The mechanical inventions of recent years have provided us with
increased facilities for the diffusion of music. The present era may
come to be regarded as similar in historical importance to those which
first benefited by the invention of the stave and by the invention
of music-printing. To some extent these changes represent merely the
adaptation of practical conditions to the increase in population. But
whereas the invention of the stave and the invention of music-printing
must in all probability have increased the number of persons who
could read music at sight, the modern reproductive machinery cannot
do more than increase the number of those who confine themselves to
listening. It remains to be seen what proportion of those who acquire
the habit of listening will be stimulated to learn something of the
art of performing. We hear much of the enthusiasm for music amongst
“the masses.” Apparently they are now singing Bach, whereas their
grandparents sang Handel; does it make much difference?
It is said that modern music has lost contact with “the people.” Had
it ever any contact with them, if by “the people” is meant those whose
musical education is not more than elementary? By all means let us do
our utmost to raise the standard of musical education in all classes
of society; but we cannot get away from the fact that at all periods
of musical history the music which really made that history was in its
own day the possession only of a limited circle of highly cultivated
enthusiasts. This is inevitable. The moment we recognize music to be
an art and not merely the instrument of magic we have to apply our
intellectual faculties to the understanding of it. Architects and
painters complain bitterly enough of the public’s unwillingness to meet
them halfway. For the musician the case is still worse; the practical
difficulty of grasping a piece of music in the transitory moment of
performance is one reason, and another is the intensity with which
musical sounds act upon human emotions. It is small wonder if large
numbers of people still regard music as almost magical.
It is the remnant of these primitive beliefs which leads so many
serious-minded and otherwise reasonable persons to take an apprehensive
view of modern music, even though they may consider themselves more
enlightened than those who view the music of all ages with moral
apprehension. The danger, if it exists now, has always existed; people
have always feared that which they do not understand.
“It is difficult,” says Dr. Burney of Plato, “to refrain from numbering
this philosopher, together with Aristotle, Aristoxenus and Plutarch,
though such illustrious characters, and, in other particulars, such
excellent writers, among the musical Grumblers and _Croakers_ of
antiquity. They all equally lament the loss of good music, without
considering that every age had, probably, done the same, whether right
or wrong, from the beginning of the world; always throwing musical
perfection into times remote from their own, as a thing never to be
known but by tradition. The Golden Age had not its name from those who
lived in it.”
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Transcriber’s Notes:
――Text in italics is enclosed by underscores (_italics_).
――Punctuation and spelling inaccuracies were silently corrected.
――Archaic and variable spelling has been preserved.
――Variations in hyphenation and compound words have been preserved.