THE GLEE CLUB AGAIN.

EDITORS HARVARD HERALD: There has appeared in the columns of your paper a communication from R. B., attacking the Glee Club in a manner that requires answering; and it is perhaps well that the answer be made by one who, while himself not a member of the club, is yet interested in its welfare. To answer the last and least important objection first, the Glee Club, to my certain knowledge, was never asked to furnish a quartette at the Pi Eta theatricals. Individual members were approached and were finally obliged to refuse to sing on account of the bad condition of their voices. Their indisposition was certainly an excuse for them personally. How the club can be called to account on a matter that was never brought before it, I do not see, especially since a quartette has never yet been a part of its organization. With regard to the duties of the Glee Club to the college, and those of the college toward the Glee Club, I must make a grave general charge against the college. Musically speaking it is at the lowest ebb of indifference. Not to speak of the neglect of the musical opportunities afforded by Boston, the number of students attending Mr. Henschel's concerts in Sanders itself was disproportionately small; while the concerts which Prof. Paine arranged, on his personal responsibility, in Sever, were a failure through the utter indifference of the students, for whose benefit they were intended. As for the Glee Club and Pierian, they have been continually disheartened by the apathy of the students. Year by year we must add to the trouble of rehearsing that of a personal canvass in and out of the college, succeeding with difficulty in raising sufficient money for defraying the current expenses. If it were not for the dancing, not a musical feature, it is doubtful whether we should even succeed in doing this. In view of these discouragements, is it to be wondered at, that few men, with high tenor voices, are willing to risk them in choral practice for the slight satisfaction of knowing that they are sustaining Harvard's musical reputation in spite of herself? As a matter of fact, there are but five creditable first tenor voices in the university, and only three of these five even are willing to sing. Any one at all acquainted with vocal music must know that this cuts off any increase in the filling of the three other parts. If you wish more basses, furnish more tenors; to do so you must make a position on the Glee Club desirable for all men by showing more interest than that contained in listening to a free concert once a week and growling if it isn't given.

If college songs are to be really worthy of the name, they must be sung by a chorus of all the students - no limited club is sufficient. If we want college songs in the evenings, let us all join in, and not expect our dozen of fine singers to ruin their voices, by trying to inspire us sybarites with the proud feeling that "we sing college songs at Harvard!"

PIERIAN.