Victor Herbert in his comic operas has contrived to write in a vein somewhat more varied than de Koven. While he has never achieved a success to equal that of 'Robin Hood,' his operas taken as a whole exhibit a more sustained power of invention and inspiration than those of de Koven. Herbert's style is more marked by piquancy and lightness, but he is not lacking in a melodic sense both charming and natural.
Herbert's style has undergone an evolution since his entrance into the comic opera field. His earlier works, such as 'The Wizard of the Nile,' 'The Serenade,' and 'The Idol's Eye,' are very simple in structure, while in some of his later works he employs an ambitious scheme that the laity are wont to identify with 'grand' opera. Some of Herbert's later scores are: 'The Red Mill,' 'Mlle. Modiste,' 'Algeria,' and 'Sweethearts.' Mr. Herbert was born in Ireland in 1859, was musically educated in Germany, and came to America at about the age of twenty-seven as solo 'cellist to the Metropolitan Opera House. His 'Americanism' is, therefore, acquired.
John Philip Sousa's fame, as is well known, is not primarily that of an opera composer. As the 'march king' Mr. Sousa's fame is as unique as it is deserved. Sousa is of German-Spanish descent. He was born in Washington in 1859. His career has been one of rich practical experience and opportunity, leading to an engagement as the leader of the United States Marine Band. In 1892 he organized the band which bears his own name and that organization has, perhaps, a more world-wide fame than any other feature of our musical life.
Mr. Sousa has been often held up as the most representative of American composers, an estimate that is not without considerable truth. An analogy has been made between the Strauss waltzes and the Sousa marches: the latter have not perhaps so much art as the former, but they are all admirable pieces of composition, solid in harmonic structure, and stirring in their melodic directness. 'The Washington Post,' 'The Liberty Bell,' 'The High School Cadets,' and 'King Cotton' have each, in turn, inspired the land with their martial vigor, while 'The Stars and Stripes Forever' has become permanent in the people's affections, being, indeed, a national anthem more eloquent in Americanism than many of the tunes that bear the official seal as such.
Sousa has written several comic operas. One only of these, 'El Capitan,' has met with success. It contains much music of an agreeable brilliancy and gracefulness, notably one of the best examples of the composer's marches. There is lacking, however, in Sousa's music a quality very essential to the rounding out of a successful opera score. We refer to the more sensuous melodic line which lends color to the sustained portions of a work. Later operas of Sousa include: 'The Bride Elect,' 'The Charlatan,' 'Chris and the Wonderful Lamp,' and 'The Glass Blowers,' and it may be added that Mr. Sousa has made several incursions into the field of more serious music, having written a symphonic poem and several other works for orchestra.
One of the most prolific composers of American light opera was Julian Edwards (1855-1910). Mr. Edwards' list of about twenty operas includes the names of several that have had remarkable success. 'Brian Boru' and 'Dolly Varden' are more than names to many. In 1904 Mr. Edwards wrote the opera 'Love's Lottery,' which served as the vehicle whereby Mme. Schumann-Heink entered the comic opera field.
Ludwig Englander and Gustav Luders are other names endeared to American comic opera lovers. Both are of foreign birth, however. The operas of the latter include 'King Dodo,' 'Grand Mogul,' and 'The Prince of Pilsen,' all works which, though neither marked by originality nor over-refined, contained enough of musical vitality to have won a place in the public esteem.
Less known writers who have from time to time added their quota to the country's enlivening and tuneful music include: G. Thorne, whose opera, 'A Maid of Plymouth,' was one of the first in the répertoire of the Bostonians; Henry Waller, the composer of 'Olgallalas,' which was also produced by the Bostonians; Carl Pflueger, who wrote '1492,' given by the Boston Cadets, an amateur organization, in one of their excellent productions; and Barnet, whose 'Jack and the Beanstalk' was also sung at one of the Cadets' 'shows.'
Several of the more serious composers have essayed the comic opera, not always successfully. George W. Chadwick's 'Tabasco,' first produced by the Boston Cadets, had a fair success when subsequently given professionally, but Edgar Stillman-Kelley's 'Puritania' and Henry Hadley's 'Nancy Brown' were decided failures. One of the recent successes was Deems Taylor's 'The Echo,' originally written as a college 'show' but achieving a long run on New York's Broadway.
Viewed in the light of present-day conditions and compared with the class of works that constitute the large part of modern musical stage-works, most of the foregoing operas may be classed as hopelessly old-fashioned and passé. The decline of comic opera commenced with the ascendency of the English 'musical comedy.' There are, it is true, many works of the latter order that contain pages of music far better than what is to be found in many of the more strictly operatic works. Such works as 'Florodora' and 'The Geisha,' as well as many later ones, have had much charm and refinement. It is the tendency of these works to abolish the romantic strain of the old-fashioned opera that constitutes its baneful influence. The play and the music have become gradually more and more divorced and to-day the musical portions of such a work have little or no bearing on the action or the scene, but consist almost entirely of topical songs introduced in much the same irrelevant manner in which they are so ingeniously brought into a vaudeville 'act.' Paraphrasing Voltaire, the majority of this degenerate class is neither musical nor comic.