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 50
Scan 50
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
21 lines. Read by computer on 27 September 2026. Printed page 28. See the scan on archive.org.
1C. Present Day Publishers
31. GENERAL MUSIC PUBLISHERS
5In this group are included those firms which publish all types of music both vocal and instrumental.
7OLIVER DITSON COMPANY, INC.
9The pioneer and one of the foremost publishing houses of the present day in the United States is the Oliver Ditson Company. Through the Boston Book Store of Colonel Ebenezer Battelle, opened in 1783, and its successors, Colonel Parker and his music store connections, this Company has its roots as far back as 1783,¹ although it was not until 1835 that Oliver Ditson began to publish and copyright music at [address hidden]
11The founder of this house, the fifth son of Joseph Ditson, was born in Boston at [address hidden] in 1811 and died in 1888.² When a lad of thirteen he entered the service of Colonel Samuel H. Parker, a publisher. In 1826 he left to apprentice himself first to Isaac R. Butts, the publisher of the North American Review, and then to Alfred Mudge.
13This seven years' training as a printer, together with his fondness for music, and perhaps his friendship with the Graupner family, who were neighbors, led to his publishing for himself in 1835. His first two publications, announced in the newspapers of July 9, 1835, were compositions of Charles Zeuner, The City Guards Quickstep and the same arranged as a duet. The next year four more songs with music by Zeuner, organist at Park Street Church, were brought out.³
15Soon after Mr. Ditson's establishment in his own business he published a folio collection of glees, and catches for two, three, four or more voices following the lead of his former employer. Seeing
17¹ For complete tracing of this history see
18Fisher, William Arms. Notes on Music in Old Boston pp. 22-9, 33-4; One Hundred and Fifty Years of Music Publishing in the United States pp. 34-6, 39-44, 48-53.
19² Fisher, William Arms. One Hundred and Fifty Years of Music Publishing in the United States p. 47.
20³ For other early publications and catalogs purchased up to 1860 see Fisher, William Arms. One Hundred and Fifty Years of Music Publishing in the United States pp. 51-2, 56-62; for Dwight's Journal of Music p. 79.
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