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Musical Courier 1892-01-27: Vol 24 Iss 623, 1892
61 lines. Read by computer on 19 September 2026. Printed page 6. See the scan on archive.org.
1by Melba, of Orleans fame. But nobody believes this story, which has a truly Maplesonian flavor.
3The best thing to do is to let the stockholders find out, by cold, hard experience, that New York does not want Italian opera and that it does want German opera. There is no truth that the Metropolitan Opera House will be sold or used for any other purpose than operatic performances.
5MR. WOLFF AND PROGRAM MAKING.
7THE German press is fast becoming generally interested in the subject of Manager Wolff, of Berlin, his monopolistic tendencies and the abuses he makes of his powers. The Hamburg "Nachrichten," one of the most independent as well as most important of German newspapers, it being Bismarck's official organ, has this to say after a recent concert given at Hamburg by Amalia Joachim:
9As regards the composition of yesterday's program, it offers opportunity for much more serious performances than that of the third evening. We will not discuss whether it was urgently necessary to give so great a space to Franz Liszt, although this question becomes important when we see that a Liedersänger of the importance of Jensen was represented only by a single number, and that not one of his best. Did Messrs. Reimann and Wolff not know "Lieder" like "O Lass Dich halten," "Murmelendes Lüftchen," "Mari" or "Lehn' Deise Wang?" Or, can Reimann, by chance, believe that a Lied stands higher than a Jensen? We know that Reimann is a Lisztianer sans phrase, but in the preparation of such a program all one-sidedness ought to be avoided. Jensen is, with Robert Franz, one of the most illustrious representatives of the German Lied—that is, of the Lied constructed in the form that has arisen historically and been normally developed, and which seeks and finds its strength and power in its lyrically tuneful contents. The program maker has had little regard for this fact. Still more strongly must we give expression to our regret and surprise that Robert Franz, the greatest and most important Lieder composer, and the most inspired arranger of older melodies, received a very modest place in the programs of the four Lieder evenings.
11This defect in the program arose from the circumstance that some of the sixteenth century Volksleider, arranged by Franz, could not be taken from the selection published by Simrock, as the music dealer, Leuckart, of Leipzig, did not permit them to be reproduced. We cannot altogether blame the last named gentleman for this, for if Simrock wished to sell together and not separately both of the two published parts, there was neither pleasure nor profit in Leuckhart's contributing to push the sale in any way. The fact that a Robert Franz can thus be thrust to the rear is thus seen to have a peculiar background, which is brought into high relief by the omission in Reimann's programs. There was not, there could not be, any artistic reason for assigning only a moderate space to the greatest living Lieder composer, but merely music sellers' interests. This cannot be sufficiently deplored for the sake of German art. That Wolff, of Berlin, who is striving to monopolize our world of music as the French Government monopolizes tobacco, tries to exercise an influence on the maker of the programs in concerts given by the artists whom he represents is known from a communication sent by Mrs. Joachim to the "Kreuz Zeitung," in which she states that Mr. Wolff took part in selecting her program. In the first fly sheet of the "Kreuz Zeitung," December 6, 1891, it is mentioned, moreover, by the musical critic that a black list exists in which the taboed composers are named.
13If this be the case we cannot but characterize it as a disgrace to German art and German artists; but we can hardly credit that business rapacity has so far made itself master of the field of music. We won't, however, agree with the critic of the "Kreuz Zeitung" when he concludes that art would be much better off if Mr. Wolff would content himself with pocketing his commissions and not troubling himself with things which do not concern him and of which he knows nothing. We can—the critic of the "Kreuz Zeitung" continues—characterize his influence on the music life of the present as nothing else but harmful, and ascribe to him, for the most part, the blame for the present intolerable condition of our musical affairs. To counteract such influence is the duty of respectable journals.
15Massenet's Latest.—Jules Massenet is going to write a new opera entitled "Thais," the libretto of which is from the pen of Louis Gallet.
17Roeder's "Ruy Gomez."—"Ruy Gomez," a musical comedy by Martin Roeder, now in this country, will be produced for the first time at the Prague Landestheater by the end of this month.
19Schroeder's "Aspasia."—Prof. Carl Schroeder, of Sondershausen, has finished an opera, "Aspasia," the libretto of which is not founded upon the story of the old Aspasia, but deals with an entirely modern subject.
21THE RACONTEUR.
23Prince, it is surely as good as a play
24To mark how the painters and poets agree;
25But of plumage aesthetic that feathers the jay,
26"Intense" is the adjective dearest to me.
27—"Envoi" of Andrew Lang's "Ballade of Aesthetic Adjectives."
29FEELING a bit satiated with older forms of music (I had been to hear "Norma" recently), I was trying to keep a cigarette alight with my temperament, but the said temperament (with a large T) not responding as ferilily as I desired it to, I yawned, turned my back on myself and tried to kill time by playing the piano. Outside, the snow mocked at the earth for being so big, heavy and brown, and the earth mocked back by daubing every flake with dirt the moment it fell. "No use," I said, "I can't endure Gotham to-day. I will press the button and let my astral soul do the rest." Then, suiting the action to the word, I pressed that symbol of eternity which is set forth in the holy "Rig-Veda" (or in any other sacred turnout), and was instantly transported to Paris to the Théâtre d'Art. I won't tell you how I did this trick of astral projection, Sâr Diego de Vivo knows, and he, as everyone is aware, was a hierophant in the lost city of Atlantis, and who, just before it was struck by Ignatius Donnelly's comet, took flight on the pinions of his imagination and side whiskers and thus escaped. To him I owe much esoteric knowledge, for, as his title, "Sâr," indicates he is one versed in holy mysteries. I left my earthly body gazing at the combat of snow and sewer, while my astral self winged its way to Lutetia.
31I was not long in getting to the City of Earthly Delights and, dispensing with the slight formality of buying a ticket, I ensconced myself in one of the loges, quite unseen by the large party already assembled there (for the astral body has no need of a tarn helm—it is visible or invisible at the will of its owner), and waited for the mysterious rites to begin. My readers are perfectly familiar with some of the phases of the new art movement in Paris, where a band of bold spirits aim at not only a synthesis of the known arts, but also seek to discover new subtle arts calling into play all the senses, and giving them as a complete whole a sort of artistic bath, wherein the soul is submerged utterly and the senses deluged with intense delights. To such a performance I had hastened, for strange rumors had from time to time reached me in philistine New York of the doings of this cenacle. Its members names were all unfamiliar to me. I knew that it would be impossible for me to gain admission to the Théâtre d'Art on a first performance of the mystery, even the police were deprived of their press tickets, so I had hazarded the bold experiment of astral projection, fearful, however, that Sâr de Vivo might discover me and call me back, because I was yet an unripe beginner and knew not the meaning of all the darkling secrets I so carelessly juggled with. I was safe anyhow in the theatre, and with beating pulses awaited the commencement of the mystery.
33The theatre was plunged into an orange gloom, punctured with tiny balls of violet light which blinked daintily and intermittently. The dominant odor of the atmosphere was Florida water with a florid counterpoint that reminded me somehow of bacon and eggs. Understand me, I do not wish to jest at all, that was the mélange that appealed to my nostrils, and though at first blush it seems hardly possible that the two dissimilar odors could ever be made to modulate and merge, yet I had not been indoors ten minutes before the subtilty of the duet was plain to me. Bacon has a delicious odor, and, like a freshly cut lemon, it causes a premonitory tickling in the palate and little rills of hunger in one's stomach. "Aha!" I cried (astrally, of course), "this is a concatenation of the senses never dreamed of by Plato when he fashioned his republic."
35Hush! The languid lisp of those assembled about me drifted into little sighs and then a low, long drawn out chord in B flat minor, for octofoons, octopuses, quadroons, shofars, tympani, Bernsteins and piccolos sounded; immediately a chorus of male sopranis blended with this chord, but they sang the plain chord of A major, and the effect was one of vividity—it was a dissonance but a pianissimo one, and it jarred on my ears in a way that made their drums warble. Then a low burbling sound ascended to me. "The bacon frying," I thought, but I was mistaken. It was caused by the hissing of a sheet of carmine smoke which slowly upraised on the stage as it melted away, the lights in the auditorium turned green and topaz and an odor of jasmine and stewed tomatoes fell about me.
37My immediate neighbors seemed to be swooning, for they were nearly prostrate, with their lips glued to a rod that encircled the house. I grasped it and received a most delicious thrill that was probably electrical in its origin, though it was velvety pleasure merely to touch it and the palms of my hands ached exquisitely afterward. As I touched this rod I noticed a little mouthpiece to it, and thinking I might hear something, applied my ear to it. It became wet instantly. That was evidently not the use to which it was to be put. After inspecting it again I put my finger to it and cautiously raised its moist end to my mouth. "Heavenly," I murmured, "What a place," and then, losing no further time in useless parleying with myself, placed my astral lips to the mouthpiece and took a long, strong pull.
39Gorgeous was the result. Gumbo soup, as sure as I now write. Not your thin New York stuff, but the genuine old gumbo soup that one can't find outside of the State of Louisiana, where old negro "mammies" make it to perfection.
41Just as I got the gumbo nocturne in my throat a shrill burst of brazen clangor from the orchestra roused me to what was going on on the stage. The steam had cleared away and showed a rocky and woody scene, the trees all sky blue and the rocks a deep Nile green. The orchestra was playing alone, something that sounded like the prelude to "Tristan." But strange odor harmonies disturbed my enjoyment of the music, for so subtly allied were the senses in this new temple of art that a single smell, taste, touch, vision or sound jarred on the meaning of the whole. The almost weird interfusion of the senses took my breath away, but full of gumbo soup as I was (and you have no idea how soup discommodes one's astral stomach) I stuck bravely to my post, determined to get some clue to the meaning of the new dispensation. The stage still remained bare, though the rocks, trees and shrubbery changed their hues about every twenty seconds. At last, as a blazing vermilion struck my tired eyeballs, and the odor shifted to that of decayed fish, cologne and dried corn, I could stand it no longer, and, turning to my neighbor, I tapped him on the shoulder and politely said: "Can you tell me the name of the play, piece, morceau, symphony, stuck, odor, sonata, picture, drama, 'cooking,' comedy, or whatever you may call it, they are about to perform?" The young man I appealed to looked about him into space—I had foolishly forgotten that I was invisible—clutched his throat, screamed aloud "Mon Dieu! still another form of aural pleasure," and was carried out full of vertiginous fits.
43Realizing the folly of addressing humanity in my astral shape, I sat down in my corner and watched the stage. Still no traces of humanity; the scenery had faded into a dullish dun hue and the orchestra was playing a Bach fugue for oboe, lamp post (transposed in E flat) and accordions in F. Suddenly the lights all went out and we were plunged into blackness that actually pinched, so drear, void and black was it. A smell of garlins made everyone cough, and then, by a sweep of some current, we were saturated with the odor of white violets, the lights were tuned in three keys, violet, yellow of eggs, marron glace and the soup supply shifted to whiskey sour. "How subtle these contrasts are," hiccupped my neighbor, and I acquiesced astrally. Then at last the stage became peopled with one person, a very tall old man with three eyes, high heels and a deep voice. Brandishing his whiskers aloft, he muttered curiously:
45And hast thou slain the Jabberwock!
46Come to my arms, my beamish boy.
47O frabjous day! Callooh, callay!
48He chortled in his joy.
50"Alice in Wonderland" then was the mystery play and I had come too late to witness the slaying of the monster in its many buttoned waistcoat. How gallantly the "beamish boy" must have dealt the death stroke to the queer brute as the orchestra sounded the "Siegfried" and "Dragon" motives, while the air was redolent of "heliotrope." I greatly wonder, me, what the potage could have been at that crucial crisis. My cogitations were interrupted by the entrance of a gallant appearing young knight dragging after him a huge carcase, half dragon and two-thirds pig (the other three-thirds could not appear on account of temporary indisposition). The orchestra gave up the "Abattoir" motive, and instantly rose odors penetrated the air, the electric shocks stopped and subtle little kicks were administered to the audience, who by this time were almost swooning with composite pleasure. The scenery had begun to gravely dance to an odd Russian rhythm and the young man intoned monotonously this verse, making the vowel sounds sizzle with his teeth and almost swallowing the consonants:
52And as in uth thought he stood, the Jabberwock, with eyes of flame, came whiffling through the tulgy wood,
53And burbled as it came, "One! Two!" as through and through his vorpal blade went snicker snack,
54He left it dead, and with its head he went galumphing back.
56The orchestra played the "Galumphing" motive from the "Ride of the Valkyrs," and the lights and odors were transposed to a shivering purple.
58Then carmine steam ascended, the orchestra gasped a gasp in C major (for corno di bassetto and strings), a smell of cigarettes and coffee arose and then I knew the great banquet of the senses was over.
60I pressed my astral button and flew wearily home, wearily and slowly, for I was full of soup and tone, and my
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