Scan 35
Musical Courier 1898-06-01: Vol 36 Iss 952, 1898
74 lines. Read by computer on 23 September 2026. Printed page 36. See the scan on archive.org.
1News from Detroit.
3AND so you have fancied that either my office or my zest as the Detroit representative of THE MUSICAL COURIER had ceased to be! Ah, dear no! Not a bit of it. I simply have yielded to the conviction that a temporary lull, an oblivion pro tem., might be good for you and for me.
5I have been pondering in the meantime, considering the complicating subtleties of the many and varied suggestions gratuitously showered upon me as a young woman mistakenly bent upon the strange and always piquant narration of truth. Not that contrition has moved me to this persistent and past meditation. It was rather the natural regret occasioned by an inherent, but foiled, Irish disposition to please all men and all women, too, for that matter. And as a foregone conclusion I have determined to remorselessly pursue the former tenor of my way regardless of the inevitable, dissenting few.
7I acknowledge but one regret, and that is that my youth offers to some such poignant and aggressive affront. Although just why Truth, glorious Truth, must needs be yielded to the inclusive monopoly of man and withered old age only the Sphinx can tell. Was not the inspiring moral of Georgie and the hatchet as thoroughly inculcated in my youthful mind as in the vacuum of the Johnnie who sat beside me on the schoolroom bench? Positively, my years are hurled at me with a vindictiveness dangerous to encounter.
9Dear people, forgive me, I pray, for 'tis a wrong that time, only too inevitably will right. And you can't tell me that my missionary work has been futile and vain. It is only regrettable that all good things, advice, truth, righteousness and the straight and narrow path, must needs be so painfully and eloquently unpleasant. Take Mr. Hahn as an instance. Of course I was deemed unladylike and impertinent, and a limited public informed that Miss Apel is wanting in all the charms and graces that make of young womanhood so beautiful and touching a thing. But think of the joy of the masses! And the thanks that have been cried unto me! People tell me almost daily "how nicely Mr. Hahn can behave when he wants to and tries to. It is a positive joy to observe his decorous and considerate deportment. He acts just like everyone else!"
11'Tis true there are those who fail to appreciate me. Frederic L. Abel is an instance. Striking similarity of name? Yes, and it is quite as incommoding as it is forcible. Confuses the mail, don't you know, sometimes, and results in an unpleasant and ugly sense of a murky and hazy atmosphere lurking about one. Mr. Abel says my spirit is the same as that displayed by Mr. de Zielinski, now of Buffalo, when he was a resident of Detroit. And his verbal attitude was indicative of an emphatic disapproval of Mr. de Zielinski's scriptory mode of procedure.
13Do you know Mr. Abel? No? Then regret it, for he is a versatile man. He will manage your business and your mail, play the 'cello, toot the horn, beat the drum or mount a gallant steed as discretion may dictate. In short, he is dubbed the best all-round musician in Michigan. I can't remember ever having heard tell of his being termed square.
15A great term that, "all round." His exterior weighs rather against him, but granted that he seems uncouth, gruff and inelegant, let me tell you that his boorish appearance but conceals the quaintest and most unique of spirits. He has a sense of humor that is delicious, so verdant, bucolic and playful.
17Sometimes, you know, he is a manager, a manager of artists, and modern history narrates that a short time ago when a Southern engagement (is St. Louis south or west?) at a stipulated price was offered an organization Mr. Abel represents, or did, he sat him down and tersely tellingly penned the following:
19Mr. ——:
20Your damn niggardly offer would scarce cover the daily beer bill of the —— Quartette. Respectfully,
21F. L. Abel.
23And history further narrates that the recipient utterly failed to sympathetically appreciate the force and humor of Mr. Abel's jocose "bandignity."
25One day he told me in grave and stentorian tones of condemnation that he had never seen but one of my effusions to the MUSICAL COURIER, but that he unreservedly disapproved of my persistent efforts to belittle and cripple the musical interests of my native town. I wonder if the confession or reproof, term it which you will, was induced by my mistaken but considerate neglect to comment upon the violin playing of May Leggett-Abel, his wife, a woman who has studied at home and abroad, and whose striking characteristic is her placid and consistently persistent ability never to play in tune. There is no doubt about it; something should be done, Mr. Abel, quite true. And still there are others who are even more palpably in need of desperate means guaranteed to kill or to cure.
27I am going to indulge in a résumé of the most important musical events of the past months. I won't attempt to cover all the ground in this one epistle, so let there be no fancy of partiality or neglect.
29The artist recital given by Gogorza, Leo Stern, Leon Marx and Florence Taylor was largely a society affair—thanks be to Providence that it was not so heralded—due to the personal energy and interest of Miss Taylor, the daughter of the well-known and esteemed Joseph Taylor. A very elegant reception was tendered the artists by Mrs. Taylor, some five hundred guests attending, and 'twas doubtless due to the personal interest aroused in musical and social circles that Philharmonic Hall was well filled despite the mud and rain, which together combined to make of the evening the most formidably disagreeable night of the season. There was much enthusiasm evinced, although the artists were painfully handicapped by an aggressively incompetent accompanist.
31Leo Stern's playing was the happiest feature of the evening, and it was a general regret that more of the program had not been allotted him. There seemed to be no definite charge made against Gogorza; he invited neither criticism nor enthusiasm, and the impression produced was dull, gray and neutral in tone and coloring. Leon Marx, the violinist, in this age of matured and uncompromising art, is disadvantaged. His youth is not so extreme as to suggest precocity, and yet, while his talent is brilliantly evidenced and his work artistically detailed, he does not compel the unreserved approbation of a big audience.
33Florence Taylor is a pianist of splendid ability. Her choice of the d'Albert Suite for a long and mixed program was unfortunate. Moszkowski's "Barcarolle" she played most exquisitely and perfectly, with charm and grace, splendid rhythm and temperament. She plays with dignity and a convincing seriousness, and there are many who would eagerly avail themselves of an opportunity of hearing her in a recital program.
35Joseph Tees undertook the management of Guilmant's Detroit appearance, and strange and unexpected was the gladsome result. The church was well filled, and as a foregone conclusion the Guilmant atmosphere prevailed. There was mental piece and quietude, an unwillingness to depart and disperse, and those to whom a prelude and fugue conveyed but chaos found satisfaction in the personality of dear, venerable Guilmant, in the contemplation of his fine head and his good, kind face, in his humble unpretentiousness and noble simplicity. The only regret or disappointment was experienced by the organists, and students in the choice of theme given him for improvisation—the first four measures of "Way Down Upon the Suwanee River."
37Gustin Wright, once W. C. G. Wright, of this city, has been en evidence, inasmuch as he has given two organ recitals. M. Gustin is one of those who overwhelm me with the courtesy of a plentitude of press tickets an hour or two before the auspicious event is to occur, and who then finds grievous affront in my ability to do nothing other than keep some previous engagement. I have not heard Mr. Wright in public, but a marked improvement is generally conceded him.
39He had everything to learn when he left for Paris and Guilmant. If pure, unadulterated, unrestricted nerve and assurance be potent factors to that shadowy thing, Success, Mr. Wright bids fair to shed his radiance upon the universe at large. He is young, he looks professional in an elusive sort of a way, wears a silk hat, a dreamy eye and a persuasive. Oriental smile and manner, and he conscientiously lives up to his own unique conception of the ethics of art. He is embarrassed by no diffidence in vaunting his sometimes fanciful exploits, his egotism is of the versatile and diverting order, and for a man young in years and a babe in art he is most promising in his attempts to render the details of his personality and existence as artistically idiosyncratic as tradition and popular taste dictate and make possible. Mr. Wright has not yet stunned New York or Boston; the effete East knows him not. "You see, Guilmant has killed this season for Clarence Eddy and me. He's an old man with a big reputation, you know. But next season you'll hear from us" (meaning Clarence Eddy and me, I presume), "and in the meantime we are all going back to Paris together, Guilmant, Clarence Eddy and me, you know."
41Bon voyage to you, Gustin.
43The Symphony Orchestra has given three concerts thus far this season. Three may not seem an imposing number to a disinterested outsider, but I guess the localites feel that the quantity has been quite sufficing. G. Arthur Depew has conducted, and the atmosphere for the men, I understand, has been a genial and humane one. G. Arthur sits upon his little table, wields his little baton, smokes his little cigarette in rhythms numerous and varied and basks in a popularity induced in part by a humid atmosphere of rehearsals, pipes and cigars and astute abbreviations.
45The subscription list this year has been an astonishingly fat one, and the first concert aroused quite a bit of enthusiasm. But, dear me, the mob becomes calloused to even the best. And eventually people were disinterestedly conferring their tickets on friends and enemies.
47The detail of the management is positively diverting. Fritz Kalsow, the manager, has no financial backing, there is no reserve fund, and he has much with which to contend. His ingenuity is in consequence to be perhaps deemed little less than a kindly caprice of fate. Kalsow is undoubtedly an ardent devotee of the divine muse; the inspiration of his persistency and zeal is one of our local mysteries, and we have many. The management of the orchestra entails endless energy and labor and but a petty lucrative little. But Kalsow has humor and Kalsow has finesse—a delicious finesse. Fancy him in that capacity. But then, we live in an hour and an age when words are subtly suggestive and darkly evasive, and Kalsow, I repeat, is delicious. For instance, he has tacitly made of his concerts a kindergarten for wigglesome, shrinking and modest but aspiring pianists. The fancy is a philanthropic one—if you fancy that view. We all love children—at least we should—and Kalsow, kindly man, indulges a fancy for pianistic babes. Not that he pays them. Heaven forbid! They pay him—but then, that bit of information is entre nous.
49They come to him, the deaf, the dumb and the blind—the dear, fond teachers and their expectant prodigies, with their fond hopes and wobbly muscles, their nervy aspirations and nerveless digits, with a heart and a piano for any fate and a head prepared for none, and they cry unto him: "Papa Kalsow, how much?" And papa benignly eyes them, and responds, "Dear teacher and dear pupil, is it merely bad or is it worse? And what is it you fain would play? A Weber concertstück, fleet and passing, or some concerto long drawn out, remorseless and tortuous? Fees, my dears, are proportionate."
51Seriously speaking, however, it must be admitted that as regards the orchestral work this has been readily recognized as the most satisfactory season the Symphony has known for several years. The men have played with more fire and energy, with more regard to detailed effect, the direction has been more forcible, the coloring warmer and more varied, and save for undue lengthiness the programs have been happily chosen. Some of the most enjoyable numbers were arrangements most effectively made by Mr. Depew.
53An appreciable astonishment was induced by the soloists. There are many of us still idly conjecturing as to the wherefore of their engagements when we have infinitely superior home talent. 'Twas policy, certainly not discretion, that dictated their choice.
55Mr. Yunck occasioned a festive mood by his à la Strauss pose when he directed and fiddled at the last concert to his heart's content. It was rather farcical, somewhat unbecoming and wholly forced. Don't strain your versatility further, we pray, Herr Yunck.
57I am reserving some of the musical and more of the gossipy news for next week.
59Mr. James, Miss Stoddard, the St. Cecilia and Mr. Corey, the Tuesday musicale, Mrs. Crowley, the Apollo and Madrigal Clubs all remain to be touched upon. And the Hofmann concerts! Indeed, yes! There is much that is interesting to be told, some things glad and some things sad, but all piquant.
61LILLIAN APEL.
63Spring-time Music at Elmhurst.
65The Florence Buckingham Joyce Trio were particularly happy in their selections for the afternoon of spring music given recently by Miss Kate Percy Douglas at the residence of Mr. and Mrs. T. F. Devoe at Elmhurst, L. I. Among the compositions, all given with pleasing effect, were "Le Matin" from Grieg's "Peer Gynt Suite," "Serenade" by Saint-Saëns, a quartet for violin, 'cello, piano and organ, the latter played by William C. Carl, and "Spring Voices," a song by Mr. Carl, which Mrs. Joyce arranged especially for this occasion, and of which Mr. Carl expressed his approval to Mrs. Joyce in a letter ending with these words:
67"It was excellently done, with much finesse and shading, giving a result that could only be obtained after careful rehearsal. Let me congratulate you and the ladies, and accept my best wishes for your success.
69Sincerely yours, WILLIAM C. CARL."
71Cleveland, Ohio.
73Hermann O. C. Korthener, whose excellent reputation in Brooklyn is well remembered by musicians, seems to be equally successful as an instructor in Cleveland, Ohio. "At the recent pupils' concert none could fail to observe," says THE MUSICAL COURIER correspondent, "that even those whose technical skill was less advanced showed surprising appreciation of the true spirit of the music." Some features of the concert are entitled to special mention, among them Miss Berenice Agnew's interpretation of Mr. Korthener's composition, which was marked by appreciation of the dramatic elements of the song; Miss Sarah Lavin's broad singing of Schubert's "Die Allmacht"; Miss Frances J. Bolton's playing of the Beethoven Sonata, op. 31, No. 2, and Miss Lily Jackson's beauty of touch and tone in the Grieg Ballade, op. 24. Mrs. R. H. Bulley, of Canton, closed the recital with a finished performance of two Chopin numbers—the Scherzo, op. 20, and the Andante Spianato and Polonaise.
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