Books › Musical Courier 1913-11-12: Vol 67 Iss 20, 1913 › scan 24
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Musical Courier 1913-11-12: Vol 67 Iss 20, 1913
62 lines. Read by computer on 26 September 2026. Printed page 25. See the scan on archive.org.
1ing into the finale." Sometimes we have tried to follow in the music the directions suggested by the guide-book, but had to give up the task as hopeless. Generally, while we were still trying to locate the place where "the subject is taken up by various instruments and treated contrapuntally," the orchestra actually was sounding the "rapid runs in the violins and double basses leading into the finale." How would you like to go to a play and have the management present you with an explanatory program booklet reading like this: "The curtain rises and discovers a room, with ceiling, walls, windows, and furniture. A man enters and speaks rapidly to a maid who is dusting the china closet. The maid replies in a light, bantering tone. She leaves and another woman, apparently a lady, enters. A short conversation ensues between her and the young man previously discovered. They both leave. An old gentleman, wearing a red necktie, comes on, puffing for breath. He speaks excitedly to himself. Some comic passages follow, which are treated very dramatically, and after a climax in which several of the leading characters take part, some further dialogue leads to the end of the act."
3If one understands music, why the program book? On the other hand, if one does not understand music, why go to concerts?
5Personally we have a grievance against Philip Hale's program booklets for the Boston Symphony concerts. While he too devotes a part of them to the "In the opening movement there is a short introduction in B flat" style of annotation, he atones for it by pages and pages of fascinating biography and anecdotal material bearing on the composer and his work, and when we fall to reading Phil's stories we pay no attention whatever to the tonal doings on the stage. We vow that hereafter we shall dodge those insidious books with the crushed strawberry cover and by thus renouncing temptation, be enabled to listen with attention and reverence to "music's golden tongue"—except when Bruckner is on the program.
7In the New York Herald we read of "Andrew Toscanini, the famous conductor." What's the use, Arturo? Per che?
9The oldest active opera singer in the world is aged eighty-six and recently assisted in the chorus at Brescia. As he is said to retain all his faculties, he doubtless can remember when the prima donnas of the company admitted that the conductor knows more than they do.
11Is any American violinist desirous of filling a position as second concertmaster in the Municipal Orchestra of Baden-Baden? Here are the enticing conditions: "Income, 2,200-2,800 marks ($550-$700), increasing every year with ten per cent. difference between the beginning salary and the maximum. For solo performances ten marks ($2.50) extra will be paid; for participation in chamber music concerts thirty marks ($7.50) an evening. Sixty marks ($15) allowed for clothes and twenty-five marks ($6.25) for strings annually. In case of official appointment in the course of the second year of service an extra income is assured, namely 100 marks ($25) if the appointee is married, eighty marks ($20) if single. Participation in pension. Trial demanded; railroad fare third class paid by the town."
13Who'll apply?
15The leading musical question of the moment: "Will last year's top hat do for this year's opera season?"
17From the Baltimore News one gathers that "To see Paderewski's nervous, artistic, and temperamental face, to observe the conflicting emotions that pass over his countenance and to listen to the music that emanates from the keyboard when he sits before it is to enjoy one of the distinct treats of the age." We move to strike out the passages about the nervous face, and the conflicting emotions.
19Anton Witek, the concertmaster of the Boston Symphony Orchestra, used to be a native of Prague and later a resident of Berlin, but now he confesses to an abiding admiration for chewing gum and ice cream soda, which means that he has the real talent for American citizenship. Witek remembers with amusement his entry into Berlin on the evening before he was to take up his duties there as concertmaster of the Philharmonic Orchestra. "I strolled into the hall to hear the organization give one of its regular concerts and found myself seated next to a loquacious old gentleman who somehow or other sniffed that I was a stranger and felt himself called upon to volunteer information about the Philharmonic and its members. 'That little man with the large head,' said my neighbor, 'is Bleuer, the second concertmaster. He's going to America soon to found a quartet in Detroit. The red haired chap is Van Beuge, a splendid cellist, but he drinks. The first concertmaster is Bram Elderling, and sorry enough we all are that he is to leave us. This is his last concert. Tomorrow the orchestra is to have a new man in his place and the patrons of the concerts are wondering what sort of a duffer the management has selected.' I did not have the courage to tell the speaker that I was the 'duffer' " concluded Witek.
21Concertmaster Witek, of the Berlin Philharmonic, turned out to be such a favorite of the public that he held his post for over fifteen years. Before that he had lived in Prague and even now retains vivid recollections of going to an orchestral concert on a certain occasion with a companion who was studying medicine. "We climbed up to the top gallery where we occupied what were termed among the students, 'standing seats.' My companion and I were in raptures over the leader's conducting. The name of the leader? It was Karl Muck. And the name of my companion? It was Josef Stransky."
23"The best critics of a conductor's abilities are the men who play under him," was a sage Witek observation, "and the fact that the Boston Symphony personnel consider Dr. Muck a great leader makes him one without any reservations."
25At a recent Boston Symphony rehearsal, just before a difficult interval for the brasses, Dr. Muck called to them jocosely: "Look out for the leap into the Infinite."
27Which reminds one of the German Kapellmeister who asked his first horn player why he had bungled a certain passage at the concert. "Ach, Herr Kapellmeister," said the man miserably, "I blew into the blamed thing so sweetly but the notes came out so sourly."
29Ever since the time when we were compelled to do harmony exercises and practise on the organ, as a side adjunct to becoming a pianist, we have hated music schools with an E flat minor hatred. Herwegh von Ende, one of our old Berlin associates of the student days, has been insisting that we inspect his newly opened music school uptown in the building formerly occupied by the Nippon Club. We promised Herwegh to make the visit but we dodged every opportunity to do so. Last week he arranged a lunch appointment with us "for the sake of talking over old times," and called for us imposingly in a taxicab. He gave mysterious orders to the driver and when the vehicle stopped a quarter of an hour later before a handsome house, we realized that we had been spirited away, for the sign on the building, "Von Ende School of Music," told us where we were. We made the best of a bad job and went in. Candor compels the statement that we were surprised, for we had not thought it possible to make a music school look attractive. Previously their bare rooms always had seemed to us like a cross between a police court and a registration office for voters. But the Von Ende School of Music is distinctly inviting and thoroughly modern in its regard for the comfort and consolation of the pupil. If only we had been able to study harmony in such a pleasant place we might have acquired some of it. We were a bit furtive as we walked through the halls of learning, for we were afraid that at any moment we might be ushered into a room where a pupils' concert had been set, but nothing so formidable happened, although we saw many young disciples of the muse making the place hum with activity. We gazed respectfully at a piano where Sigismund Stojowski is wont to sit when he teaches at the Von Ende School. But what impressed us most was the bulletin board in the corridor. Attached to it were circulars and concert programs. And, lo and marvel! among the circulars and concert programs were some of pianists, violinists, and singers who are neither teachers nor pupils at the Von Ende institution. That, surely, must be a place where the instruction is broad—perhaps so broad that if one wishes to become a pianist, they make him study not only organ and harmony, but also the history of music. Horrors! We made Herwegh pay for the lunch.
31Somebody from Chicago said that Paderewski is pennywise and poundfoolish.
33But listen to Henry T. Finck: "When a man of his rank (Paderewski) wishes to pound he has a right to do so."
35And also a left. Especially the left.
37Furthermore, Mr. Finck reminds us that Sir Frederic Cowen wrote in his reminiscences, just published: "We would sometimes go and have a game of billiards together, or else occasionally he (Paderewski) would come to my house, and leave behind him not only lasting memories of his wonderful piano playing, but more expensive ones in the form of jarred strings and broken hammers."
39It is a phrase of the day to speak of the "play with a punch." How about the player with a punch?
41LEONARD LIEBLING.
43LONDON THEATER MUSIC.
45In the London Daily Telegraph, Robin H. Legge Analyzes the Theater Orchestras of the English Capital—Symphony Players Are Members.
47All who are interested in the matter of music in the theaters must know well enough that recently there has been considerable discussion on the subject, and even action in one or two cases, and while one hears on the one hand of theatrical managers "economizing" by either cutting down the number of instrumentalists in their already small bands, or by dispensing with entra'acte music altogether, it is pleasant to note that there are others who are, or would seem to be, making something of an innovation by introducing soloists.
49On all hands I hear, and I believe it is strictly true, that by far the larger number of professional musicians, that is, players upon orchestral instruments, depend upon the work they may obtain in theater orchestras for their actual living wage, whether in the bands of musical comedy, the music hall or the theater. No symphony organization can possibly offer a livelihood to its members. For example, I imagine that by far the busiest of our metropolitan orchestras is that of the Queen's Hall, but if my information is correct, the members receive a regular salary only during the splendid season of Promenade Concerts; that is, for something under three months of the whole year. For their performances after and before the Promenade season each player receives his pay per concert. Now there are not a great many of these, so that it is easy to see that an orchestral player stands no great chance of becoming embarrassed by riches. Further, it is a well known fact that the members of the London Symphony Orchestra draw no salary whatever for the series of first rate concerts they give every winter and spring. They are a federation who play at their own concerts, as it were, for the excellent publicity the concerts bring, the idea being, of course, that paying engagements may come to them as a result of this publicity and of the all around excellence of their performance.
51Certainly the quality of theatrical entra'acte music is not of the highest, a fact, I am told, attributable to the insufficient knowledge of musical literature of the average conductor. There are many thoroughly equipped conductors, of course, as Adolf Schmidt, Christopher Wilson, Mr. Haines, Edward Jones, Norman O'Neill and Alec MacLean, who, however, has forsaken the theater for a Yorkshire municipal orchestra. But the greater number have had few, if any, opportunities for learning the essentials of their branch of the profession. I should imagine it would work for far greater advantage all round if instead of employing the pianist (who figures in so many theatrical orchestras) as deputy conductor, a violinist or woodwind player were substituted. Richter was a horn player, Balling played the viola, Nikisch the violin, Mottle the tympani, and so on; each of them, therefore, was thoroughly rouined in the ways and music of the orchestra. Were the idea carried out thoroughly here, it is reasonable to expect another really competent native conductor might arise. I have heard of one theatrical conductor who for years had been a player in an orchestra; nearly always when a new piece of music was to be played the conductor proper asked his advice as to the tempo, etc., before attempting the performance! At the Queen's Theater an experiment, I hear, is to be tried tonight that has met with pronounced success at Bournemouth, in that two orchestras have been engaged. Of these, one will play the usual entra'acte music in the theater, and the other, a string quartet, will play in the foyer during the intervals in order to interest the ladies of the audience who may elect to leave their seats. This is a change with a vengeance from the other, which abolishes music entirely from the theater.
53What the Voice Is.
55[From Winnipeg Town Topics.]
57The vocal apparatus is very much like an organ pipe, with a double reed at the top, called the vocal cords. These vocal cords are two elastic bands stretched over the top of the windpipe—near to what is called the "Adam's apple"—leaving a chink between them. The breath, coming up from the lungs through the windpipe, vibrates these membranes and so causes the sound of the voice. During the production of sound the edges of the cords are close together.
59The mouth, pharynx, and all the spaces and air passages above the vocal cords play a most important part in pure voice production; in fact, it is the proper use of these cavities that brings into play those "overtones" upon which the quality of the voice depends.
61There are so many different so-called systems in the present day for teaching the piano that it is difficult for a student to know which to adopt. Although some of these "systems" may be better than others, the student must remember that hard work is the only royal road to perfection.—Winnipeg Town Topics.
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