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Musical Courier 1892-04-20: Vol 24 Iss 635, 1892
85 lines. Read by computer on 23 September 2026. Printed page 5. See the scan on archive.org.
1The Musical Courier.
2PUBLISHED EVERY WEDNESDAY
3BY THE
4MUSICAL COURIER COMPANY,
5(INCORPORATED)
619 Union Square W., New York.
7ESTABLISHED JANUARY, 1880.
8No. 635.
9EDITORS:
10MARC A. BLUMENBERG. OTTO FLOERSHEIM.
11JAMES G. HUNEKER. HARRY O. BROWN.
12BUSINESS DEPARTMENT:
13SPENCER T. DRIGGS. R. S. MAXWELL.
14A. T. KING. FRANK M. STEVENS.
15WESTERN OFFICE: Chicago, 233 State St., John E. Hall, Manager.
16BOSTON OFFICE: 157 Tremont St., John E. Pinkham, Manager.
17BERLIN, GERMANY: PHILIPP ROTH, 84a Lützow St.
18LEIPSIC, GERMANY: GEBRÜDER HUG, Kösigrasse 16.
19LONDON AND PARIS: BRENTANO'S.
20Subscription (including postage) invariably in advance.
21Yearly, $4.00; Foreign, $5.00; Single Copies, Ten Cents.
22RATES FOR ADVERTISING.
23PER INCH.
24Three Months………….$20.00 | Nine Months………….$60.00
25Six Months…………….40.00 | Twelve Months…………80.00
26Advertisements for the current week must be handed in by 5 p. m. on Monday.
27All remittances for subscriptions or advertising must be made by check draft, or money orders, payable to the MUSICAL COURIER COMPANY.
28American News Company, New York, General Distributing Agents.
29NEW YORK, WEDNESDAY, APRIL 20, 1892.
30THEY say that Dr. Parkhurst's favorite melody is "A Frog He Would a-Wooin' Go." "Recorder," please copy.
31THE Barili-Horine-Patti scandal which disturbed last week's news gatherers has quietly ended and the curtain falls on a very touching conjugal reconciliation. Bless you, my children!
32THE Turin papers say that the Rossini centennial was commemorated in that Italian city by the performance of — Beethoven's ninth symphony and fragments from "Parsifal." "Merkwürd'ger Fall!" Wagner says in "Die Meistersinger."
33LAST week—Holy Week—gave the hard worked music critics a well earned vacation, but with the advent of Easter music making has broken out in a fresh place. There is no surcease of music from New Year to New Year in this goodly town of Gotham.
34BLOOD will tell. Victor Herbert has composed an Irish fantasy, which will be heard for the first time this evening at Lenox Lyceum. One naturally looks for a symphonic poem soon from the talented Irishman's pen to be called "Handy Andy," which would be an appropriate subject indeed for the grandson of Samuel Lover to handle.
35THE "Tribune" one day last week contained the following very interesting and sensible communication:
36Despite the opinion of several leaders in the musical world of New York to the contrary, the "Wurm" still lives, though wounded unto death. After the generous support and enthusiastic appreciation which the public has afforded the stockholders of the Metropolitan Opera House for so many seasons, and the unselfish efforts of eminent artists to establish good German opera in this city, it seems rather unjust to trample this aforesaid grateful but helpless public under foot and then to herald forth "The Wurm is dead." We do not demand Wagner's works to the exclusion of all other great composers, but, as has been stated in the "Tribune," few novelties have been given this winter, and why not have continued under the old colors, which would enable us as well to hear Wagner satisfactorily interpreted? "Die Meistersinger" was to a certain extent a success this winter; but even with Lassalle and Jean de Reszke, two of the three great champions who are to carry through the ensuing seasons of Italian opera, the house, compared to previous seasons, was empty. If one chooses to open one's ears one will hear on all sides such remarks as "What! 'Die Meistersinger' in Italian! Nothing would hire me to hear it."
37It is not the language alone that such hopeless subjects object to, but how can an Italian or a Frenchman understand or impersonate any one of Wagner's characters satisfactorily? The whole spirit of the opera is lost. A cent for Schwaben who do not know the art of munching apples or sticking pins into the unfortunate "David"! It is safe to predict that Wagner's operas in Italian will not draw as large or paying houses as is apparently expected. But on what else are three seasons of Italian opera to fall back? "Faust," perchance, "100 nights in succession, with the great cast?" In this, as in many similar cases, Americans are endeavoring to live up to their too often ruinous cry, "Give us something new!" With this cry it was proposed to oust Lehmann, in case another season of German opera were given, placing Sucher in her stead. This proposition was, to say the least, ungrateful. Probably no one has done more for opera in this city, as far as unselfish, devoted labor goes, than Lehmann. If we Americans were to observe the relation of other nations toward their benefactors in art, we might learn many lessons in gratitude and loyalty.
38No, friends or foes! the "Wurm" is not dead, but what chance has the unfortunate creature of regaining active strength when a powerful "Siegfried" in the form of caprice watches its every effort, ready to wound again, armed with the sword of sterling gold?
39S. L. A.
40New York, April 8, 1892.
41The "Wurm" certainly lives, and when the boxholders of the Metropolitan Opera House and Messrs. Abbey & Grau are tired of losing money on banal Italian operas they will be glad to go back to the Wagnerian "Wurm." The management made a bold front this year and bore their losses smilingly, but wait until the end of their second season and then "what a difference in the morning!"
42SOMEONE in Germany (they have plenty of time in Germany) has gone to the trouble of compiling a list of all the operatic performances of Wagner's works from January 1, 1876, until October 31, 1891, and here is the result:
43"Lothringen"………….was given………….3,014 times in 73 cities
44"Tannhäuser"………….1,076 " 43
45"The Flying Dutchman"….1,076 " 39
46"Die Walküre"………….829 " 42
47"Die Meistersinger"……..682 " 35
48"Rienzi"………………..464 " 32
49"Rheingold"……………..358 " 33
50"Siegfried"…………….322 " 28
51"Die Göterdämmerung"…..314 " 30
52"Tristan und Isolde"……277 " 19
53"Parsifal"……………….75 " Bayreuth
54THE following is interesting to operatic composers also in this country. The "Society of the Friends of Opera" at Berlin, which annually gives first performances, with full chorus and orchestra, of operas hitherto unknown, offers composers of merit who for some reason or other have not been able to gain a hearing for their works a chance to have them brought out before the public and critics of the German capital. Operas intended for performance may be sent to the conductor of the society, Capellmeister C. A. Raida, Linkstrasse 30, Berlin, who will decide in short time whether or not the work shall be accepted for performance.
55THE irrepressible Hans von Bulow continues to advertise himself at the expense of bigger men than himself, such as Beethoven, Bismarck, Napoleon and, lately, Schopenhauer. It is said that he is shortly to conduct a concert for the benefit of a fund for the erection of a long talked of monument to Arthur Schopenhauer, the great philosopher, at Frankfort-on-the-Main.
56At Hamburg, on the 1st inst., he gave a Beethoven concert "in commemoration of the seventy-seventh birthday of Prince Bismarck." The program consisted of the following works:
57First symphony………….
58"Prometheus" ballet…..
59"Egmont" overture…..
60"Eroica" symphony…..
61The program books contained a photolithographed reproduction in Bulow's handwriting of the sixteen bar theme in bass notes which Beethoven first published as a contredance. Beethoven's original dedication to Bonaparte is crossed out and the name Bismarck is substituted with the asterisked footnote: "For the correctness of this the copyist, Hans von Bulow, vouches. April 1, 1892." Really this looks like a tremendous April fool joke.
62Under the dedication the following "hymn," which fits Beethoven's above quoted theme and which was perpetrated by Von Bulow, is also given:
63Des Volkes Hort,
64Heil Dir, O Held,
65Es schuf Dein Wort
66Die neue deutsche Welt.
67Bis in des Herzens Mark,
68Fortan gen jeden Feind,
69Gewappnet stark,
70Hast Du uns geeint.
71The play on the name of Bismarck in the above might be called clever if it were not for the fact that the "heart's marrow" is not anatomically quite justifiable. But then such small matters don't worry Bülow, for one supposes he puts them down to poetic license.
72The curious aspect of the whole affair is that the Hamburg and Berlin papers report that the concert proved a great success and that Hans von Bülow was lustily cheered and applauded!
73"PROFESSOR" SCHLUSSELBURG, of Coney Island, beat all previous records last week by playing the piano for twelve consecutive hours in Harlem. Rumors occasionally reach us that Moriz Rosenthal practices for ten hours at a stretch, but he will have to look to his laurels, for Ferdinand Schlusselburg sticks to the keyboard with bulldog tenacity for twelve hours, during which time he is fed by others. This is art for art with a vengeance, and while the Coney Island school of pianism has not yet furnished the world any startling exemplars of virtuosi, yet much can confidently be expected from a source whence proceeds such endurance and such brilliancy. Of Professor Schlusselburg's repertory, it is perhaps wisest to reproduce the "Evening Sun's" account of the affair:
74A few minutes before 11 o'clock the professor took his seat at the piano. He was dressed in a pair of white duck trousers, a white flannel shirt, a black silk sash and necktie and a buttonhole bouquet.
75His hair, which is red, was brushed like Paderewski's. He stated that he was going to play a medley of popular songs, operatic music and every other kind of music, comprising several hundred tunes in all.
76A little alarm clock on a table showed the hour of 11 when the professor started off on his race with the "Star Spangled Banner." "The Little Fisherman" came next, and after that "Where Did You Get That Hat," referring to the fisherman's hat.
77Then came the "Swanee River," followed by "I Owe $10 to O'Grady." When "I Owe $10 to O'Grady" was reached, a man who was standing by the professor grew restless and finally walked out of the room. "Mary Green" then took her innings, and then "The Spider and the Fly" came up to the bat and struck out. "That is Love," "Johnnie Get Your Gun" and the "Mocking Bird" followed in quick succession. The "Little Lord Fauntleroy" schottische was then ground out, with "The Last Rose of Summer" close on its heels. "Mary and John" were also there with "Comrades," but up to 12 o'clock "Annie Rooney" had not been heard from.
78There were about six people about when the professor began playing, and they put their names to a paper which certified that the professor had started at 11 o'clock A. M. on April 14, A. D. 1892, on a grand twelve hour medley on a piano.
79The professor will wind up this evening with Rubinstein's concerto in G minor, "Ta-Ra-Ra-Boom-de-ay," and the classic song "We won't go home until morning."
80During the entire twelve hours the professor does not intend to take his hands from the piano, and whatever he wants to eat will be fed to him. A doctor will also be within calling distance.
81A PENNY WISE POLICY.
82FOR four summers has Anton Seidl wielded the baton at the Brighton Beach concerts, making that dreary sand dune a Mecca for musical pilgrims and bearable as a place of habitation, despite its dull surroundings. For some inscrutable reasons, although Colonel Langford telegraphed Mr. Seidl the acceptance of terms, &c., for the ensuing season, the Brighton Beach Railroad Company, of which General Jourdain is the distinguished president, did not see fit to ratify its secretary's action, so Mr. Seidl does not go to Brighton Beach this summer and Mr. Inness does. That the action of the company lacks logic or foresight is easily to be seen, for after spending much money and after having succeeded in calling attention to their enterprise and with a cheerful outlook they foolishly throw away all this by their present stingy proceedings. How Brooklyn feels on the matter may be gleaned from the "Evening Post" of this city in the Brooklyn department:
83The fact that they will not have the opportunity to hear "the music of the future" as interpreted in the present by the Seidl Orchestra at Brighton Beach the coming season is a matter of regret to not a few residents of Brooklyn. But if they are not sufficiently numerous to make the enterprise pecuniarily profitable to the combined management of the railroad and hotel, which in this case are interdependent in money making, it cannot be expected that a corporation will sustain a losing enterprise for the sake of their satisfaction. All the efforts of the Seidl Society, which was organized by enthusiastic women to promote interest in the interpretation of Wagner's compositions, and the attempts to popularize the concerts at the seaside failed to fill the music hall at Brighton, save when some noted singer, like Ritter-Goetz, was to be heard. But the last season certainly saw an increased interest in the Seidl concerts, and those who frequented them hoped in a year or two more to find the public taste educated to the point of adequately appreciating them.
84But the failure to re-engage Mr. Seidl on the part of the Brighton Beach directors may prove a blessing in disguise for Brooklyn. It may give the added impetus needed to the plan for providing a place in the city where his orchestra can be heard both summer and winter, and where music of a high order may be presented in a more satisfactory manner than heretofore. The Seidl concerts just concluded in the Academy of Music have been well attended, but there was a failure to present the selections from Wagner's operas which were expected, as the scenery could not be secured. For its notable presentation of "Parsifal" two years ago, the society had scenery painted, which it still possesses. If the hopes of the more enthusiastic members of the society can be realized a music hall can be erected, suited for summer concerts, amid agreeable surroundings, as well as for more elaborate operatic productions in winter. If the popular
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