Banking on Instruments of Change : Marketing: Even in tough economic times, those at merchants’ annual show say, there is a music business.

Perhaps the most welcome new feature at the National Assn. of Music Merchants (NAMM) Winter Market, held over the weekend at the Anaheim Convention Center, was a booth giving out free earplugs near the entrance.

The yearly show is a marketplace where about 700 musical instrument manufacturers and distributors from around the world display their wares to retailers. It is also where you hear folks simultaneously flailing away at timpani, heavy-metal guitars, accordions, synthesizers and hundreds of other instruments, creating a sonic effect that recalls the contemplative mood and refined musical talents found at, say, the Republican National Convention.

Amid the bedlam can be heard the sounds of new technologies and musical trends that will doubtlessly influence popular music in the days to come. Many dealers have concerts or guest artists to tout their products: Some of the stars this year included Buddy Guy, Vinnie Moore, Yngwie Malmsteen, Queensryche and Dweezil Zappa. Adding to the commotion are salesmen anxious to convince that their products can fly faster than the recession can catch up with them.

A tour of the market on Friday revealed that its exhibitors’ usual degrees of invention and whimsy haven’t been lessened by the economy. Relative newcomers to the business such as music software for personal computers and home karaoke machines continue to increase in numbers, while more traditional wares arrive with new twists, such as a guitar with an aquarium and live goldfish in it.

According to Bill Schultz, president of the guitar-making giant Fender Musical Instruments, it’s not a time for the industry to stick its head in the sand.

“We’ve increased research and development, increased marketing efforts. We have new models coming out every six months. There’s no cutting back. There’s a music business out there no matter how hard times get. Long before this time there was a depression, and there was a music business in it. We just feel we have to work harder and harder,” he said.

Fender recently moved its headquarters from Orange County to Scottsdale, Ariz., but still has its custom shop in Brea and its domestic manufacturing plant in Corona.

Among several additions to its line this year, Fender issued a Stevie Ray Vaughan Signature Stratocaster. Royalties from the guitar will go to various Texas charities.

The instrument was unveiled Friday morning in what proved an emotional tribute to the late guitar master, who died in a helicopter crash in 1990. Vaughan’s brother, Jimmie--himself one of the best blues guitarists--was joined by fellow players Buddy Guy, Danny Gatton, James Burton, Albert Collins, Eric Gales and Double Trouble drummer Chris Layton in remembering Stevie’s love of music. Jimmie was visibly moved by the tributes to his brother, which included letters from Texas Gov. Ann Richards, Eric Clapton and Jeff Beck.

Jimmie recently approved the manufacture of the instrument, which had been designed by Vaughan and Fender to the guitarist’s exacting specifications a year before he died. Noting the punishing technique Stevie exerted on his guitars, Jimmie said of the new model: “The only thing you could do to make it more original is drag it behind a car for about a year. Otherwise it’s perfect.”

After the unveiling, Jimmie said he felt that it was the heightened musicianship of his brother and others that compelled American guitar manufacturers--who largely had lost their reputation for quality in the ‘70s--to pay greater attention to their craft.

“That’s exactly what made them come back,” he said. “(Stevie) and the rest of us playing Fenders would only play the old ones, and eventually they had to notice. Also, Fender is almost like the Harley Davidson story: the guys that loved Harleys bought the company back, and that’s what happened to Fender.” (Schultz and other investors purchased the company in 1985 from CBS, who bought it from Leo Fender in 1965.)

Curiously, there was no grand tribute this year to the man who may be most responsible for the present size and success of the musical instrument industry: Leo Fender. The Fullerton genius, who died last March, pioneered the first successful solid-body electric guitar in 1950, and literally hundreds of variations or flagrant copies of his designs now dominate the NAMM show booths.

Fender’s last company, G&L;, was sold last year but remains an Orange County concern, owned now by BBE Sound of Huntington Beach. The firm has issued a deluxe Fender memorial version of its ASAT guitar.

Several exhibitors said the recession has compelled them to find new ways to assert themselves in the market. Custom luthier Danny Ferrington said: “In 1980 people like Van Halen and Elvis Costello wouldn’t think twice about buying three guitars at a time. But a lot of these musicians have been around long enough to see the music business fall off before, and they’re thinking twice now. So now I’m convincing people they should sell four or five guitars from their collection and just get one of mine, to have something new and custom-made. I’ve even called around sometimes to help them sell their old guitars.”

Ferrington introduced a baritone acoustic guitar (keyed halfway between a guitar and a bass) at this year’s show. “I try to think of different things like that, so that there’s a new hole players have to fill. Just making normal nice guitars, you starve to death. So I try to make things that are innovative and weird. And I’m in California, so it helps.”

There was no shortage of weirdness at the show. Neo Musical Instruments, which makes the aforementioned fishbowl guitar, also offered a line of clear or opaque plastic electric guitars and violins filled with neon lights, gum balls and even crumpled dollar bills. Head Cases of Anaheim was marketing coffin shaped instrument cases with molded raised skeletons and bone handles.

Among the more user-friendly technology on display was the NoteStation, which may revolutionize the sheet music business. Instead of stocking printed music, stores can lease the NoteStation Kiosk, a computer that prints out sheet music on demand, in any key the buyer desires.

Yamaha, with its U.S. headquarters in Buena Park, displayed its SY99 synthesizer, an upgrade from its revolutionary SY77 introduced two years ago. The SY99 combines the 77’s features with an on-board digital sampler and expanded effects capabilities. Yamaha also debuted the RY10, a “rhythm programmer” with advanced features. According to Yamaha’s Phil Block, “Most rhythm machines on the market just slap you in the face with minor variations of the same limited snare sound. The RY10 has 48 distinct snare sounds,” which presumably can slap you just about anywhere.

Sales of Yamaha’s Disklavier now match 25% of the firm’s sales of standard pianos. The Disklavier is the floppy disk answer to the player piano, enabling exacting reproductions of both prerecorded performances and a player’s own stuff.

The collapse of communism has made an impression on the NAMM market. A Canadian firm, the Oxford Music Group, offered pianos imported from Russia and Estonia. The advantage, said the company’s Dave Hinschberger, is that “it’s one of the few remaining parts of the world where you can still get some satisfaction out of helping people to learn our techniques to make a better instrument, as opposed to going to a more well-developed country and throwing your money in the pot with the rest of the world, where you wouldn’t develop a special relationship with the people.”

Mike Matthews, who has been marketing Soviet amplifier tubes for the last last couple of years, branched out this year--bringing with him not only a line of Russian amplifiers, but also a couple of Russian citizens. Two of Matthews’ new partners previously manufactured military hardware. Pointing out one dour-faced gentleman, he declared, “He used to make tubes for the triggers in hydrogen bombs, now he’s making guitar amps.”

The amps themselves have a crude tractor-works aesthetic but sound fine and are ridiculously inexpensive. Where a 100-watt Marshall head may go for $1,300, a similarly powered Sovtek MIG 100 lists for a mere $359. According to Matthews, “They sound great, they’re built great, and they’re priced for the proletariat.”