THOUGHTS ABOUT MUSIC

Evening Star, Issue 25927, 19 October 1946, Page 10

THOUGHTS ABOUT MUSIC

(Bv L.D.A./'

In last week’s article I mentioned that Messrs Charles Begg and Co. are iliviting entries from New Zealand composers for the fourth annual music composers’ contest sponsored by that firm. J do so again to-day, because this contest cannot be too widely advertised. Who knows but that somewhere in the backblocks of the Dominion there may be hidden some embryo Beethoven or incipient Chopin? World-famous creators of music have sprung from the most unexpected places and parentage in days gone by, when there were no benevolent pianoforte firms to provide incentive and encouragement. No doubt many a latent musical genius has languished in obscurity and perished unknown for want of a little recognition. I. cannot do better than quote, in this connection, portion of an article written some years ago by Dr Vernon Griffiths, under the title ‘ The Amateur Composer.

“ One of the faculties which is strong in childhood,” he wrote, “ and all too frequently atrophied through lack ot encouragement and training during school years, is the .faculty of invention. ■ The little sister sits. by the fire and invents stories for her younger sisters ■ and brothers., The small boy in solitude hums fragments of melody which are his own. Groups of children, in improvised games, dramatise romances which, though often founded on popular- lore, yet depend for their details-upon the inventive faculty of the players.. Ample evidence can be cited to prove that this faculty is susceptible to development and training in children, with remarkable results. However, we are more concerned with the encouragement of the talent for original. musical creation in older students and in those adults who, while as yet untutored in even the rudiments of composition, yet feel the urge to express themselves in the language of melody.

“In the first place, let us consider . .ho.w. the , average amateur melody-maker sets, about his task. If he is fortunate a fragment of tune . comes to him while he - is engaged in some other occupation. He may hum it over and then allow it to pass 'into oblivion; or lie may endeavour to build up a complete melody from the first idea. If he succeeds he has probably produced something of more value than that obtained by the man who sits down at the piano and allows himself the adventitious aid of fingers wandering idly o’er the keys. In the case, of such attempts .-.-at.the keyboard the result is probably' more due to accident than to any spontaneous emotional feeling; though we know that some mature musicians can, in fact, improvise very beautiful music at the keyboard: music.almost perfect ill . form and' content, This ability to improvise in a set form is rarely met with in anyone who has not had a thorough musical training. “The germ-idea of a.melody is like the germ-idea of a picture in that it is born suddenly. A momentary effect of light, a passing shadow, ancl the picture has gone—only to remain as an impression on the mind. Such an impression must be immediately noted down or it is to a considerable extent lost for, ever- The same sudden passing frequently, characterises the birth of a melodic, idea; it must be immediately committed to paper or it is gone.”,

Dr Vernon Griffiths then proceeds to give practical advice to budding composers, but as this is purely technical it need not concern us here. During the 18 years of this column’s existence 1, have always tried to avoid, musical technicalities and jargon, which hold no interest for the general reader, and not a great deal of interest, 1 fear, for the average musician. But.the foregoing . excerpt from Dr Griffiths’s article should suffice to givo heart to anyone with the smallest talent for composing original music—only, for goodness sake, let nobody try to ' iiiiitate those misguided persons who seem to imagine that writing a series •of unresolved discords constitutes real music. I have stated, often, and now state again, that the test of music is whether or hot it is pleasant aiid agreeable to the musical ear. Music that is iherely clever-looking on paper, but sounds ugly, is not good music, and no amount of specious argument can make-it good music. So now, New Zealand composers, get your, pens and paper Ana set to work, and remember the closing date—'November 30.

• Prom time to time complaints are heard about the sameness of touring pianists’ programmes. But there is another side to the question, which was well put by the late Mischa Levitzki during his last tour of New- Zealand some years ago. To an interviewer lie said: “We have to consider the sophisticated and. the unsophisticated in our audiences. To the first group belong the critics, the professional musicians, who go to all the concerts and prefer novelties because they have heard the well-established classics so many times. But then there are the others, who. do not wish to hear novelties, so much are they engrossed in the music which is familiar to them. Yet if we play this familiar music we are told that it is hackneyed. As if a Beethoven sonata, for instance, could ever become hackneyed! Do you know that I have been playing the Bach Chromatic Fantasy and Fugue for 20 years, and to-day I am discovering new features in that work? And so it is with the classics of music.” The pianist related, on this point, his experience in one Australian city, when he had drafted a programme which he regarded as one of the best he had prepared. It contained the 32 variations of Beethoven, Schumann’s Sonata in G Minor, two of the Brahms Rhapsodies, and works of Scriabin and Rubinstein. But when a lady who came to the booking office to buy tickets: saw this programme, 6he exclaimed, “ Why, he’s not playing anything of. Liszt or Chopin,” and refused to book a seat. “ This,” the pianist observed, “ is the problem which continually engages our attention—that of reconciling the claims of the musicians and those who ai‘e not so musical—the claims of those who want to hear new music and those who want to hear Chopin’s E Flat Polonaise, and Schubert’s ‘ March Militaire ’ and Liszt’s ‘ Campanella.’ And when w 6 play the music which is well known we are told by some critics that we ought to give this music a rest and play something new. It is indeed a very difficult problem.”