Scan 14
Musical Courier 1895-03-20: Vol 30 Iss 784, 1895
137 lines. Read by computer on 21 September 2026. Printed page 15. See the scan on archive.org.
1MUSIC IN BOSTON
3BOSTON, Mass., March 16, 1895.
5MR. WALTER DAMROSCH and his opera company will be at the Boston Theatre for ten performances beginning April 1. The Abbey, Schoeffel and Grau Opera Company will play a return engagement, beginning April 9 and closing the night of the 13th. And there is a rumor that the Basta-Tavary Opera Company may appear at the Castle Square Theatre late in April. To use the language of our Italian friends, Basta, basta!
7* * *
9The Bostonians drew crowded houses to the Tremont last week, for the opera was Robin Hood, which is beloved by the people of this city and neighboring towns.
11It must be a great pleasure to Mr. Barnabee, who is more and more engrossed in managerial cares, to know that his understudy, the comedian Mr. Jerome Sykes, is so warmly appreciated by the public. In Prince Ananias Mr. Sykes made a great hit. He was unctuous and irresistible. He filled up all the cracks left by the librettist. They tell me that he extracted laughter from situations and lines that were as sandy wastes to Mr. Barnabee, who found therein no food or water for jests. As the style of Mr. Sykes is utterly unlike that of Mr. Barnabee, the latter of course feels no silly jealousy. I am told that he is very fond of his understudy and does all in his power to bring him before the public. Indeed I should not be surprised to learn that Mr. Barnabee has decided to devote his whole time and well-known business instincts to the management of his commercial interests, that he may enjoy more thoroughly and advance the rapid rise of his understudy in public favor.
13* * *
15Did Mr. Jean de Reszké take great and at times inexplicable liberties with text and tempo of composers when he was in New York? Here he was not in full possession of his physical powers, and yet I should like to know why he changed radically the tempo of the F minor episode in the duet in the fourth act (Non più lai allegro con moto, 6-8).
17* * *
19Mrs. Emil Paur gave a piano recital in Steinert Hall the 11th. She played the C minor variations, Beethoven; Clavierstück, E flat minor, and two scherzi, Schubert; Songs without Words, E flat major, and scherzo, E minor, Mendelssohn; Evening and Bird as Prophet, Schumann; Intermezzo No. 1, op. 117, Brahms; nocturne, F sharp major, and waltz, E minor, Chopin; Romanze, F major, Rubinstein; Menuet Italian, Mrs. Beach; etude, E major, Pagannii-Liszt; Intermezzo, E. Paur; Fledermaus (paraphrase), Ed. Schütt.
21Mrs. Paur played in an eminently chaste and ladylike manner. She never lost her self-possession; she never made a remark that was not respectable and conventional. She would be a good summer player, she is so cool and neat, even when there is ample excuse for a flurry of temper. She plays the piano as she would play a game of chess—every move is meditated, executed in a well-bred manner, and there is no suspicion of arrogance in her voice when she says "Checkmate" to the composer. The composer demanded many things, but his movements were in vain. There is a placidity that is inexorable. There is a serenity that bites more venomously than any Spanish fly. When Mrs. Paur plays, the hearer is almost compelled to shriek aloud, to blaspheme; he would fire a gun, if he had brought one; he would fire it, not necessarily at her, but in the air, to see if she would change the tempo, or strike a false note, or show some emotion. He feels like the tortured clergyman, in The Scarlet Letter, who was tempted to whisper corrupting and vicious words in the ear of a young girl just to see her jump, though Hawthorne did not use such a flippant phrase. And yet a display of passion on the part of Mrs. Paur would seem perhaps indecent. The sight of her own distress would outweigh any possible pleasure. So let us praise her accuracy and her neatness, and forget that there are such qualities in art as perfume, color and passion.
23* * *
25Is there anything in the theory advanced by Champfleury in Souvenirs des Funambules? And the theory is this:
26"I often met in the streets of Paris an old man who played the bassoon. He was long and thin, like his instrument.
27"The old man had the countenance that is indispensable to a bassoonist. A dull eye, hollow cheeks, which are the dimples of poverty, peaked features, a yellow skin drawn tightly over the bone. A face that suited admirably the voice of the bassoon, which is an instrument full of sobs and tears.
28"Musicians, as a rule, choose hurriedly their instrument, without stopping to ask if their temperament is analogous to that of the piece of wood which is simple in appearance, and yet this piece of wood, provided with strings or keys, is not an absolutely lifeless thing."
30* * *
32The bassoonists of the Symphony Orchestra certainly look well fed and contented, and yet they played the passages in The March to the Scaffold, a week ago Saturday, with such diabolical enjoyment that the lights were low, and horned and winged things flapped about Mr. Paur, who kept on beating heroically, fortified by the thought of duty and his pleasant home in Jamaica Plain.
34* * *
36And yet the idea of Champfleury, even though it may show to the logical that he had no ideas and was simply hunting copy, is full of rich thought. Have you not seen and heard pianists who should have consecrated their energy and distinct musical talent to the xylophone? You do not instinctively think of a kettledrum man as fat. There is a peculiar expression seen only on the faces of flute players. Would you ever mistake an oboist for a trombonist?
38* * *
40Mr. Ysaye made his farewell appearance this season in Music Hall the 15th. He played Beethoven's concerto and Bruch's Scotch Fantaisie. The orchestra, under the able direction of Mr. Emil Mollenhauer, played the Anacreon overture, by Cherubini, and the march from Gounod's Reine de Saba. Miss Elizabeth Hamlin sang the air of Balkis from the last named opera, and nocturne and Before the Dawn, by Chadwick. She was not in voice. Her tones were often throaty and she wandered from the true pitch.
42As for Ysaye's performance of the Beethoven concerto there is little to be said, for it was one of overwhelming beauty and grandeur. How trivial are the stock expressions of rapture in comparison with such a revelation of genius and skill!
44* * *
46Students of Hampton Institute sang negro songs in Steinert Hall the 15th, before members of the Folk Lore Society. Captain R. R. Moten of the institute read a paper. There was a discussion in which Mrs. Selinger, Miss Hawes, Mr. Estes and Mr. Foote took part.
48* * *
50As you see, it was a dull week with the great exception of Ysaye's visit.
52* * *
54Some years ago Emile Bergerat wrote an article; and it was worded in scintillating French, which is the despair of the translator. Here is a rude Englishing of it.
56ERNEST REYER.
58"Do not do unto others the music that you would not wish them to do unto you."
60Who said this? Wisdom or Ernest Reyer? The two of 'em. But Ernest Reyer adds: "The dog barks only on two notes. If you put a tax of 10 frs. on him in a peaceful and well ordered community, how large a tax should you put on a piano that howls on eighty-five notes?"
62And who is this man, sent by God, who pushes the hatred of the piano to social economy? He's a musician. But when he speaks of the piano he rises to supreme heights.
64You know the reply of the explorer to an African king who asked him what a piano was: "Sire, it's an instrument that makes about the same noise that you would make if they should pull out in succession the thirty-two teeth which you have in the mahogany of your jaws."
66And the traveler added: "It has the same form."
68I knew that Reyer professed openly this magnificent doctrine; but I did not know that he had decided to propagate his faith. The idea of a tax is such a fine one that it places immediately its originator among the great men of the century, perhaps not far from Pasteur. Let us celebrate Ernest Reyer, for the hour is come.
70I admired him a long time ago and I shall always love him because he is "vexed as a just person." I do not remember ever to have seen him when he was not angry. That is the correct condition of mind in the nineteenth century, for thus one escapes pessimism, suicide and even "naturalisme." Irritability induces hatred of the piano, the highest flight of virtue.
72But the anger of Reyer is that of people of mind, it is gay anger. The Lord knows this fulminator has wit enough, the finest, the best grated and fresh in the French snuff box, not for the miserable noses of chumps and poor things, and the cobblers of artistic boots. Pass an hour with Reyer; it is to live an hour in the good old time when the cows were well watched by the honest critics with crooks, and when geese did not spread themselves all over the garden of France under the pretext of knowing how to save capitals.
74If this wit had not injured the artistic career of Reyer we should not be in the garden of geese. It has harmed him. Sigurd waited thirty honorable years before it was imposed on France by Belgium. The author thinks the Opéra acted too quickly in the matter. He sees in such haste a disgraceful departure from the traditions of national taste; Berlioz, for instance, knew how to keep them respected. From the top of heaven, where are the aeolian harps, Berlioz reproaches him for cowardly concessions. He suspected perhaps that Reyer had written something for the geese, or something too easily arranged for the piano, or transcribable for four hands. In short, Reyer was disturbed by the premature success of Sigurd.
76"Is it possible," said Reyer, "while I am alive, in my own country, they have finally discovered that I am not only a musician of great worth, but a musician, and not a captain of marine infantry, as my fellow countrymen insist?"
78He ran to his doctor: "Ah, doctor, are you spreading the report that I am dying? Everyone calls me 'Dear Master' just now. Is there no hope for me?"
80"Don't say a word," cried the doctor. "I do not know how to account for all this that goes on. Théodore de Banville just left; he came to be examined. Fancy it! the Comédie is about to play a one act piece by him that it accepted sixteen years ago. He is seriously alarmed. I advised him to show himself on the boulevards to reassure his friends. Ah! 'Tis a strange movement in our land."
82"Perhaps it's the Republic," said Reyer.
84And he went home, deep in thought. He had decided on a master stroke, for the ghost of Berlioz constantly ap-
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90EMILIO AGRAMONTE, Director.
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94Among our last year's graduates, Miss Maud Bliss has been engaged by Mr. Francis Wilson and Miss Rena Atkinson by Mr. Wm. T. Carleton.
96Students admitted at any time.
98SEND FOR NEW CATALOGUE 1894-95.
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