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A Wagnerian opera requires
103 musicians. A Strauss opera requires 112. Now if the concert manager
wants to economize he will insist upon cutting down on the most
expensive musicians and dropping out some of the others, say, the
supernumerary violinists and the man who blows a single blast or tinkles
a triangle once in the course of the evening. Only the trained ear will
detect the difference and the manager can make more money.
Suppose our mercenary impresario were unable to get into the concert
hall of his famous rival. He would then listen outside the window and
analyze the sound in this fashion: "Fifty per cent. of the sound is made
by the tuba, 20 per cent. by the bass drum, 15 per cent. by the 'cello
and 10 per cent. by the clarinet. There are some other instruments, but
they are not loud and I guess if we can leave them out nobody will know
the difference." So he makes up his orchestra out of these four alone
and many people do not know the difference.
The cheap perfumer goes about it in the same way.


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