Share page | Visit Us On FB |
The National Music of America. 313
described in these pages ; for, while America possessed no composers during the Revolution and the War of 1812, and no very great ones during the Civil War, she now may boast of a worthy band of native musical composers who shine in even the largest and severest forms of the art.
Paine, Chadwick, MacDowell, Strong, Foote, Buck, Parker, — the list might be extended to very large proportions. One of these composers will, some day, when the inspiration seizes him, possibly in the train of some great national events, bring forth the music of the true national hymn of America.
May God grant that the coming hymn be not born, as so many have been, in the midst of carnage and desolation; may its music not be cradled in distress and baptised in blood! Yet it must not be wholly a song of peace either; the trumpet must reverberate in its harmonies, the sacrifices which bought this country and made it what it is |
||