Perth Amboy evening news., 1922-05-02

April zg-ls your
nose educated? Can you tell, for
instance, the difference between Law.
ender and garlic with your eyes
shut? If not, you had better begin
to give your nose daily setting-up
exercises. for the long neglected
sense of smell is coming into its own.
Perfume concerts are the latest
contribution of science TO aestheti-
cism, and persons who have always
depended largely, on convention to
tell them what to like and dislike
in the category OF scents are said to
be at a loss when turned loose
among futuristic perfume harmo-
MES.
The perfume concert Is a recent
scientific experiment. 1t has long
been held by some scientists that
karmonies of color, seem, or taste,
are as capable of giving aesthetic
pleasure as harmonies of sound. IL
we enjoy a series of musical chords,
they reasoned. why should we not
enjoy a series of perfume Earmonies
or a series of blended colors, A
dress or painting may be beautiful
by reason Of it's colors alone. But
both color and perfume have always
been made to serve as accessories.
iHty nave pttH iSllOl tu so dtSliltkiS
stimulants. Yet both a be fixed
in a scale, similar TO the musical
scale, scientists find. Using these
scales, harmonious or clashing
chords and sequences can be evolv-
ed, just as in music. This, in a gen.
eral way, is the thory of the scien-
lists who have experimental with
perfume and color.
So far as taste goes, it will be re-
membered that Huysmans in one of
his novels, describes a liquor organ.
This was made up of a scale of Id
| uors in glasses. and combinations
! were formed and tasted by the oper-
ator. The symphony of taste would
| seem to be a more far-fetehed idea
than the concert of color or scent.
1t is especially far-fetched O. in
this country, for few aesthetics would
be able TO rig out compete set of
liquid notes for an organ.
Scale of Soft Stuff
More practicable, perhaps, would
be a soda fountain organ, with q
scale running from strawberry to
vanilla. The difficulty is that n
sample at a time OF the soda clerks
skill At harmonies is enough for
most people. A complete symphony,
consisting of a succession Of allie
| gros. adagois, college delights, and
cherry whoops would knock almost
any patron of the arts into trans
| ports of indigestion. The American
stomach will have to be strengthen
ed before the American sense of
taste can be very much developed to
| appreciate the soft drink concert.
The color organ presents fewer
difficulties. At least II offers no in
ternal danger TO those testing its de-
lights. II has been used for some
time as an interesting novelty.
The score for a color composition
is generally written in advance, ard
the colors r projected on a screen
in the combinations and order that
the score directs. The concert is
porduced by an operator at an or
ean-like instrument with a key
board and stops which control diff
ferent light rays.
Almost n n who is not color
blind or who is not entirely devoid OF
a feeling for beauty can get some
pleasure from a simple color concert,
II is claimed. Very subtle harmonies
require a more sensitive audience. OF
course at any color performance the
person who is a critic and a lover
of colors can get much more out of
the display than a person who is
indifferent TO the appeal o. the spec
trum.
Civilized mah is used to depending
ON his eyes for information more
than or his ears, nose. or fingers. For
that reason. at least, the color organ
has a chance tor popularity. When
IL comes TO the neglected nose, il
seems likely that at first only a few
sensitive souls will be able to enjoy
fully the subtleties of a perfume
concert.
A perfume scale has been fixed
by DIR. Septimus Piesse, a French
chemist. lie uses delicate and pun
gent scents for the high notes and
the heavy scents for low notes
Though a few of the odors of his
scale are not familiar to the layman,
most of them are; SO we quote the
plan of the perfume keyboard:
Patchouli TO Civit
Starting with the base clef. three
octaves below middle c: do. pat
chouli; re, vanilla; mi. Glove bark;
IA, benzoin: sol. frangipane: la. sto-
rax: 81. Glove: do. sandalwood: re,
clematis; mi rattan; ia castoreum;