It is a truth so obvious as to be almost a platitude that what seems radical to a previous generation is a common place twenty five years later. Not only is this true in the customs and ideas which go to make up life in general, but it can perhaps be seen even more clearly in the arts and no where in the arts more obviously than in music. Wagner for example was looked upon by many of our grandparents in the same way in which the more conservative members of the present generation look upon the cacaphonus mechanics of modern workers in sound who strive for greater, realism by introducing automobile horns and engine bells into their scores.

Realism, so-called, is indeed the password and fetish of modernity. Realism, in painting, realism in literature, realism in music--and always this realism is atended by unpleasant noise whatever be the medium of expression, and rarely is it real. Yet cacaphony in music may, for all that, have more of a log to stand on so to speak, than disharmony in other branches of art, for only last night an article appeared in a metropolitan newspaper to the effect that music through its new mechanics will strengthen certain muscles in the ear that have become attrophied through disuse--one infers, through listening to pleasant sounds. The Vagabond is not convinced.

All this, however, is a bit off the main path, the Vagabond was deflected from his original purpose in mentioning a lecture on Richard Strauss, by the fact that that composer was perhaps the first, frankly to use cacaphony in the modern sense. Not that he was unable, as many modern composers seem to be to write most beautiful melodies, yet certainly in such works as "Ein Heldenleben", he points the way to the modern "realistic" tendency. Professor Hill will give the lecture at 12 o'clock in the Music Building.

Other lectures of interest are:

9 O'clock

"Reform of State and Local Taxation" Professor Burbank. Harvard 6.

"The Rise of Prices: 1500-1700" Professor Usher. Widener U.

11 O'clock

"Florentine Painting in the Renaissance", Professor Edgell. New Fogg Museum.