Rock Island Argus. (Rock Island, Ill.) 1893-1920, 1909-11-20

Did you ever sit in the theater listen
ing to the best songs, the most CATCHY
lyrics of modern light opera, and then
suddenly be filled with heart-hunSer
for song with a soHl in its song IN
which tender, witching melody is not
married to words of sickening, gro
tesque sentimentality or salacious sug-
lgestionf / have until it hurtl And,
curiously, this revulsion has been quick
est aroused. in my own case, not by the
blatantly noDsensical song, but by the
/ lyric that had thread of the real run
! ming through the shoddy-just enough
/ trace of the genuine to make the coun-
ferteit seem all the more abhorrent. At
such times mellow loneliness has crept
over me, and 1 have ionged to hear a
real song, ringing true and clear and
breathing a spirit instead of a sound
longed for it as for an absent friend,
or as for ''the days that are no more"
And out of such moments and moods
has grown the question: How long
shall we suffer under the scourge of the
vapid, puerile, the suggestive in the songs
of the day? Is the generation which
places the laurel of popularity upon
Gee, Be Sweet To Me, Kid" and fills
streets and homes with the multiplied
repetitions of 81 Simply Cannot Make
My Eyes Behave" beyond the apprecia-
ton of honest sentiment? And if a
new G. Clifton Bingham were to arise
and give us peer TO "Love's Old Sweet
Song" would it fall upon dead ears?
he n-,l,r %ha 9TH Soxy 70
a publisher of popular music of the
better sort. Here is his reply: 81 be-
iieve that the Ieople are hungry for
songs that ring true, songs that go
straight TO the heart, songs that have
the glow of honest sentiment instead of
opera boufTe sentimentality Human
nature Las not, at bottom, greatly
changed since John Howard Payne gave
us Home, Sweet Home, or Samuel
Woodwork wrote The Old Oaken
Bucket or Stephen c. Foster set the
world singing The Obi Folks at Home
The sophisticated ard the blase may
give popularity to the song CT false mo-
tive and the cultured may scorn all
sorCs save these which bear the hall
mark of The c!ass:c-but the common
people are as ready today to give fame
to n new maker of songs which will
reach the heart of the multitude in the
same old way, as was the nation back
III 1882 to thrill with a new sense of
love of country when Samuel Francis
Smith Pvt into the lips OF the people
the ringing measure OF America And
some poet-probably a humble onc-will
answer to the call of the hour, AMI sound
the first note of new song era which
will reveal the tawdry spuriousness of
the present day favorites in all their
cheapness and tinsel. We have the mu-
sicians who are equal to the task. The
witchery and charm with which they
clothe the feeble and frivolous offerings
of the lyric writers are proof enough
of their ability. Give them lines that
have the vital spark and they will weave
melodies that will echo from a million
lips. Take the good old songs l have
named-and we have none greater-they
are as inextinguishable as the fires of
Vulcan AS we'll try to put out the sun
as TO hush those songs in the homes of
the American peoplel And whyH Be
cause they have real sentiment instead
Of the counterfeit; because they mean
something that awakens response in
the soul of every human being who Isl
not dead to love of home, of kindred
and of country.
"But each generation should add to
our national asset by its own songs, voic-
ing Its own spirit. ana the call LOT inc
contribution from this generation is now
strong. I believe that it will be an
swered and that the next few years will
be richer in new songs which have the
real fire than the period through which
we have just been passing, and in which
we are still lingering-the period of the
comic opera, of the musical farce"
That expression, "Our national asset
caught my ear. Are songs a national
asset? Give your own answer, but here
is mine: Yes; an asset unthinkabiy
precious and valuable beyond the power
of the multiplication table to express
Which would be the greater patriotic
loss to this country-to strike from the
sight of our eyes every United States
flag in existence and Danish for a CEN
fury from the vision of the people the
physical emblem of our nation, or to
hush the strains of america" or "The.
Star-Spangled Banner" in this land for
a hundred years? Thousands of chill
dren look unthinkingly upon the stars
and stripes every day without an added
heartbeat. But is there boy or girl,
in all the myriad of school rooms of
the land, who hears the strain of our ma
tional emblem without conscious thrill?
Nonel
And what is recognized as the quick
est and surest way of awakening the
love of '1and of the free and the home
of the brave" in the hearts of the i'm