ABSTRACT
Modern music it is asserted by some, is the music of modern noise. If it lapses into serenity or-horribile dictu!—romanticism, it ceases to be modern. Shortsighted friends and vaticinating enemies of modern music, both make the tacit admission that the path of music leads towards an inextricable thicket, which by some miracle is bound to appear simple to modern minds accustomed to the rebuses of modern life. Not long ago one of the solicitous sympathizers complained about the situation in a magazine devoted to modern music. In his view, the very raison d’être of modern music seemed to be lost at the pitiful sight of the modern Samson getting a hair cut. Even the redoubtable Varèse, who used to get his inspiration from the din of buildings in construction, is now preparing a “simplified edition” of his “Amériques,” to the extent of sacrificing the “crow-call” and the steamship-whistle, so tantalizingly featured in the first edition of the score.
