Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1907-02-23
JoBsoN ON RAGTIME

eiS PAeiio IA eH0 PhAioA. w hCii BAG hou
finished the first piece. a very lively compo-
sition indeed, Mr.. Jobson cut in.
''Whadda We call THAR" he asked her.
''Oh. a ragtime song that / heard at the
theater the other afternoon-I Jes' Can't
Make My Eyes Behave it's called" ,e-
piled Mrs. Jobson. Like it?''
''Humph!" grunted Mr.. Jobson, non-com-
Mutually, resuming his paper.
Mrs. Jobson began again and rollicked
through another exceedingly frivolous COM
position.
And that one-whats that called?' In
quired Mr.. Jobson from the sitting room
when she had finished.
oh, another ragtime piece" said Mrs.
Jobson. I Can't Keep My Feet STILL, is
the name of it, Like the air?"
'Uh-hum." replied Mr.. Jobson. cracking
his newspaper.
Then Mrs Jebson executed another. Mr..
when she got through with this one
And what, pray" he inquired, with
asperity, lis the title affixed to that mess?'
Coon song, called Nobody" replied
oh. Nobody hey?" growled Mr.. Job
son.. casting his newspaper on the floor and
getting up from his chair. We'll, femme
tell you something, Mrs. Jobson. Nobody
that isn't insane cares anything for al
legged music like that Nobody stuff and the
rest of the same kind that you've been saw
ing of on me"iateiy. That's what 1 think
But put In Mrs Jobson, when I first
got that piece. couple of weeks ago. and
played 1t for you, you said-dont you re-
member THAT it had the most winsome
a air Just what you said. winsome
II also said, presume" broke in Mr.
Jobson, that it sounded just like Chopin's
Funeral March of the Marionettesy
Then, suppose-to hear you tell it, went
pia of rot MI "
about making your eyes behave sounded just
like Rossinfs 'Stabat Mater hey? And
after getting that out of my system, I
plunged along and told you, I dare say
your feet still reminded me Of the over
ture from 'Zampa'-eh7'
:, But" said Mrs. Jobson I've always
thought that you had such catholic taste
in music, and that
Music! Yea, Tnusic!" broke in Mr.. job
SON. For once you've got something right.
| like music, SO long as it's nslsfc. But
I'm not addicted to this junk that you've
been slamrbanging at me lately. That's
not music. It's musical debris. ITS rot.
It's the leavings OF music. the scrap-heap
OF melody. I'd like to know what the dick
ems I've got a piano around this dump for,
anyhow. It's no good to me. The best I
get, every evening when I'm trying to dig
some sense out of my newspaper. Is rattle
and tanfarronnade of lickettysplit ham
mering that sounds like a lot Of plumbers
apprentices repairing a leak in steampipe
or a gang of riveters picking up overtime
money on busted boiler. If that's the
best you can do, 1 might well send
that plano to the auction room as quick
as possible. 1t has become almost as much
Of q nuisance to me as the phonograph OF
that pin-head across the street Is on
summer night when all of the windows are
open. You used to be able to knock out q
few sounds that a normal human being
could at least sit still under for ten or
fifteen minutes at stretch, but the stuff
that you chuck into the circumambient air
these last few months is enough to give a
hurdy-gurdy Sicilan the delrium tremens."
But, my dear" ventured Mrs. Jobson.
don't you remember how you told me,
early in the winter. that you were sick of
serious music. or so-called music, as you
called it. and how you said that the real
American music was. after all. ragtime
music and that anything American was
good enough for you, and that you liked
ragtime music more than any other kind,
and that you wished I'd get few armfuls
Of ragtime pieces and learn them, and
that
Il do not-DO NOT-remember having given
utterance to that string of explosive ego
isms-not on your Valenciennes fichu do I!
And I don't remember. either. that 1 OBJ
posed Of mixed pickles and chocolate
eclairs. Neither did l. at that same period,
frame the expression that Bath House John
of Chicago was the reincarnated spirit Or
Z
Isles Of Greece! You want to flag that
phony remembering habit of yours or it'll
swamp you and land you in the BOBBY hatch
one of these days.
But" put in Mrs. Jobson. didn't you
really say, theu.that you liked my ragtime
playing and that"
mot any more than ever claimed that
liked that Muscoyy soup made Of iced
returned Mr.. Jobson. However. as you
seem to have understood me that way.
allow me to get on record now about 1t. SO
sb again an tbef no inx
You can delete 1t from your repertoire
wholly and absolutely. never did have
any use for it.. and I never will tolerate
teen Moaui Indians pounding tom-toms
in my front room as to have that ragtime
rubbish chucked at me. What I like is
music-sure-enough music. That's what
so that I can hear little music once
in a while. II can't get the kind Of
music I want. I can see that piano being
lowered down the front steps and on its
way to place where the highest bidder'n
snag It out, that's all. hope that I've
made this plain enough
Conforming to which dictum, Mrs Job
son from that evening eschewed the rag
time stuff.
Mrs. Jobson. while an admirable woman.
has her limitations as pianist. as indeed,
have a great many ladies who own and
oPSAotC piohOo. ~, tLC lOiiONluS evening
when she sat down at the piano after din
ner she rolled off such melancholy affairs
as Monastery Bells and "Silvery
Waves" for the edification Of her spouse.
Mr.. Jobson, reading his paper, bit his
nails good deal over these musical mani
festations, with which, as performed by
Mrs. Jobson, he had been familiar through
out their entire married life but he said
nothing.
The following evening again after dinner
Mrs. Jobson. attacking the piano for her
husbands delectation. unreeled such MOURN
full and hackneyed numbers as THE Last
Hope and 1.-THE Maiden's PRAYER and
''Warblings at Eve" Mr.. Jobson during
these performances, looked like a man on
the point of succumbing to an unspeak-
able despair. but he, said nothing, only
gnawing his nails some more.
The next evening Mrs. Jobson plousihed
through the Miserere from I'll Troyatore"
and The Shepherd Boy and Waldteufel's
"A Toi' waltz 1t was a shaking of the
skeleton of music, all right, but Mr.. job
son endured 1t in silent misery.
The evening after that Mrs. Jobson I'M
wound ''The Angels Serenade" and waves
of the Ocean and one or two other messy
ones. with variations.
Then Mr.. Jobson, his nails quite gnawed
from the quick. rose majestically from his
chair.
Madam he inquired, 'fs all this put
ia n,,t-,,n ioh9', ro,,rohlod Nars Tohso,