Books › Ayars, Contributions to the Art of Music in America by the Music Industries of Boston (1937) — the Squier, Farley, Rettberg, Rockwell and Elias Howe matter, 1937 › scan 111
Scan 111
Ayars, Contributions to the Art of Music in America by the Music Industries of Boston (1937) — the Squier, Farley, Rettberg, Rockwell and Elias Howe matter, 1937
10 lines. Read by computer on 27 September 2026. Printed page 89. See the scan on archive.org.
1are employed to finish off the engraved plates. The latter are made today of block tin—a composition of lead, tin, and some zinc—which is softer and permits easier working than the earlier copper or pewter plates.
3Up to about 20 years ago, or before the offset press was invented, most of the music printing was done from stone by the lithographic process on what are termed "flat-bed" presses. The majority of these were manufactured by R. Hoe & Co. The method is to pull an impression of the work on the engraved plate on a sheet of transfer paper, which is imported from China and so called a rice paper. This transfer is then pressed upon the lithographic stone. These stones are imported from Solenhofen, Bavaria, a province in Germany. The impression on the stone is then rolled up with ink and powdered rosin is spread over it. Then it is etched with an acid in order to hold it on the stone. The printing is done directly from the stone in the press. After the edition is run off, the work is polished off the stone with sand and water, and the stones are used over again, until they are worn too thin for use, when occasionally they are backed-up with slate for their preservation. The plates are kept for future transfers as they are so soft that they would quickly be destroyed by printing from the plates.
5Present printing, however, is now largely done by photolithography, or from zinc, on an offset press, which is a much faster method of printing. The copy of music, either the original manuscript copy or a sharp pulloff from the engraved plate, is photographed, a negative is made, and then printed on a sensitized or a zinc plate. The plate is then etched and placed in the rotary offset, and the edition is run directly from the plate, which is freshly inked for each sheet printed. The offset process means that the work is offset from the zinc to the rubber blanket, and the rubber blanket coming in contact with the paper prints the work.
7Engraved music, instead of music set in type, is now largely used for making line plates for text books. This process consists of taking from the engraved plate a black and white proof from which a photo line plate is made. An electro is then made for printing from type presses.
9Engraved plates, lithographic stones, zinc press plates, and electrotype plates can be kept as long as desired, for future editions,
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