ly appreciative audiences. One of these Finsbury concerts was on a Sunday even ing, when 1100 people were present. Admission was of course free. but a voluntary collection was made afterward, of which the results averaged twopence per head.

Considering the sort of music performed, its reception by the audiences was favorable beyond what could have been expected. It has occurred that every instrumental number in a programme has been encored; single concerted movements have been so on several occasions; while violin or violoncello solos, when first-rate, elicit unbounded enthusiasm. The last number in the programmes is always instrumental, and it rarely happens that these people leave before the last note. In this how unlike the upper classes! Many well-known artists have given their services, or accepted merely nominal fees; a boon to the society of which the importance cannot be overrated, as it has been abundantly proved that to make such music intelligible to such an audience a masterly performance is even more necessary than it is when the hearers are more musically cultivated.

Except, it may be, in cases of individuals, these concerts can hardly appeal to the very lowest and most degraded class. In instrumental chamber music there is little to excite or forcibly to arrest dull attention; while to follow it at all requires on the part of those to whom it is utterly strange, an effort of mental concentration which it is hopeless to expect from people struggling and toiling for mere existence. The degree of perfec tion in performance, too, which, as we have said, is requisite if the music is to be comprehensible, makes the gettingup of concerts a serious matter, and renders it impossible for this society to multiply its operations and centres with the rapidity of the itinerant societies. Its field must for a long time be more restricted, and its results in appearance less brilliant than theirs. But by sowing the seed of art for art's sake among the people, it strikes at the root of the state of things described as existing in this country. It should with perseverance become a permanent institution, putting within the people's reach the possibility not only of hearing, but themselves pracNEW SERIES.-VOL. XXXIII., No. 2

tising the music which affords to those who know it such pure and elevating pleasure; and which, once it obtains a footing among the people themselves, will make its own way and provide a source of growing interest which may in time prove the most fatal of all rivals to lower forms of amusement. It can never compete with these on their own ground, but by withdrawing from them gradually those who are capable of better things, it must in the end raise the general standard of enjoyment.

It is not always easy to recognize the fact that there is something antagonistic in philanthropy and art. The essence of art is freedom and self-development, though there may be that voluntary subordination to a higher rule which is not incompatible with these. Practical philanthropy aims at making men better than they are, it may be by legislation, by persuasion, by inducement, but its end is always modification. No nation is so distinguished by the philanthropic spirit as the English, and a most admirable spirit it is, but not the soil most favorable to the growth of art. When concerts are presented to people as something good for them, a moral duty rather than a privilege seems involved in frequenting them. It lies at the root of so much that is done and so much that is not done in England, this doing nothing for its own sake, but for some secondary object to be gained by the doing it, some advantage, abstract or concrete, terrestrial or celestial. The object may in itself be all that is desirable, but it does not seem naturally to occur to us that by this direct aiming at it we may destroy or invalidate the most effectual means of bringing it about. Direct philanthropic action, like direct legislation, may counteract certain manifestations of evil influences, but does not necessarily tend to modify the condition of things which has brought these weeds into existence, and will produce fresh crops as fast as the first are removed. The soil must be prepared, as well as the seed of better things sown.

We are said to be, as a nation, unsociable; and it is very true that the poorer classes do not here, as in Germany, find relaxation after the labors of the day by meeting together to make music in con

cert.

18

Apart from the fact that the Ger

man standard of general education is higher than ours, there are many reasons for this. Our climate in great measure forbids outdoor recreation, while the crowding of the vast masses of poor in our great cities makes social meeting in their own homes impossible to our people. On this subject we would refer our leaders to an interesting report of parish work in Whitechapel (1878-9), by the Rev. S. A. Barnett, than whom no man has done more to raise and educate the people under his charge. Whether his work finds as yet its due recognition we know not, but it is the kind of work that leaves permanent traces behind it. He writes: "From company, from social intercourse, the mass of the people is cut off. .No one can know the lives of our people without seeing their dulness, and many of us see in such dulness an excuse for their wild courses;" while farther on he testifies to the fact that "there is nothing which people find so interesting as their fellowcreatures.' It is manifest that no place affords this interest to poor people but the public-house, of which it is to many the greatest attraction. To dwell on the numberless dangers and temptations to which the better sort of men are here exposed would be superfluous.

Now music, as if to make up for being the most abstract and ideal of all the arts, requires for its materialization, so to speak, more active co-operation than does any other one of them. In order to have an objective existence at all, it has, on every occasion of its presentment, to be re-created by performance. This gives it, for English people, at once an advantage and disadvantage as compared with other arts. Our practical nature is not the stuff of which good audiences are composed for works requiring brain-abstraction in the listener. On the other hand, it does afford the very best material for active realization, and even a little actual practice in music goes a long way in facilitating the effort of listening, besides giving the natural human interest of a possible personal participation in the kind of thing performed. No doubt this is one reason of the wide popularity of oratorio, which is greater here than in any other country. Not the only reason. The uneasy conscientiousness to which we have alluded

as an element unfriendly to art development finds in oratorio peace and repose. In the country especially, where the parochial clergy are foremost in all collective gatherings for educational and recreative purposes, there are numbers of people, the inheritors of puritanical principles, who cherish a distrust and dislike of anything theatrical, to whom an operahouse is terra incognita, and who have an unconfortable feeling about any art pursuit when it is quite dissociated from their own form of religious service. All the artistic and musical aspirations of this class are resumed and expressed in the oratorio. They go up once or twice a year to hear the Messiah" or “ Elijah" at Exeter Hall, as the Jews went up to worship in the Temple at Jerusalem. But even this would not sufficiently account for the vast comparative popularity in England of works of this sort without the fact that in these, and these only, some social co-operation is realized in art work. More of whatever capacity and love for music may be innate in us has been elicited by choral societies than by any other influence. This choral music is loved because it is known; it can be appropriated and understood, for all take, or have taken, or might take, an active share in it. When this feeling, now limited almost entirely to vocal works, extends to instrumental, there may be popular audiences here for symphony concerts.

No society has recognized this fact so distinctly, and made so sagacious and practical a move in its direction, as the Birmingham Musical Association. In the winter of 1878-9, Mr. Collings, M.P., the then Mayor of Birmingham, gave a series of four free concerts to members of the artisan class, with the double purpose of affording pleasure to his fellow-townsmen and of ascertaining how far good music would be attractive to those who had previously had few opportunities of enjoying it. The results were in the highest degree encouraging, about 3000 persons being present on each occasion. A public meeting was called to consider the matter, which resulted in the establishment of

*To him, as well as to the secretary of the society, we are indebted for full information, courteously given to us, of its proceedings.

the Birmingham Musical Association. Two objects were to be achieved, if possible.

I. "The provision of cheap concerts of a high class, which, it was believed and hoped, would be self-supporting." Toward this end great advance has already been made. Between November 8th, 1879, and April 24th, 1880, a series of twenty-two concerts was given. The music at these concerts was of various kinds. Birmingham is rich in Birmingham is rich in musical resources, and not being so vast as this unwieldy London, which can only be worked by districts, it can afford to concentrate these resources on one undertaking.

Some were ballad concerts, varied by harp, organ, or violin solos, or by vocal glees. Many were of the choral kind dear to people's hearts. Several choirs-the Festival Choir, the Birmingham Philharmonic Union, and Amateur Harmonic Association, and many more-assisted on different occasions, performing selections from the best oratorios; cantatas, glees, and part-songs. On other evenings Mr. Stockley's band was the attraction, when such works were given as the overtures to Oberon and Masaniello, the ballet music from Schubert's Rosamunde, and Rubinstein's Feramors, the introduction to the third act of Lohengrin, Meyerbeer's Coronation March, and Beethoven's First Symphony; these being interspersed not only with ballads and Volkslieder, but with songs by Handel, Mendelssohn, and Beethoven. Many of the tickets (price 6d. and 3d.) were sold, by permission, at coffeehouses, and in this manner reached the right class of persons. On some occasions all tickets had been disposed of on the day before the concert, and on many evenings hundreds of people were turned away before the doors were opened.

2. The second object proposed by the association is the establishment of popular classes for musical instruction, both vocal and instrumental, with the addition of a musical library, so varied as to include the compositions of all the great masters, so copious as to afford a sufficient number of practice parts, and so accessible as to bring within the reach of all classes music

hitherto unattainable except at serious cost.'

How this splendid project will work can only be shown by time, and remains yet to be seen. Here, however, we seem to have the suggestion of what most of all is wanting, the co-operation of all classes in one object for its own sake. Of all influences adverse to our end, none is perhaps so fatal as the prevalence of endless class distinctions, and nowhere are these so complex nor so aggressive as in our democratic" country. In Germany the broad line of demarcation between the nobility and the "people" saves a good deal of trouble by dividing the world in two well-defined sections. But here, where professional people fight shy of shopkeepers, where large shopkeepers will not send their children to school with those of small shopkeepers, nor small shopkeepers theirs with those of arti sans, where farmers' daughters and squires' daughters have distinct cles," where every one knows that nothing prevents him from rising any number of grades in the social scale-if he can, where each man, and still more each woman, is on the defensive lest he or she should be suspected of associating on equal terms with any one in a "lower set"-what chance here is there for an art which neither knows nor recognizes any of these things? If we are to combine in musical art work, all sense of favors conferred or received must be put aside. What is wanted is association; and unless the upper classes are finally to be excluded from progress, the example must emanate from themselves.

In these centres where concerts are established for introducing to the people a kind of music as yet utterly new to them, can nothing be done toward putting such people en rapport with what they are to hear? We constantly hear complaints from people of leisure, women especially, of lack of scope for their powers or their energy. In this attracting and drawing together of the atoms of our masses of poor, there is work for any number, if rightly set about. The choral societies are doing a great deal, but in the large cities, and above all in London, there are vast

numbers of the population quite beyond their reach, and much remains to be done that is not even attempted. We do not want only to beg people to come and hear us, but to put them in the way of doing for themselves what we now do for them. We should like to see such a possibility established in every important concert centre, in the shape, to begin with, of a singing-class for imparting the rudiments of musical knowledge. Trained teachers should be appointed to these classes, for to do such work efficiently requires knowledge and experience. But the labor would be lightened and the impetus of the move ment tenfold increased if amateurs would associate with the work by themselves joining such classes and singing too. If the teaching were good, this would be very instructive to those who did so join; there are plenty of men in the upper classes to whom it would be as improving as to their artisan broth ers; while ladies whose musical education is limited, as too often it is, to the mere finger-practice of the pianoforte, would materially gain by such association.

But besides this, if we expect working-people to come and listen patiently to instrumental music, after the novelty of the thing has worn off, we should found some associations, be they at first on ever so humble a scale, for concerted instrumental practice. The conductor should be a good practical musician, either professional and paid out of the society's funds, or an amateur fit for the work and able to devote himself to it. Some competent person, too, should be retained" for the piano, which would be necessary, at any rate at first, to fill up blanks in so elementary an orchestra. A room with a piano in it should be hired for, say, one or two evenings a week; a few special fittings for this room, desks, etc., would be required. It should then be made known in the neighborhood that any man who can play on an instrument is welcome on such and such evenings for concerted practice; perhaps some nominal fee might be charged as condition of membership and toward defraying expenses. If this appeal were responded to, it would be necessary to separate those who came into two classes: those who

may have some knowledge of reading music at sight, and those who play by ear only. For those who desired it, of these last, special extra instruction might be provided. The music would probably have at first to be arranged to suit the materials. From simple melodies purely harmonized, it might be possible soon to proceed to arrangements of easy overtures and symphony movements. Here, again, if our amateurs who can read and play "a little," and especially some of those many gentlemen who now learn to play on the violin and other orchestral instruments, would associate themselves with such practice, they might turn their smattering of knowledge to the best account, and most effectually help themselves in helping others who have not had their opportunities.

It is probable that the nucleus of a sort of orchestra might soon be formed in this way. When we come to inquire, it is astonishing how many men in the artisan class can play a little on some instrument or other-cornet, saxhorn, flute, concertina, nay even violin or violoncello. A "sister" engaged in hospital work at Clewer states that in the male wards they have had, at different times, numbers of men who played such instruments. On some occasions, when there has been an unusual amount of " talent" among the convalescent patients, they have got up concerts among themselves with great success. But what was performed? Solo tunes on the various instruments, and songs. Nothing, beyond perhaps a "Christy Minstrel" chorus in unison, was attempted in the way of ensemble. Each individual showed off in his own individual manner. All this, with organization and perseverance, might be made available for better purposes. How constantly in some English circles is music still spoken of as a kind of snare, likely to lead men who are its devotees into "low company." In all ranks it is true that men who possess any accomplishment by means of which they can amuse their fellows are generally popular, especially among idle people; and when a working-man sings his songs or plays his tunes to his companions in the public-house, no doubt the situation is fraught with some peril, to say nothing