Not a word was uttered in regard to the contents of the masterpieces in question, the special emotions, the overwhelming passions they revealed, the mighty experiences of which they were the result.  Nothing was said about the source of a great book in the life of its author, or its value as a record of what many minds and hearts of an entire epoch have thought, felt and desired.  The learned professors were so deeply concerned with what they considered the demands of strict scholarship that they lost sight of the spirit which animates every true work of art.  To them literature consisted of words, phrases, sentences, figures of speech, classical allusions, and well-constructed forms.  They regarded it apparently as an artificial product, compounded according to traditional and cautiously prescribed recipes.

An aged man of letters present, one who was characterized by his ripe scholarship, his richly cultured personality, sat listening in silence to the conversation.  Suddenly he rose up, and, in vibrant tones, exclaimed:  “Where hath the soul of literature fled, its vital part?  If we are to trample upon our impressions the best that is within us will be chilled.  Of what avail is education if it does not lead to the unfolding of our God-given intuitions?  Friends, if the trend of modern criticism be to divorce literature from life, the throb and thrill of great art will soon cease to be felt.”

The lesson conveyed by these words may with equal propriety be applied to the field of music.  Viewing certain current tendencies the cultured musician is often moved to wonder where the soul of music has fled.  The critical faculty is keenly alive to-day, but musical criticism, shorn of its better part, musical appreciation, can never lead to the insight requisite for true musical interpretation.  Observation and perception, intellectual discernment and spiritual penetration are essential to gain insight into a great musical composition until its musical ideas, the very grade and texture of its style, are absolutely appropriated.

In his “Death in the Desert,” Robert Browning tells of the three souls that make up the soul of man:  the soul which Does; the soul which Knows, feels, thinks and wills, and the soul which Is and which constitutes man’s real self.  Appreciation of music requires the utmost activity of all three souls.  The more we are, the broader our culture, the more we think, feel and know, the more we will find in music.  Dr. Hiram Corson, commenting on Browning’s words, says the rectification, or adjustment of what Is, that which constitutes our true being, should transcend all other aims of education.  If this fact were more generally accepted and enforced it could soon no longer be said that few persons reach maturity without the petrifaction of some faculty of mind and heart.

Every faculty we possess needs to be keenly alive for the interpretation of the best in music.  One who is accustomed to earnest thinking, quick observation and sympathetic penetration will see, hear and feel much that utterly escapes those whose best faculties have been permitted to lie dormant, or become petrified.  The interpreter of music must have vital knowledge of the inner, spiritual element of every work of art he attempts to reproduce.  His imagination must be kindled by it, and musical imagination is infinitely more precious than musical mechanism.