The Daily Alaska empire Newspaper, April 24, 1936, Page 15

THE DAIl‘r /\LASKA EMPIRE P'RID’\\ APRIL 24, |‘)3() have dug up an ancient law prohibiting immoral musiec. Which seems to be as far as they are likely to get.. Many amd heated arguments have been held, but in a eity filled with supreme court judges and astute senators no one is able to finally decide just what music is immoral. “Any music is immoral which causes evil thoughts and desires,” vehemently declares one authority. It must be admitted that music has the power to do this. It not only has “charms to soothe the savage breast,” but it can stir up most un- holy and unorthodox impulses. Many & man has listened to the cornet next door until he longed to commit everything from arson to mayhem. But this, of course, is not the kind of immorality they mean. What they really seek to prove is that girls leaye home and husbands fall in love with other women and # late wives elope with the friend of the family, because they have list- ened to the voluptuous lure of the jazz orchestra. And the whole storm of indignation centers around the saxophone. Its seductive moans is said to arouse every emotion we have ever had or ever hope to have. “Any music played on any saxo- phone is distinctly immoral,” asserts Washington's chief of policewomen, Rhoda Milliken, the same who decid- cd the only way to cure flirting hus- bands was to send a mote to their wives. a UTHORITIES in Washington Blame the Musician. But the militant policewoman finds tew who will agree with her. Most folks seem to feel it is the man and the music behind the saxophone which are to blame for the sensuous results, and not the instrument itself. Such Is the opinion of Syd- ney Loewenstein, , leader of the fa- mous Stanley Orchestra. “In days gone by the saxophone did not have this very bad reputa- tion.” Mr. Loewenstein declares. “It can produce very fine and sweet mu- slc when played well. But, al- though there are lots of players, very few do anything but blare “It was invented about 1840 by Adolph Sax, who was endeavoring to create a new kind of clarinet. But it did not appear in American or- chestras until about 15 years ago, when it was introduced to New York audlences by Chensley. It was very beautifully played there, as I first heard it. “It is the keight of foolishness to place blame on a saxophone for the music it plays. It is the man behind the gun. Any instrument can be- come demoralizing if it is played that way.” Violin or Sax More Effectivet #“But do you think a violin, how- ever sensuously §t might be played, could produce such wlld ebandon as 80 often follows the saxophone?’ he was asked. “Can a violin poasibly have as much effect as a saxo- phone?” “Well, you can play it so it will make my dog howl like the devil,” he replied with a smile. “One of the , great errors the saxophone bhas made is in allowing itself to become assoclated with such disreputable characters. It lends itself so admir- ably to the kind of music favored by, the jazziest of cabarets. They simpl; couldn't get along without it. And when you play around with that sort’ of company you must expect to lose’ your reputation. Everybody has' grown to consider the sax as much a} part of night life as the ukelele is of the free and easy morals of the Hn- walian maiden. “It has a moaning quality whlch carries the melody in a way you d not get in any other fnstrument,”, says Mr. Loewenstein. “And you can take all sorts of liberties with it. A’ plager can slide all over the place on a saxophone. A “It's all a part of the after-the-war mania for excitement; the wild crav- ing for thrills, for lack of restrainty and the disregard for conventions., Everyone is breathlessly seeking en- tertainment, but they don’t want any- thing which will make them think. ‘That's too much trouble. They go to a show and park their brains at the door, “But it is only a temporary phase. The demand for sane amusements this craze is, it can never long as good music.” “But whether the - S — g00d musfc. NG matter K:: extreme cussed instrument is lmprlscned for last as life or allowed to remain at liberty on promise of good behavior, there indictment can be no question of the effect of against the saxophone stands or is the music of today as played by the will return, and with it the love of quashed, and whether the much-dis- sax. It is the consensus of opinion ‘Left-Handed Publicity’ the Dr sic and the mind close enbugh to pro- duce considerable emotional rever- berations,” says Gehring, who has made an extensive study of the basis ®of musical reaction. “Music evokes emotion and our feeling may be ac- companied by certain internal mo- tions, every shade of joy or sorrow being conditioned by a correspond- ing psycho-physiological process. ‘Whenever the process is simulated, ‘the emotions are sympathetically caught up. “It is the rhythm of the tones which produces the regular move- ment of the body—an effect which " very likely extends far beyond the of those ‘who have studied the situa- tion that the typical saxophone mu- sic 1s largely, if not wholly, respon- sible for the atmosphere of our cabarets today. “There {s an analogy between mu- apparent mm-u-uou The con- clusion 18 nevitable that there must be numerous effects of a subtler ‘na. ture extending into the recesses of the nervous organization.” It is doubtful if the swaying, quiv- ering, rhythm-mad man who plays the saxophone would understand all this. He doesn't know much about emotional reverberations or psycho- physiological processes. But he does know that in two minutes after he starts his seductive, loul-reumu moan every couple n the room will be in each other’s arms, swaying in answer to every voluptuous note. He kpows, because be has secn it night after night, as those within reach of his ‘Fascinating Rhythm” reach 8 pitch of ecstatic emotion where all restraint 18 ready to slip its moor- ings. ‘Why should an athelst enjoy beau- titul church music as much as a be- llever? Why does the Slav love the tender melody of Killarney? Does it not all come back in rhythm? That rhythm which can intoxicate a sav- age and rouse him to such frénzy that he falls in a faint. He is nat- urally more suaceptible than his civilized brother, or at least he door not have his susceptibilities so well in hand. But the most civllucd of us often find ourselves welling up with uticoi- trollable emotion at a crescendo or going to places at the sudden shock of an explosion. The vibrations sét in motion by. either of these things strike upon our auditory merves and # upon our Kervous systéms lu & hi {dipossible to resist. . Professor Elihu Thompson, one ¢ the founders of the General Eleetric Company, holder of more than' 100 electrical patents, 18 the @ref Aplr- fcan 0 be honored with the: Ldré Kelvin gold medel, IWIM .w,‘ three years by B un and Amg:igu’ enstneering socleties acting togethio:. o ead of the RiCI‘l Oniv the Poor Are Immune F rom the Clutches of the Human Blackmail Valtures less to the poor man, but fraught with the direct pos- sibilitfes to those whose coffers are BLACKMAIL—-n word meaning bursting with the coveted shekels. Let your rich man—your person who #tands In some high place of the world—commit the least indiscretion and the blackmailers will flock about him like vultures to the field of bat- tle. And even the most virtuous—those whose feet ' cling clogely to the straight and narrow path—cannot al- ways be certain to escape the ever- present blackmailer, The human reptiles frame some compromising situation, and demand their price. It matters not that the great man i§ innocent—his exalted position will not permit the least ampersion of his reputation, and he pays. True, he might fight the blackmailers in the courts and iJrovo his innocence. But even so the world, always ready to belfeve the worst, would accuse him of walking upon the dim borderland twixt good and evil. Regular Lists of Possibie Victims. Those who have caught a fleeting view of the blackmailing game as it is played in the United Btates say it is of vast proportions—reaching in its numerous’ramifications almost every town and ety of the country. We are even told that the criminals keep lists of the rich saps and are ready to ensnare them the minute they set their fect beyomd the sofl of thelr native heath. Great as the blackmailing business Is, we hear little about it—it is only at rare intervals that some wealthy man is squeezed too hard and that the newspapers get the story. For every ‘exposurg therc are hundreds, 1f not thousands, of cases where the victim pays, and oftentimes to the ut- termost farthing. The blackmajlers are not botchers——they never strike before they have thelr victim closely pinned to the wall A Safe Bort of Crime. The idea of black mail has & streng hold upon . the imagination of the criminal class, for it is ome of the most lucrative professions to which they can band their talents. More- jag over, it 1s much safer than most forms of crime. -It, however, takes more intelligence than second-story becomes doubt ruhzod. .. Tof .indulged in half, N’buh."’Courm is victory; timidity.is work or platn burglary, and the dumbells-are apt to find thie doors of a penitentiary swinging behind their backs. Edsel Ford Escapes. iy That is what happened to the gang that attempted to extort $1,050,000 from Edsel Ford, president of the Ford Motor Car Company of Detroit. The criminals, while they had enough sense to select someone who had money to supply their fondest im- aginings, had no brains. ’fl;’y wrote a letter to Mr. Ford's secretary, say: thg that unless the sum mentioned was placed upon a vacant lot the Ford children would be kfiled or in- jured. The handwriting was so bad and so mixed with foreign idfoms that it could scarcely be read. The matter was handed over to the po- lice, a trap set, and when the would- be blackmallers showed up &t the lot they were apprehended. Not everyone, however, ;m off so well as Mr. Ford. There wu a cer- tain man, an offictal at the capital of a Western state. The blackmall- ers had bad their éyes upon him for quite a long time—they knew him for a sap—one who could bé caught by a s0appy girl. Ome day this man and wired partders, % The Big “Brother” “ That 4 the ing girl of 3 " Xnown be vo@l fall for smiled A him, & few hours after he had Ar- ived in the nbby botel. 1n @ shidct MW?IE best o friends! days they played- the man persuaded Wl allow hln to evnu up to ment. Crt of his New Yorl’ot A