MUSIC.

Dominion, Volume 1, Issue 45, 16 November 1907, Page 13

MUSIC.

(By , Treble Cr.EF.)

The Butts on Holiday. Madame Clara Butt and Mr. Konnerloy Rumford resolved before* they left England to make their Australasian visit a holiday trip ns well as a "business" tour. Already in pursuance of- that intention the ( y nave had one week of pleasure seeking—m Melbourne for • the Cup arid its consequent festivities, though Messrs J. and N. Tait wore ablo to induce thorn to appear for ono night only (on November 7) before the public during their week's gaieties. Again before they commence their tour through Now Zealand they aro planning to spend a few days sight seeing and resting at Rotorua, arid New Zealand's great show plaee will therefore be the first to welcome them to the Dominion'. ' . ' "Elijah" at Palmerston North. At nn. enthusiastic meeting held in Palmerston North on Tuesday ovoniiiß, it was decided that a performance of "Elijah" bo given there at an early date, Mr. Mauriea Cohen to bo the conductor. Tho following coiiimitteo have the arrangements in hand: I)r. Peach, Messrs. J. Nash, Essox, Bennett, Wnllnco, Pnrk, Barnicoat, Dallow, Jickell, Young, Chisholm. Loot, Vivian, Drew, Bctt, Mason, Mooro," Portc'oiis, Totnliuson, Lano and Hughes.' ' ' ' ' . / ■ KUDGIIk. ; Kubolik, ono of the greatest violin virtuosi in tho-world, is to, commence a tour of Australia in Juno next. One of the last

Srofessional engagements at Homo of Mr. ohn Prouso, of Wellington, was given in conjunction with the', great fiddler, still a young man, and both Mr. and Mrs. Prouso are enthusiastically praiscful of the GoJgiven talent possessed by the violinist that is to visit Australia next year. 'iPaderessKl." Ignaco Paderewski — or pronoueecllj "Padoresski"—is the subject of an interesting in a recent "Windsor Magazine." Tho master pianist keeps up two homes, one the Chateau Riond-Bosson, at Morges, Lake Geneva, and the other on his largo estate "Kosna," not far from Yarrow, in Poland.

"Padcrowski's second homo, which holds perhaps tho first place in his affections, is upon his estate in Poland, for heie a philanthropist, and his plans for the future aro invariably of the laying of some scheme by which his fellowmcn will benefit.- At Kosna ho is adored by his tenantry, who realise that it is his greatest ambition—an ambition that more than equals that other —to follow in the footsteps of Liszt and Chopin, and leave behind him something which tho world will not willingly let die to benefit them and free then! and his country from tho dire distress of poverty which lies upon her like a blight. s \ "At all hours of the day and night Paderewski plays the piano. His passionate devotion to his art is, perhaps, the most wonderful thing about him. 'I nover neglect my daily practice,' he told me—'arduous and wearing though it bo. My hands and fingers are always kept perfectly oiled, as you sec, and both hands and wrists aro massaged daily. I find it an excellent thing, just before giving an important recital, to steop my hands for some time, in extremely hot water. , " 'Perhaps the piano has earned me away at times, 1 lie says. 'I have'often spent tho entire night on a sonata of Beothovcn. Ono day I shall retire from concert work altogether and devote myself entirely to composition.' That.he should do this is not unlikely, for ho craves above all things peace and quiet, with opportunity to work out his destiny, his great ambition being to write music rather than interpret it. . ■ '"■'■' "Judged by any standard, evon by a nonmusical ono, Ignaco Paderewski is a remarkable figure in the world. Ho is marvellously well informed on every Bubieot, and to talk with him is to be left with tho impression that ho would have made the same phenomenal success in any other career that he has made in music. He speaks no loss than six languages fluently, and ho understands men almost as well as ho understands tho piano. He is great at the 'ivory allegory , '-ychess —a game that for ekill and • loresight involves the faculties of anxiety, memory, and strategy to a largo degree: ■ho ; o a. mathematician, which shows him tho sessor of a flbxiblo mind; ho is intellectual iu tho truest sense of the word : , since his intellectuality is of that typo which is an intelligence to others; ho is a scientist, .which —since ho is so great a 'musician—is not'perhaps wonderful, for is not all.science.one, its different parts being .for sake divided under different names? His miiid is the seal of a score of groat equalities; .to each of which, when he considers somo special power), he gives his whole soul." Solonco and Music.

Whon questions aro raised as to the modification, of any of tho characters of a- living spociee, tho modern biologist, well assured that acquired characteristics are not transmitted by inheritance, is careful to analyse tho alleged facts his own standpoint. ~ In the case of man, the enquiry'is'complicatod by a unique factor ,> to ;which, indeed, we owe an incalculable debt. This is tho ■> factor introduced by tho human, and! only human, power of recording achievement, so that it may bo stored up ior futuro generations, Thus man has, in effect and within. sharp limits, ovaded Nature's denial to living .speoies of tho powers: of transmitting acquirements. Acquirements aro, in a .Bouse, transmitted; else, for instance, neither could I write nor tho reader read,.unless wo were goniusos so consummate as. to create' theso arts for.ourselves. Ilpqn'jthis power cording and transmitting' achievement extra-biqlogically—that is. to,' soy,, quite apart ,from.and_outsido of the tho traditional progress of .mankind.';. It has no necessary relation to racial, is quito compatible with racial (i.e., biological) decadence —as history proves at large. If the Lamarckinn doctrine of heredity be denied, as it must bo, it follows that the / bolo factor of racial progrss is some form of natural or artificial selection; individuals, progressive in tho character under consideration being selected, as against others, to ' perpetuate tho spreier., and thereby, according to the laws of heredity, to transmit, their progressive' characters to tho next generation. ' " , ■' .'■■ ."•'■

These aro some of tho preliminary assumptions'with which one is already furnished, when there arises such a question as "Are wo becoming more musical?" Contemplate tho Queen's Hall any of theso evenings, and observe, the tightly-packed crowd, standing in what is described, with a pretty 'wit, as the "promenade," inhaling an atmospherewhich you could not cut with a knife,- and listening intently, not only to .tho. masterpieces of Ikothoven and Wagner, or oven the austere grandeurs of Brahms, but actually to new compositions of vast length and corresponding tenuity, with sincerity at lecsfc. As has often been observed, this spectacle would have been utterly incredible to our forefathers, and is'probably not-to bo matched anywhere in tho world at the present time. "Ergo," says tho optimist, ; "wo aro becoming moro musical." " This I entirely disbelieve, simply because,; knowing that wo gain nothing inherently, by our fntners' attendance at concerts, I am ' left with the factor of selection alone., to account for' any such racial change'. ".'.V-' I should certainly not assert that tho liking for music is without any "survival value,' . nnd may not promote psychical honlth, and so tend towards making its possessor favoured in the modern struggle for existence. If musical faculty had never had any sur-vh'al-valuo, or value for life, it would never havo been evolved, whether in tho birds or in man. But, of course, no ono would suggest that the immensely creditable, contrast between present audiences and their fathers was tho result of such a selective process—, except in a guito infinitesimal degree. In tho substantial nbfii'iico of this, and ■ of Lamarekiau inheritance (by winch wo could listen to Brahms because our fathers listened to Cosjta and Balfe, and so enabled-us to \ begin wbero they left off), it is a necessary truth that wo aro not becoming niorfi musical—in the only useful sense of the words;-

What, then," is happoning, the facts not being in question? js it uot patently absurd to deny that wo aro •■■■becoming more musical if wo listen rantly to Brahms—oven 1 ' Brahms —whilst our fathers not merely found him dull, but—which is far eiastically worshipped trash us treasure— Not at all: an obvious and adequate oxplanation is to hand, which conforms perfectly with scientific fact and common oxperienco.' A vital character ,as I have often said here, ie the product of tho multiplication'of the inherited potentiality—it is no "more—by the factor of environment: thus all vital characters are products of both heredity and , environment —many controversies on this subject buing quite beside the point. But it must surely bo tho case, with a creature so complex as man, that the utmost.is never - made of his inherent' potentialities. Ideally environed—or educated, in tho exact and only adequate seimc of tho wordShakespeare would havo beon a greater writer than Shaespearo. It is not that no ono is perfect, but that no one expands oven us far as his predestined limits. Our enso merely shows that the musical faculty—which is far less, extensively educated than tho visual faculty and tho literary faculty, for instnnco —was not developed in our fathers, whoso potentialities worn just as good as ours. In tho absence of anything remotely approaching stringout "musical selection" there is no othor explanation, nor is any other necessary. It may bo added, also, that tho fact of education, otherwise conceived, is tho fact of "adaptation to environment," a supremo and absolutely univorsal principle of all life whatsoever. Tho Queen's Hall audience of to-night is so adapted or educated. Had it never heard the reality it would bo content with imitations of music, as its fathora woro: as content as the iuvalid soon becomes with his eick-bed or tho many with had literature, the elave_ with his chains, or the microbe with a modified culture-medium. All lifo has somo capacity for adaptation, and Mr. Wood, for instance/is only beginning .to teach us the capacity of that capacity 'in respect of music,—C. W.-S., in tho "Pall Mall Gazette." -