Author: Lelia Loban ★2017
Date: 2010-11-25 15:24
>>In my second year teaching, I had a student come in with an instrument that was obviously the property of a school district in another state. I was young and idealistic, and I questioned her. She swore it was really her instrument. I notified my supervisor and asked how I should handle the situation. >>
Clearly you know that specific situation and I don't -- your suspicion may have been right. But it's possible, in general, that a student with a school-marked horn may be telling the truth about owning it legitimately. The reason is that when schools close, buy new equipment or discontinue their music programs, they often consign the old stuff to auction houses.
Odd thing about that -- libraries stamp their books as "released by" when they send them to auction houses or otherwise sell them (and often the librarian will sign the stamp for good measure), but in the forty years I've been cockroaching, and specifically looking for instruments for the last thirty years, I've never seen school musicial equipment marked as "released by" in an auction lot, even when it's clearly a legitimate sale run by the school itself.
I've always thought of the school horns as the absolute bottom-of-the-barrel beaters -- mishandled by the kids and not serviced adequately by the schools. For a picker, it's been worthwhile to take a quick look-see over that merch, on the outside chance that the school might have acquired (from another, older school) or hung onto something decent long enough for it to age into "vintage" value -- maybe it sat around unplayed for ages because it was Albert System keywork or High Pitch, for instance. But most of that discarded school equipment was so beat-to-snot that it would have cost more to repair than it was worth. The only people who bought it were parents who weren't musicians themselves and didn't know any better.
That last paragraph was in past-tense because, unfortunately, this situation has changed. These days, with many schools discontinuing or cutting back on music for budgetary reasons, good, servicible instruments do get into the used market. The majority of the discarded school horns are still beaters and I still don't think it's a good market for the parent or end-user who isn't a musician and can't evaluate the merch, but it's worthwhile for legitimate dealers to check out what's available.
Of course, it's also still worthwhile for legitimate buyers and music teachers to watch out for the stuff that "fell off the truck...."
Lelia
http://www.scoreexchange.com/profiles/Lelia_Loban
To hear the audio, click on the "Scorch Plug-In" box above the score.
|
|
The Clarinet BBoard
.jpg){kind=small}
.jpg){kind=small}
.jpg){kind=small}
.jpg){kind=small}
.jpg){kind=small}
.jpg){kind=small}
