"Jurgen"

"I have tried to show Jurgen facing the unanswerable riddle of why things are as they are; Jurgen, 'clad in the armor of his hurt,' spinning giddily through life, strutting, posturing, fighting, loving, pretending; Jurgen proclaiming himself count, duke, king, emperor, god; Jurgen, beaten at last by the pathos and mystery of life, bidding farewell to that dream of beauty which he had the vision to see but not the strength to follow."

Thus wrote Deems Taylor, critic-composer, of his symphonic poem, "Jurgen," which was given last week by the New York Symphony Society before an audience composed partly of admirers of Mr. Taylor, of modern music and of the Symphony Society, and partly of leering persons who, well knowing that the novel of James Branch Cabell is crisp with supposed "salaciousness," came in hope that the music would furnish sauce for the same salad. These last were disappointed. He has used the "Jurgen" legend merely as a pretext for the expression of certain emotions which might have been roused by the book or by some-thing else. The score is persuasive, adept, unoriginal. Critics--Mr. Taylor's colleagues, friends and rivals--were enthusiastic.