Scan 7
Musical Courier 1896-07-15: Vol 33 Iss 854, 1896
62 lines. Read by computer on 23 September 2026, twice; the two readings disagreed in places. Printed page 8. See the scan on archive.org.
1Scarcely have they left the chapel when, likewise in the garb of a friar, Lucretia comes upon the scene. How she evaded the inquiries of the brother doorkeeper is not explained. She is the woman who made all the mischief, and of course is the contralto of the opera, while equally of course Fra Francesco is the tenor. Being the tenor he has again of course believed, and this without a particle of proof to substantiate the fact, that Mary has been unfaithful to him, just as he is told by Lucretia, who is in love with him herself, and thus wants to rid herself of her rival.
3The result is a different one from the one she had anticipated; for the recalcitrant lover turns into an ascetic and absolutely unyielding monk, upon whom even the wiles and beauty of the contralto, who throws herself at his feet in the chapel, make no further impression. She retires behind a pillar just as the brother bellringer comes in to toll for evening prayers. With the country people who assemble in the choir Mary enters the chapel, and of course a scene of recognition and explanation ensues between the two former lovers.
5Lucretia jumps into the breach from behind her pillar, and now a situation is given out of which a Verdi would have made one of his most stirring musical moments. With Waller, however, it only becomes a case of watered Mas- cagni, and very much watered at that. Equally unsatisfactory is the short dramatic solution of the situation. Fra Francesco is led away by the Prior and the two women, instead of pulling each other's hair, as they would probably have done in life, if they had not, as is the custom in such cases in Italy, gone for each other with stilettos, sink into each other's arms in prayer and in forgiveness. Thereupon the curtain sinks in dismay.
7The performance was an excellent one under Dr. Muck's careful and intelligent guidance. Sommer has the voice demanded by the title part and sang well. His acting is always so stupid that one was almost inclined to believe the actual stupidity of the monk, and thus the impersonator gained, even if it happened quite unconsciously and without particular merit of his own, the greatest triumph in dramatic representation—that of vraisemblance. Frau Goetz looked and acted stunningly seductive in the part of Lucretia and her warm voice and verveful singing aided her in securing a personal triumph in her ungrateful rôle. The short part of Mary was equally beautifully sung and represented by Miss Hiedler, whose fine soprano voice is ever gaining in strength and expressiveness. Moedlinger sang the part of the Prior in his usual dignified manner and was vocally satisfactory. Chorus and orchestra had rather a bad time of it, for the composer neither treats them well nor effectively. Just in this respect he showed himself most barely as an amateur and one who needs learning more than anything else.
9Tetzlaff's mise-en-scène was befitting and in good taste, as it always is.
11Fra Francesco is to be repeated twice in the course of the present week, despite its most pronounced failure on the occasion of the above described première, after the conclusion of which, and as a welcome and quite satisfactory earwash, I listened to an excellent performance of Humperdinck's Hänsel and Gretel, with those two excellent artists Misses Rothauser and Dietrich in the title parts.
13On Thursday, the night previous to the above described première, we had at the Royal Opera House a commemoration performance. On June 18, 1821, Weber's immortal Freischütz was given for the first time at the Berlin Royal Opera House, and the seventy-fifth anniversary of this memorable event was commemorated with a really first-class and in every way worthy festival performance of the opera, which was once and is even to this day, with the exception of Lohengrin, the most popular one in the entire repertory.
15In the lobby facsimile copies of the original housebill of the first production of seventy-five years ago were sold, but as the names are not of particular interest to Americans of the present era I refrain from reproducing it here. The last of the festival performance of last Thursday night included the Misses Hiedler as Agathe and Dietrich as Aennchen and Messrs. Sommer as Max, Moedlinger as Caspar, Bulsa as Prince Ottokar, Krolop as Kuno, Stammer as Hermit, Krasa as Kilian and Schmidt as Samuel.
17Dr. Muck conducted and everything went smoothly, but nevertheless with a certain quite unwonted festive spirit. I enjoyed the performance very much, especially the coy singing of Miss Hiedler and the girlish and really schel- misch behavior of little Miss Dietrich. Sommer's beautiful vocal material shone to advantage in the part of Max, for which his personality is likewise better suited than for that of the Hamletian Fra Francesco.
19Two more novelties were vouchsafed us on Saturday and Sunday night.
21The former evening brought the first, and I hope soon last, appearance here of the Budapest German Operetta Troupe, which appeared at the Neues Theatre. The troupe or their impresario must have been entirely and completely ignorant of the elevated standard and high character of this, one of Berlin's prettiest and coziest theatres, and of the sort of performances which are usually given there, and of the high class of audiences that are wont to gather there. This Budapest evidently haphazard troupe is no operetta company at all, but a Tingeltangle crowd picked up at various Austro-Hungarian cafés-chantants. They all of them, together and individually, belong to a variety show, and I am told that some of the female members of the troupe really were heard here at the Wintergarten, which is the Berlin equivalent for New York's Koster & Bial's hall. I don't want to say anything against the existence of such halls, in fact, I enjoy such a variety entertainment once in a great while and for a change, but I don't care to hear such a personnel in a fine theatre giving alleged operetta performances.
23I say alleged, for what they performed were no operettas at all, but simply show pieces in which music played the least and the ladies' costumes and lack of costumes, as well as their limbs, the most important part. The singing of the two principal females in the cast, Misses Louise Rueck and Hansi Reichsberg, was something dreadful to listen to, and their voices had that shrill, knifelike quality which the cafe-chantant vocalists affect.
25The two pieces they gave are entitled A Battalion of Women and The Ladies' Duel, and they are the veriest rubbish and rot that was ever strung together. Karl So- mosky is the perpetrator of the plots, and whatever there occurs in these pieces of so-called music was written by Wilhelm Rosenzweig, who also acted as conductor. You ought to have heard the orchestration! Well, it fitted the occasion, pieces, music, performance and all! The Berlin first nighters left the theatre in a state of disgust before the performance of the second piece was over, and the papers, with rare but not surprising unanimity, gave the undertaking a roasting.
27The next novelty was Franz von Suppé's legacy, his posthumous operetta, The Model, which was produced here for the first time on last Sunday night at the Lessing Theatre, the very theatre at which Strauss' Waldmeister has just been given fifty times in succession, and with success, and with the same very pleasing and highly satisfactory cast.
29The Model is as charming a work as any that that emanated from Suppé's fertile pen, and some moments in it, especially for instance the finale of the first act, without being exactly reminiscent of Boccaccio, suggests this, unquestionably Suppé's best, operetta. Although I don't know anything definite on the subject I feel sure that the entire first act is really from the pen of Suppé, in whose desk the work was found in an unfinished and in parts only sketched condition. Zamar and some other Viennese Kapellmeisters are said to have completed the operetta and the greater part of the orchestration. They did so with rare tact, skill and discretion, for, barring some episodes in the second act, which are not quite up to the pitch of the first act, nobody would doubt Suppé's paternity of the work as a whole.
31The libretto, by Messrs. Victor Leon and Ludwig Held, is a very good one, and has the one great and rare advantage that interest in the action is kept up and even increased in the final act. The scheme of the plot is, as is mostly the case in operetta, a trifle too mixed up to allow of a synopsis, but it is very funny all the same, and it winds up most satisfactorily by the model, who was separated from her lover because she posed as a model, being afterward reunited with him because she was a model model, and in this moral respect far superior to Trilby.
33Director Ferenczy again proved himself a splendid stage manager in the production of The Model, as he had demonstrated himself to be in Waldmeister. The work was staged with the utmost nicety and attention to detail. The performance was in every respect likewise a model one. The principal female part is in the hands, and not only in the hands, but really in the entire personality of Mme. Kopaczy-Karczay. I raved over her, her looks, her singing, her acting, her voice and her stage presence in Wald- meister, but she is still more ravishing in The Model. When she drops her cloak as she is posing as Phryne opera glasses are twisted up to the strongest possible focus. Edward Steinberger was funny beyond all description. His bath scene in the third act brought forth such an uproar of hilarity that for minutes the auditorium seemed a lunatic asylum of people crazy with laughing. one of two readings
34Director Ferenczy again proved himself a splendid stage manager in the production of The Model, as he had demonstrated himself to be in Waldmeister. The work was staged with the utmost nicety and attention to detail. The performance was in every respect likewise a model one. The principal female part is in the hands, and not only in the hands, but really in the entire personality of Mme. Kopacz-Karczay. I raved over her, her looks, her singing, her acting, her voice and her stage presence in Waldmeister, but she is still more ravishing in The Model. When she drops her cloak as she is posing as Phryne opera glasses are twisted up to the strongest possible focus. Edward Steinberger was funny beyond all description. His bath scene in the third act brought forth such an uproar of hilarity that for minutes the auditorium seemed a lunatic asylum of people crazy with laughing. one of two readings
36The cast also brought a surprise, and one of the most pleasing nature. Julius Spielmann, who appeared here for the first time in the part of Niccolo, has one of the most beautiful natural lyric tenor voices which you can imagine. He is said to be musically entirely untrained as yet, and can hardly read a note. Still he sang very musically, and I doubt not has a great future before him. I learn that the intendency is eager to secure Spielman for the Royal Opera House, if he is willing to go into serious study and work.
38The Model is an operetta which in my opinion would draw well in the United States if it were given by a company such as the Bostonians, or any other which will bestow care and intelligence upon a fine production with re- fined ensemble.
40Last night I went to the Royal Opera House, where the Wagner cycle, of which I spoke in my last week's budget, had in the meantime proceeded up to Tristan and Isolde. Of all of Wagner's works this is my favorite one, and I never miss a performance of it if I can help it. If, however, I had neglected to attend last night's reproduction I should surely have had little cause for serious regret, for it was poor in almost every respect. Herr Oberhauser, from the Carlsruhe Court Opera, had been telegraphed for, and he appeared as Tristan, without having had a chance for a single rehearsal. Likewise without rehearsal Miss Reinl sang as a substitute for Frau Goetz in the part of Brang- aene. The latter suddenly became indisposed, and Fri. Reinl had to sing the difficult rôle at short notice. I cannot blame her if she did not sing well in the way of ensemble, but she was, besides, vocally very unsatisfactory. Mr. Oberhauser likewise is by no means a second Jean de Reszké; and thus the performance, in which only Frau Sucher as Isolde was in fairly good trim, was bound to be a failure. Even the royal orchestra, under Muck's usually safe and absolutely reliable guidance, was not in good condition, and they played worse than I ever heard them play heretofore.
42"An Old Subscriber" in Boston is informed that Frau Sachse-Hofmeister, the Aida he heard in Berlin in 1885, has retired into private life and is residing here at No. 9 Genthinestrasse. She has not appeared in public for many years.
44Else Kutscherra has severed her short relations with the Paris Grand Opéra management, and has signed a new contract with the Brussels Monnaie Theater.
46To-morrow night we shall have at the Neues Koenig- liches Operntheater (Kroll's) the première of Karl Gold- mark's opera, The Cricket on the Hearth.
48Two young Americans, Messrs. Robert and Lucil Thrane, from Eau Claire, Wis., appeared as instrumental soloists at a recent conservatory concert at Sondershausen. Robert played Saint-Saëns' A minor violoncello concerto and Lucil some variations for violin by Vieuxtemps.
50Among the number of American visitors to The Musical Courier's Berlin headquarters last week was Mr. Karl Wolfsohn, the Chicago pianist and pedagogue; Mr. David Mannes, from Brooklyn, a pupil of Halir; Mr. H. M. Hirschberg, the New York musical manager; Mrs. Jeanne Franko, from New York; Mrs. Sarah and Miss Céleste Groenevelt, from New Orleans; Miss Caroline P. Maben, a former student at the Klindworth-Scharwenka Conservatory, who came to say good-bye, as she is returning to the United States, and Miss Melville, from New York, who played for me Paderewski's A minor variations and the Brahms F minor sonata, and who has really made wonderful progress in piano playing under the instruction of Professor Jedliczka.
52A Luckless Impresaria.—Mme. Stolzmann, an impresaria who has created a sensation in Italy for some years past, has just been sentenced to two years' imprisonment.
54The Gerard Prize.—Mme. Gerard, née Elizabeth Bauchain, has by will bequeathed to the Minister of Public Instruction, France, the sum of 10,000 francs; the interest to be awarded every year to the female pupil who has gained the second prize for piano at the Conservatory.
56Milan.—Sonzogno will produce during the autumn season at the International Lyric Theatre, Milan, five of six stars of the first magnitude, Mmes. Van Zandt, Sander- son, Arnoldson, Nuovina, Nevada and Simonnet. Among the novelties will be Saint-Saëns' Phryne, Godard's Vivandiere, and Goldmark's Cricket on the Hearth.
58Brussels.—The Conservatory of Brussels has experienced a great loss by the death of Ferdinand Kofferrath, who for twenty-five years directed the class of counterpoint and fugue. He was seventy-eight years old, a native of Mühl- heim, and the last pupil of Mendelssohn at Leipzig, and went to Brussels fifty years ago. He was the author of many distinguished symphonic works, and had success as a pianist and organist. He was a great favorite of old King Leopold I., who had musical tastes which his present majesty does not inherit. one of two readings
59Brussels.—The Conservatory of Brussels has experienced a great loss by the death of Ferdinand Kofferrath, who for twenty-five years directed the class of counterpoint and fugue. He was seventy-eight years old, a native of Müh- heim, and the last pupil of Mendelssohn at Leipzig, and went to Brussels fifty years ago. He was the author of many distinguished symphonic works, and had success as a pianist and organist. He was a great favorite of old King Leopold I., who had musical tastes which his present majesty does not inherit. one of two readings
61Donizetti at Work.—In 1842 Donizetti made a contract to furnish the Théâtre Italien, Paris, with an opera within the space of three months. One month, two months passed, and to the dismay of the management nothing was forthcoming from the composer, who was enjoying his Paris. At the end of the second month the director reminded him of the date announced for the performance. "Ah, bah," said Donizetti, "we have only twenty-five days! Well, we have lots of time. Do not bother yourself about anything. In five days I'll have the libretto ready, in ten days I can write the score, ten days will do for rehearsals and all will go well." The work was a great success, the artists being Lablache, Mario, Tamburini and Giulia Grisi.
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