nevitable that a pioneer like Schumann should make many
mistakes, but he escaped the one great fatal mistake of those who are
not open to conviction, nor alert for new beauty and fresh truth, who
are willing to take art to their affections or respect only when it
has lost its bloom and has been duly appraised and ticketed by other
generations or foreign scholars. And yet, even worse than this
languorous inanition is the active policy of those who despise
everything contemporary or native, and substitute sciolism for
catholicity, contempt for analysis.

While the greater part of the world has stayed aloof, the problem of a
national American music has been solving itself. Aside from
occasional attentions evoked by chance performances, it may be said in
general that the growth of our music has been unloved and unheeded by
anybody except a few plodding composers, their wives, and a retainer
or two. The only thing that inclines me to invade the privacy of the
American composer and publish his secrets, is my hearty belief, lo,
these many years! that some of the best music in the world is being
written here at home, and that it only needs the light to win its meed
of praise.

Owing to the scarcity of printed matter relating to native composers,
and the utter incompleteness and bias of what exists, I have based
this book almost altogether on my own research. I studied the
catalogues of all the respectable music publishers, and selected such
composers as seemed to have any serious intentions. When I heard of a
composer whose work, though earnest, had not been able to find a
publisher, I sought him out and read his manuscripts (a hideous task
which might be substituted for the comparative pastime of breaking
rocks, as punishment for misdemeanors). In every case I secured as
many of each composer's works as could be had in print or in
manuscript, and endeavored to digest them. Thousands of pieces of
music, from short songs to operatic and orchestral scores, I studied
with all available conscience. The fact that after going through at
least a ton of American compositions, I am still an enthusiast, is
surely a proof of some virtue in native music.

A portion of the result of this study was published _au courant_ in a
magazine, awakening so much attention that I have at length decided to
yield to constant requests and publish the articles in more accessible
form. The necessity for revising many of the opinions formed hastily
and