V
During the second half of the nineteenth century the teaching of music passed in large measure from the hands of single, independent teachers into the direction of music masters associated in institutions for class instruction, which are generally known as conservatories, although this term in its European signification of a large, completely equipped and nationally endowed school of music is misleading. Indeed, the pretense seems to have been deliberate. Dr. Frank Damrosch, in an address on 'The American Conservatory,' before the Music Teachers' National Association at Oberlin, Ohio, in 1906, said:
'The so-called conservatory, college, or university of music ... may be found in every American community.... It is usually organized by an individual whose commercial instincts are stronger than his musical conscience, and who, banking on the dense ignorance of the average citizen in matters of art, offers what seems to be a great bargain in the acquisition of musical ability in one form or another.... There are many such schools which seemingly flourish by the glittering, if empty, promises which they advertise. Some of them confer degrees; ... one of the first musical doctor degrees conferred by the director of one of these schools was on himself!'
While there are hundreds of conservatories of the class described by Dr. Damrosch scattered over the Union, a number of institutions are to be found which rank in thoroughness and comprehensiveness of instruction with the best European conservatories. These have been in every instance of slow growth, the most pretentious in chartered plans having made early and signal failures in the province of musical education, though some of them won success in other musical activities. A typical example of this order is the Academy of Music of New York, whose career is recorded in Chapter VI.
The earliest American conservatory worthy of its name is the Conservatory of Music of the Peabody Institute, Baltimore, which was founded in 1857. Its chief contribution to American musical education has been the Peabody concerts, a series of eight performances having been given annually since 1865. From 1872 to 1898 Asger Hamerick, the Danish composer, was director. He organized an orchestra of fifty performers, which became, under his intelligent training, a highly efficient instrument for the rendition of the most advanced music. The programs of his concerts were formed of overtures, symphonies, concertos, suites, and vocal solos. He gave especial attention to works by American, English, and Scandinavian composers, performing for the first time in America many notable compositions, among them a number of his own. The good work of the Peabody concerts, attracting, as it has done, the respectful attention of foreign masters, should be a matter both of encouragement and pride to those who have the cause of American music at heart. It points the way to high attainment in our musical appreciation and notable achievement in native composition.
The year of 1867 is notable in American musical history for the establishment of five leading conservatories or musical colleges: the New England Conservatory in Boston; the Boston Conservatory; the Cincinnati Conservatory; the Oberlin Conservatory; and the Chicago Academy of Music, later known as the Chicago Musical College.
The New England Conservatory was founded by Eben Tourjée, whom Sir George Grove, in his 'Dictionary of Music and Musicians,' denominates the 'father of the conservatory or class system of instruction in America.' The nature of this system and its advantages have been well expressed by Felix Mendelssohn-Bartholdy, who said: 'The class system has the advantage over the private instruction of the individual in that, by the participation of several in the same lessons and studies, a true feeling is awakened; and in that it promotes industry, spurs to emulation, and is a preservative from one-sidedness of education and taste.'
Dr. Tourjée, in 1851, at the age of seventeen, formed classes at his home, Fall River, Mass., for instruction in vocal and instrumental music. In 1859 he founded a musical institute at East Greenwich, where he greatly developed his method. In 1863 he visited Europe to gain information concerning the conduct of European conservatories, and upon the ideas thus secured he established the Providence Conservatory of Music, and in 1867 the New England Conservatory of Music in Boston. For a time he conducted both schools, then devoted himself exclusively to the latter. From its beginning the Boston institution secured the best masters available and gave a maximum of musical instruction at a minimum of cost. It has sent forth over the country thousands of accomplished pianists, organists, and vocalists, and, what is even more pertinent to the present subject, music teachers, trained in Tourjée's methods. After the founder died (in 1890), Carl Faelten acted as director, until in 1897 he founded a school of his own for instruction in the piano. No school of its kind stands higher in America.
In 1897 George W. Chadwick, the professor of harmony, composition, and orchestration, was made director of the New England Conservatory. For several years Mr. Chadwick had conducted the annual musical festivals at Springfield and Worcester, Mass., and his special attention was thereby directed toward great orchestral and choral performances by the students, whose number was mounting into the thousands. By the generosity of patrons of the Conservatory, especially Eben D. Jordan, president of the trustees, a large building was erected in 1902, containing facilities for instruction superior even to those of European conservatories, and an auditorium, Jordan Hall, whose large size and fine acoustic properties render it one of the important concert halls of the country, use as such being frequently made of it by visiting artists, to the great advantage of the students as well as the general public. The instrumental equipment of the conservatory is large, the collection of organs, including the pipe organ in Jordan Hall, which is one of the largest in the world, being especially notable.
The conservatory possesses one of the best working musical libraries in the country, a unique feature being the choral library of the Boylston Club (founded 1872) and its successor, the Boston Singers, which contains many copies of manuscript treasures in European collections. This library was a gift to the conservatory by George L. Osgood. The Boston Public Library nearby contains the Allen A. Brown collection of musical books and manuscripts, which is excelled in America only by the Congressional Library at Washington. Accordingly, the pupils of the conservatory have at hand every facility for acquiring a musical education which the most ardent student could desire. It is not surprising that among its three thousand and more students every one of the forty-eight states of the Union is represented, as well as a dozen foreign countries, even distant Russia and Turkey.
The curriculum of the conservatory has been generally described by Frederick W. Colburn in 'The Musical Observer' for July, 1913. Mr. Colburn, after mentioning special features, such as the conservatory orchestra of seventy-five members, affording the training and routine indispensable to professional performers whose ranks it is annually supplying, says: 'While the new is studied, the fundamentals are not lost sight of. All the courses have been planned to avoid turning out narrow and one-sided specialists. The management realizes that the professional musician has need of very broad and very correct culture. The students listen to lectures on the history and theory of music from such authorities as Louis C. Elson and Wallace Goodrich. The modern languages and English diction are taught by experts, several of whom are authors of their own text-books. The pianoforte instruction follows approved methods; it shows much of the influence of the late Carl Baermann, one of the most eminent of the German musicians who have settled in this country. The vocal instruction is along the lines of the old Italian method which has formed the voices of most of the world's great singers. The teaching of the organ accords with the practice of the best German and French organists. In all departments there is present the idea of thoroughly grounding the student in the essentials of musical art and of avoiding easy, ready-made and get-culture-quick methods.'
The Boston Conservatory, second in the list of five founded in 1867, was organized by Julius Eichberg, a distinguished German violinist and composer, who had been, since 1859, director of the orchestra at the Boston Museum. This speedily won and long maintained a high reputation, particularly for instruction in the violin, on which subject Eichberg prepared a number of valuable text-books.
The Cincinnati Conservatory of Music was founded by Clara Bauer, who still is active in its management, having charge of the home for the female pupils. This was the first conservatory in the country to establish a residence department—indeed, its group of buildings and park-like grounds give the conservatory a truly academic aspect possessed by few institutions of its kind that are situated in cities. Miss Bauer, however, recognized from the beginning that the all-important element of a conservatory was its teaching force. She secured representative talent in the various branches of music from the various European musical centres, thereby securing warm approbation of the institution from foreign musical artists and critics. The faculty now numbers sixty members; it contains artists notable for excellence in every branch of musical arts and pedagogy. General cultural studies, such as dramatic art, literature, and modern languages, are conducted with special application to their relation to music.
The Cincinnati Conservatory was the first to conduct a summer music school. The sessions have been uninterrupted since 1867. Attended largely by music teachers, they have greatly advanced the cause of musical education in the territory tributary to the city.
The Oberlin Conservatory of Music, at Oberlin, presents so many object lessons of musical pedagogy that it demands rather extended treatment here.
In the first place, the institution had a natural origin: it was formed to teach psalmody to a religious community and, in growing beyond this limited field by adding one musical feature after another as the developing taste of the people demanded, it typifies the history of music in the nation. Secondly, the conservatory has a proper environment. It was planted in a soil already enriched by culture, Oberlin being the seat of a college distinguished for progressive ideas and high ideals, the reaction of which upon musical work is always inspiring—indeed, is essential to the highest achievement. Thirdly, the Oberlin Conservatory has a proper organization. It is a social democracy and thereby calculated to produce that free and fraternal spirit which is the soul of art. Young men and women meet on equal terms and there are no distinctions among them based on wealth or nationality or even race, Oberlin having been the first college to include negroes among its students. Lastly, the conservatory has a sound program and is living up to this as well as could be expected in view of the pressure exerted on all 'schools of the people,' to supply immediate demands. It believes in constructive work, in learning by doing. Thus it regards a practical knowledge of the science of musical composition as necessary to an intelligent appreciation of musical masterpieces, and to this end has established a course in theory and composition which requires four years of hard study and assiduous practice. The class system of instruction is the one adopted as the chief method, it being supplemented by private instruction.
Dr. Florens Ziegfeld, a distinguished German pianist, still conducts (1915) the conservatory which he founded in Chicago—the last of the five started in 1867—under the name of the Chicago Academy of Music, and which is now called the Chicago Musical College. The institution was burned out in the great fire of 1871, but with indomitable courage Dr. Ziegfeld at once secured new quarters and continued his classes. The course of study was steadily enlarged until now it includes every department of music and the principal modern languages, the faculty being one of the strongest in the country, comparing favorably with those of European conservatories. By authority of the State of Illinois the college grants music teachers' certificates and confers musical degrees. The college is finely situated on Michigan Boulevard, overlooking Lake Michigan and Grant Park. It contains a concert hall seating 1,000. A student orchestra of seventy members is maintained, affording practical training in conducting and ensemble playing.
In 1871 a conservatory of music was established in Jacksonville, Ill., the seat of Illinois College. Its founder was Professor W. D. Sanders, a leading Western educator, and its first director was I. B. Poznanski, a violinist and composer who later became instructor at the Royal Conservatory, London. In 1903 the conservatory was merged with the college. The Cleveland Conservatory of Music was also founded in 1871. It adopted the European conservatory method of instruction.
In 1873 Northwestern University at Evanston, Ill., became a co-educational institution and at once established a 'Conservatory of Music' that began, and for many years thereafter remained, on a low plane of instruction. The university authorities, in the manner of old-time monarchs, 'farmed out' to the director of the conservatory the privilege of running the business for a percentage of the receipts, and gave him a free hand and full responsibility. Naturally the conservatory was conducted in a way to produce the greatest immediate returns.
In 1891 Prof. P. C. Lutkin was put in charge of the conservatory. He insisted that the title be dropped and that the school be made a department of the university, directly under control of the university authorities; and that its director should receive a full professorship with a fixed salary, in order that educational ideals should not be compromised by financial considerations. These changes were authorized, and Professor Lutkin radically revised and extended the curriculum to make it conform to academic standards. By 1895 a four-years course was developed, to correspond with that of the Liberal Arts department. The 'Department of Music' then assumed the title of 'School of Music' and became a coördinate division of the university, like the School of Law, the School of Mines, etc., with its own dean and faculty. Its pupils, of course, retained all the opportunities for general culture afforded by the college of Liberal Arts.
In an address delivered before the Music Teachers' National Association at Oberlin in 1906, Professor Lutkin said: 'The exact point where general education should give way to the study of music is a much discussed one, and we will not stop to consider it here, except to say that we have placed it at the point of entrance-requirements in the College of Liberal Arts. The fact that the students are able to pursue advanced work in history of music, harmony, counterpoint, analysis, etc., is of itself a clear index as to their mental capacity, and places them, without doubt, upon a plane of mentality quite up to that required of college students.' The music department of the Northwestern University now ranks with the best conservatories in the country.
Concerts have always formed the leading element in developing American appreciation of music. The enthusiasm created by the festivals conducted in Cincinnati by Theodore Thomas in the early seventies led directly to the establishment in 1878 of the Cincinnati College of Music by Miss Dora Nelson. The institution was planned along the lines of European conservatories, with a close relation to superior public performances in the city, the patrons of which were patrons of the college. With a fine faculty the institution has retained to the present the high reputation it won at the outset. Theodore Thomas was the first musical director of the school, and among his successors is Frank Van der Stucken.
Of the important Chicago schools of music the earliest was the Chicago Conservatory, established in 1884. Quite a typical institution is the American Conservatory of Chicago. It was founded in 1886 by its present head, President John J. Hattstaedt, with the assistance of several of Chicago's music-loving citizens. Its quarters were in Weber Hall Building, corner of Wabash Avenue and Jackson Street, which were retained for ten years, when the conservatory was removed to the adjoining building—Kimball Hall, where it still remains.
From a small institution it has grown to be one of America's largest schools of music, registering about 2,000 students annually. The faculty numbers seventy-five, and contains many teachers of national reputation. A modern and thorough curriculum includes all branches of instrumental and vocal music, theory and composition, dramatic art, expression, physical culture, and modern languages. Special features are: a complete and well-established Normal School, a student's orchestra, a musical bureau and a carefully arranged series of faculty and pupils' recitals.
In 1885 two conservatories, the American Institute of Applied Music and the National Conservatory of Music, were established in New York. Miss Kate S. Chittenden was the founder of the Institute, Mrs. Jeannette M. Thurber of the Conservatory. Both are flourishing to-day under control of the founders and with excellent faculties and ample musical facilities.
The National Conservatory, because of certain philanthropic features, is deserving of special mention as a type of institution which is not wholly commercial in its ends, and which has prepared the way for a type that is purely artistic in its purposes. It offers musical instruction to every applicant without regard to race, sex, or creed, the sole condition being that he shall give proof of a natural talent for music; this instruction it imparts without cost to those unable to pay.
The title of National Conservatory is formally justified by the fact that it was chartered in 1891 by a special act of Congress, the official home being designated as Washington. A far better claim to the title could be based on the facts that names of even more than national fame appear on the roll of its faculty from the beginning, when such musicians as Rafael Joseffy, Camilla Urso, and Victor Herbert were connected with the institution, down through Dvořák's brilliant régime to the present day.
The Conservatory at its outset secured experts in special lines of music as instructors. For three years (1892-95) Dr. Antonin Dvořák was its director. Under his management liberal prizes were awarded for original compositions, and the works, a symphony by Henry Schoenefeld, a piano concerto by Joshua Phillen, a suite for string orchestra by Frederick Bullard, and a cantata by Horatio W. Parker, were performed in public concert. Under the direction of the distinguished composer the National Conservatory orchestra became notable not only for artistic excellence, but, what pertains more to the present subject, for the superior training it afforded poor young men of talent, and the places this enabled them to obtain in leading American orchestras. This work, of course, did not cease with Dr. Dvořák's retirement.
An institution incorporating in a systematic and substantial way the public and philanthropic spirit which has called into existence so many of our conservatories and schools of music is the Institute of Musical Art of the City of New York. This is the model institution of its kind in America; and, as there is promise that its example will be followed in other cities of the Union, leading to the establishment of musical education on a high and uniform plane, it deserves special notice.
Recognizing that schools of music, inaugurated with fine ideals and a sound program to attain these, have almost without exception been forced by the need of funds to lower their standard and modify their curricula to suit the popular demand for easy and flashy courses, Dr. Frank Damrosch determined to found an institution wherein commercial considerations would not enter. In James Loeb, a New York banker, he found a patron of art in thorough sympathy with the project. By a fund of a half million dollars, given in memory of his mother, Betty Loeb, Mr. Loeb put the splendid idea into concrete form, and in 1905 established and endowed the Institute of Musical Art with Dr. Damrosch as its director.
The purpose of the Institute is to provide thorough and comprehensive courses in music, each of which is planned to include every study necessary for mastering a particular branch of music, and all of which taken together cover the whole art. The Institute is enabled to execute this plan inflexibly because it is independent of tuition fees, since the revenue from these is supplemented by the interest of the funds. Accordingly the fees have been fixed at moderate and uniform rates, while no expense is spared in securing the best talent available as a teaching and training force.
The roll of the faculty contains seventy-seven names. The faculty council which directs the policy of the Institute consists of the director and five other experts. Since operatic and concert managers agree that individual instruction and criticism cannot be too carefully given in the case of students intending to make the performance of music a profession, and, as this thorough system of education is equally beneficial to the amateur, it has been adopted by the Institute. Theoretical subjects are the only ones taught in class.
In addition to the direct personal teaching which the student receives, he is surrounded by artistic and educational influences calculated to broaden his general knowledge and culture and to improve his taste and discrimination. The discipline which is an essential principle of the Institute, and which is lacking in private instruction, where the pupil often demands and obtains relaxing modifications of the instructor's system to suit his inclinations, since he is paying for his education, is of the highest value in developing character. Students of an art which in its nature tends to overstimulate the emotional nature need a corrective cultivation of the powers of the intellect and the will which students of other subjects do not so much require, since, from their studies, intellectual development is acquired directly and, reason being the governor of the will, control of this great moral force is indirectly imparted.
Like the National Conservatory the Institute is open to students of both sexes, irrespective of creed or race. The only demand is that they give proof of general intelligence, musical ability and serious purpose. Every regular student is required to follow a prescribed course not only in the specific branch which he has selected, but, in order to provide a proper foundation for this, in the subject of music in general. The student begins the course at the stage for which his attainments and abilities have prepared him, as these are indicated by three tests: as to his general knowledge of music; as to his sense of musical hearing; as to his vocal or instrumental talent.
The departments of study are singing, piano, organ, stringed instruments, orchestra, public school music and theoretic course. The courses are divided into seven grades, the last four being post-graduate. The post-graduate diplomas are of two types, called teachers' and artists'. For the teachers' diploma two grades of pedagogy and advanced work in theory and technique are required; for the artists', either two or three grades in theory, technique, and ear training, according to the proficiency of the student, which is tested not only by work done in the Institute, but by a public recital before musicians not connected with the Institute. The work of the seventh grade in the artists' course is confined to the study of composition in the various forms of complete sonata, chamber music, vocal forms, overture and orchestration. A prize sufficient to provide for a year of European life and experience is given annually to that graduate in any of the artists' courses, or in composition, whom the faculty and trustees think most deserving of the award and distinction.
The leading schools of music in Canada are the Toronto Conservatory of Music and the Conservatorium of Music in McGill University at Montreal.
The Toronto Conservatory was founded by the late Dr. Fisher in 1886 and opened in 1887. In the thoroughness of its courses and the completeness of its equipment it ranks with the best conservatories in Europe. In 1897 it purchased its present centrally located site, in close proximity to the cluster of educational and public buildings, and began the erection of the structures which now form its commodious home. Its music hall is architecturally one of the finest edifices of the kind and its auditorium is acoustically one of the most satisfactory halls in Canada for chamber music and other recitals. It contains a three-manual concert organ which is a masterpiece of Canadian workmanship. The main hall is supplemented by smaller ones for lectures and recitals and by practice rooms equipped with two-manual organs. The musical equipment in general is ample and comprehensive, meeting the needs of the 2,500 pupils in attendance.
On the death of Dr. Fisher in 1913, Dr. A. S. Vogt, whose work as conductor of the Mendelssohn Choir of Toronto is well known, and who had been for many years teacher of piano in the Conservatory, was advanced to the position of director. The faculty consists of 139 professors and instructors. It is almost exclusively British in composition, in striking contrast to the faculties of leading conservatories in the United States, on whose roll Continental European names abound, often to the point of a majority. However, many of the instructors have received their education at foreign conservatories.
The Conservatory is divided into eleven departments, schools for the piano, the voice, the organ, the violin, and other stringed instruments, theoretical instruction, embracing harmony, counterpoint, composition, orchestration, musical history and acoustics, orchestral and band music, expression (including education, physical culture, etc.), modern languages, piano tuning, and kindergarten music method. The extremely practical elements of this curriculum indicate the attention paid to the fundamental needs of the public.
The Conservatory maintains an orchestra for practice in routine and training for students sufficiently advanced to justify their assignment to places in the organization. Frank E. Blatchford, of the violin faculty, who is also concert master of the Toronto Symphony Orchestra, is the conductor.
The Conservatory is affiliated with its near neighbor, the University of Toronto. Students who pass the conservatory examinations in musical theory are exempted from corresponding examinations by the University for the degree of Bachelor of Music. In its desire to spread at least a measure of musical knowledge and appreciation among the people, the conservatory conducts correspondence courses in musical theory, and, for the convenience of practice, especially in the piano, maintains eleven branches in the outlying residential districts of Toronto.
The McGill University Conservatorium was opened in 1904. The Conservatorium, however, was then only in its experimental stage and it was not until October, 1908, that the connecting link between the University and the Conservatorium was completed by the appointment as director of Dr. Harry Crane Perrin, professor of music in the University. In 1909 the orchestra was formed, which was composed of students of the Conservatorium, and in February of that year they gave their first orchestral concert.