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Musical Courier 1894-03-14: Vol 28 Iss 731, 1894
117 lines. Read by computer on 22 September 2026. Printed page 21. See the scan on archive.org.
1BOSTON, Mass., March 11, 1894.
3MY letter to-day must be a thing of shreds and patches. The grand opera of a year has been crowded into a season of two weeks, and the city now suffers from the effects of an operatic debauch.
5According to the report published in a local newspaper this morning 97,000 people listened to the performances at Mechanics' Hall. The gross receipts were $132,000. There is a clear profit of $40,000 for Messrs. Abbey, Schoeffel & Grau.
7According to Mr. Schoeffel the "banner day" was at the "Carmen" matinée, when Calvé was expected to sing, and Arnoldson took her place; this was the 8th. There were then over 7,000 in the hall and the receipts were $12,000. The receipts for the whole day were $21,000.
9"Up to and including last Wednesday night the figures for attendance and receipts exceeded any other two weeks of grand opera ever had in Boston," said Mr. Schoeffel, "and it is understood that at the end of Thursday night all contingent expenses were liquidated."
11* * *
13Such a powerful company has not visited Boston for many years, if ever. Strong as it is, it lacks a first-class contralto.
15The chorus singing was not always faultless, but there were many evidences of intelligent drill. There was general accuracy, and there was such an unexpected and welcome attention paid to dynamics that the appearance of the chorus as a rule gave pleasure instead of the customary severe pain.
17The orchestra played exceedingly well. I have seldom heard in any opera house abroad better orchestral operatic performances than those this last fortnight under the direction of Mr. Mancinelli, a most admirable leader. Certain performances under Mr. Bevignani were almost of equal worth.
19* * *
21You may wonder at the few operas given. Out of fifteen performances three were devoted to "Faust," three to "Carmen," and two to "Romeo and Juliet." But the nature of the stage in Mechanics' Building is such that it would be impossible to give "L'Africaine" and other operas in the répertoire.
23* * *
25There was a concert last Sunday night in which Melba, Arnoldson, Plançon, Mauguierre, Guercia and the orchestra took part. It was a long winded affair that gave great delight to the audience. Melba and Plançon sang superbly; Mrs. Arnoldson-Fischof showed herself to advantage in florid airs. The encore fiend was there, and his name was legion. He even insisted on recalling Miss Guercia after she had hanged, drawn and quartered the poor son in "The Prophet." Mancinelli's ballet music from "Isora di Provenza" tickled the crowd mightily.
27* * *
29The de Reszkés, Nordica, Scalchi, Pettigiani, Lassalle and Ancona were heard the 5th in "The Huguenots." Are we all growing old, or is it after all Meyerbeer's fault? At any rate the men and the women of this generation soon grow weary of five sections of historical musical tapestry. This is the day of the short story, of the few strokes of the brush, or the reckless use of the palette knife, of the cocktail, of the madding momentary episode.
31It is the fashion to laugh at Castil-Blazé, but soon after the first performance of "The Huguenots" he advocated seriously giving the fourth act alone, as a "fragment superbe." To hear the fourth act "without any prelude, without the act that follows, would be good luck that the public would appreciate," said the flippant Frenchman, and he admitted the possibility of giving the fifth act of "Gustave" as a contrast and a conclusion.
33Nordica sang the part of "Valentine" exceedingly well.
35* * *
37Calvé played "Mignon" on the 8th for the first time. It was an unlucky evening. I am told that Mr. Abbey regards Thomas' opera as a hoodoo. Now the cast was as follows:
39Mignon……………………………………………..Calvé
40Friederica…………………………………………..Scalchi
41Filina………………………………………………….Nordica
42Lothario……………………………………………..Plançon
43Laerte………………………………………………..Carbone
44Guglielmo…………………………………………..De Lucia
46It seemed to me that all the pegs were in the wrong holes with the exception of the Carbone peg.
48Calvé was evidently nervous at the start. Her figure is not adapted to the character, and her page's dress was awkward and ugly beyond description. Dame Gossip says the singer was hysterical when she made her first entrance.
50To judge conclusively of a performance that was marred in an unfortunate manner by an accident is impossible. In the third act Calvé stumbled and had an ugly fall. It is reported that she broke the little bone at the end of the spine; pardon my vagueness, but I know little about bones, their location or their names. The curtain went down and groans and shrieks were heard. There was a slight delay; there was a speech of reassurance by Mr. Seymour, and Calvé finished the opera. But she did not sing as announced at the Thursday matinée.
52Calvé's face answers the conventional idea of how "Mignon" looked, with her Southern tint, her large melancholy, haunting eyes. Her replies to "Wilhelm Meister" were finely delivered, but when in the midst of her gratitude to the handsome stranger she tugged frantically at his coat tails because he chatted with "Filina" away went any thought of a new, ideal "Mignon." In the whole second act there was nothing that I now remember except the final, short, passionate outburst. The beginning of the third act was strong, and there should have been a heartier recognition of its power. Then came the accident.
54Vocally Calvé appeared to best advantage in the last act, although she sang the "Connais-tu" with unexaggerated, touching sentiment.
56The question that might well arise after such an imperfect performance is this: "What is her conception of the character?" and not "How do you like her conception?"
58I do not believe that Calvé at present has any definite conception of the part.
60Is it not likely that her peculiar individuality may prevent her from being an actress of versatility?
62Her "Mignon" seemed to me to be a promise of misconception and failure rather than a guarantee of future success.
64Nordica, who made her first appearance as "Filina," sang brilliantly.
66What had De Lucia, a creature of passion, to do with "Wilhelm Meister," a walking gentleman, who is not far removed from being a tiresome cad?
68Or why should Pol Plançon have been obliged to wander about aimlessly, picking at an impossible harp, or producing proofs and affidavits, like a family lawyer in the last act of a melodrama?
70* * *
72"Romeo and Juliet," with Eames, was given the 7th. The performance was excellent, although Plançon is a finer "Frère Laurent" than is Edouard de Reszké.
74"Semiramide" is a corpse bedecked with roulades and trills. Nevertheless the opera was given the 8th for the benefit of Scalchi, who had a beautiful time as "Arsace." Melba sang with consummate art. The tunes of the opera, however, all sounded alike, and nobody pretended to understand what the singing was about, and nobody really cared. Edouard de Reszké showed volubility in the florid part of "Assur;" he aspirated freely, bow-wowed a little, and occasionally forgot Rossinian legato.
76* * *
78"Lohengrin" was given the 9th, with Nordica, Jean de Reszké, Lassalle, Plançon, de Vaschetti and Domenech. It may be said that, with the exception of Miss Domenech, vocally it was a performance of unusual worth.
80* * *
82At the matinée yesterday "Faust" was sung, with Melba, Mauguierre and Plançon in the cast. As I prefer the "Marguerite" of Melba to that of Eames, so I prefer the "Mephistopheles" of Plançon to that of Ed de Reszké. Plançon is the greater singer in the management of his voice and in finesse. So is his conception of the part more subtle, more truly diabolical.
84"Carmen," with Calvé, de Lucia, Arnoldson and Lassalle, ended the season last evening.
86* * *
88I have been unable to attend concerts this week. May I quote Mr. Apthorp's criticism of the Kneisel Quartet concert, "Transcript," March 6?
90"The Kneisel Quartet, assisted by Mr. Charles Molé, gave the seventh concert of this, its ninth, season in Chickering Hall last evening, the program being as follows:
92Serenade, for flute, violin and viola, in D major, op. 25…..Beethoven
93Quartet in A minor, op. 51, No. 2…………………….Brahms
94Quartet in D major………………………………….Haydn
96"The Beethoven serenade is one of those charming works in the composer's first manner that have generally escaped public notice. It was first given here a few years ago by the club formed by Mr. Molé for the performance of chamber music for wind instruments, and has not been heard since. Indeed the work has been rather used to neglect from the beginning, for there is a story that a certain publisher, when the score was offered him, said contemptuously that 'he would not give 25 gulden for Beethoven's opus 25!' It is for the most part in the vein of light badinage, and contains many strokes of peculiarly Beethovenish humor; one wonders how the composer could do so much with his three slight instruments. The thing is infinitely charming, full of exquisite grace and tricksy vivacity. It was admirably played, Mr. Molé's tone and phrasing in the flute part being especially fine.
98'Brahms' A minor quartet is a horse of another color, but none the less delightful for that. It seems, upon the whole, to be among the compositions best adapted to lead the general music loving public up to a comprehension of the composer's style, to act as the thin end of the wedge of a Brahms' propaganda. Its beauty of form and sentiment are quite equalled by its clearness of style, while it is unmistakably Brahms, and nothing but Brahms, from beginning to end. The quartet was beautifully played, with that finish of detail and unanimity of ensemble—not, however, precluding a certain tendency to individualize the expression of each one of the four parts—which belongs to the best chamber playing.
100"With the Haydn quartet one got back once more to the general atmosphere of the first number on the program, to Father Haydn's 'eternal sunshine.' Here, too, the playing was admirable at every point, and showed the beautiful music for just what it was."
102* * *
104The Apollo Club gave a concert Wednesday evening. The following criticism by Mr. B. E. Woolf, appeared this morning in the "Gazette," and as it will undoubtedly excite wide discussion I quote it in full:
106On Wednesday evening the Apollo Club gave its third concert of the season in Music Hall. The chief point of interest in the program was the symphonic ode for male voices, soprano, solo and orchestra, by Jean Louis Nicodé, and entitled "The Sea," which was accorded its first hearing here on this occasion. It is a work of slight interest, and of no permanent musical value. The introduction, for the orchestra alone, fitly heralds the noise, the dreadful cacophony and the sensationalism that are to follow. Then comes an unaccompanied chorus, in slow time, remarkable for nothing but the orchestral effect with which the voices are used. In fact the composer shows throughout rare skill in writing for voices in combination. Then follows another more spirited chorus, this time with the orchestra; but here again there is nothing of intrinsic musical worth, despite the strong dramatic color that characterizes the number.
108There is much richness and variety of tone color, but the composer makes much ado about nothing, and seems to be groping after results that he never attains. After this comes an instrumental episode, called "Phosphorescent Lights," the meaning of which it was impossible to discover. The orchestra is cleverly used for the production of novel and bizarre effects, but they say nothing that can be understood, and are no more nor less than crass sensationalism. Berlioz, whom Nicodé seems to have studied industriously, has done the same thing in his "Will o' the Wisp" music much better, and so has Saint-Saëns in portions of his "Dance Macabre." This is succeeded by a soprano solo, a hymn called "Fata Morgana," which seems to have been written for a voice combining the lower registers of a contralto and the higher registers of a soprano, and it wanders through these extremes drearily and ineffectively.
110Then comes another chorus, in which some voices sing behind the scene, and are answered by the other voices on the stage; but here also the effort to produce an effect is wholly out of proportion to the meagreness of the results. The whole closes with a chorus and a quartet, in the latter of which there is the first gleam of melody and the first clear moment in the work. This composition is abundant in learning, especially in connection with the use of the orchestra and voices; but as a whole it is pretentiously blatant, uninspired and tiresome. In a notice appended to the program the work is said to be worthy "a place by the best acknowledged masterpieces;" but this claim is sheer nonsense. There is no vitality in the music; it is wholly without beauty, and is distressingly monotonous.
112It is true that it was heard under very disadvantageous circumstances, and that it might prove somewhat more interesting under the direction of a more adequate orchestral conductor than is Mr. B. J. Lang, who, on this, as on other occasions, conducted as if the whole duty of a conductor consisted in beating time with more or less uncertainty of accent, and as if the composer went to unnecessary trouble in writing marks of expression, dynamic or otherwise, in his score. As we have suggested in this column on many previous occasions, Mr. Lang is not possessed of the qualities that are essential to a good orchestral conductor. In the first place he is without magnetism; in the second place he is nervous and fussy, and in the next he does not lead with the authority to inspire the performers with confidence in his ability, and hence he cannot hold them well in hand, and we therefore have the strange sight of an orchestra conducting their director, instead of their director conducting them.
114It was absurd in Mr. Lang to attempt to interpret "The Sea" with an orchestra, and it was impossible not to experience a throe of sympathy with him in the almost ludicrous perplexity into which he was thrown at times by his inability to do so. There was throughout an absence of proper rhythmic accent. He ran mad amid the difficulties that beset him, and naturally the orchestra followed suit. It was inevitable, under the circumstances, that the work should suffer the disaster that attended it. It would have been better not to give it at all, rather than give it in so bungling a manner. If it was his ambition to present it for the first time here he should have let some competent conductor lead it, and have been content himself with the credit of having been mainly instrumental in producing it, instead of indulging his strange and persistent fatuity for a task for the proper performance of which he has so often shown himself unfitted. The purely artistic and the purely mercantile never harmonize. He would be wiser were he to confine himself to conducting part songs, with their unexciting little crescendos and pianissimos.
116His prevailing weakness as a conductor was emphasized most convincingly in the "Phosphorescent Lights" episode, where his jerky and uncertain beat with the right hand, his conflicting beat with the left, and still another beat with the bobbing of his head, set the players completely at loggerheads. The score is very complicated, and the performers need the constant attention of the conductor to give them their cues; but he kept his face buried in the book before him, and left them to their own resources, and hence there was constant confusion. Music in Boston has passed that infantile stage which can tolerate such conducting as this, even as an advertisement. In fact Mr. Lang is something of an anachronism at the head of an orchestra, and something of an injury also, for he is liable to mislead rather than to improve the tastes of the uninitiated. His methods are of the old fashioned order, in which the mere time beater ruled supreme and the interpreter was unknown. There are more advanced and more competent men, such as Mr. Chadwick, Mr. MacDowell and Mr. Parker, who are better fitted for the work that Mr. Lang at-
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