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MUSIC IN LONDON
MUSIC IN LONDON
LONDON
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TORONTO
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
BY BERNARD SHAW
IN THREE VOLUMES
VOLUME
LONDON
CONSTABLE AND COMPANY
LIMITED
Revised and reprinted 'for this Stanford Edition
Reprinted
All rights fully protected and reserved
FRITTED 13* OREA.T BRITAIN
BY B- & R. CT..ARK, UMITED, EDINBURGH
"MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
6 January 1892
NEED I say anything more in justification of The Mountebanks, a
Gilbert opera with Cellier as composer vice Sullivan, retired, than
that it made me laugh heartily several times. The brigands whose
motto is "Heroism without Risk'*; the alchemist who pays his
bills with halfpence, accompanied by a written undertaking to .
transmute them into gold as soon as he discovers the philosopher's
stone; the girl who thinks herself plain and her lover handsome,
but has to confess to him that she finds herself in a hopeless
minority on both subjects; the unsuccessful Hamlet who so dreads
to be ever again laughed at by the public that he has turned clown;
the mountebank whp, pretending that he has swallowed poison
and is in the agonies of stomach-ache, is forced to swallow an
elixir which has the magic property of turning all pretences into
realities; the transformation by this same elixir of the brigands
into monks, the clown and columbine into automatic clockwork
figures, the village belle into an old hag, the heroine into a lunatic,
and the rustic hero into a duke: if all these went for no more
than one laugh apiece, the opera would come out ahead of many
of its rivals in point of fun. With them, however, the merit of the
piece stops: every line that goes a step further is a line to the bad.
Mr Gilbert has gone wrong in his old way: he has mixed his
genres. In this Shakespear-ridden land one cannot be a stickler for
the unities of time and place; but I defy any dramatist to set the
fantastic and the conventional, the philosophic and the senti-
mental, jostling one another for stage-room without spoiling his
play. Now The Mountebanks begins in an outrageous Sicily,
where the stage-struck people want to play Shakespear, and where
impossible brigands, prosecuting farcical vendettas, agree to hold
a revel for twenty-four days on wine ordered from the chemist's,
and not to cheer during all that time above a whisper, because of a
bedridden alchemist upstairs, shattered by the repeated explosions
which have attended his researches into the transmutation of
VOL. II I
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
metals. As aforesaid, brigands, mountebanks, and everyone else
become enchanted by drinking a magic potion, and are restored
to their natural, or rather normal, condition by the burning of
the label of the bottle which contains the philtre.
Clearly there is no room here for the realism of Ibsen or the
idealism of Drury Lane. That a man so clever as Mr Gilbert could
have supposed that the atmosphere of such a Sicily could be.
breathed by a figure from the conventional drama is a startling
example of the illusions of authorship. He undoubtedly did sup-
pose It, however; for one of the characters, a girl who loves the
hero and is cordially detested by him, might have been turned out
by Tom Taylor himself. When Alfredo impersonates the duke,
and is caught in that assumption by the action of the elixir, she
impersonates the duchess and shares his fate, thereby becoming
his adored wife. Incidentally she delays the action, bores the audi-
ence, and, being quite unfancifully conceived, repeatedly knocks
the piece off its proper plane. In the second act, she goes to the
incredible length of a sentimental denouement. She "relents" at the
entreaty of the heroine, not in the fashion of the Pirate of Pen-
zance on learning that his prisoner is an orphan the only variety
of ruth conceivable in Gilbertland but actually in the orthodox
manner of Hubert in Kong John.
I am afraid that Miss Lucille Saunders will think me grossly
inconsiderate when I say, as I must, that if her part were com-
pletely cut out, the opera would be vastly improved; but that is
certainly my opinion. Alfredo could quite Gilbertianly be repre-
sented as devoted to an absent duchess whom he had never seen-
and the incident of Pietro losing the charm might easily be man-
aged otherwise, if not wholly omitted. Under these circumstances
it is little to be thankful for that Ultrice, though she is ugly is at
least not old. The old woman of the play is happily not a new
lady Jane or Katisha, but a young maiden who takes the elixir
when simulating octogenarianism, and pays the penalty like the
rest.
Another weakness in the scheme is that there is no dramatic
action in the second act nothing but a simple exhibition of the
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
characters in the plight to which the elixir reduced them at the end
of the first. They walk on in twos; sing comic duets recounting
the anomalies of their condition in Gilbertian verse; and go off
again, all except the incorrigibly malapropos Ultrice, who sings a
tragic scena which nobody wants to hear. And nothing else hap-
pens except an incident planned in the first act and deprived of its
reason d*$tre by the charm, and the sentimental denouement, which
is dragged in by the ears (if I may so mix my metaphors) when
the fun begins to wear out. The result is that the opera is virtually
over ten minutes before the curtain falls; and this means that the
curtain falls rather flatly, especially as the composer signally failed
to come to the rescue at this particular point.
Cellier's strength never lay in the working up of finales; but
this one flickers and goes out so suddenly that one can almost
hear ghostly muffled drums in the orchestra. The rest of the score
is what might have been /expected from the composer that is,
better than die occasion required it to be; and in this very super-
fluity of musical conscience one recognizes his want of the tact
which has saved Sir Arthur Sullivan from ever wasting musical
sentiment on Mr Gilbert. Musicians will not think the worse of
Cellier for this. There are many points, such as the graceful for-
malism of the little overture, with its orthodox "working out,"
and the many tender elaborations in the accompaniments, all done
from sheer love of music, which will shield Cellier more effec-
tually than his new dignity of de mortuis from that reproach of
musical unscrupulousness which qualifies every musician's ap-
preciation of the Sullivanesque savoir-faire.
But from the more comprehensive standpoint which is neces-
sary in judging an opera, it must be confessed that, since Sullivan
is spontaneously vivacious where Cellier was only energetic
and that, too, with an effort which, though successful, was ob-
vious and since Sullivan is out of all comparison more various
in his moods, besides being a better song-writer, Mr Gilbert can-
not, on the whole, be said to have changed for the better when he
left the Savoy for the Lyric. Only, Cellier's master, Sterndale
Bennett, would not have thought the worse of him on that
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MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
account; nor 'do I set* it down here as any disparagement to
him.
In speaking of Cellier as generally less vivacious than Sullivan,
I do not of course imply that he is behindhand in those musical
facetiousnesses which tickled the public so hugely at the Savoy.
The duet for the automata with the quaint squeaking accompani-
ment, the clockwork music, and the showman's song with big
drum obbligato by Mr Monkhouse, are quite up to the Savoy
standard if, indeed, that does not prove too modest an apprecia-
tion of the popularity of Put a penny in the slot. The old and easy
expedient of making the men sing a solemn chorus and the women
a merry one successively (or vice versa, as in Patience), and then
repeat them simultaneously, is achieved in the second act to the
entire satisfaction of those who regard it as one of the miracles
of counterpoint.
One of the operatic jokes is the best in the whole Gilbertian
series. The monkized brigands receive the Duke with a mock
ecclesiastical chorus on the syllable La. He expresses his acknow-
ledgments by an elaborate recitative in the same eloquent terms,
and, having to finish on the dominant, and finding himself at a
loss to hit that note, explains that he is "in want of a word,"
whereupon they offer him La on the tonic. He shakes his head,
and a monk gives him La on the dominant, which he immediately
accepts with an air of relief, and so finishes triumphantly. Not to
damp my readers too much, I may add that anybody with an ear
can appreciate the j oke when they hear it without in the least know-
ing what "the dominant" means.
Mr Gilbert has not much to complain of in the way his work is
given to the public. Miss Aida Jenoure makes a hit as the dancing
girl who becomes an automaton. She is clever, funny, pretty, a
sufficient singer and dancer, with the only woman's part in the
opera worth having. Poor Miss Lucille Saunders does her work
earnestly, in spite of the fact that the better she does it the more
heartily the audience (through no fault of her own) wish her at
the Adelphi. Miss Geraldine Ulmar can do little except clothe her-
self in the dignity of leading lady, and get through her part as
4
MUSIC IN LONDON
prettily as possible. She rather declines to be mad in the second
act, mistrusting, as I surmise, the effect of vociferous lunacy on the
voice. Miss Eva Moore, as one of a subsidiary pair of lovers,
brings in a second tenor, Mr Cecil Burt, who, though condemned
to impersonate a particularly fatuous brigand, and to answer to
the name of Risotto all of which he does without apparent re-
luctance looks like an early portrait of Daniel O'Connell by Sir
Thomas Lawrence. Mr Robertson, the leading tenor, retains all
his freshness, even to the extent of an occasional rawness of voice
which suggests that it has not yet attained full maturity, and an
air of unfamiliarity with the stage which often clings for long to
men who are not mummers by natural temperament. The come-
dians are as funny as could be desired. Mr Monkhouse's Bartolo is
a genuine creation: he shews a thoroughly artistic perception of
the fact that as the pseudo-Ibsenite clown with drum and pipes he
has to make his part funny, whereas in the automaton scenes his
part makes him fimny, and he has only to be careful not to spoil it
by trying to help it too much. Mr Brough gets everything that is
to be got out of the business of the chief mountebank; and Mr
Wyatt is in the highest spirits, dancing less than usual, but exe-
cuting every step with all his old air of receiving the most ex-
quisite anguish from the exercise. Furneaux Copk, as the inn-
keeper, describes the alchemist with an unembarrassed conviction
which sends the fun well across the footlights. And the band, un-
der Mr Caryll, is excellent. I am bound to mention, though, that I
am writing all this before the first public performance, on the
strength of a dress rehearsal. But I do not think I shall have occa-
sion to change any of my judgments, however the cat may jump.
The death of Cellier has diverted public attention from that of
Weist Hill, who was chiefly remarkable, as far as my knowledge
of him went, for what he did as a conductor. The set of concerts
he conducted for Madame Viard Louis, when orchestral music in
London was at its lowest ebb, can hardly yet be forgotten by the
survivors of that famine. Had he been lucky enough to find a cap-
italist of sufficient staying powers, he would undoubtedly have
anticipated Mr Henschel's London Symphony enterprise. He
5
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
knew that the London orchestral forces of his day were capable of
extraordinary feats of combined speed and precision; and he saw,
what everybody has since learned from Richter, the need for en-
lamng the orchestra and insisting on the importance of broad
handling and sustained tone. It is not altogether to the credit of
English musical enterprise that it should have been possible for
Mm to give such signal proofs of capacity as he did with Madame
Viard Louis without succeeding in finding another backer when
that lady's resources were exhausted.
13 January 1892
PROFESSOR RISELEY, conferring with an assembly of professional
musicians at Newcastle, complains of the absence of orchestras in
England. I have often complained of this myself, without receiv-
ing any encouragement to believe that my grievance received the
smallest attention. Mr Riseley, I see, appeals to Church and State
for aid; and it is just possible that persistent hammering away in
this direction might get something done in the course of half a
century or so. At present every parish in England has a parish
church in which instrumental and vocal music is performed at
least once a week, and in which the congregation, however im-
patient of serious and elevated art on weekdays, resigns itself on
Sunday to countenance the highest pretensions that music can
make. Unfortunately, most of these churches are provided with
nothing better in the way of instrumental music than a huge
machine called an organ, which, though capable of great things in
the hands of a first-rate player dealing with solo music specially
written for it, is in many ways highly objectionable for accom-
panying choral music, and a quite atrocious substitute for orches-
tral accompaniments. The manipulator of this mechanical monster
is generally selected by a sort of open competition, one applicant
after another playing before a few gentlemen who bring a trained
judgment of horses, crops, groceries, or dry goods to the assist-
ance of the clergyman, who may perhaps know the difference be-
tween the Greek ft and B flat, or perhaps may not. Every organist
will tell you stories of the games he has had with these tribunals,
6
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
and of the ingenious dodges, wholly irrelevant to his musical fit-
ness, with which he has borne off appointments from less adroit
competitors. Once accepted, an organist is underpaid; his autho-
rity in directing the services is jealously limited by the clergy-
man; and he is relegated to a social status intermediate between
that of a gentleman and an organ-blower or gravedigger. Clearly,
thai, a church which has only an organ in the hands of an organist
of no more than ordinary force of character will do little or
nothing for music, and will presumably do less for The Church
(as distinguished from the church) than it might if its services were
musically decent. For my part, I have hardly ever heard a service
at a country church without wondering at the extraordinary irrev-
erence of the musical arrangements the gabbling and bawling of
the boys in the psalms, the half-hearted droning of the congrega-
tion in the hymns, and the trumpery string of modulations and
t$es played by the organist, with perhaps a flight into compara-
tive classicism with a number from Mozart's Twelfth Mass, the
jDufus Animam from Rossini's Stabat, or the march from Le Pro^-
phfete, to play the people out. When there is anything better than
that, you always find, either that the incumbent (not the organist)
is a musical enthusiast, or else that there are several churches in
die neighbourhood which compete hotly with the parish church
for worshippers. Deplorable as this state of things is, and deeply
corrupted as the ears of most English people become by their be-
ing trained from youth up to listen patiently to bad music once a
week, it is not easy to see where the remedy is to come from so
long as no musical qualification is expected from those who have
the supreme control of a service that is half music. This is hardly
to be wondered at in view of the fact that many bishops will ordain
men who, though they can satisfy the chaplain of their ability,
under stress of preparation, to blunder through the Gospels in
Greek, cannot read a chapter of the Bible aloud in English in-
tejligibly. And indeed I do not pretend that The Church could fill
its pidpits if itsi ministry were to be made musical as well as
spiritual* The .artistic part of the service should be ptaoed under
me separate ^oiitrol of a capable artist, fust as the Mating &rrange-
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
ments are placed in the hands of a capable plumber. But since only
those few clergymen who are themselves artists can recognize or
even understand this, present circumstances offer no chance of the
emancipation of the organist from the despotism of the rector.
The organist is, and will always be, a slave. But if there were an
orchestra in the church the organist would have to be a conductor,
capable of inspiring some degree of confidence' in a whole band;
and the most inveterately obtuse incumbent could no longer make
him feel that he might be replaced by any person who knew
enough about the organ to strum through a service, pending
whose appointment one of the young ladies from the rectory-
could keep things going for a week or two. Besides, the artistic
conscience of a band is a stronger resisting force than that of an
individual organist. It is always easier to say "We object" than
"I object." The parish church bands would give the orchestral
nuclei which Professor Riseley wants. As a first step in reconcil-
ing public opinion to them, let everyone of musical pretensions
do his or her best to discredit the notion that the organ is a
specially sacred kind of music machine. It is, as a matter of fact,
quite the reverse; for I doubt if there is any instrument which so
frequently and irresistibly provokes the player to profanity. In-
deed, organists are far from being the majestic and self-contained
men their office might lead outsiders to expect.
As to Mr Riseley's other suggestion, of bands maintained by
the municipalities, or at least subventioned by them, I have urged
that also, being quite unable to see why a County Council or
Town Corporation should refrain from providing bands in parks
when they provide flower-gardens. However, we must first edu-
cate the rate-paying classes on the subject, as they seem at present
to have no idea of the plain fact that people who are bred in towns
where there is no good theatre, no good picture-gallery, and no
good orchestra, are ill-bred people, and that this is the reason why
provincial society consists so largely of men who, though they
are positively wallowing in money, are, with the best intentions,
the dreariest boors imaginable. The twenty thousand bandsmen of
Lancashire (I do not guarantee the figure, which I quote from an
8
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
old number of the British Bandsman) are all men who work for
weekly wages. .
There was a time, as any instrument manufacturer will inform
' you, when gentlemen also broke into spontaneous musical activity
of this kind, and amateurs of the key bugle, cornetto, serpent, and
other musical weapons were not uncommon. My own father,
armed with a trombone, and in company with some two dozen
others of ascertained gentility, used to assemble on summer even-
ings on a riverside promenade on the outskirts of my native .town,
and entertain their fellow-citizens with public spirited minstrelsy.
In fact, my father not only played his trombone part, but actually
composed it as he went along, being an indifferent reader-at-sight,
but an expert at what used to be known as "vamping." What my
father's son might have said had he been compelled to criticize
these performances in his present capacity is a point upon which I
shall pursue no unfilial speculation: suffice it that such music must
have been infinitely better and more hopeful than no music at all.
At any rate, it did not encourage that sort of materialism which
makes England a desert wherein music has to resort to the most
degrading shifts for a living. We are all very angry when anyone
calls us an unmusical nation; but let the holder of that opinion
come from the general to the particular by proposing a rate of half
a farthing in the pound for musical purposes; and he will soon
have plenty of documents to support his contention.
Meanwhile, we have, outside London, just one first-class or-
chestra, the result of Halle's life work at Manchester. And all the
music in London last week was its two performances of Berlioz'
Faust. One of the advantages of being a critic in London is that at
all seasons of rejoicing and holiday making, Music vanishes from
the critical sphere and takes to the streets, where she is very voci-
ferous between eleven and two at night. The drunken bachelor
sings, four or five strong, beneath my window; and the drunken
husband passes doggedly on his way home, with his hardly sober
wife one pace behind, nag, nag, nagging, except at such crises of
screaming as are produced by the exasperated husband proving
himself unworthy the name of a British sailor. This is a leading
9
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
feature of our English Christmas, with its round of slaughtering,
gorging, and drinking, into the midst of which this time comes
Halle with his orchestra, and finds his stalls anything but well
filled, though the gallery is faithful even to "standing room only/'
and not too much of that.
When he first introduced The Damnation of Faust here, there
were no rival performances to compare with that of the Man-
chester band. Now the work is a stock piece at the Albert Hall and
the Richter concerts; and it has been heard at the Crystal Palace.
The result is that London is utterly eclipsed and brought to
naught. Li vain does Mr Barnby guarantee metronomic regularity
of tempo and accurate execution of every note in the score: the
work is usually received at the Albert Hall as an unaffectedly
pious composition in the oratorio style, Richter, by dint of in-
cessant vigilance and urgency, only gets here and there a stroke of
fancy, power, or delicacy out of his orchestra in its own despite.
Mr Manns conducts Faust conscientiously, but without opposing
any really sympathetic knowledge to the blank ignorance of the
orchestra. Halle simply indicates the quietest, amblingest tempos
at his ease; and the score comes to life in the hands of players who
understand every bar of it, and individualize every phrase.
The Hungarian March, taken at about half the speed at which
Lamoureux vainly tries to make it "go," is encored with yells
literally with yells in St James's Hall. Nobody mistakes the
Amen parody for a highly becoming interlude of sacred music,
nor misses the diabolic elan of the serenade, the subtler imagina-
tive qualities of the supernatural choruses and dances, or the
originality and pathos of the music of Faust and Margaret. Here is
the experimental verification of my contention that no precision
in execution or ability in conducting can, in performing Berlioz'
music, supply the want of knowledge on the part of the band of
the intention of every orchestral touch. Victories over Berlioz are
soldiers' victories, not generals'. The long and short of the matter
is that our London men do not know the works of Berlioz and
the Manchester men do; hence the enormous superiority of the
latter on such occasions as the one in question.
10
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
The principal parts were taken by the Henschels, Herr Georg
of that ilk singing on this occasion better, if less prettify, than his
wife. The gentleman who sang Brander's music only needs to
raise his standard of accuracy of intonation to gain my unquali-
fied approval. During the recent fog, when Messrs Besson were
cheering me up one afternoon by the pipings of their new epntra-
bass clarionet, they also submitted a new compensating piston, by
which they have improved certain false notes in the scale of the
cornet. If this compensating piston can be applied successfully to
English bass singers, I do not hesitate to pronounce it the greatest
invention of modern times.
Mr Barton McGuckin had to take Mr Lloyd's place, at the dis-
advantage of a very superficial acquaintance with a difficult part.
His words were quite unintelligible; and in the invocation, at the
very climax of the tremendous burst into C sharp major, he
altered the cadence in a way that robbed me of breath. I see no
reason why Mr McGuckin should not some day make an excellent
faust quite as good as Mr Lloyd, who is not at his best in the
part as soon as he learns it. Pending which event, I reserve fur-
ther criticism.
zy January 1892
I HAVE seldom been more astonished than I was last week, when
the manager of the Haymarket Theatre offered me an opportunity
of hearing the music which Mr Henschel has just composed for
Hamlet. Not only had I never heard of a tragedian regarding in-
cidental music as having any interest separable in the remotest
degree from his own performance, or as being a less mechanical
part of that than the last touch of paint or limelight, but I had
been brought up to believe that Hamlet in its. natural state con-
sisted musically of the march from Judas Maccabasus for the entry
of the Court, and the Dead March in Saul for Hamlet's death, the
entr'actes being selected from no longer popular overtures such as
La Sirene, etc. My opinion of Mr Tree consequently rose to such a
pitch as to all but defeat the object of my visit to the last rehearsal;
for instead of listening to Mr HenscheFs interludes^ I spent the
ii
MUSIC UST LONDON 1890-94
intervals in explaining to Mr Tree exactly how his part ought to
be played, he listening with the patience and attention which
might be expected from so accomplished an actor. However, I
heard enough with one ear to serve my purpose.
What Mr Henschel has done with his opportunity cannot be
<iescrit>ed off-hand to those who have never thought over the
position of the composer in the theatre. For him there are two
extremes. One is to assume the full dignity of the creative musi-
cian, and compose an independent overture which, however
sympathetic it may be with the impending drama, nevertheless
takes the forms proper to pure music, and is balanced and finished
as a beautiful and symmetrical fabric of sounds, performable as
plain Opus 1000 apart from the drama, as satisfactorily as the
drama is performable apart from it. Example: Egmont, in which
Beethoven and Goethe associate as peers in their diverse arts,
Beethoven not merely illustrating Goethe's masterpiece, but add-
ing a masterpiece of his own on the same subject. The other ex-
treme is fc> supply bare melodrame^ familiar samples of which may
be found in the ethereal strains from muted violins which accom-
pany the unfolding of transformation scenes in pantomimes, the
animated measures which enliven the rallies in die harlequinade,
or the weuxl throbbings of the ghost melody in The Corsican
Brothers.
The production of these is not musical composition: it is mere
musical tailoring, in the course of which the mllodrame. is cut and
made to the measure of the stage business, and altered by snipping
or patching when it comes to be tried on at rehearsal. The old-
fashioned actor got his practical musical education in this way;
and he will tell you that certain speeches are easy to speak
"through music" and frightfully hard without it; or, as Richard
HI, he will work himself up to die requisite pitch of truculence in
the * c Who intercepts me in my expedition?" scene, partly by
listening to the trumpets, and partly by swearing at them for not
playing louder.
Beyond this he is so untutored that he will unhesitatingly call
upon the chefcTorchestra to "stop that music" in the very middle
12
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
of a suspension, or with a promising first inversion of the com-
mon chord, or on a dominant seventh or the like, quite uncon-
scious of the risk of some musician rising in the theatre on the first
night and saying, "I beg your pardon for interrupting you, sir;
but will you kindly ask die band to resolve that four-to-three be-
fore you proceed with your soliloquy?" The idea that music is
written in sentences with full stops at the end of them, just as
much as dramatic poetry is, does not occur to him: all he knows is
that he cannot make the audience shudder or feel sentimental with-
out music, exactly as the comedian knows that he cannot make
the audience laugh unless the lights are full on. And the music
man at the theatre seldom counts for more than a useful colleague
of the gas man.
This state of things at last gives way to evolutionary forces like
Other ^states of thmgs. The rage for culture opens a career for
c^p^Blaf i&earely rajtivated pkyers) as theatrical man-
l die o!4-fofaioned actors arid managers find
s cbiaperied by stress tif competition to pose as con-
noisseurs in all the arts, and to set up Medicean retinues of literary
advisers, poets, composers, artists, archaeologists, and even critics.
And whenever a masterpiece of dramatic literature is revived, the
whole retinue is paraded. Now the very publicity of the parade
makes it impossible for the retinue to be too servile: indeed, to the
full extent to which it reflects lustre on the manager can it also
insist on having a voice in the artistic conduct of his enterprises.
Take the composer, for instance. No actor-manager could tell
Sir Arthur Sullivan to "stop that music," or refuse to allow Mr
Henschel to resolve his discords. On the other hand, no manager
will engage an orchestra of from eighty to a hundred performers
for an overture and entr'actes; and no actor will sacrifice any of
the effectiveness of his business in order to fit it to the musiq
whilst at the same time the actor-manager expects all the most
modern improvements in the way of "leading motives," which
make excellent material for press-cuttings. The situation being
thus limited, the composer submits to become a musical tailor as
far as the m&lodrame is concerned, but throws over the manager
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
completely In the overture and entr'actes by composing them with
a view to performance as "an orchestral suite" at the Crystal
Palace or London Symphony concerts, laying himself out frankly
for a numerous orchestra and a silent audience, instead of for a
theatre band contending feebly with the chatter of the dramatic
critics. Clearly he might venture upon a great overture like Eg-
mont or Coriolan but for the modern improvements the lead-
ing motives which are an implied part of his contract. The
tragedian must have his motive; and the leading lady, even when
she is not the most influential person in the theatre, is allowed to
have one also as a foil to the tragedian's. Macduff, Richmond, and
Laertes will soon advance their claims, which are obviously no
more valid than those of high-reaching Buckingham, Duncan,
Polonius, and Claudius.
Mark my words: as actors come to understand these things
better, we shall have such scenes at rehearsal as have never before
been witnessed in a theatre Rosencrantz threatening to throw
up his part because his motive is half a bar shorter than Guilden-
stern's; the Ghost claiming, on Mozart's authority, an absolute
monopoly of the trombones; Hamlet asking the composer, with
magnificent politeness, whether he would mind doubling the
basses with a contrafagotto in order to bring out the Inky Cloak
theme a little better; Othello insisting on being in the bass and
OEvia on being in the treble when their themes are worked simul-
taneously with those of lago and Viola, and the wretched com-
poser finally writing them all in double counterpoint in order that
each may come uppermost or undermost by turns.
Pending these developments our composers lean towards com-
promise between the leading motive system and the old sym-
phonic form. At first sight a double deal seems easy enough. Use
your bold Richard motive or your tragic Hamlet motive as the
first subject in your overture, with the feminine Ophelia theme as
the second subject ("happily contrasted/' as the analytic pro-
gramist is sure to say if he is a friend of yours), and then proceed
in orthodox form. Unfortunately, when this formula comes to the
proof y you find that a leading motive is one thing and a symphonic
14
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
subject another, and that they can no more replace one another
than drawings of human figures in dramatic action can replace
arabesques. It is true that human figures can be expressed by
curved lines, as arabesques are; and there are arabesques composed
of human figures, just as there are pictures in which the figures are
decorations. In the hands of the greatest masters the success of the
combination of decorative and dramatic seems complete, because
every departure from perfect grace and symmetry produces a
dramatic interest so absorbing that the spectator feels a heightened
satisfaction instead of a deficiency.
But take a picture in which the epic and dramatic elements have
been wrought to the highest pitch say Ford Madox Brown's
Lear and Cordelia and contrast it with a shutter decorated by
Giovanni da Udine. Imagine Giovanni trying to tell the story of
Lear in his own way as convincingly as Madox Brown has told it,
or Madox Brown attempting to give his picture the symmetry of
Giovanni's shutter. The contrast at once reveals the hollowness of
the stock professorial precept about uniting the highest qualities
of both schools, which is seen to mean no more than that a man
may reasonably prefer Tintoretto's Annunciation in the Scuola di
San Rocco because the flight of angels shooting in through the
window is more graceful than Giovanni's designs, whilst the story
of the virgin is as well told as that of Cordelia. But in subjects
where flights of angels are unworkable, Tintoretto had, like
Brown, to fall back on qualities of beauty not in the least arab-
esque.
Bring up a critic exclusively on such qualities, and he will find
Giovanni vapidly elegant, empty, and artificial; whereas if you
nurse him exclusively on arabesque he will recoil from Madox
Brown as being absolutely ugly and uncouth. In fact, though
Madox Brown is no less obviously the greatest living English epic
painter than Mr Burne- Jones is the greatest decorative painter, his
friends are at present collecting a thousand pounds to get him out
of pecuniary difficulties which are no fault of his own, but a con-
sequence of the nation beirig still too exclusively addicted to
arabesques and pretty sentimentalities. Just as pictorial story-tell-
15
MUSIC IN LONDON
ing, having a different purpose from arabesque, has necessarily c
different constructive logic, and consequently must seek a differ-
ent beauty; so the dramatic composer must proceed differentl}
from the composer of absolute music. If he tries to walk with one
foot in each way, he may be as fine a musician as Sterndale Benneti
was, and yet not be safe from producing futilities like Paradise
and the Peri.
Take, for example, the overture to Richard III, which Mi
Edward German, a musician of considerable talent, composed
for Mr Mansfield. In this work the first subject begins as a genuine
Richard motive; but in order to adapt it to sonata treatment it is
furnished with an arabesque tail, like a crookbacked mermaid,
with the result that the piece is too clumsy to be a good overture,
and yet too trivially shapely to be a fitting tone symbol of Richard
EL It is far surpassed fay Grieg's Peer Gynt music, which con-
sists of two or three catchpenny phrases served up with plenty of
orchestral sugar, at a cost in technical workmanship much smaller
than that lavished on Mr German's overture. But the catchpenny
phrases are sufficiently to the point of the scenes they introduce,
aid develop if Grieg's repetitions can be called development
according to the logic of those scenes and not according to that
of Haydn's symphonies. In fact, Grieg proceeded as Wagner
proceeded in his great preludes, except that, being only a musical
grasshopper in comparison with the musical giant of Bayreuth,
be could only catch a few superficial points in the play instead of
getting to the very heart and brain of it.
Mr Henschel has wisely taken the same course, avoiding arab-
esques, and sticking to the play and nothing but the play through-
out, except in one passage where he casts the oboe for the part of
"the cock that is the trumpet [not the oboe] to the morn." This
tod Is usually persona muta; and Mr Henschel had better have
left Mm so. Save in this one bar, the mHodrame is the simplest
and most effective I can remember. Then there are preludes
Hamlet tragic but irresolute for Act I, Ophelia a trifle gushing for
Act II, Hamlet ferocious and deaf to Ophelia's blandishments for
Act HI, Dirge for the Drowning for Act IV, and Pastorale (with
16
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
real birds) for Act V. Of all which I shall have more to say when
I hear them in full orchestral panoply at the postponed London
Symphony concert. For the present, suffice it to say that they go
deeper than Grieg, besides confining themselves, as aforesaid,
strictly to their own business, without any digressions into
arabesque.
3 February 1892
WHEN I received an invitation to a Grand Scotch Festival at the
Albert Hall on the Burns anniversary, I was a little staggered;
but I felt that a man should have the courage of his profession,
and went. The population of the Albert Hall was scanty and
scattered, probably through crofter emigration. I had no sooner
entered when bang went two saxpences for a program! Now I
am not a Scotchman quite the reverse: my nature is an excep-
tionally open and bounteous one; and a shilling more or less will
neither make me nor break me. All the meaner is the conduct of
those who take advantage of my lavishness. And at the Albert
Hall they always do take advantage of it. I look at this matter as
a political economist. The charge made for a program is exactly
a hundred per cent on the charge for admission at the margin of
cultivation I mean in the gallery. This program is not, like the
sixpenny program at the Crystal Palace or the Popular Concerts,
full of elaborate analyses, quotations in music type, latest his-
torical discoveries concerning the compositions performed, and
so forth. It is a bare list of the names of the pieces played, with
the words of the songs more or less accurately copied, and spread
out as widely as possible over sixteen quarto pages. Now in a
huge building like the Albert Hall, where a couple of thousand
copies could be easily sold if the price were reasonable, it would
be possible, without any help from advertisers, to sell a sixteen-
page program, quite sufficient for the purposes of the evening,
at a penny, and make a profit on the transaction. At twopence the
profit per cent would be huge. I am a sufficiently old hand at
pamphleteering to know this off-hand, without the trouble of
making inquiries. Fancy my feelings, then, on being compelled
VOL. ii 17 c
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
to disburse a whole shilling for the sixteen quarto pages afore-
said, made to that size for the more effective setting forth, on a
dozen other pages, of the excellencies of Quinine and Iron
Tonics, Dental Institutes, Scientific Dentifrices (with seductive
illustration), Voice Production Studios based on the purest Italian
methods, Parisian diamonds, Steinway pianos, and Yorkshire
Relish, Of course, not one Scotchman in twenty will buy a pro-
gram on such terms. This means that the price is too high to
extract the largest obtainable booty from the audience. It is obvi-
ously more profitable to receive from ten people a penny apiece
than to receive eightpence from one person, when both opera-
tions fit equally into the night's work. And this is why I, as a
critic, meddle in the matter.
I cannot say that the concert was particularly Scotch in any-
thing but the name. The part-songs given by Mr Carter's choir
were so primly British in their gentility as to suggest that the
native heath of the singers must be Clapham Common at the very-
wildest. Perhaps the highest pitch of emotional excitement was
reached in that well-known Caledonian morceau, the Miserere
from II Trovatore, with military accompaniments from the band
of the Scots Guards, in which Madame Giulia Valda expressed
the distraction of the heroine by singing convulsively out of
time. The effect of the entry of the organ and side drum ad Kb.
on the concluding chord was sublime; and the idea of having
Mannco imprisoned in the cellar instead of in the tower was not
unhappy in its effect; but, on the whole, I should not like to
answer for Verdi's unqualified approval of the performance.
Most of the songs were in the last degree unlike themselves. I
presume Mr Dalgety Henderson is a Scotchman; for only a
Scotchman could have been so bent on making the vengeful
Macgrcgors Gathering into a sentimental English ballad. From
Sims Reeves it was memorable-almost terrible; but when Mr
Henderson sang Give their roofs to the flame and their flesh to
the eages ^ with his most lackadaisically pathetic nuance on
eagles,^ I t that the whole Macgregor clan might be invited
to tea with every confidence in the perfect propriety of their be-
18
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
havior. Miss Rose Williams's nationality is unknown to me. She
is a contralto of the school of Madame Antoinette Sterling, sing-
ing very slowly and with a steady suffusion of feeling (physically
a steady pressure of chest voice), which only admits of the most
mournful expression. Her song was A man's a man for a' that;
and she sang it exactly as if it were The Three Fishers. It was
pretty; but it would have damped a whole revolution had there
been one on at the moment.
Even Miss Macintyre was not in the least racy of the soil in her
cosmopolitan rendering of Mary Morison. In short, the only
singer who hit the mark in the first part of the concert (I did not
wait for the second) was Mr Norman Salmond, who, having
nothing Scotch about him, sang and sang to perfection what
a cockney printer next morning described as Green grow the
rashers O. The only other item in which any sense of the beauty
and romantic dignity of Scotch folk-music was shewn by the
artist was a movement from Max Bruch's Scottish Violin Fan-
tasia, finely played by Mr Seiffert (a Dutchman), under the heavy
disadvantage of a pianoforte accompaniment and a silly misde-
scription in the program, which led the audience to believe that
he was to play a simple transcription of a Scotch melody. On the
whole, I would not ask to hear a less Scotch concert.
The London Symphony Concert on the 26th was none the
worse for its postponement as far as the band was concerned,
though it unluckily found Mrs Henschel on the sick-list. The
Lohengrin prelude and Schubert's unfinished symphony in H
moll were played con amore, and went splendidly, in spite of a
rough detail or two. Mr Gorski gave a respectable performance
of Max Bruch's first violin concerto. The Hamlet music, eked out
a little by some illogical repeats, was naturally much more effect-
ive in its stormier phrases than it is when played at the Hay-
market by a band of forty thrust under the stage. In dramatic
force and consistency it is undoubtedly better than anything
which our great theatrical revivals have yet produced. The im-
petuous interlude (No. 3), in which occur the remarkably graphic
passages for the piccolo which laugh away the Ophelia motive,
19
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
is, on the whole, the best number. The pastorale, the march, and
the dirge would probably have been better done by Sir Arthur
Sullivan or any of our "absolute musicians."
The Hamlet music reminds me of the Haymarket conductor,
Mr Carl Armbruster, and of a lecture on Wagner which I heard
him deliver the other evening at the London Institution. It is
my special merit that I have always seen plainly that in this Philis-
tine country a musical critic, if he is to do any good, must put off
the learned commentator, and become a propagandist, versed in
all the arts that attract a crowd, and wholly regardless of his per-
sonal dignity. I have propagated my ideas on other subjects at
street comers to the music of the big drum; and I should not
hesitate to propagate Wagnerism there with a harmonium if I
were sufficiently a master of that instrument, or if the subject
were one which lent itself to such treatment. Failing that, Mr
Armbruster's lectures, under the auspices of educational bodies,
with magic lantern and vocal illustrations, are clearly the next
best thing. Of course the modern Arcedeckne, being unable to
say, "You should have a piano, Thack," will say, "You should
have an orchestra, Armby"; but in view of the impossible ex-
pense, the conclusive reply is, "Dont you wish you may get it?"
Once or twice I thought Mr Armbruster was more ornate than
candid in his descriptions. It is all very well to represent Bayreuth
as a quiet spot where Nature invites the contemplative peace in
which Wagner's message comes to you with the full force of its
deepest meaning (or words to that effect); but in solemn truth
the place is such a dull country town that the most unmusical
holiday-maker is driven into the theatre to avoid being bored out
of his senses.
The proper way to enjoy Parsifal is to step into the temple
straight out of the squalid rush and strain and vulgar bustle of
London, with every faculty in keen activity, instead of loafing
up a country road to it in a slack, unstrung, vagabondizing, over-
fed and underworked holiday humor, when a stroll through the
pines seems better than any theatre. I once, on a Parsifal night,
when there was a wonderful sky outside, spent the last act on the
20
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
hills pretending to terrify myself by venturing into pitchy dark-
nesses in the depths of the woods. You do not suppose, probably,
that I would have wandered about Drury Lane under the same
circumstances.
However, it is no use complaining of the absurd things people
will say about Bayreuth. It is a European centre for high art
mendacity; and Mr Armbruster, who is always professionally
busy inside the theatre, and so carries his London activity thither
with him, has never realized -what the genuine tourist-suited
Bayreuth pilgrim experiences at the shrine of the Meister. The
lecture, however, unmistakeably roused considerable interest and
curiosity; and although I doubt if the London Institution audi-
ence quite knew how well Miss Pauline Cramer sang Isolde's
death-song, they were left well on the way to a state of greater
grace.
Mr D'Oyly Carte has withdrawn The Nautch Girl at the
Savoy, and put on The Vicar of Bray. Mr Rutland Barrington is
very fimny as the Vicar; but in the work as a whole there is no
life. It is, at best, a tolerable stop-gap.
10 February 1892
THE musical season is still very dull. Miss Macintyre's charity
concert was quite an event last week, though it was of the mis-
cellaneous order, with A fors e lui on top of O luce di quest*
anima, and Un di si ben to finish up. Such concerts always give
me an uneasy sensation of being still a boy of twelve, just wak-
ened from a mad dream of maturity. And my impulse most de-
cidedly is to add, Ah, do not wake me: let me dream again ! to the
program. There is, perhaps, a faint critical interest in hearing
how Miss Fanny Moody makes the provincial dilettanti think
that she is a great prima donna, and in watching the result of
Miss Macintyre's original and very modern views as to how
Verdi's music should be treated. Mind, I do not imply any sort of
disparagement, or the opposite; no miscellaneous concert can
stimulate me to face the risk and effort of forming a critical judg-
ment, much less expressing it. I greatly enjoyed the performance
21
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
of the Meister Glee Singers, and admired the success with which
Miss Macintyre brought off her enterprise; but I mention the
subject chiefly as an excuse for saying a word or two on the sub-
ject of charity concerts generally, concerning which I have often
to act with apparent callousness to the claims of the poor and
ailing. Every lady who has any turn for getting up such enter-
tainments is keenly aware that a few lines in this column, costing
me no more than a turn of the wrist, may help to feed many
hungry persons, clothe many shivering children, and provide an
extra bed or so at the hospital for some suffering and indigent
fellow-creature. An announcement beforehand will sell tickets
for any concert which is to provide funds for these purposes;
whilst a word of notice afterwards will gratify the artists, and
make it easier to get them to sing or play again for nothing next
year. Under these circumstances, it cannot but appear the height
of wanton hardheartedness in me to withhold my help and re-
ceive all appeals for it in stony silence. But the very ease with
which I might help if I chose is so obvious, that the idea of ask-
ing for it occurs to someone or other at least twice a day during
the crises of charity-concert organization which occur from time
to time. If I were to comply, my compliance would soon defeat
its own object; for what I wrote would cease to be read, nothing
being less interesting than strings of puffs preliminary, however
pious their objects may be; whilst as to criticizing the perform-
ances subsequently, I always think it as well not to look gift-
horses in the mouth, particularly when the verdict might be
anything but gratifying to the donors. In short, it is impossible
for me to notice on charitable grounds concerts which I should
not mention if they were ordinary commercial speculations; and
I appeal to the charitable not to make me feel like a monster by
writing me touching and artful appeals, which I must, neverthe-
less, disregard. All I can say is, that if a concert is musically im-
portant, I shall not be deterred from noticing it by the fact that
the aims of its promoters are philanthropic,
The closing of the New English Opera House has elicited a
chorus of indignant despair from us all as to the possibility of
22
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
doing anything for a public which will not support The Basoche.
It does not appear to be certain that The Basoche is stark dead
I see it stated that it is only speechless for the moment; but, as-
suming that it has had its utmost run, let me point out that it is
not true that it has received no support. There are many degrees
of failure. If I compose an opera, and get Mr Carte to produce it
at his theatre, with the result that not a single person is found
willing to pay to hear it, that will undoubtedly be a failure.
Suppose, however, that Mr Carte, bent on surpassing all previ-
ous examples of managerial enterprise and munificence, spends
1,000,000 sterling in mounting my opera, and that it is played
for a thousand nights to a thousand people every night with the
free list entirely suspended, that will be a failure too. Failure
means simply failure to replace the capital expended with a fair
profit to boot in a single run; and this may be brought about by
the manager spending more than the first run is worth, as well as
by the public paying less. The fact is, there is no grand opera in
the world which will run long enough in one capital to pay for a
complete and splendid mise-en-sclne. On the other hand, such a
mise-en-sc&ne will last for years as part of the stock of the house.
What Mr Carte wants is a repertory, and a position in the social
economy of London like that occupied in Germany by such
opera-houses as those of Frankfort or Munich, where works like
The Trumpeter of Sakkingen or The Barber of Bagdad may have
a prodigious vogue without the manager dreaming for a moment
of running them exclusively and leaving the town for months
bereft of all opportunity of hearing Der Freischiitz, or Fidelio,
or Die Walktire, or Le Nozze di Figaro. And here Mr Carte will
recoil, and ask me whether I seriously propose that he should
attempt to recover his outlay on Ivanhoe and The Basoche by
mounting half-a-dozen grand operas to sandwich them. Cer-
tainly not, if the mounting is to be as sumptuous as that of these
two operas. But why should it be? Of course, it is impossible to
insult gentlemen like Messager and Sir Arthur Sullivan with less
than the best of everything; but there is no need to be particular
with Mozart, Beethoven, Weber, and Wagner. They are all dead;
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
and when they were alive they had to put up with what they
could get. Signor Lago has shewn that the way to make money
out of the classic masterpieces of lyric drama is to practise the
severest asceticism, not to say downright mortification, in respect
of scenery, dresses, and everything in which Mr Carte is habitu-
ally extravagant.
Not that I would have Mr Carte too slavishly copy Signor
Lago, who, perhaps, overdoes his Lenten severities a trifle; but
there is no avoiding the conclusion that if the expensive ventures
of the Royal English Opera are to be spread over the full period
needed to produce a reasonable return on them, their runs must
be broken by performances of attractive operas mounted neatly
but not gaudily, and perhaps performed on "popular nights"
with lower prices than when the stage is en grande tenue for Ivan-
hoe, etc. I see nothing else for it, unless Mr Carte by chance dis-
covers some Individual performer whose magnetism may do for
The Basoche what Mr Irving's does for the Lyceum plays. The
smallness of the cultivated section of our population is the dis-
abling factor in all these costly schemes for performing musical
works of the best class. London, artistically speaking, is still a
mere village.
Meanwhile, Sir Augustus Harris is said to be about to modern-
ize the Covent Garden repertory to the extraordinary extent of
introducing world-famous operas which were composed as re-
cently as 1860 or thereabouts, and which have not been familiar
to the German public for more than fifteen years. This is not bad
for an impresario whose musical education consisted in watching
the spectacle of post-Rossinian Italian tragic opera slowly dying
of Madame Titiens at one house, without any serious attempt at
rescue by Madame Patti at the other. I do not say these things by
way -of a fleer at Sir Augustus Harris; for I also am an old subject
of the Titiens dynasty.
Imagine being mured from one's cradle to the belief that the
siibKme in music meant Titiens singing the Inflammatus from
Rossini s Stabat Mater; that the tragic in operatic singing far
overtopping anything that Mrs Siddons could ever have done,
24
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
was Titiens as Lucrezia Borgia; that majesty in music-drama
reached its climax in Titiens tumbling over the roulades in
Semiramide; that Valentine in Les Huguenots, the Countess in
Le Nozze, Pamina in Die Zauberflote, all weighed eighteen stone,
and could not be impersonated without a gross violation of
operatic propriety by anyone an ounce lighter. I was brought up
in these articles of faith; and I believe Sir Augustus Harris was
brought up in them too. Nothing will persuade me that he was
not moved by some desperate yearning to recall the ideals of his
boyhood when he allowed Mile Richard, who is- more like
Titiens than any living artist, to play La Favorita at Covent
Garden a couple of seasons ago.
What I am not so sure of is whether Sir Augustus Harris ever
found Titiens out whether he ever realized that in spite of her
imposing carriage, her big voice, her general intelligence, and,
above all, a certain goodhearted grace which she never lost, even
physically, the intelligence was not artistic intelligence; the voice,
after the first few years, was a stale voice; there was not a ray of
creative genius in her; and the absurdity of her age, her pleasant
ugliness, and her huge size (which must have been to at least
some extent her own fault), the public got into a baneful habit of
considering that the end of opera-going was not to see Lucrezia,
Leonora, Valentine, or Pamina, but simply Titiens in these parts,
which was tantamount to giving up all the poetry of opera as a
mere convention, which need not be borne out by any sort of
artistic illusion. The first time I was taken to the opera, I was so
ignorant of what the entertainment meant that I looked at the
circle of resplendently attired persons in the boxes and balcony
with a vague expectation that they would presently stand up and
But when I was an experienced young opera-goer, and had
seen Titiens the great Titiens a dozen times, I believe I was
far more hopelessly astray on the subject than I had been on that
memorable first night before the curtain so astonished me by
going up. For such experience only tended to make me a con-
noisseur in this pseudo-opera which was nothing but a prima
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
donna show, and to train me to regard the impresario as one
whose sole business it was to engage the most famous performers
in that spurious genre, and to announce them at the beginning of
the season in a long prospectus which was equally remarkable
for the absence of any allusion to the artistic conditions under
which the operas were to be performed, and the presence of
names of artists whom the manager had not engaged, and whom
he had no reasonable prospect of being able to engage.
Sir Augustus Harris has reformed that prospectus altogether;
but for the life of me I can never quite divest myself of a sus-
picion that the great Wagner Reformation has never convinced
him, and that he regards people like myself as heretics and rene-
gades. However, if the Nibelungen tetralogy and Tristan really
reach Covent Garden or Drury Lane this year nay, if even one
of them, say Siegfried or Die Walkure, comes off that will be
the best answer to me.
17 February 1892
THE first packed audience of the year at St James's Hall was
drawn on Thursday last by the Wagner program, plus the
Eroica, at the London Symphony Concert. Wagner, neverthe-
less, failed to get the room settled by half-past eight. I was late-
but that would have made no disturbance worth mentioning had
not about a hundred other people been late too. Our struggle
or rather scrimmage, to get into the room when the doors were
opened after the first piece, and our persistence in wandering in
search of our seats in the wrong direction when we did get in
necessitated a longish interval between the first and second num-
bers; and later on it became evident that the concert could not be
finished by half-past ten without cutting the customary interval
betweea the two parts very short indeed. This Mr Henschel
accordingly did, with the result that when, by dint of repeated
rappmgs he succeeded in getting a perfect "Bayreuth" hush for
*e Parsrfal prelude, he was paralysed by the discovery that the
ba was absent. After a period of intensifying suspense the artist
duly appeared, and took his place with the solid calm of a man
26
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
who knew that we could not begin without him. Up went Mr
Henschel's stick again; and we were once more breathless with
expectation when the fresh discovery was made that the orchestra
lacked its apex in the familiar and conspicuous person of the
eminent drummer, Mr Smith. Hereupon the Bayreuth hush, over-
strained, broke into ripples of laughter and a chatter of questions
from those who did not understand the delay, and explanations
by those who did. Finally, Mr Smith hurried in, and was received
with an ovation which took him aback for the first time in the
experience of the oldest concert-goer. Somehow, the Bayreuth
hush seems to be an unlucky institution, even in St James's Hall.
In the Bavarian Festspielhaus, of course, it is, and always has
been, quite hopeless: somebody inevitably drops an opera-glass,
or slams a seat, or rushes in all but late out of the sunshine with-
out, and remarks before the solemn influence has had time to
operate, "Oh my, aint it dark! however are we to tell our seats?"
But hitherto I have been able to boast that there is never any
difficulty in getting the London hush, about which, by the bye,
no Briton is patriotic enough to gush. After last Thursday I fear
I shall have to confess that the malign influence of Bayreuth has
reached and corrupted us at last. What used to be a spontaneous
piece of good sense and good manners has now become, when
Parsifal is in question, a "put-up" solemnity. Naturally, the
Powers that rule over Art are angered by this, and have made
Mr Smith, formerly the most punctual of drum-players, their
scourge and minister to bring the ways of Bayreuth to confusion.
The performance proved afresh that Mr Henschel has now
got hold of the art of orchestral conducting, and that the bringing
to perfection, humanly speaking, of the London Symphony Con-
certs is only a question of time and perseverance. The perform-
ances come right in the mass; the due balance of tone, the color,
and, above all, the intelligent and imaginative execution which
is produced by playing steadfastly to fulfil the poetic purpose of
the composition, are now so far achieved that Mr Henschel's
battle for a place as a conductor is nine-tenths won. The remain-
ing tenth, depending on purity of tone, subtlety of nuance^ and
27
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
delicacy and precision of touch in the details, he is not likely to
cease striving for, since it was, in fact, a premature attempt to
achieve these that caused him at first to worry his band and waste
his time at rehearsals by beginning at the wrong end.
At present, whilst this tithe is still in arrear, it is instructive to
compare the Henschel band with the Philharmonic band, which
exactly lacks what the London Symphony band has, and has
what the London Symphony band lacks. For my own part,
though I insist on the necessity of the combination of the qualities
of both, I cannot understand the taste of the man, if such a one
lives, who would not rather a thousand times have the interesting
roughness of the new band than the empty elegance of the old.
At the same time, it must be understood that the interest does not
lie in the roughness, any more than the emptiness lies in the
elegance; and my criticism on the performance of the Eroica
symphony is, therefore, that it will take five years more work
to make the vigorous sketch of Thursday last into a finished
picture. The violin work which accompanies the Grail motive in
the Parsifal prelude also requires a tremendous application of
elbow-grease to make it in the least like the wing- winnowing
which it should suggest. For the rest, there was nothing to com-
plain of and much to be thankful for. The Siegfried Idyll, in par-
ticular, shewed a huge improvement on last season's performance
of t. Madame Nordica, always courageous to the verge of auda-
city, and strong in that technical skill in the management of her
voice which seems to be now almost a monopoly of American
prima donnas, attacked Isolde's death-song in superb black velvet
and diamonds, and survived it, not without deserved glory;
though there is all the difference in the world between Madame
Nordica's bright impulsiveness and the seas of sentiment in
which Isolde should be drowned.
One of the curiosities of this concert was the analytic program
by Mr Joseph Bennett, who, as everyone knows, consecrated his
life, rather unfortunately, to the cause of Anti-Wagnerism. Now,
when you are engaged to write a program for a, concert com-
memorative of Wagner, you cannot at least without risking a
28
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
certain friction with the entrepreneur take the opportunity to
demonstrate to the audience that what they are listening to is a
series of outrages on all the true principles of musical art. Even
the story of Wagner's milliner-made dressing-gowns would
hardly be in place on such an occasion, since it is held to be fatal
to his pretensions as a composer. Mr Bennett, thus hard put to it,
yet came off triumphantly, like a man of resource as he is.
First, he got over the difficulty of singing the praises of the
composition under analysis by quoting them from his enemies,
thus: "Mr Edward Dannreuther, than whom no one knows
better what he is talking about when Wagner comes up for dis-
cussion, declares," etc. Or: "The following admirable notes upon
the prelude to Wagner's last and, as many believe, greatest music-
drama are from the pen of Mr C. A. Barry, than whom no better
authority," etc., etc. The ground being cleared in this fashion,
Mr Bennett gave the analyses the slip no less ingeniously. Die
Meistersinger was eluded by the remark that "technical discus-
sion here of so elaborate an overture would serve little purpose."
Of the Siegfried Idyll we were told that "it would serve little
purpose, even if confusion could be avoided, were we to follow
Wagner's working of the themes through all its elaborate details."
Tristan was treated in the same way. "This music," said Mr
Bennett, "evades analysis: indeed, it is intended to be felt rather
than submitted to any process of scientific inquiry." In the refer-
ence to the prelude there was, for those behind the scenes, a rich
double meaning in the following artful passage, which to the out-
sider appeared remarkable for nothing but its extraordinary reck-
lessness of metaphor. "The movement, as a whole, will be best
understood and enjoyed by him who most clearly perceives the
connection of its various parts with the theme which is its germ.
Mere verbal commentary cannot contribute to this end in the
slightest degree, since there is no form to define, and there are no
salient features serving as milestones on the road for the identifica-
tion of stage after stage." Amusing as all this is, it is extremely
provocative of a discussion on the modern system under which
the critic joins the retinue of the entrepreneur as writer of his pro~
29
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
gram, or his catalogue preface, or what not.
When Macfarren used to do the programs for the Philhar-
monic Society, he allowed his opinions of modern music to
appear pretty plainly between the lines, and even openly sneered
at Goetz's overtures as examples of the effect of consecutive
sevenths. Yet he did not say all that he would have said had his
hands been perfectly free, although he was in a stronger position
than any critic, and had behind him the Philharmonic Society in
a stronger position than any private entrepreneur like Mr Vert or
Mr Henschel. It is not surprising, then, to find the most remark-
able difference between Mr Bennett's Wagner programs and
those articles of his which contain his whole mind on the same
subject Without pretending to be deeply scandalized by the dis-
crepancy, I still think it sufficiently awkward to make its avoid-
ance desirable if it can be managed. Of course, it is not easy for
if analytic programs are to be written at all, they must come from
musicians who can write; and all scribbling musicians now turn
an honest penny by criticism. But the same man need not write
every article in a program any more than every article in a
magazine.
In the Crystal Palace programs the signatures of Sir George
Grove, Mr Dannreuther, Mr Manns, and Mr Barry may occur in
one and the same Saturday sixpenny book; so that none of these
gentlemen need say smooth things about compositions which he
dislikes. If Mr Henschel were to ask me to write a program for
Brahms Requiem, for instance, I should as a matter of course
send him to Dr Parry, who has an unquenchable appetite for
pedal points, of which delicacies this colossal musical imposture
mainly cons.sts Surely that would be better than suppressing my
own opmion of the work, and stringing together between in-
verted commas the opinions of those who differ from me, with
a prdatory observation to the effect that they are the people to
T^ZtoT 3 ^ VkW f ** Requiem - H C0uld
ey would not resent my annexing their work
' or magnanimity, consent to the operatiorTaTmy^e-
30
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
quest? The distribution of the articles among different writers
would meet this difficulty, though it would leave untouched the
graver question of what musical criticism will be worth when all
die men who write it are programists in the pay of the persons
criticized.
It seems to me that if we musical critics ever get tired of the
irresponsible freedom of odd-jobbing, and make ourselves into
a regular guild of workers with a recognized professional status,
we shall have to establish a pretty strict etiquette on one or two
points of this kind.
Herr Jan Mulder's concert at Mrs Jackson's last week was
more important than drawing room concerts generally are, as
it brought forward a capital 'cello sonata by the Rev. J. Ridsdale,
who composes unambitiously, but with genuine feeling and
grace, in the old formal arabesque style, of which Spohr was the
last famous exponent.
The Crystal Palace concerts, I may remind my readers, were
resumed last Saturday.
24 February 1892
THE Stock Exchange orchestra is not, as I firmly believed up to
Thursday last, composed entirely of stockbrokers. If it were,
probably an orchestral concert by it would be impossible. The
performance of the simplest overture requires an immense power
of business organization and knowledge of business method on
the part of the composer and conductor, as well as absolute
punctuality and high efficiency on the part of their staff of
players. In fact, the strain on a musician's business capacity tires
it out so, that his reluctance to exercise it in the intervals between
performance and performance often leads to more confusion in
his pecuniary affairs than is common in the case of men of quite
ordinary capacity in the City, although City business means
chiefly the systematizing of want of system and waste of time.
I often pause to contemplate with melancholy amazement the
"man of business" wasting the lives of innumerable clerks, at
great expense to himself, in counting over his money, as if
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
counting it, even in the most inaccurate manner, could add a
single sovereign to the pile, or in making reduplicated records of
millions of insignificant and imniemorable transactions, knowing
well that not five out of each million will ever be referred to
again, and that the absence of any record even of these five would
not cost a half per cent of what it costs to register the remaining
999,995. The Chinaman burning down his house to roast his pig
is nothing to this. One's impulse is to exclaim, "Give these men,
not a fiddle, since they could not play it, but at least a big drum
or a pair of cymbals, and let them have just one run with an
orchestra through the overture to II Seraglio to shew them what
business really means."
But I should not hope to derive any enjoyment from such a
performance; and this is the real reason why I have hitherto
always steadfastly refused to go to the Stock Exchange concerts.
The likelihood of every man, on City principles, making a point
of coming in several bars late, and playing thirty notes for every
one set down for him, seemed so strong that I pooh-poohed the
newspaper accounts of the achievements of Mr Kitchin's band.
Yet I had a certain curiosity about the affair, too, which eventually
helped a friend of mine to break down my prejudice. This friend
is a stockbroker for whom I have always had a great admiration,
softened by a feeling of compassion for a chronic affliction which
has embittered his whole existence. He is what they call brilliant
imaginative, vivacious, full of humor and dramatic perception,
a man who might still make his mark if he pleased, in literature
or the drama, who might even have made a good musical critic
if he had been caught young and trained to die work. But he is.
the victim of a chronic successfulness which forces him, in spite
of strong social sympathies, to become continually richer and
richer, and threatens finally to cut him off from human society,
and leave hm a solitary Monte Cristo, When I first knew him
Ee was comparatively poor: I doubt if his income was much
more than forty times as large as mine; and I think, in spite of
his generous temperament, he envied me my poverty. Since then
lie has straggled with his unfortunate propensity as earnestly as
32
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
any man could; but his efforts are vain: every time I go to see him
he is in a more magnificent house than the former one; and as I
glance significantly over the palatial environment he looks at
me with a mutely pleading eye, which says plainly: "I know, old
chap; but dont reproach me: I cant help it: you mustnt drop me
for having failed to stave off an extra thousand or two." What
can I do but make myself as comfortable as possible on the spot
in order to reassure him? The other day he demanded, as a
crowning proof of my undiminished friendship, that I should go
to the Stock Exchange concert in order to convince myself that
Art does not utterly wither in the atmosphere of Capel Court. I
confess I suspected him of having taken secretly to playing the
cornet, and of having a design to astonish me by appearing before
me as a performer. But, being afraid to refuse him lest I should
seem to be casting in his teeth my entire freedom from his com-
plaint, I went; and I do not mind admitting that more than
I could have considered possible can be done with a squad
of musical stockbrokers if you sandwich them between two
thoroughly trustworthy professional veterans. I will go further:
I will confess nay, proclaim that the combination of the pro-
fessional steadiness and accuracy with the amateur freshness,
excitement, and romance, produces a better result than an ordinary
routine performance by professionals alone; and I would rather
hear this Stock Exchange band at work than hear the best of our
professional orchestras playing under a mediocre conductor.
For, in the profession, the better the men are, the staler they
are, and the more formidable and inspiring must be the energy
and devotion of the leader who rouses them. The symphony on
Thursday was an old one by Gade, the last movement of which
was mere filigree-work of the Mendelssohnian pattern, requir-
ing nothing but extreme prettiness and precision of execution,
which I can hardly say it got, though the performance was credit-
able on the whole. Before the symphony Miss Alice Schidrowitz
and the leader of the band made a very elegant display with
voice and violin respectively in Harold's Jours de mon enfance,
which reminded me of the jours of my own enfance. It sofnetimes
VOL. ii 33 D
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
seems odd that Harold's sort of music should be going on still,
and that there are plenty of young people to whom it is as novel
and romantic as even After the symphony we had Beethoven's
violin concerto; and this proved something of a find for me, the
young lady who played the solo part Miss Lilian Griffiths
being decidedly an artist of considerable talent. Except for a
trifling slip or two in the last movement her technical success
quite justified her ambitious selection; and her execution was
remarkably firm and dainty, all the phrases, besides, being
rhythmically placed to a nicety. She should, however, have
chosen Mendelssohn's concerto instead of Beethoven's; for she
is a graceful rather than a poetic or eloquent player: indeed, her
fourth string verges on the prosaic, a bad fault when Beethoven
is in hand. Only, as increase of knowledge in this direction gener-
ally means increase of sorrow, I am far from grumbling because
a young Englishwoman is not absolutely Beethovenian at her
del>uL All I say is, why not choose Mendelssohn? For the rest of
die omcert I cannot answer, as I left whilst Miss Lilian Griffiths
was bowing to die gallant and enthusiastic plaudits with which
Capel Court, as one man, saluted her. By that time, I am sorry
to say, it was too late to hear Beethoven's posthumous quartet
in A minor and Mr Algernon Ashton's new violin sonata at Mr
Gompertz's concert over the way in Prince's Hall.
Miss Osmond, who appeared at Steinway Hall on the i6th,
is a young English pianist who has studied in England from first
to last, which is at present, I am sorry to say, a course rather
patriotic than wise. Miss Osmond has exceptional agility of
finger; and this has led her, apparently, to depend for success
chiefly on her ability to strike all the notes in florid compositions
of the Bafekireff type with great rapidity. But I recommend Miss
Gsf&piK! to go abroad for a while, after all. Not that she will find
rs there; but she will find places where a young lady
t excessive expense or scandal, spend enough of her
the opera-house and the concert-room to educate herself
Basically an end not to be gained by any quantity of pianism
alone. For her fault now is that her pianism has* outstripped her
34
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
musicianship; and it is but too likely that this is due to her mis-
fortune in living in a country where you cannot have even a
cheap piano provided for the children to march to in a Board
School without some mean millionaire or other crying out that
the rates will ruin him.
Messrs Longmans have just published the most interesting
book I have opened for a long time the late Ferdinand Praeger's
Wagner as I Knew Him. It is an account of Wagner by a man
who was not ashamed of him as he really was, and who was not
afraid of being denounced for exposing the failings of a gentle-
man recently dead, as Sir Augustus Harris would call Wagner.
A more vivid and convincing portrait than Praeger's was never
painted in words: even the bluntest strokes in it are interesting.
No doubt the author, with all his vigor of mind and strong
commonsense, was too matter-of-fact to see all the issues that
presented themselves to Wagner's very subtle mind. For instance,
Wagner wrote in 1876: "In my innermost nature I really had
nothing in common with the political side of the Revolution [of
1849]." Praeger's comment on this is simply: "Max von Weber
told me that he was present during the Revolution, and saw
Wagner shoulder his musket at the barricades."
A deeper experience of revolutionary politics would have
taught Praeger that the very speech on "The Abolition of the
Monarchy," which he quotes, shews that Wagner's vehement
hatred of the gross military despotism of that time, though it
made a revolutionary orator and a barricader of him, never made
him a really able politician. Wagner found this out eventually;
and the discovery was sufficient to alter his tone as to his exploits
in 1849, of which he had previously been sufficiently vain. No
doubt the usual demand for a coat of perfectly respectable white-
wash for all great men when their turn comes to be hero-wor-
shipped has led some of Wagner's later disciples to try very hard
neither to know nor to let the public know that "The Master"
was once a colleague of Bakunin, with whom he helped to organ-
ize the barricading affair in Dresden in 1849; and Praeger's flat
refusal to countenance any such feeble-minded suppression is
35
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
altogether to his credit; but he hardly appreciates the grounds
Wagner had for coming at last to think of himself as having
taken a comparatively commonplace, superficial, and amateurish
part in the political side of the Revolution of which, on the
artistic side, he was the supreme genius.
But since Praeger has given the facts, it matters little that he
has once or twice missed their exact significance; and I only wish
I had space to quote a few dozen of the anecdotes and pregnant
instances with which he makes us see his extraordinary hero as
genius, buffoon, coward, hero, philosopher, spoilt child, affec-
tionate and faithless husband, king of musicians, execrable
pianist, braving poverty and exile, wearing silk dressing-gowns
and sending for confectionery in the middle of a barricading
affray in short, defying all the regulation categories by which
we distinguish admirable from despicable characters, and yet
throughout all standing out consistently as a great and lovable
man. Praeger, by the bye, mentions an autobiography which
Wagner left for publication on his son's majority. Will someone
ask Siegfried Wagner, who was born in 1870, how soon we may
expect this book, which is likely to prove the most interesting
autobiography since Goethe's Dichtung und Wahrheit?
2 March 1892
THE winter series of London Symphony Concerts came to an
end on Thursday last; and Mr Henschel celebrated the occasion
by making a speech. It was just before the Schumann symphony
(in D minor), and what he said was: "Ladies and gentlemen,
I feel it to be my duty to inform you that although any defects
in the performance are, no doubt, altogether my own fault, yet
die light here is so bad that it is hardly possible for the orchestra
to distinguish a flat from a sharp." The band rubbed in this pro-
test with vigorous applause; and the audience smiled vaguely and
fell to counting the incandescent lights above the platform six
to each pendant, five pendants on each side: total, sixty lights,
and sharps nevertheless indistinguishable from flats. It seemed
36
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
hardly reasonable; but Mr Henschel was right for all that.
Most amateurs have found out by experience that in a room
which is lighted sufficiently for all ordinary purposes the piano-
forte candles are indispensable if music is to be read comfortably.
There was certainly not light enough on the orchestral desks on
Thursday for any but very young eyes. Of course the parts were
read accurately enough; but a first-rate orchestral performance
uses up the executants so thoroughly that the slightest uneasiness
or preoccupation tells on its artistic quality; and I have no doubt
that the mess which was made of the accompaniments to Hugo
Becker's last two solos was due to lack of candle power overhead.
Becker himself, playing from memory, was sufficiently illu-
minated from within. The repeated calls which followed his
performance were partly due to Stradivarius, who would, I think,-
be famous on the strength of that violoncello alone, even if he
had never made a violin.
I cannot pay Becker a higher compliment than to say that he
is worthy to be the trustee of such an instrument. I say die
trustee; for I flatly refuse to recognize any right of private pro-
perty in such a treasure. If he played it badly I should advocate
its immediate and forcible expropriation, no matter what it had
cost him. I live in constant dread of some Chicago millionaire
purchasing the best twelve Strads in the world; having them
altered into glove boxes; and presenting them to the bridesmaids
at his daughter's marriage with an English peer.
When E. M. Smyth's heroically brassy overture to Antony
and Cleopatra was finished, and the composer called to the plat-
form, it was observed with stupefaction diat all that tremendous
noise had been made by a lady. But the day is not far distant
when everything that is most passionate and violent in orchestral
music will be monopolized by women just as it is now in novel
writing. I shall not say that there is any likelihood of our ever
seeing a female Mozart or Wagner, lest I should hurt the feelings
of many male composers who are nothing like so clever as Miss
3myth or Miss Ellicot; but surely nobody who is not imposed on
by the bogus mysteries of musical composition will deny that
37
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
there is no reason why we should not have a female Moszkowski,
a female Rubinstein, or a female Benoit, and find the change of
sex rather an improvement than otherwise.
In fact, if the chief of the Royal Academy of Music does not
carefully avoid composing in die style of that entr'acte from
Colomba which was performed at the close of this very concert,
we shall have female Dr Mackenzies by the score. When the
whole mass of strings and the harp began that strum! strum!
strum! strum! to a tune on the cornet which had all the vulgarity
of a music-hall patriotic song without its frankness and simplicity
of metre, I distinctly saw the ghost of Sterndale Bennett looking
at me just as he looks out of Millais's portrait. And when I told
him that the composer of the cornet morceau was his successor
at Tenterden Street, he disappeared with a shriek before I could
assure him that though the composer once thought this allegro
giovale (gzwale is Italian for rowdy) good enough for the theatre,
and was, perhaps, even a little proud of the elaborate incon-
venience of the rhythm, it is not up to his standard academic
mark.
T^e Schumann symphony might have been more delicately
pkyed; but the result, as far as I am concerned, would have been
much the same in any case. I cannot understand why we take
ourselves and Schumann seriously over a work the last half of
which is so forced and bungled as to be almost intolerable. I wish
someone would extract all the noble passages from Schumann's
symphonies, and combine them into a single instrumental fan-
tasia Reminiscences of Schumann as the military bandmasters
would call it so that we might enjoy them without the drudgery
of 8siening to their elaboration into heavy separate works in
wbfcfa, during three-quarters of the performance, there is nothing
to .acta^e, except the composer's devoted perseverance, which
he had not exercised. We all have a deep regard for
; imt it is really not in human nature to refrain from
Qca&oeal!y making it clear that he was greater as a musical
embusiast than as a constructive musician. If he had only had
Rossini's genius, or Rossini his conscience, what a composer we
38
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
should have had! I drag in Rossini because he was born on the
29th of February, 1792, and so gained the distinction of having
a concert all to himself on Monday last at the Crystal Palace
too late for description here.
The Saturday concert brought forward Becker again. He was
to have repeated the Saint-Saens concerto; but he thought better
of it, and gave us instead a harmless concert piece by Bazzini,
which soothed me to such an extent that I have no very clear
recollection of the details. Becker was rapturously encored for
the tarantella of the inevitable Popper, whereupon he inhumanly
sat down again and inflicted on the Popperites an "old master"
of the severest type. One of the- novelties of the concert was a
scena by a Mr Herbert Bunning, being the soliloquy of Lodovico
il Moro in prison. Mr Oudin sang this as well and sympathetically
as the most sanguine composer could have desired; but as the
scena began with a spirited breakdown for the whole orchestra,
which recurred whenever Lodovico's dullness, or perhaps the
coldness of his cell, drove him to seek relief in the dance, the
whole composition acquired a serio-comic flavor which was not,
I imagine, intended by Mr Bunning. Still, in the words of Mr
Leland's judge, "I like to see young heroes ambitioning like
this"; and though I must pronounce Mr Bunning's emotional
matter too commonplace, and his modes of expression too cheap
and obvious to entitle him to the rank he seems to challenge, yet
the same criticism might have been justly made of Wagner him-
self up to a later period of development than I take Mr Bunning
to have reached as yet. Mr Oudin also gave us a piece of the
Templar in Ivanhoe.
The overture of The Barber of Bagdad, with which the con-
cert opened, made another step forward in popularity. I should
like to hear the whole opera again; and, a fortiori, the general
body of our amateurs, less jaded than I, must be of the same mind.
Why does not Mr Carte turn his attention to Cornelius's most
popular work, and to the Beatrice and Benedict of Berlioz, the
nocturne from which, by the bye, was sung by Mrs Henschel
and' Madame Hope Temple at the London Symphony concert?
39
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
The comparative roughness of Mr HenschePs band on that
occasion heightened the effect of the finished execution of Men-
delssohn's Italian symphony by the Crystal Palace Orchestra,
which was in its best form on Saturday. I am far from having
grown out of enjoying the Italian symphony; but I confess to
becoming more and more disagreeably affected by the conven-
tional features of the instrumentation, especially the trumpet
parts in the first movement.
I think it must be admitted that even in Beethoven's sym-
phonies the trumpet parts are already in many places mere
anachronisms. Perhaps the dots and dashes of trumpet, which
we learn from "the study of the best masters" between the Bach
period of brilliant florid counterpoints for three trumpets, and
the modern Berlioz- Wagner style based technically on the
essentially melodic character of our cornets and tubas, were
always ridiculous to ears unperverted by custom and the pedantry
which springs from the fatal academic habit of studying music
otherwise than through one's ears. People would compose music
skilfully enough if only there were no professors in the world.
Literature is six times as difficult an art technically as composi-
tion: yet who ever dreams of going to a professor to learn how
to write? Anyhow, when Mr Manns next performs the Italian
symphony, I hope he will either omit the dots and dashes, or else
have them played on those slide trumpets which are always pro-
duced with such solemnity when that august classic, the piano-
forte concerto in G minor, is in the bill.
9 March 1892
THE Rossini Centenary passed without any celebration in
London (as far as I know) except an afternoon concert at the
Crystal Palace, whither I went, partly for the sake of old times,
and partly because the concert afforded me an opportunity, now
very rare, of hearing Rossini's overtures, not from a military
band, or from a careless promenade-concert orchestra with an
enormous preponderance of string quartet, but from a first-rate
wind-band, balanced by about as many strings as the composer
40
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
reckoned upon. The program was made up of no fewer than
four overtures Siege of Corinth, La Gazza Ladra, Semiramide,
and William Tell with an admirable arrangement of the prayer
from Moses for orchestra and organ by Mr Manns, and two vocal
pieces, Di piacer and Una voce, curiously chosen, since one is
almost an inversion of the intervals of the other. There was,,
besides, a selection from William Tell, arranged for the band
alone.
This was rather too much for the endurance of the orchestra,
which became a little demoralized towards the end. Rossini's
band parts consist mostly of uninteresting stretches of rum-turn,
relieved here and there by some abominably inconvenient
melodic trait; for he was the most "absolute" of musicians: his
tunes came into his head unconnected with any particular quality
of tone, and were handed over to the instrument they would
sound prettiest on, without the least regard to the technical con-
venience of the player further, of course, than to recognize the
physical limits of possibility, and not write piccolo parts down
to sixteen-foot C, or trombone parts up to C in altissimo. Con-
sequently, though the scores of Berlioz and Wagner are in a
sense far more difficult than those of Rossini, you do not hear
during performances of their works any of those little hitches or
hair-breadth escapes which are apt to occur when a player has
to achieve a feat, however trifling, which is foreign to the genius
of his instrument.
It is true that what I call the genius of the instrument varies
with the nationality of the player; so that a French horn, though
most refractory to a compatriot of its own, or to an Englishman,
will be quite docile in the hands of a German; or twelve violins
played by Italians will have less weight in an orchestra than five
played by Englishmen, not to mention other and subtler differ-
ences. Yet the fact remains that we have at present a sort of inter-
national school of orchestration, through which an English
player, whatever his instrument may be, finds much the same
dass of work set for him, whether the composer be the Italian
Verdi, the French Gounod or Massenet, the Jew Max Bruch, the
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
Bohemian DvoMk, the Norwegian Grieg, the Dutchman Benoit,
and so on to the Irish Villiers Stanford, the Scotch Hamish Mac-
Cunn, and the English well, perhaps I had better not mention
names in the case of England. Rossini's scores, especially those
which he wrote for Venice and Naples, run off these lines; and
the result is, that at a Rossini concert there is more likelihood of
actual slips in execution than at a Wagner or Beethoven concert;
whilst the eventual worrying, fatiguing, and boring of the execu-
tants is a certainty when the program is a long one.
The Crystal Palace band held out brilliantly until the final
number, which was the overture and selection from William Tell,
in the course of which it occurred to most of them that they had
had about enough of the Swan of Pesaro. Yet the Swan came off
more triumphantly than one could have imagined possible at this
time of day. Dal tuo stellato soglio was as sublime as ever. Mr
Manns conducted it as he had arranged it, with perfect judgment
and sympathy with its inspiration; and in spite of myself I so
wai&ed lo hear it again that after a careful look round to see that
ndu of my brother-critics were watching me I wore away about
an eighth of an inch from the ferrule, of my umbrella in abetting
an encore. Another encore, of which I am guiltless, was elicited
by the cabaletta of Una voce, which, however, Miss Thudichum
did not sing so well as Di piacer. The repeats in the overtures
were, strange to say, not in the least tedious: we were perfectly
well content to hear the whole bag of tricks turned out a second
time. Nobody was disgusted, a la Berlioz, by "the brutal cres-
cendo and big drum." On the contrary, we were exhilarated and
abused; and I, for one, was astonished to find it all still so fresh,
so imposing, so clever, and even, in the few serious passages, so
I felt? fcot without dread, that the nails were coming out of
<3ssfef$ coffin as die performance proceeded; and if I had been
seated a little nearer die platform, there is no saying that I might
net faarre seized Mr Manns's arm and exclaimed, "You know not
what yoa do. Ten minutes more and you will have this evil genius
of musk alive again, and undoiiig die last thirty years of your
42
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
work." But after the third overture and the second aria, when we
had had six doses of crescendo, and three, including one encore,
of cabaletta, I breathed again. We have not heard the last of the
overture to Semiramide; but we shall not in future hear grave
critics speaking of it as if it were first-cousin to Beethoven's No.
3 Leonora. The general opinion, especially among literary men
who affected music, used to be that there was an Egyptian grand-
eur about Semiramide, a massiveness as of the Great Pyramid, a
Ninevesque power and terror far beyond anything that Beethoven
had ever achieved. And when Madame Trebelli, as a handsome
chieftain in a panther-skin, used to come down to the footlights,
exclaiming, "Here I am at last in Babylon," and give us Ah quel
giorno, with a cabaletta not to be distinguished without close
scrutiny from that to Rosina's aria in II Barbiere, we took it as
part of the course of Nature on the operatic stage. We are apt to
wonder nowadays why the public should have been so impressed
at first by the apparent originality, dramatic genius, depth and
daring of Meyerbeer as to be mystified and scandalized when
Mendelssohn, Schumann, and Wagner treated him with no more
respect than if he had been an old clo' man from Houndsditch.
But the explanation is very simple. We compare Meyerbeer
with Wagner: amateurs of 1840 compared him with Rossini; and
that made all the difference. If we are to have any Rossini cele-
brations during the opera season, the best opera for the purpose
will be Otello, partly because the comparison between it and
Verdi's latest work would be interesting, and partly because it is
one of the least obsolete of his operas. When it was last played
here at Her Majesty's, with Nilsson, Faure, and Tamberlik, it
proved highly bearable, although Faure was then almost at the end
even of his capacity for singing on his reputation, and Tamberlik
was a mere creaking wreck, whose boasted ut Jepoitrine was an
eldritch screech which might just as well have been aimed an
octave higher, for all the claim it had to be received as a vocal note
in the artistic sense. The only difficulty at present would be to
replace Nilsson, who sang Desdemona's music beautifully.
William Tell, of course, we may have: Sir Augustus Harris- s
43
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
attempts with it have always ranked among his triumphs from
the artistic point of view, probably because (like Rienzi) it is an
opera not of heroes and heroines, but of crowds and armies. He
is therefore able to deal with it as he deals with his pantomimes
and melodramas, which he takes so much more seriously and
artistically than he is able to take those unfortunate operas in
which his spoiled children of the Paris Opera, lazier than Rossini
himself, have to be petted at every turn. However, enough of
Rossini for the present. I cannot say "Rest his soul," for he had
none; but I may at least be allowed the fervent aspiration that we
may never look upon his like again.
Before quitting the subject of the opera season, let me express
a hope that the statement lately made as to the likelihood of
Nessler's Trumpeter of Sakkingen being produced at Covent
Garden may not be borne out. The Trumpeter, to begin with, is
not a trumpeter at all, but a flagrant amateur of the cornet-a-
putoru The opera is a pretty but commonplace work of the long-
lost-child order of plot and pathos; and there is not the smallest
reason why it should be dragged across the frontier, seeing that
we have half a dozen native composers who could furnish an
opera of equal interest provided some reasonable care were taken
to engage the services of a competent librettist. I heard The Trum-
peter once at Frankfort, and have no desire to hear it again,
especially on a stage which should be reserved for the best of
the best, and not for the Adelphi commonplaces of musical melo-
drama. If it need be heard here at all, it is more in Mr Carte's line
than Sir Augustus Harris's. That is, if I rightly understand Sir
Augustus Harris as aiming at the consecration of Covent Garden
to works of the highest grade, leaving what I may call semi-grand
and cottage opera to the house at Cambridge Circus. -Nessler's
opera is no more a first-class work than The Basoche is; and it is
much less witty.
The death of Lady Jenkinson the Dowager Lady Jenkinson
as she had been for only five weeks ought not to pass without
a word of notice from the musical chroniclers. She founded a
scholarship at the Royal Academy in memory of her friend Thai-
44
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
berg; and she gave a yearly prize for pianoforte-playing at the
Guildhall School, thereby setting an excellent and much-needed
example. Lady Jenkinson was an Irishwoman, early famous for
her pianoforte-playing and her personal beauty, the tradition of
which reached me through my mother, who was a neighbor of
hers at Stillorgan Park, near Dublin, in her young days, when
she was the beautiful Miss Lyster.
On one occasion I happened to explain in this column, Apropos
of Paderewski's playing of Mendelssohn's Songs without Words,
that the real reason why they are so seldom played nowadays is
not that they are out of fashion, but that, innocent as they look,
they are too difficult for most of our players. It not uncommonly
happens that people whose opinions I express in expressing my
own, write to me, sometimes assuming that I must agree with
them on every other point as well as the one in question. Lady
Jenkinson wrote to me on the strength of the word I had put in
for Mendelssohn; and her letters shewed that at sixty-five her en-
thusiasm for music, her good nature, and her belief in her fellow-
creatures, even including critics, were as fresh as ever. Many
musicians whom she helped will have solid reason to regret her
loss. May I suggest to die many women in her social position
who are at present busily employing their means in such a way
as to render their existence a matter of utter indifference to every-
one but themselves and their next-of-kin, that if any one of them
happens to be looking about for a vacancy, in filling which she
could become of some use in the world, there can be no doubt
that Lady Jenkinson's death has just created one?
1 6 March 1892
I AM unable to give any account of Mr Hamish MacCunn's
Queen Hinde in Calydon, because the first performance was un-
reasonably fixed for the day of the polling for the County
Council. Municipal bands were at stake at that election, and I
threw myself into it with ardor, my candidate having pledged
himself not only to vote steadily for municipal made hut to
45
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
agitate for giving citizens a really effective power of moving street
pianos out of earshot instead of to the next house but one. His
opponents never once alluded to music, confining themselves to
political matters of entirely secondary importance. The result
was that we brought him in by a most tremendous majority,
which will, I hope, serve as a lesson to all politicians and parties
wHo identify their cause with that of the enemies of music. Yet I
did not quite neglect Mr MacCunn. I made a dash for the Crystal
Palace between the canvassing of two streets, but arrived just too
late for Queen Hinde, and had to be contented with a wantonly
dismal Wagner selection. Rienzi's prayer was first sung by a
tenor who was much bothered by die gruppetto on the second
note. The lugubrious prelude to the third act of Tannhauser fol-
lowed. Miss Fillunger then extinguished the last ray of vivacity
left in us by Elizabeth's prayer; after which the band, with a
forced and ghastly merriment, attacked the bridal prelude to the
third act of Lohengrin, which sounded like the clattering of
bop^s wi skulls. Even canvassing was a relief after it.
Por.some years past the Wind Instrument Society has been
giving concern for the performance, of chamber music for wind
instruments,, which gerierally proves attractive whenever it is
tried at the Popular Concerts. Last year difficulties arose between
the Society and the little group of players known as "Clinton's
wind-quintet," consisting of Mr G. A. Clinton, the well-known
clarinettist, Mr Borsdorf (horn), Mr Malsch (oboe), Mr Griffiths
(flute), and Mr Thomas Wotton (bassoon). Preparation for the
Society's performances cost these gentlemen so much time that,
to secure an adequate return, they found it necessary to stipulate
that they should be engaged for all the concerts.
IBe Society, naturally wishing to keep its platform open to
p^;^^iimrunieiit players, demurred, and offered Mr Clin-
^albisr co&qeits out of six. The quarrel was a pretty one, as both
parties were perfectly reasonable in their demands Mr Clinton,
for concerts enough to make it worth his while to keep his quintet
ia harness; aixl the Society, for freedom to engage what artists it
pleased at its own concerts. Finally, they agreed to differ; and Mr
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
Clinton has now resolved to give concerts on his own account at
Steinway Hall. The first of these was announced for Tuesday the
8th; and I have no doubt it duly and successfully came off. The
program included Hummel's septet and Spohr's nonet, pretty
works both of them, but no longer magnetic enough to draw me
to Steinway Hall in such an abominable east wind as prevailed
on the 8th. On April the 6th, when Mozart's clarionet trio in E
flat will be in the bill, and on May 3rd, when there will be a
Beethoven serenade, not to mention some new works at both
concerts, I shall perhaps venture. Meanwhile the Wind Instru-
ment Society's concerts are in full swing at the Royal Academy
of Music, mostly on Friday nights, when it is quite impossible
for me to attend them.
It is important that both enterprises should receive sufficient
support to keep them going, for the sake of the opportunities
they afford for turning mere bandsmen into artists. At present
the dearth of first-rate wind-players is such that important con-
certs and rehearsals may be made impracticable by the pre-
engagement of two or three players a ridiculous state of things
in a city like London. But men will not, as a rule, face the labor
of acquiring extra skill unless there is extra credit and remunera-
tion to be got for it; and there will always be a marked difference
between the orchestral routine hand and the artist who has occa-
sionally to step out from the rank-and-file before an audience
and acquit himself of a difficult task with all the responsibility
and prominence of a soloist. The multiplication of concerts at
which this occurs means the multiplication of wind-players of
the class of (to name veterans alone) Lazarus and the elder
Wotton.
And we want, besides these Wind Chamber Concerts, as Mr
Clinton calls them, an awakening on the part of our conductors
to the fact that it is rather more important,, on the whole, that the
best players in their bands should sometimes have a chance of
playing a concerto, than that young ladies and gentlemen with a
crude relish for instrumentation should have their overtures and
symphonic poems tried over in public for them* Not long ago a
47
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
to be profound compositions, caviare to the general. Much as if a
picture-fancier should consider Gustave Dore's and Leon Gal-
lait's work finer and deeper than Carpaccio's, or a literary critic
declare Victor Hugo the great master of masters, and Moli&re an
obsolete compiler of trivial farces.
I do not deny that there has been an improvement in popular
taste in the last few years, and that mere musical stimulants, from
the comparatively innocent whisky-and-water of the Beethoven
coda and the Rossini crescendo to the fiery intoxicants of Liszt
and Berlioz, are beginning to be recognized for what they really
are that is, excitements which have their use on the stage, in
the dance, and in flashes of fun and festivity, but which are as
much out of place in the highest class of music as a war-dance
would be at a meeting of the Royal Society. The notion that the
absence of such stimulants from the symphonies and the chamber-
music of Mozart is to be counted against him as a deficiency, is
precisely analogous to the disappointment which a sporting
collier might experience at going to the Lyceum Theatre and
finding that the incidents in Henry VIII did not include a littfe
tatting. And if no such notion has prevailed among our Wagner-
ians, how is it that when you turn over the programs of the
Richter Concerts you find such an inordinate proportion of
Walkiirenritt and seventh symphony to such a paltry scrap of
Mozart? in spite of the fact that Richter's conducting of the E flat
symphony was one of his highest achievements if not his very
highest here as a conductor.
When no demand arose for a repetition of it, I could not help
suspecting that if Richter had tried his followers with the chorus
of Janissaries from II Seraglio, or with a vigorous arrangement of
Viva la liberta, he might have hit off th^ir Mozartian capacity
more happily. On the whole, I have no hesitation in saying that
as soon as our Wagnerians (and do not forget that there is no
more enthusiastic Wagnerian than I have shewn myself) bave
had their eyes opened to the fact that Wagnerism may cov^r a
plentiful lackof culture and love
hear more of Mozart's syniphoiaies
VOL. n 49
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
neglected now for a whole generation, and yet far more beautiful
and interesting than any of their kind produced since, by Bee-
thoven or anyone else.
To return to the performance, I have to congratulate M. de
Greef on having come triumphantly through the ordeal of taking
Mozart's own place at the pianoforte in the C minor concerto
and in the obbligato to the scena Ch' io mi scordi di te, composed
for Nancy Storace in 1786 to words from Idomeneo. Nancy was
succeeded on Thursday by Madame Giulia Valda, who sang
with her usual vigor and self-possession, but fell far short of
the standard of vocal execution and delicacy of style required
for Mozart's music. The Philharmonic Society was on its best
behavior, and committed only two blunders and one crime. The
crime was the singling me out from the general body of critics
and putting me in a seat right between the two doors, in a most
glacial draught a clear attempt to "remove" me from my post
in the most permanent and effectual way. Its success will depend
on the course taken by the cold from which I am suffering.
Blunder number one was the retention of a vulgar old concert
coda in the overture to Idomeneo, instead of finishing it as
written, with the quiet passage leading into the first act of the
opera. Blunder number.two was the interpolation of Mr Joseph
Bennett's extraordinary valentine to Mozart, which Mr Fry re-
cited at die Albert Hall, and need hardly have recited again at St
James s Hall. Perhaps Mr Fry thought so himself; for he began
to wander towards the end, expressing his astonishment that
Mais s thunder did not remonstrate -about the cheapness of
Mozart s funeral, and-if my ear caught the word aright-taking
the liberty of transforming Mr Bennett's "strangers" who, "tear-
kssm careless, lay that precious form," etc., into "ravens."
3S f notable ex -
;: ere an S reat e **ss of string-tone
over what Mozart calculated upon caused the violins to enter
On A TfT? ^ Whldl S **** bu < -ceptab e
On the other hand, Mozart would have been delighted with thdr
-gor and splendor in the broader passages, if slewhattston
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
ished at their screamingly high pitch. The only point -which they
can be said to have actually spoiled was the demisemiquaver
figure in the andante of the G minor symphony. This was much
too heavily touched; and the blemish was the more apparent be-
cause Mr Cowen took the movement a shade too slowly, as
musicians are apt to do on the suggestion of the first bar. At least
I thought so; but Mr Cowen is entitled to his opinion on the
matter; and I will not urge my own now, lest I should seem to
disparage the most satisfactory appearance he has yet made as a
conductor.
23 March 1892
SOME alarm was created at the Crystal Palace on the i2th by the
announcement that "Professor Joseph Joachim" was to play
Max Bruch's latest violin concerto. At a time when all the best
friends of art are striving to turn our professors into artists, it
seemed too bad to turn one of our greatest artists into a pro-
fessor. However, he did not play in the least like one. His artistic
conscience is as sensitive and as untiring as ever; his skill is not
diminished; and his physical endurance proved equal to a severe
test in a quick movement practically a moto perpetuo by Bach.
Bruch's concerto, like most of his works, is masterly in the most
artificial vulgarities of the grandiose, the passionate, the obvi-
ously sentimental, and the coarsely impulsive. Those partisans of
Joachim who contend for his superiority to all other violinists
(that is the worst of your amateur critic: he or she always has a
Dulcinea whose charms are to be maintained against all comers)
are fond of proclaiming the severity of his taste. He knows, they
tell us, all the fantasias and the claptrap to which Sarasate and
Isaye condescend, and can execute them superbly; but he refuses
to play any music in public that is not of the very highest class.
Then, I ask, why does he play Max Bruch?
I do not, of course, address the question to Joachim himself,
since I know better than to hold any artist responsible for every-
thing that his devotees ascribe to him; but I do ask it of the de-
votees themselves, with a view to instructing them a little as to
5*
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
always receives a special ovation at the end. The b^nd rises to
the occasion with its greatest splendor; and I have to make a
point of looking interested and pleased, lest Sir George should
turn my way, and, reading my inmost thoughts, cut me dead for
ever afterwards. For it seems to me all but wicked to give the
public so irresistible a description of all the manifold charms and
winningnesses of this astonishing symphony, and not tell them,
on the other side of the question, the lamentable truth that a
more exasperatingly brainless composition was never put on
paper. Fresh as I was this time from the Rossini centenary, I
could not help thinking, as I listened to those outrageously over-
done and often abortive climaxes in the last movement, how much
better than Schubert the wily composer of Tancredi could en-
gineer this sort of sensationalism. It was not only his simple
mechanism and the iftfellible certainty with which it wound you
up to striking-point in exactly ^sixteen bars: ii was his cool ap-
preciation of the precise worth of the trick when he had done it.
Poor Schubert, whd laughed at Rossini's overtures, and even
burlesqued them, here lays out crescendo after crescendo, double
after quickstep, gallopade after galbpade, with an absurdly
sincere and excited conviction that if he only hurries fast enouglt
he will presently overtake Mozart and Beethoven, who are not to
be caught up in a thousand miles by any man with second-rate
brains, however wonderful his musical endowment. Much as I
appreciate the doughtiness with which Sir George Grove fought
Schubert's battle in England, yet now that it is won I instinctively
bear back a little, feeling that before any 'artist, whatever his
branch may be, can take his place with the highest, thei?e is a
certain price to be paid in head-work, and that Schubert never
paid that price. Let that be admitted, and We may play the Sym-
phony in C until we are all black in the face: I shall not be? the
first to tire of it,
A modern disciple of Schubert or at least a walker in his
wa y S i s Mr Algernon Ashton, who gave a concert of his own
music at Prince's Hall ,last Wednesday. Mr Algernon Ashton
goes in for the flight of creation, stopping short at the pomt
53
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
always receives a special ovation at the end. The band rises to
the occasion with its greatest splendor; and I have to make a
point of looking interested and pleased, lest Sir George should
turn my way, and, reading my inmost thoughts, cut me dead for
ever afterwards. For it seems to me all but wicked to give the
public so irresistible a description of all the manifold charms and
winningnesses of this astonishing symphony, and not tell them,
on the other side of the question, the lamentable truth that a
more exasperatingly brainless composition was never put on
paper. Fresh as I was this time from the Rossini centenary, I
could not help thinking, as I listened to those outrageously over-
done and often abortive climaxes in the last movement, how much
better than Schubert the wily composer of Tancredi could en-
gineer this sort of sensationalism. It was not only his simple
mechanism and the infallible certainty with which it wound you
up to striking-point in exactly ^sixteen bars: it was his cool ap-
preciation of the precise worth of the trick when he had done it
Poor Schubert, who laughed at Rossini's overtures, and even
burlesqued them, here lays out crescendo after crescendo, double
after quickstep, gallopade after gallopade, with -an absutdly
sincere and excited conviction that if he only hurries fast enough
he will presently overtake Mozart and Beethoven, who are not tp
be caught up in a thousand miles by any man with second-rate
brains, however wonderful his musical endowment. Much as I
appreciate the doughtiness with which Sir George Grove fought
Schubert's battle in England, yet now that it is won I instinctively
bear back a little, feeling hat before any 'artist, whatever his
branch may be, can take his place with die highest, there is a
certain price to be paid in head-work, and that Schubert never
paid that price. Let that be admitted, and we may play the Sym-
phony in C until we are all black in the face: I shall not be*the
first to tire of it.
, A modern disciple of Schubert or at least a walker in his
wa ys i s Mr Algernon Ashton, who gave a concert of his own
music at Prince's Hall last Wednesday. Mr Algernon Asfaton
goes in for the delight of creation, Stopping short ai
53
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
where die intellectual grapple turns that delight into the grim
effort wMch makes the greater sort of creators rather glad when
it is over. He is at no loss for pretty themes who is, nowadays?
aad he dandles them in his arms, in at one key and out at
Brother, in a very tender, playful, and fatherly way. This is en-
gaging, and even interesting, for a limited period usually some-
thing short of four movements; but it is not quite the same thing
as composing quintets in the sense established by the practice of
ffae greatest masters. It may be that I was lazy and discursive,
and did not concentrate my attention with sufficient intensity on
Mr Ashton's ideas.
Anyhow, I thought the quintet purposeless and extemporane-
ous, fluent without being coherent, carefully finished in detail
without being elegant or striking on the whole, and generally
tending to recall that terrible couplet of Mr Gilbert's which so
often runs through my head at concerts:
Though Fm anything but clever,
I could talk like that for ever.
' i'<\ t
At die sasie time, I do not wish it to be inferred that such quin-
tets sbmild not be composed. They give a great deal of pleasure
l& musical circles where Spohr and Hummel are venerated, and
Schubert's violin sonatas not despised. They help to educate the
members of such circles in the latest harmonic developments,
and to accustom them not to make wry faces in good company
when they hear a dominant eleventh in some other form than
tbe venerable four-to-three of the schools. But my business is to
<fedare0(ncerning chamber music offered at Prince's Hall whether
h is of die stuff from which Monday Popular programs are made.
Ail I can say is^ that Mr Ashton is far from having touched even
the Schumann level, without bringing into question the summit
marked by Mozart's G minor quintet. He is far more successful in
his songs and fantasias, which are pretty, and not lacking in
appropriate feeling.
I return for a moment to the Crystal Palace to congratulate
the directors on having decided not to waste the thunders of the
54
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
Handel orchestra this year on Gounod or Mendelssohn. Their
selection of Samson was arrived at after some hesitation be-
tween Samson and Judas. But why not between Samson and
Jephtha? The objection to Samson is that, in its integrity, it de-
pends largely on solos which can only be executed by highly ac-
complished vocalists. It is humiliating to have always to omit, as
a matter of course, such numbers as Then long eternity because
no one can sing them, or even understand what Handel meant
the singer to do with them.
However, we shall do very well if we hear the choruses in
their full splendor; for though Samson is not one of Handel's
most deeply felt works, yet it shews him in his brightest, most
heroic vein, at the height of his strength, decision, audacity, and
mastery. The first four bars of Fix'd in His everlasting seat are
alone worth getting up a performance on the festival scale for^
and if it were possible to get an English tenor md an Ei^lsfc
chorus to catch the ring of pagan joy-worshij) in Great Dag<m
has subdued our foe, that too would be a memorable experience.
I have also to congratulate the veteran E. Silas on his success
at the last Saturday concert with his new pianoforte concerto in
B minor, of the brilliancy and cleverness of which we should
hear no end if the composer were forty years younger. Had the
technical quality of his playing been, equal to its spirit and artistic
feeling, the reception of the work would have been warmer than
it was. Probably Mr Silas will find no difficulty now in inducing
some popular pianist to add it to his or her repertory.
30 March 1892
THAT light-hearted body the Bach Choir has had what I may be-
fittingly call another shy at the Mass in B minor. When I last had
occasion to criticize its singing, I gathered that my remarks
struck the more sensitive members as being in the last degree un-
gentlemanlike. This was due to a misunderstanding of the way in
which a musical critic sets about his business when he has a
choral performance in hand. He does not on such occasions
55
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890^94
prime himself with Spitta's biography of Bach, and, opening his
mouth and shutting his ears, sit palpitating with reverent in-
terest, culminating in a gasp of contrapuntal enthusiasm at each
entry and answer of the fugue subject.
On the contrary, the first thing he does is to put Bach and
Spitta and counterpoint and musical history out of the question,
and simply listen to the body of sound that is being produced.
And what clothes his judgments in terror is that he does not, like
the ordinary man, remain unconscious of every sound except
that which he is expecting to hear. He is alive not only to the
music of the organ, but to the rattling and crashing caused by
the beating of the partial tones and combination tones generated
by the sounds actually played from in the score; and he is often
led thereby to desire die sudden death of organists who use their
stops heedlessly. He hears not only the modicum of vocal tone
which the choristers are producing, but also the buzzing and
wheezing and puffing and all sorts of uncouth sounds which
ladies and gentlemen unknowingly bring forth in the agonies of
holding on to a difficult part in a Bach chorus. And his criticism
of the choir is primarily determined by the proportion of vocal
tone to the mere noises.
To the amateur who has heroically wrestled with the bass or
tenor part in the Cum Sancto Spiritu of the B minor Mass, and
succeeded in reaching the "Amen" simultaneously with the con-
ductor, it probably seems, not musical criticism, but downright
ruffianism to tell him publicly that instead of deserving well of
Ms country he has been behaving more like a combination of a
debilitated coalheaver with a suffocating grampus than a com-
petent Bach chorister. But the more outraged he feels, the more
necessary is it to persecute him remorselessly until he becomes
humbly conscious that in the agonies of his preoccupation with
his notes he may perhaps have slightly overlooked the need for
keeping his tone sympathetic and telling, and his attack precise
and firm. The conscientious critic will persecute him accordingly,
not giving him those delicately turned and friendly hints which
a fine artist catches at once, but rather correcting him with such
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
salutary brutality as may be necessary to force him to amend his
ways in spite of his natural tendency to question the existence of
any room for improvement on his part.
When the critic has duly estimated the quality of the vocal
material, he begins to take Bach into consideration. An untrained
singer can no more sing Bach's florid choral parts than an un-
trained draughtsman can copy a drawing by Albrecht Durer.
The attempts of ordinary amateurs to make their way through a
Bach chorus are no more to be taken as Bach's music than a
child's attempt to copy one of Diirer's plumed helmets is to be
taken as a reproduction of the original. The critic accordingly
must proceed to consider whether the ladies and gentlemen
before him are tracing the lines of the great Bach picture with
certainty, mastery, and vigilantly sensitive artistic feeling, or
whether they are scrawling them in impotent haste under th
stick of the conductor.
In the first case, the master's design will come out in aHjis
grandeur; and the critic will give himself up gratefully to pare
enjoyment: in the second, he will sit in implacable scorn, asking
how these people dare meddle with Bach when they are hardly
fit to be trusted with The Chough and Crow. Need I add, that
if they happen to have had the unbounded presumption to call
themselves by the name of a great man, he will entertain just so
much extra contempt for them as we feel for a bad circus clown
who aggravates his incompetence by calling himself The Shake-
spearean Jester,
Although the facts have fallen, as usual, somewhere .between
these two extreme cases, I nevertheless might now, perhaps,
most mercifully leave the Bach Choristers to their own con-
sciences, and say no more about their last performance. It Cer-
tainly was a very bad one; for the audience, as their coldness
shewed, hardly caught a glimpse of the splendor of the work
through the cloud of artistic poverty raised by the execution of
it. The principal singers were uncomfortable all through holclipij;
on desperately to their books, and never feeliasg s^fe m^ifa%$
came to a cadence, whw they invariably perked ^p ^4;<^?r^d
J7
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
it with a confidence and expression so absurdly different from
that with which they had been gingerly picking their way to it,
that it says much for the politeness of the musicians in the
audience and for the ignorance of the rest that every cadence was
not received with an ironically congratulatory laugh.
Miss Hilda Wilson was the steadiest of the soloists. As to Mrs
Hutchinson, Mr Watkin Mills, and Mr Borsdorff (who played
the horn obbligato in the very funniest performance of the
Quoniam I ever heard), they are far too good artists to expect
any compliments from me on a performance concerning which
they can have no feeling except one of devout thankfulness that
it is over. The Choir's worst effort was in the Kyrie, a number
requiring the highest sensitiveness in the voices and finesse in
the execution. As it was, the tone was horribly common, and the
execution slovenly. The Sanctus, being much easier, was much
better. And this relation between the easier and harder numbers
faeld good throughout the performance. The brisk, florid, but
coiiip&atively mechanical movements, in which no great deli-
t^y^dr. expressiveness is called for, such as the Et vitam venturi,
the Hosanna, and the Gloria, all of which are pretty plain sailing,
w^at fekly well; whilst the Cum Sancto Spiritu, the most diffi-
cult numberin this class, was an undignified scramble, and the Et
Besurrexit was only so-so. The slow numbers, though carefully
done, were constrained and unhappy; and some of the more
beautiful modulations, notably that into G major at the end of
the Cracifixus, were spoiled by being made obvious "points" of
by the conductor.
' Tie suHH&ary of the above criticism of the choruses is that
the 'm&fe only received about one-third of the necessary re-
bearsaL And mtil this deficiency is ungrudgingly remedied, the
petfccmraces of the Mass can never be brought up to the standard
^eiikfc Aeyattained under Goldschmidt, who, although he alto-
geilier lacked the vivacity needed to place him in perfect sym-
pathy with Bach, yet approached the work with a deep German
smonsness^whidb ensured strenuous preparation, and banished
afl triviality and vulgarity from die performances he conducted.
58
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
Mr Villiers Stanford conducted the Mass much better than last
time. At such work, it is true, he is always more or less the round
peg in the square hole; and he was at fault here and there, drag-
ging the tempo, managing a transition like that from the jubilant
Gloria to the solemnly tranquil Et in terra pax without tact, or
obtrusively calling on his forces to mark some nuance which
ought to have quietly marked itself. And he is not to be absolved
from his share of the general responsibility for the insufficiency
of the preparation. Still, these shortcomings are not irremediable;
and if Mr Stanford's next attempt is as much better than this as
this is than the last, there will be little to complain of always
provided that he will discard the flippancy with which he at
present tolerates the unpardonably low standard of quality of
tone and refinement of execution which satisfies the Choir*
Mr Morrow's success with the principal trtuipgt pait v$
much more complete than in his former attempt C^A^olfc
sion, as his lip tired early in the performance, so thai tbaay of tile
notes above A were missed during the latter half of the concert,
the result of the experiment was doubtful. This time his lip was
in good condition; and though he did not attain the infallibility
of Kosleck, he quite settled the question as to the practicability
of the original parts. It is all the more to be regretted that the
effect should have been two-thirds spoiled by his colleagues,
Messrs Backwell and Ellis. These gentlemen used the old slide
trumpets, which they blew sedately into their desks whilst Mr
Morrow's uplifted clarion was ringing through the hall, the
effect being that of a solo trumpet obbligato instead of three trum-
pets concertante.
Now, surely Mr Ellis and Mr Backwell could have procured
"Bach trumpets" from Messrs Silvani & Smith without any fear
of being unable to play the comparatively easy second and third
parts on them. The three instruments would then have been
equally well heard, and the characteristic play of the three-part
counterpoint fully realized. Until this is done the trumpet parts
will in some respects sound actually less like what the composer
intended than they used to when played on three dark>fief& I
59
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
believe that it is only in its new-old form that the trumpet has
any chance of restoration to the orchestra.
At the Crystal Palace the other day, and at the Philharmonic
on Thursday, they played Mendelssohn's Trumpet Overture
without trumpets, using cornets instead. But who can wonder at
the conductors allowing this, in spite of all the protests of the
treatise writers, when the choice lies between a cornet of which
the player has complete command and a dull hard slide trumpet
to which he is so unused that when he has to filer a note, as in the
opening of the Rienzi overture, he must either fly to his cornet
or conspicuously bungle his work? In the hands of a man who
can really play it, the slide trumpet is undoubtedly better than
the cornet for fanfares, penetrating held notes, and certain florid
passages which are meant to ring metallically. But such players,
since their skill does not repay the cost of cultivation, are scarce;
and even in their hands one never gets even a suggestion of the
silvery, carillon-like clangor of the top notes of the clarion. All
that is ever required of the slide trumpeter is occasionally to get
through the obbligato to Let the bright seraphim or The trumpet
shall sound, in an amateurish fashion at a festival.
On all other occasions trumpet parts are played on the cornet;
and the scores of Wagner, Gounod, and Verdi abound in cornet
effects which would come out villainously on slide trumpets. The
way to restore the "Bach trumpet," or clarion proper, is simply
to induce composers to write parts for it in their scores, and to
agitate for its introduction into military bands. Until this is done
it will be hardly better worth a player's while to learn the clarion
than it is now to learn the viol J' amore or the harmonica.
I greatly regret that my absence from town last Friday pre-
vented me from taking advantage of the discussion on Colonel
SJiaw-Hillier's United Service Institution lecture on military
music to raise the question of clarions in bands. Anyone who has
ever noticed how the peculiar bugling tone of an Italian military
band using flugel horns contrasts with that of an English military
band using cornets, and compared both with the tone of the
clarion as played by Kosleck and Morrow, must have felt how
60
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
far we are from having fully developed the orchestra on this
side.
I gave Dvorak's Requiem one more chance on Wednesday
last, when it was performed and very well jterformed too for
the first time in London, at the Albert Hall, under Mr Barnby.
And I am more amazed than ever that any critic should mistake
this paltry piece of orchestral and harmonic confectionery for a
serious composition.
At the Philharmonic on Thursday, Sapellnikoff, who was re-
ceived coldly, like a forgotten man, had his revenge after the
concert in a series of recalls and an encore which were, for a
Philharmonic audience, quite frantic. No doubt we shall have
some recitals from him, though the agents have been so timid
in that department of late.
THE last place a musical critic otdfawfly thinks ofg^iiig ft>8* a
music-hall. I should probably hot know what a music-hall is
like,, if it were not for the transfer of the ballet in London fcpm
the Opera to the Alhambra. The effect of this transfer has been
to confront music-hall audiences, nursed on double meanings^
with an art emptied of all meaning with the most abstract, the
most "absolute," as Wagner would have said, of all the $rts*,
Grace for the sake of grace, ornamental motion without destina-
tion, noble pose without locus staruti in the legal sense: this is the
object of the tremendous training through which the
dancer goes before figuring as "assoluta" in
program. * ; , ,i
Some years ago, a section, of the Church of Entei*dr mwfe
discovery, then rather badly needed in dais country,
est orare" is true of labor devoted directly to the
beauty nay, more true of it than of labor devoted *o
This came with the shock of a blasphemous .violation
interests to the seetioik which had oMgmgty
whole beauty p^odtidteg^epaftrfient of
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
devil as his exclusive property.
One discovery generally leads to another; and the clergymen
who took up the new ideas had no sooner opened their minds re-
solutely to the ballet than they were greatly taken aback to find
that the exponents of that art, instead of being abandoned volup-
tuaries, are skilled workers whose livelihood depends on their
keeping up by arduous practice a condition of" physical training
which would overtax the self-denial of most beneficed clergymen.
Strange doings followed. Clergymen went to the music-halls and
worshipped the Divine as manifested in the Beautiful; and a de-
putation of dancers claimed their rights as members of the Church
from the Bishop of London, who, not being up to date in the
question, only grasped the situation sufficiently to see that if it is
a sin to dance, it is equally a sin to pay other people to dance and
then look on at them. He therefore politely and logically excom-
municated the deputation and all its patrons^ lay and clerical.
Matters have smoothed down a little since that time; and
whilst nobody with any pretension to serious and cultivated
views of art would now dream of ridiculing and abusing Mr
Stewart Headlam as the fashion was in the early days of the
Church and Stage Guild, the enthusiasts of that body would not
now, I imagine, dispute the proposition that the prejudices
against which they fought could never have obtained such a hold
on the common sense of the public had not too many music-hall
performers acquiesced in their own ostracism by taking advan-
tage of it to throw off all respect for themselves and their art. The
ideas of the Guild have by this time so far permeated the press,
that the present tendency is rather to pet the halls, and to give
free currency to knowing little paragraphs about them, the said
paragraphs often amounting to nothing more than puerile gushes
of enthusiasm about exploits that ought to be contemptuously
criticized off the face of the earth.
Last week I devotedly sat out the program at the Empire; and
i am bound to say that I was agreeably surprised to find the "lion
comique ' and the wearisome "sisters" with the silly duet and the
interminable skin dance quite abolished for that evening, at all
62
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
events. Instead, we had Poniatowski's Yeoman's Wedding, I fear
no foe, and some of Mr Cowen's most popular drawing-room
songs. I took what joy I could in these; in the inevitable juggler
who had spent his life practising impossibilities which nobody
wanted to see overcome; in the equally inevitable virtuoso, who,
having announced his intention of imitating "the oboy," seized
his own nose and proceeded grossly to libel the instrument; and
in "the Bedouins," the successors of the Bosjesmen who turned
somersaults round my cradle, and of the Arab tribes who cheered
my advanced boyhood in flying head-over-heels over rows of
volleying muskets.
I heard also the Brothers Webb, musical clowns who are really
musical, playing the Tyrolienne from William Tell very prettily
on two concertinas though I earnestly beg the amateurs who
applauded from the gallery not to imagine that the .thing can be
done under my windows in. the small hours on tfaree~a#rf-six-
penny German instruments* The concertinas on which the Webbs
discourse are English Wheatstones of the best sort, such as are
retailed at from sixteen to thirty guineas apiece. There were two
frankly odious items in the program. One was a Hungarian
quartet, in which the female performers did their worst to their
chest registers in striving to impart the rowdiest possible entrain
to some Hungarian tunes and to Le Pre la Victoire. The other
was Ta-ra-ra, etc., sung by a French lady, whose forced abandon-
ment as she tore round the stage screaming the cabalistic words
without attempting to sing the notes, was so horribly destitute of
any sort of grace, humor, nalvet, or any other pleasant quality,
that I cannot imagine any sober person looking on without being
shocked and humiliated.
Let me now hasten to admit that as the words of the refrain
were perfectly harmless, and the lady dressed with a propriety
which none of her antics materially disturbed, the most puritan-
ical censor could have alleged nothing in court against the per-
formance, which was nevertheless one of the least edifying I have
ever witnessed. I have not had the pleasure of hearing Miss Lottie
Collins sing this ancient piece of musical doggerel; but I should
63
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
be sorry to believe that it "caught on" originally in the unre-
deemed condition to which it has been reduced at the Empire.
All this, however, was by the way. What I went to see was the
ballet I have already said that classical dancing is the most ab-
stract of the arts; and it is just for that reason that it has been so
little cared for as an art, and so dependent for its vogue on the
display of natural beauty which its exercise involves. Now the
ballet, as we know it, is a dramatic pantomime in which all sorts
of outrageous anomalies are tolerated for the sake of the "ab-
solute" dancing. It is much worse than an old-fashioned opera in
this respect; for although the repeated stoppages of the dramatic
action in order that one of the principal dancers may execute a
"solo" or "variation" is not more absurd than Lucrezia Borgia
coming forward from the contemplation of her sleeping son,
under thrillingly dangerous circumstances, to oblige the audience
with the roulades of Si voli il primo, yet Lucrezia is allowed, and
even expected, to wear an appropriate costume; whereas if the
opera wore a ballet she would have to wear a dress such as no
human being, at any period of the earth's history, has worn when
out walking.
But this advantage of the pritna cantatrice over the prima
ballerina is counterbalanced by the fact that whereas dancers
must always attend carefully to their physical training, singers
are allowed, as long as their voices last, to present themselves on
the stage in a condition ludicrously unsuitable to the parts they
have to play. Twenty years ago or so you might have seen
TMens playing Valentine, just as you may today see Signor
Glannini playing Radames or Manrico, with a corporal opulence
which is politely assumed to be beyond voluntary control, but
which, unless it culminates in actual disease as of course it
sometimes does is just as much a matter of diet and exercise as
the condition of the sixteen gentlemen who are going to row
from Putney to Mordake next Saturday. Everything in opera is
condoned, provided the singing is all right; and in the ballet
everything is condoned, provided the dancing is all right.
But, as Rossini said, there are only twelve notes in European
64
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
music; and the number of practicable vocal ornaments into which
they can be manufactured is limited. When you know half-a-
dozen caballettas you have no more novelty to look for; and you
soon get bored by repetitions of their features except when the
quality of the execution is quite extraordinary. My recollection of
Di Murska's Lucia does not prevent me from yawning frightfully
over the fioriture of the dozens of Lucias who are not Di
Murskas. In the same way, since the stock of pas which make up
classical dancing is also limited, the solo dances soon become as
stale as the rosalias of Handel and Rossini.
The entrechats of Vincenti at his entry in the ballet of As-
modeus were worthy of Euphorion; but the recollection of them
rather intensifies the boredom with which I contemplate the
ordinary danseuse who makes a conceited jump and comes down
like a wing-clipped fowl without having for an instant shewn
that momentary picture of a vigorous! and beautiful flying feature
which is the sole object 6 &e feat In short, I am as tired, of the
ballet in its present phase as I became of ante-Wagnerian Italian
opera; and I believe that the public is much of my mind in the
matter. The conventional solos and variations, with the exasper-
ating teetotum spin at the end by way of cadenza and high B flat*
are tolerated rather than enjoyed, except when they are executed
with uncommon virtuosity; and even then the encores are a little
forced, and come from a minority of the audience. Under such
circumstances, a development of the dramatic element, not only
in extent but in realistic treatment, is inevitable if the ballet is to
survive at all.
Accordingly, I was not surprised to find at the Empire that the
first and most popular ballet was an entertainment of mixed genre
in which an attempt was made to translate into Terpsichorean tbe
life and humors of the seaside. Maria Giuri, a really brilliant
dancer, condescended to frank step-dancing in a scene set t6
national airs, which, however^ included one brief variation on
Yankee Doodle which the most exclusive pupil of the grand
school need not have disdained. Vincenti himself had an air of
being at Margate rather than in the Elysian fields as usuaL I asfc
VOL. II 65 F
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
afraid he is rather lost in Leicester Square, where the audience,
capable of nothing but cartwheels, stare blindly at his finest entre-
chats*, but that is the fate of most artists of his rank. He confined
himself mainly to mere tours deforce in the second ballet, Nisita,
in which Malvina Cavallazzi, as the Noble Youth, was nobler
than ever, and Palladino, who reminded me of the approaching
opera season, hid her defects and made the most of her qualities
with her usual cleverness.
Perhaps by the time I next visit a music-hall the ballet will
have found its Wagner, or at least its Meyerbeer. For I have had
enough of mere ballet: what I want now is dance-drama.
13 April 1892
AT the Philharmonic Concert last week I went down during the
interval to find out from the placards at the door whether the
musical season was really so dull as I had gathered from the com-
paratively few concert invitations which had reached me. For I
am never quite certain as to how much music may be going on
behind my back. The people who only want pufTs have given
me up as a bad job; the concert-givers who cannot afford to have
the truth told about their performances shun me like the plague;
the spoiled children of the public are driven by a word of criticism
into fits of magnificent sulking; the soft-hearted, uncritical patrons
and patronesses, always regarding me as the dispenser of a great
power of giving charitable lifts to hard-up people who have mis-
taken their profession, see plainly that since I reserve so much of
my^ praise for comparatively well-to-do artists my favorable
notices must be simply the outcome of invitations, chicken and
champagne, smiles of beauty, five-pound notes and the like (I
am far from wishing to discourage such realizable illusions); and
the genuine enthusiasts, whenever I do not appreciate their pet
artists and composers, will have it that I am an ignorant fellow
writing musical criticism for the gratification of my natural hatred
of the sublime and beautiful. In brief, there is always a section of
tne musical world thoroughly convinced that, like the creditor
66
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
who detained Sam Weller in the Fleet, I am "a malicious, badly-
disposed, vorldly-minded, spiteful, windictive creetur, with a
hard heart as there aint no softnin." When a person, in passing
through this harmless and transient madness, gives a concert or
an opera, I am not invited; and as I never bias myself by reading
advertisements or criticisms, I may quite easily, at any given
moment, be the worst-informed man in London on every current
musical topic except the quality of the performances I have
actually attended.
Sometimes it is I who have to stand on the offensive, and ex-
clude myself, in self-defence. The entrepreneurs who send me a
couple of stalls the week before a concert, and a lawyer's letter
the week after it, may be irascible gentlemen who must splutter
in some direction from congenital inability to contain themselves,
or they may be long-headed men of business who understand the ,
overwhelming disadvantages at which the law of libel places
every writer whose subject is completely outside the common
sense of a British jury. But the effect on me is the same eithet
way. The moment I understand that the appeal to law is not
barred between myself and any artist or entrepreneur, I fly in
terror from the unequal contest, and never again dare to open my
lips, or rather dip my pen, about that litigious person.
No doubt, in the case of an entrepreneur, the fact that I dare
not allude to the artists he brings forward is a disadvantage to
them, to the public, and to myself; but I submit that the remedy
is, not for me to defy the law and bring ruinous loss of time on
myself and of money on my principals, nor for the artists, who
are mostly foreigners and strangers, with no effective choice in
the matter, to avoid litigious agents, but for the public, as electors
and jurymen, to make criticism legal. Many innocent persons
believe it to be so at present; but what are the facts?
Last season an opera-singer, of whom I am reminded by an
unconfirmed report of his death at Malta, had his performance
criticized by my emitient colleague Mr Joseph Bennett in a
manner which was almost culpably goodnatured. The artist,
however, declared that the effect of the criticism was to open the
67
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
eyes of impresarios to the undisputed fact that he was no longer
in his prime; and, the paper in which the notice appeared being
well able to pay any amount of damages, he sued it. The case
was peculiarly favorable to the critic, as there was no difficulty
in making even a jury see that the criticism erred only on the side
of leniency. But one of the proofs of its justice was that it had
depreciated the market value of the artist's services, as every un-
favorable criticism must if it has any effect at all. The jury ac-
cordingly gave a verdict for the artist against the critic, putting
the damages at a farthing to emphasize the fact that they con-
sidered that the critic would have been in the right if his occupa-
tion had been a lawful one. And if Mr Bennett had called on me
next day, and asked me in the common interests of our profession
and of the public never to mention that artist's name again, he
could have been indicted for conspiracy and imprisoned.
In spite of the adverse verdict, some critics expressed them-
selves as satisfied with the termination of the case, on the ground
that the artist had a fine lesson, since he had gained nothing, and
incurred both heavy costs and loss of reputation, not to mention
such press boycotting as arises spontaneously from the esprit de
corps of the critics without any express concert between them
Mo doubt this was so, though it does not offer the smallest set-off
to the sol! heavier costs incurred by the defendants. But let us
proceed from what actually happened on that occasion to what
might have happened. Suppose the artist, instead of depending
on his own resources, had been backed by a rich and influential
impresario who had made up his mind to muzzle the press If I
were such an impresario I could do it in spite of all the boasted
thunders of the Fourth Estate. First, I would take the young
men; culttvate them; natter them a little; wave my hand round
Ae stalls, and say, 'Come in whenever you like-always a plac
>
ace
r * as n wou ke
penpal fhends of them; invite them to garden-parties and intro-
duce them to my arosts; make them feel themselves a part of the
ttc wor ld o f which I was the great solar centre? and grve
them hypnotic suggestions of my intentions in such a way Sto
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
create tremendous expectations of the artists I had in my mana-
gerial eye. No young man recently promoted from the uncomfort-
able obscurity of the amphitheatre or gallery, no matter how con-
ceited he may be, knows enough of the value of his goodwill to
suspect that a great impresario could have any motive beyond
pure amiability in shewing so much kindness to a mere beginner
in journalism. The old men would give me still less trouble. They
would have learnt to live and let live: not a fault in my perform-
ances would they find that they had not pointed out over and
over again twenty years ago, until they were tired of repealing
themselves. I should not quarrel with them, nor they with me.
What with the foolish critics who would think everything de-
lightful as long as I made them happy, and the wise ones who
would call everything beautiful as long as I made them comfort-
able, the ground would be cleared for my final coup. This, of
course, would be struck at the few born critics the sort of men
who cannot help themselves, who know what good work is^
crave for it, are tortured by the lack of it, will fight tooth and nail
for it, and would do so even if the managers were their fathers
and the prima donnas their sweethearts. These fellows would
presently find their principals figuring as defendants in libel
actions taken by my artists. They would learn from bitter ex-
perience that they must either hold their tongues about the short-
comings in my theatre, or else find themselves costing more in
damages and lawyers' fees than any paper could afford to spend
on its musical department alone; and the full accomplishment of
this would not cost me a thousand pounds if I managed it
adroitly. If one big manager can do this, what could not a ring
of managers and concert-agents do by organizing a boycott
against any obnoxious critic? They could drive him out of his
profession, unless his danger roused his colleagues to the need
for a counter-organization, which would not be easy in an occu-
pation which employs so much casual and unskilled labor as
musical criticism. In short, then, I pursue my present calling by
sufferance by a sort of informal Geneva convention, which
puts actions-at-law in the same category with explosive bullets.
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
When a combatant shews the least disposition to violate this con-
vention, I prudently avoid him altogether. At the same time, I do
not object to retorts in kind. The one manager with whom I feel
on perfectly easy terms runs a paper of his own; and whenever I
libel his enterprises in this column to the tune of 500 damages,
he does not meanly take an action against me, but promptly fires
off a round thousand worth of libels on me in his own paper. I
appreciate his confidence as he appreciates mine; and we write
reciprocally with complete freedom, whereas, if we suspected
any possibility of litigiousness, we should never dare allude to
one another.
I offer this little glimpse behind the scenes partly to explain to
a bewildered public how it is that only the most desperate and
ungovernable critics say half what they think al^out the short-
comings of the performances they sample, and partly to com-
plete my reasons for going down to the entrance of St James's
Hall between the parts of the Philharmonic Concert to ascertain
whether there was a tremendous eruption of musical activity
going on unknown to me under the auspices of the gentlemen
who shelter their enterprises from criticism beneath the shield of
Dodson and Fogg.
But there was nothing of the sort: the season has not recovered
from the discouragement of the failure of the concerts given by
the Manchester band, and the recoil after the disastrous over-
speculation of the year before last, when the program of each week
was as long as the program for the month is now. At the Phil-
harmonic concert in question, the chief attraction was Joachim,
who played Bruch's new concerto badly outrageously, in fact
for the first twenty bars or so, and then recovered himself
and played the rest splendidly. The orchestra played Mr Cowen's
suite de ballet, entitled The Language of Flowers, very prettily,
though the audience must have felt that, in the absence of any
dancing, the performance was much as if Mr Cowen had ar-
ranged the accompaniments of some of his songs for the band,
and given them without the aid of a singer.
As to the other pieces, I am sorry to say that their execution
70
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
shewed a relapse into the old Philharmonic faults from the stand-
ard reached at the Mozart Concert. The death-song from Tristan,
with which Madame Nordica did so well at the London Sym-
phony Concert under Henschel, fell flat: every time the orchestra
began to rise at it Mr Cowen threw up his hand in agony lest the
singer should be drowned. There was not the slightest danger of
that. And, if there had been, she would probably have ^preferred
to risk it rather than have her only chance at the concert spoiled,
as it was, by being handled like a trumpery drawing room ballad.
I call it her only chance; for I am quite sure that Madame Nordica
will agree with me that she was not up to her highest standard of
brilliancy and smoothness of execution in the polacca from
Mignon.
For the rest, nothing but the suite de lallet, and perhaps the
Cherubini overture, had been sufficiently rehearsed; and the old
complaints of superficiality, tameness, dullness, and so on, have
begun again. The fact is, that the Philharmonic thinks its band
above the need for rehearsing as carefully as its rivals. But since
superiority in London means superiority to first-rate competitors,
it can only be secured by the hardest workers. And that is why
the Philharmonic is the worst band of its class in London, and
will remain so until it sets to work in earnest, instead of simply
getting one of its directors to write Panglossian puffs for circula-
tion among the audience, assuring them and the "bigoted" critics
that the Society is the best of all possible societies, and the con-
ductor the best of all possible conductors. It had much better give
its conductor a fair chance, by either shortening its programs or
multiplying its rehearsals, and insisting on a full attendance at
each of them.
At the Crystal Palace concert last Saturday I heard a new note
in thfe orchestra, and traced it to the first flute, Mr Fransella,
whom I have not, as far as I know, had the pleasure of hearing
before, but who shewed himself a fine artist, fully worthy of the
post he has just taken. Mr Arthur Hervey's Overture in G has a
Fate motive and a Love motive, transformable into one another;
this being the latest development of double counterpoint, which
7*
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
used to mean merely that two simultaneously played parts would
sound equally well when you turned them upside down. It
shewed how easily a man of artistic taste and intelligence, with a
dash of imagination, can turn out imposing tone-poems. Mr
Hervey handles the orchestra and manages his themes with such
freedom and ingenuity that I hope he will try his hand at some-
thing more interesting to me than fate and love, for which, in the
abstract, I do not care two straws. The pianist at this concert was
Mr Lamond, who played a swinging concerto of Tchaikowsky's
in the Cyclopean manner, impetuous and formidable, but a little
deficient in eloquence of style and sensitiveness of touch.
Miss Gambogi sang Merc6 dilette well enough to justify her in
having attempted it, which is no small praise; whilst another
singer, a gentleman who had evidently often brought off Dio
possente with applause on the stage, discovered that the only
operatic method known to the Crystal Palace audience was pure
smgiog, ^bidb isahiefcily happened to be his weak point.
.far Easfa^tSne ; there is nothing for the musical critic to do but
go to chordi and listen to Bach's Passion Music. This year, I con-
fess to having neglected my duty for the sake of snatching a few
days out of London before the season sets in at its worst.
In speaking of the performance of the Brothers Webb at the
EaiqpK<e recently, I paid the concertinas they used the compliment
describing them as "English Wheatstoftes of the best sort"
Bete I mwariiy fell into the, old-iasshio&ed habit of speaking of
tbe EngKsfa concertkja as the Wheatstone concertina, the instru-
a^t twlog been! mve^tt fey the late Sir diaries Wheatstone.
lib s ^i&e:9 Wheatstoiie still ftottrishes; but the manufacture
f WieatstcHie cQCioertmas is no more peculiar to it today than
the nisaimfec^re of saAorns Is w the hbuse of Sax^ or of Boehm
iutes to the rq^reseatative^ of Boehm. Now Mr Jones, of 350
CfHmaefcfe} Road, Eas% ^bo^jp^ii^uired tte.i^mnnents I
altaded t0,aiKtwfao dabusAe Messrs Wetfeas fejs pfcpi!&> thinks
72
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
that my way of putting the case confers the credit due to him
upon Messrs Wheatstone of Burlington Street.
Accordingly, he not only asks me to correct my statement
forthwith, but, I regret to say, deprives my willing compliance
of much of its grace by adding that he will place the matter in
the hands of his solicitor if I dont. The oddity of this threat lies
in the fact that to mistake any English concertina for one made
by Messrs Wheatstone, who have much the same prestige among
concertina makers as Messrs Broadwood have among pianoforte
makers, is to pay it a very high compliment. Possibly Mr Jones
feels on this point much as Mr Whistler did when he uttered his
celebrated "Why drag in Velasquez?" But I wonder whether if
I had by mistake attributed the portrait of Miss Alexander to
Velasquez, Mr Whistler would have threatened to place the
matter in the hands of his solicitor? I confess I wonder still more
what could possibly happen to me if he did? However, if I cannot
quite understand Mr Jones's legal position, I can sympathize tvith
his desire to get full credit for his two fine instruments; and I shall
in future take due care not to hark back ambiguously to the father
of English concertina makers.
The last Monday Popular Concert of the season came off on
Monday week with the usual demonstrations. Joachim and Ner-
uda played Bach's concerto in D minor, and were so applauded
that they at last returned to play again with a new accompanist in
the person of Hall6, who was received with three times three, but
who probably retained his own opinion as to the way his Man-
chester enterprise was treated by the London amateurs. Mr Plun-
ket Greene sang three songs by Lully, Cornelius, and Schumaim
admirably in the first part of die concert; but whether he waited
for the second part in a draught, or was disheartened by the
trashy quality of the Magyar song which he sang afterwards,
certain it is that he made hardly anything of his second oppor-
tunity. There were two quintets, the great G minor of Mozart
and die E flat of Schumann, one of the best of his works. Miss
Fanny Davies, who accompanied Joachim in some of his arrang^
ments of Brahms' Hungarian dances, was foil of those <wtws
. 73
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
tricks and manners of hers which so often suggest wicket-keeping
rather than pianoforte-playing; and Miss Agnes Zimmermann
played the pianoforte part in the Schumann quintet like the excel-
lent artist she is. Piatti gave us Kol Nidrei, and retired covered
with glory, as who should say, "Well, ladies and gentlemen: you
have been making remarks on my age, and listening to Popper,
Becker, Hollman, and all sorts of wonderful people; and yet here
I am precisely where I was." Joachim was very warmly greeted
indeed; and I am not surprised at it; for he seems to be passing
now through a sort of St Martin's summer of his talent Three or
four years ago it seemed to me ttiat he was living more on his re-
putation than on his current achievements; but this year and last
his playing would have made his reputation afresh if it had never
been made before.
In answer to a request for my opinion of the new Brahms
quintet, I must explain that I did not hear it. Messrs Chappell,
proibably knowing that I am not to be trusted on the subject of
lrfte&, forbore to invite me on the occasions of its performance;
and I was quite content to know nothing of the important event
in progress. If there is one thing of which I am more convinced
than another it is the worthlessness of criticisms that have dislike
at the back of them. Now I do not exactly dislike Brahms; but I
can never quite get over that confounded Requiem of his. There-
fore, I am not going to meet the quintet half-way. It will come to
me some day, I have no doubt; and I shall do my best to make it
prove the validity of the estimate of Brahms as a serious com-
poser which I have so often expressed. Until then, why should
one another?
\ : ' , 27 April 1892
^m^sd& fe so good an opera of its kind that I am quite at a
loss m &$n facrtf it succeeded in getting itself trusted to the
saerey of London. The plan of the work is almost perfect: the
dainty combination of farce and fairy tale in an historical frame-
work could hardly be more happily hit off. The farce is void of all
wlgarity; the fairy tak proceeds by natural magic alone, giving
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
us its Cinderellas and its princesses without any nursery miracles;
ahd the pie-crust of history is as digestible as if it had been rolled
by the great Dumas himself. Add to this that the music has a
charming liveliness, and that whilst Messager, the composer, has
avoided the more hackneyed and obvious turns of the modern
operatic stock-in-trade in a fresh, clever, cultivated, and ingeni-
ous way, yet he does not presume upon his ability. The man who
knows his place as well as this is scarce in French art, where the
colder and less humorous talents waste themselves on bogus
classicism, and the lighter-hearted throw away all self-respect
and take to what polite policemen call gaiety. Paris encouraged
Meyerbeer in posing as the successor of Mozart and Beethoven,
as it encourages Saint-Saens and Massenet in posing as the suc-
cessors of Meyerbeer; whilst it allowed Offenbach and Lecocq
openly to play the fool with their art. And London, unfortun-
ately, never had any proper accommodation for the works of
Auber, who kept his self-respect without losing his head. Our
operatic stages were always either too large or too rowdy for his
dainty operas.
Now that Mr*D'Oyly Carte has at last given us the right sort
of theatre for musical comedy, it is too late for Auber: we have
had enough of the serenade in Fra Diavolo and the Crown
Diamonds galop, and can no longer stand the Scribe libretto
which sufficed to keep our fathers from grumbling. We want con-
temporary work of the Auber class. The difficulty, so far, has
been to find a contemporary Auber. The Gilbertian opera did
not exactly fill the vacancy: it was an altogether peculiar pro-
duct, extravagant and sometimes vulgar, as in the case of the
inevitable old woman brought on to be jeered at simply because
she was old, but still with an intellectual foundation with a
certain criticism of life in it. When the Gilbert-Sullivan series
came to an end, the attempt to keep up the school at second-hand
produced the old vulgarity and extravagance without the higher
element; and Savoy opera instantly slipped down towards the
lower level. Sir Arthur Sullivan, meanwhile, made a spring at the
higher one by trying his hand on Ivanhoe, which is a good aovel
75
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
turned Into the very silliest sort of sham "grand opera." I hardly
Believed that the cumulative prestige of Sir Walter Scott, Sir
Arthur Sullivan, Mr D'Oyly Carte with his new English Opera
House, and the very strong company engaged, not to mention
log-rolling on an unprecedented scale, could make Ivanhoe pay
a reasonable return on the enormous expenditure it cost. Yet it
turns out that I either overrated the public or underrated the
opera. I fancy I overrated the public.
Now La Basoche is exactly what Ivanhoe ought to have been.
Though it is a comic opera, it can be relished without several
years' previous initiation as a bar loafer. The usual assumption
that the comic-opera audience is necessarily a parcel of futile
blackguards, destitute not only of art and scholarship, but of the
commonest human interests and sympathies, is not countenanced
for a moment during the performance. The opposite, and if pos-
sible more offensive and ridiculous, assumption that it consists of
undesirably naive schoolgirls is put equally out of the question:
you can take your daughter to see it without either wishing that
you had left her at home or being bored to death. You attain, in
short, to that happy region which lies between the pity and terror
of tragic opera and the licentious stupidity and insincerity of
opera-bouffe.
Now comes the question, What is going to happen to The
Basoche? The opera-goers who support the long runs upon
which Mr Carte depends for the recoupment of his princely ex-
penditure, must be largely taken from the social strata upheaved
by popular education within the last twenty years. These novices
have only just learned, partly from glimpses of Wagner, but
mostly from the Savoy operas, that music can be dramatic in
itself, and that an opera does not mean merely the insertion of
songs like When other lips into plays otherwise too bad to be
tolerated. Only the other day they were encoring The flowers
that bloom in the spring, tra la, I forget how many times every
evening, with a childish delight in frank tomfoolery and turn-
turn which a digger or backwoodsman might have shared with
them. In Ivanhoe they found plenty of the old rum-turn, with
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
sentimentality substituted for the tomfoolery, and a huge stage
glitter; and it is these, and not the elegance of the musical work-
manship or the memories of Scott's story, which have kept the
work on the stage so long for it is still flourishing: it was re-
vived last Friday, with Mr Barton McGuckin in the title-part.
I begin to think that Mr Sturgis was right in concluding that
the first thing to do with Scott, in order to adapt him to the Cam-
bridge Circus audience, was to remove his brains. Now, on the
plane of The Basoche there is neither tomfoolery nor sentiment-
ality: the atmosphere is that of high comedy, of the very lightest
kind, it is true, but still much cooler, wittier, finer, more intelli-
gent than that of either Ivanhoe or The Nautch Girl. It remains
to be seen whether the admirers of these works will respond to
the new appeal. If they do not if Mr D'Oyly Carte is forced
back on the normal 'assumption that the respectable opera-goer
must be catered for as at best a good-humored, soft-hearted,
slow-witted blockhead, void of all intellectual or artistic cultiva-
tion, then the critics may as well abandon English opera to its
fate for another generation or so. There is no use in our making
ourselves disagreeable to the managers by .clamoring for higher
art, if the managers can simply retort by shewing us rows of
empty benches as the result of complying with our demands.
Deep as is the affection in which I am held by most of our
London impresarios, they can hardly be expected to ruin them-
selves solely to carry out my ideas.
Mr Carte, in mounting the piece, seems to have had no mis-
giving about its running powers. He has not only spent a huge
sum of money on it, but he has apparently got value for every
penny of his outlay. This sort of economy is so rare among
managers for instance, Mr Irving, in a Shakespearean revival,
generally contrives to spoil a scene or two; whilst Sir Augustus
Harris will occasionally slaughter a whole opera, like poor Orfeo,
by dint of misdirected expenditure I say it is so rare, that I
strongly suspect that Mrs Carte comes to the rescue at the Royal
English Opera just at the point where the o&er jm&agess hf@afc
down. However that may be, the only disparaging
77
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
have to offer on the staging of The Basoche is, that the dance at
the beginning of the third act is a pointless, poorly invented
affair, and that the scene, considering that the audience consent
to wait half an hour to allow time for its setting, ought to be a
wonder of French Gothic, best of the best, which can hardly be
said for it at present, handsome as it is.
However, the fact that things have progressed far enough to
set me complaining that the scene-painters have not saturated
the stage with the architectural beauty of the Middle Ages, proves
the attainment of something like perfection from the ordinary
standpoint. Bianchini's dresses are admirable; and the movements
of the crowds engaged in the action are free alike from the silly
stage-drill of opera-bouffe and the hopeless idiocy and instinctive
ugliness of our Italian choristers. As the work has been thoroughly
rehearsed, and the band is up to the best English standard of deli-
cacy and steadiness, I think it must be admitted that, incredible
a&it may sound, we have at last got an opera-house where musical
wodfcs ase? treated as seriously and handsomely as dramatic works
a$e at the Lyceum. Mr Carte has really put London, as far as his
department of art is concerned, in a leading position for us; and
tfae acknowledgment of that service can hardly be too cordial.
' Tfae "dram of eale" in the matter is, that The Basoche is the
work of a French author and a French composer. Such draw-
backs> however, cannot be helped as long as we abandon high
musical comedy to the French, and persist in setting men who
are not dramatists to compile nonsensical plays of the obsolete
Mfler and his Men type, in order that popular musicians, of
gloved incapacity for tragedy, may pepper them with senti-
mental ballads, and make royalties out of them when para-
gisapfaisJs faarve puffed them as pages of grand opera*
Mpor Ae fdacipal performers in The Basoche I have nothing
b&i liaise, as they are all quite equal to the occasion, and do no
less than their best. A prodigious improvement in the diction
and stage manners of the company has taken place since the
opening of die theatre. Even Mr Ben Davies conquers, not with-
out evidences of an occasional internal struggle, his propensity
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
to bounce out of the stage picture and deliver his high notes over
the footlights in the attitude of irrepressible appeal first dis-
covered by the inventor of Jack-in-the-box. Being still suffi-
ciently hearty, good-humored, and well-filled to totally dispel all
the mists of imagination which arise from his medieval surround-
ings, he is emphatically himself, and not Clement Marot; but ex-
cept in so far as his opportunities are spoiled in the concerted
music by the fact that his part is a baritone part, and not a tenor
one, he sings satisfactorily, and succeeds in persuading the audi-
ence that the Basoche king very likely was much the same
pleasant sort of fellow as Ben Davies.
Miss Palliser is to be congratulated on having a light, florid
vocal part instead of a broad, heavy one, in which she would
probably knock her voice to pieces through her hard way of
using it; but the inevitable association of the light music with
comedy is less fortunate for her, as her dramatic capacity evi-
dently lies rather in the expression of strong feeling. On the
other hand, Miss Lucile Hill, who was thrown away as Rowena,
has in Colette a part which exactly suits her genuine humor, her
qtiiet cleverness, and her well, whatever is the feminine of bon-
homie. And then she affords one the relief of hearing a singer
whose method of producing her voice is not also a method of
finally destroying it Nine times out of ten, when a prima donna
thinks I am being thrilled through and through by her vibrant
tones, I am simply wrestling with an impulse to spring on the
stage and say, "My dear young lady, pray dont. Your voice Is not
a nail, to be driven into my head: I did not come here to play
Sisera to your Jael. Pray unstring yourself, subdue your ebullient
self-assertiveness, loosen your chin and tongue, round the back
of your throat, and try to realize that the back of the pit is not a
thousand yards beyond ordinary earshot." Miss Hill, far too
sensible to need such exhortation, gets her encores as triumph-
antly as if she shortened her natural term as a singer by two years
every time she sang a song in public. And her acting, for the pur-
pose of this particular part, could hardly be bettered. Mr Burgo%
Mr Bispham, and the rest, down to the players of the snjalkst
79
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
parts, make the most of their tolerably easy work. Altogether, if
we do not take kindly to The Basoche, we may make up our
minds to ninety-nine chances in the hundred of having to fall
back on something worse in its place.
4 May 1892
HERR HEINRICH LUTTERS, who gave a pianoforte recital at St
James's Hall last week, is not what one would call a magnetic
player. He is accurate and businesslike, reasonably tasteful and
intelligent, and altogether the sort of artist you praise when you
want to disparage the other sort. His interpretation of Beethoven
and Schumann is commonplace; and his technique, though trim
and gentlemanlike, is undistinguished in Quality, and particularly
deficient in dynamic gradation, his changes from piano to forte
sometimes sounding more mechanical than those of the best sort .
of clockwork orchestrion.
I seldom now write a criticism of a player without wondering
isfaa&iiBptession I am producing upon my readers. The terms I
pse^ Ac^i ifaey appear to me to be, taken with their context,
perfectly intefligiHe, must suggest the most unexpected and un-
fatjeoded ideas, if I may judge by the way my correspondents
take tfaem* For example, on the occasion of Mr E. Silas's per-
fonnance of Ms own concerto at the Crystal Palace, I made, in
estimating the work from the .performance, a certain allowance
for what I called the lack of technical quality in Mr Silas's play-
ing. By which I meant that Mr Silas's touch was not that of the
trained atblete of the pianoforte, able to bring out upon every
step of a rapid scale the utmost and finest tone the instrument is
capable of.yfeidisg. This power is the foundation of such tech-
aiques as , Aose of PaderewsH and Rubinstein.
|Hi^eaa^|)feai^ of excellent musicians and good teachers who
^fltlf ^fsy J^htdy and neatly "with their right hands, and
i^qp Way mtb:tfae greatest vigor and spMt with their left
T$S, fefeSKje% -win 0ot play in half a year as many wrong notes as
hetol both Paderewski and Rubinstein play in half a
, and wfao ase imvahable as accompanists an4 professors,
So
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
retired disheartened at the end of the first part, which concluded
with those heavy and barren variations by Saint-Saens for two
pianos, on a theme of Beethoven's. In the meantime Mr Norman
Salmond had sung Tyrannic Love, accompanied by his wife,
who also took the second piano in the Saint-Saens piece; and
Simonetti, the Italian violinist, had played a couple of pieces
by Beethoven and Sarasate in his clever, free-and-easy way, just
too free-and-easy to be perfectly classical.
Mr Mann's benefit at die Crystal Palace was, of course, a huge
success, and would have been made so by the unassailable popu-
larity of the beneficiary if it had been the worst concert ever
known. Its only fault was that there was too much of it. It began
with Mr Hamish MacCunn's overture, The Dowie Dens o'
Yarrow, which has a good musical fight in the middle section,
but is otherwise a predestined failure, since, it is impossible to
tell a story in sonata form, because the end of a story is not a re-
capitulation of the beginning, and the end of a movement in
SQiiata form is. Mr MacCunn has chosen his subject like a school-
boy, and tes form like a pedant, the result being some excellent
thematic material spoiled, and another example held up of the
danger of mixing genres in musical composition, a danger already
quite sufficiently exemplified by the follies of Sterndale Bennett
in overture composition. Mr Manns might perhaps have given
the work a more consistent air by a melodramatic treatment of
the opening section; but as this would have been an artistic con-
descension as well as a forlorn hope, it is not to be wondered at
that he did not attempt it.
The most noteworthy event at the concert was the first appear-
e ia England of Gabriele Wietrowetz, who bounded into
,
immediate popularity on the back of Mendelssohn's violin con-
certo. She has been thoroughly trained, and has abundant nervous
energy; but her performance of the work was only a highly
finished copy of the best models. It left me quite in the dark as to
her unaided original capacity. Not that she is a mechanical copy-
WE: she seizes on her model and assimilates it with an intensity
which amounts to positive passion. Whether she can interpret for
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
herself at first hand remains to be seen.
Another artist who was new to me was Madame Marie Mely,
whose voice, though somewhat worn, is still one of rare beauty.
Unfortunately she does not appear to have learned what to do
with her middle register, which is veiled and uncertain; and this
defect, with a certain languor in her delivery possibly the effect
of indisposition or nervousness and the characteristically Italian
vein of tragedy in the song she chose (Pace, pace, mio Dio! from
Verdi's Forza del Destine), rather perplexed the audience, in
spite of the peculiarly fine and touching quality of some of the
singer's upper notes.
Mr Andrew Black got and deserved much applause for
Vanderdecken's scene from the first act of The Flying Dutch-
man, which can only be made effective by one who knows how
to handle his voice all over, from top to bottom, like a competent
vocal workman. Beethoven's Choral Fantasia, the slenderest
measure of justice to which always enchants me, was played by
Miss Fanny Davies. To those who cannot understand how any-
body could touch a note' of that melody without emotion, her
willing, affable, slap-dash treatment of it was a wonder,.
The Philharmonic concert last Wednesday was better than the
previous one. The worst of this admission is that the Philhar-
monic is certain to presume on it by so neglecting its next pro-
gram that it will be necessary to invent some exceptionally
poignant form of insult to flog it up to the mark again. It is the
most troublesome of Societies, this old Philharmonic, without
conscience, without manners, without knowledge enough to
distinguish between Benoit and Beethoven or Moszkowski and
Mozart except by tradition, unable to see anything in its own
prestige and its great opportunities except a pretext for giving
itself airs. We all do our best to keep it going, sometimes by coax-
ing and petting it, sometimes by cuffing it when it gets too ex-
asperating, not unfrequently by telling the innocent public lies
about it, and giving it the credit that is really due to Manns,
Richter, Henschel, Halle, and others.
There is nothing to prevent the band being the best in the
83
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
world, and the concerts from leading music in Europe, except the
belatedness of the directorate, which at the present time includes
a clear majority whose ages range from fifty-seven to seventy-
one. As none of these gentlemen would have passed as specially
advanced musicians thirty years ago, and as since that time there
has been something like a revolution in music (the position may
be faintly realized by recalling the fact that Lohengrin, now more
hackneyed than II Trovatore, provoked a furious controversy on
its production here as a daring novelty in 1875, when it was
twenty-eight years old), I think I may fairly say that the placing
of them in a majority shews that the Society takes no real thought
or trouble about electing its Board, particularly as there are
plenty of vigorous and up-to-date members to choose from.
The chief event at this last concert was the playing of Bee-
thoven's E flat concerto by Madame Sophie Menter. Poor Bee-
thoven came out of it better than I expected. When the joyous
Sophie lays her irresistible hands on a composer who has any-
tfaiog of a serious turn, he seldom escapes in a recognizable con-
dition, I have seen her leave Weber and Schumann for dead on
the platform. To see her play a Beethoven sonata in her puissant,
splendid, tireless manner, without any perceptible yielding to its
poetry or purpose, and yet presiding over its notes and chords
with a certain superb power, is a spectacle that never palls on
me. In the concerto, however, Beethoven, though somewhat put
out of countenance at first, finally rose to the occasion, and gave
her all die could manage of the softly brilliant, impetuous revelry
which suits her Austrian temperament and her Lisztian style.
At. the end came die usual burst of Menter worship; and the
Joyo*i% exalted by the occasion, returned and played Liszt's Erl
Bsgl^jscripticm. The symphony was Raffs Lenore, in which
a geeat ftisi: :was made of the crescendo of the march. The open-
lag piasissamb was certainly successful enough; but the cKmax
oogfct lo have been much more magnificent. It is not enough for
aa prc&estra to "be able to coo: it should be able to thunder as
well The Lenore symphony requires rather more study and
stage management, so to sp^atk, than a Philharmonic conductor
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
can be expected to give to it unless it has a special attraction for
him; and so I do not blame Mr Cowen for having foiled to excite
the audience sufficiently to conceal the weakness of the work as a
symphony, especially in the last movement, which will not bear
cool examination, notwithstanding its one really imaginative
theme and the clever picture of the night scene before the arrival
of William's ghost.
It is odd, by the bye, that the program-writer never points out
that William's appearance is preceded by a Wagnerian quotation
of the phrase in which Vanderdecken speaks of the resurrection
that is to release him from his curse. But your born program- -
writer is always so much bent on pointing out some marvellous
harmonic surprise caused by a masterly resolution of D, F, G, B,
into C, E, G, C, that he seldom has time to mention matters con-
nected with the poetic basis of the music. Except in this last move-
ment, which ended rather raggedly, the performance was careful
and precise, shewing that its preparation had not been altogether
perfunctory. Still, it was far from being as perfect as that of Mr
Villiers Stanford's (Edipus prelude, in which the composer's
imagination occasionally gets the better, for once in a way, of
his scholarly trivialities. The Rex theme might have been more
broadly handled by Mr Cowen, even at the cost of comparative
roughness: otherwise, the band made the most of the piece.
it May 1892
ONLY the other day I remarked that I was sure to come across
Brahms' new clarionet quintet sooner or later. And, sure enough,
my fate overtook me last week at Mr G. Clinton's Wind Concert
at Steinway Hall. I shall not attempt to describe this latest exploit
of the Leviathan Maunderer. It surpassed my utmost expecta-
tions: I never heard such a work in my life. Brahms' enormous
gift of music is paralleled by nothing on earth but Mr Gladstone's
gift of words: it is a verbosity which outfaces its own common-
placeness by dint of sheer magnitude. The first movement of the
quintet is the best; and had the string players been on sufficie&tiy
85
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
easy terms with it, they might have softened it and given effect to
its occasional sentimental excursions into dreamland. Unluckily
they were all preoccupied with the difficulty of keeping together;
and they were led by a violinist whose bold, free, slashing style,
though useful in a general way, does more harm than good when
the strings need to be touched with great tenderness and sensi-
tiveness.
Mr Clinton played the clarionet part with scrupulous care, but
without giving any clue to his private view of the work, which,
though it shews off the compass and contrasts the registers of the
instrument in the usual way, contains none of the haunting
phrases which Weber, for instance, was able to find for the ex-
pression of its idiosyncrasy. The presto of the third movement is
a ridiculously dismal version of a lately popular hornpipe. I first
heard it at the pantomime which was produced at Her Majesty's
Theatre a few years ago; and I have always supposed it to be a
composition of Mr Solomon's. Anyhow, the street-pianos went
through an epidemic of it; and it certainly deserved a merrier fate
diaa burying alive in a Brahms quintet. Quite charming, after the
quintet, was Thuille's elegant and well-written sextet for wood,
wind, horn, and pianoforte, the slow movement of which begins
as if the horn had forgotten itself and were absently wandering
into See the Conq'ring Hero. Messrs Griffiths, Clinton, Malsch,
Borsdorf, Wotton junior, and Oscar Beringer were the execut-
ants. Miss Clara Samuell sang one of Dr Mackenzie's best songs
admirably; and I could say the same for her Nymphs and Shep-
herds if she had not made one of those absurd attempts to turn
the final cadence into a cadenza by altering the penultimate note
aod hanging on to it a sort of daptrap which one hardly ex-
pects to bear at this time of day, except at third-rate concerts or
in tbe pmviaces. It is only at the Opera that such things are still
perpetrated by artists of first-rate pretension.
Tbe performance of Elijah at the Albert Hall last Wednesday
was one of remarkable excellence. The tone from the choir was
dean and unadulterated: there was no screaming from the so-
pranos, nor brawling from the tenors, nor growling from the
86
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
basses. In dispensing with these three staple ingredients of Eng-
lish choral singing Mr Barnby has achieved a triumph which can
only be appreciated by those who .remember as well as I do what
the choir was like in its comparatively raw state some fifteen
years ago. Nowadays he gets the high notes taken piano as easily
as the middle ones; and the sharpness of attack and the willing
vigor and consentaneousness of the singing when the music in
hand is as familiar to the singers and as congenial to the con-
ductor as Mendelssohn's, are all that could be desired.
I sat out the performance on "Wednesday to the last note, an
act of professional devotion which was by no means part of my
plan for the evening; and I did not feel disposed to quarrel with
Mr Barnby more than twice. The first time was over the chorus
Hear us, Baal, which he quite spoiled by taking allegro molto. If
he had taken it as Mendelssohn directed, allegro non troppo, with
the quaver accompaniment excessively detached, and the theme
struck out in pompous, stately strokes, the result would have
convinced him that Mendelssohn knew quite well what he was
about; and the chorus would not have discounted, by anticipation,
the effect of the startled Hear our cry, O Baal, or of the frantic
Baal, hear and answer. The second occasion was of the same kind.
The chorus Then did Elijah the prophet break forth like a fire
was taken almost twice too fast, in spite of Mendelssohn's in-
structions. For surely no- difference of opinion as to the right
tempo can extend to making a rattling allegro of a movement
marked moderato maestoso. The consequence was that the unac-
companied phrase And when the Lord would take him away to
heaven sounded ludicrously hasty; and there was no sensation at
the end like that after Thanks be to God: He laveth the thirsty
land, which, taken as Mendelssohn ordered it to be"taken, roused
the audience to enthusiasm. Madame Albani hardly needed the
apology which was circulated for her on the ground of a "severe
cold" which she simply had not got, though I have no doubt she
was suffering, as we all were, from the abominable east wind.
The selection of Mr Ben Davies and Madame Belle Cole for the
tenor and contralto parts could not easily have been improved
8?
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
on; and though Mr Watkin Mills began badly, and did not at any
time exactly break forth like a fire, he was not too far over-
parted.
The audience was a huge one, shewing, after all deductions
for the numbers of the foolish people who only run after the re-
putations of the solo singers, that there is no falling off in the
great popularity of Elijah. This need not be regretted so long as
it is understood that our pet oratorio, as a work of religious art,
stands together with the pictures of Scheffer and Paton, and the
poems of Longfellow and Tennyson, sensuously beautiful in the
most refined and fastidiously decorous way, but thoughtless.
That is to say, it is not really religious music at all. The best of it
is seraphic music, like the best of Gounod's; but you have only
to think of Parsifal, of the Ninth Symphony, of Die Zauberflote,
of the inspired moments of Handel and Bach, to see the great
gulf that lies between the true religious sentiment and our delight
in Mendelssohn's exquisite prettiness. The British public is con-
vinced in its middle age that Then shall the righteous shine forth
as the sua> is divine, on grounds no better and no worse than
tfaose on which, in its callow youth, it adores beautiful girls as
angek Far from desiring to belittle such innocent enthusiasm, I
rather echo Mr' Weller's plea that "Arter all, gen'lmen, it's an
amiable weakness."
At the same time, a vigorous .protest should be entered when-
ever an attempt is made to scrape a layer off the praise due to the
seraphs in order to spread it over the prophet in evening dress,
who, in feeble rivalry with the Handelian prophet's song of the
power that is "like a refiner's fire/' informs the atudience, with a
i4dous exultation worthy of Mrs Clennam, that "God is angry
mk tfae !wieid every day." That is the worst of your thought-
lessly $earaphi# composer: he is a wonder whilst he is flying; but
K*ea his wings fail him, he walks like a parrot.
W$ have aow reached the season at which professional ladies
lad gentlemen are wont to give what they call their annual con-
*3ts> aad sometimes to take it very ill on my part that I find so
Me to say abom^em. But what can I do when the programs
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
contain nothing that I have not described at least forty thousand
times already? No matter how charmingly Madame Belle Cole
may sing Sognai and O Fatima, or how featiy Tivadar Nachez
may play RafFs rigadoon, there must at last come a time when
the public will yawn over my opinion of these performances,
however wide awake it may remain during the performances
themselves. The same observation must cover the case of Mr
Plunket Greene's German Lieder, as it soon will, no doubt, that
of the irresistible Irish soldier's song which he sang the other
night at Miss Shee's concert at Steinway Hall, to an old tune ar-
ranged by Mr Fuller Maitland. Having been a Bayreuth flower-
maiden (one of the enchantresses of Klingsor's magic garden, and
not a vendor of buttonholes), Miss Shee herself rather challenged
criticism as an artist of some pretension. She is so young that I
am almost afraid to tell her that she has still much to learn
notably two things. Number one, never to sing with that wind
pressure which blew out the shake at the end of the Jewel Song
like a candle before it was finished, and which is quite able to do
for a whole voice in less than four years what it did for the shake
in less than four seconds. Number two, to learn the difference
between Italian vowels and English diphthongs. "Ei la figlia
d' un rei che ognun dei salutarei" is not Italian: neither is "mi
troverebbei bela." It is perhaps rather hard on Miss Shee that I
should single her out for a fault which sets my teeth on edge
almost every time I enter a concert room where English singers
are singing Italian songs; but I really must be allowed to break
qut into protest sometimes, necessarily at somebody's expense.
Why on earth cannot they go to my veteran friend, Tito PagB-
ardini, and get him to set their vowels right? For the rest,* Miss
Shee's is a pretty talent; and I hope she may succeed in cultivat-
ing it to perfection. My evening was divided between her concert
and Mr Ernest Kiver's, at which I heard a new string quartet by
Reinecke, full of all the composer's engaging qualities. It might
have been better played; but this is an inevitable criticism except
where the four players have been able to work together for years.
I took an opportunity the other night of acquainting myself
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
with Miss Collinses interpretation of Ta-ra-ra, etc. It is a most
instructive example of the value of artistic method in music-hall
singing, and may be contrasted by students with Violette's crude
treatment of the same song. Violette's forced and screaming self-
abandonment is a complete failure: Miss Collins's perfect self-
possession and calculated economy of effort carry her audience
away. She takes the song at an exceedingly restrained tempo, and
gets her effect of entrain by marking the measure very pointedly
and emphatically, and articulating her words with ringing bril-
liancy and with immense assurance of manner. The dance re-
frain, with its tjiree low kicks on "Ta-ra-ra" and its high kick
on "Boom" (with grosse caisse adlib.\ is the simplest thing ima-
ginable, and is taken in even a more deliberate tempo than the
preceding verse.
Miss Collins appears to be in fine athletic training; and the
combination of perfect sang-froid and unsparing vigor with
which she carries out her performance, which is so exhaustively
studied that not a bar of it is left to chance or the impulse of the
moment^, ought to convince the idlest of her competitors and the
most cynical of music-hall managers that a planned artistic
achievement "catches on" far more powerfully than any random
explosion of brainless rowdiness. I do "not propose to add to the
host of suggestions as to the origin of the tune. As it is only a
figuration of the common major chord, it is to be found almost
wherever you choose to look for it. In the last movement of
Mozart's finest pianoforte sonata in F, in the opening allegro of
Beethoven's septuor, and even in the first movement of Mendel-
sohn's violin concerto, it will henceforth make itself felt by all
rfsose who continue obsessed by it
18 May 1892
THE otfeer dayman actor published a book of directions for mak-
ing a good play. His plan was a simple one. Take all the devices
which bring down the house in existing plays; make a new one
by stringing them all together; and there you are. If that book
succeeds, I am prepared to write a similar treatise on opera com-
9,
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
position. I know quite a lot of things that would be of great use
to any young composer. For instance, when two lovers are on
the stage together, be sure you make them catch sight of the
moon or stars and gaze up rapturously whilst the violins discourse
ravishing strains with their mutes on. Mutes are also useful for
spinning-wheel business and for fires, as in Marta and Die
Walkiire.
For dreamy effects, tonic pedals as patented by Gounod and
Bizet are useful. When large orchestras are available, broad
melodies on the fourth string of the violins may be relied on for
a strong and popular impression. When the heroine is alone on
the stage, a rapid, agitated movement, expressive of her anticipa-
tion of the arrival of her lover, and culminating in a vigorous
instrumental and vocal outburst as he rushes on the stage and
proceeds without an instant's loss of time to embrace her ardently,
never fails to leave the public breathless. The harmonic treat-
ment of this situation is so simple that nobody can fail to master
it in a few lessons. The lady must first sing the gentleman's name
on the notes belonging to the chord of the dominant seventh in
some highly unexpected key; the gentleman then vociferates the
lady's name a peg higher on the notes of a more extreme discord;
and, finally, the twain explode simultaneously upon a brilliant
six-four chord, leading, either directly through the dominant
chord, or after some pretty interruption of the cadence, to a flow-
ing melody in which the gentleman either protests his passion or
repeatedly calls attention to the fact that at last they meet again.
The whole situation should be repeated in the last act, with
the difference that this time it is the gentleman who must be
alone at the beginning. Furthermore, he must be in a gloomy
dungeon, not larger at the outside than the stage of Covent
Garden Theatre; and he must be condemned to die next morn-
ing. The reason for putting the gentleman, rather than the lady,
in this situation is to be found in the exclusion of women from
politics, whereby they are deprived of the privilege of being
condemned to death, without any reflection on their personal
characters, for heading patriotic rebellions. The difficulty has
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
nevertheless been successfully got over by making 'the lady go
mad in the fourth act, and kill somebody, preferably her own
child. Under these circumstances she may sing almost anything
she pleases of a florid nature in her distraction, and may take the
gentleman's place in the prison-cell in the next act without for-
feiting the moral approval of the audience. Florid mad scenes,
though they are very pretty when the lady's affliction is made to
take the playful turn of a trial of skill with the first flute^ which
should partly imitate the voice and partly accompany it in
thirds, is now out of fashion; and it is far better, in dramatic
opera, to be entirely modern in style.
Fortunately, the rule for modernity of style is easily remem-
bered and applied. In fact, it is one of the three superlatively easy
rules, the oilier two being the rules for writing Scotch and archaic
music. For Scotch music, as everyone knows, you sustain E flat
and B flat in the bass for a drone, and play at random in some
Scotch measure on the notes which are black on the piano. For
archaic music you harmonize in the ordinary way in the key of
E major; but in playing you make the four sharps of the key
natural, reading the music as if it was written in the key of C,
which, of course, simplifies the execution as far as the piano is
concerned. The effect will be diabolical; but nobody will object
if you explain that your composition is in the Phrygian mode. If
a still more poignant effect be desired, write in B natural, leaving
out die sharps as before, and calling the mode Hypophrygian. If,
as is possible, the Phrygian is more than the public can stand,
write in D without sharps, and call the mode Dorian, when the
audience will accept you as being comfortably in D minor, except
wiien you fed that it is safe to excruciate them with the C natural.
This & easy, but not more so than the rule for making music
souod modern.
For eompbsitioijs w the major, all that is necessary is to write
^rfiaary diatonic harmonies, and then go over them with a pen
and cross the t>s, as it were, fay sharpening all the fifths in the
ooapiooii chords. If the composition is in the minor, the common
chord mist be left unaltered; but whenever it occurs some instru-
92
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
ment must play the major sixth of the key, apropos de bottes, loud
enough to make itself heard rather distinctly. Next morning all
the musical critics will gravely declare that you have been deeply
influenced by the theories of Wagner; and what more can you
desire, if modernity is your foible?
But I am neglecting my week's work. Although I repeat that
"How to compose a good opera" might be written as easily as
"How to write a good play," I must not set about writing it my-
self in this column, although the above sample will shew every
learned musician how thoroughly I am qualified for the task.
The fact is, I had been reading the reviews of Mr Frank Archer's
book; and it set me thinking of what are called actors' plays,
meaning plays which are not plays at all, but compilations con-
sisting of a series of stage effects devised ad hoc. Indeed, stage
effects is too wide a term: actors' effects would be more accurate.
I thought of how hopelessly bad all such works are, even wbea,
as in the case of Gibber's Richard III and Garrick's Katharine
and Petruchio, they are saved from instant perdition by a muti-
lated mass of poetry and drama stolen from some genuine play-
wright.
And then I fell to considering which would be the worst thing
to have to sit out in a theatre an actor's play or a singer's opeia.
Before I could settle the point the clock struck; and I suddenly
realized that if I lost another moment I should miss the one-fifty-
five train to the Crystal Palace, where I was due at two-forty-five
to witness the performance of Mr George Fox's new opera,
Nydia. And when I sat down just now to write an account of
Nydia, it naturally reminded me of Mr Frank Archer, and led to
the above tremendous disgression on the subject of operatic
composition in general.
Nydia is founded on Bulwer Lytton's Last Days of Pompeii, a
novel which I read when a boy. I remember nothing of It except
the name Arbaces, and the Roman sentinel, arid PHny though,
indeed, I am not sure that I did not get the last two out of Chasi-
bers's Miscellany. At all events, I found the libretto of Nydia as
new to me as it is in the nature of any libretfo to be to a ms$&ai
93
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
critic of my age. It began with a bustling crowd, singing:
Water melons, rich and rare,
None excel them we declare;
Olives, figs, and honey sweet,
You will find them hard to beat;
Here is game, wild mountain boar,
Oysters too from Britain's shore,
Come and buy, come and buy.
This was out of Carmen, tune and all, except the oysters; and
even their freshness must have been severely tried by hawking
them in the full blaze of an Italian sun.
Then we had a blind girl with a Leitmotif, also rather like the
jealousy motive in Carmen, with a heroine, lover, and villain, in
due course. The villain, a Pompeian archbishop, held a service in
a temple on the lines of the one in Aida; and die lover came in
and dashed him down the steps of the altar, for which exploit he
was haled away to prison very properly, as I thought in spite
of the entreaties of the heroine. In prison he shared his cell with
a Nazarene, who strove hard, not without some partial success,
to make him see the beauty of being eaten by a lion in the arena.
Next came the amphitheatre, with a gladiator fight which only
needed a gallery full of shrieking vestals with their thumbs turned
down to be perfectly & la Gerome. Then the hero, kept up to the
mark by the Nazarene, was thrown to the lion, whereupon
Vesuvius emitted clouds of spangles and red fire. A scene of
terror and confusion in the streets followed, the crowd standing
stock-still, with its eyes on the conductor, and the villain falling,
slain by lightning, and then creeping off on all-fours behind the
calves of the multitude.
Finally the clouds parted; and we had a- pretty pictorial com-
position of the hero and heroine at sea in a galley with the blind
girl, who presently took a deliberate header into the waves, to
die intense astonishment of everybody except the hero, who,
without making the smallest attempt to save her, set up a thun-
dering Salve eternum just as I was expecting him to break into
94
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
Rosy lips above the water,
Blowing bubbles soft and fine;
As for me, I was no swimmer,
So I lost my Clementine.
Mr Durward Lely sustained the tenor part with great heroism;
and Madame Valda, after innumerable high C's, finished the
third act with a big big D which brought down the house.
Mile de Rideau did her best with the part of the blind girl; and
Messrs Clifford,. Pyatt, King, Joyce, and the rest did, I imagine,
much what the composer expected them to do. The Crystal
Palace orchestra played through the score with deadly skill at a
serene me^o-forte, not paying the smallest attention, as far as I
could perceive, to any of the composer's numerous pianos and
pianissimosy though some of his fortissimos, notably an astound-
ing series of double knocks on the drum in the second act, re-
ceived rather more attention than I should have bargained for
had I been the conductor. On the whole, though I must compli-
ment Mr George Fox on his industry, his ambition, and his
energy, I find that the point of view from which he regards
operatic composition is so far remote from mine that I shall
continue to esteem him rather as a singer than as a composer.
As to the concerts of last week, I have only space to say that
Miss Evangeline Florence, an American soprano with the extra-
ordinary range of three octaves from the B natural below the
treble stave upward (the same, allowing for the rise of pitch, as
that recorded by Mozart of Lucrezia Agujari), made her appear-
ance at a concert given by that clever and cultivated singer, Miss
Marguerite Hall. She fully satisfied the curiosity of the audience as
to her high notes, which sound like violin harmonics of ordinary
quality. She is a pleasant young lady, with a sufficiently strong
turn for music; but she did not strike me as being an artist by
temperament; and I cannot say that her cheerful, rather domestic
kind of musical accomplishment is likely ever to make her inde-
pendent of her upper octave as a public singer*
Of Elkan Kosman, the new Dutch violinist, and of Sir Charles
95
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
Halle*, whom I found on Friday in St James's Hall playing Schu-
bert to Mr John Morley (who was listening with quite a vegetarian
air) and a happy and perfectly attentive audience, I must take
some later opportunity of writing.
25 May 1892
JOSEPH SLIVINSKI, the latest rival of Paderewski, would make an
unparalleled mattre armes. Everything that can be said of Eugene
Pini's wrist is true of each separate joint of Slivinski's fingers. He
is prodigiously swift; and that air of deliberate, undistraught pur-
pose which a man can only maintain when he is at something well
within his physical power, sits unmoved on Slivinski when he is
doing things that Paderewski or Isaye (on the violin) could not
match without some show of desperation. From the purely gym-
nastic point of view he, and not Paderewski, is the exponent of
the Leschetitzky technique; for in his case it has not, as in Pader-
ewski's, become overlaid by a technique of his own: besides,
.bejag natural to him, it does not sound cruel and artistically con-
iiadic&ay from him as it often does from Paderewski. His steely
finger is always elastic: it leaves the piano ringing unhurt in-
deed, you feel no more pity for the instrument than you do for a
sword that has parried a brilliant thrust, Slivinski's feeling for it
being a veritable sentiment dufer,
Whenever the piece which he has in hand enables him to bring
his extraordinary gymnastic powers fully to bear, it becomes
transfigured, sometimes quite dazzlingly. Even in cases where he
brings it to bear in flat defiance of the obvious intention of the
composer, as he repeatedly does, it is often curiously and not un-
pleasantly novel Where it is entirely appropriate, as in Chopin
pote^ri^s and Liszt rhapsodies, the effect is tremendous. Never-
tfeefes^ I tostit tempted to dwell on the mafcre <F armes view of
ijjfe'ifa^ sosfeapfy and unaffectedly masculine that the moment
Aes^isfc becomes clearly womanly as in Schumann's Romance,
fog instance he modestly abnegates his supremacy at once, and
plays neady and gently, with the utmost good feeling much a,s
aa athlete might sew on a button but without any pretence of
96
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
being in his element. Paderewski, in such moments, brings into
action a wealth of feminine power and delicacy which no woman
could surpass.
The two men, indeed, contrast at all points except the high dis-
cipline under which both have brought their executive ability.
Paderewski has the passionate, nervous, wilful power of the artist
in poetry, tonal or other: Slivinski has the cool muscular strength,
elasticity, and rhythm that make the artist in bodily exercises.
Slivinski is a toughly knit, free-stepping, spare man, with salient
cheek-bones and closely cropped black hair. Paderewski is a thin,
flat man, with a startling turban of the fluffiest red hair on his head.
He moves determinedly, but with his chin down and his ankles
feeling nervously for the floor, like one walking in darkness.
There is no reason to doubt that Slivinski is quite as ambidex-
terous as Paderewski, if not more so; but he has not his variety of
touch, his sympathy with all phases of music, his comprehensive
intelligence in a word, his powers of interpretation as distin-
guished from his power of manual execution. Nor has he the ex-
quisite though naive musical instinct of Sapellnikoff: his plain,
exclusively virile talent seems impatient of the luxuries, dreams,
and enfantillages of art.
On the whole, though he is unquestionably a player to be heard
and studied, and one, too, not easily to be forgotten, he takes his
place for the present without supplanting Paderewski or indeed
any other player of established eminence. I say for the present,
because the whole of the foregoing criticism must be taken as
provisional in view of the fact that Slivinski is a very young
man, certain to develop largely on the sympathetic side as he
matures.
A very different player from Slivinski is Mr H. S. Welsing,
who combined his forces with Carl Fuchs, the violoncellist, at a
concert in Prince's Hall on Wednesday. Mr Welsing is a light-
fingered player with a pretty touch. He patters with terrific rapid-
ity over the lighter scales and arpeggios, and presently shoots
himself plump into a heavy bit of work at a speed quite beyond
its possibilities. His cheval de bataille for the occasion was the
VOL. II 97 H
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
Waldstein sonata, which is full of such traps; and it is hardly too
much to say that he fell headlong into all of them, invariably
rescuing himself with great gallantry, but not without moments
of confusion during which the notes rolled over one another in
the wildest confusion, though I will not venture to assert that any
of them escaped him. The fact is, the Waldstein sonata requires a
more contemplative and less impetuous temperament than Mr
Welsing's to expound it; for in spite of the pernicious old con-
vention to the contrary it is not a mere bravura piece, and has
never been really successful when so treated. Mr Welsing had a
flattering success as a composer, his setting of Shelley's Love's
Philosophy, sung by Marie Brema, being enthusiastically encored.
As to Herr Carl Fuchs, I can only say that if his right hand were
as skilful as his left, he would rank as a first-rate player.
Sauret had the good sense to make a solid concert of his first
"recital" at St James's Hall on Thursday last. The Beethoven
quartet (F major, Op. 59) was well worth hearing, which means
that it had more elbow grease put into its preparation than is
ammoviy spent on such occasions. Sauret also circulated a trans-
lated notice of himself from the Neue Berliner Musikzeitung, ex-
plaining, in a free English style, that "there is in him a strong
Violin individuality 5 not to. be mistaken for 'speciality,' like
[sic] Sarasate." The public will infer that the thing for a violinist
to aim at is specialty rather than individuality. What the critic
meant, if he had only hunted down his meaning sufficiently to be
able to express it accurately, was that Sauret is less of a virtuoso
than Sarasate because fee has not sunk the man so completely in
tfae VK>lmlst~4ias not specialized his individuality so devotedly.
No doubt he gains in fullness and variety of life what he loses in
aitfetkperfediou. The critic goes on to say: "In the power which
he fw^ses OY^F faisraadfence l*e approaches the great Paganini.
3n*fcaBafe ovfcreomiitg every imaginable difficulty is fabu-
Iq^plis is jke reverse of what the writer means; but the inten-
tion is afcyiotis.] Thus may the Italian hero pf die violin have
played." Now it is true that Sauret's command of die violin is
-soiBBci
98
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
music, and to the comparatively unimportant and revolting sub-
ject of mathematics. For the present I can only add that the work
done at the concert was unexceptionable as far as I heard it, and
that Miss Elsie Hall, who played a couple of movements from an
early concerto of Chopin's, and, for an encore, his Berceuse, has
improved I had almost said matured, though she is only thirteen
, remarkably since I heard her at Steinway Hall. She is a real, not
a manufactured, "wonder child/' The concert was for the benefit
of the Maria Grey Training College for Teachers. I wonder
whether it trains them in the whole duty of a headmistress to-
wards the art on which the college sponges for pecuniary aid.
On Saturday, at Prince's Hall, Mr J. H. Bonawitz began a His-
torical Recital, which must, I think, be going on still, as I had to
leave after the sixteenth piece, and there were eleven, including
the Appassionata Sonata, yet to come. Besides, there was a running
commentary by the editor of the Musical Times, Mr Edgar
Jacques, who, being clever, popular with his colleagues, and well
up in the subject, would have been the very man for the occasion,
were he not afflicted with a sense of humor, with which he main-
tained a cheerful struggle throughout the performance. Not that
the recital was uninteresting by no means; nor was it anybody's
fault that the harpsichord jingled like a million bell-wires, or that
the effect of the Bach clavichord fugue upon it was execrable,
or that the Palestrina ricercate had to be played on the most
modern of American organs, or that the audience, overcome by the
association of reading-desk and organ, was ludicrously solemn.
Yet these things were; and when Jacques pleaded that the Ameri-
can L instramentwas "something between" the organ in the Albert
Hall and the portable organs of Palestrina's day, and frankly gave
up the harpsichord as a bad job after the audience had listened to
it for half an hour with unsuspicious awe, the twinkling of his
eye betrayed the suppressed convulsions within. At last he dis-
appeared from the platform for a while; and, as I seized the oppor-
tunity to sKp out, I was conscious of a seismic vibration in the
buildHig which convinced me that Jacques, hidden somewhere
among the foundations, was having his laugh out. It does not do
Tf\f\
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
to t have too clever a lecturer on these occasions unless you have
all the other arrangements to correspond.
i June 1892
L' AMICO FRITZ has one strong recommendation from the critic's
point of view: there is no trouble in taking its measure. Some of
it is fresh, freehanded, bouncing, rather obstreperous, like Caval-
leria was composed before it, perhaps. The rest is more arti-
ficial without being in any way better, except that the orchestra is
more knowingly handled. High spirits and audacity are jewels in
the crown of youth when they are lucky enough to pass with half
the musical wiseacres of Europe as strength and originality; but
the imposition is one that cannot be repeated. The most striking'
example I know of a very young composer astonishing the world
by a musical style at once fascinating, original, and perfectly new,
is Mendelssohn's exploit at seventeen with the Midsummer Night's
Dream overture. One can actually feel the novelty now, after
sixty-six years. There was nothing whatever of this sort in Caval-
leria. The style was the common Italian style of the day; and
Mascagni's "originalities" were simply liberties taken with it,
liberties consisting of unconventional I had almost written
cheeky progressions which were exhilarating in their rough-
ness, and freshened up the old musical material wonderfully.
The exactly parallel case of Massenet in France ought to have
shewn every critic what to expect from Mascagni's next attempt.
However, all this is an old story with? me. I was not taken in by
Cavalleria; and now that everybody finds L' Amico Fritz obvi-
ously deficient in first-rate promise and first-rate accomplishment,
I am in the pleasing position of being able to say, "I told you so."
Let us therefore clear the discussion of all nonsense about genius
of the highest order, and of the ridiculous comparisons with Verdi
and Wagner which were rife last year, and give Mascagni fair
play as an interesting young composer with a vigorous talent,
and plenty of courage in asserting it, congratulating ourselves
meanwhile on the fact that Bellini has at last found a disciple,
albeit one far inferior to his master. *
101
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
L* Amico Fritz, then, is an opera which will pass the evening
pleasantly enough for you, but which you need not regret miss-
ing if you happen to have business elsewhere. The libretto is as
delightfully free from blood and thunder as that of La Sonnam-
bula: it is more an idyllic picture than a story. The cherry-tree
duet ought really to be hung in the Royal Academy. The pretty
harmonies of the opening line, changing in the most fashionably
petted Tosti manner, belong rather to the drawing room; but
when Madame Calve climbed the ladder with an apron on, and
threw down cherries to the tenor on the other side of the wall, I
was transported as if on a magic carpet to Burlington House,
where I remained in imagination until it suddenly occurred to me
that I had paid a guinea instead of a shilling for my stall, when I
came to myself in rather a melancholy frame of mind.
For the cherry duet "caught on"; and immediately I had a
vision of Mr Worldly Wiseman coming from his strongholds in
Bond Street and in the Strand theatres to conquer the Opera with
his pretty trivialities, his happy endings, his second-hand morals,
aixl his impotent cowardice and superficiality, offering golden
opportunities to intellectual and artistic mediocrity, and cloaked
indulgence to the sanctimonious people whose appetite for beauty
is of such a character that they are themselves ashamed of it.
Goodbye, if my vision comes true, to Gluck, Mozart, Weber,
Wagner even to Meyerbeer. The worst of it was that the in-
vader was so horribly well treated. Sir Augustus had taken the
greatest pains with that cherry tree, and with the well and bucket,
the watering-pot, and the inevitable landau and horses. His "un-
p*eeede$ted combination of the first [and laziest] musical talent in
Europe'* actually contributes one first-rate artist to help out
Ikfedaiiae Calv& and Mascagni, although it is so busy with those
Stpartog novelties^ Faust and Romo et Juliette, that a compara-
tiv% provincial Genuan company has had td be sent for to do
tte Nfbehingen tetralogy. For that, it appears, is the end of load-
iag^Oiir favorites with princely salaries and fulsome ptaise.
;Hs^iippreeedenie<! combination puts us off for years by pre-
tf it is going to learn a new work (meaning a work thpt
IOZ
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
has been familiar in every second-rate German town for the last
ten years); and now, when the limit of our patience is reached, the
unprecedented ones tell us that London had better ask Hamburg
to come over and help it out of its difficulty, and offer us another
performance of Romo by way of consolation. I throw the re-
sponsibility on the combination rather than on the manager, be-
cause I know how helpless he is in the face of his guarantors and
their pets, and how, even if this were not so, the progress made
with new work would still depend mainly on ,the devotion of the
artists to their work; but, all the same, had I been in his place, I
think I could have managed to get at least a Siegfried of my own
as well as a Meistersinger and an Otello. If I had in my company
such a Siegfried and such a Wotan as Bayreuth never heard, I
would make them feel that I was something more than their
showman, and that a leading singer should not be content to
wallow in the old parts which he picked up by ear when he was
a little boy.
However, I am forgetting all about L J Amico Fritz and tiie
cherry tree. The duet, as I said, "caught on" immensely; and
there was a frantic encore a little later when Madame Calv aond
Signor de Lucia finished a number with a sudden pianissimo on a
sustained high note, the effect a favorite one with Mascagnt
being that of a ravishing caterwaul. Next to the cherry-treeepisode,
the most effective bits in the opera are the recital of the story of
Eleazar and Rebecca at the well ("something out of Dante, I
think/* said one of my neighbors); the procession of orphans to a
jolly music-hall tune, said to be an Alsatian march; and the long
violin solo played behind the scenes which prepares the entry of
Giulia Ravogli so cleverly in the first scene. The last act is pre-
, ceded by the now inevitable intermezzo, with the equally inevit-
able and exasperating encore (pure affectation on the part of the
gallery), and contains a duet in which there is a touch, of the
dramatic energy of Cavalleria. The story is too happy and sun-
shiny for more than the touch; and on the whole I think I may
compendiously describe the work as having all the merits of a fine
bank holiday.
103
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
As to the performance, it was more than good enough for the
occasion. Signor de Lucia succeeds Valero and Lubert as artificial
tenor in ordinary to the establishment. His thin stridentforte is in
tune and does not tremble beyond endurance; and his me^a voce,
though monotonous and inexpressive, is pretty as prettiness goes
in the artificial school I cannot say that I like that school; but I
must admit that its exponents have hitherto set a good example
by minding their business and identifying themselves with their
parts; and this, considering the lax discipline of the operatic stage
at present, is a considerable merit Giulia Ravogli has evidently
been taking lessons somewhere. Strange to say, instead of having
had her voice ruined, she has been led to correct the looseness and
raggedness of the upper part of it; so that her vocal style has
gained in compactness and force. She is as irresistible as ever: else
I might venture to tell her that she has not the remotest idea of
how a fiddle should be held, much less a fiddle-bow.
Madame Calve was so affecting in the simple grace and naive
musical feeling which exhaust the scope of the part of Suzel, that
in a tragic role I should expect a good deal from her. She has a
free, even voice of adequate volume, not of the brightest color,
but very sympathetic. As a soprano of innate dramatic force,
she is the most notable recruit we have had at the Opera for
some years. The orchestra had no difficulty with the score,
which is^ vigorous, and supplies all the usual stimulants and
luxuries in profusion. The worst orchestral number is the pre-
lude, which is arrant shop stuff. Bevignani conducted; and there
was an enthusiastic ovation at the end: Sir Augustus, coy as
usual, being dragged out by main force to share in it.
May I, without offence, suggest to the Italian visitors at the
Opera that however backward we may be as a nation in musical
culture we have at least got beyond the stage at which we can
tolerate strident "Bravas" breaking in on the silence of the audi-
ence and the flow of the music after every high note and every
salient phrase. To me at least, the jar of such an interruption is
^irritating as a slap in the face. The chattering from English
ladies in the boxes is bad enough; but it does not usually begin
104
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
until late in the season, when the owners leave town and sublet
the boxes to trippers from the provinces; whereas the "Brava"
nuisance is in full swing already. I submit it to the gdod sense of
our visitors whether our insular custom of confining such ex-
clamations to political meetings is not, on the whole, to our
credit, musically speaking.
On Wednesday there was a grand operatic concert a St
James's Hall for the benefit of those who wished to hear the un-
precedented combination without entering a theatre. Sir Augus-
tus hospitably invited me; but after a glance at the program I
decided to go and hear Mr Lunn lecture at Prince's Hall on sing-
ing. It is now thirty years since I first met a singing-master who
was having a discussion with Mr Lunn; and during that whole
period I have met fresh cases at intervals of from eighteen months
to five minutes. A more hot-headed, pugnacious, intolerant,
impossible controversialist than Mr* Lunn does not exist He OffiS.
tell you that he is nothing if not logical, and then offer you tbi
most fantastic comparisons and analogies as stepping-stones to
his conclusions. Although you may be the most sympathetic of
his partisans, or the most innocent and humble-minded of his
disciples, he will treat you as if you had personally instructed
every bad singer who has appeared at the Opera since Grisf s
time.
The scientific world for him is divided into ignoramuses who
do not know of his discoveries, and plagiarists who have an-
nexed them without acknowledgment. As to the things he says
about teachers of singing, I simply dare not describe them, they
are so inhumanly true. On lids particular occasion at Primes
Hall he was more himself thaa ever. He ,had written OTJ& an dbw
borate and surpassingly bad lecture by way of a tramway q*
keep himself straight upon; but he soon went hopelessly soff fhe
rails, to our great relief, and abandraed^fais manijsejfpt wisb^tel
appalling threat of publishing it. Do riot for a moment sejppas^
however, that the lecture was not a success. Mr Liw% m f$k
of all the difficulties he places in his own way, has tfee
of being desperately in earnest, and of bek3g >
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
fectly right. It was, of course, easy for him to ridicule Ravelli's
singing of II mio tesoro at the Opera, and to caricature that
hurrying of the accompaniment which is always resorted to in
order to get a singer over a long-sustained note. But he also
produced a pupil of his own who sang the song far better than
the average Covent Garden Don Ottavio.
Nevertheless, I cannot admit Mr Lunn's claim that the crucial
passage with the long-sustained F was sung exactly as Mozart
meant it to be sung. The singer, though he held the F, took
breath in the middle of the fourth bar, which was most certainly
a violation of Mozart's intention. Any singer who has been
taught to hold back the air-current at the larynx like Mr Lunn's
pupils, can, if he also distends his pharynx by rounding the back
of it, sing the whole five and a half bars through without taking
breath. I have often heard it done; and I have half a mind to
offer to do it myself, provided the passage be transposed into G
to accommodate a limited baritone, and the quality of the exe-
<iti>ixidt out of account. In the minor section of The trumpet
shall S$B^J WL The Messiah, there are phrases of ten and eleven
bars, the losigest containing notes equivalent to thirty-two
crotchets. They can be, and should be, sung in one breath,
though they bring a singer nearer to the end of his tether than
the twenty-two crotchets, in slower time, of II mio tesoro. If
Mr Lunn's baritone pupil, who sang very well, had vanquished
For this corruptible, etc., the feat would have been quite d la
FarineUL
However, I do not complain; and I hope Mr Lunn will keep
pegging away at his most useful mission. Only I can assure him
that ^s soon a$ pupils really want to sing well, and the public
tesw< &>> prefer Mozart's sustained F in II mio tesoro to the B
ft*f wfakb Ra^elB bawls in its place, there will be no difficulty
alone the supply of teachers. Mr L\mn himself admits that his
ptipife are apt to go to feshionable teachers to get "finished."
That means that he shews them what good singing means; that
they dont like it, and dont beHeve in it; and that they find the
public agrees with them. It seeds the authority of genius like
106
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
that of Sims Reeves to enable a young artist to differ from the
public and compel it to admit, for the moment^ that fine singing
is better than popular bull-roaring. In short, it is the demand,
and not the supply, that is lacking; and the quality of the demand,
in spite of such aberrations as the revival of the goat-bleat school
produced by the success of Gayarre, is improving. Let Mr Lunn,
therefore, be of good cheer: he is not quite such an isolated
phenomenon as he supposes.
% June 1892
ON Tuesday last week I found myself with tickets for nine con-
certs and a speech by Mr Gladstone. At this I lost my temper, and
declared that I would not stir out of the house all day. But I have
never been a man of my word; and at three I began my round as
usual. First there was Miss Clara Eissler at^Erards', playing-die
harp, which is a cool, limpid instrument for a hot day, and almost
suggests that some stout pianoforte has realized Sydney Smith's
aspiration by getting out of its skin and sitting in its bones. The
particular harp which Miss Eissler used was a very fine one; and
she played it as if she appreciated it, instead of pinching it to make
it speak in the professorial manner. Unfortunately nobody seems
to think of writing anything but the most old-fashioned sort of
filigree music for the harp; and as a little of this goes a consider-
able distance with a critic, however handsomely executed^ I W*s
soon on my way to Steinway Hall, where I found Miss Efee
Sonntag giving a pianoforte recital.
It was a curious freak of fate that made Miss Sonntag, with
her frail physique and her characteristic nalvet, a pupil of Liszt.
To hear her play a Chopin ballade in her master's way is die
oddest of musical experiences. She has appropriated his coftcep-
tions in her own fashion, mostly by making fairy tales of them.
But she has not been able to appropriate his powers of execution;
and when she comes to a passage whkh, from Liszt's point of
view, might be arranged as a duet for a Mdn and a hurric^no, it
is almost as if a baby mermaid had got into a whirlpool ^t:^d
petulantly insisted on trying to shoot the rapids below Nigsf^
107
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
However, she comes out alive, and disports herself prettily, if
sometimes rather quaintly, in the 'smoother waters. On this
occasion she was not at her best; for the weather was warm
enough to make anybody play wrong notes almost warm
enough to make me play right ones. Even Slivinski, whose re-
cital I next visited, was all but dissolved by the time I got to St
James's Hall.
It was amazing to see the smallness of the paying part of his
audience, considering the extraordinary quality of the perform-
ance. Of course this will not last for ever. In about fifteen years'
time I shall have people rushing up to me to ask whether I have
heard the new pianist Slivinski, for whose recitals there is not a
seat to be had. But the danger in this system of deferred results
is that the greater a player is, the more apt is he to find some-
thing better to do than dancing attendance on English stupidity.
If Slivinski meets Rubinstein now, Rubinstein will not ask him
has succeeded in England, but simply whether the
as usual, to appreciate him. To which Slivin-
mtfae affirmative. And Rubinstein will re-
fatei tl&t winHed also in his own case and in Liszt's, and
prompt recognition of Paderewski must
fe accounted ft>r by the feet that every intelligent Englishman
could see by his head of hair that he was an exceptional man.
If Slivinski does not come back to London in a hurry, the
loss will be ours and not his. He unbent somewhat in his last two
recitals, and shewed the most astonishing power of making the
pianoforte sing in transcriptions of vocal melodies, so that the
.<*** *pie:|>cgar to compare him to Thalberg, He also gave
m% cfe&Kse of -hearing one of those prodigious opera fantasias of
few joists ca& pfay. arid fewer understand. The
8 ****^ *at on Robert, is a prnigetit criticism
as weH as a mar, deforce of adaptation to the piano-
~~~ _ 1.^ i ____ .1 : *
.. .
y, HO -written analysis b Robert eonM-be half so in-
teresting as this fentasia itt-wfakiir I&a, ^jfct Vivi% reproduc-
ing Meyafeee^s demiy; eeantoazed and daborated scraps of
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
fantasy, grace, and power, picks up the separate 'themes appar-
ently at random, and fits them to one another with a satirical in-
genuity which brings out in the most striking way how very
limited and mechanical the Meyerbeerian forms were.
After Slivinski, there remained only six more concerts, and
Mr Gladstone on current London politics. It Is commonly held
that the finest politeness is needed to enable you to listen quietly
to a man when he proceeds to instruct you at great length in a
subject which you understand and which he does not Feeling
unequal to this strain, I consigned the Gladstone ticket to the
waste-paper basket with all the remaining concert tickets except
one; and with that one I went off to St James's Hall to the fare-
well concert of Henry Lazarus, at which everybody sang, or
conducted, or did something in honor of the occasion. Lazarus's
age was for long an inscrutable mystery; and I haw my doubts
as to the value of the latest settlement amved at As lately as
twelve years ago he was the best clarionet player in England:
when you were sitting behind Costa at the Opera you listened
for certain phrases from the clarionet just as you did from the
prima donna, except that you were much less likely to be dis-
appointed in the former case. Lazarus was beginning to
oldish then, though he made no flesh, and was still a trim,
proportioned man, with old-fashioned but very
whiskers, thin lips, and a perfect mouth for his ms
a chronic lift at the corners that looked like a srofe, aiad
readily developed into one. Your neighbor on the right would
tell you that he remembered Lazarus as premier clarionet fof
twenty years. Your neighbor on the left would cdtte^Msn ted
say thirty years at least Some veteiam wotdd then pDolhfo^fe
both calculations and declare that he had heard Lazarus befea^
1840, and that he was then in his prime. , ^ ^ / &
And yet it is only within the 'bet cempk >of y^rsittef iir
Egerton has taken his place at the Monday Popular
when Beethoven's septet is i$ the prograrau
put it that he has been playing in public for
and that during at least forty of tem^datMg
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
Willman in 1840, his pre-eminence was unquestioned, as it would
be still if his lip and fingers had their old strength. For, with all
due respect for the ability of his successors, I do not know one
of them who can pretend to his distinction of tone and style, and
his elegant phrasing. He now retires finally, confessing to seventy-
seven years. We were all a good deal touched when he came up
out of the past, as it were, on to the platform at the farewell con-
cert, and sat down to play us a couple of pieces with fingers that
trembled a little, but with something of his old habit of assured
competence, his old style, and here and there, especially in the
chahaneau and middle registers, his old fineness of tone.
At the end the applause was tremendous; and when he re-
turned to the platform for the second time, leaving his instrument
behind him, he had perhaps some idea of making a speech.
Whether this was so or not, he was taken aback by the appear-
ance of a huge wreath poking itself at him over the platform rail;
^t|d when, after a moment of bewilderment, he collected himself
#,pftb *fae offering, there was another green monster lunging
fl$j*;4fiftkis ri^at. By the time he had got hold of both, he had
gi&en t*p ;aBI idea of speaking, if he had really entertained any.
Jie put his hand on his heart, as all public performers used to
do in the days when he was taught to make a bow, and with
many mute acknowledgments edged himself to the steps in
a quite sufficiently eloquent fashion, and disappeared; The
practical object of the concert was the starting of a testimonial
fund, of which Mr Charles Coote, of 42 New Bond Street, is
treasurer.
At the Philharmonic last week Miss Macintyre sang Robert,
to* que f aime and Ritorna il vindtor with her usual cleverness,
^: with > ; tfasit iftva&Kjbk determination of hers to succeed which
cam only be appreciated by those who know how much talent is
^^d r i| i$$s world for want of will. The orchestra gave itself
1*0, real trouble, and was good only in the accompaniments to
&e Beethoven concerto. In the symphony (Schubert's unfinished)
there was m*gettiag a decent/am^ much less a pianissimo, from
&e 'cellos; so that the exquisite and quite sfebple second subject
no
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
of the first allegro was stolidly murdered. The fortes in the slow
movement were also unsatisfactory, Mr Cowen allowing his
attention to be drawn off to the great slashes and accents of
the strings, instead of concentrating it on the sustained flow of
melody in the wind, with the result, of course, that the melody
was not sustained at all, the ends of the notes tailing off in the
usual feeble Philharmonic fashion.
Becker played a concerto of Raff's for the violoncello, and
was warmly applauded for the first movement. He could do but
little with the finale, which is trivial, with an ugly solo part. Mr
Lamond was the pianist; and he chose that beautiful fourth con-
certo of Beethoven's, as great in a feminine way as die fifth is in
a masculine way. I thought it a curious selection for so rough a
player; but I never dreamt that he, or any musician, could miss
the grace and tenderness of the opening phrase, even if Bee-
thoven's "dolce" were erased from the pianoforte copy. However,
Mr Lamond saw nothing in it but a mere battery of chords He
smacked it out like a slater finishing a roof; and I paid no more
attention. I remember how exquisitely Jano'tha used to play that
concerto in the latter half of the seventies, when she first came
over here. Nowadays she is content to gabble over Mendelssohn's
G minor concerto like a schoolgirl; and when I went to her re^
cital the other day, I found her idly displaying her rare dexterity
of hand and her capricious individuality of style without a ray
of thought or feeling; so that I left sorrowfully after sitting out
two or three barren numbers. - ,
LAST Wednesday I was told that Siegfried was to be produced
that evening at Cpvent Garden. I was incredulous, and asfeed
my informant whether he did not mean Carmen, with Miss Zelie
de Lussan in .the title part. He said he thought not I suggested
Faust, Les Huguenots, even Die Meistersinger; but he stuck to
his story: Siegfried, he said, was really and truly in the bills, and
the house was sold out. Still doubting, I went to the boxi-oiBpe,
where they confirmed the intelligence, except that tfeey : faad Jiist
in
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
one stall left. I took it, and went away wondering and only half
convinced. But when I reached the theatre in the evening a little
late, fully expecting to find notices on the seats to the effect that
Siegfried was unavoidably postponed, in consequence of the
sudden indisposition of the dragon, and Philemon and Cavalleria
substituted, I found the lights out and the belated stall-holders
wandering like ghosts through the glpom in search of their num-
bers, helped only by the glimmer from the huge orchestra and
some faint daylight from the ventilators.
The darkness was audible as well as visible; for there was no
lafetaldng that cavernous music, with the tubas lowing like
Plutonian bullocks, Mime's hammer rapping weirdly, and the
drums muttering the subterranean thunder of *Nibelheim. And
before I left the house to be exact, it was at half-past twelve
next morning I actually saw Rosa Sucher and Sir Augustus
Harris hand in hand before the curtain, looking as if Covent
Ganfati! liad been Ae birthplace of her reputation, and as if he
"beard' 'La Favorite in his life. Perhaps it was all a
ted ^>nie, and does so still. Assuming that
$ I may ohte that at least one of those curtain-calls
was not fd the manager 1 at all, but for me and for those col-
leagues of mine who so strongly urged Sir Augustus Harris to
try this experiment in the golden years when money was plenty
and there was no Dissolution impending, even at the cost of
depriving London of the opportunity of witnessing the dbut of
Signor Rawner as Manrico.
The performance was vigorous, complete, earnest in short,
that was needed to make Siegfried enormously interesting to
sfcirvettogs like the Covent Garden frequenters. The
is rough; but the tiie&i faiow the work, and
&d wflMag yisdpMnet In, readiness and car-
tbey are fully e<qud^ if hot superior, to the
Gowfeat Garden orchestra; But I casnot say as much for
in :she matter of pmity asod indiviitaality of tone. After
every allowance for dfefexfiflfefttaee between the Getman
ttadidoi^ iriftlrirfttfy {fepultt^akid'd* EfcgKsh,
112
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
which is purely classic, as well as for the effect, peculiar to the
Nibelungen tetralogy, of the rugged and massive ground bass
which pervades so much of the score, I still cannot accept this
imported orchestra as being up to the standard of tone quality
we have been accustomed to expect in London.
In that vast mass of brass, it seemed to me that instead of
three distinct and finely contrasted families of thoroughbred
trombones, horns, and tubas, we had a huge tribe of mongrels,
differing chiefly in size. I felt that some ancestor of the trom-
bones had been guilty of a misalliance with a bombardon; that
each cornet, though itself already an admittedly half-bred trum-
pet, was further disgracing itself by a leaning towards the fliigel
horn; and that the mother of the horns must have run away with
a whole military band. Something of the same doubt hangs over
the lineage of the wood-wifcd, the bass clarionet alone being
above suspicion. Even in the strings^ die 'cellos aad tenors feck
distinction, though here the thicker and heavier tone is partly
due to the lower pitch, which is in every other respecta prodigi-
ous relief. I think it will not be disputed that the Covent Garden
orchestra, if it had half the opportunities of the Germaa one,
could handle the score of Siegfried not only with much greater
distinction of tone and consequent variety of effect, but also with
a more delicate and finished execution of the phrases which make
up the mosaic of leading-motives, and with a wider range of
gradation from pianissimo to fortissimo than Herr Mahler's band
achieved, excellent in many respects as its performance certainly
was. This is no mere conjectures we have already heard the
Siegfried blacksmith music and forest music played by our own
orchestras in concert selections better than it was played o$
Wednesday last. . ' :
And that is why I still complain that Sir Augustus
no more establishing the Wagnerian music-<trama in
than Mr Kiralfy is establishing the gondola. When he
the performance of Die Meistersinger by his own company
his own orchestra, he achieved his greatest feat as an topres
This time he has only sent for a German impresario *d4 G&&
VOL. ii 113 *
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
man company to help him out of the difficulty; and for that I
grudge him the smallest exaltation, as I could have done as much
myself if I had the requisite commercial credit.
The impression created by the performance was extraordinary,
the gallery cheering wildly at the end of each act. Everybody was
delighted with the change from the tailor-made operatic tenor
in velvet and tights to the wild young hero who forges his own
weapons and tans his own coat and buskins. We all breathed that
vast orchestral atmosphere of fire, air, earth, and water, with
unbounded relief and invigoration; and I doubt if half-a-dozen
people* in the house were troubled with the critical reflections
which occurred to me whenever the orchestra took a particularly
rough spin over exquisitely delicate ground, as in the scene be-
tween Wotan and Erda. It is not to be doubted that all the women
found Brynhild an improvement on Carmen and Co.
I say nothing of the great drama of world-forces which the
Nibelung story symbolizes, because I must not pretend that the
Cbvent Garden performance was judged on that ground; but
coissideriiig how very large a proportion of the audience was
still seated when the curtain came down at half-past twelve, I
think it is fair to assume that the people to whom Wotan is noth-
ing but an unmitigated bore were in a minority. At the same
time, Herr Grengg, with his imposing presence, powerful voice,
and perpetual fortissimo, did very little to break that ponderous
monotony which is the besetting sin of the German Wotan.
Lorent, who was on the stage for a few minutes as Alberich, was
also earnest, but pointless and characterless. Fortunately Mime
(Heir Lieban) saved the situation by his unflagging vivacity. It
would be unreasonable to ask for a cleverer representation than
his of the crafty, timid, covetous, and, one must admit, un-
s*erafi% bullied old dwarf. His singing shewed remarkable
artistic ingenuity exactly the quality which Mime's music re-
quires.
There are two great points in the part: first, that awful night-
mare which comes upon Mime after die question-and-answer
scene in die first act, whsn he curses die shimmering light and
114
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
falls into a growing terror which is just reaching an intolerable
climax when it vanishes as if by magic at the voice of Siegfried
in the wood outside; and, second, his attempt to poison Siegfried
after the fight with the worm, when he involuntarily talks murder
instead of the flattery he intends. Both of these passages were
driven home forcibly by Lieban, especially the poison scene,
where the effect depends more on the actor and less on the
orchestra than in the other. Alvary, though he has something of
that air of rather fancying himself in his part which distinguishes
some of the most popular impersonations of Mr Wilson Barrett
(whom Alvary rather resembles personally), attained a very con- *
siderable level of excellence as Siegfried, especially in the forest
scene, the remembrance of which will, I think, prove more
lasting than that of the first and last acts when we have seen a few
rival Siegfrieds and grown a little more critical. Fraulein Traub-
mann, as the bird, was energetic, purposeful, human, and, in
short, everything that a bird ought not to be. For so nice a stage
illusion we need wilder and far more spontaneous wood-notes
than hers.
As I have already intimated, Fraulein Heink, as Erda, had her
scene rather roughly handled both by the orchestra and by
Wotan; but she nevertheless succeeded in rescuing something of
its ineffable charm by her expressive delivery and her rich con-
tralto tones. As to Rosa Sucher, she was as prompt, as powerful,
as vigorous, as perfect in her drill, as solid and gleaming in her
tone as ever. Her efficiency, brilliancy, and strength have a charm
that is rather military than feminine; and consequently they will
fail to rouse the voluptuous enthusiasm of our devotees of that
splendid and invariably repentant female, the Womanly Woman;
but as Brynhild was no Magdalen, Frau Sucher can hardly be
blamed for not making her ojne. Finally, I have to chronide
several curtain-calls for the energetic conductor, Herr Mahler.
He knows the score thoroughly, and sets the tempi with excellent
judgment. That being so, I hope he will yet succeed in getting
a finer quality of execution from his band.
The scenery is of the usual German type, majestic, but in-
115
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
tensely prosaic. The dragon, whose vocal utterances were man-
aged jointly by Herr Wiegand and a speaking-trumpet, was a
little like Carpactio's dragon at San Giorgio Schiavone, a little
like the Temple Bar griffin, and a little like a camel about the
ears, although the general foundation appeared to be an old and
mangy donkey. As usual, people are complaining of the dragon
as a mistake on Wagner's part, as if he were the man to have
onntted a vital scene in his drama merely because our stage
machinists are such duffers as to be unable, with all their re-
sources, to make as good a dragon as I could improvise with two
old umbrellas, a mackintosh, a clothes-horse, and a couple of
towels. Surely it is within the scope of modern engineering to
make a thing that will give its tail one smart swing round, and
then rear up.
The stage effects throughout were punctual and conscientious
(always excepting the flagrant exhibition of Brynhild in the last
act as the Sleeping Beauty instead of as an armed figure whose
sex isoiaias a mystery until Siegfried removes the helmet and
cuts away the coat of jnail); but they were not very imaginative.
Tfae stithy was lighted like a Board School; and the fires of Loge
and the apparition of Erda might have been ordered from the
gas company, for all the pictorial art they displayed. Sir Augustus
Harris need not look to Bayreuth for a lead in this direction.
Where .Bayreuth surpasses us is not in picturesque stage com-
position, but in the seriousness, punctuality, and thoroughness
-with which it looks after the stage business, which is mostly left
to take care of itself at Covent Garden.
I am compelled by want of space to postpone until next wefek
aay notice of Mr de Lara's Light of Asia, which was successfully
paxxfeced on Saturday evening. If it is repeated in the meantime,
Mr de: Lara will do well to withdraw the fourth act, unless the
^staMistoent can do something better in' the way of staging it.
It almost eclipses the absurdities of the Tannhauser mise en sctne
at present.
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
and you will see that what with patronizing critics, bigoted
academicians, and indiscreet adorers, Mr de Lara has much to
live down.
It must not be supposed that The Light of Asia is a philo-
sophical opera. It is necessary to say this explicitly, because there
are some people who, if I were to write an opera called The Light
of Edinburgh, and make Adam Smith the hero, would immedi-
ately find that the overture contained a good deal of political
economy. Wagner's Nibelung Ring tetralogy may be called a
philosophic music-drama, because the characters are dramatic
personifications of the forces which are the subject-matter of
metaphysics, the Pilgrim's Progress itself not being a more un-
mistakeable allegory. The Light of Asia is a representation of the
adventures of the man Buddha and his mistress, with about
as much Buddhism in it as an ordinary oratorio contains of
Christianity.
Still, The Light of Asia differs in one vital respect from the
general ran of modern oratorios. These works are mostly written
by men who are or have been church organists; and church
organists are, as a class, more utterly void of religious reverence
than any other body of men in the world. As Mr de Lara has
presumably never played the organ in a Buddhist temple, he re-
mains fresh to the impressiveness of the Buddha legend, and has
set Mr Beatty Kingston's poem to music which is remarkably
free from professional pedantry, deliberate imitation, claptrap,
padding, and vulgarity. Naturally, a work so deficient in all that
the professors can teach is not likely to be popular with them.
The feet that it is conscientiously finished to the utmost of the
composers ability completes Hs title to be criticized with entire
Mr de Lara's chief disadvantage at Covent Garden is that the
best side of the composition is the worst side of the performance.
The centre- of the opera is the song, Loosen from thy foot the
bangle, which made its mark a few years ago when Miss Ella
Russell sang it at St James's Hall, and for which Miss Eames was
heartily applauded on Saturday week. It is a languorous, dreamy,
118
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
half mystical, half voluptuous Oriental love-song, as the Oriental
love-song exists in the English imagination. This sort of seraglio
music pervades the whole work, more or less: the second and
third acts consist almost entirely of it. Now, in an opera, the
creation of an atmosphere so subtle as this requires not only
appropriate music but poetic dancing and delicate stage manage-
ment. I need hardly say that neither of these luxuries were to be
had at Covent Garden.
The principal dancer, Miss Mabel Love, whose chronic ex-
pression of tragic indignation replaces this season the smile of
Palladino, understands what is wanted for the scene in whjch
she appears, and makes a courageous and interesting attempt to
supply it; but her powers are not yet matured, and her physical
training is still far from thorough; so that she can do but little
/to soften the ruinously prosaic effect produced by the corps de
ballet, which accompanies Mr de Lara's swaying -syncopations
and incense-breathing consecutive fifths with a feeble modiica^
tion of its ordinary exercises. If the regular ballet was a failure
as, on the whole, it decidedly was ^hat could be expected from
the passages in the third act, where the movements of the chorus
of odalisques (if that is the correct expression) should be sub-
dued from positive dancing almost to the abstract poetry of
gliding, weaving motion? With this in view, a group of young
ladies wandered about in the prompt corner as if some vivisector
had removed from their heads that portion of the brain which
enables us to find our way to the door; and though the audience,
restrained by the presence of Lassalle and Miss Eames, who
might have broken into song at any moment,' waited patiently,
they probably blamed Mr de Lara for maundering.
But Mr. de Lara was not in a position to complain. Everybody
on the stage was lending a willing hand to the utmost of his or
her knowledge; and the management had been quite princely in
the way of expenditure. Unless Mr de Lara had torn out hand-
fills of his hair and strewn them despairingly on the stage in
protest against having his opera stifled with goodwill and hunr
dreds of pounds' worth of silks and predous-Ioofcing raetak
119
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
when it was perishing for want of two-penn'orth of skill and
fancy, I do not see what he could have done. His feelings in the
fourth act must have been particularly unenviable. The persons
who appeared therein were mostly supernatural; and this im-
mediately brought out the superstitious side of the Covent Gar-
den stage management. Sir Augustus Harris has been imbued
from his earliest years with 'the belief that the vital distinction
between the inhabitants of the other world and of this is that the
latter move horizontally and the former vertically. Enter his
room through the door and walk across to his chair, and he will
recognize you as human. Remove a square piece of the floor and
rise slowly into the room on a lift, and he will believe you to be
a demon as firmly as if you were a musical critic and had found
fault with die Royal Italian Opera. You cannot get this out of
his mind: it is part of the faith of his childhood.
No fair-minded critic can doubt that when Signor Miranda
was hoisted on to a lift; shot up like a Jack-in-the-box out of a
canvas eloud resembling a photographer's back-
nrf monstrous size; and bathed in the fiery glow of a red
, Sir Augustus was convinced that only a hardened
atheist couid refuse to believe and tremble. And yet everybody
laughed except Mr de Lara and Signor Miranda, who was stand-
ing giddily on the brink of a precipice some twelve or fourteen
feet high. As to the siren's cave business which followed, I really
have not the patience to describe it, further than to say that it
was as like a kitchen fireplace as usual, and that nobody was sur-
prised at the insensibility to its seductions displayed by Buddha,
^> ted fceen having a nap under a tree in a heavy shower.
When be walked off the stage, and the curtain came down for a
k^ifjailse >ust at the wrong time, die fortunes of The Light of
M*ixm$te& ttiek lowest ebb. Will no friend of Sir Augustus
Haj^s 6|>en his mind gently to the fact that all this machinery
of traps and ^visions is as dead as Queen Anne?
It will be seen that Mr de Lara cannot be said to have had his
f work performed to the greatest possible advantage Still, he had
much to be thankful for. Lassafie* who took the^part of Buddha,
120
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
and comported himself with a sublime self-satisfaction which
would have put the very smuggest Indian idol out of counten-
ance, sang magnificently* Miss Eames, though a little matter-of-
fact, gave sufficient weight to the part of Yasodhara; and Planon
saved the first scene, which is musically the weakest par* qf the
work. The rather empty motive with which it opens is nearly
identical with the refrain of Autolycus's song in A Winter's Tale;
the song of Atman is only a pretty piece of troubadouring; and
the mock-scholastic choral passages beginning For earth's sake,
produce a burlesque effect not unlike that of the Amen in Berlioz'
Faust.
One or two of the instrumental interludes are too long: they
cause stage waits; and it struck me that the material of the funeral
march got just a shade more repetition than it cm l>ear with the
best effect. The scene in the fieWs^is mteh tbrwoss for tbe
transformation of the work from & &ata to an ' ~
the rest is of remarkable merit; and dig whole wx$
vocal melody of exceptional excellence, When I
travagant praise that was lavished on Ivanhoe, with it
voice parts nailed down to a perpetual mechanical : . . .
cannot but wonder why so little has been said of Mr jde I-asa's
purely musical, well-phrased, and often eloquent vocal writing/
What he lacks at present is more intellectual vivacity; an intent,
more symphonic grip of his musical material; greater variety of
mood; and a distinct orchestral style as distinguished from &i$re
taste in orchestral effects.
The best point in the score at present is the we n^ m
Yasodhara's song of the mstmnxeirt taowfc &> miltey- fctofe^
men as "Jingling Johnny" a point that would not be wollh
mentioning in a score of Gwaod'a; It Witt be noticed ti&t ft^
are all negative failings, ^and tfert I have admitted ^0pemM i
be throughout sincere and original I will not go so &ra& t&sagp
that Mr de Lara is the only English composer of his gei^tfeii
whose feeling for his work is calatlate4 to do bis country qr$U%
but there is certainly .store hope i&^Thte L^p 0C*tei^pj^d
those things with tjb pedal potos &*d the
21
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
them which are composed by our professors for the provincial
festivals. I hope Mr de Lara will never condescend to take shares
in the mixolydian business. Some of the partners in it began, like
himself, as musicians. Let him consider what they are now, and
take heed that he follows not in their footsteps.
29 June 1892
SOME months ago I mentioned that a performance of Handel's
Samson, on the festival scale, had been arranged at the Crystal
Palace. Then came the news that a substitution of the compara-
tively hackneyed Judas Maccabaeus would save Mr Edward
Lloyd trouble. The program was accordingly changed for the
worse; and the performance thereby became a gigantic celebra-
tion of Mr Lloyd's indisposition to exert himself. Formerly, when
musicians wanted to describe the most fatuous depths of stupid-
ity, they used to say "bete, comme un tenor." Nowadays tenors
are^cfevsr enough; but they are not energetic. Miss Eames lately
told an interviewer, who kept his countenance with heroic con-
stancy, that the severity with which Jean de Reszke studies his
work is beyond description. No doubt she was thinking of the
iact that he has spent die past year in cerebrating with volcanic
"intensity over the color of Romeo's beard, as to which he could
now probably write us a volume worthy to rank with the fam-
ous essay on the character of that master of refined pleasantry,
the nurse's husband. A paper upon his old fair theory ar^d his
new dark theory, which may yet give place* to a shaving
aar even a fK>-beard-at-all theory, would draw a huge cro
sieetiiigx>f && New Shakespear Society.
lii the meantime the years are flying; and we have
h^rf^foDrfier Jean as Siegfried, or Siegmund, or
h 3VtottMftgv &^gb his Walther in Die Meistersinger,
as* fer &&I know, the bdst m the world, shews what he ..
fcr Ws^a: if be had the will. The age is therefore cor
wife two f^oHems: (i) to make Edward Lloyd learn
aad r) to naake Jean de Reszke karfc Siegfried. I wish the
legal process by w^eh we oorfd lock them
122
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
Holloway Gaol until they had taught one another the parts.
They would get on capitally together; for there is no rivalry be-
tween them: to Lloyd, Brother Jean is simply a baritone of ex-
ceptional range; whilst to Brother Jean, Lloyd is an admirable
soprano robusto.
The Judas performance came off last Saturday. The audience
was the usual festival crowd, big and extremely barbarous, as the
soloists well knew; for unscrupulous alterations of the text in
order to finish with the most absurd high notes were the order
of the day; and the more outrageous they were the better the
audience liked them. The choruses left little to be desired in
point of precision and none in point of magnitude. The baritones
distinguished themselves specially by the brilliancy and steadi-
ness of their tone. I say baritones advisedly; for there seemed to
be very few bass voices among them: the tone, which rose tci
great splendor above the stave, fell off almost to nothing when
they got down below C. The sopranos were very bad: they had
a noble opportunity in the first verse of God save the Queen;
and all they did was to give us a careless, common, vulgar piece
of screaming. The altos were much better; the tenors better still;
and the baritones, as I have said, best of all.
Miss Clara Samuell sang some of the soprano music, and made
the most of her voice by her good intonation and well-formed
tone. As to Albani, Patey, Lloyd, and Santley, it is not necessary
to say more than that From Mighty Kings, Sound an Alarm,
Arm, arm, ye brave, etc., produced all the customary cheering
and clapping. Mr Manns was not in his brightest and most con-
fident vein; but he was none the less equal to the occasion.
After the performance of DaS Rhdngold last Wednesday at
the Opera, I do not think we shall hear much more about Ae
impropriety of beginning the season with Siegfried, which,
should have come third instead of first If it be true that It was
Alvary who insisted on the transposition, let us admit now that
Alvary knew what he was about. Siegfried was a sucdeSs beeausfe
there was hardly a moment in the three acts during
or Alvary, or both, or Sucher and Alvary,
123
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
to keep things going. Besides, the defects of the orchestra did not
matter so much in a score which admits of a certain degree of
roughness of treatment The dullest moment in Siegfried was
the dialogue at the beginning of the second act between Wotan
and Alberich.
Now imagine our German visitors setting to at a music drama
which contains an enormous percentage of Woian-cum- Alberich,
with a score requiring the most delicate handling, and you will
be able to understand that the performance of Das Rheingold
was none of the liveliest. The band, no longer braced up by the
excitement of the first night, did what I hope was its worst. Its
playing of the wonderful water music prelude suggested that the
Rhine must be a river of treacle and rather lumpy treacle at
that; the gold music was arrant pinchbeck; Freia's return to
heaven brought no magical waftings of joy to the audience; and
the rainbow music, with its hosts of harps (I distinctly heard one,
and was not well placed for seeing whether there were any others),
rfgbtfeave been pleasant deck music during a steamboat ex-
e^fcii H6 Hampton Court, for all the success it attained in pro-
vidfeg 3 'splendid climax to the prologue of a mighty drama.
Theft the stage arrangements were rather hard to bear. There
was nothing to complain of in the 'first scene, since no better
way of doing it has yet been invented. The Rhine daughters
waved their arms, and floated up and down and round and round
in their aquarium; and if I could only have forgotten the scene
as it appeared to those behind the curtain the three fire-escapes
being elongated and shortened and raced round the floor, each
with a lady fastened to the top and draped with a modest green
skirt of prodigious length I should have been satisfied. But the
orchestra did nfct make me foiget it, nor did Alberich, nor any-
one except Rosshilde (Fraulein Heink), who quite fulfilled the
premise of her Erda in Siegfried. , The 1 really difficult part of
&e stage management in Das Rheingold is the change from
the home' of the gods to that of the dwarfs, and the business
of Alfaeridb's inetamorphoses and final capture.
Hie way in which these'were either bungled or frankly given
124
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
up in despair shewed with brutal directness what I have so often
tried to hint delicately: namely, that if Sir Augustus Harris would
dismiss a round dozen of his superfluous singers, and give a fifth
of what they cost him to#n artistic and ingenious stage-manager,
he would double the value of the performances at Covent Gar-
den. The attempts of Herr Lissman, who is, to say the least, no
harlequin, to disappear suddenly through a trick shutter,, the
obviousness of which would have disgraced a cheesemonger's
shop in a Christmas pantomime, were not made any the more
plausible by the piffling little jet of steam which followed. As to
the changes into the dragon and the toad, they were simply taken
for granted, although Sir Augustus might easily have taken ad-
vice on the subject, not from Bayreuth, but from any provincial
manager who has ever put the story of Puss in Boots on the
stage. The descent from god-home to dwarf-hoiro ^as avoided
by dropping the curtain and making aa Jntcrvdt Aft.eedfctf iJto
second scene; and the change b*<& again, whi<sh sfep*itd b^*t
ascent into the clouds, was a badly managed Attempt at tfee^
scent which had been omitted* Evidently the scene-plot had got
mixed on its way from Hamburg.
The shortcomings in the staging of the work were all tfaei3e
depressing because, with , two conspicuous excqptioi%
principal performers were so averagely German that fc
by repeatedly telling myself not to be rude tfaafcl'
myself from saying flatly that they might as^wetl fab
English, so powerfully mediocre were they, Greo^ sang his way
loudly and heavily through the part of Wotan with both to, eyes,
wide open (one of them should have been removed). Every Hue
he uttered was exactly like eve*y other line. Albericfa did' not
even sing: he shouted, and seemed content if he came v
half-quarter tone of the highest notes he aimed at. His '
though conscientious, was .that- of a pirate in a Sm^
drama: neither in his ghastly dedarattem to Logfe of his ambition
to become master of the world, not in his frantic despair *ben
Wotan wrests the ring fit him, did he vote'**
'M ": - Vi
sensation. *
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
Frau Andriessen failed to make Fricka interesting small
blame to her, perhaps, considering the impossibility of getting
any variety of play out of Wotan. Fraulein Bettaque, as Freia,
was pretty and pleasing enough to disarm criticism; and the
giants, having little to do except to appear clumsy and intel-
lectually and artistically dense, took to their parts with con-
siderable aptitude. But they certainly would not have made the
performance endurable but for the two exceptions I have alluded
to: namely, Lieban (Mime), whose ten minutes on the stage, in-
cluding his capital singing of Sorglose Schmiede, sent up the
artistic level of the performance with a bound during that too
brief period; and Alvary, who, as Loge, the northern Mephis-
topheles, succeeded by his alertness in making the rest of the
gods look anything but quick-witted.
On the whole, it was fortunate for the success of the work
that most of us are at present so helplessly under the spell of the
Ringfs greatness that we can do nothing but go raving about the
theatre between the acts in ecstasies of deluded admiration. Even
die qritics lose their heads: you find the same men who are quite
alive to the disparities between Jean de Reszke and Montariol,
Maurel or Edouard de Reszke and Miranda or De Vaschetti,
Calve or Giulia Ravogli and Melba or Miss de Lussan, losing all
discrimination when the German artists come up for judgment;
admiring a third-rate Alberich as devoutly as a first-rate Mime;
and meekly accepting the German tendency to coarse singing
and wooden declamation as the right thing for Wagner, whose
music really demands as much refinement, expression, and
vivacity as Mozart's.
As^to die band, one hardly knows what to say of the revela-
tion it has made of the fewness of the people who know iy ear
the difference between a second-rate German orchestra rein-
forced by a number of students from the Guildhall College and
first-rate ones like those of London and Manchester.
When the public wakes up from its happy hypnotic trance and
resumes its normal freedom of judgment, it will inevitably be
bored by Das Rheingold, unless it is smartly and attractively
MUSIC IN LONDON
stage-managed and well acted in English. And even then it will
remain, like Die Zauberflote, a mere extravaganza, except to
those who see in all that curious harlequinade of gods, dwarfs,
and giants, a real drama of which their own lives form part.
Herren Wiegand and Litter, raised to gigantic stature on thick-
soled boots, and poking at one another with huge cudgels
the drum is pounded unmercifully down in the orchestra,, i
look ridiculous; but the spectacle of good-natured igftdranee-aod
serviceable brute force, suddenly roused to lust and greed,^and
falling to fratricidal murder, is another matter one that makgs
the slaying of Fasolt by Fafnir the most horrifying of stage duels*
Wotan is a delicate subject, especially in England, where you
do not know whose toes you may tread on if you suggest that
the Wagnerian stage is not the only place in which itel^gijDp,,
corrupted by ambition, has bartered away its l^r$$$gjj^ j^r a ;
lordly pleasure-house, and then called k* tibe he&rttegs iptelfeog
to rescue it from the consequences of its bargain by ;%poctefe^
fraud, and force. As to Alberich* renouncing love for gold^ aifdb
losing all fellow-feeling in his haste to accumulate it, I question
whether it is good taste to exhibit him at Covent Gardm p
"diamond nights." But I am sure that Das Rheingold must elite
be read between the lines and through the lines, or
at. Siegfried, Die Walktire, and Gotterdammerung may
ordinary dramas, barring a little interruption from tnje to
by the prolixities of Wotan; but Das Rheingold isi .either a pro-
found allegory or a puerile fairy tale. Consequently It is hardly
worth doing at all unless it is done very well, which is precisely
why it was so much less successful at Covent Garden
Siegfried.
IT is only fair to the artists whom I have &> mtidbein Ais Iw^
of political battle to ask that a large allowance njay fee
the deterioration of my character produced by
A fortnight ago I still had, I will not say a
vestiges of the moral habits formed in
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
a critic. These have entirely disappeared; and, as I now stand,
I am capable of anything except a findable-out infringement of
the Corrupt Practices Act. A collation of the speeches I have de-
livered would destroy all faith in human nature. I have blessed
in the south and banned in the north with an unscrupulously
single-hearted devotion to the supreme end of getting my man
in which has wholly freed my intellect from absolute conceptions
of truth. I learnt long ago that though there are several places
from which the tourist may enjoy a view of Primrose Hill, none
of these can be called the view of Primrose Hill. I now perceive
that the political situation is like Primrose Hill.
Wherever I have been I have found and fervently uttered a
true view of it; but as to the true view, believe me, there is no
such thing. Place all the facts before me; and allow me to make
an intelligent selection (always with the object of getting my man
in); and the moral possibilities of the situation are exhausted.
And now I can almost hear some pillar of the great church of
Cfaadbaiid saying, "Faugh! IK> more of this; let us return to the
f&rer atmosphere of art" But is the atmosphere of art any purer?
One ervenmg I find myself appealing to the loftiest feelings of a
town where many of the inhabitants, when you canvass them,
still keep up the primitive custom of shutting the door carefully,
assuring you that they are "all right," and bluntly asking how
much you are going to pay for their vote. The next evening I
am at the Opera, with Wagner appealing to my loftiest senti-
ments* Perhaps Mr Chadband would call that a return to a purer
atmosphere, But I know better. Speaking for myself alone, I am
as much a politician at a first-night or a press-view as I am on the
hustings.
When I was more among pictures than I am at present, certain
#e&5frife fe painting which I desired were advocated by the Im-
pfcgsskfci&t party, and resisted by the Academic party. Until
ffeose reforms ted been effectually wrought I fought for the
up men who could not draw a nose
from an elbow aga&si Leighton and Bouguereau
I coidd $ &a&$& public conscious of the ugly
MUSIC IN LONDON
unreality of studio-lit landscape and the inanity of second-hand
classicism. Again, in dealing with the drama, I find that the
forces which tend to make the theatre a more satisfactory resort
for me are rallied for the moment, not round the so-called French
realists, whom I should call simply anti-obscurantists > but around
the Scandinavian realists; and accordingly I mount their plat-
form, exhort England to carry their cause on to a glorious vie*
tory, and endeavor to surround their opponents with a s&btk
atmosphere of absurdity.
It is just the same in music. I am always electioneering. At the
Opera I desire certain reforms; and, in order to get them, I make
every notable performance an example of the want of them >
knowing that in the long run these defects will seem as ridiculous
as Monet has already made Bouguereau's backgrounds, or Ibsen
the "poetical justice" of Tom Taylor. Never in my life haye I
penned an impartial criticism; and I feope I aevefrmay, As lotig
as I have a want, I am necessarily partM to the felfitloesJt of tfeaf
want, with a view to which I musft strive with all, Hny W| &> Ji*~
feet everyone else with it. Thus ther6 arises a deadly enmity ,&-*
tween myself and the impresarios; for whereas their aim is &>;
satisfy the public, often at huge risk and expense, I seize on likm
costliest efforts as the most conspicuous examples of tbe sbq;rt-t
comings which rob me of the fullest satisfaction of my artistfe
cravings.
They may feel this to be diabolically unfair to them whenetw
they have done the very utmost that exi$tir*g ^
allowed them; but that does not shake me, since I know that the
critic who accepts existing cireuJTOtances loses from that laoam^it
all his dynamic quality. He s$op$ tfe0 clock. His red l*isi*iessfe
to find fault; to ask for j&or^ to km>ek hs head 3gai&^ ;s stv .
walls, in the full assurance .that Arce? or four g*xxl tois-^wUii
batter down any wall that stancfe across die worW*$paf!u ife^;
no dispenser of justice: reputations $a^ to ten only ttefo
of the opposing camps; and he helps to build or
according to his side m tfes oo&SicvTo
even if it were possiye^rfwotdd te to
VOL. II Of,
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
means, which would be profoundly immoral.
One must, of course, know the facts, and that is where the
critic's skill comes in; but a moral has to be drawn from the facts,
and that is where his bias comes out. How many a poor be-
wildered artist, in the conflict of art movements, has found him-
self in the position of the harmless peasant who sees a shell burst-
ing in his potato-patch because his little white house on the hill
accidentally happens to help a field battery to find its range.
Under such circumstances, a humane artillery officer can at least
explain the position to the peasant. Similarly, I feel bound to
explain my position to those in whose gardens my shells occa-
sionally burst. And the explanation is probably quite as satisfac-
tory to the shattered victim in one case as in the other.
Electioneering notwithstanding, I have been at countless
concerts during the past few weeks, and am well content to for-
get a good deal of what I have heard of them. Some were what
I may call Cooperative Concerts, each artist guaranteeing the
sale of a certain number of tickets in return for the advantage of
appearing before the London public. For further particulars I
saust refer my readers to my Confessions of a Concert Agent,
which is to be published when death has placed me beyond the
fear of assassination. It will not contain anything scandalous
at least, anything very scandalous; but part of it will be suffi-
ciently surprising to the innocent British public to offer some
inducement to our entrepreneurs to pay me every possible atten-
tion with a view to prolonging my life to the utmost. Besides the
Cooperative Concerts, there have been a good many concerts of
the annual benefit or one-good-turn-deserves-another descrip-
tion, some of them good of their kind, but not critically interest-
ing. We have had two remarkable examples of the value of great
Pastes ml faefy receptive pupik Miss Nettie Carpenter, who
played Bi$e&*s first violin concerto at the concert given by her
husband, Mr Leo Stern, shewed that she had caught everything
from Sarasate except the extraordinary strength and endurance,
tie imremitting and exquisite sensitiveness and vigilance of his
right hand. And Miss Szumowska gave a pianoforte recital at
130
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
which she played so beautifully and intelligently that I think
Paderewski would have admitted that she gave his interpreta-
tions of the works in her program better than he, in his coarser
and more headstrong moods, has often given them himself. We
are having a visit now from Reisenauer, a most Boanergetic dis-
ciple of Liszt, who has acquired a huge superfluity of technical
power, which, doubtless after sufficient consideration, he has
resolved to take out in speed rather than in thought. The result
is satisfactory in compositions which are meant to excite and
dazzle; but I fervently hope I may never again hear the last varia-
tion in Schumann's Symphonic Studies as it sounded under the
Reisenauer treatment. Max Schwarz, another pianist, or rather a
professor of the piano, reminded me a little of Heinrich Lutters.
He is Director of the Raff Conservatoire at Frankfort.
Among the best miscellaneous concerts I have attended were
Miss Palliser's and Ivjiss Gambogi's. Miss Palliser produced a
child-fiddler, Arthur Hartmann, small enough to be Gerairdy's
little brother, but grave, self-possessed, and capable to a degree
which four times his years have not enabled me to attain. Another
and more mature young violinist is the girl Panteo, who played
one of Wagner's few pieces de salon at the last Opera Concert,
and triumphed over an orchestral accompaniment that would
have disheartened an older performer. We shall probably hear
more of her. Dutch violinists still arrive in shoals. They almost
all play with remarkable neatness, and seem likely to be favor-
ites at miscellaneous concerts and in drawing rooms; but Henri
Seiffert remains the only one from whom there is much to be
expected. Unlike most of his compatriots, he excels in the power
of his cantabile playing, and often executes florid ornaments with
reckless roughness. I am bomd to add that he never, l&e some
of his smoother competitors, suggests any doubt as t0 whether
he could play his scales if put to it I return to the subject of Mjss
Palliser's concert for a moment to say that I was mjuch struck by
the singing of Mr D,avid Bispham, who seems to me to be folly
qualified to take his place on the stage as an operatic artist of
considerable distinction^ No doubt this has been known and said
131
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
long ago; but it so happens that I have only heard him at this
concert, and once before, in The Basoche, when I took him to be
a drier singer than I now perceive him to be. Miss Marie Brema
has sung much this season, and always with success, notably at
one of the operatic concerts, where her singing of The Erl King
completely eclipsed the clumsy concert-singing of the rank and
file of the Covent Garden company; but at present she is an organ
with one stop, the quality of which will not be improved if it is
too persistently ground at. Miss Brema must be more versatile
than she has hitherto shewn herself (as far as I have had the op-
portunity of observing); and if she succeeds in widening her
dramatic scope in the direction of comedy, and also enlarging her
purely musical resources by occasionally substituting the attrac-
tion of simple beauty of sound in the upper part of her voice for
that of dramatic intensity in the lower, she will take high rank as
a singer. At present she is narrowing her talent by over-special-
ization. Miss Gambogi's concert was abruptly finished, for me,
by Miss Ellen Terry, who projected herself into a recitation with
Sfccfa superb artistic power that I was quite unable to face the
feeble superficiality of ordinary concert business after it, and so
hurried out of the xoom. Miss Gambogi is too young as yet to
have much grip of her talent, which is, besides, by no means pre-
cociously developed; but she has natural refinement, good looks,
and an engaging personality, reminding one occasionally of Tre-
bellL A young lady named Leonora Clench spiritedly attacked
the last two movements of Mendelssohn's violin concerto, and
came off with credit Hollmann also helped, and compelled us to
atfcnofwiedge his excellence, now so well proved that it is an im-
f>ertineaice ito praise it. *
: ' I am fer from having exhausted my concerts; but space begins
n ste fa, and I have yet a couple of other matters to mention.
&* Stasis &i Commandeer is now preceded at the Prince of
Wales Theatre by a musical tomfoolery called Did you Ring
movm^tomcscf^^^d^QTwardsbrou^t
me down off my pedesial (Bke Le Commandeur), and made me
feugh'wuh undignified heardaess. It is by Messrs Haughton and
132
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
Mabson, and is played by Miss Amy Farrell, Miss Kate James,
and Mr Templar Saxe. I saw La Statue for the second time, and
enjoyed it more than I had done before. The dancing of Mile
Litini is as good as the singing of Miss Alice Gomez, whom she
somewhat resembles; and the Don (M. Burguet), though he gives
the Commandant no excuse for taking him so very seriously at
the end, is a capital comedian and a skilful pantot&imist. Tfae
piece needs to be visited twice, because on the first occasion one
sees hardly anything but the petrified personality, or rather colos-
sality, of Tarride as the Commendatore. You lose all sorts of
good things whilst you are gaping at the huge white marble man,
The second act, as a highly organized artistic achievement, is
far superior to anything in L'Enfant Prodigue. The music is' a
clever piece of rococo in the most modern taste, just half in earn-*
est, like the dumb show itself. It is quite understood, however,
between Adolphe David and his audience that thinking of
Mozart is barred. , . '
I must postpone notice of Die Walkiire at the Opera fnfl3
next week, strongly recommending everybody meanwhile to ga
and hear the first act, which retrieved for the German company
all the credit it lost over Das Rheingold. The rest is not so good.
The second act is horribly mutilated; and Reichmann is* ovetr
parted as Wotan. The Valkyries are good; and Frau Andriessen,
though she was not dazzling on the warlike side, played Brynhfld
with a sincerity and depth of feeling that greatly advanced &er
popularity.
I HAVE just received the most aaratsingly frank book I have read
for a long time just the tiling for asc$rold musMiasd ^fe
would like to be led back, widwHiUxx) much detail, over Aeffest
thirty years. It is the History of die Leeds Musical Festiv^ bf
Joseph Bennett and Alderman Frederick' Spark. Which of ;tbe
twain handled the scissors and which the paste is not stated m
the title-page; but I think I may venture to guess daat Mr Bennett
selected the press notices quoted, and suppKad mmt of &e pea-
113
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
and-ink setting for the mosaic of programs, facsimiles, advertise-
ments, letters, balance-sheets, and miscellaneous excerpts of
which the volume is composed.
Pray do not suppose that I mention the scissors and paste as
a reproach to the authors. On the contrary, they have made the
book exactly as it ought to be made. Instead of an essay on the
festivals, which would be insufferable, we get all the documents
needed to give concert-goers the required information in the form
to which they are most accustomed that of the program and
prospectus, which is also the most compact for reference. The
statistical particulars are thus packed into a book of 400 pages,
which you read easily in two hours, picking out what you are
curious about in the programs; skipping the dry records of hours,
days, and names of nobodies; abstracting the letters at a glance;
and taking the anecdotes and significant bits of narrative at your
ease.
J Imagine a parcel of Yorkshire manufacturers, trained to go
through the .world on the understanding that every man with
\yares to sell is to get as much for them as he can; every man with
money to buy to give as little as possible for what wares he wants;
and nobody without wares to sell or money to buy with to be
considered at all. Conceive these plain dealers suddenly set to
bargain with great singers, the highest souled and most sensitive
artists of their time, creatures to be approached like princes and
princesses, too delicate to name a price, and too proud to endure
a bid lower than what they privately think themselves well worth!
Naturally, there was a pretty confusion until Yorkshire dis-
covered that the pursuit of manufacturing profits might pass for
disinterested benevolence in comparison with artistic rapacity;
Aat^manuiacturing competition looked like pure altruism beside
9msfcM jealousy; and that manufacturing domineering and push
k*d'aoe<a Aanog against the absolutism of the foreign favorites
^f die musical public. Prima donna number one coolly demand-
ing (and getting)* in addition to her salary, the handsome sum
sfae was to subscribe with queenly charity to the Leeds hospitals;
prima donna number two inserting a clause in her agreement that
134
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
no artist engaged should be paid more than herself; Costa order-
ing the committee not to write letters but to send an ambassador
to see him, as if Leeds lay within ten minutes' walk of London,
and browbeating them out of every proposal to get a little ahead
of Rossini; impresarios planting unspeakable miscellaneous con-
certs of operatic bits and scraps on them as choice expositions
of the highest glories of musical art: these and cognate matters
are recorded with all possible openness in Messrs Bennett arid
Spark's volume.
The Leeds committee-men do not always cut a very dignified
figure in its pages. When Charles Halle treated them politely,
reasonably, and unassumingly, in a thoroughly artistic spirit,
they immediately proceeded to insult him, and let him know that
his Manchester orchestra was not good enough for Leeds that
they were accustomed to a first-rate article from London, con-
ducted by the great Costa. When Costa treated them with con-
tempt, sneered at their ignorance, personally insulted those who
dared to argue with him, publicly brought their York stare novelty
(Smart's Bride of Dunkerron) to grief in order, I presume, to
have an excuse for refusing to have anything to do with novel-
ties in future, and demanded a hundred guineas more for his $ar~
vices than Hall6, they grovelled before him, and only fell back
on Sir Arthur Sullivan when their Neapolitan tyrant finally re-
fused to have anything further to do with them. And yet, while
Costa was .treating them in this way, they had the assurance to
write to Liszt asking him whether he would not like to "submit"
a work of his for performance at the Festival (of 1877). Which
of course elicited die following snub:
"Messieurs, En r^ponse & votre lettre du 22 d6cembre, fai
1'honneur de vous informer que je suis tout & fait en defeors
des soumissions auxquelles vous avez 1'obligeance de m*kivi*&r;
Veuillez agr&r, Messieurs, mes civilit&. F. LISZT/*
30 d<cembre '76, Budapest.
Down to 1877 the majority of the committee nevejr got be-
yond the primitive notion that a great musical evi*t was ooe ait
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
which Tietjens sang and Costa conducted. I should myself have
been educated in that superstition if it had been possible to edu-
cate me at all, which it most fortunately was not. Poor Tietjens
herself, I imagine, believed in it devoutly; and so did Costa: it
was not until she died and he repudiated the committee that
Leeds at last found out that familiarity with The Messiah, Elijah,
and the overture to William Tell, was not the climax of nine-
teenth-century musical culture. Since then, thanks to the tact of
Sir Arthur Sullivan, the Leeds Festival has become a really im-
portant musical event. The forthcoming performances in October
will be welcomed by all except those who incautiously attended
the benumbing fourth day of the 1889 Festival, on which occa-
sion the whole West Riding was plunged into listless gloom by
an unprovoked performance of Brahms' Requiem.
On one point this book, which may be obtained at Novello's
for the considerable sum of twenty-five shillings, has made me
somewhat remorseful. A friend of mine asked me the other even-
tig: wfaetfaef Ae Opera, at which I am so constantly grumbling,
fcfc0t ftr bsttser than it used to be under the regime that collapsed
36 soon after 4 Costa vanished. And I replied, in the words of
Matthew Bagnet, "Yes; but I never own to it. Discipline must
be maintained." The memories awakened by the programs in
the History of the Leeds Musical Festival bring home to me how
great the advance has been, and nerves me to clamor implacably
for further progress.
20 July 1892
MAUREL'S lecture at the Lyceum Theatre on Tuesday last week
-was amuck more businesslike afiair than the crowded and fashion-
$f>k ^eceptioEfeof $89*. Our aims on this occasion were supposed
ipt Jbe e&ete^ively scientific and artistic; and we did our best to
look Jjke a select kxJy of critics and savants. I think, on the
^faole, we kept up appearances fairly wefi, though a stranger
from another planet might have thought it rather a suspicious
drcHH^tance that Maurel should have felt it necessary to spend
<pifi3e half ail hour in aftaiiging our ideas for us before he came
136
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
to the actual business of his lecture. In fact, the first half of his
address might have been introduced in the following terms.
"Ladies and Gentlemen: Most of you are either musical critics
or teachers of singing. A long experience of both classes in the
various countries I have visited during my long professional
career has convinced me that neither musical critics nor teachers
of singing ever think intelligently. It is, therefore, necessary that
I should give you a little rudimentary instruction in the art of
thinking before I give you something to think about."
Here I think Maurel made a mistake. The attempt was pro-
bably entirely unsuccessful in the cases of those who needed it^
and was perhaps resented in the cases of those who did not. Be-
sides, in making it, he forgot to allow for the English habit of
mind. It is our insular custom to tackle intellectual problems
without any preliminary arrangement of the subject-matter; and^
however slovenly this may sfcfem to a Frenchman, we find that it
serves our turn, and are rather proud of it than otherwise* '
We admit that they order things better in France, but not ^t
they do them better on the whole. Mere order for the sake of
order is wasted in London: if Maurel had bundled all his practical
points into a sack, brought it in a cab to the Lyceum, aikl simpfy
emptied it out anyhow on the table before us, we should have
been quite satisfied that he was setting about the job in the short-
est and handiest way, though he would no doubt have felt guilty
of a monstrous want of consideration for our intellectual con-
venience.
The -matter of the lecturedwhich was so excellently delivered
in French that even I, who am tfae most maladroit of linguists,
understood evety word of it ^consisted of two points. First, sa
unanswerable condemnation of the cmtp deglotte method of \K*ea|
attack, as to which I need say no more than that I doubt whether
any practical sitiger has ever dreamt of using it sy$tecoatka%^
though I suppose everybody uses it unconsciously for special
effects. Most advocates of the coup ds glotte mean nothkag
than to discountenance the habit of gasping like a
clock before striking, as many distinguished
137
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
do, instead of attacking their notes cleanly and promptly.
The second point excited more curiosity. Every critic knows
to his cost that singers take considerable liberties with the vowels
which they have to sing, producing the extreme notes of their
compass on any sound that is most convenient, without regard
to the word they are supposed to be uttering. Singers usually
exhort composers not to set unfavorable vowels to high notes;
and composers, who want to be as free as possible and not to hear
every high A sounding exactly like every other high A, exhort
singers to master the art of producing all the vowel sounds on
every note, without reference to its pitch.
Maurel declares that it is impossible to do this effectively with-
out injury to the voice; but instead of defending the customary
barefaced resort to the Italian a or French d for every difficult
note, he declares that it is possible to modify every vowel so as
to accommodate it exactly to the pitch, and yet to deceive the ear
so completely that the modified sound will be accepted as un-
modified* This art of vocal prestidigatation of substituting
what he calls a trompe d'oreille for the true vowel where the pitch
is not favorable to the latter, is one of the things that he proposes
to explain in his forthcoming book on the art of singing. The
need for it is also the main theme of his Le Chant renov6 par la
Science, a report of his lecture at Milan, just published by Quin-
zard & Cie, of Paris. This little book at least settles the question
of Maurel's literary competence; for his style is as clear as Tyn-
dall's. His conspicuous urbanity and good taste, qualities almost
as ineligible in a musical controversialist as in a Cossack or a
Turco, are fortunately counter-balanced by a conscientious sin-
cerity; so that his determination not to talk about himself or to
criticize his fellow-artists as I should do most unboundedly if I
were la bis place is not likely to lead to the suppression of any
naatesial scientific points, however hardly their recognition may
bear on living singers and teachers.'
Quite another sort of musical demonstration is that of. Miss
Constance Howard, who has just completed a series of three lec-
mres on Die Meistersinger at Stdnway Hall. Miss Howard's plan
138
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
is to give a verbal description of an act of one of Wagner's music
dramas, playing the motifs associated with the various points as
she comes to them. She then plays the whole act straight through
on the pianoforte, declaiming the words as she goes along. This
sort of analysis is not altogether novel: Mr Carl Armbruster has
sent, from his public lectures and private classes, shoals of care-
fully grounded Wagnerian amateurs to Bayreuth; but Mr Arm-
bruster has never, as far as I know, limited his demonstrations to
what one person, not a singer, can do with a pianoforte and a
vocal score alone.
One of the truest practical things Wagner ever said was that
the masterpieces of music are kept alive, not at the theatres and
concert-halls, but at the pianofortes of lovers of music. It is the
young people who hammer away at Meyerbeer and Verdi just
as other young people read Dumas and Victor Hhago; who get
their knowledge of the Bible" from Handel and Bacfa muck as
Marlborough got his knowledge of history from Shakespear;
who, having learnt from Mozart how to appreciate Mol&re,
arrive at the level of epic poetry and Greek tragedy through
Wagner, all with the aid of a Bord pianette and a cheap Hbrary
of Peters editions: these are the people upon the number of whom
in a nation its musical prosperity depends.
It is true that the pianette-Peters culture can only be turned to
its full account by those who have opportunities of learning by
actual comparison the relation the pianoforte score bears to the
complete performance. Indeed, pounding through such scores
is, with most players, a process that is only tolerable in so far as
it suggests or recalls the very different sound of the orchestra;
but the fact remains that nobody, not even a critic, can acquire
more than a fragmentary musical culture from public perform-
ances alone. You may find a veteran who has heard every soprano
from Pasta to Calv<, every tenor from Rubini to Van Dyk, every
Don Giovanni from Ambrogetti to Maurel, every pianist from'
Cramer to Paderewski, and yet he may know less of the great
composers than the playgoer who never reads knows of Shakes^
pear. There are critics of ten years' experience in London at
139
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
present who have only just heard The Nibelung's Ring performed
for the first time, and who have not yet heard two operas by
Gluckor Weber, or more than one pianoforte sonata of Mozart's.
Here, then, we have the importance of a lecture like Miss
Howard's. It suggests the true use of the pianoforte as a domestic
instrument. At present men refuse to learn their notes because
they feel that they will never be able to play well enough to be
worth listening to. They might just as well refuse to learn to read
because they will never be able to recite or declaim the contents
of volumes of poetry well enough to delight an audience. Miss
Howard illustrates how people may read tone poetry and music
drama to themselves for their own enjoyment and culture. I wish,
however, that the music publishers, who have most to gain by
the spread of this idea, would help it by abandoning the absurd
scale of charges now in force for copyright works.
Two pounds fifteen for vocal scores of the four numbers of
The Nibelung's Ring; twelve shillings for Verdi's Otello: what
possible sense is there in maintaining these prohibitive prices
after the cream is taken off the sale? It is not conceivable that the
restricted circulation involved by such charges brings in the
largest attainable profit to the publishers and owners; whilst its
crippling effect on musical culture is obvious. If I were Chan-
cellor of the Exchequer, I would devote the proceeds of the tax
by which spirits are made artificially dear, to making music artifi-
cially cheap. I should buy up all the Wagner, Verdi, and Gounod
copyrights, and sell vocal scores at the post offices at a uniform
sate of half-a-crown.
The Goring Thomas memorial concert was the smoothest of
successes. The platform was a perfect bower of white blooms;
die WQM& was crowded, and stuffy enough to gratify the most
e&^tffeg fester of ventilation; and the inordi&atiely long program
out to the utmost by Mr Villiers Stanford, who ap-
converted the elkgro vivace of the Cambridge Suite
dead march by taking it at rather less than half its natural
The result was that I was utjable to wait for the second act
of Nade&bda, wfaicfa is by fer the best piece of work Goring
140
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
Thomas ever turned out for the stage. Goring Thomas's fame
will not, I fear, be very long-lived. He always seemed to be
dreaming of other men's music mostly Frenchmen's; so that
he spent his life in elaborating, with remarkable facility and ele-
gance, what Gounod and his disciples had done before. Still, there
is a good deal to be done in the world by men who are first-rate
hands at their work when once they have been shewn how to do
it. Goring Thomas, always a little too much of a voluptuary in
music, was more completely Frenchified than an islander of grit
ought to have been; but he was no bungler: his work could not
have been much better without becoming really original and
powerful.
In speaking lately of the operetta Did you Ring? at the Prince
of Wales Theatre, I inadvertently put the librettist in the place
of the composer, Mr Landon Ronald, to whom I tender my ex-
cuses.
27/^1892
THE season is practically over now as far as music is concerned;
and a very bad season it has been for everyone but myself for
had the General Election been complicated by a really active
musical season, I should hardly have been here to tell the tale.
As it was, my last visit to the Opera terminated tragically. After
contemplating Gotterdammerung for over three mortal hours
exactly as I usually contemplate the Calais light during the last
half of a rough crossing from Dover, I fled in disorder, leaving
Siegfried, with about a hundred bars still to live. His death-scene
and that of Brynhild would have rewarded me for holding out
another half-hour; but the limit of human endurance was reached;
and the season ended then and there for me. Looking back over
it, I am bound to say that it has been a discouraging one to
musicians. I have always watched the people who fill the stalk
in St James's Hall when serious musical business is in hand wit
certain misgivings as to their sincerity. I have asked myself Is It
love of music that brings them here, or merely social pressms,
lika that which forces little children into church to listen to
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sermons that they cannot possibly understand? Obviously this
question could only be settled by observing their behavior under
circumstances which gave them a valid social excuse for staying
away without in the least obliging them to do so if they still craved
for music. Such circumstances do not often arise; but they were
created this year by the death of the Duke of Clarence. The effect
was instantaneous and unmistakeable. The music was still there;
but the excuse was provided; smart dressing was out of the ques-
tion; and the audiences vanished.
I do not see how that fact is to be got over. It was sufficiently
depressing to have to admit, at the best of times, that St James's
Hall sufficed for the morsel of first-rate music required by the
largest and richest city in the world; but when even this limited
demand turns out to be heavily adulterated with hypocrisy and
millinery, I am half driven to drop the subject altogether. We are
living, artistically speaking, in a hovel; and yet I am expected to ,
agitate about the condition of the dome.
Undoubtedly the great musical event of 1892 has been the
performance in London of Wagner's Nibelung's Ring, after an
interval of ten years. Das JRheingold, composed thirty-eight
years ago, and first performed twenty-three years ago at Munich;
Die Walkiire, composed thirty-six years ago, and first performed,
also at Munich, twenty-two years ago; Siegfried and Gotter-
dammerung, finished respectively twenty-three and twenty-two
years ago, and first performed sixteen years ago at Bayreuth:
London has just heard these world-famous works for the second
time, not as part of the regular repertory of an English opera house,-
but, as before, by a German company imported for the occasion.
And our new English Opera House, built last year, is lying
ifeere, a failure so fer, nobody knowing whether it will be pulled
down^ or turned into a music-hall, or utilized as a carriage re-
posifoary, like the old Queen's Theatre in Long Acre. I know
these dates; I remember these facts; I understand the value of the
Manchester orchestra, which we sent back home the other day as
not worth its travelling expenses to us. And I ask any reasonable
person whether 1 can be expected to hurrah, and shake hands,
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and drink healths, and beam, and congratulate, and pay compli-
ments over a state of things which if it existed in the cotton trade
would raise a general alarm of national bankruptcy.
I am half inclined to doubt whether I am in my right mind
when I see everybody so unconcerned and satisfied merely be-
cause Madame Calv6 has touched them with her beautiful sing-
ing, or because Die Walkiire, which I have known almost by
heart for years, cuts and all, has thrown its spell on them for the
first time. I remember one day visiting a relative of mine who
had shewn a considerable power, rather rare in the family, of
making money. His doctors had persuaded him strongly to leave
his work, and had been even more urgent with his people to
attend closely to him. When I called on him in the course of his
vacation, he took me aside into the window, and asked me
whether I saw those rooms, and the remains of the meal he had
just risen from. I said I did. He thai informed me in a whisper
that his wife was mad, that they had not a penny in the world to
pay for all these costly things, daat they were stark ruined. I have
been wondering these six weeks whether I have inherited his
malady whether the pressure of the season and the election
have not made me imagine disaster and failure whilst the reality
is that we are passing through a climax of unexampled musical
prosperity. If so, I hope the impresarios and concert agents will *
come forward with their balance-sheets, and have me removed
at once to an asylum.
Still, it is considerably to the credit of this season that it has
seen the production of Mr Isidore de Lara's Light of Asia, Mr
Bemberg's Elaine, Mr George Fox's Nydia, and SignorMascagnfs
L' Amico Fritz. The old subscription night routine, with its
scratch performances of the worn-out Italian repertory, has all
but vanished; and I should be unspeakably grateful for that if I
did not know that what Burke said of politics is true also of criti-
cism: there is no room for gratitude in it. And if there were, the
gratitude would be due to me, who have so ruthlessly hunted
down the old repertory, with its perfunctory Trovatores and
slip-shod Traviatas.
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
This year we have had new works tried and old works let
alone to an unprecedented degree. We have also had an oppor-
tunity of learning something from the German company. The
orchestra played Wagner just as the Manchester band plays
Berlioz: it knew the works instead of merely spelling through
them at sight in the London fashion; and everybody must have
been Struck with the difference this made, even when the famili-
arity of the orchestra degenerated into vulgarity. Among the
leading artists the one whose success is likely to have the greatest
influence is undoubtedly Alvary. I do not mean that Alvary was
the member of the company who had the largest share of direct
natural gifts for the stage. In that case, his success would have
been no more remarkable than that of Frau Klafsky, Fraulein
Heink, or Lieban.
Van Dyk's eminence as a tenor is explained at once by his
exuberant force and brilliancy, as Jean de Regzke's is by his ro-
mantic grace and distinction both of voice and person. Put either
of them infx) a group of half a dozen barristers, and you would
single them out at a glance as confidently as you would single
out SalvinL Put Alvary there in his habit as he lives off the stage,
and you would accept him without suspicion as a sufficiently
barristeristic person, well set up, but with no more of Siegfried
about him than there would be of Hamlet about Mr Beerbohm
Tree under the same circumstances. His voice is serviceable,
but by no means beautiful; and in plucking Nothung from
the Branstock, or forging it anew on Mime's anvil, he has no
superfluity of physical power wilh which to exult and play the
Titan, And yet be held the attention and interest of the house
whenever he was on the stage, and made a smart Loki, a pathetic
Siegnauad* and a remarkably handsome and picturesque Siegfried.
WffiGes, wba-was one of the ugliest of mortals, used to boast
tbat be was only quarter of an hour behind the handsomest man
in Europe; and I can imagine Alvary boasting that, with nothing
exceptional to help him except his brains, he could keep pace all
through Der Ring with Van Dyk or De Reszke, perhaps falling
five minutes behind the one in shouting over the sledge-hammer,
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MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
and behind the other in singing Winterstiirme wichen dem
Wonnemund, but regaining his ground at other points, and hold-
ing his audience to the end as successfully as either of them. He
has proved to us that as soon as the development of opera into
genuine music drama makes the lyric stage attractive to clever
and cultivated men, we shall no longer be dependent on prodigies.
Possibly some of my readers may prefer prodigies, thinking,
no doubt, that they are all De Reszkes and Van Dyks; but if they
had seen as much as I have of the results of picking up any Italian
porter, or trooper, or gondolier, or ice-barrow costermonger
who can shout a high C; thrusting him into heroic roles; and
sending him roaring round the world to pass in every capital over
the prostrate body of lyric drama like a steam roller with a power-
ful whistle, they would understand the immense value I attach
to the competition of artists like Alvary, who could not retain his
place on the stage at all if he bad nothing but his lungs to recom-
mend him. The career is now opening to the talented; and the
demand for artists of the Alvary type will increase with the num-
ber of our music dramas.
For you must not for a moment suppose that Wagner is going
to be an isolated phenomenon in art. The peasant who, on hear-*
ing of Wordsworth's death, said he supposed his son would
carry on the business, was not half such a fool as the man who
imagines that the list of Bayreuth dramas closed with the death
of Wagner. We have produced our ./Eschylus: our Sophocles and
Aristophanes have yet to come; and very handsomely our Wag-
nerians will abuse them when they do come for violating the
classic traditions of Wagner, and dispensing with his continual
melody, his careful regard for form, and his effective but simple
and quiet scoring.
3 August 1892
A LONG string of mishaps prevented me from hearing Mr Bem-
berg's Elaine until last Saturday week, when the second act some-
how got omitted. The oversight passed unnoticed, however;
and I cannot say that I wa gready disappointed: indeed, I should
VOL. ii 145
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
not have mentioned the circumstance if it did not form a prac-
tical criticism of the opera as distinct from its presentation, with
which I shall, by your leave, not concern myself. Mr Bemberg is
no English composer, but rather a music- weaver who, having
served an apprenticeship to Gounod, and mastered his method
of working, now sets up in business for himself. In Elaine we
have the well-known Gounod fabric turned out in lengths like
the best sort of imitation Persian carpet, the potential supply be-
ing practically unlimited.
There is one ballad, L' Amour chaste comme la flamme, which
would probably never have been written if Gounod had not sup-
plied the pattern in Mireille, but which is certainly a charming
elaboration of the master's suggestions. Mind, I do not hurl Mr
Bemberg's want of originality at him as a reproach. One of the
greatest artists the world has ever seen began in this very way.
Raphael mastered Perugino's style before he developed his own.
Mr Bemberg may yet leave Gounod as far behind as Raphael
left Perugino. But there are no signs of his doing so yet.
I wonder how soon strong men in England will begin to take
to musical composition. It cannot be said that the national genius
is for the genteel, the sentimental, the elegant, the superficial.
When I am asked to name a composer who is to England what
Wagner is to Germany, I do not cite our elderly imitators of
Spohr and Mendelssohn, or our youthful imitators of Gounod:
I have to go back to Henry Purcell, whose Yorkshire Feast sug-
gests that if he were alive today he might give us an English
equivalent to Die Meistersinger.
Again, in what I may call epic or dramatic painting, I do not
refer the inquiring foreigner to Mr Frank Dicksee, Mr Herbert
Schmalz, Sir Noel Paton, or even Sir Frederick Leighton, as
typical English painters: I send them to Mr Ford Madox Brown.
And I should certainly never dream of holding up Tennyson's
poetry as the verse-mirror of the English spirit. It seems to me
quite obvious that if our popular art was really the expression
of the national character, England would long ago have been
annexed as a convenient coaling station by Portugal. Fortunately,
146
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
Englishmen take their business and their politics very differently
from their art. Art in England is regarded as a huge confectionery
department, where sweets are made for the eye and ear just as
they are made for the palate in the ordinary "tuck-shop."
There is a general notion that painting tastes better before
dinner, and music after it; but neither is supposed to be in the
least nutritious. Too great a regard for them is held to be the
mark of a weak character, or, in cases like those of Ruskin and
Morris, of derangement due to genius. Under these circtim-
stances we are kept well supplied with pretty things; but if we
want really national music-dramas we shall have to take art seri-
ously, or else wait for the advent of a genius big enough and
strong enough to set himself against us all and cram his ideas
down our throats, whether we like them or not.
I am obliged to Elaine for one thing in particular: it reconciled
me to Madame Melba, who is to all intents and purposes a new
artist this year. I do n6t mind confessing now that I used not to
like her. Whilst recognizing the perfection of her merely musical
faculty, I thought her hard, shallow, self-sufficient, and altogether
unsympathetic. Further, she embarrassed me as a critic; since,
though I was utterly dissatisfied with her performances, I had
nothing to allege against them; for you really cannot take excep-
tion to an artist merely because her temperament does not happen
to be sympathetic with yours.
This year, however, I find Madame Melba transfigured, awak-
ened, no longer to be identified by the old descriptions in sum,
with her heart, which before acted only on her circulation, now
acting on her singing and giving it a charm which it never had
before. The change has. completely altered her position: from
being merely a brilliant singer, she has become a dramatic soprano
of whom the best class of work may be expected.
A little book on Wagner, just published by Messrs Kegan
Paul & Co., should be bound up with every library copy of the
late Ferdinand Praeger's very entertaining Wagner as I knew
him. Mr Ashton Ellis's retort to Wagner as I knew him Is
practically, "Yes; but you didnt know him.'* Praeger was
147
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
never at any time able to take in more of Wagner than his natural
size enabled him to hold, which was somewhat less than the whole
man; and their acquaintanceship began rather later than Praeger,
when at the height of his biographic fervor, quite realized.
At any rate, Mr Ellis shews that in the Dresden rising in 1849
Wagner, though he took his share of public duty by managing
the business of escorting convoys into the town, and "conduct-
ing" the signalling, was not, like Bakunin, what the Fenians used
to call a "head centre" in the affair. The sensational incident
of the woman falling shot, and Wagner heading a charge on
the Prussian soldiers and capturing them, turns out to be just
about as true as might have been expected: that is to say, the
woman was not shot; the soldiers were not captured; and Wagner
was not present; but the story is otherwise founded on fact. Mr
Ellis straightens out the whole narrative very completely, and
explains, for the benefit of those persons who have not die re-
volutionary temperament, how the German sovereigns, unable
t^iacmeeive how monarchy could in the nature of things be con-
stitutionally limited, forced all the best-informed and most
public-spirited of their subjects to resist them.
To me Wagner's conduct needs no apology, since it is plain
that every man who is not a Pangloss is bound to be in a state
of incessant revolutionary activity all his life long if he wishes
to leave things better than he finds them. However, there are un-
accountable people who think otherwise; and to them I recom-
mend Mr EUis's Vindication. Indeed, I recommend it to all Eng-
lish Wagnerians, who already owe more to its author than to
any other man, except perhaps Mr Dannreuther. And when Mr
Eijis's translation of Wagner's prose works, which has now
reached die 1851 Mittfaeilung an meine Freunde, is complete,
even Mr Daniireuther's claims must give way to those of the
editor of Hie Meister.
28 September 1892
THE light operas which have been running 'for some time past
at die Lyric and Trafi%**< Square theatres did not succeed in
148
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
moving me to break the autumn silence on their account. Cigar-
ette is a work of uncertain genre, melodramatic and farcical in
alternate episodes, except during one desperately melancholy
moment in the second act, when Messrs Collette and Evelyn have
to sing a duet with chorus, intended to be comic, but void to a
quite stupefying degree of any passable nonsense or fun, not to
say sense or humor. I must say that I like opera-manufacturers
to make up their minds as to die plane they are going to work
on, and stick to it. The Marquis de Portale, disowning and curs-
ing his son (who wants to marry for love) in a ranting exit speech
of the best Wardour Street workmanship, is all very well ia his
way; and there is, perhaps, a place in the world for recruits
comically labelled BenzoUne and Nicotine, though I stipulate
that the place shall not be in my neighborhood. Again, there is
no general objection to church scenes with sacred music sung
behind the scenes to the pealing of the solemn American organ.
Nor do these exclude the possibility of Gaiety trios with stsep-
dance refrains. But when the Marquis de Portaie and BenzoKn^
the anthems and the step-dances, jostle one another on the same
stage on the same evening, the effect, to my taste, is unseemly.
And that is what occurs in Cigarette. Its aberrations into common-
place melodrama on the one hand, and unsuccessful burlesque
on the other, may harmlessly divert our light-opera audiences,
which seem to me artistically less intelligent and less cultivated
than even the big oratorio audiences at the Albert Hall and Crys-
tal Palace; but they are not worth the powder and shot of serious
criticism. The only member of the cast whose performance sug-
gested any comment was Miss Florence Bankhardt, who ha&
apparently had a training as a dancer, and is therefore in a better
position than the ordinary comic-opera prima donna who has
had no training at all. Her playing as Cigarette was rather spoiled
on the first night by restlessness and exaggeration; but if she has
sufficient instinct for her profession to tranquillize her abundant
energy and turn it to account in pursuit of softness and ease of
style, there is no reason why she should not hold her own IB p&tfs
like Cigarette.
149
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
The Wedding Eve, at the Trafalgar, is at least homogeneous
in its triviality. It is much more smartly and tastefully mounted
than Cigarette; and the leading parts are both better and better
cast. Mr Tapley, whose powers as a tenor singer enabled him to
gain a prominent position when he was still rather a rough dia-
mond as to his carriage and diction, has now polished himself
into one of the best artists in his line in London, and that, too,
without losing the freshness and natural humor which put him
on easy terms with his audiences from the first. Miss Decima
Moore gets on very prettily in the part of Yvonette, her gift of
good looks, good manners, facility, and tact carrying her through
in spite of an occasional pettiness of touch and emptiness of play
which shew how far she is from having attained the skill and
breadth of style which mark the fully accomplished artist. The
customary humors of comic opera abounded in the portion of
The Wedding Eve which I witnessed; and there was no lack of
choral young ladies, all dressed and wigged and complexioned
alike, according to operatic custom, which seems to me to be
stupid and thoughtless on this point. I would fine a chorus-singer
half a crown for looking like any other chorus-singer. For the
rest, the management of the new theatre is evidently liberal and
tasty if I may use that revolting expression for want of a sub-
stitute that will not overshoot the mark. Of the music of both
Cigarette and The Wedding Eve I need say nothing except that
it is as neat and plausible as anything in the shop windows of
Bond Street. Mr Haydn Parry has supplied the score of the for-
mer, .and M. Toulmouche that of the latter. Some dances in The
Wedding Eve are by "Yvolde," a voluminous composer whose
aliases are too numerous for mention here.
.To a superficial person it may seem that my objection to a
uaxture of genres in opera has been most signally exploded by
the huge success of Haddon Hall at the Savoy last Saturday. I do
not admit this for a moment. I contend that Savoy opera is a
genre in itself; and that Haddon Hall is the highest and most con-
sistent expression it has yet attained. This result is due to the
critical insight of Mr Grundy. He is evidently a frequenter of
150
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
Covent Garden; for he has discovered that what Italian opera
desperately lacks is the classic element of comic relief. He has sat
out the last acts of Lucia, and has felt, as I so often have myself,
that what was wanted there was a comic Highlander with a fling,
and a burlesque chorus to enliven the precepts of Raimondo.
He has then gone to the Savoy, and has seen that there, too,
relief was wanted sentimental relief generally, but anyhow re-
lief from Mr Gilbert, whose great fault was that he began and
ended with himself, and gave no really congenial opportunities to
the management and the composer. He exploited their unrivalled
savoir faire to his head's content; but he starved their genius,
possibly because he did not give diem credit for possessing any.
Now The Basoche and Haddon Hall prove that Mr and Mrs
D'Oyly Carte have unmistakeable genius for management: their
stage pictures are as recognizable by the style alone as a picture
by Watteau or Monticelli. You do not catch them spending ten
guineas on two-penn'orth of show: they are at once munificent
and economical, getting their full pound of beauty out of every
yard of costly stuff on the stage. As to Sir Arthur Sullivan, he is
certainly not a dramatic composer; but he has over and over
again proved that in the sort of descriptive ballad which touches
on the dramatic his gift is as genuine as that of Schubert or
Loewe. In this province he excites a feeling which is as different
as possible from the cynical admiration of his adroitness, his tact,
his wit, and his professional dexterity, which is all that could ever
be evoked by his settings of Mr Gilbert's aridly fanciful lyrics,
whether for the stage or the drawing room.
All these observations have evidently been made by Mr
Grundy, who has accordingly devised a unique entertainment^
consisting of a series of charming stage-pictures which at once
put you in the mood to listen to episode after episode of descrip-
tive ballad music, full of unforced feeling, and tenderly handled
down to the minutest detail of their skilful and finished work-
manship. After each of these episodes you are let down into in-
dulgent boredom during a brief would-be dramatic number, in
which the principals are consciously ridiculous, and the music
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
suggestive of nothing but a storm in a tin pot. And then, just as
you are beginning to feel dull and apprehensive of failure, comes
the comic relief the unspeakably outrageous but unspeakably
welcome comic relief. The patter song which Mr Kenningham
suddenly fired into the house from a masked battery in the form
of a futile "dramatic" trio in the first act, produced, by its mere
unexpectedness and contrast, an effect beyond the reach of Mr
Grossmith.
Later on, the business of Mr Rutland Harrington and the
comic Puritans, who are addicted to Stage Socialism (a very
fearful variety), created, uproarious merriment; and if Mr Rut-
land Harrington's elaborate japes on the land question fell some-
what flat, it was probably not so much because the joke was at
the expense of the audience as because everybody had got ac-
customed during the late general election to hear better and
fresher fun made out of the subject at every political meeting
throughout the country. In the second act die comic business was
less bappy. The act began with it; so that it did not take the form
of "relief"; and the hopes raised by the entrance of Mr Denny in
a kilt, playing the bagpipes, were speedily dashed by the dis-
covery that his Scotch dialect was spurious, and that Mr Grundy's
treatment of the tempting theme of Social Purityism was cheap
and witless, the duet, If we but had our way, being the least
successful comic number in the opera.
It is always a mistake to undervalue our friend the enemy; and
Mr Grundy had better recognize that unless his social satires are
at least as smart as Mr Hugh Price Hughes's sermons, Mr Hughes
will get the better of him. The real relief in this act occurs when
Sir Arthur Sullivan takes up the running with his romantic set-
ting of the dependent scene as a quartet, or rather as a descriptive
ballad for .four voices. (By the way, in the previous comic trio
ifeity ioity,<tfae <x>mposer has reproduced the exact movement
of For a British tar , is a soaring soul from Pinafore, the notes
alone being altered.) The following few minutes, during which
the stage remains a black void, with hammer-and-tongs storm
anisic and patent lightning flashes recurring with unerring pre-
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
suggestive of nothing but a storm in a tin pot. And then, just as
you are beginning to feel dull and apprehensive of failure, comes
the comic relief the unspeakably outrageous but unspeakably
welcome comic relief. The patter song which Mr Kenningham
suddenly fired into the house from a masked battery in the form
of a futile "dramatic" trio in the first act, produced, by its mere
unexpectedness and contrast, an effect beyond the reach of Mr
Grossmith.
Later on, the business of Mr Rutland Barrington and the
comic Puritans, who are addicted to Stage Socialism (a very
fearful variety), created. uproarious merriment; and if Mr Rut-
land Harrington's elaborate japes on the land question fell some-
what flat, it was probably not so much because the joke was at
the expense of the audience as because everybody had got ac-
customed during the late general election to hear better and
fresher fun made out of the subject at every political meeting
throughout the country. In the second act the comic business was
less happy. The act began with it; so that it did not take the form
of "relief"; and the hopes raised by the entrance of Mr Denny in
a kilt, playing the bagpipes, were speedily dashed by the dis-
covery that his Scotch dialect was spurious, and that Mr Grundy's
treatment of the tempting theme of Social Purityism was cheap
and witless, the duet, If we but had our way, being the least
successful comic number in the opera.
It is always a mistake to undervalue our friend the enemy; and
Mr Grundy had better recognize that unless his social satires are
at least as smart as Mr Hugh Price Hughes's sermons, Mr Hughes
will get the better of him. The real relief in this act occurs when
Sir Arthur Sullivan takes up the running with his romantic set-
ting of tfae elopement scene as a quartet, or rather as a descriptive
ballad for four voices. (By the way, in the previous comic trio
H<Sty $oity^ the composer has reproduced die exact movement
of For a British tar is a soaring spul from Pinafore, the notes
alone being altered,) The following few minutes, during which
the stage remains a black void, with hammer-ar*d-tongs storm
dusk and patent lightning flashes recurring with unerring pre-
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
as they tried his own. If at such moments he were allowed to sing
in Italian, the effect would be far finer. It only remains to warn
the matter-of-fact theatre-goer that from the hour when, at the
beginning of the piece, Sir George Vernon points to the sixteenth-
century fagade of Haddon Hall, and remarks that it "smiled be-
fore the Conquest," to the final happy moment when Charles I,
having beheaded Cromwell in 1680, or thereabout, restores the
property to the evicted parent of the heroine, Haddon Hall, in
history, costume, logic, and everything else of the kind, is per-
fectly impossible.
5 October 1892
THE recent death of Trebelli must not pass without a word of
comment in this column, more especially as so many of the obit-
uary notices contain descriptions of her singing which are purely
imaginary. In her best days her voice was extraordinarily rich in
the middle. Her tribute to Bella Venezia in the opening chorus
of Lucrezia Borgia:
Men di sue notti e limpido
D'ogn* altro cielo il giorno,
sounded better than a ripe plum tastes, though the phrase lies
round the middle of the treble stave, altogether above the point
at which ordinary singers have to leave their chest register, on
pain of displacing and ruining their voices. She produced con-
tralto effects in mezzo-soprano and transposed soprano parts
more successfully than in contralto parts, in one of which
Amneris, in Aida she ground her lower notes so unmercifully
for the sake of "dramatic effect" that their old rich purple-velvety
quality vanished irrecoverably.
This was one of many exploits of hers which seemed to prove
her^natural judgment much inferior to her cultivated taste; but
I am afraid the truth was that the public were so obtuse to her
finest qualities as an artist, and so appreciative of claptrap, that
she either lost faith in herself at times, or else gave up the struggle
with the public in despair. At Her Majesty's, as Cherubino or
if 4
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
Zerlina, she would sing Voi che sapete, or Batti, batti, transposed,
but without a note altered or a phrase vulgarized, only to find
herself written of with much less enthusiasm than Pauline Lucca
at Covent Garden, whose treatment of Mozart was well, I have
spent five minutes in trying to find an epithet both adequate and
decorous, without success. On the other hand, when, as Maffio
Orsini, she turned the brindisi into a bad joke by that never-to-
be-forgotten shake of hers, which was certainly the very worst
shake ever heard in an opera-house (it used to get sharper and
sharper by perceptible jerks), she was encored and applauded to
the echo. She liked Maffio, as she liked Siebel, Urbain, Arsaces,
and all parts which freed her from the tyranny of the petticoat,
of which, like most sensible women, she was impatient She never
seemed to lose her fresh enjoyment of these parts.
Once, happening to be behind the scenes at the end of the
prologue to Lucrezia, I saw her, the moment the curtain fell,
throw herself in a transport of excitement into the arms of Titiens,
though the two had played the scene together often enough to
make it the most hackneyed piece of business in the world to
them. Trebelli was at her best in the most refined and quiet class
of work. It is quite a mistake to suppose that she fell short as an
oratorio singer. I have never heard her singing of He shall feed
His flock surpassed: her diction alone put many of her English
colleagues to shame. Her Cherubino, her Zerlina, and her Rezia
in Oberon were criticism-proof. Her Carmen was, vocally, the
most finished we have heard. In the tragic, passionate contralto
parts in Verdi's operas she was not good: she played them out of
imaginative ambition, just as she sang such things as Offenbach's
C'est 1'Espagne out of high spirits; but the result was common-
place, and, by contrast with her fine Mozartean work, vulgar.
Unlike her daughter, she was deficient in agility of vocal exe-
cution, and could not manage a shake. She had also a certain
mannerism which affected her intonation, and made her one of
the many great artists who are always the piquant shadow of a
shade out of tune flat, as I judged it; though I confess tfm m
very minute dissonances I cannot tell flat from sharp. She was,
155
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
I should say, a much more cultivated musician than most of her
colleagues; and she was an eminently good-looking woman, with
a ready smile that did full justice to her teeth. The collapse of the
old regime at the opera caused the stage to leave her long before
she was ready to leave the stage; and she was by no means worn
out as a singer when physical infirmity, produced by a paralytic
stroke which fell on her some years ago, created the vacancy
which remained unfilled until Giulia Ravogli came.
Criticism, of course, knows no gratitude and no regret; but
I must say that if all the artists of the Titiens epoch had been as
good as Trebelli, my occasional references to that dark age
would be much less ferocious than they generally are.
Of the late Emil Behnke I knew just enough to be able to
say that his death is a considerable loss to teachers-in-training,
speakers, and singers who find themselves stopped by a difficulty
which they cannot get round. He was an exceedingly good de-
monstrator with the laryngoscope, and would shew you exactly
what he wanted done instead of making more or less vague sug-
gestions to your imagination. His scorn of the professors who
tell you to sing from the head, or the throat, or the chest, or to
pin your voice to your hard palate, was immense: he was justly
proud of his ability to name with the exactitude of a watchmaker
the movement and action he wished you to produce. He knew a
great deal about the physical act of voice production; and his
principal achievements were the relief of experienced singers
from disabilities which their ordinary training had not overcome
(or had created), and his cures of stammering.
Everybody who went to him learnt something, though no-
feody learnt everything from him; and even those who knew be-
fbrebaijd what he demonstrated to them with the laryngoscope
knew it much better afterwards. He was always keenly interested
m himself arid his work, and would talk about it, rush into con-
troversies about it, and denounce the ordinary commercial sing-
ing-master tip hill and down dale with unabated freshness at an
age which finds most professional' men stale routineers. Needless
^o add, he was not a popiilat character in academic drdes. As to
156
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-^4
his artistic capacity, I confess I had and have my doubts about
it. Besides his scientific interest in voice production, he un-
doubtedly had a strong practical turn, and hated to hear voices
spoiled or wasted or only half turned to account. He wanted to
have every throat in first-rate working order.
But whether he had that passion for perfect beauty of vocal
tone and perfect dignity and expressiveness of delivery in sing-
ing which is the supreme attribute of the greatest singers and
teachers of singing, I do not know, though I guess with some
confidence that he had little more than the ordinary appetite for
them. He once "sang" the notes of the common chord for me
when shewing me the action of lifting the soft palate. He then
got me to "sing" the same notes whilst he observed that action
in me. I use the inverted commas because laryngoscopic vocalism
can only be called singing by courtesy: as a matter of feet we
simply bawled the syllable "Haw" at one another in a manner
which would have created the utmost consternation in the theatre
or on the platform.
I remember being struck by the fact that though he seemed
interested by my success in managing my soft palate, he did not
make any comment on the extreme unloveliness of the noise with
which I had responded to his invitation to sing, which he had
not qualified by any allusion to the impossibility of my comply-
ing in the artistic sense under such conditions. The incident by
itself proved nothing; but it put me on the track of further ob-
servations, which finally left me under the impression (possibly
a mistaken one) that his authority was limited to the physical
acts involved by ordinary voice production, and did not extend
even to the modifications of those acts which have no reasons for
their existence except purely artistic ones.
For instance, he had made an elaborate study offareathmg, and
could teach people to use their diaphragms; but I once heard a
pupil of his who had her diaphragm tinder perfect cootrol, mil
who yet blew away her voice in the most ineffective way as sfee
sang, because she had not been taught to acquire, tfaa&feiiiar
steadying and ecoiiesiismg of the air column t^isshiel* j&l&e |bsl
MUSIC IN LONDON 1896-94
his artistic capacity, I confess I had and have niy doubts about
it. Besides his scientific interest in voice production, he un-
doubtedly had a strong practical turn, and hated to hear voices
spoiled or wasted or only half turned to account. He wanted to
have every throat in first-rate working order.
But whether he had that passion for perfect beauty, of vocal
tone and perfect dignity and expressiveness of delivery in sing-
ing which is the supreme attribute of the greatest singers and
teachers of singing, I do not know, though I guess with some
confidence that he had little more than the ordinary appetite for
them. He once "sang" the notes of the common chord for me
when shewing me the action of lifting the soft palate. He then
got me to "sing" the same notes whilst he observed that action
in me. I use the inverted commas because laryngoscopic vocalism
can only be called singing by courtesy: as a matter of feet we
simply bawled the syllable "Haw" at one another in a manner
which would have created the utmost consternation in the theatre
or on the platform.
I remember being struck by the fact that though he seemed
interested by my success in managing my soft palate, he did not
make any comment on the extreme unloveliness of the noise with
which I had responded to his invitation to sing, which he had
not qualified by any allusion to the impossibility of my comply-
ing in the artistic sense under such conditions. The incident by
itself proved nothing; but it put me on the track of forther oi>-
servations, which finally left me under the impression (possibly
a mistaken one) that his authority was limited to the physical
acts involved by ordinary voice production, and did not extend
even to the modifications of those acts which have no reasons for
their existence except purely artistic ones.
For instance, he had made an elaborate study offorea&ing, and
could teach people to use their diaphragms; but I once heard a
pupil of his who had her diaphragm under perfect control, and
who yet blew away her voice in the most k^fiective way ys ste
sang, because she had not been taught to acquim that feeMpar
steadying and econiitag of the air column isiiM*
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
condition of beauty of tone in singing. I am therefore sceptical
as to Behnke's having ever trained a complete artistic singer or
speaker; though many singers and speakers learnt a good deal
from him. I was so convinced on the latter point that at the mo-
ment of his death I had arranged with him to take in hand a class
of about twenty political speakers, some of whom had already
acquired sufficient skill and experience to enable them to teach
an ordinary elocution professor his business.
Perhaps the most important thing to make known about
Behnke is, that though he elected to take his differences with the
majority righting instead of lying down, and so made enemies of
many whose countenance is supposed to be indispensable to
musical success, he prospered, as far as I am able to ascertain,
quite as well as his more compliant rivals. Although his terms
were higher than any but first-rate teachers can venture to ask in
these days of Guildhall Schools and Royal Colleges, he was over-
worked. His Voice Training Exercises sold at the rate of over
eight thousand copies a year; and his Mechanism of the Human
Voice got into a seventh edition, whilst the better advertised
book which he wrote in collaboration with Dr Lennox-Browne
nearly doubled that record.
It may be, of course, that London, according to its custom
with professional men, gave with one hand and took back with
the other, and that all the return he got for his labor over and
above his bare subsistence was the privilege of collecting money
for his landlord, his servants, his tradesmen, and so forth. But
this is the common lot of the orthodox and the heterodox alike.
My point is that he had not to pay any more for his self-respect
than less courageous men have to pay for being humbugs and
nonentities. It is a mistake to be too much afraid of London
saerely because it is much stronger and much stupider than you
are, just as it is a mistake to be too much afraid of a horse on the
same ground. Behnke, I imagine, was shrewd and resolute
enough to know this.
His death is a real loss; for on his weak side (as I judge him)
he at least did no mischief, whilst on his strong side he undid a
15*
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
great deal. Besides, he ventilated his profession, which is, if I
may say so in a whisper, rather a stuffy one.
12 October 1892
Now that we have five comic operas running, London perhaps
feels satisfied. I, for one, do not want any more. Sufficient for me
the privilege of living in the greatest city in the world, with five
comic operas within easy reach, and not a symphony to be heard
for love or money. However, it is a poor heart that never re-
joices; and I have been doing my best to rejoice at the Royalty
over The Baroness, and at the Lyric over Incognita. To Incog-
nita especially I must be civil; for is it not financed by that great
syndicate which has set about buying up the London press as the
Viennese press has been bought up? Do not expect outspoken
criticism from me in such days as these: I cannot afford it: I must
look to the future like other journalists. Therefore the utmost I
dare say against Incognita is that the more you see of it the less
you like it, because the first act is better than the second, and the
second much better than the third, which produces the effect of
being the first act of some other comic opera. The piece has a
plot turning upon some maze of Portuguese diplomacy; but I
speedily lost my way in it, and made no attempt to extricate my-
self, though I was conscious of its boring me slightly towards the
end of the performance. The music is quite Lecocquian: that is
to say, it is cleverly scored, rises occasionally to the level of a
really graceful chansonette, is mechanically vigorous in the
finales, and calculatedly spirited in the frequent Offenbachian
rallies, for which the old quadrille and galop prescription has
been compounded with the old remorseless vulgarity. It is also
Lecocquian in the speedy running dry of its thin fountain of
natural grace and piquancy, and the eking out of the supply with
machine-made louffe music more and more as the opera proceeds.
This remark does not apply to the third act, which is not by
Lecocq at all, but by Mr Bunning, who* if I recollect aright, re-
cently had a most tremendous tragic scena performed at the
Crystal Palace; by Mr Hamilton Clarke; and by the composer
159
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
who conceals his identity under the exasperating name of Yvolde.
I may add that the pretty stage pictures of the first act degenerate
into the pecuniary garishness of the second in sympathy with the
degeneration of the music; and with this I abandon all attempt
at formal criticism, and proceed to discuss the affair at random.
To begin with Miss Sedohr Rhodes, she made all the usual
American mistakes. First, by a well-worked battery of puff, she
led us to expect so much from her that an angel from the spheres
would have disappointed us; and then she arranged an elaborate
handing up of floral trophies across the footlights, in spite of the
repeatedly proved fact that this particular method of manufac-
turing a success invariably puts up the back of an English audi-
ence. I have never seen the American flower show turned to good
account by any prima donna except Miss Macintyre. One even-
ing at Covent Garden, when she was playing Micaela to the
Carmen of an American d&butante, the two ladies appeared be-
fore the curtain simultaneously; and the contractor's men set to
work at once to deliver bouquets and wreaths. Carmen, over-
wfadbaed with innocent surprise at this spontaneous tribute from
the 'British public, gracefully offered a nosegay to Micaela, who
quietly turned hear back and walked off the stage amid signs of
thorough and general approval which ought to have settled the
question of flowers or no flowers for all future American prima
donnas. On Thursday night Miss Rhodes, though she entirely
foiled to make herself first favorite on the merits of her perform-
ance, got so overloaded with trophies that she had to ask Mr
Wallace Brownlow to carry the last basket for her. He, being
good-natured, did not there and then inform her publicly that
he was not her florist's porter; but if he had done so he would,
I isaa^ae, have had the entire support of the house. The puffs
and lie flowers were the more ill-judged fa Miss Rhodes's case
became $he has exactly that degree of talent which playgoers,
with &e&p generosity, like to discover and encourage when it is
modestly and friendlessly presented to them, whereas if it be
thrust pretentiously upon them as first-rale, they delight in tak-
ing it down a peg. When Miss Rhodes' stepped out of her sedan
160
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-^4
chair in the first act she was for a few moments a complete suc-
cess; for, with her delicate skin, fine contours, slender fragile
figure, small hands and feet, and perfect dress, she was sufficiently
near the perfection of the ladylike ideal of beauty. Unfortunately,
it presently appeared that she not only looked like a Court
beauty, but sang like one. Her voice, thin, and with a flexibility
which is only a quality of its fault, could not be fitted by hear
wannest admirer with any stronger adjective than prettyish. It*
order to substantiate her pretensions as a vocalist, she had t
attempt a florid vocal waltz which was much too difficult for her,
and which was only encored from a chivalrous desire to console
her for the opposition of a party of malcontents who were, I must
say, musically in the right, though they would have done wise^
lier to have kept silent. Her dancing, again, was rather pretty,
but not extraordinary. She speaks in .the American dialect, which
I do not at all dislike; but her diction, though passable, has afi
the amateurish deficiency in force and style which we tolerate so
weakly in our operatic prima donnas. On the other hand, the
assurance with which she carried off her part in spite of her want
of technical grip, and the courage with 'which she faced the op-
position from the gallery, shewed that she is not lacking in force
of character. I therefore conclude that she will improve with ex-
perience up to a certain point. To pass that point she will require
something of the genius for her profession which is displayed so
liberally by Miss Jenoure, who quite fulfilled the promise of her
performance in The Mountebanks. Her singing, from the purely
musical point of view, is commonplace enough; but her dancing
and pantomime are capital. Mr Wallace Brownlow made a very
decided hit as the hero. He is a vigorous and handsome young
man of the type which Kemble made fashionable in "die palmy
days"; his voice is a genuine baritone, of good tone afl over Ms
range; he sings with fire and feeling, without any suicidal shout-
ing; and he has abundant freshness, virility, humor, and activity.
What he lacks is training in speech and movement; he is always
offhis balance, and is therefore only comfortable wheo tefe faafei
at work at some stage business or other; and his ciefio is i&i^b
VOL. ii i<fc M
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
and ready, audible and intelligible certainly, but no more artistic
than the diction of the Stock Exchange. Happily, these are emi-
nently remediable faults; and when they are vanquished, Mr Hay-
den Coffin will have a rival all the more formidable because of
the wide difference of style between them. The tenor is Mr John
Childs, whose vigorous B flat will be remembered by the patrons
of Carl Rosa. It is still in stentorian condition; and though Mr
Childs has a strong provincial tendency to bawl occasionally (if
he will pardon the expression) and to concern himself very little
about his tone and style when using the middle of his voice, the
encore he won for the catching soldier's song in the first act was
the heartiest of the evening. The opera is so strongly fortified by
a squadron of comedians of established drollery and popularity
that a great deal of thin and childish stuff becomes amusing in
their hands. Mr Monkhouse, who has gained remarkably within
the last two years in quietude and refinement of play without
losing an inch of the breadth of his humor, was seconded by Miss
Susie Vaughan in a stale and odious duenna part which she con-
trived to make not only bearable, but for the most part genuinely
funny* The attempt to doub,le the harlequinade in the third act
by the introduction of a second comic king (Mr Fred Kaye) and
a second comic old woman (Miss Victor) was not a success. Mr
Kaye was certainly laughable in his surpassingly silly character;
but Miss Victor, who had really no function in the piece at all,
and had been engaged solely that she might repeat the vulgar
business of her part in Miss Decima a part entirely unworthy
of her cannot be congratulated this time. The whole third act,
however, is such a desperate and obvious makeshift that it would
be mere affectation not to accept it, with its serpentine dance,
pastoral symphony with transformation scene, and comic turns
for Mb Monkhouse as a gipsy-girl, etc., as a brilliant variety
entertainment. The band is good, as it usually is at the Lyric; and
the chorus, though not up to the Savoy level of refinement,
would pass with credit if some of the men could be induced to
refrain from shouting. Finally, let me say that the Lord Chamber-
lain, by licensing the second act of Miss Decima, has completely
162
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
cleared himself of all suspicion of Puritanical intolerance. When
I saw the audience laughing at the spectacle of a father, in night-
cap and bedgown, chuckling as he listened at the door of his
daughter's bridal chamber, I could not help feeling how vast an
advance we had made since last year, when all London was sup-
posed to have shuddered with horror at the wickedness of that
scene in Ibsen's Ghosts, where the mother in the drawing room
overhears her son kissing the housemaid in the dining room.
Mr Cotsford Dick's Baroness, at the Royalty, is not so well
staged as Incognita, the management having evidently been com-
pelled to accept what recruits they could get for the rank and file
in the face of a heavy competition. On the whole, they have
made the best of their circumstances; and the opera gets a toler-
able chance. The book, which begins as a burlesque of King Lear,
and proceeds on the lines of the Who's who? pattern offeree, is
funny enough, especially in the Turkish-bath scene, until the
third act, in which the tangled threads of the plot are unravelled
in a rather butter-fingered way. The fact is, Mr Cotsford Dick,
who is his own librettist, takes matters too easily and genially
to turn out distinguished work; but he always manages to keep
on pleasant terms with his audience. The music is lively and
pretty, with plenty of Cotsford-Dickian ballads, and much un-
blushing borrowings from The Mikado and Trial by Jury, not
to mention a vocal waltz of which the honors are divided between
Gounod and Weber. The verses I need not describe, as Mr Dick's
powers in that field are familiar to all my readers. The cast has
been selected with a view to having the music sung rather than
to having the opera played. Miss Giglio, who makes a consider-
able display as a vocalist, and is evidently quite conscious of
being able to sing the heads off most comic-opera prima donnas,
hardly seems to know that speech and action on the stage are arts
not a whit less important and less difficult than fluent vocaliza-
tion. Mr William Foxon, too, though rather 'above the usual
stage mark as a tenor singer, is, to speak plainly, such a stick that
it is difficult to believe that he has ever seriously studied aad
practised the business of the stage with a competent instructor.
163
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
The principal tenor, Mr Charles Conyers, is an agreeably robust
and good-looking young gentleman, no great artist dramatically,
but a pleasant singer of ballads. Mr Magrath, familiar to us as the
old knight in Cosi fan tutti and the venerable barber of Bagdad
in Cornelius's opera, flashes out in The Baroness as a dark-eyed
handsome youth who might serve the President of the Royal
Academy as a model for a young Italian noble. He was much
more nervous over this comparatively trivial job than he shewed
himself in his former far more difficult exploits; and his air of
melodramatic exaggeration was not always humorously inten-
tional: there was a touch in it of that traditional penny-plain-and-
twopence-colored style which has left so many promising young
artists fit for nothing better than the boundless absurdities and
artistic shams of "English Opera" in the provinces. His drinking
song in the last act was loudly applauded; but it would have been
a much greater success if it had been sung with the easy self-
possession of a gentleman at a ball, and not with the heroic stress
of John of Leyden's Versez in the last act of Le Prophte. I take
Mr Magrath the more specially to task on this point because he
has improved in every other respect, and is likely to have an
honorable career if he shuns the burnt-cork path along which I
have seen so many well-equipped aspirants go down to their
destruction. The fun of the opera was kept up vigorously by Mr
Lionel Brough, Mr Fred Emney, Mr George Grossmith, junior,
and Mr Charles Stevens, a comedian whom I last saw, if I mis-
take not, at Bristol, where he was for some years a leading mem-
ber of Mr Macready Chute's company.
; I am informed that three other comic operas are in contem-
,|Moiv m addition to the five already in full swing. I can quite
feife^ it* The one business notion that theatrical managers have
isftfaast when the bank flourishes, then is the time to make a run
on it.
19 October 1892
ON Saturday last the Crystal Palace concerts came to relieve the
musical famine. Before saying anything about the music, I may
164
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
point out that a move has been made at last in the direction of
reducing the expenses of attending these concerts* Hitherto the
bill has been made up in the following way: railway ticket, two
shillings first-class (saving by second-class not worth making, and
third-class barred on special concert train); program, sixpence;
admission to Palace, half-a-crown; admission to concert-room,
one shilling, or for a numbered stall half-a-crown, reducible
to two-and-a-penny-fifthing by booking in advance for the
whole twenty concerts: total, five-and-sixpence at least, and
seven-and-sixpence at most, without counting a probable visit
to the tea-room for persons addicted to that deleterious fluid.
These charges are absolutely prohibitive for four out of five
Londoners; and regular frequenters of the concerts are, conse-
quently, very scarce outside the ranks of the season-ticket holders
resident in the neighborhood of the Palace.
In general social value the free orchestral concerts given on
other afternoons, with a smaller band, are probably much more
important than the Saturday ones. This season, however, the
railway companies have consented to issue twenty first-class re-
turn tickets from London to the Palace, available on concert
Saturdays only, for a guinea to holders of tibe two-guinea serial
stall tickets. By this arrangement I shall save nineteen shillings
if I go to all the concerts; and even if I only go to one more tfean
half of them, I shall still save a shilling. A further concession has
been made in favor of those families who take one or two serial
stall tickets and transfer them from one member of the house-
hold to another according to tastes, circumstances, and the
fortunes of the weekly war for their possession. By paying an
additional guinea the transferable stall ticket can be made to
carry with it admission to the Palace, which formerly involved
twenty separate half-crowns, since the ordinary guinea season
ticket is not transferable.
I make no apology for dwelling on these financial Arrange-
ments. It has always been evident to people who understand the
importance of these concerts, that their utility is fer too much
restricted by the necessity of making charges wfakfa cutofl^ not
165
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
only the shilling public, but the half-crown public as well. If Mr
Irving, Mr Tree, Mr Hare, etc., were to raise the prices at their
theatres to a minimum of five-and-sixpence, the stupidest citizen
would see that we should have either to endow a theatre or else
face the consequences of leaving the mass of the people without
any higher dramatic recreation than such as they might extract
from die excitement of playing the very mischief by using their
votes without the smallest regard to the vital necessity of main-
taining a high general level of artistic culture in a country rapidly
becoming entirely democratized.
Even as it is, with the Lyceum gallery accessible daily for a
shilling, people are asking for an endowed theatre, because
the social need for art of the highest order is so inadequately
expressed by the effective commercial demand for it: our Philis-
tines being able easily to outbid our Idealists and Realists com-
bined for the use of all the capital that is available for dramatic
enterprise. Still, London is never left absolutely without dra-
matic performances, as it so commonly is without concerts. You
can go to the theatre every weekday all the year round; but when
there is an orchestral concert once a fortnight in St James's Hall,
music is supposed to be in full swing, whilst such a concert once
a week indicates the height of the season.
What we want in London is an orchestral concert every day,
with permanent engagements and pensions for the conductors
and players, among whom there should be, in each division,
competent soloists, each playing solo once, a week or so. Con-
certos should, on all ordinary occasions, be played by members
of the orchestra, and not by wandering "stars" who pay an agent
a lump sum to foist them off for three or six months on givers of
concerts and parties as distinguished virtuosos. All masterpieces
should be rehearsed up to that point of intimate knowledge which
the Manchester band has attained in its Berlioz repertory; and
this should be insisted on whether the work in hand were a trifle
by Grieg, requiring two or three days* attention, or the Ninth
Symphony, requiring two years (a la Habeneck).
I say this with deep feeling; for I protest that if there is any-
166
MUSIC IN LONDON 1*90-94
thing of which I am heartily sick, it is the London no-rehearsal
system, under which, with the best players in the world, equipped
with the best instruments in the world, we have orchestras tiiat
read everything and know nothing; so that the moment we are
confronted by works which can only be played properly by a
band thoroughly obsessed with every melody and every accent
in the score, we are beaten and disgraced not only by our pro-
vincial rivals from Manchester, but by a second-rate German
band from Hamburg, which supersedes us in our own leading
opera house.
I do not make these remarks propos de bottes. A gentleman
of benefactorious disposition has offered to endow the Albert
Palace to the tune of 10,000. Let us suppose that the Vestry,
the County Council, etc., rise to the occasion and complete the
endowment of the Palace. It will then remain for some musical
millionaire to eclipse all the rest by endowing an Albert Palace
orchestra on the lines I have suggested. Who speaks first?
Meanwhile I am forgetting the Crystal Palace concert, which
introduced to us two novelties: to wit, Mr C. A. Lidgey's Ballade
for Orchestra, Op. 7, after Dore's picture A Day Dream, and
Les Lupercales, by Andre Wormser, the composer of L'Enfant
Prodigue. M. Wormser's "symphonic poem" (save the mark)
occasionally rises, at second hand, to die level of Offenbach's
Orphee. There is one little dance tune in the style of L'Enfent
which is tolerable: the rest, with its sham Greek modes which are
simply minor scales without leading notes, is vulgar, noisy, and,
except in the dance tunes, ingeniously ugly. Mr Lidgey's Ballade
is much better. The first section is very successful in point of
form (in the real as distinguished from the common, academic
sense of the term). It is well balanced, all of one piece, with
gathering movement and a strong climax. But it has no special
originality or distinction if it had, Mr Lidgey would have
ranked as an eminent composer after its performance. When the
double bar is passed the composition fells off, the working out
containing a good deal of stale imagination and instrumentation,
and the tremendous outlay of organ and orchestra on die perora- '
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
tion adding nothing to the value of the theme on which it is
lavished. Vladimir de Pachmann, pianist and pantomimist, played
Beethoven's third concerto and some Chopin, including a juve-
nile scherzo which nobody wanted to hear at full length at five
o'clock in the afternoon. De Pachmann is unquestionably a very
able pianist, and by no means an insincere one; but now that I
have seen, in La Statue du Commandeur, a lady sing a song in
dumb show, I want to see a pianoforte concerto played in the
same way; and I think there can be no doubt that de Pachmann
is the player for that feat The concert opened with Sullivan's In
Memoriam overture, substituted for a number from one of Bach's
suites.
Now that the new English Opera House is about to be turned
into a music-hall, and that the Theatre of Varieties is supposed
to be swallowing up all other theatres, I have resolved to keep
myself up to date by visiting the halls occasionally. The other
evening I wait to the Empire, where I immediately found my-
self to my great delight, up to the neck in pure classicism, stecle
de Lotiis Quatorze. To see Cavallazzi, in the Versailles ballet,
waikj stand, sit, and gesticulate, is to learn all that Vestris or
Noblet could have taught you as to the technique of doing these
things with dignity.
In the stage management too in the coloring, the costuming,
the lighting, in short, the stage presentation in the completest
sense an artistic design, an impulse towards brilliancy and grace
of effect, is always dominant, whether it is successful or not; and
in some scenes it is highly successful. Now is it not odd that at
a musk-tell to which, perhaps, half the audience have come to
hear Mane Lloyd sing Twiggy voo, boys, twiggy voo? or to see
jNbEtediy jump a ten-barred gate, you get real stage art, whereas
at fee Opera tiie stage is managed just as a first-rate restaurant
is^managed, with everything served up punctually in the most
expensive style, but with all the art left to the cook (called "prima
donna"), helped by the waiters (otherwise the chorus).
* Wagner noticed long ago that the supremacy of the ballet-
masters, who are all enthusiasts in the ballet, made it the most
168
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
completely artistic form of stage representation left to us; and I
think that anyone who will compare Versailles at the Empire with
Orfeo at Covent Garden from this point of view, will see what
Wagner was driving at, and what I have driven at pretty often
without any further effect so far than to extract from my friends
many goodnatured but entirely irrelevant assurances that our
operatic impresarios are the best fellows in the world when you
come to know them. As to which I may observe that I am a
capital fellow myself when you come to know me.
One performance at the Empire exhibited the audience to piti-
ful disadvantage. A certain Sefiorita C. de Otero, described as a
Spanish dancer and singer, danced a dance which has ennobled
the adjective "suggestive" for me for ever. It was a simple aflair
enough, none of your cruel Herodias dances, or cleverly calcu-
lated tomboyish Tararas, but a poignant, most meaning dance,
so intensely felt that a mere walk across the stage in it quite
dragged at one's heart-strings. This Otero is really a great artist
But do you suppose the house rose at her? Not a bit of it: they
stared vacantly, waiting for some development in the manner of
Miss Lottie Collins, and finally grumbled out a little disappointed
applause. Two men actually, hissed if they will forward me
their names and addresses I will publish them with pleasure, kst
England should burst in ignorance of its greatest monsters.
Take notice, oh Sefiorita C. de Otero, Spanish dancer and
singer, that I wash 4 my hands of the national crime of felling to
appreciate you. You were a perfect success: the audience was a
dismal failure. I really cannot conceive a man being such a dull
dog as to hold out against that dance. Shall it be said that though
Miss Collins could stimulate us cleverly but mechanically, Otero,
an immeasurably greater artist, cannot touch us poetically? If so,
then let the nations know that dancing in England is measured
simply by the brightness of the scarlet and the vigor of the kick-
ing. But I wax too eloquent.
There was a second ballet, called Round the Town, mostly
mere drill and topical spectacle, plus a few excellent pantomime
episodes in which Cavallazzi again distinguished he*sei as c8d
169
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
also Mr W. Warde, a skilful and amusing comic dancer, who
played the swell (archaic name for a Johnny). Vincenti has given
up the British public in despair, and treats them to unlimited
cartwheels and teetotums instead of to the fine classic dancing he
used to give us in Asmodeus. Both ballets, I may remark, became
tedious at the end through the spinning-out of the final scenes
by mechanical evolutions involving repeats in the music almost
beyond endurance.
One other performer must not go unnoticed. Miss Marie
Lloyd, like all the brightest stars of the music-hall, has ail ex-
ceptionally quick ear for both pitch and rhythm. Her intonation
and the lilt of her songs are alike perfect. Her step-dancing is
pretty; and her command of coster-girls' patois is complete. Why,
then, does not someone write humorous songs for her? Twiggy
voo is low and silly; and Oh, Mister porter, though very funnily
sung, is not itself particularly funny. A humorous rhymester of
any genius could easily make it so.
I am greatly afraid that the critics persisted so long in treating
the successes of music-hall vocalism as mere impudent exploita-
tions of vulgarity and indecency (forgetting that if this were more
than half true managers could find a dozen Bessie Bellwoods and
Marie Lloyds in every street) that the artists have come to ex-
aggerate the popularity of the indecent element in their songs,
and to underrate that of the artistic element in their singing. If
music-hall songs were written by Messrs Anstey, Rudyard Kip-
ling, W. S. Gilbert, etc., our best music-hall singers would prob-
ably be much more widely popular than they can ever become
now. Twiggez vous~, Miss Lloyd?
26 October 1892
IT is impossible not to sympathize with the devotion of Signor
Lago to the romance and adventure of opera management. When
I was a boy I took that view of opera myself: the wildest pirates
and highwaymen in fiction did not fascinate me more than the
prima donnas in Queens of Song, nor could the pictures of their
deeds and the tales of their exploits please me as did Heath's gift
170
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
books with decorative borders and operatic tableaux, or the
anecdotes in that quite inimitable work, Sutherland Edwards's
History of the Opera, which I take to be the most readable book
of its kind ever written. I have lived to become the colleague, and
to all appearances considerably the senior of Mr Sutherland
Edwards; and I tired long ago of paying at the Opera doors and
then supplying all the charm of the performance from my own
imagination, in flat defiance of my eyes and ears.
Yet I still remember the old feeling of the days when the
Opera was a world of fable and adventure, and not a great art
factory where I, with wide open eyes and sharpened ears, must
sit remorselessly testing the quality of each piece of work as it is
turned out and submitted to my judgment. I read Wagner now,
and take the theatre seriously to make amends for my youthful
profligacy; and I am tremendously down on the slovenly tradi-
tions of the old school when they survive apart from its romantic
illusions and enthusiasm; but when it survives in such integrity
as is possible under existing circumstances, I cannot always bring
myself to be hard upon it.
And that is why I always approach a Lagb season in an indul-
gent humor. I know that the atmosphere of the stage will be one
of perfect freedom; so that every individual thereon, down to
the hindmost chorister, will be welcome, released from control
or direction of any kind, to give the rein to his or her individual
genius. I also know that the choristers, hindmost and foremost,
will have no individual genius to give the rein to, and that they
will stand and look on at the principals, criticizing their solos,
and trusting to me as one who has known many of their faces for
years, and who ought therefore to be glad to see them all there
again, not to try to get the bread taken out of their mouths
by a lot of new-fangled girls from the Savoy with Cambridge
certificates.
I know, further, that the treasury will not run to downright
splendor in the way of dresses and scenery, and that the ballet
will have to be made the best of by kind friends in front. In, shorty
that, as in the old times, unless the principal singers are good
171
MUSIC IN LONDON
enough to triumph for the moment over surroundings which at
every turn defeat the efforts of the imagination to produce a
gratuitous illusion, there will be virtually no opera. I am not
sorry to see that the power of the younger generation of critics
to put up with these hard conditions is comparatively small,
leading them to greatly underrate the value of the Italian operas
of the old repertory which they more especially associate with
such conditions; but to me submission is not so difficult; for I
was broken in to the system when young, and can get back only
too easily to my old attitude and concentrate my attention wholly
on consent to do this at Covent Garden, where the public posi-
tion of the enterprise, its pretensions, and the prices charged en-
title me to demand that the performances shall in all respects set
the highest European standard; but with Signer Lago, playing
to his two-shilling pit and shilling gallery, and frankly offering
his entertainment on the old lines, I do not feel bound to be so
strict.
Besides, Signor Lago discovered Giulia Ravogli and Caval-
leria, and in due course had these trumps annexed by his rival,
and played against him on his opening night. Who would not
sympathize with him under such circumstances?
Eugene Onegin, his latest card, reminded me, I hardly know
why, of The Colleen Bawn. Something in the tailoring, in the
scenery, in the sound of the hero's name (pronounced O'Naygin,
or, to put it in a still more Irish way, O'Neoghegan) probably
combined with the Balfian musical form of the work to suggest
this notion to me. There is something Irish, too, as well as
Byronic, in the introduction of Eugene as an uncommonly fine
fellow when there is not the smallest ground for any such esti-
iBateroCbim, The music suggests a vain regret that Tchaiko wsky 's
semaskabk artistic judgment, culture, imaginative vivacity, and
self-respect as a musical workman, should have been unaccom-
panied by any original musical force. For, although I have de-
scribed the form of the opera as Balfian, it must not therefore be
inferred that Tchaifcowsky's music is as common as Balfe's
ballads apart generally was. Tchaikowsky composes with the
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
seriousness of a man who knows how to value himself and his
work too well to be capable of padding his opera with the child-
ish claptrap that does duty for dramatic music in The Bohemian
Girl. Balfe, whose ballads are better than Tchaikowsky's, never,
as far as I know, wrote a whole scene well, whereas in Eugene
Onegin there are some scenes, notably those of the letter and the
duel, which are very well written, none of them being bungled
or faked (factitious is the more elegant expression; but the other
is right). The opera, as a whole, is a dignified composition by a
man of distinguished talent whose love of music has led him to
adopt the profession of composer, and who, with something of
his countryman Rubinstein's disposition to make too much of
cheap second-hand musical material, has nothing of his diffuse-
ness, his occasional vulgarity, and his incapacity for seeing when
to drop a worn-out theme.
The performance, as far as the principals are concerned, is by
no means bad. Signor Lago was particularly fortunate in finding
to his hand, in Mr Oudin, just the man for Onegin, dark, hand-
some, distinguished, mysterious-looking in short, Byronic,
and able to behave and to act in a manner worthy of his appear
ance, which is not always the case with the Don Juans and Cor-
sairs of the stage. Miss Fanny Moody achieved a considerable
dramatic success as Tatiana; and it may possibly interest her to
learn, on the authority of no less critical a Russian than Stepniak,
that she so exactly represented the sort of Russian woman of
whom Tatiana is a type, that he is convinced that she would make
a success in the part in Russia, even if she sang it in English. To
my mind, however, it is a pity that Miss Moody's gifts are so
exclusively dramatic. If she were only musical if she could give
that hard, penetrating voice of hers the true lyric grace of execu-
tion and beauty of sound s as unerringly as she can give it con-
vincing dramatic eloquence, she would be a prima donna in a
thousand. Happily for Signor Lago, he could not have chosen a
part better calculated than Tatiana to emphasize her power as an
actress and cover her want of charm as a vocalist. Mr Manners
scored the hit of the evening in a ballad in the k$f a^tfae aadi-
173
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
ence being, to tell the truth, greatly relieved after a long spell of
Mr Oudin's rather artificial style by the free, natural, sympathetic
tone of Mr Manners's voice, which is as sound and powerful as
ever. Mr Ivor McKay, having been shot with a terrific bang, pro-
duced by a heavy charge of anything but smokeless powder, by
Mr Oudin, retired from the tenor part, which is now filled by
Mr Wareham: how, I know not. Madame Swiatlowsky is good
and very Russian as the nurse; and Mile Selma fits well into the
part of the mother. Miss Lily Moody, a vigorous young lady
with a strong mezzo-soprano voice which has not been sweet-
ened by her work as a dramatic contralto, is a somewhat inelegant
Olga.
The stage management was, I submit, rather worse than it
need have been. Granted that there is nobody capable of making
the willing but helpless chorus do anything in the quarrel scene
except make it ridiculous, and that the two capital dances are
utterly beyond the resources of the establishment, I still think
that the gentleman, whoever he was, who loaded that pistol with
so fine a feeling for the stage effect of the duel, might, if pro-
moted to the post of chief gasman, manipulate the lights so as to
make the change from dark to dawn in the letter scene rather
more plausible than on the first night. The dresses were quite
good enough for all purposes; but the supply ran short, the
dancers at Madame Larina's in Act II reappearing in the same
costumes at Prince Gremin's in Act IE. Onegin fought the duel
in a dark coat with two rows of blazing golden buttons, which
made him a perfect target; and he would most certainly have been
slain if he had not fired first Years afterwards he came back, a
grey-haked man, to make love in that Same coat. In fact, Signor
Lago might have made a "missing-word competition" out of
Qaegin's exclamation, "I change from one land to another, but
cannot change my ." The missing word is "heart," but
would be guessed as "coat" by nine-tenths of the audience. This
scrap from the book reminds me that Mr Sutherland Edwards,
who knows Russian, has expiated that unnatural accomplish-
ment by translating the libretto, the most impossible of literary
174 *
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
tasks, but one which he has managed, with his usual tact, to ac-
complish without making himself at all ridiculous. Onegin is
now being played three times a week; and it is to be hoped that
it will pay its way for the better encouragement of Signor Lago
in his policy of bringing forward novelties.
La Favorita was played on the following night; but I forebore
it. I saw an act and a half of Lohengrin on Saturday, and can
certify that the pit got handsome value for its money, although
they would do it differently at Bayreuth. Signor Zerni, the tenor,
is a representative of that modern Gayarrean school which has
raised bleating to the rank of a fine art throughout Europe. He
has been carefully warned to keep his voice as steady as the
nature of his method will permit; and this he does with sufficient
success to save himself from the fate of Suane, Signor Lago's last
venture in that manner. Mr Manners will make a good king when
he has become thoroughly familiar with the part; and Signor
Mario Ancona, as Telramund, is exceptionally good as Telra-
munds go in London.
Mr Worlock, too, is by no means an everyday herald; and on
the whole, if there were only somebody to make the chorus look
alive occasionally, especially at the entry of Lohengrin; if Signor
Lago would urge the choristers to either let their beards* grow
or not, but by no means to shave only once a week; and if, further,
some of the band would follow the example of Albani, who plays
Elsa as scrupulously and carefully as ever she did on the most
brilliant night at Covent Garden in the regular season, Signor
Lago would be able to boast of having pulled the biggest opera
on his list very creditably off. Arditi conducted. Onegin, by the
bye, was conducted by Mr Henry J. Wood, who did his work
steadily, and, as far as my acquaintance with the music enabled
me to judge, chose the tempi well; but he did not succeed in get-
ting any really fine execution out of the band, which does not
play at all as well as it could if it liked.
Slivinski, who stepped in to replace Paderewski (laid up with
rheumatic fever) at Manchester, gave a recital last week at St
James's HalL The altogether extraordinary degree of tedbnkal
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
accomplishment displayed by him during his last visit has had
its edge very perceptibly taken off by, as I guess, too much draw-
ing-room playing, and perhaps by yielding to squeamish com-
plaints of the swordsmanlike quality of his touch.
However that may be, he has certainly been cultivating the
feathery execution which Paderewski sometimes uses for Chopin
studies; and though he is too skilful a player to attempt any style
without some success, he has lost more in force and distinction
than he has gained in softness and prettiness. Also he has con-
tracted a habit of slurring over indeed, all but dropping
the unaccented notes in rapid passages. This was more or less
noticeable all through the recital; but when he came to Liszt's
transcription of Schubert's Auf dem Wasser zu singen, with its
exquisite accompaniment of repeated semiquavers, the ticking of
the second semiquavers was not heard until they were played as
chords instead of single notes. His deficiency in eloquence of
style was very apparent in his playing of that touching and digni-
fied piece of musical rhetoric, Schubert's Impromptu in C minor,
which he quite misconceived.
In Schumann's Fantasie Stiicke, which he played right through
all the numbers, he was very good, except in the first, 'which he
gave with a rubato which had the worst fault a rubato can have
that of sounding as if the pianist, vainly trying to play in strict
time, were being baffled by the sticking of the keys. But on the
whole the Schumann pieces proved that Slivinski has advanced
as an interpreter. One or two of them were perfectly played; and
the whole program was full of evidences of his exceptional powers.
2 November 1892
THE yotmg English composer is having a good time of it just
now, with his overtures and symphonies resounding at the
Crystal Palace, and his operas at the Olympic. Mr Granville
Bantock's Caedmaris an enthusiasticany ingenious piece of work,
being nothing less than an adaptation of all the most fetching
passages in Wagner's later tragic musk-dramas to a Htde poem
176
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
in which Tristan, Siegmund, Siegfried, Hunding, Isolde, and
Sieglinde are aptly concentrated into three persons. The idea is
an excellent one; for in the space of an hour, and within a stone's-
throw of the Strand, we get the cream of all Bayreuth without
the trouble and expense of journeying thither. There is al$o,
for the relief of anti-Wagnerians, an intermezzo which might
have been written by the late -Alfred Cellier or any other good
Mendelssohnian.
The plot, as I understood it, is very simple. A pious knight-
errant wanders one evening into the garden of Eden, and falls
asleep there. Eve, having had words with her husband, runs
away from him, and finds in the sleeping warrior the one thing
lacking to her: to wit, somebody to run away with. She makes
love to him; and they retire together. Elves appear on the de-
serted stage, and dance to the strains of the intermezzo. They are
encored, not because the audience is particularly charmed, but
because Cavalleria has put it into its head that to recognize and
encore an intermezzo shews connoisseurship. Then the pair re-
turn, looking highly satisfied; and presently Adam enters and
remonstrates. Ten minutes later the knight-errant is die sole
survivor of the three, whereupon he prays the curtain down.
The whole affair is absurdly second-hand; but, for all that, it
proves remarkable musical ability on the part of Mr Granville
Bantock, who shews a thorough knowledge of the mechanism
of the Wagnerian orchestra. If Caedmar had been produced as
a newly discovered work by Wagner, everyone would have ad-
mitted that so adroit a forgery implied a very clever penman.
After Caedmar, Signor Lago put up the third act of Ernani.
Strange to say, a good many people did not wait for it.
Just imagine the situation. Here is a baritone singer, Signor
Mario Ancona, who has attracted general notice by his perform-
ance of Telramund in Lohengrin and Alfonso in La Favorita,
Signor Lago accordingly mounts a famous scene, the classic
opportunity for lyric actors of the Italian school (baritone
variety), a scene which is not only highly prized by all students
of Italian opera, but which had its dramatic import, well taugfct
VOL. ii . 177 N
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
to Londoners by the Comedie Frangaise when they crowded to
see Sarah Bernhardt as Dona Sol, and incidentally saw Worms
as Charles V. In the play Charles is sublime in feeling, but some-
what tedious in expression. In the opera he is equally sublime in
feeling, but concise, grand, and touching in expression, thereby
proving that the chief glory of Victor Hugo as a stage poet was
to have provided libretti for Verdi.
Every opera-goer who knows chalk from cheese knows that
to hear that scene finely done is worth hearing all the Mephisto-
pheleses and Toreadors that ever grimaced or swaggered, and
that when a new artist offers to play it, the occasion is a first-class
one. Yet, when Caedmar was over there was a considerable
exodus from the stalls, as if nothing remained but a harlequinade
for the children and the novices. "Now this," thought I, "is
pretty odd. If these people knew their Ernani, surely they would
stay." Then I realized that they did not know their Ernani
that years of Faust, and Carmen, and Les Huguenots, and
Mefistofele, and soi-disant Lohengrin had left them ignorant of
that ultra-classical product of Romanticism, the grandiose Italian
opera in which the executive art consists in a splendid display of
personal heroics, and the drama arises out of the simplest and
most universal stimulants to them.
II Trovatore, Un Ballo, Ernani, etc., are no longer read at the
piano at home as the works of the Carmen genre are, and as
Wagner's are. The popular notion of them is therefore founded
on performances in which the superb distinction and heroic force
of the male characters, and the tragic beauty of the women, have
been burlesqued by performers with every sort of disqualifica-
tion for such parts, from age and obesity to the most excruciating
ptases of physical insignificance and modern cockney vulgarity.
I used often to wonder why it was that whilst every asphalt con-
tractor could get a man to tar the streets, and every tourist could
find a gondolier rather above the average of the House of Lords
in point of nobility of aspect, no operatic manager, after Mario
vanished, seemed to be able to find a Manrico with whom any
exclusively disposed Thames mudlark would care to be seen
178
MUSIC IN LONDON '1890-94
grubbing for pennies. When I get on this subject I really cannot
contain myself. The thought of that dynasty of execrable im-
postors in tights and tunics, interpolating their loathsome B flats
into the beautiful melodies they could not sing, and swelling with
conceit when they were able to finish Di quella pira with a high
C capable of making a stranded man-of-war recoil off a reef into
mid-ocean, I demand the suspension of all rules as to decorum of
language until I have heaped upon them some little instalment
of the infinite abuse they deserve. Others, alas! have blamed
Verdi, much as if Dickens had blamed Shakespear for the ab-
surdities of Mr Wopsle.
The general improvement in operatic performances of late
years has taken us still further away from the heroic school. But
in due time its turn will come. Von Biilow, who once contemp-
tuously refused the name of music to Verdi's works, has recanted
in terms which would hardly have been out of place if addressed
to Wagner; and many who now talk of the master as of a tune-
ful trifler who only half-redeemed a misspent life by the clever
artificialities which are added in Aida and Otello to the power
and freedom of his earlier works, will change their tone when his
operas are once more seriously studied by great artists.
For the present, however, it is clear that if Signer Mario An-
cona wishes to interest the public, he must depend on character
parts instead of heroic ones. His offer of Charles V could hardly
have been less appreciatively received. This was certainly no
fault of his own; for he sang the opening recitative and cavatina
well, and the solo in the great sestet, Oh sommo Carlo, very well.
As a piece of acting his performance was a trifle too Italian-
operatic; his fold of the arms and shake of the head when Ernani
insisted on being beheaded was overmuch in the manner of Mr
Lenville; and there was too constant a strain throughout, since
even in the third act of Ernani there are moments which are
neither stentorian nor sentimental. But one does not expect a
revolution in operatic acting to be achieved in a single night,
especially in a part which is, to say the least, somewhat inflated;
and, on the whole, Signor Ancona was more dignified and sin-
179
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
cere than any experienced opera-goer had dared to hope.
The applause at the end was only moderately enthusiastic; but
this was largely due to the carelessness of the management,
which, instead of providing a book of the triple bill, left the audi-
ence entirely in the dark as to what the Ernani excerpt meant,
and tried to effect separate sales of vocal scores of Caedmar and
shilling books of L' Impresario to elucidate the rest of the pro-
gram. After which you felt that Signor Lago deserved anything
that might happen to him in the way of the performance falling
flat.
And the chances of Ernani were not improved by the modesty
of Charles's coronation arrangements, or by the unkempt stagi-
ness of the conspirators, or by the fact that though the music had
been rehearsed sufficiently to secure accuracy, no attempt was
made to color and enrich the sombre depths of the orchestra.
As to the choristers, they were allowed to bawl away in the old
slovenly, rapscallionly fashion, on the easy assumption that, if
the time came right and the pitch right (or thereabouts), the
quality of tone and style of delivery did not matter two straws.
When will S^nor Lago pay a visit to our comic-opera houses
with their English choruses, and realize that Queen Anne has
been dead for some time now?
Der Schauspieldirector, in the version known as L' Impresario,
of course put all the rest of the entertainment into the shade.
Every number in it is a masterpiece. The quartet would make a
very handsome finale for any ordinary opera; the overture is a
classic; the air Quando miro quel bel ciglio will last as long as
Pergolesi's Tre giorni son die Nina, or Gluck's Che far6 senza
Euridice? How far its finest qualities are above our heads, both
before and behind the curtain, I need riot say. The overture was
scrambled through post-haste in the old exhilarating slapdash
style, expressive of the idea that Mozart was a rattling sort of
drunkard and libertine, tempered by the modern and infinitely
more foolish notion that he was merely a useful model of aca-
demic form for students.
Mr G. Tate sang Quando miro in the person of Mozart him-
180
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self. To shew how thoroughly he grasped the character he altered
the last phrase so as to make the ending more "effective,'* much
as, if he were a sculptor instead of a singer, he might alter the
tails of the Trafalgar Square lions by sticking them up straight
in order to make their endings more effective. This public an-
nouncement on Mr Tate's part that he considers himself a better
judge of how a song should end than Mozart is something that
he will have to live down. Unless, indeed, the real explanation be
that Mr Tate is too modest, and succumbed, against his own
better sense, to the bad advice which is always thrust upon young
artists by people who have all the traditional abuses of the stage
at their fingers' ends, and know nothing about art. And that is
why, on the boards as off them, eminence is only attained by
those whose strength of conviction enables them to do, without
the least misgiving, exactly the reverse of what all the non-emi-
nent people round them advise them to do. For naturally, if these
non-eminents knew the right thing to do they would be eminent.
Of the performance generally, I have only to say that it has
been well prepared and is really enjoyable. Mile Leila, who played
Mile Herz, has a naturally good voice, which has been somewhat
squeezed and wire-drawn by an artificial method; but she mapr-
aged to hold her own in her very difficult part, which is worth
hearing not only for its own sake, but for the very fine Mozar-
tean aria which she introduces when asked by the Sdbauspiei-
director (Mr R. Temple) to give a sample of her powers,
I have to chronicle the resumption of the Monday and Satur-
day Popular Concerts, and to congratulate Senor Arbos on his
playing in the adagio of Beethoven's quartet in E flat (Op. 74)
at die opening concert, and Mile Szumowska on her neat hand-
ling of the last three movements of the Pastoral Sonata. The first
movement came to nothing, perhaps because Mile Szumowska
had a cold, perhaps because she has not a pastoral turn. Mite
Wietrowetz succeeds Senor Arbos this week as first violin.
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9 November 1892
To Dvorak's Requiem, which was performed last Wednesday
at the Albert Hall, I could not be made to listen again, since the
penalty of default did not exceed death; and I had much rather
die than repeat the attempts I made, first at Birmingham, and then
at Kensington Gore, to sit it out. It is hard to understand the
frame of mind of an artist who at this time of day sits down to
write a Requiem Apropos de lottes. One can fancy an undertaker
doing it readily enough: he would know as a matter of business
that in music as in joiners' work, you can take the poorest mat-
erials and set the public gaping at diem by simply covering them
with black cloth and coffin-nails. But why should a musician
condescend to speculate thus in sensationalism and superstition?
When I hear Dvorak's weird chords on muted cornets (patent
Margate Pier echo attachment), finishing up with a gruesome ding
on the tam-tam, I feel exactly as I should if he held up a skull with
a lighted candle inside to awe me. When in the Dies Ira, he pro-
ceeds, as who should say, "Now you shall see what I can do in
the way of stage-thunder," to turn on organ pedal and drum to
make a huge mechanical modern version of the Rossini crescendo,
I pointedly and publicly turn up my nose, and stare frigidly. But
the public, in spite of Charles Dickens, loves everything con-
nected with a funeral.
Those who are too respectable to stand watching the black
flag after an execution, take a creepy sort of pleasure in Requiems.
If Sir Joseph Barnby were to conduct with a black brass-tipped
Mton; if the bandsmen wore black gloves and crape scarves; if
the attendants were professional mutes (sordini}, and the tickets
edged with a half-inch jet border, I believe the enjoyment of the
audience would be immensely enhanced. Dvorak seems to have
felt this. Mozart's Requiem leads you away from the point: you
find yourself listening to the music as music, or reflecting, or
otherwise getting up to the higher planes of existence. Brahms'
Requiem has not the true funeral relish: it aims at the technical
traditions of requiem composition rather than the sensational,
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MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
and is so execrably and ponderously dull that the very flattest of
funerals would seem like a ballet, or at least a danse macabre,
after it.
Dvofik alone, mechanically solemn and trivially genteel, very
careful and elaborate in detail, and beyond belief uninspired, has
hit the mean. One almost admires the perseverance with which he
has cut all those dead strips of notes into lengths, nailed and glued
them into a single structure, and titivated it for the melancholy
occasion with the latest mortuary orchestral decorations. And
then, the gravity with which it is received and criticized as a work
of first-rate importance, as if it brought the air of a cathedral close
with it, and were highly connected! Whereas, if the same music
had been called "Ode to Revolution," or "The Apotheosis of
Ibsen," or "Dirge for the Victims of Vaccination," it would have
been found out for what it is before the end of the first ten bars, as
I found it out at the Birmingham Festival.
That is the way things go in England. Some few years ago
Peter Benoit, a much-in-earnest Dutch composer, who is almost
as great in music as Haydon was in painting, made his debut here
with an oratorio called Lucifer, containing one pretty song (by
Schumann), but otherwise a most barren colossus of a work. The
public felt that Lucifer was an integral part of the Church of Eng-
land, most Englishmen being persuaded that Milton's Paradise
Lost is a poetical paraphrase of the book of Genesis; and Benoit
was received with deep respect as a too long neglected Dutch
Beethoven. Presuming on this success, Peter laid a work called
Charlotte Corday at the feet of the Philharmonic Society. That
infatuated body, feeling itself traditionally committed to the dis-
covery and encouragement of foreign Beethovens, allowed him
to conduct it at one of its concerts. He promptly found out that
in England, though Lucifer is respectable, Charlotte Corday is
quite out of the question.
The Corday revolutionary scenes were not a whit more me-
chanical and shallow than the oratorio, and were nearly as bulky,
besides being twice as lively (thanks to a ira, The Marseillaise^
etc.); but the British public would have none of them; and Bepott
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
has not since been heard of in London. I mention the matter to
illustrate how easy it is to get taken seriously as a composer if
you begin with an oratorio. But if you want to make assurance
doubly sure, begin with a Requiem. After Dvorak every musical
agent and publisher in Europe will give, as the straightest of tips
to foreign composers, the word to write Requiems. I foresee the
arrival of shiploads of such compositions on these coasts. When
that day comes, I shall buy a broom; select some crossing out
of earshot of the muffled drums, and earn my bread in a more
humane and less questionably useful occupation than that which
I now follow. It is true that even then I shall have to see a funeral
go past occasionally. But a funeral goes past in less than two
minutes, whereas a Requiem takes a matter of two hours. Besides,
it is generally understood that funerals are to be avoided as long
as possible, whereas Requiems are offered as a sort of treat,
whether anybody is dead or not.
I have myself, however, to sing the requiem of Signer Lago's
opera season, which expired on Thursday after a performance of
Die Zauberflote, which I did not attend, partly because of the
London Symphony Concert, and partly because the disappear-
ance of Signer Lago's advertisements from the morning papers
had led me to believe that the end was already come. It is im-
possible not to sympathize with the defeated impresario, who has
given us so much fresh music during his brief struggle.
From my personal point of view, I hugely appreciated his un-
spoiled condition. He had the courage of his profession as well as
the enterprise of his business, and always stood up without win-
cing to the hardest hitting in the way of criticism. He never raised
the cry of "personal attack," or invited me to discharge my duties
with the pistol of the law of libel held to my ear. He did not
expect me to gorge him with impossible flattery, nor did he keep
a critic and a.paper of his own to supply me with weekly examples
of what he considered fair and becoming notices of his enter-
prises. He may even, for all I know to the contrary, have attained
the superlative managerial wisdom of seeing that the only criti-
cism which really helps operatic enterprise is criticism which
184
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
creates and sustains public interest in music, even when it deals
with impresarios almost as severely as they generally deserve;
and that however agreeable it may be to be extolled daily in terms
which would be considerably over the mark if applied to the
management of Liszt at Weimar or Wagner at Bayreuth, the end
of that must be the same as the end of the old experiment of caHtng
Aristides "the Just" about a thousand times too often.
He belongs, does Signor Lago, to the old days, now for ever
fled, it appears, when no critic ever dreamt of alluding to the legal
conditions under which his work was carried on, much less to the
relations between himself and the managers. The public assumed
that there was an unwritten understanding by which its represen-
tative was to be absolutely free to pursue his occupation un-
molested, both in its legal phase of applauding and its illegal
phase of finding fault. Whilst that understanding was observed,
every public allusion to it from either side was an impertinence.
But now that it is past to the winds, and that such verdicts as
the one given in favor of the late Signor Ciampi against the Daily
Telegraph have proved that even in the cases most favorable to
the critic, the public, through its juries, will generally console
adversely criticized persons at the expense of newspaper pro-
prietors on the general ground that they can well afford it, I, for
one, am forced to remind the said public from time to time tfrat
since they will neither protect themselves in the jury-box nor pay
enough for their papers to provide for the huge cost and worry
of continual litigation, a critic must either give up his work and
fall back on some safer branch of literature, or else absolutely
refuse to criticize the undertakings of agents and impresarios who
resort to the law whenever they are dispraised.
Great artists and most interesting performances pass, and must
continue to pass, unnoticed in this column because they are under
the auspices of gentlemen who have threatened me ;with actions
when I have pointed out imperfections in their enterprises^
though, most inconsistently, they never sent me a ten-pound insfce
when I praised them. I do not blame them in the least^ as" Aegr^ife
by no means bound to observe the old truce loager An>. they see
185
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
the advantage of it: only, I insist on the public being warned that
the truce is no longer general, so that it may be understood that
I neither neglect my duties nor slight the artists whose visits I
pass by silently; and I also wish artistic entrepreneurs of all sorts to
know that if they want mere advertisements they must pay for
them, and if they want criticism they must take the rough with
the smooth.
So, you see, I pay Signor Lago no small compliment when I
say that the above observations, the bearings of which lays in the
application thereof, need never have been obtruded on the public
if his fortitude in facing severe criticism, even when followed by
heavy losses, were quite as much a matter of course as it once was.
At the first London Symphony Concert last Thursday the
band was very rough; and there must have been something ex-
ceptionally unfavorable in the atmospheric conditions, for the
wind was badly out of tune. Even the drums could not catch the
pitch accurately. Berlioz' King Lear overture sounded positively
music-halfy. I was curious to hear it; but I did not know it or care
for it enough to have found out the right way to play it; and I
venture to guess that Mr Henschel and the band were in exactly
the same predicament. Anyhow, it made a great noise and gave
no sort of satisfaction. At the end of the concert the orchestra had
a lively game of football with Wagner's celebrated American
Potboiler, the second and last of his short series of efforts in that
fascinating genre (the first was Rienzi).
Mrs Henschel sang Liszt's setting of Kennst du das Land
cleverly, but without anything approaching the requisite depth
of feeling. Szumowska played Weber's Concertstiick, which she
has apparently picked up, not quite accurately, by ear, with fewer
slips than she made when she played it at the Crystal Palace a
fortnight ^50. The most successful item in the program was the
C minor symphony, in which Mr Henschel shewed sound con-
ductorial instinct by boldly roughing it for the sake of a powerful
general effect instead of giving us smoothness and prettiness of
detail with no general effect at all. But it is not to the credit of the
band that such an alternative should be forced on him.
1 86
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
I especially protest against the way in which those first three
notes of the symphony, forming a gigantic appoggiatura to
Fate's knock at the door, were executed. Some of the band re-
garded them as a triplet of quavers, some as three ordinary
quavers, and some as a quaver and two semiquavers, whilst
doubtless there were other views represented which I was not'
quick enough to catch. The coda to the first movement was
spoiled by want of crispness; and the second section of the trio
was too slow and heavy-footed. However, Mr Hensdhel has the
root of the matter in him. The concerts are interesting and of
reasonable length; and the shortcomings are shortcomings of
detail which are certain to be remedied in time, and which do not
meanwhile interfere seriously with the value of the performances,
which is high enough to make it a matter of public importance
that they should be well supported.
16 November 1892
LAST season appears to have been a favorable one for specialists
in singing, for volumes and pamphlets on voice production have
been hurled at me from all sides; and this, I suppose, indicates a
wave of interest in the subject. All such treatises used to be practi-
cally identical as to their preliminary matter, which invariably
dealt with the need for a new departure, so as to get away from
the quackery of the ordinary singing-master and rediscover the
lost art of Porpora. Nowadays, the new departure is still advo-
cated; but there is a tendency to leave Porpora out of the question,
and to claim for the latest methods a modern scientific basis, con-
sisting mostly of extracts from Huxley and Helmholtz, With all
due respect, however, I beg to remark that there is no sort of
sense in attempting to base the art of singing on physiology. You
can no more sing on physiological principles than you can feace
on anatomical principles, paint on optical principles, or compose
on acoustic principles.
Sir Joshua Reynolds painted none the worse for believing A^t
there were three primary colors, and that the human eye wafc 0ae
of the most exquisite and perfect instruments ever desigaecl for
187
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
the use of man; nor have his successors painted any the better
since Young exploded the three primary colors for ever, and
Helmholtz scandalized Europe by informing his pupils that if an
optician were to send him an instrument with so many easily
avoidable and remediable defects as the human eye, he would feel
bound to censure him severely. Again, half a century ago every
singing-master firmly believed that there were in the human body
three glands one in the head, immediately behind the frontal
sinus; one in the throat; and one in the chest: each secreting a
different quality of voice.
Nowadays even an Italian singing-master must, on pain of
appearing a gross ignoramus to his pupils, know that all voice is
produced by the same organ, the larynx, and that the so-called
three voices are "registers" made by varying the adjustment of
the vocal cords. This advance in scientific knowledge does not
alter the position of those teachers of singing who study their
profession iy ear, or of the painters who paint by eye who are
artists, in shdrt But it has a good effect on the gentlemen whose
methods are "scientific/ 9 In the days of the three primary colors,
there were teachers of painting who held that the right color for a
scarf across a blue robe was orange, because blue was a primary
color, and the proper contrast to it was a compound of the other
primary colors, red and yellow. The Divine Artist had colored
the rainbow on these principles; therefore they were natural,
scientific, and orthodox.
There are still gentlemen who teach coloring dn natural, scien-
tific, orthodox principles; and to them the discovery that the
doctrine of the three primary colors will not do, and that Shelley's
"milKon-colored bow" is nearer the truth than Newton's tri-
color^d one, no doubt has its value, since their daubs are more
TmecJ than before, though the artist-colorist remains no wiser
than Bellini or Velasquez. In the same way, the scientific vocal
methods based on the latest observations of the laryngoscopists
are, on the whole, less likely to be dangerous than those based on
the theory of the three glands, although the artistic method is just
die same as ever it was*
188
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
Now, I am hopelessly prejudiced in favor of the artistic
method, which is, of course, the genuinely scientific method
according to the science of art itself. On behalf of my prejudice I
plead two chapters in my experience of "scientific" methods.
When the study of the vocal cords first began, it led straight to
the theory that the larynx was a simple stringed instrument, and
that singing was, physically, a mere question of varying the
tension of the vocal cords, and throwing them into vibration by
a vigorous current of air. This was duly confirmed by an experi-
ment, of the physiological-laboratory type, by Muller; and then
we had the "tension-of-cords-and-force-of-blast" theory of sing-
ing, which all the violent and villainous methods prevalent in the
middle of the century, to the ruin of innumerable pupil-victims,
claimed as their "scientific" foundation, and which every true
artist was able to explode to his or her own satisfaction by the
simple experiment of listening to its results.
The second chapter concerns composers more than singers.
When it was discovered that musical sounds, instead of being
simple, are really enriched by a series of "partial tones," and that
the most prominent of these "partial tones" correspond to the
notes of the commonest chords, all the professors who could not
distinguish between science and art jumped at the notion of dis-
covering a scientific method of harmonizing which should quite
supersede the barbarous thoroughbass of Handel and Mozart.
A stupendous monument of ingenious folly, in the form of a
treatise on harmony by Dr Day, was installed at the Royal
Academy of Music, where it reigns, for aught I know, to this day;
and the unhappy pupils who wanted certificates of their com-
petence to write music could not obtain them without answering
absurd challenges to name "the root" of a chord, meaning tfee
sound that would generate the notes of that chord apioqg Its
series of "partial tones."
Now as, if you only look far enough through your $aie% yoi|
can find every note used in music among those generated % 3^f
one note used in it, the professors, though tolesably
as to the root of C, E, G, or C, E, G, B flat, Qwld
189
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
the chromatic chords, and even the more extreme diatonic dis-
cords. The result was that when you went to get coached for your
Mus. Bac. degree, the first thing your coach had to ascertain was
where you were going to be examined, as you had to give different
answers to the same questions, according to whether they were
put by Ouseley and Macfarren, or Stainer. (Sir John Stainer finally
succumbed to an acute attack of common sense, and invested
Day's system with that quality in the only modern treatise on
harmony I have ever recommended anyone to open.) Sterndale
Bennett was a convinced Dayite, and sometimes spoiled passages
in his music in order to make the harmony "scientific."
Meanwhile Wagner, working by ear, heedless of Day, was
immensely enlarging the harmonic stock-in-trade of the profes-
sion. Macfarren kept on proving that the Wagnerian procedure
was improper, until at last one could not help admiring the
resolute conviction with which the veteran professor, old, blind,
and hopelessly in the wrong, would still rise to utter his protest
whenever there was an opening for it.
Here, then, we have science, in the two most conspicuous cases
of its application to musical art, doing serious mischief in the
hands of the teachers who fell back on it to eke out the poverty of
their artistic resources. Yet do not suppose that I am an advocate
of old-fashioned ignorance. No: I admit that a young teacher of
singing, if he cannot handle the laryngoscope, and knows nothing
of anatomy or physics, deserves to be mistrusted as an uneducated
person, likely to offer fantastic and ambiguous suggestions in-
stead of exact instructions.
But. I do declare emphatically that all methods which have
come into existence by logical deduction from scientific theory
can only be good through the extravagantly improbable accident
of a coincidence between the result of two absolutely unrelated
processes, one right and the other wrong. Practically, they are
certain to be delusive; and this conclusion is not the anti-scientific,
but the scientific one. And in all books on die subject which I
may happen to review here I shall concern myself solely with the
practical instructions offered, and criticize them in the light of
190
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
my own empirical observation of singing, without the slightest
regard to the hooking of them on to physiology or acoustics.
First comes the redoubtable Mr Lunn with a reprint (Forster
Groom a sixpenny pamphlet) of the lecture he delivered last
May at Prince's Hall, which I noticed at the time. I disagree with
him flatly in his denunciation of the vowel oo for practice, and am
quite of the opinion of the sensible and practical author of Our
Voices, and How to Improve Them, by A Lady (Willcocks a
two-shilling manual), who recommends practice on oo in the
middle of the voice, and points out that the traditional Italian a is
invariably translated here into the English ah, which would have
driven the old Italian masters out of their senses.
Mr Lunn's objection is that oo sets people "blowing," against
which vice his pamphlet gives effective and valuable warning.
But if Mr Lunn will teach his pupils to round the back of the
throat (the pharynx) as they sing and this is a trick of the old
school which he does not seem to know he will find that they
can "compress the air," as he puts it, just as effectually on oo as
on Italian a; and his well-taught tenor pupil, Mr Arthur, will be
able to do in one breath that passage in II mio tesoro which cost
him one and a quarter at Prince's Hall. A Lady might learn some-
thing from Mr Lunn as to the importance of not wasting the
breath (the skilled singer, in rounding the pharynx, has an
imaginary sensation of holding the breath back of expressing
it at the larynx, though the control really comes from the dia-
phragm). She says, "The voice should be directed forward,
always forward, until the vibrating air is felt right on the lips."
This is both fanciful and misleading. The phrase "direction of
the voice" means really shaping the cavity of the mouth by the
disposition of the lips, tongue, and jaw, the voice being immov-
able; and the attempt to carry out the precept as to feeling the air
on the lips would lead in practice simply to "blowing." Dr J- W.
Bernhardt, the author of Vox Humana (Sirapkin, Marshall &
five-shilling book), gives the proper word of command for tfafe
particular emergency in the ten quite invaluable paragraphs (94 1
103) in which he urges the necessity of putting no strain on the
191
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
geniohyoid muscles in other words, of keeping your chin loose
whatever you do. By his emphasis on this point and his know-
ledge of the importance of the pharynx, he is able to give some
excellent advice; but in suggesting the vowel o for practice, he
forgot that it would be read as ah-oo, ow, aw-oo ? etc., by different
readers, Mr Irving being the only living Englishman who makes
it a pure vowel.
Dr Bernhardfs plan of beginning it with an aspirate and an n,
thus, AVo, is a clever trick as far as the n is concerned; but the h
belongs to his notion (also Mr Lunn's) that the air should be
compressed by the vocal cords as by a safety-valve. He carries
this so far as to advocate attacking a note, not merely by the coup
de glotte, as Mr Lunn does, but by nothing short of an explosion.
I quite agree with Maurel, that the coup de glotte is objectionable;
and I never heard a good singer who attacked notes explosively.
I am convinced that both Mr Lunn and Dr Bernhardt have been
misled by the imaginary sensation, described above, of pressing
back the air with the vocal cords.
Any good singer can touch a note gently, reinforce it to its
loudest, nd let it diminish again, without the least alteration of
the pitch, and consequently without the least alteration of, or
pressure downwards of, the glottis, the crescendo and diminuendo
being visibly effected by the diaphragm. The explosive process
produces bawling, not singing; and Dr Bernhardt virtually
admits this when he says that the ladies who, when asked to sing
louder, plead "I really have no more voice," would scream loud
enough to awaken the echoes a mile away if any sudden fright
came lipon them. If one of Dr Bernhardt's pupils were to apply
this remark practically, by beginning to scream instead of singing
(as isany prima donnas do), he would, I have no doubt, pull her
up with a remarkably short turn.
But "^t this point I must pull myself up with equal sharpness,
leaving unnoticed many points in these three interesting books,
for which I beg Mr Lunn, Dr Bernhardt, and A Lady, to accept
my best thanks.
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
23 November 1892
"I BELIEVE,'* says Santiey in his Reminiscences, just published by
Mr Edward Arnold, "I would have preferred being an actor of
moderate fame to being the most renowned singer on earth/*
That is the beginning. Now listen to the end. "The stage had
proved my great illusion perdue, my own enthusiasm and love
for it had not abated; but I could not fight almost single-handed
against the lack of earnestness, except for pecuniary gain, which
I encountered turn what way I might, and I resolved to quit it."
Let me quote a few of the steps of the disillusionizing process:
*1 essayed the part of Don Giovanni for the first time at
Manchester on September i4th, 1865. As usual, I had one re-
hearsal the morning of the day of performance. Mario, who was
always a late riser, did not come in until we were half-way
through the rehearsal.
"Tannhauser was not produced at all during my Italian career*
I always regret this, as I had a great desire to play Wolfram.
"Queen Topaz might have proved a fair success if some care
had been taken in its production. Swift, who played the hero,
never knew his part neither music nor words. There was no
attempt at stage-management: we all wandered on and off and
about the stage as we pleased. The effect produced was very
curious: neither players nor audience seemed to have the re-
motest notion what it was all about. The stage^management
throughout was the most perfect of its kind I ever knew. At
one performance of Fra Diavolo matters were so well arranged^
that principals, chorus, supers, et<x, were all left outside Ae .
curtain at the end of the first act. At one of the rehearsals of l^be
Amber Witch, the stage-manager shewed off to peculiar aebasn
tage. In the last act, the so-called witch, finding he^setf W8&&&&
by a number of peasants, conceives the idea of acting- p tfeeb*
VOL. ii 193 o
MUSIC IN LONDON 1*90-94
superstitious fears, and sings or recites a Latin prayer. This they
take for a spell, and hurry away, leaving her in peace. Mr Stage
Manager, hearing the prayer, called out, T>ont you hear? she's
praying: down on your knees.' I happened to know the situation
from Chorley, the author of the libretto, and took upon myself
to point out the mistake. The stage-manager merely remarked,
'How the devil should I know anything about k? I have never
read the book. Here, you Chorus, it's a spell to frighten you; so,
as soon as you hear the first words, clear off as fast as you can.'
"We had (at La Scala, Milan, 1865) a rehearsal for the stage
business with the stage-manager, Piave, the author of several of
Verdi's librettos, including that of H Trovatore. I was highly
amused; for the old gentleman wandered about the dark stage
with a coil of wax-taper, directing us. He had evidently forgot
all about his own work. He told me to come on from the wrong
side for my first entrance, and was highly indignant when I
suggested he was mistaken; but he begged my pardon when he
found his mistake led to a muddle For II Templario Xve had
several rehearsals on the stage with the full orchestra and with a
multiplicity of directors Cavallini directing the orchestra with
his fiddlestick, and taking the time from Mazzucato, who, seated
in front of the stage, beat the time with his hand, whilst the
chorus-master stood in front of his regiment, also beating time.
Altercations between the conductor and the principal instruments
were not uncommon. I remember one which amused me very
much. Cavallini turned to the principal 'cello and bass, and re-
marked that .a certain B ought to be natural, not flat. The pro-
fessors replied that he was mistaken, upon which a long argu-
ment ensued, ending in the double bass requesting the conductor
to 'shut up,' as he did not know what he was talking about."
I make these extracts because I have been so often told that my
criticisms of the opera are "too cynical," and I am so fully aware
of how improbable the truth seems to the innocence of the ordi-
nary opera-goer that I am not sorry to be able to call as a witness
194
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
to the state of things of which we are at present enjoying "the
traditions" our chief baritone, one who has achieved all that is as
yet possible for a great English singer, and who speaks, never-
theless, as a disappointed man, driven from the stage by the im-
possibility of getting any honest work done there.
When my witness says, "I can conscientiously say that I never
had money-making for an object; my aim and ambition have
always been to make the best use of the talent God entrusted to
me," I believe he carries conviction of his sincerity to all who
remember any considerable portion of his career; and it is not
necessary for me or anyone else to supplement that statement by
any compliments. The impression he made on me years ago,
under the Mapleson regime, was that he was not a ready-made
artist for stage- work, and had never be$n able to get thoroughly
finished.
As to his singing, I cannot say how long it took him to perfect
that; for the first time I ever heard him (it was as Di Luna in II
Trovatore) he was already fully accomplished vocally. But as an
actor he was blunt, unpractised, and prone to fall back on a good-
humored nonchalance in his relations with the audience, which
was highly popular, but which destroyed all dramatic illusion.
He was always Santley, the good fellow with no nonsense about
him, and a splendid singer; but never (except as Papageno) was
he the character in the opera, who was usually a person with a
very great deal of nonsense about him. The nonchalance was
really diffidence: one could see that a man of his straightforward
temperament could only acquire the art of impersonation by
years of unremitting and severe practice.
If he had been on the staff of a National Theatre, working his
way steadily on to an unassailable position and a secure aixi
sufficient pension, he would have had plenty of thorough re-
hearsal to train him; and his earnestness and vigor would have
been transmuted into dramatic intensity of feeling and grip of
character. A National Opera could hardly have had better material
to work up. But there was no National Opera; aad the oppose
tunities he actually got were of the kind described m Aetypical
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passages I have quoted. For example, he may be said to have
created Valentine in Faust, as it was considered a minor part
until he made it a leading one; yet I heard him, when he was about
forty, play it in an unfinished, hail-fellow-well-met way, even to
the extent of rattling off Dio Possente at the rate of a hundred
crotchets per minute or thereabouts; and though he was tre-
mendously in earnest in the death scene, the earnestness was by
no means fiilly incorporated with the part.
Later on, in Vanderdecken, Mikdi, Claude Melnotte, and the
Porter of Havre, his dramatic grip was much surer; and at the
present moment, on the verge of his sixtieth year, he is a more
thorough artist than ever. There can be no doubt that his sincerity
of temperament, developed by the Philistine atmosphere of his
native Liverpool into blufihess, and his sensitiveness, with nothing
to exercise it but the snubs and checks which fall to the lot of a
young clerk in a commercial town, were hindrances to him on
the stage r where, under honest artistic conditions, they would
have helped ten. It is noteworthy that when he went to Milan to
sttidy^iie brought thither a. Lancashire eye to which the showy
cathedral and beautiful church of Sant Ambrogio were absolutely
indifferent He describes the services at both without a word to
indicate any consciousness of the artistic gulf which separates
the one building from the other; and he adds, "Picture-galleries,
museums, libraries, or exhibitions never possessed much attrac-
tion for me."
And yet he is beyond a doubt a highly imaginative man. If he
had been a romantic humbug and poseur , he would perhaps have
educated himself in the artifices of the stage by his efforts to look
picturesque in private life; but being the very reverse of that, he
, started as an awkward masquerader^ and was received with the
usual BOfisense about his not being a bqm actor a convenient
evasion, for the critic who feeb that there is something wanting,
and does not know his business well enoug^b to be able to say
what die something is. If Sandey's eyes and limbs had been
educated from his childhood & his ear was> he would have been
as much a born actor as a bQnj singer; fpr Nafcaore had >een as
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kind to him in the matter of face and figure as in that of voice.
As it was, one remembers his performances far better than those
of the numerous "born artists/* "thorough artists," "artists to
the tips of their fingers," and so on, who have played his parts
here.
There is much more in Student and Singer which I should like
to quote and moralize upon if I had space all the more freely,
as Mr Santley declares that, as a rule, he does not read criticism.
His self-criticism is extraordinarily frank; and after reading such
remarks as he permits himself on his fellow-artists I should set a
good deal of store by his opinion if he were to set up in my
business. On the subject of singing he says little, explaining that
he intends to deal fully with it in a separate work, which will be
awaited with interest by many young singers who are curious to
know how a man can sing for forty years and then appear at a
Handel Festival with a much fresher voice than most baritones
have after forty weeks* run of their first comic opera. I conclude
with an extract which may be useful to students bound for Italy:
"I had letters of introduction to several musical and other
influential people in Milan, three of which I delivered, and this I
regretted having done, as they were die cause of no little per-
secution for loans, gifts, etc. . . . But I had no need of letters of
introduction to make the acquaintance of similar gentry, all bent
on plunder. I had journalists, or people who called themselves
such, who wanted subscriptions to papers I had never heard of
and did not wish to see," etc., etc., etc.
Ma mie Rosette, produced last Thursday at the Globe by
.Messrs Lart and Boosey, is refreshingly free from the stale
vulgarities without which no comic opera is supposed to be
complete. It is positively elegant, and appeals throughout to the
tastes of people who have not a deliberate preference for baseness
in art. Therefore it may very possibly fkiL M. Paul Lacome's
music is taken from good sources; his reminiscences are those of a
fairly cultivated musician and not of a mere music-hall frequenter.
The numbers interpolated by Mr Caryll fall considerably below
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this standard: they are thin and trivial, and might have been
composed by Mr Solomon in an uninspired moment. The cast is
good. Mr Oudin is not mellow and humorous enough for Henri
Quatre; but he brings down the house by his singing, especially
in an air in the second act, founded, apparently, on Vincent
Wallace's "Why do I weep for thee?" Miss Nesville, whose voice
is no larger than the point of a very small pin, is clever enough to
please the audience, though, for all her undoubted stage talent, I
do not feel disposed to admit that she is in her place as a prima
donna. Miss Jessie Bond, Mr Wyatt, and Mr D'Orsay are amusing
and not oppressive in the comic parts; and Miss Jennie McNulty
shews some capacity as Corisande. The opera is prettily mounted;
but the electric candles in the second act so dazzle the spectator
and kill the costumes in front of them, that their miraculous
extinction half-way through is a relief. And Mr Courtice Pounds'
second dress, which makes him look like Tavannes in Les
Huguenots pretending to be a Highlander, is simply inconceiv-
able, even by those who have seen it.
30 November 1892
By far the most important musical event in London last week was
the annual competition of the Board School choirs at Exeter Hall
for a Challenge Medallion. I spent three mortal hours listening
to eight choirs singing, first, See the chariot at hand, then a "sight
test," and finally, whatever part-song was the cheval de lataUle
of the particular school in hand. The audience consisted of the
judges, Sir John Stainer and Mr McNaught, of a few critics to
Judge the judges from the reserved seats, and of the Lord Mayor
and Lady Mayoress in great honor and glory on the platform,
supported by a contingent of the London School Board, includ-
ing at one extreme the Reverend Chairman Diggle, who listened
moderately, and at the other the Reverend Stewart Headlam, who
listened progressively. There was, besides, a vast audience of
friends, relatives, and partisans of the competitors, who followed
the points of the competition with an intelligence unknown at
St James's Hall.
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Some young ladies behind me were eagerly scanning the
choristers to find "the angel," who, as I gathered from the con-
text, was a boy of seraphic beauty and goodness. I sought him
eagerly, but entirely failed to identify him. There were dreamy,
poetic, delicate-featured boys and girls; docile, passively recep-
tive ones (with medals I despised them); little duchesses whom
I should have liked to adopt, little dukes who would have Aeen
considerably enriched if anyone had cut them off with a shilling;
and a sprinkling of Miss Morleena Kenwigs and Bailey junior, aH
making points of interest in a crowd of the children of Voltaire's
wise friend, Monsieur Tout le Monde. But angel there was nosie^
except all our good and bad angels, who, being two to each mem-
ber of a crowded audience, must have been kept pretty constantly
on the wing to avoid being crushed. Then there were pupil-
teachers' choirs, large bodies of picked young women, all of them
survivals of the fittest, resolute, capable, and with a high average
of good looks. When I look at a fashionable audience of ladies
at a recital I always feel, in spite of my profession, as if I were an
honest, useful, hard-working citizen; but before the pupil-
teachers I quailed, and knew myself for what I really am that
is to say, a musical critic.
The competition, like all competitions, was more or less a ham-
bug, the Elcho shield going eventually to the conductor who had
trained his choir single-heartedly in the art of getting the highest
marks, which is not the same thing as the art of choral singing.
His pupils performed with remarkable vigor and decision, and
were the only ones who really succeeded in reading the "sight
test" all through; but Mr Casserley's choir from the Great College
Street school shewed more artistic sensibility; and Mr Long-
hurst's boys from Bellenden Road were not further behind than
all choirs of one sex alone are inevitably behind mixed choirs,
both in quality of tone, in which the difference is enormous, and
in the address with which girls pull boys out of difficulties, and
boys girls, according to their special aptitudes. The decision
shewed that the "sight test," which is the most mechanical part
of the business, was five-sixths of the battle. And it was not even
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fairly conducted. I concluded that it was not possible to keep all
the later competitors quite out of earshot of die earlier ones; for
the reading of the upper part got better as the afternoon wore on,
the little pitchers using their long ears to pick up the tune; whilst
the reading of the middle and lower parts in the harmony shewed
no such improvement. Thus, the winners of the shield, who, as
it happened, sang last, must, unless they had been carefully
plugged with cotton-wool for some two hours or so, or else kept
outside the building, have heard the "sight test" sung no less than
seven times before they tried it. This was sufficient to prepare
them completely for the chief difficulty presented by the dotted
crotchet and five quavers in the ninth bar, which so bothered the
early competitors; as well as by the trap into which even the
conductors fell, to their great credit, in the tenth, the composer,
Mr Roston Bourke, having deliberately truncated the metre by
leaving out a bar at that point If I had been one of the judges I
should unhesitatingly have given twenty marks to every choir
which made the mistake Mr Bourke intended it to make, and
struck twenty off the unintelligent plodders who passed uncon-
sciously and safely through the danger. As to the senseless syn-
copation on the word "death," I am ready to head a deputation
of ratepayers to the School Board about so perfect an instance of
the evil inherent in aE competition.
Mr Roston Bourke, instead of acting as a musician desirous to
write beautiful music for children, acted as a Jack-o'-Lantern,
and did his worst to mislead them. If Haydn had written that
"sight test," I believe that the very first symptom of confusion
among the children would have sent him out into the Strand to
publicly kneel doTsm and beg forgiveness of Heaven for his crime.
Tbe sight test was otherwise bad in respect of the minor section,
w&ese tibe greatest difficulty was experienced in reading the notes,
being : ateo the only episode calculated to test a choir's power of
eafrfamg a change in the sentiment of die music.
As might have JDeen foreseen, tbe resuk was that the choir
which caught die change m semtinent bungled the notes; whilst
the winning choir, wfaidtataie vanquished all three parts in this
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section, absolutely disregarded the change in sentiment. As I have
already said, the conductor of that choir, Mr J. Harris, a very
competent gentleman, knew that if his children came out right
upon matters of fact, they might safely disregard matters of taste.
And this brings me to the injustice to the children of a competi-
tion which depends more on their instructor than on themselves.
This is more or less true of all school competitions; but it is
especially true of choral singing, the difference between one school
and another being mostly a difference in the ability of the con-
ductors, since children, in the lump, are all alike. There is, how-
ever, an element of luck in the matter as well, arising out of the
existence of specially gifted children.
Every practical musician knows that sight reading is a very
rare accomplishment, and that the champion exponents of the
tonic sol-fa, the Cheve method, Hullah's system, and so forth,
are usually persons who have what is called a sense of absolute
pitch, and who, in reading from the ordinary staff notation, are
guided neither by the intervals from one note to the next, nor
by the "mental effect" of the note in the scale, but simply re-
member the pitch of every separate note, and sing it when they
see it written down. These tuneful mortals, if you met them in
the middle of the Great Sahara, and asked them to give you B
flat, would strike it up like a tuning-fork. The easiest and com-
monest method of sight reading is to sit next to an absolute pit-
cher, and sing what he or she sings.
The sense of absolute pitch is rather commoner among chil-
dren than among adults^ and here the school conductor's luck
comes in. If he happens to have one absolute pitcher in each
division, he may, without having taught a single child to read at
sight, get his choir to sing a test on the follow-my-leader plan
more successfully than a rival whose singers are all consciously
calculating their intervals or sol-faing. Obviously, this possibil-
ity introduces an additional element of chance into the competi-
tion. On the whole, I think it would be well to discard the chal-
lenge shield from the annual exhibition, and so get rid of the
senseless game of winning marks. There is quite incentive enough
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in the presence of the audience and the Lord Mayor to secure all
the benefits which are supposed to accrue from an invidious
award of the custody for one year of an absurd signboard to the
choir which does the ill-office of humiliating all the rest.
The really tragic feature of the exhibition, however, was not
in the pedagogic method, but in the little snatches of sweet and
delicate singing which occasionally came from the mass of sound
of which, in the main, no musical adjustment could disguise the
vulgarity. It was not quite so bad as an ordinary oratorio chorus
the remnants of the charm of childhood saved it from that ex-
tremity; but already every child's voice was in far better training
for slang and profanity than for poetry.
Children become adepts at what they hear every day and what
they see every day; and the notion that you can educate a child
musically by any other means whatsoever except that of having
beautiful music finely performed within its hearing, is a notion
whkh I feel constrained to denounce, at the risk of being pain-
folly personal to the whole nation, as tenable only by an idiot.
Imagine a country teaching its children for half the day how to
read the police intelligence, how to forge, and how to falsify ac-
counts, and the other half how to tolerate, and eventually prefer,
uncouth sights,' discordant sounds, foul clothes, and graceless
movements and manners.
However, I am gratified to be able to announce, by special re-
quest, that the Duke of Westminster, who so firmly protested
against the extravagance of furnishing each Board School with
a pianoforte, has presented the Westminster Orchestral Society
with a life-membership donation of ten guineas.
As to Mr Cliffe's new symphony in E minor, composed for the
Leeds F^tival, and performed some weeks ago at .the Crystal
'ittfeki^'l am dfeejualified from any fruitful criticism of it by find-
ing te 1 4o not like it. This is |iot Mr Cliffe's fault: neither is it
mme. The general mood of the work is too sentimental for me;
and the Orchestration, to my taste, is particularly cloying. Mr
Cliffe seems to have no respect for the instruments: instead of
giving them real parts, or at least firm virile touches to lay in, he
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uses them only to rouge his themes up to the eyes, and to hang
rings on their fingers and bells on their toes, so to speak.
The themes themselves have no backbone: they languish along
by diminished intervals whenever they get a chance of leaning on
chromatic progressions; and it is quite a relief to come to some
commonplace but straightforward prettiness, like that of the
serenade, with the affectionate reminiscence of one of Mendel-
ssohn's Songs without Words' in the first phrase. Another re-
miniscence, which is very conspicuous among the thematic
materials of the opening movement, is the first bar of Siegmund's
spring song in Die Walkiire, extended by a sequence through a
second bar, and with its intervals altered, but still unmistakeable.
As to the program of Sunset, Night, and Morning (I need not
mention the inevitable Fairies' Revel scherzo), all I can say is that
sunset, night, and morning never make me feel like that. Evi-
dently a case of deficient sympathy, on which account I do not
lay any stress on my impression of the work. Mr Cliffe has ap-
parently done exactly what he aimed at, and done it with great
skill and industry, though also, I must reproachfully add, with-
out the least regard for my idiosyncrasy.
Last Saturday we had a new symphonic poem, The Passing
of Beatrice, by Mr William Wallace, a young Scotch composer
with a very tender and sympathetic talent. I would cite the pre-
lude to Lohengrin as an instance of the successful accomplish-
ment of what Mr Wallace tries to do in his poem, which, if cut
down by about nine-tenths, and well worked over, would make
a pretty entr'acte. The orchestra, by the bye, has rubbed off the
rustiness of the beginning of the season, and has been playing
admirably these last few weeks.
7 December 1892
AT the London Symphony Concert last Thursday, Mr Henschel
staked the capacity of his orchestra for refinement of execution
on Raff's Lenore symphony, and won. The crescendo of the
march, from pianissimo to forte, was admirably managed. It did
not quite reach fortissimo not what I call fortissimo^ at least
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and it fell short of the final degrees of martial brilliancy which Mr
Manns has sometimes achieved in it; but it was enormously
superior to the recent attempt of the Philharmonic band, which
began moderately piano, tumbled into a me^oforte in the second
section, and stuck there for the rest of the movement. The second
movement was perfectly executed: it held the attention of the
audience from the first note to the last, as slow movements very
seldom do. The quick movements would have been equally per-
fect but for a certain unpunctuality of attack in the vigorous
touches, especially in the bass, and an occasional want of weight
when the fullest power of the band was needed.
I should explain, however, that I heard the performance, not
from my usual seat, but from the extreme back of the room,
where, as I went in, I spied a few empty benches suitable for a
secluded nap. A long work by Brahms was in the program; so I
thought I would go, and sit there in case of accidents. It was a
, cofioerto for violin and violoncello, with one or two glorious be-
IStotopin it in Brahms* vigorous, joyous, romantic style; but
tl&pdkl $ot; hdld out; and there was nothing for it, most of the
time, but resignation or slumber. Gorski, the violinist, had not
come to much of an understanding with Fuchs, the 'cellist; and
neither of them had come to an understanding with Brahms
at least, it seemed so to me; but then my attention wandered a
good deal Miss Evangeline Florence sang the balcony scene from
Lohengrin; and the concert wound up with the overture to Die
Mdstersinger.
Violoncellists who want to play like Gerardy will be interested
by the Cours Pr^paratoire de Violoncelle of his master, Alfred
Massau,' of the Venders school, of music. There is an abominable
eoftosaa among agents of persuading young and unknown artists,
K^erer aomarably they may have been taught, to prepare for
*afr4ftntfey taking three months' fessons from some celebrated
player, fe order that they may be anin>i&iced aod puffed as pupils
of the eminent So-and-so. Thus they ar^ taught to begin by be-
ing ashamed of their own tafeot, and ungrateful to Ae master to
whom they owe its c^Wv^ton. Hie master is robbed of the
204
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
credit due to him; and the eminent one finds Europe full of
players claiming to be his pupils on the strength of perhaps a
dozen lessons.
Think of the legion of pianists, good, bad, and indifferent,
who, because they once loafed about Weimar for a few month%
and managed to obtain the not very difficult entry to the famous
music-room there, are now "pupils of Liszt." The system is not
only a dishonest one, but stupid into the bargain; for the public,
as far as it concerns itself with an artist's antecedents at all, judges
the master by the player, and not the player by the master. I
therefore give Alfred Massau as Gerardy's master neither on his
own claim nor on that of his famous pupil, but on the authority
of an official certificate from the Communal Administration of
Venders, duly stamped with the town seal, whereon a lion ramps
in a meat safe, with a crown above him, and the motto L 9 Union
fait la force below.
The document, dated November, 1891, runs as follows:
"I subscribe, declare, and certify that Mr Jean Gerardy, violon-
cellist, has gone through the regular violoncello course at our
establishment (professor, Alfred Massau), from October ist,
1885, to August i5th, 1889. He has carried off the following dis-
tinctions: Competition of 1886 (2nd division), ist accessit; 1887
(idem), ist prize; 1888 (ist division), ist prize, with distinction;
1889 (higher competition), silver-gilt medal, with the greatest
distinction.
"The jury for these last competitions was composed of MM,
L. Kefer, Presiding Director; Van der Heyden, violoncellist from
Paris; J. de Swert, violoncellist, Conductor at Ostend; Ed.
Jacobs, violoncellist, Professor at the Brussels Conservatoire;
and Jos. Mertens, Government Inspector of Schools of Music.**
[Here follow the signatures of M. Louis Kefer and the Presi-
dent of the Communal Administration, solemnly affixed in "our**
presence. That is, the presence of the Burgomaster, whose signa-
ture, as becomes that of a man with a plural pronoun, is
illegible.]
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MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
I give this document for the sake of its suggestiveness as to
the state of affairs in the musical profession. Verviers is a small
Belgian town; its school of music is not widely famous; and
Massau, though his reputation as a teacher is first-rate, is not
known as a virtuoso in London and Paris. The consequence is
that Verviers and Massau, instead of finding themselves made
famous by the brilliant European success of Gerardy, actually
have to place official certificates in my hands in order to make it
known in London that the five years' training which made Ger-
ardy what he is were not the work of Herr Bellmann or any other
virtuoso who may have subsequently given him "finishing les-
sons."
As to the Cours Preparatoire, I can only testify to its complete-
ness and intelligibility. Not being a 'cellist, I must take Gerardy's
playing as evidence of its soundness. It is published by Schott,
has its instructions printed in French, German, and English, and
is remarkably cheap, considering its bulk and quality, at ten shil-
lings, or in two volumes at six shillings each.
I have received from Messrs Sampson Low & Co. a Life of
Chopin, by Mr Charles Willeby, which strikes me as really sup-
plying a want. For some years past the Liszt-George Sand stereo
on the subject has been wearing out; and the arrival of an ex-
ceedingly cool young gentleman, adequately skilled in music,
who gives his own account of the matter without the least regard
for the expiring Chopin fashion, is highly refreshing. The older
I grow, the more I appreciate the sang-froid of early manhood.
Middle age makes me sentimental, hot-headed, and withal con-
scious of the folly of the multitude and the ease with which that
folly can be exploited by anybody with a moderate power of
self-expression in politics or in any of the popular arts. This I
call becoming wise; but if I were anybody else, I should doubt-
le& call it becoming stale.
Anyhow, it is a condition in which I could not write as freshly
about Chopin as Mr Willeby; and I welcome his book accord-
ingly; though I cannot refrain from giving utterance to the
melancholy conviction that time will mellow his stern judgment
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of George Sand, and shake his incredulity as to her having boxed
her son-in-law's ears and turned him out of the house for smiting
one of her guests on the nose. "Were we dealing with children,
and the nursery our scene," says Mr Willeby, "we might accept
this story. But when we think that the parties concerned were
men and women of the world, it is laughable, and to accept it
seriously, impossible." Alas! alas! it is precisely the men and
women of the world who do these things, whilst the novices are
furtively studying manuals of etiquette to ascertain the proper
use of the finger-bowl.
Mr Willeby, to tell the truth, rather breaks down over George
Sand. He says:
"However lenient we may be towards the woman who so
worthily added to the art of her country, one cannot deny the feet
that she was of a nature the reverse of admirable a woman who,
while stopping at nothing in the gratification of her desires, yet
was ever ready with an excuse for herself, and who posed before
the world as an example of all that was good and upright in
womanhood. Moreover, she seems to have been wanting alike in
tact, reserve, and dignity of conduct; while by no means the least
noticeable feature in her character was the manner in which die
succeeded in deceiving even herself/*
All of which, though irrefutable from its point of view, is en-
tirely worthless as a description of George Sand, because it would
be equally irrefutable of dozens of other eminent women who
were not in the least like George Sand. One does not refute that
sort of criticism; one repudiates it.
Again:
"One of the vices of George Sand seems to have been not an
extraordinary one in women generally, that of curiosity. This
fatal feeling," etc.
Observe the implication that "this fatal feeling" is a stranger to
the nobler male breast. Only once does Mr Willeby relent:
"Inasmuch as she kept his accounts, wrote many of his fetters,
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MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
and tended him with the greatest devotion in the many trying
times when his disease laid him up, she is worthy of some praise "
I should rather think so. I do not hold a brief for George Sand;
but Mr Willeby provokes me to ask what would have been said
if the shoe had been on the other foot. Suppose Chopin had been
George Sand's benefactor. Suppose he had found after a time
that she was as exacting as an invalided child; that she spoiled the
home life of his other children by quarrelling with them; and that
he could not spare from his own work as a composer the energy
wasted in combating these circumstances. Would any reason-
able person have blamed him for refusing to share his home with
her any longer? If not, how can any reasonable person blame
George Sand, except on the gratuitous assumption that she and
her children were Chopin's slaves, with no duty to anybody but
to him? For the life of me, I cannot see how she behaved worse
than Chopin.
f The fact that he appears to have suffered more by the separa-
tion tfaan she did is dearly a proof that he gained more than she
by their association. Mr Willeby has certainly made out a case
of ingratitude against Chopin, as well as one of levity against
George Sand; but neither of them is more interesting or con-
vincing than the cases against Salvini for vagabondism, against
Mr Hamo Thornycroft for breach of the Second Commandment,
against the Duke of Wellington for rapine and murder, or against
any English Mahometan for not attending his parish church.
Nothing is more idle and tedious than the sort of criticism which
deals with a man who is acting up to his own convictions, right
or wrorig, as if he was simply violating his critic's convictions,
* tbqs of his critic's putlisfae^.
, ><>** 4f@ 'fwfe>fe> Mr WiBeby's moral judgments must be taken
as a triie disabled by the very quality of youth which gives value
to his book as a wbofe. To say, for instance, that Chopin was
not a? tna$ to grasp opportunities merely because he did not jump
at a chance of giving a paying concert, is to substitute the busi-
ness standard df a si&3Jt agfefct for the artistic standard of the
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critic of a great composer. A man who died of consumption at
thirty-nine, and yet produced what Chopin has left us, was clearly
a man of immeasurably greater energy and practicality than the
late Mr Jay Gould, who worked far longer than Chopin, and
produced nothing.
On musical ground I agree better with Mr Willeby, though
even here I am made somewhat restive by such passages as:
"In the Concerto, Chopin's subordination to, and inability to
cope with, form was as conspicuous as was his superiority and
independence of it in his smaller works."
This implies that form means sonata form and nothing else,
an unwarrantable piece of pedantry, which one remembers as
common enough in the most incompetent and old-fashioned
criticisms of Chopin's ballades, Liszt's symphonic poems, and
Wagner's works generally, but which is now totally out of coun-
tenance. Mr Willeby himself evidently would not stand by it for
a moment. Yet on another page (229) he goes still further in the
same direction by identifying music in sonata form with "abso-
lute music," and describing all other music as "program music."
Now a Chopin ballade is clearly no more program music than
the slow movement of Mozart's symphony in E flat is.
I submit that a definition which makes program music of
Chopin's tone poems, and abstract music of Raff's symphonies,
clearly wants a little further consideration. However, I must not
unduly depreciate Mr Willeby's book by dwelling too much on
our differences. A few slips in the critical analyses may very well
be condoned for the sake of a readable biography of Chopin
which is not nine-tenths a work of pure imagination.
14 December 1892
I HAVE to complain strongly of the Royal College of Music for
its neglect to exclude the parents and relatives of the students
from its performance of Gluck's Orfeo on Saturday afternoon.
The barbarous demonstrations of these Philistines, who treated
VOL. ii 209 p
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
the band just as they would have treated a quadrille player at on
of their own dances, spoiled many a final strain in the score
Surely, if the students are to be nurtured as artists, the first an<
most obvious step is to cut off all communication between thet]
and their families.
A member of an ordinary British household cannot becomi
an artist: the thing is impossible. This was well understood ii
former ages with regard to the religious life, the devotees o
which invariably began by cutting all their people dead, know-
ing full well that on no other terms was any unworldly life pos-
sible. Now the artistic life is the most unworldly of lives; anc
how can it be lived in any sort of association with people who
rather than wait for the band to finish Che faro senza Euridice:
break into uncouth noise the moment the singer's mouth is
closed?
Giulia Ravogli came to the performance, presumably to se*
what Gluck's Orfeo looked like. The unfamiliar spectacle musi
have made her envy those obscure students the artistic frame-
work which she, one of the greatest Orfeos in the world, cannot
get in the richest capital in Europe. The work was admirably put
on the stage. One scene, in which a soul newly released from
earth came groping into the Elysian fields, bewildered and lonely,
and was discovered and welcomed by two child-shades, was a
most pathetic piece of pantomime. That shade one believed to be
the lost Euridice, until Euridice appeared later on in the person
of quite another young lady no great pantomimisr. Very pretty,
too, was the array of spirits stretching their hands after die de-
parting Orpheus as he started on his return to earth.
The Elysian fields Vere situated on the uplands between
Frensham and Selborne: I know the place, and thought it well
dbostn for the purpose. The furies and spectres were not quite
up to the artistic level of the blesseder shades; and they gave no
adequate sign of the shock given to them by the first note of
Orpheus's lute in that dreadful region. I think, too, that the
orchestral piece in D minor, since it was not danced to by the
spectres, should have been played with the tableau curtain down,
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instead of as a storm symphony to a lightning and thunder cloth
which became ridiculous after its levin bolts had remained for a
couple of minutes without getting along. But the fact that these
two matters exhaust my fault-finding speaks for the general ex-
cellence and artistic integrity of the staging.
The principal performer, Miss Clara Butt, a comparatively raw
recruit from Bristol, far surpassed the utmost expectations that,
could have been reasonably entertained. She has a good voice,
and went at her work without the least conceit, though with
plenty of courage and originality, shewing an honesty of artistic
character which is perhaps the most promising quality a novice
can display. She has a rich measure of dramatic sympathy; and,
considering that the management of the costume and deport-
ment proper to the part would tax the powers of our most ex-
perienced actresses, her impersonation suffered surprisingly little
from awkwardness. If Miss Butt has sufficient strength of mind
to keep her eyes, ears, and mind open in the artistic atmosphere
of the Royal College, without for a moment allowing herself to
be taught (a process which instantly stops the alternative process
of learning), she may make a considerable career for herself.
Euridice (Miss Maggie Purvis) sang like a pupil of the Royal
Academy. She had apparently been taught to practise all over
her voice on the vowel a, because that is the most beautiful vowel.
The way in which a soprano produces the G or A fiat above the
stave had been taken as a model for the production of every
sound within her compass. To make a crescendo she simply
breathed harder; and she attacked her notes with the coup deglotte.
I have heard basses actually basses who had been taught to
do exactly the same thing; and the difference between their voices
and that of Edouard de Reszke was very striking.
Imagine that genial giant with his voice trained like the top
register of a soprano, bleating a few genteel notes between his
upper B and D with the feather-edge of his vocal cords (the E
natural and F not to be practised too much lest they should
fatigue the larynx)-, and with all the middle of his voice worn to
the sound of a cracked Pandean pipe. I do not know the names
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of the teaching staff at the Royal College, nor of Euridice's pre-
ceptor, whose instructions she may, of course, have been syste-
matically violating, as the wont of pupils is when they get before
the public.
But I am bound to say that though she sang prettily, and is
not at all deficient in capacity, the sort of voice she produces
would never stand the knocking about of real dramatic work,
nor has it the least force or variety of color. It is impossible for
me to go at length into the system of teaching singing which has
prevailed for so long in our own Royal Academy and many of
the foreign Conservatoires, and which has been maintained so
ably by that clever and dramatically gifted family, the Garcias.
Suffice it to say that I have heard a good many pupils of the
Garcias in my time, and a good many pupils of other masters,
too, from Santley to Melba and our modern American prima
donnas; and I must frankly say that though I do not doubt that
all the great Garcias were masterful people and powerful actors,
I am a confirmed sceptic as to the practical value of their system
of vocal instruction. And I was sorry to infer, from Euridice's
singing, and from my recollection of the previous annual oper-
atic perfonnances, that the Garcia method is in the ascendant at
Kensington as well as in Tenterden Street
My observation has kd me to believe that if you take an ordi-
nary English girl and try to make her sing, your business is not
to elicit from her sounds as fine as G above the stave on the vowel
a (Italian) as Patti would sing it, but to work her voice on aw
(without rolling her tongue up into a ball, Ken entendu) below
the stw, on oo and ee in the middle, and on a at the top only,
shewing' her how to manage her breathing and so forth mean-
while, and keeping her at that until she has learnt the physical
aWof singing, and is in possession of a fully developed voice well
uHifer ifer control, which she can use as vigorously as she wants
to without any damage. Then, and fcot until then, is the time
to awaken her artistic conscience, to purify her pronunciation,
refine her tone, and, in feat, turn your mere singer into an
artist.
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Try to make her into an artist before she can sing by worry-
ing her at the very first lesson to produce the ideal tone aimed at
by Garcia, and unless her physical endowment is so rich and her
vocation so strong that she stumbles into the right path in spite
of you, you will arrive at that melancholy result, the ordinary
Academy pupil who, after a brief trial of her thin and colorless
perfections on the public, takes to helping herself out by brute
force, and presently grinds away her voice and takes to teaching
the art in which she has failed. Of course she has been repeatedly
warned that she must not force her voice; but when she finds that
she can produce no effect in any other way, all these excellent
negative precepts are thrown to the winds. No method that is
merely negative is of any use to a dramatic singer, or indeed to
any artist whatever.
Unless singers have a positive method, into which they can
throw their utmost energy and temper at moments when they are
about as much interested in the quality of the vowel a as a tiger
is in the quality of his roar as he springs on a sheep, they must
resort to brute force on the stage, or else foil through an obvious
gingerly preoccupation with their negative instructions. The
first demand of the dramatic instinct is for a safe and powerful
fortissimo. To tell students of dramatic singing that there is no
need for vehemence in singing is only an evasion, like telling the
student who wants to paint a white cat that "in the grand school,
all cats are grey." Shouting is not necessary in political oratory;
but I should like to see the political speaker who would put up
with a teacher unable to put him in the way of thundering a little
occasionally.
It so happened on Saturday that Miss Purvis did not parti-
cularly want to be vehement. But if she had been playing Elvi*3
or Valentina or Fidelio, I wonder how much use her academic
method in its negative purity would have been to her. Much less,
I venture to affirm, than no method at all. She would simply have
had to scream through all the formidable passages.
I turn with relief to the subject of the band. Here the per-
formers, having all been -taught their instruments by mea -
213
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
earn their living by playing them, knew their business, and were
no worse than their instructors in respect of not always sustaining
the tone for the full duration of the notes. The execution was
smart, and the quality of sound remarkably bright and fine.
The conductor, Professor Stanford, guided, as I judged, by
a genuine love of the work and an intimate knowledge of it,
only went astray once in the immensely grand chorus Che mai
delP Erebo, which he took, like a true Irishman, as he would
have taken the first movement of the Eroica, and not in the tempo
of God Save the Queen, which would have been much nearer the
mark, reserving the quicker tempo for the later repetitions. For
the performance as a whole there can be nothing but praise. It
could only be possible in an institution where there was a well-
spring of genuine enthusiasm for art. The credit of stimulating
and centring that enthusiasm belongs, I imagine, to Sir George
Grove, whose life-work has been of more value than that of all
the Prime Ministers of the century.
Let me add, by the way, that the Royal College has selected its
opera much better this year and last than it used to. Tales like
those of The Barber of Bagdad, and classic legends like Orpheus,
are understood by young students far better than silly intrigues
like Cosi fan tutti, or with all due respect to Shakespear
explosions of what I may call sex-Podsnappery like that atrocious
play The Taming of the Shrew,
21 December 1892
THE Nursing Homes of St Mary's, Plaistow, succeeded in making
up a program at St James's Hall on Thursday, which induced me
to go, for once in a way, to a miscellaneous concert. I there heard
Mrs Katharine Fisk, the American contralto, who seems to have
made a considerable impression on her first appearance (at which
I ttfefcgable to assist) some weeks ago. She selected a song called
Calm as the Night, by Bohm, and, by dint of grinding and driv-
ing her voice iard down on every note, produced a certain effect
which may have appealed to some of the audience as one of
brooding intensity. To me it seemed a mechanical device which
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any contralto could acquire at the risk of being left presently
with a hollow and unsympathetic voice, almost useless for what
I, according to my particular prejudice on the subject, consider
legitimate singing. However, Mrs Fisk obtained her share of
applause; and, as it is her business to please the public and not
to conform to my notions of voice production, I have nothing
more to say.
Giulia Ravogli sang a scena from Vaccai's Giulietta e Romeo,
chosen for the sake of one of those long recitatives beginning with
In questo loco (In this neighborhood), and proceeding with the
usual observations. I like to hear Signorina Giulia singing In
questo loco, just as I should have liked to hear Mrs Siddons ask-
ing the linen-draper "Will it wash?" But let there be no mistake
about the fact that In questo loco is as dead as My name is Norval.
No doubt if Mr Irving suddenly took a fancy to Norval and
began reciting about the Grampian Hills, and his father feeding
his flock, a frugal swain, whose constant care was to increase his
store, we should listen to him with high enjoyment, much as we
listen to Miss Ellen Terry bringing Monk Lewis bads: to life with
her pet recitation of Stay, gaoler, stay: I am not mad. But we
should not regard the entertainment as up to date. And that is my
objection to Vaccai. Like Monk Lewis and Home, he was a mzn
for an age, but most emphatically not for all time.
Sofia Ravogli joined her sister in a duet from Le Roi de
Lahore, which they sang with a distinction and quiet perfection
of style which shewed that they have found out the good side of
the London artistic atmosphere, and profited by it. Their former
touch of provinciality, which one did not care to mention, so
trivial a drawback was it to their genuine musical and dramatic
force, has vanished without taking any of their intensity away
with it; and we may now esteem ourselves rarely fortunate in
having, apparently, attached them to England* No doubt we
shall shew our sense of that by offering them the chance of some
half-a-dozen appearances on the stage every year in the heigbt of
the season, with a turn at the Philharmonic and Crystal Palace, a
liberal allowance of charity concerts, and plenty of pdvate
MUSIC IN LONDON
to make a serious matter of the treatment of what is, at best, an
arrant piece of claptrap.
An interesting point in the program was Mr Henschel's singing
of Schumann's setting of Heine's Two Grenadiers, followed by
Mr Bispham with Wagner's setting of a French version one of
thepi&ces de salon which he produced in his early Parisian 4ays.
Mr Henschel sat down comfortably to the piano and murdered
Schumann in cold blood. He played the mournful, weary-footed,
quasi-military dead march accompaniment anyhow, flicking off
the semiquaver turn in semidemisemiquavers, and beginning
the Marseillaise at the top of his voice, which is the surest way I
know to make the song fail. And it did fail, in spite of Mr Hen-
schel's popularity, his staleness in it being obvious.
Mr Bispham, thoroughly on the alert, took his turn like the
intelligent and cultivated artist he is; and though Wagner's
setting taxed his voice fully twenty shillings in the pound, he
came off solvent. I then fled from the miscellaneous scene, asd so
cannot say how the last quarter of the program was doae^ 4&
whether it was done at all. ,
On the previous Tuesday I went to the Royal Academy of
Music to hear Mr Ashton Ellis confront the Musical Asspda&oia
on the subject of Wagner's prose. There was a time when Mr
Ellis would have taken his life in his hand on such an errand; imt
he now holds the field unopposed. I looked round for the old
gang (if I may use that convenient political term without offence),
and looked in vain.
When Mr Ellis sat down, after a sufficiently provocative ex-
posure of the garblings of Opera and Drama which used to
appear in the Musical World in the old days of anti-Wagnerism,
I asked myself was there no man left to get up and complain dF
the "false relations" in Tristan, to plead for "a foil close in the
key" at frequent intervab during Der Ring, to explain &3t
Wagner's music shattered the hranan voke and overpoweml it
with deafening instrumentation, to deplore the total absence of
melody in Lohengrin, to praise the Tannhiiiser inarch as tiie sdb
endurable work of Wagner (because plagiarized feoaa
217
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
scena in Der Freischiitz) in short, to put himself totally out of
the question, for ever and a day, with every musician whose ideas
of art were wider than those of a provincial organist?
But the enemy was chapfallen and speechless that is, if the
enemy was present; but I think he had stayed away. At any rate,
Mr Ellis's party had the discussion all to themselves.
4 January 1893
THESE are not busy times for musical critics. In London every-
thing serves as an excuse for having no music, from the death of a
Royal personage to Christmas, just as in school everything serves
as an excuse for a holiday. I have been in the country, in an old-
English manor-house, where we all agreed to try and forget the
festive season. We were not altogether successful. On the very
first evening we were invaded by "the mummers," who were not
in the least like the husbands of Mr George Moore's Mummer's
Wife, They were laborers, overgrown with strips of colored
paper as a rock is overgrown with seaweed; and they went
through an operatic performance which I did not quite follow, as
they were quite equal to professional opera-singers in point of
unintelligibiliry, and, being simple country folk, were so un-
versed in the etiquette of first nights that they neglected to pro-
vide me with a libretto. I gathered that one of them was King
Alfred, and another St George. A third, equipped with a stale tall
hat, was announced as "the doctor." He drew a tooth from the
prima donn% whom I did not succeed in identifying; revived the
Other characters when they were slain in single combat; and sang
a J bdfeici expressive of his aspiration to live and die "a varmer's
b'rw^Y 1&& -h? 1 delivered with such a concentrated lack of
<^m^j^k tBaf I * once concluded that he actually- was a farmer's
bajj^fi^r subsequent inquiries as to the rate of wages in the
district oo^finned my surmise. We of the audience had to assume
&e : cbaracfc-br of good old English gentlemen and ladies keeping
iq> a seasonabk custom; aod it would be difficult to say whether
we or tibe pexfocraers w&^tbe most put out, of countenance. I
218
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
have seldom been so disconcerted; and my host, though he kept
it up amazingly, confessed to sharing my feelings; whilst the
eagerness of the artists to escape from our presence when their
performance was concluded and suitably acknowledged, testified
to the total failure of our efforts to make them feel at home. We
were perfectly friendly at heart, and would have been delighted
to sit round the fire with them and talk; but the conventions of
the season forbad it. Since we had to be mock-baronial, they had
to be mock-servile; and so we made an uneasy company of
Christmas humbugs, and had nothing to cheer us except the
consciousness of heartily forgiving one another and being for-
given. On Christmas Eve there was more music, performed by
the school-children, the carol-singers, and finally by an orchestra
consisting of a violin, a tambourine, a toy instrument with a
compass of one wrong note, which it played steadily on the
second and third beats in the bar, and anything else that would
make a noise ripieno, ad lib. The singers sang traditional Le*
inaccurate versions of old airs and modern music-haH sosigs,
the latter strangely modified by transmission from mouth to ear
along the whole length of the Thames.
On my return to town I was casting about me in an unsettkd
state of mind for some pretext for keeping away for another
evening from my work, when I found myself, as luck would have
it, outside the Lyceum Theatre. Recollecting that I had not heard
Mr Hamilton Clarke's incidental music to King Lear, I went
inside, and found myself late for the overture, and only just in
time for the march to which the Court enters. Mr Hamilton
Clarke's music is graceful, and sensitive to the tenderer emotions
of the drama. It is far too civilized for Lear; but it is, perhaps,
unreasonable to expect a composer to aim at the powerful and
barbaric when he well knows that the orchestral resources at liis
disposal will not be adequate to much more than sentimental
mtlodrame. I may .add that I decidedly prefer Mr Ford Madox
Brown as an illustrator of Shakespear to Mr Frank Dicksee; and
as Mr Hamilton Clarke is in music exactly whatMr Frank Dkksee,
is in painting, his interludes do not altogether satisfy me.
219
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
is nobody's fault, and my own misfortune. :
Whilst I am on the subject of the Lyceum, I may as well exttact
the following from a letter in one of the musical papers: "Speak*
ing of the letter O, Mr G. B. S. says that Mr Irving is the only
living Englishman who makes it a pure vowel. What a marvellous
being Mr G. B. S. must be ! All the English, twenty-seven millions
in number, have passed in review before him, and only one has
succeeded in properly pronouncing the vowel O!" Now I did
not say that Mr Irving pronounces O properly:, I said that he
makes a pure vowel of it. The effect was so strange at first that
for years his pronunciation of "gold," "bowl," "pole to pole" (in
Vanderdecken), etc., was unsparingly ridiculed and mimicked.
I should like to have it settled whether Mr Irving is right or
wrong.
There can be no doubt that the usage is to make O a diphh
thong: one hears "goh-oold," "gowld," "gah-oold," in all direc-
tions, but never pure "gold," except from Mr Irving or his
isftators. On the other hand, the pure vowel is, to my artistic
sense^ much pleasanter, Which, then, should be recommended to
the young actor? This question is much better suited for dis-
cussion in a musical paper than the misapprehensions arising
from my unfortunate habit of saying things I do not mean, such
as "the barbarous thoroug^hbass of Handel and Mozart." My
critic has deserved well of his country for nipping that thoughtless
slander in the bud.
I afeo hasten to explain that when I called Sterndale Bennett a
Dayite, I did not mean that he agreed with Day's
The first symptom of inveterate Dayism
to be a violent attack on one of Day's imaginary
My impression is that Bennett belieyed in "roots/' and
^Mtdlecttial harmonies" of his are logical applica-
iMtetiMfa* itxJt theory. Also, that the change from die rule-of-
taught by Mftzart to Sussmayer, to the
ms of Xfcip art Macforrai, was forwarded
d'of opposed by Stettdafe Be&aett. My critic contradicts
tie; Mit as. las style <iofs?^f impire :&e with .unreserved con-
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
fidence, I remain, pending further information, in the same
mind still.
ii January 1893
THE Incorporated Society of Musicians has been holding its
annual conference. Being rather short of subjects to confer about,
it has taken to listening to music even on the organ^to wik
away the time. It is a pity we have not an incorporated society of
critics, so that the musicians and critics might confer together,
with a strong police force present to maintain order. It would be
more amusing, even to the provincials, than organs and schools
for the musical training of the blind; and the eternal question of
raising the status of the musician could perhaps be met by die
previous question as to what is the matter with the musician's
status that he should want it raised.
It seems to me that the social opportunities of the musician are
greater, instead of less, than those of other craftsmen. The ehurcfc
organist may find, like the rest of us, that those who pay fbef iffer
insist on calling the tune; and if they happen to have n ear aad
no soul for music nay, if, as may very easily be tfae case* tfeey
actually make a virtue of disparaging it the unfortunate iwsicfes
may be grievously oppressed; but he is not compelled to pit up
with oppression because he is a musician, but solely because he
depends on his post for his bread-and-butter. He is at a disadvan-
tage, not as artist, but as employee, just as he would be in any
other trade or profession. He is certainly at no social disadvan-
tage: on the contrary, it is always assumed that the professional
player of a musical instrument is socially superior to the skilled
mechanic or artisan, though there is no reason in d*e *rodd why
he should be. .1 *
An orchestral player may be a pers06?of distingofetied cutem
and address; but he may also be illiterate, coarse, drunken, st
scrupulously honest, and, in short, a person whom se^siwe
composers and conductors would not employ if his Biecfaaakal
dexterity could be dispensed with. An organist may be i
respect the superior of the rector; but he fejastas
221
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
inferior of the keeper of the village shop, who does not complafc
particularly about his status. Some of the more innocent of my
readers may be shocked at this, and may demand of me whether
a man whose occupation is to interpet Handel Mozart, Beet-
hoven, or even Jackson in B flat, is not likely to have a more
elevated soul than a buyer and seller of pots and pans. I reply^
not in the least. You might as well ask whether a navvy, con^
stantly employed on vast engineering schemes, is not likely to be
more large-minded than a watchmaker.
Take a man with a quick ear and quick fingers; teach him how
to play an instrument and to read staff notation; give him some
band practice; and there you have your "professional," able to
do what Wagner could not have done for the life of him, but no
more necessarily a musician in the wider sense than a regimental
marksman or broadsword instructor is necessarily a general or a
master of foreign policy. He need make no more distinction
between Beethoven and Brahms than a compositor does between
Shakespear and Tennyson: even when he has an exceptionally
fine sense of the difference between good and bad execution, he
may not have the ghost of an idea of the difference between good
and bad music.
Orchestral players, good enough to find constant employment
in the best European orchestras, and yet with the manners, ideas,
and conversation of ordinary private soldiers, are less common
than formerly; but they are still contemporary facts, and not at all
anomalous ones, except to muddle-headed people who imagine
that every man who can play a string of notes written down by
Mozart or Bach must have the heart and mind of Mozart and
Badi No dot&t I shall presently be told that I have slandered an
session by declaring that the members of our Lon-
2re all illiterate, drunken, private-soldierly rap-
is quite as near -tfhat I have just said as some of
itics ever get to the meaning of my most careful
discriminate statements, fet abne my more epigrammatic
the &ct ismatng ^ I bavs stated it, that the professional
222
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
musician, as such, can have no special social status whatever,
because he may be anything, from an ex-drummer boy to an artist
and philosopher of world- wide reputation. It would be far more
reasonable to demand a special status for the musical critic as
such, since he is bound to be skilled in music, in literature, and in
criticism, which no man can be without a far wider culture than
an executive musician need possess. But I never have any trouble
about my status, though I probably should have if I were asked to
draw the line between myself and the country-town reporter who
occasionally copies out a concert program and prefaces it with a
few commonplaces. I am welcome among the people who like
my ways and manners; and I believe musicians enjoy the same
advantage.
When we are not welcome, probably the ways and manners
are to blame, and not the profession.
With this soothing contribution to the ever-burning question
of the conference, I pass on to the part of it which I personally
attended: to wit, the lecture on the spinet, harpsichord, and
clavichord by Mr Hipkins, and that on die lute and viols by Mr
Arnold Dolmetsch. Mr Hipkins's proficiency as a player on tie
harpsichord and clavichord is an old story upon which I need i*ot
dwell. If any swaggering pianist is inclined to undervalue that
proficiency, let him try his hand on a clavichord and see what be
can make of an instrument which depends for its "action,'* not on
the elaborate mechanism of Erard or any modification thereof,
but on the dexterity of the player.
Not to mention,' by the bye, that clavichord music is mostly of
that sort in which every wrong note or rough touch betrays itself
at once, unlike your modern thickly harmonized pieces, in which
one fistful of notes is as good as another when a grandiose chord
is wanted. The Rosencrantzes who know no touch of the old
instruments, but who are not content to leave them alone, should
go to Mr Hipkins, consider his ways, and be wise. For my own
part, I hope Mr Hipkins will find many imitators. There is no
sort of doubt that the pianoforte must succumb sooner or later
to the overwhelming objection that you can hear It next door. In
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MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
an age of general insensibility to music this does not matter: die
ordinary citizen today, who regards pianoforte playing as a mem
noise, may drop an oath or two when the young lady at the other
side of the party- wall begins practising; but he soon gets used to
it as he gets used to passing trains, factory hooters, fog signals,
and wheel traffic. Make a musician of him, however, and his
tolerance will vanish. I live, when I am at home, in a Lorkfoa
square which is in a state of transition from the Russell Square
private house stage to the Soho or Golden Square stage of letting,
for all sorts of purposes. There are a couple of clubs, with "bars"
and social musical evenings, not unrelieved by occasional clog
dances audible a quarter of a mile off. There is a residence for the
staff of a monster emporium which employs several talented
tenors behind its counters. There is a volunteer headquarters in
which the band practises on the first floors whilst the combatants
train themselves for the thousand yards range ijy shooting through
tubds in the area. Yet I have sat at work on a summer
>: with every window in the square open and all these
m foil blast^ and found myself less disturbed than I
BaVe been by a single private pianoforte, of the sort that the
British faobseholdee thinks "brilliant/* played by a female with
no music in het whole composition, simply getting up an "ac-
complishment" either to satisfy her own vanity or to obey the
orders of her misguided mother. Now if such females had spinets
to play on instead of pianos, I should probably not hear them.
Again, take the fiddle. It is a good sign, no doubt, that it is so
muefe saore generally practised than it used to be. But it is a
^tfeljr jpdwerful instrument ifc neighborhoods where only
^ii&^^ tat*;afed to Kve in detached houses.
itet it ^ould be to live next to Mr Arnold
with his hites, love viofe, and leg viols, than to an
You can study the difference at Covent
@fe i fcattiigdenots night,, when tfae kader of the violas, after
ffe airliiuthe first act on a-ravishingly
r&v%rlg to fa& modem viola when he
* ogato te Ae*^
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MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
harsh and tuneless scraper. A mouthful of margarine after a
mouthful of honey would be far less disappointing. But if we
went back to the old viols with sympathetic strings and the old
harpsichords, I suppose we should have to begin to make them
again; and I wonder what would be the result of that.
To me the difference between the beautiful spinet which Mr
Hipkins played the other day and a modern cottage pianoforte of
the sort that sells best in England is as the difference between the
coloring of Bellini or Carpaccio and that of the late Frank Holl.
But hereupon comes the horrible reflection that most of us prefer
Frank Holl's pictures to Bellini's. Is there the smallest reason to
suppose that if we took to making harpsichords we would make
good ones? Alas! the question is already answered. Mr Hipkins
not only played on the beautiful spinet already mentioned, and
on a comparatively middling harpsichord, but also on a new
harpsichord manufactured by a very eminent Parisian firm of
pianoforte makers; and not only did it prove itself a snarling
abomination, with vices of tone that even a harmonium would
have been ashamed of, but it had evidently been deliberately
made so in order to meet the ordinary customer's notion of a
powerful and brilliant instrument.
Mr Dolmetsch did not exhibit any modern lutes, perhaps
because none have been made; but if our fiddle-makers were to
attempt to revive them they would probably aim at the sort of
"power" of tone produced by those violins which ingenious
street-players make out of empty Australian mutton tins and odd
legs of stools.
I must not omit to say that Mr Dolmetsch's viol concerts,
apart from their historical interest, are highly enjoyable from the
purely musical point of view, his own playing and that of his
daughter (on the viol da gamba) being excellent.
1 8 January 1893
LEST I should seem to slight that deservedly esteemed champion
of good singing, Mr Charles Lunn, by taking no notice of his
VOL, ii 225 q
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
criticism of my utterances on his pet subject, I shall answer it, m
spite of the difficulty created by the fact that whilst Mr Luim
firmly believes himself a disciple of Garcia and an advocate of tfa&
coup de glotte, he has, as a matter of fact, spent his life in fighting
against the practical results of Garcia's method of instruction
and is no more a coup de glottist than I am. It will be remembered
that I recently mentioned Santley and Melba as examples of the
long line of good singers who have had nothing of the Academy
method about them.
Mr Lunn, in reply, claims Santley and Melba as virtual pupils,
of Garcia. He says, "Ihave a letter before me in which I am in-
formed 'Santley told me he had learned more in twelve lessons
from my father than in all the years he had studied with others/ "
To which I answer (i) that there is no evidence that when Santley
made that polite but ingeniously ambiguous speech to Garcia's
son he was alluding to the subject of voice production; (2) that in
Santley's history of himself lately noticed in this column I re&l
of his having grown up as a choirboy to the profession of singer,
and of his obligations to his master Gaetano Nava of Milan, but
not a solitary word of Garcia; and (3) that I have heard a Garcia
sing, and that he did not sing like Santley. However, I must
honestly add that the one lesson I ever had from a pupil of the
Garcia school was prodigiously instructive, especially as to
whether it was advisable to take another.
Mr Lunn proceeds: "Next, as to Melba. She was trained by
Marchesi; and Marchesi was trained by Garcia and Viardot his
sister," This proves exactly nothing. Marchesi may, for aught I
feikrw^ l&ve greatly modified, or even entirely abandoned, the
infetli^l imparted to her by die Garcias. And Melba's method is
i^it tfe't&etbod of the Aca<Jemy pupils, nor of the young ladies
wboia I have heard as they came fresh from the tuition of Madame
Viardot. If I knew Madame Melba's personal history, I might
possibly be abk to shew that it was her success as a singer in
Australia that induced her to seek from Marchesi and others that
criticism and advice as to style, habits, f>hrasing, pronunciation,
stage business and tradition, which makes our eminent professors
2*6
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
of singing so useful to pupils who, like Santley, already know
how to sing.
Mr Lunn defends the vowel Ah on the extremely cheerful
ground that "with death the jaw drops, and the last exhalation is
ah!" Therefore aA, says Mr JLunn, is not metaphysical, like the
other vowels, but physical. It is nature revealing itself. But I did
not say it was not: all I contended for was that i wfafc die
ordinary young Englishwoman is not dropping her jaw in death,
but simply singing scales in life, she practises on ah instead of oo
and ee in the middle, and aw in her lowest register, she will sing
like an Academy pupil instead of developing the full vocal
capacity, physical and metaphysical, needed by a public singer.
Sing on Garcia's method when you are dead by all means; but
whilst you are alive you will find Edouard de Reszke's more
useful: only dont abuse your power when you have gained it by
wilful bawling for the mere fun of making a thundering noise, as
he sometimes does. If you want to study nature freely expi^essing
itself in vowels, and are averse to post-mortem examinations} you
can pursue the following methods. To get the vowel O, with a
marked coup de glotte, surprise a gentleman of full habit by a
smart dig of your finger into his epigastrium at the moment when
he has taken a full inspiration. For oo, with a B prefixed, simply
write a play and appear before the curtain at the end. F<*r at,
stick a pin into a lady. And so on.
The notion that ah is the best vowel and that no other should be
used for practice is cognate to that of the gentlemen who tell you
that D or F or B flat is the best note on their voice, thtough they
do not go on to recommend you to practise exclusively on that
note and to mistrust the others as "metaphysical/' In Mr Lunn's
own terminology, my contention is that the vowd wfakh is
physical at one pitch is metaphysical at another, and that nature
does not freely express itself on a bass's low G in tbe same vowel
as on the soprano's high A. Also that the dead-man, "oo effort,"
unvolitional theory of singing, though it has arisen, naturally
enough, in protest against the tight chin, rolled-up tosgpe,
squeezed throat, and blowhard method, is Just as impracticable,
227
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
and consequently just as revolting to the student's common
sense, as the celebrated instruction in the old volunteer drill-
book, "Bring the rifle smartly to the shoulder without moving
the hands."
Expert teachers and singers, knowing what the "no effort"
precepts mean, approving of their drift, and careless of accuracy
of statement, may declare their adhesion to it off-hand; but I, as
an expert writer, have to say what I mean as exactly as possible.
And I mean, among other things, that dramatic singing is one of
the most arduously volitional acts that man can perform; and
whoever compares it in that respect to moribund collapse, says
(to quote a well-known controversialist) that which is not the
truth, but so far from it, on the contrary, quite the reverse.
Whilst I am on the subject of my critics (whom I pass over in
dignified silence only when they happen to have the best of the
argument), I may as well astonish the gentleman who gives me
such a tremendous taking-down over the competition of the
School Board children. He is evidently a professional musician;
for to no other <dass could such innocence be found as he displays
in his interpretation of my recent remarks about the extent to
which systems of sight-reading get credited with feats that fire
really due to the pupils having the power of remembering the
absolute pitch of sounds.
Long ago I compared Hullah's "fixed Do" system with the
Cheve and Tonic Solfa systems, and drew the inevitable con-
clusion that Hullah's was impracticable, whereas the other two
were reasonable enough, though Rousseau's objection that no
notation is so graphic as the staff, as far as pitch is concerned,
incjined me to recommend some method of applying the
Do system to the ordinary notation. But when I came
Itbeetry to practice, and found that the Hullah system seemed
Ho produce much the same sort of result m classes as its more
pkiasible rivals, I became sceptical.
My attention was presently drawn to a young lady who was
exhibited as a marvellous example of the success of the Chev6
system as a trainiijg for t&estaff notation. I was impressed at first;
228
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
but eventually I discovered that she was an absolute pitcher, and
could not only have read the staff notation just as well if she had
never heard of Cheve or Galine*, but that she could get the hang
of any sort of notation, numeral or syllabic, with amazing quick-
ness, and translate it into absolute pitch. I was slow to find this
out, because I cannot remember absolute pitch myselfj and the
faculty for doing so was at first as inexplicable to me as weie the
feats of the pupils of "Professors of Memory" until I read Mr
Galton's work on Human Faculty, and learnt for the first time
that there was such a faculty as "visualization."
Granted a faculty of "auralization," by which the auralizer can
remember notes quite independently of one another, just as the
visualizer remembers numbers; and the practicability of Hullah's
system becomes quite intelligible. I soon came to the conclusions
set forth in my previous article, which will probably be accepted
by most disinterested musicians who have themselves the sense of
absolute pitch, or have discovered its existence. For example, that
excellent musician, Mr W. H. Cummings, whom I oeoe headd
inform an audience that when he was a boy his father struck aaoffg
on the piano and told him that it was A, and that he always te*
membered A from that, would be easily able to explain to my
critic what has puzzled him so much. ''*"
However, I rather object to being contemptuously informal
that the Chev6 and Tonic Solfa systems are relative pitch system
If I am ignorant of these systems I may deserve to be snubbed;
but I ought to be told the truth. The Tonic Solfa is not a relative
pitch system; and that is just where it is superior to the movable
Do system applied to the staff notation I think they call it die
Lancashire Solfa. The genuine Tonic Solfaist remembers his not
by its dramatic effect in the key. He feels Soh (Tonfc Soifeese
for Sol) as Wagner felt it when he wrote the Flying Ehit<iia
motive, and not by calculating a fifth above Doh. Some day 1
must write a supplement to Schuim&n's Advice tx> Young Masl*
cians. The title will be Advice to Old Musicians; and the fet
precept will run, "Dent be in a hurry to contradict Gl /IL&, as
he never commits himself on a mtisical subject waafferlrivmA
229
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
least six times as much about it as you do." But then I hate saying
conceited things, however true they may be, even to people who
seem to regard me as a mere Aunt Sally instead of a fellow-
creature.
A notable event of the week is the publication by Messrs Kegan
Paul & Triibner of the first volume of Wagner's prose works,
translated by Mr Ashton Ellis. It contains two works of the first
importance, The Art- Work of the ,Future (once well known to
those who had not read it as The Music of the Future), and the
Communication to My Friends, a unique artistic document, and
one, by the bye, which every woman who admires Lohengrin
should read, as it contains that remarkable account of his con-
version to the view that Elsa, whom he at first conceived as
having "failed" Lohengrin, was quite right in insisting on know-
ing all about him. In the later dramas, you will remember, the
woman's part is as heroic as the man's.
The rest of the volume is taken up with Art and Revolution, a
classic example of brilliant pamphleteering; the Autobiographic
Sketch, which wiU amuse those for whom the Communication is
too deep; the essay on Art and Climate, and the tolerably full
design for the unfinished poem of Wieland the Smith. This in-
stalment will suffice to open die eyes of English readers to the
absurdity of the notions concerning Wagner and his views which
were current here until quite lately, and which only began to
collapse when the public, instead of reading about his music, got
opportunities of listening to it, and lost all patience with the old
nonsense about its dullness, harshness, lack of melody, and so on.
Mr Edward Dannreuther's translation of On Conducting, too,
revealed die supposed obscure and fantastic theorist as a very
practical person, with simple and broad tastes in music, and with
that saving; salt ,of htimor and common sense which are so vital to
feeisNaify*$f an att enthusiast. .And his attacks were so sympatheti-
cally afeied af the very incompetencies and impostures from which
we cmrselves are suffering that those who read the essay at once
concluded that the disparagement and ridicule which had been
heaped on Wagner the writer were just as stupid as those which
230
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
had been heaped on Wagner the composer. Besides, Wagner
never stopped short at the merely negative "Thats not the way
to do it": he always said "This is the way to do it," and did it
forthwith.
There is something pleasant, too, in the thorough popularity
of his likes and dislikes in music. His love of Beethoven and
Mozart, and of the Mendelssohn of the Scotch symphony and
the Hebrides overture, and his sovereign contempt for the efforts
of Schumann and Brahms to be "profound," taken with the posi-
tive productive power of the man to realize his own ideas with his
own hand, make up a personality as convincing and as genial as
that of William Morris, who has a prodigious appetite for Dickens
and Dumas (need I say which Dumas?), and his masterpieces in
poetry, in prose, in printing, in picture-glass, in tapestry and
household wares of all kinds.
In proof of my own sympathy with the practical and popular
side of Wagner, I hasten to add that the volume in question costs
I2S. 6d. net, and is well worth the money. The translation is so
good that it deserves the praise that Wagner gave to Liszt's in-
terpretation of Beethoven's sonatas.
Grateful acknowledgments to the member of "the Rag" wlio
sets me right as to the key of "Jackson." I said "Jackson in B flat* *:
I should have said in F. "Only fancy the additional horror of the
thing a fifth higher," exclaims my correspondent. I shake that
warrior's hand. He, too, has suffered as I have.
25 January 1893
To Miss E. M. Smyth, the composer of the Mass performed for
the first time at the Albert Hall last Wednesday, I owe at feast one
hearty acknowledgment. Her Mass was not a Requiem, True, it
was carefully announced as "a Solemn Mass"; but when it came
to the point it was not so very solemn: in fact, the Gloria, which
was taken out of its proper place and sung at the end by way of
a finish, began exactly like die opening choruses which are now
de rigueur in, comic operas. Indeed, th6 whole work,
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
externally highly decorous, has an underlying profanity that
makes the audience's work easy.
If you take an average mundane young lady, and ask her what
service to religion she most enjoys rendering, she will probably
if she is a reasonably truthful person, instance the decoration of
a church at Christmas. And, beyond question, a girl of taste in
that direction will often set forth in a very attractive and becoming
way texts of the deepest and most moving significance, which
nevertheless, mean no more to her than the Chinese alphabet!
Now I will not go so far as to say that Miss Smyth's musical
decoration of the Mass is an exactly analogous case; for there are
several passages in which her sense of what is pretty and becom-
ing deepens into sentimental fervor, just as it also slips back
occasionally into a very unmistakeable reminiscence of the enjoy-
ment of the ballroom; but I must at least declare that the decora-
tive instinct is decidedly in front of the religious instinct all
through, and that the religion is not of the widest and most
satisfying r sort.
Ttere^e great passages in the Mass, such as "I look for the
life of the world to come," which stir all men who have any faith
or hops left in them, whether the life they look for is to be lived
in Londm streets and squares, or in another world, and which
stand out in adequate modern settings of religious services from
among the outworn, dead matter with which creeds inevitably
become clogged in the course of centuries. Every critic who goes
to hear a setting of words written hundreds of years ago knows
that some of them will have lost their sincerity, if not their very
^eamn& to the composer of today; and at such points he looks
for a cfesjjfey of putfe musicianship to fill the void; whilst he waits
~* Ttntewst ar*i faqpe for the live bits.
* owever, .makes no distinctions. She writes m*-
_ wi& Ae feidiof a child and the orthodoxy of a
^-_Jn6tewenthose:smwig preferences which appear in
Ae^nlgioas TOfa of Mozart aod Raphael. Consequently,
feMassWengstoste
it is not famous and vulg^assb much Church music unforS-
232
MUSIC IN LONDON 1890-94
nately is. It repeatedly spurts ahead in the briskest fashion; so
that one or two of the drum flourishes reminded me, not of any-
thing so vulgar as the Salvation Army, but of a crack cavalry band.
There is, too, an oddly pagan but entirely pleasant association
in Miss Smyth's mind of the heavenly with the pastoral: the
curious trillings and pipings, with violin obbligato, which came
into the Creed at the descent from heaven; the Et vitam venturi,
on the model of the trio of the Ninth Symphony; and the multi-
tudinous warblings, as of all the finches of the grove, at the end
of the Gloria, conveyed to me just such an imagination of the
plains of heaven as was painted by John Martin. Much of the
orchestral decoration is very pretty, and shews a genuine feeling
for the instruments. The passage in the Hosanna for the long
trumpet which Mr Morrow mastered for the use of the Bach
Choir, fairly brought down the house.
I have often tried to induce composers to avail themselves of
this instrument; and now that Miss Smyth has set the example,
with immediate results in the way of applause both forfaerself and
the player, I do not see what there is to prevent a triumphant
renovation of the treble section of the brass, especially now that
Mr Wyatt's application of the double slide to the trumpet faas&t
last made the slide-trumpet as practicable as the incurably vulgar
but hitherto unavoidable cornet. Miss Smyth's powers of expres-
sion do not go beyond what the orchestra can do for her. None 
