PRAISES GLEE CLUB COLLECTION OF SONGS

If anything were needed to refute those occasional critics of the Harvard Glee Club who complain that by going in for first-class music the Club is killing the old college songs, the "Harvard Song Book" would do the trick. Certain graduates have written dismal letters to the "Alumni Bulletin" during the past two or three years, conveying an impression that always until now it has been a major sport for undergraduates to gather in compact groups about a piano of an evening and split the air with "Giniral Grant", but that the Glee Club is spoiling all this by its disconcerting preference for Palestrina. It has been a little hard to answer some of these criticisms. The reply that the so-called college songs have not flourished at Harvard for many a college generation as vigorously as some sentimental graduates seem to imagine, has not impressed the die-hards. The reply Dr. Davison, through his institution of the Freshman Jubilee and in other ways, has encouraged rather than discouraged general singing among undergraduates, has been received here and there with incredulity. But now, in the "Harvard Song Book", compiled and published by the Glee Club, we have physical proof that the Club is not indifferent to college singing as that term has usually been understood. The critic would be bilious indeed who would not congratulate the Glee Club on its achievement.

Contains All Types of Music

The book contains, first, a collection of Harvard songs, beginning with "Fair Harvard" and the stirring "Harvard Hymn", and including football songs old and new, familiar and less familiar. The new Converse song, "Harvard, Sovereign Mother", is a feature of this part of the book. In the remainder of the volume are fifty or more songs of various types, ranging from the splendid "Prayer of Thanksgiving" at one extreme to "Hall, Hall, the Gang's All Here!" at the other.

The preface explains that "it has been the purpose of the Club to incorporate those of distinctive merit or of outstanding popularity, together with a few new ones and some that have not hitherto been printed"; and explains further that some old favorites omitted from recent song-books have been brought back; that a few folk-songs not generally appearing in college books have been added; and that the negro melodies occurring in every collection have been omitted.

Fills Long Felt Want

No two people will ever agree as to what individual songs should be put in such a collection. Some will lament the absence of close-agony gems such as 'Rebecca" and "My Old Kentucky Home." Some may wonder how "Over the Banister" and the "Song of the Life-Boat Men" happened to survive the qualifying round. The present reviewer is not inclined to set himself up as arbiter in a matter in which individual tastes are so various. He is content to call attention to the fact that Harvard has needed such a song-book for a long time, that the Glee Club saw the need and filled it, that the editors gathered together most of the songs which any rational group of judges would agree upon, and that the book is compact, attractive in appearance, and as inexpensive as the Glee Club could afford to make it. The "Harvard Song Book" ought to sell well and keep on selling.