MUSICAL RECONSTRUCTION.
(By our Special Reporter, who is also busy with the Coal Commission).
At the meeting of the Musical Reconstruction Commission last Saturday the President, Mr. Justice Bland, announced the resignation of Mr. Patrick Horan, an Irish choirmaster, owing to the results of his adjudicating between the competing Sinn Fein brass bands at a "Feis," or festival, held at Athlone on Easter Monday. Mr. Justice Bland said that he felt sure he was interpreting the feelings of all the members of the Commission in uniting to express regret at Mr. Horan's resignation and hope for his speedy recovery from his injuries. Continuing, the President said he had received a letter from the Minister of Music, informing him that Sir Hercules Plunkett, K.B.E., Chairman of the Amalgamated Society of Mandolin, Balalaika and Banjo-makers, had been invited to fill the vacant place.
Mr. Tony Hole, Scriabin Fellow of Syndicalist Economics at Caius College, Cambridge, then presented a memorandum on the Guild Control of Composers on the bagis of a forty-hour week, with equal opportunity for performance, the economic use of orchestral resources and the preferential treatment of Russian folk-tunes as thematic material. All members of the Guild should receive the same salary free of income tax; all performances should be free, and applause or encores prohibited as likely to lead to the rupture of artistic solidarity. The profits from the sale of programmes should go into the National Exchequer, but should be earmarked for a Pension Fund for the relief of composers on their compulsory retirement at the age of sixty.
Examined by Sir Leonardo Spaghetti Coyne, Mr. Hole said that he was not aware that the mortality among monkeys employed in the piano-organ industry during the late War was excessive. But he agreed that the fearlessness shown by the monkeys at the Zoo in the course of air-raids deserved a special decoration.
Mr. William Susie, who next occupied the chair, was examined by Mr. Moody MacTear on the question of the nationalisation of Royalty Ballads.
Mr. MacTear, quoting an estimate by a Fellow of the Thermaëro-statistical Society, that the ballad composers of the country could produce one hundred and ninety thousand million ballads in five hundred and eighty years, asked the witness whether it would be legitimate that a royalty charge should be made on every ballad produced during that period for the benefit of certain individuals of future generations. Mr. Susie replied that the State had recognised the right of royalties and therefore he saw no good reason for discontinuing the charge.
Mr. Gladney Jebb. Are you aware that there have been more cases of influenza amongst people who have attended Royalty Ballad concerts in 1918 than amongst all the troops who served on the Palestine Front since 1916? Mr. Susie challenged Mr. Jebb to produce his statistics, and it was arranged, at the suggestion of the President, that Mr. Jebb should be given facilities to proceed to Jericho and collect them.
After the luncheon interval Mr. Cyril Blunt read a report, which he had prepared at the request of the Commission, on the Nationalisation of the Folk-song Industry. He said that it was a scandalous paradox that this natural and obvious reform had hitherto been successfully resisted by unscrupulous individualistic action. Folk-tunes were the product of and belonged to the People, but they had been seized, exploited and perverted by composers, who should be forced to refund the profits they had derived from their robbery. The conservation of our national musical resources should be jealously guarded, and the collection, notation and harmonisation of these tunes carried on under rigorous State supervision. At the same time the State might issue licences for the symphonic use of folk-tunes, the profits from the sale of these licences to be devoted to the maintenance of village festivals, at which only genuine folk-music should be performed by the oldest inhabitants.
Asked by Sir Mark Holloway what he meant by genuine folk-music, Mr. Blunt said, "Tunes of which it is impossible to assign the authorship to a known composer."
Mr. Kilcrankie Fox, who was the next witness, was subjected to a very searching examination by Mr. Moody MacTear, Mr. Gladney Jebb and Sir Leonardo Spaghetti Coyne.
Mr. Moody MacTear. Are you aware that brass instrument players are habitually sweated in orchestras and bands?—It depends on what you mean. I certainly admit that their activities often conduce to profuse perspiration.
Mr. Moody MacTear. Have you ever played the trombone yourself?—No, nor the lyre either.
Mr. Gladney Jebb. Are you prepared to deny that the strain on the nerves of players in Jazz-bands, especially drums, is greater than that endured by soldiers in the front-line trenches during an intense bombardment?—As a rule I am prepared to deny at sight any statement for which you are responsible, but I concede you the big drum.
Sir Leonardo Spaghetti Coyne. Are you aware that, owing to profiteering in the cloth trade, organ-grinders have been unable to provide their Simian assistants with proper habiliments during the recent inclement weather?—"Apes are apes though clothed in scarlet"—or broadcloth. I have not noticed any shabbiness of late in the garb of those with whom I am acquainted.
The Commission broke up at a late hour. At the next meeting evidence will be taken on the subject of the housing of musical seals and the alleged profiteering of dealers in burnt cork at the expense of players in Jazz-bands.
Waiter (a demobilised Sergeant—as Staff officer enters). "ROOM—'SHUN!"
FOR SALE,
STANDARD BABY.
Lately overhauled."Cape Times.
Inhuman, we call it.