The orchestra and orchestral music

by W. J. Henderson

We have now come to the period when the mere time-beater began to give way to the interpreting conductor, the director who invites you to consider his especial “reading” of this or that work and be wise. Before we leave the time-beater, however, let me remind the reader that his function is by no means to be despised, and in the case of some suave and gentle classical works it would be well if he presided over the performances of some of our present orchestras. Berlioz has said: “The talent of the beater of time, without demanding very high musical attainments, is nevertheless sufficiently difficult to obtain; and very few persons really possess it. The signs that a conductor should make—although generally simple—nevertheless become complicated under certain circumstances by the division and even the subdivision of the time of the bar.” Berlioz has given us, in the concluding chapter of his admirable work on orchestration, an essay on the art of the time-beater, which is well worth reading. It is sufficient to say here that the old-fashioned time-beater’s work was complete when he indicated the correct tempo, and plainly marked the beginning and necessary subdivisions of each bar.

When the composer conducted his own works, as was so often the case in the earlier days of symphonic music, there was no need of an interpretative conductor. But when the composer had long passed from the land of the living and the traditions of his readings had become obscured, or when his works were to be introduced in a foreign country—as in the case of Beethoven’s symphonies in France—the interpretative conductor became a necessity. Furthermore, when the art of conducting began to be recognized as a specialty, it was conceded that composers were generally poor conductors of their own works, and the orchestral director became a distinct species. Hector Berlioz, for example, could not play any instrument save the guitar, and Richard Wagner was only a very poor pianist; yet both were admirable conductors.

The interpreting conductor came into existence in the early part of the present century. It cannot be said that any one man was the first representative of the species, but rather that it was one of the first-fruits of the romantic movement, that healthy renaissance of musical emotion. Both German capellmeisters and French directors had occupied themselves wholly with the regulation of the technics of the orchestra, and if the tempo was about right and the instruments kept well together and gave the broader effects of light and shade, they were satisfied. But two or three progressive conductors insisted upon further refinement of orchestral performance.

Johann Karl Stamitz (1719-61), director of the Mannheim orchestra, and François Joseph Gossec (1733-1829), founder of the Concert des Amateurs in Paris, were the two conductors who carried orchestral technics up to the point at which genuine interpretative work became possible by reason of the refinement of the means of expression. It was in studying the means of orchestral expression that these conductors gradually approached the questions of interpretation. As they polished the phrasing of their orchestras, they began to inquire whether they were applying their nuances in the proper places, and so they advanced toward that point at which the interpreting conductor sits down before a score to study out a complete plan of performance deduced from his conception of the intent of the composer. Gossec founded the Concert des Amateurs in 1770 and was himself the conductor. Symphonies by Toeschi, Vanhall, Stamitz and other composers were produced, and the conductor had at any rate to decide the tempo and place the broader dynamic effects according to his own conception, for these matters were not carefully marked in the scores as they are now.

Before Gossec’s death the modern interpretative conductor had made his appearance. Spohr, Mendelssohn, and Weber were early representatives of the species. All three of them occupied at different times posts of the highest importance in the department of conducting. Spohr at Cassel, Mendelssohn in the Leipsic Gewandhaus, and Weber at the Dresden Opera were, without doubt, interpreting conductors. They advanced without hesitation beyond the mere study of orchestral technics to the study of the correct style and feeling in the performance. Spohr was an enthusiast on the subject of Mozart’s music, and he conducted Mozart’s symphonies according to his own ideas. Weber revived old German operas and treated them as he believed their composers would have treated them. Mendelssohn was the resurrector of Bach’s Passion music, which had lain buried for a century, and he was not silent as to his conception of its proper performance.

The most conspicuous figure among the early interpreting conductors was unquestionably François Antoine Habeneck (1781-1849), the founder of the Société des Concerts du Conservatoire. Habeneck was compelled to be an interpreter. He was a conductor pure and simple. He had no gospel of his own to preach, but he aimed at making the symphonies of Beethoven known in France, and he was thus forced to become an interpreter of the mighty Ludwig’s thought. He not only brought the Conservatoire orchestra to a remarkably high point of technical ability, but he conducted Beethoven’s music with a force, a sentiment, a nobility of style that carried conviction with it and compelled Paris to acknowledge the genius of the German master. Berlioz, himself a skilful conductor, has rendered homage to Habeneck’s powers, and there is abundant testimony that he was the Richter or the Gericke (or whom you please) of his day.

The list of conductors of the Leipsic Gewandhaus concerts shows conclusively that, so far as they were concerned, interpretative conducting began with Mendelssohn. His predecessors were merely good leaders; his successors have all been men of talent, such as Ferdinand Hiller, Julius Rietz, Neils Gade, and Karl Reinecke. In France it is easy to follow the succession of great interpretative conductors. Habeneck conducted the concerts of the Conservatoire until 1848. In 1851 Jules Etienne Pasdeloup founded and conducted the first concert of the Société des Jeunes Artistes du Conservatoire. In 1873 Colonne began his career as a conductor, and in the same year Lamoureux made himself a place. These men are admirable representatives of the genus conductor as known in our day.

There is no doubt that the art of interpretative conducting received a strong impulse in Germany from the work of Richard Wagner, who entered upon his career as a director at the Magdeburg Theatre in the autumn of 1834. It was not so much by his individual labors as a conductor that Wagner aided in the development of the interpreting art as by his fiery castigation of the mechanical and slovenly work of careless capellmeisters, and his luminous words upon the right method of directing orchestral performances. In the spread of his doctrines he was mightily aided, first by the admirable conducting of Liszt, and afterward by that of Hans von Bülow, without doubt, one of the best conductors who ever set foot on the platform. His readings of Wagner were, of course, authoritative, and his interpretations of Beethoven carried with them so much conviction that they were regarded as equally so. Dr. Hans Richter, who came into prominence in 1875, carried forward the work, and Germany has since produced a number of the most eminent interpreting conductors. Indeed, there can be no question that the best representatives of the class have been and still are German or Austrian, including Hungarian in the latter.

In the United States all the eminent conductors have been men whose early musical nourishment was obtained in Germany. The conductors of the Philharmonic Society of New York began with Theodore Eisfeld, who came into notice in the season of 1849-50. Subsequently he shared his labors with Carl Bergmann, who became the sole conductor in 1865 and remained in office till the close of the season of 1875-76. Mr. Bergmann was an interpreting conductor and a determined advocate of certain advances in music. Once, when he had been giving his hearers a good deal of Wagner, someone expostulated with him, saying, “But, Mr. Bergmann, the people don’t like Wagner.” “Don’t like Vagner!” answered Bergmann; “den dey must hear him till dey do!”