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Musical Courier 1897-01-13: Vol 34 Iss 880, 1897
93 lines. Read by computer on 23 September 2026. Printed page 13. See the scan on archive.org.
1THE MUSICAL COURIER.
3BOSTON, Mass., January 10, 1897.
5THE RACONTEUR spoke some days ago about the song of Richepin concerning the lover who cut out his mother's heart to carry it to his cruel mistress; and as the wretch was hastening back to the rewarding arms, he stumbled and fell; the heart asked: "Are you hurt, my son?"
7Now, there is an old French song which gave perhaps this idea to Jean Richepin. It is one of those strange, often fantastical songs called Complaintes, for the word "ballade," as it is used to-day, was scarcely known in France before the beginning of this century, and it was put in fashion by novels of Sir Walter Scott. The word "ballade" in France before 1800 was applied to a kind of dance song, the Italian "balata," which entered France through Provence.
9I do not know the title of this Complainte; I am not able to find the whole of the poem; but here is a free-and-easy prose translation of the fragments that I have seen:
11*** "You come from seeing your darling, who is not far from here. I would give one hundred pistoles to have her heart right here."
13"Oh, give them to me, my mother; I'll go at once to find her."
15The young page went his way; straight to his darling he went; and when he was at her door he rapped three little raps.
17The fair one sprang to let in her lover. He took her by the hand so white and led her into her garden. They went under a grafted tree, a tree that gives seeds, but does not flower; and when they were under this grafted tree he said, "It is here that you must die."
19He plucked her heart from her body and wrapped it in his white handkerchief.
21"Look here, look here, mother, my mother; here's your heart's desire!"
23Now Julien Tiersot declares that Richepin found in this Complainte the motive of his own heart-rending song. "Only in the folk-song," adds Mr. Tiersot, "the heart does not speak." Yes, and the exquisite horror of the Richepin song is the piteous interest of the mother in her son's welfare. All maternity is in that plucked out bleeding heart.
25***
27Then there is a dreadful story about a heart in Barbey d'Aurevilly's "La Vengeance d'une Femme," and also in "A un Diner d'Athées." But let us talk of more cheerful things.
29***
31The fourth concert of the Kneisel Quartet was given in Association Hall the 4th. The program included Beethoven's quartet, op. 59, No. 2; Mozart's E flat quartet; and a sonata for piano and violin in A minor, op. 34, by Mrs. Beach, which was performed for the first time. This sonata was played by Mr. Kneisel and the composer.
33I am sorry I did not hear this sonata. My colleague, Mr. Woolf, of the Herald, and I attended the first performance in Boston of Half a King, by Francis Wilson and his company, at the Tremont. Mr. Capen wrote the following review for the Journal:
35Of the new sonata by Mrs. Beach it is a pleasure to write that from beginning to end it fairly teems with musical ideas, all fine, original and fresh. There is not a commonplace bar or cadence in it; neither anything feebly said at second hand. The short first subject of the opening movement is in the pure minor or hypo-dorian mode, and has a quaint, incisive rhythm all its own. The second subject offers a fine contrast, and is full of just such comfortable enjoyment as one derives from an idealized waltz. The second movement, a quick scherzo, could but have put everybody in good humor, while leaving the appetite keen for the admirably contrasting movements that followed. In the third movement, a largo condolore, there is a succession of distinct, delicately quaint and mystical changes, which seem also to present a series of musical interrogations. With a remarkably spirited allegro con fuoco the sonata comes to an end, this final movement containing an abundance of free, clear and natural counterpoint, while at the same time being a bright and animated composition not without many a dash of fantasy, almost elishness. The sonata, as a whole, is an eminently sincere, spontaneous and able work, and one that bears the stamp of originality as well as scholarship of surpassing merit. It contributed the most interesting feature of perhaps the most interesting concert of the Kneisel Quartet season thus far.
37It is only fair to say that there are widely differing opinions concerning the worth of this sonata. Neither Mr. Apthorp in the Transcript nor Mr. Elson in the Advertiser was enthusiastic in praise, or positive in condemnation. I do not mean to do either of these gentlemen an injustice, but it seemed to me the day after the concert that their opinions were miscellaneous and their vote uncertain. Perhaps I am too exacting, too much like the man who not only called a spade "a spade," but insisted on the phrase, "a damned spade."
39Mr. Apthorp took to the wood; that is, he sought refuge behind the piano lid. He cherishes the belief, in all honesty, that a piano lid should be raised in a chamber concert. Mrs. Beach played with the lid down. Therefore Mr. Apthorp could not understand fully the sonata, because he could not hear the piano part. Now I believe the lid should be down, especially when the piano is a concert grand. Messrs. Joseffy, Paderewski, Miss Aus der Ohe and other prominent pianists have played with piano lid closed in chamber concerts in this city and have charmed the hearers. A concert grand, with lid flaringly open and an athletic pianist with hands ready to bash the keys, while a pavid violinist stands within safe distance, is to me one of the most pathetic sights in the picture gallery of music, but Mr. Apthorp is of sterner stuff; he delights in the roar and thunder of battle.
41Mr. Kneisel admires the sonata and calls it a work of much more than ordinary merit. I understand that the violin part is of extreme difficulty; not the difficulty that comes from inexperience on thoughtlessness in writing for the instrument, but difficulties that are inherent, necessary to the expression of the thought; difficulties that repay the labor spent in o'ercoming them.
43***
45You have talked agreeably about Half a King, and I shall not tell the story or criticise the performance; for the cast is, I believe, the same as it was in New York. But I wish that some of Lajarte's music to the original libretto—Le Roi de Carreau Nouveautés, Paris, October 26, 1883—had been preserved. I suppose much of it is beyond the ability of Mr. Wilson and his comedians, although we may yet see Siegfried with Miss Glaser as Brünhilde and Mr. Wilson as Mime. This is a period of vaulting ambitions.
47I confess I like the libretto of Half a King better than the music; but Messrs. Lettierer and Vanloo are experienced librettists, and Mr. Smith followed them closely, while Mr. Englander is not the equal of Lajarte.
49You remember that Mistigris is about to hit the pitcher in the Court of Miracles just before he is to wed Pierrette. Do you remember in Hugo's Notre-Dame the wedding scene in the Court of Miracles? The guests were vagabonds and thieves. Gringoire was the groom and Esmeralda the bride. "The Duke of Egypt, without uttering a word, brought forth a clay pitcher. The gypsy girl presented it to Gringoire. 'Throw it on the ground,' said she. The pitcher broke in four pieces. 'Brother,' then said the Duke of Egypt, laying his hands upon their foreheads, 'she is thy wife; sister, he is thy husband—for four years. Go thy way.'"
51Now, this scene of the pitcher is in Le Roi de Carreau, and there are two versions of a song that evidently startled Mr. Smith in his work of adapting. One song begins:
52Cette cruche est un emblème,
53Un précieux talisman
54Au gai pays de Bohême.
55And the refrain is:
56Fille gentille et sage
57Retenez bien cela,
58Ce n'est qu'un jour du mariage
59Qu'il faudra casser la cruche, que voilà!
60And the refrain of the other version is:
61Mais un jour, patatras,
62Un jour, quoi qu'elle fasse
63Tout en ne voulant pas,
64La cruche se casse.
65See for further information the famous picture by Greuze.
67***
69Mr. Max Heinrich gave his first concert this season in Steinert Hall, on the 5th. He sang songs by Schubert, Schumann, Moór, MacDowell, Templeton Strong, Brahms, Foote. The program contained little that was new, but even the familiar songs of Schubert seemed new through Mr. Heinrich's interpretation. I know of few more interesting song singers than Mr. Heinrich. I am not blind to his technical faults, which sometimes rise to the dignity of crimes, but even when I am ready to protest against some unwarrantable liberty in rhythm or the aggressive singing of consonants, there will be a masterly dramatic stroke, or display of soaring imagination that disarms criticism and compels applause. Mr. Strong's songs, Philon and Shall a Smile, were sung here once by Mr. Heinrich when he assisted Mr. MacDowell in concert. They almost persuade; they are almost authoritative; they just fall short of the work; for they suggest music that Mr. Strong might have written.
71Mr. Heinrich's daughter Julia will make her début at his next concert, the 18th.
73***
75Mrs. W. H. Sherwood, pianist, assisted by Messrs. Jacques, Hoffmann and Carl Barth, gave her second concert in Association Hall the 5th. Miss Suza Doane and Mr. Albert Gérard-Thiers gave a concert in Chickerin Hall the 6th. The hall was filled with an applausive audience. Mr. Martinus Sieveking gave the first of his piano recitals yesterday afternoon in Steinert Hall.
77***
79The program of the eleventh Symphony concert was as follows;
81Overture to Anacreon,………………………………………Cherubini
82Divertimento for violin and orchestra, in A minor, op. 9………….Loeffler
83I. Preamble: Allegro (A minor).
84II. Elogue: Andante (F major).
85III. Carneval des Morts: Moderato (A minor).
86Overture, Scherzo, Notturno and Wedding March from
87Midsummer Night's Dream……………………………Mendelssohn
88Symphony in E flat major (B. & H., No. 8)…………………Mozart
90Mr. Loeffler's divertimento, the solo part of which was played most brilliantly by the composer, was the feature of the concert. When this work was first performed here two years ago I wrote at length and in eulogistic phrases concerning it for THE MUSICAL COURIER. A second hearing has only enlarged my admiration.
92The musical fastidiousness of Mr. Loeffler is neither arrogant nor snobbish; but it is a species of refinement that will not tolerate a commonplace in thought or expression. This fastidiousness or refinement is the chief characteristic of this composition, which is illuminated throughout by imagination. When it is necessary, for Mr. Loeffler to be macabre he is sinister enough; but his shudder is always that of a nevrose, not of a sleek, fat-witted person who is shocked materially. Take the last movement for instance; I know few passages even in dramatic music that produce such pronounced goose-flesh as his first chord, which calls to mind the whole Inferno. But a cool head, that knows how to reject as well as to accept prevents him from sinking into vulgarity or mistaking noise for sound. The word "vul-
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