Scan 33
Musical Courier 1902-03-26: Vol 44 Iss 1148, 1902
88 lines. Read by computer on 26 September 2026. Printed page 34. See the scan on archive.org.
1BOSTON, Mass., March 23, 1902.
3The second and last week of the Grau Opera Company presented the following works: Monday, "Tannhauser"; Tuesday, "The Marriage of Figaro"; Wednesday afternoon, "Carmen"; Wednesday evening, "The Huguenots"; Thursday, "Lohengrin"; Friday, "Othello"; Saturday afternoon, "The Magic Flute," and in the evening, "Cavalleria Rusticana" and "I Pagliacci."
5"Tristan and Isolde" was to have been given Thursday night, but owing to the indisposition of van Dyck and Bispham the opera had to be changed.
7The patrons have had very little to complain of as regards changes in the announcements.
9The great event of the week was the "Othello" performance.
11In this opera Mrs. Eames was seen at her best and Alvarez gained a pronounced success. So also did Scotti.
13The audience was madly enthusiastic at the end of the second act, and the performers were recalled time and time again. No such uproarious enthusiasm was displayed at any of the other performances.
15Seppilli, who did so badly with "Aida," redeemed himself on this occasion and was brought out before the curtain in recognition. I was pleased to see this exceptionally talented conductor thus re-establish himself in the estimation of the audience.
17It will be found that none of the later Wagner works found a place in the repertory during the season.
19"The Magic Flute" and "Othello" drew the largest audiences. There was a large audience present at the performance of "Cavalleria" and "I Pagliacci." The season has proved a financial success.
21The city of Boston instituted a music department April 23, 1898, for the purpose of creating a love for good music among the common people, and provided a municipal band of forty instruments to carry out the scheme. During the summer months about forty outdoor concerts are given in different parts of the city, besides the regular concert given on Boston Common each Sunday afternoon. E. N. Catlin was the conductor the first season, when only outdoor concerts were given by the brass and reed band.
23He was succeeded by Emil Mollenhauer, and the scope of the department increased by the institution also of a municipal orchestra.
25The effort is made to have as many members of these organizations as possible native by birth, the assisting vocalists coming under the same head, while only English words are allowed to be sung.
27Twice this past year Mr. Mollenhauer, with a well drilled orchestra of fifty players, has given a program of works by American composers only.
29A second branch of this music department embraces the giving of organ concerts, for which purpose the city has provided a three manual organ and placed it in a municipal auditorium.
31The third branch includes the giving of a series of concerts of chamber music, for which events the halls in the various public schools are utilized.
33For these latter purposes a small orchestra of nine players is employed. The works for larger orchestras are condensed for the use of these nine players, and thereby the listeners, mostly of the wage earners' class, become familiar with compositions the hearing of which is a splendid school in the improvement of their musical taste.
35I have attended some of these and been surprised at the appreciation shown by the audience, which listened in the most attentive and gratified manner.
37A special effort of the trustees of the department (who serve without pay) is the presentation of the works of worthy American composers.
39Is not this the most rational course pursued in behalf of the advancement of the cause of the native musician and composer, a cause that has long been advocated by THE MUSICAL COURIER?
41Is there another such instance of municipal support to the cause of good music and native talent elsewhere in this country?
43I went in to see "Ben-Hur" at the Colonial Theatre and hear Edgar Kelly's music. This big theatre was crowded to the doors by a most attentive and appreciative audience.
45You of course know all about this music of Mr. Kelly's, upon what a high plane it moves—music that for genuine inspiration and happy adaptation to the demands of the drama I doubt could be surpassed by any of the contemporary composers.
47In fact it throws down the gauntlet to the greatest of modern writers.
49It is most gratifying to realize that an American composer has at last found recognition among his countrymen.
51It is also gratifying to know that at last, after many years of neglect and straitened circumstances, this able and worthy composer now realizes a suitable income from the product of his brain.
53Mr. Kelly now has the distinction of professor of music at Yale, a position he most ably fills.
55I remember well his "Puritania," a comic opera, libretto by C. M. S. McLellan, first produced on June 7, 1892, at the Tremont Theatre, in Boston, by the Pauline Hall Opera Company.
57As far as the music is concerned this work is a masterpiece in originality and spontaneousness; in fact, it rises to a loftiness that places it among the best lyric works extant.
59It is also buoyant and rhythmic in the extreme and wonderfully scored for the orchestra.
61Unfortunately the work was burdened with a libretto that sought to be facetious over the hanging of witches. The location was Salem, Mass., in witchcraft days, a grimness of humor that was not sufficiently lightened by episodic contrast, hence it fell by the way.
63Now here is the irony of fate. It probably took the librettist six weeks to cook up his book, and it took the composer one year to write the music.
65Nevertheless the composer was obliged to divide equally with the librettist in the matter of royalties from performances.
67If I remember rightly the composer got very little out of the undertaking to pay for his whole year's work, and what he did get was acquired through a process of law. A most discouraging experience for a composer of his marked ability.
69Are we ever to have the English language employed exclusively upon our operatic and concert stage? Or must we wait until the public cry out against the present polyglotical usurpation and the managers refuse to engage a singer who cannot, or will not, use the vernacular.
71As long ago as when Seidl first came to the Metropolitan Opera, he declared that all the works should be sung in English. Someone replied that "the singers do not know English." "Well, let them learn it then, for they have no right to come here and employ other than the native tongue of the country."
73There are good translations of every opera that has been performed by the Grau Company.
75Let each city make a law that will compel foreign singers to use our language in all performances given within its precincts.
77Let the audience hiss the singers if they fail to address it in its own tongue, and even the most prominent of our high priced foreigners will conform to the demand before they will lose their extortionate fees.
79All these people sing in French, German and Italian, even if they do butcher the tongue somewhat; why not in English as well?
81The most disgusting feature of this polyglot matter is the affectation of our native singers, even amateurs, who indulge this custom.
83We have an English opera in Boston with a prima donna who sings all her parts in Italian, because she can't speak English.
85Is the race of good native singers so extinct that candidates competent to assume operatic roles in a native opera company cannot be found? It looks like it.
87The Cecilia Society here is soon to give Massenet's cantata, "The Promised Land," but are to sing it in French.
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