Waltz on a Spinet

Harry Truman had worn a harried and rumpled air during General MacArthur's three days of testimony before Congress. But when he appeared for his press conference last week, his navy blue suit had a knife-edged crease again and his shirt a starched and snowy gleam. The presidential grin had seldom been wider.

When the assembled reporters demonstrated that they had almost nothing to ask him, the President picked up the ball, beaming with satisfaction: I guess most of your questions have been answered. I am very well satisfied with General Marshall's testimony. I know he has told the exact truth, word for word.

The President's mood of optimism was with him all week--even during an address on the perils of relaxation, delivered to 700 businessmen who act as advisers to U.S. defense agencies.

"The country," he said, "has never been in a greater emergency . . . We cannot afford to relax."

Then Truman hustled back to the White House for a little ceremony commemorating National Music Week, which is dedicated to promoting "music as a source of relaxation and tranquillity."

To celebrate his 67th birthday, his office staff had already presented him with two birthday cakes. But the music men had a grander present: a full keyboard spinet, jointly built by the nation's leading piano manufacturers of woods, metals, ivory and wool gathered from nine of the United Nations. The President sat down, obviously pleased, and played the Little Fairy Waltz, a tinkling tune he had learned as a boy back in Independence.

He also talked a little about music: "I am very fond of light opera ... I can't say that I can go to a 'high-hat' opera . . . and enjoy it all. But there is usually one aria . . . that is worth listening to. Most of the rest of opera music is boring.

"I have no objection to the noise they call music these days, any more than I have to the daubs they call art these days, but I would like to see ... people interested in good music."

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