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PAN PIPES • SUMMER 2016 • sai-national.org 20 POETRY IN SONG women composers. And, not to be forgotten was a 15 year old Canadian girl with a vision, who through dedicated work and networking with like-minded women, helped chart this course. Mezzo-soprano and Epsilon Xi initiate Kathleen Shimeta celebrates musical and theatrical excellence in Life! Love! Song! A Visit with Gena Branscombe! End Notes 1 Adrienne Fried Block, Amy Beach: Passionate Woman, (New York, Oxford University Press, 1998) 244 2 Block, 246 3 Block, 246 4 Laurine Elkins Marlow, Gena Branscombe: American Composer and Conductor, A Study of Her Life and Works, (Ph.D. dissertation, University of Texas at Austin, 1978) 161-162 5 Marlow, 152 6 Joan Burstyn, Past & Promise: Lives of New Jersey Women. Metuchen, (Syracuse University Press, 1977), 416 7 Gena Tenney Phenix, personal conversation, August 1999 8 General Federation of Women's Clubs – Department of Fine Arts – author not cited, approximately 1935 9 National Federation of Music Website, "About Us" page 10 Block, 164 11 Marlow, 158 12 Music News, Volume 10, Issue 17, pg 13, April 26, 1913, (Chicago), no author cited Bibliography Ammer, Christine, Unsung: A History of Women in American Music, Portland: Amadeus Press, 2001. Blair, Karen J., e Torchbearers: Women and eir Amateur Arts Associations in America, 1890-1930, Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1994. Block, Adrienne Fried, Amy Beach: Passionate Victorian, New York: Oxford University Press, 1998. Fuller, Sophie, e Pandora Guide to Women Composers Britain and the United States 1629-Present, San Francisco: Pandora/ Harper Collins, 1994. Elkins-Marlow, Laurine, Gena Branscombe: American Composer and Conductor, A Study of Her Life and Works; Doctoral Dissertation – 1978. General Federation of Women's Clubs – Department of Fine Arts Publication, "American Musical Works Performance Essential to National Development," author: Gena Branscombe, 1934. General Federation of Women's Clubs – e Fine Arts Department Publication, "A Few Aims and Accomplishments," no date given or author cited. General Federation of Women's Clubs – e Fine Arts Department Publication – "Women in the Field of Music of the United States of America" Mrs. Eli F. Seebirt, approximately 1941. General Federation of Women's Clubs – Department of Fine Arts Publication, "American Musical Works Performance Essential to National Development," author: Gena Branscombe, 1934. General Federation of Women's Clubs – e Fine Arts Department Publication, "A Few Aims and Accomplishments," no date given or author cited. General Federation of Women's Clubs – e Fine Arts Department Publication – "Women in the Field of Music of the United States of America" Mrs. Eli F. Seebirt, approximately 1941. General Federation of Women's Clubs – Department of Fine Arts – author not cited, approximately 1935. BRANSCOMBE continued from page 19 FOR MORE INFORMATION visit kathleenshimeta.com/ branscombe.html H onorary Member Mary Howe, a 1931 resident of Pan's Cottage at the MacDowell Colony, spoke at the 1956 SAI Golden Anniversary Convention in Chicago, where her chamber music was a featured Musicale at the Composers Dinner. Here is a small portion of her speech: In MUSIC--our all-important object here today--we badly and quickly need something very like mass production of beauty-lovers in our audiences. is would hold good as a desirable thing in audiences of every kind, because beauty finds itself in queer atmospheres sometimes. A given play may seem sordid to you. But if the play is a sincere work, and you approach it in all sincerity, and unprejudiced, you may find beauty and courage where you least expect them, if you don't close your mind. A piece of modern music may sound unbearable to some listeners, but not unless they close their ears, or have a preconceived idea of what they are going to hear. Preconceived ideas have killed many a program and many a taste. e best immediate antidote to this is a good dose of curiosity in the open vessel of a free mind. Audiences could be a gold mine in defense of beauty, and audiences owe a responsibility towards performers, towards the play, or the music. Naturally individuals have each a right to his or her opinion, but it must be founded on reality, in all sincerity, and should be as we said "without prejudice," as jurors are meant to be. e fact that an audience is really an entity in itself, in spite of its component parts, should eventually make it a valuable weapon to our hands if its search is for Beauty. How to find the forge on which the weapon may be turned is another matter. I am convinced that among the genuine lovers of Beauty, there is a leaven in musicians especially that could make them find ways of literally applying its gospel, almost as a good research doctor pursues his theories, beliefs, and discoveries till eventually he arrives as near truth as possible, and gathers followers. Great things have been done through small beginnings; fires have been pushed away by counter fires; waters have been held back by piling sand bags; faith in the right has been fostered by spreading ideas. If you in the least agree with me, and will take any small or great opportunity that comes your way to strike your special blow for Beauty openly, something will emerge, and more will follow on the same trail. I am all too aware that this statement has all the attributes of a 100% blank cartridge, but even blank cartridges sometimes frighten people into realizing a loss. is of course is not yet getting down to tacks. Actually, trying to get down to the few tacks I can find, let me say again that this is not an average audience, it's a meeting of specialists. ey can, as audience or as individuals, eventually find ways of administering music of all kinds to the public; they can have patience with lack of instinctive understanding as well as with lack of experience. ey needn't struggle to prove themselves right, even in taste; they can make the music real to those who do not yet believe in it, or even do not believe in the need for Beauty; they can instruct the need for curiosity, for eagerness, for interest. Human processes are very much the same in general performance, varying of course in the 1000 degrees of difference included in the sum of combined human traits. is sameness seems to point to definite responsibility on the part of those who today are ahead in understanding and ability, to impart not just the notes on program or page, but the universal element of music latent in every human, so that the individual will want to reach out, will want to ask, to know, to tell. Audiences as well as individuals can be drawn to know finally that music is a friend of infinite patience that never has to die, that always may be heard again, and understood without concreteness, not static or crystallized. As one writer said to me: "Beauty survives in spite of Progress." If we can make even parts of an audience have imagination enough to feel Beauty and the need for it, for the first time, we will be starting to handle the danger that besets us. A flicker even, of the desire to impart, to help, to believe, can be a great beginning. "e Audience Supports Beauty"

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