as a profession? The only conclusion can be that it will be greatly
increased. By this I mean that it will be more interesting, more likely
to give pleasure to the worker as a by-product. I do not mean that it
will necessarily pay very much better. The most interesting and
pleasurable occupations are generally, I think, those that do not pay
well in money. One should not expect full payment in both cash and
pleasure. The exception is where the acquisition of money is itself the
feature of the occupation that gives the pleasure. I do not quarrel with
those who pursue this form of pleasure, but they certainly have no
business to be librarians or teachers, or artists or authors, or to
engage in any occupation which in itself constitutes to the worker the
fullness of life and its illumination. The library profession will make
its appeal in 1950, as it does today, to men and women who like to work
with and among and through books; who also like to work with and among
and through people; who enjoy watching the interplay of relations
between the man and the book and using them for the advancement of
civilization. This is an intellectual and spiritual appeal, and it is
not likely to be replaced by that which glitters on the metallic face of
the dollar.
In taking leave of our subject we may go back to our opening simile of
the railroad train. The flier that reaches New York is the same train
that left Chicago; its passengers have not greatly changed, and yet its
environment is wholly different, so that the outlook of those within it
has totally altered. It is in some such fashion that the library of 1950
will differ from that of today. It will be the same institution with the
same staff, but it will have traveled far on the rails of time. Its
environment, its outlook will be different, and in its response to that
variation it must needs do different things and render a different
service. May its motive power never fail, its machinery be kept well
oiled, and the crew maintain their strength, intelligence and sanity!
POPULARIZING MUSIC THROUGH THE LIBRARY[18]
The purchase of music by a public library is justified by the assumption
that its use is to be somewhat analogous to that of printed speech. The
analogy is, in fact, somewhat closer than most persons realize, and its
consideration reveals some mistaken ideas about the use of music in a
library and may give rise to suggestions for the improvement of that
use. A page of music, like a page of written language, is a record of
something whose primary expression is obtained through sound. Anyone who
understands the notation in either case may reproduce the sounds. In one
case this is “reading aloud”; in the other it is a performance of the
music. In the case of the music the sounds may be made with the voice,
or with an instrument or with one or several of both at once, but this
is only an apparent complication and does not affect the principle. The
reader, of course, may learn the language, or the music, by heart and
then dispense with the written record. In practise there are important
differences between the treatment of records of speech and music. As
sound is readily imagined as well as actually produced, both speech and
music may be enjoyed by a reader without making a sound. If the reader
of a book cannot do this, he is not regarded as at all skilled. Most of
us, I think, do not consider that a person knows completely how to read
when he is not able to read “to himself”, but finds it necessary to
make the actual sounds of speech, whether loudly, or only under his
breath. In the case of music, however, only the skilled musician, as a
general thing, is able to read a page of music “to himself”, as he would
read a page of written language. This is especially the case with
instrumental music and with music where there are several parts. An
accomplished musician, however, may run over an orchestral score and
hear the performance “in his mind”, with the quality of each instrument
brought out, the harmonies and the shading of intensity.
We may go a step further as a matter of curious interest. Language is
not necessarily connected with sounds at all. A deaf mute, who has never
heard a sound, and is incapable of understanding what sound is, may
nevertheless learn to read. He is, however unable to appreciate a page
of written music, and I do not know how it would be possible to explain
to him what it is like, except the rhythm of it, which may be made to
appeal to the senses of sight and touch, as well as to that of sound. In
general, however, the reader of music must at least imagine the sounds
represented by the notation before him. This is not the case with the
reader of speech. Anyone who can read fast and well enough may, like the
deaf mute, understand what he reads without even imaging the sound of
the words. One may even read so fast that the mere speed forbids any
thought of the corresponding oral language. Skilled readers may take in
a sentence, a paragraph, almost a page, at a glance. This is the sole
point of difference between reading language and reading music; and it
does not greatly concern us here because all that it practically affects
is speed of appreciation.
Something that is of greater importance is the difference of purpose
usually found between those who read words and those who read musical
notes. When we say of a child that he is studying music we usually mean
that he is learning how to sing or to play on some instrument with the
special view of being able to perform before some kind of audience. A
music-teacher in like manner is one who teaches his pupils how to play
on the piano or the violin, or how to sing.
But when we teach a child to read we are not primarily concerned with
his future ability to read aloud or to recite so as to give pleasure to
an audience, what we are thinking of is his ability to read rapidly to
himself so as to understand what is in books. Looked at in the same way
the main thing in musical instruction would be to teach rapid
sight-reading so that the reader should get the ability to become
acquainted with as large a number of musical masterpieces as possible.
One learns to talk by talking; one learns to read by reading; and the
same is true of reading music. And as the omnivorous reader of books
always wants to express his own thoughts in writing, so the omnivorous
reader of music will want to compose. Neither the one nor the other may
produce anything great, but the effort will aid in mental development.
As a matter of fact, the child begins to put his thoughts into words
before he knows how to read. He is encouraged to do so. No mother ever
tried to stop her baby from learning to talk because its first efforts
were feeble, halting and unintelligible. How differently we treat the
child’s attempts at musical expression--for that is the explanation of
many of the crude baby noises that we hear. As the child grows, its
expression in this direction is discouraged, and seldom is any effort
made at encouragement or development. Is it not a wonder that anyone
succeeds in composing original music? How many great poets or novelists
should we have if every baby were discouraged in its efforts to express
itself in words; if it were never taught to talk and never to read?
By the time we librarians are able to exert an influence on the reader,
this period is past, but it is still possible to do something. Our first
job is to disabuse the public of the idea that enjoyment of music has
necessarily something to do with mastering the technique of some musical
instrument. The phonograph has done good work in removing this
impression, but we should never be content with the phonograph any more
than we should consent to do away with all printed books and rely wholly
on works “read aloud” on the victrola. There will always be pleasure and
profit in doing one’s own reading, whether in speech or in music. One
must understand musical notation of course, just as one must know the
notation of written speech before he can read books. He must also
understand a little of some instrument, preferably the piano; though
only enough for sight-reading, his object being to understand and
appreciate the music himself, not necessarily to bring understanding and
appreciation to others.
I think I have gone far enough along this train of thought to show the
principle on which I should select the music for a public library
collection. I should form such a collection in precisely the same way as
my collection of books. A very large proportion of the books in a public
library are properly intended for those who will read them for their own
delectation, enjoying and appreciating and profiting personally by what
they read. A much smaller proportion are books for study and research. A
still smaller number are dramatic or other selections intended
principally for recitation or declamation. So, in selecting my music I
would acquire chiefly selections for reading. I do not mean elementary
reading--one does not limit his language books to primers. I should buy
works of all grades of difficulty, but I should have always in mind the
primary use of these for sight reading. Comparatively few would be
pieces written solely for display--to dazzle the hearer or to show off
technique. Few would be pieces whose interest is chiefly historical or
academic. I do not say that I should exclude either of these kinds, but
I certainly should not include them in greater degree than I should
include analogous material in buying ordinary books. Bear in mind also
that I am speaking of an ordinary public library, of average size, not
of a university library nor that of a music school; nor a public library
so large that it may properly have some of the functions of both of
these.
Just as it is a conspicuous duty of the library to raise and maintain
the level of literary taste in its community and to keep this fact in
mind in the selection of its books, so it is the business of its musical
collection to raise and maintain the level of musical taste.
My own opinion, which some may regard as heretical, is that taste can
not be cultivated, in literature, or art, or music, to any considerable
extent by study. The study of these things must have to do largely with
history and technique, and while a knowledge of these is desirable it
can not affect taste, although we may imagine that it does. We may
reduce this matter to its lowest terms by thinking for a moment of
something that depends on the uncomplicated action of an elementary
sense--physical taste. If one does not like an olive when he eats one
for the first time, that judgment can not be reversed by studying the
history of olive culture. If he dislikes cheese, it will be useless to
take him into a cheese factory and explain to him, or teach him the
technical processes of manufacture. The only way to make him change his
mind is to induce him to keep on eating olives, when one of two things
will take place--either his dislike of olives will be confirmed, or it
will disappear. As most people like olives when they become accustomed
to the taste, the latter result is to be expected. Now suppose that
someone does not care for Beethoven’s “Moonlight Sonata”. My contention
is that he cannot be made to like it by studying the history of music,
or that of this particular selection, nor by analyzing its structure,
but that he may be led to do it by listening to it repeatedly. As
persons familiar with good music do generally enjoy this piece, it is
probable that this result will follow.
I know that I must now justify this comparison. When I make it I am
accustomed to indignant protest on the part of some of my students. Is
it not unworthy to compare the music of the Moonlight Sonata to a mere
physical sensation like the taste of an olive? Only as it may be
considered unworthy to compare the great and the small; the complex and
the simple. Both the taste of the olive and the sound of the sonata,
have a physical origin and impress the brain through the agency of the
sense organs. And as a matter of fact I doubt whether the sensation of
the music is much more complicated than that of the taste. We know that
an acoustic sensation is a unit. When a chorus is singing with
orchestral accompaniment the result is not a hundred sound waves, but
one; it strikes the ear drum as a unit, and that vibrates as a unit, so
that the impression on the brain, about whose mechanism we are ignorant,
must also be a unit. The popularity of the phonograph enables us to
illustrate this familiarly. Examine with a microscope a record of a
complicated musical performance, with many voices and many different
kinds of instruments, and you will find a single wavy line. When the
needle causes the disk to vibrate by following this line, it vibrates as
a unit, just as the ear-drum does. There is but one disk, yet its
vibration enables us to pick out separately the different voice parts,
and to recognize the separate quality of the stringed instruments, the
woodwinds and the brasses, with the drums, bells, and what not. When we
taste the olive, we get a sort of chemical effect. We do not know what
happens as definitely as we do in the case of a musical sound, but the
various atoms, each vibrating in its own way, act upon the taste-buds of
the tongue so that a sensation is transmitted to the brain--transmitted
as a unit, just as the sound is. I want to be fair, so I will
acknowledge that instead of comparing a single sensation of taste to a
sequence of sounds, I should have likened it to a musical chord. To get
a taste analogy with a sonata we should have to use a sequence of taste
sensations, possibly that presented by a course dinner. I submit,
however, that this does not affect my argument.
Let me repeat my conviction, then, that art is primarily a matter of the
heart and not of the head--of the feelings and not of the intellect, and
that the feelings are trained by personal experience, not by study. One
cannot learn to appreciate a poem, or a picture or a piece of music by
examining it historically or structurally, only by experiencing it and
others like it again and again, and also by experiencing in life the
emotions that the art is intended to arouse. Of course I do not mean to
say that knowledge of history and technique is not interesting and
valuable. It is highly interesting to know the recipe for the pie and to
watch the cook make it; but this does not affect the taste.
Knowledge obtained by study does affect ability to reproduce or create.
One must know how the pie is made before he can make one himself. One
can not write a poem or paint a picture or compose a song, without
preliminary study. This should be understood, but it is outside the pale
of our present discussion, which relates to the chief purpose of the
music collection in a library and of its chief uses. My contention, to
repeat, is that it is related to musical art precisely as the purpose of
the book-collection is related to the art of literature.
Now the present status of the music collection is precisely what that of
the book collection would be in a community where the percentage of
literacy was small, where a considerable number of persons did not
understand the language of the books, even when spoken or read aloud,
where those who knew the language understood it only when spoken or read
and where readers were obliged to read aloud before they could
appreciate what they were reading. A community, moreover, where teaching
generally meant solely teaching how to recite or read aloud acceptably
to others, with only enough ability to read to get the sense of an
extract and enable the reader to commit it to memory. A librarian set
down with a collection of books in such a community would not be true to
his vocation if he did not attempt to better this state of things, while
admitting the elements of good that it contained. For instance, the
imaginary situation that I have described would be quite comparable with
a real appreciation and love of good literature.
In the first place, the librarian would wish to see that all the members
of his community were able to understand the language of his books, if
not to read it. To remember our analogy for a moment, he would
practically fit his books to his people. If they were predominantly
French, for instance, he would buy many French books. But one can not do
this with music, for music is a language by itself, for the most part
untranslatable into any other. We must assume that in the world to which
our imaginary community belongs there is but one language, and that to
understand the books those who do not know that language must be taught
it. School instruction in language is largely limited to reading.
Children who go to school understand and talk their language already,
having been taught it at home. It is to the homes, therefore, that the
librarian would have to look for this instruction and he would have to
bring to bear on parents whatever influence might be at his disposal to
make them see its value and uses.
Secondly, he would have to see that as many as possible were taught to
read the language. This would be the function of the schools.
Thirdly, it would be necessary to see that facility in reading proceeded
so far that readers would not find it necessary to read aloud, but could
when they desired, read rapidly “to themselves”. It would be necessary,
of course, to show many of the teachers and almost all of their pupils,
that reading is primarily not to enable the reader to recite to others,
but to make an impression on his own mental equipment. It is quite
possible for one to learn to read out loud after a fashion, in a foreign
tongue, without understanding a word of it, but so that listeners may
get a fair idea of it. The effect on the reader in this case is
absolutely zero.
Musically, this kind of community is precisely the one that public
libraries have to deal with. Many of our clients do not like or
understand music at all, or they care for only the most elementary
melodies, harmonies and rythms--comparable to the literature that one
gets in a child’s primer. Of those whose range of appreciation and love
is fairly wide, comparatively few are familiar with musical notation,
and can not read music. Of those who can read, few can read rapidly and
with assurance, and fewer still can read without audible utterance; that
is, they can not read to themselves. It is common to hear persons who
can sing or play on some instrument with a fair degree of success and
taste say “Oh, I can’t read; I have to pick out the notes and get my
teacher to help me.” This is exactly as if someone who had just recited
an oration or a poem with some feeling should proclaim complacently:
“Oh, I can’t really read. I had to pick out that piece word for word,
with my teacher at my elbow to help me out.”
In the face of such a situation the librarian should feel and act
precisely as he would feel and act if the situation existed with regard
to books, as it has already been imagined and described.
First, he should try to influence the growth of musical appreciation
through the home, so that all the children in a family shall come to
understand and use musical language as they do the language of the
spoken word.
Secondly, he should try to influence the schools so that they shall
teach the reading of musical notation as thoroughly as they do the
reading of the printed word, and to persuade teachers of music to teach
music really and not simply the art of performing on some musical
instrument.
Thirdly, he should point out to his musical clients that music may be
read “to oneself”, just as language can, and encourage them to try it,
beginning with easy examples. Note that reading to oneself can be done
only by those who already know how to read aloud, and only by practise.
There is no way in which it can be taught.
Fourthly, he should have in his library a selection of music picked out
to a great extent to further the ends outlined above. Much of it should
be for readers, not for performers. His lists should be made for readers
and the comments on individual titles should be for readers. Moreover,
they should at present be such as will help the beginner; for a very
large proportion of our musical readers are beginners although they may
be in the anomalous position of the reader who knows and appreciates his
subject matter very thoroughly, while he can read about it only
hesitatingly and haltingly. Imagine a well-informed and intelligent
student of history who has completely forgotten to read, owing to some
concussion of the brain which has not impaired his knowledge in any
other way, and you have the situation of many music-lovers.
There were doubtless poets before the invention of alphabets, and one
may appreciate a symphony concert without knowing his musical alphabet
or being able to use it; but we are accustomed now to considering
thorough ability to read as a prerequisite to the requirement of a
general education; and I do not see why as complete an ability to read
music should not be a prerequisite for such a musical education as all
persons ought to possess.
The analogy between the reading of music and that of language is very
close, as we have seen, and we may be guided by it largely; but there is
one respect in which it fails. Music and poetry may both be bad in the
sense that they are ugly, of faulty construction, or trivial. But poetry
may also be bad because it conveys a bad moral lesson or causes one to
accept what is false. I can not see that it is possible for music to do
this, except by association. A tune that has always been associated with
improper words may in time come to be considered as itself improper, but
there can be nothing objectionable about the music in itself. Again,
music may be improperly used. Anyone would say that a largo in a minor
key was out of place at a wedding, or a jig at a funeral. Association
may have, but does not necessarily have anything to do with this; but
here again the music in itself is not objectionable. This simplifies the
selection of music for a library; for it excludes at the outset almost
all the problems of censorship. Music is rejected usually for negative
reasons--because it is not worth buying; not for any active evil
influence that it is likely to exert.
This question comes up especially in connection with certain adjuncts to
a music collection--pianola rolls and phonograph records. These are both
of great aid in assisting the public to understand the language of
music, which they must do before they learn to read it. They may be
profitably used, of course in connection with reading, and yet the
pleasure of following a piano player or a phonograph with the printed
score seems to be known to few. Every library must judge for itself
whether it can afford to put money into these adjuncts but in most
cases it is unnecessary to do so, it being easy to get the rolls and
records by donation. In doing this at my own library I have been struck
with the trivial or so-called “popular” character of most of the rolls
received. I am told, also that those who borrow them (and they have gone
out “like hot cakes”) are largely persons who have not visited the
library before. I believe that this sort of music is popular not because
it is trivial or “trashy”, but because it is easy to understand. There
is some music that is both good and easy--easy to understand and easy to
read. Schumann’s Album for the young will occur to anyone. The
compositions of Ludwig Schytte are modern examples. But the general
impression that good music is difficult both to read and appreciate--is
“high-brow”, in fact; and that easy music is always trivial and poor, is
a deduction, I am afraid from experience. It is certainly not in the
nature of things. However, so long as we want easy music, both to hear
and to read, and a good deal of it is trashy, I can see nothing to do
but to use the trashy music. With the music rolls triviality is all we
have to object to--the ceaseless repetition of the same phrases and
harmonies. We must remember, however, that these are not boresome to the
beginner. It takes a good deal of repetition to make one tired of a
musical phrase. And there is absolutely no question of active badness
here--only of worthlessness.
When we come to phonograph records, however, we encounter something
different. So far as these are purely musical, what has been said of the
music rolls applies to them also, but many of them are vocal, and the
words are often far below library standard. When a record is rejected
for its words, the music, of course, must go with it, although as music
it may be quite unexceptionable.