There are, however, two festivals which stand out from all the others by virtue of their origin and the nature of their activities. The older of these is the Norfolk Festival of the Litchfield County Choral Union, which has now (1914) completed its twenty-eighth season. This is not a drummed-up affair. It is a perfectly natural outgrowth of the numerous old singing societies with which Litchfield county was dotted in the psalm-singing days; it is in the best sense a product of the soil. The Litchfield County Choral Union grew out of the association of neighboring small ensembles for the occasional production of large choral works in a manner which none of them individually could accomplish in an effective manner. The purpose was a very useful one and it has had the effect of raising materially the standard of the choral work among the small societies composing the union. The Norfolk Festival itself, which is a comparatively recent institution, owes most of its present value to the efforts of Robbins Battell, the founder of the professorship of music at Yale, and more specially to the generosity and artistic idealism of Carl Stoeckel, who was, during Mr. Battell's lifetime, his secretary and aid. Mr. Stoeckel, as Mr. Battell's successor, has backed the festival with unstinted liberality. He has enabled it to bring before the public new works of famous as well as little known contemporary composers--particularly American--giving substantial cash prizes for the best new American compositions. He has placed at the disposal of the Litchfield County Choral Union a meeting place in ideal surroundings, modestly termed the 'Music Shed,' and he has brought to the support of the chorus for each festival an orchestra recruited from the best New York and Boston organizations, as well as an array of distinguished soloists. To secure the best possible performance of new works produced at the festival he has spared neither trouble nor expense, as may be instanced by the fact that he brought Jean Sibelius to America to conduct his own compositions. The value of these festivals to all the choral societies and church choirs composing the Litchfield County Union is obvious, but they have a still wider and greater value in introducing to the world the creations of native American composers and in holding up an example of fine artistic idealism which cannot be without its influence on the soul of the nation.