This  music  you  will  remember  if  you  have  ever
attended  a  performance  of  a  Lincoln  J.  Carter
melodrama  in  which  a  train  was  wrecked,  or  a  hero
rescued  from  the  teeth  of  a  saw,  or  a  heroine  pur-
sued by  bloodhounds.  (Those  were  the  good  old
days!)  Recently  I  heard  a  pianist  in  a  moving
picture  house  on  Fourteenth  Street  in  New  York
eke  out  a  half-hour  with  similar  poundings  on  two
or  three  well-used  chords  (well  used  even  in  the
time  of  Hadyn).  The  scenes  represented  the
whole  of  a  two-act  opera,  and  the  ambitious  pian-
ist was  trying  to  give  his  audience  the  effect  of
singers  (principals  and  chorus)  and  orchestra
with  his  three  chords.  (Shades  of  Arnold  Schoen-
berg!)

A  certain  periodical  devoted  to  the  interests  of
the  moving  picture  trade,  conducts  a  department
as  first  aid  to  the  musical  conductors  and  pianists
who  figure  at  these  shows.  In  a  recent  number
the  editor  of  this  department  gives  it  as  his  solemn
opinion  that  musicians  who  read  fiction  are  the
best  equipped  for  picture  playing.  Then,  with
an  almost  tragic  parenthesis,  he  continues,
"  Reading  fiction  is  the  last  diversion  that  the  av-
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Music    for    the    Movies

erage  musician  will  follow.  He  feels  that  all  the
necessary  romance  is  to  be  found  in  his  music."
Facts  are  dead,  says  this  editor  in  substance,  but
fiction  is  living  and  should  make  you  weep.  When
you  cry,  all  that  remains  for  you  to  do  is  to  think
of  a  tune  which  will  synchronize  with  the  cause  of
your  tears ;  this  will  serve  you  later  when  a  simi-
lar scene  occurs  in  a  film  drama.
