Their purpose is to teach the people a musical language different from
that of cultured people; and although it may not be as difficult as is
supposed to go from a knowledge of the one to a knowledge of the other,
it is always wrong to raise up a fresh barrier--however small it
is--between the cultured people and the other people, who in our own
country are already too widely separated.
And besides, it is not enough to know one's letters; one must also have
books to read. What books have the people had?--so far songs sung at the
cafe concerts and the stupid repertoires of choral societies. The
folk-song had practically disappeared, and was not yet ready for
re-birth; for the populace, even more readily than the cultured people,
are inclined to blush at anything which suggests "popularity."[243]
[Footnote 243: M. Maurice Buchor relates an anecdote which typifies what
I mean. "I begged the conductor of a good men's choral society," he
says, "to have one of Haendel's choruses sung. But he seemed to hesitate.
I had made the suggestion tentatively, and then tried to enlarge on the
sincerity and breadth of its musical idea. 'Ah, very good,' he said, 'if
you really want to hear it, it is easily done; but I was afraid that
perhaps it was rather too popular.
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