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Musical Courier 1902-01-01: Vol 44 Iss 1136, 1902
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1excellent voice and gave an effective accounting of the composition. She responded to an insistent recall with a delightfully given encore number.
3A very creditable organ recital was given last evening (December 11) at Simpson Auditorium, by Miss Ada Showalter and Mrs. Florence Eaker, pupils of Frank H. Colby, assisted by Miss Clementina Barrows, contralto. The program included representative compositions from Bach, Guilman, Gigout, Salome and other writers for the organ. The recital was the sixth given at the Auditorium by Mr. Colby's pupils.
5Edward Baxter Perry gave a lecture-recital at Blanchard Hall November 30. This was Mr. Perry's second annual visit to Los Angeles, and the interest taken by the musical cult of our city in the work of the blind pianist will make his annual visits welcome events.
7Miss Marion Gordon gave a song recital at Blanchard Hall, December 4, before a cultured audience. Your correspondent was unable to be present, but understands the singer made a favorable impression.
9Mme. Emma Nevada is planning to sing in Southern California during this season.
11Julius Albert Jahn, the Milwaukee pianist, is a new addition to Los Angeles musical circles.
13A fine three-manual organ was recently "inaugurated" at the beautiful new Methodist Episcopal Church, Pasadena, by the organist of the church. The performer wholly ignored such writers as Bach, Guilman, Mendelssohn and other composers whose works are supposed by old-fashioned organists to be quite indispensable to a good organ program, and in lieu of organ compositions written by composers for the instrument there were substituted Liszt's derangement (from an organ point of view) of Schubert's "Serenade"; some transcriptions (?) of sacred choruses; an imitation, from a Wallace opera, of Nature in her various moods, and, as a finale, the "Anvil Chorus"! We are a good ways West, yet we still have with us some organists who seem unable to get out of the rut of playing organ music on the organ, and I for one am old fogey enough to trust that the "wonderful performance" of the aforementioned "eminent organist" may find no imitators among us unsophisticated folks. As to the performance, per se, it belonged to the "impressionist school"—much omitted, to be filled in by the imagination.
15Mme. Emma Calvé has created quite a flutter here by legally adopting Edna Darsch, a young Los Angeles girl whose talents and beautiful voice have for a year or more attracted considerable local attention. Edna is a strong, fine looking girl of about thirteen years. Her folks were without the means to do for her as they wished, and the young girl was soon to have given a concert for the purpose of aiding herself. Madame Calvé was prevailed upon to hear her sing, and was so taken with the possibilities within the girl that finding she could obtain the consent of the parents, she took steps to adopt the child, and Edna Darsch-Calvé is now en route to New York with her famous new mother. She will spend much of the next four years under Madame Calvé's personal guidance, and will acquire also a musical training abroad. Miss Edna is exceedingly proficient as a pianist as well as a singer. She was under Herr Becker's instruction in piano playing, and studied vocal work with Miss Elizabeth Carrick. She has appeared with success in a number of concerts under the management of F. W. Blanchard.
17R. U. BATO.
19LOUDON G. CHARLTON, Carnegie Hall, NEW YORK,
20Has the Honor to Announce an Extended Tour of
21KATHERINE RUTH HEYMAN
22Distinguished American Pianist.
23Tour—October to April—New Booking.
24Steinway Piano Used.
26MRS. WEBB GARDNER
27SOPRANO.
28FIRST SEASON IN AMERICA.
29Sole direction, LOUDON G. CHARLTON, Carnegie Hall, New York.
31VIENNA, DECEMBER 14, 1901.
33THE Joachim Quartet has recently given four concerts here. The Vienna critics have only words of fulsome praise. Without unreservedly indorsing all these have to say, we cannot agree with the German Times, which speaks of Joachim's latest performance in Berlin as "soothing," implying that this "soothing" was one of soporific tendency. Vienna certainly managed to keep wide awake. The master's own intonation at times painfully testifies to the fact that he has long passed his prime; but it is old age that gives Joachim his musical force and the supreme beauty which characterizes his conception of such a work as the A major Schumann Quartet? If so, ye tribe of proud young violinists, go add to yourselves years—and rapidly.
35The Brahms A minor was fully satisfying; with the noble cadence one realized that a wonderful work had been wonderfully given, and when the quartet walked off the platform it seemed meet that they should have played in the hall whose walls record in letters of gold Bülow's playing, Carl Reinecke's and Brahms', the Rubinstein cyclus and Liszt's triumphal passage in 1879.
37But is it an abnormal heresy to find fault, though ever so timidly, with Joachim's Beethoven? Whether or no, the B flat Quartet seemed a trifle too sweet and simple, almost Mozartean in parts; moreover, it was cold. Little Bösendorfer Saal went quite mad as usual. It cannot find it, in its innocent heart, to do anything but rejoice.
39On Wednesday, December 3, an unusual thing happened: An absolutely bad performance at the opera, probably one of the very worst of the "Flying Dutchman" ever presented to any public. Reichmann undertook the role of the Dutchman, and succeeded in casting over the whole drama a lurid Svengali glow, very repelling to all lovers of the most lovable of Wagner's works. It is only fair to interpolate that Slezak, notwithstanding the uninspiring environment, made an artistic success of the part of Erik. It is true also that Frau Sedlmair has an exquisite pianissimo, and that she made an attempt at good acting. She made, however, no attempt to lengthen the lines of her buxom, matronly figure. A better costume and a suitable wig might have done something toward producing the illusion of early youth and other Senta requirements. Such artificialities were sternly eschewed, and Frau Sedlmair stood forth and defied the world to say that she is not girlishly slender. Her declamation of the ballad in the second act was remarkable only for a ferocity in attacking the false accents which could scarcely be attributed to any possible conception of sforzandos. The Spinning Chorus was conspicuously bad, even rhythmically quite faulty. And so that nothing should be wanting, even the orchestra! Can the Philharmoniker themselves do wrong? On that evening their most evident desire was to go to sleep themselves and as promptly as possible to induce sleep in their auditors—and still there was deafening applause! Are ovations a foregone conclusion at the Kaiser Königlich Hof Opern Theater? Does Vienna applaud for the pure joy of so doing?
41Some who have heard Sauer's admirable interpretation of the G major Beethoven Sonata, op. 31, No. 1, were shocked, almost pained, at his reading of the A major Mozart Sonata, which opened his program on Wednesday, December 11, in the Grosser Musikverein Saal. It would be impossible truthfully to state that it was not well played. The notes were all there, each one announcing itself with clearness and precisely on time. But the artist concealed himself beneath a mountain of traditions and successfully resisted all temptation to assert his individuality, demonstrate his powers or bring forth the exquisite poetry of the composition. The intention of subordinating virtuosity to music is always praiseworthy. No doubt the learned critics were delighted. This is much; one cannot please everybody. Besides, possibly Sauer, like a kind, painstaking teacher, was playing that particular number for the edification of the numerous conservatory pupils present, who, under the impression that they were improving their opportunities to the utmost, pencil in hand, conscientiously noted down every faint shade of color not already on the printed page before them.
43Enough can scarcely be said in praise of Sauer's reading of the C major Schumann Fantasie. It was most admirable in every respect. The D flat Chopin Nocturne and the Mendelssohn-Liszt "Auf Flugeln des Gesanges" were faultless. Sauer revealed in pianissimos, and they were beautiful and full of meaning. The Brahms Variations on a Händel Theme were not what others have led us to expect from the gigantic work. Indeed, even a casual glance at the notes reveals intellectual and dramatic contents not forthcoming in Sauer's interpretation. As for his own G flat study, its composition may possibly have been a suitable whiling away of idle moments, but there is no excuse for putting such a thing on a classic program. Probably the composer wished to show that he can play his work; probably there are few others who can. But he scarcely needed this for the exhibition of his immense virtuosity; the Liszt Rhapsody, No. 9, gave him ample opportunities, and he gloriously availed himself of them.
45Moreover, not content with pianistic display, Sauer amused himself with circus antics which raised fears in some minds that at any moment he and his chair would be violently projected onto the heads of the unoffending front rows. But Vienna has adopted Sauer as one of her children, and she is an indulgent mother. The brilliant audience would not tire of applauding, and the concert
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