EXPRESSION]

The word _interpret_, as ordinarily used means "to explain,"--"to
elucidate,"--"to make clear the meaning of," and this same definition
of the word applies to music as well, the conductor or performer
"making clear" to the audience the message given him by the composer.
It should be noted at once, however, that interpretation in music is
merely the process or means for securing the larger thing called
_expression_, and in discussing this larger thing, the activity of two
persons is always assumed; one is the composer, the other the
performer. Which of these two is the more important personage has been
for many decades a much mooted question among concert-goers.
Considered from an intellectual standpoint, there is no doubt whatever
concerning the supremacy of the composer; but when viewed in the light
of actual box office experience, on an evening when Caruso or some
other popular idol has been slated to appear, and cannot do so because
of indisposition, it would seem as if the performer were still as far
above the composer as he was in the days of eighteenth-century opera
in Italy.

It is the composer's function to write music of such a character that
when well performed it will occasion an emotional reaction on the part
of performer and listener. Granting this type of music, it is the
function of the performer or conductor to so interpret the music that
an appropriate emotional reaction will actually ensue. A recent writer
calls the performer a _messenger_ from the composer to the audience,
and states[8] that--

As a messenger is accountable to both sender and recipient
of his message, so is the interpretative artist in a
position of twofold trust and, therefore, of _twofold
responsibility_. The sender of his message--creative
genius--is behind him; before him sits an expectant and
confiding audience, the sovereign addressee. The
interpretative artist has, therefore, first to enter into
the _spirit_ of his message; to penetrate its ultimate
meaning; to read in, as well as between, the lines. And then
he has to train and develop his faculties of delivery, of
vital production, to such a degree as to enable him to fix
his message decisively, and with no danger of being
misunderstood, in the mind of his auditor.

[Footnote 8: Constantin von Sternberg, _Ethics and Esthetics of Piano
Playing_, p. 10.]

This conception of the conductor's ta