Our children, after years of conventional music study, are finally taken to hear an orchestral concert. A great man is to speak to them. He does not use words. What he has to say issues forth in a myriad of sounds, now soft, now loud, now fast, now slow. This that the child hears is what is called _music_, seemingly a mere succession of sounds, really a vision of what a great man has seen of all those inner things of life which only he can truly see. These sounds are formed into a perfect order. Their very soul may hide in the peculiar tone of the oboe or horn; they change their significance a dozen times in as many moments; slender filaments of them run through and through as in a fairy web. The child gapes. “Is this music?” it says; “I thought music was the black and white keys, or holding my hand right, or scales, or the key of F or G, or sonatinas, or something.” No one has ever told her what music really is. She has only her delicate, tender, childlike feelings as a guide What she has been doing may have been as little like music as grammar is like literature. Both the child and the adult must be brought into contact with music; with rhythmic movement in all its delightful diversity; with great musical themes and the uses to which they are put by composers; with musical forms by means of which pieces of music are made coherent; with harmonies in their primary states, or blended into a thousand hues. They must learn to listen, so that, as the music unfolds, there takes place within them an unfolding which is the exact answer to the processes going on in the music. All this cannot be brought about save by intention. It is the purpose of this book, then, to lead the reader by what capacity he possesses to such an understanding of the art of music as shall make every part of it intelligible to him. And since some readers may have little knowledge of music, this book also attempts to set forth the common grounds upon which all art rests, and to tempt those who are interested in the other arts to become inquisitive about music. Curiosity is a necessary element in human intelligence. MUSIC AND LIFE CHAPTER I WHAT IS MUSIC? I. DISTINCTION BETWEEN MUSIC AND THE OTHER ARTS