Scan 5
Musical Courier 1927-11-10: Vol 95 Iss 19, 1927
97 lines. Read by computer on 29 September 2026, twice; the two readings disagreed in places. No printed page number was found. See the scan on archive.org.
1MRS. COOLIDGE GIVES VENICE CONCERT IN IDEAL HALL
3Four New Works Heard in Palazzo Pisani—Fine Performances Enthusiastically Received.
5VENICE.—Mrs. Elizabeth Coolidge, famous for her Berkshire Chamber Music Festivals, has adopted a novel method of furthering modern music in Europe. In contra-distinction to the I. S. C. M., for example, which induces people to gather at one center for the purpose of hearing modern music, Mrs. Coolidge carries the music to the people.
7In Venice, a concert of four new works was given in the lovely hall of the Conservatorio Benedetto Marcello, at the Palazzo Pisani; ideal surroundings for chamber music. The program began with a quintet for oboe and string quartet by Arthur Bliss; a charming work, full of good ideas excellently worked up. It "sounds" delightful, especially if there is an artist like Leon Goossens playing the oboe. It was followed by the first movement of an unfinished work by Francesco Malipiero for violoncello and piano. The piece, when completed, will contain a movement for violin and piano and a finale for the three instruments together.
9I do not recall ever having heard music by Malipiero of such dramatic power and at the same time so easy of comprehension; and this despite the fact that its melodies have not been "written down" to the general public. Hans Kindler played the 'cello part superbly; Malipiero will scarcely find another interpreter who can bring out its innermost meaning better than Kindler.
11"In Memory of Louis Fleury," the late excellent French flautist, Gabriel Pierné has written a light, but by no means light-weight, trio for flute, cello and piano. It contains some fine counterpoint in that graceful style so characteristic of French composers. The great success this work met with was due in great measure to the performance given it by Marcel Moyse—that incomparable Paris flute player, whose tone is the finest one can hear—Hans Kindler and Emma Lübbecke-Job who, two years ago almost to a day, played the Hindemith piano concerto here with such success that it made its way all over Europe. She also played the pianoforte part in the Malipiero piece.
13OLD-FASHIONED MUSIC
15The last item on the program was a string quartet by Henry F. Gilbert. Following the three others it sounded like an entirely out-of-the-world work. Some thirty years ago it might have made a respectable figure on a chamber music program. The clever workmanship cannot be denied; but even the themes are rather indistinct and it is almost a wonder that Gilbert could make so long an opus of them. The Quartetto Veneziano did all that can be done for this quartet, but the excellence of the four players was far more noticeable in the Bliss quintet.
17By engaging such fine artists for the performance of all these compositions, Mrs. Coolidge has certainly rendered a great service to the composers. There was no public sale of tickets. The audience was invited, and filled the hall to the last seat. In spite of the general disinclination of Venice audiences towards modern music, all the works were received with much applause; and Bliss as well as Malipiero had to come to the platform several times to share the success with the artists.
19There was an indefinable atmosphere of festivity throughout the concert that always goes a long way toward making people willing to accept new music, which under other circumstances might have to struggle hard for an applauding hand. But the praise in any case must be given first and foremost to Mrs. Coolidge, who has a profound confidence in the mission she has undertaken; a task she is carrying through with an energy very rarely spent on an enterprise whose only aim is to assist artists.
21H. W. DRABER.
23PERSONALITIES AT MRS. COOLIDGE'S VENICE CONCERT
241. Malipiero, 2. Mrs. Coolidge, 3. Hans Kindler, 4. Emma Lübbecke-Job.
26PARIS FULL OF BUSY AMERICANS
28A Good Place for Work as Well as Play—American Singers Popular.
30PARIS.—Paris officially begins its musical season with the opening of the Conservatoire on October 15. During the summer, nothing is supposed to happen, except that the Opéra and the Opéra Comique never close their doors. But there has been plenty of fine music in the studios of the visiting teachers, who come to Paris for the summer to combine business with pleasure.
32Claude Warford had his usual large class of vocal pupils, and a number of very interesting recitals in his capacious rooms, with the help of artist friends.
34Richard Buhlig has been working very hard all summer in preparation for his forthcoming concert tour. He has some surprises in store, which I am requested not to divulge. When he was not at the piano himself, he was beside it while his pupils played. With his hard work and large class he has had no time for the distractions which Paris is supposed to offer to its visitors.
36UNFAIR REPUTATION
38May I remark here that the reputation which Paris has among a certain class of visitor is unfair to the Paris of the serious student. Those who have seen the miles of books, the streets of publishing houses, the universities, the galleries, the museums, the innumerable shops for the sale of pictures, art supplies, statuary, plaster casts of famous busts and monuments, laboratories, schools of everything, including music, have a different conception of Paris than those who know the bars, and cabarets, casinos and dance halls.
40Many famous musical artists pass their summer in Paris, or a part of it, without appearing on the concert stage. Rachmaninoff, for instance, emerges occasionally from his seclusion. I had a half hour chat with Serge Koussewitzky before his departure for Boston about orchestral conditions in America. He seemed to be of the opinion that the public, outside of the very largest cities, did not care to have part of the two hours of the program given to a soloist in a concerto, but preferred to hear the orchestra. There were times, of course, when a famous artist was an attraction to the symphony concert.
42HEMPPEL PATRONISES THE OPERA
44Frieda Hempel was frequently seen at the Opera and at occasional musical entertainments, but has not appeared in public as a singer. She told me she was singing before long in London, but had not yet decided whether she would sing in Paris or not. Charles Hackett also spent some time here without singing in public. He was in excellent health and spoke most enthusiastically about his forthcoming engagements. Eleanor Sawyer sang at the Opera Comique, as has already been reported in these columns.
46Several Sunday evenings during September and October were spent in the concert hall of the American University Women's Club, where Luella Melius gave a short song recital, where another American vocalist, Harriet Maconel, sang a program of songs for contralto voice, where Marguerite Morgan gave a piano recital, and where the well known soprano from the Metropolitan Opera, Cecil Arden, also delighted her hearers.
48WANTED—A CESAR OF FRANCS
50The orchestras of Paris have already begun their season's work. The Lamoureux Orchestra, under the direction of Paul Paray, and the Pasdeloup Orchestra under the direction of Rhene-Baton were the first to break the summer's silence. They play as well as first class men might be expected to play with a minimum of rehearsal. This question of expensive rehearsals is the reason why so many old standard works are repeated from season to season. A new work requires long and many rehearsals; and rehearsals cost many, many francs. Paris music needs a Napoleon of finance—a César of Francs, as it were.
52I fully expect to hear of the great success of the basso Laporojetz, a Russian who is now in Paris preparing for his American tour in December. Real bassos are as rare as real tenors. His is not one of those thin voices which extend downwards in vaporous vacuity. He has the solid tones of an organ.
54Louise Loring, an American recently with the Chicago Opera, has been engaged for the Paris Opera, for Monte Carlo, for London, and elsewhere. William Martin, who made his appearance not long ago at the Opéra Comique, is now at the Opéra, enjoying immense popularity. He is about to make a concert tour of Europe.
56Jeanne Gordon is singing at the Paris Opéra, and at Bordeaux, Marseille, and Lyons. The American vocalist, in fact, seems to find a hearty welcome in Paris. Well, why not?
58Sarah Fischer, of the Opéra Comique, recently held a reception for her friends and sang a generous number of songs on the day before she started for her tour of Canada, which begins early in November.
60JAMES HAGENEY GOING HOME
62James Hageney, an American tenor who has not visited his native land for ten years, gave a recital in the Salle des Agriculteurs, on October 14, previous to a concert tour in the United States. His program, as usual, was serious, mostly operatic, and showed his long familiarity with the best works in the repertory of a tenor. His voice is a pure tenor, not very powerful, but of excellent quality. He was obliged to add several extra numbers.
64A number of negro singers from Utica, Miss., gave a concert of plantation songs and spirituals, which drew a very large audience in which the American element was conspicuous. The Salle Gaveau, in fact, could not contain the crowd which tried to gain admission. The singers were able to interest their hearers, which is the important thing, though the singing was mediocre and the various voices were not always in tune with each other. But the jolly, good natured disposition of the singers found a hearty response in their listeners. The applause was vigorous and prolonged.
66L.
68MUNICH HAS BELATED PREMIERE OF ERNST KRENEK'S MAMMON
70A Realistic Elektra—California Singer Wins Approval.
72MUNICH.—Munich's first ballet novelty this season was Ernst Krenek's Mammon, which, thanks to the excitement caused by the same composer's jazz opera, Jonny Spielt Auf, gave rise to more comment than would otherwise have been the case. For Mammon, though only just produced, is of an earlier date.
74It is the joint work of Krenek, Bela Balasz, Viennese essayist and playwright, and Heinrich Kröller, ballet master of the Vienna and Munich state operas. Here Krenek strives visibly and audibly for simplicity, and elements of atonality notwithstanding, it is contrapuntally an uninvolved score not devoid of romantic leanings. A Charleston, however, foreshadows Jonny. The great asset of the score is its strong rhythmical element.
76The Staatsoper coupled the piece with de Falla's Amor Brujo and with a revival of Julius Bittner's often heard opera, Das Höllisch Gold, which fitted particularly well into the scheme, treating as it does of the same subject, "filthy lucre," though in a more popular and folk-song-like manner. Paul Schmitz conducted the performances exceedingly well, thus justifying his promotion to the prominent new Munich post from the comparatively minor functions he recently fulfilled in Stuttgart. Kröller himself supervised the choreographic portion of the production and reaped double honors, both as ballet master and author.
78TOO REALISTIC
80The outstanding operatic event of the season so far has been the revival of Strauss' Elektra at the Staatsoper. It was re-studied and re-staged, but unfortunately the new version was hardly an improvement on the old. Adolf one of two readings
82MARGHERITA MARSDEN, one of two readings
84American mezzo, who sang opera in Italy with success, and whose interpretation of German Lieder has won the approval of Vienna, Berlin, Leipzig and Munich. one of two readings
86Linnebach's settings and costumes were far from suggesting the atmosphere of the plot and characters, while Max Hofmüller's stage direction were both sober and disillusioning. The acting, in particular, was of the realistic sort which emphasized the brutality of the story rather than transplanting it into the realm of Greek mythology viewed through modern eyes. It was not Greek tragedy that we saw, but cinema of the most glaring sort; visions, as it were, of a Greek Hollywood, with a disconcerting melodramatic fire spectacle as the final coup. one of two readings
87The outstanding operatic event of the season so far has been the revival of Strauss' Elektra at the Staatsoper. It was re-studied and re-staged, but unfortunately the new version was hardly an improvement on the old. Adolf Linnebach's settings and costumes were far from suggesting the atmosphere of the plot and characters, while Max Hofmüller's stage direction were both sober and disillusioning. The acting, in particular, was of the realistic sort which emphasized the brutality of the story rather than transplanting it into the realm of Greek mythology viewed through modern eyes. It was not Greek tragedy that we saw, but cinema of the most glaring sort; visions, as it were, of a Greek Hollywood, with a disconcerting melodramatic fire spectacle as the final coup. one of two readings
89Musically, "al fresco" was the keynote of the performance. Hans Knappertsbusch, the conductor, was in his most "shirt sleeve" mood as regarded tempi and dynamics, and as for the singing, it was in the Puccini style without Puccini voices. Only Felicie Hüni-Mihacek had the true Straussian note which she had acquired in many years' work with the composer in Vienna. Local patriotism, however, elicited ovations for the singers and, notably, for the conductor.
91MARGHERITA MARSDEN IN RECITAL
93Margherita Marsden, a Californian mezzo-soprano, who has sung in opera in Italy, recently made her initial bow to Munich recital audiences. Her program revealed serious occupation with the master songs of all nations, and notable linguistic abilities. Miss Marsden's beautiful and well-trained voice earned her loud and prolonged applause. P. B. one of two readings
94Margherita Marsden, a Californian mezzo-soprano, who has sung in opera in Italy, recently made her initial bow to Munich recital audiences. Her program revealed serious occupation with the master songs of all nations, and notable linguistic abilities. Miss Marsden's beautiful and well-trained voice earned her loud and prolonged applause. one of two readings
96P. B. one of two readings
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