Democratic Sentinel, Volume 17, Number 32, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 25 August 1893 — Popular Songs. [ARTICLE]

Popular Songs.

One of the strongest productions arising from modern conditions is the popular song. Somebody, in a theater or concert hall, nowadays will sing a song that “catches,” and the first thing we know it is on the lips of thousands of ale and is heard from one end of the in to the other. In the last few years this musioal phenomenon has grown more and more marked and more remarkable. The singular part ot it al is the fact that, almost without excep tion, these songs wholly lack merit of either melody or sentiment. Once in a while, as in the case of “Annie Rooney,” the music will be good, but usually it is simply a catchy jingle with no worth ot real beauty at all. Think of the air of “McGinty.” Think of this ballad of “After the Ball." Any man who would hum the wretched and silly words of the thing would naturally strike the arrangement of notes by the writing of which Mr. Harrison has gained popularity such as no great poet ever knew in the history of the world. It is an inexplicable phenomenon. If the song touched any chord of genuine emotion, or awoke any response of tender feeling, we could understand the miracle. But, it is not so. The author catches the fag end of some trivial and commonplace phase of feeling. and then raves over it in bad meter and commonplace words, and the nation fairly howls with delight. There must be a good deal of truth in the old theory of the French cynic that the masses love the commonplace because the excellent is an insult to the r intelligence.—[Minneapolis Commercial.