Many interesting musical productions took place during Manuel Garcia's residence in Paris.
In 1828, the year of his arrival from Mexico, Liszt was a boy of sixteen, an infant prodigy, just returned from a visit to England, and beginning to teach pianoforte, owing to circumstances already referred to in speaking of the lessons which Mme. Viardot had from him.
Berlioz had been sent by his parents some little time before to study medicine in the French capital. Instead of doing so, however, he had devoted himself to music, and was at this time a pupil at the Conservatoire.
Soon after Garcia's arrival there took place the production of one of Auber's best known works, "La Muette di Portici," or, as it is usually entitled, "Masaniello." The next year, that in which Schubert died, saw the completion of "Agnes von Hohenstaufen," the greatest work of Spontini, whose opera, "La Vestale," had been greeted with enthusiasm and adjudged Napoleon's prize of 10,000 francs twenty-two years before.
In 1830 came Auber's "Fra Diavolo" and Halévy's "Manon Lescaut."
The following year was an important one in many ways, for there were produced not only Bellini's two favourite operas, "Somnambula" and "Norma" (the "Puritani" was given four years later), but Hérold's "Zampa" and Meyerbeer's "Robert le Diable." But this is not all, for it saw the advent to Paris of Frédéric Chopin, a young man of twenty-two. Here he quickly found fame, and became the idol of the salons, giving lessons to a select clientèle of pupils, and employing his leisure in composition. He rarely performed in public, though, in Mendelssohn's judgment, he was "a truly perfect virtuoso" as well as a thorough musician, with a faculty for improvisation such as, perhaps, no other pianist ever possessed.
In 1832, a date made memorable on the tablets of literature by the death of Goethe and Sir Walter Scott, there came Hérold's "Le Pré aux Clercs," while Berlioz obtained the first proper hearing for some of his compositions. Their complicated and peculiar nature, however, failed to win popular recognition, and he was driven to support himself and his wife by writing musical criticisms.
In the summer of 1833 the birth took place of a musician who was to become world-famous, Johannes Brahms; while the winter was rendered memorable in the artistic circles of Paris by the fatal journey which Alfred de Musset made to Italy with George Sand. In the following April he reappeared alone, broken in health and sunk in the deepest depression. A quarter of a century later, when Garcia had long been settled in London, he was to be reminded of the episode by reading the version of the events which George Sand gave to the world in the guise of a novel, 'Elle et Lui'; to which Paul de Musset at once retorted with 'Lui et Elle,' in which he asserted that she had been grossly unfaithful.
The year, which robbed the world of one musician and brought forth another,—for with the death of Bellini there came the birth of Saint-Saëns,—was one full of musical interest, for 1835 saw the completion of a perfect avalanche of new operas, including Auber's "Cheval de Bronze," Halévy's "La Juive" and "L'Etoile du Nord," Adolphe Adam's "Postilion de Longjumeau," and two operas by Donizetti, "Marino Faliero" and "Lucia di Lammermoor."
In 1836 the first performance took place of Meyerbeer's great opera, the "Huguenots," given at the Académie Royale de Musique on February 29, with the following cast:—