Ernani, as we have remarked, was the work by which Verdi was first introduced to the British public; and it is, therefore, of especial interest to English readers. It involved a dispute among musical people such as has only been equalled by the famous Gluck and Piccini feud (1776) just referred to, or that great controversy engendered by Wagner's music and doctrines, the wrangle that gave us the term "music of the future," that spiteful innuendo which the enemies of the master invented to indicate the fit location of his music, and which epithet Wagner himself adopted as exactly describing an art and teachings which a debilitated and distempered age was too feeble to understand.
No one was more concerned in this musical stir than the zealous and assiduous Mr. Lumley, who had his heart and fortune in the affairs of the opera-house, Her Majesty's Theatre:—
Industrious importer! who dost bring
Legs that can dance, and voices that can sing,
From ev'rywhere you possibly can catch 'em;
Let others try, they never yet could match 'em.
The stumbling-blocks were the bigoted lovers of the old school, who, dissatisfied with all that had been given them, were, like that hero in fiction, always clamouring for "more," which, when obtained, they always pronounced unsatisfactory. "The season," states Mr. Lumley, "was announced to open with the Ernani of Verdi, a composer as yet unknown to the mass of the musical English public. But he had been crowned triumphantly, and had achieved the most signal successes in Italy. Ernani was generally pronounced, at that period, one of the best, if not the best, of his many applauded operas. It would have been strange if the announcement of the first production of one of Verdi's works upon the Anglo-Italian stage had failed to excite the attention and interest of the musical world. At all events, it was the duty, as well as the policy, of the management to bring forward the greatest novelty of the day. Novelty sure to be called for with indignant remonstrance if not laid before the subscribers, however it might be scouted (according to custom) when it did make its appearance.
"After some unavoidable delay, the season opened on the 8th March (1845) with the promised opera of Ernani. That it excited the general enthusiasm awarded to it so lavishly in Italy cannot be asserted; that it was a failure may be emphatically denied. The general result of this first introduction of Verdi to the English public was a feeling of hesitation and doubt; or, as some one drolly said at the time, the 'Well, I don't know's' had it! The English are tardy in the appreciation of any kind of novelty, and the reception of Verdi's opera was only in accordance with the national habit. It is well known that a taste for this composer's music has survived all the opposition of an earlier period, and that he is now generally popular among the musical amateurs in this country. Whatever their intrinsic merits, his operas have achieved a widely-spread success, as provincial theatres and music-halls can testify throughout the land; and there can be no doubt that, whatever his alleged shortcomings in some respects, he has at command passion, fire, and strong dramatic effect.
"On the first production, then, of Ernani, the public seemed as yet unprepared to give a verdict of its own as to the merits of the young composer, now first placed in England on his trial."[12]
The principal singers at this first representation in England were—Madame Rita Borio, prima donna; Moriani, the tenor; Signor Botelli, baritone; and Fornasari, as the old Castillian noble. The audience, if not the critics, were delighted with the work. The characters so musically individualised, the new and attractive orchestration, the motivi distinguishing the singer, the perfect ensemble, the well-proportioned whole opera—all these thoroughly Verdinian characteristics were seized upon and admired. "Encore followed encore from the rising of the curtain.... Solos, duets, and trios were applauded with equal fervour, but the concerted pieces created the most surprise and admiration.... The ensembles possess a novelty and an impassioned fervour unprecedented."[13]
In a retrospect of the season's opera, a talented critic wrote of Ernani as follows:—"We were then introduced to a composer engaging in Italy surprising popularity, one whose works have been brought out at almost all the great continental theatres, whose productions in his native country met with the most enthusiastic admiration—Verdi. It cannot, therefore, be wondered at that the present able management of Her Majesty's Theatre should have fixed upon the works of this composer to bring before the English public. Ernani did full justice to its brilliant reputation. It presents the real type of the lyrical tragedy, where feeling finds its appropriate expression in music. Musical judges allotted to it the palm of sterling merit, but the leaning of public taste was against the probabilities of its obtaining here the high favour it has elsewhere enjoyed.
"The meritricious sentimental style of the modern school to which, of late years, we have become so accustomed was a bad preparation for the full appreciation of such work as this. Ernani, however, at first only half understood, gradually worked its way into the public favour, and was given a greater number of times than any opera of the season; finally, it might be pronounced completely successful; but yet, on the whole, the result of the production of this opera was not such as to encourage the management to substitute another work of this composer, I Lombardi, for more established favourites. We are sorry for this; we grieve to see in the English musical public so little encouragement for novelty in art, and an unwillingness to patronise works which have not received the sometimes questionable fiat of approbation from the audiences of former seasons, not a whit more infallible than the present. English audiences will rarely judge for themselves in matters of art. They wail that Fashion should have openly set her seal on works which should claim a fair and unbiassed judgment.