decades rose to the position of director (appointed June 1926). In early 1928, he was elected vice-president in charge of the wholesale and retail radio and phonograph departments, and all wholesale departments except sheet music.

In both Britain and the US, it was common for dealers to support phonograph societies in various ways. Roche does not loom large in reports of the Society's activities, and it would be easy to devalue his contribution by suggesting that he joined not as a private, music-loving citizen but as a retail salesman, intent on cultivating potential customers. The Society's members would certainly have seemed promising prospects, attracted as they were to the kind of music Roche had identified as good business in a profile published some time before in a trade paper:

'The popularity of the better class record is increasing steadily, and the recent new methods adopted for building up in the minds of the millions of listeners-in a memory of the names, personalities and styles of great recording artists, are helping to increase vastly the number of those who buy the best music in record form. We work constantly upon new ideas for the better education of our sales force and I may say that one of our most successful methods is found in putting a premium on the sale of the highest-class records.'

Roche may have played an important part in the Society's short existence, by acting as an intermediary between it and Lyon & Healy's clientele. Another employee, S.B. Curren, was credited with putting the firm's concert hall and gramophones at the Society's disposal, but Roche may also have had a hand in giving it this highly visible and reputable public forum.

His later career has not been investigated in detail, but by 1942 he was working as an air conditioning salesman, and did so until he retired. Roche died in the Chicago satellite of Hines, Illinois on 11 July 1955.

L.J. Harris

For the present, Harris can be identified only tentatively (he is presumed to have been male, pending contrary evidence). He signed all but one reports of Chicago Gramophone Society meetings published in The Phonograph Monthly Review; they contain no information about the author.

Two candidates have been identified.

Of the two, the more likely is Leon Julian Harris (1901-93), always known as L. Julian or Julian Harris. Born in Nebraska, Harris studied law at the University of Chicago from 1920 to 1924, overlapping with the slightly younger Robert Pollak; both were members of the Pi Lambda Phi student fraternity. In addition, Harris appears to have been a member of the University Glee Club. In May 1925, one Julian Harris acted alongside Pollak in a medieval French farce put on at Chicago's Arts Club. By 1926 Harris was employed by a prestigious Chicago law firm as as an attorney; two years later, he apparently had his own practice in Chicago's business district, and thereafter he is attested in census returns and press reports as a general and corporate lawyer, ending his life as a parter in another prestigious firm, D'Ancona and Pflaum. Intriguingly, a 'Julian' is mentioned in Dorothy Fisher's account of a 1926 gramophone recital, quoted above, although no conclusive evidence has been found to confirm that he was a friend of the Fishers. More significantly, perhaps, L. Julian Harris was also mentioned in much later press reports as a supporter of classical music in and around Chicago. In 1950, he was apparently Co-Chairman of the Ernest Bloch Festival Association, which was responsible for organizing a 6-day festival in Chicago in honour of the Swiss-born composer's seventy-fifth birthday. Later, Harris was a trustee of and fund-raiser for the Ravinia Festival, and as patron of the Chicago Symphony he accompanied the Orchestra on its first foreign tour, as well as on subsequent tours.

The less likely and less well documented candidate is L.J. Harris M.D., regularly listed as a physician in Chicago business directories, member of a medical fraternity at the Chicago College of Medicine and Surgery (now Valparaiso University), and President of a local lodge of a Jewish fraternal order. No evidence has been found that Dr. Harris had any interest in classical music.

Confirmation, correction or any further information will be gratefully received.

Membership

Terms and Conditions

Commonly, amateur societies draw up more or less formal constitutions, statements of intent and/or rules of membership. They may publicize them at meetings, in circulars, in the press (and, now, online) etc. Some charge a membership fee, to cover administration costs and other expenses.

At its first open meeting, the Chicago Gramophone Society elected provisional officers (see above), whose names were published a month a later. At the next meeting, it adopted a set of 'by-laws' - presumably including terms and conditions of membership. These were never published; they may have been circulated privately, although no circulars were mentioned in reports. Thus, it is not known if the Society levied membership dues, which were likewise not mentioned in reports.

Subscription to the Society's issues was apparently open to all, whether members or not, and the cost, $2.50 per disc, was the same for members and non-members alike. In this respect, the Society departed considerably from its two known predecessors. In Britain, the National Gramophonic Society initially restricted its issues to members, who were also obliged to take them all and pay for a whole year's worth in advance, a considerable outlay, although in early 1927 the N.G.S. relaxed this rule, which appeared to militate against increased membership. In Japan, Dainippon Meikyoku Rekōdo Seisaku Hanpu Kwai did not restrict its issues to members, but charged non-members a hefty premium of 60%. The Chicago Gramophone Society could surely not afford to impose such conditions: it would probably not have covered the costs of producing its issues if they had been available only to members. The Japanese society also levied a non-refundable deposit on each disc subscribed for; not only did the Chicago Gramophone Society forego this security, it did not require payment in advance but only on delivery. These relaxed terms presumably exposed the underwriters, Fisher and Pollak, to some personal risk, although there is no mention of defaults in known sources.

Size and Composition

Reports of the Society's activities gave no figures for the size of the membership, or for attendance at meetings. Both were almost certainly small. The make-up of the membership was not characterized or discussed, and no members were named other than the Fishers, Pollak, Roche and Harris. No membership roll or list has been located. Any information about members not named on this page will be gratefully received.

Because the Society did not restrict subscriptions, the fact that its first issue of 200 sets was fully subscribed, indeed over-subscribed, is no indication of the size of the membership. Not being reliant on the membership alone to finance its recordings, it was under no pressure to grow, unlike the National Gramophonic Society, which based its recording programme on a projected membership of 500, a target it never attained at any one time. The Chicago Society did briefly address the question of growth, adopting a word-of-mouth approach to recruitment which was also favoured by the N.G.S. (see below).

The membership certainly included both men and women: Mrs. Dorothy B. Fisher was a prominent founder-member, and her account of an informal, pre-formation meeting mentioned another female attendee - possibly fictitious, but suggesting that the presence of women was not unheard of. On the other hand, all three of the Society's provisional officers were men, as was the norm at that time.

The social make-up of the Society's membership can be surmised from several lines of evidence. In Britain, gramophone societies typically drew their members predominantly from the urban lower-middle class, and to a lesser extent (and mainly in London) from the middle class. The N.G.S. was atypical, in that the high cost of subscription to its issues was affordable only for the affluent or the very determined; among its known members were several upper-middle class and even aristocratic individuals. In the USA, the earliest documented phonograph societies also seem to have had mainly middle-class members, not least because of their focus on classical recordings. Known members were drawn from the professions, business and finance, and the worlds of music and the arts.

The scant evidence about the Chicago Gramophone Society's members tallies with this picture. At this time, Mrs. Fisher worked in advertising. Her husband and Robert Pollak, co-sponsors of the Society's issues, were both stock brokers. If correctly identified above, Julian Harris was a lawyer. Walter P. Roche exemplifies a different type of member: as an employee of Lyon & Healy, he was cultivating potential buyers of his company's stock of 'the highest-class records', as he termed them in his 1925 profile, quoted above.

Commercial Partners

The Chicago Gramophone Society did not have its own premises, nor any means of producing records or printed material, and relied on commercial partners to provide these.

Lyon & Healy

Once the Society was officially formed, it met in the Concert Hall of Lyon & Healy, Chicago's most prominent musical instrument manufacturer and general music retailer, which occupied a building on the corner of Wabash and Jackson Avenues. The company was sold several times from the 1950s to the 1980s, and its business archive has unfortunately disappeared, leaving details of its relationship with the Society obscure. For instance, it is not known who proposed that Lyon & Healy host the first meeting. On that occasion, an employee, S.B. Curren, offered the Society the use of the firm's Concert Hall and gramophones; all subsequent meetings were held there. As noted above, another employee considered it worth his while to act as one of the Society's officers. This was not unusual: several US phonograph societies had ties to record producers and retailers, although some individuals considered such ties problematic. In Britain, too, producers such as the Gramophone Company dispatched lecturers to address gramophone societies, and dealers lent premises, equipment and records for society meetings. In early 1927, the National Gramophonic Society began holding open meetings in the showroom of a prominent London retailer, which agreed to act as a kind of shop-front, where prospective members could audition N.G.S. discs 'in a special room' and, if satisfied, join the Society and place orders for past and future issues. Did Lyon & Healy also act as a hub for the Chicago Gramophone Society? If not, at least its Concert Hall lent the Society's meetings some of this sumptuous establishment's solidity and prestige.

The inaugural meeting was also attended by representatives of Brunswick, Columbia and Victor, who reportedly 'extended to the society any help which their respective companies might be able to give', although reports made no further mention of attendance by these or any other record company employees.

Columbia Personal Record Department

The Society's issues were recorded and pressed by the Columbia Phonograph Company, Inc. The Company provided a 'Personal Record' service which has been little investigated. Thanks to research carried out by Tim Brooks, Columbia's 'Personal Record' rates for 1917-18 are documented. It is not known if, or how much, the rates had changed by 1927, but calculations based on the documented rates yield highly plausible results for the costs of the Society's sessions (see below). The rates relevant to the Chicago Gramophone Society are as follows:

• To record two 12-inch matrices [with one voice and/or instrument] and press three 12-inch double-faced records = $150.00
• To press over 100 and up to 250 12-inch double-faced records = $187.50 for the first 100 + $1.20 each for excess

See below for the Society's pricing of its issues, and for a discussion of their production.

Printers (unknown)

It is not known who manufactured the only known printed item published by the society, a leaflet which accompanied its first issue. No copy has been located.

No leaflet was produced for the second issue.

Meetings

The principal activity of the Chicago Gramophone Society was holding meetings, at which members discussed and voted on Society business, heard talks or lectures by members or guests, and listened to gramophone recitals. All open meetings were held in the Lyon & Healy Concert Hall in the evening; start and end times were not given in reports.

Pre-formation meeting(s)

The embryonic organization held an unknown number of meetings before its first open meeting as the Chicago Gramophone Society. As noted above, early reports by the Fishers made it clear they had been giving 'concerts on the phonograph' at least since 'the past winter', i.e. that of 1925-26, and described the first, dated 22 October [1925?] and probably held at their home.

First open meeting

The Society's inaugural meeting was held on 9 November 1926, and presided over by Robert Pollak, as temporary chairman. The report in the December 1926 Phonograph Monthly Review was again titled 'Chicago Phonograph Society', this time clearly in error, contradicting the body of the report, as well as a brief notice in the Chicago Sunday Tribune. The Society never publicly explained or justified its unusual name; but its debt to British models was made clear in the meeting's opening address, given by Vories Fisher, and titled

'"The History and Purpose of This and Kindred Societies," in which he set forth in general what the gramophone societies had accomplished in England and what this society intends to accomplish here. Mr. Fisher presented some very interesting ideas on gramophone programs and on a public subscription foreign record library, which will in all probability elicit further discussion at the next meeting of the society.'

Exactly what the Society intended to accomplish was not spelled out in the Review; significantly, there was no mention of issuing records. Fisher's 'public subscription foreign record library', which very much reflected his own interests as a collector, was never again mentioned in reports of the Society's meetings or in Fisher's known writings. His talk was followed by a gramophone concert:

'Prince Igor – Polovetski Dance (Victor)				Borodin
Philadelphia Symphony – Leopold Stokowski, Conductor

Sonata in A major for Violin and Piano – First Movement (Columbia)	Brahms
Toscha Seidel and Arthur Loesser

Negro Spirituals
On ma' Journey (Victor)						Arr. Lawrence Brown
Nobody Knows de Trouble I've Seen (Victor)				Arr. Lawrence Brown
Paul Robeson

Sonata in B minor – Fourth Movement (Columbia)				Chopin
Percy Grainger

The Valkyrie – Fire Music (Victor)					Wagner
Symphony Orchestra conducted by Albert Coates

The program was enthusiastically received by all present.'

After this recital, the Society elected three officers (see above). Then came an 'informal discussion', at the end of which members were invited to attend a lecture on electrical recording at a forthcoming meeting of the Chicago Chapter of the American Institute of Electrical Engineers.

The meeting must have been judged a success, not only by the Society, but also by Lyon & Healy, which 'extended an invitation to the society to use the Concert Hall and machines of the company when it so desired.' Three record company employees, also in attendance, likewise 'extended to the society any help which their respective companies might be able to give'. It is not known if they were invited by Lyon & Healy or by the Society, or how many further meetings they attended, if any, although Columbia's W.G. Link was possibly present at the March meeting which his company hosted to commemorate the centenary of Beethoven's death (see below).

Phonograph Art Society

Alongside its report of the Chicago Gramophone Society's inaugural open meeting, the Phonograph Monthly Review printed another, announcing the imminent formation of a second society in the city, the Chicago Phonograph Art Society. Like its sibling, this was the brainchild of a Chicago couple, William and Elizabeth Braid White, and had been in gestation for some time; Mr. Braid White was the journalist who had been agitating for US gramophone societies since 1925. The report included an account of an informal phonograph recital held at the Whites' home, very like the one written up in the Review by Dorothy Fisher, and held just 6 days later, on 28 October 1926. The planned programme, printed in some detail, consisted of works by Tchaikovsky, Elgar and Wagner. The following month, the Phonograph Monthly Review carried a report of the Phonograph Art Society's formal foundation at an administrative meeting on 30 November, when officers were elected and a 'Declaration of Principles' was drawn up and approved. Printed in full, this made clear how keen William Braid White was to see the N.G.S.'s example followed and emulated:

'4. The Society recognizes gratefully the pioneer work done by the National Gramophonic Society of Great Britain in organizing groups of music loving men and women throughout the world into Societies of which the aims are similar to those of the Phonograph Art Society of Chicago; and while desiring to maintain its own individuality intact, wishes to be affiliated with the N.G.S., and to assist in every practical way the valuable and unique work of publishing in record form music otherwise unobtainable in that form.'

The report named two women as present at this meeting, and three as having voted by proxy. Would the city sustain two societies? The Phonograph Art Society and Chicago Gramophone Society did come into contact, as noted below, but the Braid Whites did not join forces with the Fishers. One reason, perhaps, was the determination, expressed above, of the group to 'maintain its own individuality intact'.

Second open meeting

At the start of the Chicago Gramophone Society's second meeting, held on 13 December 1926, 'by-laws of the Society were adopted'; these were not published. The main event of the evening was a substantial talk on Hugo Wolf, given by Robert Pollak and illustrated with both records and live performances by a young local pianist, Marion Roberts, then on the threshold of a promising career. Roberts performed three songs, one each by Hugo Wolf, Schubert and Brahms (no titles were given), to support Pollak's argument that Wolf was the best song composer of the three. No singer was named. Presumably, Roberts played reductions which included the vocal part, but it is not known if she prepared them herself beforehand, extemporised them, or used existing arrangements, or whether she was already under consideration as a recording artist; four months later, she would make her first and only known recording for the Society. The talk ended with an audition of the following Wolf songs on records:

'Zur' [sic] Ruh Zur Ruh' (Victor)			Reinald Werrenrath [(baritone)] 
Fussreise (Polydor)					Elizabeth van Endert [(soprano)]
Der Freund (Polydor)					Heinrich Schlusnus [(baritone)]
Der Musikant (Polydor)					Heinrich Schlusnus
Auf Den Grunen [sic] Balkon (His Master's Voice)	Elena Gerhardt [(mezzo-soprano)]
Verschwiegene Liebe (Polydor)				Heinrich Schlusnus
Der Rattenfanger [sic] (Polydor)			Heinrich Schlusnus

Pollak's talk and musical programme were printed in full in The Phonograph Monthly Review. Before Pollak began his talk, 'it was decided to invite the cooperation of the Chicago Phonograph Art Society'; an open letter of invitation to the new group was included in the Secretary's report. The following day, 14 December, Vories Fisher attended a meeting of the Phonograph Art Society and reiterated the invitation in person.

Third open meeting

The meeting on 18 January 1927 brought news of an important development. Opening the proceedings, Vories Fisher

'told the Society about the private recording of the Caesar [sic] Franck "Prelude, Choral and Fugue" by Miss Marion Roberts which he and Mr. Robert Pollak are underwriting. Mr. Fisher announced that only a few more subscriptions would be accepted, as the edition will be limited, and that the subscription list would then be closed. Upon motion duly made, seconded and carried it was resolved that Messrs. Fisher and Pollak be authorized to have this new recording issued under the label of The Chicago Gramophone Society.'

(The Secretary's report was printed only in the March 1927 number of the Phonograph Monthly Review, and so appeared after the previous number's announcement of the Society's first issue.)

The main business of the evening was a talk, given by Fisher, on the life and music of Modest Musorgsky. It was illustrated with recorded excerpts from the opera Boris Godunov and was printed in full in the Review, after the Secretary's report. The text named no performers but gave catalogue numbers, allowing all the discs played by Fisher to be identified:

• Part 1 / Prologue - 'Скорбит душа' (Coronation scene), Fyodor Chaliapin (bass), chorus, orchestra, Albert Coates H.M.V. DB900 (12-inch)
• Part 2 / Act I - scene i, 'Еще одно, последнее сказанье' (Pimen's tale), Dmitri Smirnov (tenor), Konstantin Kaidanov (bass), orchestra, Piero Coppola, H.M.V. DB765 (12-inch)
• Part 2 / Act I - scene ii, 'Как во городе было во Казани' (Varlaam's song), Fyodor Chaliapin (bass), orchestra, Josef Pasternack, Victor 558 (10-inch)
• Part 3 / Act II - 'Достиг я высшей власти' (Boris's monologue), Fyodor Chaliapin (bass), orchestra, Eugene Goossens [III], Victor 6489 (US issue) (12-inch)
• [-] / Act IV, scene ii, (Revolution scene), Walter Widdop (tenor), Robert Gwynne (tenor), Edward Halland (bass), B Mills, Frederick Kelsey (baritone), chorus, orchestra, Albert Coates, H.M.V. D1090, D1091 (12-inch)
• Part 4 / Act IV, scene ii, 'Прощай, мой сын, умираю' (Death of Boris), Fyodor Chaliapin (bass), Francis Lapitino (harp), orchestra, Josef Pasternack, Victor 6455 (12-inch)

Fisher guided his listeners through each excerpt in some detail, dwelling mainly on the action and music, but occasionally passing comment on one of the recorded performances:

'The choral work is really very enthusiastic and Coates' spirited conducting shows a very sympathetic understanding of the work.'

Fourth open meeting

According to the Secretary's very brief report of the meeting held on 21 February 1927, the musical programme consisted of a comparison of 'new piano recordings of the various recording companies, after which a general discussion was had as to the relative merits of each.' No details of discs played were given. Before that,

'The business meeting was devoted to a discussion of whether or not the Society should endeavor to increase its membership. It was the consensus of opinion that this should be done to a small extent, and it was therefore decided to endeavor to do so by personal solicitation.'

This decision is discussed below, in the section on the Society's Marketing and Publicity.

Fifth open meeting

On 24 March 1927, the Chicago Gramophone Society and Phonograph Art Society held a joint meeting at Lyon & Healy, commemorating the centenary ('centennial' in the USA) of Beethoven's death. The report by the Secretary of the Phonograph Art Society revealed that this was

'at the suggestion of the President, William Braid White. [...] The Phonograph Art Society is greatly indebted to Mr. F.N. Sard, Director of the Beethoven Centennial Committee, for valuable and interesting literature on the subject of the life and works of the great composer.'

It was Frederick Nathan Sard (1889-1958), a music-loving New York publicist, who had had the idea of harnessing the gramophone to the commemoration, to their mutual benefit. He proposed a centennial programme to Columbia in the US, but found only the British branch prepared to make new recordings, an opportunity it seized eagerly and boldly. The resulting issues - all of the symphonies and most of the string quartets, plus some sonatas and a trio, taking up more than 160 discs and costing over £20,000 to record - were heavily promoted in English-speaking markets, with a Beethoven Week, 20 to 26 March 1927, as a focus. The Chicago meeting fell squarely within it, and it is noteworthy that Sard himself was attentive to events as small and local as this; possibly, he shared White's belief in the marketing potential of groups like the Chicago societies. (Sard's innovative and influential initiative was deemed so successful that it was followed the next year by another, again under Sard's direction, commemorating the death of Schubert in 1828.)

This meeting was effectively a celebration of Columbia's celebration: as two other reports made clear, all the discs played during the evening were new Columbia issues, bar one (in addition to the Chicago Gramophone Society's report in The Phonograph Monthly Review, the meeting was briefly noted in the Music Trade Review). Vories Fisher opened proceedings with an illustrated talk 'on the improvement in Beethoven's orchestral records under the new [i.e. electrical] method of recording'; his illustrations, all from the symphonies, were listed without performers but are easily identified:

• Symphony No.2 in D Op.36 - (iv) Allegro molto, London Symphony Orchestra, Sir Thomas Beecham, Columbia 67226-D (12-inch)
• Symphony No.4 in Bb Op.60 - (iv) Allegro ma non troppo, Halle Orchestra, Sir Hamilton Harty, Columbia 67238-D (12-inch)
• Symphony No.5 in c minor Op.67 - (iii) Scherzo: Allegro, (iv) Allegro. Presto, Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, Felix Weingartner, Columbia 67241-D, 67242-D (12-inch)
• Symphony No.8 in F Op.93 - (ii) Allegretto scherzando, Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, Felix Weingartner, Columbia 67304-D (12-inch)

Next, the meeting was played a disc, donated by Sard, of a talk on the second movement of the Symphony No.3 in E flat Op.55 ('Eroica'), recorded by the conductor Walter Damrosch just weeks before:

• 'Funeral March from Beethoven's Symphony No.3 (Eroica) explained at the piano', Walter Damrosch (speaker, piano), Columbia 7122-M (12-inch)

Damrosch was a veteran of musical appreciation: following the example of his older brother Frank, he had been giving musical lecture-recitals and concerts (mainly on Wagner) since the mid-1880s, and was an early and firm convert to radio as an ideal medium for musical appreciation and education. On 19 March 1927, four days before the Chicago societies' joint meeting, he had broadcast a lecture-concert on Beethoven's Fifth Symphony, live, from the Lyceum Theater in Carnegie Hall, New York, in the first of two radio programmes titled The Beethoven Hour, sponsored by Columbia and transmitted nationwide on NBC's Red Network. Damrosch would soon be engaged by NBC as musical advisor, and in 1928 would start presenting the long-running and influential radio series The RCA Educational Hour (later Music Appreciation Hour; the series ran until 1942).

The evening ended with a talk on Beethoven's string quartets by Robert Pollak, 'bringing out the development of Beethoven's genius in this field.' His illustrations too were all drawn from Columbia's anniversary recordings, made in London by the Léner Quartet (not named in the report), except one; this was not an act of perversity or rebellion on Pollak's part, but a pragmatic choice, necessitated by the fact that Columbia had not yet issued its centennial recording of Op.135:

• String Quartet in G Op.18 No.2 - (ii) Scherzo: Allegro, Léner Quartet], Columbia 63707-D (12-inch)
• String Quartet in e Op.59 No.2 - (iii) Allegretto. Maggiore - Thème russe, Léner Quartet, Columbia 67250-D, 67251-D (12-inch)
• String Quartet in F Op.135 - excerpt(?, not specified), Flonzaley Quartet, Victor 1222-25 (10-inch)

After this, the Society is not known to have held any further meetings. The reasons for the cessation of its activities are examined below.

Publications

The Chicago Gramophone Society is known to have published:

• Four twelve-inch 78 rpm records
• One printed leaflet (size unknown)

It does not seem to have published a catalogue, prospectus, or any other publicity or marketing material.

Because the Chicago Gramophone Society was the first body in North America to adopt the National Gramophonic Society's subscription model (or a version of it), and is now remembered only as a publisher, it can easily seem a straightforward imitator of the N.G.S., as the slightly older Japanese gramophone society was. But issuing recordings was not among the proposals aired by Vories Fisher at the Chicago Society's first open meeting in November 1926, nor was the N.G.S. mentioned by him or anyone connected with the Society until several months later. The Chicago group apparently started life as a conventional gramophone society, dedicated to communal listening and enjoyment, with no publicly declared intent to commission or publish records.

Phonograph Monthly Review Contest

In fact, recording was originally the aim of an arm of The Phonograph Monthly Review, the Contest Committee. The inaugural issue of the Review introduced Fisher to readers as Chairman of this Committee, which would oversee two contests:

'The first will give our readers the opportunity of selecting a work to be recorded and the second [...] will be a comparative test of instruments [i.e. phonographs]. The leading recording companies in this country have shown themselves more than willing to co-operate with us. They are ready to record any work for which there is shown a demand.' 

Both contests were probably inspired by those run by The Gramophone, from early in 1924, and they appear to have been Fisher's own initiative; there is no sign in the Review that either project was instigated by the Editor, or was dear to him or any other writer.

In the magazine's second number, the recording contest was explained and refined by Fisher, signing his first published contribution as Chairman of the Committee:

'This contest itself is three-fold in nature.
(1) An orchestral work, never before recorded, to be contained on a single double-sided twelve inch record. [...]
(2) A work of any form, previously recorded under the old, mechanical [i.e. acoustical] method [...] This part of the contest, which, if possible, should include the name of the conductor and orchestra, or in the case of a concerto, the soloist, best suited to record it, is not intended to displace a good old recording, but rather to give the American public an adequate recording of a work which has been known only in an unsatisfactory version or one which is difficult to obtain.
(3) A work of any form, offered as a suggestion to the recording companies. Here is the opportunity to make known some favorite work, unknown to the majority perhaps. [...]

Later on, contests will be held to select full length symphonies, concertos, chamber-music works, etc. For the present, we are anxious to start in a small and very practical way [...] The companies cannot give attention to all the suggestions they receive; they have too much to do recording the works they are recording.'

The last sentence suggests Fisher had some contact with commercial companies, perhaps by correspondence.

Ambitious and detailed as this scheme was, it came to nothing - at least, under the aegis of The Phonograph Monthly Review. Despite attempting to forestall 'the danger of scattering and sporadic votes for a great many works', Fisher was apparently swamped by suggestions: his next three articles did not advance the contest, but were devoted almost entirely to readers' letters. Only in March 1927 were detailed rules and a voting form promised, but neither materialized. Ostensibly, Fisher continued to conduct the contest, alongside a new, simpler and less ambitious competition for prizes of records; but was his heart still in it? In January, he had unveiled a recording project to the Chicago Gramophone Society (see above); his fellow-members had approved it and agreed to have the recording issued under the Society's imprint. In February, the project's model was acknowledged:

'This is, as far as we know, the first attempt to issue privately in this country any records that are made for the express purpose of suiting the taste of the record collector and connoisseur. They are not being put out with the idea of profit behind them at all, but rather as an attempt to start an interest in this country such as there is in England, in private recordings of what is generally considered the better class of music.'

Was Fisher juggling both - the contest and the Society - as potential sources of new recordings, abandoning the former when he saw that it was a dead end? (Possibly, too, he calculated that the companies might renege on the promise which underlay the contest.) This might explain why recording was not among the ideas he mooted at the Society's inaugural meeting, and why he did not hold up the N.G.S. as a model until he had thrown in his lot with his fellow-Chicagoans:

'We are very proud in Chicago of the first set of privately made records that is soon to be issued; we will always look upon The National Gramophone [sic] Society in London as one of the really important movements in modern phonograph activities'

Tellingly, too, the work which Fisher had recorded was one which his abortive Contest had in fact thrown up, as noted below.

Production

How, when, where and by whom were the Society's recordings produced?

The published facts are few. The Society's first issue was put before members and authorized by them in January 1927, announced in February as a limited edition of 150 sets, and distributed in late May or early June. It consisted of the Prelude, Chorale and Fugue by César Franck, the work's gramophone premiere, performed complete by Marion Roberts on two records. Either some effective but undocumented salesmanship, or the shocking news of the pianist's murder on 23 April 1927 - or both - generated greater than expected demand: the final pressing run was 200 sets. These were accompanied by a leaflet, whose author is unknown, as are its contents, other than a tribute to the pianist quoted in one review, which also revealed that the recording had been made by Columbia; presumably, the leaflet also discussed the composer and work, and possibly summarized the Society's aims, rules and activities. The edition was reported to have been fully subscribed at issue, and was confirmed as 'long sold out' by January 1928. The recording has been transferred by the British Library and in 2016 was republished in a post on its 'Sound and vision' blog. (Full discographical details can be found on the page devoted this issue.)

The first mention of a second issue came in November 1927, in a report of a delay caused by 'an over-crowded schedule at the recording studios'. The issue was announced two months later, the first time its contents were made known. Consisting again of two discs and pressed in an edition of 200, and distributed in late January or February 1928, it comprised seven songs, performed by the mezzo-soprano Mina Hager and two pianists. The first record contained John Alden Carpenter's Water-Colors, four settings of Chinese poems in English translations, with the composer at the piano. The second record contained two songs by Hugo Wolf one one side, Auch kleine Dinge and Nimmersatte Liebe, and Blindenklage Op.56 No.2 by Richard Strauss on the other; the pianist was not named in the press or on the record itself. No leaflet accompanied this issue, possibly to save costs: whereas the first had required only one artist, the second called for three, and the texts of Carpenter's songs may also have attracted publisher's charges. (Full discographical details can be found on the page devoted to this issue.)

These bare facts raise many questions, which are addressed below, with considerable help from one important unpublished source; unless more such sources come to light, the answers must remain partial, tentative and often speculative.

The Society was active during the early years of the electrical 78 rpm era, when recording and manufacturing discs required expensive equipment and heavy (partly electro-chemical) industrial plant. Independent record 'societies' did not own such facilities and had to contract out their productions to commercial record companies. This does not mean that the societies played no role in the production process; its purely technical and industrial aspects were necessarily under the control of a contractor, but not its managerial, artistic and editorial aspects. The process can be divided into three phases, in each of which some or all of these latter, non-industrial aspects were present:

• Pre-production: selection of artists and repertoire, negotiation and contracting, editing of works to be recorded
• Studio production: technical and artistic supervision of recording session(s)
• Post-production: processing of recorded takes, manufacture of 'tests' (test pressings), technical and artistic assessment of tests, selection for issue, design, marketing etc.

What role, if any, did the Society's members play any this process? The sole contemporary comment bearing on this question was made by Vories Fisher in The Phonograph Monthly Review in August 1927, some months after the Society's first two discs had been distributed:

'I must admit they would never have been the success that they are had it not been for my good friend Mr. Pollak who did in reality more work than myself.'

Fisher's self-deprecating reticence is frustrating for modern researchers, if typical of such early testimonies. Most focus on the technical and practical aspects of recording, but only very few touch on its aesthetic and editorial aspects. Nevertheless, closer consideration of the above three production phases suggests Fisher's statement may be fairly accurate.

Artists and Repertoire

Four artists recorded for the Chicago Gramophone Society:

• composer John Alden Carpenter (as pianist)
• mezzo-soprano Mina Hager
• pianist Lora Orth Kimsey
• pianist Marion Mahan Roberts

They performed the music of four composers:

• John Alden Carpenter
• César Franck
• Richard Strauss
• Hugo Wolf

The Society did not divulge how these artists or repertoire were selected; but, despite the loss of the Society's archive, there is enough circumstantial evidence to allow at least a speculative reconstruction. If Vories Fisher did shift his ambition to record from the Phonograph Monthly Review Contest to the Society, as argued above, that does not mean that he necessarily planned or oversaw its recording programme. He was a passionate music-lover but he was no musician; to work with professional artists requires musical training or experience (the leading record companies all employed professional musicians for this purpose). Fortunately, Fisher knew someone with both the requisite skills and an entrée into musical circles.

Robert Pollak grew up in Indiana and trained as a pianist, but did not take up higher musical studies. After studying at the University of Chicago, where he and Fisher met, he moved to the city and was now deeply immersed in the city's financial and musical life. Like Fisher, Pollak was a stock and commodity broker, but he also pursued a vocation as music critic of The Chicagoan. Newly launched, the magazine aimed 'to give expression to Chicagoans' thoughts, to assure the amusement and diversion of Our Public.' Once Fisher raised the possibility of issuing recordings under the imprint of the Society, did Pollak see this as an opportunity to 'give expression' to the musical culture of his adopted home? Among the figures who loomed largest in Chicago's amusements and diversions were John Alden Carpenter and his wife, Rue Winterbotham Carpenter (1876-1931), a well-regarded interior designer and leading light in the city's artistic and charitable circles. It is striking that Carpenter, then Chicago's leading composer, made his only issued commercial recording as a pianist for the Society, while Mina Hager had not only forged a considerable reputation in the city over the previous decade (although she had moved to New York in 1925), she was also a champion and regular recital partner of Carpenter. Marion Roberts was a local pianist, reportedly considered by her professors to share 'the biggest talent of them all' with her sister, and to be 'on the threshold of an extraordinary musical career'. (Only Kimsey had no known connection with Chicago.) A small detail on the Society's discs also seems to support this hypothesis: the 'jazzy' design of their record label, which seems to spring from the same playful, progressive world as The Chicagoan (see below).

The only known mention of any of the above performers in connection with the Society, other than in announcements or reviews of their respective recordings, concerned Marion Roberts - and, as it happens, Hugo Wolf. At the Society's second meeting, in December 1926, Pollak gave a lengthy talk on Wolf, in which he made it very clear that he admired his songs above those of all other composers. The talk was illustrated with both recordings (see above) and live performances. The latter were given by Roberts, who played a song each by Schubert, Brahms and Wolf (apparently without a singer), in support of Pollak's contention that Wolf was the finest song composer of the three. She would certainly have been known to Pollak, having made her name in and around Chicago since 1920, in concert and on air. A few months after the talk, he would describe her sister, the violinist Stella Roberts, as a 'very, very talented' composer; he could well have attended Stella's debut recital in March 1921, at which she played her own Violin Sonata, with Marion at the piano. Were he and Fisher already looking for a pianist and trying Marion Roberts out at the meeting, or did her playing on that December evening make such an impression that the Society's first recording was entrusted to her? The routine report of the meeting divulged nothing about any such plan; but at the next meeting, a month later, Fisher put his proposal to the members. The work Roberts recorded, Franck's Prelude, Chorale and Fugue, was just the kind of repertoire she would have studied at the Ecole normale in Paris; she may have suggested it herself. But it is also possible that Fisher's recording contest played a part in in this choice. In the January 1927 instalment of 'Is Your Favorite Work Recorded?', his regular contest column in The Phonograph Monthly Review, Fisher had noted,

'While on the subject of large size works for piano record sets, we might suggest a few more compositions, many of which might not be suitable for issue today, but which will undoubtedly be recorded eventually. Franck's Prelude, Aria, and Finale, and his Prelude, Choral, and Fugue are widely played and admired.'

Fisher probably wrote those words in December 1926. They follow a substantial list of piano works nominated by readers; there is no hint that the Franck pieces enjoyed any special favour, but at least they show that the Prelude, Chorale and Fugue was under consideration.

As it happened, in her repertoire Marion Roberts had a work by John Alden Carpenter, probably the Polonaise américaine from his 2 Piano Pieces. Was she also under consideration by the Society to record something by Carpenter? True, Robert Pollak had been none too impressed by Carpenter's ballet Skyscrapers at its Chicago premiere, though he later published a favourable profile of the composer, based on an interview with him. But it would surely have seemed natural (and politic) to approach Chicago's best-known composer with a proposal to record his music for the Society, and Pollak was probably best placed to make such an approach. How ambitious was that proposal? Did the Society initially envisage an all-Carpenter album, perhaps of two discs? An affordable but satisfying programme might have coupled songs, of which Carpenter was a noted and prolific composer, if still little recorded by 1927, with instrumental music, none of which had ever been on disc. Again, unless or until correspondence between Carpenter and the Society comes to light, or any unpublished recordings of his music for the Society are documented, this cannot be answered. In the event, the Society issued only one work by Carpenter, taking up a single 12-inch disc: the Water-Colors for voice and piano. That choice is easily explained, if Carpenter nominated Mina Hager as singer from the start: in 1917, with the composer at the keyboard, she had sung the premiere of his new version for orchestra and piano (which would have been too expensive for the Society to record). This was the beginning of an artistic partnership which lasted until Carpenter's death. The composer's partner would not have met with any objections from Pollak; had heard and praised her, if in very different repertoire.

If the Society did originally propose an all-Carpenter album, this did not materialize. The delay in announcing the contents of this issue, noted above, could be taken as evidence that they were settled only shortly before the sessions, or even at them. Was the Society trying, unsuccessfully, to convince Carpenter to record one of his own piano works, now that Marion Roberts was dead? Or had it always envisaged a mixed issue of his and other composers' songs? In either case, to match the first issue, the Society needed a second disc, for which Hager was again the obvious choice. And the three other songs she recorded spoke directly to the interests of Pollak and Fisher. Pollak's talk on Hugo Wolf, given at the Society's second meeting in December 1926, had included illustrations from discs; introducing them, Pollak had remarked, 'It is significant that all but one [...] are foreign recordings.' This must have seemed a good opportunity to improve Wolf's showing on home-grown discs; is this why Mina Hager apparently began singing his songs in concert only in 1927, just two months before the recording sessions?

If Pollak was allowed to nominate Wolf for one side, it would have been only fair to have Vories Fisher suggest something for the other. By his own admission, Fisher was not fond of Wolf; but when it came to another composer's songs, he was something of a completist:

'I have, let us say, in my collection some twenty or twenty-five Strauss songs, a section in which I am much interested. A new one is issued – one that has never before been made – and no matter what the quality of the record, no matter how well or how poorly it is sung, I am always tempted to buy, for if I do not it will mean that there is a Strauss song that is not among my records. I have now about five Hugo Wolf songs that no one can induce me to play.'

Two years earlier, Fisher had helped compile an early discography of Richard Strauss, and imported foreign discs of Strauss's music had apparently been played at one of the Fishers' private gramophone concerts. Mina Hager, for her part, had performed Strauss's songs since at least 1922. Again, Marion Roberts would have been a natural choice as pianist for this second disc, although she seems never to have performed in concert with Hager. But by then she was dead. On the day when Carpenter and Hager set down the Water-Colors, the singer also made an unsuccessful first attempt at the Wolf and Strauss songs, for which Carpenter was either too busy or, more likely, unwilling to stay on. The pianist who officiated at both that session and a remake some days later was Lora Orth Kimsey. Like Roberts, she had had no known contact with Hager; most likely, she was supplied by the Columbia 'Personal Record' department, which perhaps retained her as a versatile accompanist, equally at home in the classics and at evangelical song meetings. Kimsey was not mentioned in the Society's announcement of this issue or in reviews, and her name was left off the labels of the disc, as house accompanists' names often were.

It is entirely plausible, then, that Pollak played the leading role in contacting and engaging artists, as musician to musician, and in negotiating repertoire and other matters for the Society, with Fisher's input and approval. If so, they also showed considerable resourcefulness in engaging local artists, while programming music of widely diverse origins - Belgian, American and Austro-German. If the Society had survived longer and attracted more members, perhaps others would have played a part in planning further recordings.

'Cuts' and 'duplications'

In the early to mid-1920s, British record companies commonly issued classical chamber works on disc only in excerpted or heavily abridged form, if at all; and, across the board, they tended to re-record the same, popular works - practices which especially irked Compton Mackenzie. To counter these commercial practices, commonly known as 'cuts' and 'duplications', Mackenzie's National Gramophonic Society pledged to record all works complete and for the first time. The Chicago Gramophone Society practised the same policies. Announcing its first issue, the Society stressed that the Franck had never before been recorded, but did not state that it would be complete. It probably assumed that members, as well as readers of The Phonograph Monthly Review, took the latter for granted - quite reasonably: by 1927 'cuts' in classical recordings were rapidly becoming the exception, whereas 'duplications' were still, and would long remain, a bugbear of record-buyers. Announcing its second issue, the Society made no mention of completeness or newness - again, not unreasonably: songs were hardly likely to be cut, and subscribers would surely assume that Carpenter's Water-Colors were new to disc, though it is perhaps surprising that the Society did not stress that the Wolf and Strauss songs were also receiving their gramophone premieres.

Recording

As stated above, the Chicago Gramophone Society owned no recording or manufacturing facilities. Its recordings were made in New York by Columbia, presumably by the Personal Record Department. The Columbia recording cards documenting the Society's two issues survive, unique and invaluable sources of much information about the Society's sessions, including the names of the Columbia 'recording operators' who presided over them:

• Raymond ('Ray') Anton Gloetzner, for the first session (Franck) on 11 April 1927
• Clyde Dunford Emerson, for the second (Carpenter, Wolf, Strauss) and third (Wolf, Strauss) sessions on 5 and 12 December 1927

The resulting discs were pressed by Columbia, too, presumably at its plant in Bridgeport, Connecticut.

If, as proposed above, Robert Pollak approached and negotiated with the Society's artists, who in turn suggested repertoire, in consultation with him and Vories Fisher, it was Fisher who seemingly had contacts with record companies, so perhaps he contracted the Columbia Personal Record Department. Next, editorial work was required before the first session could take place: Franck's Prelude, Chorale and Fugue had to be divided into sections, to fit onto however many sides it was determined were needed (four 12-inch, in this case). Who did this for the Society, and who decided where in the score the side-breaks should be placed? An obvious candidate is Marion Roberts herself, perhaps with someone to start and stop a timer. Pollak was a trained pianist and could have helped or given advice, as could Roberts's sister Stella; perhaps Fisher was also consulted, as a habitual gramophone user who might have views on satisfactory or irritating side-breaks.

Once the recording sessions were under way, decisions had to be made about which takes to process and press as 'tests' for audition by the artists and Society. In the 1920s, it was standard practice to aim to complete a session with two usable takes of any side, so that if one was damaged in transit or during processing, or had a defect not detected on the day, the other could be used instead. This does not mean that no more than two takes of any side were recorded; clearly unsuccessful takes (spoiled by an unacceptable error in execution or a technical fault) were immediately rejected and the wax blanks put aside to be shaved and reused. At the Society's sessions, technical faults (such as over-modulation of the recorded signal) could be spotted on the fly by the Columbia operators. What of artistic faults? It seems unlikely the operators would have pronounced on these. Was an external 'producer' (in modern parlance - the term was not then in use), in other words an artistic supervisor, allowed or recommended? If so, only Pollak, of the Society's two co-sponsors, had the musical expertise required; but there is no evidence that he travelled to New York. Roberts was staying in the city with a friend, colleague and former fellow-student from Chicago, the pianist and teacher Grace Welsh (1895-1999); Welsh could have attended the session with Roberts, and acted as a second pair of ears (or helped prepare the side-breaks).

Columbia documented its sessions for the Society on matrix cards, which survive today and meticulously note all takes and tests - but, tantalisingly, not who took editorial decisions on the Society's behalf. Marion Roberts recorded two takes of each of the four sides of the Franck on 11 April 1927; the next day, all eight matrices were shipped to the Columbia factory for processing. Test pressings were 'received' (presumably, at the Personal Record Department in New York) on 16, 20 and 21 April. These were 'reported' on 4 May (i.e. assessments of their quality made and logged), presumably after audition; finally, on unknown dates, a 'Disposition' (i.e. action) was noted, in each case a simple 'Rej.' (for 'Rejected') or 'O.K.'. Meanwhile, Roberts had sailed for France on 13 April, and during the night of 22-23 April was murdered near Paris. She cannot have auditioned any test pressings; the simplest hypothesis, therefore, is that eight tests were posted to Pollak in Chicago, for him to audition, reject or pass as 'O.K.'. But Roberts would surely have her own opinion of each take in the studio, immediately after recording it. The second side was issued from take -2; yet on this side two 'noises off' can be heard, the first very intrusive and seemingly caused by an object in the studio falling over, the second less so. Usually, such audible accidents would cause a take to be rejected. But this side includes the start of the Chorale with its tricky pianissimo crossing of left hand over right. Did Roberts feel take -2 was the better performance of that notorious passage, and insist on it being issued, despite the noises? The third side, meanwhile, was the only one to be issued from take -1; this side, too, includes hand-crossings and other technical difficulties, and take -1 could, again, have been nominated by Roberts as the better played. It is tempting to imagine that Roberts did direct which takes were to be issued, subject to final approval by the Society; but it is equally possible that she left Pollak (and perhaps Fisher) to choose. In either case, the Society made a delicate and brave judgement, as subscribers might well object to the noises off (this happened to the National Gramophonic Society, whose issues were somewhat beset by technical problems and accidents).

Mina Hager's recordings for the Society present a less perplexing case, if only because all the artists were available to audition tests. Hager recorded two takes of all four of her sides on Monday 5 December 1927; the matrices were shipped for processing the same day. Tests were received on Wednesday 7 December and could have been posted immediately to Carpenter in Chicago, and to Hager in New York (it seems unlikely Kimsey was invited to audition them). On Monday 12 December a second session was held. Clearly, it had been decided in the interim that one take of each of the Carpenter sides was good enough to issue (both from take -2) and no more takes were needed; only the Wolf and Strauss songs were re-recorded, two further takes of each side. The simplest hypothesis is that the Carpenter songs had been passed as 'O.K.' by the composer and Hager, but that Hager was unhappy with the Wolf and Strauss recorded on 5 December. The tests were 'reported' only on 28 December, which would have given Hager ample time to audition thesongs recorded at the second session, compare them with the earlier takes if necessary, and make her final choices. After this, Pollak, and possibly Fisher, could bestow the Society's seal of approval. But, as ever, this hypothesis floats in something of a void of knowledge, not only of the Society's editorial modus operandi, but also of those of custom and standard commercial recording activities.

Label Design

A further mystery is the identity of the designer of the Chicago Gramophone Society's record label. At this period, Columbia's standard Personal Record labels were very old-fashioned in appearance: Personal Record 50018-P, which falls between the Society's two issues, has a label of the same design as those of considerably earlier Columbia Personal Records, presumably dating from the official launch of the Department in 1915, if not earlier. By contrast, the Society's label has a strikingly modern 'art deco' design, which incorporates a small, 'jazzy' anthropomorphic monogram cleverly composed of the Society's initials, and strongly projects the Society's presumed aim of celebrating its home city (see above). Unfortunately, it is not signed.

The person most likely to have commissioned the design is Robert Pollak. It is reminiscent of the work of at least three artists who were employed by The Chicagoan, and who occasionally illustrated Pollak's column in the magazine. Professor Neil Harris, who has made a thorough study of The Chicagoan and its artists, does not recognize any one hand in the design, characterizing it as 'somewhat conventionalized', and cautions against attributing it to an artist on the magazine's roster. It is also possible, if less likely, that Vories Fisher or Dorothy Fisher commissioned the label; he later became a photographer and may already have had an interest or involvement in graphic and visual design, while she had worked in advertising for some years.

The labels of the Society's first issue were designed to be numbered; copies are not common, but none of those known carries a number in the space provided. Reportedly, they were also to have been signed by Marion Roberts, but there is no obvious space for a signature; perhaps the design was only finalised after the pianist's untimely death in April 1927. The labels of the second issue did not allow for numbering, and no mention was made of artists' signatures.

Fees

No currently known source reveals the fees which the Society paid artists to record.

Pricing

In 1927, the Chicago Gramophone Society sold its records at $2.50 each. This was a high price. Typically, the leading US producers, Victor and Columbia, charged $1.50 per disc for 12-inch records of classical repertoire; Victor's premium Red Seal records cost $2 each, as did Brunswick's 12-inch classical issues.

The Society was probably not aiming to be exclusive in charging this high price; rather, it was obliged to do so by the production costs. At Columbia's 1917 prices for Personal Records (see above), to have each of its issues recorded and pressed would have cost the Society $712.50 for runs of 150 (i.e. 300 discs), or $802.50 for runs of 200 (i.e. 400 discs). Initially, the Society announced that the first issue would be pressed in an edition of 150 sets; even without adjusting for inflation over the intervening decade, one can see that this would leave the Society with just $37.50 for additional costs such as Marion Roberts's recording fee (which is not documented). The edition was quietly enlarged to 200, which gave the Society a healthier buffer of $197.50. The second issue was also pressed in an edition of 200; this involved three artists, although only Carpenter and Hager would have been due recording fees, if Lora Orth Kimsey was indeed supplied by Columbia, whose charge for making a Personal Record included 'piano or organ accompanist, if desired'.

Although the Society's exact outlay will probably never be known, these figures broadly corroborate its claim that the records were 'not being put out with the idea of profit behind them at all'.

Subscriptions and Distribution

Nominally, the Secretary-Treasurer of the Society was L.J. Harris, but would-be subscribers were directed to apply to Vories Fisher at 208 South LaSalle St. for the first issue, and at 105 West Adams Street for the second - both, presumably, Fisher's business addresses. Evidently, Fisher managed the subscriptions, but how and by whom were the finished discs distributed? No mention was made of postage costs in the Society's reports and announcements, so it seems likely that subscribers were required to collect their copies in person - perhaps again from Fisher's offices, since he and his wife were in Europe at the time of the first issue.

Marketing and Publicity

In his first article about the Society (see above), Fisher complained that it had

'encountered some difficulties in gaining the publicity that would give it the firm start that it knows is possible in a city of such extended musical taste as Chicago.'

What were these difficulties? Papers such as the Chicago Daily Tribune (and Sunday Tribune) gave considerable editorial coverage to private societies and their activities, including many musical performances by professionals and amateurs. These societies were often women's clubs, and were usually covered on variously titled 'women's pages', unlike men's societies such as the Rotary and Kiwanis Clubs. Both kinds had prominent citizens as members and leaders, and did charitable work. Understandably, a very small group such as the Chicago Gramophone Society, which catered to a specialist interest and had no well-known members or charitable function, would struggle to attract the attention of the metropolitan press; whether that was also true of the suburban press is not known (few of Chicago's leading early twentieth-century newspapers have been digitized, let alone smaller publications).

This was about to change. In Britain, the National Gramophonic Society was able to use the magazine launched by its parent company, The Gramophone, as a mouthpiece for announcements, reports, reviews and other propaganda, presumably at no cost. Fisher's article was published in the first issue of a Boston-based imitator of The Gramophone, and expressed the hope that

'with the advent of the Phonograph Monthly Review things will become easier and things that at first appeared impossible will be found to be well within the bonds [sic] of reason through the great assistance of this medium.'

This hope was well founded: the Review made itself an advocate and forum for American phonograph societies, publishing news and reports of their activities, and it remains the richest source of information about the Chicago Gramophone Society. It was also the only publication to review both of the Society's issues (see below).

Just one editorial notice is so far known to have appeared in the general press, a brief mention in the Chicago Sunday Tribune of the Society's forthcoming inaugural open meeting. This was held in the Concert Hall of Lyon & Healy, a prominent advertiser in the Tribune; the firm could have used its influence to place the notice in the paper (and perhaps also in other Chicago newspapers, not yet consulted). None of the Society's four subsequent meetings are known to have been promoted in this way. Lyon & Healy could also have displayed notices on its premises informing customers of them.

If editorial coverage was difficult to obtain, the alternative was presumably paid advertisements. Could the Society really not afford such publicity, or was selling oneself abhorrent to middle-class sensibilities, too reminiscent of the practices of the commercial industry? Fisher's and Pollak's known writings do not answer this question, while the practices of other North American societies remain to be investigated. Certainly, the National Gramophonic Society laboured under a curious resistance to advertising outside The Gramophone, and from the start urged members to enrol friends. Strikingly, this stance was also taken by members of the Chicago Gramophone Society who attended its penultimate meeting, where it was resolved to increase the membership by 'personal solicitation'. Unlike the N.G.S., the Chicago Society had no regular recording programme to fund, so this decision had no immediate financial consequences, and probably little effect on the Society's viability, which depended far more on the continued involvement and enthusiasm of Vories Fisher himself (see below), although increased enrolment might have brought in other members willing and able to carry it on without him.

The National Gramophonic Society devised another technique for promoting its issues, which was borrowed from the commercial industry and would be seen today as blurring the line between editorial and advertising. Writers connected with the N.G.S., either directly (as members of its Advisory Committee) or indirectly (as members and advocates), produced 'analytical notes' on works issued by the Society, which were published in the reviews section of The Gramophone, although they did not critique the recordings. A notice of the Chicago Gramophone Society's second issue, written by Robert Pollak and published alongside his regular critical column in The Chicagoan, made no mention of his involvement in its production, and can be considered an example of such 'advertorial', although it would probably not have offended sensibilities at the time. Pollak did not promote the Society's first issue in this way, perhaps because it sold out without his help.

Finally, another publicity technique used by the N.G.S. was the practice of sending complimentary copies of its issues to individuals or publications, in the hope of generating reviews in the general or specialist press. The Chicago Gramophone Society probably did not do this to any great extent (see below).

Marketing and Publicity

The Chicago Gramophone Society engaged in little visible marketing or publicity for itself or its publications.

The National Gramophonic Society was able to use The Gramophone, published by its parent company, as a mouthpiece, placing announcements, reports, reviews and other propaganda in its pages, presumably at no cost. Vories Fisher clearly hoped that Boston's newly-launched counterpart to the British magazine would fulfil the same function for Mrs. Fisher's and his group:

'The Chicago Phonograph [sic] Society has encountered some difficulties in gaining the publicity that would give it the firm start that it knows is possible in a city of such extended musical taste as Chicago. It feels that with the advent of the Phonograph Monthly Review things will become easier and things that at first appeared impossible will be found to be well within the bonds [sic] of reason through the great assistance of this medium.'

This hope was well founded: The Phonograph Monthly Review made itself an advocate and forum for the American gramophone society movement, publishing news and reports of the Chicago and other groups' activities, and it remains the richest source of information about the Society. It also published the only substantial reviews of its two issues (see below).

What were the 'difficulties in gaining [...] publicity' the Fishers had encountered? It is unclear whether they were unable to devote time and money to publicity, or were unwilling to do so. No paid advertisements for the Chicago Gramophone Society have been located. Was the mainstream press indifferent to such a venture? Was overt marketing abhorrent to middle-class sensibilities, too reminiscent of the practices of the commercial industry? The National Gramophonic Society, certainly, was reluctant to advertise itself outside The Gramophone, and from the start relied on members to enrol friends. Strikingly, this position was echoed by members of the Chicago Gramophone Society who attended its penultimate meeting (see above).

The only known notice of the Society published outside The Phonograph Monthly Review, and which probably resulted from a press release or other communication, is a brief mention of the Society's forthcoming inaugural open meeting in the Chicago Sunday Tribune of 7 November 1926. It is possible that other such items, published in small or local publications, may yet be unearthed. Perhaps, too, Lyon & Healy, which placed its Concert Hall at the Society's disposal and seconded a prominent employee as the Society's Vice-President, made some effort to help spread the word among its affluent clientele. Unfortunately, the company was sold several times from the 1950s to the 1980s and its business archive has disappeared.

The National Gramophonic Society also promoted its issues in a way which, today, would blur the line between editorial matter and advertising: writers connected with the N.G.S., either directly (as members of its Advisory Committee) or indirectly (as members and advocates), wrote 'analytical notes' on works issued by the Society which were published in the reviews section of The Gramophone. A notice of the Chicago Gramophone Society's second issue, written by Robert Pollak and published in his regular musical column in The Chicagoan, made no mention of his involvement in its production, and can be considered an example of such 'advertorial', even if it would probably not have offended sensibilities at the time. If Pollak did not also promote the first issue in this way, this was perhaps only because it sold out without his help.

Unlike the N.G.S., the Chicago Society had no regular recording programme to fund, so its policy had no immediate financial consequences; but, as the Society it may have helped to shorten the Society's life.

Reception

Criticism of classical records was apparently in its infancy in the mid-1920s US; there were few review columns in the general or musical press, and even fewer outlets for such specialised and non-commercial items as the Chicago Gramophone Society's issues. The Phonograph Monthly Review was the only publication to discuss both in detail:

• 'The First Recording by an American Phonograph Society', The [Music Lovers'] Phonograph Monthly Review, Vol.1 No.10, July 1927, p.442
• 'Special', Music Lovers' Phonograph Monthly Review, Vol.2 No.8, May 1928, pp.306-15

Like much of the magazine's content, these unsigned reviews were probably written by Robert D. Darrell (1903-88).

Operating on a tight budget, and apparently not seeking to increase its membership significantly, the Society probably did not send unsolicited copies of its issues to other US publications. So far, only one review has been located elswehere, in the long-running New York-based weekly The Outlook. As Lawrence J. Abbott (1902-1985) noted, these records' very limited availability posed a problem for publications aimed at consumers, but he admired both the performance and the Society's aims enough to overcome his scruples:

'It would be out of place in this department to include among the reviews mention of a privately issued set of records. But perhaps my readers will forgive me if I should mention it separately as an interesting example of the progress of recorded music in this country. [...] In two respects this recording of the Chicago Gramophone Society's is worthy of mention. It has caught in permanent form a performance which would otherwise have been lost to the world forever. It has also started a precedent. It has shown that a comparatively small group of people, by subscribing in advance, can have music made to order for their phonograph libraries.'

The author (grandson of an influential early editor of The Outlook, and son of his successor) was clearly the kind of person to whom the Society addressed itself, and he probably procured the records by requesting or purchasing them, rather than being sent them 'on spec'.

As discussed above, The Phonograph Monthly Review was the only consumer publication to report the Society's activities, but they were also mentioned briefly in two US trade periodicals. A single reference in The Talking Machine World was almost certainly not solicited, but formed part of a wider campaign waged by a member of the magazine's staff: British-born William Braid White (1878-1959) had written several articles promoting the British gramophone society model to the US record trade, and was eager to report local progress on that front. Braid was also the founding President of Chicago's Phonograph Art Society, and a champion of the player-piano; on 24 March 1927, he performed at a player-piano recital commemorating the centenary of Beethoven's death, and the following day, the Phonograph Art Society and the Chicago Gramophone Society held a joint meeting at Lyon & Healy's hall to celebrate the same anniversary; both events were reported by The Music Trade Review.

That, at present, is almost the full extent of the Society's documented reception in the US press. (Its recordings were very occasionally mentioned in later years, notably in reviews of subsequent recordings of the works which it had been the first to issue on disc.)

Outside the US, The Gramophone was made aware of the Society by Vories Fisher, whose summer tour of Europe with his wife included a visit to the magazine's offices; there, they met its London Editor, who was also Secretary of the N.G.S. On his return to the US, Fisher sent The Gramophone a copy of his Society's first issue, probably as a gesture of courtesy and friendship, rather than in the hope of a review, as the discs were effectively unobtainable by British readers. No mention was made of the second issue until several years later; the magazine may not have received a copy.

The only other notice of the Society known to have been published outside the US appeared in a Brazilian newspaper:

• 'Pingos de cêra...', in 'Discos e machinas falantes', O Paiz [Rio de Janeiro], Anno XLIII, No.15,624, Sunday 31 July 1927, p.14

The uncredited writer had probably not heard the records, but was relaying information garnered from The Phonograph Monthly Review; this practice, common at the time, can be observed in the Australian press of the period, for instance, which regularly passed on snippets gleaned from The Gramophone, The Musical Times and other British publications.

Decline

In April 1927, The Phonograph Monthly Review noted that Mr. and Mrs. Fisher would soon leave on a voyage to Europe. In June, the magazine reported that 'The advent of the summer season finds a few of the Phonograph Societies suspending meetings until September, but for the most part meetings and concerts are continued in a less formal manner in the private homes of different members.' With the Fishers abroad, it seems unlikely that the Chicago Gramophone Society met over the summer, although its first issue was distributed around June. By late July, the couple had probably returned; in August, the (inconsistently) renamed Music Lovers' Phonograph Monthly Review published Vories Fisher's account of their trip, which included a visit to the offices of The Gramophone in London and meetings with its London Editor Christopher Stone, also Secretary of the N.G.S.

In the autumn of 1927, US record societies resumed their meetings, although in November The Phonograph Monthly Review observed that

'The Phonograph Societies are unexpectedly slow in getting under way; so far we have heard only from those in Philadelphia, Providence, New York, and Minneapolis. However, the season is barely begun yet, and next month will undoubtedly see full activities resumed.'

But no reports materialized of any further meetings of the Chicago Gramophone Society. Instead, plans were announced for a second set of records by Christmas 1927, but this was delayed for many months. In May 1928, the Music Lovers' Phonograph Monthly Review published a detailed review. With this, the Chicago Gramophone Society disappeared from view. In October 1928, the Music Lovers' Phonograph Monthly Review reported,

'The Phonograph Societies are beginning to display signs of real life as the season is about to open. Except from Chicago (which is as silent as the grave), we have word of the activities of all the old societies and plans for several new ones.'

This was the last mention in the magazine of the Society as an organization. Vories Fisher had contributed regularly to the Review since its inception, but published nothing after May 1928. Perhaps significantly, in the final instalment of his column 'Recorded Remnants', Fisher had written,

'I have found that my interest in phonograph records has somewhat cooled – perhaps not waned because I am still buying just as many records as before, but I do not find myself rushing to get them as I did a few years ago. [...] I do not get the excitement that I once did over ordering from a long way off something very choice once every two or three months'

Fisher's engagement with records, and its sudden end, are discussed further on the page devoted to him. The Fishers, especially Vories, appear to have been the main force behind the Chicago Gramophone Society, which was neither large enough nor firmly enough established to survive Vories' loss of interest. Robert Pollak, who did not contribute to The Phonograph Monthly Review, was either unable or not motivated to sustain the Society without the Fishers.

Archive

The Chicago Gramophone Society left no known archive.

Conclusion

The Chicago Gramophone Society was highly atypical in producing subscription recordings, but otherwise it closely resembled known North American classical record societies. All were probably small, founded and headed by enthusiasts who were strongly motivated (and, possibly, somewhat domineering), and none seems to have survived for very long. The Phonograph Art Society of Chicago also suspended meetings for the summer of 1927; that fall, nothing more was heard of it. Of the ten or so other societies whose activities were reported in The Phonograph Monthly Review, only one, the Winnipeg Gramophone Society, was still active in 1930. It may seem foolhardy to draw conclusions from the evidence of just one magazine; still, the Review had appointed itself the incubator and mouthpiece of the record society movement in America. At first, it regularly printed news of projected and newly-formed societies and extensive reports of the meetings and leading personalities of existing societies. But over time, as in its model The Gramophone, society news and reports fell off in frequency and extent. In the December 1927 Review, an unsigned editorial note admitted that,

'Members of American phonograph societies have often expressed their wonder over the successful and smooth running British societeis [sic]. Discouraged sometimes by the efforts necessary to overcome the difficulties of gathering and keeping an American society together, they marvel at the apparent ease with which the British organizations seem to progress and develop. Perhaps the reason may be partly due to the fact that across the water programs and activities of the societies are more entertaining, better suited to hold the members together and to attract new enthusiasts.'

Perhaps so; but another reason was that British and American societies, though superficially similar, were fundamentally different. The British ones were mainly urban gatherings of lower middle-class hobbyists with an overriding interest in mechanics and reproduction; the American societies documented in The Phonograph Monthly Review were middle-class, displaying a penchant for musical appreciation, and some delight in showing off hard-to-obtain rarities. In the early 1920s, some lovers of recorded classical music (besides opera) clearly felt isolated, and neglected by record companies and local dealers. In the later 1920s, as the industry began to cater to them - by making domestic recordings using new electrical technology, and issuing or importing foreign recordings - the urge to band together for reassurance, and to share information and records, dwindled.

The Chicago society was almost certainly the creation of Mr. and Mrs. Fisher, and if Mrs. Fisher showed delight in the social aspect of communal listening and discussion, Vories Fisher was, by his own admission, a collector drawn by the all too familiar lures of completeness and rarity. Allied to his entrepreneurial bent (he was a financier), these traits made him a natural 'early adopter' of the subscription model pioneered by the N.G.S. If not for Fisher's sudden disenchantment with record collecting, and an apparent increase in his professional commitments in early 1928, he might have made a go of his cottage venture; Chicago would probably have continued to provide enough subscribers to make pressing runs of 200 break even. But it is difficult, even now, to run a one-man band. And when Fisher did turn his back on the Society, there was nobody else ready to take on his role. Pollak was a music-lover first, and a record-buyer second (or even third or fourth; Pollak was also a composer and music critic, as well as a financier like Fisher). Tellingly, though, even Lyon & Healy did not take over the operation, as they might easily have done. Quite simply, their main suppliers - Victor, Brunswick, and Columbia - produced more than enough to keep their highbrow customers happy. Small, specialist classical record labels, however they were financed, remained extremely rare in the USA until after World War II, and even then they had a hard time of it.