were HUERTA, THE GUITARIST. beings! Where do you find that marvellous language which ACCORDING to a notice in the Italia e Popolo, the Spanish causes you to converse with your instruments? What guitarist Huerta committed suicide, a short time since, by secret do you possess to call forth these voices, multishooting himself through the heart. His corpse was discovered plied and varied to infinity, and which beforehand in one of the most unfrequented streets of Nice. Before carry-It is in vain that he endeavours to describe the divine sounds sleeping in their cavities? But a writer is here powerless! ing out his fatal purpose, he wrote a letter in which a wish was expressed that a sum of money belonging to him should be dis- that pass and repass in his imagination, like the capricious tributed in charity to the poor. He was to have given a concert, arabesques produced by fireworks; he is scarcely able to render and the posters announcing it were already stuck about all parts part, we shall not endeavour to analyse the talent of Huerta, for the vague, indefinable sentiment he experiences. For our own of the city, when his violent death was discovered. The papers had already announced that Huerta died in 1849, it is an endeavour in which he himself would, perhaps, have failed. and, since that date, nothing had been heard of him. It would "After he had made his instrument say all that the Pythoness seem that the Italia e Popolo has resuscitated the celebrated had suggested to his artistic soul, Huerta performed, to rest guitarist, merely for the purpose of making him fall by his own himself, one of the dances of his native country, accompanying it hand. Be this as it may, Huerta will always be considered by on his guitar, which he raised above his head, threw behind his those who have heard him a celebrated artist, "Lé Paganini dé back, and passed between his legs, and all without ceasing la gouitare," as he entitled himself. to dance. The gravity of his physiognomy formed a pleasant contrast to the mirthful character of the music and the vivacity of the steps. This original intermède highly delighted the company, who testified their satisfaction by boisterous applause. "The party had been prolonged beyond the usual limits, and the guests began to think of retiring. At the moment of their departure there was a general rivalry as to who should have the honour of relieving Huerta from the trouble of carrying his guitar. The musician, however, would not deliver up his instrument, until he had replaced it, with his own hands, in the case, with the same scrupulous precautions with which he had taken it out. Lamartine, Victor Hugo, and Madame de Girardin, have often inspired their muse from that of Huerta. Sur la guitare, il chante et soupire à la fois; MAD. DE GIRARDIN. Trinity Francis Huerta-y-Caturla was born at Orihuela, near Cadiz, on the 8th of June, 1803. A Belgian writer speaking of him says: "One evening, twelve years ago, at Brussels, happening to be in the house of Doctor X, I saw a little man, dressed in black from head to foot, and carrying under his arm a long box which harmonised_exactly in colour with that of his costume, enter the room. He might have been about forty years of age. A small brown moustache extended gracefully along his upper lip, and enhanced the animation of his Spanish physiognomy. "After carelessly extending his hand to the Doctor, he threw himself into a seat, and, taking from his pocket a pinch of tobacco, rolled it up delicately, in a slight envelope, into the shape of a cigarette: he then commenced smoking gravely and silently. "The name of the little gentleman in black was Huerta. "When he had finished the papelito, Huerta drew forth, from his long box, a guitar, which he handled with the greatest precaution, I was about to say, veneration. He carefully avoided allowing any foreign body to come in contact with it. I argued well from these preliminaries. An artist, really worthy of the name, respects the instrument of his art as much as he does himself. Away, O ye profane! Inspiration seizes him; his instrument, whether it be a pen, a pencil, or a guitar, is the recipient of his most secret confidence; it is something sacred and inviolable. "Carrying his guitar, therefore, in his arms, like a beloved child, Huerta proceeded to the drawing-room, where the company, not particularly select, was awaiting him. The artist manifested his dissatisfaction by a slight contraction of the muscles of his face-the movement was almost imperceptible, but could not escape the notice of a keen observer. "At the first sounds he drew from his guitar, the assembly was in ecstacies, as if in obedience to a signal previously agreed on. This prelude, however, was nothing very striking; the artist was not inspired by his entourage. But, gradually, his eyes became excited; fixed apparently upon a picture hanging on the wall, in reality they no longer saw it. Huerta then played airs that caused the tears to fill the eyes of his auditors; joyous arpeggios; and, lastly, melancholy notes, while his soul, like a despairing and loving woman, or a gay minstrel, smiled or lamented in turn, on the vibrating strings. 66 Inspiration gushed forth from every pore in the body of the artist, whose limbs trembled under its grasp, and harmony was exhaled in wild notes, which, however, were always expressive and always striking, from the fragile instrument, that, a short time previously, was dumb. Oh! Musicians, ye privileged "As he left, he kept murmuring between his lips, the words he had repeated several times in the course of the evening: 'Je souis le Paganini dé la gouitare.' "To sum up: Huerta was a highly distinguished guitarist. The following details concerning him were communicated to me by a celebrated musician : he makes up for his ignorance by a marvellous instinct for "Huerta never learnt music, and does not know it, but melody. There is one fault, however, for which I must blame him. Because he hears the numerous and varied chords of a whole orchestra sounding in his own head; because he feels all the echoes of his soul vibrating through his being, in every tone, he fancies he can convey all this volcano of internal harmony upon the five strings of a guitar. But he is the only person deceived on this point. The ear of the dilettante hears only one voice, which modulates harmoniously, it is true, artist hears singing within himself. Huerta is, notwithstandbut which cannot be the interpreter of the thousand voices the ing this, an excellent guitarist, and even the most excellent one I know.' PORPORA. In the time of Charles the Sixth, the celebrated Porpora lived at Vienna, poor and unemployed. His music did not please the imperial connoisseur, as being too full of trills and mordenti. Hasse wrote an oratorio for the Emperor, who asked him for a second. He entreated His Majesty to permit Porpora to compose it. The Emperor at first refused, saying that he did not like the capering style; but touched with Hasse's generosity, he at length complied with his request. Porpora, having received a hint from his friend, did not introduce a single trill in the whole oratorio. The Emperor, surprised, continually repeated during the rehearsal-""Tis quite a different thing-there are no trills here." But when they came to the fugue which concluded the sacred composition, he observed that the theme commenced with four trilled notes. Now, everybody knows that in fugues the subject passes from one part to another, but does not change. When the emperor, who never laughed, heard in the full height of the fugue this deluge of trills, which seemed like the music of crazy people in a play, he could no longer preserve his gravity, but laughed outright, perhaps for the first time in his life. In France, the land of jokes, this might have appeared out of place; but at Vienna it was the commencement of Porpora's fortune. REVIEW OF THE HISTORY OF MUSIC BEFORE MOZART. HAYDN, who surpassed Gluck in invention and in science, went much further in the application of the fugue treatment to the elegant style. He called in the aid of the contrapuntal analysis of ideas, which had become the soul of great instrumental music, and which contained in itself the solution of the great problem of unity, together with progression of interest and inexhaustible variety. He created, or at least perfected what might be called the melodic-thematic style of composition. Let us hear the rest of the remark of Gerber, of which we have only given half: "The feeling for the beautiful and true, which moved our excellent Haydn so deeply, suggested to him the types which were to regenerate instrumental music. Instead of patching together a parcel of incoherent rags, after the fashion that has latterly prevailed, he showed how a whole could be constructed, full of grandeur and of beauty, with a single musical thought, developed and analysed on different sides. That led us to the study of pure music, which for seventy years had been too much neglected, and which consists in the art of inventing a fruitful theme, of dismembering it, and with its parts constructing a well-designed (motivirtes) and complete whole, whether the composer works in the melodic style and in accordance with the taste of the times, or follows the rules of counterpoint and fugue. In either case the unity of the work will be the more apparent, as one feels the musical expression of one and the same emotion from the beginning to the end." It seems to me that the last of the progressive revolutions in music has never been explained more clearly and in fewer words; a revolution (as it respects composition,) in which Haydn was the most prominent actor, and which Mozart carried through to its extremest consequences. With the exception of a few opponents, the universal opinion in our day places Haydn above all musicians who preceded him; and no opinion ever seemed to be more truly founded. Was it not he who first combined the whole elementary power of composition in his works, and knew how to unite the opposite advantages of styles so long incompatible, leading them into the way of mutual concessions and borrowings, whereby he balanced the natural frailty of the one with the somewhat systematic stiffness of the other? In whom before Haydn do we find a greater charm of expression united with the greatest solidity of labour, popularity coupled with science, the pledges of passing success with all those of a long futurity! More fortunate than Mozart, Haydn found recognition of his greatness before he went down into the grave; his contemporaries overloaded him with proofs of their admiration, which time, indeed, could never lessen, although he was destined to share it with another. This is another contrast in the histories of the two musicians. The greatness of our hero (Mozart) was only recognised after his death. While he was unremarked, and, as it were, hidden from the eyes of his age, to Haydn remained the glory, single and alone, of standing on the lofty summit of the musical Parnassus. To-day he is no more alone, and the head of a young man is there visible, in a much brighter halo than the patriarchal head of him who sang of the "Creation." There is a very remarkable passage in Burney, which affords an evidence of the enthusiasm which Haydn inspired among the most enlightened of his contemporaries, and of the significance of the until then unknown power of instrumental music left to its own resources. The reader will permit me to remind him, that Burney, in his travels and in London, had heard all the great singers of a period so rich in talent of that kind; that he knew the ancient as well as modern music from its alpha to its omega; that both as an Englishman and as a scholar he was a passionate admirer of Händel; and that his personal taste, in spite of all this, drew him to the opera. He expresses himself in the following manner: "I am now happily arrived at that part of my narrative where it is necessary to speak of Haydn the admirable and matchless Haydn! from whose productions I have received more pleasure late in my life, when tired of most other | music, than I ever received in the most ignorant and rapturous part of my youth, when everything was new, and the disposition to be pleased undiminished by criticism or satiety."-In another place he says: "Haydn's adagios are often so sublime in ideas and the harmony in which they are clad, that though played by inarticulate instruments, they have a more pathetic effect on my feelings, than the finest opera air united with the most exquisite poetry.' Of no other man has Burney, in his long survey of the dead and the living, of all countries and of all times, employed such passionately eulogistic expressions. We should feel authorised, after such decisive words from the mouth of such a man, to settle a question which has been so often raised among dilettanti, namely: Whether more genius be required for vocal or for instrumental music? Persons of an exclusive turn always decide easily, because they only see, or are willing only to see one side of a thing; but to us, whose point of sight lies in the middle, whence we would fain look round on every side, the for and against appear so nearly balanced, that we find it hard to say. It cannot be doubted that the style essentially pertaining to the great instrumental music is in itself the richest and most beautiful of all; equally certain is it, that the instrumentist, robbed of the co-operation of the human voice, in the contest with the illusions of the theatre and the transporting evidence of musical meaning based upon a text, would infallibly get the worst of the battle, if he did not have to oppose to the union of several arts musical beauties which stand higher than the opera; beauties which are independent of every illusion, as well as of every predetermined explanation. By this we perceive that the instrumentist does not lack the means, unless it be his personal deficiency, of equalising the game. With an orchestra, such as we have, no mechanical difficulty stops him; none of the thousand considerations and perplexities which besiege the musician, who has to translate the poetry of the words and at the same time enhance its beauty, can ensnar! and break the thread of his happiest conceptions. The musical foundation forms his only law. Free to execute, without the slightest hindrance, whatsoever he has power to conceive, he is in in a certain manner the human Me in person; feeling and fancy are his interpreters, the infinite his only limit, and the entire resources of his art enable him to fill out the psychological frame, which admits neither of words nor of determinate action. If, therefore, one should judge the works of the dramatic and the instrumental composer simply as scores, that is, if he should see only notes in them, he would find that a symphony, a quintet, or a worked-up quartet, are objects of greater value than an aria, a duet, an ensemble, or a chorus of an opera. But it would also be a great injustice to judge a dramatist merely by a comparison of scores, or even by a hearing of his music outside of the theatre. One might as well have a piece of scenic decoration displayed in his chamber, to judge there of the optical or perspective effect which it would produce upon the stage. The analogy is precise enough, since illusion runs through all the effects of theatrical music, and often constitutes its whole success. Many a nothing, if you regard the notes alone, brings to pass wonders in its dramatic application, and becomes quite a genial and felicitous idea. The instrumentist obeys only his art, that is to say, himself; he who labours for the theatre obeys entirely other masters. His first and most important law is dramatic truth or correct application; his second law, which is to have an eye always to the interest of the singers and to their powers of execution, is all the more tyrranical, since it is subject to arbitrary construction; finally there comes in play his own interest, or the absolute worth of the work considered as a score. How many requirements, not to reckon the caprices of the local or the temporary taste, which reigns here more than anywhere else! Finally, we must not forget, that the human voice, whose ascendancy, wherever it co-operates, must be taken into account, possesses neither the compass nor the variety, nor the mechanical power of the leading instruments of the orchestra; that its progression is limited to a comparatively very small number of phrases and melodic forms; which is the reason why it is far more difficult to be new and original in opera. With so many difficulties, so many limitations, so many contrary regards besetting him, how can we assign the dramatist a place below any other, supposing him to have nearly suceeded in conquering and harmonising all? Shall we not count among the first of men the musician, who redeems the feeble outlines of a libretto from their nothingness, clothes them with a poetic splendour, and breathes into them the life of passion? who can move the heart by the charm and power of his pictures, satisfy the mind by the fidelity of his musical translation, and ravish the ear, while he produces themes which will traverse the whole world and be repeated by every mouth: "In all ears resounding, Foreign to no tongue." That such musicians are not too frequent, it will readily be granted, as well as that they are in no respect inferior to any. Hence it follows, that music with words and music without words, having one a compound and the other a single aim, require, for their perfect treatment, different peculiarities, and are not to be judged by the same rule. You judge the instrumentist by what he has made, and the dramatist by what he has been able to make under the given conditions; you must take account, in fact, of what he has not done. With the one there is only one thing to be considered, namely, the score; whereas three things claim the other's regard, namely, the score, the drama, and the personale of the singer's at the maestro's disposal. Since the value of an instrumental work resides exclusively in the music, it demands comparatively a much greater power of invention, greater wealth of ideas, and a much deeper study of counterpoint. In an opera the musical value is diminished by a sort of compromise between clearly expressed and equally imperative necessities; but it is this very compromise which forms the triumph of the dramatist. But to conduct this ultra diplomatic business to a good end, wherein all must gain by whatsoever each one loses, he needs more reflection, more calculation, more aesthetic tact, more taste and cleverness than the instrumentist; if the merit of the one consists in making it forgotten by his work that has its limits, the merit of the other lies in filling, without overstepping, the bounds, with which he has declared himself contented by his very acceptance of the libretto. Therein lie for him the elements of success and the pledges of the most brilliant and most honourable popularity to which a musician can lay claim; the popularity of Gluck, Cimarosa and a Weber. No one has so large an audience as the dramatic composer; no fame resounds so loud as his. The circle of the instrumentist is much smaller; but his hearers listen to him a much longer time. A symphony outlasts an opera, for the reason that no value which it is possible to lend to a musical work, can equal the pure musical value. The peculiarities which form the distinctive genius of these two classes of musicians, seldom meet in the same degree in the same individual. Mozart excepted, I know no one, who could have taken the first rank equally in instrumental music and in the opera, although nearly all the first celebrities of modern times have striven for this double crown. Haydn's operas have been long forgotten. Beethoven's Fidelio proves, in spite of of its actual and numerous beauties, that the giant of the symphony felt himself cramped within the dramatic limits. Besides, he has only written this one opera, a proof that the opera was not his calling. The instrumental music of Weber would not, without the Freischütz, have made his name more than European and immortal. What shall we say of the violin quartets of Rossini! We once played them through and could scarcely credit that they were by Rossini. The composer of Il Barbiere must know, better than another, all he lacks for making violin quartets. Here we might conclude this long, but necessary introduction. I had to premise with a history of music as a foundation for the following labour, since the works of Mozart, which we now mean to examine, include in themselves this history from Josquin down to Haydn. May I be permitted to recapitulate the events and thoughts, which serve for the main pillar of this introduction. Music, intrinsically considered, divides itself into natural and artificial music. The first proceeds from the instinct of the chord; the other rests upon a positive knowledge of harmony. In all times, everywhere, music has existed in the state of nature, as it still exists in nine-tenths of the habitable earth; true musical art appears first in the sixteenth century, and indeed only in some parts of Europe. There never was, then, a revival of music, whatever the books may say about it. As much controversy as there has been between learned and natural music, still the former was no art; it was nothing but a striving or an aspiration. Her first advances date from the time when she began to borrow from her older sister; this led her nearer and nearer to the truth, and ended with a perfect reconciliation of science and instinct, that is to say, with chords and melody. The progress of musical art was constantly logical, without being supported by proofs. The canonical counterpoint begat chords, and chords begat melody, a chain so perfectly consecutive, that it would have produced nothing, if it had lain in the power of any man to change its order. It was necessary to begin with cultivating music, without any reference to its application, before the application could be rendered possible. Without the abuses of the contrapuntal style, the way that led it to the stand-point of art, there would have been no church music. Without the abuses of the melodic style, which threatened to stifle the drama in Italy, and which nevertheless were nothing but the natural and necessary development of this style, Gluck and Piccini would have found nothing, on which they could base the true and beautiful, the one in lyric tragedy, the other in the opera buffa. After a long and seemingly irreconcileable separation, counterpoint and melody reproduced two different kinds of value in the works of music. To the fugue belonged the strict development of a subject or motif, and the logical combination of musical ideas, as the result of a mighty and enduring labour; to melody the power of expression, the charm that lies in the musical analogies of impassioned feelings. At length these two extremes approached each other; the contrapuntist and the melodist began to melt into one man, who is now called simply the composer. While I have thus sought to cast a philosophical glance over the history of musical art, I must confess that I have counted upon an indulgence, which cannot reasonably be refused to individual and confessedly hasty representations. I have in a few pages given the fruit of several years' studies. Whether my judges, the well-informed musicians, approve me or condemn me, they at least will not forget, that the first steps on an untrodden way are always difficult, and that a leaf out of one's self in so new a matter, frequently requires more mental outlay, than a whole volume of compilations and extracts. ODOARDO E CRISTINA. SUCH was the title of an opera that Rossini had just produced at the theatre of Venice in 1819. The reputation of the maestro was already something immense throughout Italy, and, whenever he entered any city, the inhabitants gave him a triumphal reception, and begged for some new work; he had, therefore, at the pressing solicitation of the impresario of Venice, composed Odoardo e Cristina. From the very first, the public applauded and appeared to be enthusiastically disposed; unfortunately, in the pit there was a Neapolitan merchant, who seemed to enjoy the music as much as any one, but who kept humming the motives of the various pieces. This musical second-sight naturally astonished those near him, and they at last questioned him on the subject. "Pooh!" he exclaimed, "there is nothing surprising in my knowing the whole thing by heart, as it is nothing more nor less than Ricciardo e Zoraide and Ermione, that all Naples heard and applauded times out of number six months ago." In fact, Rossini-if we can believe the report-had adapted the motives of these two operas to the new libretto, without even taking the pains to impart fresh youth to them by the slightest touches, suppressions, or additions. The impresario was boiling with rage; but Rossini said to him, with the greatest sangfroid: "Of what do you complain? I promised to write you some music that should be applauded; this has succeeded, and tanto basta; besides, if you possessed the slightest common sense, you would have perceived by the edges of the various orchestral parts, completely dingy from time, that the music was old and had been used." It was a second-hand opera, too, if we may use the term which introduced Rossini to the Académie de Musique; for Le Siége de Corinthe, the author's first work for that establishment, was nothing but Maometo, which had been damned at Venice and Naples, a fact, however, which detracts nothing from its merit. OPERA AND DRAMA. BY RICHARD WAGNER. (Continued from page 698.) the melodiously strengthened, but of itself truthful rendering of the natural expression of speech, kept to the accent of dis course, as the only thing that could constitute a natural and intelligence-spreading bond between the discourse and the melody, what he had to do in this case was totally to suspend the verse, because it was necessary that he should bring forward the accent as the only thing to be intonated, and omit all other intonations, whether those of an imaginary prosodiacal stress, or those of the final rhyme. He passed over the verse, therefore, for the same reason that determined the intelligent actor to speak it as naturally accentuated prose; by doing this, however, he not only resolved the verse, but his melody also APART from the word-verse, which had separated from it, the into prose, for nothing but a musical prose remained of that melody had pursued a particular course of development. We melody which simply strengthened, by means of the expression have already followed this minutely, and seen that the melody, of the tone, the rhetorical accent of verse resolved into prose. as the surface of an endlessly developed system of harmony, and In fact, the whole dispute, on the varied acceptation of melody, borne upon the pinions of a most varied rhythmical method, turned upon the simple question: Whether and how the melody borrowed from the corporeal dance, and expanded into the most was to be determined by the word verse? The melody readyexuberant fulness, advanced its pretensions, as an independent made, and, according to its essential attributes, won from the artistic fact, to the point of determining poetry and arranging dance, and under which our modern ear is alone capable of comthe drama according to its own standard. Again, the word-prehending the essential attributes of melody generally, will verse, developed independently for itself, could, on account of its never conform itself to the spoken accent of the word-verse. feebleness and unsuitableness for the expression of feeling, This accent is found first in one and then in another member of the exercise no plastic power upon this melody, whenever it came word-verse, never returning to the same place in the line because in contact with the latter; on the contrary, when it did so, all our poets flattered themselves with the delusive idea of a prosodiaits untruthfulness and nullity were necessarily apparent. The cally rhythmical verse, or one melodically tuned by the final rhyme, rhythmical verse was resolved by the melody into its component forgetting, while busied with this phantasm, the real, living parts, which were really altogether unrythmical, and employed spoken accent, as the sole rhythmical standard for the verse. in a completely new manner, in accordance with the absolute Nay more, in their unprosodiacal verse, these poets did not judgment of the rhythmical melody; all sound and trace of the even think of laying the spoken accent with certainty upon the final rhyme were, however, lost in the waves of this melody as only recognizable sign of such verse, namely the final rhyme; it struck the ear with omnipotent force. When the melody on the contrary, every unimportant adverb, and, in fact, every adhered closely to the word-verse, and attempted, by its own or- concluding syllable, that should be altogether without any intonamentation, to render perfectly manifest the framework of this nation, was employed by them the more frequently, as the verse, especially constructed for sensuous perception, it exposed quality of rhyme was more usual to it. A melody is, however, precisely that element which the intelligent declaimer, whose only comprehensively impressed on the ear, from the fact of object was to render its purport comprehensible, thought he its containing a return of definite melodic moments in t was bound to conceal, namely, its wretched outward fashion, definite rhythm; if such moments do not return, or if they which distorted the proper conversational accent, and embarrassed are rendered irrecognizable by returning in portions of bars its expressive contents-a fashion which, so long as it remained which do not rhythmically correspond with each other, the simply something imagined and not pointedly thrust upon the melody wants that very connecting bond which first senses, was least capable of a disturbing effect, but which cut makes it melody, just as a precisely similar bond transoff from the purport all possibility of comprehension immediately forms the word-verse into real verse. The melody so conit was manifested, with determining significance, to the sense of nected refuses now to adapt itself to the word-verse, which hearing, and thus caused the latter to be placed as a precipitous possesses this connecting bond, however, in imagination only, barrier between the communication and the inward reception of and not in reality; the spoken accent, which according to the it. But while the melody was thus subordinate to the word- sense of the verse alone is to be rendered prominent, does not verse, and contented itself with adding to its rhythm and satisfy the necessary melismic and rhythmical accents of the rhymes only the fullness of the tone sung, it not only effected the melody in its return, and the musician who does not wish to representation of the falsehood and ugliness of the sensuous sacrifice the melody, but, above all things, to give it-because it fashion of the verse, simultaneously with the unintelligibility of is in the melody alone that he can render himself intelliits purport, but deprived itself of all capability of being re-gible to the feelings-is therefore compelled to pay regard to presented in sensuous beauty, and of raising the purport of the word-verse to a striking moment of feeling. the spoken accent only when it accidentally tallies with the melody. This, however, is tantamount to giving up all connection between the melody and the verse; for if the musician once finds himself compelled to leave the spoken accent out of consiprosodiacal rhythm of the verse, and, at last, he treats the verse-as the primitive causative moment of speech-simply in accordance with absolutely melodic will, which he can regard as perfectly justifiable as long as he attaches importance to expressing as effectively as possible in the melody the general feeling contained in the verse. The melody, always conscious of the capability it had gained in the field of music for the endless expression of feeling, did not pay the least attention to the sensuous fashion of the word-deration, he must feel still less bound to observe the imaginary verse, which necessarily injured the melody materially for its configuration out of its own powers, but directed its efforts to manifesting itself, completely for itself, as independent songmelody, in an expression which conveyed the purport of the sentiment contained in the verse according to its furthermost universality, and it did this, moreover, in a peculiar, purely musical fashion, to which the word-verse stood in the relation of a mere explanatory inscription under a picture. The bond of connection between the melody and verse remained the spoken accent, when the melody did not of itself show also the purport of the verse, and did not employ the vowels and consonants of the syllables of its words as so much mere absolute material to be chewed to pieces in the mouth of the singer. Gluck's endeavours, as I have already said, were directed only to the justification of the melodic accent-until his time, mostly arbitrary as far as the verse was concerned-by means of the spoken accent. If the musician, whose sole object was If any poet had ever experienced the actual desire of raising the spoken expression at his command to the convincing fulness of melody, he would necessarily have exerted himself, in the first instance, so to employ the spoken accent, as the sole standard for the verse, that in its suitable return it would have accurately fixed a healthy rhythm, necessary for the verse itself as well as the melody. But nowhere do we find a trace of this, or if we do recognise such a one, it is when the verse-maker, renouncing, from the onset, any poetical intention, does not wish to write poetry, but, as an obedient servant and verbal mechanic of the absolute musician, merely to arrange a certain number of syllables to be rhymed, with which the musician, evincing the most supreme contempt for the words, then does whatever he likes. How significative is it, on the other hand, that some beautiful verses of Goethe, that is to say, verses in which the poet exerted himself as much as possible to attain a certain melodic turn, are commonly designated by musicians as too beautiful, too perfect for musical composition! The truth of the matter is that a musical composition even of these verses, and one that should be perfectly appropriate to the sense of them, would first be obliged to resolve them into prose, and then bring them forth, as independent melody, out of this prose again, because it involuntarily strikes our musical feelings that the melody of such verses is only imaginary, their appearance a mere flattering picture of the fancy, and therefore quite different from the musical melody, which has to manifest itself in most decided sensuous reality. If, therefore, we consider these verses too beautiful for composition, we only say that we are sorry to be obliged to destroy them as verses, a step which we should allow ourselves to take with less remorse, immediately we met with a less respectable effort on the part of the poet; but, in acting thus, we acknowledge our perfect inability to form a correct idea of a proper relation between the verse and the melody. The melodist of the most recent times, after glancing over all the fruitless attempts to produce a suitable connection, mutually redeeming and creatively determining, between the word-verse and the tune-melody, and, especially, after perceiving the injurious influence exercised on the melody by a truthful rendering of the spoken accent, resulting in the distortion of the latter into musical prose-found himself, immediately he pursued an opposite course, and rejected the distortion or complete abnegation of the verse by the frivolous melody, called upon to compose melodies where he avoided all disagreeable contact with the verse, which he respected for itself, but which proved troublesome as far as the melody was concerned. He called these melodies Lieder ohne Worte, and songs without words were the very proper conclusion of a dispute in which the only means of arriving at a settlement was by allowing the matter to remain unresolved. The Lied ohne Worte, at present so popular, is the true translation of all our music into the pianoforte, for the more convenient use of our artistic bagsmen: in it, the musician says to the poet: "Do what you like, and I shall do what I like! We can agree best when we have nothing in common with each other.' Let us now see how we can get at this "Musician without Words," through the impulsive force of the highest poetical intention, in such a manner as to lift him gently down from his soft music stool, and set him in the midst of a world of the highest artistic power, which the creative strength of the Word shall open to him; of the Word, of which he got rid in a manner so womanishly easy-of the Word, that Beethoven brought forth from out the terrible labour-pangs of Music. (To be continued.) SPONTINI. (FROM THE FRENCH OF HECTOR BERLIOZ). (Concluded from page 691) His entrance into the Institute was most nobly done, and, it must be confessed, one that reflected great honour upon the French musicians. All those who might have taken a position in the ranks felt that they must yield to this great genius, and on retiring joined their votes to those of the entire Académie des Beaux Arts. In 1811, Spontini married the sister of our celebrated manufacturer of pianos, Erard. The attentions with which she surrounded him contributed not a little to calm the irritation and to soothe the sorrows of which his nervous nature and too real motives had rendered him the prey during the latter years of his life. In 1842, he made a pious pilgrimage into his native land, where he founded, with his own funds, several benevolent establishments. Latterly, in order to escape the sorrowful thoughts which beset him, he determined to undertake another journey to Marjolati. He arrived there, and stood beneath that deserted roof where, seventy-two years previous, he had first seen the light; he reposed there several weeks, meditating upon the long agitations of his brilliant but stormy career, and suddenly breathed his last, loaded with glory, and covered with the benedictions of his compatriots. The circle was closed; his task was accomplished. Notwithstanding the honourable inflexibility of his artistic convictions, and the solidity of the motives of his opinions, Spontini, whatever may have been said of him, allowed of discussion up to a certain point, into which he entered with that ardor manifest in every production of his pen; yet he sometimes yielded, with much philosophy, when he was at the end of his arguments. One day, reproaching my admiration for a modern composition, which he esteemed but little, I succeeded in giving him some very good reasons in favour of this work of a great master who was not a favourite of his. He listened with surprise; then, with a sigh, he exclaimed: "Hei mihi, gratis est! Sed de gustibus et coloribus non est disputandum." He wrote and spoke the Latin language with great fluency, and frequently employed it in his correspondence with the king of Prussia. He has been accused of egotism, violence, and harshness; but, taking into consideration the incessant hatred of which he has been the butt, the obstacles which he has had to overcome, the barriers which he has been obliged to break through, and the tension which this almost continual state of warfare must have produced in his mind, it may be, perhaps, permitted to evince some astonishment that he should have remained as companionable as he was, particularly if one bear in mind the immense value of his creations, and his conscience with regard to them, in comparison with the inferiority of most of his adversaries and the lack of elevation in the motives which guided them. Spontini was not a musician properly speaking; he did not belong to the class of those who produce music from themselves, and who write without finding it necessary that an idea emanating from another should give rise to their inspiration. Therefore he would not have succeeded, I think, in quatuor, nor in symphony. The grace and charm of his dancing airs; the majesty and the brio of certain parts of his overtures are, doubtless incontestable: but they do not prevent one from seeing that he never attempted high instrumental composition. ; He was, above all, a dramatic composer, whose inspiration increased with the violence of the passions which he had to depict. Hence the pale colouring of his first scores, written to puerile and vulgar Italian libretti; hence the insignificance of the music which he applied to that mean, cold, and false style of which the opera-comique of Julie is so perfect a model hence the ascendant movement of his thought in the two fine scenes of Milton-that in which the blind poet deplores the misfortune which has deprived him for ever of contemplating the marvels of nature; and that in which Milton dictates to his daughter his lines upon the creation of Eve, and her appearance amid the calm splendors of Eden. Hence, in fine, the prodigious and sudden explosion of the genius of Spontini in La Vestale, that shower of burning ideas, those heartfelt tears, that rippling of noble, touching, proud and threatening melody, that so warmly coloured harmony, those modulations so new in the theatre, that young orchestre, that truth, that profoundness of the expression, (I always insist upon this point), and that luxury of grand musical images, so naturally presented, imposed with so magistral an authority, and clasping the thought of the poet with so much force, that one cannot believe that the words to which they are adapted could ever be separated from them. There are, not involuntary faults, but certain harmonic harshnesses intentionally introduced into Cortez; in Olympie, this style of harshness is, to me, very magnificent. Only, the orchestra, so richly sober in La Vestale, becomes complicated in Cortez, and is overburdened with various an useless designs in Olympie, so much so as, at times, to render the instrumentation heavy and confused. Spontini had a certain number of melodic thoughts for every noble expression; when once he had scanned the circle of ideas to which these melodies were predestined, their source became less abundant; and this is why there is not so much originality |