Evening star., 1940-02-04

earth the best that native COM
posers have created and bring 1t out
into the light of the present day for
a new revaluation. There has been
no real effort to consider American
music, both past and present, with a
firm intent to see if there is enough
OF good in it to warrant a universal
championship of it.
There is hardly more objection
able virtue than excessive patriotism.
It is usually accompanied by a
blindness of the worst sort and a
narrowness of outlook that is more
harmful than helpful. But as re-
CARDS American music. we have
never suffered from any extreme
loyalty to it, in fact, just the con-
trary.
1t is not claimed that every work
written by a composer who belongs
to this country must be considered as
ranking with the greatest, but it is
possible that some of it might. More
than this, an openly expressed inter-
est in what the American composer
Is doing generates feeling of we'll
being that may release the springs of
inspiration. Composers in this coun-
try have been able to survive and
follow their musical bent under the
most adverse circumstances; it is
quite possible that a change of atti-
tude on the part of the public and
those who could help them by max
ing their works known would bring
about astonishing results.
Public Uncertainty.
The trouble is that the greater
part of the American public has
never really known whether there
has been anything like continual
progress among our musical writer's.
It does not know with any degree
of certainty how well those who
modelled themselves on the great
masters have succeeded or how
much of new character has been
discovered by our later writer's,
or, If any, how much it is worth. In
fact, music by American composers
as something substantial is hardly
recognized, but that does not mean
that it could not be very substantial
in the place it might occupy in
the music literature of the world.
Very often it is the policy of pro-
gram makers to begin with the
works of an early writer and build
from that point on down to the
present time. This gives the listener
the great advantage of being able to
compare style, talent and progress.
Such thing has rarely been done,
even in an all-American program,
of which very few are given at
any time. In the minds of most
of us, when we think of this coun-
try's composers, we think of the
men whose names are before the
public today and certainly go back
as little as possible to those first
essayists in this field.
The composers of the present mo-
ment are too close to us for a
Just and lasting evaluation. They
are disciples, for the most part, Of
the kind of writing that has de-
veloped within the last quarter of
q century and the majority of people
are not entirely sure that they like
it. They are still torn between the
best of intentions toward all the
new music and their firm love of
and pleasure in the old.
Stamp of Excellence.
But there are several composers
of an older generation whose works
are all too seldom played. The
worth of some of these men has
been attested by European sue
cesses, if such thing is still needed
as a proper stamp of excellence.
The peer of these earlier composers
was MacDowell, whom Liszt him.
self urged to further composition
after hearing the performance Of