[Footnote 254: _Revue Musicale_, December 15, 1903, and 1 and 15
January, 1904.]
All this is not much, and we are yet terribly behindhand, especially as
regards secondary teaching, which is considered less important than
primary teaching.[255] But we are scrambling out of an abyss of
ignorance, and it is something to have the desire to get out of it. We
must remember that Germany has not always been in its present plethoric
state of musical prosperity. The great choral societies only date from
the end of the eighteenth century. Germany in the time of Bach was
poor--if not poorer--in means for performing choral works than France
to-day. Bach's only executants were his pupils at the Thomasschule at
Leipzig, of which barely a score knew how to sing.[256] And now these
people gather together for the great _Maennergesangsfeste_ (choral
festivals) and the _Musikfeste_ (music festivals) of Imperial Germany.
[Footnote 255: "In this," says M. Buchor, "as in many other things, the
children of the people set an example to the children of the middle
classes." That is true; but one must not blame the middle-class children
so much as those in authority, who, "in this, as in many other things,"
have not fulfilled their duties.
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