Music in a New Found Land. Themes and Developments in the History of American Music byWilfrid MellersReview by: Theodore M. FinneyNotes, Second Series, Vol. 22, No. 2 (Winter, 1965 - Winter, 1966), pp. 877-879Published by: Music Library AssociationStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/894933 .

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possess a considerable degree of spe- cialisation and authority as it stands simply cannot be sustained. It needs revising and expanding in each of the two principal areas of coverage, and if

possess a considerable degree of spe- cialisation and authority as it stands simply cannot be sustained. It needs revising and expanding in each of the two principal areas of coverage, and if

the best way to achieve this would ap- pear to be by means of the group ap- proach, then so much the better.

K. H. ANDERSON

the best way to achieve this would ap- pear to be by means of the group ap- proach, then so much the better.

K. H. ANDERSON

Music in a New Found Land. Themes and developments in the history of American music. By Wilfrid Mellers. London: Barrie and Rockliff, 1964. [xv, 43 p., illus., music, 8vo; 60s.]

Music in a New Found Land. Themes and developments in the history of American music. By Wilfrid Mellers. London: Barrie and Rockliff, 1964. [xv, 43 p., illus., music, 8vo; 60s.]

The sub-title of this volume is im- portant. It does not pretend to be an- other history either of music in America or of American music. It is, rather, "themes and developments in the history of American music." Book titles are notoriously hard to come by. Certainly America-meaning always, of course, the United States-can be "new found" at any time by any newcomer to its shores (or even by a native), but the implica- tion that the land and its culture are all that new can hardly avoid sounding a little naive to one whose ancestors had to flee the barbarisms of Archbishop Laud early in the seventeenth century. Nevertheless, it is quite possible that liv- ing in the United States for two years, especially if one avoids radio, television, newspapers, and the mass magazines, would produce a wide-eyed sensitivity that could perceive "themes and developments" more clearly than we can ourselves.

Reservations as to the book's title aside, however, this is a valuable and an interesting book. When Professor Mellers comes together with a piece of music either at the piano or phonograph, fasci- nating things happen. He brings a clearly held philosophy-with which one need not, indeed cannot, always agree- covering how music functions as both a psychic and a social phenomenon. He is delighted by the "noise" that music makes. His perceptions are quick and sharp, grounded in a critical faculty con- ditioned by a wide knowledge of both music and literature and a familiarity with modern psychological analysis. When he finds what he is looking for in the music, he writes-he quite apparently has a compulsion to write-for others to read. As always, however, this writing must be read as program notes: the music

The sub-title of this volume is im- portant. It does not pretend to be an- other history either of music in America or of American music. It is, rather, "themes and developments in the history of American music." Book titles are notoriously hard to come by. Certainly America-meaning always, of course, the United States-can be "new found" at any time by any newcomer to its shores (or even by a native), but the implica- tion that the land and its culture are all that new can hardly avoid sounding a little naive to one whose ancestors had to flee the barbarisms of Archbishop Laud early in the seventeenth century. Nevertheless, it is quite possible that liv- ing in the United States for two years, especially if one avoids radio, television, newspapers, and the mass magazines, would produce a wide-eyed sensitivity that could perceive "themes and developments" more clearly than we can ourselves.

Reservations as to the book's title aside, however, this is a valuable and an interesting book. When Professor Mellers comes together with a piece of music either at the piano or phonograph, fasci- nating things happen. He brings a clearly held philosophy-with which one need not, indeed cannot, always agree- covering how music functions as both a psychic and a social phenomenon. He is delighted by the "noise" that music makes. His perceptions are quick and sharp, grounded in a critical faculty con- ditioned by a wide knowledge of both music and literature and a familiarity with modern psychological analysis. When he finds what he is looking for in the music, he writes-he quite apparently has a compulsion to write-for others to read. As always, however, this writing must be read as program notes: the music

must go along with it. Mellers is aware of this and provides a copious discog- raphy, hoping that the reader will use it.

The point of this kind of writing is to provide qualitative judgments which can, and with Mellers very often do, give the reader and listener fresh insights. In 1964 it is trite to say that we live in a world in which we have lost the old, com- fortable, and probably false, sense of direction. The New World, in Meller's title the "New Found Land," seems to him to have been from the beginning an empty place-empty, almost, that is, of tradition-in which the search for a di- rection has been less trammelled than in Europe. His interest turns to composers whose music, to him, reflects an aware- ness of the necessity, the opportunity, to create anew. He shows very little inter- est in the comfortable ones, the ones who thought they knew where they were going. The frames he constructs, visible in the Table of Contents, indicate the insights that await the reader. Part One begins in this framework:

I A pre-history of American music: the primitives, the retreat to Eur- ope, and the conservative tradi- tion.

II Realism and transcendentalism: Charles Ives as American hero.

III Men and mountains: Carl Ruggles as American mystic; Roy Harris as religious primitive.

IV Skyscraper and prairie: Aaron Copland and the American isola- tion.

Although Part I evaluates and illumi- nates the music of Professor Meller's choice of the "concert-hall" composers, Part II probably makes the most original contribution to the understanding of America's music. He calls it "The World

must go along with it. Mellers is aware of this and provides a copious discog- raphy, hoping that the reader will use it.

The point of this kind of writing is to provide qualitative judgments which can, and with Mellers very often do, give the reader and listener fresh insights. In 1964 it is trite to say that we live in a world in which we have lost the old, com- fortable, and probably false, sense of direction. The New World, in Meller's title the "New Found Land," seems to him to have been from the beginning an empty place-empty, almost, that is, of tradition-in which the search for a di- rection has been less trammelled than in Europe. His interest turns to composers whose music, to him, reflects an aware- ness of the necessity, the opportunity, to create anew. He shows very little inter- est in the comfortable ones, the ones who thought they knew where they were going. The frames he constructs, visible in the Table of Contents, indicate the insights that await the reader. Part One begins in this framework:

I A pre-history of American music: the primitives, the retreat to Eur- ope, and the conservative tradi- tion.

II Realism and transcendentalism: Charles Ives as American hero.

III Men and mountains: Carl Ruggles as American mystic; Roy Harris as religious primitive.

IV Skyscraper and prairie: Aaron Copland and the American isola- tion.

Although Part I evaluates and illumi- nates the music of Professor Meller's choice of the "concert-hall" composers, Part II probably makes the most original contribution to the understanding of America's music. He calls it "The World

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of Art and the World of Commerce: The Folk-song of the Asphalt Jungle." Guided by long lists of recordings which are cited by number, we are here taken into other jungles than those paved with asphalt. One wonders at times, even though he is fascinated with this kind of history, if the lack of attention European music historians pay to this aspect of their art, to the "love and wonder" in their music, is because their bordellos are silent places. Here, at any rate, music history leans heavily on a kind of ethno- musicology; and if our country is des- tined to produced a new music on this basis, it will be the first time that the beginnings of a music can be studied from such rich documentation. In pass- ing, it should be noted that such a study would be impossible without re- cordings which preserve performances for which no other notation is adequate. But it might be suggested that no one is now alive who can know what the Ameri- can melting pot will eventually become. The search for its unique qualities in areas, both geographical and spiritual, which represent culture lags, may not be any more prophetic than would be such a search in the slums of Liverpool.

Some relatively minor details need to be noted:

Most American musicians and music dealers would recognize the firm hidden in the misprint in the footnote on page 8. It is, of course, Elkan-Vogel Co., not Gekan-Vogel Co. Europeans might hunt in vain!

On page 377 Professor Mellers makes one of the profound observations of the book. Speaking of the performer-com- poser, he says "his clever hands may carry the composer where his integrity would not want to go." Mellers is an extremely clever writer, and his integrity occasionally suffers in consequence.

To an Englishman, for instance, the word "continental" inevitably suggests the land mass just across the narrow waters. Even to hint, for a hardly dis- cernable purpose except perhaps for the sake of cleverness, that it meant the same to William Billings (page 12) suggests that in addition to a fairly wide reading of literature, Professor Mellers might

well have read a little American history. Englishmen-and their hired Hessians- are buried in our soil who knew about the "continental" congress and army, if not the currency. The name of Billing's book does have a point: his music had moved out of New England-one song had be- come almost a national anthem-and he was now publishing to a whole new country, not just a province.

Two other points in Professor Mellers' discussion of this "pre-history" might be mentioned. Americans can't agree on how we are going to spell "fuguing," but someone must have been spoofing the English sense of humor to suggest that "fudging" could be anything but a print- er's error. In any case, we are told that the "unconscious pun" is appropriate when it might have been more illuminat- ing to remind us how much these pas- sages look like Purcell's examples in the later editions of Playford's Introduction to the Skill of Music. The conclusions drawn in this paragraph (page 8) might have been different had this English writer pointed out that false relations constitute one of the most characteristic aspects of our inherited English tradi- tion. Again, when the author tells us (page 16) that the sonority of massed voices is related to the "technique of medieval organum," he is being trapped twice: once by the idealized college- choir sound of the recording from the University of Maryland, and next by an unjustified certainty concerning the performance practice of organum.

In his discussion of Henry Cowell (page 149) Mellers invents, among other things, a new American university. This, certain- ly, is not too serious: even in England York University has only now been es- tablished. Mellers, as a composer, was a student of Wellesz. It would be in- teresting to read what the London Sunday Times would do to an American who put Mellers in Wellesz University. English users of the book should read "Charles Seeger at the University of California" instead of "Seeger University."

Professor Mellers comes up with some rather amazing misconceptions concerning New Orleans. On page 250 he implies an 1829 (the year of Gottschalk's birth)

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population for the city of 465,000 negro slaves, "about 30,000 free blacks and the same number of whites." This looks like a total of about 525,00, and is so com- pletely unbelievable that it sent this re- viewer to the library to look at the 1830 abstract of the Fifth Census. Numbers are divided between "free" and "slave"; for New Orleans and all its suburbs on both sides of the river, 33,187 free, 16,639 slave. This was hardly an asphalt jungle!

Aside from this, Professor Mellers should be advised either to keep his book out of New Orleans or never appear there in person. His definition of Creole aristoc- racy as "mostly the free descendents of mulattoes who had been the favored mis- tresses of white men" might subject him to retaliation. The apparent purpose of this definition is to classify Gottschalk through his mother's Creole descent; ra- ther a pity when the lady's men folk are not here to defend her reputation. One has to be very careful with the word "Creole." Merriam-Webster would have been useful.

On page 365 one finds most of a para- graph devoted to Charles Bell's Con- temporary Jazz Quartet, with Bell called "the white leader." This is a Pittsburgh group. Bell is a fine young gentleman, a highly intelligent and very talented mu-

population for the city of 465,000 negro slaves, "about 30,000 free blacks and the same number of whites." This looks like a total of about 525,00, and is so com- pletely unbelievable that it sent this re- viewer to the library to look at the 1830 abstract of the Fifth Census. Numbers are divided between "free" and "slave"; for New Orleans and all its suburbs on both sides of the river, 33,187 free, 16,639 slave. This was hardly an asphalt jungle!

Aside from this, Professor Mellers should be advised either to keep his book out of New Orleans or never appear there in person. His definition of Creole aristoc- racy as "mostly the free descendents of mulattoes who had been the favored mis- tresses of white men" might subject him to retaliation. The apparent purpose of this definition is to classify Gottschalk through his mother's Creole descent; ra- ther a pity when the lady's men folk are not here to defend her reputation. One has to be very careful with the word "Creole." Merriam-Webster would have been useful.

On page 365 one finds most of a para- graph devoted to Charles Bell's Con- temporary Jazz Quartet, with Bell called "the white leader." This is a Pittsburgh group. Bell is a fine young gentleman, a highly intelligent and very talented mu-

sician, but he is not white. It is curious that Mellers, writing his book in Pitts- burgh, could make such a mistake; one wonders, too, what such mistakes imply with regard to important stylistic judg- ments.

One of the facts in the creative lives of a great many American composers since the first world war is that they have studied with Nadia Boulanger. This source of nurture has not worked for young Englishmen. The present writer has listened to discussions in England among English musicians of the problem of where the young composers of that island could study. The conversations usually ended in frustration. This, per- haps, accounts for the tone of voice Mel- lers uses the one time he mentions the great lady. It does sound a little snide, though, when he limits this (page 416) to having Blitzstein study "at the Boulan- gerie." The retort might be that very few of our talented men have come out half-baked!

Finally, the present writer did a double take (page 337) at the word "acciacia- turas," and passed it off as a typo. But it happens again (page 373) ! "Perhaps it is not an accident" that this comes out a-cha-cha!

THEODORE M. FINNEY

sician, but he is not white. It is curious that Mellers, writing his book in Pitts- burgh, could make such a mistake; one wonders, too, what such mistakes imply with regard to important stylistic judg- ments.

One of the facts in the creative lives of a great many American composers since the first world war is that they have studied with Nadia Boulanger. This source of nurture has not worked for young Englishmen. The present writer has listened to discussions in England among English musicians of the problem of where the young composers of that island could study. The conversations usually ended in frustration. This, per- haps, accounts for the tone of voice Mel- lers uses the one time he mentions the great lady. It does sound a little snide, though, when he limits this (page 416) to having Blitzstein study "at the Boulan- gerie." The retort might be that very few of our talented men have come out half-baked!

Finally, the present writer did a double take (page 337) at the word "acciacia- turas," and passed it off as a typo. But it happens again (page 373) ! "Perhaps it is not an accident" that this comes out a-cha-cha!

THEODORE M. FINNEY

Prokofiev. A Biography in Three Movements. By Lawrence and Elisabeth Hanson. New York: Random House, 1964. [xiii, 368 p., illus., 8vo; $6.95]

Prokofiev. A Biography in Three Movements. By Lawrence and Elisabeth Hanson. New York: Random House, 1964. [xiii, 368 p., illus., 8vo; $6.95]

From the dust jacket Sergei Prokofiev's friendly, vigorous phiz fixed my eyes. The intensity of the replica nearly approxi- mated reality. But . . . something jarred. Those notes in the background. That music! Rachmaninov!!! about whom Prokofiev once admitted: "Rachmaninov -well, I'd rather say nothing about him. The truth is we hated each other's guts!" (Quoted by Alexander Werth, "The Real Prokofiev," Nation, CLXXVI [April 4, 1953], p. 286.)

The dereliction of the designer is not imputed to Mr. and Mrs. Hanson. But it breeds a wariness that the Hansons, guilty of their own indiscretions, never

From the dust jacket Sergei Prokofiev's friendly, vigorous phiz fixed my eyes. The intensity of the replica nearly approxi- mated reality. But . . . something jarred. Those notes in the background. That music! Rachmaninov!!! about whom Prokofiev once admitted: "Rachmaninov -well, I'd rather say nothing about him. The truth is we hated each other's guts!" (Quoted by Alexander Werth, "The Real Prokofiev," Nation, CLXXVI [April 4, 1953], p. 286.)

The dereliction of the designer is not imputed to Mr. and Mrs. Hanson. But it breeds a wariness that the Hansons, guilty of their own indiscretions, never

quite dispel. Indulgence might be pled on grounds that popular biographers dare not don the austere vestments of scholar- ship, lest the unwieldiness inhibit the free flight of fictive fancy. The Hansons are popular biographers. Witness a few of their prior credits: The Four Brontes; Verlaine: Fool of God; Passionate Pil- grim: The Life of Vincent van Gogh. They undertake "musical portraiture" for the first time in the present volume. However, their foreword never candidly addresses either the "music lover" or the specialist. Presumably, both are invited. So be it.

The first paragraph announces, "only

quite dispel. Indulgence might be pled on grounds that popular biographers dare not don the austere vestments of scholar- ship, lest the unwieldiness inhibit the free flight of fictive fancy. The Hansons are popular biographers. Witness a few of their prior credits: The Four Brontes; Verlaine: Fool of God; Passionate Pil- grim: The Life of Vincent van Gogh. They undertake "musical portraiture" for the first time in the present volume. However, their foreword never candidly addresses either the "music lover" or the specialist. Presumably, both are invited. So be it.

The first paragraph announces, "only

879 879

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