The mirror. (Stillwater, Minn.) 1894-1925, 1918-07-18
HE human mind finds
special delight in tracing
things back to their be-


HSNNgN things back to their be-
lN2g ginning. We wish to
know where things come from,
and the more stupendous they are
in their completion, the more anx-
ious we are to know their origin.
In the history of the evolution
of art, music has rather unique
place. Poetry, painting, sculpture,
all these arts had reached compare
lively high levels of perfection
when music still was in it's infancy.
Several thousand years had to pass
by before music became what it is
now. Music is very old, but ex-
act dates of its inception cannot be
given. The monuments on old
Egyptian tombs contain harps and
Tyres, which proves that this art is
at least 1000 years old.
But the question is, how did mu-
sic really originate? No doubt the
human voice must be considered
as the oldest instrument, and the
first music teacher was Mother Ma
ture; the bowling of the wind, the
roaring. of the sea, the rolling
thunder, the mysterious rustling
of the forest, the cries of beasts,
and the singing of birds, must
have given man the first impress
sion of the variety of sounds that
prevail in nature and was a neces-
sary preamble for musical percep-
ton. From listening to initiating
these various sounds seems to be
only short step. The tendency
to initiate, which we find in all
normal children, must have been
equally strong in primitive man.
Indeed, Aristotle, the Greek phil
ospher, who was born 384 B. c.,
holds that all art is imitation.
Thus most likely at first the hu-
man voice initiated the sounds of
nature, and later simple instru-
ments were invented for the same
purpose. The wind blowing
through the reeds of the river
banks and producing a whistling
sound led to the invention of the
flute. Every group of people may
be presumed to have especially
initiated the sounds that surround
ed them. the people living on sea-
boards the roaring of the ocean,
the inhabitants of the inland the
rustling of the forest. etc.
The regularity of certain natur-
al sounds and the tendency to imi-
tate must soon have developed a
sense of rhythm, reproduced in the
even pace of two persons walking
together, or the even stroke of
hammers, or the rhythmic beat of
= the fails, or the timed shouts at
any other kind of common work,
Which even in our times is quite
common.
A further stage of development
was reached when hands and feet
joined in the marking of time, to
the sound of the human voice.
This sort of singing would hurt a
trained ear of today, because there
was no melody in it, and must be
compared to the first attempts of a
child to speak. In general it may
be said that the development of the
individual reflects to large extent
the development of the whole race.
Between the rattle we give the
baby and the primitive instruments
to produce noise among savages
there is very little difference. A
baby does not only use a rattle in
more or less rhythmical way,
but with any firm object given into
it's hands hits other objects and
evidently enjoys the repetition OF
the same noise. That indicates the
first stages of its sense of rhythm.
From all this we understand why
the first instruments invented were
all noise" producers, rattles and
drums. They were sufficient tC