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"THE WORTH OF ART APPEARS MOST EMINENT IN MUSIC, SINCE IT REQUIRES NO MATERIAL, NO SUBJECT-MATTER, WHOSE EFFECT MUST BE DEDUCTED: IT IS WHOLLY FORM AND POWER, AND IT RAISES AND ENNOBLES WHATEVER IT EXPRESSES."-Göthe.

SUBSCRIPTION-Stamped for Postage-208. PER ANNUM

Payable in advance by Cash or Post-Office Order to BOOSEY & SONS, 28, Holles Street, Cavendish Sq. London, W.

VOL. 40-No. 41.

SATURDAY, OCTOBER 11, 1862.

ST. JAMES'S HALL.
WELSH NATIONAL MELODIES.

THURSDAY, OCTOBER 16, AT EIGHT O'CLOCK.

BAND OF TWENTY HARPS AND CHORUS OF FOUR HUNDRED VOICES

Vocalists, Miss EDITH WYNNE (Eos Cymru Pencerddes), Miss ELIZA HUGHES, and Miss LASCELLES. The Band of twenty harps will include the names of the most eminent artists in London. The Chorus will consist of the Members of the Vocal Association and the Royal Academy of Music. Conductor, Mr. JOHN THOMAS (Pencerdd Gwalia.) Sofa Stalls, 5s.; Balcony, 3s.; Area, 2s.; Admission, 1s., at Austin's Office, 28, Piccadilly, W.

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HE ENGLISH GLEE AND OPERA UNION.Madame BENNETT GILBERT, Miss ELIZA TRAVERS, Madame LAURA LESLIE ; Mr. STANLEY MAYO, and Mr. ABRON THOMAS. Conductor, Dr. BENNETT GILBERT. For terms for engagements address Mr. STANLEY MAYO, Sec., 116 Camberwell, New Road, S.

MR.

R. VIOTTI COOPER will sing BEETHOVEN'S "ADELAIDA" at CROYDON, October 13th. Address, care of Messrs. DUNCAN DAVISON & Co., Foreign Music Warehouse, 244 Regent Street, W.

MISS

ISS HELEN HOGARTH begs to announce to her
Friends and Pupils that she has returned to town for the season.
1 BLOOMSBURY SQUARE, W.C.

GREENWICH.-MR.

S4d. Unstamped.
PRICE 5d. Stamped.

HENRY KILLICK
MORLEY'S ANNUAL CONCERT will take place on Wednesday Evening,
December 3. Vocalists: Madile. Florence Lancia, Madame Laura Baxter, Miss
Eleanor Armstrong, Mr. Lewis Thomas, and Mr. Sims Reeves. Instrumentalists:
Herr Joachim, Signor Piatti, and Mr. Lindsay Sloper. Conductors: Messrs. Harold
Thomas and Henry Killick Morley.
Laurel Bank, High Road, Lee, S.E.

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THE CONSERVATIVE LAND SOCIETY.

THE

The
eleventh year. Trustees, Viscount RANELAGH, and J. C. CовBOLD, Esq., M.P.
This Society has now entered on its eleventh year, having been established on
September 7th, 1852. Prospectuses explanatory of the Share, Deposit, Land and
Building Departments, will be sent free of charge to any part of the world. No
Partnership liability, and the taking of land entirely optional. Present rate of in-
terest, payable in half-yearly warrants, five per cent. per annum on shares, (with
participation in any profits above that allowance) and four per cent. per annum on
Deposit Accounts-the investors then becoming members of the Society.
CHARLES LEWIS GRUNEISEN, Secretary.

Offices: No. 33, Norfolk Street, Strand, London, W.C.

ST

T. MARTIN'S HALL, LONG ACRE.-To be Let on Lease or Sold, these very valuable Premises, consisting of Large and small music halls, admirably adapted for musical, religious, or literary purposes, or for any object requiring large space, together with class-rooms, a good dwelling-house, cellars, and conveniences. For particulars apply p.p. to Messrs. DANGERFIELD and FRASER, Solicitors, 26, Craven Street, Charing Cross.

BUSINESS,An Old Established Business to be

disposed of, conducted by the late Mr. D. ROLLS upwards of forty-five years.
Stock consists of 35 Pianofortes (best makers), mostly new, Violins, Violincellos,
Tenors, Brass Instruments, Flutes, Concertinas, Accordions; and a rare collection of
Old and Modern Music. The House is furnished and fronts the sea, lets well, and
clears itself of rent, rates, and taxes, has a good commodions shop which may be had
fair G. 4,
Tottenham Court Road, W.C., or of Mr. J. J. ROLLS, Weymouth, Dorset.
Weymouth, October 11th, 1862.

M. TON JOEL will play his admired Waltz, ir valuation. Apply to Mr. C. F. ROLLS, Professor of Music, o, University Street,

"THE SILVER CORD," THIS DAY, and during the ensuing week, in the English and German Courts, at the International Exhibition.

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D'AMOUR" will be played by the Band of the Coldstream Guards, under the direction of Mr. Godfrey, at the SOUTH KENSINGTON MUSEUM CONVERSAZIONE, on Wednesday Evening next.

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have much pleasure in announcing that these instruments have received the Prize
Medal of the International Exhibition. An Illustrated Catalogue may be obtained
upon application to the manufacturers, BOOSEY & SONS, 24, Holles Street, W.

MEDAL FOR BOOSEY & SONS' MILITARY

BAND INSTRUMENTS, CORNETS, &c.-BOOSEY & SONS have much pleasure in announcing that these instruments have received the Prize Medal of the International Exhibition. An Illustrated Catalogue may be obtained upon application to the manufacturers, BOOSEY & SONS, 24, Holles Street, W.

All communications respecting engagements, &c., to be addressed to H. THE CECILIAN PITCH PIPE (a new invention), for

JARRETT, Esq., at Messrs. DUNCAN DAVISON and Co.'s Foreign Music Warehouse, 244 Regent Street, W.

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SHDOWN & PARRY (successors to Wessel & Co.)
beg to inform the Profession that they forward Parcels on Sale upon receipt of
Their Catalogues, a
purposes, may be had, post-free, on application.
London; 18 Hanover Square.

MR. BENEDICT begs to announce that he will references in towns, which contain a great variety of Music calculated

for the Season the Last Week in October. All communications to be addressed "2, Manchester-square, W."

Berlin, Sept., 1862.

WORLD

for teaching

MUN

NEWSPAPER

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Mr.

"These are three morceaux de salon of the most elegant description. AGUILAR'S'Dream Dance' is a graceful and imaginative movement, which would make a charming accompaniment to a dance of sylphs or fairies in a ballet. Mr. Berger has selected as the themes of his fantasia the two most favourite airs, There's truth in woman still,' and A young and artless maiden,' in Mr. Howard Glover's pretty operetta; working them, by adding a short introduction, and a brilliant coda in tempo di valsa, into a masterly and animated pianoforte piece, in which the vocal melodies are embellished by a rich and varied accompaniment. Mr. Macfarren's Tarantella is of course in the time and measure of this Neapolitan dance, and preserves the rapidity of its breathless whirl. While, however, it is thus conventional in its form, it is new and original in its details. There occurs, in particular, in the midst of it, a deliciously soft and flowing melody, played with the left hand, as if on the violoncello or bassoon, with a light and airy accompaniment in the upper part which contrasts beautifully with the impetuous current of the rest of the movement." The Press.

THE AIRS, BALLADS, FANTASIAS, QUADRILLES, WALTZES, &c. IN THE OPERETTA OF

"ONCE TOO

OFTEN."

COMPOSED BY HOWARD GLOVER.

Performed with the greatest success at the Theatre Royal, Drury Lane.

"Oh! Glorious Age of Chivalry." Duet. For Soprano and Contralto "The Solemn Words his Lips have spoken." Grand Air. For Soprano "The Love you've slighted still is true." Ballad. Sung by Mlle. JENNY BAUR "Stratagem is Woman's Power." Ballad. Sung by Miss EMMA HEYWOOD... "Love is a gentle Thing." Ballad. Sung by Miss EMMA HEYWOOD "A young and artless Maiden." Romance. Sung by Herr REICHARDT "There's Truth in Woman still." Romance. Sung by Herr REICHARDT "The Monks were jolly Boys." Ballad. Sung by Herr FORMES "In my Chateau of Pompernik." Aria Buffa. Sung by Herr FORMES

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Emile Berger's Fantasia, on "Once too Often " "Fontainbleau Quadrille," by Strauss. (Handsomely Illustrated in Colours) "La Belle Blanche Waltz," ditto

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London: DUNCAN DAVISON & Co. 244 Regent Street, W.

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MEYERBEER. THE FOLLOWING COMPOSITIONS (Copyrights), Gre pod 9

VOCAL.

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Basses "To thee, dear land, I sing" (à la Patrie), for 2 Tenors, 2 Basses, and Chorus "God save the Queen," 2 Tenors and 2 Basses, with Piano ad lib. The Lord's Prayer for Soprano, Alto, Tenor, and Bass, with Organ ad lib.... "This house to love is holy." Serenade for s Voices (without accompaniment) "Aspiration," for Bass, Solo, and Chorus of 3 Sopranos, 2 Tenors, and 1 Bass "Here on the mountain," with Clarinet obbligato Violin or Violincello in lieu of Clarinet, each "Near to thee," with Violincello obbligato ... "The Fishermaiden." (Das Fischermädchen)

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Mrs. CRAWFORD. The Music by EDWARD LAND. 38.
London: DUNCAN DAVISON and Co.

"The above are a few of the prettiest vocal pieces that have appeared during the past publishing season. They are all by well-known and popular composers, of whose talents they are agreeable specimens. Balfe's French romance is in his happiest vein. Our countryman has successfully contended with the Parisian composers un their own ground-witness the reception of his fine operas, Les Quatre Fils Aymon and Le Puits d'Amour, at the Opéra Comique; and in the little song before us he shows how entirely he is at home in the French style. It is tender and passionate, with that infusion of graceful lightness and gaiety which gives the French poetry and music of this class their peculiar charm. Signor Gardoni has sung it in public with delicious effect; but it by no means requires the aid of such a singer to make it charming. Mr. Alfred Mellon's ballad is worthy of that able and eminent musician. The melody is simple and natural, without being trite or commonplace; and the whole composition shows that new and striking effects of modulation and harmony may be produced without setting at defiance (as is too often done) the established principles and rules of art.-Few vocal pieces of the present time have obtained greater popularity than Herr Reichardt's song, "Thou art so near," not only in English, but (by means of its German and French versions) all over the Continent. His new production, Memory,' is of a similar character, and bids fair to have a similar success. Mr. Desmond Ryan's verses are elegant, and Reichardt has united them to s melody at once pure, simple, and expressive. Signor Pinsuti's ballad, Hast thou no tear for me?' has been recommended to the attention of the public by the pleasing performance of Mr. Tennant, for whom it was written, and by whom it has been sung at many of the best concerts of the season. Signor Pinsuti, an Italian, has produced an air of Italian grace and beauty, while he has entirely avoided the faults into which foreign composers so often fall in setting English words to music. The melody not 'only expresses the sentiment conveyed by the poetry, but does not present a single misplaced emphasis or accent-a most important requisite in vocal music. Mr. Knight's canzonet is melodious, flowing, and extremely well fitted for a mezzo-soprano or contralto voice. There is a flaw in one place which dims the clearness of the harmony. In bar 8, page 2, G flat in the melody is accompanied by E natural in the bass, creating a diminished third (or tenth)-an interval very rarely allowed, and not, we think, in the present case. There is much that is masterly in Mr. Land's romanza, and Mr. Santley, for whom it was composed, has sung it with deserved suc

cess. We could have wished it had been a little less elaborate; that the flow of the

melody had been less disturbed by extraneous modulation; and that the pianoforte accompaniment had been lighter and less loaded with notes. It is a fine song, nevertheless, and not unworthy of the author's well-merited reputation."-The Press.

NEW AND REVISED EDITION.

Price 12s.

4 0 THE VOICE AND SINGING (The Formation and Cultivation of the Voice for Singing).

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Royal Wedding March. Composed for the marriage of the Princess Royal of England with Prince Frederick William of Prussia

Ditto, as a duet

MLLE

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London: DUNCAN DAVISON & Co. 244 Regent Street, W.

Just published, price 3s.

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LLE. ADELINA PATTI'S NEW WALTZ, "DI GIOJA INSOLITA." Sung with distinguished success by Mlle. ADELINA PATTI, in the operas of "Il Barbiere di Seviglia,"" Don Pasquale," &c. &c. The Words by LORENZO MONTERASI, the Music by MAURICE STRAKOSCH.

London: DUNCAN DAVISON AC 214 Regent Street, W.

Just published, price 3s. with a Portrait.
PATTI'S

LLE. ADELINA

ADOLFO FERRARI.

"The great and deserved success of this work has brought it, in no long time, to a second edition, carefully revised, and enriched with a number of additional exercises, which greatly increase its value."-Illustrated News.

LONDON: DUNCAN DAVISON & Co. 244 Regent Street, W.

Just Published,

NEW BALLAD, SIX OPERATIC RECITALS for the PIANOFORTE,

MLLE
THE OLD HOUSE BY THE AANDENS." The Poetry by 10MLAD

Sung with the greatest success by Mlle. ADELINA PATTI, for whom it was expressly composed by HOWARD GLOVER.

London: DUNCAN DAVISON & Co. 244 Regent Street, W.

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Composed by

3. "Norma," dedicated to Miss Katherine Greenhill

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4. "Norma," dedicated to the pupils of Miss Gilbertson

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5. "Oberon," dedicated to Miss Parkes

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BRINLEY RICHARDS, sung with such distinguished success at the CARNARVON FESTIVAL, by Mr. LEWIS THOMAS, is published, price 3s. by

DUNCAN DAVISON & Co. 244 Regent Street, W.

6. "Martha," dedicated to Miss Frances Gurney

London: DUNCAN DAVISON & Co. 244 Regent Street, W.

REVIEW.

"Rome or death, for my own lov'd Italy!" Composed by
MADAME DE VAUCHERAN (Charles Jefferys).

This spirited effusion is appropriately dedicated to the hero of the Two Sicilies. The words embodying the patriotic aspirations which inspire the bosom of every Italian who loves freedom, and yearns for that" United Italy !" which was the dream of the dead Cavour, as it is of the happilly still living Garibaldi. The melody to which Madame de Vaucheran has wedded them is energetic, stirring, and to the purpose. It is best suited to a baritone or contralto voice, and just now, if delivered with the requisite point and force, would produce a marked effect at certain of our metropolitan concerts.

OPERA.

FROM opera resulted the effort of music to escape the fantastic fetters of science, and the tedium of long monkish training, and to get back to nature. It was her strong and successful protest against church-cramped forms. By the time that these old, rigid, half-furnished scales, which the church preserved and consecratedthese ecclesiastical "tones" or "modes," with their Greek names66 Dorian," ""Lydian," "authentic," "playul," etc.-had got developed into the full modern scale with all the semi-tones and means of modulation; by the time that science and invention, working and refining on that slender stock of rude and antique models, the plain chants, had well nigh exhausted ingenuity in the working up of those old themes for lack of fresh ones. By that time thought had got more free, the human mind and conscience had attained to their majority, ecclesiastical supremacy in all affairs of life was questioned; the senses began to be respected, as well as the native instincts of the human breast, and music got replenished from the spontaneous secular melodies in which the full heart found so often utterance without the aid of science or the confirmation of the church. Popular melodies sprang up like wildflowers in the low places and by-paths of life, in the listless warblings of the shepherd's pipe, in the warm love ditties of the Troubadours, in the Tyrolean mountain airs, in the boat songs and the ballads of the streets of Naples, etc. They were an unwritten music. The ecclesiastical composer did not recognise them. They modulated through many a natural and expressive interval which science ruled out. They accompanied themselves spontaneously in thirds and sixths, while artificial church harmony, confined to barren fourths and fifths, cast but occasional fond furtive glances at their forbidden charms. Towards the opening of the 17th century, these natural melodies attracted the attention of scientific composers, who had taste and feeling. The popular airs, especially the Neapolitan and the Sicilian, were gathered up and written out and harmonized. And recitative, or singing speech, which had the double charm (1), of natural expressiveness (the rhythm and melody following more the free direction of the sentiment expressed than any law of science), and (2) of being supposed to be the very same glorified and lofty speech in which the whole of the old Greek drama was recited, came into notice about this time, and has been ever since, more properly than any other (reasoning inside of the music) the distinctive feature of opera or dramatic music.

Man was born to imitation. The trick of fancying ourselves others whom we read or dream of, and of acting their deeds, their lives over in our own persons with an artistic comprehensive brevity, is the least artifical part of us. It is wearing the mask professedly and playfully, and with a lively alternating catholicity, instead of keeping on always the calculating, sober mask of habit which too often constitutes the propria persona. It is a happy, genial, frank faculty. Children have it to perfection, and they grow worldings as they lose it. It is one of the soul's arts self-recovery, like humor. It is a way of testing and securing our moral freedom, of getting outside of the limitations of our own characters, of realising things from the stand-points of many characters, of cultivating the universal, the cosmopolitan side of our nature, of most vividly rehearsing the maxim: "There is nothing foreign to us which is human, " and of confessing, as we ought, our portion of the responsibility of every human action under every set of circumstances. Could we expect literature and art, then, to be less dramatic than human life itself is; or the creative artist, the poet and composer, to cease to dramatise in humble imitation of the all-wise and loving artist and Creator? Is not the best and most effective part of story-telling

dramatic? And do we not find the same true of the childlike style of histories which last the longest,-witness the Bible and Herodotus? Music, which underlies speech, as character and feeling underlies opinion,-Music, which is the universal dialect, through which souls converse from those inmost intentions which are apt to harmonise; -Music lends itself most readily to this dramatic need; the play of passions and of feelings, in which souls vibrate to or across each other, sometimes chiming, sometimes jarring, becomes in her more fluid medium transparent and suggestive, in their worst chaos and imbraglio of the harmonic resolution to which all things tend.

The Musical Drama, (including originally Oratorio as well as Opera), grew, like the spoken drama, out of the old Mysteries and Moralities which formed so large a part of the religious festivals, and in which the church dramatised the characters and events of Sacred History, or the allegorical personifications of moral and metaphysical entities (if not sometimes nonentities), by way of making its dull lessons palatable to the wandering minds of weary listeners. Classic and mythological subjects followed sacred, or were mixed quite early, at least to the extent of here and there a chorus in the grotesquely up with them. Music must have borne a part in them course of the performance. But it was only when composers, outgrowing the church ordinances, grew liberal towards secular spontaneous melodies, and dared to wander from the beaten path of the plain chant, which was the subject-matter of the old music; it was only when there began to be a mania for reproducing the traditional effect of the Greek drama in the recitative, that Opera developed held among into that unique and pronounced form which it has since the departments of musical Art.

These hints afford the key to its entire significance. Opera was the first leap of the genius of Music, from its cradle in the church, where it had been held down till well nigh bedridden and paralysed for ever, out into the secular air. It was the idealising of the hopes and fears, the loves and joys and sorrows, the social sympathies and excitements, the whole tragedy and comedy of private life. Music sought its own in this natural, spontaneous religion of the human heart. It became a voice to the good tendency which there is at the bottom of all our love of excitement and pleasure. It took up the despised senses and saved them from wandering away out of all hearing of the soul. It refined sensibility into a love of beauty, and developed in passion the divine restlessness, the prophetic as piration of the soul, which is at the bottom of it; and thus effected in a measure a reconciliation between the higher and the lower tendencies in man, between the sacred and the secular.

Opera makes a purely ideal thing out of a personal history. It does away all the reserve and disguise, all the common-place there is in human intercourse; and satisfies our craving for expression, by showing us men and women moving together in so strong a light that they become transparent. Passions, feelings, desires live and move and interact before us without any screen of dullness or imperfect utterance. The rude materials are all fused together in music, which is a perfect medium of communication. The dramatis persona of an opera, therefore, are so many personified passions or emotions, wearing glorified bodies, in place of the awkward, stiff and homely embodiment of spoken words, the cast-off mantle of the flesh. They are the inward history, the present inner lives of so many men and women, passing before us instead of their outward forms, which would be so cramped and conventional, fixtures of habit, and therefore impervious to the light. What romance, what tragedy there would be in many a little scene of daily life, could we but remove this evil of custom and appearance! This music does. It lifts the veil, it banishes the obstructions, it abridges the time, concentrates the intrest, drops out the extraneous and accidental, compresses the life of days and years into as many moments, giving life the speed it would have in a less resisting element, and shows us spirits as it were embodied here in time and space, and yet exempt from all their limitations. It does away the friction and shows the effect in the cause. In an opera, therefore, there are very few words, and a very slight skeleton of a story. When we see the spirits, what they are, we do not want to know what they will do. They sing themselves to us; the story is no more than the stage on which they move, the canvas on which they project their esential "form and pressure.' Could we know the feelings, the vital springs and tendencies of men, we should learn at once what their words and actions could only gradually and by a roundabout way reveal to us. Music is the spontaneous language of feeling. Her tones are but the audible

"

vibration of other souls transmitted through the nervous medium of our sensibilities. We seldom act or speak naturally. But when we do, the mere tones, without words, indicate enough. Or rather, words indicate, but tones convey, transmit; words are signals, tones are arrivals of the real presence. We know persons by their voices more infallibly than by almost any sign. The opera composer, therefore, must be he who knows most of this natural language of the feelings; and of course he must be a person of sensibility. But Opera meets another want. It supplies the craving of the senses for excitement, quenching the thirst of pleasure with a wholesome draught. It feeds the appetite with a nectar that is good also for the soul. Our tendency to excess, to reckless, glorious enthusiasm, which is dangerous to deny, dangerous to indulge unworthily, overflows with graceful self-recovery in the world of art and beauty. Transport is a part of our divine birth-right; no soundness, no freshness, no nobleness of soul can long survive its seasons of reThis is the virtue of such music as Mozart's-that it transports one into voluptuousness, that does not smack of earth or aught impure. He in music, as Raphael in colours, has taught us the spiritual ministry of the senses. Through music Palestrina rises above the life of the senses. Through music Mozart bears a charmed life in the sphere of the senses. The consecration of the senses, the idealizing of common life, the vindication of Nature, the harmony of sense with soul appears to be the meaning of Opera. J. S. DWIGHT.

currence.

Boston, Massachusetts, Sept, 20.

MUSIC IN NORTH GERMANY. (From The Athenæum.)

66

Berlin, September, 1862. The Opera-house in Berlin, apparently, still keeps some of its old traditions among others, liberality in all matters appertaining to stage direction. The works given are mounted with sufficient luxury, some of which could be well spared, were the funds sustaining it spent on objects of greater intrinsic importance. In a theatre on such a footing, there ought to be no such performances possible as one of Der Freischütz which I heard there, ventured by an Agatha," an "Aunchen" and a "Max" as innocent of every idea and precept of the singer's art as if they had come out of the music loft of some village church in the obselete days of noisy and drawling unisonal psalmody. They were, nevertheless, applauded and called for by the indulgent audience. The "Casper," Herr Fricke, was better. He is young, of good presence, acts well, and possesses a tuneful bass voice; but this, it may be feared, is on the road to ruin. Every passage is forced out by him, not delivered-to which evil practice there can be but one sequel and issue. The orchestra is weak in its stringed instruments, and its conductor, Herr Taubert, is either tired of Der Freischutz, and allowed his band to be slovenly, or else he is not a good conductor. From the general absence of accent, and neglect of the closing note of every bar (a habit not uncommon with those imperfectly gifted with nice rhythmical sense), I suspect the latter may be the case. The chorus is not as good nor as sure as the Carlsruhe chorus. Donizetti's best serious opera, La Favorite, is given very lamely, with omissions (in the fourth act especially) which displayed not merely disregard of Italian effect but also of German power to please. Why, for instance, seeing that so much store is set on the chorus in this country, should some of the most picturesque portions of the Monastery music have been suppressed? The principal male singers were very poor, and evaded a large part of their task by singing the cantabiles with a slipshod secrecy which, however favourable to the concealment of their want of skill, was destructive of the composer's intentions. The "Leonora," Mdlle. D'Ahna, is young and inexperienced, but her appearance is pleasing; her mezzo-soprano voice, a good one, ceived some training, and there is nothing to offend in her acting. In a more favourable atmosphere she might become a good singer. It will be hard for her to improve, if compelled habitually to appear before an audience so deficient in discrimination as that of the Prussian capital. The "cynosure," meanwhile, of Berlin opera-goers, who flock to the theatre to be amused, and not to seek for ideas in dreary modern

has re

*It is in curious coincidence with this thought that the first opera, (properly so called) and which was produced at Rome in 1600, by Emilio del Cavalieri, had for its title: Rappresentazione del Animo e del Corpo. It was of the nature of a morality, and its characters were the Body, the Soul, Pleasure, the World, and Time; which allegorical personages were treated after the orthodox fashion, no doubt; yet it is impossible after what we have been considering, not to notice how accidentally the opera symbolised its own mission by touching on the problem of the soul and body in its first essay.

works, where no ideas exist, is Mdlle. Lucca-a lady as potent as Mdlle. Löwe was a score of years ago. In stature and stage behaviour she is not unlike Mdlle. Piccolomini, but greatly inferior to that little lady as an actress. Her voice, which is strong and extensive in compass, reaching to E in alt by its pea-hen tone (no other epithet presents itself), recalls that of Mdlle. Anna Zerr; but that lady, if not charming, was, at least, honest in her execution. This cannot be said of Mdlle. Lucca, who avoids, yet is complete in, no passage of voluble brilliancy, and already is uncertain as to intonation. Herr Vielka, in M. Meyerbeer's Camp of Silesia, was a poor and pretending exhibition, though quoted as if it had been a choice display of Art by a Sontag or a Lind. Nothing could be less satisfactory to the ear than the entire execution of this opera. The elegant duet and effective finale to the first act, and the charming trio in the third (not introduced into L'Etoile), could hardly be followed, so incompetent are those to whom they were intrusted. The trio with two flutes was a piece of discord rather than cunning dialogue. Even the military choruses in the Camp Act were weak and insipid. M. Meyerbeer's music bears such disrespectful handling worse than most; nor will the squadrons of accurately dressed and accoutred supernumeraries on the stage pacify the ear, which becomes irritated by the ineficiency and the pretension of those to whom the principal interest of the story and the music is confided. The repertory still continues to be the strong point of the Berlin Opera-house. During the few past and coming weeks might and are to be heard, in addition to the operas specified, Spontini's Nourmahal, Gluck's Armida, among the farewell representations of Madame Köster, with whom the faëry opera may for a time vanish, no successor appearing in the horizon; and Gluck's Orpheus, for which work it has been necessary to recall Madame Jachmann-Wagner, although she has left the musical stage in consequence of the total failure of her voice, and, like our Mrs. Cibber, in similar circumstances, taken to tragic acting. Anyhow, it appears to matter little whether there be style or no style, method or no method, voice in or voice out of tune, provided the demanded amount of noise be emitted and the action be busy. Much lower the requisitions of taste cannot fall.

The number of second-class theatres here has increased greatly during the last fifteen years. In some I hear of winter Italian operas, given with the solo parts in the Southern language and the choruses in German! If we poor English permitted such practices, how our cousins would stare! At the second opera-house, Herr Wachtel (whose beautiful tenor voice has small chance of being set in its place) is singing in Fra Diavolo. To another minor establishment, M. Offenbach's farce-operas are imported from "Les Bouffes Parisiens." Nothing like home comedy in music appears to have succeeded, since Nicolai's death.

While the managements of the Berlin theatres are so strenuously working out the hopeless task of giving musical dramas without adequate singers, and while, betwixt this incompatibility and the noxious influence of false principles paraded as discoveries, public taste suffers, Berlin has still its own quieter musical parishes, in which a love of what is sterling in composition and excellent in performance flourishes unobtrusively and wholesomely. Herr Liebig's Symphony Concerts, which were originated some fifteen years ago, and are given on the cheapest possible scale of admission, are of the very highest merit. This is the programme of a sixpenny entertainment at which I was present in the Sommer-salon :-Overture, Idomeneus, Mozart; Symphony, C minor, Spohr; Overture, Elise, Cherubini; Romance, Schwantzer; Overture, Euryanthe, Weber; Symphony, F major, Beethoven. The Sommer-salon, a cool, cheerful room in three divisions, decorated in the best taste, was filled by a burgher audience of some eight hundred strong, most prepossessing in appearance, in attention, and in refinement of behaviour; an audience worth pleasing, by the best offerings. Herr Liebig's band consists of forty-five performers. I have never heard such symphony-playing for many a long day, nor German symphonic music more competently conducted, with due ease, expression, breadth and spirit. The following has been the repertory of the year:-The nine symphonies of Beethoven, all his overtures, his music to Egmont, and to The Ruins of Athens, entire; also his Septuor-twelve symphonies by Mozart, all his overtures, and three unpublished marches-choice pieces by Bach and Gluck-eighteen symphonies by Haydn-three symphonies by Spohr (including The Power of Sound)-Schubert's symphony in C major, Schumann's in B flat major-all the overtures of Weber, of Mendelssohn, his symphonies also, and his Midsummer Night's Dream music-all the overtures of Cherubini-the triumphal symphony of Titus Ulrich, with lighter music. H. F. C.

VIENNA. A biography of Franz Schubert has been completed by Ferdinand Luib.

MUNICH. A composer who resides here, Max Bach by name, has been completing Mendelssohn's unfinished opera, Loreley (!) — Dwight's Journal of Music.

HANDEL IN 1718-1728.*

FOUNDATION OF THE OPERA IN LONDON.

had created a scandal in Dresden, in order to get to London sooner, the academy was too careful and intelligent to accept their services It is difficult to say what circumstance first suggested the idea of before the time stipulated in their contracts; but we must except Signora Durastanti, who was necessary at that moment. Count an academy for opera. But it is possible that the plan originated Flemming, who was a man of great power in the court of the at one of those musical entertainments, so extravagantly brilliant, elector August, with titles and places at command, could not which the Duke of Chandos prepared in Albermarle Street for the understand, of course, why a simple musician should treat his fashionable world of London. The wish must have been frequently invitations with indifference. But Handel was not everybody's expressed, that these enjoyments might become prominent, especially friend, or a conceited virtuoso, seeking to make himself of conseas London was then behind many other large cities in musical quence through powerful protection; he was a plain, independent advantages. Paris had already an academy, Vienna a court opera, man, who attended to his business, who maintained his freedom in almost every insignificant prince on the continent could command private life, without molesting others, or allowing himself to be enjoyments that London principally owed to accident, or the molested by them. He never visited any one who did not return liberality of a few. We have more certain information as to the period when the plan and the Saxon general-field-marshal had to content himself with his visits on a footing of equality (except in matters of business); became ripe. It was deliberated on during the winter of 1718--19, such treatment as English dukes and earls had already received. at the time of the South Sea speculation; but, without requiring The pride that inspired such behaviour could not offend, as it disa dissolution of Parliament, was sooner decided on than that. played itself principally in reserve; but the ladies of the court Already in February, 1719, Handel, in a letter to his brother-in-concerts long bore ill will towards the master, because he could law, spoke of the affair as settled; for the "urgent business" that had so long occupied" him, and on which he cheerfully and expectantly believed that his "fortune depended," was nothing else but the preparatory measures necessary before the erection of an opera house, the musical department of which would probably be placed in the hands of Handel, from the commencement. On the 21st of February, a London paper, "Applebee's original Weekly Journal," published the following announcement: "Mr. Handel, a famous Master of Musick, is gone beyond sea, by order of his Majesty, to collect a company of the choicest singers in Europe, for the Opera in the Hay-Market." We do not know which, or how many places he visited with this object; we only know that he was in Dresden and Düsseldorf, and as he found nearly all that he wanted here, he did not probably travel farther, but spent a quiet summer, partly at the Hanoverian court, and partly with his family

and friends in Halle.

In Düsseldorf he obtained Benedetto Baldassarri, chamber singer to the Palatine. In autumn, 1719, he found almost all the celebrities of the Italian world of song assembled in Dresden, under the direction of Lotti, the composer, to celebrate the marriage of the electoral prince with the archduchess Maria Josepha. But these

talents were not attainable for the next winter. The elector had

apparently invited the singers to Dresden with the enjoinment that they should remain in his service some time after the festivities; and a year's contract, from the first of October, 1719, was closed with all those whom Handel also desired to engage. That Handel was in Dresden at the time of the famous September festivities we are assured by a letter of the Saxon general-field-marshal Count Flemming, to Handel's pupil, Fræulein von Schulenburg. Here is the letter:

Dresden, October 6th, 1719. "Mademoiselle! With this I send you from Vienna that operetta about which I had the honor of speaking with you. I could not yet obtain the operas from here; they are so particular about them that they will not even leave the parts with the singers, which enrages these people terribly. I wished to see Mr. Handel, and to show him some attention on your account, but I have not been able to do so; I made use of your name to induce him to come and see me, but he was always ill or out; I think he is a little foolish, and he certainly should not be so with me, seeing that I am a musician from inclination, and that I consider it an honor to be one of your most faithful servants, mademoiselle, and that you are the most amiable of the pupils;-I thought I would tell you this, so that, in your turn, you might give some lessons to your master.-I have the honor to be," &c. &c.

Handel's position was a difficult one, and required great care and foresight, in order to lull the suspicions of the Saxon court, and not to tempt the singers, who longed for English guineas, to a breach of contract. All that he could do was to engage Signoras Durastanti and Salvai, the sopranos Senesino and Berselli, and the bassist Boschi, for the academy, from October 1st, 1721. Although the Italian singers conducted themselves in their usual manner towards the German musicians in Dresden, Senesino especially, towards the chapel-master Heinichen, so that the elector was obliged to drive away his entire Italian Parnassus as early as February, 1720, this had no influence on the London Academy; for although the Italians • Translated from Friedrich Chrysander's Life of Handel, by Fanny Malone Raymond.

never be persuaded to accompany them in their chamber music. Handel, when he allowed himself to be heard by His Majesty and the Royal Princes on the clavier, received a hundred ducats. The that Handel was still in Dresden, but rather that the expense of order is dated February, 1720, from which we must not conclude this "royal pleasure" was noted down late and negligently, or else that the hundred ducats were afterwards sent to Handel in London through the Saxon ambassador. Handel was more fortunate than Bach, who, having won an artistic victory over the French clavier player Marchant, a year before at the same court, was cheated out of a similar reward through the rascality of an officer of the court. It would be most interesting, could any remarks on the play of these men, by Count Flemming, or some other bel esprit of this court, be discovered. Forkel says that Bach expressed a wish to make Handel's personal acquaintance, and undertook a journey to Halle left. This must have been late in the autumn of 1719. The King with that object, but only arrived there when the composer had went back to London in the middle of November; Handel probably returned a little sooner. At least I conclude so, as the opera house academy formed itself into a society and held several meetings in the beginning of November. The first representation took place Galatea, and the composition of the opera, Radamisto, to the winter on the 2nd of April, 1720. I set the first performance of Acis and months of 1719-20.

(To be continued).

DURHAM.

(From a Correspondent.)

THE trial of candidates for the Tenor vacancies in Durham Cathedral
Choir, occasioned by the deeply lamented death of Mr. Charles Ashton,
and the resignation of Mr. Thomas Brown, took place in the choir of
the cathedral, on Thursday and Friday, Sep. 25th and 26th. Twelve
candidates appeared from various cathedrals, six of whom sang on the
Thursday, and six on the Friday. The following six sang on Thursday,
rotation was determined by lot:-No. 1. Mr. Barraclough, of Lincoln
in the following order, each a solo of his own choice. The order of
Cathedral. Anthem, "Ascribe unto the Lord," Travers. Has a good
strong voice, quality coarse, and sings out of tune.-No. 2. Mr. Barnby, of
Hereford Cathedral. Anthem, "Comfort ye my people," Messiah. Voice
Mr. Dawson, of Newcastle. Anthem, "Ascribe unto the Lord," Travers.
is more loud than pleasant; singing too much strained; reads fairly.-No. 3.
Very good voice, but style rough and uncultivated.-No. 4. Mr. Horton, of
Cork Cathedral. Anthem, "Praise the Lord," Croft. A beautiful voice;
but too limited in quantity for a large cathedral.-No. 5. Mr. Pheasant, of
Peterboro'. Anthem, "Give the Lord the honour due," Kent.
very limited, both in range and quantity; no style.-No. 6. Mr. Roberts,
of Armagh Cathedral. Anthem, "Comfort ye, my people," Messiah.
Has a very moderate voice, and did not make much of his pieces.
Each candidate sang a second Anthem in the same order, as follows:--
No. 1. "Comfort ye." No. 2. "Ascribe unto the Lord." No. 3. "I
will cry," Mozart. No. 4. O Lord our Governor," Stevenson. No. 5.
"Comfort ye," and No. 6. " Wherewithall," Elvey.
Messrs. Barraclough, Barnby, and Dawson were selected for a trial of
skill in reading at sight, and each sang, "Praise the Lord," Boyce.
None sang it well. Mr. Barnby was eventually selected to sing with the
six who were to appear the following day. This closed the trial for
Thursday, which was resumed on Friday, when six new candidates
appeared, and the singing was of a much superior order. No. 1. Mr.

Voice

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