il.l'usic in educafioninstruments can be classified in three categories : tubes giving forth
sounds, or wind instruments; stringed instruments, whether played
with a bow or plectrum, or plucked; and taut surfaces which are struck
in various ways to produce either mere noise or true musical sounds.
These latter are the so-called percussion instruments. I leave out of
account certain less common devices, such as bells, xylophones and
metallophones.
Those who have travelled much and seen both civilized and still
barbarian peoples know that certain instruments are more or less uni-
versal, such as the flute, either beaked or transverse. The same applies
to stringed instruments played with a bow, and to percussion instru-
ments, which are found among peoples who are still very close to the
primitive state.
It is noteworthy that, in an age in which the patterns of everyday
objects change at the whim of inventors and dealers, the structure of
the violin has remained substantially the same for several centuries.
This absence of change leads to certain extremely interesting con-
clusions from the standpoint of teaching.
People interested in music may be either purely passive, or active. They
may be either music-lovers, or musicians or, as we still say, performers.
A taste for music, in both listeners and performers, teaches first of
all respect for rhythm-develops and makes us appreciate a sense of
rhythm. All the great composers have been, first and foremost, creators
of rhythms. Primitive and civilized music alike are governed by rhythm.
This is perfectly natural. Rhythm is the very principle of life; it governs
most natural phenomena. The heart beats with a definite rhythm, and
all disturbances of that rhythm are a sign of some organic disorder.
Breathing involves rhythm, One sick person may be suffering from
cardiac irregularity, another from polypnoea or apnoea. There is a
famous sonata of Beethoven, for violin and piano, which is known
as the 'heart' sonata. The slow movement of the fourth symphony is
also based on the rhythm of the heart. I have mentioned the heart and
the respiratory apparatus but I ought also to speak of the glandular
functions governed by the rhythm of life, and the needs of the orga-
nism, such as sleep, whose rhythm normally follows that of day and
night. I ought to pass on from animate creatures to the rhythm of the
tides, the winds, the rains and the stars in infinite space.
If the listener, humbly passive as he is, nevertheless perceives,
demands and appreciates rhythm, the performer is obliged to observe a
discipline which helps to train a man's character and govern his relations