VANITY FAIR

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume 74, Issue 229, 28 September 1931, Page 2

VANITY FAIR

AN OLD-TIME SINCER.

We lad had a guest in the house for three weeks. A Musical Convention—the first ever hell in Richmond—was in session under the conduct of Lowell Mason tnd Ceorge Francis Root. Ms father, mS sister, ms brother Herbert, and myself were members of a flourishing Sacred Musical Society, composed principally of amateurs, and We had engaged the distinguished leaders in the profession tp preside over the conference, by which it was hoped public taste in the mailer of choir and congregational singing might be improved. Classes were formed for the study of methods and for drill in vocalisation. The course would be closed by a grand concert, in which no professional artists Would take part. The thought that the imported leaders of the programme should be allowed to put up at a hotel Was opposed to the genius of southern hospitality. Doctor and Mrs. Lowell Mason were the honoured guests of Mr. Williams, the president of the society. My father invited Mr. Root “to make our house his home while he was in our city." That was the old-fashioned form of asking strangers to take bit and sup and bed with us. We made good the words, too. The “home" Was theirs as truly as il Was ours. The convention Was advertised to last ten days. When the time was expired, the extraordinary success of the experiment induced the projectors to extend the time to a month. Mr. Root was for removing to a hotel, but We arose up in arms and forbade it. His bonhomie, intelligence, and general attractiveness of manner and disposition had endeared him to us all. We hailed as a reprieve the postponement of the date of departure It was during that Christmas week that I attended a full rehearsal of the programme to be given at the grand concert. JVear the close of the rehearsal, Mr. Root came down to the back °f the house and dropped into a seat by me, among the auditors and lookers-on. He was tired, he explained, “and would loaf for the rest of the affair.” The “affair” Wound up with Handd’s Hallelujah Chorus. My “loafing" neighbour pricked up his ears, as the war-horse at sound of the trumpet; sat upright and poured the might of heart md voice into the immortal opus. With the precision of a metronome, and the fire of a seraph, he went through it, from the first io the last note, with never a book or score. It was more to us, who had the good fortune to be near him, than all the rest of the performance. It Was inevitable that two of us should recall and speak together in awed tones, of Handel's rejoinder to a query, as to his emotions in writing the chorus. “1 did verily believe that I saw the Ctcat White Throne and Him Who sat thereon, and heard the harpers harping with their harps, and all Cod’s holy angels.” I was watching the fine, uplifted head and rapt unconsciousness of him whose whole frame throbbed and thrilled with clarion tones that pealed out, “Hallelujah! hallelujah!” when a voice on the other side of me murmured in my ear; "And all that sat there, steadfastly watching him, saw his face as if it had been the face of an angel!” I cherish a hundred pleasant and dear memories of our musical visitor. I like none other so well as this vision.—From “Marion Harland's Autobiography.”