æsthetic nature and the formation of worthy character are the most important objects of education, and that music, more directly than any other study in the schools, assists in the accomplishment of this highest aim of a broad education.

CONTENT AND EXTENT OF MUSIC IN PUBLIC SCHOOLS

BY HERBERT GRIGGS, DIRECTOR OF MUSIC, PUBLIC SCHOOLS,
DENVER, COLO.

Music as taught in some schools is entirely mental, entirely musical, or entirely exhibitional.

What should be the content or the extent of the study of music in our schools? Do we wish to turn out of our eighth year or of the high school well-equipped musicians? Do we wish to study music for exhibition purposes only? Do we have the music hour for the sake of recreation or pleasure for the pupil or teacher? Or do we wish a combination of all or part of the above?

Of course, the result to be obtained depends upon the point of view of those in authority. Personally I believe the object of public education. is to make good citizens, and I believe that the study of music should be an important part of that education.

Should you ask me if I thought the acquisition of knowledge made good citizens, I should certainly say no; and as I believe the acquisition of knowledge is only a part of education, and it is that part which has nothing whatever to do with morals any more than theology has to do with religion, so I do not believe that a good musician is necessarily a good man.

The standard I have of music in the public schools is high, but no higher than it should be to be fair to the teacher, the pupil, and the public; but it is as high as, if not higher than, that of any other study. If pupils on leaving the eighth year or the high school have ability to sing intelligently music of ordinary difficulty at first sight- well enough to sing their part with good quality of tone in choir or chorus; if they have learned thru the practice of musical exercises to concentrate their thought, strengthen their mental power, quicken their perception; to appreciate the good and beautiful in music, so that they would rather associate with those who live better and purer lives than with the companions to be found on the streets; then I think that the object of music in the public schools is attained.

Music, when properly taught, should accomplish the following results: 1. Mentally, a quickening of the perceptive faculties thru exercise in rapid discovery, recognition, and concentration.

2. Physically, thru exercise in breathing, tone production, correct position of the body, and of the saturation of the body and mind with sonorous fluid.

3. Disciplinary, thru doing the same thing, in the same way, at the same time, and the effect of sustained tone and harmony on the mind, thus dissipating the spirit of contradiction.

4. Morally, by creating a love for the good and beautiful in music, thereby causing in pupils, especially of older years, a desire to associate with company of refined and elevated tastes; also to impress on the mind lessons of honesty, courage, cleanliness, truthfulness, patriotism, and respect for parents and elders by the repetition of good words set to good music. If the above results are obtained, good citizenship will take care of itself.

To what extent should the study of music be carried? Shall it be carried so far as to cause the pupils to be hypercritical? Shall we carry it so far that they will become expert harmonists and adepts in musical history and musical form? Shall they be such super-finished musical dissectors that all the life and soul is wrenched out of what they perform or hear, and they receive no pleasure or enjoyment thereby? I think not. It seems that with the multiplicity of systems (each one the best) we are moving in the wrong direction; we are teaching and talking thru our heads instead of our heads and hearts. There should be a limitation. We have been too critical and analytical, and have not been paying enough attention to the aesthetical and emotional.

The analytical and critical should be carried only so far as it promotes appreciation and sympathy. When the two lines begin to diverge it is time to stop. There is a certain mental work that must be done to enable the pupil to appreciate the beauty of anything. A child must learn to read words and sentences to appreciate a poem. A child must learn to read music readily to take in the beauty of a composition; but when the head goes before the heart, we have as a product a set of pedantic critics; and when the heart gets beyond the head, we have a lot of watery-minded sentimentalists. In the lower grades of the schools the technical and mental must be largely taught, but not to the entire exclusion of the emotional. In the eighth year and high school the two should be joined.

As I understand it, public education is not for the individual exclusively, but for the mass. I do not suppose that the public cares whether John Jones, or even a whole class of John Joneses, when they leave school have the ability to name technically every flower or plant, or their parts, or that they can transpose, harmonize, or sing at first sight any music set before them; but the public does care that they leave school with minds bright and active; that they take their places in business capable of earning a respectable livelihood; and, as members of society, courteous, honest, courageous, with respect for parents and elders; and, as citizens,

with love for their country, ready and willing to do their part toward the furtherance of their country's good. This is what I think taxpayers are paying their money for, and it is what they should expect and should have. This is public education; and, as I have said before, music is a part of it and a most important part.

Unfortunately, the average citizen is very shortsighted; he does not know, but the school board and the superintendent should know, that the people of this country should have value received for the money they pay in the form of taxes not here and there for an exceptionally proficient musician; not for a song, however beautiful, sung on exhibition day; but rather for boys and girls with well-rounded characters, all the better for the ability and desire to be useful to society, and to contribute their part to the pleasure and happiness of others.

But some would say that this would make the study of music dry and uninteresting, and that pupils would soon have a distaste for the study, and would drop it as soon as allowed. This brings me to another point,

namely, the teacher.

We all know that the success or failure of a study depends on the manner in which it is presented. There are teachers who would make the Mississippi river dry if they had to do with it. There are dry and uninteresting facts to be learned about music; and this is not peculiar to this branch of study. There are many characters, many technical terms, used, and many difficulties to be overcome; and, if all this were for the sake of music alone, I would say: Teach only that which is pleasant, easy, and the most quickly learned. It depends on the teacher to make a difficulty pleasant; to make what is in itself dry, interesting; to create a desire to learn that which would be distasteful but for the manner in which it is presented.

Men and women learn in their youth what they never will learn in their later years, viz., the rudimentary principles of anything; and music is no exception to the rule. Neither men nor women will be content to apply themselves to that which they feel is more appropriate to minds of younger age.

If at the age of twenty-five one cannot read music readily at first sight, however much he may desire it, he will never learn. On the other hand, one who at the same age can sing easily at first sight music of ordinary difficulty will never leave it. How necessary, then, for the good and benefit of those who hear and those who sing in later years that it should be most thoroly taught, even if at the time it seems so dry and uninteresting; that the literature of music should be to them an open book of delightful and easy perusal!

What should be the character of the music of our schools for the various occasions which so often occur?

I am quite sure that all will agree in demanding music of a good,

wholesome character. Trivial music, from the lowest grade to the high school, should never be allowed. From out of the number of books published, and the large number of songs in them, a school is without excuse that has not music and words of a suitable character for all occasions. Music can be good and yet be cheerful and pleasant; it may be classical and yet not be tedious or too difficult. Suitable songs appropriate to the age of the children and to the occasion, well sung, are a delight to teachers, pupils, and listeners.

For morning exercises, especially in the high school, the music has much more effect than is generally supposed; if it is of a quiet, forceful dignity, or of a healthful, manly, or cheerful character, it surely leaves an impression on the minds of the pupils, whether they be conscious of it or not, that will effect their conduct; and the use of such music, with proper words, from day to day and month to month cannot fail to affect their characters for good. The pupil may not know why, but he feels better, a little more manly; perhaps a weak resolution is strengthened, or he sees for the first time the meanness of some contemplated action, and it is dropped. Of course, boy-like he would not, if he knew, acknowledge the reason, even to himself, but the effect is there just the same.

I have tried in this paper to impress upon your minds the necessity of a high standard of music, the importance of music as a study, the neces sity of the use of the best methods of teaching, and some encouragement to those to whom the study has become tedious and irksome.

Is it possible that you have no pleasure in your work, and such work? You come before your class with all conditions favorable in so far as yourself is concerned, prompt and regular attendance of your pupils, disciplinary power, authoritative right, mutual confidence. You have an aim, it is high; you know what your object is, it is noble; with those pupils before you, is there no joy in creatión? no pleasure in discovery? no satisfaction in development? It is for you in the study of music to create, discover, and develop in the mind of the child that which will make his life brighter and better, and from day to day, as he hears, reads, and thinks music, he comes to the lessons more and more prepared to receive new thoughts and experience new pleasure in the consciousness of gaining more power and control over faculties, the possession of which he had scarcely realized.

As he overcomes technical difficulties and learns to apply them in song and chorus, he feels a satisfaction in the acquirement of such knowledge, and then he learns to appreciate the beauties of music for its own sake. He desires to associate with those who love the good in music for his own sake, and he becomes a more manly and a purer-minded citizen for his country's sake.

DISCUSSION

MISS ALICE LYON, Whittier, Cal. Is it not quite as necessary to develop the æsthetic and emotional nature in the early grades of school as in the later?

HERBERT GRIGGS, Denver, Colo.-The emotional side of music should receive attention as well as the technical, but not to so great an extent, as there is not sufficient time in the fifteen minutes a day devoted to it.

P. C. HAYDEN, Quincy, Ill.—Practically, if the child has not learned the technics of music before the eighth year of school life, it will not be learned later. Ability to sing well and give expression to what is sung should be the main feature in the eighth grade and the high school. The mere singing of the song in the grades below develops the emotions.

MRS. GASTON BOYD, Newton, Kan.-Every grade teacher recognizes that to teach dry, technical facts in any subject there must be an excitement of the imagination of the child in a pleasant direction. The teacher who can do this is the most successful in teaching any branch, not music alone.

WHAT POWER DOES THE CHILD GAIN THRU MUSIC

STUDY?

BY THOMAS TAPPER, BOSTON, MASS.

I. I shall state my reply to this query at once, in order that I may use the time at my disposal to suggest how the power may be gained; for a catalog of virtues must at all times prove less interesting than the process by which the virtues are acquired. If I were to state it in a word, I should say that the child gains thru music study the power of entering more fully into the complete life. To amplify this simple statement and to specify the lines of activity along which the child must travel will show how valuable an investment his music activity is.

Primarily the child's gain is that he becomes attached by a strong tie to the complete life. Its inspirations and its possibilities are the more open to him. He has gained another interest in life. Thru one more powerful channel he may pass out into self-expression. Not only is he provided with a new form of mental activity, but he is permitted to enter another world of thought; a world of thought that is as distinctive as that of the representative arts; a world in which he shall be a delightful sojourner, finding on all sides the records of lofty men, of men whose thought is unsurpassed in any other realm of the intellectual or emotional. In brief, his inheritance is greater, his interpretation deeper.

What has education for its aim? However we reply to this query,