Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1908-11-01
DON'T YOU THINK HES JUST Too
LOVELY, TNRTLEa".

doubtless was caused by the Person Who
The Person Who HUNS the Score can,
and does. belong to either sex. His or
her idea Is to let you and everybody else
seated within auricular range know that
ne or she has heard the opera before.
To have seen the opera before really
is no wonderful achievement, nor does
the fact that he or she has heard the
opera before cast. in the unbiased and
impartial view. the slightest nimbus of
glory or grandeur around the humful
form of the hummer who has heard the
opera before. Why. we beg to inquire.
should anybody be conceited not to say
all swollen out of human semblance. be-
cause he or she has happened. for ex-
ample. to have heard I'll Trovatore'' or
La Trayiata" Or La Somnambula" or
The Bohemian Girl at some previous
time? Well may he submit such ques-
ton. and then again well, well, we'll!
But for some inscrutable reason the
Person Who HUNS the Score imagines
that his or her relative Importance is
bound to be magnfied a thousand fold In
the view of the surrounding victims il he
or she manages to firmly impress it upon
'em that he or she has heard the opera
before And how is such an impression
to be created and clinched if the heard-it-
before individual doesn't pick up and hum
each and every aria about three bars be-
fore the orchestra catches up with the
opening measure of said aria? There isn't
any other way of course, and so the hum
full one just huns and huns and huns
Perhaps the view of the hummer is that
you ought to be blamed glad. and no
questions asked to be thus informed by
way of sort of hummed prelude. as to
what's going to be sprung on you next.
This must be the case, for the Person
Who HUNS the Score always chances
around in thoroughly self-satisfied man
ner while humming. as much as to say
On. I'm not asking you to thank me
right out loud for doing this-for letting
you know what's coming SO that you
won't evince too much foolish astonish-
ment when it does come-but YOU know
very well. all the same. dear folks that
I'm doing you all great service, and
really you ought to look properly CRATE
full to me, any way"
Putting You Wise.
Now. of course you know perfectly we'll
from having heard it since your earliest
youth. that the "Miserere" from III Tro-
vatore'' starts off this way:
Turn, tum. ia ia Ia ia, tum. tum''
OF course you know it. You've heard
every barrel organ in North America play
1t. Moreover. III Trovatore" was the
first opera you ever heard. and you've
heard il at least 917 times since that first
time. Hackneyed as it has been and al
ways will be. you've a soft spot in your
heart for the old. fraZZed, warped Mis-
erere" and you don't tire of it when it is
sung on the stage by singing people who
know how to sing and who are paid for
singing and whom you have paid to hear
sing.
Does the Person Who HUNS the Score
admit. even by remote implication or in
ference, that you've ever heard the opera
before. or even selections from the opera :?
Does the Person Who HUNS the Score ac-
cept II even as a vague possibility that
you've ever heard much as one bar
of the "Miserere" before?
No. The Person Who HUNS the Score
does not.
The Person WHO HUNS the Score