MUSICAL EDUCATION IN AMERICA
Early singing teachers and schools--Music societies in
colleges--Introduction of music in the public schools--The
Germanic influence--Conservatories--Musical courses in
colleges and universities; community music--Present state of
public school music--Municipal music.
There seems to be general agreement among students of American music
that we are entering upon a national era. That we did not attain
this stage long before has generally been laid to the inadequacy of
our educational system in music. A less apparent yet more rational
statement would be that our educational equipment, growing with the
increasing culture of the people and adapting itself to their timely
needs and developing comprehension, was the kind most desirable. A
'mugwump' was defined by General Horace Porter as 'a man educated
beyond his ability.' Had a European system of musical education,
however theoretically ideal, been imposed on young America when
necessarily occupied with material problems, we might now be a nation
of musical mugwumps, smugly satisfied with ourselves, and incapable of
original achievement.
If it be granted, then, that musical culture is conditioned, in kind
and degree, upon the character of the people concerned, then the
colonization of our country becomes a subject of prime importance,
affording, indeed, the best logical method, in conjunction with a
general chronological order, for discussing the present subject.
The various colonies which were planted on our eastern shores
developed by permeating in successive waves of immigration New York,
northern Ohio, Indiana and Illinois, and Michigan and Wisconsin; thence
the lines became divergent, broadening through the trans-Mississippi
plains until, emerging on the Pacific, they embrace the entire coast,
from Seattle to Los Angeles. While the original spirit has been greatly
tempered in the course of this progress, its distinctive character
still remains--a pale tinge of Puritanism, as it were, which colors
every expression of life, and which can be traced on the sociological
map of the United States by a narrowing belt of ever-deepening hue,
back to its undiluted source: the all-pervasive theocracy of colonial
New England.
From the time when this religious influence began to reach beyond its
original boundaries, it met and amalgamated, in a social though not
sectarian sense, with Presbyterianism, a kindred spirit which, somewhat
later than Puritanism, came to America, largely from Scotland, and
took root in almost all the colonies from New York to the Carolinas.
The 'blue laws' of Connecticut, so repressive of the graces of life,
of love and laughter and music, found their counterpart in the
Westminster Catechism, wherein the 'moral law,' that is, the regulation
of social relations, is said to be 'summarily comprehended in the Ten
Commandments,' the first four of which are specifically religious.
Religion being the dominant factor in this stream of social influence
which flowed through America, and the Bible standing as the chief
and final authority on all matters of life, music, the ever-willing
handmaid of every human institution asking her assistance, was
naturally drafted into the exclusive service of the church. The
first singing books were psalm books; the first singing schools were
organized for the purpose of the instruction and training of church
congregations and church choirs.
I
Private instruction in music was unknown for more than a century after
the settlement of the country. In 1673 the British Commissioner for
the Plantations reported that there were no 'musicians by trade' in
the United States. Indeed, it was not until 1730 that an advertisement
appears of a music teacher. In that year a newspaper in Charleston, S.
C., printed a notice that John Salter was teaching music in a young
ladies' boarding school conducted by his wife.
It is true that some of the psalm-books contained hints for singing,
but these were either too obvious or too vague to be of practical
value. Thus in the 1698 edition of the 'Bay Psalm-Book' (the work,
first published in 1640, ran through seventy editions) there is this
general direction: 'First, observe how many note-compass the tune is
next the place of your first note, and how many notes above and below
that, so as you may begin the tune of your first note, as the rest
may be sung in the compass of your and the people's voices, without
Squeaking above or Grumbling below.'
As we have seen (in Chapter II), the first books of psalmody pretending
to be works of instruction were those of the Rev. John Tufts, of
Newbury, Mass., published in 1712 and 1714, and that of the Rev. Thomas
Walter, of Roxbury, Mass., published in 1721. Largely as a result
of Tufts' and Walter's publications, singing schools to teach the
reading of psalm-tunes by sight began to be established in New England,
although not without strenuous opposition.
In 1723 the Rev. Thomas Symmes, of Bradford, Mass., published a
'joco-serious dialogue concerning regular singing,' which bore the
title '_Utile Dulci_.' In this he presents and answers prevalent
objections to singing by note, among which the following are
significant of the ignorance, intolerance and pruriency of the 'unco
guid' of that day:
'5. That it is _Quakerish_ and _Popish_, and introductive of
_instrumental_ musick.
'6. That the names given to the notes are _bawdy_, yea _blasphemous_.'
The second stimulus to musical education in America was imparted
by various American reprints of two English books on psalmody: W.
Tansur's collection, 'The Royal Melody Complete,' published in 1754,
and Aaron Williams' 'The New Universal Psalmodist,' published in 1763.
The prevalent taste in England for musical rococo, such as florid and
meaningless 'fuguing choruses,' was thus transplanted to the colonies,
where it made a deep impression which was harder to remove and
persisted longer than in the mother country.
The most conservative strain of English musical culture, that
associated with the Anglican church, existed also in America, awaiting
its turn to reign, when growth in general culture and artistic capacity
should cause the people to tire of the ingratiating but inconsequential
music which held sway. Its exponent was William Tuckey, an English
musician of high training and culture, who came to New York in 1753
and made an earnest attempt to educate the colonial people in an
appreciation of the best church music. His career as teacher as well as
organist and composer has already been touched upon in these pages (see
Chap. II). Tuckey called himself 'Professor of the Theory and Practice
of Vocal Music,' and the part he played in the musical education of
New York and Philadelphia fully justifies the assertion that he was
the first teacher in America worthy of the title. His pupils became
prominent in all movements of their respective cities for the elevation
of not only sacred but secular music to the best standards of Europe.
Already there was the leaven of German influence working for the
betterment of music in America. In 1741 Moravian Brethren in their
community at Bethlehem, Pa., a little town which has retained to the
present day the distinction of being a home of music of the highest
order, had established singing schools. Ten years later they formed,
in connection with these, an orchestra for the rendition of secular
as well as sacred music. In the correspondence of the time, lovers of
their country, men who, like Samuel Adams, of Boston, had begun to
think nationally and who shortly afterward were to become patriots of
the Revolution, put on record their gratification at this important
contribution to American culture.
A taste for good music and a desire to inculcate it were also
developing in Philadelphia and Baltimore, as shown by records of the
time. In 1764 the vestry of St. Peter's and Christ Church in the
prosperous city founded by William Penn extended a vote of thanks to
two of its most cultured and public-spirited citizens, William Young
and Francis Hopkinson (who was soon to achieve distinction as a poet
and patriot of the Revolution), for instructing the children of the
church in psalmody. In 1765, at St. Anne's Church, Baltimore, Hugh
Maguire, probably the organist, established a singing school, for use
in which he published 'a new version of the psalms, with all the tunes,
both of particular and common measure.' He announced that he would
teach singing at their homes to young ladies who played the spinet, his
remuneration to be fifteen shillings a quarter and an entrance fee of
one dollar.
Returning to New England, we find in William Billings, the 'great
Yankee singing-master,' the most important musical influence of the
time. The date of publication of his original compositions, 1770, marks
an era in American music. By this time the old psalm-tunes in use,
only four in number, were worn to death, and the new tunes, having
been composed in the novel fuguing style of the English compositions,
became instantly popular with the singing schools, which Billings was
energetic in organizing and conducting. The most notable of these, that
at Stoughton, Mass., is elsewhere described, as well as the general
activities of Billings and other teachers of the same general school.
In the circle of musical development of which Philadelphia was the
centre, Andrew Adgate of that city was the leading spirit. In 1784 he
established an 'Institution for the Encouragement of Church Music'
supported by subscription and governed by trustees. So fervent was
Adgate in the cause of 'music for the people' that, as conductor of the
institution, he organized 'public singings,' which became so popular
that within a year the trustees, objecting to 'the indiscriminate
assemblage' of the general public, restricted admission to subscribers.
Adgate thereupon resigned his position and established a free school,
'Adgate's Institution for diffusing more generally the knowledge of
vocal music.' It is significant of the public spirit of the 'cradle
of independence' that he found a number of influential men willing
to act as trustees of the new organization. The splendid institution
which is now the University of Pennsylvania opened its doors to the
new enterprise. Inviting requests to join these free classes, Adgate
announced: 'The more there are who make this application and the sooner
they make it, the more acceptable will it be to the trustees and the
teacher.'
Adgate's Institution had a marked influence in Philadelphia in the
development of musical appreciation, which is an essential precedent in
any community of the practical cultivation of the art. Foreign music
teachers after trying vainly in other places, such as New York, for
something like remunerative recognition, finally found it in the city
whose civic spirit had been broadened by Adgate to include artistic
as well as material progress. Among these may be mentioned William
Tuckey, already noted; the English musician, Rayner Taylor, who came to
America in 1792; and Filippo Trajetta, a Venetian, the son of the noted
composer Tomaso Trajetta. Filippo was trained by the best masters,
notably Piccini; entering the revolutionary army of Italy, he was
captured by the royalists, but, escaping, fled to America, arriving in
Boston in 1799, where he taught singing. He toured through the South
as a theatrical manager, and finally settled in Philadelphia, teaching
and composing music ('Washington's Dead March' being his most popular
composition) until his death at the age of seventy-eight in 1854. He
published 'Rudiments of the Art of Singing' as a text-book for the
'American Conservatorio,' an institution established in Philadelphia
by his pupil, Uri K. Hill; in this he advocated the Italian system of
_solfeggio_ to supersede the 'defective sol-fa-ing' in universal use in
America.
In New England, more particularly Boston, we find that the foreign
influence was making itself felt in music through 'The Massachusetts
Compiler,' a work which embodied something of the theory of music as
given in the works of German, French, and English authorities. The
introduction of this element was probably due to Hans Gram, the German
organist at Brattle Church, Boston, who, with Oliver Holden and Samuel
Holyoke, published the work in 1795. To Gottlieb Graupner, another
German, was mainly due the foreign influence which caused Boston to
become for half a century the leading city of the country in musical
influence. The 'Philharmonic Society,' which was formed by Graupner
and his associates in 1810, prepared the way for the Handel and Haydn
Society, founded in 1815, which not only educated Boston and New
England in musical appreciation, but had a formative influence on the
taste of the entire country.
English talent conjoined at Boston with German in this educational
work. Dr. G. J. Jackson, an English musician of the order of William
Tuckey and Rayner Taylor--indeed, he was Taylor's schoolmate--had come
to America in 1796, and taught music at Norfolk and Alexandria, Va.,
and Baltimore, Philadelphia, and New York. In his northward progress
he arrived in Boston in 1812, and became organist successively of the
Brattle Street Church, King's Chapel, Trinity Church, and St. Paul's
Church. He was the leading choirmaster of his day, teaching the English
method of chanting, and was employed as music teacher by the first
families. He published a book of chants, anthems, etc., and contributed
original compositions to 'The Churchman's Choral Companion,' published
in New York in 1808 by the Rev. William Smith. His friend Rayner Taylor
was also represented in the collection.
II
A singing club, more social than serious in its purpose, had been
formed at Harvard in 1786. In 1808 a novel institution, the 'Pierean
Sodality,' was established at the college. This was a singing
fraternity, the members of which were linked together by a common
interest in music. The Sodality was the germ of the present Department
of Music in Harvard University. Out of it there arose in 1837 the
'Harvard Musical Association,' composed of alumni of the college
who had been members of the Sodality. The report of the committee
on organization admirably described the fraternal function of music
and stated the fashion in which this was to be realized by the new
association:
'Nothing unites men more than music. It makes brothers of strangers;
it makes the most diffident feel at home; the most shy and suspicious
it renders frank and full of trust; it overflows the rocks of
separation between us; it comes up like a full tide beneath us, and
opens a free intercourse of hearts.
'We propose, then, to form an association which shall meet here
annually on commencement day: if for nothing more, at least to exchange
salutations and review recollections, and feel the common bond of music
and old scenes....
'But the ultimate object proposed is the advancement of the cause of
music, particularly in this university. We would have it regarded
as an important object of attention within its walls, as something
which sooner or later must hold its place in every liberal system
of education; and that place not accidental or a stolen one, but
formally recognized. We that love music feel that it is worthy of its
professorship, as well as any other science.'
As we shall see later this high purpose was fulfilled in the
establishment of a Department of Music in Harvard on an equal basis
with the other departments. The association stated that one of its
objects was to collect a musical library, and another to promote the
production of great symphonies. This program was greatly extended in
the course of the existence of the association; chamber concerts,
hitherto unknown in Boston, were given in the winter under the
leadership of such artists as Herwig and Hohnstock. These concerts
led in 1849 to the organization of the Mendelssohn Quintet Club for
the exclusive cultivation of chamber music. In 1852, with the moral
backing of the association, J. S. Dwight, one of its leading spirits,
established 'Dwight's Journal of Music,' a periodical of the highest
aim and most authoritative character. Its publication ceased in 1881.
The 'Handel Society of Dartmouth College,' discussed in another
connection, had a fate unworthy of its high character and sadly
significant of the low state of musical appreciation in the smaller
colleges of the times, and in the 'common people' from which class
their students were chiefly drawn. It dwindled and died for lack of
recruits. Pity it is that some loyal patron of the college had not
provided for the perpetuation of the society, if only as a memorial
of Dartmouth's chief glory, even surpassing that of having trained in
some measure the classic rhetoric and Olympian accents of the greatest
of American orators. Our democracy alone, unaided by college culture,
produced Lincoln, in most minds the rival of Webster in perfect phrase
and his superior in heart-moving utterance, if not in ear-entrancing
tone. It has not yet brought forth the compeers of these in music,
since education is required to supply the nurturing musical environment
found abroad but hitherto lacking in American life. Had music been
permanently established as a part of the curriculum of Dartmouth alone,
not to speak of the other colleges, a few young men with a native taste
for it would undoubtedly have been found in every class and these would
have cherished and transmitted the sacred fire with increasing ardor
until the inevitable time arrived when native genius would be kindled
into immortal flame.
III
A new order of native-born music teachers, those who pursued European
methods in their instruction, was now arising. The chief of this class
was Lowell Mason. Mason was born at Medfield, Mass., and spent his
youth and early manhood in Savannah, Ga., where he was engaged in
business. A music-lover from early childhood, he carried to the South
the psalmody of New England, but, becoming master of a church choir, he
felt the inadequacy of existing collections of church music and, with
the valuable assistance of a local music teacher, Mr. Abel, prepared a
new one suited to his needs.
He came to Boston seeking a publisher and found it in the Handel and
Haydn Society, which, in 1822, not only published the collection but
gave the society's name to it. It met with great success, running
through many editions. In 1826 its compiler delivered a series of
lectures in Boston churches on church music which attracted such
favorable attention that he was induced to make his home in the city.
In time he became president of the Handel and Haydn Society, and,
when the Boston Academy of Music was established, largely through his
efforts, he was put in charge of it.
At this period began a movement to reform radically our entire
system of school instruction, and the moment was propitious for the
introduction of music in the public schools, a purpose upon which Mr.
Mason had set his heart. In 1830 William C. Woodbridge delivered before
the American Institute of Instruction in Boston an address on 'Vocal
Music as a Branch of Common Education,' illustrated by Mason's pupils,
in which the lecturer, recently returned from Europe, warmly advocated
the cultivation of music as an essential element of American, as it
was of foreign life. One sentence of his lecture is startling to us of
the present generation in its inferential revelation of the primitive
nature of juvenile instruction in the United States as late as 1830.
Mr. Woodbridge, speaking of music being 'the property of the people' in
Germany and Switzerland, heard in field and factory, and in gatherings
for pleasure no less than in assemblies for worship, added: 'But we
were touched to the heart when we heard its cheering animating strains
issuing from the walls of a schoolroom.'
Mr. Woodbridge was an enthusiast over the Pestalozzian method as
applied to instruction in music. He not only collected all the
literature he could on the subject, but even translated the more
important works and turned over the entire material to Mr. Mason.
This wise teacher experimented first with the method before adopting
it. The success of the trial made him an ardent supporter of the new
system of instruction, which completely overthrew the old custom of
starting the pupil off with a complete tune and correcting defects
as these manifested themselves. The Pestalozzian method is truly the
natural one, building up, instead of patching up. This will be seen by
examining its principles:
1. To teach sounds before signs (have the pupil learn notes
orally first).
2. To lead the pupil to observe and execute differences in
sound, instead of explaining these to him, i. e., to make
him active instead of passive in learning.
3. To teach one thing at a time--rhythm, melody,
expression--instead of a selection embodying all these
elements.
4. To have the pupil master each step by practice before
passing to the next.
5. To explain principles after practice (the inductive
method).
6. Analysis and practice of articulation of speech in order
to use it in song.
To apply this revolutionary method to teaching music was the central
purpose of the establishment of the Boston Academy of Music. It had a
useful career during the fourteen years of its existence. Mr. Mason,
like Mr. Adgate, of Philadelphia, believed in 'music for the people,'
and his generosity in extending this without considering material
profit kept the institution in constant need of funds until it gave up
the struggle and closed its doors in 1847.
The Academy was more than a New England institution: it was a national
one, in that music teachers in every part of the country wrote to
it for guidance in their work. And it left behind it the finest of
mmorials, the establishment in Boston, and, through Boston's example,
all over the nation, of music in the public schools, not merely as
a relief from other studies, but as a study itself. This innovation
was made by the city fathers of Boston in 1837, after a trial of the
propositions had proved successful. T. Kemper Davis, chairman of the
school committee, made a long and learned report upon the subject
which is a classic of its kind, and as such may be read with profit by
teachers of music, particularly those in the public schools.[56]
Music in the public schools of New York had an independent origin. In
1835 Darius E. Jones experimented with the idea of forming singing
classes in the schools and teaching them without compensation. The
trial was successful, and the school board gave him permission to
continue the work provided no expense was incurred and regular studies
were not interfered with. Music in the New York schools was not
effectively recognized by provision for compensation until 1853. T. B.
Mason, the brother of Lowell Mason, introduced singing in the public
schools of Cincinnati. Pittsburgh began such instruction in 1840.
Nathaniel D. Gould, a music teacher and composer, claimed to have been
the first to teach singing to children in a systematic method. From
1820 onward he organized such classes in New England, New York, and New
Jersey.
The recognition by municipal authority of music as an essential
element of education has been ratified in the fullest manner by
national authority. Philander P. Claxton, United States Commissioner of
Education, addressing the National Education Association convened at
St. Paul, in July, 1914, asserted that music is of more practical value
than any subject of the usual curriculum, except reading and writing,
and with these studies, and physical culture and arithmetic, forms the
fundamentals in elementary education.
While in the later thirties colleges and universities were not prepared
to grant music a place in the academic curriculum, they began to
recognize it as an important element of culture, and to extend to
it their patronage. In 1838 William Robyn, a professor in St. Louis
University, formed, under the auspices of the institution, a musical
society called the 'Philharmonic' for the performance of public
concerts. These were well patronized.[57]
IV
The German immigration was in full force in the forties, cities such
as St. Louis, Cincinnati, and Milwaukee becoming the homes of great
numbers of this music-loving people. In the broad sense of the term,
they formed the greatest educational influence in music that the
country had yet received. It is said that wherever two Germans settled
in America they organized themselves into a _Sängerbund_. Tyrolese
and Swiss singers and bell-ringers began to tour the country in 1840
and delighted Americans of every class--even now they are popular in
the Chautauqua circles. However, when, lured by the success of the
_jodlers_, really fine German bands, such as the Steiermarkers, Gungl's
band, the Saxonia and Germania, came over in quest of American dollars,
they met with consistent failure, and were forced to dissolve--to the
great benefit of American musical education, for the individual members
generally became teachers of instrumental music in the localities where
they were stranded. It was only by playing dance music and popular
airs that the bands met with any success whatsoever. Gungl (whose
'Railroad Galop,' an imitative composition, was the most popular in his
répertoire) wrote home to a musical journal in Berlin that music 'lies
still in the cradle here and nourishes herself on sugar-teats.'
The sentimental strain in German vocal music of the period made it
more popular than German instrumental music, in that the American
palate had been prepared for sentimentality by a saccharine sort of
psalmody and secular music which was being sprinkled over the country
by a second generation of Yankee music teachers of the Billings order.
Elijah K. Prouty and Moses E. Cheney were leading representatives of
this class. Prouty was a peddler, singing teacher, and piano tuner.
Cheney was a leader of a church choir. In 1839 they organized and
conducted a musical 'convention' at Montpelier, Vt., at which, with
shrewd perception of popular interest in novelty and variety, they
practised 'unusual tunes, anthems, male quartets, and duets and solos
for both sexes.' For the secular music they used the 'Boston Glee Book
and Social Choir,' compiled by George Kingsley. In order to attract the
attendance of non-musical people, in the intervals between performances
short debates were held between the local ministers, lawyers, and other
prominent citizens.
In May, 1848, another musical convention was held in Chicago, which
discussed the general question of musical education and the specific
one of music in the public schools. Four years later William B.
Bradbury led a similar but larger convention. At this convention
the 'Alpine Glee Singer,' a compilation by Bradbury, was used for
secular music, indicating the strong influence which the elementary
sentimentality of German popular music exerted upon Americans. Sugared
American psalmody, flavored with German sentimentality, and colored
with a crudity of technique almost aboriginal produced that sort of
musical candy which we know as the Sunday-school song. Bradbury was a
pioneer in the composition and publication of such music, although,
to do him justice, the especially deleterious coloring of the mixture
was added by his successors, among whom Ira D. Sankey and P. P. Bliss
may be mentioned as chief offenders. The collections of this school
of musical composers must be reckoned by thousands in editions and
millions in numbers of copies. Bradbury alone compiled more than fifty
singing books, containing many of his own compositions. Of these
collections 'The Jubilee,' published in 1857, sold 200,000 copies;
'Fresh Laurels' (1867), 1,200,000 copies; and a series known as the
'Golden Series,' 2,000,000 copies.
This flood of sentimentality, completely inundating the Sunday-school,
poured into the public school, and almost swamped the ark of juvenile
education in music which careful hands had just committed to that great
stream of popular culture. When music became recognized as an essential
element of education, it was inevitable that the only available
juvenile songs, those of the Sunday-school, should be introduced in
the public schools. Indeed, the singing of anything in the schools was
preferable to the entire absence of song, and so this order of music,
representing, as it did, the popular taste of the time, marks, although
we are loath to say it, an important step forward.
Dr. Lowell Mason was the chief assistant at an event which marks an
epoch in American musical education, namely, the birth of the normal
musical institute from the so-called musical convention. This occurred
in 1856 at North Reading, Mass., where an annual musical convention of
the usual sort was converted into a school of a fortnight's duration
for instructing its members, particularly teachers, in both musical
theory and practice. The example was followed all over the country to
the great benefit of musical pedagogy. Associated with Dr. Mason in
this work of popularizing music was George F. Root, who journeyed over
the country conducting conventions, lecturing, etc.[58]
V
During the second half of the nineteenth century the teaching of
music passed in large measure from the hands of single, independent
teachers into the direction of music masters associated in institutions
for class instruction, which are generally known as conservatories,
although this term in its European signification of a large, completely
equipped and nationally endowed school of music is misleading. Indeed,
the pretense seems to have been deliberate. Dr. Frank Damrosch, in an
address on 'The American Conservatory,' before the Music Teachers'
National Association at Oberlin, Ohio, in 1906, said:
'The so-called conservatory, college, or university of
music ... may be found in every American community.... It
is usually organized by an individual whose commercial
instincts are stronger than his musical conscience, and
who, banking on the dense ignorance of the average citizen
in matters of art, offers what seems to be a great bargain
in the acquisition of musical ability in one form or
another.... There are many such schools which seemingly
flourish by the glittering, if empty, promises which they
advertise. Some of them confer degrees; ... one of the first
musical doctor degrees conferred by the director of one of
these schools was on himself!'
While there are hundreds of conservatories of the class described
by Dr. Damrosch scattered over the Union, a number of institutions
are to be found which rank in thoroughness and comprehensiveness of
instruction with the best European conservatories. These have been
in every instance of slow growth, the most pretentious in chartered
plans having made early and signal failures in the province of musical
education, though some of them won success in other musical activities.
A typical example of this order is the Academy of Music of New York,
whose career is recorded in Chapter VI.
The earliest American conservatory worthy of its name is the
Conservatory of Music of the Peabody Institute, Baltimore, which was
founded in 1857. Its chief contribution to American musical education
has been the Peabody concerts, a series of eight performances having
been given annually since 1865. From 1872 to 1898 Asger Hamerick, the
Danish composer, was director. He organized an orchestra of fifty
performers, which became, under his intelligent training, a highly
efficient instrument for the rendition of the most advanced music.
The programs of his concerts were formed of overtures, symphonies,
concertos, suites, and vocal solos. He gave especial attention to works
by American, English, and Scandinavian composers, performing for the
first time in America many notable compositions, among them a number of
his own. The good work of the Peabody concerts, attracting, as it has
done, the respectful attention of foreign masters, should be a matter
both of encouragement and pride to those who have the cause of American
music at heart. It points the way to high attainment in our musical
appreciation and notable achievement in native composition.
The year of 1867 is notable in American musical history for the
establishment of five leading conservatories or musical colleges:
the New England Conservatory in Boston; the Boston Conservatory; the
Cincinnati Conservatory; the Oberlin Conservatory; and the Chicago
Academy of Music, later known as the Chicago Musical College.
The New England Conservatory was founded by Eben Tourjée, whom Sir
George Grove, in his 'Dictionary of Music and Musicians,' denominates
the 'father of the conservatory or class system of instruction in
America.' The nature of this system and its advantages have been well
expressed by Felix Mendelssohn-Bartholdy, who said: 'The class system
has the advantage over the private instruction of the individual in
that, by the participation of several in the same lessons and studies,
a true feeling is awakened; and in that it promotes industry, spurs to
emulation, and is a preservative from one-sidedness of education and
taste.'
Dr. Tourjée, in 1851, at the age of seventeen, formed classes at his
home, Fall River, Mass., for instruction in vocal and instrumental
music. In 1859 he founded a musical institute at East Greenwich, where
he greatly developed his method. In 1863 he visited Europe to gain
information concerning the conduct of European conservatories, and upon
the ideas thus secured he established the Providence Conservatory of
Music, and in 1867 the New England Conservatory of Music in Boston.
For a time he conducted both schools, then devoted himself exclusively
to the latter. From its beginning the Boston institution secured the
best masters available and gave a maximum of musical instruction at
a minimum of cost. It has sent forth over the country thousands of
accomplished pianists, organists, and vocalists, and, what is even more
pertinent to the present subject, music teachers, trained in Tourjée's
methods. After the founder died (in 1890), Carl Faelten acted as
director, until in 1897 he founded a school of his own for instruction
in the piano. No school of its kind stands higher in America.
In 1897 George W. Chadwick, the professor of harmony, composition, and
orchestration, was made director of the New England Conservatory. For
several years Mr. Chadwick had conducted the annual musical festivals
at Springfield and Worcester, Mass., and his special attention was
thereby directed toward great orchestral and choral performances
by the students, whose number was mounting into the thousands. By
the generosity of patrons of the Conservatory, especially Eben D.
Jordan, president of the trustees, a large building was erected in
1902, containing facilities for instruction superior even to those of
European conservatories, and an auditorium, Jordan Hall, whose large
size and fine acoustic properties render it one of the important
concert halls of the country, use as such being frequently made of it
by visiting artists, to the great advantage of the students as well as
the general public. The instrumental equipment of the conservatory is
large, the collection of organs, including the pipe organ in Jordan
Hall, which is one of the largest in the world, being especially
notable.
The conservatory possesses one of the best working musical libraries in
the country, a unique feature being the choral library of the Boylston
Club (founded 1872) and its successor, the Boston Singers, which
contains many copies of manuscript treasures in European collections.
This library was a gift to the conservatory by George L. Osgood. The
Boston Public Library nearby contains the Allen A. Brown collection of
musical books and manuscripts, which is excelled in America only by
the Congressional Library at Washington. Accordingly, the pupils of
the conservatory have at hand every facility for acquiring a musical
education which the most ardent student could desire. It is not
surprising that among its three thousand and more students every one of
the forty-eight states of the Union is represented, as well as a dozen
foreign countries, even distant Russia and Turkey.
The curriculum of the conservatory has been generally described by
Frederick W. Colburn in 'The Musical Observer' for July, 1913. Mr.
Colburn, after mentioning special features, such as the conservatory
orchestra of seventy-five members, affording the training and routine
indispensable to professional performers whose ranks it is annually
supplying, says: 'While the new is studied, the fundamentals are not
lost sight of. All the courses have been planned to avoid turning out
narrow and one-sided specialists. The management realizes that the
professional musician has need of very broad and very correct culture.
The students listen to lectures on the history and theory of music
from such authorities as Louis C. Elson and Wallace Goodrich. The
modern languages and English diction are taught by experts, several of
whom are authors of their own text-books. The pianoforte instruction
follows approved methods; it shows much of the influence of the late
Carl Baermann, one of the most eminent of the German musicians who
have settled in this country. The vocal instruction is along the lines
of the old Italian method which has formed the voices of most of the
world's great singers. The teaching of the organ accords with the
practice of the best German and French organists. In all departments
there is present the idea of thoroughly grounding the student in
the essentials of musical art and of avoiding easy, ready-made and
get-culture-quick methods.'
The Boston Conservatory, second in the list of five founded in 1867,
was organized by Julius Eichberg, a distinguished German violinist and
composer, who had been, since 1859, director of the orchestra at the
Boston Museum. This speedily won and long maintained a high reputation,
particularly for instruction in the violin, on which subject Eichberg
prepared a number of valuable text-books.
The Cincinnati Conservatory of Music was founded by Clara Bauer,
who still is active in its management, having charge of the home for
the female pupils. This was the first conservatory in the country
to establish a residence department--indeed, its group of buildings
and park-like grounds give the conservatory a truly academic aspect
possessed by few institutions of its kind that are situated in
cities. Miss Bauer, however, recognized from the beginning that the
all-important element of a conservatory was its teaching force. She
secured representative talent in the various branches of music from the
various European musical centres, thereby securing warm approbation of
the institution from foreign musical artists and critics. The faculty
now numbers sixty members; it contains artists notable for excellence
in every branch of musical arts and pedagogy. General cultural studies,
such as dramatic art, literature, and modern languages, are conducted
with special application to their relation to music.
The Cincinnati Conservatory was the first to conduct a summer music
school. The sessions have been uninterrupted since 1867. Attended
largely by music teachers, they have greatly advanced the cause of
musical education in the territory tributary to the city.
The Oberlin Conservatory of Music, at Oberlin, presents so many object
lessons of musical pedagogy that it demands rather extended treatment
here.
In the first place, the institution had a natural origin: it was
formed to teach psalmody to a religious community and, in growing
beyond this limited field by adding one musical feature after another
as the developing taste of the people demanded, it typifies the history
of music in the nation. Secondly, the conservatory has a proper
environment. It was planted in a soil already enriched by culture,
Oberlin being the seat of a college distinguished for progressive ideas
and high ideals, the reaction of which upon musical work is always
inspiring--indeed, is essential to the highest achievement. Thirdly,
the Oberlin Conservatory has a proper organization. It is a social
democracy and thereby calculated to produce that free and fraternal
spirit which is the soul of art. Young men and women meet on equal
terms and there are no distinctions among them based on wealth or
nationality or even race, Oberlin having been the first college to
include negroes among its students. Lastly, the conservatory has a
sound program and is living up to this as well as could be expected in
view of the pressure exerted on all 'schools of the people,' to supply
immediate demands. It believes in constructive work, in learning by
doing. Thus it regards a practical knowledge of the science of musical
composition as necessary to an intelligent appreciation of musical
masterpieces, and to this end has established a course in theory and
composition which requires four years of hard study and assiduous
practice. The class system of instruction is the one adopted as the
chief method, it being supplemented by private instruction.
Dr. Florens Ziegfeld, a distinguished German pianist, still conducts
(1915) the conservatory which he founded in Chicago--the last of the
five started in 1867--under the name of the Chicago Academy of Music,
and which is now called the Chicago Musical College. The institution
was burned out in the great fire of 1871, but with indomitable courage
Dr. Ziegfeld at once secured new quarters and continued his classes.
The course of study was steadily enlarged until now it includes every
department of music and the principal modern languages, the faculty
being one of the strongest in the country, comparing favorably with
those of European conservatories. By authority of the State of
Illinois the college grants music teachers' certificates and confers
musical degrees. The college is finely situated on Michigan Boulevard,
overlooking Lake Michigan and Grant Park. It contains a concert hall
seating 1,000. A student orchestra of seventy members is maintained,
affording practical training in conducting and ensemble playing.
In 1871 a conservatory of music was established in Jacksonville, Ill.,
the seat of Illinois College. Its founder was Professor W. D. Sanders,
a leading Western educator, and its first director was I. B. Poznanski,
a violinist and composer who later became instructor at the Royal
Conservatory, London. In 1903 the conservatory was merged with the
college. The Cleveland Conservatory of Music was also founded in 1871.
It adopted the European conservatory method of instruction.
In 1873 Northwestern University at Evanston, Ill., became a
co-educational institution and at once established a 'Conservatory of
Music' that began, and for many years thereafter remained, on a low
plane of instruction. The university authorities, in the manner of
old-time monarchs, 'farmed out' to the director of the conservatory the
privilege of running the business for a percentage of the receipts,
and gave him a free hand and full responsibility. Naturally the
conservatory was conducted in a way to produce the greatest immediate
returns.
In 1891 Prof. P. C. Lutkin was put in charge of the conservatory.
He insisted that the title be dropped and that the school be made a
department of the university, directly under control of the university
authorities; and that its director should receive a full professorship
with a fixed salary, in order that educational ideals should not be
compromised by financial considerations. These changes were authorized,
and Professor Lutkin radically revised and extended the curriculum to
make it conform to academic standards. By 1895 a four-years course was
developed, to correspond with that of the Liberal Arts department. The
'Department of Music' then assumed the title of 'School of Music' and
became a coördinate division of the university, like the School of Law,
the School of Mines, etc., with its own dean and faculty. Its pupils,
of course, retained all the opportunities for general culture afforded
by the college of Liberal Arts.
In an address delivered before the Music Teachers' National Association
at Oberlin in 1906, Professor Lutkin said: 'The exact point where
general education should give way to the study of music is a much
discussed one, and we will not stop to consider it here, except to say
that we have placed it at the point of entrance-requirements in the
College of Liberal Arts. The fact that the students are able to pursue
advanced work in history of music, harmony, counterpoint, analysis,
etc., is of itself a clear index as to their mental capacity, and
places them, without doubt, upon a plane of mentality quite up to that
required of college students.' The music department of the Northwestern
University now ranks with the best conservatories in the country.
* * * * *
Concerts have always formed the leading element in developing American
appreciation of music. The enthusiasm created by the festivals
conducted in Cincinnati by Theodore Thomas in the early seventies
led directly to the establishment in 1878 of the Cincinnati College
of Music by Miss Dora Nelson. The institution was planned along the
lines of European conservatories, with a close relation to superior
public performances in the city, the patrons of which were patrons of
the college. With a fine faculty the institution has retained to the
present the high reputation it won at the outset. Theodore Thomas was
the first musical director of the school, and among his successors is
Frank Van der Stucken.
Of the important Chicago schools of music the earliest was the
Chicago Conservatory, established in 1884. Quite a typical institution
is the American Conservatory of Chicago. It was founded in 1886 by
its present head, President John J. Hattstaedt, with the assistance
of several of Chicago's music-loving citizens. Its quarters were in
Weber Hall Building, corner of Wabash Avenue and Jackson Street, which
were retained for ten years, when the conservatory was removed to the
adjoining building--Kimball Hall, where it still remains.
From a small institution it has grown to be one of America's largest
schools of music, registering about 2,000 students annually. The
faculty numbers seventy-five, and contains many teachers of national
reputation. A modern and thorough curriculum includes all branches of
instrumental and vocal music, theory and composition, dramatic art,
expression, physical culture, and modern languages. Special features
are: a complete and well-established Normal School, a student's
orchestra, a musical bureau and a carefully arranged series of faculty
and pupils' recitals.
In 1885 two conservatories, the American Institute of Applied Music and
the National Conservatory of Music, were established in New York. Miss
Kate S. Chittenden was the founder of the Institute, Mrs. Jeannette
M. Thurber of the Conservatory. Both are flourishing to-day under
control of the founders and with excellent faculties and ample musical
facilities.
The National Conservatory, because of certain philanthropic features,
is deserving of special mention as a type of institution which is not
wholly commercial in its ends, and which has prepared the way for
a type that is purely artistic in its purposes. It offers musical
instruction to every applicant without regard to race, sex, or creed,
the sole condition being that he shall give proof of a natural talent
for music; this instruction it imparts without cost to those unable to
pay.
The title of National Conservatory is formally justified by the
fact that it was chartered in 1891 by a special act of Congress, the
official home being designated as Washington. A far better claim to the
title could be based on the facts that names of even more than national
fame appear on the roll of its faculty from the beginning, when such
musicians as Rafael Joseffy, Camilla Urso, and Victor Herbert were
connected with the institution, down through Dvořák's brilliant régime
to the present day.
The Conservatory at its outset secured experts in special lines of
music as instructors. For three years (1892-95) Dr. Antonin Dvořák was
its director. Under his management liberal prizes were awarded for
original compositions, and the works, a symphony by Henry Schoenefeld,
a piano concerto by Joshua Phillen, a suite for string orchestra by
Frederick Bullard, and a cantata by Horatio W. Parker, were performed
in public concert. Under the direction of the distinguished composer
the National Conservatory orchestra became notable not only for
artistic excellence, but, what pertains more to the present subject,
for the superior training it afforded poor young men of talent, and the
places this enabled them to obtain in leading American orchestras. This
work, of course, did not cease with Dr. Dvořák's retirement.
An institution incorporating in a systematic and substantial way the
public and philanthropic spirit which has called into existence so many
of our conservatories and schools of music is the Institute of Musical
Art of the City of New York. This is the model institution of its kind
in America; and, as there is promise that its example will be followed
in other cities of the Union, leading to the establishment of musical
education on a high and uniform plane, it deserves special notice.
Recognizing that schools of music, inaugurated with fine ideals and
a sound program to attain these, have almost without exception been
forced by the need of funds to lower their standard and modify their
curricula to suit the popular demand for easy and flashy courses, Dr.
Frank Damrosch determined to found an institution wherein commercial
considerations would not enter. In James Loeb, a New York banker, he
found a patron of art in thorough sympathy with the project. By a
fund of a half million dollars, given in memory of his mother, Betty
Loeb, Mr. Loeb put the splendid idea into concrete form, and in 1905
established and endowed the Institute of Musical Art with Dr. Damrosch
as its director.
The purpose of the Institute is to provide thorough and comprehensive
courses in music, each of which is planned to include every study
necessary for mastering a particular branch of music, and all of which
taken together cover the whole art. The Institute is enabled to execute
this plan inflexibly because it is independent of tuition fees, since
the revenue from these is supplemented by the interest of the funds.
Accordingly the fees have been fixed at moderate and uniform rates,
while no expense is spared in securing the best talent available as a
teaching and training force.
The roll of the faculty contains seventy-seven names. The faculty
council which directs the policy of the Institute consists of the
director and five other experts. Since operatic and concert managers
agree that individual instruction and criticism cannot be too carefully
given in the case of students intending to make the performance
of music a profession, and, as this thorough system of education
is equally beneficial to the amateur, it has been adopted by the
Institute. Theoretical subjects are the only ones taught in class.
In addition to the direct personal teaching which the student
receives, he is surrounded by artistic and educational influences
calculated to broaden his general knowledge and culture and to
improve his taste and discrimination. The discipline which is an
essential principle of the Institute, and which is lacking in private
instruction, where the pupil often demands and obtains relaxing
modifications of the instructor's system to suit his inclinations,
since he is paying for his education, is of the highest value in
developing character. Students of an art which in its nature tends to
overstimulate the emotional nature need a corrective cultivation of the
powers of the intellect and the will which students of other subjects
do not so much require, since, from their studies, intellectual
development is acquired directly and, reason being the governor of the
will, control of this great moral force is indirectly imparted.
Like the National Conservatory the Institute is open to students of
both sexes, irrespective of creed or race. The only demand is that
they give proof of general intelligence, musical ability and serious
purpose. Every regular student is required to follow a prescribed
course not only in the specific branch which he has selected, but, in
order to provide a proper foundation for this, in the subject of music
in general. The student begins the course at the stage for which his
attainments and abilities have prepared him, as these are indicated by
three tests: as to his general knowledge of music; as to his sense of
musical hearing; as to his vocal or instrumental talent.
The departments of study are singing, piano, organ, stringed
instruments, orchestra, public school music and theoretic course.
The courses are divided into seven grades, the last four being
post-graduate. The post-graduate diplomas are of two types, called
teachers' and artists'. For the teachers' diploma two grades of
pedagogy and advanced work in theory and technique are required; for
the artists', either two or three grades in theory, technique, and ear
training, according to the proficiency of the student, which is tested
not only by work done in the Institute, but by a public recital before
musicians not connected with the Institute. The work of the seventh
grade in the artists' course is confined to the study of composition
in the various forms of complete sonata, chamber music, vocal forms,
overture and orchestration. A prize sufficient to provide for a year
of European life and experience is given annually to that graduate in
any of the artists' courses, or in composition, whom the faculty and
trustees think most deserving of the award and distinction.
* * * * *
The leading schools of music in Canada are the Toronto Conservatory of
Music and the Conservatorium of Music in McGill University at Montreal.
The Toronto Conservatory was founded by the late Dr. Fisher in 1886 and
opened in 1887. In the thoroughness of its courses and the completeness
of its equipment it ranks with the best conservatories in Europe.
In 1897 it purchased its present centrally located site, in close
proximity to the cluster of educational and public buildings, and began
the erection of the structures which now form its commodious home.
Its music hall is architecturally one of the finest edifices of the
kind and its auditorium is acoustically one of the most satisfactory
halls in Canada for chamber music and other recitals. It contains
a three-manual concert organ which is a masterpiece of Canadian
workmanship. The main hall is supplemented by smaller ones for lectures
and recitals and by practice rooms equipped with two-manual organs. The
musical equipment in general is ample and comprehensive, meeting the
needs of the 2,500 pupils in attendance.
On the death of Dr. Fisher in 1913, Dr. A. S. Vogt, whose work as
conductor of the Mendelssohn Choir of Toronto is well known, and
who had been for many years teacher of piano in the Conservatory,
was advanced to the position of director. The faculty consists of
139 professors and instructors. It is almost exclusively British
in composition, in striking contrast to the faculties of leading
conservatories in the United States, on whose roll Continental European
names abound, often to the point of a majority. However, many of the
instructors have received their education at foreign conservatories.
The Conservatory is divided into eleven departments, schools for
the piano, the voice, the organ, the violin, and other stringed
instruments, theoretical instruction, embracing harmony, counterpoint,
composition, orchestration, musical history and acoustics, orchestral
and band music, expression (including education, physical culture,
etc.), modern languages, piano tuning, and kindergarten music method.
The extremely practical elements of this curriculum indicate the
attention paid to the fundamental needs of the public.
The Conservatory maintains an orchestra for practice in routine and
training for students sufficiently advanced to justify their assignment
to places in the organization. Frank E. Blatchford, of the violin
faculty, who is also concert master of the Toronto Symphony Orchestra,
is the conductor.
The Conservatory is affiliated with its near neighbor, the University
of Toronto. Students who pass the conservatory examinations in musical
theory are exempted from corresponding examinations by the University
for the degree of Bachelor of Music. In its desire to spread at least
a measure of musical knowledge and appreciation among the people, the
conservatory conducts correspondence courses in musical theory, and,
for the convenience of practice, especially in the piano, maintains
eleven branches in the outlying residential districts of Toronto.
The McGill University Conservatorium was opened in 1904. The
Conservatorium, however, was then only in its experimental stage and
it was not until October, 1908, that the connecting link between the
University and the Conservatorium was completed by the appointment
as director of Dr. Harry Crane Perrin, professor of music in the
University. In 1909 the orchestra was formed, which was composed of
students of the Conservatorium, and in February of that year they gave
their first orchestral concert.
VI
Henry Dike Sleeper, professor of music in Smith College, a women's
college of the first rank, has made an interesting analysis of the
character of musical instruction given in the leading universities
and colleges where the subject is taught. He says that there are four
ideals of study:
1. Musical composition: Great emphasis is laid on this at the
University of Pennsylvania, and it is a predominant, though lesser
element in the schemes of Harvard and Yale.
2. Public performance: This is the chief feature of education in the
conservatories affiliated with, but not a part of the regular academic
course. These conservatories are founded largely in the West and South,
and are connected with colleges that either are for women or are
co-educational.
3. Culture: Amherst, Beloit, Cornell, and Tufts are examples of
institutions where the music courses tend chiefly to imparting musical
appreciation.
4. A balance of the three: composition, concerts, culture. Examples of
where this ideal of rounded development is sought for are the women's
colleges, Smith and Mount Holyoke, and co-educational institutions,
such as Oberlin and Ohio Wesleyan, and the State Universities of
Michigan, Wisconsin, and Nebraska.
In the light they throw on the status of musical education in American
universities the following authoritative statistics, the latest of the
kind compiled, are illuminating:
In a monograph on 'Music Instruction in the United States,' prepared
by Arthur L. Manchester after exhaustive inquiry and published by the
United States Bureau of Education in 1908, the enrollment of students
of music in 151 colleges and universities was 18,971, of whom 5,257
were men and 13,714 were women. There was an average attendance in each
institution of about 125.
Dr. Rudolf Tombo, registrar of Columbia University, in an article in
'Science' for December 25, 1908, and January 1, 1909, stated that
from statistics supplied him by twenty-five leading universities,
not counting summer schools conducted under their auspices, ten
had departments of music and five had courses of music. In a total
attendance in all departments of all the twenty-five universities
amounting to 35,885, the students of music numbered 1,940, which is
only 5.4 per cent. of the total.
When the great popular interest in music, as exhibited by the
attendance at operas, concerts, and musical festivals, is taken into
consideration, this low percentage would indicate that the universities
are not adopting attractive methods of musical instruction. Evidently
the cause of higher musical education will be more readily served by
improving the character of instruction in the conservatories, where
enthusiasm among the students prevails, than by attempting to wake up
university men from their indifference to music--for enthusiasm is a
prerequisite in all studies and pursuits.
The pioneer in creating a department of music in American universities
was John K. Paine, teacher of music in Harvard in one capacity or
another from 1862 until 1905, when he retired on a pension. Although
practical music courses, piano-playing and singing, were taught in
women's colleges, notably Vassar, before Mr. Paine began his work
in Harvard, he was the first teacher to direct his energies toward
establishing music as an academic study, on an equality with all the
other branches, counting like them for the arts degrees of A. B. and A.
M.
The history of music is obviously an academic study, and Mr. Paine
judiciously began his campaign by securing permission in 1870 to
deliver a university course of lectures on the subject. In 1870 he had
persuaded the faculty to introduce harmony and counterpoint in the
curriculum, counting for the bachelor of arts degree. After this vital
concession, the faculty could not well deny to music full standing in
the university. In 1875 Mr. Paine was appointed professor of music.
The indifference of the students to the art, and their prejudice
against music as an academic study, were harder to contend with. For
twenty years Prof. Paine carried on his work without assistance in
instruction and with small classes. Then the students seemed suddenly
to wake up to the fact that a department of music conducted on the
high plane of Oxford and the great German universities was a matter
to be proud of, and they began in increasing numbers to embrace the
rare advantage extended to them. When Prof. Paine retired he had three
assistants in his work and over two hundred students in his classes.
Prof. Walter R. Spalding, Mr. Paine's successor, aided by able
teachers, such as Edward Burlingame Hill, instructor in musical
history, have continued the good work of the founder. The course is
essentially theoretical; it includes harmony, counterpoint, musical
form, musical history, and the higher branches of composition,
including orchestration. In 1912 the students of the department
established the 'Harvard Musical Review,' a publication of high ideals.
Professor Paine, and Professors Parker and MacDowell, his
contemporaries at Yale and Columbia, respectively, achieved fame as
practical exponents of the art in its highest realm. Professors of
music in European universities as a rule are learned theorists and
historians, but not composers. It is a moot question which class of
instructors is the better. In behalf of instruction by a creative
genius it is claimed that it inspires students with pride in their
teacher and, if training is afforded in composition, with desire to
emulate his achievements. In behalf of the academic drill-master it
is urged that the thorough grounding which he imparts develops that
all-round ability in music which, when the purpose is in time realized
by students, will itself generate enthusiasm. The respective merits
of the two systems may thus be summed up: the American early develops
musical appreciation, the European musical knowledge. Since these
qualities have reciprocal influence, it would seem that the two systems
should be combined, at least in America, where musical appreciation on
the part of the student can not always be assumed, as in Europe.
Of the departments of music in women's colleges, that in Wellesley
may be considered the most academic. A school of music was established
in 1875, its pupils being drawn chiefly from the special students,
who lacked preparation for the regular college studies and so were
limited to the so-called 'accomplishments' of music and drawing, with
a smattering of literature. As it became increasingly evident that the
emphasis in the school of music was on performance--the development of
highly specialized skill--and that the predominating interests in the
college were intellectual rather than vocational, the school was seen
to be out of place. The students diminished in members to less than 100
in 1895. In 1896-7 the school was converted into a regular department
of the college, the curriculum in music being made mainly theoretical,
the courses being harmony, counterpoint, musical form, history of
music, and free composition. The director since 1897 has been Hamilton
C. Macdougall. There are eight other professors in the department
faculty, and students number over two hundred. In 1907 Billings Hall
was erected for the use of the department. While practice in music has
been subordinated to theory, it has been retained and even improved
since the school became the department. Indeed, in 1897 a college
orchestra was organized.
The four leading women's colleges in the East, Vassar, Wellesley,
Smith, and Mt. Holyoke, have much the same curriculum in music,
instruction being given in both theory and practice with mutual benefit
resulting from the reacting influence one on the other. In this respect
it would seem that these institutions have a decided advantage over
such universities as Harvard, where there is no training in musical
performance.
In the same year that music was made a part of the curriculum of
Harvard (1875), classes in music were inaugurated at the University
of Pennsylvania under Professor Hugh A. Clarke. As has already been
stated, the attention paid to composition is the distinguishing feature
of the course.
In 1894 the department of music was established in Yale University,
and Horatio W. Parker, Mus. D., was placed at its head. At present
there are nine other professors and instructors in the faculty of the
department. The aims of Dr. Parker and his assistants are to provide
adequate instruction for those who desire to become musicians by
profession, either as teachers or as composers, and to afford a course
of study for those who intend to devote themselves to musical criticism
and the literature of music. Accordingly the work of the department is
divided into practical and theoretical courses. The practical courses
consist of instruction in pianoforte, organ, violin, and violoncello
playing, in singing, and in chamber music (ensemble-playing). No
student is admitted to a practical course other than singing and
violoncello playing unless he is also taking at least one of the
theoretical courses.
The theoretical courses are subdivided into elementary and advanced.
The former class includes harmony, counterpoint, and the history
of music; the latter class instrumentation, advanced orchestration
and conducting, and strict and free composition. Both courses in
composition are under the immediate direction of Dr. Parker, whose
special fitness has been commented upon in another chapter. Dr. Parker
requires every student in the composition courses to produce an
extended original work. This usually takes the form of a sonata. The
students are incited to excel in original composition as well as in
artistic performance by the Sandford Fellowship, which gives two years'
study abroad to the most gifted performer who shall also show marked
ability as a composer.
Allied with the department is the New Haven Symphony Orchestra, a
complete and well-equipped organization of seventy players, which gives
a series of concerts during the winter. It affords opportunity to the
students of orchestration to hear their work actually and adequately
played, and, when its quality warrants, to have the composition
publicly performed. Several original works are thus produced every
year. They are commonly overtures, but piano concertos and other works
have occasionally been presented.
The orchestra also opens to the student a gateway into professional
life by admitting to it those whose performance on the violin or
violoncello has been approved. Students of the piano, as well as of the
violin, are allowed to rehearse with the orchestra and even to perform
publicly if their fitness to do so has been demonstrated. The students
give informal recitals from time to time and, toward the end of the
college year, a concert, accompanied by the Symphony Orchestra.
This insistence on the study of the theory of music and the
demonstration of the theoretical principles by original composition
as the only proper foundation of education in the art are the
distinguishing characteristics of the Yale department of music, and the
practical achievements of Dr. Parker and his students would seem to
justify the soundness of the idea.
In 1896 Edward MacDowell, the composer, was called to the chair of
music in Columbia University. Mr. MacDowell, either because of his
temperament or the limitations imposed by the university on his work,
did not find the position so congenial as Dr. Parker has done at Yale.
Instead of being inspired by teaching to greater feats of composition,
Mr. MacDowell seemed hampered, and, to the great loss of American
music, produced fewer and fewer of those fine works which cause him to
be acclaimed as the greatest of American composers. He resigned the
position in 1904, two years before his death.
In 1906 the department of music which had developed independently
in the Teachers' College was combined with the department in the
university to form the Columbia School of Music. Cornelius Rübner, Mus.
D., is the present head. The declared aims of Prof. Rübner and his four
associates in the faculty of the school are to treat music historically
and æsthetically, as an element of liberal culture; to teach it
scientifically and technically, with a view to training musicians who
shall be competent to teach and compose; and to provide practical
training in orchestral music. There are a university chorus and an
orchestra (the Columbia Philharmonic) in connection with the school,
which present much the same opportunities to the students as those
afforded by the New Haven Symphony Orchestra to the Yale students.
The school holds two annual concerts of original compositions by its
students and conducts many other concerts as well as public lectures
and recitals.
The various courses may be counted toward the degrees of bachelor of
music, of arts, of science, and master of arts. The curriculum includes
the history of music, conducted by Prof. Daniel Gregory Mason; harmony,
counterpoint, sight-singing and playing; composition, orchestration,
and symphonic form, conducted by Prof. Rübner. The school also offers
courses in teaching and supervising music at the Teachers College. The
equipment of the school is large and comprehensive. The department
of music in the University Library contains a well-selected working
collection not only of treatises but also of compositions. The private
library of Anton Seidl, consisting of 1,220 scores, which was presented
to the university, has been placed in the rooms of the School of Music.
The University School of Music at Ann Arbor, which is conducted by
the Musical Society of the University of Michigan, was founded by
Prof. Henry S. Frieze, and its membership is restricted to officers,
graduates, and students of the university. In 1888 the present head of
the school, Albert A. Stanley, took charge. He greatly strengthened
the technical and theoretical work. Under his direction the policy of
the school has been to train a few students thoroughly rather than
many superficially. The courses are those generally given in schools
of music connected with American universities: harmony, single and
double counterpoint; canon and fugue; history of music; analysis and
criticism; musical appreciation.
Since our Western State universities form each the summit of public
education in its state, such institutions as Michigan pay much
attention to training teachers of music in the public schools. The
University of Wisconsin goes much further than this. In connection with
its admirable University School of Music, which is one of the best in
the country in that not only the theory of music is taught in the most
approved academic fashion, but practice is also afforded in choral and
instrumental music, and it has established a 'university extension'
division for educating the whole people of the state in music.
As stated in a bulletin of the university, the School of Music stands
ready to assist any community in strengthening its musical life by the
following means:
1. It gives advice to communities desiring such aid, by
sending to it an expert who studies the situation, and, with
local representatives, prepares a plan of action.
2. It supplies lists of materials, names of persons and
books that would be helpful to the plan.
3. It rents out at low cost such materials, including chorus
music and material for bands and orchestras.
4. It supplies at reasonable prices musical attractions of
high quality and wide variety, such as concerts and lecture
recitals--singly or in series.
5. It assists in providing competent music teachers to
communities which are too small to support them unaided.
These teachers direct the music in the public schools
and assist in general community music, both vocal and
instrumental, and in the music of churches and social
organizations.
6. Through the coöperation of the Wisconsin University
School of Music, the American Federation of Music, and
other organizations, it assists in building up bands and
orchestras throughout the State by supplying organizers and
teachers.
7. It conducts correspondence courses in which experts
give advice in solving the various problems which arise in
connection with school and church music, bands, orchestras,
choruses, and concerts.
Truly an extensive program and one worthy of emulation.
VII
The introduction of music into the public schools has already been
discussed. It is a great tribute to the soundness of the pedagogic
principles laid down by Mason and Woodbridge, the pioneers in juvenile
musical education, that, despite the many new methods which have
been tried, music in the public school is largely conducted along
the original lines. Singing in chorus with use of specially prepared
and successively graded exercises printed on charts or written on
the blackboard and song books, and, most important of all, under the
leadership of a teacher with winning personality and knowledge of the
childish mind, has been found to produce the best results. So great
proficiency has been achieved in the training of juvenile choruses for
musical festivals that the only really satisfactory choruses given by a
great multitude of persons are the choruses of children, some of which
have exceeded three thousand voices.
The basis of juvenile instruction in music is marked rhythm and simple
melody, with a short range of pitch, which are best taught in unison.
The voices of the children with a good natural ear being fortunately in
a large majority they tend to correct the defective auditory perception
of the minority.
When the voices of the children are sufficiently trained by singing
together simple rote songs, musical analysis is begun. The notes are
taught to be recognized first by the ear, and then by the eye, and
a practical application of this knowledge is made by exercises and
songs. The same general process is pursued until, by the time the pupil
reaches the higher grades, he has acquired an ability to sing at sight
any new song which a non-professional musician is likely to be called
on to render.
In small American towns the regular teachers in the public schools
carry on musical exercises. But they are not without easy access to
knowledge of approved methods, for this is published in a special
magazine, 'The School Music Monthly,' which was established in 1900.
Many other magazines, educational as well as musical, contain articles
and even departments on the subject.
Furthermore, there exists a great and influential organization, the
Music Teachers' National Association, which was founded in 1876 with
Dr. Eben Tourjée as its president. This uses every means in the power
of an extra-governmental association to keep up the standard of musical
education in the country. It holds annual sessions wherein methods in
musical pedagogy are presented and discussed. In many states similar
associations are found whose membership is confined to music teachers
in the state. These are not affiliated with the National Association,
and their activities are less general in scope, although of more
immediate interest to the members because applied to matters of special
concern.
Cities of from 8,000 to 200,000 inhabitants usually employ a special
teacher to direct instruction in music in the public schools. Larger
cities have a number of these teachers and one or more supervisors
or directors of public school music. New York, for example, has one
director, one assistant director and fifty-six special teachers. From
the vastness and complexity of the situation in the largest cities,
musical education has of necessity become highly systematized and
correspondingly efficient.
New York perfected its system about 1900. The capstone may be said to
be the public musical lectures and performances given in connection
with the evening lecture courses presented in the public schools and
other public buildings under the general auspices of the Board of
Education and the special supervision of Dr. Henry M. Leipziger.
Indeed, it is only since the beginning of the century that the
country in general has come to recognize at all adequately the supreme
importance of musical culture to community or civic life. As a result
of this recognition there has been a general movement in the central
and western states, and in encouragement of the study of music to add
the forces of private instruction to public by giving credit in the
schools for musical work done outside of them, which credit many state
universities have in turn accepted by admitting high school graduates
upon their certificates.
A more spectacular expression of appreciation of the value of music to
community life is the growing use of children's singing for musical
festivals, concerts, and pageants. In many cities the performance by
public school children of concerts ranging from simple unison songs
to part songs, cantatas, and even light operas has become a regular
feature of community life. In many cases school orchestras and bands
have accompanied the choruses. In this way the public schools have
become foreshadowings of the conservatories and the university schools
of music. In time the weak spot in our higher musical curricula, the
course in 'musical appreciation' which so many idlers follow as a
'royal road' to a musical education (although it is found in none of
the Royal Conservatories of Europe), will have no excuse for being
retained, for our high school pupils will already possess it in
sufficient measure to pursue with zest the hard technical courses the
mastery of which is necessary to the making of a real musician.
VIII
While the American people have shown themselves opposed to the
conduct or subsidization of music by the national government, as
this has been often proposed in plans for a national conservatory,
we have seen, in the case of Wisconsin, that this does not apply to
the state governments, at least in respect to the feature of popular
education in music. Still less does it apply to the conduct of music
by the municipal government. For many years the 'city fathers' of most
American municipalities have provided band concerts in the public parks
during the summer season. The programs of these concerts, however,
until quite recently, were planned with little regard to education of
the people in appreciation of the best music--the selections being of
the so-called 'popular' order, the prevalent opinion of the directors
being that the mass of the American people did not enjoy music of a
high order.
A few far-seeing men, whose prescience was based on long and intimate
acquaintance with the musical taste of every class in the community,
had a confident faith that if selections of the best music were placed
on the programs of the park concerts the public would become rapidly
educated to prefer them to the other selections. This was done, and
the result showed that the proposers of the innovation had been, if
anything, too reserved in their prophecy. From the very beginning the
new selections met with favor. Music lovers, many attending for the
first time, crowded into the parks to hear the concerts and, by their
intense interest during the performance and enthusiastic hand-clapping
at its close, they not only silenced opposition, but even converted it
into approval.
Said Arthur Farwell, supervisor of municipal music in New York from
1910 to 1913, in 'The Craftsmen' (Nov., 1910): 'The little comedy of
resistance to classical music on the part of the average American
man ends when he finds himself one of fifteen thousand similar
persons--as happened repeatedly in New York this summer--listening in
perfect silence to the great musical imaginings of the age by that
most wonderful of instruments, the modern orchestra in the hands of a
capable leader.'
New York is the acknowledged leader of American cities, and in many
respects is their model in this development of municipal music from the
most defective of instrumentalities for educating the people in musical
appreciation into possibly its most effective one. Accordingly the
story of the regeneration wrought in this municipality will indicate
better than any other account the movement in the same direction all
over the country. And for purposes of record it is well to quote Mr.
Farwell, who in his official position was mainly responsible for the
revolution:
'Municipal music in New York falls within the province of two
departments, the Department of Parks and the Department of Docks and
Ferries. It has been customary in the past to have frequent band and
orchestral concerts at the Mall in Central Park with organizations of
some size, and to have weekly concerts by smaller bands of twenty-one
men and a leader in a number of the other parks. It has also been
customary to have concerts nightly on all of the nine recreation piers
on the North and East Rivers.
'Without describing the status of most of the music in the past, it may
at least be said that the administrations supporting it let the work
out to many independent band leaders, without requiring the upholding
of musical standards, or having the means to uphold them, and without
even suggesting such standards.
'The task of the new department heads, Charles B. Stover, Commissioner
of the Department of Parks, and Calvin Tomkins, Commissioner of the
Department of Docks and Ferries,[59] was therefore to place the work of
providing municipal music upon a basis admitting of musical standards,
and thus to make possible the systematic carrying out of new and
progressive ideas.
'In the Park Department, Commissioner Stover's first act in extending
the scope and influence of the municipal music was to increase the
number of music centres. Most important of all, he increased the
number of symphony orchestras to two, and opened a new music centre
for orchestral music at McGowan's Pass in the upper end of the park,
where there is a natural amphitheatre. The crowds from the upper East
Side that frequent this portion of the park are made up of persons
who for the most part have never heard a symphony orchestra. It is
an interesting fact that at the first concert given them there was
much curiosity, but little real response, up to the performance of a
movement from a Beethoven symphony, which brought forth prolonged and
enthusiastic applause until an encore number was played. The concerts
at McGowan's Pass have grown steadily and rapidly in popularity, eager
audiences of from four to six thousand, or more, assembling at every
performance....
'One other feature of fundamental importance in any truly national
development, a feature wholly new, has marked the season's concerts
in Central Park. This is the establishment by Commissioner Stover
of a rule that each of the two orchestras shall perform one new or
little-heard composition by an American composer each week. This is a
step of the utmost moment, not so much in the mere gaining of a hearing
for the works now performed, as in the recognition of the composers of
our own land as a factor in the creation of America's dawning musical
democracy.
'On the recreation piers the band concerts provided by the Dock
Department have been enjoyed by many thousands. An innovation there
has been to classify the program, and give the concerts distinctive
character on different evenings--an Italian Opera Night, American
Night, Wagner Night, Folk Songs and Dances, German-Slavonic Night,
etc....
'In these activities of only a single summer, it will be seen what a
vista of possibilities has been revealed. If these developments have
any meaning whatsoever, they have a meaning of the deepest sort for
every American city and village. The magnitude of New York's operations
is not the most important point. We are most deeply concerned with
the spirit of these progressive activities, a spirit which may find
its appropriate expression wherever there exists a community, large
or small, which senses the upward trend of American humanity and
democracy.'
M. M. M.
FOOTNOTES:
[56] It is reproduced in 'The Musician,' Vol. X, p. 484.
[57] This society must not be confounded with one of the same name
founded in 1858 at St. Louis by Edward Sobolewsky, the opera composer,
for the purpose of producing the best choruses.
[58] During the Civil War Root was a missionary of patriotism as well
as of music, his 'Tramp, tramp, tramp, the boys are marching' and 'The
Battle-cry of Freedom' contributing greatly to the martial spirit of
the North. _Cf._ Chap. XI.
[59] Members of the so-called 'reform' administration of Mayor William
J. Gaynor, which came into power January 1, 1910.