There were sixty-six performances in the season of light operas, and one ballet, the latter Delibes's "Sylvia." The operas were Goetz's "Taming of the Shrew" (five times), Gluck's "Orpheus" (thirteen times), Wagner's "Lohengrin" (ten times), Mozart's "Magic Flute" (six times), Nicolai's "Merry Wives of Windsor" (nine times), Delibes's "Lakmé" (eleven times), Wagner's "Flying Dutchman" (seven times), and Massé's "Marriage of Jeannette" (in conjunction with the ballet, five times). "The Taming of the Shrew" received its first performance in America on January 4, 1886; "Lakmé" on March 1st; "The Marriage of Jeannette," on March 24th, and "Lohengrin" (in English), on January 20th.
Immediately on the death of Dr. Damrosch, trouble broke out in the Metropolitan company. There had been some jealousy among the women singers because of the large honorarium paid to Mme. Materna. It was her third visit to America, and she had learned to say dollars when at home she was accustomed to think of florins. Moreover, in the spring of the year she had made an extensive concert tour with Mme. Nilsson, under the direction of Mr. Thomas, and knew something about the liberality of Americans in the matter of artists' fees. Herr Schott (Dr. von Bülow's dis-, des-, and detonating tenor), developing a large and noisy managerial ambition, scarcely waited for the burial of Dr. Damrosch before beginning an agitation looking toward his installation in the dead director's place. All this might have been done in a seemly manner, and if it had been so done might have been carried through successfully and with popular approbation, for Herr Schott's project, in the main, was the one acted on by the directors. But Herr Schott, in an effort to promote his scheme, made an ungallant attack upon the artistic character of Mme. Materna, and this the public found to be "most tolerable and not to be endured." The occasion soon presented itself for Schott to show that he had an overweening sense of his own importance and popularity. At the end of the fourth of the five supplementary performances there was a demonstration of applause. Herr Schott interpreted it as a curtain call for himself, and promptly showed himself, and bowed his thanks. The applause was renewed, and he repeated this performance. Then came a third call, and again the tenor stepped out before the footlights. Now the applause of his friends was mingled with cries of "Materna!" but on a fourth call, and a fourth appearance of Schott, the popular feeling exploded in hisses and calls for the soprano. He retired unabashed, but Mme. Materna, answering the next call, was tumultuously greeted. So far as the overwhelming majority of the patrons of the house was concerned, Herr Schott's cake was now dough. Foolishly he, or his friends for him, proceeded to anger the directors from whom they were expecting favors. It was given out that he had submitted a proposition concerning the management of the opera house at the request of the directors. This met with prompt denial at the hands of Mr. Stanton, the secretary of the board, and by some of the directors themselves.
Herr Schott had submitted a proposition, however, and had coupled it with a hint, which sounded like a threat, that in case it was not promptly accepted it would go to the directors of the Academy of Music. This vexed some of the stockholders of the older institution, who made public denial that they were considering German opera, even as a remote possibility. Herr Schott's proposition was dismissed with little ceremony by the Metropolitan directors, who, however, sent Mr. Stanton and Mr. Walter Damrosch to Europe to organize a company to carry out the lines already established during the coming season. In doing so they adopted several valuable suggestions contained in Herr Schott's plan. In this plan Schott was to be the musical director of the company, of course, but not the conductor. For this post he contemplated engaging Anton Seidl, then conductor of the Municipal Theater of Bremen and husband of the jugendlich Dramatische, who had successfully gone through the ordeal of one season—Auguste Krauss. Walter Damrosch was to be assistant conductor, Mme. Schroeder-Hanfstängl, Frau Krauss, Fräulein Brandt, and Herren Staudigl and Blum, of the old company, were to be kept, and the new singers were to be a Fräulein Gilbert, Fräulein Koppmeyer, Ferdinand Wachtel (son of Theodore, already referred to), and Carl Hill, bass.
The organization, as finally effected, placed Mr. Stanton at its head as director, acting for the stockholders; Walter Damrosch, as assistant director, and also conductor; Lilli Lehmann, of Berlin, was the principal soprano; Marianne Brandt, principal contralto; Albert Stritt, principal tenor; Emil Fischer, of Dresden, principal bass, and Adolf Robinson, principal barytone. Other singers were Auguste Krauss (who now became Seidl-Krauss), Max Alvary, tenor; Fräulein Slach, mezzo-soprano; Eloi Sylva, tenor; Kemlitz, tenor; Lehmler, bass; Frau Krämer-Wiedl, dramatic soprano; Herr Alexi, barytone, and Fräulein Klein, soprano. With this company the second season of German opera was opened on November 23, 1885, the opera being "Lohengrin." I shall not take up the features of the season seriatim, nor make detailed record of the consecutive productions of the operas on its list. Only special incidents shall be recorded; but before this is done something may be said touching the newcomers:
Anton Seidl was a young man when he came to New York, but he had filled the position of secretary to Richard Wagner, and been a member of his household for six years. Before then he had studied at the Leipsic Conservatory (which he entered in October, 1870), and been a chorus master or accompanist at the Vienna Opera. There he came under the eyes of Hans Richter, who sent him to Wagner when the latter asked for a young man who could give him such help on "The Ring of the Nibelung" as Richter had given him on "Die Meistersinger"—that is, to write out the clean score from the composer's hurried autograph. The period which he spent with Wagner was from 1872 to 1879. During all the preparations for the first Bayreuth Festival in 1876 he was one of the poet-composer's executive officers. He was one of the assistant conductors on the stage during the festival, and afterward conducted the preliminary rehearsals for the concerts which Wagner gave in London and elsewhere to recoup himself for the losses made at the festival. Then, on Wagner's recommendation, he was appointed conductor at the Municipal Theater at Leipsic (his associates being Victor Nessler and Arthur Nikisch), later on of Angelo Neumann's "Richard Wagner Theater," which gave representations of "Der Ring des Nibelungen" in many cities of Germany, Holland, England, and Italy, and still later of the Municipal Theater in Bremen—the post which he held when the death of Dr. Damrosch created the vacancy which brought him to New York. All this he had accomplished before his thirty-fifth year (he was born in Pesth on May 7, 1850), and he was not yet thirty when Wagner, in a speech delivered in Berlin, alluded to him as "the young artist whom I have brought up, and who is now accomplishing astounding things." Naturally, when he came to New York, he was looked upon as a prophet, priest, and paladin of Wagner's art. For twelve years he filled a large place in the music of New York, in concert room as well as opera house, and when he died it was like his predecessor, in the fulness of his powers, and in the midst of his activities. But this belongs to a later chapter of this story.
Lilli Lehmann brought to New York chiefly the fame which she had won in Bayreuth at the first Wagner festival, of 1876, at which she was one of the Rhine daughters (Woglinde), and one of the Valkyrior (Helmwige), and where she also sang the music of the Forest Bird in "Siegfried." At that period in her career she was still classed among the light sopranos, and so she continued to be classed until she broke violently away from the clogs which tradition puts upon artists in the theaters of Germany. She felt the charm of freedom from the old theatrical conventions when she sang Isolde at Covent Garden on July 2, 1884, and her growth to a lofty tragic stature was rapid. She was filled with fervor for the large rôles of Wagner when she came to New York, and her success in them was so gratifying to her ambition that it led her at the expiration of her leave of absence from the Court Opera at Berlin (where she had been fifteen years as erste Coloratursängerin) to extend her stay in America beyond the period of her furlough, and involved her in difficulties with the Berlin Intendant, and the federation of German theatrical managers, called the Cartellverband. Having carried to her an offer from the president of the Cincinnati Festival Association to sing at the festival of May, 1886, which was the ultimate reason for her action, I am in a position to give the details of the story of what became a cause célèbre, and led to a wide discussion of the relations between the German managers and their singers. A short time before Miss Lehmann had declined an offer from the committee of the North American Sängerbund to take part in the Sängerfest, which was to be held in Milwaukee in June, 1886. She had also been asked by the artistic manager of the house of Steinway & Sons to go on a concert tour with Franz Rummel and Ovide Musin. When I came to her with the dispatch from Cincinnati she spoke of her unwillingness to break her contract with Berlin, and of the loss of the lifelong pension to which her period of service at the Court Opera would eventually entitle her. I declined to advise her in the premises, but made a calculation of her prospective net earnings from the three engagements which were offering, and suggested that she compare the income from their investment with the pension which she would forfeit. I also agreed, if she wished it, to reopen the negotiations with the Sängerfest officials at Milwaukee. She took the matter under advisement, and in a few days, having concluded the engagement with a representative of the Cincinnati association, she told me she had determined to stay in America during June. In July, against the advice of some of her American friends, she paid a fine imposed upon her by the Intendant of the Court Opera. The amount of the fine was 13,000 marks ($3,250), and this amount she had received from the Milwaukee engagement. I had written to Mr. Catenhusen, the director of the Sängerfest, as promised, and he had reopened negotiations with more than willingness. Asked for her terms, she replied: "Three thousand three hundred dollars," and turning to a friend said: "I'll let the festival pay my Berlin fine." After she had paid the money into the royal exchequer, the manager of Kroll's Theater engaged her for a series of representations, but met an unexpected obstacle in the form of a refusal of the Intendant of the Court Theater to restore her to the privileges which she had forfeited by breaking her contract. It was long before she succeeded in making peace with the Governmental administration of the Court Opera, and in the public discussion which accompanied her efforts she took part in an eminently characteristic way. The newspapers were open to her, and in the Berlin Tageblatt (I think it was) she defended her course on the ground that America had enabled her to exercise her talent in a field which the hidebound traditions of the German theaters would have kept closed to her. Once a florid singer, always a florid singer, was her complaint, and she added: "One grows weary after singing nothing but princesses for fifteen years." Though she began in "Carmen," and followed with "Faust," Miss Lehmann soon got into the Wagnerian waters, in which she was longing to adventure, and in them set some channel buoys which the New York public still asks Brünnhildes and Isoldes to observe. It was then, however, and still is, characteristic of her broad ideals in art, that, while winning the highest favor in tragic parts, she preserved not only her old skill, but her old love for good singing in the old sense. When, at the height of her Wagnerian career, she sang at a performance for her own benefit, she chose "Norma."
From 1885 till the time when her operatic experiences had become the exception to her rule of concert work, the greater part of her career was spent in New York; and during the whole of the period she was in all things artistic an inspiration, and an exemplar to her fellow artists. For industry, zeal, and unselfish devotion in preparing an opera I have never met an artist who could be even remotely compared with her. When "Siegfried" was in rehearsal for its first American production, she took a hand in setting the stage. Though she had nothing to do in the second act, she went into the scenic lumber room and selected bits of woodland scenery, and with her own hands rearranged the set so as to make Siegfried's posture and surroundings more effective. When the final dress rehearsal of "Götterdämmerung" was reached a number of the principal singers were still uncertain of their music. Miss Lehmann was letter perfect, as usual, but without a demur repeated the ensembles over and over again, singing always, as was her wont, with full voice and intense dramatic expression. This had been going on literally for hours when the end of the second act was reached. When she came into the audience room for the intermission I ventured to expostulate with her:
"My dear Miss Lehmann, pray have a care. You are not effecting your début in New York, nor is this a public performance. Think of to-morrow. You will weary your voice. Why do you work so? Markiren Sie doch!"
"Markiren thu Ich nie!" ("Markiren," it may be explained, is the technical term for singing in half-voice, or just enough to mark the cues.) "As for the rest, rehearsals are necessary, if not for one's self, then at least for the others. Don't be alarmed about my voice. It is easier to sing all three Brünnhildes than one Norma. You are so carried away by the dramatic emotion, the action, and the scene that you do not have to think how to sing the words. That comes of itself. But in Bellini you must always have a care for beauty of tone and correct emission. But I love 'Norma,' and Mozart's 'Entführung.'"
Very different this from the conduct of Max Alvary after he had begun to grow into public favor. He was a son of the Düsseldorf painter, Andreas Achenbach, and came to New York without reputation, and engaged to sing second rôles. Early in the season Stritt, the first tenor, after creating the part of Assad in Goldmark's "Königin von Saba" yielded it up to Alvary, finding the range of the music a little too trying for his voice. Alvary's handsome face and figure, especially the latter, his gallant bearing, and his impeccable taste in dress, made a deep impression, and it was not long before he developed into a veritable matinée girl's idol. He developed also an enormous conceit, which near the end of his New York career led him to think that he was the opera, and that he might dictate policies to the manager and the directors back of him. So in the eyes of the judicious there were ragged holes in his shining veneer long before his career in New York came to a close. The preparation of "Siegfried" for performance led to an encounter between him and Mr. Seidl, in which the unamiable side of his disposition, and the shallowness of his artistic nature were disclosed. At the dress rehearsal, when alone on the stage, he started in to go through his part in dumbshow. Seidl requested him to sing.