MUSIC
Music has been called "the youngest of the arts" in view of the fact that, as we now understand it in the Western world, it dates roughly from the year 1600. But the "heavenly maid" had already ceased to be the Cinderella of the Muses, though still condemned in restaurants and places where they feed to the menial function of acting as an obbligato accompaniment to conversation, deglutition, and digestion. A pessimistic observer remarked about fifteen years ago that modern life bade fair to be dominated by music and machinery, and the correlation of the two factors has since been abundantly illustrated by the momentous development of the gramophone and the pianola, the cult of "sonority" and the dynamics of the orchestra. When to these influences are added the successive experiments in harmony and tonality and rhythm associated with the names of Strauss and Debussy, Scriabine and Stravinsky, Ravel and Schönberg, one cannot deny that the ferment in letters has been more than matched by the exuberant activities of musical modernists. In the period under review the "whole tone scale" was partially acclimatized and "rag-time" was domesticated, Wagner ceased to be regarded as an anarch of discord, and the "Music of the Future" became the music of the past. It was no longer a guarantee of enlightenment to worship Brahms or admire Beethoven. Of the three "B's" Bach alone has maintained his prestige, and to-day counts upon the allegiance of all schools. Otherwise, and in spite of the renown of Strauss, Germany ceased to exercise her old musical supremacy, and, even before the war, Russia, France and Italy had entered into a formidable competition with the "predominant partner" in the domain of opera. And though opera is an artificial blend of incompatibles and must always remain on a lower plane than abstract or absolute music—the most transcendental thing in the whole range of art—it claims priority of notice in this record for two sufficient reasons: its social prestige and the amount of space devoted to it by Punch.
Wagner's operas were now established in the Covent Garden repertory, and as I have already noticed, their new-found and fashionable popularity was largely due to the appeal of the great singers, notably Jean and Edouard de Reszke and Mlle. Ternina, who proved that Wagnerian melody was all the more effective when sung beautifully and not declaimed or barked as by so many German singers. Moreover when, as in the artists mentioned, this vocal lustre was combined with a splendid presence, dignity of bearing, and dramatic intelligence, the appeal was well-nigh irresistible. I insert the qualification advisedly on behalf of Punch who, in these years at any rate, was never reconciled to Wagner, and when he heard Jean de Reszke and his brother in the Meistersinger in 1897 could not refrain from jocular disparagement of the score.
Foreign Stars and Native Composers
Verdi's Falstaff had been produced in 1894, but Punch abstains from any criticism of that exhilarating work, merely pronouncing the performance a success, and a few years later further advertised his inability to recognize the supreme achievements of the later Verdi by declaring that Otello as an opera was "heavy." In opera he was in the main an inveterate laudator temporis acti and chiefly enjoyed himself when opportunities arose for indulging in alliterative quips such as "merry Mancinelli," "beaming Bevignani," or puns on the name of the performers, e.g. "Mlle. Bauermeister-singer." Puccini's operas—Manon, La Bohême and Madama Butterfly— found favour in his sight; they had sparkle, elegance and brio. But he was not impressed with La Tosca, holding that the "operaticizing" of successful plays was a mistake; in general his notices are void of musical criticism and only deal with the singing of Melba and Caruso and the admirable Destinn. Still Punch had lucid intervals of vision when he saw a good or great thing and praised it handsomely. The Santuzza of Calvé, in 1894, was "grand and magnificent" and her Carmen "marvellous" and unique. The epithets were fully deserved, but Punch acutely detected that this great artist and actress suffered from the excess of her qualities, and wittily described her Marguerite in Faust as "a Mädchen with a past." Madame Patti's reappearance in opera in 1895 after many years' absence was genially welcomed, none the less so for her choice of La Traviata for her rentrée, for Punch was faithful to his old operatic loves. In the next few years English opera and operatic composers claimed Punch's attention. The scheme of a National Opera House was revived in 1899 when Punch represented Music petitioning the L.C.C. for a site, but the sinews of war were not forthcoming. Sir Charles Stanford's Much Ado about Nothing, the libretto adapted from Shakespeare by Mr. Julian Sturgis, with Miss Marie Brema, Miss Suzanne Adams, Mr. David Bispham and M. Plançon in the cast, was pronounced "an undisputed success" in 1901. In 1902 there were two native novelties. In Mr. Herbert Bunning's Princesse Osra, founded on "Anthony Hope's" novel, Punch found little scope for positive praise: it was "musically disappointing save for accidental reminiscences." Nor was he much more enthusiastic over Miss Ethel Smyth's Der Wald, with its lurid plot "of the penny plain, twopence coloured type" and "interminable duets." Over one stage direction, "Peasants turn pale," Punch waxed ribald, and he concludes his notice with the ambiguous sentence: "Miss Smyth was acclaimed vociferously, the Duke of Connaught and the occupants of the Royal box testifying their great pleasure at what may come to be, after judicious elimination, a satisfactory success." The first of the Salomes who de-decorated the lyric and variety stages was not Strauss's but Massenet's version, produced in the summer of 1903. Mme. Calvé was in the cast, but the opera provided no scope for her genius, and Punch damned it with faint praise as not likely to be retained in the repertory, a very safe prediction. In the summary of the season Punch puts Richter at the head of the successes, a well-merited recognition of his direction of the Wagner performances; the list of "stars" includes the "two Vans"—Van Rooy, the Dutch baritone, and Van Dyck, the Dutch tenor—Destinn, Calvé and Melba, Caruso and Plançon. In the winter the San Carlo troupe from Naples visited London, with Sammarco and Caruso—or Robinson Caruso, as Punch liked to call him—as the chief male singers, but no new operas were produced. André Chénier in 1907 is described as of the Tosca or lurid type. A new hand is observable in the notice which acknowledges an unexpected dignity and refinement in Caruso's always brilliant singing and pronounces Destinn "adorable." Wagner's star was still in the ascendant in 1908, and Richter's splendid conducting of the Tetralogy is commemorated in the cartoon of Hans the Ring-master; while the "record operatic duel" between Melba and Tetrazzini is similarly honoured a little later. Never before, unless I am much mistaken, had two cartoons with a musical motive appeared in the same year. In 1910 Strauss was the grand and conspicuous portent of the operatic world, for Elektra, was produced in the spring and Salome in the winter. The former was hailed by Punch as a supreme manifestation of the Maladie de Siècle. His verses are quoted not for their literary merit so much as because they are a fairly compendious record of the fashions and foibles of "England de luxe" at the time:—
"Elektra" and "Salome"
O sons of the new generation
Athirst for inordinate thrills;
O daughters, whose love of sensation
Is shown in your frocks and your frills—