And to him who sits in bereavement to-day, may there come consolation and the gift of the tender pity of the Great Father, and may the darkened homes in Boston and Chicago be made holy for all his and their coming days, with the recollections of her loveliness and true womanly character.
It is a clear, cloudless day, and had that man Gilmore, with the steam engine inside of him, made special arrangements with the weather-clerk, he could not have secured a more auspicious day. The crowd yesterday was great, but the crowd to-day is greater.
The programme to-day is purely a popular one. There are the overture to Fra Diavolo, a Peace March composed for the occasion by Janotta, whoever he is, which is not original and very tiresome; the inevitable Anvil Chorus, with the artillery and bells; a sensational and rather commonplace overture, built up by C. C. Converse, on "Hail Columbia;" and national airs, which the orchestra flounder through rather than play. Indeed, if you watch Wulf Fries, Rosa, Schultze, or any of the leading players, you see their faces all scowled up as they wade through so much musical swash, so unworthy of the great orchestra. In fact, there is no atmosphere of art here to-day. The only feature of interest in the Fra Diavolo overture is the trumpet solo, which is taken by fifty instruments instead of one, and gives out a clarion blast which might wake the dead. The rest of the overture, however does not go well. The second violins are shocking. Gilmore has not got them well in hand. In the Grand March, done by Janotta for the occasion, there are reminiscences all the way through, of Tannhauser, the Coronation and the Wedding March, and the connecting links are very weak, sometimes almost stupid. The man who writes marches for such an orchestra should be inspired. He should feel the electricity of the great audience tingling through his veins. Heavens! If only Beethoven, Mendelssohn, Handel, Haydn, Meyerbeer, Rossini, anybody, were living to write for this organ and orchestra. We want columbiads and have got pop-guns—a mountain thunder-storm, and we have a silly April rain—a Jeremiah, and we have nothing better than Daniel Pratt. Converse's trivial arrangement of "Hail Columbia" is no better, perhaps not so good. It is profanation to devote a thousand instruments and an organ four times the power of that in the Music Hall to such commonplaces. The old masters would have died contented once to have got the baton in their hands with such a massing of instruments and voices for the production of their works. Then, again, we are treated to Bilse's "Marche Militaire," to the "Star Spangled Banner," the "Harp that Once thro' Tara's Halls," and the overture to "Stradella," all good enough in their way and in their place. But how feeble, how purposeless, how silly they all are in this place! What does Hercules want of a wax doll? Or Samson of a child's grasp to carry off the gates of Gaza?
We have again the "Anvil Chorus." To be sure, it goes well. The artillery is fired with strict precision, because it can't be fired any other way. It emphasizes the initial notes of the bars very grandly and very effectively, but then what is the use of emphasizing such stuff at all? The firemen pound their anvils very precisely, and on the very second of time, and make a very hearty cling-clang; but it would be to more purpose were a hundred horses waiting to be shod. There is no music in all this. It is noisy; it is sensational; it is humbug; it is anything you please—but music. And yet the audience is hugely delighted and they demand the bis each day; and this, too, in Boston, where the purists live—where art is supposed to have its home and flourish like the green bay tree. Tell it not in Gath that a Boston audience has encored Verdi's Anvil Chorus, performed by red-shirted firemen, batteries of artillery, etc., and allowed the grand chorals of Luther and "He Watching Over Israel," which were done as they have never been done before—which were so full of sublimity and majesty and dignity, and so musically excellent in their treatment that it made one's heart fairly stop beating—to go by almost without recognition. It seemed to me that all possibilities of life and all conditions of the hereafter were bound up in that performance of Mendelssohn's chorus. Zerrahn himself approached it with fear and trembling. The organ was silenced. The instruments were toned down. He would not even trust himself upon the conductor's stand, but took his place right in the heart of the vast chorus. How sweetly the sopranos take the opening of the theme, and then come the tenors alone—"Shouldst thou walking in grief." How sublimely that prayer is delivered? Then how part after part rises in splendid climax and finally dies away in a soft piano, with just the faintest ripple of sounding, like the plashing of waves on a beach, stealing across the orchestra! There is a slapping of hands among the audience as if the music had been tolerated, but they will go crazy when the Anvil Chorus comes.
To-day, I have sat within three rows of the conductor's stand. The effect is very grand, but it is more noise than music, and you can put nothing together. If you go to the rear of the hall, you get a better harmonic blending and less noise. Indeed, a thousand performers in Farwell Hall would make just as much noise as the ten thousand performers do in the Coliseum, or, rather, the effect would strike you with equal power. It is probable that no amount of technical skill upon the part of the conductor, or of force and fidelity upon the part of the singers, could change this. It is impossible for such a great body of sound, occupying such a vast space, to reach a single ear with anything like its full force, or even with any degree of regularity; and if you watch the conductor, you will be still more confused, for, apparently, he is beating ahead of time—such is the discrepancy of time between the blow of the baton and the speed with which time travels. The chorus may, and with trivial exceptions does, follow the beat of the conductor with great precision, but the confusion is always noticeable. Again, the distance from those in the rear of the chorus to the front ranks is very large, and, although all may start upon the beat, by the time the sounds reach you, there is a difference, very slight, it is true, but nevertheless perceptible, especially in words ending with "s," "t," or any harsh letter. In the long notes of the chorals which are decidedly the features of the concert, you do not notice it so much, but, in many of the quick choruses, sometimes everything seems at sea to you, when, in reality, it is going very smoothly. With so vast a chorus, also, it is very difficult to preserve the delicate transitions. You can get a fortissimo or a pianissimo, but it is extremely difficult to get the forte and piano. The tendency of this multitude is either to sing too loud or too soft, and there is the same fact noticeable upon the part of the orchestra. With the organ it is different. Mr. Wilcox, at any moment he pleases, has the power in his hands to drown chorus and orchestra both, with its thunder. Its tones fairly pierce through and through the aggregate of sound at times with almost startling effect, and, wherever there is a weak spot, it can be covered up without difficulty. In the chorals, the power is specially manifested. In the hands of a skillful person, one beat of a baton would be all that was necessary to keep the chorus to its work. It could not get away from that organ if it tried—the pedal bass is so immense, so uplifting and so sustaining.
I think there is a universal disappointment in regard to the volume of sound to be produced by this chorus. People have imagined that the sound of ten thousand voices in the Coliseum, for instance, would be ten times as loud as one thousand voices in the Music Hall; but in reality it is no louder. They did not make calculations for the increased size of the building and the obstacles placed in the way of the traveling of sound and grasping it with the ear. My own disappointment has been a happy one. I had thought the noise would be simply noise, but the noise has been music. It has now been thoroughly proved that a chorus and orchestra of this size can be manipulated and not only be made to sing and play together, but to sing and play with expression and even approximate to a certain degree of light and shade. But yet, apart from the magnetism, there is in such a vast human presence, I do not see that the increase in numbers is really an advantage in making effects. It was a splendid experiment to try, however, and it speaks volumes for the skill of Mr. Gilmore, who conceived and organized it, and for Mr. Zerrahn, who has conducted the oratorio and classical parts of the programme.
June 18, 1869.
The crowd is not quite so large as that of yesterday, and yet the building is well filled. The programme was almost exclusively classical, and was opened with Weber's brilliant "Jubilee Overture," with the baton in Eichberg's hands. It was not given very effectively until the national theme in the finale was reached. This was played superbly by the brasses. The Fifth Symphony of Beethoven was only given in part, the Andante and last half of the Finale being played. It was something to be grateful for, to get even a fraction of the symphony, but it seemed almost cruel to cut the work or mar its unity in the least. It is the first time I have seen the orchestra really get down to its work as if they loved it. There was no talking among them, no listlessness. Every man sat in his place as eager for the start as a hound to slip from his leash, one eye upon Zerrahn, and the other upon his score. Two policemen standing in the aisle near the first violinists are talking together, and Carl Rosa and a half dozen others snap at them to stop their gossip. Apropos of Carl Rosa, he has proved himself an artist through this jubilee. He has been in his place every day promptly at the hour, and has played through every note of every programme. I regret that Ole Bull, who has been in the city during the whole week, only appeared on the opening day. It will be a matter of surprise to his admirers that he should so far have lacked enthusiasm as to absent himself upon such an occasion. The two movements of the symphony were played conscientiously and con amore, and there was little to ask for which was not given in its production.
Zerrahn seems to have a partiality for Mendelssohn, for when he came to the "Elijah" chorus, "Thanks be to God, He laveth the thirsty land," his instructions were more than usually explicit. The chorus, however, did not get the beat, and for a moment there was danger of a catastrophe. Zerrahn left his stand as quick as a rocket, and, waving his baton, went down into the chorus. The electricity of his manner fused the discordant elements, and with "The waters gather they rush along," all were together. Zerrahn remained at his post, and Schultze took the orchestra in hand, with his bow for baton, and the two batons moved like magic, and chorus and orchestra played like magic to the end, sweeping through the jubilant number like the march of a storm. If the chorus had never sung any thing else this would have paid for the difficulties of organization and been a rich remuneration for all the labors.