MUSIC IN N.Z.

Press, Volume LXIII, Issue 19063, 27 July 1927, Page 11

MUSIC IN N.Z.

CONSERVATOKIUM NEEDED.

M. FRIEDMAN'S VIEWS. "I think your musical standard is a good one considering that you have no Conservatorium of Music in the Dominion," said M. Ignaz Friedman, the famous Polish pianist, to an interviewer from The Press yesterday. "Sport is all right," he continued, "but the time is opportune now to develop the aesthetic side of your national life." New Zealand, lie said, was a wealthy country and could easily afford to move in the direction he had indicated. Every nation had its quota of talented people, and New Zealand had no more or less in proportion than other countries, but owing to the disability he had referred to local geniuses were given no chance to reach the top of their profession. They progressed to a | certain stage under private teachers and then stopped in the ranks of mediocrities if their friends were unable to send them abroad to complete their studies. In many of the cities of Europe no larger than Auckland or Christchurch, said M. Friedman, the value of art to the people was recognised. Consequently there would be an opera house, a permanent orchestra, a choir, and a refectory theatre. It was recognised that often they were not paying propositions, but as they were looked on as essential to the city any deficits made in conducting them were met by the taxation imposed on all classes of amusement. "Consider, for instance, the case of a school of he said. "You would never get sufficient money in students' fees to pay the salaries of the teachers and for the general maintenance of the school, and you would not expect it; consequently you would meet the position by subsidies. Just think of the value it would be to New Zealand to produce a great artist like Melba, who, I consider, has done more to make Australia known abroad than all that country's exports of meat and wool. Think also what names like Paderewski, Conrad, and other great artists and writers have done to make Poland known. In. New Zealand you want to get this point of view and endeavour to look a little beyond farmers and jockeys." M. Friedman considers that there should be a permanent State Orchestra, if not a municipal one, in each of the larger centres, in order to develop the musical education of the people, and also a little refectory theatre, where the works of Shakespeare, Sheridan, and other masterpieces may be produced at regular intervals. It was a sad thing to realise that the people of tVe Dominion had practically no other opportunity of seeing Shakespearean plavs than those afforded by the visits paid to New Zealand occasionally by a certain well-known company.