Evening public ledger. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1914-1942, 1919-04-19
eekly Comment on Things
Musical in Discriminating
Philadelphia
TURING the last musical season,
- France. with the Endorsement and

S& &DcTlHteuJ Will De IL Is lHlVOSSlDle 10
! say at this time. So far as the writer
knows, it is the first time in history
that an open propaganda in favor of
nationalized art in any form has ever
received the outward approval of the
government of first class power. One
immediate result, and that one prob
ably not foreseen or even contemplated
by the French government, was that
the Conservatoire Orchestra went back
to France minus a lot of its finest
players, who yielded to the lure of
American contracts based upon salaries
far larger than those paid for similar
services abroad. Mr. Damrosch, for
one, secured his new concertmeister.
Gustave Tinlot, and his new solo viola
Rene Pollain, one of the worlds great
est viola players, from this orchestra
while some Of the wood wind players.
the finest and most distinctive choir in
the French orchestra. found better pay
ing positions with other large American
organizations.
"A MOTHER interesting result of the
"A French musical propaganda will be
the report carried back TO France by
the musicians who spent the season
here, to the effect that America is ar
tistically not quite the wild and woolly
region that it was popuiarly supposed
to be in the continental ministries of
the fine arts, and that even before the
French artists arrived there was very
respectable knowledge of French music,
not only among the cognoscenti, but
among the people at large who attend
Only portion of the seasons $ concerts.
The reason for this is largely our cos
mopolitanism. Having not as yet dc e
yeioped distinctive music of our own.
we are, therefore. free from the
shackles of musical nationaIism. and for
that reason can select that which
pleases US best in the music of all coun-
tries. Thus intelligent American con
cert goers know all the great European
schools, French. German and Russian,
as well as Italian opera, and what little
absolute music of any value that ma :
ton has produced.
In strong contrast TO this. we find
that abroad the element of nstiOnalsm
>tends toward an excess Of native com
positions, to the inevitable loss of
knowledge of those of contemporaneous
composers Of other countries. The nat
ural result Of this is that we have in
the great cities of the United States a
, more open minded musical life than thai
~<cf ANY foreign country. This assertion
Is made in the face of the admitted fact
that there are many instances where a
composer has been accorded recognition
by some country other than his own be
fore he received full acceptance in his
own land.
THIS absence of a highly concen
i Srated nationalism has made it DOS
sible for the great American orchestras
TO include all nationalities in their per
sonnel, so that as class they nov
rank higher than any others in tn
world. 1t is an unquestioned fact tha
the French play the wood wind instru
ments better than any others, while th'
Germans have always excelled as strin,
players. The old Boston Symphony Or
chestre was the first to utilize this idea
with the result that it was conceded t
be the finest in the world, even by Eu
ropean conductors, after the two Ma
qparres (Hutes), Longy and Lenor
(oboes). Porteau and later Mimart an
Sand (clarinets) and Sadony (bassoon)
all French, were taken into the orches
ira with the string section that Nikisc
and Gericke, assisted by Kneisel, ha
built up.
This plan has been followed since b
virtually every great American orches
ira with equal success. Take. for in
stance. the "firsts' Of the reed sec
tion of our own orchestra today-Ma
quarre, flute; Tabuteau, oboe, Bonad
clarinet-all French, with a string bod
drawn from all nations, according
their individual abilities.
This procedure, which makes II
finest orchestra, would be almost in
possible in the great music centers
F Europe, where native sons" wou
be chosen, or at least given the prefer
ence.
TN THE same way the freedom fro
i national prejudices, or obligations,
whatever you may call it, has made
possible for our conductors at all tim
to select programs that "balance," i,
respective of the nationalities of Il
composers who figure upon it. Their
fore, each year we hear Cesar Franc
Saint -Saens, Debussy. Bach, Mozar
Beethoven, Brahms, Dvorak, Tscha
kowsky. Borodine, Rimsky Korsako
Scriabine, ct cetera, in due proporti,
to the amount of permanent or conten
poraneous worthy music which tn
have produced.
OF course, in each of the great mus
centers of Europe many works are pr
duced every year of composers of TO
eign nationalities. but, nevertheless,
is only natural and to be expected tn
the music of their native land is tn
which the audiences not only enj
most, but also that which they unde
stand the best. We in the Unit
States, thanks to the diverse progral
which we hear every season, have be
,sble to hear all and pick our favor
composers with no limitations otf
than those of our personal tastes a
understanding.
TUST what the ultimate result of 4
II French experiment will be is Il
possible to say now. To the writer
4 seems as il a great deal of money b
been spent to teach US something
slready knew. So far as the progra
OF the Ccnservatoire Orchestra w
Z available, nothing was observed on tn
thst had not been played many tin
bs American orchestras within the Il
4ifteen years, and the orchestra, fine
II WAS, had nothing to teach our b
'7f a uxor{can arga m ia ti0ps either in toI