Scan 4
Musical Courier 1896-12-16: Vol 33 Iss 876, 1896
97 lines. Read by computer on 26 September 2026, twice; the two readings disagreed in places. Printed page 5. See the scan on archive.org.
1THE MUSICAL COURIER.
3GERMAN HEADQUARTERS OF THE MUSICAL COURIER,
4BERLIN, W., LINKSTRASSE 17, November 24, 1896.
6THAT artistic couple Rudolf Gmür, baritone, and Amélie Gmür-Harloff, soprano, from Weimar, gave one of their delightful joint vocal recitals at the Singakademie on Tuesday night of last week. About the lady's clear and fluent soprano voice (she should nevertheless refrain from such coloratura display as is demanded in the Chopin-Viardot transcription), and of her husband's sonorous and mellifluous baritone, as well as of their expressive delivery of Lieder, I have repeatedly written in years gone by, and I should not have mentioned this recital if it were not for the exceedingly interesting program, which contained several novelties, and for that reason I reproduce it:
8Duets—
9Frühlingslied, ………………………………………….. E. Lassen
10Trennung, …………………………………………………. G. Henschel
11Mit Myrthen und Rosen, …………………………… R. Schumann
12Lachen und Weinen, …………………………………. F. Schubert
13Mein Herz ist die Quelle, …………………………… H. Sommer
14Aime-moi, …………………………………………………. Chopin-Viardot
15Amélie Gmür-Harloff.
16Letztes Blühen (cyclus in five Gesängen), …….. H. Sommer
17Rudolf Gmür.
18Norwegische Lieder in Originalsprache—
19Frühling, …………………………………………………. E. Grieg
20Sehnsucht, …………………………………………………. H. Kjerulf one of two readings
21Sehnsucht, ………………………………………………… H. Kjerulf one of two readings
22Sing', sing' Nachtigall du, …………………………… F. Bengzon
23Wiegengedicht, ………………………………………….. Amélie Gmür-Harloff.
24Liedesmacht, …………………………………………….. J. Selmer one of two readings
25Liedesmacht, ………………………………………………. J. Selmer one of two readings
26Dein Rath ist wohl gut, …………………………… E. Grieg
27Geheimnis, …………………………………………………. C. Ansorge
28Schenk ein, …………………………………………………. B. Stavenhagen
29Proschkönig, …………………………………………….. E. Lindner one of two readings
30Proschkönig, ………………………………………………. E. Lindner one of two readings
31Krokodilemma, ………………………………………….. Rudolf Gmür. one of two readings
32Krokodilemma, …………………………………………… Rudolf Gmür. one of two readings
33Mädchenlied, …………………………………………….. B. Stavenhagen one of two readings
34Mädchenlied, ………………………………………………. B. Stavenhagen one of two readings
35Ingerids Lied, …………………………………………….. E. Dell' Acqua
36Villanelle, …………………………………………………. Amélie Gmür-Harloff. one of two readings
37Villanelle, ………………………………………………….. Amélie Gmür-Harloff. one of two readings
39Duets—
40All' die wachsenden Schatten (norwegisch) ……. J. Selmer
41Hans und Grete, ………………………………………….. W. Berger
43If I speak of valuable novelties, I don't mean the Hans Sommer cycle, for that excellent musical mathematician's melodic vein seems to have dried up very quickly and completely, and he works now only with Wagner reminiscences. Nor was I referring with any degree of specialty to Lindner's Krokodilemma, for this not excruciatingly funny song ought to belong to the repertory of the Udel Quartet, or—the Barrisons. Incidentally I may mention that Manager Wolff received a very irritated letter from a Berlin Comstock in the audience, but thereby hangs a tale—not that of the crocodile in the song, but one smuggled into the text by the printer's devil.
45The really interesting novelties were the characteristic Northern Lieder by Selmer, a very pretty lullaby by Bengzon, which was redemanded; the somewhat gesucht but nevertheless very musical songs by Stavenhagen, and above all others two new Lieder by our old friend Conrad Ansorge. Of these the first one is set to four lines by a rising young German poet, Richard Dehmel, whose personal acquaintance I made the other day. Some of his poems are the talk of the day, and are to my mind as Swinburnian as anything that has so far been written in Germany. But the four lines which Ansorge has set to music, and I must say in a transcendently beautiful manner, I have to acknowledge are beyond me, and I can make neither head nor the afore quoted crocodile's hindest part of them. They are called Geheimniss (Secret), and I give them to you for unraveling:
47In die dunkle Bergschlucht kehrt der Mond zurück.
48Eine Stimme singt am Wassersturz:
49O Geliebter, deine höchste Wonne
50Und dein tiefster Schmerz sind mein Glück!
52The second Ansorge song, Schenk ein, to very exhilarating and inviting words by Arno Holz, is quite the cleverest drinking song I have heard for a long time, and with it Herr Gmür made such a hit that he was forced to a da capo, and very nearly a double repetition of the same.
54Wednesday, November 18, was the official day of repentance and atonement set down by the Government. All theatres and other places of amusement were of course closed, and the Royal Opera House was opened only for the serious, not to say sacred, concert, which is annually given on that day for the benefit of the Royal Opera House chorus. This hard worked, conscientious and painstaking body of singers well deserves a benefit, and I am glad to be able to state that the attendance was a large one and that thus the members of the chorus were benefited by this concert.
56Weingartner conducted, and had selected a program of considerable attractiveness, but not one beyond all criticism. He opened with the Parsifal prelude, which he took at an unwarrantable slow tempo, and as the woodwind was not in the very best of trim, the effect was not in accordance with Wagner's intentions. Moreover, Weingartner for some unexplained reasons had tacked on to the Vorspiel the finale of the third act of Parsifal, without chorus, which plays the main part in this superhuman swan song ending. Leaving Bayreuth and its traditions and the daring of such excerpt mutilation out of the question, I don't think that Weingartner accomplished an artistic or even a musically pleasing deed when he perpetrated this piece of vandalism. Thus the greatest sometimes err in judgment.
58Another piece of musical malapropos was to place the Schumann piano concerto between Parsifal and the Brahms German Requiem, the only three numbers on the program. I consider the Schumann work the most beautiful piano concerto ever written, but thus sandwiched in it could not possibly be heard to the best advantage. More unhappily still, the opera house acoustics are not well adapted for piano solo performances, and, to cap the climax, Prof. Heinrich Barth, usually one of the most reliable of artists one can imagine, did not have a good day. Of course he could not play badly, but his proverbially infallible technic was not infallible this time, and his interpretation of the Schumann concerto (putting the highest standard as just and the only one commensurate with Professor Barth's standing as an artist) was rather dry and lacking in sentiment, as well as in poetry.
60An operatic chorus is usually not the very best one to interpret a work like the Brahms German Requiem. Amateur choruses bring to such compositions more naïveté, more genuineness of religious and musical sentiment, than a hard worked professional chorus, which sings to-day the Kermess scene from Faust and to-morrow the gypsy strains from Trovatore. Moreover, you want masses, solid tone volume in such weighty music as Brahms' Requiem, and for such I prefer an amateur chorus of the dimensions of Ochs' Philharmonic chorus to that of our opera house, even if it must be conceded that the latter did very well and their utmost, and that those professionals outweigh in real work and tone production any amateur chorus at the rate of at least two to one.
62The soli in the German Requiem did not fill me with enthusiasm. Frau Thessa Gradl, from the Schwerin Court Opera, whom I did not much admire as Cricket in last summer's première of Goldmark's latest opera, was still less satisfactory in so serious music. She has a nice soprano voice, but she has much to learn yet vocally as well as musically. In the latter respect our venerable Franz Betz is of course beyond reproach, but his vocal organ is now so nearly sung out that the opening words of his baritone solo, Herr lehre doch mich, dass im Ende mit mir haben muss, sounded like a very strong and indeed befitting self-reminder.
64***
66The town is full of good violinists, Petschnikoff, Burmester, Betty Schwabe, Flesch and others, and new ones are coming up every day—"still they are coming." I heard another young violinist, a first-class one at that, on Thursday night, in Bechstein Saal. His name is Max Lewinger, and he played here first some three or four years ago, but since then he has studied more and taught at the Budapest Conservatory. Now he comes back a complete and full-grown artist.
68I enjoyed his finished performance of the Wieniawski D minor concerto very much, and was still more impressed with his broad and elevating interpretation of Bach's noble Chaconne, that chef d'œuvre of unaccompanied violin music.
70***
72In the meantime I proceeded to the Singakademie, where on the same night our Chicago pride, Miss Augusta Cottlow, made her successful début before a very large, recherché and enthusiastic audience. America was of course well represented from the Embassy down, but also Berlin's highest social element, and everybody who plays the piano, or thinks he does, was present, and thus one of the most representative as well as one of the most competent audiences passed verdict over this frail looking but mighty strong little American girl. That this verdict was a unanimously favorable one I am enabled to state from personal observation and from reading of all of the Berlin criticisms, and that the outward success was a great one I took an early opportunity to communicate to you by cable.
74Miss Cottlow played first the Schumann concerto, of which, however, I am sorry to say I heard only the last bars of the intermezzo and the finale. The allegro vivace she performed with a tonal and intellectual power which were truly inspiring, and the technical display, despite the fact that the girl was suffering the tortures of the damned from two sore and split fingers, was wellnigh faultless. It is wonderful what a big tone she was able to draw out of the very same Bechstein grand that had sounded so flat and unyielding the night before at the opera house. In one respect, however, Miss Cottlow overdoes the thing. Her left hand is so much more powerful than her right one that frequently tonal balance is wanting in her playing, and I should advise her in the future to handicap that Sullivanian left arm a trifle for the benefit of the less strong right hander, so as to make, if possible, a dead heat of it. Please excuse my sporting terms in connection with so pretty and sweet a young lady, but really I can find no others which convey so closely what I want to express.
76The Philharmonic Orchestra, which did not accompany well that evening, gave under Mannstaedt's direction as an entremet Saint-Saëns' delightful Rouet d'Omphale, the meaning of which French title one American in my hearing translated to his fair neighbor into the Roué of Omphale. He looked what he said, and she looked daggers.
78If some of the audience might have thought Miss Cottlow as somewhat deficient in the sentimental side of musical reproductive ness, they were most decidedly taught differently in her interpretation of the Chopin E minor concerto. While in the two outer movements she gave us the virile side of Chopin's not infrequently somewhat hypersentimental music, and while she felicitously avoided all maudlin gushing on the piano, all slobbering, exaggerated rubati, she was all woman, all feeling and all poetry in the romanza, and this movement I consider her best interpretation of the evening.
80The Tausig false octaves at the close of the finale were taken at a Rosenthalian speed, and were carried through with an irresistible élan and brilliancy. No wonder the audience cheered, roared and clapped their hands. They wanted more and they were bound to get it. First Raff's La Fileuse, and when that was not enough, and people still waited, applauded and refused to leave the hall, the tired little girl had to come out once more, and this time gave them Schumann's Vogel als Prophet in a Josefian, tender and 'telling mood. It was pleasing and satisfying in the extreme, and thus everybody left the Singakademie in a happy frame of mind, especially we Americans, who had reason to feel proud of our young countrywoman.
82***
84On Friday night I heard first in the Bechstein Saal a tolerably fair pianist, Miss Martha Sauvan, who performed the op. 110 A flat sonata of Beethoven in straightforward but not very interesting fashion, getting mixed up in the beginning of the fugue, but pulling herself together and closing strongly despite this embarrassing slip of memory. In conjunction with her concertized Miss Emmy Pehl, an unimportant mezzo of no striking qualities in any direction. I heard from her a group of Lieder made up from the usual Schumann, Schubert and Franz selections.
86***
88Lilli Lehmann's second vocal recital, which took place the same evening at the Philharmonie, I could not attend. Her program was made up exclusively of Lieder by Robert Franz, to whom the much needed recognition, like to many others, comes after death. Twenty songs by one and the same composer on one evening is "a little much," but Franz, in Lilli Lehmann's variegated interpretation, is reported to have stood the test well, and the Lieder Abend, this time accompanied by Reinhold L. Herman, was an even greater success than its predecessor.
90***
92Instead of to the Philharmonie I wended my way to the Singakademie, where Ossip Gabrilowitsch gave his first concert here with orchestra, and met with a rousing reception. After his first piano recital I ventured upon the rather courageous statement that this young chap (he is scarcely more than eighteen) will eventually become one of the legitimate successors of Rubinstein, and now after I have heard him with orchestra I am more than ever convinced of the correctness of this high estimate.
94Gabrilowitsch has completely and deservedly conquered Berlin just as he did Leipsic, and I am sure if he were to go to the United States he would carry everything before him, for he is just the sort of player to please, interest and excite an American audience. He is full of power, energy, sweep and élan, with the reliable technic to back up with rare infallibility the execution of his ideas. Of what stuff he is made you can see in the by no means conventional selection of his concertos, the Tschaikowsky B flat minor and the Irish flavored C minor one of Saint-Saëns. Wonderful in his strong sense of rhythm and the way he piles up his climaxes, which, without ever overtaxing the natural limits of his very beautiful Bechstein grand, produce a sonority, a tonal volume, which is as rare as it is telling.
96On the other hand, in a little group of solo pieces he
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