The daily worker. [volume] (Chicago, Ill.) 1924-1958, 1934-01-23

ONCE time began the masses Of the
y people have been the truest Gre
atorS of music. Love, fear, worship
and bondage have been some Of the
themes which have given birth to
folk music. The theme of revolt has
been rarer, but strong and compel
ling when it appeared. To those who
doubt the capacity OF the masses for
creation, there is living evidence.
Aboriginal, Australian, and African
tribes, Central Asiatic nomads, Ne
groes and Hillbilies in America, liv-
ing in toll and tilling Of the earth,
have created musical forms and con-
tents Of the highest value.
From creation to appreciation is
just step. The vast cordons of
peasant and proletariat are stepped
in some form Of music. 1t lightens
the drab pageant of their lives, it
awakens them to rebellion, although
often, and this must be said, it dulls
them with opiates Or leads them to
an ignorant chauyinism. But, what
ever music does, it is part of their
lives.
It is in this connection that the
revolution calls on music and its com
posers. Before millions OF workers
struggling for power against terror
and repression, the art Of music takes
on deep responsibility. It's purpose
is not to please" m ely, but to
point a way and to integrate itself
vitality in the life CT the masses. Just
as the workers movement grows year.
ly in new weapons and new tactics,
based on the concrete facts and les
sons Of Marx and Lenin, so music
must move. refresh itself, shedding
what is outdated and useless, taking
its place in the contemporary scheme
Of things, aYailing itself of all tech
biological innovations Of our age
This does not mean that the work
ers shall swallow whole and undigest-
ed the more extreme forms Of must
cal cubism, expressionism, and other
decadent escapes Of modern bour-
geois music. But weak as these are
in content, they have nevertheless
achieved some technical advances
which are Of Use.
1t is strange that many comrades
who are politically left" should raise
the barriers to their musical counter
parts. The honest MARKHAM composer
Of today must ride with the tide Of
progress. He can't sit down and
dream his music in the plushes and
satins of yesterday. He must make
1t out Of his identity with the whole
revolutionary movement. It must be
sturdy, bru5quc, vigorous and simple.
It must have something Of the field
and factory in it, of strikes and
achievements, OF warm comradeship
and bitterness against the ruling
class.
For this he needs an audience. Let
1t be said that the audience is there
but, if one part OF it is understanding
and appreciatiYe, another is reaction
airy and disparaging. Lost in the
maze Of bourgeois music, still drink
ing at the sterile sources of insipid
ronanticisln, fond Of banal operas,
sugary violin pieces and acrobatic
singers, the latter group resists stub
bornly the influx of new and vital
music 1t forgets that the arts move
with time and change, that the hon
ored figures Of the past were revo-
lutionsries in their day. Where enc
would expert a healthy sympathy
one finds an unreasoning opposition.
The radical composer becomes an
outlaw in his own home. His efforts
for change and new methods are met
with rebllffs and sabotage.
Two courses face the revolutionary
composer. Persistence and education.
He knows the glorious history of
those whom Dostoievsky called the
injured and oppressed" They have
given music its heart and muscles
Ee adds his mind and experience.
Together they can go toward the real
communism that is implied in the