Scan 4
Musical Courier 1902-06-04: Vol 44 Iss 1158, 1902
26 lines. Read by computer on 22 September 2026. No printed page number was found. See the scan on archive.org.
1THE MUSICAL COURIER
3Berlin Branch Budget
5GERMAN HEADQUARTERS OF THE MUSICAL COURIER,
6BERLIN, W., LINKSTRASSE 17,
7May 16, 1902.
9The musical signature of Berlin was and is Verdi. We are having a dramatic "master performances" and "Verdi festival" stagione, all under the skillful managerial manipulation of Angelo Neumann. Hence lots of reclame, many fine words, some fairly good performances and, what seems surprising, a general reawakening to the appreciation of the charms of Verdi's music. I mean it is surprising that people behave as if they were but just now and through the Italian performances of these works by Italian artists being made aware of the fact that Verdi was a genius. And to read the yard long criticisms of some of my Berlin confères on "Ballo in Maschera," "Aida," "Rigoletto" and "Ernani," the four operas so far performed in the cycle, one would think that they were novelties, posthumous masterworks of the man who wrote "Falstaff." They are, however, but "running in open doors," or rather they are proving to their own satisfaction things which are well known all the world over, and which in fact have never been disputed. Angelo Neumann, the smart one, this time has Count Hochberg as his artistic and in a certain sense also financial backer, for these Verdi festival performances—I abstain from talking about the dramatic theatricals, which do not concern a strictly musical paper—are taking place at the new Royal Opera House (Kroll's), and members of the Royal Opera personnel are in the cast. Financially also the stagione so far, perhaps even more than artistically, has been an outspoken success. That this is all that Neumann has been speculating for becomes plainly patent through the one fact that he is giving us a Verdi festival cycle in which the master's masterpiece, "Falstaff," is missing. This is really as bad as a "Hamlet" performance without the Prince of Denmark. "Falstaff," however, is still above the masses; it is a work only for musical gourmets; it does not "draw," and hence there was no place for it in Angelo Neumann's scheme. He does not care to educate the public to a better appreciation of Verdi's chef d'oeuvre through "master performances." He is out for the almighty dollar, or the four times smaller reichsmark, once and for all time, and as the reichsmark is so much punier than the dollar nothing would do him but to raise the prices of admission to the show. He did so with courage and—success, for the Berlin public, which grumbles at paying 6 marks for a parquet seat at the Royal Opera House, is paying more than twice that sum at Kroll's for a Verdi performance and the house is crowded every time. In fact so pronounced has been the success and so great the desire for seats that "Aida" was repeated in like performance at the much larger Royal Opera House, and every seat was taken a day or two before the raising of the curtain.
11And now the wiseacres are asking, "Why is this thus?" Is it a revival of the fancy for Italian opera; is it a Verdi fever, or the desire to hear once more representatives of the art of bel canto? With respect to the latter question the connoisseurs among these large and hyper-enthusiastic audiences must have been severely disappointed in several instances, for the principals in the cast could not compare with most of those I heard in the Sembrich Italian opera stagione here a couple of years ago. This despite the fact that Angelo Neumann had not spared big words and proclaimed that he was going to show Berlin "how Verdi's operas are sung by Italians in a most exemplary style," and that young Germany should be made acquainted "with the great and beautiful tradition of Italian vocal art and its ennobling influence." Well, as for myself, I don't believe in the favorite outcry of Wagnerites to the effect that Italian vocal art has been foundered by the sticking to formalism, and that Germans have of necessity to build up a special vocal art of their own corresponding to the peculiar demands of their language. On the contrary, I believe that many of the ultra German singers of our day would do well to cultivate a little bel canto and get some of the "Italian tradition" into their throats. But let them not take Angelo Neumann's troupe as an example, for not many among these proved the real thing, and excepting perhaps the "Aida" performance not one of those so far given proved a vocally satisfactory, let alone "master," or "model" or "festival" representation.
13The greatest merit, as far as the artistic success of these Verdi performances is concerned, I ascribe to the youthful chef d'orchestre Arturo Vigna. He owns a strong and exuberant temperament. But with temperament alone he would not reach very far were it not that he holds the most intimate as well as enthusiastic relationship of the full blood musician to that branch of the art which he transmits to the public, and if he were not besides a past master of the technic of operatic conducting. In the latter respect he evinces a never tiring energy and a circumspection which is always on the alert. He understands the author's sense and meaning of the music. He recognizes its inherent tempo, a thing which cannot be imparted to one who does not feel it even by the most careful prescriptions. A mistake in tempo is an impossibility for him, because his subtle artistic instincts force him to the right measure in the use of his baton as well as his other gestures. Perhaps those are right who complain that Vigna is seated too high, and that his personality projects itself into and thereby frequently disturbs the stage picture. But to me otherwise the vivacity of his emotions was not for one moment unsympathetic, because I could not discover a single one which was without an artistic object or had been made merely for decorative purposes. The orchestra, consisting mostly of musicians from the various royal orchestra, but gathered ad hoc, is welded by Vigna into an ensemble of astonishing perfection, and no less accurate and precise is the co-operation on the stage.
15I did not hear the opening performance of "Un Ballo in Maschera," which took place while I was still on my way from London back to Berlin, but the "Aida" performance, which was the best one so far given during the cycle, proved worthy of the enthusiasm it evoked. Nevertheless not all those concerned in the cast were strictly first class. Where and when is this ever the case anyhow? But there was virtually not one among them who did not fill his place in an acceptable style. Maria de Macchi was an excellent representative of the title role. The artistic treatment of her lithe and yet abundantly resonant soprano voice, together with her passionate histrionic conception of the role, amalgamated themselves into an exceedingly effective impersonation of the part. Virginia Guerini was a better Amneris than most of those I have heard here of late years. Vittorio Arimondi, who is no stranger, for he conquered Berlin when he was a member of the Sembrich personnel, again surprised me through the noble quality of his basso profundo and the dignified style of his delivery. Least of all I liked the tenor Francesco Signorini, although his Rhadames was a respectable representation of the part. He shouts, however, instead of singing, and his "obst voice then sounds more brutal than brilliant. He looks and sings more like a butcher than like an artist.
17The "Rigoletto" performance on Sunday night was a mediocre and hence by no means a "masterly" one. There was, however, a Sunday night public present which filled every seat and standing room at Kroll's, and this explains in part the roaring outbursts with hands and feet, especially the latter, which followed each vocal effort, good, bad or indifferent, and which forced a repetition of the duet in the third act between Rigoletto and Gilda, although just this effective piece of true Verdi writing was by no means well sung. The Rigoletto was Signor Sanmarco, who did full justice to the buffoon side of the part, but vocally he is unsatisfactory because he frequently departs from the right pitch and his lower notes vanish into almost inaudibility. Krasa, from the Royal Opera, who sang the few bars allotted to Ceprano, was a vocal Goliath compared to Sanmarco. Tetrazzini, the Gilda of the occasion, was vocally and histrionically alike blood-and-color-less. If she is a model representative of the style of Verdi, I must say that I prefer Frau Herzog, who at least is every inch a musician and an artist. Most miserable was the impersonation of the part of the Duke by Signor de Marchi. Last night I witnessed a performance of "Ernani," an opera which I had not heard since the palmy days of Italian opera under the régime of Col. J. H. Mapleson at the Academy of Music in New York. In front of me sat Marcella Sembrich, who could have given Maria de Macchi some points on the singing of the "Ernani Involami" aria. All through the opera Elvira was not in the best of voice, but she acted with spirit and intelligence. Arimondi also seemed indisposed, and Mario Sanmarco sang more pitifully out of tune than before, while Signorini in the title part gave more lung power than ever, and shouted his ut de poitrine in the first act to the great delight of the groundlings. The real "star" of the performance, however, was again Vigna, who worked up the dramatic ensemble in E flat in the first act to a tremendous and irresistible climax. The new mise-en-scène was gorgeous and picturesque, of special interest to me personally being the scene of the third act, the place of action being laid in the vault underneath the cathedral of my native town of Aachen, built by Charlemagne. When I saw it at Kroll's last night I involuntarily was reminded of the Hungarian count who gave a celebrated painter the order to paint a portrait of his dead father, whom the painter had never known and of whom the count had no photograph and could give the artist only a verbal description. On beholding the finished picture the count is reported to have exclaimed: "O father, dear, how much you have changed!"
19When I listened with attention last night more to the music than to the performance of "Ernani," the first youthful work of Verdi that brought him general recognition and met with the most rousing reception in his native land, it suddenly dawned upon me after the 'cello solo before the curtain rises on the third act why these German audiences all of a sudden have gone Verdi mad. It is not a matter of la mode, it is not the art of bel canto which draws them to Kroll's, it is the hunger for melody, genuine, naive, veritable melody that drives them thither, and to Verdi in these days of poverty, nay, sterility of musical invention, in these days of technic and technic alone, technic in orchestration, technic in thematic development, in the art of making something out of nothing, an art which so far only the Lord Almighty understood with perfection when he created the earth, and even He does not seem satisfied with his own work, or else He would not in all probability have destroyed the island of Martinique and incidentally about 40,000 human lives.
21There is no counterpoint in "Ernani" and the orchestration is partially still crude and brassy, but there is melody in Verdi, and as John Philip Sousa once told me here in Berlin, "all people, be they Germans, Italians, Americans, French or of any other nationality, love melody and hence my success!" This is also the solution, the only true solution of the riddle of the great success of the Verdi festival performances at Berlin.
23While this Verdi festival was going on in Berlin, another operatic festival such as has of late years been regularly celebrated each spring was inaugurated last week under the protectorate and in the august presence of Emperor William at Wiesbaden. His Majesty takes a special interest in the royal theatre of that Rhenish city, of which Georg von Huelsen, the son of the former Berlin royal intendant, is the leading spirit.
25Last year it was the new version of Weber's "Oberon," which proved the pièce de résistance of the operatic festival and caused quite some comment for and against the proceeding of a new scenic arrangement and partially rewritten score, viz., Weber corrected by Schlar. But as the Emperor was enthusiastic in his praise of the performance, and as on the whole the critics seemed more favorably impressed than might have been expected, the same artisans went to work upon an improvement of Gluck's "Armida" for this year's festival. Together with the new foyer of the Wiesbaden Opera House and the fanfares with which the Emperor is greeted when he enters the royal box, the gorgeous mise-en-scène with which "Armida" has been staged caused unanimously favorable comment on the part of the critics present at the festival. Dr. Leopold Schmidt, of the Berliner Tageblatt, one of the kindliest and most gentle of critics, also bestows limited praise upon Georg von Huelsen's text newly underlaid and constructed to fit Gluck's "Armida" music. The condensing of the lengthy plot from five into three acts is also approved by him, albeit the part of Rinaldo, sleepy as it is in the original, is thereby doomed to still greater insignificance. Musically, however, Dr. Schmidt this time disapproves emphatically of Kapellmeister Schlar's Gluck improvements (?). "H," he says, "Mozart made new arrangements of some of Händel's oratorios and Wagner even went so far as to write an entirely new ending to Gluck's 'Iphi-
The computer misreads some letters and numbers. Where a name matters to you, read the scan.