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About The Chemawa American (Chemawa, Or.) 19??-current | View Entire Issue (April 28, 1926)
. 3 MAY » The ChemaWaAmerican Printed at Chemawa, Oregon, and Devoted to the Interests of Indian Education Wednesday, April 28, 1926 Vol. XXVII MUSIC Lack of culture is practically the sole difference be tween savagery and civilization, so called. Mankind has developed many cultural things and processes in the last twenty or more centuries and they all have weight and influence in the opinions of the educated and refined people of our day. Various, indeed, and multitudinous as well, are the pursuits of a mental character that are open today for the improvement of the human mind. As man has developed, advanced, he finds more and more sciences and truths just before him awaiting further investigation to the end that new truths may be discovered for the enlightenment of all. “The man who hath no music in his soul is fit for treason, strategems and spoils,” so wrote the immor tal William Shakespeare, or at least words of the same import, and he added the warning to “let no such man be trusted. ’ ’ Music is not always produced by an instrument of wood or metal, or even the human voice. Many things are music to our souls and move us to ecstacies of bliss. The patter of the rain on the roof will be music to the man whose corn crop is drying up for lack of moisture. The cry of “land ho!” is musical to one who has tossed in the agony of seasick ness for days on the crest of the wave of the briny deep. News of that which is to change for the better a condition of anguished humanity is ever sweet mu sic to the sorely pressed and distressed. That which relieves the mind of worry, or of sorrow, and makes us forget for a time our troubles must be music for us. A * ‘concord of sweet sounds’ ’ that bring joy to us is music indeed. Throughout the last ten centuries the greatest minds have been busy developing a process whereby musical notation and all of the tones possible of recognition by the human mind can be re corded, printed, and given to the world. From what is now known it seems that we are near to perfection so far as mere mechanics are concerned, but it is not conceivable that the time will ever come when the possibilities of composition will have been ex hausted. Such possibilities are limited wholly to the individual composer—not to the musical scale. Music is with us from the time our mothers croon lullabys to us as she rocks our cradles until we are finally carried to the grave and the last sad hymn that No. 31 carries conviction of a “hereafter” has been sung over us. Throughout life our sorrows are relieved and our joys enhanced by listening to good music. It makes of us a better people. It is a prime necessity in the lives of the young. During school days it plays a larger part than many people realize in building char acter in a cultural way. What one learns to cherish during school days will in all probability be found in the home of a student when school is behind him. A home must be a happier and a better place for having music in it. One does not need to be a professional musician in order to have music for himself and his friends. All over the United States there has been a great awakening of recent years to the value of music in the schools and in many cities the boards of education have expended thousands of dollars for musical instru ments and equipment for orchestras and bands, and for music for the same. Every year sees large addi tions to the force of instructors for teaching music in our public schools. It appears that we are on the eve of an awakening to the great cultural value of mu sic, and it is well that it is so. It is a movement making for better laws and order. Confucius, the great Chinese law-giver, some 550 B. C., said: “Wouldst thou know if a people be well governed, if its laws be good or bad? Examine the music it practices. ” It is a wise parent who encourages his child to study music or any other cultural subject. In so doing there is assurance that the child will be assisted to es cape the thousand and one pitfalls that hover in the paths of the young. The greatest security of a moral and well-ordered life lies in grounding the youthful mind in cultural subjects; getting him so infused with a love for better things that anything low or criminal will be repugnant to him—that he will look upon crime with abhorence. Music, books, and right- minded companions are necessary. Many an oily- tongued person is a potential criminal and as danger ous as an associate of the young as one with a prison record. Both parents, and young people as well, should remember this. Culture leads to better and greater things, to recog nition and respect by people worth while, to a satis faction with self and life—it is our safeguard against possible crime. If the world had more genuine culture there would be fewer law-enforcing officers, fewer courts, and fewer prisons. The money spent on culture for all would far better be expended in this way than for the upkeep of states’ prisons—prisons which of necessity must stand as a monument to the degrada tion of a certain percentage of our population a> a whole.
