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Show v Hallelujah and Bananas One hardly knows whether to be in-dignan'- or merely amused by the shamel-ss manner in which our jazz composers steal and distort the melodies melo-dies of the masters, in grinding out the syncopated songs and dance tunes of the day. It is a far cry from the majestic "I-Ifllolujah Chorus" of Handel's "Messiah" to the notorious "Yes We Have No Bananas," but they are essentially es-sentially the same melody. Rach-maininoff's Rach-maininoff's "Prelude" has been trans-fo-ned into "The Russian Rag;" "Marareta" is adapted from Nichol-ai's Nichol-ai's "Merry Wives of Windsor;" Cho-nir.'s Cho-nir.'s "Ir.-.t romptu in D-flat Major" become5; "Ohasing Rainbows." Somr- nf the modern "composers" are even brazen enough to indicate by their titles the sources of their stolen air, as vilness a tune called "Ragged Williaro." based on a theme from Rossim's "William Tell," and another entitled "So This Is Venice," a distortion distor-tion o!' 'he well-known "Carnival of Venice" by Schumann. More :e:ent are the "jazzed up" version-, i" Liszt's "Second Hungarian Hungar-ian Rhaprody," Greig's "Peer Gynt." and msnv operatic airs. There ai e dozens of other similar examples of piracy which might be pointed ni t, which are easily recognizable recog-nizable by anyone acquainted with real music. But, as there is no way to stop ru 'h a sacrilege, it is probably prob-ably jr,-;t -s well to smile, for indignation indig-nation wT not help matters |