As of May 31, 2017, Phillips Music Corporation of Missouri, a repair and rebuild service for musical instruments, closed after 72 years of service.
The store started in 1946 in Elkhart, Indiana when Jack Phillips initially opened the store under the name Elkhart Band Repair. The store later moved to Kirksville, Missouri in 1952 and was renamed Phillips Band Instrument Repair. Later on in their history, the store was renamed again to become Phillips Music Corporation. When Phillips passed away, his two sons Tom and Jeff Phillips took over the business.
“We decided to close the shop due to a continually slowing demand for the restoration of American made brass instruments,” said Tom Phillips. “We will miss the actual restoration process and working closely with all of our ‘Mom and Pop’ music stores to provide them consistent high quality rebuilding!”
Moving forward, Phillips noted “our plans for the future are to sleep for a week and then re-invent ourselves just like the owner of the Chapel Bell Foundry in London that built the Liberty Bells, Big Ben and West Minister Bells. They have been forced to close also this year in May. We appreciate all of the support the musical instrument industry has provided us and to say THANK YOU to all of all small “Mom & Pop” stores that believed in us for 72 years!”
“Their attention to detail and painstaking dedication to perfection made their work the best in the business. They were literally artists when it came to brass work. From the metallurgy of brass to the fabricating parts when no parts existed, there was nothing Tom and Jeff could not do,” said Jack Meister of Meister Music. “They will be missed, as will the beauty of their service to the music industry. As for the artistry and the great volume of experience and dedication they have provided over the years, its final curtain is like the end of a great movie. Like so many precious things now rendered to the past; it has gently ‘Gone with the Wind.’”
