Back before MP3s, CDs, cassettes, LPs, 78-rpm records, and Edison cylinders, the primary medium for the sale of songs was sheet music, and sheet music stores were as common as florists or dry cleaners are today. With every technological advance in the sale of music, the sheet music trade has dwindled a little further, and some anticipate that the latest threat–the Internet–will be the death of brick-and-mortar sheet music retailers.
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Ray Coulson, who co-owns the shop with his wife, Bette, understands the personal aspect of shopping for musical scores. “There’s a lot of people out there who love music,” he says. “They’re looking for things that they want to play for pleasure. It’s great therapy.” Coulson is a bit unusual among sheet music retailers in that he doesn’t play an instrument. “Most people would think you’d have to be a musician to do this,” he says, “and really that’s not true at all. It’s really closer to library work, if anything. The pace in here is equivalent to a library–it’s very calm. A knowledge of music helps, there’s no question about that, but it’s more about the history of music rather than its details. It’s not important to me what the music sounds like that I’m selling. What’s important is being able to find it when it’s asked for.”
Coulson got started in the business in 1948, after a stint with the army in New Orleans, working for Carl Fischer, Inc., a major corporate franchise at the time. “We used to call this ‘Music Row,’” he says, gesturing toward Van Buren. “Almost every publisher–and there were many–used to have an office down here. They used to have song pluggers all over the place. A common arrangement in those days was to have a horseshoe-like counter in the middle of the store. There’d be a piano player right in the middle of it, and they’d all have their hot sheets around it, and they’d play what people wanted to hear. Publishers used to send the stuff for free to get it stocked in the stores, get it put in the counters. That certainly doesn’t happen anymore.”
“Oh yes, only for 21 years,” replies Bodem, already kneeling down and opening filing cabinets in search of her requests, beginning with Adventures in Piano. Before long the tote bag is full. “Do drop by again now that you’ve found us at last,” he tells her as she makes for the door.
“That’s the one I want,” says the customer.
Current pop hits, explains Coulson, draw customers into the store but have a very short shelf life. He cites Britney Spears: “Not long ago she had a song called ‘Oops!…I Did It Again’ that sold pretty well. Then, all of a sudden, just dead. You can’t get most of this stuff anymore. Most of the songs only get published once in a single form. But eventually, someone will ask for it, although it could be years.”
