New-York tribune., 1918-07-03
Just a Song at
7uiHght
FTHREE nights week the folk up
around Columbia University take UP
By Sarah Addington

around Columbia University take UP
their hall rugs and journey over to
campus green. They take the rugs to sit
on and they go to the green for music
fest, the summer concerts given by the New
York Military Band free to all who will
come and listen.
But on Wednesday nights there's still an
other reason for consorting together under
the trees and the stars at Columbia. For
Wednesday nights there's community sing
ing. At least the programme alleges and
promises that the community will sing. And
it is presumed that the professors and
their wives, the dressm2kers and the bust
ness men, the storekeepcrs and the stu
dents who fill the campus to running over on
Wednesday nights do so with the direct
intention of giving expression to the songs
they carry around in their hearts, or some
thing like that
The question is, do they?
Well, the first night they did not, simply
and emphatically did not. The professors
sat incoming on their camp stools, trying
to look unconscious of the fact that they
were expected to sing and couldn't to save
their lives. They wore exactly the express
SioH lHdt lucy wear W0en tnclr classes aD-
plaud them at the end of course of lect-
ures, scared, helpless, CLASSY eyed. No, the
professors were not expressing themselves
in song that night.
The business men did very little better.
They clustered good deal about it, rustled
the programmes, cleared their throats,
doomed few notes, hummed the bass,
looked the director straight in the eye,
doomed a few more notes, la-la'd, but you
couldn't say they really sang. Their pub
lcity was good, but their production was
very poor.
And so it the women, Of course. who
bore the brunt that first night. Women
have practice in singing of Sunday morn
ing, and they have family pride SO they
sang and kept the family head above water.
They did not sing with loud or strong or
jubilant voices, but they moved their lips
and said the words, and that was some
thing for non-singing civilization that
let's down its hair, goes out in the twilight
and tries for the first time to get back to
ballad days and sing for the pure jov
therein.
The next was an improvement. One pro-
fessor got behind tree and with carefully
calculated abandon embarked upon the
"Suwanee River" Negro dialect did not come
easily to his classic tongue, but he strug-
gled like man and stopped only after he
had discovered that the band had 1t was
awkward, but he had the tree for protec-
ton and row Of water drops on his brow
told what good exercise it had been The
others did better, too, that night, though
tho ballad iGpa eli
Then. last Wednesday night, the kew was
found that opened up all the doors of bash
fulness and stiffness and let out the floods
OF soprano and tenor, alto and bass and
other unclassifable sounds that the director
had been waiting for these weeks The kew
was a sentimental song played as an en-
core, Cloves Sweet Song" 1t was played
as a reward for the patience of the crowd
in listening to the previous number, "Good
Friday SPELL" from "Parsifal" And what
a reward it was!
For no sooner had the first notes
drifted out caressngly to the crowd
than there went up a great, soft humming
all over the campus, everybody singing the
song to himself, dreaming up at the stars.
signing over his memories 1t was per-
feet orgy of sentiment, of sweet misery. of
delicious heartbreak. And SO thew all
swayed and hummcd and hugged their
knees, while the violins walled and the trees
blew above them, and the moon sailed into
sight over there above the o." The COM
munity was singing.
The business man forgot to look brisk
and alert, lapsing into most unbusiness-
like broodng. The dressmakers unpursed
their lips to smile reminiscently, lips that
100 often hold pins even after the davis
work is done. The professors forgot to
jump at the unaccustomed sound Of their
own voices. The students held hands openlv
After that it was easy They had got the
pitch and nothing could stop them They
shouted that they wanted to go back to
ole Virginny" and you almost believed
they did. They wished they were in the
land OBJ cotton" fervidly And the last
thing we heard was the mournful voice of
the shyest professor in Columbia singing
the first words of the sentimental song.
"Ihe Dear, Dead Days Beyond Recall" as
he turned the corner toward home and the
midnight Gil.
T/sx.