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The topic of pianos came up in another thread. A moment after posting there, I recalled an unusual tidbit which might be of interest to folks here.

You know the formidable John Aasen as Colosso in Lloyd's Why Worry?. Upon his death from pneumonia August 1, 1938, his body was shipped to Dr. Charles Dean Humberd, a physician who studied "giants" and other anomalies, who kept the skeleton for study (the "soft parts" of the body were separated and suitably interred). The whimsical--I won't say "eccentric"--Dr. Humberd also had musical talents as an arranger and performer; and so it is we come to what ties all of this together with me: Myself being a collector of not human skeletons but rather sheet music of the 1900-1930 era, especially ragtime, I noticed over the course of time that a number of pieces in my collection--all acquired at different times--happened to bear the signature of one Chas. Dean Humberd; indeed, with the printed copy of one was an entire new (and better!) arrangement of the piece by Dr. Humberd. As these pieces of sheet music from Humberd's collection came to me separately by chance, I would guess that his collection must have been quite large indeed, and that there is much more of it "out there" in sheet-music collecting circles.

As recently as yesterday, I was sitting at the piano playing one of these pieces of sheet music signed by Humberd. Every time I do, I feel as if I'm playing in the presence of Aasen, Lloyd, and Humberd. Life has its interesting moments.

_____

Other than the above, I don't know wny anyone would be interested in what's in my own collection; but, as it happens, I'm at present working on an on-line catalog of it just for fun. Should you like a look (there are a few pictures sprinkled through), here are links to the first page and the second (which I am currently working on):

http://www.csulb.edu/~odinthor/music.html" target="_blank

http://www.csulb.edu/~odinthor/music2.html" target="_blank

You'll find some of the Humberd pieces on each page (more to come on later pages)...

Maybe you can answer this, as no one on this board has been able to.
Is there important sheet music that is presently considered lost to history?

telical wrote:Maybe you can answer this, as no one on this board has been able to.
Is there important sheet music that is presently considered lost to history?

To a degree, this would depend upon whether the frame of reference is all sheet music (manuscript as well as printed), or just manuscript (or just printed). Though it's not something I have focused on, I'm certain that there are, for instance, works by Bach, Haydn, and other notables of which we just have scattered or single manuscript pages (and nothing of the piece was ever printed). On a less lofty level, most of the music of the first Gilbert & Sullivan work Thespis, Ltd. is lost (or at least unrecognized as being re-used elsewhere in Sullivan's works), and Scott Joplin had a rag called "Pretty Pansy Rag" which is lost. For lost printed music, I was going to cite a song arranged by Scott Joplin by the name of Snoring Sampson which was at one time considered lost; but--checking on Google before posting this answer--I find it appears that the music has been found and is available. Certainly it cannot be but that there are instances of unimportant sheet music of which a low number of copies was published by obscure and unsuccesful publishers, and all copies are lost (or the remaining ones are lining trunks in people's attics). As to important published sheet music, however, I can't think of any instances, nor do I have a notion that I have ever heard of any such instances. With a piece which proved popular (which is what "important" tends to mean to music publishers), the publisher would be more likely to print far too many of them than so few that none could be found. Others who have specifically looked into all of this may surprise me with another answer; but I would indeed be surprised...

odinthor wrote: To a degree, this would depend upon whether the frame of reference is all sheet music (manuscript as well as printed), or just manuscript (or just printed). Though it's not something I have focused on, I'm certain that there are, for instance, works by Bach, Haydn, and other notables of which we just have scattered or single manuscript pages (and nothing of the piece was ever printed).

(snip)

As to important published sheet music, however, I can't think of any instances, nor do I have a notion that I have ever heard of any such instances. With a piece which proved popular (which is what "important" tends to mean to music publishers), the publisher would be more likely to print far too many of them than so few that none could be found. Others who have specifically looked into all of this may surprise me with another answer; but I would indeed be surprised...

There was a previously unknown Vivaldi flute concerto discovered recently...umm...a few years ago? It's recently been recorded. I don't know if Vivaldi would qualify as "sheet music." Would musicians make a distinction?

Frederica wrote:

odinthor wrote: To a degree, this would depend upon whether the frame of reference is all sheet music (manuscript as well as printed), or just manuscript (or just printed). Though it's not something I have focused on, I'm certain that there are, for instance, works by Bach, Haydn, and other notables of which we just have scattered or single manuscript pages (and nothing of the piece was ever printed).

(snip)

As to important published sheet music, however, I can't think of any instances, nor do I have a notion that I have ever heard of any such instances. With a piece which proved popular (which is what "important" tends to mean to music publishers), the publisher would be more likely to print far too many of them than so few that none could be found. Others who have specifically looked into all of this may surprise me with another answer; but I would indeed be surprised...

There was a previously unknown Vivaldi flute concerto discovered recently...umm...a few years ago? It's recently been recorded. I don't know if Vivaldi would qualify as "sheet music." Would musicians make a distinction?

Yes; and wasn't some juvenile Mozart found recently as well? Professional "this is my everyday living" musicians, I can't answer for their usage with any authority; but my experience is that, be it Vivaldi or muzak, both manuscript and printed music is potentially "sheet music" . . . meantime remembering as well that musicians tend to drop the "sheet" part and just call it "music" (unless there's some pressing reason at the particular moment to be more specific) . . . and that the music's owner may at times be motivated in referring to it to emphasize the fact that the music is manuscript rather than just some easily replaceable printed copy (the subtext being, "...so keep your goddam hands off it, nitwits!").

Albert Cazabon's accompaniment to The Flag Lieutenant (1926) is said to be the 'only surviving' original British accompaniment to a silent film, which implies that there must have once been many more that are no longer around.

I've read somewhere that mass quantities of sheet music were lost in the paper drives of the World War II era.

Of course later, it was said that the collections of metal, paper, tires, etc. did not necessarily get used in the war effort as much as people were led to believe. Everyone that participated felt that they had contributed, however.

Part of the problem is a lack of a catalog of what SHOULD be out there -- not knowing all of the titles that were composed, who knows what might be missing? Some of the publishing companies put out lists of pieces on their music jackets, others actually published catalogs, but some of the smaller companies probably not so much.

Every time I come across a collection of silent film music, there are pieces I've never seen before. There was a lot of this published.

John Aasen can be seen in this March 1928 home movie footage also featuring Laurel & Hardy:

The Milwaukee Sentinel - Feb 1, 1936









Aasen's obit (below), almost lost among the notices for Warner Oland, John Blystone, Constantin Stanilslavsky,
Billy Dooley , and Pearl White, presents him as a few years older than recorded elsewhere,
and nearly a decade more elderly than the man alleged to be 24 years in the photos above.
Photos of his apparently still unburied skeleton can be found via a Google image search.




Mental & Physical Decline & Death


The Milwaukee Sentinel - Dec 4, 1933





Spokane Daily Chronicle - Oct 31, 1936





The Spokesman-Review - Aug 3, 1938






Berkeley Daily Gazette - Aug 5, 1938

In the contract: I note "acts of guard"; any possible acts of God were presumably considered too trifling to bother with. Moral: Don't mess with studio guards! The party of the first part can't control them!