"HOME-MADE" MUSIC

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXII, Issue 22030, 9 February 1935, Page 10 (Supplement)

"HOME-MADE" MUSIC

return to popularity INFLUENCE OF WIRELESS It was announced recently that British pianoforte manufacturers had in 1934 increased their output by 20 to 25 per cent over that of last year. The war dealt home-made music a staggering blow. Cheap (and good) gramophones gave it another. And wireless apparently finished tho job. That was wlsat most people felt. The minority was divided into two camps —those who regarded mechanical musio a-j tho enemy of art, and those who believed that, given time, it would educate people into a love of gqod musio and stimulate music in the home.

This last section is proving correct, comments Miss Nancy Morison in the London Evening Standard. The head of a famous girls' school told her the other day that when wireless first became popular, there was a tremendous drop in the number of pupils studying a musical instrument. Gradually, however, reaction set in, and now more than half the girls learn the piano. But—and here is the difference —they no longer learn because it is " the thing." They learn only if they aro really keen and show talent.

Nor is the piano the only favoured instrument. The school orchestra boasts a membership of 50, and beside the usual string instruments, the flute, clarinet, oboe and drum are well represented. And a race of enthusiastic omateurs is coming into being, keen to play as well as to listen. Now here again is a change. In the past foreigners have been puzzled by the English attitude to amateurs. " As soon as an English boy becomes pretty good at the fiddle—or whatever it is—he wants to earn his living by it," a Serbian friend said to mo once. " There is no idea, as at home with us, of a few enthusiasts getting together and playing for fun. That may have been true even a year or two ago, but not now " Here is an experience of my own. Last week, some neighbours (keen wireless fans) sent a hesitating invitation to a few friends to come in one evening and make musio. Tho party produced a passable pianist, an excellent,, though rather rusty 'cellist, and a could-be-good-with-practice fiddler, to say nothing of a pair of very pleasant singers—and all enjoyed themselves hugely. . Publishers, piano- tuners and conv» posers, may, I believe, take heart, Home-made music is coming back.