POPSGORE

Both the Boston Pops and the Harvard Glee Club appear to achieve success through habit. What would seem startling to most American communities, the business of listening to music flippantly rather than in the solemnity of Art or of conspicuous leisure, is now an accepted part of Boston-in-the-spring. And the Harvard Glee Club has now reached practical perfection in the repertoire developed since last fall.

According to the program notes, the Boston Pops began back in 1885 and "no other orchestra this side of the Atlantic, has made a success of serving the larger part of the audience at tables while the music is in progress." The Pops leans heavily on atmosphere; the flavor of the German beer hall and the English garden party.

The Pops is called provincial, but in many respects, not including its programmes, it smacks of cosmopolitanism. At Harvard Night at the Pops on Monday, people sat at little green tables in a carnivalized Symphony Hall sipping claret lemonade, drinking Black Horse Ale, eating Hood's ice cream, satisfying the lusts of the palate along with the pleasures of the ear. They chattered through the waltzes and they stood for "Fair Harvard" and they were careless and relaxed all night in the lap of familiarity.

Harvard's Glee Club made its selections, for the most part, in the spirit of the Popes, with the accent on the popular, the spirited, and the original. It fortunately recognized that the "Thanksgiving Hymn" it used last year had no place in a champagne glass. Harvard hit its stride in the Pops manner with Gershwin, and in "The Golden Trumpeter" it substituted for "Hey. Mac, where are the glass flowers?" the more appropriate "Where's Scollay Square?" A good time was enjoyed by all, the lady at the next table would remark. jgt