North Andover High School - Knight Yearbook (North Andover, MA)

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1 9 3 9 YEAR BOOK compositions for a circle of admiring comrades. They were proud of his musical talent and provided him with music paper, since they knew that he had little spending money. At this time he was active both in the school orchestra, and, on Sundays and holidays, in a quartet at home. After supper his father and his two elder brothers would go into the living room and tune up their instruments while Franz hunted in his music case for a new composition he had written for them. After five years in the choir his voice changed and he had to leave the music school. To avoid military conscription he taught in his father’s school. He disliked teaching the restless little boys, and did it very poorly, but the posi¬ tion was not without its compensations, as he formed many new friendships during this period. One of them was with the poet Mayerhofer, many of whose poems Franz set to music. His naturally sunny disposition contrasted strangely with the extreme melancholy of the poet, yet they became firm friends. Another compensation was his composing. During these years of drudgery in the parish school Schubert wrote an incredible amount of music. One of his compositions, the Mass in F, was performed at the centenary of the parish church, and he himself conducted the orchestra. His father was so pleased at this that he gave him a new piano. Also in this period he wrote one of his best-known compositions, the setting of Goethe’s poem “The Erl-King.” After he had read the poem the story of the weird ride took possession of him, and he composed his setting on the same day. His friend Spann appeared in time to see him writing furiously at his desk, dashing to the piano to play the notes, then dashing back to his desk to write more. Oddly enough, Goethe never liked this setting for his poem, nor did he approve Schubert’s settings for any of his other poems. He prob¬ ably regarded him as an obscure composer who sought to rise to fame on his reputation. It was shortly after this that Von Schober, a well-to-do young law student, heard some of Schubert’s music at the house of a friend. “He cannot be al¬ lowed to waste his life in teaching school!” he cried. Schubert had just made an unsuccessful application for the post of choirmaster in a neighboring town and had been feeling particularly miserable about his failure. Von Schober invited him to join him in his lodgings, an offer which he readily accepted. Thus he was finally rescued from school life. For a while he tried to support himself by giving music lessons, but this was just as unbearable as school teaching, so he abandoned it for composing. It was at this time that he said, “I write all day, and when I have finished one piece I begin another.” He was the only composer who ever successfully employed such a method of work, but his gift of song would not be stilled, even to the extent of revising music once he had written it. Although Schubert’s music was beginning to be performed by several fam¬ ous artists, little of it was published, and he had practically nothing on which to exist. He and his friends shared food, lodgings, and everything else they could get. At one time Schubert, who always wore glasses, could not find his wooden glasses case for several days. Finally he noticed that his friend Schwind had filled the case with tobacco, bored a hole in it, inserted a stem, and was using it for a pipe. This was in one of their less affluent times. When one of them happened to come into unexpected wealth, they all lived in luxury for a few days. 21

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JOHNSON HI GH SCHOOL are to unite to stop the menace of dictatorships. China, with whom we are led to sympathize, is the second severest dictatorship existing today. V hen the dictator Kemal Ataturk of Turkey, a much worse dictator than Hitler or Mussolini, died recently, those editors who pretended to despise dictatorships lauded him to the skies. This illustrates the deception and falsity of the prop¬ agandists. This propaganda is evidently an evil which, if successful in creat¬ ing war, would throw our country into great turmoil and disturbance, the undesirable and underlying element of communism rising up into prominence. Be critical of everything you read and hear. Check up on editors by com¬ paring their facts, if possible, with authoritative facts from the departments of war and commerce. Don’t be influenced by the appearance of good. As soon as the emotions are played upon, stop and consider with skepticism. Intelligent doubting is to the mind as a blink is to the eyes. All foreign mat¬ ter is removed, clearness results. Keep your eyes on the stars, but keep your feet firmly on the ground! HELEN GREENLER VALEDICTORY X T is my privilege tonight to speak on the life of a man who, through his gift of melody and his devotion to his art, placed himself among the immortals of our world. He did not excel in statesmanship or in the science of warfare, but in music, an art common to all nations, all races, and all civilizations. This man was Franz Schubert. Franz Schubert was a paradox. Although during his life he suffered more from lack of recognition than any other great composer, he appears as one of the happiest of all. In his short life—- he only lived to be thirty-one— he produced more great music than many musicians who lived their allotted three-score years and ten. He was born in 1797 in a suburb of gay Vienna. His father was the parish schoolmaster. It is not surprising that Franz was musical, for his father and elder brothers were musicians, and when he was very young they taught him the rudiments of piano and violin. It was not long before he outgrew their instructions and was sent to Herr Holzer, the choirmaster of the parish, who apparently had never had such a brilliant pupil, for he later said of him, “Whenever I wished to teach him anything new, I found that he had already mastered it.” Yet perhaps the good man was blinded by admiration, for one authority states that Schubert gained more from one of his friends, a joiner’s appentice, for he took him to a neighborhood pianoforte warehouse to practice on the new pianos before they were packed. When he was nine the shy Franz, a chubby, plainly dressed little boy, went with many others to a big bare room presided over by several awesome and dignified men, whose duty it was to choose the best singer as choirboy in the Imperial Chapel, a post which carried with it a free education in the Stadt-Convict, the chief music-school of Vienna. After all had sung, the gentlemen retired for a short discussion and returned with the announcement, “Franz Schubert is the winner.” At the music school Franz not only gained much practical musical know¬ ledge, but also made many of the friends who were so loyal to him in later life. Franz was always the merriest of the group. Often he played his own 20

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JOHNSON HIGH SCHOOL For a summer he was appointed music master to the family of Count Johann Esterhazy. Members of this family had been patrons of Hayden and other great composers, but they were not destined to help Franz Schubert. One account says that Schubert, shy, awkward, and unu sed to society life, was ill at ease in the presence of so much grandeur. At any rate, he soon re¬ turned to Vienna and his friends. It was chiefly timidity that prevented Schubert from becoming a friend of the great Beethoven. When he heard that the great moster was dying, Schubert got up courage to visit him. Then, glancing over a few of Schubert’s compositions, Beethoven exclaimed, “He has at least a spark of the divine fire!” When he died shortly afterwards, Schubert was one of the torch-bearers in the funeral procession. When it was over he and two of his friends went to a tavern to drink to Beethoven’s memory. There Schubert proposed this toast: “To the next great composer who is to die.” Less than two years later, at the age of thirty-one, this shy young man had passed from the stage of life, leaving only the outward expression of his gift of melody. In the record of his life we are impressed not only by his unique power to record his inspired songs, but also by his devotion to his work. He achieved fame in doing that which he loved best and which he could not live without. Mr. Hayes: You have piloted us through four years at Johnson High School. You have been our counselor, adviser, and friend. May you remem¬ ber this class of nineteen hundred and thirty-nine as often as we shall re¬ member you. Teachers: You have worked and toiled with us. It is your faithful work with us in the class rooms that has endeared you to us. It would be im¬ possible for us to express adequately our appreciation of your patience and forebearance. Parents and Friends, Not only for these past four years, but for many years before you have aided us in our troubles and helped us solve our prob¬ lems. We shall never forget your kindness. Schoolmates: To you we leave the future of Johnson High. It is your part to keep up the traditions and spirit of this school. May you have success in your task. Classmates: For four years we have been together. Tonight we must part, each to take a different road in life. Yet the memory of these years of work and play will inspire us to reach our goals. Good by, and good luck! VIRGINIA CARVELL 22