ADDS RICHNESS TO THE EXPERIENCE
Life would be one long ennui if we all shared the same opinions, ate the same food, drank the same drink, and wore the same clothes. Happily, our forms of amusement are diversified. The patrons of chamber music and symphony concerts do not go to the music-hall unless they are dragged there. The converse also holds good. So, too, for the same reason, we may be grateful that some go to the cinema while others stop away.
Life is made more tolerable by our taking our relaxations from varying angles. The cinema-goers, for example, may be classified into four groups, to wit, those who go to see the pictures, those who go to hear the music, those who go because of both, and that large percentage who go because they have nowhere else to go. I exclude the type to which the old lady belongs who, when asked how she had enjoyed the pictures, exclaimed, “Oh! very much indeed. They were splendid, but really, do you know, my hearing is so bad I couldn’t hear a word they said!”
Now the cinema industry is an enormous activity. It attracts as much capital as any form of entertainment to-day. Its artists are among the highest paid in the land. Its patrons are numbered in millions. Indeed, it may be called the Universal Pictorial Speech of the Peoples of the Earth, compared to which Esperanto is a dead language.
As an industry, in the commercial sense, purely, it embraces some of the keenest brains in the world, men who are ever alert to see what the big public wants, and whose life’s business it is to supply that need. But have these men, film-makers, producers, cinema proprietors, put the film to its best and uttermost use? ‘Those who have seen a film projected in one of the private little theatres attached to most of the filmrenters’ establishments will agree that there are few experiences more wearying than having to sit in one of these theatres and watch a film in a silence which is only broken by the constant whirring of the film reel. The most thrilling of Western dramas or detective plays will taste like cold mutton compared to the rich flavour of the same film when served with a little musical dressing.
A MUSICAL PROGRAMME.
Those having this experience must surely realise all that the musical end of a cinema programme stands for. It would perhaps come as a distinct surprise to some of these estimable gentlemen to learn that I number among my circle of friends one who goes to the cinema and sits with his eyes closed listening only to the music being played. His may be regarded as an eccentric case, but I submit that were the cinema interests to eliminate all music from the programmes, and project the pictures in the cold-blooded fashion prevalent at the cinema private trade-shows, the film theatres would lose more than three-quarters of their present revenue. Of course, most cinemas are served only by a pianist, or a pianist and violinist, but even in such instances, what is called the “fitting up” of the pictures involves arduous labour. This term implies the arranging of the music to be played while the picture is being exhibited. The utmost care is bestowed on this task, and in such theatres where full orchestras are employed, considerable ingenuity and thorough rehearsals are necessary in order to do the work effectually.
The cinema orchestra conductor is, perhaps, among the most hard-worked of his confrères in the film industry. His hours are long, and, in addition to his regular employment, extra duties devolve upon him in arranging and conducting the music at what are called trade shows held at the public cinema to which he is attached. Some of these conductors in London are compelled to work sixteen to eighteen hours a day.
ENDLESS VARIETY.
Subconsciously, of course, the importance of the musical side of the picture programme is appreciated, for the astute cinema owner strives to make his band the best available. The cinema patron comes in his flocks to see the pictures. He, of course, is not conscious; or only half-conscious, of the part the generally concealed orchestra plays in entertaining him, but this would he readily brought home to him should he one day see one of these pictures without hearing any musical accompaniment whatever. Some of the better cinemas issue printed programmes. These do not enjoy a large sale because they contain little in the letterpress that the cinema screen does not relate. In fact, these are little else than a repetition of the title of the pictures, the names of the principal performers, with an added reprint of the résumé of the story. They are indeed painfully superfluous. But if the musical side of the entertainment were to receive the real recognition it merited, those same programmes could be turned to good account by offering details of the various selections to he played during the entertainment. Some of the lengthier pictures, though, involve the playing of an endless variety of music, and here it would be difficult to give full details of the various items so assembled. But every conductor includes in his “fitting up” some special musical suite, or ballet, or opera, or light operetta music, and it would most certainly encourage and stimulate the added interest of that large percentage of cinema-goers who are also music-lovers, if some such prominence were given to the orchestral side of the programme.
I am convinced that the cinema as an industry will materially benefit from any development along the lines suggested. Besides, it may thereby render an incalculable service to the greater cause of music in its general sense. May I say that that gentleman among my friends to whom I referred earlier in this article is not the only one who goes to the cinema with his eyes closed?