I have just returned from the Moderner Abend at the Kaim Saal, and am so excited that to go calmly to bed and to sleep is an impossibility. I don't know when I have enjoyed anything as much. The concert, as you may have judged by the name, was made up of compositions by living composers. Stavenhagen arranged it and all the numbers but one were played for the first time. Here is the program:
The names in brackets are those of the soloists. For some reason or other the order was altered. Thuille's piece and Hugo Wolf's changed places. Edgar Istel, who conducted his own overture, is a tall, broad-shouldered, fine-looking young fellow, and a pupil of Thuille. I am in doubt as to his nationality for he certainly looks too well groomed for a German. The Schillings piece was a lovely, sustained thing. That man certainly knows how to write for the 'cello! We heard his opera Ingwelde last week, and remarked the same thing then. The third number was, however, the number of the evening. I wish I could describe to you the enchanting beauty of this music from Gugeline—its delicacy, freshness, and tenderness. And yet withal there is no semblance of insipidity about it, for in spite of the dominance of fanciful, graceful motifs the music every now and then assumes a more passionate tinge, as though an undercurrent of deeper feeling flowed beneath its charming surface. Agnes Stavenhagen, the wife of the director, sang with great niceness. Thuille has a trick of ending a phrase by a jump to a high pianissimo note, and she rendered this most effectively.
Prejudiced as I naturally was in favor of my Maestro, I was not alone in my enthusiasm, for at the close of the piece the audience burst into a storm of applause, cheering, stamping, and crying "Bravo! Bravo!" "Thuille! Thuille!" The whole house rose as one person. Thuille, who had been sitting about eight rows back, at length came forward. He did not mount the stage, but remained below the conductor's stand, bowing and smiling in the delightful, unaffected fashion peculiar to him. Again and again he was recalled, the audience remaining standing and applauding. Clearly, aside from his musical ability, he is a great favorite in Munich. When the tempest had at last subsided and we had settled back into our places, Frau Langenhan-Hirzel appeared to play the concerto of vom Rath. Her entrance was the signal for a fresh outburst of applause, and there was no more enthusiastic group in the hall than ours in the east corner, for Polly, Edith, and Louise are all her pupils and loyally adore her. "Frau Langenhan," as they generally call her, looked very young as she took her place at the piano. She is slight, and her short black hair curls roguishly about her head, while a pair of dark, innocent eyes give her an almost childlike appearance. But however youthful she may seem, she plays with a mastery and force unusual in a woman. Lescheticsky is proud of her I hear, and one can readily see why. The concerto itself is most brilliant and was originally composed and dedicated to her. Long and prolonged applause followed its close. Frau Langenhan-Hirzel bowed repeatedly, and at length vom Rath came forward and joined her. He is tall, with extremely light hair. In spite of his dignified bearing he was blushing up to his ears with embarrassment, and looked greatly relieved to sit down.
As for the last number, we had forgotten all about it, for we started impetuously off to the green room. When we entered, there was the little pianist calmly smoking a cigarette and carelessly shaking her black curls from to time with a characteristic movement of the head. The girls rushed enthusiastically up to her. After the first eager words of congratulation they presented me, and she was most cordial in her greeting as she turned and shook hands, holding her cigarette in her fingers. Quite a number of the German women smoke and she does so constantly, in fact even when giving lessons, which goes ahead of Thuille.
But my head all the time was full of Gugeline—how could one forget it?—and I looked about for Thuille. He was talking to Stavenhagen in the corner, with his back towards me. A moment later he turned, and as I went forward with outstretched hand he met me half way. The beauty of his music had so intensely moved me, that I grew excited when I endeavored to congratulate him, and my German flew away as if on wings. I could only murmur stupidly something about "wunderschön" (very beautiful) and "entzückend" (charming), the sole adjectives I could at the moment recall. Perhaps my expression told him more than my words, for he was good enough to look much pleased as he shook hands warmly.
Then we girls all came out together. None of us cared to hear the rest of the last number. I for one wanted to be quiet and think—or rather to hear again in my mind those haunting, exquisite strains. Is there anything in the world more marvellous than music or more indescribable than its hidden soul? And now I must to bed, and hear it all over again, I hope, in my dreams.
München, March 6.
As soon as my greetings with Thuille were over to-day I hastened to congratulate him again on the success of his Gugeline music last Monday. This time my German was a little more fluent, and I even made bold to ask him how long it had taken him to write the act. He said that he started it in the middle of June, 1899. After waiting two weeks for text from Bierbaum, and after countless other interruptions, he finished it by the end of August.
Then began the lesson. With a sinking heart I placed my fugue on the rack. I don't know how many hours I had worked on it! At any rate the stretto had almost reduced me to tears. A stretto is a net, and if one is not constantly on the watch, he is caught in its meshes. Thuille looked it over, made some corrections, and to my surprise said, "Sie sind recht fleissig gewesen, Fräulein. Die Fugue ist gut" (You have been very industrious. The fugue is good). My spirits rose with a leap, for he seldom praises.