Albuquerque morning journal., 1907-09-24

able American community can be i'm
agined. In larger cities there are
teachers Of piano or voice who earn
as much as $4,000 year. In smaller
places those who are thoroughly COM
petent get at least a better living than
they would have been likely to secure
If they had become, say, clerks. stem
0graphers or bookkeepers. Again. the
openings for teachers in private
schools and seminaries at salaries
ranging from a few hundred to three
thousand dollars year are numer-
Gus and steadily increasing. More
than 100 colleges in the United States
have music departments. Again, not
a few young women have taken con-
servatOry work in piano tuning and
have discovered that there Is a lucra-
tive field Of usefulness in this line. In
deed. II Is said TO be impossible to
meet the demand for expert tuners.
There is hardly any American city Of
so, 600 inhabitants where young
man or young woman, thoroughly
versed in the mechanism of the piano
and the organ cannot expect to earn
in excess of q thousand dollars year
on account of these and many other
openings, although the chances of the
person of average talent for stage ap-
pearance are none too many, and for
attaining great prominence on the
operate stage are very few indeed, vet
nearly all the graduates of high-grade
American music schools seem to be
reasonably certain. If possessed Of or
binary common sense to make their
way in the world. When Colonel Saw
age advertised for flower girl chorus
for his production of "Parsifal" in
England more than a thousand young
Americans presented themselves. But
the plethora of American beauties
was undoubtedly due not so much to
the munificence of the compensation
offered as to the general glamour of
the stage and the particular desira-
bility of appearance in so famous a
production.
Men in the United States are gen.
orally less ready than women to take
the musical profession seriously. This
is particularly true of the educated
classes from which the ranks of the
other professions are recruited. There
is, thowever a tendency now for col
lege bred young men to think of music
as something which they may take up
instead Of law. ministry, medicine or
engineering Some, like Frederick s
Converse, a young Harvard man who
entered upon a business career but
| found the call of music too strong to
resist have discovered in musical com
position a very interesting field. Since
the production of his opera, The Pipe
| Of Desire by conservatory students
| in Boston two years ago, Mr.. Con
verse has had several introductions tC
| New York audiences and has become
recognized as one of the coming com
oosers.
Another graduate of Harvard whC
| has become very popular in New Yorl
is Francis Rogers. who has added
/ technical power to the manner II
which he used to sing glee and college
songs and has met with great success
on the concert stage. Herbert With
| erspoon is another collegian. a grad
uate Of Columbia who has gained
great professional and social favor az
| a singer The attention that is nov
paid to music in the colleges-partic
ularlv where such an alliance as tina
| that has heen concluded between tht
| oldest Of American universities, Har
/ ward and tho New England Conscrva
| tory Of Music, by which work done II
the conservatory can be counted to-
ward Harvard degrees-is helping. un
ldoubtedly. to induce more and more o.
| the educated young men of the coun
try to compete for the very consider
| able financial and artistic rewards o
the musical profession.