The writer has intentionally overstepped the bounds of orchestral composition for the purpose of emphasizing the prodigious activity displayed by our professional brethren on every hand. Throughout these pages there runs an undercurrent of discontent provoked by the listless attitude of the American public taken as a whole. The fickleness of their support seems to be at the root of our troubles. Everything conceivable is being done for this public. Music in the schools is encouraged. The colleges are alive to the needs of the hour. Many of our composers are sacrificing their inner convictions on the altar of patriotism with the determination to write simply. Music lovers and philanthropists are enlisted in the cause. A high musical standard for religious worship is maintained. Orchestral performances can be listened to at moderate cost. Such renditions are as good as, frequently better than, those in Europe. How is it, then, that so many choral societies flourish for a few seasons, only to eventually die a lingering death? Buffalo's Symphony Orchestra is no more. Other cities have allowed similar mortifying conditions to come to pass. On the other hand, the singer or the instrumental virtuoso reaps rewards that are out of all proportion to the tardy recognition and modest remuneration awarded to their colleagues--the composers, conductors, and organists--who are almost invariably possessed of an artistic education far superior to that of the soloist. A Rossinian era would appear to have reasserted itself! The larger number of these soloists are themselves rarely patriotic, for only with difficulty can they be persuaded to sing or perform even the finest of American productions. Orchestral conductors who come to our shores from abroad soon perceive that the public does not support home talent in a whole-hearted manner, and adjust their programs accordingly. With a few notable exceptions, they too are disloyal. Again, the worthy efforts of our comparatively few eminent newspaper critics in behalf of the American composer are constantly counteracted by the superficial and bombastic criticisms of their lesser brethren. The American composer is to-day ready to enter the lists against the entire world. His own countrymen are impeding him. It is high time that the American public awake out of its lethargy! (Summary on page 180.) SUMMARY OF PART III. CHAPTER IX. THE ROMANTIC SCHOOL. The German composers of the nineteenth century are for convenience classified in three general groups: "The Romantic School," "The Classical Romanticists," "The New Movement." The so-called founders of the Romantic School, Spohr and Weber, were followed by such representative composers as Schubert, Mendelssohn and Schumann. The evolution of orchestration was conspicuously advanced by Weber. He stands at the head of modern instrumentation, for with him a new period began.