This photograph of a Wurlitzer Style 43 Concert PianOrchestra was included in Wurlitzer's Complete Musical Merchandise Catalogue for Dealers, No. 132, The dealer's catalogue included some early de Kleist and Wurlitzer built machines, as well as various PianOrchestra styles imported prior to the 1914 importation cutoff due to World War I. It is made up of individually bound pages of exceptionally high quality, high resolution photographs.
Noting the obvious differences between the Philipps and Wurlitzer catalogue images, most notably between the statuary and the floral arrangements draped over them, this imposing instrument, photographed by Wurlitzer here in the United States, is clearly not the same instrument pictured in the Philipps catalogue. How many of these impressively large Concert PianOrchestras might have been built is unknown, but how many of them might Wurlitzer have bought on speculation? The Style 43 reportedly had a Wurlitzer price tag of $10.000.00, which was an impressively large amount of money in 1910. Thus, it is likely that no more than a few of these were ever imported, and it is possible that only a single Style 43 was ever imported and sold in the United States by Wurlitzer. |