Superstitious Musicians

"Well, 1 believe In gome signs," said jolly Ciiarlie Warner, when asked whether he, in partioular, and musicians in general, were superstitious. Proiessor Warner in his lifetime has been connected with all the , famous musical organizations of this country. He played E flat cornet with Gilmore's band, was leading i lin in various symphony orche3tras, besides having had a long oxperience with circus and minstrel bands. "If musicians are superstitious," said he. "It is because their dealings with the show people have made them so. Take, for instance, the man with a yellow clarionet. He couldn't get a job even with a barnstorming outflt. I remember when I was a member of Forepaugh's circus band, when Tony Franks was the leader, Alexander Fischer, now soloclarionetist at McVicker's Chicago theater, was one of our men, and he joined with three yellow clarionets. "The other members were very much alarmed at this doleful occurrence and importuned Fischer upon every occasion to get rid of those boxwood instruments. The circus performers 'got on' to the color of the clarionets, and came running to Leader Franks with alarm pictured on their counte nances. " 'If the old man sees those clarioneta,' said Franks, 'we'll all get discharged;' and he told Fisher to either buy instruments of another color or paint the ones he had black. Alexander, however, did not have money enough to make the requisito change and told the leader so. "Driven almost to distraction, Franks sent and bought three handsome buffet clarionets and hid them in his m!sic chest. He then told one of the canvas men to tako Fischer's yellow clarionets and drive them in the rinbank for stakes. The man did as ha was directsd, and the fir.st thing that Alexander saw that night wa5 his clarionets' mouthpieces and all being driven into mother earth by lusty blows f rom a twen'y-pound sledge. " 'Here, what are you doing with my clarionets?' he yelled; but the brawny circus attaché paid no attention to him. but kept on unt.il nothing more could be seen of the three 'tuners' but their yellow bells. Fischer hastened tó Franks with tears in his eyes, but was instantly mollified when Tony placed in his hands the new black clarionets. "A yïllow base viol is also considered the harbinger of bad luck. I recall ono instance where a corpulent Germán engaged at a Louisville theater persisted in coming to work with a 'bull-fiddle' the color of a sunflower: Business at the house kept going from bad to worse, but the obstinate bass player continually refused to make a change in the color of his instrument. 'When the curtain went up one Friday night there were but five people in the b-puse, and the members of the orchestra deoided that something must be doue with that yellow flddle. After the thow they began arguing again with the Germán, but he replied that it was all 'tam fooi business.' Thi so exasperated the men that they tirew the Germán and his yellow bass from a second story window into tfie street below, and 'ha never cama back.'"