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Musical Courier 1903-01-28: Vol 46 Iss 1192, 1903
50 lines. Read by computer on 23 September 2026. Printed page 5. See the scan on archive.org.
1HOTEL CECIL, LONDON, January 17, 1903
3ALTHOUGH he has only been before the public a short time, as the career of a pianist goes, there is already no possible doubt as to the position which Harold Bauer is destined to take. Indeed, in the last two or three years he has reached a height calculated to make other pianists tremble in their shoes. And Mr. Bauer has not taken that meteor like course which has characterized many of the musical stars who have risen suddenly upon the horizon, only to fade into nothingness after a brilliant but brief career. He has risen slowly but steadily into his present position, and it is quite evident that he is destined to rise still higher. At every fresh appearance he makes a deeper impression, and every time he plays he makes fresh conquests. For Mr. Bauer is not a pianist who depends upon a showy equipment for his success. His equipment is sound enough, it is true, and he possesses a technic which would, if he chose to allow it, at once give him a place on a level with the leaders. In Mr. Bauer's case, technic is fortunately subordinated to brains, and it is as an intellectual pianist that he has made his mark.
5It was his performance of Brahms' Variations and Fugue on a theme by Handel that raised the Popular concert of last Saturday out of the ordinary. Variations in the hands of the average pianist, are things to be avoided. For the average pianist apparently regards them as clever technical exercises, especially designed to show off the strong points, which are generally non-existent in his equipment. The wise critic, therefore, when he learns that Miss Jones proposes to entrance her audience with Beethoven's Variations on a theme by Diabelli, generally so orders his arrival that the fair pianist shall have struck the last note before he enters the hall. But such a performance as Mr. Bauer gave on Saturday would convert even the bitterest enemy of the variation form. There is no doubt that the variation form can be appallingly dull, probably dullest than any other form that has even been invented. But it can also be exceedingly interesting, as Mr. Bauer showed, if it is only taken in the right way. It needs, however, a pianist with brains, and not a pianist whose only boast is his technic to make them so, and I have known this very set of variations seem the most tedious piece of music in the world in the hands of a player with whom intellect was not a strong point.
7Mr. Bauer's Saturday reading must have come as something of a revelation even to those who knew the variations by heart. It was evidently the fruit of long and very careful study; each variation had been regarded as a separate little poem complete in itself, of which the characteristics had to be specially studied. And never have I heard the spirit of these variations caught with more perfect success. No pianist, indeed, without Mr. Bauer's remarkable qualities could have given such a reading. He has technic, he has power, he has sympathy, but the whole is dominated by intellect. The technic is never exhibited for its own sake, the power never degenerates into brute force, the sentiment never becomes debased into sentimentality. And his command over tone color is really marvelous. The delicate neatness of the sixteenth and seventeenth variations, the quiet reserve of the nineteenth, the mystery of the twentieth and the glorious breadth of the twenty-fourth and twenty-fifth stood out in sharp contrast to one another, and in each case he seemed to reveal the true meaning of the music. Mr. Bauer's performance of this remarkable set must stand out as one of the finest that we have heard in this country.
9Otherwise the concert does not call for very much comment. Mr. Bauer joined the Kruse Quartet in a good performance of Schumann's popular Quintet, and Miss Marie Brema sang the "Frauen Lieben und Leben" with all the dramatic effects which we are now accustomed to expect from her.
11George Grossmith is, of course, a licensed humorist of recognized standing, and, such being the case, he has a comparatively easy task when he sets to work to keep an audience amused for two hours at a stretch. Unlike other humorists of more recent standing, he is not upon his trial, and in consequence he can raise a laugh whatever he may say or do. At his recital at St. James' Hall on Thursday afternoon, I heard him elicit roars of laughter with two of the most fatuous songs that I have ever come across. One of them concerned the trials of an ancient spinster whom no one would marry, the other dealt with certain aspects of Mrs. Grundy, and the two songs did not possess an ounce of real humor. Yet elderly gentlemen who ought to have known better almost split their sides with laughing, simply because it is a tradition that Mr. Grossmith is always funny. That he is occasionally funny I am quite willing to admit. His imitation of an inaudible alderman making a speech and certain portions of a new sketch in which he deals with our pet affections were excellent. But he is not without his lapses, and when those lapses occur they are rather serious.
13The directors of the Broadwood concerts, quite undismayed, are pursuing their heroic policy of giving English music a chance, and at the sixth concert of the series, which took place at St. James' Hall in the evening, they met with a greater measure of success than usual. Arthur Hinton's Suite in D for piano and violin, which was given a first hearing, is, indeed, a very attractive work. Mr. Hinton's melodies are charming and effective, while his workmanship is excellent. The impress of individuality is not, perhaps, very strong, but the suite is distinctly good music, and it gives one cause to hope for still better things to come. The engagement of the Brompton Oratory Choir for their concert was a rather happy thought, for the fine motets of Palestrina, Byrd and Anerio are but seldom sung, and then only indifferently. The Oratory Choir, however, has long since made a name for itself in old church music, and on Thursday it lived up to its reputation. Under Arthur Barclay, a number of old motets and two examples of the modern school were very beautifully sung, and it is to be hoped that the example of the Messrs. Broadwood will be followed by other concert givers.
15I cannot end this letter without alluding to the very excellent article on Richard Strauss, which appears in the current number of the Fortnightly Review. The article is from the pen of Ernest Newman, a writer who is already quite well known to the readers of THE MUSICAL COURIER. No saner estimate of the great German composer has ever appeared in this country. Mr. Newman is a devoted Straussite, but he does not fall into the mistake—so common among those who are espousing a new cause—of besmirching his hero with excessive adulation. The article deals with Strauss, the destroyer, who is helping to move music one step further toward naturalness. "The Romantic movement," Mr. Newman writes, "has done its work, and the future is with men who live not in that old and somewhat artificial world of gloomy forests, enchanted castles, impossible maidens and the obsolete profession of magic, but in a world recognizably similar to that in which we move from day to day." Speaking of the predominance of sex music in the scheme of most of the modern writers, Mr. Newman says: "Instead of imitating his weaker brethren who occupy themselves energetically in vending the spith of Wagner's wine, Strauss has turned his eyes upon other elements than the erotic in the human composition." In short, Mr. Newman writes of Strauss as the preacher of the world of bustle and hurry in which we now live, and he writes of him in terms which the veriest layman can understand. I should like to quote at length from his excellent article, but it is so full of good things that it is difficult to know where to begin. But it should do much toward opening the eyes of musicians, both amateur and professional, to the truth about Richard Strauss.
17ZARATHUSTRA.
19LONDON NOTES.
21PHILIP BROZEL has just returned from Budapest, where he has been singing at three special performances at the Opera House. He made an enormous success, especially in "Tristan," which opera had to be repeated. During the performance the success was so great that the curtain was raised over twenty times on each occasion. It is interesting to note that this is the first time that "Lohengrin," "Pagliacci" and "Tristan" have been sung in English on the Continent. Mr. Brozel will return again to Budapest in May for performances of "Siegfried," "Götterdämmerung," "Lohengrin," "Tristan," "Pagliacci" and "Carmen."
23The Beethoven Festival that is being given, organized by Prof. Johann Kruse and conducted by Weingartner, is definitely fixed at Queen's Hall for Saturday afternoon, May 16; Monday evening, the 18th; Tuesday evening, the 19th; Wednesday afternoon, the 20th; Thursday evening, the 21st; Friday evening, the 22d, and Saturday afternoon, the 23d. At the last concert will be performed the Choral Symphony and the Choral Fantasia.
25Kreisler will give his third recital at St. James' Hall on Wednesday afternoon, the 21st inst., under the direction of N. Vert.
27Dr. Lierhammer will give a vocal recital at the Bechstein Hall on Wednesday evening, the 21st inst., under the direction of N. Vert, assisted by Benno Schönberger. At this recital Dr. Lierhammer will introduce several new songs, both German and English.
29Miss Jean Newman, the Canadian, who has been studying in Paris, will give her first concert in England at the Bechstein Hall on Thursday evening, January 22. She will be assisted by M. Joseph Saucier, the French-Canadian, of whom reports speaks very highly.
31Leonard Borwick will give four recitals on the afternoons of January 23 and 30, February 6 and 13, at St. James' Hall, under the direction of N. Vert.
33Madame Albani sailed last Thursday in the Pretorian for Canada, where she is giving a series of concerts.
35Mme. Suzanne Adams made her début as an oratorio singer in New York December 26, and the New York Tribune said of her performance:
37Mme. Suzanne Adams evidently was the only one of the four who had newly studied the music of the oratorio. She took no liberties with the text, barring the entirely proper appoggiaturi in the recitatives, which belong to the Handel style, but sang everything in a spirit of elevated serenity which was uplifting. Her voice was purity itself, her phrasing perfect, her taste impeccable, her enunciation beautifully distinct. A more lovely performance of "Come Unto Him" it may safely be said has not been heard in New York for twenty years.
39Mme. Suzanne Adams intends to settle in England to sing and devote herself to oratorio.
41CONNECTICUT VALLEY NOTES.
43SPRINGFIELD, Mass., January 21, 1903.
45TWO musical events in Springfield since my last communication—a recital of songs by Mrs. Corinne Moore Lawson and a concert by the Boston Symphony Orchestra. Mrs. Lawson's exquisite recital of dainty songs was under the direction of the high school management—the third of this year's series. Miss Mary L. Regal, who directs the high school music and arranges these recitals, is rendering the community a service that cannot be too highly commended. To her more than to any other one agency is due a widespread interest in music matters. The young people who come under her instruction in the high school acquire the capacity to enjoy good music; and how few of our music teachers really attain this end.
47The symphony concert last night was the first given in this town by the Boston players for more than six years. Owing to the illness of Mr. Gericke, Franz Kneisel conducted and he handled the orchestra admirably. If he were not such an excellent violinist, Kneisel would make a first class conductor. Miss Maud MacCarthy, the young Irish violinist, played the Mendelssohn Concerto with the orchestra. The other selections were the Bizet Suite, "L'Arlesienne"; Schumann's Overture to "Genoveva," and the Tchaikovsky Symphony No. 5. As might be expected, the work was admirably done.
49Monday evening the Boston Symphony Orchestra concerted at Hartford.
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