Omaha daily bee. (Omaha [Neb.]) 187?-1922, 1910-05-22

3
s.--"l Of opera, OF choral societies, OF
oultics, and of orchestras. Here follows the
main portion Of the article:
Opera is a very popular amusement and
IT'S seducuons are such that they tempt
many otherwise honest people ~ befool
themselves with the belief that because
they applaud the shoutings of famous sing
ere they themselves have suddenly gone
musical. Alas! one is noe musical because
ne cries "bravo!" when the tenor emits a
nlSh or prima donna greasiy slices
down a besmeared chromatic scale.
No matter whether you sit in your COM
Portable home in Manhattan or in your
hi ne 1hg IN Brooklyn, whether you live
tbos Sns shores OF the Allegheny river or
those OF Lake Michigan, whether you
wander by the banks of the Wabash or
those of the Passamaquoddy, you will
easily learn that the advent of an opera
company upset all the musical conditions
OF your place.
,Ihe moment an opera company rises
ABOVE the local horizon the editor discovers
mat MS paper has n musical department
ana that 1t is his privilege to edit It, The
result very often Is that eXecrabe per-
tOrIndnceS by inferior singers are cele-
prated by many columns of type merely
because the entertainment is opera, which
the editor with his eyes on the many
thousands of eager seekers after operate
heroes to worship naturally regards az
more important than all the symphonies
OF Beethoven, the passions of Bach and
When the newspapers take this position
people who have thought little about music
are easily led astray Again, consider the
harm done to students OF music, especially
OF singing All through this country honest
and intelligent teachers Of singing are
| striving to develop real vocal artists. Along
comes the opera company and the vocal
| students spend their last pennies in Sc
curing tickets.
| They 30, they sit breathless through the
performances, they hang upon every ac-
| celebrated Signor Tnat. The next day they
| say to their teachers, You have always
| told us that we should not do thus and
we should not do so, but Nine. This does
| thus and Signor That do So"
The poor teacher answers and says unto
| them, THAT does not make II right"
Whereupon the students with one accord
respond, But Nine. This gets a thousand
q night and Sgnor That gets twelve hun
| dred and they are famous all over the
World: So what is the use of studying so
How Is the teacher to answer?
There is an answer, true and beauti-
full answer. 1t is that the artist should
take no delight in applause ignorantly
and wrongly given, but should be bound
| to teach his public TO admire only that
which Is good. Perhaps there was a time
| when artists took this lofty stand, per-
haps few great artists take. 1t, now; but
| the operate stage has so long been a
| parade ground that 1t is hard to find sing
ers who do not seek merely to dazzle
| 1t is indeed difficult to make pupil see
| that II is harder to sing a song recital
! well than TO below an act of an opera and
get applause. Yet when tenor sings
| 'Ridi Pagllacci'' in concert he seldom eN-
cites his audience as he does when he sings
II in the opera Even that bald fact ought
| to suggest something. Deprive him of his
costume, his makeup, his scenery and ms
action, and often you expose the poverty
| OF his vocal resources
When You have got this idea through
your pupils head he answers; "All the
| stronger reason why / should not study
so hard and should appear as soon as
possible in opera, where success is easy.
| 1t is certainly the first and foremost duty
of the newspapers to print the news II Is
the custom of skilful editors to print news
that their readers wish to get, and when
the opera or the circus comes to town
everyone wishes to read all about the
elephant, the giraffe, the tenor and the
soprano.
In several cities the problem of provid-
ing certain amount of musical stimula-
the practice of publishing a weekly article
bearing on some musical topic. This Is a
good custom, and 1t might easily be made
the agency OF much instruction In COM
munities where ideals are false.
The musical reporter or critic or editor
| (call him what you Wild of the local news
paper can offer to his readers matter which
they cannot get anywhere outside Of a
daily newspaper except in books which
they could not readily be induced to read
They will never get from their magazines
the sort Of matter that a conscientious
music critic will ask them to read.
He will invite them to consider the i'm
portant fact that the songs of Schubert
are worthy of careful study and will per
haps suggest to them the line OF artistic
development by which the German sons
advanced from the stiff utterance of the
minnesinger to the passionate expressive
ness of Hugo Wolf or Strauss. He may
take up the topic of plano music and offel
a study of the different schools and thC
different methods of Interpretation.
| .
Magazine editors, as a rule, appear t.
fancy that their readers, so far as music
is concerned, are an army of curious chill
dren without the desire or the power t
| regard an art as an art. The only place;
in which serious essays on musical sub
jects are printed are the columns of this
newspapers. There is no reason why thi:
| should not be the case in the small city
or town as we'll as in Boston or New York
There is no editor who cannot spare q
column a week for the earnest discussion
| of music,
There is no excuse for making this
LEGATION OF petty gossip about Geraldine
Farrar and her wondrous hats, abou
Fanny Bloomfield zeisler and her con
firmed habits OF domesticity or the i'm
pending changes in the choir of the Flrs
Presbyterian church and the approaching
picnic OF the West Corhstalk Choral SO
The simple truth is that there is toda,
hardly community OF more than lOOo
persons anywhere in this country whiel
make a column a week of real music stud!
worth while. II any reader of this pape
desires to know how the writer OF thl
| article knows this the answer Is eXtremel!
easy to make He knows 1t by his CORE
spondence.
1t is the fervent hope OF the presen
writer that the time is not far off wnsi
every town will have at least one COM
| mentator on musical topics cepab'e D
writing suggestvey, II not with 2Hthority
The country is unquestlonably quite read!
for this. The interest in m|Sie%l ert I
J growing at a marvellous speeo, ana thougl
al present the public appefHe Is rathe
| that OF a hungry man thar thaF OF a.
epicure, that az least is normal conan
| ton. ,,.,4 ht.,
! state the chief agent viii not be opera
That is now, as y always has been an
always viii be, a disturbing element IN
best taste Is to be developed as alreadl
, noted by the performance or goo
. | orchestra, by those OF competent chAmbe
music organizations, and by the studies
; No town is so small that il cannot hay
A chorus. IL is not essential that tn
chorus shall number 800 or 100 voices