MODERN MUSIC

New Zealand Listener, Volume 3, Issue 74, 22 November 1940, Page 19

MODERN MUSIC

Sir-As an old buffer well into his sixth decade it astounds me to read the letters of other old buffers in reference to their dislike for jazz and crooning! Those are not new accomplishments by any means, and if they will cast their minds back half a century or more they may recollect their own jazz bands on Saturday mornings out in the back garden before their Dads came home for lunch. There would be quite a number of performers, and it all depended on the length of time which had elapsed since Christmas as to what instruments actually were in commission and which had suffered from having been walked or sat down on, but as a rule the following had a part in the programme and the results were very similar but admittedly slightly more melodious than we get at present: Pride of place of course was given to the big tea-tray, which with the tea-cosy as uniform, led the procession; then there would be a small drum with one side still in working order; next came the large and much-dented gilt cardboard trumpets which you booed through; a kazoo perhaps the leading instrument, in sound the forerunner of the saxophone for funny noises, but more accurate and always in good working order for some unknown reason; bones with lead things that rattled; a concertina; an ocarina; a

real penny tin whistle; a jew’s harp; a pre-Adler mouth-organ which in those days merely produced two chords (a blow and a suck); the comb and tissue paper which made your lips go all funny (a sensation also caused by the old battered bugle), and the smaller tea-tray to bring up the rear. There might possibly have been additions or subtractions at times, but ten performers was about the average number, and fortunately nobody sang. There was usually one particular " signature " tune for each year-"White Wings," "Two Little Girls in Blue," " After the Ball," and so forth, and the extraordinary and outstanding fact was that in those days you could actually tell one tune from another-nowadays a forgotten art, when all tunes (pardon, " melodies ") sound much the same, only some are worse than others. As regards crooners the subject is somewhat painful. These, too, are ancient, and even after all these years the sight and sound of two of them remains photographed on my mind: At the age of seven I was returning from the Pantomime in a four-wheeler, when there was a stoppage for a few moments in a block at the corner where the blazing gas lights and brilliantly lit windows of a public house illuminated the whole street. There in the gutter before the door stood a ragged couple, male and female, and the sounds which issued from their lips still haunt me, but not the words. These were "crooners" and they were "crooning "!-" THE SKOOSHOOK" (Ohura). ;