MUSIC NOTES.

New Zealand Illustrated Sporting & Dramatic Review, Issue 1249, 26 March 1914, Page 37

MUSIC NOTES.

By

“G” String.

On her forthcoming tour of Australia and New Zealand, Miss Maud Allan, the renowned classical dancer, will have the assistance of the three Chrniavskys, who have already appeared in the Dominion with much success. The three young artists are much improved since they last visited New Zealand, and now bear the proud distinction of being specially appointed Court Musicians to the Tsar of Russia.

A new and unknown song was included in the programme of the Irish national concert, which was given in the Wellington Town Hall on St. Patrick’s night. This was Augusta Holme’s beautiful “Noel ' d’lrland’’

(“The Child Christ and Ireland”) the composer being the same talented woman who wrote the stijrring story song “Au Pays,” and it was sung by Mr. Paul Dufault. The curious features about this- new song and its rendition at this -concert were the facts that, though on an Irish theme, it was written origijnally in French} by an Irish lady resident in Paris, and that it was sung in French by a French-Canadian singer to a New Zealand audience on St. Patrick’s night.

Anent the recent theatre musicians’ strike in London, a contemporary asks.—“ Can the theatre orchestra be dispensed with?” One fears not- It Was tried by a certain English manager some years ago, and the resdlt wasi a deadly failure. Conversation faltered and fell lifeless between the acts, and everybody felt as if something were wrong. The late Mr. Andrew Lang declared that music was “the enemy of conversation.” Never was a wilder statement uttered. The most ordinary drawing-room pianist can tell tnat from experience. An interesting new work to be heard at Liverpool (England) during the next few weeks will be Professor Granville Bantock’s latest essay in choral music, in the case of which he has found his text in the Book of From information,

concerning the work which has been published it appears that it carries further the ingenious experiments in the development of the possibilities of choral technique which have been exemplified already in the composer's setting of Swinburne’s “ Atalanta in Calydon” Thus we are told that “the ‘orchestra’ of voices is similarly disposed; it is required to do similar things; and it is clearly designed to exploit the 'composer’s theories c'j vocal technique—of which colour and timbre are not the least prominent,” after which it is not surprising to learn that “it requires all the skill of the best competitive choirs to do it anything like justice.” It is only to be hoped that the hearers may not be disposed to adapt in the face of so much complexity two lines from the composer's text —“ What profit Lath a man of all his labour which he hath taken under the sun!” The latest “combine” is that talked uf in the music-pub'! filing world-— needless to say—-of America, A movement, one learns, has been set on foot for forming an immense amalgamation of publishing interests in New York, each of the firms concerned to be run as “departments,” and the present heads to be retained on a salary for a term of years after receiving the amount agreed upon for the business and stock. One gathers that the various firms whose acceptance of the scheme is sought are those connected with “popular” music, by which, presumably, is meant ragtime and other ditties and dances beloved by the man in the street. Those who favour the project declare that the publishing business (of this class) has not been flourishing cf late, owing to fierce competition and the cost of fighting ft. The sales of popular successes are admittedly enormous, but the increasing output and the publication of songs, etc., at cheap prices are said to have lowered profits all round. However, this may be, the huge vogue obtained by songs of the frankly “popular” type referred to is hardly likely to encourage the idea that those who pub ish them aro cn the verge of starvation But of this class of goods composers are known to have made their fortunes, and it is not precisely the rule for composers to flourish while their publishers struggle for a living. On the subject of the sales of ragtime and other songs of the “catchy” order some significant figures have been published lately. “Hitchy Koo,” the rage of pantomimes and revues some twelve months ago, and the hardly less übiquitous “Waiting For the Robert E. Lee” are said to have so d to the extent of over half a miliio-.i -copies of each. “My Little Wooden Hut” was mentioned as having attained to a total -of 750.000 copies, while the sale of the song called “In the Shade of the Old Apple Tree’ is said to have run into a million copies. The once famous “Honeysuckle and the Bee” is believed to have exceeded this total by 100,000, while for Leslie Stuart’s “Soldiers of the Queen” the record has been claimed of one million and a-quarter- The accuracy of these figures cannot be vouched for, but they are likely to be approximately correct.