A Pre-History of the San Francisco Community Music Center

On November 20, 2016, the San Francisco Community Music Center will hold a "Field Day" to celebrate its 95th Anniversary.  This event features an afternoon full of musical performance by Community Music School students and faculty. 

This anniversary commemorates the arrival of the San Francisco Community Music School (the Community Music Center's name until the 1950s) at its present location at 544 Capp Street.  The Community Music Center, however, has earlier roots that originated in a larger movement that sought to provide free or low cost music instruction as a way to ameliorate social conditions in American cities.

The settlement movement was a social reform movement in the late 19th century aiming to provide cultural and educational uplift to the urban poor.  According to Boyer, the goal of the settlement movement was "consciousness raising" to make the urban poor, often immigrants, aware of a "larger world beyond the tenement or factory, the richness of their cultural heritage, and the possibilities of community organization and cooperative effort."

In San Francisco this movement was set in motion in 1894 when Chicago-based activist and social worker Jane Addams came to lecture.  Motivated by her example, local social reformers soon set to work in the immigrant communities in the South of Market neighborhood establishing the South Park Settlement.

The South Park Settlement at 15 South Park (source: The Commons June 1897)

The South Park Settlement, which eventually became the San Francisco Boys' Club, did not focus on girls leaving an opening for the efforts of the Rachael and Eva Wolfsohn who started the Girls' Club of San Francisco in a small flat on Clara Street, also in South of Market, in 1900.  Devoting their energies on young women who came from modest means, Rachael Wolfsohn wrote that "the club had a "...two-fold purpose at that time ... to assist girls in delinquency prevention and to prepare these young ladies for the responsibility of womanhood."  The club became an important part of their social life with its activities directed toward education and recreation.

A few years later the Girls' Club moved to 262 Seventh Street, a site that was destroyed in the 1906 earthquake. A 1904 article in the San Francisco Chronicle mentioned music instruction and music instruction as part of the club's wider offerings which also included "domestic economy," cooking, and various crafts. The workers at the club were described as "university people" (faculty and students from institutions like the University of California and Stanford University).

The club's members at that time were between the ages of 8 and 14 who lived in the surrounding neighborhood. In an oral history, a club member for the Girls' Club's earliest days recalled that the teachers and many of the students were Jewish, but that religion was never discussed at the club.

Girls' Club at 362 Capp from 1911, W.E. Dassonville, photographer

Source: The Girls' Club of San Francisco: Its Music School at 362 Capp Street (San Francisco History Center collection)

With financial support from Jewish businessmen and philanthropists like the Hellman, Fleishacker, Sloss, Lilienthal and Stern families, a new building was constructed for the Girls' Club in 1911, designed by the architectural firm Ward and Blohme.

At the outset, it was apparent that music would play an important part of the club's activities. This new emphasis is demonstrated in the brochure The Girls' Club of San Francisco: Its Music School at 362 Capp Street.  Below are photographs of a chorus and an orchestra from that 1912 publication.

 Friday Night Choral directed by Wallace Sabin (source: same as above)

Senior Orchestra directed by Hother Wismer (source: same as above)

The pamphlet lists prices for instruction:

Individual half hour lessons with a student teacher ... 25 cents
Individual full hour lessons with a student teacher ... 50 cents
Individual half hour lessons with an experienced teacher ... 50 cents
Individual full hour lessons with an experienced teacher ... $1.00
Orchestra classes, with weekly rehearsals ... 50 cents a month
Class lessons in chorus, theory, ear-training and sight-reading open free of charge to all members of the Girls' Club and music school students.

Twenty-five cents would be equivalent to six dollars today.  They also provided scholarships for which they depended upon sponsorship from donors within the community.

The pamphlet also names a very accomplished faculty:

Department heads:

Singing (vocal music) - Mrs. M. E. Blanchard
Voice and ear training - Miss Elizabeth Putnam
Choral classes - Mr. Wallace Sabin
Orchestral classes - Mr. Hother Wismer
Pianoforte - Mr. Julius Rehn Weber
Violin - Mr. Hother Wismer
Violoncello - Mr. Arthur Weiss
Theory of music and harmony - Mr. E. G. Stricklen

Mrs. Blanchard was a voice teacher a Mills College. Wallace Sabin was a composer and organist at Temple Emanu-El and St. Luke's Episcopal Church. At that time Arthur Weiss was the principal 'cellist of the San Francisco Symphony.  Hother Wismer, a Danish-American was a concert violinist who was later a member of the San Francisco Symphony.  Julius Rehn Weber, who later changed his last name to Waybur, was a pianist who became a major benefactor of the Music Department of the San Francisco Public Library.

At that time San Francisco had many music schools and private music instructors.  In the brochure, the Girls' Club emphasized that they did not want their efforts to undercut the livings of professional music teachers:

It is to be distinctly understood that the school does not wish to encroach upon the domain of the professional teacher. Its aim is to start modestly and to accept only such pupils who, after the strictest investigation, are found to be unable to pay the regular professional prices. To accomplish this object many loyal, devoted teachers of good standing have volunteered their services.

The San Francisco Community Music School of the Girls' Club of San Francisco was part of a wider groundswell to provide wholesome recreation within the City. One organization spearheading this was the Recreation League of San Francisco of San Francisco which advocated building parks and playgrounds, and also supported amateur athletics, theater and music for all ages. It was led by Jesse W. Lilienthal, then the president of the United Railways and the San Francisco Bar Association.  He and his wife were donors to the Girls' Club of San Francisco and later to the Community Music School.  She was also the organization's president during that time.

The Recreation League encouraged community singing to draw them away from listening to ragtime music by converting to become "patrons of [musical] art in its exalted expression."  A San Francisco Examiner article mentions the Girls' Club as one of the organizations where the Recreation League planned to teach "singing based on systematic study and practice under teachers who are masters of their craft."

The popularity of the music classes is evidenced by the fact that by 1918 the Girls' Club spun off a separate Community Music School at 914 Dolores Street (the site of the present-day Edison Elementary School).

The Community Music School at 914 Dolores Street (from Musical America November 15, 1919).

Harriet Selma Rosenthal, a violin student of Leopold Auer, came from New York in 1918 to direct the school's activities, at the behest of Mrs. Jesse Lilienthal, the president of the Girls' Club of San Francisco at that time. There she already had 8 years experience at the New York Music School Settlement.

Mrs Jesse Lilienthal in 1937 (image source: San Francisco Historical Photograph Collection)

She evidently was a tireless worker.  An article in Musical America reported on Harriet Rosenthal and the school:

The institution is composed of a board of far-seeing and large-hearted women; a building at 914 Dolores Street, reconstructed and completely equipped for the purpose at considerable expense; instruments--not only pianos, but violins, celli, wood-wind and brass, lent by the leading music houses of the city;--a faculty of thirty from among the many splendid instructors of San Francisco; pupils from department stores, irons works, factories and the like, to the number of 176 receiving private instruction besides class work and orchestral or choral experience; and--Miss Rosenthal.

Community Music School of The Girls' Club letterhead 

(source: Alfred Hertz Papers, Art, Music and Recreation Center, San Francisco Public Library)

In October 1919 Harriet Rosenthal wrote to Alfred Hertz, the conductor of the San Francisco Symphony, asking whether he would agree to be the Honorary Director of the school.  "We know of your interest in the school and would appreciate it we could look to you for your advice and guidance."  Hertz replied that he would "be very happy indeed to accept this position" and that he was "looking forward with pleasure to see you Monday evening at the school." 

In 1920 the school had 250 students taught by 30 faculty members which included such luminaries as Alfred Hertz, the San Francisco Symphony's concert master, Louis Persinger, and Elias Hecht, a flutist and organizer of the San Francisco Chamber Music Society.  Students also benefited from donations of tickets that enabled them to attend concert and stage performances.

Alfred Metzger, the editor of the Pacific Coast Musical Review, extolled the work of Harriet Selma Rosenthal and the Community Music School.  He posited that:

If it is possible to inculcate the idea in a child's mind that music exercises a certain beneficial influence upon everyone, even outside actual artistic performance, a most important step toward future realization of what constitutes fine citizenship has been taken.

By the time the Community Music School opened its doors at 544 Capp Street in 1921, its mission had been shaped by more than 25 years of community activism. The efforts at reform by the settlement movement, the Girls' Club of San Francisco and the Recreation League all shared the belief that participating in music and receiving music instruction by accomplished musicians were a means of ameliorating social problems and of providing social and cultural uplift.  It is impressive to see how some of San Francisco's most esteemed community leaders and musicians supported the provision of musical instruction to all.  These early ideals have continued and remain expressed in the Community Music Center's mission statement - "to make high quality music accessible to all people, regardless of their financial means."


Bibliography:

Alfred Hertz Papers, Art, Music and Recreation Center, San Francisco Public Library.

Amy Steinhart Braden: Child Welfare and Community Service / an interview conducted by Edna Tartaul Daniel (Regional Cultural History Project, The Bancroft Library,1965).

Beals, Elena M., "Sumptuous Musical Feast to Regale San Franciscans," Musical America vol. 3, no. 3 (November 15, 1919), 185-187.

Boyer, Paul, Urban Masses and Moral Order in America 1820-1920 (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1978).

"'Bright Eyes' Will Sparkle in Aid of New Girls' Club," San Francisco Chronicle (October 29, 1911), 37.

Brown, Ray C., "Music Claims Obeisance Due in New World," San Francisco Chronicle (October 19, 1919), 29.

Character Building Resources; A Study of the Recreational Opportunities and Facilities Provided by Agencies Affiliated with the Community Chest of San Francisco: Made for the Special Committee on Recreation of the Council of Social and Health Agencies of San Francisco, November, 1924-March,1925 by Josephine D. Randall, E. P. Von Allmen, Esther De Turbeville (San Francisco: Press of the Margaret Mary Morgan Co., 1926.

Edwards, George Boosinger, "A Music School and the Community Spirit," Pacific Coast Musical Review vol. 36 no. 7 (May 17, 1919), 6.

Ethington, Philip J., The Public City: The Political Construction of Urban Life in San Francisco 1850-1900 (University of California Press, 2001).

"Girls' Club Has Housewarming," San Francisco Chronicle (February 28, 1904), 41.

"Girls' Club One of City's Monuments," San Francisco Chronicle (December 20, 1929), 9.

"Girls' Club To Dedicate New Home; Gift Marks 20th Anniversary," San Francisco Chronicle (February 22, 1920), 23.

The Girls' Club of San Francisco: Its Music School at 362 Capp Street ([San Francisco]: [Girls' Club of San Francisco], 1912). 

The Girls' Club, San Francisco [oral history transcript]: Recollections of Members and Associates / interviews conducted by Leah Selix and Adrienne Bonn in 1972-73 (Regional Oral History Office, The Bancroft Library, University of California, 2005).

Metzger, Alfred, "Re-organization of Girls Club to Result in a Community School," Pacific Coast Musical Review vol. 34, no. 23 (September 7, 1918), 1.

M'Lean, Fannie W., "South Park Settlement," The Commons (June 1897), 1.

Mason, Redfern, "List of Songs Selected for Community Singing," San Francisco Examiner (June 25, 1914), ??.  In San Francisco programs. Music (San Francisco Public Library, 1915-196.

"National Register of Historic Places Inventory -- Nomination Form: Girls Club." National Park Service [website].

"Nobody Lives There Now; South Park Settlement Deserted," San Francisco Chronicle (August 5, 1895), 12.

"Planning Concert in Aid of the Girls' Club Settlement," San Francisco Chronicle (January 28, 1910), 3.

Rackle, Karl E., "Community Singing in San Francisco," Musician vol. 22 (January 1917), 22-23.

Rosenbaum, Fred, Cosmopolitans: A Social and Cultural History of the Jews of the San Francisco Bay Area (University of California Press, 2009).

"Teacher in Girls' Club Gets Leave," San Francisco Chronicle (November 1, 1919), 11.

Nature and Its Applications - an illustration index

With the wealth of information and data available through the World Wide Web, often the dilemma for the researcher is navigating this over-whelming quantity of information and data. The job of the librarian is to understand how to both evaluate and supplement this wealth of information.

A well-made and well-conceived reference book can often open up an unknown world of possibilities. These books that we still depend upon are the product of the work of creative and assiduous librarians of years past.

Jessie Croft Ellis is the creator of four such references in the Art, Music and Recreation Center.  Ms. Ellis received a Bachelors degree from the University of Michigan in 1923.  She conducted her original work at the School of Architecture but later became a librarian in the school of Business Administration at the University.

There are many ways to search for images -- a Google image search, an online database like the New York Public Library Picture Collection or specialized files organized by subject like the Etching and Engraving Picture file that we maintain at the San Francisco Public Library.  The indexes created by Jessie Croft Ellis are also organized by subject and provide references to images in books and periodicals.

Her first work was the Nature Index of 1930 which was expanded, in 1949, to become Nature and Its Applications.  The former indexed 5,000 references and the latter indexed 200,000 references. The earlier work retains value because it is not as vast and because a larger percentage of the images are in the public domain.

These two indexes are dominated by plants and animals.  Nature-scapes like "field," "forest," "garden," "pond" or "waterfall" are also included.  There are broader categories like "feather," "dog," "wildcat," "rocks," or "seed."  But most of the categories are very specific.

Using redwood as an example there are categories for Redwood Forest, Redwood Forest Road, Redwood Tree, Redwood Tree Cone, Redwood Tree Roots, Redwood Tree Twig and Redwood Wood.

The majority of images are from popular magazines from the time like American Forestry, American Museum Journal (the predecessor of Natural History), Better Homes and Gardens, California Arts and Architecture, Country Life, House Beautiful, National Geographic Magazine, Nature Magazine, etc... Selected books, dictionaries and encyclopedias are also indexed.

One entry under Redwood Tree is the citation "Count life 35:67 Mar '19" refering to Country Life vol. 35 (March 1919), 67.  The image above (located in Google books using Ms. Ellis's index) accompanies an advertisement for the California Redwood Association.  This association existed not to conserve the redwood, but to exploit it.  They extol the conifer's "soft ... (yet firm) texture [that] makes it especially suitable for sand-blasting, hand-carving and other unusual treatments."

It's nonetheless a striking image with the primitive truck bathed in sunbeams showing the scale of the forest's grandeur and wonder.

The citation for the above image is "Fortune 3: 3 My '31" meaning Fortune vol. 3 (May 1931), 3. It is also part of an advertisement, this one by "Californians Inc." promoting our City of San Francisco "where life is better."

San Francisco is the center of the world's most varied outdoorland [sic]... Almost in an instant, whenever you choose, the stir of the city may be left behind as you drive along the ocean or through fragrant valleys.

This artistic photograph truly gives a sense of the redwood's scale.  The presence of the lone car projects a dual sense of escape and accessibility (fundamentals of advertising to this day).  But even without knowing the wider context, the photograph works on its own as a work of art.

By consulting Nature and Its Applications, the user can get more than just a beautiful or striking image but also an understanding of how nature was viewed -- as an area of study, wonder, beauty or exploitation.

Here is a bibliography of Jessie Croft Ellis' works at the Library.


General Index to Illustrations; 22000 Selected References In all fields Exclusive of Nature, compiled by Jessie Croft Ellis (The F.W. Faxon Company, 1931).

Index to Illustrations, by Jessie Croft Ellis (Boston : F. W. Faxon Co., 1966).

Nature and Its Applications; Over 200,000 Selected References to Nature Forms and Illustrations of Nature as Used in Every Way, compiled by Jessie Croft Ellis (F.W. Faxon Co., 1949).

Nature Index; 5000 Selected References to Nature Forms and Illustrations of Nature in Design, Painting and Sculpture, compiled by Jessie Croft Ellis (The F.W. Faxon Company, 1930).

Ladies' Knight: women's chess club

 

The Art, Music and Recreation Center of the San Francisco Public Library presents

Ladies' Knight: women's chess club

Chess has traditionally been a male dominated game. Renowned chess master Lauren Goodkind will teach women of all levels in a supportive, fun environment. Join us on the fourth Wednesday of every month for instruction and free play.

First Meeting: Wednesday, October 26th, 2016

6pm - 7:30pm

Main Library, Sycip Room (4th floor)

Teach yourself or brush up on your chess skills by checking out these books:

Women in chess: players of the modern age by John Graham; with a foreword by George Koltanowski

The queen of Katwe: a story of life, chess, and one extraordinary girl's dream of becoming a grandmaster by Tim Crothers

Chess and The art of war: ancient wisdom to make you a better player by Al Lawrence, International Grandmaster Elshan Moradiabadi  

100 chess master trade secrets: from sacrifices to endgames by Andrew Soltis 

Tactics time: 1001 chess tactics from the games of everyday chess players by Tim Brennan and Anthea Carson 

Chess for dummies by James Eade 

Lessons with a Grandmaster: enhance your chess strategy and psychology with Boris Gulko by Boris Gulko & Joel R. Sneed 

How to reassess your chess: chess mastery through chess imbalances by Jeremy Silman 

Music & Politics in San Francisco

Leta E. Miller, a professor of music at the University of California, Santa Cruz, published Music and Politics in San Francisco in 2012. As the subtitle notes this book covers our City's musical history from the early part of the twentieth century into the 1940s.

This period of time is very important because it was time when three of our most important cultural institutions - The San Francisco Conservatory, The San Francisco Symphony and The San Francisco Opera - were established. These organization experienced financial difficulties and sometimes created political controversy during their formation and development which Miller documents in great detail.

Miller also devotes considerable space to music at the two large twentieth century fairs held in San Francisco during the first half of the twentieth century, the Panama Pacific International Exposition (1915) and Golden Gate International Exposition (1939 and 1940). She shows how the former did a great deal to bolster the Symphony while the latter largely omitted it.

The Golden Gate International Exposition also overlapped with another important discussion in her book - the Federal Music Project that was a component of the New Deal. The Federal Music Project was deeply mired in politics and was never had a unified vision about its music.  Was it supposed to provide relief or make great music?

Some of the musicians in the 70-piece WPA Federal Music Project Symphony orchestra leaving for Stockton to give the first of a series of concerts in Northern California towns, 1936. From the San Francisco Historical Photograph Collection.

But the book is not only about these more elite organizations. She discusses African American jazz bands on the Barbary Coast and their struggles against the mainly white musicians union. She also traces the history of Chinese opera and the impression it made upon western musicians. Finally there is a section about the contemporary music concerts and publications of Henry Cowell's New Music Society.

Music and Politics in San Francisco, while packed with detail, is very entertaining and readable.

Exterior of the War Memorial Opera House, 1934, from the San Francisco Historical Photograph Collection.

Music and Politics in San Francisco: From the 1906 Quake to the Second World War by Leta E. Miller (University of California Press, 2012).

Facts Behind The Songs

Facts Behind the Songs by Marvin E. Paymer is an idiosyncratic reference book for popular music. Its scope is the music from the 1890s (the earliest days of Tin Pan Alley) to the early 1990s.  The books consists of alphabetical succession of articles by 11 contributors that are classified into 8 categories: 1) origin; 2) foreign influence; 3) domestic influence; 4) dissemination; 5) historical survey; 6) genre; 7) song subject; and 8) style of music and lyrics.

"Origin" brings together articles relating to the creators and the production of music. Some articles are about locales, others are about venues for creation.

"Foreign Influence" looks at the contribution of other cultures in American popular music.  Domestic Influence likewise considers how American genres (ranging from Bebop to Zydeco) entered the musical mainstream.

"Dissemination" looks at technology and the institutions that offer music.  The "Historical Survey" devotes a chapters to a variety of time periods; genre lists articles on a variety of styles of music.

Perhaps the most useful category is "Song Subject." There are articles about more than 100 categories ranging from "age" ("Forever Young," "My Generation") to "writing" ("Take a Letter, Maria," "Paperback Writer"). I have found this book to be helpful for the article "Classics" which includes a table called "The Classics and Popular Song." This provides a convenient listing of classical melodies that have become popular songs.

The book closes with a "Catalogue of Songs" that lists every song mentioned in the book giving the year it was written and the names of the songwriters. It also indexes every article where each song is mentioned.

The information in Facts Behind The Songs is mostly covered in other reference sources. The value of the book is the unique organization of this information.


Facts Behind the Songs: A Handbook of American Popular Music From the Nineties to the '90s, Marvin E. Paymer, general editor (Garland Pub., 1993).

Sfiato Wind Quintet performs . . .

 

Sfiato means to breathe or exhale in Italian. The Sfiato Wind Quintet was formed in 2014 in San Francisco. Currently, the quintet consists of Catherine Jennings on flute, Audrey Gore on oboe, Leah di Tullio on clarinet, Jeremiah Broom on bassoon, and Ryan Timmons on French horn. They will play a broad range of chamber music composed by musicians as varied as Haydn, Francaix, Hindemith, Piazzola, Ravel, Uhl, Jacob, Gershwin.

     Leah di Tullio was previously in a music group called The Bernal Hill Players and together they presented two world premieres by  Mexican composers Guillermo Galindo and Eduardo Gamboa inspired by neighborhoods of Mexico City. Sfiato Wind Quintet’s last performance at the Koret auditorium of Main Branch of San Francisco Public Library was very well attended and much appreciated by the audience who after the performance engaged the musicians in a lengthy Q&A session. 

    On Sunday, August 21^st, the quintet will play pieces by Barber, Gershwin, Ibert, Danzi, Arrieu, Arnold and more. This promises to be an exciting afternoon. Don’t miss it!

San Francisco Neon: Survivors and Lost Icons

The Art, Music & Recreation Center is currently hosting an exhibit of images from the book San Francisco Neon: Survivors and Lost Icons through October 30, 2016.  These images taken by Al Barna and Randall Ann Homan were taken over a nearly 40 years period and document signage past and present.

Tom Downs' introduction provides an appreciation of what neon light does for a cityscape.  He recalls that fifty or more years ago, when neon was at its peak, the "collage effect" that it created within the night-scape.  Neon is especially effective in the fog-socked city like San Francisco where it creates a film noir-ish atmosphere.  In the book's "Neon Notes," Eric Lynxwiler writes that neon began to wane in the City in the 1970s as many locally owned shops shut down.

The endnotes of San Francisco Neon, written by Barna, Homan, Downs and Lynxwiler, provide addresses and background information for every image in the book.  The images in the exhibit also provide this background.  There is also a very helpful "Photo Index by Neighborhood."  The entries in this index are color coded to indicate whether a sign exists and continues to be illuminated, exists but the neon tubes are damaged or gone, or has been removed.

For a wider, historical context, Architecture of the Night: The Illuminated Building, by Dietrich Neumann, traces the evolution of light as a feature used to enhance a structure and as signage.  This became a feature beginning with the various World's Fairs beginning with Chicago in 1893. The first Neon sign appeared at the Grand Palais in Paris in 1910.  The first American Neon signage appeared in 1923 with the brand "Packard" illuminated at a Los Angeles Car dealership

Companies started advertising in San Francisco newspapers to install neon lights around 1929.  A search of the San Francisco Chronicle Historical database shows evidence of the growth in neon lighting in the City.

Advertisement from the San Francisco Chronicle April 5, 1929 

The rise of neon lighting also result in the jobs for those who created and fabricated oneon light, as well as the profession of neon light salesmen.

Want ad from the San Francisco Chronicle March 27, 1931

By the early 1930s, San Francisco's Chinatown must have been bathed in neon light.  A review of the 1933 film The Son Daughter, set in Chinatown, remarks that the of the film "The scene is not Grant Avenue today, but the Dupont street of the pre-Neon light era..." (San Francisco Chronicle (January 23, 1933)).  Downs, in his forward to San Francisco Neon, notes how many remnants of Chinatown's neon light era remain in signs that no longer work that are still attached to building above street level.

The images and the book San Francisco Neon perform the excellent of service of documenting elements of our City's past and present.  They also give us cause to notice our surroundings more carefully and appreciate these beautiful illuminations.


Bibliography:

Architecture of the Night: The Illuminated Building by Dietrich Neumann with essays by Kermit Swiler Champa, et al. (Prestel, c2002).

San Francisco Neon: Survivors and Lost Icons: Photographs 1976-2014 by Al Barna and Randall Ann Homan; foreword by Tom Downs ; neon notes by Erick Lynxwiler (Giant Orange Press, 2014).