Leading Articles in the Reviews. 



571 



ARTS AND ARTISTS. 



CHORAL MUSIC IN ENGLAND. 



Professor Bantock's Views. 



Mr. Granville Bantock, says Mr. Robert J. 

 Buckley in the October Pall Mall Magazine, is 

 aggressive, a born pioneer. Up to the present 

 he has written about forty thick folio volumes 

 of music, covering the whole range of the art, 

 yet he did not take up music seriously till he 

 was twenty. 



orchestras too big. 



Speaking of the musical prospect In England, 

 Professor Bantock told his interviewer it was 

 hopeful. Things are looking up ; we are pro- 

 gressing steadily. But orchestral music has 

 developed towards megalomania. Bands are 

 becoming too big, for financial reasons. Com- 

 posers write for the band, making the chorus 

 secondary ; but the result is that the chorus gets 

 six months' rehearsal and the band, the pre- 

 dominant partner, only a few hours'. To have 

 a sufficient number of band rehearsals might 

 cost several hundred pounds. The result is im- 

 perfection. Orchestras are too expensive, and 

 the composer who relies on orchestral effects 

 must suffer. We must return to orchestras of 

 moderate dimensions. Strauss has taken instru- 

 mental music as far as it can go ; Debussy has 

 shown how much can be done with a small 

 orchestra. England is primarily a singing 

 nation, and our true and safe course of develop- 

 ment is on choral lines. Every village in Ger- 

 many has its orchestra ; every village in Eng- 

 land and Waies has its choral society. At the 

 Blackpool and Southport Festivals Professor 

 Bantock says he was amazed to hear all sorts 

 of choirs singing the music of Bach and Brahms, 

 and singing it expressively and intelligently. 



A musician's hobbies. 



Referring to music in the Birmingham Uni- 

 versity, Mr. Bantock said the desire was to 

 produce musicans who will emulate Sibelius, 

 Strauss and Debussy, in his opinion the best 

 orchestral writers living. He also named 

 Frederick Delius as a truly great musician, one 

 of the most interesting of living British com- 

 posers. The Professor has many hobbies. 

 Napoleonic literature is one, and his shelves con- 

 tain thirty-six volumes of Napoleon's letters. 

 Another is Asiatic travel. He is familiar with 

 Persian, French, Arabic and Greek, and he 

 knows enough Japanese to enable him to read 

 the titles of Hokusai's drawings. A Buddha 

 from a Llama monastery in Tibet is his mascot. 



WELSH MUSIC. 



The recent Esteddfod at Wrexham, says a 

 writer in Wales for October, marked the high- 

 water mark of success — in regard to the magni- 

 tude of the audiences and the number and ex- 

 cellence of the competitors. Financially, also, 

 it was a success, for, notwithstanding the out- 

 lay of ;^5,ooo, there was a surplus of ;^i,ooo. 

 Yet, we read, criticism has not been wanting. 



A cry for reform. 



Mr. Granville Bantock, in delivering the 

 adjudication on the chief choral competition, 

 pointed out that Welsh music was in serious 

 danger of losing its individuality and pre- 

 eminence under the present condition of compe- 

 titions at the Eisteddfod, and he urged Welsh- 

 men to establish a Welsh National School of 

 Music if they desired to retain for Wales its 

 position as the home of the first musical race in 

 the British Isles. Many other suggestions for 

 reform were made. Eminent musicians in 

 Wales have 'time and again been pointing out 

 the sterility of the festival in the domain of 

 music, and the writer agrees that no music of 

 commanding merit is being fostered under its 

 aegis. Also there has of late been a marked 

 depreciation in quality of the literary output. 

 Thus a cry has gone forth for drastic reform 

 of the old institution. 



CHINESE DRAMA. 



M. G. de Banzemont contributes to La Revue 

 of October ist an interesting article on Contem- 

 porary Chinese Drama. 



Scenic representations accompany religious 

 festivals and every year, at the time tutelary 

 divinities are solemnly venerated, a temporary 

 theatre is improvised in front of the temple. In 

 some large towns, however, permanent theatres 

 have been erected, where plays are performed all 

 the year round, except during the first month of 

 the year and the time of mourning for an 

 Emperor recently deceased. The stage is a 

 simple platform with two doors. All the per- 

 formers enter together by one door and go off b\- 

 the other. There is no curtain. When one act 

 is finished the performers go off and others come 

 on. At one performance, usually a dozen one- 

 act pieces are given. Admission is free, but 

 refreshments have to be paid for. Eating and 

 drinking, the public follow the performance. 

 The stage may be at the south, east, or north 

 side, but never at the west side of the building, 

 generally regarded as the unlucky side. Scenerv 

 is represented by tables piled up one above 



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