The same qualities of Parker's art which contribute to the success of _Hora Novissima_, the first work to bring him fame, are those which operate against the success of his latest and largest effort, the opera 'Mona.' The former offered to the composer the most suitable field for his scholarly but somewhat ascetic conceptions and by this same self-contained and poised loftiness of style, together with a rare skill in handling vocal masses in contrapuntal design, does he achieve in _Hora Novissima_ a work of genuine strength and a valuable addition to the list of modern oratorios. The work, written in 1893 for the Church Choral Society of New York, received its first performance by that body. Performances by several other choral societies and at several musical festivals in America rapidly followed, and in 1899 it had the honor of being the first American work to appear upon the program of the Three Choirs Festival in Worcester, England, at which performance the composer conducted. Since that time it has assumed its place among the standard choral works of our day. Parker's opera, 'Mona,' was awarded the prize offered by the Metropolitan Opera Company in 1911 in a contest of American composers. Its score reveals an enormous advance in the composer's mastery of resource, both as regards dramatic expression and orchestral color. There are an admirable freedom of line and sustained polyphonic interest, while the skill with which the orchestral color is distributed exhibits Parker's strongest feature. In spite of these merits the almost unanimous opinion of the music critics must be admitted, in a degree, as just. The opera, upon its production at the Metropolitan Opera House, New York, in 1911-12, was found to be lacking in a really convincing musical grip, due to the absence of an underlying emotional warmth and to the essentially unmelodic treatment of the solo voices. The choruses and mass effects proved the best features of the opera, again showing that Mr. Parker's first successes were in a field more suited to his talents than the domain of dramatic music. Another opera, 'Fairyland,' won another prize of ten thousand dollars in 1915. Mrs. H. H. A. Beach stands quite in a class by herself as the only American woman who has essayed compositions in the larger form. Her success entitles her to a prominent place among the most serious of American composers. Her 'Gaelic Symphony' and her sonata for violin and piano are two long successful works, while recently she has had a most cordial and flattering reception in Europe for her piano concerto in which she herself played the solo part. Besides these works Mrs. Beach has written a _Jubilate_ for chorus with orchestra, and a quantity of piano music and songs, of which some of the latter have achieved a wide popularity.