The sun., 1919-10-12

Gu dS lHe ulOSI nOIlOTdDle VI Ill poS-
has never been told. 1t never will be.
The bald truth about most of them
would seem to be so brutal that even
the indifference Of hurried newspaper
readers would be broken and there
| would be storm of protests. Time
c nd time again the musical editor of
THE SUN goes away from a song re-
cital and does not write a single line
about it. Nothing but pity for mis-
guided effort could be expressed. and
why should it be? Impudence, char
latanry, trickery, might be met with
stern condemnation; but the futile
blunderings of the poor deluded crea-
lures who have been cajoled by dis
honest teachers or fiattered by igno-
rant or mendacious friends call for
nothing but charitable silence.
| Money Backs Musical Battle.
Yet If one of these unfortunates has
money, or friends with money. the
battle for acceptance goes on. Re
cital after recital Is given at a heavy
pecuniary cost and still the purchasers
of tickets do not materialize. The
longer the struggle goes on the more
agonizing must be the final admission
of defeat. Yet this is the sort of thing
that is encouraged by the misdirected
munificence Of some rich men, who
honestly believe that their money can
buy anything and everything.
1t would be for the everlasting good
of musical art if would be patrons of
music would perceive that they could do
far more good by educating competent
wood wind players for orchestras and
military bands than by burdening the
lyric stage with singers of less medi-
ocre ability. An orchestra in com
munity of moderate size is the founda-
ton of healthy and wholesome musi-
cal life. 1t is a genuinely educationa~
institution. for it cultivates public
taste for all kinds of music whereas
opera teaches people to love opera and
to forsake all else for it.
Any city of a hundred thousand peo
pie can have a symphony orchestra.
1t ought to have one. 1t ought also to
have a chorus. With these and the
travelling soloists it becomes capable
of an independent musical life. If
travelling opera company, such, for in
stance as that of Mr.. Gallo. visits it
for a brief season each year, it gets as
much opera as it can properly assim-
ilate.
what the Newspapers Do.
In concluding these rambling COM
ments the writer cannot and will not
levade the plain duty of declaring that
newspapers are much to blame for
certain conditions bearing on the situ-
alton. The musical departments Of
newspapers exist only because the do
ings of the musical world are in a wide
sense news. The musical news which
appeals to the largest number of read
ers is about opera, because opera in
terests thousands of people who care
nothing about music. Therefore the
typical musical department prints
three or four times as much about
opera as about any other form of
music.
When the San Carlo Opera Company
visits Scrabbletown the Netcs- Gazette
OF that town carries five or six columns
about the first night. When the local
chorus gives it's long prepared per-
formance of Elgar's Dream of Geron-
thus" the Nelos- Gazette labors through
a column or less.
The result of this type of publicity
is that every young person who can
make six consecutive notes with the
voice is encouraged to study singing,
while only some poor chap who is not
good enough to be a plumber or a
carpenter is driven to studying clarinet
or oboe. Furthermore this young man
is usually too poor to undertake such
study even II he wishes to do It, He
has to get to work to earn living.
This is one reason why almost all
the wood wind players of the leading
orchestras have to be imported or sec
ond rate. Mr.. Damrosch has pointed
out the way to remedy the evil Let
us hope that some of the millionaire
patrons of music will follow his mer-
itorious example.