Jack Westheimer was among the first industry leaders interviewed for the NAMM archives back in July 2002. Four years later we had the unique opportunity to complete a second interview wit...
Theo Dollmann was the sales representative for Schott Music, the famed music publisher located in Mainz Germany. He joined the company in 1939 and continued to work for the company past h...
K. Ethel Merker was asked by the Holton Company to create the now popular Merker French horn. Her career has included acclaimed symphonic performances, radio and TV jingle work, and sever...
Masamitsu Yamano’s grandfather opened up a small music stop in the heart of Ginza –the shopping area of Tokyo, Japan. The year was 1892. The retailer, which started out as a small keyboar...
Kitty Wells has been crowned the First Lady of Country Music for her pioneering style and impressive string of hit recordings beginning in the 1940s and continuing into the mid 1960s. For...
George Koregelos made a series of well-respected flutes under his name in the 1970s that was but one of his career highlights in the music products industry. After studying instrument rep...
Wolfgang Förster’s family-owned piano company was formed in 1859 by August Förster, who opened a small piano workshop in "Löbau, Germany. Wolfgang grew up in the family business and recal...
Jack K. Lewis served as President and COO for the Conn Organ Company after years of serving as it's Manager of Marketing Administration, General Sales Manager, Director of Marketing and S...
Jim McEvoy apprenticed as a piano technician in his native Ireland in 1946. The following decade he and his bride moved to San Diego, CA where he worked at a local music store before open...
Eddy Shenker teamed up with Marty Golden in the mid 1970s to form JAM Industries. The distribution company has become one of the largest in Canada and introduced the market to a number of...
Harold Smith ran the Baldwin factory in Greenwood, Mississippi and became president of the famed piano company in the 1980s. In addition to the task of improving production and working co...
Elliot Fine is best known to percussion students for the method book he wrote with Marvin Dahlgren called 4-Way Coordination, which was first published in 1963. Over the years, he has pub...
Bobby Dukoff was a big band saxophone player during the swing era when he looked for ways of improving his own sound. While working for the Jimmy Dorsey Orchestra, Bobby began playing hi...
Ed Cramer was the long time music attorney who played a vital role in ensuring the performance and composing rights of musicians and songwriters. His list of clients reads like a who’s wh...
Lester Wagner began in the woodworking and sanding department of the C.F. Martin & Company before World War II. He moved from the North Street Plant in 1964 to the bigger manufacturin...
Warren Price’s father started a small Canadian music retail store when Warren was just 17 years old. Soon after Warren purchased his first drum kit and discovered he wanted to join his fa...
Jim Marshall was in a full body cast as a 12-year-old boy due to polio. He managed to overcome the incredible odds to not only walk again, but also to become a trained tap dancer. He foun...
George Shorney’s grandfather formed a small music publishing company in 1892 with the goal of serving the church by printing hymnals. The company, Hope Publishing, has done just that and ...
Earl Scruggs was the father of bluegrass and country banjo playing. His style and techniques have been both influential and inspiring for generations of banjo players around the world. Hi...
George Douglas's grandfather opened a small music shop in Canada, which his father managed following his military service during World War II. The small store chugged along over the years...
James “Red” Holloway was an accomplished jazz saxophone player who began his love affair with music while a student of Captain Walter Dyette at DuSable High School in Chicago back in 1942...
Gerhard Keilwerth grew up loving the saxophone and dreaming of building his own line, which of course he did do to international success. The Keilwerth name has been synonymous with innov...
Chuck Barnhouse is the third generation to own and operate the C. L. Barnhouse Publishing Company. His grandfather established the firm in 1886 and over the years the company has commissi...
Rose Wernes Drake traveled with her husband, Ivor, when he became the second salesperson hired for the Winter Piano Company following World War II. He often said the company got two for t...
Johnny Davis had several key roles within the music products industry, which made his Oral History interview particularly meaningful for the NAMM collection as we seek to preserve our ind...
Tom Ostrander was the founder of Colonial Music in Mt. Vernon, Ohio. Now a string of stores, the retail company began with the simple idea of providing top quality instruments to the area...
Bernie Kalban was one of the great veterans of the music publishing industry. Having worked in the era right after Tin Pan Alley, in the Brill Building and with many of the top firms, Ber...
Jack Linton followed in the footsteps of his father who formed the famed Linton oboes brand of musical instruments. The instruments have been handcrafted in Elkhart, Indiana, since the 19...
Ralph MacDonald grew up in Harlem, where he was exposed to many musical traditions. As a drummer, he focused on his African roots and as a songwriter he relied on his soulful understandin...
John Majeski Jr. was appropriately given the AMC Lifetime Achievement Award in 2005 for a long career as editor of the Music Trades Magazine. During John’s era, the Beatles came to Americ...
This audio only interview was conducted for a radio program by Dan Del Fiorentino and donated to the NAMM Oral History program: Bob Brookmeyer played trombone for several name big bands d...
Ed Roman opened a guitar store in Las Vegas after a successful career in the motorcycle industry. What he learned about that business and the customer base he found, he could easily apply...
