Stage to Studio: Musicians and the Sound Revolution, 1890–1950 by James P. Kraft

Abstract

TECHNOLOGY AND CULTURE Book Reviews 167 terns. She explores the introduction of showers, stationary basin bowls and sinks, hoppers, and pan water closets into homes across America. Ogle notes that the wide array of choices is often masked by a paucity oflanguage, as “privy,” “necessary,” and “water closet” were used interchangeably in contemporary accounts. While she does not address effectively the degree to which they were adopted across America, her clear descriptions of the plumbing fixtures and informative illustrations bring this era to life. Her discussion on the unreliable nature of these new fixtures, due to factors that included cold weather, rats, and foul odors, is compelling. Ogle also makes a strong argument for the individualistic adop­ tion of these new fixtures. As Ogle explains, families chose among a wide array of fixture options and typically scattered these fixtures throughout their houses. The standard “bathroom” containing a tub, water closet, and basin emerged slowly. Ogle chronicles a major change in the way Americans adopted plumbing after 1870. The rise of sanitarians and the acceptance of water carriage sewerage as the preferred technology for the removal ofwaste “played a key role in plumbing history after 1870” (p. 112). By 1890, household plumbing had becomejust a small part oflarger water and waste systems. As sanitarians and systems became central to plumbing in the 1880s and 1890s, the idiosyncratic adoption offixtures which charac­ terized the mid-19th century disappeared. Sanitarians fought for oversight and regulation of plumbing by local governments. Order and pattern in the plumbing business had arrived. Ann Durkin Keating Dr . Keating is associate professor of history at North Central College in Naper­ ville, Illinois. She is the author of Building Chicago: Suburban Developers and the Creation of a Divided Metropolis (Columbus: Ohio State University Press, 1988) and Invisible Networks: Exploring the History ofLocal Utilities and Public Works (Chicago: Public Works Historical Society, 1991). Stage to Studio: Musicians and the Sound Revolution, 1890-1950. By James P. Kraft. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1996. Pp· x+255; illustrations, notes, appendix, bibliography, index. $35.00 (cloth). In Stage to Studio, James Kraft presents a concise, well-researched, and well-written historical account of the actions and reactions of unionized musicians as they faced new technologies and changing conditions of labor in early 20th-century America. His account be­ gins with a brief, golden period at the turn of the century, when the popularity of “silent” motion pictures provided musicians with 168 Book Reviews TECHNOLOGY AND CULTURE unprecedented opportunities for work in the pit orchestras of small neighborhood theaters across the nation. With demand exceeding supply and organized musicians negotiating salaries and work condi­ tions with unorganized theater-owners, the musicians generally pros­ pered. But this situation quickly changed, first with the advent of “talkies” and the rise of national chains of studio-controlled the­ aters, then with the appearance of network-dominated radio, which depended heavily upon recorded music for its programming. In both the motion picture and radio industries, sound recording tech­ nology combined with a powerful new corporate structure, and the result was the replacement of the live performances of numerous musicians across the nation with the recorded performances ofjust a fortunate few located in the new media centers of New York and Los Angeles. Fully sympathetic to the plight of unemployed and underem­ ployed musicians, Kraft presents a traditional style of labor history that focuses upon unions, union leaders, strikes, negotiations, and national policies toward labor. His account of the musicians’ record­ ing ban of 1942-44 is particularly interesting. He describes how mu­ sicians felt compelled to eliminate the source of competition for their labor, even though that competition was none other than re­ corded transcriptions of their own labor, and they themselves were that source. The story of this unique “strike” and its resolution, and the history of American musicians as laborers more generally, has been little studied, and Kraft’s book is an important contribution to the literature on organized workers in America. But to this reader the explanatory power of Kraft’s account is lim­ ited by his exclusive focus upon the producers of commercial music. The best examples of more recent labor history, such...