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diff --git a/16467-8.txt b/16467-8.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..676bf84 --- /dev/null +++ b/16467-8.txt @@ -0,0 +1,9405 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of Musicians of To-Day, by Romain Rolland + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Musicians of To-Day + +Author: Romain Rolland + +Commentator: Claude Landi + +Translator: Mary Blaiklock + +Release Date: August 7, 2005 [EBook #16467] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK MUSICIANS OF TO-DAY *** + + + + +Produced by David Newman, Chuck Greif and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net + + + + + + + + + +MUSICIANS OF TO-DAY + +BY + +ROMAIN ROLLAND + +AUTHOR OF "JEAN-CHRISTOPHE" + +TRANSLATED BY + +MARY BLAIKLOCK + +WITH AN INTRODUCTION BY + +CLAUDE LANDI + +[Illustration: Decorative] + +NEW YORK + +HENRY HOLT AND COMPANY + +1915 + + + + +CONTENTS + + +INTRODUCTION + +BERLIOZ + +WAGNER: + +"Siegfried" + +"Tristan" + +CAMILLE SAINT-SAËNS + +VINCENT D'INDY + +RICHARD STRAUSS + +HUGO WOLF + +DON LORENZO PEROSI + +FRENCH AND GERMAN MUSIC + +CLAUDE DEBUSSY: + +"Pelléas et Mélisande" + +THE AWAKENING: A SKETCH OF THE MUSICAL MOVEMENT IN PARIS SINCE 1870 + +Paris and Music + +Musical Institutions before 1870 + +New Musical Institutions + +The Present Condition of French Music + + + + +INTRODUCTION + + +It is perhaps fitting that the series of volumes comprising _The +Musician's Bookshelf_ should be inaugurated by the present collection of +essays. To the majority of English readers the name of that strange and +forceful personality, Romain Rolland, is known only through his +magnificent, intimate record of an artist's life and aspirations, +embracing ten volumes, _Jean-Christophe_. This is not the place in which +to discuss that masterpiece. A few biographical facts concerning the +author may not, however, be out of place here. + +Romain Rolland is forty-eight years old. He was born on January 29, +1866, at Clamecy (Nièvre), France. He came very early under the +influence of Tolstoy and Wagner and displayed a remarkable critical +faculty. In 1895 (at the age of twenty-nine) we find him awarded the +coveted Grand Prix of the Académie Française for his work _Histoire de +l'Opéra en Europe avant Lulli et Scarlatti_, and in the same year he +sustained, before the faculty of the Sorbonne--where he now occupies the +chair of musical criticism--a remarkable dissertation on _The Origin +of_ _the Modern Lyrical Drama_--his thesis for the Doctorate. This, in +reality, is a vehement protest against the indifference for the Art of +Music which, up to that time, had always been displayed by the +University. In 1903 he published a remarkable _Life of Beethoven_, +followed by a _Life of Hugo Wolf_ in 1905. The present volume, together +with its companion, _Musiciens d'Autrefois_, appeared in 1908. Both +form remarkable essays and reveal a consummate and most intimate +knowledge of the life and works of our great contemporaries. A just +estimate of a composer's work is not to be arrived at without a study of +his works and of the conditions under which these were produced. To +take, for instance, the case of but one of the composers treated in this +volume, Hector Berlioz. No composer has been so misunderstood, so +vilified as he, simply because those who have written about him, either +wilfully or through ignorance, have grossly misrepresented him. + +The essay on Berlioz, in the present volume, reveals a true insight into +the personality of this unfortunate and great artist, and removes any +false misconceptions which unsympathetic and superficial handling may +have engendered. Indeed, the same introspective faculty is displayed in +all the other essays which form this volume, which, it is believed, will +prove of the greatest value not only to the professional student, but +also to the _intelligent listener_, for whom the present series of +volumes has been primarily planned. We hear much, nowadays, of the value +of "Musical Appreciation." It is high time that something was done to +educate our audiences and to dispel the hitherto prevalent fallacy that +Music need not be regarded seriously. We do not want more creative +artists, more executants; the world is full of them--good, bad and +indifferent--but we _do_ want more _intelligent listeners_. + +I do not think it is an exaggeration to assert that the majority of +listeners at a high-class concert or recital are absolutely bored. How +can it be otherwise, when the composers represented are mere names to +them? Why should the general public appreciate a Bach fugue, an +intricate symphony or a piece of chamber-music? Do we professional +musicians appreciate the technique of a wonderful piece of sculpture, of +an equally wonderful feat of engineering or even of a miraculous +surgical operation? It may be argued that an analogy between sculpture, +engineering, surgery and music is absurd, because the three former do +not appeal to the masses in the same manner as music does. Precisely: it +is because of this universal appeal on the part of music that the public +should be educated to _listen_ to _good_ music; that they should be +given, in a general way, a chance to acquaint themselves with the laws +underlying the "Beautiful in Music" and should be shown the demands +which a right appreciation of the Art makes upon the Intellect and the +Emotions. + +And, surely, such a "desideratum" may best be effected by a careful +perusal of the manuals to be included in the present series. It is +incontestable that the reader of the following pages--apart from a +knowledge of the various musical forms, of orchestration, etc.--all of +which will be duly treated in successive volumes--will be in a better +position to appreciate the works of the several composers to which he +may be privileged to listen. The last essay, especially, will be read +with interest to-day, when we may hope to look forward to a cessation of +race-hatred and distrust, and to what a writer in the _Musical Times_ +(September, 1914) has called, "a new sense of the emotional solidarity +of mankind. From that sense alone," he adds, "can the real music of the +future be born." + + CLAUDE LANDI. + + + + +MUSICIANS OF TO-DAY + +BERLIOZ + +I + + +It may seem a paradox to say that no musician is so little known as +Berlioz. The world thinks it knows him. A noisy fame surrounds his +person and his work. Musical Europe has celebrated his centenary. +Germany disputes with France the glory of having nurtured and shaped his +genius. Russia, whose triumphal reception consoled him for the +indifference and enmity of Paris,[1] has said, through the voice of +Balakirew, that he was "the only musician France possessed." His chief +compositions are often played at concerts; and some of them have the +rare quality of appealing both to the cultured and the crowd; a few have +even reached great popularity. Works have been dedicated to him, and he +himself has been described and criticised by many writers. He is popular +even to his face; for his face, like his music, was so striking and +singular that it seemed to show you his character at a glance. No clouds +hide his mind and its creations, which, unlike Wagner's, need no +initiation to be understood; they seem to have no hidden meaning, no +subtle mystery; one is instantly their friend or their enemy, for the +first impression is a lasting one. + +[Footnote 1: "And you, Russia, who have saved me...." (Berlioz, +_Mémoires_, II, 353, Calmann-Lévy's edition, 1897).] + +That is the worst of it; people imagine that they understand Berlioz +with so very little trouble. Obscurity of meaning may harm an artist +less than a seeming transparency; to be shrouded in mist may mean +remaining long misunderstood, but those who wish to understand will at +least be thorough in their search for the truth. It is not always +realised how depth and complexity may exist in a work of clear design +and strong contrasts--in the obvious genius of some great Italian of the +Renaissance as much as in the troubled heart of a Rembrandt and the +twilight of the North. + +That is the first pitfall; but there are many more that will beset us in +the attempt to understand Berlioz. To get at the man himself one must +break down a wall of prejudice and pedantry, of convention and +intellectual snobbery. In short, one must shake off nearly all current +ideas about his work if one wishes to extricate it from the dust that +has drifted about it for half a century. + +Above all, one must not make the mistake of contrasting Berlioz with +Wagner, either by sacrificing Berlioz to that Germanic Odin, or by +forcibly trying to reconcile one to the other. For there are some who +condemn Berlioz in the name of Wagner's theories; and others who, not +liking the sacrifice, seek to make him a forerunner of Wagner, or kind +of elder brother, whose mission was to clear a way and prepare a road +for a genius greater than his own. Nothing is falser. To understand +Berlioz one must shake off the hypnotic influence of Bayreuth. Though +Wagner may have learnt something from Berlioz, the two composers have +nothing in common; their genius and their art are absolutely opposed; +each one has ploughed his furrow in a different field. + +The Classical misunderstanding is quite as dangerous. By that I mean the +clinging to superstitions of the past, and the pedantic desire to +enclose art within narrow limits, which still flourish among critics. +Who has not met these censors of music? They will tell you with solid +complacence how far music may go, and where it must stop, and what it +may express and what it must not. They are not always musicians +themselves. But what of that? Do they not lean on the example of the +past? The past! a handful of works that they themselves hardly +understand. Meanwhile, music, by its unceasing growth, gives the lie to +their theories, and breaks down these weak barriers. But they do not see +it, do not wish to see it; since they cannot advance themselves, they +deny progress. Critics of this kind do not think favourably of Berlioz's +dramatic and descriptive symphonies. How should they appreciate the +boldest musical achievement of the nineteenth century? These dreadful +pedants and zealous defenders of an art that they only understand after +it has ceased to live are the worst enemies of unfettered genius, and +may do more harm than a whole army of ignorant people. For in a country +like ours, where musical education is poor, timidity is great in the +presence of a strong, but only half-understood, tradition; and anyone +who has the boldness to break away from it is condemned without +judgment. I doubt if Berlioz would have obtained any consideration at +all from lovers of classical music in France if he had not found allies +in that country of classical music, Germany--"the oracle of Delphi," +"Germania alma parens,"[2] as he called her. Some of the young German +school found inspiration in Berlioz. The dramatic symphony that he +created flourished in its German form under Liszt; the most eminent +German composer of to-day, Richard Strauss, came under his influence; +and Felix Weingartner, who with Charles Malherbe edited Berlioz's +complete works, was bold enough to write, "In spite of Wagner and Liszt, +we should not be where we are if Berlioz had not lived." This unexpected +support, coming from a country of traditions, has thrown the partisans +of Classic tradition into confusion, and rallied Berlioz's friends. + +[Footnote 2: _Mémoires_, II, 149.] + +But here is a new danger. Though it is natural that Germany, more +musical than France, should recognise the grandeur and originality of +Berlioz's music before France, it is doubtful whether the German nature +could ever fully understand a soul so French in its essence. It is, +perhaps, what is exterior in Berlioz, his positive originality, that the +Germans appreciate. They prefer the _Requiem_ to _Roméo_. A Richard +Strauss would be attracted by an almost insignificant work like the +_Ouverture du roi Lear_; a Weingartner would single out for notice +works like the _Symphonic fantastique_ and _Harold_, and exaggerate +their importance. But they do not feel what is intimate in him. Wagner +said over the tomb of Weber, "England does you justice, France admires +you, but only Germany loves you; you are of her own being, a glorious +day of her life, a warm drop of her blood, a part of her heart...." One +might adapt his words to Berlioz; it is as difficult for a German really +to love Berlioz as it is for a Frenchman to love Wagner or Weber. One +must, therefore, be careful about accepting unreservedly the judgment of +Germany on Berlioz; for in that would lie the danger of a new +misunderstanding. You see how both the followers and opponents of +Berlioz hinder us from getting at the truth. Let us dismiss them. + +Have we now come to the end of our difficulties? Not yet; for Berlioz is +the most illusive of men, and no one has helped more than he to mislead +people in their estimate of him. We know how much he has written about +music and about his own life, and what wit and understanding he shows in +his shrewd criticisms and charming _Mémoires_.[3] + +[Footnote 3: The literary work of Berlioz is rather uneven. Beside +passages of exquisite beauty we find others that are ridiculous in their +exaggerated sentiment, and there are some that even lack good taste. But +he had a natural gift of style, and his writing is vigorous, and full of +feeling, especially towards the latter half of his life. The _Procession +des Rogations_ is often quoted from the _Mémoires_; and some of his +poetical text, particularly that in _L'Enfance du Christ_ and in _Les +Troyens_, is written in beautiful language and with a fine sense of +rhythm. His _Mémoires_ as a whole is one of the most delightful books +ever written by an artist. Wagner was a greater poet, but as a prose +writer Berlioz is infinitely superior. See Paul Morillot's essay on +_Berlioz écrivain_, 1903, Grenoble.] One would think that such an +imaginative and skilful writer, accustomed in his profession of critic +to express every shade of feeling, would be able to tell us more exactly +his ideas of art than a Beethoven or a Mozart. But it is not so. As too +much light may blind the vision, so too much intellect may hinder the +understanding. Berlioz's mind spent itself in details; it reflected +light from too many facets, and did not focus itself in one strong beam +which would have made known his power. He did not know how to dominate +either his life or his work; he did not even try to dominate them. He +was the incarnation of romantic genius, an unrestrained force, +unconscious of the road he trod. I would not go so far as to say that he +did not understand himself, but there are certainly times when he is +past understanding himself. He allows himself to drift where chance will +take him,[4] like an old Scandinavian pirate laid at the bottom of his +boat, staring up at the sky; and he dreams and groans and laughs and +gives himself up to his feverish delusions. He lived with his emotions +as uncertainly as he lived with his art. In his music, as in his +criticisms of music, he often contradicts himself, hesitates, and turns +back; he is not sure either of his feelings or his thoughts. He has +poetry in his soul, and strives to write operas; but his admiration +wavers between Gluck and Meyerbeer. He has a popular genius, but +despises the people. He is a daring musical revolutionary, but he +allows the control of this musical movement to be taken from him by +anyone who wishes to have it. Worse than that: he disowns the movement, +turns his back upon the future, and throws himself again into the past. +For what reason? Very often he does not know. Passion, bitterness, +caprice, wounded pride--these have more influence with him than the +serious things of life. He is a man at war with himself. + +[Footnote 4: "Chance, that unknown god, who plays such a great part in +my life" (_Mémoires_, II, 161).] + +Then contrast Berlioz with Wagner. Wagner, too, was stirred by violent +passions, but he was always master of himself, and his reason remained +unshaken by the storms of his heart or those of the world, by the +torments of love or the strife of political revolutions. He made his +experiences and even his errors serve his art; he wrote about his +theories before he put them into practice; and he only launched out when +he was sure of himself, and when the way lay clear before him. And think +how much Wagner owes to this written expression of his aims and the +magnetic attraction of his arguments. It was his prose works that +fascinated the King of Bavaria before he had heard his music; and for +many others also they have been the key to that music. I remember being +impressed by Wagner's ideas when I only half understood his art; and +when one of his compositions puzzled me, my confidence was not shaken, +for I was sure that the genius who was so convincing in his reasoning +would not blunder; and that if his music baffled me, it was I who was at +fault. Wagner was really his own best friend, his own most trusty +champion; and his was the guiding hand that led one through the thick +forest and over the rugged crags of his work. + +Not only do you get no help from Berlioz in this way, but he is the +first to lead you astray and wander with you in the paths of error. To +understand his genius you must seize hold of it unaided. His genius was +really great, but, as I shall try to show you, it lay at the mercy of a +weak character. + + * * * * * + +Everything about Berlioz was misleading, even his appearance. In +legendary portraits he appears as a dark southerner with black hair and +sparkling eyes. But he was really very fair and had blue eyes,[5] and +Joseph d'Ortigue tells us they were deep-set and piercing, though +sometimes clouded by melancholy or languor.[6] He had a broad forehead +furrowed with wrinkles by the time he was thirty, and a thick mane of +hair, or, as E. Legouvé puts it, "a large umbrella of hair, projecting +like a movable awning over the beak of a bird of prey."[7] + + +[Footnote 5: "I was fair," wrote Berlioz to Bülow (unpublished letters, +1858). "A shock of reddish hair," he wrote in his _Mémoires_, I, 165. +"Sandy-coloured hair," said Reyer. For the colour of Berlioz's hair I +rely upon the evidence of Mme. Chapót, his niece.] + +[Footnote 6: Joseph d'Ortigue, _Le Balcon de l'Opéra_, 1833.] + +[Footnote 7: E. Legouvé, _Soixante ans de souvenirs_. Legouvé describes +Berlioz here as he saw him for the first time.] + +His mouth was well cut, with lips compressed and puckered at the +corners in a severe fold, and his chin was prominent. He had a deep +voice,[8] but his speech was halting and often tremulous with emotion; +he would speak passionately of what interested him, and at times be +effusive in manner, but more often he was ungracious and reserved. He +was of medium height, rather thin and angular in figure, and when seated +he seemed much taller than he really was.[9] He was very restless, and +inherited from his native land, Dauphiné, the mountaineer's passion for +walking and climbing, and the love of a vagabond life, which remained +with him nearly to his death.[10] He had an iron constitution, but he +wrecked it by privation and excess, by his walks in the rain, and by +sleeping out-of-doors in all weathers, even when there was snow on the +ground.[11] + +[Footnote 8: "A passable baritone," says Berlioz _(Mémoires_, I, 58). In +1830, in the streets of Paris, he sang "a bass part" _(Mémoires_, I, +156). During his first visit to Germany the Prince of Hechingen made him +sing "the part of the violoncello" in one of his compositions +(_Mémoires_, II, 32).] + +[Footnote 9: There are two good portraits of Berlioz. One is a +photograph by Pierre Petit, taken in 1863, which he sent to Mme. Estelle +Fornier. It shows him leaning on his elbow, with his head bent, and his +eyes fixed on the ground as if he were tired. The other is the +photograph which he had reproduced in the first edition of his +_Mémoires_, and which shows him leaning back, his hands in his pockets, +his head upright, with an expression of energy in his face, and a fixed +and stern look in his eyes.] + +[Footnote 10: He would go on foot from Naples to Rome in a straight line +over the mountains, and would walk at one stretch from Subiaco to +Tivoli.] + +[Footnote 11: This brought on several attacks of bronchitis and frequent +sore throats, as well as the internal affection from which he died.] + +But in this strong and athletic frame lived a feverish and sickly soul +that was dominated and tormented by a morbid craving for love and +sympathy: "that imperative need of love which is killing me...."[12] To +love, to be loved--he would give up all for that. + +[Footnote 12: "Music and love are the two wings of the soul," he wrote +in his _Mémoires_.] + +But his love was that of a youth who lives in dreams; it was never the +strong, clear-eyed passion of a man who has faced the realities of life, +and who sees the defects as well as the charms of the woman he loves, +Berlioz was in love with love, and lost himself among visions and +sentimental shadows. To the end of his life he remained "a poor little +child worn out by a love that was beyond him."[13] But this man who +lived so wild and adventurous a life expressed his passions with +delicacy; and one finds an almost girlish purity in the immortal love +passages of _Les Troyens_ or the "_nuit sereine"_ of _Roméo et +Juliette_. And compare this Virgilian affection with Wagner's sensual +raptures. Does it mean that Berlioz could not love as well as Wagner? We +only know that Berlioz's life was made up of love and its torments. The +theme of a touching passage in the Introduction of the _Symphonic +fantastique_ has been recently identified by M. Julien Tiersot, in his +interesting book,[14] with a romance composed by Berlioz at the age of +twelve, when he loved a girl of eighteen "with large eyes and pink +shoes"--Estelle, _Stella mentis, Stella matutina_. These words--perhaps +the saddest he ever wrote--might serve as an emblem of his life, a life +that was a prey to love and melancholy, doomed to wringing of the heart +and awful loneliness; a life lived in a hollow world, among worries that +chilled the blood; a life that was distasteful and had no solace to +offer him in its end.[15] He has himself described this terrible "_mal +de l'isolement_," which pursued him all his life, vividly and +minutely.[16] He was doomed to suffering, or, what was worse, to make +others suffer. + +[Footnote 13: _Mémoires_, I, 11.] + +[Footnote 14: Julien Tiersot, _Hector Berlioz et la société de son +temps_, 1903, Hachette.] + +[Footnote 15: See the _Mémoires_, I, 139.] + +[Footnote 16: "I do not know how to describe this terrible sickness.... +My throbbing breast seems to be sinking into space; and my heart, +drawing in some irresistible force, feels as though it would expand +until it evaporated and dissolved away. My skin becomes hot and tender, +and flushes from head to foot. I want to cry out to my friends (even +those I do not care for) to help and comfort me, to save me from +destruction, and keep in the life that is ebbing from me. I have no +sensation of impending death in these attacks, and suicide seems +impossible; I do not want to die--far from it, I want very much to live, +to intensify life a thousandfold. It is an excessive appetite for +happiness, which becomes unbearable when it lacks food; and it is only +satisfied by intense delights, which give this great overflow of feeling +an outlet. It is not a state of spleen, though that may follow later ... +spleen is rather the congealing of all these emotions--the block of ice. +Even when I am calm I feel a little of this '_isolement_' on Sundays in +summer, when our towns are lifeless, and everyone is in the country; for +I know that people are enjoying themselves away from me, and I feel +their absence. The _adagio_ of Beethoven's symphonies, certain scenes +from Gluck's _Alceste_ and _Armide_, an air from his Italian opera +_Telemacco_, the Elysian fields of his _Orfeo_, will bring on rather bad +attacks of this suffering; but these masterpieces bring with them also +an antidote--they make one's tears flow, and then the pain is eased. On +the other hand, the _adagio_ of some of Beethoven's sonatas and Gluck's +_Iphigénie en Tauride_ are full of melancholy, and therefore provoke +spleen ... it is then cold within, the sky is grey and overcast with +clouds, the north wind moans dully...." _(Mémoires_, I, 246).] + +Who does not know his passion for Henrietta Smithson? It was a sad +story. He fell in love with an English actress who played Juliet (Was it +she or Juliet whom he loved?). He caught but a glance of her, and it was +all over with him. He cried out, "Ah, I am lost!" He desired her; she +repulsed him. He lived in a delirium of suffering and passion; he +wandered about for days and nights like a madman, up and down Paris and +its neighbourhood, without purpose or rest or relief, until sleep +overcame him wherever it found him--among the sheaves in a field near +Villejuif, in a meadow near Sceaux, on the bank of the frozen Seine near +Neuilly, in the snow, and once on a table in the Café Cardinal, where he +slept for five hours, to the great alarm of the waiters, who thought he +was dead.[17] Meanwhile, he was told slanderous gossip about Henrietta, +which he readily believed. Then he despised her, and dishonoured her +publicly in his _Symphonie fantastique_, paying homage in his bitter +resentment to Camille Moke, a pianist, to whom he lost his heart without +delay. + +[Footnote 17: _Mémoires_, I, 98.] + +After a time Henrietta reappeared. She had now lost her youth and her +power; her beauty was waning, and she was in debt. Berlioz's passion was +at once rekindled. This time Henrietta accepted his advances. He made +alterations in his symphony, and offered it to her in homage of his +love. He won her, and married her, with fourteen thousand francs debt. +He had captured his dream--Juliet! Ophelia! What was she really? A +charming Englishwoman, cold, loyal, and sober-minded, who understood +nothing of his passion; and who, from the time she became his wife, +loved him jealously and sincerely, and thought to confine him within the +narrow world of domestic life. But his affections became restive, and he +lost his heart to a Spanish actress (it was always an actress, a +virtuoso, or a part) and left poor Ophelia, and went off with Marie +Recio, the Inès of _Favorite_, the page of _Comte Ory_--a practical, +hardheaded woman, an indifferent singer with a mania for singing. The +haughty Berlioz was forced to fawn upon the directors of the theatre in +order to get her parts, to write flattering notices in praise of her +talents, and even to let her make his own melodies discordant at the +concerts he arranged.[18] It would all be dreadfully ridiculous if this +weakness of character had not brought tragedy in its train. + +So the one he really loved, and who always loved him, remained alone, +without friends, in Paris, where she was a stranger. She drooped in +silence and pined slowly away, bedridden, paralysed, and unable to speak +during eight years of suffering. Berlioz suffered too, for he loved her +still and was torn with pity--"pity, the most painful of all +emotions."[19] But of what use was this pity? He left Henrietta to +suffer alone and to die just the same. And, what was worse, as we learn +from Legouvé, he let his mistress, the odious Recio, make a scene before +poor Henrietta.[20] Recio told him of it and boasted about what she had +done. + +[Footnote 18: "Isn't it really devilish," he said to Legouvé, "tragic +and silly at the same time? I should deserve to go to hell if I wasn't +there already."] + +[Footnote 19: _Mémoires_, II, 335. See the touching passages he wrote on +Henrietta Smithson's death.] + +[Footnote 20: "One day, Henrietta, who was living alone at Montmartre, +heard someone ring the bell, and went to open the door. + +"'Is Mme. Berlioz at home?' + +"'I am Mme. Berlioz.' + +"'You are mistaken; I asked for Mme. Berlioz.' + +"'And I tell you, I am Mme. Berlioz.' + +"'No, you are not. You are speaking of the old Mme. Berlioz, the one who +was abandoned; I am speaking of the young and pretty and loved one. +Well, that is myself!' + +"And Recio went out and banged the door after her. + +"Legouvé said to Berlioz, 'Who told you this abominable thing? I suppose +she who did it; and then she boasted about it into the bargain. Why +didn't you turn her out of the house?' 'How could I?' said Berlioz in +broken tones, 'I love her'" _(Soixante ans de souvenirs_).] + +And Berlioz did nothing--"How could I? I love her." + +One would be hard upon such a man if one was not disarmed by his own +sufferings. But let us go on. I should have liked to pass over these +traits, but I have no right to; I must show you the extraordinary +feebleness of the man's character. "Man's character," did I say? No, it +was the character of a woman without a will, the victim of her +nerves.[21] + +[Footnote 21: From this woman's nature came his love of revenge, "a +thing needless, and yet necessary," he said to his friend Hiller, who, +after having made him write the _Symphonie fantastique_ to spite +Henrietta Smithson, next made him write the wretched fantasia _Euphonia_ +to spite Camille Moke, now Mme. Pleyel. One would feel obliged to draw +more attention to the way he often adorned or perverted the truth if one +did not feel it arose from his irrepressible and glowing imagination far +more than from any intention to mislead; for I believe his real nature +to have been a-very straightforward one. I will quote the story of his +friend Crispino, a young countryman from Tivoli, as a characteristic +example. Berlioz says in his _Mémoires_ (I, 229): "One day when Crispino +was lacking in respect I made-him a present of two shirts, a pair of +trousers, and three good kicks behind." In a note he added, "This is a +lie, and is the result of an artist's tendency to aim at effect. I never +kicked Crispino." But Berlioz took care afterwards to omit this note. +One attaches as little importance to his other small boasts as to this +one. The errors in the _Mémoires_ have been greatly exaggerated; and +besides, Berlioz is the first to warn his readers that he only wrote +what pleased him, and in his preface says that he is not writing his +Confessions. Can one blame him for that?] + + * * * * * + +Such people are destined to unhappiness; and if they make other people +suffer, one may be sure that it is only half of what they suffer +themselves. They have a peculiar gift for attracting and gathering up +trouble; they savour sorrow like wine, and do not lose a drop of it. +Life seemed desirous that Berlioz should be steeped in suffering; and +his misfortunes were so real that it would be unnecessary to add to them +any exaggerations that history has handed down to us. + +People find fault with Berlioz's continual complaints; and I, too, find +in them a lack of virility and almost a lack of dignity. To all +appearances, he had far fewer material reasons for unhappiness than--I +won't say Beethoven--Wagner and other great men, past, present, and +future. When thirty-five years old he had achieved glory; and Paganini +proclaimed him Beethoven's successor. What more could he want? He was +discussed by the public, disparaged by a Scudo and an Adolphus Adam, and +the theatre only opened its doors to him with difficulty. It was really +splendid! + +But a careful examination of facts, such as that made by M. Julien +Tiersot, shows the stifling mediocrity and hardship of his life. There +were, first of all, his material cares. When thirty-six years old +"Beethoven's successor" had a fixed salary of fifteen hundred francs as +assistant keeper of the Conservatoire Library, and not quite as much for +his contributions to the _Debits_-contributions which exasperated and +humiliated him, and were one of the crosses of his life, as they obliged +him to speak anything but the truth.[22] + +[Footnote 22: _Mémoires_, II, 158. The heartaches expressed in this +chapter will be felt by every artist.] + +That made a total of three thousand francs, hardly gained on which he +had to keep a wife and child--"_même deux_," as M. Tiersot says. He +attempted a festival at the Opera; the result was three hundred and +sixty francs loss. He organised a festival at the 1844 Exhibition; the +receipts were thirty-two thousand francs, out of which he got eight +hundred francs. He had the _Damnation de Faust_ performed; no one came +to it, and he was ruined. Things went better in Russia; but the manager +who brought him to England became bankrupt. He was haunted by thoughts +of rents and doctors' bills. Towards the end of his life his financial +affairs mended a little, and a year before his death he uttered these +sad words: "I suffer a great deal, but I do not want to die now--I have +enough to live upon." + +One of the most tragic episodes of his life is that of the symphony +which he did not write because of his poverty. One wonders why the page +that finishes his _Mémoires_ is not better known, for it touches the +depths of human suffering. + +At the time when his wife's health was causing him most anxiety, there +came to him one night an inspiration for a symphony. The first part of +it--an allegro in two-four time in A minor--was ringing in his head. He +got up and began to write, and then he thought, + + "If I begin this bit, I shall have to write the whole symphony. It + will be a big thing, and I shall have to spend three or four months + over it. That means I shall write no more articles and earn no + money. And when the symphony is finished I shall not be able to + resist the temptation of having it copied (which will mean an + expense of a thousand or twelve hundred francs), and then of having + it played. I shall give a concert, and the receipts will barely + cover half the cost. I shall lose what I have not got; the poor + invalid will lack necessities; and I shall be able to pay neither + my personal expenses nor my son's fees when he goes on board + ship.... These thoughts made me shudder, and I threw down my pen, + saying, 'Bah! to-morrow I shall have forgotten the symphony.' The + next night I heard the allegro clearly, and seemed to see it + written down. I was filled with feverish agitation; I sang the + theme; I was going to get up ... but the reflections of the day + before restrained me; I steeled myself against the temptation, and + clung to the thought of forgetting it. At last I went to sleep; and + the next day, on waking, all remembrance of it had, indeed, gone + for ever."[23] + +That page makes one shudder. Suicide is less distressing. Neither +Beethoven nor Wagner suffered such tortures. What would Wagner have done +on a like occasion? He would have written the symphony without +doubt--and he would have been right. But poor Berlioz, who was weak +enough to sacrifice his duty to love, was, alas! also heroic enough to +sacrifice his genius to duty.[24] + +[Footnote 23: _Mémoires_, II, 349.] + +[Footnote 24: Berlioz has already touchingly replied to any reproaches +that might be made in the words that follow the story I have quoted. +"'Coward!' some young enthusiast will say, 'you ought to have written +it; you should have been bold.' Ah, young man, you who call me coward +did not have to look upon what I did; had you done so you, too, would +have had no choice. My wife was there, half dead, only able to moan; she +had to have three nurses, and a doctor every day to visit her; and I was +sure of the disastrous result of any musical adventure. No, I was not a +coward; I know I was only human. I like to believe that I honoured art +in proving that she had left me enough reason to distinguish between +courage and cruelty" (_Mémoires_, II, 350).] + +And in spite of all this material misery and the sorrow of being +misunderstood, people speak of the glory he enjoyed. What did his +compeers think of him--at least, those who called themselves such? He +knew that Mendelssohn, whom he loved and esteemed, and who styled +himself his "good friend," despised him and did not recognise his +genius.[25] The large-hearted Schumann, who was, with the exception of +Liszt,[26] the only person who intuitively felt his greatness, admitted +that he used sometimes to wonder if he ought to be looked upon as "a +genius or a musical adventurer."[27] + +[Footnote 25: In a note in the _Mémoires_, Berlioz publishes a letter of +Mendelssohn's which protests his "good friendship," and he writes these +bitter words: "I have just seen in a volume of Mendelssohn's Letters +what his friendship for me consisted of. He says to his mother, in what +is plainly a description of myself, '---- is a perfect caricature, +without a spark of talent ... there are times when I should like to +swallow him up'" (_Mémoires_, II, 48). Berlioz did not add that +Mendelssohn also said: "They pretend that Berlioz seeks lofty ideals in +art. I don't think so at all. What he wants is to get himself married." +The injustice of these insulting words will disgust all those who +remember that when Berlioz married Henrietta Smithson she brought as +dowry nothing but debts; and that he had only three hundred francs +himself, which a friend had lent him.] + +[Footnote 26: Liszt repudiated him later.] + +[Footnote 27: Written in an article on the _Ouverture de Waverley_ +(_Neue Zeitschrift für Musik_).] + +Wagner, who treated his symphonies with scorn before he had even read +them,[28] who certainly understood his genius, and who deliberately +ignored him, threw himself into Berlioz's arms when he met him in London +in 1855. "He embraced him with fervour, and wept; and hardly had he left +him when _The Musical World_ published passages from his book, _Oper und +Drama_, where he pulls Berlioz to pieces mercilessly."[29] In France, +the young Gounod, _doli fabricator Epeus_, as Berlioz called him, +lavished flattering words upon him, but spent his time in finding fault +with his compositions,[30] or in trying to supplant him at the theatre. +At the Opera he was passed over in favour of a Prince Poniatowski. + +[Footnote 28: Wagner, who had criticised Berlioz since 1840, and who +published a detailed study of his works in his _Oper und Drama_ in 1851, +wrote to Liszt in 1855: "I own that it would interest me very much to +make the acquaintance of Berlioz's symphonies, and I should like to see +the scores. If you have them, will you lend them to me?"] + +[Footnote 29: See Berlioz's letter, cited by J. Tiersot, _Hector Berlioz +et la société de son temps_, p. 275.] + +[Footnote 30: _Roméo, Faust, La Nonne sanglante_.] + +He presented himself three times at the Academy, and was beaten the +first time by Onslow, the second time by Clapisson, and the third time +he conquered by a majority of one vote against Panseron, Vogel, Leborne, +and others, including, as always, Gounod. He died before the _Damnation +de Faust_ was appreciated in France, although it was the most remarkable +musical composition France had produced. They hissed its performance? +Not at all; "they were merely indifferent"--it is Berlioz who tells us +this. It passed unnoticed. He died before he had seen _Les Troyens_ +played in its entirety, though it was one of the noblest works of the +French lyric theatre that had been composed since the death of +Gluck.[31] But there is no need to be astonished. To hear these works +to-day one must go to Germany. And although the dramatic work of Berlioz +has found its Bayreuth--thanks to Mottl, to Karlsruhe and Munich--and +the marvellous _Benvenuto Cellini_ has been played in twenty German +towns,[32] and regarded as a masterpiece by Weingartner and Richard +Strauss, what manager of a French theatre would think of producing such +works? + +But this is not all. What was the bitterness of failure compared with +the great anguish of death? Berlioz saw all those he loved die one after +the other: his father, his mother, Henrietta Smithson, Marie Recio. Then +only his son Louis remained. + +[Footnote 31: I shall content myself here with noting a fact, which I +shall deal with more fully in another essay at the end of this book: it +is the decline of musical taste in France--and, I rather think, in all +Europe--since 1835 or 1840. Berlioz says in his _Mémoires_: "Since the +first performance of _Roméo et Juliette_ the indifference of the French +public for all that concerns art and literature has grown incredibly" +(_Mémoires_, II, 263). Compare the shouts of excitement and the tears +that were drawn from the dilettanti of 1830 (_Mémoires_, I, 81), at the +performances of Italian operas or Gluck's works, with the coldness of +the public between 1840 and 1870. A mantle of ice covered art then. How +much Berlioz must have suffered. In Germany the great romantic age was +dead. Only Wagner remained to give life to music; and he drained all +that was left in Europe of love and enthusiasm for music. Berlioz died +truly of asphyxia.] + +[Footnote 32: Here is an official list of the towns where _Benvenuto_ +has been played since 1879 (I am indebted for this information to M. +Victor Chapót, Berlioz's grandnephew). They are, in alphabetical order: +Berlin, Bremen, Brunswick, Dresden, Frankfort-On-Main, +Freiburg-im-Breisgau, Hamburg, Hanover, Karlsruhe, Leipzig, Mannheim, +Metz, Munich, Prague, Schwerin, Stettin, Strasburg, Stuttgart, Vienna, +and Weimar.] + +He was the captain of a merchant vessel; a clever, good-hearted boy, +but restless and nervous, irresolute and unhappy, like his father. "He +has the misfortune to resemble me in everything," said Berlioz; "and we +love each other like a couple of twins."[33] "Ah, my poor Louis," he +wrote to him, "what should I do without you?" A few months afterwards he +learnt that Louis had died in far-away seas. + +He was now alone.[34] There were no more friendly voices; all that he +heard was a hideous duet between loneliness and weariness, sung in his +ear during the bustle of the day and in the silence of the night.[35] He +was wasted with disease. In 1856, at Weimar, following great fatigue, he +was seized with an internal malady. It began with great mental distress; +he used to sleep in the streets. He suffered constantly; he was like "a +tree without leaves, streaming with rain." At the end of 1861, the +disease was in an acute stage. He had attacks of pain sometimes lasting +thirty hours, during which he would writhe in agony in his bed. "I live +in the midst of my physical pain, overwhelmed with weariness. Death is +very slow."[36] + +[Footnote 33: _Mémoires_, II, 420.] + +[Footnote 34: "I do not know how Berlioz has managed to be cut off like +this. He has neither friends nor followers; neither the warm sun of +popularity nor the pleasant shade of friendship" (Liszt to the Princess +of Wittgenstein, 16 May, 1861).] + +[Footnote 35: In a letter to Bennet he says, "I am weary, I am +weary...." How often does this piteous cry sound in his letters towards +the end of his life. "I feel I am going to die.... I am weary unto +death" (21 August, 1868--six months before his death).] + +[Footnote 36: Letter to Asger Hammerick, 1865.] + +Worst of all, in the heart of his misery, there was nothing that +comforted him. He believed in nothing--neither in God nor immortality. + + "I have no faith.... I hate all philosophy and everything that + resembles it, whether religious or otherwise.... I am as incapable + of making a medicine of faith as of having faith in medicine."[37] + + "God is stupid and cruel in his complete indifference."[38] + +He did not believe in beauty or honour, in mankind or himself. + + "Everything passes. Space and time consume beauty, youth, love, + glory, genius. Human life is nothing; death is no better. Worlds + are born and die like ourselves. All is nothing. Yes, yes, yes! All + is nothing.... To love or hate, enjoy or suffer, admire or sneer, + live or die--what does it matter? There is nothing in greatness or + littleness, beauty or ugliness. Eternity is indifferent; + indifference is eternal."[39] + + "I am weary of life; and I am forced to see that belief in + absurdities is necessary to human minds, and that it is born in + them as insects are born in swamps."[40] + +[Footnote 37: Letters to the Princess of Wittgenstein, 22 July, 21 +September, 1862; and August, 1864.] + +[Footnote 38: _Mémoires_, II, 335. He shocked Mendelssohn, and even +Wagner, by his irreligion. (See Berlioz's letter to Wagner, 10 +September, 1855.)] + +[Footnote 39: _Les Grotesques de la Musique_, pp. 295-6.] + +[Footnote 40: Letter to the Abbé Girod. See Hippeau, _Berlioz intime_, +p. 434.] + + "You make me laugh with your old words about a mission to fulfil. + What a missionary! But there is in me an inexplicable mechanism + which works in spite of all arguments; and I let it work because I + cannot stop it. What disgusts me most is the certainty that beauty + does not exist for the majority of these human monkeys."[41] + + "The unsolvable enigma of the world, the existence of evil and + pain, the fierce madness of mankind, and the stupid cruelty that it + inflicts hourly and everywhere on the most inoffensive beings and + on itself--all this has reduced me to the state of unhappy and + forlorn resignation of a scorpion surrounded by live coals. The + most I can do is not to wound myself with my own dart."[42] + + "I am in my sixty-first year; and I have no more hopes or illusions + or aspirations. I am alone; and my contempt for the stupidity and + dishonesty of men, and my hatred for their wicked cruelty, are at + their height. Every hour I say to Death, 'When you like!' What is + he waiting for?"[43] + +[Footnote 41: Letter to Bennet. He did not believe in patriotism. +"Patriotism? Fetichism! Cretinism!" (_Mémoires_, II, 261).] + +[Footnote 42: Letter to the Princess of Wittgenstein, 22 July, 1862.] + +[Footnote 43: _Mémoires_, II, 391.] + +And yet he fears the death he invites. It is the strongest, the +bitterest, the truest feeling he has. No musician since old Roland de +Lassus has feared it with that intensity. Do you remember Herod's +sleepless nights in _L'Enfance du Christ_, or Faust's soliloquy, or the +anguish of Cassandra, or the burial of Juliette?--through all this you +will find the whispered fear of annihilation. The wretched man was +haunted by this fear, as a letter published by M. Julien Tiersot +shows:-- + + "My favourite walk, especially when it is raining, really raining + in torrents, is the cemetery of Montmartre, which is near my house. + I often go there; there is much that draws me to it. The day before + yesterday I passed two hours in the cemetery; I found a comfortable + seat on a costly tomb, and I went to sleep.... Paris is to me a + cemetery and her pavements are tomb-stones. Everywhere are memories + of friends or enemies that are dead.... I do nothing but suffer + unceasing pain and unspeakable weariness. I wonder night and day if + I shall die in great pain or with little of it--I am not foolish + enough to hope to die without any pain at all. Why are we not + dead?"[44] + +His music is like these mournful words; it is perhaps even more +terrible, more gloomy, for it breathes death.[45] What a contrast: a +soul greedy of life and preyed upon by death. It is this that makes his +life such an awful tragedy. When Wagner met Berlioz he heaved a sigh of +relief--he had at last found a man more unhappy than himself.[46] + +[Footnote 44: Letters to the Princess of Wittgenstein, 22 January, 1859; +30 August, 1864; 13 July, 1866; and to A. Morel, 21 August, 1864.] + +[Footnote 45: " ... Qui viderit illas + De lacrymis factas sentiet esse meis," +wrote Berlioz, as an inscription for his _Tristes_ in 1854.] + +[Footnote 46: "One instantly recognises a companion in misfortune; and I +found I was a happier man than Berlioz" (Wagner to Liszt, 5 July, +1855).] + +On the threshold of death he turned in despair to the one ray of light +left him--_Stella montis_, the inspiration of his childish love; +Estelle, now old, a grandmother, withered by age and grief. He made a +pilgrimage to Meylan, near Grenoble, to see her. He was then sixty-one +years old and she was nearly seventy. "The past! the past! O Time! +Nevermore! Nevermore!"[47] + +Nevertheless, he loved her, and loved her desperately. How pathetic it +is. One has little inclination to smile when one sees the depths of that +desolate heart. Do you think he did not see, as clearly as you or I +would see, the wrinkled old face, the indifference of age, the "_triste +raison_," in her he idealised? Remember, he was the most ironical of +men. But he did not wish to see these things, he wished to cling to a +little love, which would help him to live in the wilderness of life. + + "There is nothing real in this world but that which lives in the + heart.... My life has been wrapped up in the obscure little village + where she lives.... Life is only endurable when I tell myself: + 'This autumn I shall spend a month beside her.' I should die in + this hell of a Paris if she did not allow me to write to her, and + if from time to time I had not letters from her." + +So he spoke to Legouvé; and he sat down on a stone in a Paris street, +and wept. In the meantime, the old lady did not understand this +foolishness; she hardly tolerated it, and sought to undeceive him. + +[Footnote 47: _Mémoires_, II, 396.] + + "When one's hair is white one must leave dreams--even those of + friendship.... Of what use is it to form ties which, though they + hold to-day, may break to-morrow?" + +What were his dreams? To live with her? No; rather to die beside her; to +feel she was by his side when death should come. + + "To be at your feet, my head on your knees, your two hands in + mine--so to finish."[48] + +He was a little child grown old, and felt bewildered and miserable and +frightened before the thought of death. + +Wagner, at the same age, a victor, worshipped, flattered, and--if we are +to believe the Bayreuth legend--crowned with prosperity; Wagner, sad and +suffering, doubting his achievements, feeling the inanity of his bitter +fight against the mediocrity of the world, had "fled far from the +world"[49] and thrown himself into religion; and when a friend looked at +him in surprise as he was saying grace at table, he answered: "Yes, I +believe in my Saviour."[50] + +[Footnote 48: _Mémoires_, II, 415.] + +[Footnote 49: "Yes, it is to that escape from the world that _Parsifal_ +owes its birth and growth. What man can, during a whole lifetime, gaze +into the depths of this world with a calm reason and a cheerful heart? +When he sees murder and rapine organised and legalised by a system of +lies, impostures, and hypocrisy, will he not avert his eyes and shudder +with disgust?" (Wagner, _Representations of the Sacred Drama of Parsifal +at Bayreuth, in 1882_.)] + +[Footnote 50: The scene was described to me by his friend, Malwida von +Meysenbug, the calm and fearless author of _Mémoires d'une Idéaliste_.] + +Poor beings! Conquerors of the world, conquered and broken! + +But of the two deaths, how much sadder is that of the artist who was +without a faith, and who had neither strength nor stoicism enough to be +happy without one; who slowly died in that little room in the rue de +Calais amid the distracting noise of an indifferent and even hostile +Paris;[51] who shut himself up in savage silence; who saw no loved face +bending over him in his last moments; who had not the comfort of belief +in his work;[52] who could not think calmly of what he had done, nor +look proudly back over the road he had trodden, nor rest content in the +thought of a life well lived; and who began and closed his _Mémoires_ +with Shakespeare's gloomy words, and repeated them when dying:-- + + "Life's but a walking shadow, a poor player + That struts and frets his hour upon the stage + And then is heard no more: it is a tale + Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, + Signifying nothing."[53] + +[Footnote 51: "I have only blank walls before my windows. On the side of +the street a pug dog has been barking for an hour, a parrot screaming, +and a parroqueet imitating the chirp of sparrows. On the side of the +yard the washerwomen are singing, and another parroqueet cries +incessantly, 'Shoulder arrms!' How long the day is!" + +"The maddening noise of carriages shakes the silence of the night. Paris +wet and muddy! Parisian Paris! Now everything is quiet ... she is +sleeping the sleep of the unjust" (Written to Ferrand, _Lettres +intimes_, pp. 269 and 302).] + +[Footnote 52: He used to say that nothing would remain of his work; that +he had deceived himself; and that he would have liked to burn his +scores.] + +[Footnote 53: Blaze de Bury met him one autumn evening, on the quay, +just before his death, as he was returning from the Institute. "His face +was pale, his figure wasted and bent, and his expression dejected and +nervous; one might have taken him for a walking shadow. Even his eyes, +those large round hazel eyes, had extinguished their fire. For a second +he clasped my hand in his own thin, lifeless one, and repeated, in a +voice that was hardly more than a whisper, Aeschylus's words: 'Oh, this +life of man! When he is happy a shadow is enough to disturb him; and +when he is unhappy his trouble may be wiped away, as with a wet sponge, +and all is forgotten'" (_Musiciens d'hier et d'aujourd'hui_).] + +Such was the unhappy and irresolute heart that found itself united to +one of the most daring geniuses in the world. It is a striking example +of the difference that may exist between genius and greatness--for the +two words are not synonymous. When one speaks of greatness, one speaks +of greatness of soul, nobility of character, firmness of will, and, +above all, balance of mind. I can understand how people deny the +existence of these qualities in Berlioz; but to deny his musical genius, +or to cavil about his wonderful power--and that is what they do daily in +Paris--is lamentable and ridiculous. Whether he attracts one or not, a +thimbleful of some of his work, a single part in one of his works, a +little bit of the _Fantastique_ or the overture of _Benvenuto_, reveal +more genius--I am not afraid to say it--than all the French music of his +century. I can understand people arguing about him in a country that +produced Beethoven and Bach; but with us in France, who can we set up +against him? Gluck and César Franck were much greater men, but they were +never geniuses of his stature. If genius is a creative force, I cannot +find more than four or five geniuses in the world who rank above him. +When I have named Beethoven, Mozart, Bach, Händel, and Wagner, I do not +know who else is superior to Berlioz; I do not even know who is his +equal. + +He is not only a musician, he is music itself. He does not command his +familiar spirit, he is its slave. Those who know his writings know how +he was simply possessed and exhausted by his musical emotions. They were +really fits of ecstasy or convulsions. At first "there was feverish +excitement; the veins beat violently and tears flowed freely. Then came +spasmodic contractions of the muscles, total numbness of the feet and +hands, and partial paralysis of the nerves of sight and hearing; he saw +nothing, heard nothing; he was giddy and half faint." And in the case of +music that displeased him, he suffered, on the contrary, from "a painful +sense of bodily disquiet and even from nausea."[54] + +The possession that music held over his nature shows itself clearly in +the sudden outbreak of his genius.[55] His family opposed the idea of +his becoming a musician; and until he was twenty-two or twenty-three +years old his weak will sulkily gave way to their wishes. In obedience +to his father he began his studies in medicine at Paris. One evening he +heard _Les Danaïdes_ of Salieri. It came upon him like a thunderclap. He +ran to the Conservatoire library and read Gluck's scores. + +[Footnote 54: _A travers chants_, pp. 8-9.] + +[Footnote 55: In truth, this genius was smouldering since his childhood; +it was there from the beginning; and the proof of it lies in the fact +that he used for his _Ouverture des Francs-Juges_ and for the _Symphonie +fantastique_ airs and phrases of quintets which he had written when +twelve years old (see _Mémoires_, I, 16-18).] + +He forgot to eat and drink; he was like a man in a frenzy. A +performance of _Iphigénie en Tauride_ finished him. He studied under +Lesueur and then at the Conservatoire. The following year, 1827, he +composed _Les Francs-Juges_; two years afterwards the _Huit scènes de +Faust_, which was the nucleus of the future _Damnation_;[56] three years +afterwards, the _Symphonie fantastique_ (commenced in 1830).[57] And he +had not yet got the _Prix de Rome_! Add to this that in 1828 he had +already ideas for _Roméo et Juliette_, and that he had written a part of +_Lelio_ in 1829. Can one find elsewhere a more dazzling musical debut? +Compare that of Wagner who, at the same age, was shyly writing _Les +Fées, Défense d'aimer_, and _Rienzi_. + +[Footnote 56: The _Huit scènes de Faust_ are taken from Goethe's +tragedy, translated by _Gérard de Nerval_, and they include: (1) _Chants +de la fête de Pâques_; (2) _Paysans sous les tilleuls_; (3) _Concert des +Sylphes_; (4 and 5) _Taverne d'Auerbach_, with the two songs of the Rat +and the Flea; (6) _Chanson du roi de Thulé_; (7) _Romance de +Marguerite_, "D'amour, l'ardente flamme," and _Choeur de soldats_; (8) +_Sérénade de Méphistophélès_--that is to say, the most celebrated and +characteristic pages of the _Damnation_ (see M. Prudhomme's essays on +_Le Cycle de Berlioz_).] + +[Footnote 57: One could hardly find a better manifestation of the soul +of a youthful musical genius than that in certain letters written at +this time; in particular the letter written to Ferrand on 28 June, 1828, +with its feverish postscript. What a life of rich and overflowing +vigour! It is a joy to read it; one drinks at the source of life +itself.] + +He wrote them at the same age, but ten years later; for _Les Fées_ +appeared in 1833, when Berlioz had already written the _Fantastique_, +the _Huit scènes de Faust, Lelio_, and _Harold; Rienzi_ was only played +in 1842, after _Benvenuto_ (1835), _Le Requiem_ (1837), _Roméo_ (1839), +_La Symphonie funèbre et triomphale_ (1840)--that is to say, when +Berlioz had finished all his great works, and after he had achieved his +musical revolution. And that revolution was effected alone, without a +model, without a guide. What could he have heard beyond the operas of +Gluck and Spontini while he was at the Conservatoire? At the time when +he composed the _Ouverture des Francs-Juges_ even the name of Weber was +unknown to him,[58] and of Beethoven's compositions he had only heard an +_andante_.[59] + +Truly, he is a miracle and the most startling phenomenon in the history +of nineteenth-century music. His audacious power dominates all his age; +and in the face of such a genius, who would not follow Paganini's +example, and hail him as Beethoven's only successor?[60] Who does not +see what a poor figure the young Wagner cut at that time, working away +in laborious and self-satisfied mediocrity? But Wagner soon made up for +lost ground; for he knew what he wanted, and he wanted it obstinately. + +[Footnote 58: _Mémoires_, I, 70.] + +[Footnote 59: _Ibid_. To make amends for this he published, in 1829, a +biographical notice of Beethoven, in which his appreciation of him is +remarkably in advance of his age. He wrote there: "The _Choral Symphony_ +is the culminating point of Beethoven's genius," and he speaks of the +Fourth Symphony in C sharp minor with great discernment.] + +[Footnote 60: Beethoven died in 1827, the year when Berlioz was writing +his first important work, the _Ouverture des Francs-Juges_.] + +The zenith of Berlioz's genius was reached, when he was thirty-five +years old, with the _Requiem_ and _Roméo_. They are his two most +important works, and are two works about which one may feel very +differently. For my part, I am very fond of the one, and I dislike the +other; but both of them open up two great new roads in art, and both are +placed like two gigantic arches on the triumphal way of the revolution +that Berlioz started. I will return to the subject of these works later. + +But Berlioz was already getting old. His daily cares and stormy domestic +life,[61] his disappointments and passions, his commonplace and often +degrading work, soon wore him out and, finally, exhausted his power. +"Would you believe it?" he wrote to his friend Ferrand, "that which used +to stir me to transports of musical passion now fills me with +indifference, or even disdain. I feel as if I were descending a mountain +at a great rate. Life is so short; I notice that thoughts of the end +have been with me for some time past." In 1848, at forty-five years old, +he wrote in his _Mémoires_: "I find myself so old and tired and lacking +inspiration." At forty-five years old, Wagner had patiently worked out +his theories and was feeling his power; at forty-five he was writing +_Tristan_ and _The Music of the Future_. Abused by critics, unknown to +the public, "he remained calm, in the belief that he would be master of +the musical world in fifty years' time."[62] + +[Footnote 61: He left Henrietta Smithson in 1842; she died in 1854.] + +[Footnote 62: Written by Berlioz himself, in irony, in a letter of +1855.] + +Berlioz was disheartened. Life had conquered him. It was not that he had +lost any of his artistic mastery; on the contrary, his compositions +became more and more finished; and nothing in his earlier work attained +the pure beauty of some of the pages of _L'Enfance du Christ_ (1850-4), +or of _Les Troyens_ (1855-63). But he was losing his power; and his +intense feeling, his revolutionary ideas, and his inspiration (which in +his youth had taken the place of the confidence he lacked) were failing +him. He now lived on the past--the _Huit scènes de Faust_ (1828) held +the germs of _La Damnation de Faust_ (1846); since 1833, he had been +thinking of _Béatrice et Bénédict_ (1862); the ideas in _Les Troyens_ +were inspired by his childish worship of Virgil, and had been with him +all his life. But with what difficulty he now finished his task! He had +only taken seven months to write _Roméo_, and "on account of not being +able to write the _Requiem_ fast enough, he had adopted a kind of +musical shorthand";[63] but he took seven or eight years to write _Les +Troyens_, alternating between moods of enthusiasm and disgust, and +feeling indifference and doubt about his work. He groped his way +hesitatingly and unsteadily; he hardly understood what he was doing. He +admired the more mediocre pages of his work: the scene of the Laocoon, +the finale of the last act of the _Les Troyens à Troie_, the last scene +with Aeneas in _Les Troyens à Carthage_.[64] The empty pomposities of +Spontini mingle with the loftiest conceptions. One might say that his +genius became a stranger to him: it was the mechanical work of an +unconscious force, like "stalactites in a dripping grotto." He had no +impetus. It was only a matter of time before the roof of the grotto +would give way. One is struck with the mournful despair with which he +works; it is his last will and testament that he is making. And when he +has finished it, he will have finished everything. His work is ended; if +he lived another hundred years he would not have the heart to add +anything more to it. The only thing that remains--and it is what he is +about to do--is to wrap himself in silence and die. + +[Footnote 63: _Mémoires_, I, 307.] + +[Footnote 64: About this time he wrote to Liszt regarding _L'Enfance du +Christ_: "I think I have hit upon something good in Herod's scena and +air with the soothsayers; it is full of character, and will, I hope, +please you. There are, perhaps, more graceful and pleasing things, but +with the exception of the Bethlehem duet, I do not think they have the +same quality of originality" (17 December, 1854).] + +Oh, mournful destiny! There are great men who have outlived their +genius; but with Berlioz genius outlived desire. His genius was still +there; one feels it in the sublime pages of the third act of _Les +Troyens à Carthage_. But Berlioz had ceased to believe in his power; he +had lost faith in everything. His genius was dying for want of +nourishment; it was a flame above an empty tomb. At the same hour of his +old age the soul of Wagner sustained its glorious flight; and, having +conquered everything, it achieved a supreme victory in renouncing +everything for its faith. And the divine songs of Parsifal resounded as +in a splendid temple, and replied to the cries of the suffering Amfortas +by the blessed words: "_Selig in Glauben! Selig in Liebe_!" + + + + +II + + +Berlioz's work did not spread itself evenly over his life; it was +accomplished in a few years. It was not like the course of a great +river, as with Wagner and Beethoven; it was a burst of genius, whose +flames lit up the whole sky for a little while, and then died gradually +down.[65] Let me try to tell you about this wonderful blaze. + +Some of Berlioz's musical qualities are so striking that it is +unnecessary to dwell upon them here. His instrumental colouring, so +intoxicating and exciting,[66] his extraordinary discoveries concerning +timbre, his inventions of new nuances (as in the famous combining of +flutes and trombones in the _Hostias et preces_ of the _Requiem_, and +the curious use of the harmonics of violins and harps), and his huge and +nebulous orchestra--all this lends itself to the most subtle expression +of thought.[67] + +[Footnote 65: In 1830, old Rouget de Lisle called Berlioz, "a volcano in +eruption" (_Mémoires_, I, 158).] + +[Footnote 66: M. Camille Saint-Saëns wrote in his _Portraits et +Souvenirs_, 1900: "Whoever reads Berlioz's scores before hearing them +played can have no real idea of their effect. The instruments appear to +be arranged in defiance of all common sense; and it would seem, to use +professional slang, that _cela ne dut pas sonner_, but _cela sonne_ +wonderfully. If we find here and there obscurities of style, they do not +appear in the orchestra; light streams into it and plays there as in the +facets of a diamond."] + +[Footnote 67: See the excellent essay of H. Lavoix, in his _Histoire de +l'Instrumentation_. It should be noticed that Berlioz's observations in +his _Traité d'instrumentation et d'orchestration modernes_ (1844) have +not been lost upon Richard Strauss, who has just published a German +edition of the work, and some of whose most famous orchestral effects +are realisations of Berlioz's ideas.] + +Think of the effect that such works must have produced at that period. +Berlioz was the first to be astonished when he heard them for the first +time. At the _Ouverture des Francs-Juges_ he wept and tore his hair, and +fell sobbing on the kettledrums. At the performance of his _Tuba mirum_, +in Berlin, he nearly fainted. The composer who most nearly approached +him was Weber, and, as we have already seen, Berlioz only knew him late +in life. But how much less rich and complex is Weber's music, in spite +of its nervous brilliance and dreaming poetry. Above all, Weber is much +more mundane and more of a classicist; he lacks Berlioz's revolutionary +passion and plebeian force; he is less expressive and less grand. + +How did Berlioz come to have this genius for orchestration almost from +the very first? He himself says that his two masters at the +Conservatoire taught him nothing in point of instrumentation:-- + + "Lesueur had only very limited ideas about the art. Reicha knew the + particular resources of most of the wind instruments; but I think + that he had not very advanced ideas on the subject of grouping + them." + +Berlioz taught himself. He used to read the score of an opera while it +was being performed. + + "It was thus," he says,[68] "that I began to get familiar with the + use of the orchestra, and to know its expression and timbre, as + well as the range and mechanism of most of the instruments. By + carefully comparing the effect produced with the means used to + produce it, I learned the hidden bond which unites musical + expression to the special art of instrumentation; but no one put me + in the way of this. The study of the methods of the three modern + masters, Beethoven, Weber, and Spontini, the impartial examination + of the traditions of instrumentation and of little-used forms and + combinations, conversations with virtuosi, and the effects I made + them try on their different instruments, together with a little + instinct, did the rest for me."[69] + +[Footnote 68: One may judge of this instinct by one fact: he wrote the +overtures of _Les Francs-Juges_ and _Waverley_ without really knowing if +it were possible to play them. "I was so ignorant," he says, "of the +mechanism of certain instruments, that after having written the solo in +D flat for the trombone in the Introduction of _Les Francs-Juges_, I +feared it would be terribly difficult to play. So I went, very anxious, +to one of the trombonists of the Opera orchestra. He looked at the +passage and reassured me. 'The key of D flat is,' he said, 'one of the +pleasantest for that instrument; and you can count on a splendid effect +for that passage'" _(Mémoires_, I, 63).] + +[Footnote 69: _Mémoires_, I, 64.] + +That he was an originator in this direction no one doubts. And no one +disputes, as a rule, "his devilish cleverness," as Wagner scornfully +called it, or remains insensible to his skill and mastery in the +mechanism of expression, and his power over sonorous matter, which make +him, apart from his creative power, a sort of magician of music, a king +of tone and rhythm. This gift is recognised even by his enemies--by +Wagner, who seeks with some unfairness to restrict his genius within +narrow limits, and to reduce it to "a structure with wheels of infinite +ingenuity and extreme cunning ... a marvel of mechanism."[70] + +But though there is hardly anyone that Berlioz does not irritate or +attract, he always strikes people by his impetuous ardour, his glowing +romance, and his seething imagination, all of which makes and will +continue to make his work one of the most picturesque mirrors of his +age. His frenzied force of ecstasy and despair, his fulness of love and +hatred, his perpetual thirst for life, which "in the heart of the +deepest sorrow lights the Catherine wheels and crackers of the wildest +joy"[71]--these are the qualities that stir up the crowds in _Benvenuto_ +and the armies in the _Damnation_, that shake earth, heaven, and hell, +and are never quenched, but remain devouring and "passionate even when +the subject is far removed from passion, and yet also express sweet and +tender sentiments and the deepest calm."[72] + +[Footnote 70: "Berlioz displayed, in calculating the properties of +mechanism, a really astounding scientific knowledge. If the inventors of +our modern industrial machinery are to be considered benefactors of +humanity to-day, Berlioz deserves to be considered as the true saviour +of the musical world; for, thanks to him, musicians can produce +surprising effects in music by the varied use of simple mechanical +means.... Berlioz lies hopelessly buried beneath the ruins of his own +contrivances" (_Oper und Drama_, 1851).] + +[Footnote 71: Letter from Berlioz to Ferrand.] + +[Footnote 72: "The chief characteristics of my music are passionate +expression, inward warmth, rhythmic in pulses, and unforeseen effects. +When I speak of passionate expression, I mean an expression that +desperately strives to reproduce the inward feeling of its subject, even +when the theme is contrary to passion, and deals with gentle emotions or +the deepest calm. It is this kind of expression that may be found in +_L'Enfance du Christ_, and, above all, in the scene of _Le Ciel_ in the +_Damnation de Faust_ and in the _Sanctus_ of the _Requiem_" (_Mémoires_, +II, 361).] + +Whatever one may think of this volcanic force, of this torrential stream +of youth and passion, it is impossible to deny them; one might as well +deny the sun. + +And I shall not dwell on Berlioz's love of Nature, which, as M. +Prudhomme shows us, is the soul of a composition like the _Damnation_ +and, one might say, of all great compositions. No musician, with the +exception of Beethoven, has loved Nature so profoundly. Wagner himself +did not realise the intensity of emotion which she roused in +Berlioz,[73] and how this feeling impregnated the music of the +_Damnation_, of _Roméo_, and of _Les Troyens_. + +[Footnote 73: "So you are in the midst of melting glaciers in your +_Niebelungen_! To be writing in the presence of Nature herself must be +splendid. It is an enjoyment which I am denied. Beautiful landscapes, +lofty peaks, or great stretches of sea, absorb me instead of evoking +ideas in me. I feel, but I cannot express what I feel. I can only paint +the moon when I see its reflection in the bottom of a well" (Berlioz to +Wagner, 10 September, 1855).] + +But this genius had other characteristics which are less well known, +though they are not less unusual. The first is his sense of pure beauty. +Berlioz's exterior romanticism must not make us blind to this. He had a +Virgilian soul; and if his colouring recalls that of Weber, his design +has often an Italian suavity. Wagner never had this love of beauty in +the Latin sense of the word. Who has understood the Southern nature, +beautiful form, and harmonious movement like Berlioz? Who, since Gluck, +has recognised so well the secret of classical beauty? Since _Orfeo_ was +composed, no one has carved in music a bas-relief so perfect as the +entrance of Andromache in the second act of _Les Troyens à Troie_. In +_Les Troyens à Carthage_, the fragrance of the Aeneid is shed over the +night of love, and we see the luminous sky and hear the murmur of the +sea. Some of his melodies are like statues, or the pure lines of +Athenian friezes, or the noble gesture of beautiful Italian girls, or +the undulating profile of the Albanian hills filled with divine +laughter. He has done more than felt and translated into music the +beauty of the Mediterranean--he has created beings worthy of a Greek +tragedy. His Cassandre alone would suffice to rank him among the +greatest tragic poets that music has ever known. And Cassandre is a +worthy sister of Wagner's Brünnhilde; but she has the advantage of +coming of a nobler race, and of having a lofty restraint of spirit and +action that Sophocles himself would have loved. + +Not enough attention has been drawn to the classical nobility from which +Berlioz's art so spontaneously springs. It is not fully acknowledged +that he was, of all nineteenth-century musicians, the one who had in the +highest degree the sense of plastic beauty. Nor do people always +recognise that he was a writer of sweet and flowing melodies. +Weingartner expressed the surprise he felt when, imbued with current +prejudice against Berlioz's lack of melodic invention, he opened, by +chance, the score of the overture of _Benvenuto_ and found in that short +composition, which barely takes ten minutes to play, not one or two, but +four or five melodies of admirable richness and originality:-- + +"I began to laugh, both with pleasure at having discovered such a +treasure, and with annoyance at finding how narrow human judgment is. +Here I counted five themes, all of them plastic and expressive of +personality; of admirable workmanship, varied in form, working up by +degrees to a climax, and then finishing with strong effect. And this +from a composer who was said by critics and the public to be devoid of +creative power! From that day on there has been for me another great +citizen in the republic of art."[74] + +[Footnote 74: _Musikführer_, 29 November, 1903.] + +Before this, Berlioz had written in 1864:-- + + "It is quite easy for others to convince themselves that, without + even limiting me to take a very short melody as the theme of a + composition--as the greatest musicians have often done--I have + always endeavoured to put a wealth of melody into my compositions. + One may, of course, dispute the worth of these melodies, their + distinction, originality, or charm--it is not for me to judge + them--but to deny their existence is either unfair or foolish. They + are often on a large scale; and an immature or short-sighted + musical vision may not clearly distinguish their form; or, again, + they may be accompanied by secondary melodies which, to a limited + vision, may veil the form of the principal ones. Or, lastly, + shallow musicians may find these melodies so unlike the funny + little things that they call melodies, that they cannot bring + themselves to give the same name to both."[75] + +And what a splendid variety there is in these melodies: there is the +song in Gluck's style (Cassandre's airs), the pure German _lied_ +(Marguerite's song, "D'amour l'ardente flamme"), the Italian melody, +after Bellini, in its most limpid and happy form (arietta of Arlequin in +_Benvenuto_), the broad Wagnerian phrase (finale of _Roméo_), the +folk-song (chorus of shepherds in _L'Enfance du Christ_), and the freest +and most modern recitative (the monologues of Faust), which was +Berlioz's own invention, with its full development, its pliant outline, +and its intricate nuances.[76] + +[Footnote 75: _Mémoires_, II, 361.] + +[Footnote 76: M. Jean Marnold has remarked this genius for monody in +Berlioz in his article on _Hector Berlioz, musicien (Mercure de France_, +15 January, and 1 February, 1905).] + +I have said that Berlioz had a matchless gift for expressing tragic +melancholy, weariness of life, and the pangs of death. In a general way, +one may say that he was a great elegist in music. Ambros, who was a very +discerning and unbiassed critic, said: "Berlioz feels with inward +delight and profound emotion what no musician, except Beethoven, has +felt before." And Heinrich Heine had a keen perception of Berlioz's +originality when he called him "a colossal nightingale, a lark the size +of an eagle." The simile is not only picturesque, but of remarkable +aptness. For Berlioz's colossal force is at the service of a forlorn and +tender heart; he has nothing of the heroism of Beethoven, or Händel, or +Gluck, or even Schubert. He has all the charm of an Umbrian painter, as +is shown in _L'Enfance du Christ_, as well as sweetness and inward +sadness, the gift of tears, and an elegiac passion. + + * * * * * + +Now I come to Berlioz's great originality, an originality which is +rarely spoken of, though it makes him more than a great musician, more +than the successor of Beethoven, or, as some call him, the forerunner of +Wagner. It is an originality that entitles him to be known, even more +fitly than Wagner himself, as the creator of "an art of the future," the +apostle of a new music, which even to-day has hardly made itself felt. + +Berlioz is original in a double sense. By the extraordinary complexity +of his genius he touched the two opposite poles of his art, and showed +us two entirely different aspects of music--that of a great popular art, +and that of music made free. + +We are all enslaved by the musical tradition of the past. For +generations we have been so accustomed to carry this yoke that we +scarcely notice it. And in consequence of Germany's monopoly of music +since the end of the eighteenth century, musical traditions--which had +been chiefly Italian in the two preceding centuries--now became almost +entirely German. We think in German forms: the plan of phrases, their +development, their balance, and all the rhetoric of music and the +grammar of composition comes to us from foreign thought, slowly +elaborated by German masters. That domination has never been more +complete or more heavy since Wagner's victory. Then reigned over the +world this great German period--a scaly monster with a thousand arms, +whose grasp was so extensive that it included pages, scenes, acts, and +whole dramas in its embrace. We cannot say that French writers have ever +tried to write in the style of Goethe or Schiller; but French composers +have tried and are still trying to write music after the manner of +German musicians. + +Why be astonished at it? Let us face the matter plainly. In music we +have not, so to speak, any masters of French style. All our greatest +composers are foreigners. The founder of the first school of French +opera, Lulli, was Florentine; the founder of the second school, Gluck, +was German; the two founders of the third school were Rossini, an +Italian, and Meyerbeer, a German; the creators of _opéra-comique_ were +Duni, an Italian, and Gretry, a Belgian; Franck, who revolutionised our +modern school of opera, was also Belgian. These men brought with them a +style peculiar to their race; or else they tried to found, as Gluck did, +an "international" style,[77] by which they effaced the more individual +characteristics of the French spirit. The most French of all these +styles is the _opéra-comique_, the work of two foreigners, but owing +much more to the _opéra-bouffe_ than is generally admitted, and, in any +case, representing France very insufficiently. + +[Footnote 77: Gluck himself said this in a letter to the _Mercure de +France_, February, 1773.] + +Some more rational minds have tried to rid themselves of this Italian +and German influence, but have mostly arrived at creating an +intermediate Germano-Italian style, of which the operas of Auber and +Ambroise Thomas are a type. + +Before Berlioz's time there was really only one master of the first rank +who made a great effort to liberate French music: it was Rameau; and, +despite his genius, he was conquered by Italian art.[78] + +By force of circumstance, therefore, French music found itself moulded +in foreign musical forms. And in the same way that Germany in the +eighteenth century tried to imitate French architecture and literature, +so France in the nineteenth century acquired the habit of speaking +German in music. As most men speak more than they think, even thought +itself became Germanised; and it was difficult then to discover, through +this traditional insincerity, the true and spontaneous form of French +musical thought. + +But Berlioz's genius found it by instinct. From the first he strove to +free French music from the oppression of the foreign tradition that was +suffocating it.[79] + +[Footnote 78: I am not speaking of the Franco-Flemish masters at the end +of the sixteenth century: of Jannequin, Costeley, Claude le Jeune, or +Mauduit, recently discovered by M. Henry Expert, who are possessed of so +original a flavour, and have yet remained almost entirely unknown from +their own time to ours. Religious wars bruised France's musical +traditions and denied some of the grandeur of her art.] + +[Footnote 79: It is amusing to find Wagner comparing Berlioz with Auber, +as the type of a true French musician--Auber and his mixed Italian and +German opera. That shows how Wagner, like most Germans, was incapable of +grasping the real originality of French music, and how he saw only its +externals. The best way to find out the musical characteristics of a +nation is to study its folk-songs. If only someone would devote himself +to the study of French folk-song (and there is no lack of material), +people would realise perhaps how much it differs from German folk-song, +and how the temperament of the French race shows itself there as being +sweeter and freer, more vigorous and more expressive.] + +He was fitted in every way for the part, even by his deficiencies and +his ignorance. His classical education in music was incomplete. M. +Saint-Saëns tells us that "the past did not exist for him; he did not +understand the old composers, as his knowledge of them was limited to +what he had read about them." He did not know Bach. Happy ignorance! He +was able to write oratorios like _L'Enfance du Christ_ without being +worried by memories and traditions of the German masters of oratorio. +There are men like Brahms who have been, nearly all their life, but +reflections of the past. Berlioz never sought to be anything but +himself. It was thus that he created that masterpiece, _La Fuite en +Égypte_, which sprang from his keen sympathy with the people. + +He had one of the most untrammelled spirits that ever breathed. Liberty +was for him a desperate necessity. "Liberty of heart, of mind, of +soul--of everything.... Real liberty, absolute and immense!"[80] And +this passionate love of liberty, which was his misfortune in life, since +it deprived him of the comfort of any faith, refused him any refuge for +his thoughts, robbed him of peace, and even of the soft pillow of +scepticism--this "real liberty" formed the unique originality and +grandeur of his musical conceptions. + +[Footnote 80: _Mémoires_, I, 221.] + + "Music," wrote Berlioz to C. Lobe, in 1852, "is the most poetic, + the most powerful, the most living of all arts. She ought to be the + freest, but she is not yet.... Modern music is like the classic + Andromeda, naked and divinely beautiful. She is chained to a rock + on the shores of a vast sea, and awaits the victorious Perseus who + shall loose her bonds and break in pieces the chimera called + Routine." + +The business was to free music from its limited rhythms and from the +traditional forms and rules that enclosed it;[81] and, above all, it +needed to be free from the domination of speech, and to be released from +its humiliating bondage to poetry. Berlioz wrote to the Princess of +Wittgenstein, in 1856:-- + +[Footnote 81: "Music to-day, in the vigour of her youth, is emancipated +and free and can do what she pleases. Many old rules have no longer any +vogue; they were made by unreflecting minds, or by lovers of routine for +other lovers of routine. New needs of the mind, of the heart, and of the +sense of hearing, make necessary new endeavours and, in some cases, the +breaking of ancient laws. Many forms have become too hackneyed to be +still adopted. The same thing may be entirely good or entirely bad, +according to the use one makes of it, or the reasons one has for making +use of it. Sound and sonority are secondary to thought, and thought is +secondary to feeling and passion." (These opinions were given with +reference to Wagner's concerts in Paris, in 1860, and are taken from _A +travers chants_, p. 312.) + +Compare Beethoven's words: "There is no rule that one may not break for +the advancement of beauty."] + + "I am for free music. Yes, I want music to be proudly free, to be + victorious, to be supreme. I want her to take all she can, so that + there may be no more Alps or Pyrenees for her. But she must + achieve her victories by fighting in person, and not rely upon her + lieutenants. I should like her to have, if possible, good verse + drawn up in order of battle; but, like Napoleon, she must face the + fire herself, and, like Alexander, march in the front ranks of the + phalanx. She is so powerful that in some cases she would conquer + unaided; for she has the right to say with Medea: 'I, myself, am + enough.'" + +Berlioz protested vigorously against Gluck's impious theory[82] and +Wagner's "crime" in making music the slave of speech. Music is the +highest poetry and knows no master.[83] It was for Berlioz, therefore, +continually to increase the power of expression in pure music. + +[Footnote 82: Is it necessary to recall the _épître dédicatoire_ of +_Alceste_ in 1769, and Gluck's declaration that he "sought to bring +music to its true function--that of helping poetry to strengthen the +expression of the emotions and the interest of a situation ... and to +make it what fine colouring and the happy arrangement of light and shade +are to a skilful drawing"?] + +[Footnote 83: This revolutionary theory was already Mozart's: "Music +should reign supreme and make one forget everything else.... In an opera +it is absolutely necessary that Poetry should be Music's obedient +daughter" (Letter to his father, 13 October, 1781). Despairing probably +at being unable to obtain this obedience, Mozart thought seriously of +breaking up the form of opera, and of putting in its place, in 1778, a +sort of melodrama (of which Rousseau had given an example in 1773), +which he called "duodrama," where music and poetry were loosely +associated, yet not dependent on each other, but went side by side on +two parallel roads (Letter of 12 November, 1778).] + +And while Wagner, who was more moderate and a closer follower of +tradition, sought to establish a compromise (perhaps an impossible one) +between music and speech, and to create the new lyric drama, Berlioz, +who was more revolutionary, achieved the dramatic symphony, of which the +unequalled model to-day is still _Roméo et Juliette_. + +The dramatic symphony naturally fell foul of all formal theories. Two +arguments were set up against it: one derived from Bayreuth, and by now +an act of faith; the other, current opinion, upheld by the crowd that +speaks of music without understanding it. + +The first argument, maintained by Wagner, is that music cannot really +express action without the help of speech and gesture. It is in the name +of this opinion that so many people condemn _a priori_ Berlioz's +_Roméo_. They think it childish to try and _translate_ action into +music. I suppose they think it less childish to _illustrate_ an action +by music. Do they think that gesture associates itself very happily with +music? If only they would try to root up this great fiction, which has +bothered us for the last three centuries; if only they would open their +eyes and see--what great men like Rousseau and Tolstoy saw so +clearly--the silliness of opera; if only they would see the anomalies of +the Bayreuth show. In the second act of _Tristan_ there is a celebrated +passage, where Ysolde, burning with desire, is waiting for Tristan; she +sees him come at last, and from afar she waves her scarf to the +accompaniment of a phrase repeated several times by the orchestra. I +cannot express the effect produced on me by that _imitation_ (for it is +nothing else) of a series of sounds by a series of gestures; I can never +see it without indignation or without laughing. The curious thing is +that when one hears this passage at a concert, one sees the gesture. At +the theatre either one does not "see" it, or it appears childish. The +natural action becomes stiff when clad in musical armour, and the +absurdity of trying to make the two agree is forced upon one. In the +music of _Rheingold_ one pictures the stature and gait of the giants, +and one sees the lightning gleam and the rainbow reflected on the +clouds. In the theatre it is like a game of marionettes; and one feels +the impassable gulf between music and gesture. Music is a world apart. +When music wishes to depict the drama, it is not real action which is +reflected in it, it is the ideal action transfigured by the spirit, and +perceptible only to the inner vision. The worst foolishness is to +present two visions--one for the eyes and one for the spirit. Nearly +always they kill each other. + +The other argument urged against the symphony with a programme is the +pretended classical argument (it is not really classical at all). +"Music," they say, "is not meant to express definite subjects; it is +only fitted for vague ideas. The more indefinite it is, the greater its +power, and the more it suggests." I ask, What is an indefinite art? What +is a vague art? Do not the two words contradict each other? Can this +strange combination exist at all? Can an artist write anything that he +does not clearly conceive? Do people think he composes at random as his +genius whispers to him? One must at least say this: A symphony of +Beethoven's is a "definite" work down to its innermost folds; and +Beethoven had, if not an exact knowledge, at least a clear intuition of +what he was about. His last quartets are descriptive symphonies of his +soul, and very differently carried out from Berlioz's symphonies. Wagner +was able to analyse one of the former under the name of "A Day with +Beethoven." Beethoven was always trying to translate into music the +depths of his heart, the subtleties of his spirit, which are not to be +explained clearly by words, but which are as definite as words--in fact, +more definite; for a word, being an abstract thing, sums up many +experiences and comprehends many different meanings. Music is a hundred +times more expressive and exact than speech; and it is not only her +right to express particular emotions and subjects, it is her duty. If +that duty is not fulfilled, the result is not music--it is nothing at +all. + +Berlioz is thus the true inheritor of Beethoven's thought. The +difference between a work like _Roméo_ and one of Beethoven's symphonies +is that the former, it would seem, endeavours to express objective +emotions and subjects in music. I do not see why music should not follow +poetry in getting away from introspection and trying to paint the drama +of the universe. Shakespeare is as good as Dante. Besides, one may add, +it is always Berlioz himself that is discovered in his music: it is his +soul starving for love and mocked at by shadows which is revealed +through all the scenes of _Roméo_. + +I will not prolong a discussion where so many things must be left +unsaid. But I would suggest that, once and for all, we get rid of these +absurd endeavours to fence in art. Do not let us say: Music can.... +Music cannot express such-and-such a thing. Let us say rather, If genius +pleases, everything is possible; and if music so wishes, she may be +painting and poetry to-morrow. Berlioz has proved it well in his +_Roméo_. + +This _Roméo_ is an extraordinary work: "a wonderful isle, where a temple +of pure art is set up." For my part, not only do I consider it equal to +the most powerful of Wagner's creations, but I believe it to be richer +in its teaching and in its resources for art--resources and teaching +which contemporary French art has not yet fully turned to account. One +knows that for several years the young French school has been making +efforts to deliver our music from German models, to create a language of +recitative that shall belong to France and that the _leitmotif_ will not +overwhelm; a more exact and less heavy language, which in expressing the +freedom of modern thought will not have to seek the help of the +classical or Wagnerian forms. Not long ago, the _Schola Cantorum_ +published a manifesto that proclaimed "the liberty of musical +declamation ... free speech in free music ... the triumph of natural +music with the free movement of speech and the plastic rhythm of the +ancient dance"--thus declaring war on the metrical art of the last three +centuries.[84] + +[Footnote 84: _Tribune de Saint Gervais_, November, 1903.] + +Well, here is that music; you will nowhere find a more perfect model. It +is true that many who profess the principles of this music repudiate +the model, and do not hide their disdain for Berlioz. That makes me +doubt a little, I admit, the results of their efforts. If they do not +feel the wonderful freedom of Berlioz's music, and do not see that it +was the delicate veil of a very living spirit, then I think there will +be more of archaism than real life in their pretensions to "free music." +Study, not only the most celebrated pages of his work, such as the +_Scène d'amour_ (the one of all his compositions that Berlioz himself +liked best),[85] _La Tristesse de Roméo_, or _La Fête des Capulet_ +(where a spirit like Wagner's own unlooses and subdues again tempests of +passion and joy), but take less well-known pages, such as the +_Scherzetto chanté de la reine Mab_, or the _Réveil de Juliette_, and +the music describing the death of the two lovers.[86] In the one what +light grace there is, in the other what vibrating passion, and in both +of them what freedom and apt expression of ideas. The language is +magnificent, of wonderful clearness and simplicity; not a word too much, +and not a word that does not reveal an unerring pen. In nearly all the +big works of Berlioz before 1845 (that is up to the _Damnation_) you +will find this nervous precision and sweeping liberty. + +[Footnote 85: _Mémoires_, II, 365.] + +[Footnote 86: "This composition contains a dose of sublimity much too +strong for the ordinary public; and Berlioz, with the splendid insolence +of genius, advises the conductor, in a note, to turn the page and pass +it over" (Georges de Massougnes, _Berlioz_). This fine study by Georges +de Massougnes appeared in 1870, and is very much in advance of its +time.] + +Then there is the freedom of his rhythms. Schumann, who was nearest to +Berlioz of all musicians of that time, and, therefore, best able to +understand him, had been struck by this since the composition of the +_Symphonic fantastique_,[87] He wrote:-- + + "The present age has certainly not produced a work in which similar + times and rhythms combined with dissimilar times and rhythms have + been more freely used. The second part of a phrase rarely + corresponds with the first, the reply to the question. This anomaly + is characteristic of Berlioz, and is natural to his southern + temperament." + +Far from objecting to this, Schumann sees in it something necessary to +musical evolution. + + "Apparently music is showing a tendency to go back to its + beginnings, to the time when the laws of rhythm did not yet trouble + her; it seems that she wishes to free herself, to regain an + utterance that is unconstrained, and raise herself to the dignity + of a sort of poetic language." + +And Schumann quotes these words of Ernest Wagner: "He who shakes off the +tyranny of time and delivers us from it will, as far as one can see, +give back freedom to music."[88] + +[Footnote 87: "Oh, how I love, honour, and reverence Schumann for having +written this article alone" (Hugo Wolf, 1884).] + +[Footnote 88: _Neue Zeitschrift für Musik_. See _Hector Berlioz und +Robert Schumann_. Berlioz was constantly righting for this freedom of +rhythm--for "those harmonies of rhythm," as he said. He wished to form a +Rhythm class at the Conservatoire (_Mémoires_, II, 241), but such a +thing was not understood in France. Without being as backward as Italy +on this point, France is still resisting the emancipation of rhythm +(_Mémoires_, II, 196). But during the last ten years great progress in +music has been made in France.] + +Remark also Berlioz's freedom of melody. His musical phrases pulse and +flow like life itself. "Some phrases taken separately," says Schumann, +"have such an intensity that they will not bear harmonising--_as in many +ancient folk-songs_--and often even an accompaniment spoils their +fulness."[89] These melodies so correspond with the emotions, that they +reproduce the least thrills of body and mind by their vigorous +workings-up and delicate reliefs, by splendid barbarities of modulation +and strong and glowing colour, by gentle gradations of light and shade +or imperceptible ripples of thought, which flow over the body like a +steady tide. It is an art of peculiar sensitiveness, more delicately +expressive than that of Wagner; not satisfying itself with the modern +tonality, but going back to old modes--a rebel, as M. Saint-Saëns +remarks, to the polyphony which had governed music since Bach's day, and +which is perhaps, after all, "a heresy destined to disappear."[90] + +[Footnote 89: _Ibid_. "A rare peculiarity," adds Schumann, "which +distinguishes nearly all his melodies." Schumann understands why Berlioz +often gives as an accompaniment to his melodies a simple bass, or chords +of the augmented and diminished fifth--ignoring the intermediate parts.] + +[Footnote 90: "What will then remain of actual art? Perhaps Berlioz will +be its sole representative. Not having studied the pianoforte, he had an +instinctive aversion to counterpoint. He is in this respect the opposite +of Wagner, who was the embodiment of counterpoint, and drew the utmost +he could from its laws" (Saint-Saëns).] + +How much finer, to my idea, are Berlioz's recitatives, with their long +and winding rhythms,[91] than Wagner's declamations, which--apart from +the climax of a subject, where the air breaks into bold and vigorous +phrases, whose influence elsewhere is often weak--limit themselves to +the quasi-notation of spoken inflections, and jar noisily against the +fine harmonies of the orchestra. Berlioz's orchestration, too, is of a +more delicate temper, and has a freer life than Wagner's, flowing in an +impetuous stream, and sweeping away everything in its course; it is also +less united and solid, but more flexible; its nature is undulating and +varied, and the thousand imperceptible impulses of the spirit and of +action are reflected there. It is a marvel of spontaneity and caprice. + +[Footnote 91: Jacques Passy notes that with Berlioz the most frequent +phrases consist of twelve, sixteen, eighteen, or twenty bars. With +Wagner, phrases of eight bars are rare, those of four more common, those +of two still more so, while those of one bar are most frequent of all +(_Berlioz et Wagner_, article published in _Le Correspondant_, 10 June, +1888).] + +In spite of appearances, Wagner is a classicist compared with Berlioz; +he carried on and perfected the work of the German classicists; he made +no innovations; he is the pinnacle and the close of one evolution of +art. Berlioz began a new art; and one finds in it all the daring and +gracious ardour of youth. The iron laws that bound the art of Wagner are +not to be found in Berlioz's early works, which give one the illusion of +perfect freedom.[92] + + + +[Footnote 92: One must make mention here of the poorness and awkwardness +of Berlioz's harmony--which is incontestable--since some critics and +composers have been able to see (Am I saying something +ridiculous?--Wagner would say it for me) nothing but "faults of +orthography" in his genius. To these terrible grammarians--who, two +hundred years ago, criticised Molière on account of his "jargon"--I +shall reply by quoting Schumann. + + "Berlioz's harmonies, in spite of the diversity of their effect, + obtained from very scanty material, are distinguished by a sort of + simplicity, and even by a solidity and conciseness, which one only + meets with in Beethoven.... One may find here and there harmonies + that are commonplace and trivial, and others that are incorrect--at + least according to the old rules. In some places his harmonies have + a fine effect, and in others their result is vague and + indeterminate, or it sounds badly, or is too elaborate and + far-fetched. Yet with Berlioz all this somehow takes on a certain + distinction. If one attempted to correct it, or even slightly to + modify it--for a skilled musician it would be child's play--the + music would become dull" (Article on the _Symphonie fantastique_). + +But let us leave that "grammatical discussion" as well as what Wagner +wrote on "the childish question as to whether it is permitted or not to +introduce 'neologisms' in matters of harmony and melody" (Wagner to +Berlioz, 22 February, 1860). As Schumann has said, "Look out for fifths, +and then leave us in peace."] + +As soon as the profound originality of Berlioz's music has been grasped, +one understands why it encountered, and still encounters, so much secret +hostility. How many accomplished musicians of distinction and learning, +who pay honour to artistic tradition, are incapable of understanding +Berlioz because they cannot bear the air of liberty breathed by his +music. They are so used to thinking in German, that Berlioz's speech +upsets and shocks them. I can well believe it. It is the first time a +French musician has dared to think in French; and that is the reason why +I warned you of the danger of accepting too meekly German ideas about +Berlioz. Men like Weingartner, Richard Strauss, and Mottl--thoroughbred +musicians--are, without doubt, able to appreciate Berlioz's genius +better and more quickly than we French musicians. But I rather mistrust +the kind of appreciation they feel for a spirit so opposed to their own. +It is for France and French people to learn to read his thoughts; they +are intimately theirs, and one day will give them their salvation. + + * * * * * + +Berlioz's other great originality lay in his talent for music that was +suited to the spirit of the common people, recently raised to +sovereignty, and the young democracy. In spite of his aristocratic +disdain, his soul was with the masses. M. Hippeau applies to him Taine's +definition of a romantic artist: "the plebeian of a new race, richly +gifted, and filled with aspirations, who, having attained for the first +time the world's heights, noisily displays the ferment of his mind and +heart." Berlioz grew up in the midst of revolutions and stories of +Imperial achievement. He wrote his cantata for the _Prix de Rome_ in +July, 1830, "to the hard, dull noise of stray bullets, which whizzed +above the roofs, and came to flatten themselves against the wall near +his window."[93] When he had finished this cantata, he went, "pistol in +hand, to play the blackguard in Paris with the _sainte canaille_." He +sang the _Marseillaise_, and made "all who had a voice and heart and +blood in their veins"[94] sing it too. On his journey to Italy he +travelled from Marseilles to Livourne with Mazzinian conspirators, who +were going to take part in the insurrection of Modena and Bologna. +Whether he was conscious of it or not, he was the musician of +revolutions; his sympathies were with the people. + +[Footnote 93: _Mémoires_, I, 155.] + +[Footnote 94: These words are taken from Berlioz's directions on the +score of his arrangement of the _Marseillaise_ for full orchestra and +double choir.] Not only did he fill his scenes in the theatre with +swarming and riotous crowds, like those of the Roman Carnival in the +second act of _Benvenuto_ (anticipating by thirty years the crowds of +_Die Meistersinger_), but he created a music of the masses and a +colossal style. His model here was Beethoven; Beethoven of the Eroica, +of the C minor, of the A, and, above all, of the Ninth Symphony. He was +Beethoven's follower in this as well as other things, and the apostle +who carried on his work.[95] And with his understanding of material +effects and sonorous matter, he built edifices, as he says, that were +"Babylonian and Ninevitish,"[96] "music after Michelangelo,"[97] "on an +immense scale."[98] + +[Footnote 95: "From Beethoven," says Berlioz, "dates the advent in art +of colossal forms" (_Mémoires_, II, 112). But Berlioz forgot one of +Beethoven's models--Händel. One must also take into account the +musicians of the French revolution: Mehul, Gossec, Cherubini, and +Lesueur, whose works, though they may not equal their intentions, are +not without grandeur, and often disclose the intuition of a new and +noble and popular art.] + +[Footnote 96: Letter to Morel, 1855. Berlioz thus describes the +_Tibiomnes_ and the _Judex_ of his _Te Deum_. Compare Heine's judgment: +"Berlioz's music makes me think of gigantic kinds of extinct animals, of +fabulous empires.... Babylon, the hanging gardens of Semiramis, the +wonders of Nineveh, the daring buildings of Mizraim."] + +[Footnote 97: _Mémoires_, I, 17.] + +[Footnote 98: Letter to an unknown person, written probably about 1855, +in the collection of Siegfried Ochs, and published in the _Geschichte +der französischen Musik_ of Alfred Bruneau, 1904. That letter contains a +rather curious analytical catalogue of Berlioz's works, drawn up by +himself. He notes there his predilection for compositions of a "colossal +nature," such as the _Requiem_, the _Symphonie funèbre et triomphale_, +and the _Te Deum_, or those of "an immense style," such as the +_Impériale_.] + +It was the _Symphonie funèbre et triomphale_ for two orchestras and a +choir, and the _Te Deum_ for orchestra, organ, and three choirs, which +Berlioz loved (whose finale _Judex crederis_ seemed to him the most +effective thing he had ever written[99]), as well as the _Impériale_, +for two orchestras and two choirs, and the famous _Requiem_, with its +"four orchestras of brass instruments, placed round the main orchestra +and the mass of voices, but separated and answering one another at a +distance." Like the _Requiem_, these compositions are often crude in +style and of rather commonplace sentiment, but their grandeur is +overwhelming. This is not due only to the hugeness of the means +employed, but also to "the breadth of the style and to the formidable +slowness of some of the progressions--whose final aim one cannot +guess--which gives these compositions a strangely gigantic +character."[100] Berlioz has left in these compositions striking +examples of the beauty that may reveal itself in a crude mass of music. +Like the towering Alps, they move one by their very immensity. A German +critic says: "In these Cyclopean works the composer lets the elemental +and brute forces of sound and pure rhythm have their fling."[101] It is +scarcely music, it is the force of Nature herself. Berlioz himself calls +his _Requiem_ "a musical cataclysm."[102] + + + +[Footnote 99: _Mémoires_, II, 364. See also the letter quoted above.] + +[Footnote 100: _Mémoires_, II, 363. See also II, 163, and the +description of the great festival of 1844, with its 1,022 performers.] + +[Footnote 101: Hermann Kretzschmar, _Führer durch den Konzertsaal_.] + +[Footnote 102: _Mémoires_, I, 312.] + +These hurricanes are let loose in order to speak to the people, to stir +and rouse the dull ocean of humanity. The _Requiem_ is a Last Judgment, +not meant, like that of the Sixtine Chapel (which Berlioz did not care +for at all) for great aristocracies, but for a crowd, a surging, +excited, and rather savage crowd. The _Marche de Rakoczy_ is less an +Hungarian march than the music for a revolutionary fight; it sounds the +charge; and Berlioz tells us it might bear Virgil's verses for a +motto:-- + + " ... Furor iraque mentes + Praecipitant, pulchrumque mori succurrit in armis."[103] + +When Wagner heard the _Symphonic funèbre et triomphale_ he was forced to +admit Berlioz's "skill in writing compositions that were popular in the +best sense of the word." + + "In listening to that symphony I had a lively impression that any + little street boy in a blue blouse and red bonnet would understand + it perfectly. I have no hesitation in giving precedence to that + work over Berlioz's other works; it is big and noble from the first + note to the last; a fine and eager patriotism rises from its first + expression of compassion to the final glory of the apotheosis, and + keeps it from any unwholesome exaggeration. I want gladly to + express my conviction that that symphony will fire men's courage + and will live as long as a nation bears the name of France."[104] + +[Footnote 103: Letter to some young Hungarians, 14 February, 1861. See +the _Mémoires_, II, 212, for the incredible emotion which the _Marche de +Rakoczy_ roused in the audience at Budapest, and, above all, for the +astonishing scene at the end:-- + + "I saw a man enter unexpectedly. He was miserably clad, but his + face shone with a strange rapture. When he saw me, he threw himself + upon me and embraced me with fervour; his eyes filled with tears, + and he was hardly able to get out the words, 'Ah, monsieur, + monsieur! moi Hongrois ... pauvre diable ... pas parler Français + ... un poco Italiano. Pardonnez mon extase.... Ah! ai compris votre + canon.... Oui, oui, la grande-bataille.... Allemands chiens!' And + then striking his breast violently: 'Dans le coeur, moi ... je vous + porte.... _Ah! Français ... révolutionnaire ... savoir faire la + musique des révolutions_!'"] + +[Footnote 104: Written 5 May, 1841.] + +How do such works come to be neglected by our Republic? How is it they +have not a place in our public life? Why are they not part of our great +ceremonies? That is what one would wonderingly ask oneself if one had +not seen, for the last century, the indifference of the State to Art. +What might not Berlioz have done if the means had been given him, or if +his works had found a place in the fêtes of the Revolution? Unhappily, +one must add that here again his character was the enemy of his genius. +As this apostle of musical freedom, in the second part of his life, +became afraid of himself and recoiled before the results of his own +principles, and returned to classicism, so this revolutionary fell to +sullenly disparaging the people and revolutions; and he talks about "the +republican cholera," "the dirty and stupid republic," "the republic of +street-porters and rag-gatherers," "the filthy rabble of humanity a +hundred times more stupid and animal in its twitchings and revolutionary +grimacings than the baboons and orang-outangs of Borneo."[105] + +[Footnote 105: Berlioz never ceased to inveigh against the Revolution of +1848--which should have had his sympathies. Instead of finding material, +like Wagner, in the excitement of that time for impassioned +compositions, he worked at _L'Enfance du Christ_. He affected absolute +indifference--he who was so little made for indifference. He approved +the State's action, and despised its visionary hopes.] What +ingratitude! He owed to these revolutions, to these democratic storms, +to these human tempests, the best of all his genius--and he disowned it +all. This musician of a new era took refuge in the past. + + * * * * * + +Well, what did it matter? Whether he wished it or not, he opened out +some magnificent roads for Art. He has shown the music of France the way +in which her genius should tread; he has shown her possibilities she had +never before dreamed of. He has given us a musical utterance at once +truthful and expressive, free from foreign traditions, coming from the +depths of our being, and reflecting our spirit; an utterance which +responded to his imagination, to his instinct for what was picturesque, +to his fleeting impressions, and his delicate shades of feeling. He has +laid the strong foundation of a national and popular music for the +greatest republic in Europe. + +These are shining qualities. If Berlioz had had Wagner's reasoning power +and had made the utmost use of his intuitions, if he had had Wagner's +will and had shaped the inspirations of his genius and welded them into +a solid whole, I venture to say that he would have made a revolution in +music greater than Wagner's own; for Wagner, though stronger and more +master of himself, was less original and, at bottom, but the close of a +glorious past. + +Will that revolution still be accomplished? Perhaps; but it has suffered +half a century's delay. Berlioz bitterly calculated that people would +begin to understand him about the year 1940.[106] + +After all, why be astonished that his mighty mission was too much for +him? He was so alone.[107] As people forsook him, his loneliness stood +out in greater relief. He was alone in the age of Wagner, Liszt, +Schumann, and Franck; alone, yet containing a whole world in himself, of +which his enemies, his friends, his admirers, and he himself, were not +quite conscious; alone, and tortured by his loneliness. Alone--the word +is repeated by the music of his youth and his old age, by the _Symphonie +fantastique_ and _Les Troyens_. It is the word I read in the portrait +before me as I write these lines--the beautiful portrait of the +_Mémoires_, where his face looks out in sad and stern reproach on the +age that so misunderstood him. + +[Footnote 106: "My musical career would finish very pleasingly if only I +could live for a hundred and forty years" _(Mémoires_, II, 390).] + +[Footnote 107: This solitude struck Wagner. "Berlioz's loneliness is not +only one of external circumstances; its origin is in his temperament. +Though he is a Frenchman, with quick sympathies and interests like those +of his fellow-citizens, yet he is none the less alone. He sees no one +before him who will hold out a helping hand, there is no one by his side +on whom he may lean" (Article written 5 May, 1841). As one reads these +words, one feels it was Wagner's lack of sympathy and not his +intelligence that prevented him from understanding Berlioz. In his heart +I do not doubt that he knew well who was his great rival. But he never +said anything about it--unless perhaps one counts an odd document, +certainly not intended for publication, where he (even he) compares him +to Beethoven and to Bonaparte (Manuscript in the collection of Alfred +Bovet, published by Mottl in German magazines, and by M. Georges de +Massougnes in the _Revue d'art dramatique_, 1 January, 1902).] + + + + +WAGNER + +"SIEGFRIED" + + +There is nothing so thrilling as first impressions. I remember when, as +a child, I heard fragments of Wagner's music for the first time at one +of old Pasdeloup's concerts in the Cirque d'Hiver. I was taken there one +dull and foggy Sunday afternoon; and as we left the yellow fog outside +and entered the hall we were met by an overpowering warmth, a dazzling +blaze of light, and the murmuring voice of the crowd. My eyes were +blinded, I breathed with difficulty, and my limbs soon became cramped; +for we sat on wooden benches, crushed in a narrow space between solid +walls of human beings. But with the first note of the music all was +forgotten, and one fell into a state of painful yet delicious torpor. +Perhaps one's very discomfort made the pleasure keener. Those who know +the intoxication of climbing a mountain know also how closely it is +associated with the discomforts of the climb--with fatigue and the +blinding light of the sun, with out-of-breathness, and all the other +sensations that rouse and stimulate life and make the body tingle, so +that the remembrance of it all is carved indelibly on the mind. The +comfort of a playhouse adds nothing to the illusion of a play; and it +may even be due to the entire inconvenience of the old concert-rooms +that I owe my vivid recollection of my first meeting with Wagner's work. + +How mysterious it was, and what a strange agitation it filled me with! +There were new effects of orchestration, new timbres, new rhythms, and +new subjects; it held the wild poetry of the far-away Middle Ages and +old legends, it throbbed with the fever of our hidden sorrows and +desires. I did not understand it very well. How should I? The music was +taken from works quite unknown to me. It was almost impossible to seize +the connection of the ideas on account of the poor acoustics of the +room, the bad arrangement of the orchestra, and the unskilled +players--all of which served to break up the musical design and spoil +the harmony of its colouring. Passages that should have been made +prominent were slurred over, and others were distorted by faulty time or +want of precision. Even to-day, when our orchestras are seasoned by +years of study, I should often be unable to follow Wagner's thought +throughout a whole scene if I did not happen to know the score, for the +outline of a melody is often smothered by the accompaniment, and so its +sentiment is lost. If we still find obscurity of meaning in Wagner's +works you can imagine how much worse it was then. But what did it +matter? I used to feel myself stirred with passions that were not human: +some magnetic influence seemed to thrill me with both pleasure and pain, +and I felt invigorated and happy, for it brought me strength. It seemed +as if my child's heart were torn from me and the heart of a hero put in +its place. + +Nor was I alone in the experience. On the faces of the people round +about me I saw the reflection of my own emotions. What was the meaning +of it? The audience consisted chiefly of poor and commonplace people, +whose faces were lined with the wear and tear of a life without interest +or ideals; their minds were dull and heavy, and yet here they responded +to the divine spirit of the music. There is no more impressive sight +than that of thousands of people held spellbound by a melody; it is by +turns sublime, grotesque, and touching. + +What a place in my life those Sunday concerts held! All the week I lived +for those two hours; and when they were over I thought about them until +the following Sunday. The fascination of Wagner's music for youth has +often troubled people; they think it poisons the thoughts and dulls the +activities. But the generation that was then intoxicated by Wagner does +not seem to have shown signs of demoralisation since. Why do not people +understand that if we had need of that music it was not because it was +death to us, but life. Cramped by the artificiality of a town, far from +action, or nature, or any strong or real life, we expanded under the +influence of this noble music--music which flowed from a heart filled +with understanding of the world and the breath of Nature. In _Die +Meistersinger_, in _Tristan_, and in _Siegfried_, we went to find the +joy, the love, and the vigour that we so lacked. + +At the time when I was feeling Wagner's seductiveness so strongly there +were always some carping people among my elders ready to quench my +admiration and say with a superior smile: "That is nothing. One can't +judge Wagner at a concert. You must hear him in the opera-house at +Bayreuth." Since then I have been several times to Bayreuth; I have seen +Wagner's works performed in Berlin, in Dresden, in Munich, and in other +German towns, but I have never again felt the old intoxication. People +are wrong to pretend that closer acquaintance with a fine work adds to +one's enjoyment of it. It may throw light upon it, but it nips one's +imagination and dispels the mystery. The puzzling fragments one hears at +concerts will take on splendid proportions on account of all the mind +adds to them. That epic poem of the _Niebelungen_ was once like a forest +in our dreams, where strange and awful beings flashed before our vision +and then vanished. Later on, when we had explored all its paths, we +discovered that order and reason reigned in the midst of this apparent +jungle; and when we came to know the least wrinkle on the faces of its +inhabitants, the confusion and emotion of other days no longer filled +us. + +But this may be the result of growing older; and if I do not recognise +the Wagner of other days, it is perhaps because I do not recognise my +former self. A work of art, and above all a work of musical art, changes +with ourselves. _Siegfried_, for example, is for me no longer full of +mystery. The qualities in it that strike me to-day are its cheerful +vigour, its clearness of form, its virile force and freedom, and the +extraordinary healthiness of the hero, and, indeed, of the whole work. + +I sometimes think of poor Nietzsche and his passion for destroying the +things he loved, and how he sought in others the decadence that was +really in himself. He tried to embody this decadence in Wagner, and, led +away by his flights of fancy and his mania for paradox (which would be +laughable if one did not remember that his whims were not hatched in +hours of happiness), he denied Wagner his most obvious qualities--his +vigour, his determination, his unity, his logic, and his power of +progress. He amused himself by comparing Wagner's style with that of +Goncourt, by making him--with amusing irony--a great miniaturist +painter, a poet of half-tones, a musician of affectations and +melancholy, so delicate and effeminate in style that "after him all +other musicians seemed too robust."[108] He has painted Wagner and his +time delightfully. We all enjoy these little pictures of the Tetralogy, +delicately drawn and worked up by the aid of a +magnifying-glass--pictures of Wagner, languishing and beautiful, in a +mournful salon, and pictures of the athletic meetings of the other +musicians, who were "too robust"! The amusing part is that this piece of +wit has been taken seriously by certain arbiters of elegance, who are +only too happy to be able to run counter to any current opinion, +whatever it may be. + +[Footnote 108: F. Nietzsche, _Der Fall Wagner_.] + +I do not say that there may not be a decadent side in Wagner, revealing +super-sensitiveness or even hysteria and other modern nervous +affections. And if this side was lacking he would not be representative +of his time, and that is what every great artist ought to be. But there +is certainly something more in him than decadence; and if women and +young men cannot see anything beyond it, it only proves their inability +to get outside themselves. A long time ago Wagner himself complained to +Liszt that neither the public nor artists knew how to listen to or +understand any side of his music but the effeminate side: "They do not +grasp its strength," he said. "My supposed successes," he also tells us, +"are founded on misunderstanding. My public reputation isn't worth a +walnut-shell." And it is true he has been applauded, patronised, and +monopolised for a quarter of a century by all the decadents of art and +literature. Scarcely anyone has seen in him a vigorous musician and a +classic writer, or has recognised him as Beethoven's direct successor, +the inheritor of his heroic and pastoral genius, of his epic +inspirations and battlefield rhythms, of his Napoleonic phrases and +atmosphere of stirring trumpet-calls. + +Nowhere is Wagner nearer to Beethoven than in _Siegfried_. In _Die +Walküre_ certain characters, certain phrases of Wotan, of Brünnhilde, +and, especially, of Siegmund, bear a close relationship to Beethoven's +symphonies and sonatas. I can never play the recitative _con espressione +e semplice_ of the seventeenth sonata for the piano (Op. 31, No. 2) +without being reminded of the forests of _Die Walküre_ and the fugitive +hero. But in _Siegfried_ I find, not only a likeness to Beethoven in +details, but the same spirit running through the work--both the poem and +the music. I cannot help thinking that Beethoven would perhaps have +disliked _Tristan_, but would have loved _Siegfried_; for the latter is +a perfect incarnation of the spirit of old Germany, virginal and gross, +sincere and malicious, full of humour and sentiment, of deep feeling, of +dreams of bloody and joyous battles, of the shade of great oak-trees and +the song of birds. + + * * * * * + +In my opinion, _Siegfried_, in spirit and in form, stands alone in +Wagner's work. It breathes perfect health and happiness, and it +overflows with gladness. Only _Die Meistersinger_ rivals it in +merriment, though even there one does not find such a nice balance of +poetry and music. + +And _Siegfried_ rouses one's admiration the more when one thinks that it +was the offspring of sickness and suffering. The time at which Wagner +wrote it was one of the saddest in his life. It often happens so in art. +One goes astray in trying to interpret an artist's life by his work, for +it is exceptional to find one a counterpart of the other. It is more +likely that an artist's work will express the opposite of his life--the +things that he did not experience. The object of art is to fill up what +is missing in the artist's experience: "Art begins where life leaves +off," said Wagner. A man of action is rarely pleased with stimulating +works of art. Borgia and Sforza patronised Leonardo. The strong, +full-blooded men of the seventeenth century; the apoplectic court at +Versailles (where Fagon's lancet played so necessary a part); the +generals and ministers who harassed the Protestants and burned the +Palatinate--all these loved pastorales. Napoleon wept at a reading of +_Paul et Virginie_, and delighted in the pallid music of Paesiello. A +man wearied by an over-active life seeks repose in art; a man who lives +a narrow, commonplace life seeks energy in art. A great artist writes a +gay work when he is sad, and a sad work when he is gay, almost in spite +of himself. Beethoven's symphony _To Joy_ is the offspring of his +misery; and Wagner's _Meistersinger_ was composed immediately after the +failure of _Tannhäuser_ in Paris. People try to find in _Tristan_ the +trace of some love-story of Wagner's, but Wagner himself says: "As in +all my life I have never truly tasted the happiness of love, I will +raise a monument to a beautiful dream of it: I have the idea of _Tristan +und Isolde_ in my head." And so it was with his creation of the happy +and heedless _Siegfried_. + + + * * * * * + +The first ideas of _Siegfried_ were contemporary with the Revolution of +1848, which Wagner took part in with the same enthusiasm he put into +everything else. His recognised biographer, Herr Houston Stewart +Chamberlain--who, with M. Henri Lichtenberger, has succeeded best in +unravelling Wagner's complex soul, though he is not without certain +prejudices--has been at great pains to prove that Wagner was always a +patriot and a German monarchist. Well, he may have been so later on, but +it was not, I think, the last phase of his evolution. His actions speak +for themselves. On 14 June, 1848, in a famous speech to the National +Democratic Association, Wagner violently attacked the organisation of +society itself, and demanded both the abolition of money and the +extinction of what was left of the aristocracy. In _Das Kunstwerk der +Zukunft_ (1849) he showed that beyond the "local nationalism" were signs +of a "supernational universalism." And all this was not merely talk, for +he risked his life for his ideas. Herr Chamberlain himself quotes the +account of a witness who saw him, in May, 1849, distributing +revolutionary pamphlets to the troops who were besieging Dresden. It was +a miracle that he was not arrested and shot. We know that after Dresden +was taken a warrant was out against him, and he fled to Switzerland, +with a passport on which was a borrowed name. If it be true that Wagner +later declared that he had been "involved in error and led away by his +feelings" it matters little to the history of that time. Errors and +enthusiasms are an integral part of life, and one must not ignore them +in a man's biography under the pretext that he regretted them twenty or +thirty years later, for they have, nevertheless, helped to guide his +actions and impressed his imagination. It was out of the Revolution +itself that _Siegfried_ directly sprang. + +In 1848, Wagner was not yet thinking of a Tetralogy, but of an heroic +opera in three acts called _Siegfried's Tod_, in which the fatal power +of gold was to be symbolised in the treasure of the Niebelungen; and +Siegfried was to represent "a socialist redeemer come down to earth to +abolish the reign of Capital." As the rough draft developed, Wagner went +up the stream of his hero's life. He dreamed of his childhood, of his +conquest of the treasure, of the awakening of Brünnhilde; and in 1851 he +wrote the poem of _Der Junge Siegfried_. Siegfried and Brünnhilde +represent the humanity of the future, the new era that should be +realised when the earth was set free from the yoke of gold. Then Wagner +went farther back still, to the sources of the legend itself, and Wotan +appeared, the symbol of our time, a man such as you or I--in contrast to +Siegfried, man as he ought to be, and one day will be. On this subject +Wagner says, in a letter to Roeckel: "Look well at Wotan; he is the +unmistakable likeness of ourselves, and the sum of the present-day +spirit, while Siegfried is the man we wait and wish for--the future man +whom we cannot create, but who will create himself by our +annihilation--the most perfect man I can imagine." Finally Wagner +conceived the Twilight of the Gods, the fall of the Valhalla--our +present system of society--and the birth of a regenerated humanity. +Wagner wrote to Uhlig in 1851 that the complete work was to be played +after the great Revolution. + +The opera public would probably be very astonished to learn that in +_Siegfried_ they applaud a revolutionary work, expressly directed by +Wagner against this detested Capital, whose downfall would have been so +dear to him. And he never doubted that he was expressing grief in all +these pages of shining joy. + +Wagner went to Zurich after a stay in Paris, where he felt "so much +distrust for the artistic world and horror for the restraint that he was +forced to put upon himself" that he was seized with a nervous malady +which nearly killed him. He returned to work at _Der Junge Siegfried_, +and he says it brought him great joy. + + "But I am unhappy in not being able to apply myself to anything but + music. I know I am feeding on an illusion, and that reality is the + only thing worth having. My health is not good, and my nerves are + in a state of increasing weakness. My life, lived entirely in the + imagination and without sufficient action, tires me so, that I can + only work with frequent breaks and long intervals of rest; + otherwise I pay the penalty with long and painful suffering.... I + am very lonely. I often wish for death. + + "While I work I forget my troubles; but the moment I rest they come + flocking about me, and I am very miserable. What a splendid life is + an artist's! Look at it! How willingly would I part with it for a + week of real life. + + "I can't understand how a really happy man could think of serving + art. If we enjoyed life, we should have no need of art. When the + present has nothing more to offer us we cry out our needs by means + of art. To have my youth again and my health, to enjoy nature, to + have a wife who would love me devotedly, and fine children--for + this I would give up _all my art_. Now I have said it--give me what + is left." + +Thus the poem of the Tetralogy was written with doubts, as he said, as +to whether he should abandon art and all belonging to it and become a +healthy, normal man--a son of nature. He began to compose the music of +the poem while in a state of suffering, which every day became more +acute. + + "My nights are often sleepless; I get out of bed, wretched and + exhausted, with the thought of a long day before me, which will not + bring me a single joy. The society of others tortures me, and I + avoid it only to torture myself. Everything I do fills me with + disgust. It can't go on for ever. I can't stand such a life any + longer. I will kill myself rather than live like this.... I don't + believe in anything, and I have only one desire--to sleep so + soundly that human misery will exist no more for me. I ought to be + able to get such a sleep somehow; it should not be really + difficult." + +For distraction he went to Italy; Turin, Genoa, Spezia, and Nice. But +there, in a strange world, his loneliness seemed so frightful that he +became very depressed, and made all haste back to Zurich. It was there +he wrote the happy music of _Das Rheingold_. He began the score of _Die +Walküre_ at a time when his normal condition was one of suffering. Then +he discovered Schopenhauer, whose philosophy only helped to confirm and +crystallise his instinctive pessimism. In the spring of 1855 he went to +London to give concerts; but he was ill there, and this fresh contact +with the world only served to annoy him further. He had some difficulty +in again taking up _Die Walküre_; but he finished it at last in spite of +frequent attacks of facial erysipelas, for which he afterwards had to +undergo a hydropathic cure at Geneva. He began the score of _Siegfried_ +towards the end of 1856, while the thought of Tristan was stirring +within him. In _Tristan_ he wished to depict love as "a dreadful +anguish"; and this idea obsessed him so completely that he could not +finish _Siegfried_. He seemed to be consumed by a burning fever; and, +abandoning _Siegfried_ in the middle of the second act, he threw himself +madly into _Tristan_. "I want to gratify my desire for love," he says, +"until it is completely satiated; and in the folds of the black flag +that floats over its consummation I wish to wrap myself and die."[109] +_Siegfried_ was not finished until 5 February, 1871, at the end of the +Franco-Prussian war--that is fourteen years later, after several +interruptions. + +Such is, in a few words, the history of this heroic idyll. It is perhaps +as well to remind the public now and then that the hours of distraction +they enjoy by means of art may represent years of suffering for the +artist. + + * * * * * + +[Footnote 109: The quotations from Wagner are taken from his letters to +Roeckel, Uhlig, and Liszt, between 1851 and 1856.] + +Do you know the amusing account Tolstoy gave of a performance of +_Siegfried_? I will quote it from his book, _What is Art_?-- + + "When I arrived, an actor in tight-fitting breeches was seated + before an object that was meant to represent an anvil. He wore a + wig and false beard; his white and manicured hands had nothing of + the workman about them; and his easy air, prominent belly, and + flabby muscles readily betrayed the actor. With an absurd hammer he + struck--as no one else would ever strike--a fantastic-looking + sword-blade. One guessed he was a dwarf, because when he walked he + bent his legs at the knees. He cried out a great deal, and opened + his mouth in a queer fashion. The orchestra also emitted peculiar + noises like several beginnings that had nothing to do with one + another. Then another actor appeared with a horn in his belt, + leading a man dressed up as a bear, who walked on all-fours. He let + loose the bear on the dwarf, who ran away, but forgot to bend his + knees this time. The actor with the human face represented the + hero, Siegfried. He cried out for a long time, and the dwarf + replied in the same way. Then a traveller arrived--the god Wotan. + He had a wig, too; and, settling himself down with his spear, in a + silly attitude, he told Mimi all about things he already knew, but + of which the audience was ignorant. Then Siegfried seized some bits + that were supposed to represent pieces of a sword, and sang: + + 'Heaho, heaho, hoho! Hoho, hoho, hoho, hoho! Hoheo, haho, haheo, + hoho!' And that was the end of the first act. It was all so + artificial and stupid that I had great difficulty in sitting it + out. But my friends begged me to stay, and assured me that the + second act would be better. + + "The next scene represented a forest. Wotan was waking up the + dragon. At first the dragon said, 'I want to go to sleep'; but + eventually he came out of his grotto. The dragon was represented by + two men clothed in a green skin with some scales stuck about it. At + one end of the skin they wagged a tail, and at the other end they + opened a crocodile's mouth, out of which came fire. The dragon, + which ought to have been a frightful beast--and perhaps he would + have frightened children about five years old--said a few words in + a bass voice. It was so childish and feeble that one was astonished + to see grown-up people present; even thousands of so-called + cultured people looked on and listened attentively, and went into + raptures. Then Siegfried arrived with his horn. He lay down during + a pause, which is reputed to be very beautiful; and sometimes he + talked to himself, and sometimes he was quite silent. He wanted to + imitate the song of the birds, and cut a rush with his horn, and + made a flute out of it. But he played the flute badly, and so he + began to blow his horn. The scene is intolerable, and there is not + the least trace of music in it. I was annoyed to see three thousand + people round about me, listening submissively to this absurdity + and dutifully admiring it. + + "With some courage I managed to wait for the next + scene--Siegfried's fight with the dragon. There were roarings and + flames of fire and brandishings of the sword. But I could not stand + it any longer; and I fled out of the theatre with a feeling of + disgust that I have not yet forgotten." + +I admit I cannot read this delightful criticism without laughing; and it +does not affect me painfully like Nietzsche's pernicious and morbid +irony. It used to be a grief to me that two men whom I loved with an +equal affection, and whom I reverenced as the finest spirits in Europe, +remained strangers and hostile to each other. I could not bear the +thought that a genius, hopelessly misunderstood by the crowd, should be +bent on making his solitude more bitter and narrow by refusing, with a +sort of jealous waywardness, to be reconciled to his equals, or to offer +them the hand of friendship. But now I think that perhaps it was better +so. The first virtue of genius is sincerity. If Nietzsche had to go out +of his way _not_ to understand Wagner, it is natural, on the other hand, +that Wagner should be a closed book to Tolstoy; it would be almost +surprising if it were otherwise. Each one has his own part to play, and +has no need to change it. Wagner's wonderful dreams and magic intuition +of the inner life are not less valuable to us than Tolstoy's pitiless +truth, in which he exposes modern society and tears away the veil of +hypocrisy with which she covers herself. So I admire _Siegfried_, and +at the same time enjoy Tolstoy's satire; for I like the latter's sturdy +humour, which is one of the most striking features of his realism, and +which, as he himself noticed, makes him closely resemble Rousseau. Both +men show us an ultra-refined civilisation, and both are uncompromising +apostles of a return to nature. + +Tolstoy's rough banter recalls Rousseau's sarcasm about an opera of +Rameau's. In the _Nouvelle Héloïse_, he rails in a similar fashion +against the sadly fantastic performances at the theatre. It was, even +then, a question of monsters, "of dragons animated by a blockhead of a +Savoyard, who had not enough spirit for the beast." + + "They assured me that they had a tremendous lot of machinery to + make all this movement, and they offered several times to show it + to me; but I felt no curiosity about little effects achieved by + great efforts.... The sky is represented by some blue rags + suspended from sticks and cords, like a laundry display.... The + chariots of the gods and goddesses are made of four joists in a + frame, suspended by a thick rope, as a swing might be. Then a plank + is stuck across the joists, and on this is seated a god. In front + of him hangs a piece of daubed cloth, which serves as a cloud upon + which his splendid chariot may rest.... The theatre is furnished + with little square trap-doors which, opening as occasion requires, + show that the demons can be let loose from the cellars. When the + demons have to fly in the air, dummies of brown cloth are + substituted, or sometimes real chimney-sweeps, who swing in the + air, suspended by cords, until they are gloriously lost in the rag + sky.... + + "But you can have no idea of the dreadful cries and roarings with + which the theatre resounds.... What is so extraordinary is that + these howlings are almost the only things that the audience + applaud. By the way they clap their hands one would take them to be + a lot of deaf creatures, who were so delighted to catch a few + piercing sounds now and then that they wanted the actors to do them + all over again. I am quite sure that people applaud the bawling of + an actress at the opera as they would a mountebank's feats of skill + at a fair--one suffers while they are going on, but one is so + delighted to see them finish without an accident that one willingly + demonstrates one's pleasure.... With these beautiful sounds, as + true as they are sweet, those of the orchestra blend very worthily. + Imagine an unending clatter of instruments without any melody; a + lingering and endless groaning among the bass parts; and the whole + the most mournful and boring thing that I ever heard in my life. I + could not put up with it for half an hour without getting a violent + headache. + + "All this forms a sort of psalmody, possessing neither tune nor + time. But if by any chance a lively air is played, there is a + general stamping; the audience is set in motion, and follows, with + a great deal of trouble and noise, some performer in the + orchestra. Delighted to feel for a few moments the rhythm that is + so lacking, they torment the ear, the voice, the arms, the legs, + and all the body, to chase after a tune that is ever ready to + escape them...." + +I have quoted this rather long passage to show how the impression made +by one of Rameau's operas on his contemporaries resembled that made by +Wagner on his enemies. It was not without reason that Rameau was said to +be Wagner's forerunner, as Rousseau was Tolstoy's forerunner. + +In reality, it was not against _Siegfried_ itself that Tolstoy's +criticism was directed; and Tolstoy was closer than he thought to the +spirit of this drama. Is not Siegfried the heroic incarnation of a free +and healthy man, sprung directly from Nature? In a sketch of +_Siegfried_, written in 1848, Wagner says: + + "To follow the impulses of my heart is my supreme law; what I can + accomplish by obeying my instincts is what I ought to do. Is that + voice of instinct cursed or blessed? I do not know; but I yield to + it, and never force myself to run counter to my inclination." + +Wagner fought against civilisation by quite other methods than those +employed by Tolstoy; and if the efforts of the two were equally great, +the practical result is--one must really say it--as poor on one side as +on the other. + +What Tolstoy's raillery is really aimed at is not Wagner's work, but the +way in which his work was represented. The splendours of the setting do +not hide the childishness of the ideas behind them: the dragon Fafna, +Fricka's rams, the bear, the serpent, and all the Valhalla menagerie +have always been ridiculous. I will only add that the dragon's failure +to be terrifying was not Wagner's fault, for he never attempted to +depict a terrifying dragon. He gave it quite clearly, and of his own +choice, a comic character. Both the text and the music make Fafner a +sort of ogre, a simple creature, but, above all, a grotesque one. + +Besides, I cannot help feeling that scenic reality takes away rather +than adds to the effect of these great philosophical fairylands. Malwida +von Meysenbug told me that at the Bayreuth festival of 1876, while she +was following one of the _Ring_ scenes very attentively with her +opera-glasses, two hands were laid over her eyes, and she heard Wagner's +voice say impatiently: "Don't look so much at what is going on. Listen!" +It was good counsel. There are dilettanti who pretend that at a concert +the best way to enjoy Beethoven's last works--where the sonority is +defective--is to stop the ears and read the score. One might say with +less of a paradox that the best way to follow a performance of Wagner's +operas is to listen with the eyes shut. So perfect is the music, so +powerful its hold on the imagination, that it leaves nothing to be +desired; what it suggests to the mind is infinitely finer than what the +eyes may see. I have never shared the opinion that Wagner's works may +be best appreciated in the theatre. His works are epic symphonies. As a +frame for them I should like temples; as scenery, the illimitable land +of thought; as actors, our dreams. + + * * * * * + +The first act of _Siegfried_ is one of the most dramatic in the +Tetralogy. Nothing satisfied me more completely at Bayreuth, both as +regards the actors and the dramatic effects. Fantastic creatures like +Alberich and Mimi, who seem to be out of their element in France, are +rooted deep down in German imaginations. The Bayreuth actors surpassed +themselves in making them startlingly lifelike, with a trembling and +grimacing realism. Burgstaller, who was then making his debut in +_Siegfried_, acted with an impetuous awkwardness which accorded well +with the part. I remember with what zest--which seemed in no way +affected--he played the hero smith, labouring like a true workman, +blowing the fire and making the blade glow, dipping it in the steaming +water, and working it on the anvil; and then, in a burst of Homeric +gaiety, singing that fine hymn at the end of the first act, which sounds +like an air by Bach or Händel. + +But in spite of all this, I felt how much better it was to dream, or to +hear this poem of a youthful soul at a concert. It is then that the +magic murmurs of the forest in the second act speak more directly to the +heart. However beautiful the scenery of glades and woods, however +cleverly the light is made to change and dance among the trees--and it +is manipulated now like a set of organ stops--it still seems almost +wrong to listen with open eyes to music that, unaided, can show us a +glorious summer's day, and make us see the swaying of the tree-tops, and +hear the brush of the wind against the leaves. Through the music alone +the hum and murmur of a thousand little voices is about us, the glorious +song of the birds floats into the depths of a blue sky; or comes a +silence, vibrating with invisible life, when Nature, with her mysterious +smile, opens her arms and hushes all things in a divine sleep. + + * * * * * + +Wagner left _Siegfried_ asleep in the forest in order to embark on the +funereal vessel of _Tristan und Isolde_. But he left Siegfried with some +anguish of heart. When writing to Liszt in 1857, he says: + + "I have taken young Siegfried into the depths of a lonely forest; + there I have left him under a lime-tree, and said good-bye to him + with tears in my eyes. It has torn my heart to bury him alive, and + I had a hard and painful fight with myself before I could do it.... + Shall I ever go back to him? No, it is all finished. Don't let us + speak of it again." + +Wagner had reason to be sad. He knew well that he would never find his +young Siegfried again. He roused him up ten years later. But all was +changed. That splendid third act has not the freshness of the first two. +Wotan has become an important figure, and brought reason and pessimism +with him into the drama. Wagner's later conceptions were perhaps +loftier, and his genius was more master of itself (think of the classic +dignity in the awakening of Brünnhilde); but the ardour and happy +expression of youth is gone. I know that this is not the opinion of most +of Wagner's admirers; but, with the exception of a few pages of sublime +beauty, I have never altogether liked the love scenes at the end of +_Siegfried_ and at the beginning of _Götterdämmerung_. I find their +style rather pompous and declamatory; and their almost excessive +refinement makes them border upon dulness. The form of the duet, too, +seems cut and dried, and there are signs of weariness in it. The +heaviness of the last pages of _Siegfried_ recalls _Die Meistersinger_, +which is also of that period. It is no longer the same joy nor the same +quality of joy that is found in the earlier acts. + +Yet it does not really matter, for joy is there, nevertheless; and so +splendid was the first inspiration of the work that the years have not +dimmed its brilliancy. One would like to end with _Siegfried_, and +escape the gloomy _Götterdämmerung_. For those who have sensitive +feelings the fourth day of the Tetralogy has a depressing effect. I +remember the tears I have seen shed at the end of the _Ring_, and the +words of a friend, as we left the theatre at Bayreuth and descended the +hill at night: "I feel as though I were coming away from the burial of +someone I dearly loved." It was truly a time of mourning. Perhaps there +was something incongruous in building such a structure when it had +universal death for its conclusion--or at least in making the whole an +object of show and instruction. _Tristan_ achieves the same end with +much more power, as the action is swifter. Besides that, the end of +_Tristan_ is not without comfort, for life there is terrible. But it is +not the same in _Götterdämmerung_; for in spite of the absurdity of the +spell which is set upon the love of Siegfried and Brünnhilde, life with +them is happy and desirable, since they are beings capable of love, and +death appears to be a splendid but awful catastrophe. And one cannot say +the _Ring_ breathes a spirit of renunciation and sacrifice like +_Parsifal_; renunciation and sacrifice are only talked about in the +_Ring_; and, in spite of the last transports which impel Brünnhilde to +the funeral pyre, they are neither an inspiration nor a delight. One has +the impression of a great gulf yawning at one's feet, and the anguish of +seeing those one loves fall into it. + +I have often regretted that Wagner's first conception of _Siegfried_ +changed in the course of years; and in spite of the magnificent +_dénouement_ of _Götterdämmerung_ (which is really more effective in a +concert room, for the real tragedy ends with Siegfried's death), I +cannot help thinking with regret how fine a more optimistic poem from +this revolutionary of '48 might have been. People tell me that it would +then have been less true to life. But why should it be truthful to +depict life only as a bad thing? Life is neither good nor bad it is just +what we make it, and the result of the way in which we look at it. Joy +is as real as sorrow, and a very fertile source of action. What +inspiration there is in the laugh of a great man! Let us welcome, +therefore, the sparkling if transient gaiety of _Siegfried_. + +Wagner wrote to Malwida von Meysenbug: "I have, by chance, just been +reading Plutarch's life of Timoleon. That life ended very happily--a +rare and unheard-of thing, especially in history. It does one good to +think that such a thing is possible. It moved me profoundly." + +I feel the same when I hear _Siegfried_. We are rarely allowed to +contemplate happiness in great tragic art; but when we may, how splendid +it is, and how good for one! + + + + +"TRISTAN" + + +Tristan towers like a mountain above all other love poems, as Wagner +above all other artists of his century. It is the outcome of a sublime +conception, though the work as a whole is far from perfect. Of perfect +works there is none where Wagner is concerned. The effort necessary for +the creation of them was too great to be long sustained; for a single +work might means years of toil. And the tense emotions of a whole drama +cannot be expressed by a series of sudden inspirations put into form the +moment they are conceived. Long and arduous labour is necessary. These +giants, fashioned like Michelangelo's, these concentrated tempests of +heroic force and decadent complexity, are not arrested, like the work of +a sculptor or painter, in one moment of their action; they live and go +on living in endless detail of sensation. To expect sustained +inspiration is to expect what is not human. Genius may reveal what is +divine; it may call up and catch a glimpse of _die Mütter_, but it +cannot always breathe in the exhausted air of this world. So will must +sometimes take the place of inspiration; though the will is uncertain +and often stumbles in its task. That is why we encounter things that jar +and jolt in the greatest works--they are the marks of human weakness. +Well, perhaps there is less weakness in _Tristan_ than in Wagner's +other dramas--_Götterdämmerung_, for instance--for nowhere else is the +effort of his genius more strenuous or its flight more dizzy. Wagner +himself knew it well. His letters show the despair of a soul wrestling +with its familiar spirit, which it clutches and holds, only to lose +again. And we seem to hear cries of pain, and feel his anger and +despair. + + "I can never tell you what a really wretched musician I am. In my + inmost heart I know I am a bungler and an absolute failure. You + should see me when I say to myself, 'It ought to go now,' and sit + down to the piano and put together some miserable rubbish, which I + fling away again like an idiot. I know quite well the kind of + musical trash I produce.... Believe me, it is no good expecting me + to do anything decent. Sometimes I really think it was Reissiger + who inspired me to write _Tannhäuser_ and _Lohengrin_." + +This is how Wagner wrote to Liszt when he was finishing this amazing +work of art. In the same way Michelangelo wrote to his father in 1509: +"I am in agony. I have not dared to ask the Pope for anything, because +my work does not make sufficient progress to merit any remuneration. The +work is too difficult, and indeed it is not my profession. I am wasting +my time to no purpose. Heaven help me!" For a year he had been working +at the ceiling of the Sixtine chapel. + +This is something more than a burst of modesty. No one had more pride +than Michelangelo or Wagner; but both felt the defects of their work +like a sharp wound. And although those defects do not prevent their +works from being the glory of the human spirit, they are there just the +same. + +I do not want to dwell upon the inherent imperfections of Wagner's +dramas; they are really dramatic or epic symphonies, impossible to act, +and gaining nothing from representation. This is especially true of +_Tristan_, where the disparity between the storm of sentiment depicted, +and the cold convention and enforced timidity of action on the stage, is +such that at certain moments--in the second act, for example--it pains +and shocks one, and seems almost grotesque. + +But while admitting that _Tristan_ is a symphony that is not suitable +for representation, one also recognises its blemishes and, above all, +its unevenness. The orchestration in the first act is often rather thin, +and the plot lacks solidity. There are gaps and unaccountable holes, and +melodious lines left suspended in space. From beginning to end, lyrical +bursts of melody are broken by declamations, or, what is worse, by +dissertations. Frenzied whirlwinds of passion stop suddenly to give +place to recitatives of explanation or argument. And although these +recitatives are nearly always a great relief, although these +metaphysical reveries have a character of barbarous cunning that one +relishes, yet the superior beauty of the movements of pure poetry, +emotion, and music is so evident, that this musical and philosophical +drama serves to give one a distaste for philosophy and drama and +everything else that cramps and confines music. + +But the musical part of _Tristan_ is not free either from the faults of +the work as a whole, for it, too, lacks unity. Wagner's music is made up +of very diverse styles: one finds in it Italianisms and Germanisms and +even Gallicisms of every kind; there are some that are sublime, some +that are commonplace; and at times one feels the awkwardness of their +union and the imperfections of their form. Then again, perhaps two ideas +of equal originality come together and spoil each other by making too +strong a contrast. The fine lamentation of King Mark--that +personification of a knight of the Grail--is treated with such +moderation and with so noble a scorn for outward show, that its pure, +cold light is entirely lost after the glowing fire of the duet. + +The work suffers everywhere from a lack of balance. It is an almost +inevitable defect, arising from its very grandeur. A mediocre work may +quite easily be perfect of its kind; but it is rarely that a work lofty +aim attains perfection. A landscape of little dells and smiling meadows +is brought more readily into pleasing harmony than a landscape of +dazzling Alps, torrents, glaciers, and tempests; for the heights may +sometimes overwhelm the picture and spoil the effect. And so it is with +certain great pages of _Tristan_. We may take for example the verses +which tell of excruciating expectation--in the second act, Isolde's +expectation on the night filled with desire; and, in the third act, +Tristan's expectation, as he lies wounded and delirious, waiting for the +vessel that brings Isolde and death--or we may take the Prelude, that +expression of eternal desire that is like a restless sea for ever +moaning and beating itself upon the shore. + + * * * * * + +The quality that touches me most deeply in _Tristan_ is the evidence of +honesty and sincerity in a man who was treated by his enemies as a +charlatan that used superficial and grossly material means to arrest and +amaze the public eye. What drama is more sober or more disdainful of +exterior effect than _Tristan_? Its restraint is almost carried to +excess. Wagner rejected any picturesque episode in it that was +irrelevant to his subject. The man who carried all Nature in his +imagination, who at his will made the storms of the _Walküre_ rage, or +the soft light of Good Friday shine, would not even depict a bit of the +sea round the vessel in the first act. Believe me, that must have been a +sacrifice, though he wished it so. It pleased him to enclose this +terrible drama within the four walls of a chamber of tragedy. There are +hardly any choruses; there is nothing to distract one's attention from +the mystery of human souls; there are only two real parts--those of the +lovers; and if there is a third, it belongs to Destiny, into whose hands +the victims are delivered. What a fine seriousness there is in this love +play. Its passion remains sombre and stern; there is no laughter in it, +only a belief which is almost religious, more religious perhaps in its +sincerity than that of _Parsifal_. + +It is a lesson for dramatists to see a man suppressing all frivolous +trifling and empty episodes in order to concentrate his subject entirely +on the inner life of two living souls. In that Wagner is our master, a +better, stronger, and more profitable master to follow, in spite of his +mistakes, than all the other literary and dramatic authors of his time. + + * * * * * + +I see that criticism has filled a larger place in these notes than I +meant it to do. But in spite of that, I love _Tristan_; for me and for +others of my time it has long been an intoxicating draught. And it has +never lost anything of its grandeur; the years have left its beauty +untouched, and it is for me the highest point of art reached by anyone +since Beethoven's death. + +But as I was listening to it the other evening I could not help +thinking: Ah, Wagner, you will one day go too, and join Gluck and Bach +and Monteverde and Palestrina and all the great souls whose names still +live among men, but whose thoughts are only felt by a handful of the +initiated, who try in vain to revive the past. You, also, are already of +the past, though you were the steady light of our youth, the strong +source of life and death, of desire and renouncement, whence we drew our +moral force and our power of resistance against the world. And the +world, ever greedy for new sensations, goes on its way amid the +unceasing ebb and flow of its desires. Already its thoughts have +changed, and new musicians are making new songs for the future. But it +is the voice of a century of tempest that passes with you. + + + + +CAMILLE SAINT-SAËNS + + +M. Saint-Saëns has had the rare honour of becoming a classic during his +lifetime. His name, though it was long unrecognised, now commands +universal respect, not less by his worth of character than by the +perfection of his art. No artist has troubled so little about the +public, or been more indifferent to criticism whether popular or expert. +As a child he had a sort of physical repulsion for outward success: + + "De l'applaudissement + J'entends encor le bruit qui, chose assez étrange, + Pour ma pudeur d'enfant était comme une fange + Dont le flot me venait toucher; je redoutais + Son contact, et parfois, malin, je l'évitais, + Affectant la raideur."[110] + +[Footnote 110: + + Of applause + I still hear the noise; and, strangely enough, + In my childish shyness it seemed like mire + About to spot me; I feared + Its touch, and secretly shunned it, + Affecting obstinacy. + +These verses were read by M. Saint-Saëns at a concert given on 10 June, +1896, in the Salle Pleyel, to celebrate the fiftieth anniversary of his +_début_, which he made in 1846. It was in this same Salle Pleyel that he +gave his first concert.] + +Later on, he achieved success by a long and painful struggle, in which +he had to fight against the kind of stupid criticism that condemned him +"to listen to one of Beethoven's symphonies as a penance likely to give +him the most excruciating torture."[111] And yet after this, and after +his admission to the Academy, after _Henry VIII_ and the _Symphonie avec +orgue_, he still remained aloof from praise or blame, and judged his +triumphs with sad severity: + + "Tu connaîtras les yeux menteurs, l'hypocrisie + Des serrements de mains, + Le masque d'amitié cachant la jalousie, + Les pâles lendemains + + "De ces jours de triomphe où le troupeau vulgaire + Qui pèse au même poids + L'histrion ridicule et le génie austère + Vous mets sur le pavois."[112] + +M. Saint-Saëns has now grown old, and his fame has spread abroad, but he +has not capitulated. Not many years ago he wrote to a German journalist: +"I take very little notice of either praise or censure, not because I +have an exalted idea of my own merits (which would be foolish), but +because in doing my work, and fulfilling the function of my nature, as +an apple-tree grows apples, I have no need to trouble myself with other +people's views."[113] + +[Footnote 111: C. Saint-Saëns, _Harmonie et Mélodie_, 1885.] + +[Footnote 112: C. Saint-Saëns, _Rimes familières_, 1890. + + You will know the lying eyes, the insincerity + Of pressures of the hand, + The mask of friendship that hides jealousy. + The tame to-morrows + + Of these days of triumph, when the vulgar herd + Crowns you with honour; + Judging rare genius to be + Equal in merit to the wit of clowns. + +] + +[Footnote 113: Letter written to M. Levin, the correspondent of the +_Boersen-Courier_ of Berlin, 9 September, 1901.] + +Such independence is rare at any time; but it is very rare in our day, +when the power of public opinion is tyrannical; and it is rarest of all +in France, where artists are perhaps more sociable than in other +countries. Of all qualities in an artist it is the most precious; for it +forms the foundation of his character, and is the guarantee of his +conscience and innate strength. So we must not hide it under a bushel. + + * * * * * + +The significance of M. Saint-Saëns in art is a double one, for one must +judge him from the inside as well as the outside of France. He stands +for something exceptional in French music, something which was almost +unique until just lately: that is, a great classical spirit and a fine +breadth of musical culture--German culture, we must say, since the +foundation of all modern art rests on the German classics. French music +of the nineteenth century is rich in clever artists, imaginative writers +of melody, and skilful dramatists; but it is poor in true musicians, and +in good and solid workmanship. Apart from two or three splendid +exceptions, our composers have too much the character of gifted amateurs +who compose music as a pastime, and regard it, not as a special form of +thought, but as a sort of dress for literary ideas. Our musical +education is superficial: it may be got for a few years, in a formal +way, at a Conservatoire, but it is not within reach of all; the child +does not breathe music as, in a way, he breathes the atmosphere of +literature and oratory; and although nearly everyone in France has an +instinctive feeling for beautiful writing, only a very few people care +for beautiful music. From this arise the common faults and failings in +our music. It has remained a luxurious art; it has not become, like +German music, the poetical expression of the people's thought. + +To bring this about we should need a combination of conditions that are +very rare in France; though such conditions went to the making of +Camille Saint-Saëns. He had not only remarkable natural talent, but came +of a family of ardent musicians, who devoted themselves to his +education. At five years of age he was nourished on the orchestral score +of _Don Juan_;[114] as a little boy + + "De dix ans, délicat, frêle, le teint jaunet, + Mais confiant, naïf, plein d'ardeur et de joie,"[115] + +he "measured himself against Beethoven and Mozart" by playing in a +public concert; at sixteen years of age he wrote his _Première +Symphonie_. As he grew older he soaked himself in the music of Bach and +Händel, and was able to compose at will after the manner of Rossini, +Verdi, Schumann, and Wagner.[116] He has written excellent music in all +styles--the Grecian style, and that of the sixteenth, seventeenth, and +eighteenth centuries. His compositions are of every kind: masses, grand +operas, light operas, cantatas, symphonies, symphonic poems; music for +the orchestra, the organ, the piano, the voice, and chamber music. He is +the learned editor of Gluck and Rameau; and is thus not only an artist, +but an artist who can talk about his art. He is an unusual figure in +France--one would have thought rather to find his home in Germany. + +[Footnote 114: C. Saint-Saëns, _Charles Gounod et le Don Juan de +Mozart_, 1894.] + +[Footnote 115: + + But ten years old, slightly built and pale, + Yet full of simple confidence and joy (_Rimes familières_). + +] + +[Footnote 116: Charles Gounod, _Mémoires d'un Artiste_, 1896.] + +In Germany, however, they make no mistake about him. There, the name of +Camille Saint-Saëns stands for the French classical spirit, and is +thought worthiest to represent us in music from the time of Berlioz +until the appearance of the young school of César Franck--though Franck +himself is as yet little known in Germany. M. Saint-Saëns possesses, +indeed, some of the best qualities of a French artist, and among them +the most important quality of all--perfect clearness of conception. It +is remarkable how little this learned artist is bothered by his +learning, and how free he is from all pedantry. Pedantry is the plague +of German art, and the greatest men have not escaped it. I am not +speaking of Brahms, who was ravaged with it, but of delightful geniuses +like Schumann, or of powerful ones like Bach. "This unnatural art +wearies one like the sanctimonious salon of some little provincial town; +it stifles one, it is enough to kill one."[117] "Saint-Saëns is not a +pedant," wrote Gounod; "he has remained too much of a child and become +too clever for that." Besides, he has always been too much of a +Frenchman. + +[Footnote 117: Quoted from Saint-Saëns by Edmond Hippeau in _Henry VIII +et L'Opéra français_, 1883. M. Saint-Saëns speaks elsewhere of "these +works, well written, but heavy and unattractive, and reflecting in a +tiresome way the narrow and pedantic spirit of certain little towns in +Germany" (_Harmonie et Mélodie_).] + +Sometimes Saint-Saëns reminds me of one of our eighteenth-century +writers. Not a writer of the _Encyclopédie_, nor one of Rousseau's camp, +but rather of Voltaire's school. He has a clearness of thought, an +elegance and precision of expression, and a quality of mind that make +his music "not only noble, but very noble, as coming of a fine race and +distinguished family."[118] + +He has also excellent discernment, of an unemotional kind; and he is +"calm in spirit, restrained in imagination, and keeps his self-control +even in the midst of the most disturbing emotions."[119] This +discernment is the enemy of anything approaching obscurity of thought or +mysticism; and its outcome was that curious book, _Problèmes et +Mystères_--a misleading title, for the spirit of reason reigns there and +makes an appeal to young people to protect "the light of a menaced +world" against "the mists of the North, Scandinavian gods, Indian +divinities, Catholic miracles, Lourdes, spiritualism, occultism, and +obscurantism."[120] + +His love and need of liberty is also of the eighteenth century. One may +say that liberty is his only passion. "I am passionately fond of +liberty," he wrote.[121] + +[Footnote 118: Charles Gounod, _"Ascanio" de Saint-Saëns_, 1890.] + +[Footnote 119: _Id., ibid._] + +[Footnote 120: C. Saint-Saëns, _Problèmes et Mystères_, 1894.] + +[Footnote 121: _Harmonie et Mélodie_.] + +And he has proved it by the absolute fearlessness of his judgments on +art; for not only has he reasoned soundly against Wagner, but dared to +criticise the weaknesses of Gluck and Mozart, the errors of Weber and +Berlioz, and the accepted opinions about Gounod; and this classicist, +who was nourished on Bach, goes so far as to say: "The performance of +works by Bach and Händel to-day is an idle amusement," and that those +who wish to revive their art are like "people who would live in an old +mansion that has been uninhabited for centuries."[122] He went even +further; he criticised his own work and contradicted his own opinions. +His love of liberty made him form, at different periods, different +opinions of the same work. He thought that people had a right to change +their opinions, as sometimes they deceived themselves. It seemed to him +better boldly to admit an error than to be the slave of consistency. And +this same feeling showed itself in other matters besides art: in ethics, +as is shown by some verses which he addressed to a young friend, urging +him not to be bound by a too rigid austerity: + + "Je sens qu'une triste chimère + A toujours assombri ton âme: la Vertu...."[123] + +and in metaphysics also, where he judges religions, faith, and the +Gospels with a quiet freedom of thought, seeking in Nature alone the +basis of morals and society. + +[Footnote 122: C. Saint-Saëns, _Portraits et Souvenirs_, 1900.] + +[Footnote 123: + + I know that a vain dream of virtue + Has always cast a shadow on your soul (_Rimes familières_). +] + +Here are some of his opinions, taken at random from _Problèmes et +Mystères_: + + "As science advances, God recedes." + + "The soul is only a medium for the expression of thought." + + "The discouragement of work, the weakening of character, the + sharing of one's goods under pain of death--this is the Gospel + teaching on the foundation of society." + + "The Christian virtues are not social virtues." + + "Nature is without aim: she is an endless circle, and leads us + nowhere." + +His thoughts are unfettered and full of love for humanity and a sense of +the responsibility of the individual. He called Beethoven "the greatest, +the only really great artist," because he upheld the idea of universal +brotherhood. His mind is so comprehensive that he has written books on +philosophy, on the theatre, on classical painting,[124] as well as +scientific essays,[125] volumes of verse, and even plays.[126] + +[Footnote 124: C. Saint-Saëns, _Note sur les décors de théâtre dans +l'antiquité romaine_, 1880, where he discusses the mural paintings of +Pompeii.] + +[Footnote 125: Lecture on the Phenomena of Mirages, given to the +Astronomical Society of France in 1905.] + +[Footnote 126: C. Saint-Saëns, _La Crampe des Écrivains_, a comedy in +one act, 1892.] + +He has been able to take up all sorts of things, I will not say with +equal skill, but with discernment and undeniable ability. He shows a +type of mind rare among artists and, above all, among musicians. The two +principles that he enunciates and himself follows out are: "Keep free +from all exaggeration" and "Preserve the soundness of your mind's +health."[127] They are certainly not the principles of a Beethoven or a +Wagner, and it would be rather difficult to find a noted musician of the +last century who had applied them. They tell us, without need of +comment, what is distinctive about M. Saint-Saëns, and what is defective +in him. He is not troubled by any sort of passion. Nothing disturbs the +clearness of his reason. "He has no prejudices; he takes no +side"[128]--one might add, not even his own, since he is not afraid to +change his views--"he does not pose as a reformer of anything"; he is +altogether independent, perhaps almost too much so. He seems sometimes +as if he did not know what to do with his liberty. Goethe would have +said, I think, that he needed a little more of the devil in him. + +[Footnote 127: _Harmonie et Mélodie_.] + +[Footnote 128: Charles Gounod, _Mémoires d'un Artiste_.] + +His most characteristic mental trait seems to be a languid melancholy, +which has its source in a rather bitter feeling of the futility of +life;[129] and this is accompanied by fits of weariness which are not +altogether healthy, followed by capricious moods and nervous gaiety, and +a freakish liking for burlesque and mimicry. It is his eager, restless +spirit that makes him rush about the world writing Breton and Auvergnian +rhapsodies, Persian songs, Algerian suites, Portuguese barcarolles, +Danish, Russian, or Arabian caprices, souvenirs of Italy, African +fantasias, and Egyptian concertos; and, in the same way, he roams +through the ages, writing Greek tragedies, dance music of the sixteenth +and seventeenth centuries, and preludes and fugues of the eighteenth. +But in all these exotic and archaic reflections of times and countries +through which his fancy wanders, one recognises the gay, intelligent +countenance of a Frenchman on his travels, who idly follows his +inclinations, and does not trouble to enter very deeply into the spirit +of the people he meets, but gleans all he can, and then reproduces it +with a French complexion--after the manner of Montaigne in Italy, who +compared Verona to Poitiers, and Padua to Bordeaux, and who, when he was +in Florence, paid much less attention to Michelangelo than to "a very +strangely shaped sheep, and an animal the size of a large mastiff, +shaped like a cat and striped with black and white, which they called a +tiger." + +[Footnote 129: _Les Heures; Mors; Modestie (Rimes familières_).] + +From a purely musical point of view there is some resemblance between M. +Saint-Saëns and Mendelssohn. In both of them we find the same +intellectual restraint, the same balance preserved among the +heterogeneous elements of their work. These elements are not common to +both of them, because the time, the country, and the surroundings in +which they lived are not the same; and there is also a great difference +in their characters. Mendelssohn is more ingenuous and religious; M. +Saint-Saëns is more of a dilettante and more sensuous. They are not so +much kindred spirits by their science as good company by a common purity +of taste, a sense of rhythm, and a genius for method, which gave all +they wrote a neo-classic character. + +As for the things that directly influenced M. Saint-Saëns, they are so +numerous that it would be difficult and rather bold of me to pretend to +be able to pick them out. His remarkable capacity for assimilation has +often moved him to write in the style of Wagner or Berlioz, of Händel or +Rameau, of Lulli or Charpentier, or even of some English harpsichord or +clavichord player of the sixteenth century, like William Byrd--whose +airs are introduced quite naturally in the music of _Henry VIII_; but we +must remember that these are deliberate imitations, the amusements of a +virtuoso, about which M. Saint-Saëns never deceives himself. His memory +serves him as he pleases, but he is never troubled by it. + +As far as one can judge, M. Saint-Saëns' musical ideas are infused with +the spirit of the great classics belonging to the end of the eighteenth +century--far more, whatever people may say, with the spirit of +Beethoven, Haydn, and Mozart, than with the spirit of Bach. Schumann's +seductiveness also left its mark upon him, and he has felt the influence +of Gounod, Bizet, and Wagner. But a stronger influence was that of +Berlioz, his friend and master,[130] and, above all, that of Liszt. We +must stop at this last name. + +[Footnote 130: "Thanks to Berlioz, all my generation has been shaped, +and well shaped" _(Portraits et Souvenirs_).] + +M. Saint-Saëns has good reason for liking Liszt, for Liszt was also a +lover of freedom, and had shaken off traditions and pedantry, and +scorned German routine; and he liked him, too, because his music was a +reaction from the stiff school of Brahms.[131] He was enthusiastic about +Liszt's work, and was one of the earliest and most ardent champions of +that new music of which Liszt was the leading spirit--of that +"programme" music which Wagner's triumph seemed to have nipped in the +bud, but which has suddenly and gloriously burst into life again in the +works of Richard Strauss. "Liszt is one of the great composers of our +time," wrote M. Saint-Saëns; "he has dared more than either Weber, or +Mendelssohn, or Schubert, or Schumann. He has created the symphonic +poem. He is the deliverer of instrumental music.... He has proclaimed +the reign of free music."[132] This was not said impulsively in a moment +of enthusiasm; M. Saint-Saëns has always held this opinion. All his life +he has remained faithful to his admiration of Liszt--since 1858, when he +dedicated a _Veni Creator_ to "the Abbé Liszt," until 1886, when, a few +months after Liszt's death, he dedicated his masterpiece, the _Symphonic +avec orgue_, "To the memory of Franz Liszt."[133] + +[Footnote 131: "I like Liszt's music so much, because he does not bother +about other people's opinions; he says what he wants to say; and the +only thing that he troubles about is to say it as well as he possibly +can" (Quoted by Hippeau).] + +[Footnote 132: The quotations are taken from _Harmonie et Mélodie_ and +_Portraits et Souvenirs_.] + +[Footnote 133: In _Harmonie et Mélodie_ M. Saint-Saëns tells us that he +organised and directed a concert in the Théâtre-Italien where only +Liszt's compositions were played. But all his efforts to make the French +musical public appreciate Liszt were a failure.] + +"People have not hesitated to scoff at what they call my weakness for +Liszt's works. But even if the feelings of affection and gratitude that +he inspired in me did come like a prism and interpose themselves between +my eyes and his face, I do not see anything greatly to be regretted in +it.[134] I had not yet felt the charm of his personal fascination, I had +neither heard nor seen him, and I did not owe him anything at all, when +my interest was gripped in reading his first symphonic poems; and when +later they pointed the way which was to lead to _La Danse macabre_, _Le +Rouet d'Omphale_, and other works of the same nature, I am sure that my +judgment was not biassed by any prejudice in his favour, and that I +alone was responsible for what I did."[135] + +[Footnote 134: The admiration was mutual. M. Saint-Saëns even said that +without Liszt he could not have written _Samson et Dalila_. "Not only +did Liszt have _Samson et Dalila_ performed at Weimar, but without him +that work would never have come into being. My suggestions on the +subject had met with such hostility that I had given up the idea of +writing it; and all that existed were some illegible notes.... Then at +Weimar one day I spoke to Liszt about it, and he said to me, quite +trustingly and without having heard a note, 'Finish your work; I will +have it performed here.' The events of 1870 delayed its performance for +several years." (_Revue Musicale_, 8 November, 1901).] + +[Footnote 135: _Portraits et Souvenirs_.] + +This influence seems to me to explain some of M. Saint-Saëns' work. Not +only is this influence evident in his symphonic poems--some of his best +work--but it is to be found in his suites for orchestra, his fantasias, +and his rhapsodies, where the descriptive and narrative element is +strong. "Music should charm unaided," said M. Saint-Saëns; "but its +effect is much finer when we use our imagination and let it flow in some +particular channel, thus imaging the music. It is then that all the +faculties of the soul are brought into play for the same end. What art +gains from this is not greater beauty, but a wider field for its +scope--that is, a greater variety of form and a larger liberty."[136] + + * * * * * + +And so we find that M. Saint-Saëns has taken part in the vigorous +attempt of modern German symphony writers to bring into music some of +the power of the other arts: poetry, painting, philosophy, romance, +drama--the whole of life. But what a gulf divides them and him! A gulf +made up, not only of diversities of style, but of the difference between +two races and two worlds. Beside the frenzied outpourings of Richard +Strauss, who flounders uncertainly between mud and debris and genius, +the Latin art of Saint-Saëns rises up calm and ironical. His delicacy of +touch, his careful moderation, his happy grace, "which enters the soul +by a thousand little paths,"[137] bring with them the pleasures of +beautiful speech and honest thought; and we cannot but feel their charm. +Compared with the restless and troubled art of to-day, his music strikes +us by its calm, its tranquil harmonies, its velvety modulations, its +crystal clearness, its smooth and flowing style, and an elegance that +cannot be put into words. Even his classic coldness does us good by its +reaction against the exaggerations, sincere as they are, of the new +school. At times one feels oneself carried back to Mendelssohn, even to +Spontini and the school of Gluck. One seems to be travelling in a +country that one knows and loves; and yet in M. Saint-Saëns' works one +does not find any direct resemblance to the works of other composers; +for with no one are reminiscences rarer than with this master who +carries all the old masters in his mind--it is his spirit that is akin +to theirs. And that is the secret of his personality and his value to +us; he brings to our artistic unrest a little of the light and sweetness +of other times. His compositions are like fragments of another world. + +[Footnote 136: _Harmonie et Mélodie_.] + +[Footnote 137: C. Saint-Saëns, _Portraits et Souvenirs_.] + +"From time to time," he said, in speaking of _Don Giovanni_, "in the +sacred earth of Hellene we find a fragment, an arm, the debris of a +torso, scratched and damaged by the ravages of time; it is only the +shadow of the god that the sculptor's chisel once created; but the charm +is somehow still there, the sublime style is radiant in spite of +everything."[138] + +And so with this music. It is sometimes a little pale, a little too +restrained; but in a phrase, in a few harmonies, there will shine out a +clear vision of the past. + +[Footnote 138: _Portraits et Souvenirs_.] + + + + +VINCENT D'INDY + + "I consider that criticism is useless, I would even say that it is + harmful.... Criticism generally means the opinion some man or other + holds about another person's work. How can that opinion help + forward the growth of art? It is interesting to know the ideas, + even the erroneous ideas, of geniuses and men of great talent, such + as Goethe, Schumann, Wagner, Sainte-Beuve, and Michelet, when they + wish to indulge in criticism; but it is of no interest at all to + know whether Mr. So-and-so likes, or does not like, such-and-such + dramatic or musical work."[139] + +So writes M. Vincent d'Indy. + +After such an expression of opinion one imagines that a critic ought to +feel some embarrassment in writing about M. Vincent d'Indy. And I myself +ought to be the more concerned in the matter, for in the number of the +review where the above was written the only other opinions expressed +with equal conviction belonged to the author of this book. There is only +one thing to be done--to copy M. d'Indy's example; for that forsworn +enemy of criticism is himself a keen critic. + +[Footnote 139: _Revue d'Art dramatique_, 5 February, 1899.] + +It is not altogether on M. d'Indy's musical gifts that I want to dwell. +It is known that in Europe to-day he is one of the masters of dramatic +musical expression, of orchestral colouring, and of the science of +style. But that is not the end of his attainments; he has artistic +originality, which springs from something deeper still. When an artist +has some worth, you will find it not only in his work but in his being. +So we will endeavour to explore M. d'Indy's being. + +M. d'Indy's personality is not a mysterious one. On the contrary, it is +open and clear as daylight; and we see this in his musical work, in his +artistic activities, and in his writings. To his own writings we may +apply the exception of his rule about criticism in favour of a small +number of men whose thoughts are interesting even when they are +erroneous. It would be a pity indeed not to know M. d'Indy's +thoughts--even the erroneous ones; for they let us catch a glimpse, not +only of the ideas of an eminent artist, but of certain surprising +characteristics of the thought of our time. M. d'Indy has closely +studied the history of his art; but the chief interest of his writings +lies rather in their unconscious expression of the spirit of modern art +than in what they tell us about the past. + +M. d'Indy is not a man hedged in by the boundaries of his art; his mind +is open and well fertilised. Musicians nowadays are no longer entirely +absorbed in their notes, but let their minds go out to other interests. +And it is not one of the least interesting phenomena of French music +to-day that gives us these learned and thoughtful composers, who are +conscious of what they create, and bring to their art a keen critical +faculty, like that of M. Saint-Saëns, M. Dukas, or M. d'Indy. From M. +d'Indy we have had scholarly editions of Rameau, Destouches, and Salomon +de Rossi. Even in the middle of rehearsals of _L'Étranger_ at Brussels +he was working at a reconstruction of Monteverde's _Orfeo_. He has +published selections of folk-songs with critical notes, essays on +Beethoven's predecessors, a history of Musical Composition, and debates +and lectures. This fine intellectual culture is not, however, the most +remarkable of M. d'Indy's characteristics, though it may have been the +most remarked. Other musicians share this culture with him; and his real +distinction lies in his moral and almost religious qualities, and it is +this side of him that gives him an unusual interest for us among other +contemporary artists. + + * * * * * + + "Maneant in vobis Fides, Spes, Caritas. + Tria haec: major autem horum est Caritas. + + "An artist must have at least Faith, faith in God and faith in his + art; for it is Faith that disposes him to _learn_, and by his + learning to raise himself higher and higher on the ladder of Being, + up to his goal, which is God. + + "An artist should practise Hope; for he can expect nothing from the + present; he knows that his mission is to _serve_, and to give his + work for the life and teaching of the generations that shall come + after him. + + "An artist should be inspired by a splendid Charity--'the greatest + of these.' To _love_ should be his aim in life; for the moving + principle of all creation is divine and charitable Love." + +Who speaks like this? Is it the monk Denys in his cell at Mount Athos? +Or Cennini, who spread the pious teaching of the Giotteschi? Or one of +the old painters of Sienna, who in their profession of faith called +themselves "by the grace of God, those who manifest marvellous things to +common and illiterate men, by the virtue of the holy faith, and to its +glory"? + +No; it was the director of the _Schola Cantorum_, addressing the +students in an inaugural speech, or giving them a lecture on +Composition.[140] + +[Footnote 140: Vincent d'Indy: _Cours de Composition musicale_, Book I, +drawn up from notes taken in Composition classes at the _Schola +Cantorum_, 1897-1898, p. 16 (Durand, 1902). See also the inaugural +speech given at the school, and published by the _Tribune de +Saint-Gervais_, November, 1900.] + +We must consider a little this singular book, where a living science and +a Gothic spirit are closely intermingled (I use the word "Gothic" in its +best sense; I know it is the highest praise one can give M. d'Indy). +This work has not received the attention it deserves. It is a record of +the spirit of contemporary art; and if it stands rather apart from other +writings, it should not be allowed to pass unnoticed on that account. + +In this book, Faith is shown to be everything--the beginning and the +end. We learn how it fans the flame of genius, nourishes thought, +directs work, and governs even the modulations and the style of a +musician. There is a passage in it that one would think was of the +thirteenth century; it is curious, but not without dignity: + + "One should have an aim in the progressive march of modulations, as + one has in the different stages of life. The reason, instincts, and + faith that guide a man in the troubles of his life also guide the + musician in his choice of modulations. Thus useless and + contradictory modulations, an undecided balance between light and + shade, produce a painful and confusing impression on the hearer, + comparable to that which a poor human being inspires when he is + feeble and inconsistent, buffeted between the East and the West in + the course of his unhappy life, without an aim and without + belief."[141] + +[Footnote 141: Vincent d'Indy, _Cours de Composition musicale_, p. 132.] + +This book seems to be of the Middle Ages by reason of a sort of +scholastic spirit of abstraction and classification. + + "In artistic creation, seven faculties are called into play by the + soul: the Imagination, the Affections, the Understanding, the + Intelligence, the Memory, the Will, and the Conscience."[142] + +[Footnote 142: _Id._, _ibid._, p. 13.] + +And again its mediaeval spirit is shown by an extraordinary symbolism, +which discovers in everything (as far as I understand it) the imprint +of divine mysteries, and the mark of God in Three Persons in such things +as the beating of the heart and ternary rhythms--"an admirable +application of the principle of the Unity of the Trinity"![143] + +From these remote times comes also M. d'Indy's method of writing +history, not by tracing facts back to laws, but by deducing, on the +contrary, facts from certain great general ideas, which have once been +admitted, but not proved by frequent recurrence, such as: "The origin of +art is in religion"[144]--a fact which is anything but certain. From +this reasoning it follows that folk-songs are derived from Gregorian +chants, and not the Gregorian chants from the folk-songs--as I would +sooner believe. The history of art may thus become a sort of history of +the world in moral achievement. One could divide it into two parts: the +world before the coming of Pride, and after it. + +"Subdued by the Christian faith, that formidable enemy of man, Pride, +rarely showed itself in the soul of an artist in the Middle Ages. But +with the weakening of religious belief, with the spirit of the +Reformation applying itself almost at the same time to every branch of +human learning, we see Pride reappear, and watch its veritable +Renaissance."[145] + +[Footnote 143: _Id., ibid._, p. 25. In the thirteenth century, Philippe +de Vitry, Bishop of Meaux, called triple time "perfect," because "it +hath its name from the Trinity, that is to say, from the Father, the +Son, and the Holy Ghost, in whom is divine perfection."] + +[Footnote 144: _Id., ibid._, pp. 66, 83, and _passim_.] + +[Footnote 145: _Id., ibid._] + +Finally, this Gothic spirit shows itself--in a less original way, it is +true--in M. d'Indy's religious antipathies, which, in spite of the +author's goodness of heart and great personal tolerance, constantly +break out against the two faiths that are rivals to his own; and to them +he attributes all the faults of art and all the vices of humanity. Each +has its offence. Protestantism is made responsible for the extremes of +individualism;[146] and Judaism, for the absurdities of its customs and +the weakness of its moral sense.[147] I do not know which of the two is +the more soundly belaboured; the second has the privilege of being so, +not only in writing, but in pictures.[148] The worst of it is, these +antipathies are apt to spoil the fairness of M. d'Indy's artistic +judgment. It goes without saying that the Jewish musicians are treated +with scant consideration; and even the great Protestant musicians, +giants in their art, do not escape rebuke. If Goudimel is mentioned, it +is because he was Palestrina's master, and his achievement of "turning +the Calvinist psalms into chorales" is dismissed as being of little +importance.[149] + +[Footnote 146: "Make war against Particularism, that unwholesome fruit +of the Protestant heresy!" (Speech to the _Schola_, taken from the +_Tribune de Saint-Gervais_, November, 1900.)] + +[Footnote 147: At least Judaism has the honour of giving its name to a +whole period of art, the "Judaic period." "The modern style is the last +phase of the Judaic school...." etc.] + +[Footnote 148: In the _Cours de Composition musicale_ M. d'Indy speaks +of "the admirable initial T in the _Rouleau mortuaire_ of Saint-Vital +(twelfth century), which represents Satan vomiting two Jews ... an +expressive and symbolic work of art, if ever there was one." I should +not mention this but for the fact that there are only two illustrations +in the whole book.] + +[Footnote 149: _Cours de Composition musicale_, p. 160.] + +Händel's oratorios are spoken of as "chilling, and, frankly speaking, +tedious."[150] Bach himself escapes with this qualification: "If he is +great, it is not because of, but in spite of the dogmatic and parching +spirit of the Reformation."[151] + +I will not try to play the part of judge; for a man is sufficiently +judged by his own writings. And, after all, it is rather interesting to +meet people who are sincere and not afraid to speak their minds. I will +admit that I rather enjoy--a little perversely, perhaps--some of these +extreme opinions, where the writer's personality stands strongly +revealed. + +[Footnote 150: _L'Oratorio moderne_ (_Tribune de Saint-Gervais_, March, +1899).] + +[Footnote 151: _Ibid._ As much as to say he was a Catholic without +knowing it. And that is what a friend of the _Schola_, M. Edgar Tinel, +declares: "Bach is a truly Christian artist and, without doubt, _a +Protestant by mistake_, since in his immortal _Credo_ he confesses his +faith in one holy, catholic, and apostolic Church" (_Tribune de +Saint-Gervais_, August-September, 1902). M. Edgar Tinel was, as you +know, one of the principal masters of Belgian oratorio.] + +So the old Gothic spirit still lives among us, and informs the mind of +one of our best-known artists, and also, without doubt, the minds of +hundreds of those who listen to him and admire him. M. Louis Laloy has +shown the persistence of certain forms of plain-song in M. Debussy's +_Pelléas_; and in a dim sense of far-away kinship he finds the cause of +the mysterious charm that such music holds for some of us.[152] This +learned paradox is possible. Why not? The mixtures of race and the +vicissitudes of history have given us so full and complex a soul that we +may very well find its beginnings there, if it pleases us--or the +beginnings of quite other things. Of beginnings there is no end; the +choice is quite embarrassing, and I imagine one's inclination has as +much to do with the matter as one's temperament. + +[Footnote 152: _Revue musicale_, November, 1902.] + +However that may be, M. d'Indy hails from the Middle Ages, and not from +antiquity (which does not exist for him[153]), or from the Renaissance, +which he confounds with the Reformation (though the two sisters are +enemies) in order to crush it the better.[154] "Let us take for models," +he says, "the fine workers in art of the Middle Ages."[155] + + * * * * * + +In this return to the Gothic spirit, in this awakening of faith, there +is a name--a modern one this time--that they are fond of quoting at the +_Schola_; it is that of César Franck, under whose direction the little +Conservatoire in the Rue Saint-Jacques was placed. And indeed they could +quote no better name than that of this simple-hearted man. Nearly all +who came into contact with him felt his irresistible charm--a charm that +has perhaps a great deal to do with the influence that his works still +have on French music to-day. None has felt Franck's power, both morally +and musically, more than M. Vincent d'Indy; and none holds a more +profound reverence for the man whose pupil he was for so long. + +[Footnote 153: "The only documents extant on ancient music are either +criticisms or appreciations, and not musical texts" (_Cours de +Composition_).] + +[Footnote 154: "The influence of the Renaissance, with its pretension +and vanity, caused a check in all the arts--the effect of which we are +still feeling" (_Traité de Composition_, p. 89. See also the passage +quoted before on Pride).] + +[Footnote 155: _Tribune de Saint-Gervais_, November, 1900.] + +The first time I saw M. d'Indy was at a concert of the _Société +nationale_, in the Salle Pleyel, in 1888. They were playing several of +Franck's works; among others, for the first time, his admirable _Thème, +fugue, et variation_, for the harmonium and pianoforte, a composition in +which the spirit of Bach is mingled with a quite modern tenderness. +Franck was conducting, and M. d'Indy was at the pianoforte. I shall +always remember his reverential manner towards the old musician, and how +careful he was to follow his directions; one would have said he was a +diligent and obedient pupil. It was a touching homage from one who had +already proved himself a master by works like _Le Chant de la cloche_, +_Wallenstein_, _La Symphonie sur un thème montagnard_, and who was +perhaps at that time better known and more popular than César Franck +himself. Since then twenty years have passed, and I still see M. d'Indy +as I saw him that evening; and, whatever may happen in the future, his +memory for me will be always associated with that of the grand old +artist, presiding with his fatherly smile over the little gathering of +the faithful. + +Of all the characteristics of Franck's fine moral nature, the most +remarkable was his religious faith. It must have astonished the artists +of his time, who were even more destitute of such a thing than they are +now. It made itself felt in some of his followers, especially in those +who were near the master's heart, as M. d'Indy was. The religious +thought of the latter reflects in some degree the thought of his master; +though the shape of that thought may have undergone unconscious +alteration. I do not know if Franck altogether fits the conception +people have of him to-day. I do not want to introduce personal memories +of him here. I knew him well enough to love him, and to catch a glimpse +of the beauty and sincerity of his soul; but I did not know him well +enough to discover the secrets of his mind. Those who had the happiness +of being his intimate friends seem always to represent him as a mystic +who shut himself away from the spirit of his time. I hope at some future +date one of his friends will publish some of the conversations that he +had with him, of which I have heard. But this man who had so strong a +faith was also very independent. In his religion he had no doubts: it +was the mainspring of his life; though faith with him was much more a +matter of feeling than a matter of doctrine. But all was feeling with +Franck, and reason made little appeal to him. His religious faith did +not disturb his mind, for he did not measure men and their works by its +rules; and he would have been incapable of putting together a history of +art according to the Bible. This great Catholic had at times a very +pagan soul; and he could enjoy without a qualm the musical dilettantism +of Renan and the sonorous nihilism of Leconte de Lisle. There were no +limits to his vast sympathies. He did not attempt to criticise the thing +he loved--understanding was already in his heart. Perhaps he was right; +and perhaps there was more trouble in the depths of his heart than the +valiant serenity of its surface would lead us to believe. + +His faith too.... I know how dangerous it is to interpret a musician's +feelings by his music; but how can we do otherwise when we are told by +Franck's followers that the expression of the soul is the only end and +aim of music? Do we find his faith, as expressed through his music +always full of peace and calm?[156] I ask those who love that music +because they find some of their own sadness reflected there. Who has not +felt the secret tragedies that some of his musical passages +enfold--those short, characteristically abrupt phrases which seem to +rise in supplication to God, and often fall back in sadness and in +tears? It is not all light in that soul; but the light that is there +does not affect us less because it shines from afar, + + "Dans un écartement de nuages, qui laisse + Voir au-dessus des mers la céleste allégresse...."[157] + +[Footnote 156: I speak of the passages where he expresses himself +freely, and is not interpreting a dramatic situation necessary to his +subject, as in that fine symphonic part of the _Rédemption_, where he +describes the triumph of Christ. But even there we find traces of +sadness and suffering.] + +[Footnote 157: Through a break in the clouds, revealing Celestial joy +shining above the deeps.] + +And so Franck seems to me to differ from M. d'Indy in that he has not +the latter's urgent desire for clearness. + + * * * * * + +Clearness is the distinguishing quality of M. d'Indy's mind. There are +no shadows about him. His ideas and his art are as clear as the look +that gives so much youth to his face. For him to examine, to arrange, +to classify, to combine, is a necessity. No one is more French in +spirit. He has sometimes been taxed with Wagnerism, and it is true that +he has felt Wagner's influence very strongly. But even when this +influence is most apparent it is only superficial: his true spirit is +remote from Wagner's. You may find in _Fervaal_ a few trees like those +in _Siegfried's_ forest; but the forest itself is not the same; broad +avenues have been cut in it, and daylight fills the caverns of the +Niebelungs. + +This love of clearness is the ruling factor of M. d'Indy's artistic +nature. And this is the more remarkable, for his nature is far from +being a simple one. By his wide musical education and his constant +thirst for knowledge he has acquired a very varied and almost +contradictory learning. It must be remembered that M. d'Indy is a +musician familiar with the music of other countries and other times; all +kinds of musical forms are floating in his mind; and he seems sometimes +to hesitate between them. He has arranged these forms into three +principal classes, which seem to him to be models of musical art: the +decorative art of the singers of plain-song, the architectural art of +Palestrina and his followers, and the expressive art of the great +Italians of the seventeenth century.[158] But in doing this is not his +eclecticism trying to reconcile arts that are naturally disunited? +Again, we must remember that M. d'Indy has had direct or indirect +contact with some of the greatest musical personalities of our time: +with Wagner, Liszt, Brahms, and César Franck. + +[Footnote 158: _Tribune de Saint-Gervais_ November, 1900.] + +And he has been readily attracted by them; for he is not one of those +egotistic geniuses whose thoughts are fixed on his own interests, nor +has he one of those carnivorous minds that sees nothing, looks for +nothing, and relishes nothing, unless it may be afterwards useful to it. +His sympathies are readily with others, he is happy in giving homage to +their greatness, and quick to appreciate their charm. He speaks +somewhere of the "irresistible need of transformation" that every artist +feels.[159] But in order to escape being overwhelmed by conflicting +elements and interests, one should have great force of feeling or will, +in order to be able to eliminate what is not necessary, and choose out +and transform what is. M. d'Indy eliminates hardly anything; he makes +use of it. In his music he exercises the qualities of an army general: +understanding of his purpose and the patience to attain it, a perfect +knowledge of the means at his disposal, the spirit of order, and command +over his work and himself. Despite the variety of the materials he +employs, the whole is always clear. One might almost reproach him with +being too clear; he seems to simplify too much. + +Nothing helps one to grasp the essence of M. d'Indy's personality more +than his last dramatic work. His personality shows itself plainly in all +his compositions, but nowhere is it more evident than in +_L'Étranger_.[160] + +[Footnote 159: _Id._, September, 1899.] + +[Footnote 160: _L'Étranger_, "action musicale" in two acts. Poem and +music by M. Vincent d'Indy. Played for the first time at Brussels in the +Théâtre de la Monnaie, 7 January, 1903. The quotations from the drama, +whose poetry is not as good as its music, are taken from the score.] + +The scene of _L'Étranger_ is laid in France, by the sea, whose murmuring +calm we hear in a symphonic introduction. The fishermen are coming back +to port; the fishing has been bad. But one among them, "a man about +forty years old, with a sad and dignified air," has been more fortunate +than the others. The fishermen envy him, and vaguely suspect him of +sorcery. He tries to enter into friendly conversation with them, and +offers his catch to a poor family. But in vain; his advances are +repulsed and his generosity is eyed with suspicion. He is a +stranger--the Stranger.[161] Evening falls, and the angelus rings. Some +work-girls come trooping out of their workshop, singing a merry +folk-song.[162] One of the young girls, Vita, goes up to the Stranger +and speaks to him, for she alone, of all the village, is his friend. The +two feel themselves drawn together by a secret sympathy. Vita confides +artlessly in the unknown man; they love each other though they do not +admit it. The Stranger tries to repress his feelings; for Vita is young +and already affianced, and he thinks that he has no right to claim her. +But Vita, offended by his coldness, seeks to wound him, and succeeds. +In the end he betrays himself. "Yes, he loves her, and she knew it well. +But now that he has told her so, he will never see her again; and he +bids her good-bye." + +[Footnote 161: There is a certain likeness in the subject to Herr +Richard Strauss's _Feuersnot_. There, too, the hero is a stranger who is +persecuted, and treated as a sorcerer in the very town to which he has +brought honour. But the _dénouement_ is not the same; and the +fundamental difference of temperament between the two artists is +strongly marked. M. d'Indy finishes with the renouncement of a +Christian, and Herr Richard Strauss by a proud and joyous affirmation of +independence.] + +[Footnote 162: Found by M. d'Indy in his own province, as he tells us in +his _Chansons populaires du Vivarais_.] + +That is the first act. Up to this point we seem to be witnessing a very +human and realistic drama--the ordinary story of the man who tries to do +good and receives ingratitude, and the sad tragedy of old age that comes +to a heart still young and unable to resign itself to growing old. But +the music puts us on our guard. We had heard its religious tone when the +Stranger was speaking, and it seemed to us that we recognised a +liturgical melody in the principal theme. What secret is being hidden +from us? Are we not in France? Yet, in spite of the folk-song and a +passing breath of the sea, the atmosphere of the Church and César Franck +is evident. Who is this Stranger? + +He tells us in the second act. + + "My name? I have none. I am He who dreams; I am He who loves. I + have passed through many countries, and sailed on many seas, loving + the poor and needy, dreaming of the happiness of the brotherhood of + man." + + "Where have I seen you?--for I know you." + + "Where? you ask. But everywhere: under the warm sun of the East, by + the white oceans of the Pole.... I have found you everywhere, for + you are Beauty itself, you are immortal Love!" + +The music is not without a certain nobility, and bears the imprint of +the calm, strong spirit of belief. But I was sorry that the story was +only about a mere entity when I had been getting interested in a man. I +can never understand the attraction of this kind of symbolism. Unless it +is allied to sublime powers of creation in metaphysics or morals--such +as that possessed by a Goethe or an Ibsen--I do not see what such +symbolism can add to life, though I see very well what it takes away +from it. But it is, after all, a matter of taste; and, anyway, there is +nothing in this story to astonish us greatly. This transition from +realism to symbolism is something in opera with which we have grown only +too familiar since the time of Wagner. + +But the story does not stop there; for we leave symbolic abstractions to +enter a still more extraordinary domain, which is removed even farther +still from realities. + +There had been some talk at the beginning of an emerald that sparkled in +the Stranger's cap; and this emerald now takes its turn in the action of +the piece. "It had sparkled formerly in the bows of the boat that +carried the body of Lazarus, the friend of our Master, Jesus; and the +boat had safely reached the port of the Phoceans--without a helm or +sails or oars. For by this miraculous stone a clean and upright heart +could command the sea and the winds." But now that the Stranger has done +amiss, by falling a victim to passion, its power is gone; so he gives it +to Vita. + +Then follows a real scene in fairyland. Vita stands before the sea and +invokes it in an incantation full of weird and beautiful vocal music: +"O sea! Sinister sea with your angry charm, gentle sea with your kiss of +death, hear me!" And the sea replies in a song. Voices mingle with the +orchestra in a symphony of increasing anger. Vita swears she will give +herself to no one but the Stranger. She lifts the emerald above her +head, and it shines with a lurid light. "'Receive, O sea, as a token of +my oath, the sacred stone, the holy emerald! Then may its power be no +longer invoked, and none may know again its protecting virtue. Jealous +sea, take back your own, the last offering of a betrothed!' With an +impressive gesture she throws the emerald into the waves, and a dark +green light suddenly shines out against the black sky. This supernatural +light slowly spreads over the water until it reaches the horizon, and +the sea begins to roll in great billows." Then the sea takes up its song +in an angrier tone; the orchestra thunders, and the storm bursts. + +The boats put hurriedly back to land, and one of them seems likely to be +dashed to pieces on the shore. The whole village turns out to watch the +disaster; but the men refuse to risk their lives in aid of the +shipwrecked crew. Then the Stranger gets into a boat, and Vita jumps in +after him. The squall redoubles in violence. A wave of enormous height +breaks on the jetty, flooding the scene with a dazzling green light. The +crowd recoil in fear. There is a silence; and an old fisherman takes off +his woollen cap and intones the _De Profundis_. The villagers take up +the chant.... + +One may see by this short account what a heterogeneous work it is. Two +or three quite different worlds are brought into it: the realism of the +bourgeois characters of Vita's mother and lover is mixed up with +symbolisms of Christianity, represented by the Stranger, and with the +fairy-tale of the magic emerald and the voices of the ocean. This +complexity, which is evident enough in the poem, is even more evident in +the music, where a union of different arts and different ideas is +attempted. We get the art of the folk-song, religious art, the art of +Wagner, the art of Franck, as well as a note of familiar realism (which +is something akin to the Italian _opéra-bouffe_) and descriptions of +sensation that are quite personal. As there are only two short acts, the +rapidity of the action only serves to accentuate this impression. The +changes are very abrupt: we are hurried from a world of human beings to +a world of abstract ideas, and then taken from an atmosphere of religion +to a land of fairies. The work is, however, clear enough from a musical +point of view. The more complex the elements that M. d'Indy gathers +round him the more anxious he is to bring them into harmony. It is a +difficult task, and is only possible when the different elements are +reduced to their simplest expression and brought down to their +fundamental qualities--thus depriving them of the spice of their +individuality. M. d'Indy puts different styles and ideas on the anvil, +and then forges them vigorously. It is natural that here and there we +should see the mark of the hammer, the imprint of his determination; but +it is only by his determination that he welded the work into a solid +whole. + +Perhaps it is determination that brings unity now and then into M. +d'Indy's spirit. With reference to this, I will dwell upon one point +only, since it is curious, and seems to me to be of general artistic +interest. M. d'Indy writes his own poems for his "_actions +musicales_"--Wagner's example, it seems, has been catching. We have seen +how the harmony of a work may suffer through the dual gifts of its +author; though he may have thought to perfect his composition by writing +both words and music. But an artist's poetical and musical gifts are not +necessarily of the same order. A man has not always the same kind of +talent in other arts that he has in the art which he has made his own--I +am speaking not only of his technical skill, but of his temperament as +well. Delacroix was of the Romantic school in painting, but in +literature his style was Classic. We have all known artists who were +revolutionaries in their own sphere, but conservative and behind the +times in their opinions about other branches of art. The double gift of +poetry and music is in M. d'Indy up to a certain point. But is his +reason always in agreement with his heart?[163] + +[Footnote 163: In his criticisms his heart is not always in agreement +with his mind. His mind denounces the Renaissance, but his instinct +obliges him to appreciate the great Florentine painters of the +Renaissance and the musicians of the sixteenth century. He only gets out +of the difficulty by the most extraordinary compromises, by saying that +Ghirlandajo and Filippo Lippi were Gothic, or by stating that the +Renaissance in music did not begin till the seventeenth century! (_Cours +de Composition_, pp. 214 and 216.)] + +Of course his nature is too dignified to let the quarrel be shown +openly. His heart obeys the commands of his reason, or compromises with +it, and by seeming respectful of authority saves appearances. His +reason, represented here by the poet, likes simple, realistic, and +relevant action, together with moral or even religious teaching. His +heart, represented by the musician, is romantic; and if he followed it +altogether he would wander off to any subject that enabled him to +indulge in his love of the picturesque, such as the descriptive +symphony, or even the old form of opera. + +For myself, I am in sympathy with his heart; and I find his heart is in +the right, and his reason in the wrong. There is nothing that M. d'Indy +has made more his own than the art of painting landscapes in music. +There is one page in _Fervaal_ at the beginning of Act II which calls up +misty mountain tops covered with pine forests; there is another page in +_L'Étranger_ where one sees strange lights glimmering on the sea while a +storm is brooding.[164] I should like to see M. d'Indy give himself up +freely, in spite of all theories, to this descriptive lyricism, in which +he so excels; or I wish at least he would seek inspiration in a subject +where both his religious beliefs and his imagination could find +satisfaction: a subject such as one of the beautiful episodes of the +Golden Legend, or the one which _L'Étranger_ itself recalls--the +romantic voyage of the Magdalen in Provence. But it is foolish to wish +an artist to do anything but the thing he likes; he is the best judge +of what pleases him. + +[Footnote 164: Act III, scene 3. The power of that evocation is so +strong that it carries the poet along with it. It would seem that part +of the action had only been conceived with a view to the final effect of +the sudden colouring of the waves.] + + * * * * * + +In this sketchy portrait I must not forget one of the finest of this +composer's gifts--his talent as a teacher of music. Everything has +fitted M. d'Indy for this part. By his knowledge and his precise, +orderly mind he must be a perfect teacher of composition. If I submit +some question of harmony or melodic phrasing to his analysis, the result +is the essence of clear, logical reasoning; and if the reasoning is a +little dry and simplifies the thing almost too much, it is still very +illuminating and from the hand of a master of French prose. And in this +I find him exercising the same consistent instinct of good sense and +sincerity, the same art of development, the same seventeenth and +eighteenth century principles of classic rhetoric that he applies to his +music. In truth, M. d'Indy could write a musical _Discourse on Style_, +if he wished. + +But, above all, he is gifted with the moral qualities of a teacher--the +vocation for teaching, first of all. He has a firm belief in the +absolute duty of giving instruction in art, and, what is rarer still, in +the efficacious virtue of that teaching. He readily shares Tolstoy's +scorn, which he sometimes quotes, of the foolishness of art for art's +sake. + + "At the bottom of art is this essential condition--teaching. The + aim of art is neither gain nor glory; the true aim of art is to + teach, to elevate gradually the spirit of humanity; in a word, to + serve in the highest sense--'_dienen_' as Wagner says by the mouth + of the repentant Kundry, in the third act of Parsifal."[165] + +There is in this a mixture of Christian humility and aristocratic pride. +M. d'Indy has a sincere desire for the welfare of humanity, and he loves +the people; but he treats them with an affectionate kindness, at once +protective and tolerant; he regards them as children that must be +led.[166] + +[Footnote 165: _Cours de Composition_, and _Tribune de Saint-Gervais_.] + +[Footnote 166: _Cours de Composition_.] + +The popular art that he extols is not an art belonging to the people, +but that of an aristocracy interested in the people. He wishes to +enlighten them, to mould them, to direct them, by means of art. Art is +the source of life; it is the spirit of progress; it gives the most +precious of possessions to the soul--liberty. And no one enjoys this +liberty more than the artist. In a lecture to the _Schola_ he said: + + "What makes the name of 'artist' so splendid is that the artist is + free--absolutely free. Look about you, and tell me if from this + point of view there is any career finer than that of an artist who + is conscious of his mission? The Army? The Law? The University? + Politics?" + +And then follows a rather cold appreciation of these different careers. + + "There is no need to mention the excessive bureaucracy and + officialism which is the crying evil of this country. We find + everywhere submission to rules and servitude to the State. But what + government, pope, emperor, or president could oblige an artist to + think and write against his will? Liberty--that is the true wealth + and the most precious inheritance of the artist, the liberty to + think, and the liberty that no one has the power to take away from + us--that of doing our work according to the dictates of our + conscience." + +Who does not feel the infectious warmth and beauty of these spirited +words? How this force of enthusiasm and sincerity must grip all young +and eager hearts. "There are two qualities," says M. d'Indy, on the last +page of _Cours de Composition_, "which a master should try to encourage +and develop in the spirit of the pupil, for without them science is +useless; these qualities are an unselfish love of art and enthusiasm for +good work." And these two virtues radiate from M. d'Indy's personality +as they do from his writings; that is his power. + +But the best of his teaching lies in his life. One can never speak too +highly of his disinterested devotion for the good of art. As if it were +not enough to put all his might into his own creations, M. d'Indy gives +his time and the results of his study unsparingly to others. Franck gave +lessons in order to be able to live; M. d'Indy gives them for the +pleasure of instructing, and to serve his art and aid artists. He +directs schools, and accepts and almost seeks out the most thankless, +though the most necessary, kinds of teaching. Or he will apply himself +devoutly to the study of the past and the resuscitation of some old +master. And he seems to take so much pleasure in training young minds to +appreciate music, or in repairing the injustices of history to some fine +but forgotten musician, that he almost forgets about himself. To what +work or to what worker, worthy of interest, or seeming to be so, has he +ever refused his advice and help? I have known his kindness personally, +and I shall always be sincerely grateful for it. + +His devotion and his faith have not been in vain. The name of M. d'Indy +will be associated in history, not only with fine works, but with great +works: with the _Société Nationale de Musique_, of which he is +president; with the _Schola Cantorum_, which he founded with Charles +Bordes, and which he directs; with the young French school of music, a +group of skilful artists and innovators, to whom he is a kind of elder +brother, giving them encouragement by his example and helping them +through the first hard years of struggle; and, lastly, with an awakening +of music in Europe, with a movement which, after the death of Wagner and +Franck, attracted the interest of the world by its revival of the art of +the Middle Ages and the Renaissance. M. d'Indy has been the chief +representative of all this artistic evolution in France. By his deeds, +by his example, and by his spirit, he was among the first to stir up +interest in the musical education of France to-day. He has done more +for the advancement of our music than the entire official teaching of +the Conservatoires A day will come when, by the force of things and in +spite of all resistance, such a man will take the place that belongs to +him at the head of the organisation of music in France. + + * * * * * + +I have tried to unearth M. d'Indy's strongest characteristics, and I +think I have found them in his faith and in his activity, I am only too +aware of the pitfalls that have beset me in this attempt; it is always +difficult to criticise a man's personality, and it is most difficult +when he is alive and still in the midst of his development. Every man is +a mystery, not only to others, but to himself. There is something very +presumptuous about pretending to know anyone who does not quite know +himself. And yet one cannot live without forming opinions; it is a +necessity of life. The people we see and know (or say we know), our +friends, and those we love, are never what we think them. Often they are +not at all like the portrait we conjure up; for we walk among the +phantoms of our hearts. But still one must go on having opinions, and go +on constructing and creating things, if we do not want to become +impotent through inertia. Error is better than doubt, provided we err in +good faith; and the main thing is to speak out the thing that one really +feels and believes. I hope M. d'Indy will forgive me if I have gone far +wrong, and that he will see in these pages a sincere effort to +understand him and a keen sympathy with himself, and even with his +ideas, though I do not always share them. But I have always thought that +in life a man's opinions go for very little, and that the only thing +that matters is the man himself. Freedom of spirit is the greatest +happiness one can know; one must be sorry for those who have not got it. +And there is a secret pleasure in rendering homage to another's splendid +creed, even though it is one that we do not ourselves profess. + + + + +RICHARD STRAUSS + + +The composer of _Heldenleben_ is no longer unknown to Parisians. Every +year at Colonne's or Chevillard's we see his tall, thin silhouette +reappear in the conductor's desk. There he is with his abrupt and +imperious gestures, his wan and anxious face, his wonderfully clear +eyes, restless and penetrating at the same time, his mouth shaped like a +child's, a moustache so fair that it is nearly white, and curly hair +growing like a crown above his high round forehead. + +I should like to try to sketch here the strange and arresting +personality of the man who in Germany is considered the inheritor of +Wagner's genius--the man who has had the audacity to write, after +Beethoven, an Heroic Symphony, and to imagine himself the hero. + + * * * * * + +Richard Strauss is thirty-four years old.[167] He was born in Munich on +11 June, 1864. His father, a well-known virtuoso, was first horn in the +Royal orchestra, and his mother was a daughter of the brewer Pschorr. He +was brought up among musical surroundings. At four years old he played +the piano, and at six he composed little dances, _Lieder_, sonatas, and +even overtures for the orchestra. Perhaps this extreme artistic +precocity has had something to do with the feverish character of his +talents, by keeping his nerves in a state of tension and unduly exciting +his mind. At school he composed choruses for some of Sophocles' +tragedies. In 1881, Hermann Levi had one of the young collegian's +symphonies performed by his orchestra. At the University he spent his +time in writing instrumental music. Then Bülow and Radecke made him play +in Berlin; and Bülow, who became very fond of him, had him brought to +Meiningen as _Musikdirector_. From 1886 to 1889 he held the same post at +the _Hoftheater_ in Munich. From 1889 to 1894 he was _Kapellmeister_ at +the _Hoftheater_ in Weimar. He returned to Munich in 1894 as +_Hofkapellmeister_, and in 1897 succeeded Hermann Levi. Finally, he left +Munich for Berlin, where at present he conducts the orchestra of the +Royal Opera. + +[Footnote 167: This essay was written in 1899.] + +Two things should be particularly noted in his life: the influence of +Alexander Ritter--to whom he has shown much gratitude--and his travels +in the south of Europe. He made Ritter's acquaintance in 1885. This +musician was a nephew of Wagner's, and died some years ago. His music is +practically unknown in France, though he wrote two well-known operas, +_Fauler Hans_ and _Wem die Krone_? and was the first composer, according +to Strauss, to introduce Wagnerian methods into the _Lied_. He is often +discussed in Bülow's and Liszt's letters. "Before I met him," says +Strauss, "I had been brought up on strictly classical lines; I had lived +entirely on Haydn, Mozart, and Beethoven, and had just been studying +Mendelssohn, Chopin, Schumann, and Brahms. It is to Ritter alone I am +indebted for my knowledge of Liszt and Wagner; it was he who showed me +the importance of the writings and works of these two masters in the +history of art. It was he who by years of lessons and kindly counsel +made me a musician of the future (_Zukunftsmusiker_), and set my feet on +a road where now I can walk unaided and alone. It was he also who +initiated me in Schopenhauer's philosophy." + +The second influence, that of the South, dates from April, 1886, and +seems to have left an indelible impression upon Strauss. He visited Rome +and Naples for the first time, and came back with a symphonic fantasia +called _Aus Italien_. In the spring of 1892, after a sharp attack of +pneumonia, he travelled for a year and a half in Greece, Egypt, and +Sicily. The tranquillity of these favoured countries filled him with +never-ending regret. The North has depressed him since then, "the +eternal grey of the North and its phantom shadows without a sun."[168] +When I saw him at Charlottenburg, one chilly April day, he told me with +a sigh that he could compose nothing in winter, and that he longed for +the warmth and light of Italy. His music is infected by that longing; +and it makes one feel how his spirit suffers in the gloom of Germany, +and ever yearns for the colours, the laughter, and the joy of the South. + +[Footnote 168: Nietzsche.] + +Like the musician that Nietzsche dreamed of,[169] he seems "to hear +ringing in his ears the prelude of a deeper, stronger music, perhaps a +more wayward and mysterious music; a music that is super-German, which, +unlike other music, would not die away, nor pale, nor grow dull beside +the blue and wanton sea and the clear Mediterranean sky; a music +super-European, which would hold its own even by the dark sunsets of the +desert; a music whose soul is akin to the palm trees; a music that knows +how to live and move among great beasts of prey, beautiful and solitary; +a music whose supreme charm is its ignorance of good and evil. Only from +time to time perhaps there would flit over it the longing of the sailor +for home, golden shadows, and gentle weaknesses; and towards it would +come flying from afar the thousand tints of the setting of a moral world +that men no longer understood; and to these belated fugitives it would +extend its hospitality and sympathy." But it is always the North, the +melancholy of the North, and "all the sadness of mankind," mental +anguish, the thought of death, and the tyranny of life, that come and +weigh down afresh his spirit hungering for light, and force it into +feverish speculation and bitter argument. Perhaps it is better so. + +[Footnote 169: _Beyond Good and Evil_, 1886. I hope I may be excused for +introducing Nietzsche here, but his thoughts seem constantly to be +reflected in Strauss, and to throw much light on the soul of modern +Germany.] + + * * * * * + +Richard Strauss is both a poet and a musician. These two natures live +together in him, and each strives to get the better of the other. The +balance is not always well maintained; but when he does succeed in +keeping it by sheer force of will the union of these two talents, +directed to the same end, produces an effect more powerful than any +known since Wagner's time. Both natures have their source in a mind +filled with heroic thoughts--a rarer possession, I consider, than a +talent for either music or poetry. There are other great musicians in +Europe; but Strauss is something more than a great musician, for he is +able to create a hero. + +When one talks of heroes one is thinking of drama. Dramatic art is +everywhere in Strauss's music, even in works that seem least adapted to +it, such as his _Lieder_ and compositions of pure music. It is most +evident in his symphonic poems, which are the most important part of his +work. These poems are: _Wanderers Sturmlied_ (1885), _Aus Italien_ +(1886), _Macbeth_ (1887), _Don Juan_ (1888), _Tod und Verklärung_ +(1889), _Guntram_ (1892-93), _Till Eulenspiegel_ (1894), _Also sprach +Zarathustra_ (1895), _Don Quixote_ (1897), and _Heldenleben_ +(1898).[170] + +[Footnote 170: This article was written in 1899. Since then the +_Sinfonia Domestica_, has been produced, and will be noticed in the +essay _French and German Music_.] + +I shall not say much about the four first works, where the mind and +manner of the artist is taking shape. The _Wanderers Sturmlied_ (the +song of a traveller during a storm, op. 14) is a vocal sextette with an +orchestral accompaniment, whose subject is taken from a poem of +Goethe's. It was written before Strauss met Ritter, and its construction +is after the manner of Brahms, and shows a rather affected thought and +style. _Aus Italien_ (op. 16) is an exuberant picture of impressions of +his tour in Italy, of the ruins at Rome, the seashore at Sorrento, and +the life of the Italian people. _Macbeth_ (op. 23) gives us a rather +undistinguished series of musical interpretations of poetical subjects. +_Don Juan_ (op. 20) is much finer, and translates Lenau's poem into +music with bombastic vigour, showing us the hero who dreams of grasping +all the joy of the world, and how he fails, and dies after he has lost +faith in everything. + +_Tod und Verklärung_ ("Death and Transfiguration," op. 24[171]) marks +considerable progress in Strauss's thought and style. It is still one of +the most stirring of Strauss's works, and the one that is conceived with +the most perfect unity. It was inspired by a poem of Alexander Ritter's, +and I will give you an idea of its subject. + +[Footnote 171: Composed in 1889, and performed for the first time at +Eisenach in 1890.] + +In a wretched room, lit only by a nightlight, a sick man lies in bed. +Death draws near him in the midst of awe-inspiring silence. The unhappy +man seems to wander in his mind at times, and to find comfort in past +memories. His life passes before his eyes: his innocent childhood, his +happy youth, the struggles of middle age, and his efforts to attain the +splendid goal of his desires, which always eludes him. He had been +striving all his life for this goal, and at last thought it was within +reach, when Death, in a voice of thunder, cries, suddenly, "Stop!" And +even now in his agony he struggles desperately, being set upon +realising his dream; but the hand of Death is crushing life out of his +body, and night is creeping on. Then resounds in the heavens the promise +of that happiness which he had vainly sought for on earth--Redemption +and Transfiguration. + +Richard Strauss's friends protested vigorously against this orthodox +ending; and Seidl,[1] Jorisenne,[2] and Wilhelm Mauke[3] pretended that +the subject was something loftier, that it was the eternal struggle of +the soul against its lower self and its deliverance by means of art. I +shall not enter into that discussion, though I think that such a cold +and commonplace symbolism is much less interesting than the struggle +with death, which one feels in every note of the composition. It is a +classical work, comparatively speaking; broad and majestic and almost +like Beethoven in style. The realism of the subject in the +hallucinations of the dying man, the shiverings of fever, the throbbing +of the veins, and the despairing agony, is transfigured by the purity of +the form in which it is cast. It is realism after the manner of the +symphony in C minor, where Beethoven argues with Destiny. If all +suggestion of a programme is taken away, the symphony still remains +intelligible and impressive by its harmonious expression of feeling. + +[1] _Richard Strauss, eine Charakterskizze_, 1896, Prague.] + +[2] _R. Strauss, Essai critique et biologique_, 1898, Brussels.] + +[3] _Der Musikführer: Tod und Verklärung_, Frankfort.] + +Many German musicians think that Strauss has reached the highest point +of his work in _Tod und Verklärung_. But I am far from agreeing with +them, and believe myself that his art has developed enormously as the +result of it. It is true it is the summit of one period of his life, +containing the essence of all that is best in it; but _Heldenleben_ +marks the second period, and is its corner-stone. How the force and +fulness of his feeling has grown since that first period! But he has +never re-found the delicate and melodious purity of soul and youthful +grace of his earlier work, which still shines out in _Guntram_, and is +then effaced. + + * * * * * + +Strauss has directed Wagner's dramas at Weimar since 1889. While +breathing their atmosphere he turned his attention to the theatre, and +wrote the libretto of his opera _Guntram_. Illness interrupted his work, +and he was in Egypt when he took it up again. The music of the first act +was written between December, 1892, and February, 1893, while travelling +between Cairo and Luxor; the second act was finished in June, 1893, in +Sicily; and the third act early in September, 1893, in Bavaria. There +is, however, no trace of an oriental atmosphere in this music. We find +rather the melodies of Italy, the reflection of a mellow light, and a +resigned calm. I feel in it the languid mind of the convalescent, almost +the heart of a young girl whose tears are ready to flow, though she is +smiling a little at her own sad dreams. It seems to me that Strauss must +have a secret affection for this work, which owes its inspiration to +the undefinable impressions of convalescence. His fever fell asleep in +it, and certain passages are full of the caressing touch of nature, and +recall Berlioz's _Les Troyens_. But too often the music is superficial +and conventional, and the tyranny of Wagner makes itself felt--a rare +enough occurrence in Strauss's other works. The poem is interesting; +Strauss has put much of himself into it, and one is conscious of the +crisis that unsettled his broad-minded but often self-satisfied and +inconsistent ideas. + +Strauss had been reading an historical study of an order of +_Minnesänger_ and mystics, which was founded in Austria in the Middle +Ages to fight against the corruption of art, and to save souls by the +beauty of song. They called themselves _Streiter der Liebe_ ("Warriors +of Love"). Strauss, who was imbued at that time with neo-Christian ideas +and the influence of Wagner and Tolstoy, was carried away by the +subject, and took Guntram from the _Streiter der Liebe_, and made him +his hero. + +The action takes place in the thirteenth century, in Germany. The first +act gives us a glade near a little lake. The country people are in +revolt against the nobles, and have just been repulsed. Guntram and his +master Friedhold distribute alms among them, and the band of defeated +men then take flight into the woods. Left alone, Guntram begins to muse +on the delights of springtime and the innocent awakening of Nature. But +the thought of the misery that its beauty hides weighs upon him. He +thinks of men's evil doing, of human suffering, and of civil war. He +gives thanks to Christ for having led him to this unhappy country, +kisses the cross, and decides to go to the court of the tyrant who is +the cause of all the trouble, and make known to him the Divine +revelation. At that moment Freihild appears. She is the wife of Duke +Robert, who is the cruellest of all the nobles, and she is horrified by +all that is happening around her; life seems hateful to her, and she +wishes to drown herself. But Guntram prevents her; and the pity that her +beauty and trouble had at first aroused changes unconsciously into love +when he recognises her as the beloved princess and sole benefactress of +the unhappy people. He tells her that God has sent him to her for her +salvation. Then he goes to the castle, where he believes himself to be +sent on the double mission of saving the people--and Freihild. + +In the second act, the princes celebrate their victory in the Duke's +castle. After some pompous talk on the part of the official +_Minnesänger_, Guntram is invited to sing. Discouraged beforehand by the +wickedness of his audience, and feeling that he can sing to no purpose, +he hesitates and is on the point of leaving them. But Freihild's sadness +holds him back, and for her sake he sings. His song is at first calm and +measured, and expresses the melancholy that fills him in the midst of a +feast which celebrates triumphant power. He then loses himself in +dreams, and sees the gentle figure of Peace moving among the company. He +describes her lovingly and with youthful tenderness, which approaches +ecstasy as he draws a picture of the ideal life of humanity made free. +Then he paints War and Death, and the disorder and darkness that they +spread over the world. He addresses himself directly to the Prince; he +shows him his duty, and how the love of his people would be his +recompense; he threatens him with the hate of the unhappy who are driven +to despair; and, finally, he urges the nobles to rebuild the towns, to +liberate their prisoners, and to come to the aid of their subjects. His +song is ended amid the profound emotion of his audience. Duke Robert, +feeling the danger of these outspoken words, orders his men to seize the +singer; but the vassals side with Guntram. At this juncture news is +brought that the peasants have renewed the attack. Robert calls his men +to arms, but Guntram, who feels that he will be supported by those +around him, orders Robert's arrest. The Duke draws his sword, but +Guntram kills him. Then a sudden change comes over Guntram's spirit, +which is explained in the third act. In the scene that follows he speaks +no word, his sword falls from his hand, and he lets his enemies again +assume their authority over the crowd; he allows himself to be bound and +taken to prison, while the band of nobles noisily disperses to fight +against the rebels. But Freihild is full of an unaffected and almost +savage joy at her deliverance by Guntram's sword. Love for Guntram fills +her heart, and her one desire is to save him. + +The third act takes place in the prison of the château; and it is a +surprising, uncertain, and very curious act. It is not a logical result +of the action that has preceded it. One feels a sudden commotion in the +poet's ideas, a crisis of feeling which disturbed him even as he wrote, +and a difficulty which he did not succeed in solving. The new light +towards which he was beginning to move appears very clearly. Strauss was +too advanced in the composition of his work to escape the neo-Christian +renouncement which had to finish the drama; he could only have avoided +that by completely remodelling his characters. So Guntram rejects +Freihild's love. He sees he has fallen, even as the others, under the +curse of sin. He had preached charity to others when he himself was full +of egoism; he had killed Robert rather to satisfy his instinctive and +animal jealousy than to deliver the people from a tyrant. So he +renounces his desires, and expiates the sin of being alive by retirement +from the world. But the interest of the act does not lie in this +anticipated _dénouement_, which since _Parsifal_ has become rather +common; it lies in another scene, which has evidently been inserted at +the last moment, and which is uncomfortably out of tune with the action, +though in a singularly grand way. This scene gives us a dialogue between +Guntram and his former companion, Friedhold.[172] + +[Footnote 172: Some people have tried to see Alexander Ritter's thoughts +in Friedhold, as they have seen Strauss's thoughts in Guntram.] + +Friedhold had initiated him in former days, and he now comes to +reproach him for his crime, and to bring him before the Order, who will +judge him. In the original version of the poem Guntram complies, and +sacrifices his passion to his vow. But while Strauss had been travelling +in the East he had conceived a sudden horror for this Christian +annihilation of will, and Guntram revolts along with him, and refuses to +submit to the rules of his Order. He breaks his lute--a symbol of false +hope in the redemption of humanity through faith--and rouses himself +from the glorious dreams in which he used to believe, for he sees they +are shadows that are scattered by the light of real life. He does not +abjure his former vows; but he is not the same man he was when he made +them. While his experience was immature he was able to believe that a +man ought to submit himself to rules, and that life should be governed +by laws. A single hour has enlightened him. Now he is free and +alone--alone with his spirit. "I alone can lessen my suffering; I alone +can expiate my crime. Through myself alone God speaks to me; to me alone +God speaks. _Ewig einsam_." It is the proud awakening of individualism, +the powerful pessimism of the Super-man. Such an expression of feeling +gives the character of action to renouncement and even to negation +itself, for it is a strong affirmation of the will. + +I have dwelt rather at length on this drama on account of the real value +of its thought and, above all, on account of what one may call its +autobiographical interest. It was at this time that Strauss's mind began +to take more definite form. His further experience will develop that +form still more, but without making any important change in it. + +_Guntram_ was the cause of bitter disappointment to its author. He did +not succeed in getting it produced at Munich, for the orchestra and +singers declared that the music could not be performed. It is even said +that they got an eminent critic to draw up a formal document, which they +sent to Strauss, certifying that _Guntram_ was not meant to be sung. The +chief difficulty was the length of the principal part, which took up by +itself, in its musings and discourses, the equivalent of an act and a +half. Some of its monologues, like the song in the second act, last half +an hour on end. Nevertheless, _Guntram_ was performed at Weimar on 16 +May, 1894. A little while afterwards Strauss married the singer who +played Freihild, Pauline de Ahna, who had also created Elizabeth in +_Tannhäuser_ at Bayreuth, and who has since devoted herself to the +interpretation of her husband's _Lieder_. + + * * * * * + +But the rancour of his failure at the theatre still remained with +Strauss, and he turned his attention again to the symphonic poem, in +which he showed more and more marked dramatic tendencies, and a soul +which grew daily prouder and more scornful. You should hear him speak in +cold disdain of the theatre-going public--"that collection of bankers +and tradespeople and miserable seekers after pleasure"--to know the sore +that this triumphant artist hides. For not only was the theatre long +closed to him, but, by an additional irony, he was obliged to conduct +musical rubbish at the opera in Berlin, on account of the poor taste in +music--really of Royal origin--that prevailed there. + +The first great symphony of this new period was _Till Eulenspiegel's +lustige Streiche, nach alter Schelmenweise, in Rondeauform_ ("Till +Eulenspiegel's Merry Pranks, according to an old legend, in rondeau +form"), op. 28.[173] Here his disdain is as yet only expressed by witty +bantering, which scoffs at the world's conventions. This figure of Till, +this devil of a joker, the legendary hero of Germany and Flanders, is +little known with us in France. And so Strauss's music loses much of its +point, for it claims to recall a series of adventures which we know +nothing about--Till crossing the market place and smacking his whip at +the good women there; Till in priestly attire delivering a homely +sermon; Till making love to a young woman who rebuffs him; Till making a +fool of the pedants; Till tried and hung. Strauss's liking to present, +by musical pictures, sometimes a character, sometimes a dialogue, or a +situation, or a landscape, or an idea--that is to say, the most volatile +and varied impressions of his capricious spirit--is very marked here. It +is true that he falls back on several popular subjects, whose meaning +would be very easily grasped in Germany; and that he develops them, not +quite in the strict form of a rondeau, as he pretends, but still with a +certain method, so that apart from a few frolics, which are +unintelligible without a programme, the whole has real musical unity. +This symphony, which is a great favourite in Germany, seems to me less +original than some of his other compositions. It sounds rather like a +refined piece of Mendelssohn's, with curious harmonies and very +complicated instrumentation. + +[Footnote 173: Composed in 1894-95, and played for the first time at +Cologne in 1895.] + +There is much more grandeur and originality in his _Also sprach +Zarathustra, Tondichtung frei, nach Nietzsche_ ("Thus spake Zarathustra, +a free Tone-poem, after Nietzsche"), op. 30.[174] Its sentiments are +more broadly human, and the programme that Strauss has followed never +loses itself in picturesque or anecdotic details, but is planned on +expressive and noble lines. Strauss protests his own liberty in the face +of Nietzsche's. He wishes to represent the different stages of +development that a free spirit passes through in order to arrive at that +of Super-man. These ideas are purely personal, and are not part of some +system of philosophy. The sub-titles of the work are: _Von den +Hinterweltern_ ("Of Religious Ideas"), _Von der grossen Sehnsucht_ ("Of +Supreme Aspiration"), _Von den Freuden und Leidenschaften_ ("Of Joys and +Passions"), _Das Grablied_ ("The Grave Song"), _Von der Wissenschaft_ +("Of Knowledge"), _Der Genesende_ ("The Convalescent"--the soul +delivered of its desires), _Das Tanzlied_ ("Dancing Song"), _Nachtlied_ +("Night Song"). We are shown a man who, worn out by trying to solve the +riddle of the universe, seeks refuge in religion. Then he revolts +against ascetic ideas, and gives way madly to his passions. But he is +quickly sated and disgusted and, weary to death, he tries science, but +rejects it again, and succeeds in ridding himself of the uneasiness its +knowledge brings by laughter--the master of the universe--and the merry +dance, that dance of the universe where all the human sentiments enter +hand-in-hand--religious beliefs, unsatisfied desires, passions, +disgust, and joy. "Lift up your hearts on high, my brothers! Higher +still! And mind you don't forget your legs! I have canonised laughter. +You super-men, learn to laugh!"[175] And the dance dies away and is lost +in ethereal regions, and Zarathustra is lost to sight while dancing in +distant worlds. But if he has solved the riddle of the universe for +himself, he has not solved it for other men; and so, in contrast to the +confident knowledge which fills the music, we get the sad note of +interrogation at the end. + +[Footnote 174: Composed in 1895-96, and performed for the first time at +Frankfort-On-Main in November, 1896.] + +[Footnote 175: Nietzsche.] + +There are few subjects that offer richer material for musical +expression. Strauss has treated it with power and dexterity; he has +preserved unity in this chaos of passions, by contrasting the +_Sehnsucht_ of man with the impassive strength of Nature. As for the +boldness of his conceptions, I need hardly remind those who heard the +poem at the Cirque d'été of the intricate "Fugue of Knowledge," the +trills of the wood wind and the trumpets that voice Zarathustra's laugh, +the dance of the universe, and the audacity of the conclusion which, in +the key of B major, finishes up with a note of interrogation, in C +natural, repeated three times. + +I am far from thinking that the symphony is without a fault. The themes +are of unequal value: some are quite commonplace; and, in a general way, +the working up of the composition is superior to its underlying +thought. I shall come back later on to certain faults in Strauss's +music; here I only want to consider the overflowing life and feverish +joy that set these worlds spinning. + +_Zarathustra_ shows the progress of scornful individualism in +Strauss--"the spirit that hates the dogs of the populace and all that +abortive and gloomy breed; the spirit of wild laughter that dances like +a tempest as gaily on marshes and sadness as it does in fields."[176] +That spirit laughs at itself and at its idealism in the _Don Quixote_ of +1897, _fantastische Variationen uber ein Thema ritterlichen Charakters_ +("Don Quixote, fantastic variations on a theme of knightly character"), +op. 35; and that symphony marks, I think, the extreme point to which +programme music may be carried. In no other work does Strauss give +better proof of his prodigious cleverness, intelligence, and wit; and I +say sincerely that there is not a work where so much force is expended +with so great a loss for the sake of a game and a musical joke which +lasts forty-five minutes, and has given the author, the executants, and +the public a good deal of tiring work. These symphonic poems are most +difficult to play on account of the complexity, the independence, and +the fantastic caprices of the different parts. Judge for yourself what +the author expects to get out of the music by these few extracts from +the programme:-- + +[Footnote 176: Nietzsche, _Zarathustra_.] + +The introduction represents Don Quixote buried in books of chivalrous +romance; and we have to see in the music, as we do in little Flemish and +Dutch pictures, not only Don Quixote's features, but the words of the +books he reads. Sometimes it is the story of a knight who is righting a +giant, sometimes the adventures of a knight-errant who has dedicated +himself to the services of a lady, sometimes it is a nobleman who has +given his life in fulfilment of a vow to atone for his sins. Don +Quixote's mind becomes confused (and our own with it) over all these +stories; he is quite distracted. He leaves home in company with his +squire. The two figures are drawn with great spirit; the one is an old +Spaniard, stiff, languishing, distrustful, a bit of a poet, rather +undecided in his opinions but obstinate when his mind is once made up; +the other is a fat, jovial peasant, a cunning fellow, given to repeating +himself in a waggish way and quoting droll proverbs--translated in the +music by short-winded phrases that always return to the point they +started from. The adventures begin. Here are the windmills (trills from +the violins and wood wind), and the bleating army of the grand emperor, +Alifanfaron (tremolos from the wood wind); and here, in the third +variation, is a dialogue between the knight and his squire, from which +we are to guess that Sancho questions his master on the advantages of a +chivalrous life, for they seem to him doubtful. Don Quixote talks to him +of glory and honour; but Sancho has no thought for it. In reply to these +grand words he urges the superiority of sure profits, fat meals, and +sounding money. Then the adventures begin again. The two companions fly +through the air on wooden horses; and the illusion of this giddy voyage +is given by chromatic passages on the flutes, harps, kettledrums, and a +"windmachine," while "the tremolo of the double basses on the key-note +shows that the horses have never left the earth."[177] + +But I must stop. I have said enough to show the fun the author is +indulging in. When one hears the work one cannot help admiring the +composer's technical knowledge, skill in orchestration, and sense of +humour. And one is all the more surprised that he confines himself to +the illustration of texts[178] when he is so capable of creating comic +and dramatic matter without it. Although _Don Quixote_ is a marvel of +skill and a very wonderful work, in which Strauss has developed a +suppler and richer style, it marks, to my mind, a progress in his +technique and a backward step in his mind, for he seems to have adopted +the decadent conceptions of an art suited to playthings and trinkets to +please a frivolous and affected society. + +[Footnote 177: Arthur Hahn, _Der Musikführer: Don Quixote_, Frankfort.] + +[Footnote 178: At the head of each variation Strauss has marked on the +score the chapter of "Don Quixote" that he is interpreting.] + +In _Heldenleben_ ("The Life of a Hero"), op. 40,[179] he recovers +himself, and with a stroke of his wings reaches the summits. Here there +is no foreign text for the music to study or illustrate or transcribe. +Instead, there is lofty passion and an heroic will gradually developing +itself and breaking down all obstacles. Without doubt Strauss had a +programme in his mind, but he said to me himself: "You have no need to +read it. It is enough to know that the hero is there fighting against +his enemies." I do not know how far that is true, or if parts of the +symphony would not be rather obscure to anyone who followed it without +the text; but this speech seems to prove that he has understood the +dangers of the literary symphony, and that he is striving for pure +music. + +[Footnote 179: Finished in December, 1898. Performed for the first time +at Frankfort-On-Main on 3 March, 1899. Published by Leuckart, Leipzig.] + +_Heldenleben_ is divided into six chapters: The Hero, The Hero's +Adversaries, The Hero's Companion, The Field of Battle, The Peaceful +Labours of the Hero, The Hero's Retirement from the World, and the +Achievement of His Ideal. It is an extraordinary work, drunken with +heroism, colossal, half barbaric, trivial, and sublime. An Homeric hero +struggles among the sneers of a stupid crowd, a herd of brawling and +hobbling ninnies. A violin solo, in a sort of concerto, describes the +seductions, the coquetry, and the degraded wickedness of woman. Then +strident trumpet-blasts sound the attack; and it is beyond me to give an +idea of the terrible charge of cavalry that follows, which makes the +earth tremble and our hearts leap; nor can I describe how an iron +determination leads to the storming of towns, and all the tumultuous din +and uproar of battle--the most splendid battle that has ever been +painted in music. At its first performance in Germany I saw people +tremble as they listened to it, and some rose up suddenly and made +violent gestures quite unconsciously. I myself had a strange feeling of +giddiness, as if an ocean had been upheaved, and I thought that for the +first time for thirty years Germany had found a poet of Victory. + +_Heldenleben_ would be in every way one of the masterpieces of musical +composition if a literary error had not suddenly cut short the soaring +flight of its most impassioned pages, at the supreme point of interest +in the movement, in order to follow the programme; though, besides this, +a certain coldness, perhaps weariness, creeps in towards the end. The +victorious hero perceives that he has conquered in vain: the baseness +and stupidity of men have remained unaltered. He stifles his anger, and +scornfully accepts the situation. Then he seeks refuge in the peace of +Nature. The creative force within him flows out in imaginative works; +and here Richard Strauss, with a daring warranted only by his genius, +represents these works by reminiscences of his own compositions, and +_Don Juan, Macbeth, Tod und Verklärung, Till, Zarathustra, Don Quixote, +Guntram_, and even his _Lieder_, associate themselves with the hero +whose story he is telling. At times a storm will remind this hero of his +combats; but he also remembers his moments of love and happiness, and +his soul is quieted. Then the music unfolds itself serenely, and rises +with calm strength to the closing chord of triumph, which is placed like +a crown of glory on the hero's head. + +There is no doubt that Beethoven's ideas have often inspired, +stimulated, and guided Strauss's own ideas. One feels an indescribable +reflection of the first _Heroic_ and of the _Ode to Joy_ in the key of +the first part (E flat); and the last part recalls, even more forcibly, +certain of Beethoven's _Lieder_. But the heroes of the two composers are +very different: Beethoven's hero is more classical and more rebellious; +and Strauss's hero is more concerned with the exterior world and his +enemies, his conquests are achieved with greater difficulty, and his +triumph is wilder in consequence. If that good Oulibicheff pretends to +see the burning of Moscow in a discord in the first _Heroic_, what would +he find here? What scenes of burning towns, what battlefields! Besides +that there is cutting scorn and a mischievous laughter in _Heldenleben_ +that is never heard in Beethoven. There is, in fact, little kindness in +Strauss's work; it is the work of a disdainful hero. + + * * * * * + +In considering Strauss's music as a whole, one is at first struck by the +diversity of his style. The North and the South mingle; and in his +melodies one feels the attraction of the sun. Something Italian had +crept into _Tristan_; but how much more of Italy there is in the work of +this disciple of Nietzsche. The phrases are often Italian and their +harmonies ultra-Germanic. Perhaps one of the greatest charms of +Strauss's art is that we are able to watch the rent in the dark clouds +of German polyphony, and see shining through it the smiling line of an +Italian coast and the gay dancers on its shore. This is not merely a +vague analogy. It would be easy, if idle, to notice unmistakable +reminiscences of France and Italy even in Strauss's most advanced works, +such as _Zarathustra_ and _Heldenleben_. Mendelssohn, Gounod, Wagner, +Rossini, and Mascagni elbow one another strangely. But these disparate +elements have a softer outline when the work is taken as a whole, for +they have been absorbed and controlled by the composer's imagination. + +His orchestra is not less composite. It is not a compact and serried +mass like Wagner's Macedonian phalanxes; it is parcelled out and as +divided as possible. Each part aims at independence and works as it +thinks best, without apparently troubling about the other parts. +Sometimes it seems, as it did when reading Berlioz, that the execution +must result in incoherence, and weaken the effect. But somehow the +result is very satisfying. "Now doesn't that sound well?" said Strauss +to me with a smile, just after he had finished conducting +_Heldenleben_.[180] + +[Footnote 180: The composition of the orchestra in Strauss's later works +is as follows: In _Zarathustra_: one piccolo, three flutes, three oboes, +one English horn, one clarinet in E flat, two clarinets in B, one +bass-clarinet in B, three bassoons, one double-bassoon, six horns in F, +four trumpets in C, three trombones, three bass-tuba, kettledrums, big +drum, cymbals, triangle, chime of bells, bell in E, organ, two harps, +and strings. In _Heldenleben_: eight horns instead of six, five trumpets +instead of four (two in E flat, three in B); and, in addition, military +drums.] + +But it is especially in Strauss's subjects that caprice and a disordered +imagination, the enemy of all reason, seem to reign. We have seen that +these poems try to express in turn, or even simultaneously, literary +texts, pictures, anecdotes, philosophical ideas, and the personal +sentiments of the composer. What unity is there in the adventures of Don +Quixote or Till Eulenspiegel? And yet unity is there, not in the +subjects, but in the mind that deals with them. And these descriptive +symphonies with their very diffuse literary life are vindicated by their +musical life, which is much more logical and concentrated. The caprices +of the poet are held in rein by the musician. The whimsical Till +disports himself "after the old form of rondeau," and the folly of Don +Quixote is told in "ten variations on a chivalrous theme, with an +introduction and finale." In this way, Strauss's art, one of the most +literary and descriptive in existence, is strongly distinguished from +others of the same kind by the solidarity of its musical fabric, in +which one feels the true musician--a musician brought up on the great +masters, and a classic in spite of everything. + +And so throughout that music a strong unity is felt among the unruly and +often incongruous elements. It is the reflection, so it seems to me, of +the soul of the composer. Its unity is not a matter of what he feels, +but a matter of what he wishes. His emotion is much less interesting to +him than his will, and it is less intense, and often quite devoid of any +personal character. His restlessness seems to come from Schumann, his +religious feeling from Mendelssohn, his voluptuousness from Gounod or +the Italian masters, his passion from Wagner.[181] But his will is +heroic, dominating, eager, and powerful to a sublime degree. And that is +why Richard Strauss is noble and, at present, quite unique. One feels in +him a force that has dominion over men. + +[Footnote 181: In _Guntram_ one could even believe that he had made up +his mind to use a phrase in _Tristan_, as if he could not find anything +better to express passionate desire.] + + * * * * * + +It is through this heroic side that he may be considered as an inheritor +of some of Beethoven's and Wagner's thought. It is this heroic side +which makes him a poet--one of the greatest perhaps in modern Germany, +who sees herself reflected in him and in his hero. Let us consider this +hero. + +He is an idealist with unbounded faith in the power of the mind and the +liberating virtue of art. This idealism is at first religious, as in +_Tod und Verklärung_, and tender and compassionate as a woman, and full +of youthful illusions, as in _Guntram_. Then it becomes vexed and +indignant with the baseness of the world and the difficulties it +encounters. Its scorn increases, and becomes sarcastic _(Till +Eulenspiegel)_; it is exasperated with years of conflict, and, in +increasing bitterness, develops into a contemptuous heroism. How +Strauss's laugh whips and stings us in _Zarathustra_! How his will +bruises and cuts us in _Heldenleben_! Now that he has proved his power +by victory, his pride knows no limit; he is elated and is unable to see +that his lofty visions have become realities. But the people whose +spirit he reflects see it. There are germs of morbidity in Germany +to-day, a frenzy of pride, a belief in self, and a scorn for others that +recalls France in the seventeenth century. "_Dem Deutschen gehört die +Welt_" ("Germany possesses the world") calmly say the prints displayed +in the shop windows in Berlin. But when one arrives at this point the +mind becomes delirious. All genius is raving mad if it comes to that; +but Beethoven's madness concentrated itself in himself, and imagined +things for his own enjoyment. The genius of many contemporary German +artists is an aggressive thing, and is characterised by its destructive +antagonism. The idealist who "possesses the world" is liable to +dizziness. He was made to rule over an interior world. The splendour of +the exterior images that he is called upon to govern dazzles him; and, +like Caesar, he goes astray. Germany had hardly attained the position of +empire of the world when she found Nietzsche's voice and that of the +deluded artists of the _Deutsches Theater_ and the _Secession_. Now +there is the grandiose music of Richard Strauss. + +What is all this fury leading to? What does this heroism aspire to? This +force of will, bitter and strained, grows faint when it has reached its +goal, or even before that. It does not know what to do with its victory. +It disdains it, does not believe in it, or grows tired of it.[182] + +[Footnote 182: "The German spirit, which but a little while back had the +will to dominate Europe, the force to govern Europe, has finally made up +its mind to abandon it."--Nietzsche.] + +Like Michelangelo's _Victory_, it has set its knee on the captive's +back, and seems ready to despatch him. But suddenly it stops, hesitates, +and looks about with uncertain eyes, and its expression is one of +languid disgust, as though weariness had seized it. + +And this is how the work of Richard Strauss appears to me up to the +present. Guntram kills Duke Robert, and immediately lets fall his sword. +The frenzied laugh of Zarathustra ends in an avowal of discouraged +impotence. The delirious passion of Don Juan dies away in nothingness. +Don Quixote when dying forswears his illusions. Even the Hero himself +admits the futility of his work, and seeks oblivion in an indifferent +Nature. Nietzsche, speaking of the artists of our time, laughs at "those +Tantaluses of the will, rebels and enemies of laws, who come, broken in +spirit, and fall at the foot of the cross of Christ." Whether it is for +the sake of the Cross or Nothingness, these heroes renounce their +victories in disgust and despair, or with a resignation that is sadder +still. It was not thus that Beethoven overcame his sorrows. Sad adagios +make their lament in the middle of his symphonies, but a note of joy and +triumph is always sounded at the end. His work is the triumph of a +conquered hero; that of Strauss is the defeat of a conquering hero. This +irresoluteness of the will can be still more clearly seen in +contemporary German literature, and in particular in the author of _Die +versunkene Glocke_. But it is more striking in Strauss, because he is +more heroic. And so we get all this display of superhuman will, and the +end is only "My desire is gone!" + +In this lies the undying worm of German thought--I am speaking of the +thought of the choice few who enlighten the present and anticipate the +future. I see an heroic people, intoxicated by its triumphs, by its +great riches, by its numbers, by its force, which clasps the world in +its great arms and subjugates it, and then stops, fatigued by its +conquest, and asks: "Why have I conquered?" + + + + +HUGO WOLF + + +The more one learns of the history of great artists, the more one is +struck by the immense amount of sadness their lives enclose. Not only +are they subjected to the trials and disappointments of ordinary +life--which affect them more cruelly through their greater +sensitiveness--but their surroundings are like a desert, because they +are twenty, thirty, fifty, or even hundreds of years in advance of their +contemporaries; and they are often condemned to despairing efforts, not +to conquer the world, but to live. + +These highly-strung natures are rarely able to keep up this incessant +struggle for very long; and the finest genius may have to reckon with +illness and misery and even premature death. And yet there were people +like Mozart and Schumann and Weber who were happy in spite of +everything, because they had been able to keep their soul's health and +the joy of creation until the end; and though their bodies were worn out +with fatigue and privation, a light was kept burning which sent its rays +far into the darkness of their night. There are worse destinies; and +Beethoven, though he was poor, shut up within himself, and deceived in +his affections, was far from being the most unhappy of men. In his case, +he possessed nothing but himself; but he possessed himself truly, and +reigned over the world that was within him; and no other empire could +ever be compared with that of his vast imagination, which stretched like +a great expanse of sky, where tempests raged. Until his last day the old +Prometheus in him, though fettered by a miserable body, preserved his +iron force unbroken. When dying during a storm, his last gesture was one +of revolt; and in his agony he raised himself on his bed and shook his +fist at the sky. And so he fell, struck down by a single blow in the +thick of the fight. + +But what shall be said of those who die little by little, who outlive +themselves, and watch the slow decay of their souls? + +Such was the fate of Hugo Wolf, whose tragic destiny has assured him a +place apart in the hell of great musicians.[183] + +[Footnote 183: A large number of works on Hugo Wolf have been published +in Germany since his death. The chief is the great biography of Herr +Ernst Decsey--_Hugo Wolf_ (Berlin, 1903-4). I have found this book of +great service; it is a work full of knowledge and sympathy. I have also +consulted Herr Paul Müller's excellent little pamphlet, _Hugo Wolf +(Moderne essays_, Berlin, 1904), and the collections of Wolf's letters, +in particular his letters to Oskar Grohe, Emil Kaufmann, and Hugo +Faisst.] + + * * * * * + +He was born at Windischgratz in Styria, 13 March, 1860. He was the +fourth son of a currier--a currier-musician, like old Veit Bach, the +baker-musician, and Haydn's father, the wheelwright-musician. Philipp +Wolf played the violin, the guitar, and the piano, and used to have +little quintet parties at his house, in which he played the first +violin, Hugo the second violin, Hugo's brother the violoncello, an uncle +the horn, and a friend the tenor violin. The musical taste of the +country was not properly German. Wolf was a Catholic; and his taste was +not formed, like that of most German musicians, by books of chorales. +Besides that, in Styria they were fond of playing the old Italian operas +of Rossini, Bellini, and Donizetti. Later on, Wolf used to like to think +that he had a few drops of Latin blood in his veins; and all his life he +had a predilection for the great French musicians. + +His term of apprenticeship was not marked by anything brilliant. He went +from one school to another without being kept long anywhere. And yet he +was not a worthless lad; but he was always very reserved, little caring +to be intimate with others, and passionately devoted to music. His +father naturally did not want him to take up music as a profession; and +he had the same struggles that Berlioz had. Finally he succeeded in +getting permission from his family to go to Vienna, and he entered the +Conservatoire there in 1875. But he was not any the happier for it, and +at the end of two years he was sent away for being unruly. + +What was to be done? His family was ruined, for a fire had demolished +their little possessions. He felt the silent reproaches of his father +already weighing upon him--for he loved his father dearly, and +remembered the sacrifices he had made for him. He did not wish to return +to his own province; indeed he could not return--that would have been +death. It was necessary that this boy of seventeen should find some +means of earning a livelihood and be able to instruct himself at the +same time. After his expulsion from the Conservatoire he attended no +other school; he taught himself. And he taught himself wonderfully; but +at what a cost! The suffering he went through from that time until he +was thirty, the enormous amount of energy he had to expend in order to +live and cultivate the fine spirit of poetry that was within him--all +this effort and toil was, without doubt, the cause of his unhappy death. +He had a burning thirst for knowledge and a fever for work which made +him sometimes forget the necessity for eating and drinking. + +He had a great admiration for Goethe, and was infatuated by Heinrich von +Kleist, whom he rather resembles both in his gifts and in his life; he +was an enthusiast about Grillparzer and Hebbel at a time when they were +but little appreciated; and he was one of the first Germans to discover +the worth of Mörike, whom, later on, he made popular in Germany. Besides +this, he read English and French writers. He liked Rabelais, and was +very partial to Claude Tillier, the French novelist of the provinces, +whose _Oncle Benjamin_ has given pleasure to so many German provincial +families, by bringing before them, as Wolf said, the vision of their own +little world, and helping them by his own jovial good humour to bear +their troubles with a smiling face. And so little Wolf, with hardly +enough to eat, found the means of learning both French and English, in +order better to appreciate the thoughts of foreign artists. + +In music he learned a great deal from his friend Schalk,[184] a +professor at the Vienna Conservatoire; but, like Berlioz, he got most of +his education from the libraries, and spent months in reading the scores +of the great masters. Not having a piano, he used to carry Beethoven's +sonatas to the Prater Park in Vienna and study them on a bench in the +open air. He soaked himself in the classics--in Bach and Beethoven, and +the German masters of the _Lied_--Schubert and Schumann. He was one of +the young Germans who was passionately fond of Berlioz; and it is due to +Wolf that France was afterwards honoured in the possession of this great +artist, whom French critics, whether of the school of Meyerbeer, Wagner, +Franck, or Debussy, have never understood. He was also early a friend of +old Anton Bruckner, whose music we do not know in France, neither his +eight symphonies, nor his _Te Deum_, nor his masses, nor his cantatas, +nor anything else of his fertile work. Bruckner had a sweet and modest +character, and an endearing, if rather childish, personality. He was +rather crushed all his life by the Brahms party; but, like Franck in +France, he gathered round him new and original talent to fight the +academic art of his time. + +[Footnote 184: Joseph Schalk was one of the founders of the +_Wagner-Verein_ at Vienna, and devoted his life to propagating the cult +of Bruckner (who called him his "_Herr Generalissimus_ "), and to +fighting for Wolf.] + +But of all these influences, the strongest was that of Wagner. Wagner +came to Vienna in 1875 to conduct _Tannhäuser_ and _Lohengrin_. There +was then among the younger people a fever of enthusiasm similar to that +which _Werther_ had caused a century before. Wolf saw Wagner. He tells +us about it in his letters to his parents. I will quote his own words, +and though they make one smile, one loves the impulsive devotion of his +youth; and they make one feel, too, that a man who inspires such an +affection, and who can do so much good by a little sympathy, is to blame +when he does not befriend others--above all if he has suffered, like +Wagner, from loneliness and the want of a helping hand. You must +remember that this letter was written by a boy of fifteen. + + "I have been to--guess whom?... to the master, Richard Wagner! Now + I will tell you all about it, just as it happened. I will copy the + words down exactly as I wrote them in my note-book. + + "On Thursday, 9 December, at half-past ten, I saw Richard Wagner + for the second time at the Hotel Imperial, where I stayed for half + an hour on the staircase, awaiting his arrival (I knew that on that + day he would conduct the last rehearsal of his _Lohengrin_). At + last the master came down from the second floor, and I bowed to him + very respectfully while he was yet some distance from me. He + thanked me in a very friendly way. As he neared the door I sprang + forward and opened it for him, upon which he looked fixedly at me + for a few seconds, and then went on his way to the rehearsal at + the Opera. I ran as fast as I could, and arrived at the Opera + sooner than Richard Wagner did in his cab. I bowed to him again, + and I wanted to open the door of his cab for him; but as I could + not get it open, the coachman jumped down from his seat and did it + for me. Wagner said something to the coachman--I think it was about + me. I wanted to follow him into the theatre, but they would not let + me pass. + + "I often used to wait for him at the Hotel Imperial; and on this + occasion I made the acquaintance of the manager of the hotel, who + promised that he would interest himself on my behalf. Who was more + delighted than I when he told me that on the following Saturday + afternoon, 11 December, I was to come and find him, so that he + could introduce me to Mme. Cosima's maid and Richard Wagner's + valet! I arrived at the appointed hour. The visit to the lady's + maid was very short. I was advised to come the following day, + Sunday, 12 December, at two o'clock. I arrived at the right hour, + but found the maid and the valet and the manager still at table.... + Then I went with the maid to the master's rooms, where I waited for + about a quarter of an hour until he came. At last Wagner appeared + in company with Cosima and Goldmark. I bowed to Cosima very + respectfully, but she evidently did not think it worth while to + honour me with a single glance. Wagner was going into his room + without paying any attention to me, when the maid said to him in a + beseeching voice: 'Ah, Herr Wagner, it is a young musician who + wishes to speak to you; he has been waiting for you a long time.' + + "He then came out of his room, looked at me, and said: 'I have seen + you before, I think. You are....' + + "Probably he wanted to say, 'You are a fool.' + + "He went in front of me and opened the door of the reception-room, + which was furnished in a truly royal style. In the middle of the + room was a couch covered in velvet and silk. Wagner himself was + wrapped in a long velvet mantle bordered with fur. + + "When I was inside the room he asked me what I wanted." + +Here Hugo Wolf, to excite the curiosity of his parents, broke off his +story and put "To be continued in my next." In his next letter he +continues: + + "I said to him: 'Highly honoured master, for a long time I have + wanted to hear an opinion on my compositions, and it would be....' + + "Here the master interrupted me and said: 'My dear child, I cannot + give you an opinion of your compositions; I have far too little + time; I can't even get my own letters written. I understand nothing + at all about music _(Ich verstehe gar nichts von der Musik_).' + + "I asked the master whether I should ever be able really to do + anything, and he said to me: 'When I was your age and composing + music, no one could tell me then whether I should ever do anything + great. You could at most play me your compositions on the piano; + but I have no time to hear them. When you are older, and when you + have composed bigger works, and if by chance I return to Vienna, + you shall show me what you have done. But that is no use now; I + cannot give you an opinion of them yet.' + + "When I told the master that I took the classics as models, he + said: 'Good, good. One can't be original at first.' And he laughed, + and then said, 'I wish you, dear friend, much happiness in your + career. Go on working steadily, and if I come back to Vienna, show + me your compositions.' + + "Upon that I left the master, profoundly moved and impressed." + +Wolf and Wagner did not see each other again. But Wolf fought +unceasingly on Wagner's behalf. He went several times to Bayreuth, +though he had no personal intercourse with the Wagner family; but he met +Liszt, who, with his usual goodness, wrote him a kind letter about a +composition that he had sent him, and showed him what alterations to +make in it. + +Mottl and the composer, Adalbert de Goldschmidt, were the first friends +to aid him in his years of misery, by finding him some music pupils. He +taught music to little children of seven and eight years old; but he was +a poor teacher, and found giving lessons was a martyrdom. The money he +earned hardly served to feed him, and he only ate once a day--Heaven +knows how. To comfort himself he read Hebbel's Life; and for a time he +thought of going to America. In 1881 Goldschmidt got him the post of +second _Kapellmeister_ at the Salzburg theatre. It was his business to +rehearse the choruses for the operettas of Strauss and Millöcker. He did +his work conscientiously, but in deadly weariness; and he lacked the +necessary power of making his authority felt. He did not stay long in +this post, and came back to Vienna. + +Since 1875 he had been writing music: _Lieder_, sonatas, symphonies, +quartets, etc., and already his _Lieder_ held the most important place. +He also composed in 1883 a symphonic poem on the _Penthesilea_ of his +friend Kleist. + +In 1884 he succeeded in getting a post as musical critic. But on what a +paper! It was the _Salonblatt_--a mundane journal filled with articles +on sport and fashion news. One would have said that this little +barbarian was put there for a wager. His articles from 1884 to 1887 are +full of life and humour. He upholds the great classic masters in them: +Gluck, Mozart, Beethoven, and--Wagner; he defends Berlioz; he scourges +the modern Italians, whose success at Vienna was simply scandalous; he +breaks lances for Bruckner, and begins a bold campaign against Brahms. +It was not that he disliked or had any prejudice against Brahms; he took +a delight in some of his works, especially his chamber music, but he +found fault with his symphonies and was shocked by the carelessness of +the declamation in his _Lieder_ and, in general, could not bear his want +of originality and power, and found him lacking in joy and fulness of +life. Above all, he struck at him as being the head of a party that was +spitefully opposed to Wagner and Bruckner and all innovators. For all +that was retrograde in music in Vienna, and all that was the enemy of +liberty and progress in art and criticism, was giving Brahms its +detestable support by gathering itself about him and spreading his fame +abroad; and though Brahms was really far above his party as an artist +and a man, he had not the courage to break away from it. + +Brahms read Wolf's articles, but his attacks did not seem to stir his +apathy. The "Brahmines," however, never forgave Wolf. One of his +bitterest enemies was Hans von Bülow, who found anti-Brahmism "the +blasphemy against the Holy Ghost--which shall not be forgiven."[185] +Some years later, when Wolf succeeded in getting his own compositions +played, he had to submit to criticisms like that of Max Kalbeck, one of +the leaders of "Brahmism" at Vienna: + + "Herr Wolf has lately, as a reporter, raised an irresistible laugh + in musical circles. So someone suggested he had better devote + himself to composition. The last products of his muse show that + this well-meant advice was bad. He ought to go back to reporting." + +[Footnote 185: Letter of H. von Bülow to Detlev von Liliencron.] + +An orchestral society in Vienna gave Wolf's _Penthesilea_ a trial +reading; and it was rehearsed, in disregard of all good taste, amid +shouts of laughter. When it was finished, the conductor said: +"Gentlemen, I ask your pardon for having allowed this piece to be played +to the end; but I wanted to know what manner of man it is that dares to +write such things about the master, Brahms." + +Wolf got a little respite from his miseries by going to stay a few weeks +in his own country with his brother-in-law, Strasser, an inspector of +taxes.[186] He took with him his books, his poets, and began to set them +to music. + +[Footnote 186: Wolf's letters to Strasser are of great value in giving +us an insight into his artist's eager and unhappy soul.] + + * * * * * + +He was now twenty-seven years old, and had as yet published nothing. The +years of 1887 and 1888 were the most critical ones of his life. In 1887 +he lost his father whom he loved so much, and that loss, like so many of +his other misfortunes, gave fresh impulse to his energies. The same +year, a generous friend called Eckstein published his first collection +of _Lieder_. Wolf up to that time had been smothered, but this +publication stirred the life in him, and was the means of unloosing his +genius. Settled at Perchtoldsdorf, near Vienna, in February, 1888, in +absolute peace, he wrote in three months fifty-three _Lieder_ to the +words of Eduard Mörike, the pastor-poet of Swabia, who died in 1875, and +who, misunderstood and laughed at during his lifetime, is now covered +with honour, and universally popular in Germany. Wolf composed his +songs in a state of exalted joy and almost fright at the sudden +discovery of his creative power. + +In a letter to Dr. Heinrich Werner, he says: + + "It is now seven o'clock in the evening, and I am so happy--oh, + happier than the happiest of kings. Another new _Lied_! If you + could hear what is going on in my heart!... the devil would carry + you away with pleasure!... + + "Another two new _Lieder_! There is one that sounds so horribly + strange that it frightens me. There is nothing like it in + existence. Heaven help the unfortunate people who will one day hear + it!... + + "If you could only hear the last _Lied_ I have just composed you + would only have one desire left--to die.... Your happy, happy + Wolf." + +He had hardly finished the _Mörike-Lieder_ when he began a series of +_Lieder_ on poems of Goethe. In three months (December, 1888, to +February, 1889) he had written all the _Goethe-Liederbuch_--fifty-one +_Lieder_, some of which are, like _Prometheus_, big dramatic scenes. + +The same year, while still at Perchtoldsdorf, after having published a +volume of Eichendorff _Lieder_, he became absorbed in a new cycle--the +_Spanisches-Liederbuch_, on Spanish poems translated by Heyse. He wrote +these forty-four songs in the same ecstasy of gladness: + + "What I write now, I write for the future.... Since Schubert and + Schumann there has been nothing like it!" + +In 1890, two months after he had finished the _Spanisches-Liederbuch_, +he composed another cycle of _Lieder_ on poems called _Alten Weisen_, by +the great Swiss writer Gottfried Keller. And lastly, in the same year, +he began his _Italienisches-Liederbuch_, on Italian poems, translated by +Geibel and Heyse. + +And then--then there was silence. + + * * * * * + +The history of Wolf is one of the most extraordinary in the history of +art, and gives one a better glimpse of the mysteries of genius than most +histories do. + +Let us make a little _résumé_. Wolf at twenty-eight years old had +written practically nothing. From 1888 to 1890 he wrote, one after +another, in a kind of fever, fifty-three Mörike _Lieder_, fifty-one +Goethe _Lieder_, forty-four Spanish _Lieder_, seventeen Eichendorff +_Lieder_, a dozen Keller _Lieder_, and the first Italian _Lieder_--that +is about two hundred _Lieder_, each one having its own admirable +individuality. + +And then the music stops. The spring has dried up. Wolf in great anguish +wrote despairing letters to his friends. To Oskar Grohe, on 2 May, 1891, +he wrote: + + "I have given up all idea of composing. Heaven knows how things + will finish. Pray for my poor soul." + +And to Wette, on 13 August, 1891, he says: + + "For the last four months I have been suffering from a sort of + mental consumption, which makes me very seriously think of quitting + this world for ever.... Only those who truly live should live at + all. I have been for some time like one who is dead. I only wish it + were an apparent death; but I am really dead and buried; though the + power to control my body gives me a seeming life. It is my inmost, + my only desire, that the flesh may quickly follow the spirit that + has already passed. For the last fifteen days I have been living at + Traunkirchen, the pearl of Traunsee.... All the comforts that a man + could wish for are here to make my life happy--peace, solitude, + beautiful scenery, invigorating air, and everything that could suit + the tastes of a hermit like myself.[187] And yet--and yet, my + friend, I am the most miserable creature on earth. Everything + around me breathes peace and happiness, everything throbs with life + and fulfils its functions.... I alone, oh God!... I alone live like + a beast that is deaf and senseless. Even reading hardly serves to + distract me now, though I bury myself in books in my despair. As + for composition, that is finished; I can no longer bring to mind + the meaning of a harmony or a melody, and I almost begin to doubt + if the compositions that bear my name are really mine. Good God! + what is the use of all this fame? What is the good of these great + aims if misery is all that lies at the end of it?... + + "_Heaven gives a man complete genius or no genius at all. Hell has + given me everything by halves_. + + "O unhappy man, how true, how true it is! In the flower of your + life you went to hell; into the evil jaws of destiny you threw the + delusive present and yourself with it. O Kleist!" + +[Footnote 187: Wolf was living there with a friend. He had not a lodging +of his own until 1896, and that was due to the generosity of his +friends.] + +Suddenly, at Döbling, on 29 November, 1891, the stream of Wolf's genius +flowed again, and he wrote fifteen Italian _Lieder_, sometimes several +in one day. In December it stopped again; and this time for five years. +These Italian melodies show, however, no trace of any effort, nor a +greater tension of mind than is shown in his preceding works. On the +contrary, they have the air of being the simplest and most natural work +that Wolf ever did. But the matter is of no real consequence, for when +Wolf's genius was not stirring within him he was useless. He wished to +write thirty-three Italian _Lieder_, but he had to stop after the +twenty-second, and in 1891 he published one volume only of the +_Italienisches-Liederbuch_. The second volume was completed in a month, +five years later, in 1896. + +One may imagine the tortures that this solitary man suffered. His only +happiness was in creation, and he saw his life cease, without any +apparent cause, for years together, and his genius come and go, and +return for an instant, and then go again. Each time he must have +anxiously wondered if it had gone for ever, or how long it would be +before it came back again. In letters to Kaufmann on 6 August, 1891, and +26 April, 1893, he says: + + "You ask me for news of my opera.[188] Good Heavens! I should be + content if I could write the tiniest little _Liedchen_. And an + opera, now?... I firmly believe that it is all over with me.... I + could as well speak Chinese as compose anything. It is horrible.... + What I suffer from this inaction I cannot tell you. I should like + to hang myself." + +To Hugo Faisst he wrote on 21 June, 1894: + + "You ask me the cause of my great depression of spirit, and would + pour balm on my wounds. Ah yes, if you only could! But no herb + grows that could cure my sickness; only a god could help me. If you + can give me back my inspirations, and wake up the familiar spirit + that is asleep in me, and let him possess me anew, I will call you + a god and raise altars to your name. My cry is to gods and not to + men; the gods alone are fit to pronounce my fate. But however it + may end, even if the worst comes, I will bear it--yes, even if no + ray of sunshine lightens my life again.... And with that we will, + once for all, turn the page and have done with this dark chapter of + my life." + +[Footnote 188: The writing of an opera was Wolf's great dream and +intention for many years.] + +This letter--and it is not the only one--recalls the melancholy stoicism +of Beethoven's letters, and shows us sorrows that even the unhappy +Beethoven did not know. And yet how can we tell? Perhaps Beethoven, too, +suffered similar anguish in the sad days that followed 1815, before the +last sonatas, the _Missa Solemnis_, and the Ninth Symphony had awaked to +life in him. + + * * * * * + +In March, 1895, Wolf lived once more, and in three months had written +the piano score of _Corregidor_. For many years he had been attracted +towards the stage, and especially towards light opera. Enthusiast though +he was for Wagner's work, he had declared openly that it was time for +musicians to free themselves from the Wagnerian _Musik-Drama_. He knew +his own gifts, and did not aspire to take Wagner's place. When one of +his friends offered him a subject for an opera, taken from a legend +about Buddha, he declined it, saying that the world did not yet +understand the meaning of Buddha's doctrines, and that he had no wish to +give humanity a fresh headache. In a letter to Grohe, on 28 June, 1890, +he says: + + "Wagner has, by and through his art, accomplished such a mighty + work of liberation that we may rejoice to think that it is quite + useless for us to storm the skies, since he has conquered them for + us. It is much wiser to seek out a pleasant nook in this lovely + heaven. I want to find a little place there for myself, not in a + desert with water and locusts and wild honey, but in a merry + company of primitive beings, among the tinkling of guitars, the + sighs of love, the moonlight, and such-like--in short, in a quite + ordinary _opéra-comique_, without any rescuing spectre of + Schopenhauerian philosophy in the background." + +After having sought the libretto of an opera from the whole world, from +poets ancient and modern,[189] and after having tried to write one +himself, he finally took that of Madame Rosa Mayreder, an adaptation of +a Spanish novelette of Don Pedro de Alarcón. This was _Corregidor_, +which, after having been refused by other theatres, was played in June, +1896, at Mannheim. The work was not a success in spite of its musical +qualities, and the poorness of the libretto helped on its failure. + +[Footnote 189: Detlev von Liliencron offered him an American subject. +"But in spite of my admiration for Buffalo Bill and his unwashed crew," +said Wolf sarcastically, "I prefer my native soil and people who +appreciate the advantages of soap."] + +But the main thing was that Wolf's creative genius had returned. In +April, 1896, he wrote straight away the twenty-two songs of the second +volume of the _Italienisches-Liederbuch_. At Christmas his friend Müller +sent him some of Michelangelo's poems, translated into German by Walter +Robert-Tornow; and Wolf, deeply moved by their beauty, decided at once +to devote a whole volume of _Lieder_ to them. In 1897 he composed the +first three melodies. At the same time he was also working at a new +opera, _Manuel Venegas_, a poem by Moritz Hoernes, written after the +style of Alarcón. He seemed full of strength and happiness and +confidence in his renewed health. Müller was speaking to him of the +premature death of Schubert, and Wolf replied, "A man is not taken away +before he has said all he has to say." + +He worked furiously, "like a steam-engine," as he said, and was so +absorbed in the composition of _Manuel Venegas_ (September, 1897) that +he went without rest, and had hardly time to take necessary food. In a +fortnight he had written fifty pages of the pianoforte score, as well as +the _motifs_ for the whole work, and the music of half the first act. + +Then madness came. On 20 September he was seized while he was working at +the great recitative of Manuel Venegas in the first act. + +He was taken to Dr. Svetlin's private hospital in Vienna, and remained +there until January, 1898. Happily he had devoted friends who took care +of him and made up for the indifference of the public; for what he had +earned himself would not have enabled him even to die in peace. When +Schott, the publisher, sent him in October, 1895, his royalties for the +editions of his _Lieder_ of Mörike, Goethe, Eichendorff, Keller, Spanish +poetry, and the first volume of Italian poetry, their total for five +years came to eighty-six marks and thirty-five pfennigs! And Schott +calmly added that he had not expected so good a result. So it was Wolf's +friends, and especially Hugo Faisst, who not only saved him from misery +by their unobtrusive and often secret generosity, but spared him the +horror of destitution in his last misfortunes. + +He recovered his reason, and was sent in February, 1898, for a voyage to +Trieste and Venetia to complete his cure and prevent him from thinking +of work. The precaution was unnecessary; for he says in a letter to Hugo +Faisst, written in the same month: + + "There is no need for you to trouble yourself or fear that I shall + overdo things. A real distaste for work has taken possession of me, + and I believe I shall never write another note. My unfinished opera + has no more interest for me, and music altogether is hateful. You + see what my kind friends have done for me! I cannot think how I + shall be able to exist in this state.... Ah, happy Swabians! one + may well envy you. Greet your beautiful country for me, and be + warmly greeted yourself by your unhappy and worn-out friend, Hugo + Wolf." + +When he returned to Vienna, however, he seemed to be a little better, +and had apparently regained his health and cheerfulness. But to his own +astonishment he had become, as he says in a letter to Faisst, a quiet, +sedate, and silent man, who wished more and more to be alone. He did not +compose anything fresh, but revised his Michelangelo _Lieder_, and had +them published. He made plans for the winter, and rejoiced in the +thought of passing it in the country near Gmunden, "in perfect quiet, +undisturbed, and living only for art." In his last letter to Faisst, 17 +September, 1898, he says: + + "I am quite well again now, and have no more need of any cures. You + would need them more than I." + +Then came a fresh seizure of madness, and this time all was finished. + +In the autumn of 1898 Wolf was taken to an asylum at Vienna. At first he +was able to receive a few visits and to enjoy a little music by playing +duets with the director of the establishment, who was himself a musician +and a great admirer of Wolf's works. He was even able in the spring to +take a few walks out of doors with his friends and an attendant. But he +was beginning not to recognise things or people or even himself. "Yes," +he would say, sighing, "if only I were Hugo Wolf!" From the middle of +1899 his malady grew rapidly worse, and general paralysis followed. At +the beginning of 1900 his speech was affected, and, finally, in August, +1901, all his body. At the beginning of 1902 all hope was given up by +the doctors; but his heart was still sound, and the unhappy man dragged +out his life for another year. He died on 16 February, 1903, of +peripneumonia. + +He was given a magnificent funeral, which was attended by all the people +who had done nothing for him while he was alive. The Austrian State, the +town of Vienna, his native town Windischgratz, the Conservatoire that +had expelled him, the _Gesellschaft der Musikfreunde_ who had been so +long unfriendly to his works, the Opera that had been closed to him, the +singers that had scorned him, the critics that had scoffed at him--they +were all there. They sang one of his saddest melodies, _Resignation_, a +setting of a poem of Eichendorff's, and a chorale by his old friend +Bruckner, who had died several years before him. His faithful friends, +Faisst at the head of them, took care to have a monument erected to his +memory near those of Beethoven and Schubert. + + * * * * * + +Such was his life, cut short at thirty-seven years of age--for one +cannot count the five years of complete madness. There are not many +examples in the art world of so terrible a fate. Nietzsche's misfortune +is nowhere beside this, for Nietzsche's madness was, to a certain +extent, productive, and caused his genius to flash out in a way that it +never would have done if his mind had been balanced and his health +perfect. Wolf's madness meant prostration. But one may see how, even in +the space of thirty-seven years, his life was strangely parcelled out. +For he did not really begin his creative work until he was twenty-seven +years old; and as from 1890 to 1895 he was condemned to five years' +silence, the sum total of his real life, his productive life, is only +four or five years. But in those few years he got more out of life than +the greater part of artists do in a long career, and in his work he left +the imprint of a personality that no one could forget after once having +known it. + + * * * * * + +Wolf's work consists chiefly, as we have already seen, of _Lieder_, and +these _Lieder_ are characterised by the application to lyrical music of +principles established by Wagner in the domain of drama. That does not +mean he imitated Wagner. One finds here and there in Wolf's music +Wagnerian forms, just as elsewhere there are evident reminiscences of +Berlioz. It is the inevitable mark of his time, and each great artist in +his turn contributes his share to the enrichment of the language that +belongs to us all. But the real Wagnerism of Wolf is not made up of +these unconscious resemblances; it lies in his determination to make +poetry the inspiration of music. "To show, above all," he wrote to +Humperdinck in 1890, "that poetry is the true source of my music." + +When a man is both a poet and a musician, like Wagner, it is natural +that his poetry and music should harmonise perfectly. But when it is a +matter of translating the soul of other poets into music, special gifts +of mental subtlety and an abounding sympathy are needed. These gifts +were possessed by Wolf in a very high degree. No musician has more +keenly savoured and appreciated the poets. "He was," said one of his +critics, G. Kühl, "Germany's greatest psychologist in music since +Mozart." There was nothing laboured about his psychology. Wolf was +incapable of setting to music poetry that he did not really love. He +used to have the poetry he wished to translate read over to him several +times, or in the evening he would read it aloud to himself. If he felt +very stirred by it he lived apart with it, and thought about it, and +soaked himself in its atmosphere; then he went to sleep, and the next +morning he was able to write the _Lied_ straight away. But some poems +seemed to sleep in him for years, and then would suddenly awake in him +in a musical form. On these occasions he would cry out with happiness. +"Do you know?" he wrote to Müller, "I simply shouted with joy." Müller +said he was like an old hen after it had laid an egg. + +Wolf never chose commonplace poems for his music--which is more than can +be said of Schubert or Schumann. He did not use anything written by +contemporary poets, although he was in sympathy with some of them, such +as Liliencron, who hoped very much to be translated into music by him. +But he could not do it; he could not use anything in the work of a great +poet unless he became so intimate with it that it seemed to be a part of +him. + +What strikes one also in the _Lieder_ is the importance of the +pianoforte accompaniment and its independence of the voice. Sometimes +the voice and the pianoforte express the contrast that so often exists +between the words and the thought of the poem; at other times they +express two personalities, as in his setting of Goethe's _Prometheus_, +where the accompaniment represents Zeus sending out his thunderbolts, +and the voice interprets Titan; or again, he may depict, as in the +setting of Eichendorff's _Serenade_, a student in love in the +accompaniment, while the song is the voice of an old man who is +listening to it and thinking of his youth. But in whatever he is +describing, the pianoforte and the voice have always their own +individuality. You cannot take anything away from his _Lieder_ without +spoiling the whole; and it is especially so with his instrumental +passages, which give us the beginning and end of his emotion, and which +circle round it and sum it up. The musical form, following closely the +poetic form, is extremely varied. It may sometimes express a fugitive +thought, a brief record of a poetic impression or some little action, or +it may be a great epic or dramatic picture. Müller remarks that Wolf put +more into a poem than the poet himself--as in the +_Italienisches-Liederbuch_. It is the worst reproach they can make about +him, and it is not an ordinary one. Wolf excelled especially in setting +poems which accorded with his own tragic fate, as if he had some +presentiment of it. No one has better expressed the anguish of a +troubled and despairing soul, such as we find in the old harp-player in +_Wilhelm Meister_, or the splendid nihility of certain poems of +Michelangelo. + +Of all his collections of _Lieder_, the 53 _Gedichte von Eduard Mörike, +komponiert für eine Singstimme und Klavier_ (1888), the first published, +is the most popular. It gained many friends for Wolf, not so much among +artists (who are always in the minority) as among those critics who are +the best and most disinterested of all--the homely, honest people who +do not make a profession of art, but enjoy it as their spiritual daily +bread. There are a number of these people in Germany, whose hard lives +are beautified by their love of music. Wolf found these friends in all +parts, but he found most of them in Swabia. At Stuttgart, at Mannheim, +at Darmstadt, and in the country round about these towns he became very +popular--the only popular musician since Schubert and Schumann. All +classes of society unite in loving him. "His _Lieder_," says Herr +Decsey, "are on the pianos of even the poorest houses, by the side of +Schubert's _Lieder_." Stuttgart became for Wolf, as he said himself, a +second home. He owes this popularity, which is without parallel in +Swabia, to the people's passionate love of _Lieder_ and, above all, of +the poetry of Mörike, the Swabian pastor, who lives again in Wolf's +songs. Wolf has set to music a quarter of Mörike's poems, he has brought +Mörike into his own, and given him one of the first places among German +poets. Such was really his intention, and he said so when he had a +portrait of Mörike put on the title-page of the songs. Whether the +reading of his poetry acted as a balm to Wolf's unquiet spirit, or +whether he became conscious of his genius for the first time when he +expressed this poetry in music, I do not know; but he felt deep +gratitude towards it, and wished to show it by beginning the first +volume with that fine and rather Beethoven-like song, _Der Genesende an +die Hoffnung_ ("The Convalescent's Ode to Hope"). + +The fifty-one _Lieder_ of the _Goethe-Liederbuch_ (1888-89) were +composed in groups of _Lieder_: the _Wilhelm Meister Lieder_, the +_Divan (Suleika) Lieder_, etc. Wolf even tried to identify himself with +the poet's line of thought; and in this we often find him in rivalry +with Schubert. He avoided using the poems in which he thought Schubert +had exactly conveyed the poet's meaning, as in _Geheimes_ and _An +Schwager Kronos_; but he told Müller that there were times when Schubert +did not understand Goethe at all, because he concerned himself with +translating their general lyrical thought rather than with showing the +real nature of Goethe's characters. The peculiar interest of Wolf's +_Lieder_ is that he gives each poetic figure its individual character. +The Harpist and Mignon are traced with marvellous insight and restraint; +and in some passages Wolf shows that he has re-discovered Goethe's art +of presenting a whole world of sadness in a single word. The serenity of +a great soul soars over the chaos of passions. + +The _Spanisches-Liederbuch nach Heyse und Geibel_ (1889-90) had already +inspired Schumann, Brahms, Cornelius, and others. But none had tried to +give it its rough and sensual character. Müller shows how Schumann, +especially, robbed the poems of their true nature. Not only did he +invest them with his own sentimentalism, but he calmly arranged poems of +the most marked individual character to be sung by four voices, which +makes them quite absurd; and, worse than this, he changed the words and +their sense when they stood in his way. Wolf, on the contrary, steeped +himself in this melancholy and voluptuous world, and would not let +anything draw him from it; and out of it he produced, as he himself +said proudly, some masterpieces. The ten religious songs that come at +the beginning of the collection suggest the delusions of mysticism, and +weep tears of blood; they are distressing to the ear and mind alike, for +they are the passionate expression of a faith that puts itself on the +rack. By the side of them one finds smiling visions of the Holy Family, +which recall Murillo. The thirty-four folk-songs are brilliant, +restless, whimsical, and wonderfully varied in form. Each represents a +different subject, a personality drawn with incisive strokes, and the +whole collection overflows with life. It is said that the +_Spanisches-Liederbuch_ is to Wolf's work what _Tristan_ is to Wagner's +work. + +The _Italienisches-Liederbuch_ (1890-96) is quite different. The +character of the songs is very restrained, and Wolf's genius here +approached a classic clearness of form. He was always seeking to +simplify his musical language, and said that if he wrote anything more, +he wished it to be like Mozart's writings. These _Lieder_ contain +nothing that is not absolutely essential to their subject; so the +melodies are very short, and are dramatic rather than lyrical. Wolf gave +them an important place in his work: "I consider them," he wrote to +Kaufmann, "the most original and perfect of my compositions." + +As for the _Michelangelo Gedichten_ (1897), they were interrupted by the +outbreak of his malady, and he had only time to write four, of which he +suppressed one. Their associations are pathetic when one remembers the +tragic time at which they were composed; and, by a sort of prophetic +instinct, they exhale heaviness of spirit and mournful pride. The second +melody is perhaps more beautiful than anything else Wolf wrote; it is +truly his death-song: + + _Alles endet, was entstehet. + Alles, alles rings vergehet_.[190] + +And it is a dead man that sings: + + _Menschen waren wir ja auch, + Froh und traurig, so wie Ihr. + Und nun sind wir leblos hier, + Sind nur Erde, wie Ihr sehet_.[191] + +At the moment he was writing this song, in the short respite he had from +his illness, he himself was nearly a dead man. + +[Footnote 190: + + All that is begun must end, + All around will sometime perish. + +[Footnote 191: + + Once we were also men + Happy or sad like you; + Now life is taken from us, + We are only of earth, as you see. + + _Chiunque nasce a morte arriva + Nel fuggir del tempo, e'l sole + Niuna cosa lascia viva.... + Come voi, uomini fummo, + Lieti e tristi, come siete; + E or siam, come vedete, + Terra al sol, di vita priva_. + + (Poems of Michelangelo, CXXXVI.) + + * * * * * + +As soon as Wolf was really dead his genius was recognised all over +Germany. His sufferings provoked an almost excessive reaction in his +favour. _Hugo-Wolf-Vereine_ were founded everywhere; and to-day we have +publications, collections of letters, souvenirs, and biographies in +abundance. It is a case of who can cry loudest that he always understood +the genius of the unhappy artist, and work himself into the greatest +fury against his traducers. A little later, and monuments and statues +will spring up all over. + +I doubt if Wolf with his rough, sincere nature would have found much +consolation in this tardy homage if he could have foreseen it. He would +have said to his posthumous admirers: "You are hypocrites. It is not for +me that you raise those statues; it is for yourselves. It is that you +may make speeches, form committees, and delude yourselves and others +that you were my friends. Where were you when I had need of you? You let +me die. Do not play a comedy round my grave. Look rather around you, and +see if there are not other Wolfs who are struggling against your +hostility or your indifference. As for me, I have come safe to port." + + + + +DON LORENZO PEROSI + + +The winter that held Italian thought in its cold clasp is over, and +great trees that seemed to be asleep are putting out new life in the +sun. Yesterday it was poetry that awaked, and to-day it is music--the +sweet music of Italy, calm in its passion and sadness, and artless in +its knowledge. Are we really witnessing the return of its spring? Is it +the incoming of some great tide of melody, which will wash away the +gloom and doubt of our life to-day? As I was reading the oratorios of +this young priest of Piedmont, I thought I heard, far away, the song of +the children of old Greece: "The swallow has come, has come, bringing +the gay seasons and glad years. Ear êdê." I welcome the coming of Don +Lorenzo Perosi with great hope. + +[Illustration: greek207] + + * * * * * + +The abbé Perosi, the precentor of St. Mark's chapel at Venice and the +director of the Sistine chapel, is twenty-six years old.[192] He is +short in stature and of youthful appearance, with a head a little too +big for his body, and open and regular features lighted up by +intelligent black eyes, his only peculiarity being a projecting +underlip. + +[Footnote 192: This article was written in 1899, on the occasion of +Lorenzo Perosi's coming to Paris to direct his oratorio _La +Résurrection_.] He is simple-hearted and modest, and has a friendly +warmth of affection. When he is conducting the orchestra his striking +silhouette, his slow and awkward gestures in expressive passages, and +his naïve movements of passion at dramatic moments, bring to mind one of +Fra Angelico's monks. + +For the last eighteen months Don Perosi has been working at a cycle of +twelve oratorios descriptive of the life of Christ. In this short time +he has finished four: _The Passion_, _The Transfiguration_, _The +Resurrection of Lazarus_, _The Resurrection of Christ_. Now he is at +work on the fifth--_The Nativity_. + +These compositions alone place him in the front rank of contemporary +musicians. They abound in faults; but their qualities are so rare, and +his soul shines so clearly through them, and such fine sincerity +breathes in them, that I have not the courage to dwell on their +weaknesses. So I shall content myself with remarking, in passing, that +the orchestration is inadequate and awkward, and that the young musician +should strive to make it fuller and more delicate; and though he shows +great ease in composition, he is often too impetuous, and should resist +this tendency; and that, lastly, there are sometimes traces of bad taste +in the music and reminiscences of the classics--all of which are the +sins of youth, which age will certainly cure. + +Each of the oratorios is really a descriptive mass, which from beginning +to end traces out one dominating thought. Don Perosi said to me: "The +mistake of artists to-day is that they attach themselves too much to +details and neglect the whole. They begin by carving ornaments, and +forget that the most important thing is the unity of their work, its +plan and general outline. The outline must first of all be beautiful." + +In his own musical architecture one finds well-marked airs, numerous +recitatives, Gregorian or Palestrinian choruses, chorales with +developments and variations in the old style, and intervening symphonies +of some importance. + +The whole work is to be preceded by a grand prelude, very carefully +worked out, to which Don Perosi attaches particular worth. He wishes, he +says, that his building shall have a beautiful door elaborately carved +after the fashion of the artists of the Renaissance and Gothic times. +And so he means to compose the prelude after the rest of the oratorio is +finished, when he is able to think about it in undisturbed peace. He +wishes to concentrate a moral atmosphere in it, the very essence of the +soul and passions of his sacred drama. He also confided to me that of +all he has yet composed there is nothing he likes better than the +introductions to _The Transfiguration_ and _The Resurrection of Christ_. + +The dramatic tendency of these oratorios is very marked, and it is +chiefly on that account that they have conquered Italy. In spite of some +passages which have strayed a little in the direction of opera, or even +melodrama, the music shows great depth of feeling. The figures of the +women especially are drawn with delicacy; and in the second part of +_Lazarus_, Mary's air, "Lord, if Thou hadst been here, my brother had +not died," recalls something of Gluck's _Orfeo_ in its heart-broken +sadness. And again, in the same oratorio, when Jesus gives the order to +raise the stone from the tomb, Martha's speech, "Domine, jam foetet," is +very expressive of her sadness, fear, and shame, and human horror. I +should like to quote one more passage, the most moving of all, which is +found in the _Resurrection of Christ_, when Mary Magdalene is beside the +tomb of Christ; here, in her speech with the angels, in her touching +lamentation, and in the words of the Evangelist, "And when she had thus +said, she turned herself back, and saw Jesus standing, and knew not that +it was Jesus," we hear a melody filled with tenderness, and seem to see +Christ's eyes shining as they rest on Mary before she has recognised +Him. + +It is not, however, Perosi's dramatic genius that strikes me in his +work; it is rather his peculiar mournfulness, which is indescribable, +his gift of pure poetry, and the richness of his flowing melody. However +deep the religious feeling in the music may be, the music itself is +often stronger still, and breaks in upon the drama that it may express +itself freely. Take, for instance, the fine symphonic passage that +follows the arrival of Jesus and His friends at Martha and Mary's house, +after the death of their brother (p. 12 _et seq._ of _Lazarus_). It is +true the orchestra expresses regrets and sighs, the excesses of sorrow +mingled with words of consolation and faith, in a sort of languishing +funeral march that is feminine and Christian in character. This, +according to the composer, is a picture he has painted of the persons in +the drama before he makes them speak. But, in spite of himself, the +result is a flood of pure music, and his soul sings its own song of joy +and sadness. Sometimes his spirit, in its naïve and delicate charm, +recalls that of Mozart; but his musical visions are always dominated and +directed by a religious strength like that of Bach. Even the portions +where the dramatic feeling is strongest are really little symphonies, +such as the music that describes the miracle in _The Transfiguration_, +and the illness of Lazarus. In the latter great depth of suffering is +expressed; indeed, sadness could not have been carried farther even by +Bach, and the same serenity of mind runs through its despair. + +But what joy there is when these deeds of faith have been +performed--when Jesus has cured the possessed man, or when Lazarus has +opened his eyes to the light. The heart of the multitude overflows +perhaps in rather childish thanksgiving; and at first it seemed to me +expressed in a commonplace way. But did not the joy of all great artists +so express itself?--the joy of Beethoven, Mozart, and Bach, who, when +once they had thrown their cares aside, knew how to amuse themselves +like the rest of the populace. And the simple phrase at the beginning +soon assumes fuller proportions, the harmonies gain in richness, a +glowing ardour fills the music, and a chorale blends with the dances in +triumphant majesty. + +All these works are radiant with a happy ease of expression. _The +Passion_ was finished in September, 1897, _The Transfiguration_ in +February, 1898. _Lazarus_ in June, 1898, and _The Resurrection of +Christ_ in November, 1898. Such an output of work takes us back to +eighteenth-century musicians. + +But this is not the only resemblance between the young musician and his +predecessors. Much of their soul has passed into his. His style is made +up of all styles, and ranges from the Gregorian chant to the most modern +modulations. All available materials are used in this work. This is an +Italian characteristic. Gabriel d'Annunzio threw into his melting-pot +the Renaissance, the Italian painters, music, the writers of the North, +Tolstoy, Dostoïevsky, Maeterlinck, and our French writers, and out of it +he drew his wonderful poems. So Don Perosi, in his compositions, welds +together the Gregorian chant, the musical style of the contrapuntists of +the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, Palestrina, Roland, Gabrieli, +Carissimi, Schütz, Bach, Händel, Gounod, Wagner--I was going to say +César Franck, but Don Perosi told me that he hardly knew this composer +at all, though his style bears some resemblance to Franck's. + +Time does not exist for Don Perosi. When he courteously wished to praise +French musicians, the first name he chose--as if it were that of a +contemporary--was that of Josquin, and then that of Roland de Lassus, +who seems to him so great and profound a musician that he admires him +most of all. And Don Perosi's universality of style is a trait that is +Catholic as well as Italian. He expresses his mind quite clearly on the +subject. "Great artists formerly," he says, "were more eclectic than +ourselves, and less fettered by their nationalities. Josquin's school +has peopled all Europe. Roland has lived in Flanders, in Italy, and in +Germany. With them the same style expressed the same thought everywhere. +We must do as they did. We must try to recreate a universal art in which +the resources of all countries and all times are blended." + +As a matter of fact, I do not think this is quite correct. I rather +doubt if Josquin and Roland were eclectic at all; for they did not +really combine the styles of different countries, but thrust upon other +countries the style that the Franco-Flemish school had just created, a +style which they themselves were enriching daily. But Don Perosi's idea +deserves our appreciation, and one must praise his endeavour to create a +universal style. It would be a good thing for music if eclecticism, thus +understood, could bring back some of the equilibrium that has been lost +since Wagner's death; it would be a benefit to the human spirit, which +might then find in the unity of art a powerful means of bringing about +the unity of mind. Our aim should be to efface the differences of race +in art, so that it may become a tongue common to all peoples, where the +most opposite ideas may be reconciled. We should all join in working to +build the cathedral of European art. And the place of the director of +the Sistine chapel among the first builders is very plain. + + * * * * * + +Don Perosi sat down to the piano and played me the _Te Deum_ of _The +Nativity_, which he had written the day before. He played very sweetly, +with youthful gaiety, and sang the choral parts in an undertone. Every +now and then he would look at me, not for praise, but to see if we were +sharing the same thoughts. He would look me well in the face with his +quiet eyes, then turn back to his score, and then look at me again. And +I felt a comforting calm radiating from him and his music, from its +happy harmony and the full and rhythmic serenity of its spirit. And how +pleasant it was after the tempests and convulsions of art in these later +days. Can we not tear ourselves away from that romantic suffering in +music which was begun by Beethoven? After a century of battles, of +revolutions, and of political and social strife, whose pain has found +its reflection in art, let us begin to build a new city of art, where +men may gather together in brotherly love for the same ideal. However +Utopian that hope may sound now, let us think of it as a symptom of new +directions of thought, and let us hope that Don Perosi may be one of +those who will bring into music that divine peace, that peace which +Beethoven craved for in despair at the end of his _Missa Solemnis_, that +joy that he sang about but never knew. + + + + +FRENCH AND GERMAN MUSIC + + +In May, 1905, the first musical festival of Alsace-Lorraine took place +at Strasburg. It was an important artistic event, and meant the bringing +together of two civilisations that for centuries had been at variance on +the soil of Alsace, more anxious for dispute than for mutual +understanding. + +The official programme of the _fêtes musicales_ laid stress on the +reconciliatory purpose of its organisers, and I quote these words from +the programme book, drawn up by Dr. Max Bendiner, of Strasburg: + + "Music may achieve the highest of all missions: she may be a bond + between nations, races, and states, who are strangers to one + another in many ways; she may unite what is disunited, and bring + peace to what is hostile.... No country is more suited for her + friendly aid than Alsace-Lorraine, that old meeting-place of + people, where from time immemorial the North and South have + exchanged their material and their spiritual wealth; and no place + is readier to welcome her than Strasburg, an old town built by the + Romans, which has remained to this day a centre of spiritual life. + All great intellectual currents have left their mark on the people + of Alsace-Lorraine; and so they have been destined to play the part + of mediator between different times and different peoples; and the + East and the West, the past and the present, meet here and join + hands. In such festivals as this, it is not a matter of gaining + aesthetic victories; it is a matter of bringing together all that + is great and noble and eternal in the art of different times and + different nations." + +It was a splendid ambition for Alsace--the eternal field of battle--to +wish to inaugurate these European Olympian games. But in spite of good +intentions, this meeting of nations resulted in a fight, on musical +ground, between two civilisations and two arts--French art and German +art. For these two arts represent to-day all that is truly alive in +European music. + +Such jousts are very stirring, and may be of great service to all +combatants. But, unhappily, France was very indifferent in the matter. +It was the duty of our musicians and critics to attend an international +encounter like this, and to see that the conditions of the combat were +fair. By that I mean our art should be represented as it ought to be, so +that we may learn something from the result. But the French public does +nothing at such a time; it remains absorbed in its concerts at Paris, +where everyone knows everyone else so well that they are not able and do +not dare to criticise freely. And so our art is withering away in an +atmosphere of coteries, instead of seeking the open air and enjoying a +vigorous fight with foreign art. For the majority of our critics would +rather deny the existence of foreign art than try to understand it. +Never have I regretted their indifference more than I did at the +Strasburg festival, where, in spite of the unfavourable conditions in +which French art was represented through our own carelessness, I +realised what its force might have been if we had been interested +spectators in the fight. + + * * * * * + +Perfect eclecticism had been exercised in the making up of the +programme. One found mixed together the names of Mozart, Wagner, and +Brahms; César Franck and Gustave Charpentier; Richard Strauss and +Mahler. There were French singers like Cazeneuve and Daraux, and French +and Italian virtuosi like Henri Marteau and Ferruccio Busoni, together +with German, Austrian, and Scandinavian artists. The orchestra (the +_Strassbürger Städtische Orchester_) and the choir, which was formed of +different _Chorvereine_ of Strasburg, were conducted by Richard Strauss, +Gustav Mahler, and Camille Chevillard. But the names of these famous +_Kapellmeister_ must not let us forget the man who was really the soul +of the concerts--Professor Ernst Münch, of Strasburg, an Alsatian, who +conducted all the rehearsals, and who effaced himself at the last +moment, and left all the honours to the conductors of foreign +orchestras. Professor Münch, who is also organist at Saint-Guillaume, +has done more than anyone else for music in Strasburg, and has trained +excellent choirs (the "_Choeurs de Saint-Guillaume_") there, and +organised splendid concerts of Bach's music with the aid of another +Alsatian, Albert Schweitzer, whose name is well known to musical +historians. The latter is director of the clerical college of St. Thomas +(_Thomasstift_), a pastor, an organist, a professor at the University of +Strasburg, and the author of interesting works on theology and +philosophy. Besides this he has written a now famous book, +_Jean-Sebastien Bach_, which is doubly remarkable: first, because it is +written in French (though it was published in Leipzig by a professor of +the University of Strasburg), and secondly, because it shows an +harmonious blend of the French and German spirit, and gives fresh life +to the study of Bach and the old classic art. It was very interesting to +me to make the acquaintance of these people, born on Alsatian soil, and +representing the best Alsatian culture and all that was finest in the +two civilisations. + +The programme for the three days' festival was as follows: + +Saturday, May 20th. + + _Oberon Overture_: Weber (conducted by Richard Strauss). + + _Les Béatitudes_: César Franck (conducted by Camille Chevillard). + + _Impressions d'ltalie_: Gustav Charpentier (conducted by Camille + Chevillard). + + Three songs by Jean Sibelius, Hugo Wolf, Armas Järnefelt (sung by + Mme. Järnefelt). + + The last scene from _Die Meistersinger_: Wagner (conducted by + Richard Strauss). + +Sunday, May 21st. + + _Cinquième Symphonie_: Gustav Mahler (conducted by Gustav Mahler). + + _Rhapsodie_, for contralto, choir, and orchestra: Johannes Brahms + (conducted by Ernst Münch). + + _Strasburg Concerto in G major_, for violin (played by Henri + Marteau; conducted by Richard Strauss). + + _Sinfonia domestica_: Richard Strauss (conducted by Richard + Strauss). + +Monday, May 22nd. + + _Coriolan Overture_: Beethoven (conducted by Gustav Mahler). + + _Concerto in G major_, for piano: Beethoven (played by Ferruccio + Busoni). + + _Lieder: An die enfernie Geliebte_: Beethoven (sung by Ludwig + Hess). + + _Choral Symphony_: Beethoven (conducted by Gustav Mahler). + + * * * * * + +M. Chevillard alone represented our French musicians at the festival; +and they could have made no better choice of a conductor. But Germany +had delegated her two greatest composers, Strauss and Mahler, to come to +conduct their newest compositions. And I think it would not have been +too much to set up one of our own foremost composers to combat the glory +which these two enjoy in their own country. + +M. Chevillard had been asked to conduct, not one of the works of our +recent masters, like Debussy or Dukas, whose style he renders to +perfection, but Franck's _Les Béatitudes_, a work whose spirit he does +not, to my mind, quite understand. The mystic tenderness of Franck +escapes him, and he brings out only what is dramatic. And so that +performance of _Les Béatitudes_, though in many respects fine, left an +imperfect idea of Franck's genius. + +But what seemed inconceivable, and what justly annoyed M. Chevillard, +was that the whole of _Les Béatitudes_ was not given, but only a section +of them. And on this subject I shall take the liberty of recommending +that French artists who are guests at similar festivals should not in +future agree to a programme with their eyes shut, but have their own +wishes considered, or refuse their help. If French musicians are to be +given a place in German _Musikfeste_, French people must be allowed to +choose the works that are to represent them. And, above all, a French +conductor must not be brought from Paris, and find on his arrival a +mutilated score and an arbitrary choice of a few fragments that are not +even whole in themselves. For they played five out of the eight +_Béatitudes_, and cuts had been made in the third and eighth +_Béatitudes_. That showed a want of respect for art, for works should be +given as they are, or not at all. + +And it would have been more seemly if in this three-day festival the +organisers had had the courteousness to devote the first day to French +music, and had set aside one whole concert for it. But, without doubt, +they had carefully sandwiched the French works in between German works +to weaken their effect, and lessen the probable (and actual) enthusiasm +with which French music would be received in the presence of the +Statthalter of Alsace-Lorraine by a section of the Alsatian public. In +addition to this, and by a choice that neither myself nor anyone else in +Strasburg could believe was dictated by musical reasons, the German work +chosen to end the evening was the final scene from _Die Meistersinger_, +with its ringing couplet from Hans Sachs, in which he denounces foreign +insincerity and foreign frivolity (_Wälschen Dunst mit wälschen Tand_). +This lack of courtesy--though the words were really nonsense when this +very concert was given to show that foreign art could not be +ignored--would not be worth while raking up if it did not further serve +to show how regrettable is the indifference of French artists who take +part in these festivals. And this mistake would never have occurred if +they had taken care to acquaint themselves with the programme beforehand +and put their veto upon it. + +I have mentioned this little incident partly because my views were +shared by many Alsatians in the audience, who expressed their annoyance +to me afterwards. But, putting it aside, our French artists ought not to +have consented to let our music be represented by a mutilated score of +_Les Béatitudes_ and by Charpentier's _Impressions d'Italie_, for the +latter, though a brilliantly clever work, is not of the first rank, and +was too easily crushed by one of Wagner's most stupendous compositions. +If people wish to institute a joust between French and German art, let +it be a fair one, I repeat; let Wagner be matched with Berlioz, and +Strauss with Debussy, and Mahler with Dukas or Magnard. + + * * * * * + +Such were the conditions of the combat; and they were, whether +intentionally or not, unfavourable to France. And yet to the eyes of an +impartial observer the result was full of hope and encouragement for us. + +I have never bothered myself in art with questions of nationality. I +have not even concealed my preference for German music; and I consider, +even to-day, that Richard Strauss is the foremost musical composer in +Europe. Having said this, I am freer to speak of the strange impression +that I had at the Strasburg festival--an impression of the change that +is coming over music, and the way that French art is silently setting +about taking the place of German art. + +"_Wälschen Dunst und wälschen Tand_...." How that reproachful speech +seems to be misplaced when one is listening to the honest thought +expressed in César Franck's music. In _Les Béatitudes_, nothing, or next +to nothing, was done for art's sake. It is the soul speaking to the +soul. As Beethoven wrote, at the end of his mass in D, "_Vom Herzen ... +zu Herzen_!" ("It comes from the heart to go to the heart"). I know no +one but Franck in the last century, unless it is Beethoven, who has +possessed in so high a degree the virtue of being himself and speaking +only the truth without thought of his public. Never before has +religious faith been expressed with such sincerity. Franck is the only +musician besides Bach who has really _seen_ the Christ, and who can make +other people see him too. I would even venture to say that his Christ is +simpler than Bach's; for Bach's thoughts are often led away by the +interest of developing his subject, by certain habits of composition, +and by repetitions and clever devices, which weaken his strength. In +Franck's music we get Christ's speech itself, unadorned and in all its +living force. And in the wonderful harmony between the music and the +sacred words we hear the voice of the world's conscience. I once heard +someone say to Mme. Cosima Wagner that certain passages in _Parsifal_, +particularly the chorus "_Durch Mitleid wissend_," had a quality that +was truly religious and the force of a revelation. But I find a greater +force and a more truly Christian spirit in _Les Béatitudes_. + +And here is an astonishing thing. At this German musical festival it was +a Frenchman who represented not only serious music moulded in a +classical form, but a religious spirit and the spirit of the Gospels. +The characters of two nations have been reversed. The Germans have so +changed that they are only able to appreciate this seriousness and +religious faith with difficulty. I watched the audience on this +occasion; they listened politely, a little astonished and bored, as if +to say, "What business has this Frenchman with depth and piety of +soul?" + +"There is no doubt," said Henri Lichtenberger, who sat by me at the +concert, "our music is beginning to bore the Germans." + +It was only the other day that German music enjoyed the privilege of +boring us in France. + +And so, to make up for the austere grandeur of _Les Béatitudes_ they had +it immediately followed by Gustave Charpentier's _Impressions d'Italie_. +You should have seen the relief of the audience. At last they were to +have some French music--as Germans understand it. Charpentier is, of all +living French musicians, the most liked in Germany; he is indeed the +only one who is popular with artists and the general public alike. Shall +I say that the sincere pleasure they take in his orchestration and the +gay life of his subjects is enhanced a little by a slight disdain for +French frivolity--_wälschen Tand_? + +"Now listen to that," said Richard Strauss to me during the third +movement of _Impressions d'Italie_; "that is the true music of +Montmartre, the utterance of fine words ... Liberty!... Love!... which +no one believes." + +And on the whole he found the music quite charming, and, without doubt, +in the depths of his heart approved of this Frenchman according to +conventional notions that are current in Germany alone. Strauss is +really very fond of Charpentier, and was his patron in Berlin; and I +remember how he showed childish delight in _Louise_ when it was first +performed in Paris. + +But Strauss, and most other Germans, are quite on the wrong track when +they try to persuade themselves that this amusing French frivolity is +still the exclusive property of France. They really love it because it +has become German; and they are quite unconscious of the fact. The +German artists of other times did not find much pleasure in frivolity; +but I could have easily shown Strauss his liking for it by taking +examples from his own works. The Germans of to-day have but little in +common with the Germans of yesterday. + +I am not speaking of the general public only, The German public of +to-day are devotees of Brahms and Wagner, and everything of theirs seems +good to them; they have no discrimination, and, while they applaud +Wagner and encore Brahms, they are, in their hearts, not only frivolous, +but sentimental and gross. The most striking thing about this public is +their cult of power since Wagner's death. When listening to the end of +_Die Meistersinger_ I felt how the haughty music of the great march +reflected the spirit of this military nation of shop-keepers, bursting +with rude health and complacent pride. + +The most remarkable thing of all is that German artists are gradually +losing the power of understanding their own splendid classics and, in +particular, Beethoven. Strauss, who is very shrewd and knows exactly his +own limitations, does not willingly enter Beethoven's domain, though he +feels his spirit in a much more living way than any of the other German +_Kapellmeister_. At the Strasburg festival he contented himself with +conducting, besides his own symphony, the _Oberon Overture_ and a Mozart +concerto. These performances were interesting; a personality like his +is so curious that it is quite amusing to find it coming out in the +works he conducts. But how Mozart's features took on an offhand and +impatient air; and how the rhythms were accentuated at the expense of +the melodic grace. In this case, however, Strauss was dealing with a +concerto, where a certain liberty of interpretation is allowed. But +Mahler, who was less discreet, ventured upon conducting the whole of the +Beethoven concert. And what can be said of that evening? I will not +speak of the _Concerto for pianoforte, in G major_, which Busoni played +with a brilliant and superficial execution that took away all breadth +from the work; it is enough to note that his interpretation was +enthusiastically received by the public. German artists were not +responsible for that performance; but they were responsible for that +fine cycle of _Lieder, An die entfernte Geliebte_, which was bellowed by +a Berlin tenor at the top of his voice, and for the _Choral Symphony_, +which was, for me, an unspeakable performance. I could never have +believed that a German orchestra conducted by the chief _Kapellmeister_ +of Austria could have committed such misdeeds. The time was incredible: +the scherzo had no life in it; the adagio was taken in hot haste without +leaving a moment for dreams; and there were pauses in the finale which +destroyed the development of the theme and broke the thread of its +thought. The different parts of the orchestra fell over one another, and +the whole was uncertain and lacking in balance. I once severely +criticised the neo-classic stiffness of Weingartner; but I should have +appreciated his healthy equilibrium and his effort to be exact after +hearing this neurasthenic rendering of Beethoven. No; we can no longer +hear Beethoven and Mozart in Germany to-day, we can only hear Mahler and +Strauss. Well, let it be so. We will resign ourselves. The past is past. +Let us leave Beethoven and Mozart, and speak of Mahler and Strauss. + + * * * * * + +Gustav Mahler is forty-six years old.[193] He is a kind of legendary +type of German musician, rather like Schubert, and half-way between a +school-master and a clergyman. He has a long, clean-shaven face, a +pointed skull covered with untidy hair, a bald forehead, a prominent +nose, eyes that blink behind his glasses, a large mouth and thin lips, +hollow cheeks, a rather tired and sarcastic expression, and a general +air of asceticism. He is excessively nervous, and silhouette caricatures +of him, representing him as a cat in convulsions in the conductor's +desk, are very popular in Germany. + +[Footnote 193: This essay was written in 1905.] + + +He was born at Kalischt in Bohemia, and became a pupil of Anton +Bruckner at Vienna, and afterwards _Hofoperndirecktor_ ("Director of the +Opera") there. I hope one day to study this artist's work in greater +detail, for he is second only to Strauss as a composer in Germany, and +the principal musician of South Germany. + +His most important work is a suite of symphonies; and it was the fifth +symphony of this suite that he conducted at the Strasburg festival. The +first symphony, called _Titan_, was composed in 1894. The construction +of the whole is on a massive and gigantic scale; and the melodies on +which these works are built up are like rough-hewn blocks of not very +good quality, but imposing by reason of their size, and by the obstinate +repetition of their rhythmic design, which is maintained as if it were +an obsession. This heaping-up of music both crude and learned in style, +with harmonies that are sometimes clumsy and sometimes delicate, is +worth considering on account of its bulk. The orchestration is heavy and +noisy; and the brass dominates and roughly gilds the rather sombre +colouring of the great edifice. The underlying idea of the composition +is neo-classic, and rather spongy and diffuse. Its harmonic structure is +composite: we get the style of Bach, Schubert, and Mendelssohn fighting +that of Wagner and Bruckner; and, by a decided liking for canon form, it +even recalls some of Franck's work. The whole is like a showy and +expensive collection of bric-à-brac. + +The chief characteristic of these symphonies is, generally speaking, the +use of choral singing with the orchestra. "When I conceive a great +musical painting (_ein grosses musikalisches Gemälde_)," says Mahler, +"there always comes a moment when I feel forced to employ speech (_das +Wort_) as an aid to the realisation of my musical conception." + +Mahler has got some striking effects from this combination of voices and +instruments, and he did well to seek inspiration in this direction from +Beethoven and Liszt. It is incredible that the nineteenth century should +have put this combination to so little use; for I think the gain may be +poetical as well as musical. + +In the _Second Symphony in C minor_, the first three parts are purely +instrumental; but in the fourth part the voice of a contralto is heard +singing these sad and simple words: + + "_Der Mensch liegt in grösster Noth! + Der Mensch liegt in grösster Pein! + Je lieber möcht ich im Himmel sein_!"[194] + +The soul strives to reach God with the passionate cry: + + "_Ich bin von Gott und will wieder zu Gott_."[195] + +Then there is a symphonic episode (_Der Rufer in der Wüste_), and we +hear "the voice of one crying in the wilderness" in fierce and anguished +tones. There is an apocalyptic finale where the choir sing Klopstock's +beautiful ode on the promise of the Resurrection: + + "_Aufersteh'n, ja, aufersteh'n wirst du, mein Staub, nach + kurzer Ruh_!"[196] + +The law is proclaimed with: + + "_Was entstanden ist, dass mus vergehen, + Was vergangen, auferstehen_!"[197] + +[Footnote 194: Man lies in greatest misery; Man lies in greatest pain; I +would I were in Heaven!] + +[Footnote 195: I come from God, and shall to God return.] + +[Footnote 196: Thou wilt rise again, thou wilt rise again, O my dust, +after a little rest.] + +[Footnote 197: What is born must pass away; What has passed away must +rise again.] + +And all the orchestra, the choirs, and the organ, join in the hymn of +Eternal Life. + +In the _Third Symphony_, known as _Ein Sommermorgentraum_ ("A Summer +Morning's Dream"), the first and the last parts are for the orchestra +alone; the fourth part contains some of the best of Mahler's music, and +is an admirable setting of Nietzsche's words: + + "_O Mensch! O Mensch! Gib Acht! gib Acht! + Was spricht die tiefe Mitternacht_?"[198] + +[Footnote 198: + + O Man! O Man! Have care! Have care! + What says dark midnight? + +The fifth part is a gay and stirring chorus founded on a popular legend. + +In the _Fourth Symphony in G major_, the last part alone is sung, and is +of an almost humorous character, being a sort of childish description of +the joys of Paradise. + +In spite of appearances, Mahler refuses to connect these choral +symphonies with programme-music. Without doubt he is right, if he means +that his music has its own value outside any sort of programme; but +there is no doubt that it is always the expression of a definite +_Stimmung_, of a conscious mood; and the fact is, whether he likes it or +not, that _Stimmung_ gives an interest to his music far beyond that of +the music itself. His personality seems to me far more interesting than +his art. + + + +This is often the case with artists in Germany; Hugo Wolf is another +example of it. Mahler's case is really rather curious. When one studies +his works one feels convinced that he is one of those rare types in +modern Germany--an egoist who feels with sincerity. Perhaps his emotions +and his ideas do not succeed in expressing themselves in a really +sincere and personal way; for they reach us through a cloud of +reminiscences and an atmosphere of classicism. I cannot help thinking +that Mahler's position as director of the Opera, and his consequent +saturation in the music that his calling condemns him to study, is the +cause of this. There is nothing more fatal to a creative spirit than too +much reading, above all when it does not read of its own free will, but +is forced to absorb an excessive amount of nourishment, the larger part +of which is indigestible. In vain may Mahler try to defend the sanctuary +of his mind; it is violated by foreign ideas coming from all parts, and +instead of being able to drive them away, his conscience, as conductor +of the orchestra, obliges him to receive them and almost embrace them. +With his feverish activity, and burdened as he is with heavy tasks, he +works unceasingly and has no time to dream. Mahler will only be Mahler +when he is able to leave his administrative work, shut up his scores, +retire within himself, and wait patiently until he has become himself +again--if it is not too late. + +His _Fifth Symphony_, which he conducted at Strasburg, convinced me, +more than all his other works, of the urgent necessity of adopting this +course. In this composition he has not allowed himself the use of the +choruses, which were one of the chief attractions of his preceding +symphonies. He wished to prove that he could write pure music, and to +make his claim surer he refused to have any explanation of his +composition published in the concert programme, as the other composers +in the festival had done; he wished it, therefore, to be judged from a +strictly musical point of view. It was a dangerous ordeal for him. + +Though I wished very much to admire the work of a composer whom I held +in such esteem, I felt it did not come out very well from the test. To +begin with, this symphony is excessively long--it lasts an hour and a +half--though there is no apparent justification for its proportions. It +aims at being colossal, and mainly achieves emptiness. The _motifs_ are +more than familiar. After a funeral march of commonplace character and +boisterous movement, where Beethoven seems to be taking lessons from +Mendelssohn, there comes a scherzo, or rather a Viennese waltz, where +Chabrier gives old Bach a helping hand. The adagietto has a rather sweet +sentimentality. The rondo at the end is presented rather like an idea of +Franck's, and is the best part of the composition; it is carried out in +a spirit of mad intoxication and a chorale rises up from it with +crashing joy; but the effect of the whole is lost in repetitions that +choke it and make it heavy. Through all the work runs a mixture of +pedantic stiffness and incoherence; it moves along in a desultory way, +and suffers from abrupt checks in the course of its development and from +superfluous ideas that break in for no reason at all, with the result +that the whole hangs fire. + +Above all, I fear Mahler has been sadly hypnotised by ideas about +power--ideas that are getting to the head of all German artists to-day. +He seems to have an undecided mind, and to combine sadness and irony +with weakness and impatience, to be a Viennese musician striving after +Wagnerian grandeur. No one expresses the grace of _Ländler_ and dainty +waltzes and mournful reveries better than he; and perhaps no one is +nearer the secret of Schubert's moving and voluptuous melancholy; and it +is Schubert he recalls at times, both in his good qualities and certain +of his faults. But he wants to be Beethoven or Wagner. And he is wrong; +for he lacks their balance and gigantic force. One saw that only too +well when he was conducting the _Choral Symphony_. + +But whatever he may be, or whatever disappointment he may have brought +me at Strasburg, I will never allow myself to speak lightly or +scoffingly of him. I am confident that a musician with so lofty an aim +will one day create a work worthy of himself. + + * * * * * + +Richard Strauss is a complete contrast to Mahler. He has always the air +of a heedless and discontented child. Tall and slim, rather elegant and +supercilious, he seems to be of a more refined race than most other +German artists of to-day. Scornful, _blasé_ with success, and very +exacting, his bearing towards other musicians has nothing of Mahler's +winning modesty. He is not less nervous than Mahler, and while he is +conducting the orchestra he seems to indulge in a frenzied dance which +follows the smallest details of his music--music that is as agitated as +limpid water into which a stone has been flung. But he has a great +advantage over Mahler; he knows how to rest after his labours. Both +excitable and sleepy by nature, his highly-strung nerves are +counterbalanced by his indolence, and there is in the depths of him a +Bavarian love of luxury. I am quite sure that when his hours of intense +living are over, after he has spent an excessive amount of energy, he +has hours when he is only partially alive. One then sees his eyes with a +vague and sleepy look in them; and he is like old Rameau, who used to +walk about for hours as if he were an automaton, seeing nothing and +thinking of nothing. + +At Strasburg Strauss conducted his _Sinfonia Domestica_, whose programme +seems boldly to defy reason, and even good taste. In the symphony he +pictures himself with his wife and his boy (_"Meiner lieben Frau und +unserm Jungen gewidmet"_). "I do not see," said Strauss, "why I should +not compose a symphony about myself; I find myself quite as interesting +as Napoleon or Alexander." Some people have replied that everybody else +might not share his interest. But I shall not use that argument; it is +quite possible for an artist of Strauss's worth to keep us entertained. +What grates upon me more is the way in which he speaks of himself. The +disproportion between his subject and the means he has of expressing it +is too strong. Above all, I do not like this display of the inner and +secret self. There is a want of reticence in this _Sinfonia Domestica_. +The fireside, the sitting-room, and the bedchamber, are open to +all-comers. Is this the family feeling of Germany to-day? I admit that +the first time I heard the work it jarred upon me for purely moral +reasons, in spite of the liking I have for its composer. But afterwards +I altered my first opinion, and found the music admirable. Do you know +the programme? + +The first part shows you three people: a man, a woman, and a child. The +man is represented by three themes: a _motif_ full of spirit and humour, +a thoughtful _motif_, and a _motif_ expressing eager and enthusiastic +action. The woman has only two themes: one expressing caprice, and the +other love and tenderness. The child has a single _motif_, which is +quiet, innocent, and not very defined in character; its real value is +not shown until it is developed.... Which of the two parents is he like? +The family sit round him and discuss him. "He is just like his father" +(_Ganz der Papa_), say the aunts. "He is the image of his mother" (_Ganz +die Mama_), say the uncles. + +The second part of the symphony is a scherzo which represents the child +at play; there are terribly noisy games, games of Herculean gaiety, and +you can hear the parents talking all over the house. How far we seem +from Schumann's good little children and their simple-hearted families! +At last the child is put to bed; they rock him to sleep, and the clock +strikes seven. Night comes. There are dreams and some uneasy sleep. Then +a love scene.... The clock strikes seven in the morning. Everybody wakes +up, and there is a merry discussion. We hear a double fugue in which the +theme of the man and the theme of the woman contradict each other with +exasperating and ludicrous obstinacy; and the man has the last word. +Finally there is the apotheosis of the child and family life. + +Such a programme serves rather to lead the listener astray than to guide +him. It spoils the idea of the work by emphasising its anecdotal and +rather comic side. For without doubt the comic side is there, and +Strauss has warned us in vain that he did not wish to make an amusing +picture of married life, but to praise the sacredness of marriage and +parenthood; but he possesses such a strong vein of humour that it cannot +help getting the better of him. There is nothing really grave or +religious about the music, except when he is speaking of the child; and +then the rough merriment of the man grows gentle, and the irritating +coquetry of the woman becomes exquisitely tender. Otherwise Strauss's +satire and love of jesting get the upper hand, and reach an almost epic +gaiety and strength. + +But one must forget this unwise programme, which borders on bad taste +and at times on something even worse. When one has succeeded in +forgetting it one discovers a well-proportioned symphony in four +parts--Allegro, Scherzo, Adagio, and Finale in fugue form--and one of +the finest works in contemporary music. It has the passionate +exuberance of Strauss's preceding symphony, _Heldenleben_, but it is +superior in artistic construction; one may even say that it is Strauss's +most perfect work since _Tod und Verklärung_ ("Death and +Transfiguration"), with a richness of colouring and technical skill that +_Tod und Verklärung_ did not possess. One is dazzled by the beauty of an +orchestration which is light and pliant, and capable of expressing +delicate shades of feeling; and this struck me the more after the solid +massiveness of Mahler's orchestration, which is like heavy unleavened +bread. With Strauss everything is full of life and sinew, and there is +nothing wasted. Possibly the first setting-out of his themes has rather +too schematic a character; and perhaps the melodic utterance is rather +restricted and not very lofty; but it is very personal, and one finds it +impossible to disassociate his personality from these vigorous themes +that burn with youthful ardour, and cut the air like arrows, and twist +themselves in freakish arabesques. In the adagio depicting night, there +is, though in very bad taste, much seriousness and reverie and stirring +emotion. The fugue at the end is of astonishing sprightliness; and is a +mixture of colossal jesting and heroic pastoral poetry worthy of +Beethoven, whose style it recalls in the breadth of its development. The +final apotheosis is filled with life; its joy makes the heart beat. The +most extravagant harmonic effects and the most abominable discords are +softened and almost disappear in the wonderful combination of _timbres_. +It is the work of a strong and sensual artist, the true heir of the +Wagner of the _Meistersinger_. + + * * * * * + +Upon the whole, these works make one see that, in spite of their +apparent audacity, Strauss and Mahler are beginning to make a +surreptitious retreat from their early standpoint, and are abandoning +the symphony with a programme. Strauss's last work will lose nothing by +calling itself quite simply _Sinfonia Domestica_, without adding any +further information. It is a true symphony; and the same may be said of +Mahler's composition. But Strauss and Mahler are already reforming +themselves, and are coming back to the model of the classic symphony. + +But there are more important conclusions to be drawn from a hearing of +this kind. The first is that Strauss's talent is becoming more and more +exceptional in the music of his country. With all his faults, which are +considerable, Strauss stands alone in his warmth of imagination, in his +unquenchable spontaneity and perpetual youth. And his knowledge and his +art are growing every day in the midst of other German art which is +growing old. German music in general is showing some grave symptoms. I +will not dwell on its neurasthenia, for it is passing through a crisis +which will teach it wisdom; but I fear, nevertheless, that this +excessive nervous excitement will be followed by torpor. What is really +disquieting is that, in spite of all the talent that still abounds, +Germany is fast losing her chief musical endowments. Her melodic charm +has nearly disappeared. One could search the music of Strauss, Mahler, +or Hugo Wolf, without finding a melody of any real value, or of any true +originality, outside its application to a text, or a literary idea, and +its harmonic development. And besides that, German music is daily losing +its intimate spirit; there are still traces of this spirit in Wolf, +thanks to his exceptionally unhappy life; but there is very little of it +in Mahler, in spite of all his efforts to concentrate his mind on +himself; and there is hardly any at all in Strauss, although he is the +most interesting of the three composers. German musicians have no longer +any depth. + +I have said that I attribute this fact to the detestable influence of +the theatre, to which nearly all these artists are attached as +_Kapellmeister_, or directors of opera. To this they owe the +melodramatic character of their music, even though it is on the surface +only--music written for show, and aiming chiefly at effect. + +More baneful even than the influence of the theatre is the influence of +success. These musicians have nowadays too many facilities for having +their music played. A work is played almost before it is finished, and +the musician has no time to live with his work in solitude and silence. +Besides this, the works of the chief German musicians are supported by +tremendous booming of some kind or another: by their _Musikfeste_, by +their critics, their press, and their "Musical Guides" (_Musikführer_), +which are apologetic explanations of their works, scattered abroad in +millions to set the fashion for the sheep-like public. And with all this +a musician grows soon contented with himself, and comes to believe any +favourable opinion about his work. What a difference from Beethoven, +who, all his life, was hammering out the same subjects, and putting his +melodies on the anvil twenty times before they reached their final form. +That is where Mahler is so lacking. His subjects are a rather vulgarised +edition of some of Beethoven's ideas in their unfinished state. But +Mahler gets no further than the rough sketch. + +And, lastly, I want to speak of the greatest danger of all that menaces +music in Germany; _there is too much music in Germany_. This is not a +paradox. There is no worse misfortune for art than a super-abundance of +it. The music is drowning the musicians. Festival succeeds festival: the +day after the Strasburg festival there was to be a Bach festival at +Eisenach; and then, at the end of the week, a Beethoven festival at +Bonn. Such a plethora of concerts, theatres, choral societies, and +chamber-music societies, absorbs the whole life of the musician. When +has he time to be alone to listen to the music that sings within him? +This senseless flood of music invades the sanctuaries of his soul, +weakens its power, and destroys its sacred solitude and the treasures of +its thought. + +You must not think that this excess of music existed in the old days in +Germany. In the time of the great classic masters, Germany had hardly +any institutions for the giving of regular concerts, and choral +performances were hardly known. In the Vienna of Mozart and Beethoven +there was only a single association that gave concerts, and no +_Chorvereine_ at all, and it was the same with other towns in Germany. +Does the wonderful spread of musical culture in Germany during the last +century correspond with its artistic creation? I do not think so; and +one feels the inequality between the two more every day. + +Do you remember Goethe's ballad of _Der Zauberlehrling_ (_L'Apprenti +Sorcier_) which Dukas so cleverly made into music? There, in the absence +of his master, an apprentice set working some magic spells, and so +opened sluice-gates that no one could shut; and the house was flooded. + +This is what Germany has done. She has let loose a flood of music, and +is about to be drowned in it. + + + + +CLAUDE DEBUSSY + +PELLÉAS ET MÉLISANDE + + +The first performance of _Pelléas et Mélisande_ in Paris, on April 30th, +1902, was a very notable event in the history of French music; its +importance can only be compared with that of the first performance of +Lully's _Cadmus et Hermione_, Rameau's _Hippolyte et Aricie_, and +Quick's _Iphigénie en Aulide_; and it may be looked upon as one of the +three or four red-letter days in the calendar of our lyric stage.[199] + +[Footnote 199: May I be allowed to say that I am trying to write this +study from a purely historical point of view, by eliminating all +personal feeling--which would be of no value here. As a matter of fact, +I am not a Debussyite; my sympathies are with quite another kind of art. +But I feel impelled to give homage to a great artist, whose work I am +able to judge with some impartiality.] + +The success of _Pelléas et Mélisande_ is due to many things. Some of +them are trivial, such as fashion, which has certainly played its part +here as it has in all other successes, though it is a relatively weak +part; some of them are more important, and arise from something innate +in the spirit of French genius; and there are also moral and aesthetic +reasons for its success, and, in the widest sense, purely musical +reasons. + + * * * * * + +In speaking of the moral reasons of the success of _Pelléas et +Mélisande_, I would like to draw your attention to a form of thought +which is not confined to France, but which is common nowadays in a +section of the more distinguished members of European society, and which +has found expression in _Pelléas et Mélisande_. The atmosphere in which +Maeterlinck's drama moves makes one feel the melancholy resignation of +the will to Fate. We are shown that nothing can change the order of +events; that, despite our proud illusions, we are not master of +ourselves, but the servant of unknown and irresistible forces, which +direct the whole tragicomedy of our lives. We are told that no man is +responsible for what he likes and what he loves--that is if he knows +what he likes and loves--and that he lives and dies without knowing why. + +These fatalistic ideas, reflecting the lassitude of the intellectual +aristocracy of Europe, have been wonderfully translated into music by +Debussy; and when you feel the poetic and sensual charm of the music, +the ideas become fascinating and intoxicating, and their spirit is very +infectious. For there is in all music an hypnotic power which is able to +reduce the mind to a state of voluptuous submission. + +The cause of the artistic success of _Pelléas et Mélisande_ is of a more +specially French character, and marks a reaction that is at once +legitimate, natural, and inevitable; I would even say it is vital--a +reaction of French genius against foreign art, and especially against +Wagnerian art and its awkward representatives in France. + +Is the Wagnerian drama perfectly adapted to German genius? I do not +think so; but that is a question which I will leave German musicians to +decide. For ourselves, we have the right to assert that the form of +Wagnerian drama is antipathetic to the spirit of French people--to their +artistic taste, to their ideas about the theatre, and to their musical +feeling. This form may have forced itself upon us, and, by the right of +victorious genius, may have strongly influenced the French mind, and may +do so again; but nothing will ever make it anything but a stranger in +our land. + +It is not necessary to dwell upon the differences of taste. The +Wagnerian ideal is, before everything else, an ideal of power. Wagner's +passional and intellectual exaltation and his mystic sensualism are +poured out like a fiery torrent, which sweeps away and burns all before +it, taking no heed of barriers. Such an art cannot be bound by ordinary +rules; it has no need to fear bad taste--and I commend it. But it is +easy to understand that other ideals exist, and that another art might +be as expressive by its proprieties and niceties as by its richness and +force. And this former art--our own--is not so much a reaction against +Wagnerian art as a reaction against its caricatures in France and the +consequent abuse of an ill-regulated power. + +Genius has a right to be what it will--to trample underfoot, if it +wishes, taste and morals and the whole of society. But when those who +are not geniuses wish to do the same thing they only make themselves +ridiculous and odious. There have been too many monkey Wagners in +France. During the last ten or twenty years scarcely one French musician +has escaped Wagner's influence. One understands only too well the revolt +of the French mind, in the name of naturalness and good taste, against +exaggerations and extremes of passion, whether sincere or not. _Pelléas +et Mélisande_ came as a manifestation of this revolt. It is an +uncompromising reaction against over-emphasis and excess, and against +anything that oversteps the limits of the imagination. This distaste of +exaggerated words and sentiments results in what is like a fear of +showing the feelings at all, even when they are most deeply stirred. +With Debussy the passions almost whisper; and it is by the imperceptible +vibrations of the melodic line that the love in the hearts of the +unhappy couple is shown, by the timid "Oh, why are you going?" at the +end of the first act, and the quiet "I love you, too," in the last scene +but one. Think of the wild lamentations of the dying Ysolde, and then of +the death of Mélisande, without cries and without words. + +From a scenic point of view, _Pelléas et Mélisande_ is also quite +opposed to the Bayreuth ideal. The vast proportions--almost immoderate +proportions--of the Wagnerian drama, its compact structure and the +intense concentration of mind which from beginning to end holds these +enormous works and their ideology together, and which is often displayed +at the expense of the action and even the emotions, are as far removed +as they can be from the French love of clear, logical, and temperate +action. The little pictures of _Pelléas et Mélisande_, small and +sharply cut, each marking without stress a new stage in the evolution of +the drama, are built up in quite a different way from those of the +Wagnerian theatre. + +And, as if he wished to accentuate this antagonism, the author of +_Pelléas et Mélisande_ is now writing a _Tristan_, whose plot is taken +from an old French poem, the text of which has been recently brought to +light by M. Bédier. In its calm and lofty strain it is a wonderful +contrast to Wagner's savage and pedantic, though sublime poem. + +But it is especially by the manner in which they conceive the respective +relationships of poetry and music to opera that the two composers +differ. With Wagner, music is the kernel of the opera, the glowing +focus, the centre of attraction; it absorbs everything, and it stands +absolutely first. But that is not the French conception. The musical +stage, as we conceive it in France (if not what we actually possess), +should present such a combination of the arts as go to make an +harmonious whole. We demand that an equal balance shall be kept between +poetry and music; and if their equilibrium must be a little upset, we +should prefer that poetry was not the loser, as its utterance is more +conscious and rational. That was Gluck's aim; and because he realised it +so well he gained a reputation among the French public which nothing +will destroy. Debussy's strength lies in the methods by which he has +approached this ideal of musical temperateness and disinterestedness, +and in the way he has placed his genius as a composer at the service of +the drama. He has never sought to dominate Maeterlinck's poem, or to +swallow it up in a torrent of music; he has made it so much a part of +himself that at the present time no Frenchman is able to think of a +passage in the play without Debussy's music singing at the same time +within him. + +But apart from all these reasons that make the work important in the +history of opera, there are purely musical reasons for its success, +which are of deeper significance still.[200] _Pelléas et Mélisande_ has +brought about a reform in the dramatic music of France. This reform is +concerned with several things, and, first of all, with recitative. + +[Footnote 200: That is for musicians. But I am convinced that with the +mass of the public the other reasons have more weight--as is always the +case.] + +In France we have never had--apart from a few attempts in +_opéra-comique_--a recitative that exactly expressed our natural speech. +Lully and Rameau took for their model the high-flown declamation of the +tragedy stage of their time. And French opera for the past twenty years +has chosen a more dangerous model still--the declamation of Wagner, with +its vocal leaps and its resounding and heavy accentuation. Nothing could +be more displeasing in French. All people of taste suffered from it, +though they did not admit it. At this time, Antoine, Gémier, and Guitry +were making theatrical declamation more natural, and this made the +exaggerated declamation of the French opera appear more ridiculous and +more archaic still. And so a reform in recitative was inevitable. +Jean-Jacques Rousseau had foreseen it in the very direction in which +Debussy[201] has accomplished it. He showed in his _Lettre sur la +musique française_ that there was no connection between the inflections +of French speech, "whose accents are so harmonious and simple," and "the +shrill and noisy intonations" of the recitative of French opera. And he +concluded by saying that the kind of recitative that would best suit us +should "wander between little intervals, and neither raise nor lower the +voice very much; and should have little sustained sound, no noise, and +no cries of any description--nothing, indeed, that resembled singing, +and little inequality in the duration or value of the notes, or in their +intervals." This is the very definition of Debussy's recitative. + +[Footnote 201: We must also note that during the first half of the +seventeenth century people of taste objected to the very theatrical +declamation of French opera. "Our singers believe," wrote Mersenne, in +1636, "that the exclamations and emphasis used by the Italians in +singing savour too much of tragedies and comedies, and so they do not +wish to employ them."] + +The symphonic fabric of _Pelléas et Mélisande_ differs just as widely +from Wagner's dramas. With Wagner it is a living thing that springs from +one great root, a system of interlaced phrases whose powerful growth +puts out branches in every direction, like an oak. Or, to take another +simile, it is like a painting, which though it has not been executed at +a single sitting, yet gives us that impression; and, in spite of the +retouching and altering to which it has been subjected, still has the +effect of a compact whole, of an indestructible amalgam, from which +nothing can be detached. Debussy's system, on the contrary, is, so to +speak, a sort of classic impressionism--an impressionism that is +refined, harmonious, and calm; that moves along in musical pictures, +each of which corresponds to a subtle and fleeting moment of the soul's +life; and the painting is done by clever little strokes put in with a +soft and delicate touch. This art is more allied to that of Moussorgski +(though without any of his roughness) than that of Wagner, in spite of +one or two reminiscences of _Parsifal_, which are only extraneous traits +in the work. In _Pelléas et Mélisande_ one finds no persistent +_leitmotifs_ running through the work, or themes which pretend to +translate into music the life of characters and types; but, instead, we +have phrases that express changing feelings, that change with the +feelings. More than that, Debussy's harmony is not, as it was with +Wagner and all the German school, a fettered harmony, tightly bound to +the despotic laws of counterpoint; it is, as Laloy[202] has said, a +harmony that is first of all harmonious, and has its origin and end in +itself. + +[Footnote 202: No other critic has, I think, discerned so shrewdly +Debussy's art and genius. Some of his analyses are models of clever +intuition. The thought of the critic seems to be one with that of the +musician.] + +As Debussy's art only attempts to give the impression of the moment, +without troubling itself with what may come after, it is free from care, +and takes its fill in the enjoyment of the moment. In the garden of +harmonies it selects the most beautiful flowers; for sincerity of +expression takes a second place with it, and its first idea is to +please. In this again it interprets the aesthetic sensualism of the +French race, which seeks pleasure in art, and does not willingly admit +ugliness, even when it seems to be justified by the needs of the drama +and of truth. Mozart shared the same thought: "Music," he said, "even in +the most terrible situations, ought never to offend the ear; it should +charm it even there; and, in short, always remain music." + +As for Debussy's harmonic language, his originality does not consist, as +some of his foolish admirers have said, in the invention of new chords, +but in the new use he makes of them. A man is not a great artist because +he makes use of unresolved sevenths and ninths, consecutive major thirds +and ninths, and harmonic progressions based on a scale of whole tones; +one is only an artist when one makes them say something. And it is not +on account of the peculiarities of Debussy's style--of which one may +find isolated examples in great composers before him, in Chopin, Liszt, +Chabrier, and Richard Strauss--but because with Debussy these +peculiarities are an expression of his personality, and because _Pelléas +et Mélisande_, "the land of ninths," has a poetic atmosphere which is +like no other musical drama ever written. + +Lastly, the orchestration is purposely restrained, light, and divided, +for Debussy has a fine disdain for those orgies of sound to which +Wagner's art has accustomed us; it is as sober and polished as a fine +classic phrase of the latter part of the seventeenth century. _Ne quid +nimis_ ("Nothing superfluous") is the artist's motto. Instead of +amalgamating the _timbres_ to get a massive effect, he disengages their +separate personalities, as it were, and delicately blends them without +changing their individual nature. Like the impressionist painters of +to-day, he paints with primary colours, but with a delicate moderation +that rejects anything harsh as if it were something unseemly. + + * * * * * + +I have given more than enough reasons to account for the success of +_Pelléas et Mélisande_ and the place that its admirers give it in the +history of opera. There is every reason to believe that the composer has +not been as acutely conscious of his musico-dramatic reform as his +disciples have been. The reform with him has a more instinctive +character; and that is what gives it its strength. It responds to an +unconscious yet profound need of the French spirit. I would even venture +to say that the historical importance of Debussy's work is greater than +its artistic value. His personality is not without faults, and the +gravest are perhaps negative faults--the absence of certain qualities, +and even of the strong and extravagant faults which made the heroes of +the art world, like Beethoven and Wagner. His voluptuous nature is at +once changeable and precise; and his dreams are as clear and delicate as +the art of a poet of the Pleiades in the sixteenth century, or of a +Japanese painter. But among all his gifts he has a quality which I have +not found so evident in any other musician--except perhaps Mozart; and +this quality is a genius for good taste. Debussy has it in excess, so +that he almost sacrifices the other elements of art to it, until the +passionate force of his music, even its very life, seems to be +impoverished. But one must not deceive oneself; that impoverishment is +only apparent, and in all his work there are evidences that his passion +is only veiled. It is only the trembling of the melodic line, or the +orchestration which, like a shadow passing before the eyes, tells us of +the drama that is being played in the hearts of his characters. This +lofty shame of emotion is something as rare in opera as a Racine tragedy +is in poetry--they are works of the same order, and both of them perfect +flowers of the French spirit. Anyone who lives in foreign parts and is +curious to know what France is like and understand her genius should +study _Pelléas et Mélisande_ as they would study Racine's _Bérénice_. + +Not that Debussy's art entirely represents French genius any more than +Racine's does; for there is quite another side to it which is not +represented there; and that side is heroic action, the intoxication of +reason and laughter, the passion for light, the France of Rabelais, +Molière, Diderot, and in music, we will say--for want of better +names--the France of Berlioz and Bizet. To tell the truth, that is the +France I prefer. But Heaven preserve me from ignoring the other! It is +the balance between these two Frances that makes French genius. In our +contemporary music, _Pelléas et Mélisande_ is at one end of the pole of +our art and _Carmen_ is at the other. The one is all on the surface, all +life, with no shadows, and no underneath. The other is below the +surface, bathed in twilight, and enveloped in silence. And this double +ideal is the alternation between the gentle sunlight and the faint mist +that veils the soft, luminous sky of the Isle of France. + + + + +[Illustration] + + +THE AWAKENING + +A SKETCH OF THE MUSICAL MOVEMENT IN PARIS SINCE 1870 + + +It is not possible in a few pages to give an account of forty years of +active and fruitful life without many omissions, and also without a +certain dryness entailed by lists of names. But I have purposely +abstained from trying to arouse interest by any artifices of writing and +treatment, as I wish to let deeds speak for themselves. + +I want to show, by this simple account, the splendid efforts made by +musicians in France since 1870, and the growth of the faith and energy +that has recreated French music. Such an awakening seems to me a fine +thing to look upon, and very comforting. But few people in France +realise it, outside a handful of musicians. It is to the public at large +I dedicate these pages, so that they may know what a generation of +artists with large hearts and strong determination have done for the +honour of our race. The nation must not be allowed to forget what she +owes to some of her sons. + +But you must not accuse me of contradicting myself if in another work, +which will appear at the same time as this one,[203] I indulge in some +sarcasm over the failings and absurdities of French music to-day. I +think that for the last ten years French musicians have rather +imprudently and prematurely proclaimed their victory, and that, in a +general way, their works--apart from three or four--are not worth as +much as their endeavours. But their endeavours are heroic; and I know +nothing finer in the whole history of France. May they continue! But +that is only possible by practising a virtue--modesty. The completion of +a part is not the completion of the whole. + +[Footnote 203: _Jean-Christophe à Paris_, 1904.] + + +PARIS AND MUSIC + + +The nature of Paris is so complex and unstable that one feels it is +presumptuous to try to define it. It is a city so highly-strung, so +ingrained with fickleness, and so changeable in its tastes, that a book +that truly describes it at the moment it is written is no longer +accurate by the time it is published. And then, there is not only one +Paris; there are two or three Parises--fashionable Paris, middle-class +Paris, intellectual Paris, vulgar Paris--all living side by side, but +intermingling very little. If you do not know the little towns within +the great Town, you cannot know the strong and often inconsistent life +of this great organism as a whole. + +If one wishes to get an idea of the musical life of Paris, one must take +into account the variety of its centres and the perpetual flow of its +thought--a thought which never stops, but is always over-shooting the +goal for which it seemed bound. This incessant change of opinion is +scornfully called "fashion" by the foreigner. And there is, without +doubt, in the artistic aristocracy of Paris, as in all great towns, a +herd of idle people on the watch for new fashions--in art, as well as in +dress--who wish to single out certain of them for no serious reason at +all. But, in spite of their pretensions, they have only an infinitesimal +share in the changes of artistic taste. The origin of these changes is +in the Parisian brain itself--a brain that is quick and feverish, always +working, greedy of knowledge, easily tired, grasping to-day the +splendours of a work, seeing to-morrow its defects, building up +reputations as rapidly as it pulls them down, and yet, in spite of all +its apparent caprices, always logical and sincere. It has its momentary +infatuations and dislikes, but no lasting prejudices; and, by its +curiosity, its absolute liberty, and its very French habit of +criticising everything, it is a marvellous barometer, sensitive to all +the hidden currents of thought in the soul of the West, and often +indicating, months in advance, the variations and disturbances of the +artistic and political world. + +And this barometer is registering what is happening just now in the +world of music, where a movement has been making itself felt in France +for several years, whose effect other nations--perhaps more musical +nations--will not feel till later. For the nations that have the +strongest artistic traditions are not necessarily those that are likely +to develop a new art. To do that one must have a virgin soil and spirits +untrammelled by a heritage from the past. In 1870 no one had a lighter +heritage to bear than French musicians; for the past had been forgotten, +and such a thing as real musical education did not exist. + +The musical weakness of that time was a very curious thing, and has +given many people the impression that France has never been a musical +nation. Historically speaking, nothing could be more wrong. Certainly +there are races more gifted in music than others; but often the seeming +differences of race are really the differences of time; and a nation +appears great or little in its art according to what period of its +history we consider. England was a musical nation until the Revolution +of 1688; France was the greatest musical nation in the sixteenth +century; and the recent publications of M. Henry Expert have given us a +glimpse of the originality and perfection of the Franco-Belgian art +during the Renaissance. But without going back as far as that, we find +that Paris was a very musical town at the time of the Restoration, at +the time of the first performance of Beethoven's symphonies at the +Conservatoire, and the first great works of Berlioz, and the Italian +Opera. In Berlioz's _Mémoires_ you can read about the enthusiasm, the +tears, and the feeling, that the performances of Gluck's and Spontini's +operas aroused; and in the same book one sees clearly that this musical +warmth lasted until 1840, after which it died down little by little, and +was succeeded by complete musical apathy in the second Empire--an apathy +from which Berlioz suffered cruelly, so that one may even say he died +crushed by the indifference of the public. At this time Meyerbeer was +reigning at the Opera. This incredible weakening of musical feeling in +France, from 1840 to 1870, is nowhere better shown than in its romantic +and realistic writers, for whom music was an hermetically sealed door. +All these artists were "_visuels_," for whom music was only a noise. +Hugo is supposed to have said that Germany's inferiority was measured by +its superiority in music.[204] "The elder Dumas detested," Berlioz says, +"even bad music."[205] The journal of the Goncourts calmly reflects the +almost universal scorn of literary men for music. In a conversation +which took place in 1862 between Goncourt and Théophile Gautier, +Goncourt said: + +"We confessed to him our complete infirmity, our musical deafness--we +who, at the most, only liked military music." + +[Footnote 204: One must at least do Hugo the justice of saying that he +always spoke of Beethoven with admiration, although he did not know him. +But he rather exalts him in order to take away from the importance of a +poet--the only one in the nineteenth century--whose fame was shading his +own; and when he wrote in his _William Shakespeare_ that "the great man +of Germany is Beethoven" it was understood by all to mean "the great man +of Germany is not Goethe."] + +[Footnote 205: Written in a letter to his sister, Nanci, on 3 April, +1850.] + + "Well," said Gautier, "what you tell me pleases me very much. I am + like you; I prefer silence to music. I have only just succeeded, + after having lived part of my life with a singer, in being able to + tell good music from bad; but it is all the same to me."[206] + +And he added: + + "But it is a very curious thing that all other writers of our time + are like this. Balzac hated music. Hugo could not stand it. Even + Lamartine, who himself is like a piano to be hired or sold, holds + it in horror!" + +It needed a complete upheaval of the nation--a political and moral +upheaval--to change that frame of mind. Some indication of the change +was making itself felt in the last years of the second Empire. Wagner, +who suffered from the hostility or indifference of the public in 1860, +at the time when _Tannhäuser_ was performed at the Opera, had already +found, however, a few understanding people in Paris who discerned his +genius and sincerely admired him. The most interesting of the writers +who first began to understand musical emotion is Charles Baudelaire. In +1861, Pasdeloup gave the first _Concerts populaires de musique +classique_ at the Cirque d'Hiver. The Berlioz Festival, organised by M. +Reyer, on March 23rd, 1870, a year after Berlioz's death, revealed to +France the grandeur of its greatest musical genius, and was the +beginning of a campaign of public reparation to his memory. + +[Footnote 206: We remark, nevertheless, that that did not prevent +Gautier from being a musical critic.] + +The disasters of the war in 1870 regenerated the nation's artistic +spirit. Music felt its effect immediately.[207] On February 24th, 1871, +the _Société nationale de Musique_ was instituted to propagate the works +of French composers; and in 1873 the _Concerts de l'Association +artistique_ were started under M. Colonne's direction; and these +concerts, besides making people acquainted with the classic composers of +symphonies and the masters of the young French school, were especially +devoted to the honouring of Berlioz, whose triumph reached its summit +about 1880.[208] + +[Footnote 207: I wish to make known from the beginning that I am only +noticing here the greater musical doings of the nation, and making no +mention of works which have not had an important influence on this +movement.] + +[Footnote 208: In the meanwhile France saw the brilliant rise and +extinction of a great artist--the most spontaneous of all her +musicians--Georges Bizet, who died in 1875, aged thirty-seven. "Bizet +was the last genius to discover a new beauty," said Nietzsche; "Bizet +discovered new lands--the Southern lands of music," _Carmen_ (1875) and +_L'Arlésienne_ (1872) are masterpieces of the lyrical Latin drama. Their +style is luminous, concise, and well-defined; the figures are outlined +with incisive precision. The music is full of light and movement, and is +a great contrast to Wagner's philosophical symphonies, and its popular +subject only serves to strengthen its aristocratic distinction. By its +nature and its clear perception of the spirit of the race it was well in +advance of its time. What a place Bizet might have taken in our art if +he had only lived twenty years longer!] + +At this time Wagner's success, in its turn, began to make itself felt. +For this M. Lamoureux, whose concerts began in 1882, was chiefly +responsible. Wagner's influence considerably helped forward the progress +of French art, and aroused a love for music in people other than +musicians; and, by his all-embracing personality and the vast domain of +his work in art, not only engaged the interest of the musical world, but +that of the theatrical world, and the world of poetry and the plastic +arts. One may say that from 1885 Wagner's work acted directly or +indirectly on the whole of artistic thought, even on the religious and +intellectual thought of the most distinguished people in Paris. And a +curious historical witness of its world-wide influence and momentary +supremacy over all other arts was the founding of the _Revue +Wagnérienne_, where, united by the same artistic devotion, were found +writers and poets such as Verlaine, Mallarmé, Swinburne, Villiers de +l'Isle Adam, Huysmans, Richepin, Catulle Mendès, Édouard Rod, Stuart +Merrill, Ephraim Mikhaël, etc., and painters like Fantin-Latour, Jacques +Blanche, Odilon Redon; and critics like Teodor de Wyzewa, H.S. +Chamberlain, Hennequin, Camille Benoît, A. Ernst, de Fourcaud, Wilder, +E. Schuré, Soubies, Malherbe, Gabriel Mourey, etc. These writers not +only discussed musical subjects, but judged painting, literature, and +philosophy, from a Wagnerian point of view. Hennequin compared the +philosophic systems of Herbert Spencer and Wagner. Teodor de Wyzewa made +a study of Wagnerian literature--not the literature that commentated and +the paintings that illustrated Wagner's works, but the literature and +the painting that were inspired by Wagner's principles--from Egyptian +statuary to Degas's paintings, from Homer's writings to those of +Villiers de l'Isle Adam! In a word, the whole universe was seen and +judged by the thought of Bayreuth. And though this folly scarcely lasted +more than three or four years--the length of the life of that little +magazine--Wagner's genius dominated nearly the whole of French art for +ten or twelve years.[209] An ardent musical propaganda by means of +concerts was carried on among the public; and the young intellectuals of +the day were won over. But the finest service that Wagnerism rendered to +French art was that it interested the general public in music; although +the tyranny its influence exercised became, in time, very stifling. + +[Footnote 209: Its influence is shown, in varying degrees, in works such +as M. Reyer's _Sigurd_ (1884), Chabrier's _Gwendoline_ (1886), and M. +Vincent d'Indy's _Le Chant de la Cloche_ (1886).] + +Then, in 1890, there were signs of a movement that was in revolt against +its despotism. The great wind from the East began to drop, and veered to +the North. Scandinavian and Russian influences were making themselves +felt. An exaggerated infatuation for Grieg, though limited to a small +number of people, was an indication of the change in public taste. In +1890, César Franck died in Paris. Belgian by birth and temperament, and +French in feeling and by musical education, he had remained outside the +Wagnerian movement in his own serene and fecund solitude. To his +intellectual greatness and the charm his personal genius held for the +little band of friends who knew and revered him he added the authority +of his knowledge. Unconsciously he brought back to us the soul of +Sebastian Bach, with its infinite richness and depth; and through this +he found himself the head of a school (without having wished it) and the +greatest teacher of contemporary French music. After his death, his +name was the means of rallying together the younger school of +musicians. In 1892, the _Chanteurs de Saint-Gervais_, under the +direction of M. Charles Bordes, reinstated to honour and popularised +Gregorian and Palestrinian music; and, following the initiative of their +director, the _Schola Cantorum_ was founded in 1894 for the revival of +religious music. Ambition grew with success; and from the _Schola_ +sprang the _École Supérieure de Musique_, under the direction of +Franck's most famous pupil, M. Vincent d'Indy. This school, founded on a +solid knowledge, not only of the classics, but of the primitives in +music, took from its very beginning in 1900 a frankly national +character, and was in some ways opposed to German art. At the same time, +performances of Bach and seventeenth-and eighteenth-century music became +more and more frequent; and more intimate relationship with the artists +of other countries, repeated visits of the great _Kapellmeister_, +foreign virtuosi and composers (especially Richard Strauss), and, +lastly, of Russian composers, completed the education of the Parisian +musical public, who, after repeated rebukes from the critics, became +conscious of the awakening of a national personality, and of an +impatient desire to free itself from German tutelage. By turns it +gratefully and warmly received M. Bruneau's _Le Rêve_ (1891), M. +d'Indy's _Fervaal_ (1898), M. Gustave Charpentier's _Louise_ (1900)--all +of which seemed like works of liberation. But, as a matter of fact, +these lyric dramas were by no means free from foreign influences, and +especially from Wagnerian influences. M. Debussy's _Pelléas et +Mélisande_, in 1902, seemed to mark more truly the emancipation of +French music. From this time on, French music felt that it had left +school, and claimed to have founded a new art, which reflected the +spirit of the race, and was freer and suppler than the Wagnerian art. +These ideas, which were seized upon and enlarged by the press, brought +about rather quickly a conviction in French artists of France's +superiority in music. Is that conviction justified? The future alone can +tell us. But one may see by this brief outline of events how real is the +evolution of the musical spirit in France since 1870, in spite of the +apparent contradictions of fashion which appear on the surface of art. +It is the spirit of France that is, after long oppression and by a +patient but eager initiation, realising its power and wishing to +dominate in its turn. + +I wanted at first to trace the broad line of the movement which for the +last thirty years has been affecting French music; and now I shall +consider the musical institutions that have had their share in this +movement. You will not be surprised if I ignore some of the most +celebrated, which have lost their interest in it, in order that I may +consider those that are the true authors of our regeneration. + + +MUSICAL INSTITUTIONS BEFORE 1870 + + +It is not by any means the oldest and most celebrated musical +institutions which have taken the largest share in this evolution of +music in the last thirty years. + +The _Académie des Beaux-Arts_, where six chairs are reserved for the +musical section, could have played a very important part in the musical +organisation of France by the authority of its name, and by the many +prizes that it gives for composition and criticism, especially by the +_Prix de Rome_, which it awards every year. But it does not play its +part well, partly because of the antiquated statutes that govern it, by +which a handful of musicians are associated with a great number of +painters, sculptors, and architects, who are ignorant of music and mock +at the musicians, as they did in the time of Berlioz; and partly because +it is the custom of the Academy that the little group of musicians shall +be trained in a very conservative way. One of the names of these +musicians is justly celebrated--that of M. Saint-Saëns; but there are +others whose fame is of poorer quality, and others still who have no +fame at all. And the whole forms a little group, which though it does +not put any actual obstacles in the way of the progress of art, yet does +not look upon it favourably, but remains rather apart in an indifferent +or even hostile spirit. + +The _Conservatoire national de Musique et de Déclamation_, which dates +from the last years of the _Ancien Régime_ and the Revolution, was +designed by its patriotic and-democratic origin to serve the cause of +national art and free progress.[210] + +[Footnote 210: One knows that the Conservatoire originated in _L'École +gratuite de musique de la garde nationale parisienne_, founded in 1792 +by Sarrette, and directed by Gossec. It was then a civic and military +school, but, according to Chénier, was changed into the _Institut +national de musique_ on 8 November, 1793, and into the _Conservatoire_ +on 3 August, 1795. This Republican Conservatoire made it its business to +keep in contact with the spirit of the country, and was directly opposed +to the Opera, which was of monarchical origin. See M. Constant Pierre's +work _Le Conservatoire national de musique_ (1900), and M. Julien +Tiersot's very interesting book _Les Fêtes et les Chants de la +Révolution française_ (1908).] + +It was for a long time the corner-stone of the edifice of music in +Paris. But although it has always numbered in its ranks many illustrious +and devoted professors--among whom it recognised, a little late, the +founder of the young French school, César Franck--and though the +majority of artists who have made a name in French music have received +its teaching, and the list of laureates of Rome who have come from its +composition classes includes all the heads of the artistic movement +to-day in all its diversity, and ranges from M. Massenet to M. Bruneau, +and from M. Charpentier to M. Debussy--in spite of all this, it is no +secret that, since 1870, the official action with regard to the movement +amounts to almost nothing; though we must at least do it justice, and +say that it has not hindered it.[211] + +[Footnote 211: You must remember that I am speaking here of _official_ +action only; for there have always been masters among the Conservatoire +teaching staff who have united a fine musical culture with a +broad-minded and liberal spirit. But the influence of these independent +minds is, generally speaking, small; for they have not the disposing of +academic successes; and when, by exception, they have a wide influence, +like that of César Franck, it is the result of personal work outside the +Conservatoire--work that is, as often as not, opposed to Conservatoire +principles.] + +But if the spirit of this academy has often destroyed the effect of the +excellent teaching there, by making success in academic competitions the +chief aim of the professors and their pupils, yet a certain freedom has +always reigned in the institution. And though this freedom is mainly the +result of indifference, it has, however, permitted the more independent +temperaments to develop in peace--from Berlioz to M. Ravel. One should +be grateful for this. But such virtues are too negative to give the +Conservatoire a high place in the musical history of the Third Republic; +and it is only lately, under the direction of M. Gabriel Fauré, that it +has endeavoured, not without difficulty, to get back its place at the +head of French art, which it had lost, and which others had taken. + +The _Société des Concerts du Conservatoire_, founded in 1828 under the +direction of Habeneck, has had its hour of glory in the musical history +of Paris. It was through this society that Beethoven's greatness was +revealed to France.[212] It was at the Conservatoire that the early +important works of Berlioz were first given: _La Fantastique_, _Harold_, +and _Roméo et Juliette_. It was there, nearer our own time, that +Saint-Saëns's _Symphonie avec Orgue_ and César Franck's _Symphonie_ were +played for the first time. But for a long time the Conservatoire seemed +to take its name too literally, and to restrict its sphere to that of a +museum for classical music. + +[Footnote 212: It is to be noted that since 1807 the Conservatoire +pupils have made Beethoven's symphonies familiar to Parisians. The +_Symphony in C minor_ was performed by them in 1808; the _Heroic_ in +1811. It was in connection with one of these performances that the +_Tablettes de Polymnie_ gave a curious appreciation of Beethoven, which +is quoted by M. Constant Pierre: "This composer is often grotesque and +uncouth, and sometimes flies majestically like an eagle and sometimes +crawls along stony paths. It is as though one had shut up doves and +crocodiles together."] + +In later years, however, the _Société des Concerts_, with M. Marty, +began to consider new works. Its orchestra, composed of eminent +instrumentalists, enjoys a classical fame; though it is now no longer +alone in the excellence of its performances, and has perhaps lost a +little the secret that it claimed to possess for the interpretation of +great classical works. It excels in works of a neo-classic character, +like those of M. Saint-Saëns, which are stronger in style and taste than +in life and passion. The Conservatoire concerts have also a relative +superiority over other concerts in Paris in the performance of choral +works, which up to the present have been very second-rate. But these +concerts are not easy of access for the general public, as the number of +seats for sale is very limited. And so the society is representative of +a little public whose taste is, broadly speaking, conservative and +official; and the noise of the strife outside its doors only reaches its +ears slowly, and with a deadened sound. + +The influence of the Conservatoire is, in music especially, an influence +of the past and of the Government. One may say much the same of the +Opera. This ancient association, which bears the imposing name of +_Académie nationale de Musique_ and dates from 1669, is a sort of +national institution which is more concerned with the history of +official art than with living art. The satire with which Jean-Jacques +describes, in his _Nouvelle Héloïse_, the stiff solemnity and mournful +pomp of its performances has not lost much of its truth. What is lacking +in the Opera to-day is the enthusiasm that accompanied its former +musical struggles in the times of the "_Encyclopédistes_" and the +"_guerre des coins_." The great battles of art are now fought outside +its doors; and it has become by degrees a showy _salon_, a little faded +perhaps, where the public is more interested in itself than in the +performance. In spite of the enormous sums that it swallows up every +year (nearly four million francs),[213] only one or two new pieces are +produced in a year, and they are rarely works that are representative of +the modern school. And though it has at last admitted Wagner's dramas +into its repertory, one can no longer consider these works, half a +century old, to be in the vanguard of music. The most esteemed masters +of the French school, such as Massenet, Reyer, Chausson, and Vincent +d'Indy, had to seek refuge in the Théâtre de la Monnaie at Brussels +before they could get their works received at the Opera in Paris. And +the classical composers fare no better. Neither _Fidelio_ nor Gluck's +tragedies--with the exception of _Armide_, which was put on under +pressure of fashion--are represented; and when by chance they give +_Freischütz_ or _Don Juan_, one wonders if it would not have been better +to let them rest in oblivion, rather than treat them sacrilegiously by +adding, cutting, introducing ballets and new recitatives, and deforming +their style so as to bring them "up to date."[214] + +[Footnote 213: This is according to M. Rivet's report on the +_Beaux-Arts_ in 1906. The Opera employs 1370 people, and its expenses +are about 3,988,000 francs. The annual grant of the State comes to about +800,000 francs.] + +[Footnote 214: On the occasion of the revival of _Don Juan_ in 1902, the +_Revue Musicale_ counted up the pages that had been added to the +original score. They came to two hundred and twenty-eight.] + +In spite of the changes of taste and the campaign of the press, the +Opera has remained to this day as it was in the time of Meyerbeer and +Gounod and their disciples. But it would be foolish to pretend that it +has not its public. The receipts show well enough that _Faust_ is in +greater favour than _Siegfried_ or _Tristan_, not to speak of the more +recent works of the new French school, which cannot be acclimatised +there. + +Without doubt, the enormous stage at the Opera does not lend itself well +to modern musical dramas, which are intimate and concentrated, and would +be lost in its immense space, which is more adapted for formal +processions like the marches in the _Prophète_ and _Aïda_. Besides this, +there is the conventional acting of the majority of the singers, the +dull lifelessness of the choruses, the defective acoustics, and the +exaggerated utterance and gestures of the actors, demanded by the great +dimensions of the place--all of which is a serious obstacle to the +conception of a living and simple art. But the chief obstacle will +always lie in the very nature of such a theatre--a theatre of luxury and +vanity, created for a set of snobs, whose least interest is the music, +who have not enough intellect to create a fashion, but who servilely +follow every fashion after it is thirty years old. Such a theatre no +longer counts in the history of French music; and its next directors +will need a vast amount of ingenuity and energy to get a semblance of +life into such a dead colossus. + +But it is quite another affair with the Opéra-Comique. This theatre has +taken a very active part in the development of modern music. Without +renouncing its classic traditions, or its delightful repertory of the +old _opéra-comiques_, it has had understanding enough, under the +judicious management of M. Albert Carré, to hold itself open for any +interesting productions in dramatic music. It takes no side among the +different schools; and the representatives of the old-fashioned light +opera with their songs elbow the leaders of the advanced school. No +association has done more important work, among musical dramas as well +as musical comedies, during the last twenty years. In this theatre, +which produced _Carmen_ in 1875, _Manon_ in 1884, and the _Roi d'Ys_ in +1888, were played the principal dramas of M. Bruneau, as well as M. +Charpentier's _Louise_, M. Debussy's _Pelléas et Mélisande_, and M. +Dukas's _Ariane et Barbebleue_. It may seem astonishing that such works +should have found a place at the Opéra-Comique and not at the Opera. But +if two musical theatres of different kinds exist, one of which pretends +to have the monopoly of great art, while the other with a simpler and +more intimate character seeks only to please, it is always the latter +that has a better chance of development and of making new discoveries; +for the first is oppressed by traditions that become ever stiffer and +more pedantic, while the other with its simplicity and lack of +pretension is able to accommodate itself to any manner of life. How many +artists have revolutionised their times while they were merely looked +upon as people who amused! Frescobaldi and Philipp Emanuel Bach brought +fresh life to art, but were scorned by the so-called representatives of +fine art; Mozart's _opere buffe_ have more of truth and life in them +than his _opere serie_; and there is as much dramatic power in an +_opéra-comique_ like _Carmen_ as in all the repertory of grand Opera +to-day. And so the Opéra-Comique theatre has become the home of the +boldest experiments in musical drama. The most daring or the most +violent ventures into musical realism, after the manner of Charpentier +or Bruneau, and the subtle fantasies of a delicate art of dreams, like +that of Debussy, have found a welcome there. It has also been open to +various kinds of foreign art: Humperdinck's _Hänsel und Gretel_, Verdi's +_Falstaff_, the works of Puccini, Mascagni, and the young Italian +school, Richard Strauss's _Feuersnot_, Rimsky-Korsakow's +_Snégourotchka_, have all been played. And they have even given the +classic masterpieces of opera there: _Fidelio_, _Orfeo_, _Alceste_, the +two _Iphigénies_; and taken more pains with them and mounted them with +more pious zeal than they do at the Opera. The operas themselves are +more at home there, too, for the size of the theatre is more like that +of the eighteenth-century theatres. It is true that the stage rather +lacks depth; but the ingenuity of the director and the admirable scenic +artists he employs has succeeded in making one forget this defect, and +accomplished marvels. No theatre in Paris has more artistic staging, and +some of the scenery that has been designed lately is a masterpiece of +its kind. The Opéra-Comique has also the advantage of excellent +conductors, and one of them, M. Messager, who is now Director, has, by +his clever interpretations, greatly contributed to the success of the +works of the new school. + + +NEW MUSICAL INSTITUTIONS + + +1. _The Société Nationale_ + +Before 1870, French music had already in the Opera and the Opéra-Comique +(without counting the various endeavours of the Théâtre Lyrique) an +outlet which was nearly enough for the needs of her dramatic +productions. Even when musical taste was most decadent, the works of +Gounod, Ambroise Thomas, and Massé, had always upheld the name of French +_opéra-comique_. But what was almost entirely lacking was an outlet for +symphonic music and chamber-music. "Before 1870," wrote M. Saint-Saëns +in _Harmonie et Mélodie_, "a French composer who was foolish enough to +venture on to the ground of instrumental music had no other means of +getting his works performed than by himself arranging a concert for +them." Such was Berlioz's case; for he had to gather together an +orchestra and hire a room each time he wished to get a hearing for his +great symphonies. The financial result was often disastrous: the +performance of the _Damnation de Faust_ in 1846 was, for example, a +complete failure, and he had to give it up. The Conservatoire, which was +formerly more hospitable, rather reluctantly performed a portion of +_L'Enfance du Christ_; but it gave young composers no encouragement. + +The first man who attempted to make the symphony popular, M. Saint-Saëns +tells us in his _Portraits et Souvenirs_, was Seghers, a dissentient +member of the _Société des Concerts du Conservatoire_, who during +several years (1848-1854) was conductor of the _Société de +Sainte-Cécile_, which had its quarters in a room in the rue de la +Chaussée d'Antin. There he had performed Mendelssohn's _Symphonie +Italienne_, the overtures to _Tannhäuser_ and _Manfred_, Berlioz's +_Fuite en Égypte_, and Gounod's and Bizet's early, works. But lack of +money cut short his efforts. + +Pasdeloup took up the work. After having been conductor for the _Société +des jeunes artistes du Conservatoire_ since 1851, in the Salle Herz, he +founded, in 1861, at the Cirque d'Hiver, with the financial support of a +rich moneylender, the first _Concerts populaires de musique classique_. +Unhappily, says M. Saint-Saëns, Pasdeloup, even up to 1870, made an +almost exclusive selection of German classical works. He raised an +impenetrable barrier before the young French school, and the only French +works he played were symphonies by Gounod and Gouvy, and the overtures +of _Les Francs-Juges_ and _La Muette_. It was impossible to set up a +rival society against him; and an exclusive monopoly in music was, +therefore, held by him. According to M. Saint-Saëns he was a mediocre +musician, and had, in spite of his passion for music, "immense +incapacity." In _Harmonie et Mélodie_ M. Saint-Saëns says: "The few +chamber-music societies that existed were also closed to all new-comers; +their programmes only contained the names of undisputed celebrities, the +writers of classic symphonies. In those times one had really to be +devoid of all common sense to write music." + +A new generation was growing up, however,--a generation that was serious +and thoughtful, that was more attracted by pure music than by the +theatre, that was filled with a burning desire to found a national art. +To this generation M. Saint-Saëns and M. Vincent d'Indy belong. The war +of 1870 strengthened these ideas about music, and, while the war was +still raging, there sprang from them the _Société Nationale de Musique_. + +One must speak of this society with respect, for it was the cradle and +sanctuary of French art.[215] All that was great in French music from +1870 to 1900 found a home there. Without it, the greater part of the +works that are the honour of our music would never have been played; +perhaps they would not ever have been written. The Society possessed the +rare merit of being able to anticipate public opinion by ten or eleven +years, and in some ways it has formed the public mind and obliged it to +honour those whom the Society had already recognised as great musicians. + +[Footnote 215: The facts which follow are taken from the archives of the +_Société Nationale de Musique_, and have been given me by M. Pierre de +Bréville, the Society's secretary.] + +The two founders of the Society were Romaine Bussine, professor of +Singing at the Conservatoire, and M. Camille Saint-Saëns. And, following +their initiative, César Franck, Ernest Guiraud, Massenet, Garcin, +Gabriel Fauré, Henri Duparc, Théodore Dubois, and Taffanel, joined +forces with them, and at a meeting on 25 February, 1871, agreed to found +a musical society that should give hearings to the works of living +French composers exclusively. The first meetings were interrupted by the +doings of the Commune; but they began again in October, 1871. The +Society's early statutes were drawn up by Alexis de Castillon, a +military officer and a talented composer, who, after having served in +the war of 1870 at the head of the _mobiles_ of Eure-et-Loire, was one +of the founders of French chamber-music, and died prematurely in 1873, +aged thirty-five. It was these statutes, signed by Saint-Saëns, +Castillon, and Garcin, that gave the Society its title of _Société +Nationale de Musique_, and its device, "_Ars gallica_." This is what the +statutes say about the aims of the Society: + + "The aim of the Society is to aid the production and the + popularisation of all serious musical works, whether published or + unpublished, of French composers; to encourage and bring to light, + so far as is in its power, all musical endeavour, whatever form it + may take, on condition that there is evidence of high, artistic + aspiration on the part of the author.... It is in brotherly love, + with complete forgetfulness of self, and with the firm intention of + aiding one another as far as they can, that the members of the + Society will co-operate, each in his own sphere of action, for the + study and performance of the works which they shall be called upon + to select and to interpret." + +The first Committee was made up as follows: President, Bussine; +Vice-President, Saint-Saëns; Secretary, Alexis de Castillon; +Under-Secretary, Jules Garcin; Treasurer, Lenepveu. The members of the +Committee were: César Franck, Théodore Dubois, E. Guiraud, Fissot, +Bourgault-Ducoudray, Fauré, and Lalo. + +The first concert was given on 25 November, 1871, in the Salle Pleyel; +and it is worthy of note that the first work played was a trio of César +Franck's. Since then the Society has given three hundred and fifty +performances of chamber-music or orchestral works. The best known French +composers and virtuosi have taken part as executants, among others: +César Franck, Saint-Saëns, Massenet, Bizet, Vincent d'Indy, Fauré, +Chabrier, Guiraud, Debussy, Lekeu, Lamoureux, Chevillard, Taffanel, +Widor, Messager, Diémer, Sarasate, Risler, Cortot, Ysaye, etc. And among +the compositions that have been played for the first time it is enough +to mention the following: + +César Franck: Nearly the whole of his works, including his Sonata, Trio, +Quartette, Quintette, Symphonic Variations, Preludes and Fugues, Mass, +_Rédemption_, _Psyche_, and a part of _Les Béatitudes_. + +Saint-Saëns: _Phaéton_, _Second Symphony_, Sonatas, Persian Melodies, +the _Rapsodie d'Auvergne_, and a quartette. + +Vincent d'Indy: The trilogy of _Wallenstein_, the _Poême des Montagues_, +the _Symphonie sur un thème montagnard_, and quartettes. + +Chabrier: Part of _Gwendoline_. + +Lalo: Fragments of the _Roi d'Ys_, Rhapsodies and Symphonies. + +Bruneau: _Penthésilée_, _La Belle au Bois Dormant_. + +Chausson: _Viviane_, _Hélène_, _La Tempête_, a quartette and a symphony. + +Debussy: _La Damoiselle élue_, the _Prélude à l'après-midi d'un faune_, +a quartette, pieces for the pianoforte, and melodies. + +Dukas: _L'Apprenti Sorcier_, and a sonata for the pianoforte. + +Lekeu: _Andromède_. + +Alberic Magnard: Symphonies and a quartette. + +Ravel: _Schéhérazade_, _Histoires Naturelles_, etc. + +Saint-Saëns was director with Bussine until 1886. But from 1881 the +influence of Franck and his disciples became more and more felt; and +Saint-Saëns began to lose interest in the efforts of the new school. In +1886 there was a division of opinion about a proposition of Vincent +d'Indy's to introduce the works of classical masters and foreign +composers into the programmes. This proposition was adopted; but +Saint-Saëns and Bussine sent in their resignations. Franck then became +the true president, although he refused the title; and after his death, +in 1890, Vincent d'Indy took his place. Under these two directors a +quite important place was given to old and classical music by composers +such as Palestrina, Vittoria, Josquin, Bach, Händel, Rameau, Gluck, +Beethoven, Schumann, Liszt, and Brahms. Foreign contemporary music only +occupied a very limited place. Wagner's name only appears once, in a +transcription of the _Venusberg_ for the pianoforte; and Richard +Strauss's name figures only against his Quartette. Grieg had his hour of +popularity there about 1887, as well as the Russians--Moussorgski, +Borodine, Rimsky-Korsakow, Liadow, and Glazounow--whom M. Debussy has +perhaps helped to make known to us. At the present moment the Society +seems more exclusively French than ever; and the influence of M. Vincent +d'Indy and the school of Franck is predominant. That is only natural; +the _Société Nationale_ most truly earned its title to glory by +discerning César Franck's genius; for the Society was a little sanctuary +where the great artist was honoured at a time when he was ignored or +laughed at by the rest of the world. This character of a sanctuary was +kept even after victory. In its general programme of 1903-1904, the +Society reminded us with pride that it had remained faithful to the +promises made in 1871; and it added that if, in order to permit its +members to keep abreast of the general progress of art, it had little by +little allowed classical masterpieces and modern foreign works of +interest on its programmes, it had, however, always kept its +guest-chamber open, and shaped many a future reputation there. + +Nothing is truer. The _Société Nationale_ is indeed a guest-chamber, +where for the past thirty years a guest-chamber art and guest-chamber +opinions have been formed; and from it some of the profoundest and most +poetic French music has been derived, such as Franck's and Debussy's +chamber-music. But its atmosphere is becoming daily more rarefied. That +is a danger. It is to be feared that this art and thought may be +absorbed by the decadent subtleties or pedantic scholasticism which is +apt to accompany all coteries--in short, that its music will be +salon-music rather than chamber-music. Even the Society itself seems to +have felt this at times; and at different periods has sought contact +with the general public, and put itself into direct communication with +it. "It becomes more and more necessary," wrote M. Saint-Saëns, "that +French composers should find something intermediate between an intimate +hearing of their music and a performance of it before the general +public--something which would not be a speculative thing like a big +concert, but which would be analogous to the artistic attraction of an +exhibition of painting, and which would dare everything. It is a new aim +for the _Société Nationale_." But it does not seem that it has yet +attained this goal, nor that it is near attaining it, despite some not +quite happy attempts. + +But at least the _Société Nationale_ has gloriously achieved the task it +set itself. In thirty years it has created in Paris a little centre of +earnest composers of symphonies and chamber-music, and a cultured public +that seems able to understand them. + + * * * * * + + +2. _The Grand Symphony Concerts_ + +Although it was an urgent matter that young French composers should +unite to withstand the general indifference of the public, it was more +urgent still that that indifference should be attacked, and that music +should be brought within reach of ordinary people. It was a matter of +taking up and completing Pasdeloup's work in a more artistic and more +modern spirit. + +A publisher of music, Georges Hartmann, feeling the forces that were +drawing together in French art, gathered about him the greater part of +the talented men of the young school--Franck, Bizet, Saint-Saëns, +Massenet, Delibes, Lalo, A. de Castillon, Th. Dubois, Guiraud, Godard, +Paladilhe, and Joncières--and undertook to produce their works in +public. He rented the Odéon theatre, and got together an orchestra, the +conductorship of which he entrusted to M. Édouard Colonne. And on 2 +March, 1873, the _Concert National_ was inaugurated in a musical +matinée, where M. Saint-Saëns played his _Concerto in G minor_ and Mme. +Viardot sang Schubert's _Roi des Aulnes_. In the first year six ordinary +concerts were given, and, besides that, two sacred concerts with choirs, +at which César Franck's _Rédemption_ and Massenet's _Marie-Magdeleine_ +were performed. In 1874 the Odéon was abandoned for the Châtelet. This +venture attracted some attention, and the concerts were patronised by +the public; but the financial results were not great.[216] Hartmann was +discouraged and wished to give the whole thing up. But M. Édouard +Colonne conceived the idea of turning his orchestra into a society, and +of continuing the work under the name of _Association Artistique_. Among +the artist-founders were MM. Bruneau, Benjamin Godard, and Paul +Hillemacher. Its early days were full of struggle; but owing to the +perseverance of the Association all obstacles were finally overcome. In +1903 a festival was held to celebrate its thirtieth anniversary. During +these thirty years it had given more than eight hundred concerts, and +had performed the works of about three hundred composers, of which half +were French. The four composers most frequently heard at the Châtelet +were Saint-Saëns, Wagner, Beethoven, and Berlioz.[217] + +[Footnote 216: It must be remembered that the prices of the seats were +much cheaper than they are to-day; the best were only three francs.] + +[Footnote 217: There were about 340 performances of Saint-Saëns' works, +380 of Wagner's, 390 of Beethoven's, and 470 of Berlioz's. I owe these +details to the kind information of M. Charles Malherbe and M. Léon +Petitjean, the secretary of the Colonne concerts.] + +Berlioz is almost the exclusive property of the Châtelet. Not only have +they performed his works there more frequently than anywhere else,[218] +but they are better understood there than in other places. The Colonne +orchestra and its conductor, gifted with great warmth of spirit,--though +it is sometimes a little intemperate--are rather bothered by works of a +classic nature and by those that show contemplative feeling; but they +give wonderful expression to Berlioz's tumultuous romanticism, his +poetic enthusiasm, and the bright and delicate colouring of his +paintings and his musical landscapes. Although Berlioz has his place at +the Chevillard and Conservatoire concerts, it is to the Châtelet that +his followers flock; and their enthusiasm has not been affected by the +campaign that for several years has been directed against Berlioz by +some French critics under the influence of the younger musical +party--the followers of d'Indy and Debussy. + +[Footnote 218: The _Damnation de Faust_ alone was given in its entirety +a hundred and fifty times in thirty years.] + +It is also at the Châtelet that the keenest musical passion has been +preserved in the public, even to this day. Thanks to the size of the +theatre, which is one of the largest in Paris, and to the great number +of cheap seats, you may always find there a number of young students who +make the most interested kind of public possible. And the music is +something more than a pleasure to them--it is a necessity. There are +some that make great sacrifices in order to have a seat at the Sunday +concerts. And many of these young men and women live all the week on the +thought of forgetting the world for a few hours in musical enjoyment. +Such a public did not exist in France before 1870. It is to the honour +of the Châtelet and the Pasdeloup concerts to have created it. + +Édouard Colonne has done more than educate musical taste in France; for +no one has worked harder than he to break down the barriers that +separated the French public from the art of other lands; and, at the +same time, he has himself helped to make French art known to +foreigners. When he himself was conducting concerts all over Europe he +entrusted the conductorship at the Châtelet to the great German +_Kapellmeister_ and to foreign composers--to Richard Strauss, Grieg, +Tschaikowsky, Hans Richter, Hermann Levi, Mottl, Nikisch, Mengelberg, +Siegfried Wagner, and many others. No other conductor has done so much +for Parisian music during the last thirty years; and we must not forget +it.[219] + +[Footnote 219: It is known that M. Colonne has now a helper in M. +Gabriel Pierné, who will succeed him when he retires.] + +The Lamoureux concerts have had from the beginning a very different +character from the Colonne concerts. That difference lies partly in the +personality of the two conductors, and partly in the fact that the +Lamoureux concerts, although of later date than the Colonne concerts by +less than ten years, represent a new generation in music. The progress +of the musical public was singularly rapid: hardly had they explored the +rich treasure-house of Berlioz's music than they were making discoveries +in the world of Wagner. And in that world they needed a new guide, who +had intimate knowledge of Wagner's art and of German art in general. +Charles Lamoureux was that guide. In 1873 he conducted special +performances of Bach and Händel, given by the _Societé de l'Harmonie +sacrée_. After leaving the conductorship of the Opera, he inaugurated, +on 21 October, 1881, at the Château-d'Eau theatre, the _Société des +Nouveaux Concerts_. These concerts had at first very comprehensive +programmes of every kind of music and every kind of school. At the +first concert there were works of Beethoven, Händel, Gluck, Sacchini, +Cimarosa, and Berlioz. In the first year Lamoureux had Beethoven's +_Ninth Symphony_ performed, as well as a large part of _Lohengrin_, and +numerous works of young French musicians. Various compositions of Lalo, +Vincent d'Indy, and Chabrier, were performed there for the first time. +But it was especially to the study of Wagner's works that Lamoureux most +gladly devoted himself. It was he who gave the first hearings of Wagner +in their entirety in France, such as the first and second act of +_Tristan_, in 1884-1885. The Wagnerian battle was still going on at that +time, as the notice printed at the head of the programme of _Tristan_ +shows. + + "The management of the _Société des Nouveaux Concerts_ is desirous + of avoiding any disturbance during the performance of the second + act of _Tristan_, and urgently and respectfully begs that the + audience will abstain from giving any mark of their approval or + disapproval before the end of the act." + +The same year, in the Eden theatre, to which the concerts had been +transferred, Lamoureux conducted, for the first time in Paris, the first +act of the _Walküre_. In these concerts the tenor, Van Dyck, made his +_début_; later, he was one of the leading performers at Bayreuth. In +1886-1887 Lamoureux rehearsed and conducted the only performance of +_Lohengrin_ at the Eden theatre. Disturbances in the streets prevented +further performances. Lamoureux then established himself in the +concert-room of the Cirque des Champs Élysées, where for eleven years he +has given what are called the _Concerts-Lamoureux_. He continued to +spread the knowledge of Wagner's works, and has sometimes had the help +of some of the most celebrated of the Bayreuth artists, among others, +that of Mme. Materna and Lilli Lehmann. At the end of the season of 1897 +Lamoureux wished to disband his orchestra in order to conduct concerts +abroad. But the members of the orchestra decided to remain together +under the name of the _Association des Concerts-Lamoureux_, with +Lamoureux's son-in-law, M. Camille Chevillard, as conductor. But +Lamoureux was not long before he returned to the conductorship of the +concerts, which had now returned to the Château-d'Eau theatre; and a few +months before his death, in 1899, he conducted the first performance of +_Tristan_ at the Nouveau theatre. And so he had the happiness of being +present at the complete triumph of the cause for which he had fought so +stubbornly for nearly twenty years.[220] + +[Footnote 220: My statements may be verified by the account published in +the _Revue Éolienne_ of January, 1902, by M. Léon Bourgeois, secretary +of the Committee of the _Association des Concerts-Lamoureux_.] + +Lamoureux's performances of Wagner's works have been among the best that +have ever been given. He had a regard for the work as a whole and a care +for its details, to which the Colonne orchestra did not quite attain. On +the other hand, Lamoureux's defect was the exuberant liveliness with +which he interpreted compositions of a romantic nature. He did not fully +understand these works; and although he knew much more about classic art +than his rival, he rendered its letter rather than its spirit, and paid +such sedulous attention to detail that music like Beethoven's lost its +intensity and its life. But both his talents and his defects fitted him +to be an excellent interpreter of the young neo-Wagnerian school, the +principal representatives of which in France were then M. Vincent d'Indy +and M. Emmanuel Chabrier. Lamoureux had need, to a certain extent, to be +himself directed either by the living traditions of Bayreuth, or by the +thought of modern and living composers; and the greatest service he +rendered to French music was his creation, thanks to his extreme care +for material perfection, of an orchestra that was marvellously equipped +for symphonic music. + +This seeking for perfection has been carried on by his successor, M. +Camille Chevillard, whose orchestra is even more refined still. One may +say, I think, that it is to-day the best in Paris. M. Chevillard is more +attracted by pure music than Lamoureux was; and he rightly finds that +dramatic music has been occupying too large a place in Parisian +concerts. In a letter published by the _Mercure de France_, in January, +1903, he reproaches the educators of public taste with having fostered a +liking for opera, and with not having awakened a respect for pure music: +"Any four bars from one of Mozart's quartettes have," he says, "a +greater educational value than a showy scene from an opera." No one in +Paris conducts classic works better than he, especially the works that +possess clean, plastic beauty; and in Germany itself it would be +difficult to find anyone who would give a more delicate interpretation +of some of Händel's and Mozart's symphonic works. His orchestra has +kept, moreover, the superiority that it had already acquired in its +repertory of Wagner's works. But M. Chevillard has communicated a warmth +and energy of rhythm to it that it did not possess before. His +interpretations of Beethoven, even if they are somewhat superficial, are +very full of life. Like Lamoureux, he has hardly caught the spirit of +French romantic works--of Berlioz, and still less of Franck and his +school; and he seems to have but lukewarm sympathy for the more recent +developments of French music. But he understands well the German +romantic composers, especially Schumann, for whom he has a marked +liking; and he tried, though without great success, to introduce Liszt +and Brahms into France, and was the first among us to attract real +attention to Russian music, whose brilliant and delicate colouring he +excels in rendering. And, like M. Colonne, he has brought the great +German _Kapellmeister_ among us--Weingartner, Nikisch, and Richard +Strauss, the last mentioned having directed the first performance in +Paris of his symphonic poems, _Zarathustra_, _Don Quixote_, and +_Heldenleben_, at the Lamoureux concerts. + +Nothing could have better completed the musical education of the public +than this continuous defile, for the past ten years, of _Kapellmeister_ +and foreign virtuosi, and the comparisons that their different styles +and interpretations afforded. Nothing has better helped forward the +improvement of Parisian orchestras than the emulation brought about by +the meetings between Parisian conductors and those of other countries. +At present our own conductors are worthy rivals of the best in Germany. +The string instruments are good; the wood has kept its old French +superiority; and though the brass is still the weakest part of our +orchestras, it has made great progress. One may still criticise the +grouping of orchestras at concerts, for it is often defective; there is +a disproportion between the different families of instruments and, in +consequence, between their different sonorities, some of which are too +thin and others too dull. But these defects are fairly common all over +Europe to-day. Unhappily, more peculiar to France is the insufficiency +or poor quality of the choirs, whose progress has been far from keeping +pace with that of the orchestras. It is to this side of music that the +directors of concerts must now bring their efforts to bear. + +The Lamoureux Concerts have not had as stable a dwelling-place as the +Châtelet Concerts. They have wandered about Paris from one room to +another--from the Cirque d'Hiver to the Cirque d'Été, and from the +Château-d'Eau to the Nouveau Théâtre. At the present moment they are in +the Salle Gaveau, which is much too small for them. In spite of the +progress of music and musical taste, Paris has not yet a concert-hall, +as the smallest provincial towns in Germany have; and this shameful +indifference, unworthy of the artistic renown of Paris, obliges the +symphonic societies to take refuge in circuses or theatres, which they +share with other kinds of performers, though the acoustics of these +places are not intended for concerts. And so it happens that for six +years the Chevillard Concerts have been given at the back of a +music-hall, which has the same entrance, and which is only separated +from the concert-room by a small passage, so that the roaring choruses +of a _danse du venire_ may mingle with an adagio of Beethoven's or a +scene from the Tetralogy. Worse than this, the smallness of the place +into which these concerts have been crammed has been a serious obstacle +in the way of making them popular. Nevertheless, in the promenade and +galleries of the Nouveau Théâtre, in later years, arose what may be +called a little war over concertos. It was rather a curious episode in +the history of the musical taste of Paris, and merits a few words here. +In every country, but especially in those countries that are least +musical, a virtuoso profits by public favour, often to the detriment of +the work he is performing; for what is most liked in music is the +musician. The virtuoso--whose importance must not be underrated, and who +is worthy of honour when he is a reverential and sympathetic interpreter +of genius--has too often taken a lamentable part, especially in Latin +countries, in the degrading of musical taste; for empty virtuosity makes +a desert of art. The fashion of inept fantasias and acrobatic +variations has, it is true, gone by; but of late years virtuosity has +returned in an offensive way, and, sheltering itself under the solemn +classical name of "concertos," it usurped a place of rather exaggerated +importance in symphony concerts, and especially in M. Chevillard's +concerts--a place which Lamoureux would never have given it. Then the +younger and more enthusiastic part of the public began to revolt; and +very soon, with perfect impartiality and quite indiscriminately, began +to hiss famous and obscure virtuosi alike in their performance of any +concerto, whether it was splendid or detestable. Nothing found favour +with them--neither the playing of Paderewski, nor the music of +Saint-Saëns and the great masters. The management of the concerts went +its own way and tried in vain to put out the disturbers, and to forbid +them entry to the concert-room; and the battle went on for a long time, +and critics were drawn into it. But in spite of its ridiculous excesses, +and the barbarism of the methods by which the parterre expressed its +opinions, that quarrel is not without interest. It proved how a passion +and enthusiasm for music had been roused in France; and the passion, +though unjust in its expression, was more fruitful and of far greater +worth than indifference. + + * * * * * + +3. _The Schola Cantorum_ + +The Lamoureux Concerts had served their purpose, and, in their turn, +their heroic mission came to an end. They had forced Wagner on Paris; +and Paris, as always, had overshot the mark, and could swear by no one +but Wagner. French musicians were translating Gounod's or Massenet's +ideas into Wagner's style; Parisian critics repeated Wagner's theories +at random, whether they understood them or not--generally when they did +not understand them. A reaction was inevitable directly Paris was well +saturated with Wagner; and it came about in 1890, among a chosen few, +some of whom had been, and were even still, under Wagner's influence. It +was at first only a mild reaction, and showed itself in a return to the +classics of the past and to the great primitives in music. + +There had been several attempts in this direction before, but none of +them had succeeded in making any impression on the mass of the public. +In 1843, Joseph Napoléon Ney, Prince of Moszkowa, founded in Paris a +society for the performance of religious and classical vocal music. This +society, which the Prince himself conducted in his own house, set itself +to perform the vocal works of the sixteenth and seventeenth +centuries.[221] + +[Footnote 221: It published, in eleven volumes, the ancient works that +it performed. Before this experiment there had been the _Concerts +historiques de Fétis_, preceded by lectures, which were inaugurated in +1832, and failed; and these were followed by Amédée Méréaux's _Concerts +historiques_ in 1842-1844.] + +In 1853, Louis Niedermeyer founded in Paris an _École de musique +religieuse et classique_, which strove "to form singers, organists, +choir-masters, and composers of music, by the study of the classic works +of the great masters of the fifteenth, sixteenth, and seventeenth +centuries." This school, subsidised by the State, was a nursery for +some real musicians. It reckoned among its pupils some noted composers, +conductors, organists, and historians; among others, M. Gabriel Fauré, +M. André Messager, M. Eugène Gigout, and M. Henry Expert. M. Saint-Saëns +was a professor there, and became its president. Nearly five hundred +organists, choir-masters, and professors of music of the Conservatoire +and other French colleges were trained there. But this school, serious +in intention, and a refuge for the classic spirit in the midst of the +prevailing bad taste, did not trouble itself about influencing the +public, and, in fact, almost ignored it. + +Lamoureux attempted in 1873 to perform the great choral works of Bach +and Händel; and in 1878 the celebrated French organist, M. Alexandre +Guilmant, ventured to give concerts at the Trocadéro for the organ and +orchestra, which were devoted to religious music of the seventeenth and +eighteenth centuries. But the deplorable acoustics of the concert-room +had a prejudicial effect on the works that were performed there; and the +public did not respond very warmly to M. Guilmant's efforts, and seemed +from the first only to find an historical interest in the masterpieces, +and to miss their depth and life altogether. + +Then a pupil of Franck's, M. Henry Expert, who began his admirable works +on Musical History in 1882, laid the foundation of the _Société J.S. +Bach_, in order to spread the knowledge of ancient music written between +the twelfth and eighteenth centuries. And he succeeded in interesting +in his undertaking, not only the principal French musicians, such as +César Franck, Saint-Saëns, and Gounod, but also foreigners, such as Hans +von Bülow, Tschaikowsky, Grieg, Sgambati, and Gevaert. Unhappily this +society never got farther than arranging what it wanted to do, and only +sketched out the plans that were realised later by Charles Bordes. + +The general public were not really interested in the art of the old +musicians until the _Association des Chanteurs de Saint-Gervais_ was +founded in 1892 by Charles Bordes, the choirmaster of the church of +Saint-Gervais. The immediate success and the noisy renown of the Society +were due to other things besides the talent of its conductor, who +combined with a lively artistic intelligence both common-sense and +energy and a remarkable gift for organisation--it was due partly to the +help of favourable circumstances, partly to the surfeit of Wagnerism, of +which I have just spoken, and partly to the birth of a new religious +art, which had sprung up since the death of César Franck round the +memory of that great musician. + +It is not my intention here to write an appreciation of César Franck's +genius, but it is not possible to understand the musical movement in +Paris of the last fifteen years if one does not take into account the +importance of his teaching. The organ class at the Conservatoire, where +in 1872 Franck succeeded his old master Benoist, was for a long time, as +M. Vincent d'Indy says, "the true centre for the study of Composition +at the Conservatoire. Many of his fellow-workers could never bring +themselves to look upon him as one of themselves, because he had the +boldness to see in art something other than the means of earning a +living. Indeed, César Franck was not of them; and they made him feel +this." But the young students made no mistake about the matter. "At this +time," M. d'Indy also tells us,[222] "that is to say from 1872 to 1876, +the three courses of Advanced Musical Composition were given by three +professors who were not at all fitted for their work. One was Victor +Massé, a composer of simple light operas and a man with no understanding +of a symphony, who was very frequently ill and had to entrust his +teaching to one of his pupils; another was Henri Reber, an oldish +musician with narrow and dogmatic ideas; and the third was François +Bazin, who was not capable of distinguishing in his pupil's fugues a +false answer from a true one, and whose highest title to glory is +derived from a composition called _Le Voyage en Chine_. So it is not +surprising that César Franck's teaching, founded on that of Bach and +Beethoven, but admitting, as well, imagination and all new and liberal +ideas, did, at that time, draw to him all young minds that had lofty +ambitions and that were really in love with their art. And so, quite +unconsciously, the master attracted to himself all the sincere and +artistic talent that was scattered about the different classes of the +Conservatoire, as well as that of his outside pupils." + +[Footnote 222: The following information was given by M. Vincent d'Indy +at a lecture held on 20 February, 1903, at the _École des Hautes Études +sociales_--a lecture which later became a chapter in M. d'Indy's book, +_César Franck_ (1906).] + +Among those who received his direct teaching[223] were Henri Duparc, +Alexis de Castillon, Vincent d'Indy, Ernest Chausson, Pierre de +Bréville, Augusta Holmes, Louis de Serres, Charles Bordes, Guy Ropartz, +and Guillaume Lekeu. And if to these we add the pupils in the organ +classes, who also came under his influence, we have, among others, +Samuel Rousseau, Gabriel Pierné, Auguste Chapuis, Paul Vidal, and +Georges Marty; and also the virtuosi who were for some time intimate +with him, such as Armand Parent and Eugène Ysaye, to whom Franck +dedicated his violin sonata. And if one thinks, too, of the artists who, +though not his pupils, felt his power--artists such as Gabriel Fauré, +Alexandre Guilmant, Emmanuel Chabrier, and Paul Dukas--one may see that +nearly the whole musical generation of Paris of that time took its +inspiration from César Franck. And it was largely with the intention of +perpetuating his teaching that his pupils, Charles Bordes and Vincent +d'Indy, and his friend, Alexandre Guilmant, founded in 1894, four years +after his death, the _Schola Cantorum_, which has kept his memory alive +ever since. + +"Our revered father, Franck," said Vincent d'Indy, in a speech, "is in +some ways the grandfather of the _Schola Cantorum_; for it is his system +of teaching that we apply and try to carry on here."[224] + +[Footnote 223: A complete list may be found in M. d'Indy's book.] + +[Footnote 224 2: _Tribune de Saint-Gervais_, November, 1900.] + +The influence of Franck was twofold: it was artistic and moral. On the +one hand he was, if I may so put it, an admirable professor of musical +architecture; he founded a school of symphony and chamber-music such as +France had never had before, which in certain directions was newer and +more daring than that of the German symphony writers. And, on the other +hand, he exercised by his own character a memorable influence over all +those who came into contact with him. His profound faith, that fine, +indulgent, and calm faith, shone round him like a glory. The Catholic +party, who were awakening to new life in France just then, tried, after +his death, to identify his ideals with their own. But this was, as we +have said elsewhere,[225] to narrow Franck's mind; for its great charm +lay in its harmonious union of religion and liberty, which never limited +its artistic sympathies to an exclusive ideal. The composer's son, M. +Georges César-Franck, has in vain protested against this monopoly of his +father, and says: + + "According to certain writers, who wish to reduce everything to a + dead level and deduce all things from a single cause, César Franck + was a mystic whose true domain was religious music. Nothing could + be wider of the mark. The public is given to generalisations, and + is too easily gulled. They will judge a composer on a single work, + or a group of works, and class him once and for all.... In + reality, my father was a man of all-round accomplishments. As a + finished musician, he was master of every form of composition. He + wrote both religious and secular music--melodies, dances, + pastorales, oratorios, symphonic poems, symphonies, sonatas, trios, + and operas. He did not confine his attention to any particular kind + of work to the exclusion of other kinds; he was able to express + himself in any way he chose."[226] + + +But as what was really religious in him found itself in agreement with a +current of thought that was rather powerful at that time, it was +inevitable that this one side of his genius should be first brought to +light, and that religious music should be the first to benefit by his +work. And also one of the early manifestos[227] of the _Schola Cantorum_ +dealt with the reform of sacred music by carrying it back to great +ancient models; and its first decision was as follows: "Gregorian chant +shall rest for all time the fountain-head and the base of the Church's +music, and shall constitute the only model by which it may be truly +judged."[228] + +[Footnote 225: See the Essay on _Vincent d'Indy_.] + +[Footnote 226: _Revue d'histoire et de critique musicale_, +August-September, 1901.] + +[Footnote 227: "The _Schola Cantorum_ aims at creating a modern music +truly worthy of the Church" (First number of the _Tribune de +Saint-Gervais_, the monthly bulletin of the _Schola Cantorum_, January, +1895).] + +[Footnote 228: The Schola had in mind here the vigorous work of the +French Benedictines, which had been done in silence for the past fifty +years; it was thinking, too, of the restoration of the Gregorian chant +during 1850 and 1860 by Dom Guéranger, the first abbot of Solesmes, a +work continued by Dom Jausions and Dom Pothier, the abbot of +Saint-Wandrille, who published in 1883 the _Mélodies Grégoriennes_, the +_Liber Gradualis_, and the _Liber Antiphonarius_. This work was finally +brought to a happy conclusion by Dom Schmitt, and Dom Mocqucreau, the +prior of Solesmes, who in 1889 began his monumental work, the +_Paléo-graphie Musicals_, of which nine volumes had appeared in 1906. +This great Benedictine school is an honour to France by the scientific +work it has lately done in music. The school is at present exiled from +France.] + +They added to this, however, music _à la Palestrina_, and any music +that conformed to its principles or was inspired by its example. Such +archaic ideas would certainly never create a new kind of religious +music, but at least they have helped to restore the old art; and they +received their official consecration in the famous letter written by +Pope Pius X on the Re-form of Sacred Music. + +The achievement of an artistic ideal so restricted as this would not +have sufficed, however, to assure the success of the _Schola Cantorum_, +nor establish its authority with a public that was, whatever people may +say, only lukewarm in its religion, and that would only interest itself +in the religious art of other days as it would in a passing fashion. But +the spirit of curiosity and the meaning of modern life began to weigh +little by little with the Schola's principles. After singing +Palestrinian and Gregorian chants at the Church of Saint-Gervais during +Holy Week, they played Carissimi, Schütz, and the Italian and German +masters of the seventeenth century. Then came Bach's cantatas; and their +performance, given by M. Bordes in the Salle d'Harcourt, attracted large +audiences and started the cult of this master in Paris. Then they sang +Rameau and Gluck; and, finally, all ancient music, sacred or secular, +was approved. And so this little school, which had been consecrated to +the cult of ancient religious music, and had made so modest a +beginning,[229] developed into a School of Art capable of satisfying +modern wants; and in 1900, when M. Vincent d'Indy became president of +the _Schola_, it was decided to move the school into larger premises in +the Rue Saint-Jacques. + +The programme of this new school was explained by M. Vincent d'Indy in +his Inauguration speech on 2 November, 1900, and showed how he based the +foundations of musical teaching upon history. + + "Art, in its journey across the ages, is a microcosm which has, + like the world itself, successive stages of youth, maturity, and + old age; but it never dies--it renews itself perpetually. It is not + like a perfect circle; it is like a spiral, and in its growth is + always mounting higher. I believe in making students follow the + same path that art itself has followed, so that they shall undergo + during their term of study the same transformations that music + itself has undergone during the centuries. In this way they will + come out much better armed for the difficulties of modern art, + since they will have lived, so to speak, the life of art, and + followed the natural and inevitable order of the forms that made up + the different epochs of artistic development." + +[Footnote 229: When Charles Bordes opened the first _Schola Cantorum_ in +the Rue Stanislas he was without help or resources, and had exactly +thirty-seven francs and fifty centimes in hand. I mention this detail to +give an idea of the splendidly courageous and confident spirit that +Charles Bordes possessed.] + +M. d'Indy claims that this system may be applied as successfully to +instrumentalists and singers as to future composers. "For it is as +profitable for them to know," he says, "how to sing a liturgic monody +properly, or to be able to play a Corelli sonata in a suitable style, as +it is for composers to study the structure of a motet or a suite." M. +d'Indy, moreover, obliged all students, without distinction, to attend +the lectures on vocal music; and, besides that, he instituted a special +class to teach the conducting of orchestras--which was something quite +new to France. His object, as he clearly said, was to give a new form to +modern music by means of a knowledge of the music of the past. + +On this subject he says: + + "Where shall we find the quickening life that will give us fresh + forms and formulas? The source is not really difficult to discover. + Do not let us seek it anywhere but in the decorative art of the + plain-song singers, in the architectural art of the age of + Palestrina, and in the expressive art of the great Italians of the + seventeenth century. It is there, and _there alone_, that we shall + find melodic craft, rhythmic cadences, and a harmonic magnificence + that is really new--if our modern spirit can only learn how to + absorb their nutritious essence. And so I prescribe for all pupils + in the School the careful study of classic forms, because _they + alone_ are able to give the elements of a new life to our music, + which will be founded on principles that are sane, solid, and + trustworthy."[230] + +[Footnote 230: _Tribune de Saint-Gervais_, November, 1900.] + +This fine and intelligent eclecticism was likely to develop a critical +spirit, but was rather less adapted to form original personalities. In +any case, however, it was excellent discipline in the formation of +musical taste; and, in truth, the _École Supérieure de musique_ of the +Rue Saint-Jacques became a new Conservatoire, both more modern and more +learned than the old Conservatoire, and freer, and yet less free, +because more self-satisfied. The school developed very quickly. From +having twenty-one pupils in 1896, it had three hundred and twenty in +1908. Eminent musicians and professors learned in the history and +science of music taught there, and M. d'Indy himself took the +Composition classes.[231] And in its short career the _Schola_ may +already be credited with the training of young composers, such as MM. +Roussel, Déodat de Séverac, Gustave Bret, Labey, Samazeuilh, R. de +Castéra, Sérieyx, Alquier, Coindreau, Estienne, Le Flem, and Groz; and +to these may be added M. d'Indy's private pupils, Witkowski, and one of +the foremost of modern composers, Alberic Magnard. + + +[Footnote 231: There are actually nine courses of Composition at the +_Schola_--five for men and four for women. M. d'Indy takes eight of +them, as well as a mixed class for orchestra.] + +Outside the influence that the School exercises by its teaching, its +propaganda by means of concerts and publications is very active. From +its foundation up to 1904 it had given two hundred performances in one +hundred and thirty provincial towns; more than one hundred and fifty +concerts in Paris, of which fifty were of orchestral and choral music, +sixty of organ music, and forty of chamber-music. These concerts have +been well attended by enthusiastic and appreciative audiences, and have +been a school for public taste. One does not look for perfect execution +there,[232] but for intelligent interpretations and a thirst for a +fuller knowledge of the great works of the past. They have revived +Monteverde's _Orfeo_ and his _Incoronazione di Poppea_, which had been +forgotten these three centuries; and it was following an interest +created by repeated performances of Rameau at the _Schola_[233] that +_Dardanus_ was performed at Dijon under M. d'Indy's direction, _Castor +et Pollux_ at Montpellier under M. Charles Bordes' direction, and that +in 1908 the Opera at Paris gave _Hippolyte et Aricie_. Branches of the +_Schola_ have, been started at Lyons, Marseilles, Bordeaux, Avignon, +Montpellier, Nancy, Épinal, Montluçon, Saint-Chamond, and +Saint-Jean-deLuz.[234] A publishing house has been associated with the +School at Paris; and from this we get Reviews, such as the _Tribune de +Saint-Gervais_; publications of old music, such as the _Anthologie des +maîtres religieux primitifs des XVe, XVIe, et XVIIe siècles_, edited by +Charles Bordes; the _Archives des maîtres de l'orgue des XVIe, XVIIe, et +XVIIIe siècles_, edited by Alexandre Guilmant and André Pirro; the +_Concerts spirituels de la Schola_, the new editions of _Orfeo_, and the +_Incoronazione di Poppea_, edited by M. Vincent d'Indy; and publications +of modern music, such as the _Collection du chant populaire_, the +_Répertoire moderne de musique vocale et d'orgue_, and, notably, the +_Édition mutuelle_, published by the composers themselves, whose +property it is. + +[Footnote 232: The orchestra is mainly composed of pupils; and, by a +generous arrangement, the financial profits from rehearsals and +performances are divided among the pupils who take part in them, and +credited to their account. And so besides the exhibitioners the _Schola_ +has a great number of pupils who are not well off, but who manage by +these concerts to defray almost the entire expenses of their education +there. "The concerts serve more especially as aesthetic exercises for +the pupils, and as a means of according them teaching at small expense +to themselves." I owe this information and all that precedes it to the +kindness of M. J. de la Laurencie, the general secretary of the +_Schola_, whom I should like to thank.] + +[Footnote 233: The _Schola_ has even performed, in an open-air theatre, +Ramcau's _La Guirlande_.] + +[Footnote 234: One may add to this list the choral societies of Nantes +and Besançon, which are bodies of the same order as the _Chanteurs de +Saint-Gervais_. And we may also attribute to the influence of the +_Schola_ an independent society, the _Société J.S. Bach_, started in +Paris by an old _Schola_ pupil, M. Gustave Bret, which, since 1905, has +devoted itself to the performance of the great works of Bach. It is not +one of the least merits of the _Schola_ that it has helped to form good +amateur choirs of the same type as the choral societies of Germany.] + +And all this shows such a marvellous activity and gives evidence of such +whole-hearted enthusiasm that I cannot bring myself to join issue with +the critics who have lately attacked the _Schola_, though their attacks +have been in some degree merited. Pettiness is to be found even in great +artists, and imperfection in every human work; and defects reveal +themselves most clearly after a victory has been won. The _Schola_ has +not escaped the critical periods that accompany growth, through which +every work must pass if it is to triumph and endure. Without doubt, the +sudden illness and premature retirement of the founder of the work, M. +Charles Bordes, deprived the _Schola_ of one of its most active +forces--a force that was perhaps necessary for the school's successful +development. For this man had been the school's life and soul, and +retired, worn out by the heavy labours which he had borne alone during +ten years.[235] + +[Footnote 235: M. Charles Bordes did not even then give up his labours +altogether. Though obliged to retire to the south of France for his +health's sake, he founded, in November, 1905, the _Schola_ of +Montpellier. This _Schola_ has given about fifteen concerts a year, and +has performed some of Bach's cantatas, scenes from Rameau's and Gluck's +operas, Franck's oratorios, and Monteverde's _Orfeo_. In 1906 M. Bordes +organised an open-air performance of Rameau's _Guirlande_. In January, +1908, he produced _Castor et Pollux_ at the Montpellier theatre. The +man's activity was incredible, and nothing seemed to tire him. He was +planning to start a dramatic training-school at Montpellier for the +production of seventeenth and eighteenth century operas, when he died, +in November, 1909, at the age of forty-four, and so deprived French art +of one of its best and most unselfish servants.] + +But M. d'Indy, like a courageous apostle, has continued the direction of +the _Schola_ with a firm hand and unwearying care, despite his varied +activities as composer, professor, and _Kapellmeister_; and he is one of +the surest and most reliable guides for a young school of French music. +And if his mind is rather given to abstractions, and his moods are +sometimes rather combative, and certain prejudices (which are not always +musical ones) make him lean towards ideals of reason and immovable +faith--and if at times his followers unconsciously distort his ideas, +and try to dam the stream which flows from life itself, I am convinced +it is only the passing evidence of a reaction, perhaps a natural one, +against the exaggerations they have encountered, and that the _Schola_ +will always know how to avoid the rocks where revolutionaries of the +past have run aground and become the conservatives of the morrow. I hope +the _Schola_ will never grow into the kind of aristocratic school that +builds walls about itself, but will always open wide its doors and +welcome every new force in music, even to such as have ideals opposed to +its own. Its future renown and the well-being of French art can only +thus be maintained. + + * * * * * + +4. _The Chamber-Music Societies_ + + +On parallel lines with the big symphony concerts and the new +_conservatoires_, societies were formed to spread the knowledge of, and +form a taste for, chamber-music. This music, so common in Germany, was +almost unknown in Paris before 1870. There was nothing but the Maurin +Quartette, which gave five or six concerts every winter in the Salle +Pleyel, and played Beethoven's last quartettes there. But these +performances only attracted a small number of artists;[236] and so far +as the general public was concerned the _Société des derniers quartuors +de Beethoven_ had the reputation for devoting itself to a singular and +incomprehensible kind of music that had been written by a deaf man. + +[Footnote 236: The quality of the audience atoned, it is true, for its +small numbers. Berlioz used to come to these concerts with his friends, +Damcke and Stephen Heller; and it was after one of these performances, +when he had been very stirred by an _adagio_ in the E flat quartette, +that he burst out with, "What a man! He could do everything, and the +others nothing!"] + +The true founder of chamber-music concerts in Paris was M. Émile +Lemoine, who started the society called _La Trompette_. He has given us +a history of his work in the _Revue Musicale_ (15 October, 1903). He was +an engineer at the École Poly-technique; and after he had left school he +formed, about 1860, a quartette society of earnest amateurs, though they +were not very skilled performers. This little society continued to meet +regularly, and after perfecting itself little by little, finally opened +its doors to the general public, which attended the concerts in +gradually increasing numbers. Then _La Trompette_ came into being. It +prospered from the day that M. Saint-Saëns--who was at that time a young +man--made its acquaintance. He was pleased with these gatherings, and +became an intimate friend of Lemoine; and he interested himself in the +society, and induced other celebrated artists to take an interest in it, +too. Among its early friends were MM. Alphonse Duvernoy, Diémer, Pugno, +Delsart, Breitner, Delaborde, Ch. de Bériot, Fissot, Marsick, Loëb, +Rémy, and Holmann. With such patronage, _La Trompette_ soon acquired +fame in the musical world, and "it represented in classical +chamber-music the semi-official part played by the _Société des Concerts +du Conservatoire_ in classical orchestral music. Rubinstein, Paderewski, +Eugène d'Albert, Hans von Bülow, Arthur de Greef, Mme. Essipoff, and +Mme. Menter, never missed getting a hearing there when their tours led +them to Paris; and to figure on the programme of _La Trompette_ was like +the consecration of an artist." Such a society naturally contributed a +great deal to the spread of classical chamber-music in Paris. M. Lemoine +writes: + + "Classical music was so little known to the musical public that + even the audiences of _La Trompette_, cultured as they were, did + not at all understand Beethoven's last quartettes; and my friends + jeered at my taste for enigmas. This only made me the more + determined that they should hear one of these great works at each + concert. And sometimes I would give the same work at two or three + concerts running if I thought it had not been properly appreciated. + In that case I used to say before the performance: 'It seems to me + that such-and-such a work has not been quite understood at the last + hearing; and as it is a really marvellous work, I am sure that your + feeling is that you do not know it sufficiently. So I have included + it in to-day's programme.'"[237] + +[Footnote 237: The name, _La Trompette_, was also the pretext for +embellishing chamber-music, by introducing the trumpet among the other +instruments. To this end M. Saint-Saëns wrote his fine septette for +piano, trumpet, two violins, viola, violoncello, and double bass; and M. +Vincent d'Indy his romantic suite in D for trumpet, two flutes, and +string instruments.] + +These performances of sonatas, trios, and quartettes, were attentively +listened to by an audience of five or six hundred persons, the greater +part of them cultured people, students from the poly-technics and +universities, who formed the kernel of a very discerning and +enthusiastic public for chamber-music. + +By degrees, following the example of Émile Lemoine, other quartette +societies were formed; and at present they are so numerous that it would +be difficult to name them all. And then there sprang up the same spirit +of intelligent curiosity that had induced the French _Kapellmeister_ of +the symphony concert societies sometimes to introduce their German and +Russian colleagues as conductors; and for this purpose the _Nouvelle +Société Philharmonique de Paris_ was founded, in 1901, on the initiative +of Dr. Fränkel and under the direction of M. Emmanuel Rey, to give a +hearing in Paris to the principal foreign quartette players. And the +profit was as great in one case as in the other; and the friendly +rivalry between French quartette players and those of other countries +bore good fruit, and gave us a fuller understanding of the inner +character of German music. + + * * * * * + +5. _Musical Learning and the University_ + + +While this movement was going on in the artistic world, scholars were +taking their share in it, and music was beginning to invade the +University. + +But the thing was brought about with some difficulty; for among these +serious people music did not count as a serious study. Music was thought +of as an agreeable art, a social accomplishment, and the idea of making +it the subject of scientific teaching must have been received with some +amusement. Even up to the present time, general histories of Art have +refused to accord music a place, so little was thought of it; and other +arts were indignant at being mentioned in the same breath with it. This +is illustrated in the eternal dispute among M. Jourdain's masters, when +the fencing-master says: + + "And from this we know what great consideration is due to us in a + State; and how the science of Fencing is far above all useless + sciences, such as dancing and music." + +The first lectures on Aesthetics and Musical History were not given in +France until after the war of 1870.[238] They were then given at the +Conservatoire, and, until quite lately, were the only lectures on Music +of any importance in Paris. Since 1878 they have been given in a very +excellent way by M. Bourgault-Ducoudray; but, as is only natural in a +school of music, their character is artistic rather than scientific, and +takes the form of a sort of illustration of the practical work that is +done at the Conservatoire. And as for Parisian musical criticism as a +whole, it had, thirty years ago, an almost exclusively literary +character, and was without technical precision or historical knowledge. + +[Footnote 238: On 12 September, 1871, at the suggestion of Ambroise +Thomas. The first lecturer was Barbereau, who, however, only lectured +for a year. He was succeeded by Gautier, Professor of Harmony and +Accompaniment, who in turn was replaced, in 1878, by M. +Bourgault-Ducoudray.] + +There again, on the territory of science, as on that of art, a new +generation of musicians had sprung up since the war, a group of men +versed in the history and aesthetics of music such as France had never +known before. About 1890 the result of their labours began to appear. +Henry Expert published his fine work, _Maîtres Musiciens de la +Renaissance_, in which he revived a whole century of French music. +Alexander Guilmant and André Pirro brought to daylight the works of our +seventeenth and eighteenth century organists. Pierre Aubry studied +mediaeval music. The admirable publications of the Benedictines of +Solesmes awoke at the _Schola_ and in the world outside it a taste for +the study of religious music. Michel Brenet attacked all epochs of +musical history, and produced, by his solid learning, some fine work. +Julien Tiersot began the history of French folk-song, and rescued the +music of the Revolution from oblivion. The publisher Durand set to work +on his great editions of Rameau and Couperin. Towards 1893 the study of +Music was introduced at the Sorbonne by some young professors, who made +the subject the theses for their doctor's degree.[239] + +[Footnote 239: The first three theses on Music accepted at the Sorbonne +were those of M. Jules Combarieu on _The Relationship of Poetry and +Music_, of M. Romain Holland on _The Beginnings of Opera before Lully +and Scarlatti_, and of M. Maurice Emmanuel on _Greek Orchestics_. There +followed, several years afterwards, M. Louis Laloy's _Aristoxenus of +Tarento and Greek Music_ and M. Jules Écorcheville's _Musical +Aesthetics, from Lully to Rameau_ and _French Instrumental Music of the +Seventeenth Century_, M. André Pirro's _Aesthetics of Johann Sebastian +Bach_, and M. Charles Lalo's _Sketch of Scientific Musical +Aesthetics_.] + +This movement with regard to musical study grew rapidly; and the first +International Congress of Music, held in Paris at the time of the +Universal Exhibition of 1900, gave historians of music an opportunity of +realising their influence. In a few years, teaching about music was to +be had everywhere. At first there were the free lectures of M. Lionel +Dauriac and M. Georges Houdard at the Sorbonne, those of MM. Aubry, +Gastoué, Pirro, and Vincent d'Indy at the _Schola_ and the _Institut +Catholique_; and then, at the beginning of 1902, there was the little +Faculty of Music of the _École des Hautes Études sociales_, making a +centre for the efforts of French scholars of music; and, in 1900, two +official courses of lectures on Musical History and Aesthetics were +given at the College de France and the Sorbonne. + +The progress of musical criticism was just as rapid. Professors of +faculties, old pupils of the École Normale Supérieure, or the École des +Chartes, such as Henri Lichtenberger, Louis Laloy, and Pierre Aubrey, +examined works of the past, and even of the present, by the exact +methods of historical criticism. Choir-masters and organists of great +erudition, such as Andre Pirro and Gastoué, and composers like Vincent +d'Indy, Dukas, Debussy, and some others, analysed their art with the +confidence that the intimate knowledge of its practice brings. A +perfect efflorescence of works on music appeared. A galaxy of +distinguished writers and a public were found to support two separate +collections of Biographies of Musicians (which were issued at the same +time by different publishers), as well as five or six good musical +journals of a scientific character, some of which rivalled the best in +Germany. And, finally, the French section of the _Société Internationale +de Musique_, which was founded in 1899 in Berlin to establish +communication between the scholars of all countries, found so favourable +a ground with us that the number of its adherents in Paris alone is now +over one hundred. + + * * * * * + +6. _Music and the People_ + +Thus music had almost come back to its own, as far as the higher kind of +teaching and the intellectual world were concerned. It remained for a +place to be found for it in other kinds of teaching; for there, and +especially in secondary education, its advance was less sure. It +remained for us to make it enter into the life of the nation and into +the people's education. This was a difficult task, for in France art has +always had an aristocratic character; and it was a task in which neither +the State nor musicians were very interested. The Republic still +continued to regard music as something outside the people. There had +even been opposition shown during the last thirty years towards any +attempt at popular musical education. In the old days of the Pasdeloup +concerts one could pay seventy-five centimes for the cheapest places, +and have a seat for that; but at some of the symphony concerts to-day +the cheapest seats are two and four francs. And so the people that +sometimes came to the Pasdeloup concerts never come at all to the big +concerts to-day. + +And that is why one should applaud the enterprise of Victor Charpentier, +who, in March, 1905, founded a Symphonic Society of amateurs called +_L'Orchestre_, to give free hearings for the benefit of the people. And +in that Paris, where forty years ago one would have had a good deal of +trouble to get together two or three amateur quartettes, Victor +Charpentier has been able to count on one hundred and fifty good +performers,[240] who under his direction, or that of Saint-Saëns or +Gabriel Fauré, have already given seventeen free concerts, of which ten +were given at the Trocadéro.[241] It is to be hoped that the State will +help forward such a generous work for the people in a rather more +practical way than it has done up till now.[242] + +[Footnote 240: There are ninety violins, fifteen violas, and fifteen +violoncellos. Unfortunately it is much more difficult to get recruits +for the wood wind and brass.] + +[Footnote 241: They have performed classical music of composers like +Bach, Händel, Gluck, Rameau, and Beethoven; and modern music of +composers like Berlioz, Saint-Saëns, Dukas, etc. This Society has just +installed itself in the ancient chapel of the Dominicans of the +Faubourg-Saint-Honoré, who have given them the use of it.] + +[Footnote 242: Of late years there has been a veritable outburst of +concerts at popular prices--some of them in imitation of the German +_Restaurationskonzerte_, such as the Concerts-Rouge, the +Concerts-Touche, etc., where classical and modern symphony music may be +heard. These concerts are increasing fast, and have great success among +a public that is almost exclusively _bourgeois_, but they are yet a long +way behind the popular performances of Händel in London, where places +may be had for sixpence and threepence. + +I do not attach very much importance to the courageous, though not +always very intelligent movement of the Universités Populaires, where +since 1886 a collection of amateurs, of fashionable people and artists, +meet to make themselves heard, and pretend to initiate the people into +what are sometimes the most complicated and aristocratic works of a +classic or decadent art. While honouring this propaganda--whose ardour +has now abated somewhat--one must say that it has shown more good-will +than common-sense. The people do not need amusing, still less should +they be bored; what they need is to learn something about music. This is +not always easy; for it is not noisy deeds we want, but patience and +self-sacrifice. Good intentions are not enough. One knows the final +failure of the _Conservatoire populaire de Mimi Pinson_, started by +Gustave Charpentier, for giving musical education to the work-girls of +Paris.] + +Attempts have been made at different times to found a _Théâtre Lyrique +Populaire_. But up to the present time none has succeeded. The first +attempts were made in 1847. M. Carvalho's old Théâtre-Lyrique was never +a financial success, though quite distinguished performances of operas +were given there, such as Gounod's _Faust_ and Gluck's _Orfeo_, with +Mme. Viardot as an interpreter and Berlioz as conductor; and the +directors who followed Carvalho--Rety, Pasdeloup, etc.--did not succeed +any better. In 1875 Vizentini took over the Gaîté, with a grant of two +hundred thousand francs and excellent artists; but he had to give it up. +Since then all sorts of other schemes have been tried by Viollet-le-Duc, +Guimet, Lamoureux, Melchior de Vogüé and Julien Goujon, Gabriel Parisot, +Colonne and Milliet, Deville, Lagoanère, Corneille, Gailhard, and +Carré; but none of them achieved any success. At the moment, a new +attempt is being made; and this time the thing seems to show every sign +of being a success. + +But whatever may be the educational value of the theatre and concerts, +they are not complete enough in themselves for the people. To make their +influence deep and enduring it must be combined with teaching. Music, no +less than every other expression of thought, has no use for the +illiterate. + +So in this case there was everything to be done. There was no other +popular teaching but that of the numerous Galin-Paris-Chevé schools. +These schools have rendered great service, and are continuing to render +it; but their simplified methods are not without drawbacks and gaps. +Their purpose is to teach the people a musical language different from +that of cultured people; and although it may not be as difficult as is +supposed to go from a knowledge of the one to a knowledge of the other, +it is always wrong to raise up a fresh barrier--however small it +is--between the cultured people and the other people, who in our own +country are already too widely separated. + +And besides, it is not enough to know one's letters; one must also have +books to read. What books have the people had?--so far songs sung at the +café concerts and the stupid repertoires of choral societies. The +folk-song had practically disappeared, and was not yet ready for +re-birth; for the populace, even more readily than the cultured people, +are inclined to blush at anything which suggests "popularity."[243] + +[Footnote 243: M. Maurice Buchor relates an anecdote which typifies what +I mean. "I begged the conductor of a good men's choral society," he +says, "to have one of Händel's choruses sung. But he seemed to hesitate. +I had made the suggestion tentatively, and then tried to enlarge on the +sincerity and breadth of its musical idea. 'Ah, very good,' he said, 'if +you really want to hear it, it is easily done; but I was afraid that +perhaps it was rather too popular.'" (_Poème de la Vie Humaine_: +Introduction to the Second Series, 1905.) One may add to this the words +of a professor of singing in a primary school for Higher Education in +Paris: "Folk-music--well, it is very good for the provinces." (Quoted by +Buchor in the Introduction to the Second Series of the _Poème_, 1902.)] + +It is nearly twenty-five years since M. Bourgault-Ducoudray, who was one +of the people who fostered the growth of choral singing in France, +pointed out, in an account of the teaching of singing, the usefulness of +making children sing the old popular airs of the French provinces, and +of getting the teachers to make collections of them. In 1895, as the +result of a meeting organised by the _Correspondance générale de +l'Instruction primaire_, delightful collections of folk-songs were +distributed in the schools. The melodies were taken from old airs +collected by M. Julien Tiersot, and M. Maurice Buchor had put some fresh +and sparkling verses to them. "M. Buchor," I wrote at the time, "will +enjoy a pleasure not common to poets of our day: his songs will soar up +into the open air, like the lark in his _Chanson de labour_. The +populace may even recognise its own spirit in them, and one day take +possession of them, as if they were of their own contriving."[244] This +prediction has been almost completely realised, and M. Buchor's songs +are now the property of all the people of France. + +[Footnote 244: Taken from the _Supplement à la Correspondance générale +de l'Instruction primaire_, 15 December, 1894.] + +But M. Buchor did not remain content to be a poet of popular song. +During the last twelve years he has made, with untiring energy, a tour +of all the Écoles Normales in France, returning several times to places +where he found signs of good vocal ability. In each school he made the +pupils sing his songs--in unison, or in two or three parts, sometimes +massing the boys' and girls' schools of one town together. His ambition +grew with his success; and to the folk-song melodies[245] he began +gradually to add pieces of classical music. And to impress the music +better on the singers he changed the existing words, and tried to find +others, which by their moral and poetic beauty more exactly translated +the musical feeling.[246] + +[Footnote 245: Three series of these _Chants populaires pour les Écoles_ +have already been published.] + +[Footnote 246: I reserve my opinion, from an artist's point of view, on +this plagiarising of the words of songs. On principle I condemn it +absolutely. But, in this case, it is Hobson's choice. _Primum vivere, +deinde philosophari_. If our contemporary musicians really wished the +people to sing, they would have written songs for them; but they seem to +have no desire to achieve honour that way. So there is nothing else to +be done but to have recourse to the musicians of other days; and even +there the choice is very limited. For France formerly, like the France +of to-day, had very few musicians who had any understanding of a great +popular art. Berlioz came nearest to understanding the meaning of it; +and he is not yet public property, so his airs cannot be used. It is +curious, and rather sad, that out of eighty pieces chosen by M. Buchor +only nine of them are French; and this is reckoning the Italians, Lully +and Cherubini, as Frenchmen. M. Buchor has had to go to German classical +musicians almost entirely, and, generally speaking, his choice has been +a happy one. With a sure instinct he has given the preference to popular +geniuses like Händel and Beethoven. We may ask why he did not keep their +words; but we must remember that at any rate they had to be translated; +and though it may seem rash to change the subject of a musical +masterpiece, it is certain that M. Buchor's clever adaptations have +resulted in driving the fine thoughts of Händel and Schubert and Mozart +and Beethoven into the memories of the French people, and making them +part of their lives. Had they heard the same music at a concert they +would probably not have been very much moved. And that makes M. Buchor +in the right. Let the French people enrich themselves with the musical +treasures of Germany until the time comes when they are able to create a +music of their own! This is a kind of peaceful conquest to which our art +is accustomed. "Now then, Frenchmen," as Du Bellay used to say, "walk +boldly up to that fine old Roman city, and decorate (as you have done +more than once) your temples and altars with its spoils." Besides, let +us remember that the German masters of the eighteenth century, whose +words M. Buchor has plagiarised, did not hesitate to plagiarise +themselves; and in turning the Berceuse of the _Oratorio de Noël_ into a +_Sainte famille humaine_, M. Buchor has respected the musical ideas of +Bach much more than Bach himself did when he turned it into a _Dialogue +between Hercules and Pleasure_.] + +And at last he composed and grouped together twenty-four poems in his +_Poème de la Vie humaine_[247]--fine odes and songs, written for classic +airs and choruses, a vast repertory of the people's joys and sorrows, +fitting the momentous hours of family or public life. With a people that +has ancient musical traditions, as Germany has, music is the vehicle for +the words and impresses them in the heart; but in France's case it is +truer to say that the words have brought the music of Händel and +Beethoven into the hearts of French school-children. The great thing is +that the music has really got hold of them, and that now one may hear +the provincial Écoles Normales performing choruses from _Fidelio, The +Messiah_, Schumann's _Faust_, or Bach cantatas.[248] The honour of this +remarkable achievement, which no one could have believed possible twenty +years ago, belongs almost entirely to M. Maurice Buchor.[249] + +[Footnote 247: The _Poème_ has been published in four parts:--I. _De la +naissance au mariage_ ("From Birth to Marriage"); II. _La Cité_ ("The +City"); III. _De l'age viril jusqu'à la mort_ ("From Manhood to Death"); +IV. _L'Idéal_ ("Ideals"). 1900-1906.] + +[Footnote 248: The last chorus of _Fidelio_ has been recently sung by +one hundred and seventy school-children at Douai; a grand chorus from +_The Messiah_ by the Écoles Normales of Angoulême and Valence; and the +great choral scene and the last part of Schumann's _Faust_ by the two +Écoles Normales of Limoges. At Valence, performances are given every +year in the theatre there before an audience of between eight hundred +and a thousand teachers. + +Outside the schools, especially in the North, a certain number of +teachers of both sexes have formed choral societies among work-girls and +co-operative societies, such as _La Fraternelle_ at Saint Quentin. + +In a general way one may say that M. Maurice Buchor's campaign has +especially succeeded in departments like that of Aisne and Drôme, where +the ground has been prepared by the Academy Inspector. Unhappily in many +districts the movement receives a lively opposition from music-teachers, +who do not approve of this mnemotechnical way of learning poetry with +music, without any instruction in solfeggio or musical science. And it +is quite evident that this method would have its defects if it were a +question of training musicians. But it is really a matter of training +people who have some music in them; and so the musicians must not be too +fastidious. I hope that great musicians will one day spring from this +good ground--musicians more human than those of our own time, musicians +whose music will be rooted in their hearts and in their country.] + +[Footnote 249: We must not forget M. Bourgault-Ducoudray, who was his +forerunner with his _Chants de Fontenoy_, collections of songs for the +Écoles Normales.] + +M. Buchor's endeavours have been the most extensive and the most +fruitful, but he is not alone in individual effort. There was, twenty +years ago, in the suburbs of Paris and in the provinces, a large number +of well-meaning people who devoted themselves to the work of musical +education with sincerity and splendid enthusiasm. But their good works +were too isolated, and were swamped by the apathy of the people about +them; though sometimes they kindled little fires of love and +understanding in art, which only needed coaxing in order to burn +brightly; and even their less happy efforts generally succeeded in +lighting a few sparks, which were left smouldering in people's +hearts.[250] + +At length, as a result of these individual efforts, the State began to +show an interest in this educational movement, although it had for so +long stood apart from it.[251] It discovered, in its turn, the +educational value of singing. A musical test was instituted at the +examination for the _Brevet supérieur_[252] which made the study of +solfeggio a more serious matter in the Écoles Normales. In 1903 an +endeavour was made to organise the teaching of music in the schools and +colleges in a more rational way.[253] + +[Footnote 250: Mention must especially be made of little groups of young +students, pupils of the Universities or the larger schools, who are +devoting themselves at present to the moral and musical instruction of +the people. Such an effort, made more than a year ago at Vaugirard, +resulted in the _Manécanterie des petits chanteurs de la Croix de bois_, +a small choir of the children of the people, who in the poor parishes go +from one church to another singing Gregorian and Palestrinian music.] + +[Footnote 251: It is hardly necessary to recall the unfortunate statute +of 15 March, 1850, which says: "Primary instruction _may_ comprise +singing."] + +[Footnote 252: By the decree of 4 August, 1905. At the same time, a +programme and pedagogic instructions were issued. The importance of +musical dictation and the usefulness of the Galin methods for beginners +were urged. Let us hope that the State will decide officially to support +M. Buchor's endeavours, and that it will gradually introduce into +schools M. Jacques-Delacroze's methods of rhythmic gymnastics, which +have produced such astonishing results in Switzerland.] + +[Footnote 253: M. Chaumié's suggestion. See the _Revue Musicale_, 15 +July, 1903.] + +In 1904, following the suggestions of M. Saint-Saëns and M. +Bourgault-Ducoudray, class-singing was incorporated with other subjects +in the programme of teaching,[254] and a free school of choral singing +was started in Paris under the honorary chairmanship of M. Henry Marcel, +director of the Beaux-Arts, and under the direction of M. Radiguer. +Quite lately a choral society for young school-girls has been formed, +with the Vice-Provost as president and a membership of from six to seven +hundred young girls, who since 1906 have given an annual concert under +the direction of M. Gabriel Pierné. And lastly, at the end of 1907, an +association of professors was started to undertake the teaching of music +in the institutions of public instruction; its chairman was the +Inspector-General, M. Gilles, and its honorary presidents were M. Liard +and M. Saint-Saëns. Its object is to aid the progress of musical +instruction by establishing a centre to promote friendly relations among +professors of music; by centralising their interests and studies; by +organising a circulating library of music and a periodical magazine in +which questions relating to music may be discussed; by establishing +communication between French professors and foreign professors; and by +seeking to bring together professors of music and professors in other +branches of public teaching. + +[Footnote 254: _Revue Musicale_, December 15, 1903, and 1 and 15 +January, 1904.] + +All this is not much, and we are yet terribly behindhand, especially as +regards secondary teaching, which is considered less important than +primary teaching.[255] But we are scrambling out of an abyss of +ignorance, and it is something to have the desire to get out of it. We +must remember that Germany has not always been in its present plethoric +state of musical prosperity. The great choral societies only date from +the end of the eighteenth century. Germany in the time of Bach was +poor--if not poorer--in means for performing choral works than France +to-day. Bach's only executants were his pupils at the Thomasschule at +Leipzig, of which barely a score knew how to sing.[256] And now these +people gather together for the great _Männergesangsfeste_ (choral +festivals) and the _Musikfeste_ (music festivals) of Imperial Germany. + +[Footnote 255: "In this," says M. Buchor, "as in many other things, the +children of the people set an example to the children of the middle +classes." That is true; but one must not blame the middle-class children +so much as those in authority, who, "in this, as in many other things," +have not fulfilled their duties.] + +[Footnote 256: _The Passion according to St. Matthew_ was given first of +all by two little choirs, consisting of from twelve to sixteen students, +including the soloists.] + +Let us hope on and persevere. The main thing is that a start has been +made; the thing that remains is to have patience and--persistence. + + +THE PRESENT CONDITION OF FRENCH MUSIC + +We have seen how the musical education of France is going on in +theatres, in concerts, in schools, by lectures and by books; and the +Parisian's rather restless desire for knowledge seems to be satisfied +for the moment. The mind of Paris has made a journey--a hasty journey, +it is true through the music of other countries and other times,[257] +and is now becoming introspective. After a mad enthusiasm over +discoveries in strange lands, music and musical criticism have regained +their self-possession and their jealous love of independence. A very +decided reaction against foreign music has been shown since the time of +the Universal Exhibition of 1900. This movement is not unconnected, +consciously or unconsciously, with the nationalist train of thought, +which was stirred up in France, and especially in Paris, somewhere about +the same time. But it is also a natural development in the evolution of +music. French music felt new vigour springing up within her, and was +astonished at it; her days of preparation were over, and she aspired to +fly alone; and, in accordance with the eternal rule of history, the +first use she made of her newly-acquired strength was to defy her +teachers. And this revolt against foreign influences was directed--one +had expected it--against the strongest of the influences--the influence +of German music as personified by Wagner. Two discussions in magazines, +in 1903 and 1904, brought this state of mind curiously to light: one was +an enquiry held by M. Jacques Morland in the _Mercure de France_ +(January, 1903) as to _The Influence of German Music in France_; and the +other was that of M. Paul Landormy in the _Revue Bleue_ (March and +April, 1904) as to _The Present Condition of French Music_. The first +was like a shout of deliverance, and was not without exaggeration and a +good deal of ingratitude; for it represented French musicians and +critics throwing off Wagner's influence because it had had its day; the +second set forth the theories of the new French school, and declared the +independence of that school. + +[Footnote 257: It is hardly necessary to mention the curious attraction +that some of our musicians are beginning to feel for the art of +civilisations that are quite opposed to those of the West. Slowly and +quietly the spirit of the Far East is insinuating itself into European +music.] + +For several years the leader of the young school, M. Claude Debussy, +has, in his writings in the _Revue Blanche_ and _Gil Blas_, attacked +Wagnerian art. His personality is very French--capricious, poetic, and +_spirituelle_, full of lively intelligence, heedless, independent, +scattering new ideas, giving vent to paradoxical caprice, criticising +the opinions of centuries with the teasing impertinence of a little +street boy, attacking great heroes of music like Gluck, Wagner, and +Beethoven, upholding only Bach, Mozart, and Weber, and loudly professing +his preference for the old French masters of the eighteenth century. But +in spite of this he is bringing back to French music its true nature and +its forgotten ideals--its clearness, its elegant simplicity, its +naturalness, and especially its grace and plastic beauty. He wishes +music to free itself from all literary and philosophic pretensions, +which have burdened German music in the nineteenth century (and perhaps +have always done so); he wishes music to get away from the rhetoric +which has been handed down to us through the centuries, from its heavy +construction and precise orderliness, from its harmonic and rhythmic +formulas, and the exercises of oratorical embroidery. He wishes that +all about it shall be painting and poetry; that it shall explain its +true feeling in a clear and direct way; and that melody, harmony, and +rhythm shall develop broadly along the lines of inner laws, and not +after the pretended laws of some intellectual arrangement. And he +himself preaches by example in his _Pelléas et Mélisande_, and breaks +with all the principles of the Bayreuth drama, and gives us the model of +the new art of his dreams. And on all sides discerning and well-informed +critics, such as M. Pierre Lalo of _Le Temps_, M. Louis Laloy of the +_Revue Musicale_ and the _Mercure Musicale_, and M. Marnold of _Le +Mercure de France_, have championed his doctrines and his art. Even the +_Schola Cantorum_, whose eclectic and archaic spirit is very different +from that of Debussy, seemed at first to be drawn into the same current +of thought; and this school which had so helped to propagate the foreign +influences of the past, did not seem to be quite insensible to the +nationalistic preoccupation of the last few years. So the _Schola_ +devoted itself more and more--as was moreover its right and duty--to the +French music of the past, and filled its concert programmes with French +works of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries--with Marc Antoine +Charpentier, Du Mont, Leclair, Clérambault, Couperin, and the French +primitive composers for the organ, the harpsichord, and the violin; and +with the works of dramatic composers, especially of the great Rameau, +who, after a period of complete oblivion, suddenly benefited by this +excessive reaction, to the detriment of Gluck, whom the young critics, +following M. Debussy's example, severely abused.[258] There was even a +moment when the _Schola_ took a decided share in the battle, and, +through M. Charles Bordes, issued a manifesto--_Credo_, as they called +it--about a new art founded on the ancient traditions of French music: + + "We wish to have free speech in music--a sustained recitative, + infinite variety, and, in short, complete liberty in musical + utterance. We wish for the triumph of natural music, so that it + shall be as free and full of movement as speech, and as plastic and + rhythmic as a classical dance." + +It was open war against the metrical art of the last three centuries, in +the name of national tradition (more or less freely interpreted), of +folk-song, and of Gregorian chant. And "the constant and avowed purpose +of all this campaign was the triumph of French music, and its +cult."[259] + +[Footnote 258: There is no need to say that Rameau's genius justified +all this enthusiasm; but one cannot help believing that it was aroused, +not so much on account of his musical genius as on account of his +supposed championship of the French music of the past against foreign +art; though that art was well adapted to the laws of French opera, as we +may see for ourselves in Gluck's case.] + +[Footnote 259: _La Tribune de Saint-Gervais_, September, 1903.] + +This manifesto reflects in its own way the spirit of Debussy and his +untrammelled musical impressionism; and though it shows a good deal of +naïveté and some intolerance, there was in it a strength of youthful +enthusiasm that accorded with the great hopes of the time, and foretold +glorious days to come and a splendid harvest of music. + +Not many years have passed since then; yet the sky is already a little +clouded, the light not quite so bright. Hope has not failed; but it has +not been fulfilled. France is waiting, and is getting a little +impatient. But the impatience is unnecessary; for to found an art we +must bring time to our aid; art must ripen tranquilly. Yet tranquillity +is what is most lacking in Parisian art. The artists, instead of working +steadily at their own tasks and uniting in a common aim, are given up to +sterile disputes. The young French school hardly exists any longer, as +it has now split up into two or three parties. To a fight against +foreign art has succeeded a fight among themselves: it is the +deep-rooted evil of the country, this vain expenditure of force. And +most curious of all is the fact that the quarrel is not between the +conservatives and the progressives in music, but between the two most +advanced sections: the _Schola_ on the one hand, who, should it gain the +victory, would through its dogmas and traditions inevitably develop the +airs of a little academy; and, on the other hand, the independent party, +whose most important representative is M. Debussy. It is not for us to +enter into the quarrel; we would only suggest to the parties in question +that if any profit is to result from their misunderstanding, it will be +derived by a third party--the party in favour of routine, the party that +has never lost favour with the great theatre-going public,--a party +that will soon make good the place it has lost if those who aim at +defending art set about fighting one another. Victory has been +proclaimed too soon; for whatever the optimistic representatives of the +young school may say, victory has not yet been gained; and it will not +be gained for some time yet--not until public taste is changed, not +while the nation lacks musical education, nor until the cultured few are +united to the people, through whom their thoughts shall be preserved. +For not only--with a few rare and generous exceptions--do the more +aristocratic sections of society ignore the education of the people, but +they ignore the very existence of the people's soul. Here and there, a +composer--such as Bizet and M. Saint-Saëns, or M. d'Indy and his +disciples--will build up symphonies and rhapsodies and very difficult +pieces for the piano on the popular airs of Auvergne, Provence, or the +Cevennes; but that is only a whim of theirs, a little ingenious pastime +for clever artists, such as the Flemish masters of the fifteenth century +indulged in when they decorated popular airs with polyphonic +elaborations. In spite of the advance of the democratic spirit, musical +art--or at least all that counts in musical art--has never been more +aristocratic than it is to-day. Probably the phenomenon is not peculiar +to music, and shows itself more or less in other arts; but in no other +art is it so dangerous, for no other has roots less firmly fixed in the +soil of France. And it is no consolation to tell oneself that this is +according to the great French traditions, which have nearly always been +aristocratic. Traditions, great and small, are menaced to-day; the axe +is ready for them. Whoever wishes to live must adapt himself to the new +conditions of life. The future of art is at stake. To continue as we are +doing is not only to weaken music by condemning it to live in unhealthy +conditions, but also to risk its disappearing sooner or later under the +rising flood of popular misconceptions of music. Let us take warning by +the fact that we have already had to defend music[260] when it was +attacked at some of the parliamentary assemblies; and let us remember +the pitifulness of the defence. We must not let the day come when a +famous speech will be repeated with a slight alteration--"The Republic +has no need of musicians." + +[Footnote 260: At any rate, certain forms of music--the highest. See the +discussions at the Chambre des Députés on the budget of the Beaux-Arts +in February, 1906; and the speeches of MM. Théodore Denis, Beauquier, +and Dujardin-Beaumetz, on Religious Music, the Niedermeyer School, and +the civic value of the organ.] + +It is the historian's duty to point out the dangers of the present hour, +and to remind the French musicians who have been satisfied with their +first victory that the future is anything but sure, and that we must +never disarm while we have a common enemy before us, an enemy especially +dangerous in a democracy--mediocrity. + +The road that stretches before us is long and difficult. But if we turn +our heads and look back over the way we have come we may take heart. +Which of us does not feel a little glow of pride at the thought of what +has been done in the last thirty years? Here is a town where, before +1870, music had fallen to the most miserable depths, which to-day teems +with concerts and schools of music--a town where one of the first +symphonic schools in Europe has sprung from nothing, a town where an +enthusiastic concert-going public has been formed, possessing among its +members some great critics with broad interests and a fine, free +spirit--all this is the pride of France. And we have, too, a little band +of musicians; among them, in the first rank, that great painter of +dreams, Claude Debussy; that master of constructive art, Dukas; that +impassioned thinker, Albéric Magnard; that ironic poet, Ravel; and those +delicate and finished writers, Albert Roussel and Déodat de Séverac; +without mention of the younger musicians who are in the vanguard of +their art. And all this poetic force, though not the most vigorous, is +the most original in Europe to-day. Whatever gaps one may find in our +musical organisation, still so new, whatever results this movement may +lead to, it is impossible not to admire a people whom defeat has +aroused, and a generation that has accomplished the magnificent work of +reviving the nation's music with such untiring perseverance and such +steadfast faith. The names of Camille Saint-Saëns, César Franck, Charles +Bordes, and Vincent d'Indy, will remain associated before all others +with this work of national regeneration, where so much talent and so +much devotion, from the leaders of orchestras and celebrated composers +down to that obscure body of artists and music-lovers, have joined +forces in the fight against indifference and routine. They have the +right to be proud of their work. But for ourselves, let us waste no time +in thinking about it. Our hopes are great. Let us justify them. + + +WILLIAM BRENDON AND SON, LTD PRINTERS, PLYMOUTH + + +THE MUSICIAN'S BOOKSHELF. + +A NEW SERIES. + +_Crown 8vo. Occasionally Illustrated._ + +EDITED BY CLAUDE LANDI, L.R.A.M., A.R.C.M. + +MUSICIANS OF TO-DAY. By ROMAIN ROLLAND, Author of "Jean-Christophe." +Translated by MARY BLAIKLOCK. + +PRACTICAL SINGING. By CLIFTON COOKE and CLAUDE LANDI. + +THE UNREST IN THE MUSIC WORLD. By SYDNEY BLAKISTON. + +THE SONATA IN MUSIC. By A. EAGLEFIELD HULL, Mus. Doc. + +THE SYMPHONY IN MUSIC. By the same. + +ON LISTENING TO MUSIC. By E. MARKHAM LEE, M.A., Mus. Doc. + +COUNTERPOINT. By G.G. BERNARDI. Translated by C. LANDI. + +OPERA. By HARRY BURGESS. + +_Other Volumes in preparation_. + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Musicians of To-Day, by Romain Rolland + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK MUSICIANS OF TO-DAY *** + +***** This file should be named 16467-8.txt or 16467-8.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + https://www.gutenberg.org/1/6/4/6/16467/ + +Produced by David Newman, Chuck Greif and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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