It has been said that of all the music in the world there is none better than Scandinavian music. The lyrics of many of these songs are classics that will live forever.

Let us take, for example, the words of the national hymn of Norway. Of the many translations we have read we believe the following opening words to be the best: "Yes, we love the land that towers," or our next choice, "Yes, we love this land". In the first of the above translations we see lines such as the second line, "Where the ocean foams," and the third line, "Rugged, storm swept it embowers". There is power in these two lines, power that thrills, that opens the door to visions of the grandeur of the Norse coast, that makes one feel as if Norway's rugged, storm-swept, fir-clad coast lies spread out in a panorama, with a frame of white snow, brown boulders and cliffs, green fir and pine, and the deep, deep blue of the fjords. Yes, and the song continues:

"Rugged, storm swept, it embowers many thousand homes." Or a later line: "And the Saga night that's sinking"--a midsummer night, with just two or three hours of dark, a night that is not really night, but a gossamer darkness, a night that's like a filmy substance, a night in which one can see the elves and nymphs dance in the forest glade. And another line where you can hear "Fossen" [the rushing water rapids] thunder through the ravines and valleys of a midsummer night fairyland.

We Scandinavians love our songs of the home land--songs that breathe memories of the past, of childhood, of mother love. We have heard our Scandinavian Singing Societies sing these songs, and we have been carried home to the shores of childhood.

When "Bjorgvin" sings these songs we really can dream. Or our soloists, Nilson, Andersen, Bjorn. But the greatest treat is when Alfred Paulsen [Dane] 3plays the organ, interpreting our songs in a way that can not be imitated.

Some time ago we heard Anna Nielsen, [Dane], a soprano of great promise, sing "Finlandia" with such feeling, such beauty, that every one in the audience wept, men and women alike, and when Miss Nielsen had completed her songs there was a dead silence for a full minute before a thunderous applause burst forth, an applause that lasted over twenty minutes.

We here in Chicago can be thankful, for our Danish, Swedish, and Norwegian singers and musicians, many of them outstanding, that gladden our heart time and time again. Yes many of our artists from the Scandinavian groups here in our city have made great names for themselves; many are nationally known, many are now singing in European opera; yes, we can indeed be proud of them.

Our composers are numbered among many of the most outstanding in America:

Carl Busch [Dane], Alfred Paulsen [Dane], Christian Nilson, [Norwegian], Anton Pedersen, and the Swedish composer and basso, Joel Mossberg. There are many others, too numerous to mention.

The Scandinavians, as a whole, are music lovers. They love the classics, the songs of their homeland, and national music of all countries.

The operas that are the most popular seem to be "Faust," "Othello," "Lohengrin," "Il Trovatore," and "Blossom Time" [Shubert]. Of the lighter things, done by such composers as Victor Herbert, they prefer "Caprisiosa."

A song that is on every program here is, "Finlandia". "Olaf Trygvarson," by Grieg, is another number that is always received with wild applause.

We could go on and on, naming the kind of music preferred by us, but this should be enough to prove that we love the best. Yes, not only love it, but know it.