PUBLIC MORE CRITICAL

Auckland Star, Volume LXIII, Issue 27, 2 February 1932, Page 10

PUBLIC MORE CRITICAL

MUSIC PERFORMANCES. ADVICE TO MUSICIANS. VIEWS OF DR. S. K. PHILLIPS. Smaller audiences and fewer pupils are problems which have increasingly troubled musicians in the Dominion during recent years. Both subjects were discussed at the annual conference recently of the Music Teachers' Association of New Zealand by Dr. S. K. Phillips, Auckland. His diagnosis of the root causes of the two ailments and his suggestions for their remedy were followed with more interest possibly than any other section of the business. For some time past, Dr. Phillips said, it had seemed to him in the North that there had been a growing difficulty in getting good audiences for concerts. The teachers complained also of a lack of students, saying that it had been going on now for about nine years. If that were the case, they could not say that the falling off in pupils was due entirely to the present financial stress. It would be quite evident to everyone, he continued, that music appealed to a tremendous public. One had only to think of the people who had wireless sets, gramophones and pianos to realise that that was the case. It was clear evidence that the public liked music of some kind or another. His own view was that mechanical reproductions had made the public much more critical than it used to be. The public was beginning to become restive now under inferior performances; and it was when people went to concerts and heard something badly played, often something which through the gramophone they had heard performed by some great artist or combination, that the concert hall began to lose its attraction. Must Raise Standard. It seemed to Dr. Phillips that the standard of public performance would have to be greatly raised if musicians were to attract people back again. "I have no doubt," he said, "that the average person likes to hear his music firsthand, but if lie goes to a concert and hears it badly performed he says to himself, Til listen'to music at home.'" A higher standard of artistry In performances was necessary. Programmes, too, were at fault and not what the public wished to buy. Talkie firms and theatrical firms were successful because they knew what the public wanted, and supplied it. It might be that there •was not.very much of musical worth in much of the popular music, but it was better, perhaps, if it was well done.. Some very trashy composition, if it were really beautifully done, had merit about it. "I think a concert should be like a good musical dinner," Dr. Phillips said. "It should go from the hors d'oeuvres to the savouries, with something light and something more serious. The public does not pay to be educated—it pays to be entertained." . Dr. Phillips dealt next with the staging of the concerts themselves. He spoke of the halls, the unattractive stages, the hard seats, the dress of the performers, and their conduct. A thing that had always struck him as not calculated to put audiences in a good humour was the necessity for buying programmes. "When you go into a restaurant you don't pay for the bill of fare," he remarked. "Bugbear of Examinations." Coming to the second subject, Dr. Phillips said that the study of music suffered from many counter-attractions, such as sport and some other modernities. Then, of course, there was the bugbear of examinations. "I do feel," he said, "that some day we shall despise examinations and degrees and all that kind of thing. I must confess this: I have a number of diplomas and so on, but I think really I don't care a snap of the fingers for them. Again, the highest educated people I have- ever met, either here or abroad, have been men who have had no degrees at all." Teachers could help a great deal to revive the interest taken in the study of music if they put themselves out to give private evening musicales, Dr. Phillips said. A great deal of the fault for the present state of affairs lay at their own doors, and if. they- all busied themselves a little more he was sure they could bring on a revival of interest in music-making among amateurs'. Every piece given to a pupil, should be an attractive one or an interesting one. There should - be no • dull educational music.