Musical Criticisms

BACH.

The Genius of Bach.

November 27, 1901.

In the minds of those who have specially at heart the welfare and progress of musical art in this country nothing at the present time looms larger than the church music of Bach. To acquiesce in the prevalent indifference of the public to that music we feel to be impossible. If Shakespeare is nothing but a bore, there seems to be an end of imaginative literature; and similarly, in music, any person whom Bach entirely fails to interest had better give up all pretence to being musical. For Bach is not one of the composers, like Berlioz, Liszt, Tcha?kovsky, Dvoràk, or Richard Strauss, whom it is allowable to like or dislike. Bach is the musical Bible-the foundation of the faith. Historically considered, both Bach and Handel are artists of the Reformation and the Renaissance. But if we fix attention on their essential musical personalities, we find a certain broad difference between the two great eighteenth century composers, which is fairly well suggested by calling Bach a Gothic and Handel a Renaissance artist. Bach's "Passion according to St. Matthew" stands to Handel's "Messiah" in something like the same kind of contrast that Strasburg Cathedral presents to St. Peter's in Rome. On the other hand, in its course of development music has been quite different from architecture and the graphic and plastic arts, and modern music owes quite a hundred times more to Bach than it does to Handel. Bach represents by far the greatest stimulating influence that has ever existed in the musical world. His stupendous industry, resulting in a body of first-rate work that may be reckoned among the greatest wonders of the world (it is not possible for a modern to know it all); his awe-inspiring union of very great talent with very great character; the completeness of his human nature and the absolute purity of his life and art-these things unite to make of Bach's personality something truly august, something that administers a quietus to the ordinary critical, fault-finding spirit. Glancing over the huge library of his collected works and knowing the glories that a few of them contain, one is fain to say, "There were giants in the earth in those days." Yet "giant" is scarcely the word. For the astounding sinew and sturdiness of the man were quite secondary in the composition of his character to that quality, in virtue of which he worked on throughout a long life as though in perpetual consciousness of something higher than ordinary human judgment; not waiting for full appreciation, which did not come till about a century after his death (very much as in Shakespeare's case), but perfectly realising the great ethical ideal of Marcus Aurelius-the good man producing good works, just as the vine produces grapes. No greater praise can be bestowed on Handel than to say that in his very best moments he is almost worthy of Bach, as, for example, in the choral section "The Lord hath laid on Him the iniquity of us all," or in the tenor of the recitative "He looked for some to have pity on Him, but there was no man; neither found He any to comfort Him."

Bach's Mass in B minor.

November 29, 1901.

Under Dr. Richter's irresistible generalship the most arduous task ever yet undertaken by the Hallé Choir was yesterday carried through to a brilliantly successful issue. Bach's great Mass illustrates his tendency to throw all the weightier eloquence of a sacred composition into the chorus, a solo or duet being treated as a delicate interlude, some florid obbligato for violin, oboe, or "corno di caccia"-the eighteenth century name for the ordinary orchestral horn-being intertwined with the melodic line in the manner of Gothic tracery. The Mass is in six main divisions-the Kyrie, with three sub-sections; the Gloria and the Credo, each in eight; the Sanctus, Benedictus, and Agnus Dei, each in two sub-sections. The two choruses of the Kyrie-the former a wailing supplication, the latter a mystical counterpart washed clean of earthly passion-were sufficient to show that the choir had a most thorough grasp of their parts, all the difficult and complex chromatic harmonies coming out with admirable clearness and correctness. The first chorus of the Gloria, with its joyous vivace movement, breaks into a style much more generally "understanded of the people." Here the choir were on thoroughly firm ground. The ring of the voices was magnificent, and the superbly effective contrast at the words "Et in terra pax" was perfectly given. The first occasion on which we noticed any serious defect in the choral singing was in the burst of jubilant melody at the opening of the "Et resurrexit." The jar was only momentary and was doubtless the result of an over-vehement attack. It can scarcely be questioned that the most marvellous chorus in the whole work is the Sanctus, which expresses in six-part harmony the mystical rapture of celestial beings set free from all care, pain, and strife. The effect of those persistent three-quaver groups in their garlanded similar motion is like nothing else in this world. They create a harmony of unparalleled richness, filling the ear with a feast of ravishing sound. The contrast with such choruses as Handel's "Hallelujah" and "Worthy is the Lamb" is extremely striking. Handel was always of the Church Militant. He was always strenuous, affirming the faith as it were with a note of triumph over its enemies. Such a rose of Paradise as this Sanctus of Bach's is quite remote from all that Handel could do. For an earthly choir, however, with lungs and vocal chords liable to weariness, all this infinitely ornate and elaborate passage-work is very trying, notwithstanding the absolute suavity of the musical expression, and in the ensuing "Hosanna" there were occasional signs of exhaustion. But the choir recovered their breath during the two succeeding solos, and gave a magnificent performance of the concluding "Dona nobis pacem."

"St. Matthew Passion."

January 25th, 1900.

It is possible to regard the "St. Matthew Passion" of Sebastian Bach as the greatest work of sacred musical art in existence, and thus as greater than Handel's "Messiah"; while at the same time thoroughly acquiescing in the greater popularity of the "Messiah." Handel was a mighty artist and a most lordly person; but he was a man of the world and a Court composer, and his religion, though perfectly genuine, was external and official in character. Bach, too, was a mighty artist, but he was not a man of the world. He was a devout and pious man and a man of the people, and his religion was inward and personal. Again, Handel was cosmopolitan, whereas Bach was thoroughly German. Not that Bach was wanting in knowledge of Italian and other foreign music. He was a perfectly comprehensive encyclop?dia of the musical knowledge that existed in his time. But the basis of his character was too homely, simple and loyal to be modified by foreign influence. Thus while Handel became musically an Italian, Bach remained thoroughly German. All these circumstances suggest reasons for the much wider popularity of Handel's music by comparison with Bach's. The general public like the clear and definite outline, the structural simplicity, that they find in the Italian and quasi-antique style of Handel, while they are bewildered by the subtlety, the complexity, the varied imaginative play, and the rejection of set forms that they find in Bach. It must be remembered that the average man of the world to a great extent determines the tone of the general public; one may be thankful that there exists any work of sacred musical art so splendid as "Messiah," which is to a great extent intelligible to the average man of the world, and one may rest satisfied that, for the present at any rate, the "Messiah" should be performed often, the Passion music seldom.

A long line of Christian aspiration and endeavour culminates in the "St. Matthew Passion" music. The Good Friday service, or mystery, of the Passion dates back to medi?val times. Musical settings of it are quite innumerable. They fall into three main groups, according to style. The earliest are in the "Plain-song" of the medi?val church. At the period of Luther's Reformation the plain song gave way to the chorale style. Finally, there are many settings in the oratorio style. Of these Bach himself certainly wrote four, and probably five. By universal consent the "St. Matthew Passion" is the finest of Bach's settings. The main outlines of the scheme were fixed by tradition. Bach had the assistance of a poet named Picander in arranging his text, but it was by Bach's own judgment that all important points were settled. He divided the story into two parts. The first comprises the conspiracy of the High Priest and Scribes, the anointing of Christ, the institution of the Lord's supper, the prayer on the Mount of Olives and the betrayal of Judas, and ends with the flight of the disciples. In the second part are set forth the hearing before Caiaphas, Peter's denial, the judgment of Pilate, the death of Judas, the progress to Golgotha, the Crucifixion, Death and Burial of Christ. Between the two parts there is a broad contrast, a certain solemn stillness prevailing in the first and a passionate stir in the second. Fifteen chorales are heard in the course of the work, each forming a meditation upon the foregoing incident in the story. The chorus is double, and there is immense power in the manner in which the two main masses of sound are used, both to emphasise all that has poetic value and to express the many elements composing the mighty picture. Most of the solos are supported by the first choir. The utterances of Christ are given by a bass voice with string quartet accompaniment. The bass voice is in accordance with tradition. Most of the other recitatives have an obbligato accompaniment, in which a motif bearing figurative reference to some prominent image in the text is worked out. The obbligato is in most, though not in all, cases assigned to a wind instrument, so as to contrast still further with the music accompanying the words of Christ. The longest solo part is that of the Narrator, who sings tenor. In the course of a long and masterly discussion Dr. Spitta, the great biographer of Bach, contends that the "St. Matthew Passion" is not, strictly speaking, either dramatic music or oratorio music. One passage in the discussion may here be quoted:-"Consider the passage where the Jewish people, prompted by the High Priests and Elders, demand the release of Barabbas. The Evangelist makes them reply to Pilate's question with the single word 'Barabbas.' The situation is, no doubt, full of emotion, and an oratorio writer might have let the tension of the moment discharge itself in a chorus. But it would necessarily have been embodied in a form in which the chorus could have its full value as a musical factor, in a broadly worked-out composition with a text of somewhat greater extent. The dramatic composer would have given it the utmost brevity, since it stands midway in the critical development of an event. He would have to consider the progress of the action as well as the expression of feeling. A sudden roar of the excited populace-thronging tumultuously about the governor-a sudden roar and brief turmoil of voices would be the effect best suited to his purpose. Bach, composing a devotional Passion, makes the whole choir groan out the name 'Barabbas' once only, on the chord of the minor seventh approached by a false close."

Dr. Spitta's point is that Bach's music interprets the feeling of devout Christians, neither subordinating the purport of the text to a musical poem, like a conventional oratorio composer, nor entering into the point of view of the actor, like any other kind of dramatic composer. Dr. Spitta's arguments on this point are quite convincing; and we do not follow his practice of calling the work a "mystery" instead of an oratorio, only because the former word would not be generally intelligible, and because, in this country, we call any work of sacred art for voices and instruments an oratorio, if it is not a Mass, and if it is on too grand a scale to be called a cantata.

Minor Concerto.

March 14, 1902.

Anyone who knows his interpretation of Bach's A minor Concerto can scarcely help associating Dr. Brodsky with that work very much as one associates Joachim with Beethoven's, and Sarasate with Mendelssohn's Violin Concerto. There is no other work that gives us so much of Bach's musical individuality within the scope of a clear, simple, and widely intelligible scheme. Bach made no music for the theatre, the casino, or the fashionable ballroom. He seems to have written almost exclusively for the church and for innocent, paternally safeguarded merry-making. He was a good old patriarch who composed either to praise God or to help the young people enjoy themselves-for if anyone imagines that Bach's gigues, gavottes, sarabandes, and so forth were not meant for actual dancing he is greatly mistaken. In such works as the Concertos one may still trace the twofold impulse clearly enough, though all is idealised, structurally elaborated, and otherwise adapted to a purely artistic purpose. For in the first movement of the A minor Concerto-Dr. Brodsky's special piece-we have something that brings the spirit into the proper atmosphere. Bach takes us, as it were, to church, composing our minds, as we go, with strong and able talk about subjects appropriate to the religious season and the service that we are to attend. The second movement is the service, and the Finale is the afternoon walk or dance; Bach would probably have approved of Sunday dancing. Dr. Brodsky is unsurpassable in the andante, where the powerful, composed, and majestic rhythm of the bass finds a poetic and delicately fanciful commentary in the solo part. Here one perceives the difference between Bach's and Beethoven's religious standpoint, between the ages of faith and of strife, between the ancien régime and the revolutionary period. For Bach the ancient faith is enough, while in the spirit of Beethoven there ferment, fume and rage the ideas of the French Revolution. The Hellmesberger cadenza played by Dr. Brodsky in the Finale is perhaps the best-written excursus of its kind in existence. It passes in review the thematic material of the entire work, with unfailing felicity of touch, and good judgment as to the amount of development; and the extremely rich and florid figuration is all so neatly spun out of elements contained in the body of the work, that it seems to have grown where we find it hanging, and has no suggestion of anything alien about it.

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BEETHOVEN.

C Minor Symphony, No. 5.

October 22, 1897.

The opening of the first movement forms the subject of a celebrated passage in Wagner's pamphlet on conducting, where he complains of the manner in which the pauses on E flat and D used to be scamped, and of many other defects which were usual in the performances of forty years ago. He represents Beethoven rising from his grave and apostrophising the conductor with a harangue that begins: "Hold thou my fermate [pauses] long and terribly." Wagner was a most exacting critic, but we venture to think that he would have been fairly satisfied with last night's rendering of the first movement. The contrast of the masculine and feminine elements which are inherent in the first and second subjects respectively was presented with all possible effect; the pauses were as long and terrible as Wagner could have desired, and were sustained with a perfectly equable tone-delivery; the beautiful unaccompanied phrase for oboe-which on the recurrence of the passage takes the place of the fermata, or pause, at the twenty-first measure-was given with all possible force of expression; and many other individual beauties of the rendering might be cited. The second movement is less taxing for the performers than the rest of the work; it was given in a manner well in keeping with the spirit of the symphony, which is like some vast work of sculpture in bronze, such as the gates of the Baptistery at Florence. Just such plastic force in the moulding of mighty tone-elements and just such nobility of the imagination did Beethoven possess as enabled Ghiberti to mould those wonderful gates, concerning which Michelangelo said that they were worthy to be the gates of Paradise. The scherzo, too, was an artistic triumph for the orchestra. Not a point was missed in that wonderful and uncanny tone-picture. A dance of demons it has been called; but it must be remembered that many great artists have treated grotesque and grisly subjects with an ineffably beautiful touch, such as we see, for example, in Alfred Rethel's marvellous drawing "Death the Friend." Not that the scherzo in Beethoven's C minor symphony breathes the spirit of that drawing, which is restful and serene, while the scherzo is full of weird mockery. The only point of the comparison is that in both works we find a grotesque subject ennobled and beautified by a great artistic imagination. Strange that the C minor symphony should often have been quoted as an irregular and anarchical composition. Sir George Grove has pointed out in his well-known analysis that the entire work conforms most strictly to structural principles, and that its chief irregularities are the linking together of the scherzo and finale and the reprise of the scherzo shortly before the concluding presto.

The Sixth Symphony.

February 24, 1899.

In dealing with this symphony, the conductor had occasion to show qualities different from those that have been called forth by the preceding works of the present Beethoven series. The third and fifth symphonies are of a strongly exciting character, the second is also distinctly exciting, at any rate in the finale, the fourth is a kind of mildly celestial or seraphic utterance, and the first does not truly represent the mature master in any of his moods. In previous performances of the series it was the successful rendering of some exciting element in the music, or the interpretation of a sublime emotion, upon which the conductor seemed to lay a kind of stress. Yesterday the case was quite different. The Pastoral Symphony is not exciting, or sublime, or mysterious, those qualities being alien to the genius of pastoral music or poetry. It is an expression of the emotion stirred by simple and homely delights; and for its interpretation it requires, in addition to the technical equipment, only a certain fresh and healthy energy. Even the religious note near the end is of a simple idyllic character. Once more the interpretation was, in our view, very admirable. The conductor seemed fully to grasp the poetic import of each section, and, under his guidance, the orchestra fully conveyed the breezy delights of the opening movement, the soothing murmur of the brook, the boisterous mirth of the ensuing allegro, the contrasting note of the storm, and the final hymn of thanksgiving. It has been said that Beethoven's music has an ethical bearing; and, as many persons have great difficulty in understanding how any music can have an ethical bearing, it may be worth while to suggest that the Pastoral Symphony, following the tremendous emotions of the preceding symphonies, teaches precisely the same lesson as the opening of Goethe's "Faustus and Helena," where the sylphs, typifying simple, untroubled natural influences, are busied about the person of the sleeping "Faust," pitying the "unhappy man whether good or wicked," and seeking to soothe his tormented spirit. According to the view of Goethe and Beethoven there is no other healing for the unhappy man's tormented spirit but in the simple, untroubled influences of nature. Such, in addition to its musical beauties, is the ethical lesson of the Pastoral Symphony.

The Seventh Symphony.

March 3, 1899.

One quality differentiating Beethoven's Seventh Symphony from the rest of the nine is well expressed by Sir George Grove in his famous book ("Beethoven and his Nine Symphonies") when he calls it the most rhythmical of them all. Beyond question the rhythm is on the whole more strongly marked in the seventh than in any of the others. The slow movement is not called a march; yet it has a far more definite tramping rhythm than the movement that is called a march in the Heroic Symphony. In the finale the rhythmical emphasis attains a degree of reckless violence that has never been surpassed by any composer except Tcha?kovsky. A scherzo is always strongly rhythmical; but in the scherzo of this symphony one finds a kind of frenzied rushing, whirling movement that is rare in Beethoven's works. Another differentiating quality of the symphony is grotesque expression, which is strong in the vivace, stronger in the scherzo, and goes all lengths in the finale. As with the later works of many other great artists, it is hard to divine the poetic intention of this symphony. One perceives a marvellous design, for the most part grotesque in character; one perceives the work of a gigantic imagination, smelting the stubborn tone-masses as in a furnace and moulding them to its purposes with a kind of superhuman plastic force. But what the mighty design illustrates is not, at present, obvious. The grotesqueness of the first, third, and last movements is all the more striking from the character of the slow movement, which is absolutely remote from the grotesque. The quality of the expression in that slow movement eludes all classification. It is not exactly a funeral march, and not exactly a dirge, though it is undoubtedly mournful in character. A kind of unearthly rhythmical chant one might imagine it to be, accompanying some mysterious function among the gods of the dead. There is perhaps no slow movement left by Beethoven the beauty of which is more penetrating or more imposing. After a fine and spirited rendering of the introduction and vivace, the slow movement-inscribed "allegretto" in the score, though the composer afterwards expressed a desire that the indication should be changed to "andante quasi allegretto"-was played with fine expression, though perhaps a trifle too quickly. The scherzo was entirely admirable. At the opening of the finale the rushing semiquavers in the violin part were, for some reason, not quite clear, though later in the movement, when the music had become more complex, the same figure sounded clear enough. On the whole, the rendering of the symphony well maintained the success that had previously attended the series.

"Eroica" Symphony.

February 1, 1900.

The fact that the leading theme in the first movement of the "Eroica" Symphony is taken note for note from Mozart's youthful operetta, "Bastien et Bastienne," is of no great importance. If an operetta contained something that could thus be caught up into the seventh heaven of art, its existence was thereby justified very much better than the existence of most other operettas. The notion of bringing a charge of plagiarism against Beethoven in reference to this theme is absurd beyond expression. There is, after all, nothing in the theme but a certain rhythmical arrangement of the common chord so simple that it might well have occurred to two composers independently. Whether it occurred independently to Beethoven or whether he heard Mozart's operetta at the Elector's Theatre in Bonn while he was a boy and unconsciously reproduced the theme, as is conjectured by Sir George Grove, is of no importance. With Mozart the theme is little more than a piece of chance passage-work. It leads to nothing; whereas with Beethoven it leads to developments of extraordinary richness and significance, forming the most important element in a tone-picture that greatly surpasses in passionate and incisive eloquence, in fulness of matter, varied interest, and plastic force anything that previously existed in the world of music. It would be hard to mention any other of Beethoven's themes from which results quite so tremendous have been obtained. It is repeated between thirty and forty times in the course of the movement, reappearing under an endless variety of forms, assigned to all sorts of different instruments, changing in key, in tone-colouring, in loudness or softness of utterance, producing an infinite variety of effects in the harmony, combining in all sorts of unexpected ways with other themes, and on every reappearance taking on new value, bringing fresh revelation. To such great uses may an operetta tune come at last, if it happen to be laid hold of by a Beethoven with an imagination like a mighty smelting furnace, and a hand that can model like a great sculptor in bronze. In Dr. Richter's interpretation of the "Eroica," the most striking point is his treatment of the contrast between those musical elements symbolising phases of virile energy and the strains of consolation and reconciliation. Of the latter element a characteristic example is the heavenly duet for oboe and 'cello that occurs just after the terrific outburst of rage and defiance in the "working-out" section of the first movement. It is a crisis of beauty and grandeur to which, so far as we know, no other conductor can now do justice. But here, and throughout the mighty first movement, we were reminded that Dr. Richter's pre-eminence is really more unquestionable in Beethoven than in any other music. His Wagner renderings are approached by others, but his Beethoven renderings are not even approached. To the noble and solemn strains of the Funeral March again complete justice was done; and the same may be said of the scherzo-a movement full of radiant mirth and containing in the trio the most beautiful horn music ever written-and of the finale in variation form.

Symphony No. 2 in D.

January 15, 1904.

According to Mr. Felix Weingartner, the advance from Beethoven's No. 2 to his No. 3 Symphony is so great as to be without parallel in the history of art, and this we regard as sound doctrine. The No. 3-the "Eroica"-represents not merely a contribution of unparalleled brilliancy to the symphonic music of the period, but an immense enlargement of its previously known possibilities. Such a work naturally dwarfs all that has gone before in its own kind; but it is very desirable to avoid the mistake of certain commentators who, perceiving a great gulf between No. 2 and No. 3, declare the former to be an immature work, not thoroughly characteristic of Beethoven, but exhibiting him as a mere disciple of Haydn and Mozart. While listening yesterday to the wonderfully animated and expressive rendering one could scarcely fail to be struck by the fact that it is all intensely Beethovenish; that it goes beyond Mozart, quite as distinctly and persistently as Mozart in his superb G minor Symphony goes beyond Haydn. We need a revision of the current view in regard to these early Beethoven Symphonies. Only the first is immature. No. 2 is stamped with the true Beethoven individuality on every page, and is comparable with Mozart's G minor in the richness of its organisation and the potency of its charm. The enormous difference between No. 2 and No. 3 is not to be correctly indicated by calling the former immature. It is a difference that separates the Beethoven Symphonies from No. 2 to the end into two well-defined groups. As was long ago observed, the odd-number Symphonies, beginning with 3, are cast more or less in the heroic mould, while the intervening even-number Symphonies are much milder in character-creations of halcyon periods in which the composer would seem to have been storing up energy for the titanic labours of 3, 5, 7, and 9. Bearing this in mind, we have no difficulty in assigning No. 2 to its proper place. It is to be grouped along with 4, 6, and 8, and it may thus be called the first of the "halcyon" Symphonies. Besides the general character of the music there is one very special reason for not accepting the view of No. 2 as an immature work. In the second subject of the Larghetto, we have a very beautiful and original musical idea, so thoroughly recognised by the composer as one of his best and most characteristic that he returned to it many years later when composing his last and greatest slow movement. Compare pp. 29 and 363 of Sir George Grove's "Beethoven and his Nine Symphonies," noticing in particular that the key-relation of the syncopated theme to the general scheme of the movement is the same in the two cases.

"Missa Solennis."

February 1, 1901.

Until yesterday Beethoven's "Missa Solennis" had not been heard at these concerts, but it is not surprising that performances of such a work should be few and far between. It is, beyond question, the most austere of all musical works-a product of Beethoven's quite inexorable mood. At the period when it was written the composer had become a sort of suffering Prometheus. Even apart from his deafness, it is wonderful that Beethoven's persistent ill-fortune, his isolated and unhappy life, should not have discouraged him and checked the flow of his creative energy. But that the mightiest of his compositions should have been produced when he was stone-deaf-that is surely one of the most perfectly amazing among well-authenticated facts! So far as we know, there never was any other case in which deafness failed to cut a person off altogether from the world of music. With Beethoven it only brought a gradual change of style. As the charm that music has for the ear faded away he became more and more absorbed, aloof, austere, and spiritual. The warm human feeling of his middle-period compositions gave way to a style of such unearthly grandeur and sublimity as are oppressive to ordinary mortals. Of that unearthly grandeur there is no more typical example than the "Missa Solennis." Not only in regard to the composition but even in regard to a performance the ordinary language of criticism is at fault. Who ever heard a "satisfactory" performance of the "Missa Solennis"? A spirit of sacrifice is demanded of the performers; for the music is written from beginning to end with an utter want of consideration for the weaknesses and limitations of the human voice. Of course that would be intolerable in an ordinary composer. Handel's combination of German structural solidity with Italian courtesy, sense of style, and delight in rich vocal rhetoric is the ideal thing. By comparison with the reasonable and tactful Handel, Beethoven is a kind of monster, from the singer's point of view, but a monster of such genius that his terrible requirements must occasionally be met.

The quartet was best in the astonishing "Dona nobis pacem" section, where the composer seems to represent humanity as endeavouring to take the Kingdom of Heaven by violence, protesting against all the oppression that is done under the sun, and sending up to the throne of God so instant a clamour for the gift of peace as may be heard amid the very din of strife. For that prayer for peace sounds against the sullen rolling of drums and menacing clangour of trumpets, the voices having now a mighty unanimity, now the wail of this or that forlorn victim. One looks in vain through the temple of musical art for anything to match that tremendous conception marking the final phase of the "Missa Solennis."

"Fidelio."

October 28, 1904.

A most strange and unclassifiable chamber in the palace of musical art is reserved for Beethoven's "Fidelio." A sort of despair is likely to come over one who attempts to state how Beethoven stands in relation to dramatic music. If one says that he was not a great dramatic composer, there arise the questions-Did he not make the Symphony a hundred times more dramatic than it ever was before? Did he not make music in association with Goethe's "Egmont" that seems to belong for evermore to that drama? Did he not individualise Leonora in music as well as Mozart had individualised the much less exalted characters of Donna Anna and Zerlina? Did he not achieve in his "Third Leonora" something that no one has ever equalled or can ever hope to equal in the domain of the dramatic overture? In fact he did all those things, and several more that can be cited in apparent refutation of the statement that he was not a great dramatic composer. And yet it is certain that he never composed dramatic music as one to the manner born-not with the unfailing adequateness to the theme of Gluck, the felicitous profusion of Mozart, the glowing picturesqueness of Weber. No; in the mighty river of Beethoven the symphonist's invention shrinks to a trickle in his one opera. The water is incomparably limpid, and blossoms of the rarest beauty and fragrance grow on the banks of the stream; but every page is stamped, as it were, with the admission that writing operas was not Beethoven's strong point: and beyond question he acted wisely in writing only one. How mighty is the change when he takes the symbols of his one musical drama and uses them for a monumental purpose, in the great "Leonora" Overture! Beethoven is Shakespearean in the range of his mind and in his attitude towards life, which he always approaches on the purely human side, and without the preoccupations of the Court, the camp, the cloister, the academic grove, or the church. But he is not Shakespearean in his medium of expression, which is hard and unyielding-a kind of musical bronze or granite. Yet "Fidelio"-despite its jejune story, which suggests that Beethoven, having objected to Mozart's "Don Giovanni" as scandalous, felt it his duty to compose an opera on a subject that should be "strictly proper," and despite its thin vein of invention-inevitably retains its hold on the musical world. To call the success of it a succès d'estime would be a misuse of words. It focuses a certain range of poetic ideas that nothing else of its kind touches, and stands-with its Wordsworthian simplicity and moral goodness-among other operas like a Sister Clare amid a group of fine ladies.

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BERLIOZ.

"Symphonie Fantastique."

November 1, 1901.

The "Symphonie Fantastique" offers a more complete picture of the composer's musical personality than any other single work. As a specimen of youthful precocity it also stands alone. It was written at the age of twenty-six, when the composer was still a student at the Conservatoire, being persistently snubbed by a group of dons, who all-with the possible exception of Cherubini, the Principal-were utterly his inferiors in every kind of musical power, knowledge, and skill. The experience of Berlioz at the Conservatoire of Paris was very similar to Verdi's at a like institution in Milan; but the marks of genius in work of the student period were far more distinct in Berlioz's than in Verdi's case. We have said that, as a work of precocious genius, the "Symphonie Fantastique" stands alone. No doubt other composers, such as Mozart and Schubert, had shown genius of a higher order at an even earlier age. But the "Symphonie Fantastique," as the work of a 'prentice-hand showing absolute mastery of the greatest and most complex resources, has no parallel. The great fact that has always to be remembered in regard to Berlioz is that he devoted himself with all the energy of an enormous and highly original talent to one particular task in music. That task was the winning of new material for the musical medium, and what Berlioz accomplished in the world of tone was very like what Christopher Columbus accomplished in the world of land and sea. Berlioz too opened up a new hemisphere, and he did his work much more thoroughly than the great navigator. This mighty achievement secures for Berlioz a permanent place of the first importance in the musical hierarchy. But to be deterred by respect for his genius from admitting his faults is not the best way of using his magnificent legacy. Those faults are none the less monstrous for being inseparable from his individuality, and a thoroughly enlightened modern musician would probably find it very difficult to define the attitude of his mind towards the works of Berlioz's art. In a sense, everything in the best of those works, among which the symphony played yesterday is unquestionably to be reckoned, is justified. When one finds an artist dealing with certain subjects as though to the manner born, and with enormous power and resource, one must not condemn him because those subjects are unpleasant or even horrible in the extreme. Such condemnation is not living and letting live. Artistic power is associated with qualities of the highest and rarest that human nature produces, and it is always justified. The favourite subjects of Berlioz may well prove a stumbling-block. "Orgy" very nearly became in his hands a musical form. In at least three different works of his-"Symphonie Fantastique," "Harold in Italy," and "The Damnation of Faust"-we find a movement called by some such name, and, his appetite for horrors not being satisfied with the "Witches' Sabbath" in the first of those three works, he gives us another movement representing a procession to the guillotine of a young man condemned for murdering his sweetheart. In close association with this love of the lurid, spectral, and ghastly is the bitterly ironical spirit which conceived an "Amen" chorus in mock ecclesiastical style to be sung over a dead rat, the guying of the composer's own love-theme with a jig-like variation on a specially ugly instrument (the E flat clarinet) introduced into the orchestra for that purpose, and the use of the stern and majestic Plain Song theme of the "Dies Ir?" as a cantus firmus, to which the mocking laughter of witches (rushing past through the air in a huge weltering broomstick cavalcade) makes a kind of fantastic counterpoint. It is well to bear in mind that the same talent gave us such miraculous gossamer fancies as the "Queen Mab" Scherzo and the chorus of Sylphs and that most tenderly beautiful and vividly conceived idyll "L'Enfance du Christ."

For the "Symphonie Fantastique" the orchestra had to be considerably enlarged. In addition to all the usual instruments the score requires an E flat clarinet, two bells (G and C), a second harp, an extra kettledrum, and a second bass tuba. Everything had been rehearsed with infinite care, and in all five movements the rendering was a display of virtuosity such as only a very rare combination of favourable circumstances would allow one to hear. No other composer displays a very powerful and skilful orchestra to quite such immense advantage. As Mr. Edward Dannreuther has finely and truly remarked-"With Berlioz the equation between a particular phrase and a particular instrument is invariably perfect." His violently wilful character manifests itself in the harmony. His fancies devour one another, like dragons of the prime, instead of progressing and developing in an orderly manner. But the marvellous beauty of the tone-colouring and aptness of the passage-work never fail. The parts of the symphony most thoroughly enjoyed by the audience were, no doubt, the second movement in waltz rhythm (where the most wonderful use is made of the two harps and the wood-wind) and the march in the fourth movement, where the part symbolising the emotions of the mob rather than of the victim is very brilliant and telling, with suggestions of that Hungarian March which the composer afterwards made his own.

"Faust."

March 7, 1902.

No more original or more enigmatic figure than Hector Berlioz was produced during the nineteenth century by the world of art-a word that may here be understood in its widest acceptation, and thus as including architectural, musical, graphic, plastic, and literary art. In one of the earliest critiques on his "Faust," which was first performed at the Opéra Comique in Paris in 1846, the opinion was expressed that he ought to have been a chemist, not a musician-a remark that gives extraordinary point to a piece of advice that Berlioz once gave to artists in general: "Always collect the stones that are thrown at you; they may help to build your monument." The remark that Berlioz ought to have been a chemist, originally intended as a sneer, is a perfect case in point. He was a chemist, and it is his chief glory to have been that in the world of music. He tested, analysed, combined anew, and prodigiously enriched those elements of tone which are the material of the musical artist. Of course he was far more than chemist. He was also explorer, but always in search of material for his essentially chemical experiments in tone. One can scarcely wonder that "Faust" was a failure at first. Amongst the happy-go-lucky patchwork of the book is much evidence of that coarse and satirical vein which was so strong in the composer. How could the public be expected to approve of an opera on the subject of Faust that had no love-song or truly lyrical utterance of any kind for the tenor hero, but, on the other hand, had a song about a flea and a rat's requiem, ending with an "Amen" chorus in mock ecclesiastical style, to say nothing of a scene in Pandemonium and an orgie infernale? Berlioz was a sort of a belated medi?val. The very title, "Damnation de Faust," is medi?val. Shakespeare and the other poets of Renaissance and later times recognise the fate of a soul as a matter sub judice till the end of the world. But Berlioz had no more scruple than Dante in anticipating the Last Judgment. Medi?val, too, is the coarseness of the scene in Auerbach's cellar; and the chanson gothique, about the King of Thule, sounds as if it had come to the composer as a reminiscence from some previous state of existence, so marvellous is the power of the quaint and weird melody to transport the spirit back to a musty and hierarchic world with walled towns and narrow streets, with terrorism and torture-chambers, with crusades and knight-errantry, with impossible heights of holiness and unimaginable depths of diabolism. But not to any of the defects or qualities rooted in the composer's medi?valism must we look for the popularity which the work acquired in this country some thirty-four years after the original production in Paris and has retained ever since. What the general public enjoys is the superb peasants' chorus near the beginning, the arrangement of the Rácoczy March, which is the finest piece of military music in existence, the chorus and dance of sylphs, Margaret's Romance, and Mephistopheles' Serenade. Perhaps, too, a good many of them take a sort of unregenerate pleasure in the rat and flea songs, while at heart disapproving of such things, and of course they like the ballad of the King of Thule, because no one who is musical at all can entirely fail to perceive the charm of that wonderful melody. It appeals to plenty of listeners who have no idea that there is anything Gothic or medi?val about it.

The Centenary Celebrations.

December 10, 1903.

Berlioz was the Columbus of music; he discovered the New World. By his theory and practice of orchestration he so greatly enlarged and enriched the resources of tone that all contemporary and subsequent composers capable of understanding his message experienced an immense exhilaration-a sense that new and hitherto undreamed-of possibilities were opening out before them. The starting-point of his momentous voyages was the idea of what is called "programme music." Like Wagner, he perceived that after Beethoven symphonic music could do no more on the old lines, but that music might learn to characterise much more sharply than it had ever done before. His prodigious reform, enlargement, and enrichment of orchestration was entirely carried out under the influence of the desire for stronger and finer characterisation, for a more varied and interesting play of emotion and graphic suggestion. A good many musicians and music-lovers at the present day, recognising the enormous merit of Berlioz's achievement in orchestration, yet consider that, like Moses, he was not allowed to enter the promised land to which he had led his people; or, more literally, that Berlioz was not able to make really good use of his own discoveries, the importance of which is to be recognised in the music of Wagner, Dvoràk, Tcha?kovsky, and others who learned from Berlioz, rather than in his own music. While admitting that later men, such as those mentioned, have used the Berlioz instrument to a more spiritual kind of purpose or with greater epic and dramatic significance, the open-minded music-lover can scarcely deny that the compositions of Berlioz, considered as absolute works of art, include a majestic array of masterpieces. Such things as the "Te Deum" and "Messe des Morts" bear, in their unparalleled vastness of conception, the stamp of an imagination comparable only to Michel Angelo's. They are mighty fragments of larger works never carried out-impossible to be carried out. The best-known work by Berlioz-and the most perfect, on the whole, of the extended works-is the "Faust," which must not be judged as an operatic version of Goethe's "Faust," but rather as a musical setting of the "Faust" story in the racy and drastic manner of the medi?val puppet plays, Goethe's drama being only used in so far as it affords suggestions for scenes of the well-salted and drastic animation that Berlioz loved. Berlioz was a typical French Romantic. His music is absolutely wanting in the ethical element that is so strong in Bach and Beethoven. But he had a powerful and truly poetic sense of the wonderful, the beautiful, the weird, and the characteristic. Over and over again in his "Faust" he achieves typical excellence. That rapture of spring which is one of the great, imperishable poetic themes has nowhere in music been better rendered than in the first pages of "Faust" (orchestra and tenor voice), and the ensuing peasant choruses are by far the best musical expression of that "sunburnt mirth" which outside the world of art is only possible under a southern sky. The Rácoczy March as orchestrated by Berlioz is not only the finest piece of military music in the world but is an immeasureably long way ahead of the next best piece. The energy, gaiety, and tumultuous eloquence of the final section (altogether Berlioz's own, of course), give us the musical symbol of "La Gloire"-that important conception which has played a part in history for three centuries. The scene on the banks of the Elbe is woven of moonbeams and gossamer fancies that no other composer could have handled. The rhythm of the Mephisto serenade is too good for this world. Here the composer succeeds in expressing the diabolical without any direct suggestion of malice-simply by creating the rhythm and accent of laughter too monstrously whole-hearted and full-blooded for a mere man. Another miracle is the "Chanson Gothique" (about the King of Thule), which is, as it were, the distilled essence of all medi?val romances about lovesick maidens looking forth from their casements. In the latter part the composer falls a victim to his evil genius-the macabre,-and the terrible squint of the madman is perceptible in the "Ride to the Abyss" and the howling and gibbering of demons, which entirely lack the significance of the demons in "Gerontius," and simply show us the composer indulging his taste for the grotesque horrors of the old miracle plays. The latter part of the composition should not be taken too seriously. Even in the early part there is one example of the composer's peculiar fondness for guying the offices of religion. But this, too, should be lightly passed over and forgiven in consideration of the feast that the work as a whole offers to the imagination and the bracing salt wind of the composer's manly and affirmative genius.

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