The Merry-Go-Round   By: Carl Van Vechten (1880-1964)

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BOOKS BY CARL VAN VECHTEN

MUSIC AFTER THE GREAT WAR 1915

MUSIC AND BAD MANNERS 1916

INTERPRETERS AND INTERPRETATIONS 1917

THE MERRY GO ROUND 1918

THE MUSIC OF SPAIN 1918

The Merry Go Round

Carl Van Vechten

"Tournez, tournez, bons chevaux de bois, Tournez cent tours, tournez mille tours, Tournez souvent et tournez toujours, Tournez, tournez au sons de hautbois." PAUL VERLAINE

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New York Alfred A. Knopf

MCMXVIII

COPYRIGHT, 1918, BY ALFRED A. KNOPF, INC.

PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA

Contents

PAGE

IN DEFENCE OF BAD TASTE 11

MUSIC AND SUPERMUSIC 23

EDGAR SALTUS 37

THE NEW ART OF THE SINGER 93

Au Bal Musette 125

MUSIC AND COOKING 149

AN INTERRUPTED CONVERSATION 179

THE AUTHORITATIVE WORK ON AMERICAN MUSIC 197

OLD DAYS AND NEW 215

TWO YOUNG AMERICAN PLAYWRIGHTS 227

De Senectute Cantorum 245

IMPRESSIONS IN THE THEATRE

I The Land of Joy 281

II A Note on Mimi Aguglia 298

III The New Isadora 307

IV Margaret Anglin Produces As You Like It 318

THE MODERN COMPOSERS AT A GLANCE 329

FOOTNOTES 330

INDEX 331

Some of these essays have appeared in "The Smart Set," "Reedy's Mirror," "Vanity Fair," "The Chronicle," "The Theatre," "The Bellman," "The Musical Quarterly," "Rogue," "The New York Press," and "The New York Globe." In their present form, however, they have undergone considerable redressing.

In Defence of Bad Taste

" It is a painful thing, at best, to live up to one's bricabric, if one has any; but to live up to the bricabric of many lands and of many centuries is a strain which no wise man would dream of inflicting upon his constitution. "

Agnes Repplier.

In Defence of Bad Taste

In America, where men are supposed to know nothing about matters of taste and where women have their dresses planned for them, the household decorator has become an important factor in domestic life. Out of an even hundred rich men how many can say that they have had anything to do with the selection or arrangement of the furnishings for their homes? In theatre programs these matters are regulated and due credit is given to the various firms who have supplied the myriad appeals to the eye; one knows who thought out the combinations of shoes, hats, and parasols, and one knows where each separate article was purchased. Why could not some similar plan of appreciation be followed in the houses of our very rich? Why not, for instance, a card in the hall something like the following:

This house was furnished and decorated according to the taste of Marcel of the Dilly Billy Shop

or

We are living in the kind of house Miss Simone O'Kelly thought we should live in. The decorations are pure Louis XV and the furniture is authentic.