News & Views Sunday, November 24, 2024

We won't name names… Wednesday, October 21, 2009

Considering the multitude of music titles that publishers bring out every year, it is amazing that there aren’t more printing errors that get past the proof readers.  Consequently, when a goof does come through, it usually jumps right off the page.  Without pointing fingers (it happens to the best of us) here are a few publishers’ errors that we’ve caught over the last few years.

 The writer’s name is Ruth Elaine Schram, which comically became SCRAM when printed on the cover of a piece called “Somebody Got Lost.”  And we had to wonder how much the publisher really “cared” when they printed a cover saying “Variations” for Carinet and Piano.
A boo-boo that had to have been quite disheartening to the publisher, but didn’t get caught until thousands of choral octavos had been printed, was the result of a computer font that wasn’t supported by the printer’s equipment.  Anytime an apostrophe appeared in the lyrics, the printer’s computer preceded it with the letter “i” making the apostrophe look as if it was an accent mark.  Consequently there were typos such as “all the walls came a-tumbalini’ down” and “yei’ll take the high road and Ii’ll take the low road.”  The publisher decided not to recall them but has thankfully resolved the issue for future printings.

An error that probably got the biggest laugh, but was promptly recalled by the publisher when we brought it to their attention (can anyone say “lawsuit”?) was a case a number of years ago in which a biography of rock and roll drummers had a picture of Ringo Starr in which part of the caption read, “dummer for the Beatles.”  Now some people may argue about the technical prowess of the man as a percussionist, but he had to be a pretty smart cookie to do as well as he did with what he had.  And he’s crying all the way to the bank!