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48 PAGES.
With which is Incorporated THE KEYNOTE.
VOL L
Published Every Saturday, at 3 East Fourteenth Street. New York, February 13,1897.
THE OLD TUNE.
From out a windless realm it flowed.
Fragrant and sweet as balm of rose;
Upon its breast soft sunlight glowed,
And still it glides where the jasmine blows,
An old, sweet tune of other days!
Full of the tints of the autumn time;
Scents of russets and August haze
Gathered and fell like thoughts in rhyme.
May never again that once-loved tune
Fall in my heart as a stream that flows!
Let it run as it will like a vine in June,
Fragrant and sweet as a summer rose.
Eugene Field.
O
WHY WE LACK AHERICAN ARTISTS.
A correspondent commenting on a recent
article of mine in regard to the surprising
lack of good male singers in this country
writes:
" Is it not true that the conditions under
which we live are altogether unfavorable for
artistic development? " and illustrates this
probably correct statement by referring to
the case of a young baritone of his acquain-
tance, who though possessing all the ele-
ments of a successful singer and ambitious
to make music his career, yet finds it im-
possible to do so, having no money and
being unable to find a position to enable
him to live and still have time to prosecute
his artistic studies.
My correspondent continues: " Instruc-
tors to whom the young man has applied
say that it would be useless for him to
attempt to get the necessary artistic devel-
opment in the few hours after nightfall
which he could snatch from business—that
it is almost absolutely essential that he
should live more in an artistic atmosphere."
And further he asks the pregnant ques-
tion: " What is the young man to do? The
answer to this question will perhaps dis-
close quite as potent a reason for the non-
development of native art as any 'tempera-
mental or climatic disabilities.' "
One might reply to the above by saying,
"Where there's a will there's a way," that
great art like murder will out, that many a
true artist soul has struggled with and
overcome difficulties greater than any out-
lined above, that in this country we are too
apt to look at art through commercial
spectacles and measure its value solely on
the scale of its financial returns; but the
real solution of the difficulty would come
by founding in this country such public
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and governmental institutions as exist of the vocal melody, so that the voice-part
abroad, where, as my correspondent justly need not even be played along. This is
says, "such men may gratify their artistic one of the points in which Franz resembles
Wagner, of many parts of whose operas
ambitions."
What we need in this country for the the same might be said. So far from being
development of native art in all its bran- a shortcoming, as some have maintained,
ches is a popular interest in and recognition this is the very perfection of musico-poetic
of native ability as such, and then some art; for in this last and highest develop-
system of public or national instruction ment of modern music the voice is no
and practical aid to encourage and assist longer the only bearer of the melody, but
every harmonic part of the accompaniment
worthy native talent in its development.
is a melody. Such accompaniments are
termed polyphonic, or many-melodied, and
with these the chief function of the voice
becomes the distinct melodious declama-
tion and interpretation of the poetry.
Franz is as conscientious as Wagner in
never sacrificing the poet to the musician.
In Wagner's operas the singer is primarily
an actor representing the dramatic pcet,
and in Franz's songs he represents the lyric
poet, toward whom is his first duty, while
the orchestra or the piano represents the
claims of the musician. It was not a mere
accident but a common artistic instinct
that made Franz, in 1850, an enthusiastic
convert to Wagnerism after hearing "Lo-
hengrin," and that led Wagner to keep
Franz's songs, by the side of Bach, con-
stantly on his piano during the period in
which he was composing his "Nibelung
Trilogy" in Switzerland.
Henry T. Finck.
R. DE KOVEN.
©
A national conservatory with a govern-
mental subsidy, at one and the same time
a nursery for artists and a base of supply
for a national opera, will surety come when
the country can be brought to realize that
such institutions will be of the same value
and use to the community here in their
refining and cultivating influences as they
have been proved to be abroad.
Reginald De Koven.
o
ROBERT FRANZ'S SONGS.
In the home circle Franz's songs are a
source of endless delight, even to those
who can not sing; for it is one of their
most striking peculiarities that the vocal
and the piano parts are so closely inter-
woven that it is easy to play both parts to-
gether, and thus make a complete "song
without words, " indeed, in not a few cases
the "accompaniment" contains the whole
SCHARWENKA'S NEW OPERA.
Walter Damrosch is to produce at the
Metropolitan Opera House toward the end
of March a new opera by Xavier Schar-
wenka called " Mataswintha." The opera
was sung last year at Weimar, and has been
accepted for production at Vienna, Carls-
ruhe and Berlin. The principal roles have
already been assigned excepting the title
part, and that may possibly be sung by
Miss Ella Russell, the American concert
singer who, after a successful career in
England, is to return to her own country
next month. Mmes. Gadski and Ciben-
schuetz and MM. Krauss, Ernst, and
Fischer will sing the principal roles. The
opera will be sung in German.
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Marie Louise Clary, contralto, of this
city, has been re-engaged to sing in Mon-
treal in April.
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