BOOK NOTICE.

OEDIPUS TYRANNUS OF SOPHOCLES. Music for Male Chorus and Orchestra. By JOHN KNOWLES PAINE.

WE are glad to see so important a work placed within the reach of the public; since all who are in any considerable degree sensitive to music ought to have the opportunity of studying it. Those who attend the performance of the play will be obviously helped in their appreciation and enjoyment of it by careful study of the music; while such study cannot but be a source of pleasure and profit, even to those who do not witness the representation of the tragedy. The music consists of a prelude and six choruses, remarkable alike for their dramatic spirit and for their variety. The student of music will naturally find more of value in them than the ordinary listener will be likely to. Yet those, who, though having "an ear for music," have given it no training, find much pleasure in listening to the choruses. In short, they can be enjoyed by all who are at all musically inclined. This work, with the "Spring" Symphony, is held by those competent to judge to be clearly the greatest production of native American musical art, and may be classed with the most valuable compositions of the time. Surely, then, we may urge upon students the purchase of the work as one to be proud of both as Harvard men and as Americans: the more strongly, too, since it is to be had at a very reasonable price.