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

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THE GOBBLER-1944 JOHNSON HIGH SCHOOL organized music from the haphazard “plain-song” which was not measured in terms of time. If your interests are literary rather than mathematical, music offers an even larger field of enjoyment. It is interesting, and often amusing, to observe how some of the composers have treated the authors of great literary masterpieces. Shakespeare has not been very successfully set to music on the whole. Verdi’s “Othello” and “Falstaff” are the most important operatic treatments of Shakes¬ peare, and Gounod’s “Romeo and Juliet” is at least adequate. The finest Shakes¬ pearian music is still the youthful overture to the “Midsummer Night’s Dream,” by Mendelssohn. The French poets have had an enormous influence on French music and a large proportion of all program music owes its existence to such poetry. Debus¬ sy’s “Prelude to the Afternoon of a Faun” is a characteristic example, based on a poem by Mallarme. Narrative music is almost as common as descriptive, even when no words are used. Music has often been compared with language itself. While it combines easily with actual language, it also speaks a language of its own, which has become universal. To understand the significance of the organizing factors of rhythm, melody, harmony, tone color and form, the knowledge of a familiar language is helpful. Music has its own alphabet, of only seven letters, as com¬ pared with the twenty-six of the English alphabet. Each of these letters repre¬ sents a note, and just as certain letters are complete words in themselves, so certain notes may stand alone, with the force of a whole word. Generally, however, a note of music implies a certain harmony, and in most modern music the notes take the form of actual chords. So it may be said that a chord in music is like a word in a language. Several words form a phrase, and several phrases form a sentence, and the same thing is true in music. Measured music corresponds to poetry, while the old unmeasured plain-song might be compared to prose. If you are interested in history or geography or both, the co-operation of music again becomes highly significant. There is no better way of studying nationalism than through the folk music of individual countries. There is no mistaking the character of a Hungarian Rhapsody or an Irish Jig, or a Polish Mazurka, or a Viennese Waltz. The music of a country should always be an important part of the study of its geography and history. Music has played a dramatic role on numerous historic occasions, such as the fall of the Bastille, when the Marseillaise was heard, the rise of Protestantism, inspired by Martin Luther’s hymn, “A Mighty Fortress Is Our God,” even the surrender of Cornwallis at Yorktown, when Yankee Doodle turned from an army joke into a march of triumph. Music is so closely knit with the other arts that one could not very well get along without the other. Painting, sculpture, and literature all have their anal¬ ogies in music, and the art of the dance could not exist without music, which is its heart and soul. But the greatest significance of music is in its relation to life itself. It is 20

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THE GOBBLER-1944 JOHNSON HIGH SCHOOL SALUTATORY Mr. Hayes, distinguished guests, faculty, parents and friends: It gives me great pleasure to welcome you in behalf of the Class of 1944 to this, the seventy- fifth graduation exercise of Johnson High School. The Art of Enjoying Music IS impossible to develop the art of enjoying music simply by reading books about it. The one absolute necessity is to hear plenty of music of all kinds, and thus get the habit of forming one’s own opinions. If these opinions keep changing, so much the better. It probably means that a definite development of taste is taking place. If a piece of music sounds dull and uninteresting at a first hearing, don’t give it up on that account. The fact that its beauties are not obvious is quite likely to be in its favor. On the other hand, do not be carried away by first impressions. Music that follows the line of least resistance may be temporarily popular, but is not necessarily good on that account. In listening to music of any kind, try to listen from the standpoint of the five organizing factors: rhythm, melody, harmony, tone color and form. They will appear in varying degrees of importance, but they will inevitably be present in every significant composition. The “foot-listener,” who merely responds to rhythm, is decidedly limited in his enjoyment of music, but the “head-listener,” who approaches the art with his intellect alone, is perhaps just as limited. Between the two are the “heart- listeners,” the emotionalists, to whom music is just a romantic stimulant. The great majority of haphazard listeners respond to music in this way. But anyone who makes an art of enjoying music approaches music from all three angles: physically, by way of the feet; emotionally, by way of the heart; and intellect¬ ually, by way of the head. All really great music of the world is written with this triple appeal. The direct pleasure that comes from the recognition of inspiration in a piece of music is something impossible to describe. Fritz Kreisler has given it the physical sensation of that tingling, shivering ecstasy commonly known as “goose flesh,” and he may be right when he says that only the music that produces that particular sensation is really worth while. Beyond this direct enjoyment and analysis of music there are unlimited possibilities of associating it with other interests, as well as with other studies. If your mind is a mathematical one, you can find all sorts of opportunities to work out the mathematics of music. The relationship of vibrations to pitch is a mathematical one. The 440 A is considered Standard Pitch, meaning that the sound A above middle C represents 440 vibrations per second. Each interval of the scale has a mathematical relationship to the adjoining tones and all the others. All the details of time and rhythm are naturally mathematical in a very special sense, and the term “measure” really differentiates the modern, well- 19

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THE GOBBLER-1944 JOHNSON HIGH SCHOOL unquestionably the most human of all the arts, and the one that enters most into every day experience—the mother’s lullaby, a favorite hymn, a marching tune or patriotic music of any kind. Religion has never been able to get along without music and it is one of the greatest assets of the church today. Patriot¬ ism, love, loyalty, courage, and all the other human virtues are not only expressed but stimulated by music. The art of enjoying music finds its greatest pleasure in the discovery of permanent beauty, regardless of whether the discovery has previously been made by others. When you have discovered for yourself something beautiful that proves to have passed the test of time, and to have stimulated thousands of others as it stimulates you, then you have enjoyed an experience that is akin to that of the creative artist himself; and, what is more, you have added definitely to the enduring satisfactions of life. Caroline Hayman CLASS ORATION The More Prepared, the More Powerful M HE more prepared we are, the more powerful we are. In the realm of warfare this is very evident. Germany could strike with such force and might as it did in 1939 because it had prepared for war for well over eight years. Japan, with a population of 73,000,000, could afford to attack the United States, with a population of 135,000,000, almost double that of Japan, for two primary reasons. The first was the element of surprise, and the second, but more important, was the extensive preparations that Japan had undertaken to accomplish this pur¬ pose. For years our scrap iron replenished the depleted steel stocks of the Japanese war machine. Long before Japanese naval forces struck at Pearl Harbor, Japanese troops on Formosa, in Indo-China, and on Japanese-mandated islands were waiting to strike at Guam, Wake, the Philippines and British Malaya. It took months to prepare for our invasions of Guadalcanal and North Africa. Think of the months of preparation for the much talked about and much called for “second front.” Our military leaders, the commissioned officers, must take years of military training in school and in the field before they are entrusted with a command. Education and practical preparation are absolute requisites to our military officers. In life itself this motto is just as true. On all sides of us today we hear the familiar phrase: “On the youth of today rests the world of tomorrow.” As this is only too true, the youth of today must prepare now for the tremendous task ahead of them. The young men and women in the service can continue their education, if they so desire, under a special correspondence program set up by the army and navy. But the under-classmen in the high schools today have the greatest opportunity of all to shoulder our post-war responsibilities. Special technical subjects have been put into the school curricula. These technical studies should, however, be supplemented with subjects that deal with modern economic, social, and political problems. These subjects should deal not only J 21