Repository: UIHistories Project: Book - 16 Years (Edmund James) [PAGE 239]

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$Lrt$$n Years at the University of Illinois

their activities increased. Two new organizations, the University Women's Glee Club and University Choristers, have come into existence, and various new courses have been organized to make the work more efficient. The entire thought of the Faculty in this connection has been to afford the utmost opportunity to all students of the University to acquire the most complete musical knowledge and experience possible, and to train young men and women who might become leaders of musical enterprises in their communities. On this account the degree of Bachelor of Music has been based upon a general culture with music as the nucleus rather than upon a specific professional course which should torn out concert artists. The aim has been to make teachers and leaders rather than concert performers, although there is no doubt that the standards of performance demanded of the graduates of the School are higher than they were three years ago. So far as the future is concerned, the past has pointed the way to what must now be attempted. To do more rather than less for the State of Illinois, is the present aim. Thruout the State there is an urgent demand for young men and women in the public schools who may work out the musical salvation of their communities. Accordingly, everything possible is being done to strengthen the Public School Music course and to direct the attention of the more serious students to the possibilities and demands of community music. As the facilities increase and the faculty becomes larger, it is hoped that there may be added some theoretical work which at present must be omitted, some of an advanced nature, and also some of an elementary kind to supply the deficiencies of those high school students who have come from the more backward communities* Eventually it may be possible to include grad» uate work, especially in the history of music and composition, and to this end the library of the School is being built up. The strategic situation of the University of Illinois and the rapidly increasing importance of the Twin Cities as a music center will soon bring to the School a large number of the more desirable music students who will make its musical