Scan 21
Musical Courier 1897-11-24: Vol 35 Iss 925, 1897
34 lines. Read by computer on 25 September 2026. No printed page number was found. See the scan on archive.org.
1Innes and His Concert Band.
3YEARS ago, when Ole Bull was playing in this country, Vieuxtemps, the violinist, arrived. "Now," said the critic—an old chronicler tells the story—"we shall see what good playing really is." Vieuxtemps played; the critics praised him; they were all enchanted with his correctness and his style, which they spoke of in learned technical terms, and after dinner they all repaired to—Ole Bull's concert.
5The story may answer the question that is often asked as to the difference between an orchestra and a good band. The band draws the people. They may appreciate the orchestra, and may praise it, but in their hearts they have a hidden love for the music of the band. They may talk learnedly of the orchestral instruments and the effects of strings and woodwinds and the due balance of parts, but when it all comes down to the practical test of enthusiasm, in-doors and out-doors, the people in most parts of the country will flock to hear the music which has from childhood associated itself with their every-day life. The orchestra is for state occasions. The band is for all occasions.
7When the band is one like that conducted by Innes, which has passed so far above the ordinary type of band that it is ranked by many as equal to an orchestra, the people's preference is justified. An orchestra, for instance, can never be as satisfactory as an Innes band when interpretation and leadership are considered. The concert band of Innes is as perfect in its way as the present state of music, the leader's singleness of purpose and a permanent organization allow. The Innes band gives pleasure even to the lover of classical music by brilliant and correct playing, even the string effects being simulated by careful management of the reed instruments.
9The whole performance is characterized by unity of intention, Innes leading in the real sense of the word, knowing every note of every man's score and swaying his men by the power of his enthusiasm and his knowledge. Every eye in the Innes band is upon the leader. One secret of the great success of Innes is this power of concentrating the attention of his men. He is himself no diffusive rambler after many strange gods.
11Innes' whole career offers an interesting subject for thought to musicians or students of human nature, and a glance at it will enable anyone to understand why the Innes band is now one of the three great American concert bands and may become the greatest unless all signs fail. For a band, however able the individual members may be, can only achieve fame through the leader. Like any army it must be led to victory or defeat.
13When Innes was a small boy he first showed his musical proclivities by his intense interest in the trombone of a brass band. He was sure that all the music of the band proceeded from the trombone. He prevailed upon his father to get him one and after many failures he began to control the unwieldy instrument. At the age of fourteen he was the first trombonist in Her Majesty's First Life Guards, and was called the best trombonist in Europe. Four or five years later Gilmore had heard of him and brought him to the United States, where for several years he was a sensation wherever he appeared. At this time he received sometimes $300 per week and did not play as a rule in the band, but only played two or three solos at each appearance. He was contemporary with Levy and imitated Levy's delicate cadenzas and brilliant tours de force. Levy, it is said, has never had another imitator. The instrument chosen by young Innes is considered by the best authorities to be capable of a most perfect imitation of the human voice, if properly played. It requires unerring accuracy and judgment and the most delicate sensibilities. For these reasons it was for many years after its invention greatly neglected; even when its use was indicated in old scores the part was often omitted for lack of suitable performers. Mozart began to make use of the trombone more freely than other composers; Wagner and Berlioz employed it fully when they desired certain gorgeous combinations of tone. Innes has shown its value as a solo instrument.
15But the success gained in this manner was only preliminary to a higher ambition. He soon organized a concert band and went through the country with it several times; and even in this early stage of his leadership he began to balance his men in true orchestral fashion and study unique orchestral effects. After these several tours he was offered the position of bandmaster in the Thirteenth Brooklyn Regiment, and taking a number of his men with him he soon began to bring musical honors to the regiment, which became known throughout the United States. Since Innes left the regiment it seems to have returned to its former obscurity.
17Six years ago Innes organized his present concert band, and most of the men who were with him then are still under his direction. There are from fifty to sixty-five of these men, none of them ordinary musicians, each one an actual or a possible soloist, and several of them of the highest distinction as special artists.
19But Innes did not perfect some of his peculiar innovations until three years ago, and it is more particularly since that time that his band has been a dominating musical force at festivals and expositions in all parts of the United States. The improvements sought for have been gained partly by the introduction of new reed instruments, by careful modification of the brass, and by the use for bass tones of graded tubas and two bass violins. The triple B tuba is an invention due to diagrams made by Innes and sent to a competent maker to complete. But the improvements are more specially due to the artistic standards maintained by Innes. He allows no deviation from his standard and never permits his band to associate itself with undignified musical enterprises. For his band has the repertory of a Thomas or a Seidl orchestra, and though it may be wiser in many instances for the band to give a program of so-called popular music, it may and often does give a classical program with the same care as to detail and general interpretation that characterizes a performance by the best modern orchestras. It is not strange, therefore, to learn that the classical compositions have often, as for example several times at the Nashville Centennial, awakened as much enthusiasm as the most brilliant descriptive music.
21Innes does not claim, however, to be a musical educator. He believes in giving them the best of all kinds of music and allowing them to choose what they prefer. He studies out his programs with intense earnestness, and has been known to spend three hours on one program. He knows every detail down to every note, and considers no point too small to attend to as bearing upon the whole. He constantly measures and balances effects, and, as evidenced at the last great festival in Nashville, is an artist to the finger tips. "The Hunting Scene," "The Forge in the Forest" and "A Day at the Centennial" gave to many who had not seen an operetta a glimpse of what an operatic ensemble might mean, and drew plaudits from staid opera goers. That Innes' efforts to interest and amuse the public at Nashville were practically appreciated was shown by the attendance the week in which the great musical festival took place under his sole charge. Previous to the festival week the attendance averaged 6,000 to 9,000 each day; during that week it increased to an average of 30,000 each day. But this was no new experience for the accomplished leader, who for six years has been the great "drawing card" at the Pittsburg exhibition, a city where every child knows his name and face, who has played at every great exposition, either State or national, in the United States, from Maine to California, "from Atlanta to the sea."
23The personal characteristics of Innes are those which would be expected of a leader of men. He has indomitable energy and ambition, and is a strict disciplinarian. He is quick to detect errors, and knows whether they are excusable. The man at a bass violin made the excuse one day when called to account by Innes that his bow slipped. "Yes," said Innes, "the bow slips sometimes, but never there." As he plays every instrument in the band himself, he cannot be hoodwinked by any player, and he remembers each man's part in the immense repertory, which is so large that the band can play for six weeks twice a day changing the program at each concert. Throughout this repertory he conducts without score, and assumes the whole responsibility, his men following him with absolute precision. He is the band, as every leader should be, and for him his men entertain profound respect.
25Although often misunderstood, sometimes called a classicist and sometimes a sensationalist, Innes keeps on steadily in his aim of lifting his concert band as near as possible toward orchestral perfection. Since his men play together for ten months in the year the results attained are not as surprising as they might be otherwise. Only a permanent organization can expect to become a powerful musical force. The Innes tour begins in Baltimore this season with a musical festival, in association with an orchestra of seventy pieces and a chorus of 500 voices; thence the band goes to Southern and Western cities, and finally to New Orleans, returning by way of Savannah and Atlanta.
27Katherine Kautz.—The talented young pianist, Katherine Kautz, continues to meet with success, as the appended notices indicate:
29This was followed by the appearance of Miss Katherine Kautz, a young pianist, whose technic and artistic temperament were evidenced by her rendition of Nocturne, Chopin; Scherzo Valse, Chabrier; "One Little Star," Raff, and "Dr. St. Paul," Zeiter, engaged the attention of the society. The voices blended harmoniously. Miss Kautz followed with a fantasia from Van Westerhout, and the "Soirée de Vienne," No. 6, by Schubert-Liszt. Bridge's "Two Snails" were not so slow when the society sang the tuneful number.—Troy Daily Times.
31Miss Kautz, the instrumental soloist, is a pianist of ability. While not a heroic player, she is yet very interesting and interpreted her numbers clearly and intelligently. Her pieces were Nocturne, by Chopin; Scherzo Waltz, by Chabrier; Fantasia, by Van Westerhout, and "Soirée de Vienne," No. 6, by Schubert-Liszt. She was the recipient of a hearty encore and responded.—Troy Press.
33Miss Katherine Kautz, pianist, took for her selections Nocturne, Chopin; Scherzo Valse, Chabrier; Fantasia, Van Westerhout, and "Soirée de Vienne," No. 6, Schubert-Liszt. It was Miss Kautz's first public appearance, and a storm of flowers and compliments upon her fine playing, the welcome promise of extended health and fire, filled the evening with the grateful element of triumph; a comfort in which the Troy Vocal Society joined heartily with the audience.—Troy Evening Standard.
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