1100 - THIS CLEVELAND OF OURS Courts, has become, under the insistence of women connected with the Association for Criminal Justice and the Courts Committee of the Women's City Club, really a laboratory for the handling of delinquent and dependent children. There are pleasant dormitories, with murals of children at play by Ivor Johns. There are offices for doctors and dentists, school rooms, manual training and domestic science rooms and a gymnasium. Delinquent and dependent children are kept en-tirely separate. There is an informal court room, quite like a living. room, where the judge talks with the children as a father might, and even the police officers wear no uniforms. There is also a formal court room, which is necessary for the trial of cases of grown-ups contributing to delinquency, but the courts do not dominate the building. They are merely two of the many laboratory workshops where the welfare of children is studied and worked out. Every effort has been made to make the building cheerful and hopeful, with charming inset tiles, bright pictures of busy children, pleasant rooms and plenty of light. It is a simple building, and no money has been wasted on it, but the architect has solved his problem not only with efficiency but with charm. As to houses, Abram Garfield says we are developing some definite Cleveland characteristics : "There is no great unanimity in the choice of style. Colonial, both north and south ; Cape Cod cottage; English rectories; a little farm house French ; really, almost everything ; and we often beg for some peaceful similarity. Never the less that similarity is there, and in an important respect. The owners have wanted good houses, but almost no one has asked for anything prodigious. They have had an opinion in regard to style, but have protested against carrying it too far. They have asked for formal and informal gardens, but one is always conscious that no army of gardeners is required to keep them up. I believe that this is characteristic of Cleve-land. It indicates a moderation that is often not seen in other cities. It has cut off the salient corners and angles of its houses, has shaken its head over astonishing features of de-sign, has demanded a low toned result, and shies at brilliance, and has finally asked to have its home unobstrusive." THE CITY'S LIFE - 1101 Mr. Garfield adds: "Architecture in Cleveland is improving; but so long as we believe in our form of society, we must have patience and give time for this improvement to come up slowly from below. A burst of glory at the top does not make the city." As "This Cleveland of Ours" goes to press, there is much talk of new methods of building houses. There are to be houses with arched roofs, houses of porcelain with flat roofs, houses of fabricated steel in interchangeable parts, set up on the lot in a day. So far, all these methods are in the experimental or speculative stage. There is no question but that the homes of the future will differ radically from those of the past, but in what respects it is too soon to say. There is a distinct trend to decentralization of cities. The automobile has enabled men to live fifteen or twenty miles from their work. The airplane will increase this possibility to one hundred miles if it seems desirable to act upon it. But there is also a movement to decentralize industry, setting a factory out in a thinly populated district, with the workers settling down around it. There is still a third movement to reclaim what is called "blighted areas" by tearing down the old houses and apartments which have become slum tenements, building each whole block anew, probably with gardens and playgrounds all flowing into one parked area, instead of separated, bleak and dingy back yards. What will be accomplished along these lines in the next score of years must be left for some future historian to relate. CHAPTER VI MUSIC AND DRAMA The first singing school must have been the real beginning of music in Cleveland. It seems to have been proper enough, even from the Puritan point of view, to meet in the schoolhouse, practice hymns for Sunday and finish the evening with "songes gay and roundelay," though vocal lessons as such were nonexistent. The first violin came to town in 1800 with. Maj. Samuel Jones, and fiddling was never entirely absent from that time on. But fiddling for dances was a thing a man did evenings, and learning new tunes was also a matter of leisure moments. It seemed in quite a different class from professional musicianship; but even so, it was regarded as slightly beneath the standard of really estimable conduct. The first piano, we are told, came to Cleveland in 1832. In 1838 a newspaper takes cognizance of music, and advises vocal training in both public and private schools. Music, says the editorial, disciplines the mind like any other subject, and is almost the only one which tends to improve and cultivate the feelings. It quotes a physician as saying that young ladies who are debarred by the customs of society from all healthy exercise ought to be taught singing as a means for preserving the health. Forty years, it can be seen, have made a difference in the state of Cleveland society. The generation of young ladies preceding this suffered from no lack of exercise. The first piano that came to Doan's corners, says Post, went to the Hanks family. The daughter, Romelia, not only played well, but sang, and is reputed to have had a beautiful voice. Jarvis Hanks played the violin. He was one of the founders of the Euclid Avenue Congregational Church. When - 1102 - THE CITY'S LIFE - 1103 pious ones objected to his playing in the church, he said his fiddle had been converted as well as himself, and he maintained the integrity of his life and art by continuing to play it. It must have been from some such point of view that Haydn made his famous statement, about a century earlier, that he did not believe God would be displeased if he worshipped him cheerfully. A quest for the exact date of the coming of Romelia's piano proved unsuccessful, but it must have been within a few years, one way or the other, of 1850. In the course of this search a tale turned up which more properly belongs in the pioneering chapters, but which may be told here as illustrating the popular attitude toward frivolity. It is quoted in "Pioneer Women of the Western Reserve," from an unknown source: "During the summer of 1811 a large ball was given at Seth Doan's tavern, and people came from far and near to trip the light fantastic toe 'Up the middle and down again. Swing your partners and all hands round.' All was gayety under the tallow dip and spruce boughs. Maple sugar, short cake and home-made whisky lightened the feet of the dancers and made nimble the fingers of the old fiddler, as he rent the air with the strains of 'Money Musk' and 'Jump, Jim Crow' mingling with shouts of laughter. Alas ! a reckoning came on the Sabbath following the ball. A hush rested on the congregation as the minister sternly reproved such of his flock as had been participants in the forbidden pastime. He insisted they come forward and publicly profess repentance or be suspended from church membership. Slowly, one at a time, then by twos and threes, they arose, confessed, expressed repentance and took their seats with brightened faces. One did not rise, though equally guilty. Mrs. Sarah Mcllrath Shaw said she had danced, but would not repent, for she would do it again." The strong-minded lady was suspended and stood it for about a year. But the ostracism not only from the church but from all social and friendly life was too much, in time, for her to bear. She professed repentance; and as she had been missed, her welcome was a warm one. 1104 - THIS CLEVELAND OF OURS It was in 1852 that a newspaper said, "Reed organ is the name of a new instrument for churches." In 1853 a man named Baptiste Dreher came to town and began making those new instruments called melodeons. He was a grandson of Meinrad Dreher of Ilireichen near Ulm, Germany. Meinrad Dreher built organs in European churches and was a friend of Johann Sebastian Bach, who inscribed to him a book on organ-building. The Dreher Piano Company—sold seventy years later, after three generations of Drehers had developed it, to Lyon and Healy—grew from the little worshop of Baptiste Dreher. One of his first melodeons is now at the Randall Tavern at Painesville. In 1854 a Cleveland Academy of Music was started in Hoffman's Block by R. B. Wheeler and E. A. Payne, and was maintained for a few years. Chamber music seems to have been heard of first when the "Instrumental Quartette" reported by Post used to meet at the homes of its members and friends. Nathan L. Post and Lewis J. Wadsworth were first and second violins, and Henry Talbot played a small portable melodeon. Horace Ford, who was also the leader, played the bass viol. As in the case of art, handicrafts and life in general, it was the coming of the Germans which first loosened up and made easier the general attitude toward music. The attainment of leisure by the families of the second generation had a strong influence also. Time-wasting is no longer considered a sin when there comes to be time over and above the need of hard labor to preserve life itself, time for the graces of life and money to spend on attaining them. But the Germans did not have to go through the process of having their whole attitude toward life changed before they could sing. They had always sung, came expecting to sing, and just naturally went on singing. They began to settle in Cleveland in 1840. By 1848 the first singing society, the Frohsinn, was going, and it continued several years under the leadership of a man named Heber. This faded away when the Cleveland Gesangverein was organized in 1854, with Fritz Abel for its first director. In 1851 the Cleveland Mendelssohn Society was formed THE CITY'S LIFE - 1105 "for the purpose of elevating the standard of sacred music in Cleveland." By 1853 it had 112 members, two oratorios had been publicly performed, one being "The Creation" of Haydn, and the society was hard at work on "The Seasons." Its officers were T. P. Handy, president; J. L. Severance, vice president; O. P. Hanks, secretary; T. C. Severance, treasurer; J. P. Holbrook, conductor; J. Long, pianist; S. W. Treat, F. Abel, J. H. Stanley, trustees. Fritz Abel, it will be observed, could lead one society and be trustee for another. The Severances, then as now, took an active interest in music, and Truman Handy had a cultural interest outside of banking hours.   The Gesangverein deserves more than passing notice, because it was one of the formative influences in Cleveland music. Organized in 1854, it was only a year later that the Saengerfest was held here, with three hundred singers competing for prize. Han Balatka of Milwaukee led it. In 1859 another was held in old National Hall with 400 singers, coming from many different towns and cities. This one was closed by the singing of Alessandro Stradello in the Cleveland Theatre—the first opera sung in Cleveland.   The Civil war hushed many voices, and not much artistic development of any sort is discernible until its close. By 1874, however, Cleveland was ready for a "Great Saengerfest," under the auspices of the North American Saengerfest Society. A hall was erected on Euclid Avenue between Case and Sterling avenues (now East Fortieth and East Thirtieth streets) , for which a stock company was formed and $60,000 raised by sale of stock. Railway rates at half fare helped swell the attendance. The hall seated 9,000, with room for 1,500 on the stage. The governor and lieutenant governor gave it official approbation by their presence. Dr. Gustavus C. E. Weber, that powerful old surgeon, pronounced a German eulogy on music, and Albert Nuss, Cleveland musician, com-posed a stately Saenger Gruss. William Heydler led the open-ing concert and Carl Berman the following ones. The New York Philharmonic orchestra was here for the whole week, Pauline Lucca sang at three of the concerts. Such a concen-   1106 - THIS CLEVELAND OF OURS   trated week of music, and fine music at that, Cleveland had never before heard. Isolated concerts had been given here before—Jenny Lind in 1851, Catherine Hayes in 1852, Ole Bull, violinist, in 1853, and again in 1854. Sontag sang in 1854 and Thalberg, pianist, played in 1857. Patti had appeared in 1855 and again in 1860. A dollar a ticket was charged to hear her—a high price in those days—but for her and for Ole Bull the house was filled. An optimistic newspaper writer said Patti, in time, would probably take front rank among musical stars.   But these concerts, coming at about the rate of one a year, were not much more than a whet to the musical appetites of those who cared for music, and were pleasant social occasions to those who went knowing little of what it was all about. Nobody could go to all or most of the concerts of a Saengerfest without getting a concentrated though brief education in music.   Nineteen years later—in 1893—the Cleveland Gesangverein gave another great Saengerfest. Again a hall was built, at the corner of Scovill and Willson avenues. Emil Ring directed. Again there were days of extraordinarily good music, happily remembered by many of those now living. But by 1893 there was a good deal of music of one kind and another floating on Cleveland's air, and there were other things to distract the attention, so this one did not create quite the central regard of the Saengerfest of 1874. Hard times, for example, were oppressing the public mind, and the World's Fair at Chicago was calling.   Going back to 1873, we find the Cleveland Vocal Society established. And with that society, enters a figure more important in Cleveland's musical history than is generally realized. The figure is that of Alfred Franklin Arthur.   Arthur came to Cleveland in 1871, after study in Boston and singing in a Boston church. He had played the cornet in the band of the regiment commanded by Col. Rutherford B. Hayes, afterward President. Arthur came at first to sing in Trinity, and then in the Euclid Avenue Baptist Church. Later he organized the Bach Society, starting it with the choir of   THE CITY'S LIFE - 1107   the Woodland Avenue Presbyterian Church. He conducted several music festivals, directed two or three German bands, and in the course of his vocal work composed a number of vocal studies and three light operas, "The Water Carrier," "Roundheads and Cavaliers," and "Adaline."   Music, like art, falls into certain natural classifications. There is singing by solo voices and choruses, there is playing upon solo instruments, and in bands, orchestras, quartets and other ensemble groups. There is the organ, which is an orchestra condensed. There is composition for all these instruments and groups. Underneath all these, feeding them and supporting them, are the schools and teachers.     Alfred Arthur, starting out as teacher of singing, got together his Cleveland Vocal Society of about a hundred members, and kept them together, the society doing good vocal work, for thirty years. Through it he did an incalculable service in raising the standard of musical taste. The library collected by this society is still extant, a notable array of chorales, cantatas, choruses, madrigals and part songs of all sorts. He started, moreover, the Cleveland School of Music in 1884. It is still, in its forty-eighth year, existing under the leadership of the son, also named Alfred Franklin Arthur. Other people, notably Ada Burnham, so long its capable secretary, J. R. Hall and Flora Brinsmade, have contributed to its success and long life. But the vigor of the initial push and persistent effort of its founder must have been great indeed.   There was a time in the '90s when numbered among the faculty of the school were Charles E. Clemens, William B. Colson, Henry Miller, Wilson G. Smith, James H. Rogers and Johannes Wolfram. Much of the musical interest in Cleveland was inspired by Miller's little orchestras and string quartets, Arthur's choruses, the organ teaching by Colson and Clemens, the piano work of Smith, Rogers and Wolfram. Walter Logan, now leading the orchestra at WTAM, was among Miller's pupils at this time, playing first violin in one of the quartets. And no one who attended it will ever forget that hit-or-miss ensemble class led by Clemens to which everyone could belong. A little organ was moved into Arthur's big   1108 - THIS CLEVELAND OF OURS   studio, to add to the two pianos already there. Singers, violinists, pianists, players on anything or everything, were welcome. Arthur helped with the singing, some of Miller's advanced students with the string direction, but Clemens was the big boss. He directed the motley throng and supplied on the infant organ any parts lacking that day which needed to be supplied. Marvelous were the performances of Mozart's violin sonatas with two or three violins and a couple of pianos. Still more entrancing the Messiah, with half the vocal parts and a third or fourth of the instrumental. Great was the fun with opera or cantata. There was no intention of completing or publicly performing any of these works. The idea was merely that of learning to play together, and play together those students did. Nor could anyone working under Clemens fail to gather a few stray bits of knowledge of musical form and structure.   One by one these remarkable teachers moved out of the school to their own studios and other fields. Clemens went to teach composition and other musical matters at the university, to play for years at St. Paul's Church, and finally at the Church of the Covenant. Colson's best known service to the city was the giving of his twilight organ recitals at the Old Stone Church, Mondays in the autumn at four o'clock, for something like thirty years. He was the first to do that in these parts, and the others who followed him did so after learning from his recitals how lovely organ music in a dim and quiet church can be.   Wolfram moved out into a school of his own, which, when he became incurably ill, was taken over by Carl Fessler, who still maintains it as the Fessler School of Music. In Fessler is found the concentration of German musical sentiment along with German musical thoroughness. Studying harmony under his gentle but meticulous supervision was like taking courses in mathematics and poetry at the same time.   Smith was in many respects the most interesting of these figures. He was a little man with a biting tongue. He served as music critic of the Cleveland Press for many years, and his vocabulary was fearful and wonderful to behold. There   THE CITY'S LIFE - 1109   used to be a story going the rounds that the Press had engaged him with the proviso that he should never allow himself to be understood. Any time he wrote a review in plain English, he was to be fired. The story was exaggerated, but there were days when it looked as if it must be true. But anyone willing to read his stuff carefully, without the usual newspaper haste, always found in it things worth reading. He and his paper were fearless, and there was great interest in his criticism. He made sharp distinctions, never judging amateurs by professional standards, wherefore it was the great ambition of young musicians to be roasted by Smith. A roast was in the nature of an accolade.   Smith always knew what he was doing, and his thoughts on any subject were clear, though his newspaper language might not be. He was an extremely lucid teacher, but the habit of caustic comment made him no teacher for the weakling. The young lady who merely thought she wanted to learn to play soon wilted under his sarcasm. The result was that when one could say he had been a pupil of Wilson G. Smith for any number of years more than one, the respect of the musical community was instant. Nobody who was not really musical and had not great capacity for hard and patient work could survive. The Saturday afternoon recitals in his studio were tests not only of musicianship but of self-control.   "But I feel it this way," some young woman might be ill-advised enough to say in reply to a criticism. "Hmph !" Smith would say. "You feel it do you? Well, save your feelings for where they belong. Play a piece the way the composer has written it, or keep still." Then, while the rebuked one was leaving the piano, he would turn to the group of students assembled in the dim, disorderly region back of the pianos, and in half a dozen clear and vivid sentences would explain the place of emotion and intelligence in music.   Or as a student finished, "I think we'll give you a medal today. That is, I think, absolutely the worst I have ever heard that movement played. We'll hear you again next week if you think you can do it any better." When a group of students had heard a movement of a concerto played half a dozen   1110 - THIS CLEVELAND OF OURS   times on succeeding Saturdays, with illuminating comments as it proceeded, they forever knew something about it, even if they never touched it themselves.   To those who could bear his methods, however, Smith was the soul of kindness and generosity. No time was too great for him to spend. The depths of his patience could not be plumbed by a student who cared to learn. Two young women who were starting a studio of their own he once took under his special care, simply because he liked to give all earnest young things a hand up when he could. He would catch them in the hall or at the elevator door and take them down to his studio, where he gave them long lectures on how to teach, and to one of them who was attempting to write and lecture a bit, long talks on music criticism. He would say, "Hear you're going to lecture on Brahms ! Know anything about him?"   "Not much yet," would be the reply. "Well, come on down here. Lots of music in the corner. Everything he ever wrote for the piano, and lots of arrangements. Find them for yourself, though. I can't be bothered with you." The "pile in the corner" began on the floor and was half a room high and two or three sheet-music tiers deep. Pawing through it to find things was in itself a musical education. It was buried treasure. Everything was there, if one had time and patience to find it. The young teachers took time and learned patience. They also learned something about music, and they learned what great warmth of heart, beauty of soul, keenness of mental power and lyric fancy lay under the exterior of the sharp little man who spoke like a snapping turtle, wrote rather wildly and never washed his piano keys.   "What ! Never?" asked the chorus.   "Well, hardly ever !"   When some finicky student came to the rescue he would say, with a twinkle, "Hmph ! Washed 'em myself two weeks ago Thursday."   Smith's compositions, a few pleasant songs and piano pieces, a few imitations of other composer's styles, such as his "Homage a Grieg," were interesting enough, but not important, although his Octave Studies were useful. His was the critical type, not the creative.   THE CITY'S LIFE - 1111   In James H. Rogers one found the greatest all-round success, perhaps, of any of the group. He was organist of The Temple (Jewish) and of the Unitarian Church for a great many years. He was teacher of piano and organ. He was composer of songs, piano pieces and of much religious music, for organ and voice. In his piano music his handling of chords and dissonances to some extent anticipated the moderns. His short pieces, suites and etudes compare favorably with the work of MacDowell. His organ work followed more that of the later French school. But Rogers belonged definitely by temperament and outlook to that class which deplores a realism that casts out beauty.   Rogers may be said to have been the only critic and reviewer worth mention whom the Plain Dealer had from the beginning of its music department until the retirement of Mr. Rogers from all active work in 1932. There was a time when he withdrew from the newspaper work. Musical readers breathed a sigh of relief when he returned to that desk. His always genial and sympathetic temperament made him hate to hurt anyone or give offense. He escaped this difficulty by omitting or handling very lightly the things he thought bad, stressing and expounding with beautiful clarity the things he thought good. Those who were really interested could always read between the lines, salting the story as a whole by its omissions.   About five hundred people sat down to the farewell dinner given him by Cleveland musicians, and if ever there was a loge feast, that was one. As the guests filed out, one woman was heard to say, "Look at all this crowd ! And I'll wager there wasn't one of them to whom Rogers has not at some time done a kindness." "I cannot take you," said her escort ;limply. "That's the kind of man he has always been."   Rogers is now living in California.   One might mention in passing the name of Florence Ellinwood Allen as one of those who wrote music reviews for a year or two during Mr. Rogers' absence from the Plain Dealer columns, because it so well illustrates the versatility of the young woman who was at that time teaching history at a private   1112 - THIS CLEVELAND OF OURS   school, working for a degree at the university by day, and writing about music by night, and who has come at present to hold a place as judge of the Supreme Court of the State of Ohio. Somewhere along the line she wrote a book of very good verses.   Perhaps this is as. good a point as any to state a fact, not always well understood, about music schools. Like all other educational ventures, they find it very difficult to function long without some form of subsidy. City and state take over the public schools. Colleges must get endowment or die. Private schools—including music schools—struggle along as best they can, but if they succeed for long they must have some kind of assistance. Private academic schools get on by charging rates of tuition high enough to cover their costs, and by so doing limit their attendance to children of the well-to-do. If they are good, after a time their alumni and friends come to the rescue with endowment and scholarship aid.   Music schools can succeed without endowment only if their clientele is very large—it takes the cost of a great many music lessons to pay the overhead. Their most frequent form of subsidy, unrealized by anyone concerned, is found in the devotion of the teacher, who will work a day for two hours' pay, too happy to be working in some way at his beloved art to know or, even if told, to care much about the economic aspect of what he is doing. If the school flourishes and he gets six hours' pay for nine hours' work, he is long contented. But if he has not pupils enough to fill a too-long day, he finally wakes up to the fact that his short-hours' earning will not pay for twenty-four hours' living. Then he moves out of the school in an effort to reduce his overhead. He teaches at his home, or at the homes of pupils. He can never do work so good, because the student loses the school or studio atmosphere, but the teacher and his family may be able to subsist. Sometimes he opens his own studio, believing wasteful management to be a trouble with the school. He soon finds there that overhead continues. He must get an organ position, lead a singing society or find some other form of salaried work. Lessons very seldom have paid for themselves, because the average music-loving family cannot pay more than a moderate rate.   THE CITY'S LIFE - 1113   To no branch of education more than to schooling in music is applicable that story of the teachers who made a pilgrimage to Charlemagne. "What will you?" he asked.   "Food to eat, a roof from the wind, clothing enough to cover us and pupils to teach."   "So be it," said the emperor, and since then teachers have had no more.   There are compensations in the artistic and academic life, however—compensations so great that they keep in it minds of a very high type. There is hardly a joy comparable to that of having a student understand, apply and find satisfaction in the word spoken by the instructor. The deepest parental emotions are stirred by seeing the child of one's teaching grow in grace.   Cleveland has done so many remarkable things that it will surprise no one if some day there arises a Cleveland Juilliard or Eastman to establish a foundation for the furtherance of music study.   Returning from the general movement of music history to concrete instance, there next turns up for mention the Cleveland Conservatory of Music, never a closely knit school, but a loose association of teachers. William Heydler, who tried piccolo, flute and violin before deciding to settle down to the piano, organized the group in 1871. John Underner, teacher of voice, and John Hart, violin and harmony, were with him in the beginning. Underner, unlike the others, was of Spanish and French lineage. Frank Bassett, John Nuss, Charles Heydler and Patty Stair were well-known instructors who passed through the conservatory during its long years of existence. The very highest standards always prevailed in it. Patty Stair was the first woman member of the local chapter of the American Guild of Organists. Her compositions, especially the part songs for women's voices, are well liked and often sung, as are those of Fanny Snow Knowlton.   William Becker, concert pianist, has been teaching steadily and artistically in Cleveland and Rocky River for many years.   Another of the old guard, a man who by his thoroughly   1114 - THIS CLEVELAND OF OURS   musical voice teaching has done much for the city, is William Saal. Saal does the coaching in diction and voice production at the Play House. And as for vocal teachers, Madame von Feilitch was one of the early ones, associated with the conservatory. group, to whom some of the best singers owed much. Among the many good ones of today may be mentioned Warren Whitney, Grace Probert, Emi de Bidoli, Edna Howard and Lila Robeson. Miss Robeson sang with the Metropolitan Opera for many seasons, but came back to the home town to sing and teach afterward. Ralph Everett Sapp has been working here for about thirty years. He directs the West Shore Civic Chorus and the choir of the Boulevard Presbyterian Church.   Frederick Williams, another of the older teachers, is well known for the great number of charming children's pieces he has composed. Frances Kortheuer has been doing good work for a long time. Charles de Harrack is a concert pianist who is now playing and teaching in Cleveland. Walter Pope is instructor in music at Flora Stone Mather College.   Almeda Adams, teaching singing and directing her chorus of women's voices, the Schumann Club, studying abroad and returning to do improved teaching, deserves much credit for her fine work.   The late Albert Gehring was one of the second generation Germans who had an interesting musical career. He did a little teaching, in addition to which he has left some good piano pieces and a book, "The Basis of Musical Pleasure," which is not only of musical but also of psychological value.   Back in the middle period along towards the end of the nineteenth century, there was a picturesque figure and family —both being those of N. Coe Stewart. Stewart was Supervisor of Music in the Cleveland Public Schools for a long time. Under him came the first real musical development in the schools. He conducted classes—none too popular with the imps who might have learned something had they cared to—in singing at the high schools, and had a general supervision over the grade school music.   His daughter, Gabrielle, managed a course of lectures and   THE CITY'S LIFE - 1115   concerts called the Star Course. She brought Ignace J. Paderewski to the old music hall on Vincent Street. The Boston Symphony Orchestra was also presented by the Stewarts in the Grays' Armory, and through them Cleveland had the opportunity to hear some famous soloists.   It is worth mentioning, too, that among the scattered concerts given before the turn of the century were a few by the Theodore Thomas Orchestra of Chicago, led by Thomas himself. One of these was given at the old Tabernacle at the corner of Ontario and St. Clair streets. Frederick Stock had succeeded Thomas when this orchestra played here regularly, later.   There is in Cleveland at present a very strong chapter of the American Guild of Organists. Among its members may be mentioned Edwin Arthur Kraft, organist of Trinity Cathedral, J. R. Hall, Vincent Percy, organist of Public Hall, and Albert Riemenschneider. Mr. Riemenschneider is another second-generation German. His father was at one time president of Baldwin-Wallace University at Berea, which has always given special attention to music. Mr. Riemenschneider is head of the conservatory there, where he has taught organ, as well as in Cleveland, for a long time. His is one of the Cleveland homes which includes a fine music room with a pipe organ built into it.   Cidnee Hamilton, who succeeded Rogers as organist and music director of the Unitarian Church about a dozen years ago, has another distinction. He was one of the first high-class organists to play in a moving picture theatre. His handling of the theatre organ was a revelation as to the possibilities of that line of musical development. Angeline E. Allen, who studied this type of organ playing with Hamilton, and for a time played one of the organs at the Mall Theatre while Hamilton played the other, was also a member of the local organists' guild until she went to the Plaza Theatre at Sandusky, where she played for five years. With the advent of the talkies she returned to Lakewood, where she teaches organ and piano and serves as professional accompanist. To the writer, who was once her associate in the Allen-Russell Music   1116 - THIS CLEVELAND OF OURS   Studio, Miss Allen has been of great assistance in the preparation of this book. Ida M. Reeder is another capable organist, and there are many others.   There is an active group of men music teachers called the "Musicians' Club," and there is also a "Women Music Teachers' Club."   The Cleveland Institute of Music is today the most important of the music schools. It was incorporated in 1920 "as a school where the best opportunity for the study of music in all its branches would be offered to the serious student, whether his object be general culture, or the serious preparation for professional performance, or teaching."   The faculty is composed of artist teachers, many of na-tional reputation, and every student of a regular course is required to follow a prescribed line of study. The institute is a charter member of the National Association of Schools of Music, and the curricula and courses conform to the accredited outline of study set forth by them. Mrs. Franklyn B. Sanders was its director from its inception until June, 1932, and to her energy and thoroughness much of its present success can be attributed.   Ernest Bloch was brought here at first to head the institute, but he withdrew after a few years to devote himself to composition. Beryl Rubinstein is now director of the insti-tute, as well as head of the faculty, which contains an imposing list of names of artists. Among them may be noticed only a few high lights—Josef Fuchs, violin, who is also concertmeister of the Cleveland Orchestra ; Victor de Gomez, vio-loncello ; Arthur Loesser, professional voice coaching; Her-bert Elwell, theory and composition. is also music critic of the Cleveland Plain Dealer, and Denoe Leedy, teacher of piano, is critic of the Cleveland Press. Carlton Cooley teaches viola, and Quincy Porter, who had also taught viola along with work in composition, has within the last few months been appointed instructor in composition at Vassar College.   It should be understood by the reader that no attempt at an inclusive list is made in any of these fields. A few names   THE CITY'S LIFE - 1117   are taken here and there as typical of the many good musicians in the city.   The institute cooperates with the university in offering a course in Public School Music, which conforms to the new requirements of the Department of Education of the State of Ohio. It also teaches orchestra, Dalcroze Eurhythmics and modern dancing. There is a course of lectures given each year in Comparative Arts.   At the present time the institute is flourishing, with several hundred students, many of them coming from out of town. The use of the fine Euclid Avenue home of the late Samuel Mather has been given it by the Mather heirs for the next few years.   The Cleveland Music School Settlement was incorporated in 1912 for the purpose of giving lessons at very low rates to children who could not afford the normal tuition fees. It now has a faculty consisting of one full time teacher and about thirty-five who give part time to this work, including several members of the Cleveland orchestra. Severin Eisenberger heads it. It has about four hundred students at the present time. It has developed some musicians of considerable talent, but its purpose is not limited to gifted children. It takes any who are interested in music.   Since the days when the Gesangverein was the only singing society to amount to anything, and those later ones when the Cleveland Vocal Society held the center of the stage, Cleveland has never been without many singing societies. Some of them give regular concerts of a rather professional nature, and others are merely neighborhood groups of people who like to sing. Some of the church choirs do rather notable things. The men's and boys' choir of St. Ann's Roman Catholic Church, for instance, makes a specialty of Gregorian music and that of the early church composers such as Palestrina and Di Lassus. Edgar Bowman led this for some time, but has recently removed to Pittsburgh.   A large chorus connected with the Franklin Circle Church of Christ gives "The Messiah" every year. The Bach Chorus under the direction of F. W. Strieter does increasingly artis-   1118 - THIS CLEVELAND OF OURS   tic work. Last year it sang the "St. Matthew Passion" with the Cleveland Orchestra. The Welsh Male Chorus sings delightfully, as might be expected. Groups of the various foreign nationalities foster singing societies of more than passing merit.   The two most important singing societies from every point of view are the Orpheus Club conducted by Charles D. Dawe, and the Singers Club, now under the guidance of Beryl Rubinstein. The Singers Club is an old one, organized in 1891. It began with thirty young men getting together to furnish music for Sunday afternoon Y. M. C. A. meetings. After a bit they incorporated under the name which they still bear. C. B. Ellinwood was their first leader. They have had several leaders during their forty years, and but a few of the original voices remain. The club as an institution continues to give two of the finest and largest attended concerts of each season. It now has about one hundred twenty-five voices.   The Opera Guild is under the baton of Francis Sadlier. It gives an opera or two a year, with purely local talent. Always its work is interesting, giving opportunity to its members to learn good operas and have a good time producing them.   Out of the activities of the Conservatory of Music grew some of Cleveland's best chamber music. The Cecilian String Quartet was organized about 1875, with John Nuss first violin, Philip Grotenrath second, two brothers named Koenigslow viola and cello. The Koenigslow brothers had one of the first music shops in town. This quartet gave pleasure for many years. It gave way, finally, to the Schubert Quartet, with Johann Beck, violin ; Julius Deiss, second ; John Lockhart, viola, and Charles Heydler, cello.   The next string quartet was the Philharmonic, Sol Marcosson, first violin ; Carl Dueringer, second ; James D. Johnston, viola; and Charles Heydler, cello. With that quartet the story enters the stream of musical activities initiated by the Fortnightly Musical Club, which for nearly thirty years has had a marked influence on Cleveland's music. Suffice it to say at this point that the Fortnightly was responsible for bringing Marcosson here in 1896, with the prime purpose of   THE CITY'S LIFE - 1119   organizing the quartet, and that he remained on contract with the club to produce a certain number of chamber music concerts a year for a little over ten years. Orth, writing in 1910, said : "Sol Marcosson stands at the head of the violinists in Cleveland." Twenty-two years have taken nothing from Marcosson's reputation or ability as player or teacher. In the latter capacity it is safe to say that no one in Cleveland in any educational branch has ever done more careful, delicate, firm and inspiring teaching. But in these last years other excellent violinists have come to Cleveland or have come up in it, so that although Marcosson's shadow grows no less, his work has become of less relative importance in the larger city. Herman Rosen, Felix Eyle, Josef Fuchs are among the fine violinists of today.   After a few years Carl Dueringer dropped out of the Philharmonic Quartet and his place was taken by the excellent violinist, Charles Rychlik. At one time the Philharmonic held the record in this country for having played together longer than any other quartet. Not even the Kneisels or the Flonzaleys had associated the same men for so great a time in the playing of chamber music. The work of the Philharmonic string quartet was one of the things to which Cleveland has always been able to point with unqualified pride, and the Fortnightly was always able to declare joyfully, "Behold my child !" It fell apart finally, as all things will.   Cleveland has now two or three professional string quartets playing extremely well, and a good many more of the informal kind, playing together in homes for the fun of it. One of the fine chamber music groups of today is the Cleveland String Quartet, Josef Fuchs, first violin ; Rudolph Ring-wall, second ; Carlton Cooley, viola; and Victor de Gomez, cello. The Musical Arts Association has supported through fifteen years this quartet, composed of concertmaster, principal 'cellist, principal violist, and assistant conductor of the Cleveland Orchestra. It has a national reputation, has taken part in the concerts of the Elizabeth Sprague Coolidge Foundation in Washington, and has played in New York and London. Ringwall is assistant conductor of the Cleveland Orchestra.   1120 - THIS CLEVELAND OF OURS   In the year 1894 Mrs. J. H. Webster one day invited six ladies to her home to discuss the possibility of forming a musical club. The seven present decided to see what could be done. Each one of them interested three others in the project. The twenty-eight sent out a little circular to those who, they thought, might be interested. To their entire surprise, 350 women declared their intention of joining. The time, it is plain, was ripe.   The Fortnightly Musical Club was then organized, and was divided into two groups, one of active musicians, who gave the fortnightly afternoon concerts, and one of associate members, who paid fees and listened.   Before long the club was thriving to an extent which permitted it to bring in outside artists.   There appears, in 1898, the figure of a woman of extraordinary talent and power—Adella Rouse Prentiss. This young woman was destined profoundly to influence Cleveland's music.   She was the daughter of Loren Prentiss. Her mother, Ellen Rebecca Rouse, was the daughter of Deacon Benjamin Rouse, who arrived in 1830 to establish Sunday schools for the American Sunday School Union, a non-sectarian organization. Like most of the early religious workers, he was inclined to be pessimistic as to the moral and spiritual qualities of the people in this district. He set to work with determination to improve the situation, leaving a legacy of determination to that young granddaughter yet to be.   Adella Prentiss was graduated from Vassar College in 1890, with high honors. She had always been studying music, and at college had served as accompanist many times for soloists and groups of women's voices. She liked this work, and after she left college began to do it professionally.   Towards the end of the decade, Fitzgerald's translation of Omar Khayyam's "Rubaiyat" began to be popular, and an English composer, Liza Lehmann, set some of the most poetic quatrains to music for a mixed quartet. The young accompanist had been playing a bit for Mrs. Seabury C. Ford, then soprano at St. Paul's Church. She thought it would be a   THE CITY'S LIFE - 1123   lovely thing to bring this music here. She secured David Bispham, Marguerite Hall and Gordon Mackenzie to sing the suite, called "In a Persian Garden," with Mrs. Ford soprano, and herself accompanist. This was her first venture as concert manager, and it was successful. The following year she went on tour with this quartet, which sang in half a dozen large cities.   The young woman was one of the first members of the Fortnightly. She had come out of college and further music study full of energy and without much of a field to use it in. She had always enjoyed music and welcomed any chance to do something about getting good music to hear. She began managing the evening concerts of the Fortnightly, and in the next few years she brought distinguished artists to Cleveland. She had no thought at first of concert-managing as a business or a career. But one thing led to another, and she awoke one morning to realize that willy-nilly she was engaged in a business.   By 1901 the Fortnightly had been enjoying its string quartet for five years, and had given opportunity to many of the club's active members in other fields to perform before it and to develop by performance. It had begun engaging outside artists for some of its afternoon concerts. It yearned for symphonic music. The young manager decided to enlarge her field by bringing visiting orchestras to Cleveland. She moved on along this line, and Mrs. Franklyn B. Sanders took over the work of the Fortnightly concerts.   Victor Herbert was then leading the Pittsburgh Orchestra, and that was the first one to play here. Finding Cleveland at a point where it desired symphony concerts was one thing. Finding a place for orchestras to play in was another. There had been various temporary large halls, the last one of which, the old Music Hall on Vincent Street, had finally burned down. Everyone who had ever attended concerts in it was relieved to have it burn when empty. The Y. M. C. A. hall on Prospect and East Ninth Street was too small. So were the rooms at the Colonial Club on Euclid near East Seventy-Ninth Street, which then took adequate care of the Fortnightly's afternoon affairs.   1124 - THIS CLEVELAND OF OURS   There remained the armory of the Cleveland Grays. To this forbidding structure N. Coe Stewart had brought the Boston Symphony Orchestra and some other musical events. The Fortnightly had presented here three concerts by the Theodore Thomas Orchestra of Chicago. These had been isolated events, but the present prospect was for a series of symphony concerts to be given not only this year, but in succeeding ones. Its interior was bleak. The acoustics were found to be excellent, and that was the deciding factor. The Grays, for a good contract, were willing to build an addition to their platform. In the center of its temporary proscenium arch was placed, for good measure, a singing head of papier macha which always annoyed Adella Prentiss—as well as most of the audience—because of its swollen ugliness. The hall was always badly ventilated, and being used on other nights for its original purpose of military drill, not to mention poultry and dog shows, it could have only temporary wooden seats which were uncomfortable, and quite out of key with the evening gowns of such few ladies as dared enter the place with them. Among these ladies could always be seen the young impresario, regally gowned, gracious, never too busy for a smile or pleasant word to anyone she recognized, but with a clear brain behind the smile, functioning on a thousand details so adequately that concert-goers could not dream of the labor that went on to produce their evening's good music.   In 1904 Miss Prentiss was married to Felix Hughes. The marriage was dissolved in 1923. Mr. Hughes maintains a vocal studio in New York.   During the years from 1901 to 1918, at which time the Cleveland Orchestra was born, Mrs. Hughes brought to Cleveland such soloists as Schumann-Heink, Melba, Nordica, Sembrich, Eames, Ysaye, Kreisler, Elman, and such organizations as the Mendelssohn Choir of Toronto, the Diaghileff Ballet, New York Philharmonic Orchestra, The Boston, Chicago, Cincinnati, Detroit, Minneapolis, New York and Russian Symphony orchestras and Philadelphia and Pittsburgh orchestras, Pavlowa, the Ben Greet Players, an all-star cast