Etude Magazine was published by Theodore Presser Company between 1883 and 1957. It was a staple for music teachers throughout the country, providing articles related to music history, new developments in music, and practical teaching techniques, as well as musical scores from the classics and new pieces for beginning to advanced students. Begun as an aid for piano teachers, the magazine grew to include information and literature for vocal and instrumental enthusiasts as well. Not only is the series important to the musician, but it provides an insight into the culture itself, including the impact of the development of the car, radio, and television, and expands to world music and the influence of world wars on that culture.
This offering of searchable .pdf scans of the Etude Magazine is made available by Dr. Pam Dennis of Gardner-Webb University. These scans are to be used for research only and are not to be reproduced. Attribution should be given to this website and to its compiler, when using for research. These issues are available under permission from the Theodore Presser Company as they appeared in Etude Magazine.
Dr. Pam Dennis's Index to the articles published in the Etude magazine, 1883-1957: Part 1 and Part 2 are available in the Gardner-Webb Faculty and Staff Book Gallery.
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Volume 56, Number 06 (June 1938)
James Francis Cooke
Young Lochinvar
Be Ready for Your Opportunity (interview with Eugene Ormandy)
Diatonic or Chromatic?
Operetta and the Sound Film (interview with Jeanette MacDonald)
Developing a Better Staccato Touch
Radio Flashes
Music of Marching Men up to 1865
Piano Parties Are Fun: How to Conduct a Simple Studio or Home Gathering for Music Pupils
Threshold of Music: Triads, and How They are Put Together
Mozart's Great Romance: The Youthful Love Story of a Beloved Master of Music
Making the Glissando Easy
Recent Record Releases
Oldest Authentic Voice Method
Great Music at Popular Prices: How the New Friends of Music Triumphed (interview with I.A. Hirschmann)
Etude's Music Tour Progresses: Negotiations for Musical Events are Going Forward Steadily
From $10 to $1000 a Night: Helen Jepson, Famed Opera and Movie Star—Tells Etude Readers of the Importance of Personal Appearance
Rhythm Band for Mothers
Technical Devises—The Slide
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Volume 56, Number 07 (July 1938)
James Francis Cooke
Piano and To-morrow
Passing of a Genius
Carve Out Your Own Career (interview with Ferde Grofé)
Righting the Left Hand
First Eighth Notes
Art Means Preparation (interview with Bidu Sayao)
Fatigue Demon
Radio Flashes
Women in Orchestras: Famous and Brilliant Conductors of the Fair Sex
Relaxation is Mental
Social Dancing and Its Music
Important Practical Helps for the Vocalist (interview with Isidore Luckstone)
Threshold of Music: Triads, and How They are Put Together
Making Two Part Inventions Interesting
Music and Dancing in Siam: Quaint and Curious Arts of a Far Eastern Kingdom
New Attractions Scheduled for Tour: International Music Festival to be Included
Points and Personalities of Musical Vacation Tour
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Volume 56, Number 08 (August 1938)
James Francis Cooke
Mass Music and the Masses
Personal Recollections of Anton Rubinstein
Folk Tunes of England
Queen of American Pianists: Some Unpublished Memoirs of Madame Carreño (interview with Elizabeth Sterling)
Art of Ensemble Playing (interview with Adolf Busch)
Threshold of Music: The Seven-Storied House of Chords
Combine the Arts
World's Most Famous Song: The Story of Home, Sweet Home—The Song Immortal
When Your Child Won't Practice: Practical Suggestions to Parents of Children Who are Practice Problems
Yes, Teacher, You Are in Business: A Frank Discussion of the Teacher's Approach to a Clientele
New York Tour Attracts Music Lovers
America Demands Glamour: Edward Johnson, General Manager of the Metropolitan Opera Company, Reminds Young Artists that Personal Appearance Counts
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Volume 56, Number 09 (September 1938)
James Francis Cooke
Marimba Supersedes Xylophone
How Can We Best Serve Our Students (interview with Geraldine Farrar)
About Pieces for Two Pianos: A Discussion of Musical Works Rapidly Rising in Popularity
Hymns in Teaching Harmony
Threshold of Music: When Four Notes Get Together—Seventh Chords
Modern Marimba and Its Relation to the Xyloophone (interview with Yoichi Hiraoka)
Do Not Cast the Old Aside
Chord Twins
Picturesque Prague—Home of Dvorák and Smetana
Transposing by Numbers
What Did Bach Mean: How Each of His Motives Construes a Thought
Hand and the Memory
Mazurka in F-sharp Minor of Chopin
Compactness With Comfort: Everyone Who Wants a Studio in a Limited Space will Gain Practical Hints from the Decoration and Utility Ideas of This Piano Teacher Who Studied Architecture
Marjorie Lawrence—And Achievement: How She Reached Success in Paris and New York—And What She Does to Keep Her Hard-Won Position in Opera
Educational Use of Sound Amplifying Systems in Schools
Can and Will
Scales for Little Folks
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Volume 56, Number 10 (October 1938)
James Francis Cooke
Maintaining Radio Interest
Conductor and His Orchestra (interview with John Barbirolli)
Hour of Charm: The Most Unusual Girls Orchestra of the Times (interview with Phil Spitalny)
Master as Seen by His Wife (interview with Aino Sibelius)
Threshold of Music: The Most Famous Chord in Music: The Dominant Seventh
Three Notes Against Two
Major John A. Warner: New York State's Notable Musical Police Superindentant
Training the Little Finger
Rhythm for Clearness
Caring for the Vocal Instrument (interview with Giovanni Martinelli)
Practice Is Playing
Some Two Thousand Year Old Wisdom on the Tone Art
Strike the Nail on the Head
Game of Rhythms
My Very Own Song
Scale Track Meet
Mendelssohn's Accomplishments
Preliminary Notes for Scales
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Volume 56, Number 11 (November 1938)
James Francis Cooke
Symphony a Day
Apprentice Years of a Master (interview with Moriz Rosenthal)
Threshold of Music: A Stormy Seventh—And Some Even More Complex Chords
Awakening of Ebenezer Scrooge: A Playlet in Three Acts Adapted from Charles Dickens' A Christmas Carol
Stephen Foster of Tin Pan Alley in Other Days: The Magic Story of America's Most Loved Composer of Folk Songs
What Music in Sing Sing Prison Means in the Lives and Reclamation of Many Inmates
Three Notographs
Madrigals of the Days of Good Queen Bess: Polyphonhic Masterpieces of the Elizabethan Era Formerly Heard by Few But Now Heard by Millions Over the Radio
Real Piano in the Play Room
Four Portals to Piano Playing: Speed! Dynamics! Phrasing! Pedaling!
Ballade, Op. 10, No. 1 of Brahms: A Master Lesson
Margaret Speaks Suggests Requisites for a Career in Radio (interview with Margaret Speaks)
When Schumann Played at Twilight
What About Scales?
What Does Voicing a Piano Mean?
Window Advertising
Famous Writers and Music
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Volume 56, Number 12 (December 1938)
James Francis Cooke
Christmas Love (poem)
Her Christmas Piano
What Music Has Done for Me (interview with William Allen White)
Lessons with Ossip Gabrilowitsch, Piano Virtuoso and Conductor: An Apostle of Beauty in Piano Playing
Four Octave Practice Helps
Christmas in Many Lands: A Television Christmas Recital
Lady of the Court of Henry XV (portrait)
Threshold of Music: Natural Laws That Guide the Flow of Chords
What Now for Music Teachers? A Nationwide Symposium: Eminent Members of the Music Teachers' National Association, to be in Convention in Washington During the Present Month, Discuss an Important Subject in Advance
Overcoming a Musical Crisis
Let's Go Caroling This Christmas
Beethoven's Contra Dance in C: A Master Lesson
Lowell's Harmonious Balcksmith
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Volume 55, Number 01 (January 1937)
James Francis Cooke
Superstitions in Music
Musical Food for Millions (interview with Erno Rapée)
Brighter Scale Practice
Increasing the Activity of the Fingers
Magical and Misunderstood Art of Reviewing
Romance of the Sweetest Story Ever Told
Tooting Your Own Horn: The Most Difficult Instrument for the Musician to Learn
My Toughest Spot: Taking Things as They Come
Getting the Perspective in Teaching
Composing for Pictures (interview with Erich Korngold)
Strongest Carillon in the World
First Steps in Musical Transposition
Approach to Interpretation
Berceuse Op. 57 of Chopin
Autumn Days in the Presser Gardens
Brahms Selfless Musician
Arpeggio Drill
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Volume 55, Number 02 (February 1937)
James Francis Cooke
Enesco Talks on Menuhin
How the Piano is Coming Back
How to Become a Better Pianist (interview with Isidor Philipp)
Advantages of a Poor Piano
Role of Music in Prisons
Tour of Early Keyboard Instruments in the Nation's Capital
Cure for Musicians' Cramp
Catering to America's Musical Tastes (interview with David Rubinoff)
Graceful Gavotte: A Dance to Which Several Influences Have Contributed
Pupil's Right
Benjamin Franklin's Interest in Music
Teaching Interpretation Through Thought Force
Old Music Arrives; Order Sent in '87 Is Filled by Firm
Czerny's Many-Sided Etude, Number Sixty-Five
Measure for Measure
Aids in Overcoming Finger Stiffness
Relating Music to Everyday Life
Musical Flower Garden: A Game for Music Clubs
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Volume 55, Number 03 (March 1937)
James Francis Cooke
Hydra-Headed Music License Monster
Visit to the Home of Sibelius
Art of Musical Penmanship
Yes, Practice Makes Perfect
On Building a Piano Technic
Music Vacations
Plantation Echoes In Which the Author Describes a Visit to a Negro Folk Music-Drama, the Most Pimitive of American Negro Musics Given Each Year in Charleston, South Carolina
Early Musical Influences in My Life
Musical Mathematics: How to Add and Multiply Notes
Strangest of the Arts
Verb To Be in Music
Keeping the Musical Memory Fresh
Remarkable Abbé (Abt) Vogler: Hero of Browning's Famous Poem
All-Purpose Exercise for the Busy Teacher
Some Be's for Your Studio Hive
Etude Duets Recital
Artist—A Man
Degrees of Legato and Staccato
Making Slow Playing Interesting
Abraham Lincoln's Harmonica-Band
On Organizing a Music Club
Practice Classes for Success
Sure Cure for Stage Fright
Practice That Counts
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Volume 55, Number 04 (April 1937)
James Francis Cooke
Music and Travel
America's Vast New Musical Awakening (interview with Nikolai Sokoloff)
Chopin as a Teacher
List's Singing Tone
Von Weber, Tone Poet of Romanticism
May Day Play Recital: Ten Games with Music
American Singers and the German Lied (interview with Grete Stueckgold)
Dramatizing Piano Duets
Geometry and Speed of Motion: At the Piano Keyboard in the Playing of Chromatic Passages
Two Roads to Acquaintance with Musical Form
Recital Program that Took
Studio Bulletin Board
It's An Art to Tune a Piano
Nocturne in C Minor by Chopin: A Master Lesson
Neglected Senses
Musical Sewing Cards
Profession a Business
Why Professional Pianists Practice Slowly
Pause in Practice
Prodigious Lablache
Musical Parent-Teacher Association
What Wagner Had to Stand
Summer Music Season Abroad for 1937
Music's Part in Fighting Fear
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Volume 55, Number 05 (May 1937)
James Francis Cooke
Care of the Voice (interview with Gertrud Wettergren)
Bagpipes of Braemar
Do You Know?
Business Efficiency for the Music Teacher
Mediocrity and Mastery
Benjamin Franklin Discourses on Music
Relative Minor Recognition Device
X Marks the Spot
Is There a Last Word in Piano Technic?
Why and How of Memorizing Music
Ich Liebe Dich (interview with Grieg, Fru Edvard)
From Woods and Fields: A Piano Playlet for Small Children, Suitable for a Spring Recital
Grand Manner in Piano Playing (interview with Moriz Rosenthal)
Discovering a Masterpiece: How Two Musical Sleuths of Britain found Rosamunde
Few Frank Words to the Young Composer (interview with Abram Chasins)
Oldest American Brass Band
Music for the Marionette Theater
Bach at Gallipoli
Resuming Music Study at Sixty
How to Lessen the Mortality Rate Among Music Pupils
Harp: Beautiful in Its Limitations
What Reward for Good Lessons?
For the Delinquent Left Hand
All That Was Left
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Volume 55, Number 06 (June 1937)
James Francis Cooke
Television, When?
Schumann's Forest Scenes
How Do We Behave at the Piano?
They Didn't Eat with Liszt
Color Effects in Pianoforte Playing
How One Teacher Got Ahead of The Big Bad Wolf
One Jump Ahead of the Times
Summertime Pageant Recital for Young People
Brain Teasers Intelligence Test for Music Lovers
Approach to Scales
Fifteen Years in Radio (interview with Milton J. Cross)
Training the Thumbs
Incorrect Phraseology
Enfants Terribles of Pianist's Hands
More Be's For Your Musical Hive
Scale Preparation
Moscheles in Scotland: A Very Entertaining Account of His Meeting with Sir Walter Scott
Verdi Renaissance
Wild Music of Arabia
Hand Shaping Exercises
Music's Spiritual Message
New Light on Jazz
Something Interesting Next Week
Some Key Helps for Beginners
Position in Holding the Accordion
Say It Aloud: A Little Lesson in Psychology
Food of a Genius
Summer Music Season Abroad for 1937
Making Music Talk
Exercises Made Interesting
Merry Funeral Music
Problem of Missed Notes
Grace Notes and Trills
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Volume 55, Number 07 (July 1937)
James Francis Cooke
Song of the American Revolution
Heldentenor, or Heroic Tenor (interview with Lauritz Melchior)
Answers to Brain Teasers Musical Intelligence Test
Bunched Finger Playing
Star Spangled Banner: With Photographs from the Celebrated Historical Collection of William Thompson
Longfellow's Influence on Musical Composition
America: A National Anthem Which Finds Lodgment in the Heart of Every True American
Double Purpose Exercise
Making Friends with the Wrist: An Important Phase of Pianoforte Playing
Playing Pa to Sleep at Three A.M.
Playing the Four Note Chord
Effect of Music on Wild Animals
How America Lost Chopin: A Romance of the Poet of the Piano
Cambridge Quarters: Sometimes Miscalled the Westminster Chimes
Dynamics in the Rhythm Band
Notation Made Interesting
Where Dvorák Wrote the Humoresque
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Volume 55, Number 08 (August 1937)
James Francis Cooke
Supreme Court Problem in Music
Glance at the Music of Hawaii
Tin Pan Alley Moving West
Meet Doctor Fizzle
Some Differences Between Teaching and Educating Music Students (interview with Angela Diller)
Clergyman Visits Oberammergau
Evenings with The Etude
How Shall My Pupil Sit: A Plea for the Conservation of Eyesight and the Use of Seating Equipment Designed to Aid Correct Posture and to Lessen the Expenditure of Excessive Nerve Vitality When Practicing
Making of an Orchestra Conductor
Larynx and the Voice: An Abstract of an Address by the Most Distinguished of Throat Specialists Which is Here Given its First Publication
Foster Memorial Dedicated at the University of Pittsburgh (pictures)
New Stephen Foster Memorial: The University of Pittsburgh Dedicates a Magnificent New Building
Relation of Consonance to Dissonance: An Important Problem in Musical Theory Discussed
Charm of Mexico's Popular Music
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Volume 55, Number 09 (September 1937)
James Francis Cooke
Grand Crusade
Need of Musical Pioneers
Bach and Modern Keyboard Technic
Studio Waiting Room
Queen Victoria and Music: England's Queen-Empress Studied Voice with the Great Lablache for Two Decades
Address to an Entering Class
Practice as an Art
New Gateways to Opera (interview with Lee Pattison)
Can Perfect Pitch be Acquired?: Research into the Baffling Problem of Absolute Pitch Memory
What Adult Beginners Need for Rapid Progress: Helps for This Rapidly Growing Class
Ideal Teacher for the Ideal Instrument
Their Toughest Spot: Laughing at Rejection Letters
Immortal Beautiful Blue Danube Waltzes: The Seventieth Anniversary of this Johann Strauss Masterpiece
Do You Know?
Sidney Lanier, Poet-Musician: The Story of The Laureate of the South and His Musical Achievements
Is Three-Part Writing Worth While in the Study of Harmony?
Finger Transpositions
Wagner and Offenbach
Why Rhythm?
Sunrise Club for Practice
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Volume 55, Number 10 (October 1937)
James Francis Cooke
Psychologists and Professors
Mind and Music (interview with Walter B. Pitkin)
My Work is Easy: Eleven Year Old Genius of the Piano (interview with Ruth Slenczynski)
Helping the Teacher to Get More Business: A Letter from a Piano Dealer to the Teacher
How to Make a Better Band (interview with Edwin Franko Goldman)
My First Success: The Great Norwegian Master Tells the Romantic Story of His Student Days in Leipzig
End of an Important Musical Era
Kitchen Symphony Orchestra: A Recital Program Novelty
First Use of the Piano in a Concert
Music After Marriage: A Few Words to Musical Wives
Meaning of a Musical Education (interview with Nadia Boulanger)
Apples of Discord
Did Gluck Invent the Musical Glasses?
Relaxing Before a Public Appearance
All-Around Drill
How to Get Children to Practice
Gilmore's Big Stick
Why My Child Studies Music
Ear-Gate or Eye-Gate
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Volume 55, Number 11 (November 1937)
James Francis Cooke
Justice for Genius
This is Walter Damrosch Speaking: The Eminent Conductor Give His Opinions Upon Opera, American and Otherwise (interview with Walter Damrosch)
Typewriter and the Piano
Learning Lines and Spaces
Tuneful Tweddle
Claude Debussy's American Born Teacher: His Contribution to Modern Music
How I Increased My Enrollment
Bringing the Symphony Orhcestra to Moving Picture Patrons
Gospel of Relaxation
Universality of the Piano: The Indispensable Instrument and its Place in Art
Repetition in Musical Composition: Its Important Function in the Tonal Art
Pilgrimages with Franz Liszt, in Rome, Budapest, and Weimar, 1881 to 1884, Reminiscences of His Pupil
Mystic Dances of the Far East: The Truth About the Magic of the Nautch-Girls
Play Within Your Technic
Visualize, Auralize, Practice, Criticize: Four Important Factors in the Study of Musicianship
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Volume 55, Number 12 (December 1937)
James Francis Cooke
Joy of Christmas Morning: A Merry Christmas to Etude Friends Everywhere!
Unseen Forces (interview with Charles R.Gay)
Christmas at Mrs. Santa Claus' Home: A Story Recital for Children
Memorybook Pages of a Musical Pilgrim: Presenting Messages and Music from Many States, Part 4: I Hear America Singing—Out West and Up North
Marimba Moves into the Parlor
Swing! Swing! Swing!: The Last Word in X Music
Musical Lure of the Ballet
Lessons from Beethoven's Sketch Book
Plea for the Real Debussy (interview with E. Robert Schmitz)
New Ideas on Octave Playing: A Fresh and Interesting Discussion
Musical Sandwich
Singer's Equipment: The Vocal, Mental and Physical Gifts and Training Necessary to a Career (interview with Gladys Swarthout)
New Pianos in New Settings
Greeks Had a Name for It
Hymns: The Part They Have Played in the Development of Music
Keep Your Musical Information Orderly
Enter the Typewriter as a Musical Instrument
That's Wrong
Noble Art of Teaching
Wagner's Alpha and Omega
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Volume 54, Number 01 (January 1936)
James Francis Cooke
Singer's Art (interview with Feodor Chaliapin)
What Makes a Successful Pianoforte Piece
Music of the Buddhist Devil Dancers
Consort of Musick at Dame Percy's: An Outline for a Recital in Honor of Washingotn's Birthday
New Glimpses into the Life of Chopin
Why Every Child Should Have a Musical Training
Harmonica Band: What Does it Offer
Music in Modern Home Life
Beethoven's Love of Nature
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Volume 54, Number 02 (February 1936)
James Francis Cooke
Getting Joy Out of Music (interview with Hendrik Willem van Loon)
What Grade?
Poland's Leading Composer Since Chopin
Eniment Recognition
Saint-Saëns as a Prima Donna
Mozart for Little Folk
Tone Quality and Tone Color in Piano Playing
She Made Curl Papers of His Sonatas
Liszt and Wagner
What Radio Offers the Young Composer: From an Address to the Schoolmen's Convention at Philadelphia
Modulation is Not Difficult: A Simple Technical Discussion of a Fascinating Theoretical Problem
Why Every Child Should Have a Musical Training
Be Kind to the Tuner
Music They Understand
Mexico’s Significance in Present Day Music
On Wings of Song: One of Mendelssohn's Most Inspired Song Melodies Transcribed for the Piano by Liszt, a Master Lesson
Mastering Those Difficult Passages
Developing Swift Wrist Action
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Volume 54, Number 03 (March 1936)
James Francis Cooke
What Does it Take to Make a Singer? (interview with Richard Crooks)
Prescriptions for Specific Faults: Prescribing for Musical Faults as the Doctor Prescribes for Physical Ailments
How to Organize and Manage a Successful Junior Music Club
Memory Work
Key of C
Novel Musical Watch
Left-Hand Sustained Notes
Picturesque Youth of Jules Massenet
Making the Pupils' Recital Interesting
Beginnings and Endings: How the Masters Began their Compositions
Expressing Musical Rhythm with the Body: Interesting Class Work with Young Pupils
Fighting the Song Shark
Why Every Child Should Have a Musical Training
March Through the Centuries
Keyboard Geography
Piano Musical Review Party
Solitary Practice Hour
Listening as an Aid to Finger Control
Masterng the Thumb-Under Movement
Visit to Wagner's House of Dreams
Put It to Soak
Musical Question
What Happens in the Prompter's Box
Cutting Those Gordian Knots of Music
Question of Peoper Credits
Guitar and the Child
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Volume 54, Number 04 (April 1936)
James Francis Cooke
Start the Day with a Song (interview with Henry Ford)
Easter Dawn in Music
Pictorial Visit to the Birthplacet Eisenach, of Johann Sebastian Bach (1685-1750)
Private Teacher and Music in the Schools (interview with George L. Lindsay)
Musician's Relation to the Public (interview with Edward L. Bernays)
Pitch of Musical Instruments
When Every Gentleman Was a Musician: Memories of the Golden Age of Music in England (interview with Marion Keighley Snowden)
Piano-Accordion in Musical Education: New Thoughts on a New Instrument (interview with C. Irving Valentine)
By-Products of School Music
Important Musts for the Piano Teacher (interview with Isidor Philipp)
Fifty-Seventh Annual Meeting of the Music Teachers' National Association
Love in the Orchestra
Memory Book Pages of a Musical Pilgrim: Presenting Messages and Music From Many States
Why Every Child Should Have a Musical Training
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Volume 54, Number 05 (May 1936)
James Francis Cooke
Making Your Music Live (interview with Henry L. Mencken)
Why Every Child Should Have a Musical Training
Practice Lesson
Opera on the Screen
What is Popular and What is High Brow?
Freedom of the Air (interview with Boake Carter)
Salzburg and the Mozart Spirit
Heavy Thumbs
Musician's Relation to the Public, Part 2 (interview with Edward L. Bernays)
Preliminary Presentation of the Piano Keyboard
Training Pupils for the Recital
Scale Wise
Little Recital Hour of the Philadelphia Music Teachers Association
Rhythmic Wisdom
Acoustical Revelations
Watch for This Inpostor
Crayons as Critics
Music Study Helps a Lad: A Letter to Un-Musical Youth
Recital in Musical Candy Land
Cultivating Concentration
Teaching the First Scale
Inspiration by Playing
Dangerous First Six Weeks
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Volume 54, Number 06 (June 1936)
James Francis Cooke
Background in Music Study (interview with Leopold Godowsky)
Little Tales of Music Study Accomplishment
Increasing the Activity of the Fingers (in French)
From Forty-Five to Ninety
And Now the Movies (interview with Nino Martini)
Here He Is! The Remarkable Legend of Der Liebe Augustin and How He Ridded Vienna of a Plague by Singing
Piano Accordion: Its Relation to Good Music
First Steps in Perfect Scale Playing
On Freeing the Left Hand
What about the Flute? (interview with Georges Barrère)
Improving the Musical Memory
Why Every Child Should Have a Musical Training
Watch the Musical Guide-Posts
Hands Separately