However simple the music or the words,
the effect will be well worth the little additional trouble.
Our last consideration is that of the songs to be chosen to learn.
Little children should rarely sing anything but unison songs.
Folk-songs, such as those edited by Cecil Sharp and others, and, for the
very little ones, traditional nursery rhymes and game songs are the
best. From the ages of ten to fourteen years such books as Boosey's
_National Songs_ or _Songs of Britain_ should be the staple work, while
for older children the great classical songs may be added. A good book
for these is the _Golden Treasury_, published by Boosey.
Songs by living composers should be strictly limited in number, though
not excluded. These have not stood the test of time. We teach
Shakespeare in our literature classes, not a modern poet--the essays of
Bacon, not those of a modern essayist. And our reason is that the only
way to create a standard of taste is to take our children to the
classical fountains of prose and poetry.
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