It was after his trip with Vogler and his fellow-students that Meyerbeer decidedly entered his career, though not without some fumbling. In 1813 we find him at Munich, where he gave an unsuccessful performance of Jephtha's Daughter, an opera in three acts, which had much the flavor and style of an oratorio. Disheartened by the result, he left very soon for Vienna, resolved to make known there his exceptional talent as pianist. In this capacity he achieved triumph after triumph in the capital of Austria; his execution was solid and brilliant, and at the same time full of poetry and charm. He played at these concerts a great number of his own compositions, which have never been published. At the same time he came twice before the Vienna public as dramatic composer, first with a mono-drama for soprano, clarinet obligato and chorus (the clarinetist figured as a personage of the drama) entitled The Loves of Tevelind, then with a comic opera in two acts, entitled Abimelek, or The two Caliphs, performed at the court theatre. This latter, written in the somewhat heavy style of Jephtha's Daughter, found no favor with a public which, at that period, was under the complete influence of Italian music. Meyerbeer was very much affected by this failure, and took his troubles to Salieri, who was then imperial capellmeister at Vienna. Salieri, who had taken a great fancy to him, and who had confidence in his future, consoled him as best he could, lavished encouragement upon him, and counselled him to make a trip into Italy. "There," said he, "you will learn to ripen your talent, to train your hand, and particularly to make a better disposition of the voices in your compositions and to write for them in a more rational and less fatiguing manner."
At that time Rossini was the king of musical Italy, and the enthusiasm produced by his works was beginning to take from the renown of such richly inspired artists as Cimarosa, Guglielmo, Sarti, Paisiello, his immediate predecessors. Everybody knows the influence which was exerted all over musical Europe for half a century, by the exuberant and sensual, though charming and seductive, genius of the author of the Barber and Cenerentola. All the artists, not only of Italy, but of France as well and some even of Germany, came under this influence to a greater or less extent. Meyerbeer escaped it no more than the rest; one might even say that he had no desire to escape it. He went straight from Vienna to Venice, where he arrived just at the height of Tancredi's immense success in that city; this opera, by the way, was one of the most personal, most vivacious and most savory works from Rossini's pen. He could not resist the charm of this chivalresque and enchanting music, and he was so captivated by the èclat of the Rossinian forms that he began to assimilate them as rapidly as possible.
BUST OF MEYERBEER, BY DANTAN.
From the Carnavalet Museum, Paris.
It is probable, however, that he reflected longer than people have hitherto given him credit for, on the transformation which he allowed to operate in his talent, for it was not until he had spent several years in Italy, that is to say in 1818, that he appeared to the public of that country for the first time. With his calm and meditative mind, with his studious and persevering nature, we may suppose that he employed his time in working silently, in solitude, to modify his style, to acquire the assurance which he lacked, to give elegance and facility to the forms of his melody, without compromising thereby the sentiment of a rich and abundant harmony, the beauties of an original and vigorous instrumentation. It was not, then, until after this complete remodelling of his early education, this training of his faculties, that he decided to brave the stage anew, and to solicit the approbation of a public to whom he was quite unknown. If this Italian career of Meyerbeer, of which I am about to give a brief review, offers only a secondary interest from the standpoint of the value of his works, it offers a very great one as a transitional stage, covering as it does the period of the development of his genius, and the evolution by which he was preparing himself for the great masterpieces with which he was to endow the French lyric stage, those masterpieces which were to seal his glory and render his fame universal.
CARICATURE OF MEYERBEER.
From collection of prints at the Paris Opera.