His songs are written usually in a characteristic form of dramatic, yet lyric recitative. His "Album of Five Songs" contains notable examples of this style, particularly the "Good-Night," "Come to Me in My Dreams," and the supremely tragic climax of "Jealousy." The song, "Evening," with its bell-like accompaniment, is more purely lyric, like the enchanting "At Parting," which was too delicately and fragrantly perfect to escape the wide popularity it has had. His "Declaration" is ravishingly exquisite, and offers a strange contrast to the "Requiescat," which is a dirge of the utmost largeness and grandeur. His graceful "Fly, White Butterflies," and "In Harbor," and the dramatic setting of "The Loreley," the jovial "Gather Ye Rosebuds" of jaunty Rob Herrick, the foppish tragedy of "La Vie est Vaine" (in which the composer's French prosody is a whit askew), that gallant, sweet song, "My True Love Hath My Heart," and a gracious setting of Heine's flower-song, are all noteworthy lyrics. He has set some of Tolstoï's words to music, the sinister love of "Doubt Not, O Friend," and the hurry and glow of "The First Spring Days," making unusually powerful songs. In the "Look Off, Dear Love," he did not catch up with Lanier's great lyric, but he handled his material most effectively in Aldrich' "Song from the Persian," with its Oriental wail followed by a martial joy. The high verve that marks his work lifts his "Sing, O Heavens," out of the rut of Christmas anthems.
Of instrumental work, there is only one small book, "Scènes du Bal," a series of nine pieces with lyric characterization in the spirit, but not the manner of Schumann's "Carnéval." The most striking numbers are "Les Bavardes," "Blonde et Brune," and a fire-eating polonaise.
These close the lamentably small number of manifestations of a most decisive ability.
Another Cleveland composer well spoken of is Charles Sommer.
A young woman of genuine ability, who has been too busy with teaching and concert pianism to find as much leisure as she deserves for composition, is Patty Stair, a prominent musical figure in Cleveland. Her theoretical studies were received entirely at Cleveland, under F. Bassett. Her published works include a book of "Six Songs," all of them interesting and artistic, and the "Madrigal" particularly ingenious; and a comic glee of the most irresistible humor, called "An Interrupted Serenade;" in manuscript are a most original song, "Flirtation," a jovial part song for male voices, "Jenny Kissed Me," a berceuse for violin and piano, a graceful song, "Were I a Brook," a setting of Thomas Campion's "Petition," and another deeply stirring religious song for contralto, "O Lamb of God."
The St. Louis Colony.
The most original and important contribution to American music that St. Louis has made, is, to my mind, the book of songs written by William Schuyler. The words were chosen from Stephen Crane's book of poems, "[The Black Riders]." The genius of Crane, concomitant with eccentricity as it was, is one of the most distinctive among American writers. The book called "The Black Riders" contains a number of moods that are unique in their suggestiveness and originality. Being without rime or meter, the lines oppose almost as many difficulties to a musician as the works of Walt Whitman; and yet, as Alfred Bruneau has set Zola's prose to music, so some brave American composer will find inspiration abundant in the works of Walt Whitman and Emily Dickinson.
III.
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