July 20.
Donunc the past week two letters for publication and some unwritten comment have reached us on the nature of the pr mes played bid ea Band in the Public that the Band, whether deatticted It is universally agreed
to wind instruments for open air work or in full orchestral form with strings as when heard in the Town Hall, has made striking progress under its present conduct for. No comparison could fairly be made between the public music of Shanghai to-day and what it was but a your or two ago: and much well-deserved praise has been given to Herr Buck in mam quarters for the devoted care wi which he has laboured to raise the Band to its present efficiency. There is boners an undeniable Band has hdeeel ts technical feeling that in proportion as the
excellence it has shown a tendency to pass out of sympathy wi popular taste. It is hinted that' those who pay the piper are not allowed as much liberty as they could desire in calling the tune. Indeed the main point of attack is that there is not tune enough in the daily programme.' Our correspondents, for example, ask for popular and national airs, selections from musical comedies cheerful pieces instead of those high-class renderings which are wasted on the vho have no taste for d Even in the case of the winter Sanday iconcorta, the Pted ty the large audience that!
rity of which was fully
assembled week by week in the' Town Hall, similar complaints' were occasionally heard: while the Volunteers in particular protested that the Band took no pains as in former years to give them either the quantity or quality of music that they had the right to expect on field days and reviews.
So far as the latter con: plaint is concerned some justification would to have been admitted, and ponsibility of omission in this taken to prevent any further
respect. But the immediate discussion centres uj the nature of the music provided in the Public Gardens: and the Directors of the Band reply, not without show of reason, that they have already done
grammes and that, while only too their utmost to lighten ce pro-anxious to meet the public wish, they are somewhat at a loss to know exactly what is wanted. To take only the records of the last eight days, that is both before and after the dates of our correspondents'
The B.C. herald ano S.C. & C. Gazette. letters, they might contend that} there is little, on the face of it, which could fairly be placed in the category of "high-class classical music," using the phrase in the sense it was doubtless intended to bear of what.is intricate and without easily recognizable tune. On the other hand four sets of selections from musical comedy have been played, if we include Gaiety Echoes, and a very large number of waltzes, marches and two-steps. The balance of the programmes has been chiefly made up of overtures or extracts from operas which might be said to strike a middle note between the very grave and the very gay, Fra Diavolo, William Tell, Martha, Cavalleria Rusticana and Tutti in Maschera. In such music there is certainly no lack of melody, nor indeed of variety in the whole record. So far as possible the Band is never permitted to play the same piece twice in a month and that principle is not merely recognized generally but demanded: at least we may suspect that there would be many more complaints, if the same programme were too often repeated, than are now excited by an occasional tendency to miss the right touch of—popalarit But to achieve the requisite vai tion from week: to week, it is obvious that the Band must keep a large repertoire of music in continual practice. None of this music, however easily performed, can be given in public without previous rehearsal: and since the most devoted apologist of the light and joyous in melody may occasionally weary of popular airs, though he hears them, perhaps, no more than once or twice, it is not unreasonable to suppose that the musicians also may feel an occasional need of relieving the daily diet of waltzes and two-steps with something deeper and of a more lasting appeal. The ground of complaint is not that they should indulge this longing, but that they have indulged it a trifle too freely. It is possible that our correspondents were un-Jucky in the moment they chose for entering the Garden; that they would have been better pleased by staying longer, or on another occasion. If this were the case, and we merely hazard " suggestion, it still remains that there will have been a hundred others in a similar position who did not make their complaint public.
Of all the tastes about which there is no disputing, music is, perhaps, the one in which controversy may become most scornful. Fortunately in the present instance 213 there is question neither of controversy nor of scorn; but on the one hand 2 perfectly legitimate suggestion and on the other, as we have reason to believe. it anxiety to meet it. general standard of musical appreciation in Shanghai is, if anything, above the average was fairly shown by the success of the winter concerts, and there is no doubt that the new productions promised for next season will be listened to as eagerly as those that are already familiar. But there is a wide difference between the indoor and the open air concert; nor is it surprising if the great extremity between summer and winter in Shanghai should increase our perception of that difference. Tt must be frankly recognized that the music which an audience will hear gladly in winter and in the Town Hall does not respond to their sense of fitness when they stroll in the Public Garden for the chance breeze of summer evening. As has already been shown, the directors of the Band have tried to introduce a compensating lightness into their programmes. Unfortunately their ideas of lightness do not appear to coincide with those of the audience: ind here we might venture the suggestion that if the audience were more liberal of its applause where its emotions are stirred, the bandmaster would have such a means of gauging the popular taste as enabled him to provide the charming programme with which the winter concerts were brought to u close. It is dangerous to try to express our correspondents' meaning in definite terms, but possibly some revivals of old melodies—the operettas of Gilbert and Sullivan, the early musical comedies such as the Geisha, The Shop Girland The Artist's Model, Offenbach and Audran—might go far to meet whats: general nombre thanavague, but undeniable sense of dissatisfaction.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.