CINEMA-ORCHESTRAL MUSIC

Evening Post, Volume CVIII, Issue 111, 6 November 1929, Page 10

CINEMA-ORCHESTRAL MUSIC

(To the Editor.)

Sir, —If I may be permitted to add a coda to the correspondence on the above subject, I would like first to compliment Mr. L. D. Austin on the more genial tone of his recapitulation on Thursday last. I would next appreciate an opportunity of disagreeing .with his logic.

I can hardly expect that Mr. Austin will ever quite see eye to eye with me concerning the educative value 'of cinema orchestras. Mr. Austin has a very natural bias in that he personally lias attempted, as far as lay ill his power, to raise the standard of cinema music. But I am certain that he was arguing on a false premiss when he reasoned that his audiences as a whole would pay more attention to the music than to the screen. The young fellow who attended the theatre five times a week and the two ladies who left after the overture each Saturday night are interesting phenomena, but of doubtful value as witnesses for the defence. They don't even form a quorum—not even if we include,the few who carried a tune in their heads and asked the name of it afterward. Those folk who saw the same programme twice no doubt found, as did, the writer, that the more spectacular photoplays could not be fully assimilated at one screening.

«f, cr c c ls one other Point (sub-section c of your correspondent's letter). I assure Mr. Austin that I am fully aware that almost the entire orchestral repertory has been bowderised to suit the limitations oi salon and cinema orchestras. But I am grieved that after paying a personal tribute to Mr. Austin's musicianship he sliould let me down with the followinz extraordinary statement:- That specially* condensed versions of orchestral classics do.not in any way spoil the music as music, but beyond a slight alteration in the "colour scheme," -nothing else is lost but volume . . . sixteen players form an ample accompaniment, and can make plenty of noise when wanted." The noise, in truth, can be ample enough, but Mr. Austin actually claims that re-scoring does not in any way spoil the music as music—except for a "slight" alteration to the colour scheme. But what right has a theatre conductor—or anyone, tor that matter—to alter any composer's colour scheme and still maintain that it tairly represents the composer's ideas? (I think the interpretative musician will admit that the composer's ideas are- o£ para, mount importance.) Let us assume that a printer wants to reproduce a picture by-Malais of a red cow in a green field. If his reproduction displays a yellow cow on a black field is ne justified in saying, "Well, I haven't spoiled JUillaiss picture as a picture?" We may sympathise with the printer for not iiaving any red or green ink, but we must be fair to Willais. If the printer merely says: "This is a picture of a cow in a field, it serves a useful purpose, and you don t need to look very hard at it," we can wholly agree with him. (I must ask forgiveness for drawing an analogy' between theatre musicians and printers, but I can assure Mr. Austin that in doing so I already run the dire risk of some of my friends in the latter category themselves rising to an aggrieved point of order.) If any of your readers doubt that this question of orchestral colour and balance is important, let him or her—to get down, to particular instauces—compare in retrospect the De Luxe Orchestra's performance of "Tannhauser" Overture, given oix several occasions, with-that of the Wellington Symphony Orchestra last Thursdayevening. If Mr. Austin feels that the comparison is unfair, he must bear in mind that I do not ia the least mean to disparage the De Luxe performance; and he should ask himself why he made the extraordinary statement quoted above. I feel sure, however, that Mr. Austin, has now- reconsidered the somewhat hasty statement that prompted my first letter—" that the vanishing of cinema orchestras means the eveutual extinction of man-made music. Nevertheless, should the potplants in orchestral wells again blossom, forth into instrumental ensembles, Mr. Austin- may_ assuredly count on me for a, friendly and encouraging cheer. But not trom a front seat. Like most folk, I have found the centre of (he theatre best; like most folk, I go really to see the pictures.— I am, etc.. L. D. WEBSTER, '.