ut because of its spontaneity therein. It
adds to the usual instruments only the piccolo, the English horn, the
tambourine, and triangle and cymbals. The slow introduction gives
forth an original theme in the most approved and most fetching darky
pattern. The strings announce it, and the wood replies. The flutes and
clarinets toss it in a blanket furnished by an interesting passage in
the 'cellos and contrabasses. There is a choral moment from the English
horn, the bassoons, and a clarinet. This solemn thought keeps
recurring parenthetically through the general gaiety. The first
subject clatters in, the second is even more jubilant. In the
development a dance _misterioso_ is used with faithful screaming
repetitions, and the work ends regularly and brilliantly. There is
much syncopation, though nothing that is strictly in "rag-time;"
banjo-figurations are freely and ingeniously employed, and the whole
is a splendid fiction in local color. Schoenefeld's negroes do not
speak Bohemian.

His determined nationalism is responsible for his festival overture,
"The American Flag," based on his own setting of Rodman Drake's
familiar poem. The work opens with the hymn blaring loudly from the
antiphonal brass and wood. The subjects are taken from it with much
thematic skill, and handled artfully, but the hymn, which appears in
full force for coda, is as trite as the most of its kith.

Schoenefeld was born in Milwaukee, in 1857. His father was a musician,
and his teacher for some years. At the age of seventeen Schoenefeld
went to Leipzig, where he spent three years, studying under Reinecke,
Coccius, Papperitz, and Grill. A large choral and orchestral work was
awarded a prize over many competitors, and performed at the Gewandhaus
concerts, the composer conducting. Thereafter he went to Weimar, where
he studied under Edward Lassen.

In 1879 he came back to America, and took up his residence in Chicago,
where he has since lived as a teacher, orchestra leader, and composer.
He has for many years directed the Germania Maennerchor.

Schoenefeld's "Rural Symphony" was awarded the $500 prize offered by
the National Conservatory. Dvorak was the chairman of the Committee on
Award, and gave Schoenefeld hearty compliments. Later works are: "Die
drei Indianer," an ode for male chorus, solo, and orchestra; a most
beautiful "Air" for orchestra (the air being taken by most of the
strings,--the first violins haunting the G string,--while a harp a