Scarcely a week passes that does not bring to The Etude offices an article entitled: “What is Music?” The writers of these articles attempt to express in three hundred, or three thousand, words what the poets, historians, lexicographers, physicists, and critics have abandoned years ago. What is music? Who could commence to tell what music is in less than the millions of words which make up an encyclopedia like the Britannica? Needless to say, these definitions of music find no place in The Etude and we are forced to return them to our good friends, who show their enthusiasm in sending the articles to us. In the twenty-eight years of its existence The Etude has devoted thousands of pages to the discussion of different phases of music, but to tell just what music really is would be as difficult as attempting to describe those appalling multitudes of stars, suns and planets which are beyond the vision of the most powerful telescopes. Consequently, please do not try to define music.
