BIG GRAMOPHONE COMBINE

Evening Star, Issue 19124, 16 December 1925, Page 5

BIG GRAMOPHONE COMBINE

“A MUSICAL LEAGUE OF NATIONS" UNDER BRITISH CONTROL. Tin; completion in London of what is claimed to be the biggest gramophone combine in the history of the trade is announced. Negotiations have been concluded whereby some of the largest gramophone interests in eleven European and American countries have now been united under the direct controlling interest of the Columbia tiraphophono Company in London. The, countries concerned arc France, Austria, Ocrma-uv, Italy, Swilr.orlund, Spain, Sweden, Roland, (he" Argentine, Brazil, and the United Stales. The main foreign companies which have thus become centralis4& under British interest arc ihc. Columbia Phonograph Company of New York, tin; Carl Limlstmm A.C! ol Beilin, and Ihc Transoceanic Trading Company of Amsterdam. . ~

•'The effect of this world combination,” said a director of the London company, •'should lie fell in this country in many wavs Apart, from the increased efficiency m the manufacture, and distribution of r words which should bo achieved by Ihe po-ordination ot n—ourc-'- it Hioulii have a i-evolutionary etfccl on the influence abroad of British artists and composers. Bnrh art I.ms as blr Henry Wood and (iii.-iav Holst, for instance.' will now have an entice into countries and markets not hitherto open to them —even t hrough broadeasting, and, moreover, their royalties will be substantially increased. “ Conversely, it will now be pdsWde to bring the work of diii Inert o imicer ssible foreign artists into British Immi s. in the past his ins been i-endeder impossible by prohibitive tariffs and Ihe lieavy costs and risks involved in Ibe ir insnorl of reeords The centralisation of inten-sis will remove all these obstacles; the muster records of foreign artists whose work is required in England will lie made wherever Hie artist lives abroad, sent home, and I tic records will be struck from them in London, and vice versa in the ease of British artists. Tim amalgamation thus, means, in a word, a musical league of nations.” Ai cording to the HoJumoia Company, of New York, which is ore of Hie concerns involved, the four companies now combined leave a total capital of eighteen nuliion dollars.