Wacky Display Has Ellipsis Arts Hearing a Happy Tune

Chrome towel bars and a toilet bowl float. A soap dish and toothbrush holder. Copper valves and a PVC drain pipe. Hmmm ... is it a bathroom repair project? No, it's a combination musical instrument and retail display for a CD and 96-page book about experimental instruments and the artists who produce and play them.Called an Ellipsophone, the peculiar, xylophone-like device made of bathroom hardware, wrenches and a tin can -- played with the attached rubber mallets -- is producing sweet music for Ellipsis Arts of Roslyn, N.Y. The unusual musical display has enabled this progressive and innovative recording company to penetrate hundreds of stores in a competitive industry traditionally not receptive to P-O-P."Record and book retailers normally don't respond to P-O-P, other than for best sellers, but they've accepted the Ellipsophone. We knew we'd have to go far by providing a very special, unique display to make that happen," says Jeffrey Charno, ceo of Ellipsis Arts. "The unit is also a branding piece that provides a compelling home for an innovative new title."September's introduction of the Ellipsophone was accompanied by Ellipsis Arts' release of "Orbitones, Spoon Harps & Bellowphones," its second CD and book about experimental instruments and their pioneering inventors. The title features instruments like the "fire organ," a giant glass tube with fire shooting through it; a "zgamonium," a small table made of metal plates supported by springs and strings; the "stamenphone," a large bowed string instrument with a water sloshing resonator; and other wacky instruments made from washing machines, sewing machines, tennis rackets and hockey sticks."P-O-P has made a huge difference for an obscure new CD that can easily get lost in a store with 40,000 titles," notes Charno, adding that the Ellipsophone display has helped introduce "Orbitones, Spoon Harps & Bellowphones" into big box retailers nationwide and in Europe, including Tower Records, Borders Bookstores and Barnes and Noble.Ten CD and book packages are held in place above and behind the Ellipsophone by a chrome soap dish and toothbrush holder. Each package retails for $19.95. Stores must purchase 15 each of the new title and its predecessor, "Gravikords, Whirlies & Pyrophones," also accommodated by the display, to receive the 16-inch-wide by 18-inch-high by 10-inch-deep unit. Ellipsis Arts, which designed the musical display in-house, selected Dan Lipman and Associates of Locust Valley, N.Y., to manufacture 250 units. The displays are placed by Ellipsis Arts' in-house field salesforce.The unique record and book producer and marketer is adding to its eclectic mix of CD packages, which have included Celtic, African and pygmy music, with its soon-to-be-released "Dancing with the Dead," a collection of music from funerals around the world and a book about the amazing ways people in other cultures respond to death. As with the Ellipsophone display and its other CD package introductions, this new release will be "all about creativity and self-expression," says Charno.In that same spirit, Ellipsis Arts employees are in the process of creating a massive work of art, consisting of watches and clocks, to celebrate the new millennium. Produced by Big Bang 2000, a non-profit organization of Ellipsis Arts employees, the artwork will contain timepieces contributed from around the world, with warehouses in Brazil, Germany and the United States now collecting donations. The project is being publicized, and design ideas solicited, through the Internet. The artwork's final display location has not been determined. Charno proclaims that whatever its form, and wherever its home, the masterpiece will be a work of art that will reflect what is going on in the world at the turn of the century.

Wacky Display Has Ellipsis Arts Hearing a Happy Tune

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