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TliL NEW YORK
PUBLIC LIBRARY
56 PAGES.
146535
ASTOtt, LENOX AKI»
TIL6SN POUNOATMIH*.
1100.
With which is incorporated T H E KEYNOTE.
VOL.
XXVIII. No. 1
Published Every Saturday at 3 East Fourteenth Street, New York, Jan. 7,1899.
THE PAST AND THE PRESENT.
* • T H A T higher musical education hasn't
*
really brought forth the great army
of talent fondly looked for is certain," said
a bandmaster a few days ago. " This ab-
sence of genius is particularly noticeable
now, when a comparison is made between
the few songs that have been evolved about
the late war and the works of musicians of
thirty years ago. During the civil war
fully a dozen patriotic anthems were
written, which even to-day cause a tingling
of the nerves when they are heard. What
loyal citizen has not felt a thrill at the
swing and rhythm of the melody of 'Tramp,
Tramp, Tramp, the Boys Are Marching,'
'When Johnny Comes Marching Home,'
' Marching Through Georgia,' ' The Battle
Cry of Freedom,' or 'Tenting To-Night
on the Old Camp Ground?' These are only
a few of the songs that originated during
the civil war. There are others equally
good. 'John Brown's Body Lies Moulder-
ing in the Grave' is another type of com-
position.
"The soldiers who wore the gray also
had their patriotic songs. ' Maryland, My
Maryland,' is a classic second to none in its
magnificent rhythm; ''Way Down South
in Dixie' will be remembered and sung for
a century, while the melodious ' Bonnie
Blue Flag' is one of the best songs ever
written in the English language.
" Such songs as these form an indelible
part of the history of the bitter struggle
between the North and South. Compared
to them the hundreds of songs that have
been written on the war with Spain are in
nearly every case absolutely barren of real
merit from the standpoint of a patriot or a
musician. Among the best may be cited
the 'Manila Te Deiim,' composed by Wal-
ter Damrosch and sung by the Oratorio
Society a few weeks ago. This is, in every
respect a scholarly composition, but is de-
pendent for patriotic sentiment almost en-
tirely upon the interpolation of a few na-
tional songs. There are a few songs that
appeal to certain classes, which met with
some temporary success, but have already
been relegated to oblivion. Nothing has
appealed directly to the soldiers in the
field, who, in lieu of any soul-stirring new
war song were compelled to fall back upon
th-ft old-timers, such as ' The Girl I Left
Behind Me,' and other old favorites, or
contented themselves with popular songs
of the day which, although bright, lively
and generally pleasing, contain absolutely
nothing that could be construed as patri-
otic or that will perpetuate them for more
than a year at most.
" A careful scrutiny of the field fails to
reveal a single song that possesses any
characteristic melody or sentiment which
will permanently identify it with the
Spanish-American war."
*
D
R.
DVORAK,
perhaps now that
Brahms is dead, the most famous of
the great serious composers of Austro-
ANTONIN DVORAK.
Hungary, has just received from the Em-
peror, on the occasion of the royal jubilee,
the decoration, " For Arts and Sciences "
This order, it seems, is very rarely be-
stowed, the last musician who received it
being Brahms himself.
" Writing of Dvorak brings to mind the
fact that he quite recently issued cards an-
nouncing his silver wedding.
The cir-
cumstances of his marriage were rather
romantic.
He was thirty-one, and was
miserably poor, receiving, indeed, only a
pittance as a member of the Bohemian
$2.00 PER YEAR.
SINGLE COPIES 10 CENTS.
Opera House, Prague. He had been for
a long time engaged to a girl, and it was
agreed that they should marry directly he
could afford to keep a wife. Dvorak was
composing symphonies and chamber works
and operas, but they brought him neither
fame nor money.
In 1873, however,
Dvorak was appointed organist at St. Adal-
bert's church, Prague, at a salary of $150 a
year, and the income, eked out by a little
teaching, justified him, as he imagined,
not only in giving up the orchestra, but
also in marrying.
Two years later the
Austrian Emperor granted him a pension
of $250 a year, and Dvorak considered
himself a man of opulence.
*
C R I E N D S of the permanent orchestra
*•
scheme in this city for which $55,000
has been contributed, will not be encour-
aged by reading the annexed paragraph
concerning the Thomas orchestra from the
Chicago Tribune:
" I t costs $125,000 annually to keep the
orchestra up to its present standard of ex-
cellence ; the sale of seats could conceiv-
ably bring in $115,000, but is more likely
to realize about $95,000. In other words,
the annual deficit will never be less than
$25,000. Up to the present time a few
public-spirited people have contributed
toward paying off this deficit. The ques-
tion that arises is simply this: Will those
people, or others like them, continue to
keep up the good work? "
New York needs a citizen like Banker
Higginson, of Boston, willing to spend
$200,000 in the support of an orchestra, or
a group of public-spirited citizens like the
guarantors of the Thomas orchestra, in
Chicago, possibly New York could then
have a pre-eminent musical organization.
But in New York the attempt to maintain
a symphony orchestra has never been more
than partially successful, because the con-
ductors have been left to support their own
orchestral organizations or to make them
self supporting, which is a most difficult
undertaking.
T H A T Tschaikowsky's popularity is still
*
on the increase it is never possible to
doubt. His B-minor piano concerto was
played by Mme. Carreno and by Herr Siloti
•at the Philharmonic and the Gewandhaus
concerts at Leipzig on two succeeding
days.