Sangerfest

Still close to the spirit of the homeland are U. S. Sangerbunds, though they have flourished independently for nearly 100 years. Last week the Northwest Sangerbund, one of the four biggest groups in the U. S., held a great Sangerfest in St. Paul, Minn. The homeland cousins could hear it this time, for in St. Paul's Brick Auditorium were 25 microphones to pick up the night's singing and playing, send it to London, Stockholm, Oslo, Paris, Amsterdam, Berlin and Vienna. There were choruses of children, men and women, singing in groups as big as 6,000, in German, Swedish, Norwegian and English. From throughout the Northwest, 90 singing bands participated. Minnesota's dirt-farming Lieutenant Governor Henry Arens presided. Featured were Tenor Paul Althouse, Soprano Elsa Alsen, and part of the Minneapolis Symphony directed by able Alexander Smallens, assistant conductor of the Philadelphia Orchestra. Day after the broadcast, farmers and cityfolk strolled about Harriet Park in an informal Sangervolksfest. Here they sang not Wagner or Beethoven but their own songs, beginning casually, swelling mightily as thousands joined in.

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