MUSICAL SOCIETIES LOSE GROUND

Evening Star, Issue 22596, 13 March 1937, Page 4

MUSICAL SOCIETIES LOSE GROUND

BROADCASTING BLAMED AS CAUSE At the animal meeting of the Sydney Royal Philharmonic Society the president, 3lr Edward WiLson, said that the financial year ended with a. deficit of £lB, and that “radio had depleted attendances at concerts, and it was now only with its help that the society could carry on.” Mr W. J Basden, the treasurer, said that a city of the size of Sydney that could not support one big choral society should be ashamed of itself. In an editorial comment on the position, 1 Wireless Weekly ’ states: The first thing that strikes us about this is that almost everyone who expected Sydney to be ashamed of herself has been disappointed; if she is a bad girl it is because she likes it, and the efforts of the clergy or Mr Spooner don|t seem to have much effect; nor is it likely that the whole membership of the Philharmonic Society, dressed in boiled shirts, dinner suits, and those white dresses with which, since the days of Victoria the Good, music has concentrated attention on the voices of sopranos and contraltos, can sing shame into the souls of our devotees of Gary Cooper, Marlene Dietrich, etc. The more so, because we have an Sydney at least a group of wireless singers that can do much better any night of the week; much better drilled, singing more varied programmes, better arranged. The oldstyle choral societies have been superseded as much because they remained old-style as because broadcasting cut down their audiences. No one wants to go to a choral concert to hear partsongs of drawing room ballad vintage, no matter how well sung: the composers of those days had certain effects which pleased people, but which are now worn so thin that not even a singer on street corners would hope to make pennies out of them. It is worse than useless to disregard development for old time’s sake. The only hope for choral societies is to get in front of broadcasting.