BOTTLED EMOTION

Evening Post, Volume CV, Issue 23, 28 January 1928, Page 20

BOTTLED EMOTION

MUSIC AND THE MAN IN THE . , STKEET. The complexities that civilisation has brought in its train, although introduced by man, have made him their slave, writes Dr. Leigh. Henry, the well-known composer and conductor, in. the "Daily Chronicle." Man to-day might be described as a cog in a mammoth machine, which, as it revolves, consumes an ever-increasing amount of human energy. He is confined and narrowed down to a job, which, in time, becomes merely mechanical; And the more commerce and industry expands, the more- does his work become confined and specialised. The Whole hosts of capacities in his nature are deprived of any function or expression. His emotions are bottled, and his feelings unduly repressed in the humdrum of every day. And such capacities, deprived of normal outlet; resort to sensationalism, which leads in the end to dangerous perversities. The splitting of the atom, if ever this feat of science is accomplished, will involve us in still further complications, for immediately there will be a general reduction of our daily work. How shall we employ the extra hours left on our hands f It is obvious that aesthetic occupations must be invented to take its place, and that very soon, otherwise the blind pressure of bottled emotion and feeling will find an outlet in senseless riot and sensational dissipation. That way lies anarchy. "For music is not merely an expedient to make existence possible, but an absolute necessity. It is one of the most powerful nourishments of mind and spirit, which, in any sane healthy community, require sustenance as much as the bbdjr.»? ;