Among the Danish composers of the same time we may mention Emil Hartmann (1836-1898), son of the great Hartmann, prolific composer of orchestral pieces, chamber music, and operas of professedly national character; Peter A. Heise (1830-1870), composer of songs to some of the best national lyric poetry of the time; and August Winding (1835-1899), composer of piano, orchestral and chamber music in which national color and folk humor were discreetly brought to the foreground.
In recent times the Danish school, of the four Scandinavian branches, has been least national in intent. Foreign gods have exercised their sway in one fashion or another. Nor can we say that the absolute value of the more recent works is distinguished. Among the half dozen Danish composers who have attained to eminence there is none who can be considered the equal of either Gade or Hartmann in personal ability. Much of the best efforts of the younger men has gone to larger forms, in which either their creative inspiration or their formal mastery has proved insufficient. Among them there are four of marked ability: August Enna, in opera; Asger Hamerik, in symphonic music; P. E. Lange-Müller, in lyric and piano works; and Carl Nielsen, in chamber music.
August Enna (born 1860) is the most prolific and successful of Denmark's opera composers. Chiefly self-taught, but mainly German in his influences, he has written some ten operas in which one influence or style after another is evident. 'Cleopatra,' after Rider Haggard's story, is ambitious and theatric, but it reveals, alongside of frank Wagnerism, the ghost of Meyerbeer and of Italian opera of the 'transition period' of the 'eighties. 'Aucassin and Nicolette' attempts the quaint and naïve style which is supposed to comport with the late Middle Ages; it has a distinction of its own, but too often it is mere conventional romantic opera. The fairy operas after Andersen—'The Little Match Girl' and 'The Princess of the Peapod'—are in more congenial style, but lack the necessary consistent manner of light fantasy. The truth is that Enna, with marked abilities, is limited to the expression of tender sentiment, gentle melancholy, and personal, intimate moods. His invention is happy, though uneven; his use of the orchestra colorful but not always in taste. He lacks the ability to conceive and carry out a large work in a consistent and elevated manner. He fails in that ultimate test of the thorough workman—the ability to execute a whole work in a consistent and homogeneous style. The trouble is not with his operatic instinct, which is sufficiently vivid; nor with his melodic invention as such, for this is often fresh and charming. But his musicianship and his inspiration have not proven equal to the task he has set himself.
Asger Hamerik (born 1843) has undertaken an equally big task in the field of symphonic music. He plans on a large scale, but it can hardly be said that he thinks likewise. We may note a 'Poetic' symphony, a 'Tragic' symphony, a 'Lyric' symphony, a 'Majestic' symphony, and a choral symphony, among several others. Of his two operas, one, 'The Vendetta,' received a performance in Milan. There is considerable choral and chamber music, and in particular a 'Northern' orchestral suite by which his artistic personality may be best known. But he has at bottom little of the national feeling. He is facilely eclectic, but with no individual or consistent binding principle. He has a romanticism that recalls Dvořák's—graceful, mildly sensuous, pleasing rather than inspiring; he has further a marked gift as an instrumental colorist. But his harmony is conventional, and his thematic ideas are usually undistinguished. Finally, his structural power is not sufficient to raise his musical material to a high artistic plane. Hamerik is out of the main line of Scandinavian national music, but has not been able to make a place for himself in music universal.
Much more to the purpose in intent and achievement is P. E. Lange-Müller (born 1850). He reveals a graceful sense of form and a sincere emotional feeling in his smaller works for piano and voice. His harmony is conservative and sometimes disappointing; but whenever he strikes the tender mood of folk-music he saves himself with a touch of poetry. But he is rather a follower of the old school of German romanticism than of Scandinavian nationalism. The four-act opera, Frau Jeanna, is content with an unobtrusive lyric style, but the lyricism is not exalted enough to sustain such a large-scale work. The melodrama Middelalderlig, of more recent date, shows much poetic color but a fundamental lack of invention. In the larger works he is at his best in the fairy-comedy, 'Once upon a Time.' His symphony 'In Autumn,' his orchestral suite, 'Alhambra,' and 'Niels Ebbesen' for chorus, have met with indifferent success. Lange-Müller is primarily a lyric composer for voice and piano, and in this field he shows a sort of grace and tenderness which we shall meet with frequently in recent Swedish music.
A sincere and able, yet austere, composer is Carl Nielsen (born 1865). His music is, with that of the Swede Alfvén, less programmistic and more 'absolute' than we shall meet with in any other distinguished Scandinavian musician of modern times. The national element in his work is almost nil. A master of counterpoint, and a vigorous innovator in the modern Russian style, he commands respect rather than love. His output includes more than half a dozen symphonies, a number of works for string quartet and violin, some large compositions for chorus and orchestra, and a four-act opera, 'Saul and David.' It is by this that he is best known. This is a work to command respectful attention from musicians, but hardly enthusiastic applause from ordinary audiences. The writing shows great musical knowledge, careful and ample ability in counterpoint and in modulation of the complex modern sort, a certain unity of style, and a command of special emotional color. But the work is perhaps rather that of the symphonist than of the operatic poet. His instrumentation, unlike his harmony, is conservative. His workmanship is thorough, and his musicianship wide and soundly based.
Among the minor names there are several who deserve mention for one reason or another. Ludolf Nielsen (born 1876) is a thorough classicist at heart, though he has become known in Germany through his symphonic poems 'In Memoriam,' Fra Bjaergene, and 'Summer Night Moods.' He is more than usually talented, but very conservative in his style. His themes are interesting though not striking, and his product is sufficiently inspired with human feeling to be preserved from pedantry. Hakon Börresen (born 1876) has distinguished himself with many songs which preserve the national tradition established for Norway by Grieg and Sinding. His chamber music has revealed harmonic invention and tender coloring which show him to be one of the chosen of the younger Danish composers. Finally, we may mention Otto Malling (born 1848), an able writer for organ and string quartet; Victor Bendix (born 1851), well known in Denmark for a number of symphonies which combine delicate poetry with structural beauty; Ludvig Schytte (born 1848), prolific writer of piano pieces, and Cornelius Rübner, who commands respect for solidly classic workmanship. These latter men are of the old school. Of the younger generation in Denmark we are hardly justified in hoping for works of great distinction, unless a possible exception may be made in the case of Börresen. For, speaking broadly, the national impulse has departed from Danish composition.
III
Though Scandinavian art was first brought to the attention of the world at large through the Norwegians (Grieg in music and Ibsen in literature), Sweden has in more recent years held her share of international attention. After Ibsen the Swede Strindberg was perhaps the most talked-of dramatist in Europe. Still more recently the novels of Selma Lagerlöf and the sociological writings of Ellen Key have been widely translated and read, not only in European lands, but in America also. Strindberg was a supreme artist, a personality of an intensity equalling Nietzsche and of a spiritual variety suggesting that of Goethe. The strain of violent morbidity in his Weltanschauung was a purely personal and not at all a national matter. As executive artist he showed an almost classic balance and control. Selma Lagerlöf is sane and finely poised, and Ellen Key has by her moderation and her clearness of intellectual vision made herself a leader in a department of modern sociological study which more than any other is apt to be treated sentimentally and hysterically. Poise and artistic control are, in fact, to be noticed generally in modern Swedish art, and especially in music. The cosmopolitan character of Swedish political history is here seen in its results. Someone has called Stockholm 'the Paris of the north.' The epithet is just: grace, conscious artistry, sensuous self-indulgence, are to be found in Swedish music in a degree that contrasts markedly with the militant self-expression of the Norwegian school. Without losing its national qualities the art of modern Sweden has spoken the easy language of the European capitals.
Sweden's story is like Denmark's: first a thorough Germanization of her music, then a gradual growth of the national tone. This tone grew in every case out of the early German romanticism. The first great Swedish composer and the earliest romanticist was Franz Berwald (1796-1868). His position in Sweden is somewhat analogous to that held in Denmark by Hartmann. His output was large, and in the largest forms. He undertook symphonic works which until his time had been neglected in his native land. Without being known much outside Sweden he gained a place in the hearts of his countrymen which he has held ever since. His most popular work was his Symphonie Sérieuse in G minor, composed in 1843, sincere, poetic and musicianly. The influence of Schumann is predominant. A considerable quantity of symphonic and chamber music, reflecting chiefly Beethoven and Mendelssohn, gained him a position as the foremost symphonic writer of his time. An early violin concerto, composed in 1820, reveals him as a sincere student of Beethoven, youthful, romantic and progressive. Out of half a dozen operas we may mention Estrella de Soria, a romantic work of large proportions, built on the Parisian model (though showing the homely influence of Weber)—with hunting chorus, grand ballet, and all. That he was not unconscious of his nationality is proved by the names of some of his choral compositions, such as Gustav Adolph bei Lützen, 'The Victory of Karl XII at Narwa,' and the Nordische Phantasiebilder. A 'symphonic poem,' En landtlig Bröllopfest, makes extensive use of Swedish melodies, but the style is not a national one, and the themes are merely utilized without being developed. As a highly trained and spontaneous worker in the early romantic style Berwald performed a great service in awakening musical consciousness in his native land. But here ends his national significance.