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Musical Courier 1892-09-28: Vol 25 Iss 657, 1892
103 lines. Read by computer on 23 September 2026. Printed page 5. See the scan on archive.org.
1The Musical Courier.
2PUBLISHED EVERY WEDNESDAY
3—BY THE—
4MUSICAL COURIER COMPANY,
5(INCORPORATED)
619 Union Square W., New York.
7ESTABLISHED JANUARY, 1880.
8No. 657.
10EDITORS:
11MARC A. BLUMENBERG. OTTO FLOERSHEIM.
12JAMES G. HUNEKER. HARRY O. BROWN.
14BUSINESS DEPARTMENT:
15SPENCER T. DRIGGS. R. S. MAXWELL.
16A. T. KING. FRANK M. STEVENS.
18WESTERN OFFICE: Chicago, 226 Wabash Ave., John E. Hall, Manager.
19BOSTON OFFICE: 32 West St.
20BERLIN, GERMANY: PHILIPP ROTH, 84a Lützow St.
21LEIPSIC, GERMANY: GEHRDTER HUG, Königstrasse 16.
22LONDON AND PARIS: BRENTANO'S.
24Subscription (including postage) invariably in advance.
25Yearly, $4.00; Foreign, $5.00; Single Copies, Ten Cents.
27RATES FOR ADVERTISING.
28PER INCH.
29Three Months………….$20.00 | Nine Months………….$60.00
30Six Months……………..40.00 | Twelve Months…………80.00
31Special rates for preferred positions.
32Advertisements for the current week must be handed in by 5 p. m. on Monday.
33All remittances for subscriptions or advertising must be made by check draft, or money orders, payable to the MUSICAL COURIER COMPANY.
35American News Company, New York, General Distributing Agents.
36Western News Company, Chicago, Western Distributing Agents.
38NEW YORK, WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 28, 1892.
40SPECIAL.
42THE Columbian celebration, which promises to be the greatest event of its kind ever witnessed in America, commences in New York on Saturday, October 8, and lasts until Friday, October 14, during which week there will be a general suspension of business in all lines. As THE MUSICAL COURIER wishes to do all in its power to aid everyone in having a good time on this interesting occasion it has been decided to merge the issues of October 5 and 12 into one monster number, to appear on Saturday, October 8.
44It would be manifestly impossible to bring out a paper up to our standard in the midst of a festival week, and it is deemed better to contribute our share to the celebration by bringing out a paper the like of which has never been seen in music journalism. It will be the largest MUSICAL COURIER ever published and will have a circulation of 25,000.
46The musical department will be of unusual interest, containing special articles of an appropriate nature, and a large number of portraits never before seen in this country, besides the general attractive features of the regular issues. A notable contribution from the pen of Mr. W. J. Henderson on the subject of "Music in the Days of Columbus" will be consistent with the object of this special number. This special number also inaugurates the special work which THE MUSICAL COURIER will perform in connection with this Columbian year, including all the musical events of the exposition at Chicago.
48The trade department will be enlarged and will contain all of the news of the music trade, many articles of value to all interested in the piano and organ business, and an extended discussion upon a question of vital importance to all dealers, on which subject over 200 dealers alone have contributed their opinions. It will also contain a corrected table of vibrations of the standard pitch, 435 A, and much other matter that will make it a paper worthy of careful reading and preservation.
50THE MUSICAL COURIER is circulated in every State of the Union and throughout Canada and Europe through its subscriptions, and is the only music journal handled by the American News Company, the Western News Company, the Manhattan Elevated News Company, and the other general distributing agencies.
52THE DATES OF THE SEASON.
54HERE are the dates of the Philharmonic Society, the Symphony Society and Oratorio Society concerts and public rehearsals. A glance at them will suffice to prove that though we will not have grand opera at the Metropolitan Opera House, we will yet garner sufficient music before the season is finished.
56The public rehearsals and concerts of the Philharmonic Society for the coming season, the fifty-first of the society, are to be given on November 18 and 19, December 16 and 17, January 13 and 14, February 10 and 11, March 3 and 4 and March 24 and 25, at Music Hall. Anton Seidl is to be the conductor. Further particulars of the series are to be announced early in October.
58The Symphony Society is to give a series of six afternoon and six evening concerts this coming season, under the direction of Mr. Walter Damrosch, at Music Hall. The evening concerts will occur on Saturday evenings, November 12, December 3, January 7, February 4, March 11 and April 15. The afternoon concerts will be given the Fridays preceding these dates.
60The Oratorio Society's season is to consist of four afternoon and four evening concerts. The dates arranged are, for the afternoon concerts, Friday, November 25; Thursday, December 29; Friday, February 17, and Friday, April 7. The evening concerts will be on November 26, December 30, February 18 and April 8. The Symphony Orchestra, the Oratorio Society chorus of 500 voices, and special vocal soloists are to take part in the concerts, and Mr. Walter Damrosch will conduct.
62MORE EXPOSITION NEWS.
64THE following is the latest news from that seat of music at Chicago, the music bureau of the Columbian Exposition:
66Second announcement regarding American compositions.
67Under date of June 30, 1892, the following announcement was made by the bureau of music:
68"The musical director desires to include in the programs of exposition concerts, representative choral, orchestral and chamber works by native American composers. All scores received by the bureau of music before October 15, 1892, will be submitted to a committee whose names are shortly to be announced. The favorable recommendation of this committee will be final and insure performance. Both printed and manuscript music may be sent."
69The musical director is privileged to announce the names of the following musicians who will constitute the committee to examine American compositions:
70Camille Saint Saëns…………………Paris, France.
71Dr. A. C. Mackenzie………………..London, England.
72Asger Hamerik………………………Baltimore, Md.
73Carl Zerrahn…………………………Boston, Mass.
74B. J. Lang……………………………Boston, Mass.
75Wm. L. Tomlins…………………….Chicago, Ill.
76Theodore Thomas…………………..Chicago, Ill.
77All American composers are invited to present works for the approval of this committee, and in order to accommodate the greatest number the bureau will receive scores up to November 15, 1892. For the bureau of music,
78G. H. WILSON, secretary.
80The above but proves our primary declaration, that but few foreign musicians will visit Chicago next year as guests of the exposition. The affair has been badly managed in that respect, and judging from the tone of the letter received by THE MUSICAL COURIER several weeks ago from Camille Saint-Saëns it is extremely doubtful if that gentleman will be present either. That leaves one composer, A. C. Mackenzie; for it is just possible that Theodore Thomas in his intense self absorption may overlook the fact that Dr. Antonin Dvorák will have become a resident of this country, and consequently neglect to invite him. Nous verrons.
82A MAN WITHOUT AN ENEMY.
84AN appropriate inscription for the late Patrick Sarsfield Gilmore's last resting place would be "Here lies a man who lived without an enemy." As if to give the lie to the commonly accepted fallacy that musicians are a cantankerous, quarrelsome, enemy breeding set, Mr. Gilmore's career was one of unexampled popularity and homage winning from his fellow musicians and the public alike. He was a magnetic man who understood thoroughly his musical limitations and consequently accomplished wonders in his chosen field. He died at peace with mankind, and no figure in the musical community will be more missed than that brave gentleman and earnest music lover, Patrick Sarsfield Gilmore. May he rest in peace.
86COLOR AND SOUND.
88IN a pair of excellently considered articles about "Color and Sound" in the "Music Review," of Chicago, Mr. Frederic Grant Gleason has the following pertinent things to say about his theme:
90Even as late as Bach, and in that composer's works, are to be found harmonic successions that sound crude and harsh to our ears—and these not alone in his polyphonic writing, produced incidentally by the moving voices, but also in some of his choral harmonizations. The fact is that even in his day the harmonic sense had not reached a point of development where tonality was fully appreciated. Of course, harmonic sense as we know it had not been formulated, and the attention was chiefly directed to the motion of voices rather than to the harmonic combinations which they produced. The principles of consonance and dissonance received the chief consideration, and questions of naturalness in the successions or relations of the harmonies involved occupied a subordinate position. I do not mean to imply that these received no consideration, such was not by any means the case, but it was chiefly the more obvious relationships that received the attention, and that mostly as a matter of necessity.
92Music was viewed principally from a melodic standpoint, and harmonic treatment rather as an outgrowth of polyphonic design than as an independent factor in the production of musical effect. Bach fugues are not at the present day an interesting form of music for the average person—not alone because the form of expression is "antiquated," but because the listener does not bring to the hearing the same qualifications possessed by those music lovers who lived in Bach's time. They hear the same notes—and yet do not hear them—that is the physical ear receives the impressions, but the mind does not fully grasp their relationship. Musical people of Bach's day were accustomed to follow the interweaving of the parts, and because their training and experience had been chiefly in relation to works in the polyphonic style they could mentally grasp the relationships of many moving voices to an extent which is impossible to a person with the same average amount of experience in listening to music of the present day.
94Yet the harmonic sense has progressed in its development to such a degree that many combinations which would have been entirely unintelligible to even the highly educated (musically) of Bach's day, and might even have produced a feeling of horror, seem perfectly satisfactory now. But, as an extreme illustration of the principle involved, let us imagine a highly educated musician of the time of Palestrina, familiar with the style of that day and accustomed to regard that as the highest and most truthful form which could be employed for musical expression, and suppose him transported to one of our finest modern opera houses to listen to a performance. The curtain rises, we will say, upon the first scene of the "Götterdämmerung." It is hardly likely that he would remain to hear the close of the opera with its tremendous climaxes of dramatic power, or if he did it would mostly likely be because he was too paralyzed by bewilderment to make his escape. Nothing in his previous training or experience would afford him the least assistance toward appreciating such a work—he would hear the sounds, but his mind could not arrange them in an intelligible form. Yet the magnificent designs, the beauty and truth of dramatic expression, the richness of the scoring, might all be fully expressed, but still for him they would have absolutely no existence. Probably all he would be conscious of would be the beauty of the scenery and a confused torrent of orchestral tone, with the occasional sound of a human voice. Probably by time "Siegfried's" death was reached, in case he survived so long, he would be reduced to a state bordering upon gibbering idiocy, and all because he lacked the preliminary experience required to enable him to cognize the beauties which crowed the pages of that wonderful work.
96DVORÁK AND THE AMERICAN COMPOSER.
98IN a well written editorial in last Saturday's "Evening Post," Mr. Henry T. Finck considers the probable influence of Dvorák's residence in this country on the native composer. Among other things he says:
100We have, indeed, some able composers, but, although born in America, they are in their music foreigners—Germans, with an occasional French or Italian trait. This is not as it should be. As American literature, at first little more than an echo of European writings, has at last emancipated itself, so we may hope that American composers will now make an effort to be more original, to reflect emotions that are peculiarly American.
102It is from this point of view that Dr. Dvorák may be held up as an excellent model to our young musicians. He has done for Bohemia what Chopin did for Poland, Liszt for Hungary and Grieg for Norway, by introducing a new tributary into the main stream of European music. At the core his music is German, no doubt. Beethoven, Schubert and Wagner were his models, but his ideas and his style always have certain traits which enable one to say, "This is Bohemian," just as a Chopin mazurka and a Liszt rhapsody make us exclaim, though we had never heard it before, "This is Polish," "This is Hungarian." Now, let the American composer study Dvorák's music from this point of view; let
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