Scan 4
Musical Courier 1901-11-27: Vol 43 Iss 1131, 1901
52 lines. Read by computer on 21 September 2026. Printed page 5. See the scan on archive.org.
1Berlin Branch Budget
3German Headquarters of The Musical Courier, Berlin, W., Linkstrasse 17.
5November 5, 1901.
7Berlin Concerts.
9COLONNE and his Parisian orchestra were here last week for one concert. They used the Royal Opera House, graciously lent by Emperor Wilhelm. Thus the occasion was not without a certain political significance. For us musicians the concert was interesting, because we saw in Colonne the man who had taught Paris to like Wagner, and because we were afforded a rare chance to compare Colonne with our Berlin conductors, and his men with our vaunted Philharmonic Orchestra. By the way, odious as they are, there is nothing that your musician likes better than comparisons.
11The very first number called for some. When a strange conductor plays here Beethoven's third "Leonore" overture it is equivalent to throwing a gauntlet in the face of the critics. Colonne's boldness went even farther. He played as though he had never heard of the dread word "tradition." His tempi were his own. And so were the precision and finish of his band. The audience suddenly awoke to the fact that in order to conduct Beethoven properly a leader need not stand like a wooden image and chop off measures, phrases and periods with the fatal regularity of a cutting machine. This was a suave, smooth Beethoven, and he pleased his hearers immensely. Mainly responsible for the polished reading were the strings and the woodwind. It were difficult to imagine a finer body of first violins. In volume, quality and unanimity their work seemed ideal. It is the fashion always to praise French woodwind instruments. After hearing them last week I am content to go with the fashion. I found the brass a trifle blatant at times, but not disturbingly so. The Germans seem to get more mellowness and variety of tone from their brasses. It is difficult to say whether the players or the instruments are responsible.
13Apropos of the tendency on the part of our Berlin critics to arrogate to themselves the sole right of dispensing authoritative Beethoven lore, I would recall a certain incident that happened here about two years ago. Every Berlin critic will tell you that he knows Beethoven's third "Leonore" overture in his sleep, backward and forward, from memory. At one of the Philharmonic concerts Nikisch placed this piece on his program. By way of an experiment, and in order to hear the opinion of the critics, he did not end the piece with its own coda, but used instead that of the second "Leonore" overture, entirely different in harmonic and orchestral treatment. Of all the bearded music sages who listened severely, not one noticed the substitution. It was left to an American critic—oh! those unmusical Americans—to discuss the change in his paper. The critic, Otto Floersheim; the paper, the New York Musical Courier.
15But to return to our concert. Charpentier's richly colored orchestral suite, "Impressions d'Italian," was music which these Frenchmen played con amore. Here Colonne showed that he, too, is a master of nuance. In the Beethoven number he had drawn a larger design, had made apparent the fact that it is music cast in one mold. But the Charpentier piece was a delightful succession of varying musical moods, a series of many hued miniatures, lyrical, humorous, grave, triste, sentimental. Colonne displayed all the tricks of phrasing and dynamics that belong to the modern conductor's technic of characterization.
17Saint-Saëns' A minor Symphony is pleasant music, and was pleasantly played. The work should figure more frequently at orchestral concerts.
19Wagner's "Venusberg" music, from "Tannhäuser," was done with force and fire. The tempi were exceedingly rapid. This was the more curious as Colonne had played the Beethoven Overture much slower, in all its parts, than it is usually read here by Nikisch and Weingartner.
21"Le dernier sommeil de la vierge," by Massenet, gave the strings a fine chance to display their wonderful pianissimo, and Lalo's Norwegian Rhapsodie did not want for brilliancy and temperament.
23Two bits of Berlioz's "Damnation de Faust" won demonstrative plaudits from the audience. The "Marche Hongroise," long one of Colonne's famous show pieces, was an inimitable piece of orchestral virtuosity.
25The audience was large and most enthusiastic. One ass hissed after the Massenet piece, and was promptly urged into the street. The newspaper reviews are unanimous in their praise.
27Of the second musical feast given by Leopold Godowsky at Beethoven Hall, I missed the most important part, the meat, Tschaikowsky (Sonata, G major, op. 37), Brahms and Schumann. I came for the dessert, Liodow, Rosenthal and Henselt-Weber-Godowsky. And what a dessert it was! Rosenthal's "Papillons," rapturously redeemed, as bright and stimulating as port; Liodow's Berceuse, musical sweets of the most saccharine, and to end with the most difficult technical nuts cracked for us with prodigious ease by that wizard, Godowsky.
29For the thoughtful musician, there was food in the pianist's masterful arrangement of Weber's "Invitation to the Dance." Of course the main purpose was to heap up technical obstacles in order to display the performer, but Godowsky's musicianship and musical taste ever go hand in hand with his virtuosity. The Weber number contains contrapuntal and harmonic episodes of supreme beauty and skill.
31Cheered by a solid platanx of auditors who made most determined front, Godowsky came forth again, and in his version of Weber's "Moto Perpetuum" did the quickest piano playing imaginable. Once more he was forced to his instrument, and as a compliment to Professor Leschetizky, who sat in the parquet applauding enthusiastically, Godowsky added the famous pedagogue's "Arabeske" in A flat. It was another triumphal night for this triumphant pianist, Godowsky.
33The Baginsky Trio, a local organization of three talented young women, gave an extremely interesting concert at the beautiful new recital hall of the Philharmonic. In a Schubert Trio, the brave band displayed reliable musical training, and in Rubinstein's melodious B flat Trio they played with vim and brilliance.
35Their chief merit, however, lay in the fact that they introduced to the Berlin public a singer hitherto unknown here, Minnie Methot, of New York. She chose as the vehicle of this introduction Mozart's "Deh vieni" aria, and Liszt's "Loreley," a severe vocal test. She has a soprano voice of purest quality and most sympathetic timbre. These, together with musical taste and dignity of interpretation, rendered the Mozart number a perfect performance, a fact which the large audience recognized and rewarded with an encore. In the "Loreley" Mrs. Methot proved that she understands also how to win dramatic accents from her voice. The song was done with consummate expression and effect. Volume, a rarely smooth legato and enchanting piano were all in evidence. Again the success was unequivocal, and after much applause the singer added an English song.
37Gottfried Galston is by all means a recital pianist. At Bechstein Hall, without orchestra, he was a much better player than at Beethoven Hall recently, with orchestra. In the smaller room his lack of strength was not so apparent, and closer contact with the audience revealed many details that were lost at his first concert. His best playing was done in the Brahms numbers, delivered with poetry and insight. His audience were of my opinion, and proved it by compelling Galston to many bows and encores.
39Eva Lessmann, the daughter of one of Berlin's venerable critics, gave a song recital at Beethoven Hall. In a program embracing lyrics by Schubert, Liszt (welcome sight), Brahms, Cornelius and R. Strauss, Miss Lessmann displayed interpretative gifts of no mean order. She knows well how to fathom the mood of a song, and how to send that mood across the footlights. These are separate arts, not always combined in some of our best known singers. Particularly was this rare power noticeable in the Brahms group. Miss Lessmann's voice needs further careful training and more experience in large concert halls. At present it seems to lack flexibility and freedom. Given unhampered vocal resources, in a few years Miss Lessmann should make of herself one of the best German lieder singers.
41The French invasion of Berlin was continued by the Parisian sisters Chaigneau, Therese, Suzanne and Marguerite, who played trios for piano, violin and 'cello at Bechstein Hall. Vincent d'Indy (in B), Camille Saint-Saëns (in F), and Ed. Lalo (in A minor), constituted their program. My nightly sprint through Berlin's concert halls allowed of only twenty minutes' stay with the pretty, white gowned sisters. During that time I heard them play the Scherzo and the Allegro of Saint-Saëns' clever Trio. Vivacious music it was, and brightly played. Extreme delicacy of touch, precision of attack, and absolute refinement marked what little I heard from the Chaigneau sisters.
43Two other trio concerts drew large audiences last week. Professor Georg Schumann (piano), Prof. Carl Halir (violin), and Royal Prussian chamber virtuoso Dechert ('cello) held forth at the Singakademie. I heard them play a new piano quintet, by Ludwig Thuille, whose opera "Lobestanz" was performed here about two years ago. The quintet is well made, interesting and effective. There is nothing strikingly original about its form or content. Who does write anything strikingly original nowadays in the overworked field of chamber music? I often wonder whether it has a future, whether it will ever find its Wagner?
45At the Philharmonie one could hear another professional trio, consisting of Messrs. Barth, Wirth and Hausmann, all of them teachers at the Royal High School for Music (Hochschule). Hear these gentlemen one season, and you have heard them always. The same programs, the same readings, the same audiences (with a goodly sprinkling of patriarchs wearing black velvet caps, and kindly faced grandames busily knitting shapeless socks), and the same promiscuous applause. This year there were two changes. Professor Hausmann's tone on the 'cello has grown sour, and Professor Wirth's bowing made one think he was turning an ice cream freezer.
47I must smile when I hear American musicians refer to their German colleagues as "lazy idealists, untainted by the desire for money." (I read this in a musical monthly.) Give them the chance to desire, with some prospect of realization, and they work music for all there is in it. An example of this type is Professor Halir. He teaches violin at the Hochschule, has a large private class, is assistant conductor to Joachim, trains a quartet class, belongs to the Joachim Quartet, gives concerts here, all over Germany and in England, heads the Halir Quartet, belongs to the Schumann Trio and is concertmaster at the Berlin Royal Opera! There is a record for you. Show me its duplicate in America!
49The Singakademie Choral Society gave a concert of unusual interest under the distinguished direction of that most accomplished musician, Prof. Georg Schumann. The work presented was César Franck's "Les Béatitudes." Did you read what Philip Hale and Otto Floersheim said in these columns about that fine piece of choral writing? If not I'm sorry for you, because I don't intend to try the hopeless task of improving on their analyses. The Singakademie were in fine form, and at times found accents intensely poignant and human. Try as you might to look like a hardened critic of twenty years' sitting, you were gripped by the throat and had to swallow hard.
51There came here a singing society of 180 voices from the town of Kattowitz. I looked up my railroad map and found Kattowitz to be in Silesia. Last week, on two evenings, it was in the Singakademie. I went there to see and
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