my audience into professional secrets, most artists after singing bow themselves off the stage to listen, unseen, for the applause they fondly hope will bring them back to take an encore. For my own part, I would rather give an encore plainly expected than to go off for rest I do not need, alone in a dark, stuffy, and generally uncomfortable waiting room.

CHAPTER XXXIX

PROGRAM MAKING

The difficulty in life is the choice.

- George Moore.

PROGRAM making is not the easy thing that it may at first glance appear to be. It will not do to set down at random a number of songs and expect them, however beautiful in themselves or however well sung, to fit properly together; they must be chosen with care and with the knowledge of the literature of song, which it is better to possess than to engage another to provide.

The number of songs that I have actually sung amounts to about fourteen hundred. My endeavor has always been to choose from these for the many song recitals I have given - some eight hundred in the past twenty-five years - so that every program shall bear a resemblance to a symphony, the four movements of which are in a manner exemplified by four song groups, each so constructed as to have a distinct character of its own and yet a direct relation to the whole scheme of sound and of sense.

Many kinds of programs may be made, some entirely classic, others illustrative of this period or that, of one school or another; but the finest program is that which has been so arranged as to contain notable examples of a variety of times and styles, so combined as not only to entertain the average person, but to hold the interest of even the most experienced concert goer.

The older classics of European countries, including excerpts from oratorio, should set the standard for a program of this sort. They should seldom be given at the end of a concert, while the modern selections suitable for the conclusion of such an entertainment should never be used at its opening; that would be like serving dessert at the beginning of a meal. The second group should consist of songs representative of the great period that began with Beethoven and continued through the Romanticists, Schubert and Schumann, to Brahms. A third group might feature operatic selections not often heard upon the stage, ballads by Loewe, songs by Franz, Grieg, or Strauss the combinations to be made are, of course, infinite. But the last group of a recital, whether it consist of English, American, or foreign composers of the present time, must be of such a character as to send the people away sorry to go, but glad that they have come. I have often found that at the end of such a concert the homely ditties of the British Isles or folk songs, including American negro "Spirituals," are very useful.

Realizing that an audience may become weary of hearing even the best voice of one singer, the judicious recitalist, in all programs, will take especial care so to combine the component parts of each group as to afford a change of key as well as of tempo and general character of the songs. Nothing is more wearisome than one longdrawn selection following another in the same, or nearly related, soporific key. I myself have peacefully slumbered under the soothing influence of an artist, rich voiced, but regardless of the fact that variety is the spice of life and of concert-giving. One must remember

that while such a program is made up of a patchwork of pieces, it must, after all, have an artistic design and not resemble a crazy-quilt.

The encores to each group of songs should be very carefully considered and should be not only familiar but of the same period as the group itself and, if possible, shorter than the encored song, in order that the balance shall not be destroyed.

I cannot too strongly insist upon the recognition of the gender of songs; some are masculine and some are feminine, and the opposite sexes should not encroach upon each other's preserves. Many women in this way offend the artistic proprieties; their plea that all the best songs are written for men is not well founded, for a little investigation will serve to show our sisters that there is a wealth of womanly material open to them if they will but depart from the beaten paths. Nothing, for instance, could be more beautifully feminine, or more femininely beautiful, than Schumann's little-used cycle of eight songs known as "Woman's Love and Life" (Frauenliebe und Leben). Women will also often find melodic ground that is open to their brethren as well as to themselves, for there is plenty of vocal material of a poetic character suitable for both male and female artists; it only needs to be gathered and used. Women are not the sole offenders in the mal-selection of songs: I recently attended a recital where an experienced man sang during the course of the afternoon five songs that were suitable only for a woman to render.

I append two programs in which I have endeavored to embody my ideas of how such song offerings can advantageously be made.

Sleep, then, Ah Sleep .Branscombe

(Le Gallienne)
(Kipling)

Danny Deever

Orpheus with His Lute .....Sullivan

(Shakespeare)

The Blackbird's Song. C. Scott

(Watson)

The Maidens of Cadiz

(De Musset)

....Delibes

The Little Silver Ring .... Chaminade
Rachmaninoff

(Baker)
...Damrosch The Floods of Spring

(Hapgood)

Of these programs the first is one I have repeatedly rendered since its original presentation at Carnegie Hall. In it, as well as in the specimen woman's program, it will