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THE MUSIC TRADE REVIEW
A number of American plays and play-
ers have recently attained a great success
in London, and some of our actors and
managers have come to the conclusion that
that city is a sort of theatrical klondike, to
be worked for fortunes, and they are ap-
parently imbued with a wild desire to
make a rush for '' England, fame and
fortune."
In this connection, however, it is well
to recollect that it does not always follow
that because the foreign public has ac-
cepted with acclamation one or several
plays from this side of the water, that any-
thing and everything will meet with a
similar reception. A caustic but practical
writer put the matter very neatly a few
days ago when he said: " As it is impos-
sible to walk back, and as it is a long swim
home, a little caution may be well on the
part of those who are contemplating
theatrical ventures abroad."
*
In the storm of patriotic fervor which is
now raging throughout the land, music is
playing its part. The songs of war are
being sung, the marches of martial import
are being sounded, the national anthems
are heard at every public gathering, and
melody and harmony are quickening the
pulses and heart-beats of the entire coun-
try. The ballads of the civil war have
been resurrected and the strains which
rose from the camp fires of the Blue and
the Gray now mingle in concord, in testi-
mony of the great concrete fact—a united
country.
*
The Park Commissioners were waited
upon by a delegation from the Musical
Protective Union a few weeks ago. They
asked that hereafter bands should be paid
for concerts in the parks on those Sundays
when concerts were scheduled but were
prevented by rain, saying that leaders had
to hold themselves in reserve for such con-
certs and so could not accept indoor
engagements. They also asked the Com-
missioners to abolish the rule that the
musicians must be uniformed, claiming
that the bandmasters charged excessive
rates for the uniforms. The Commission-
ers gave no answer. They are considering
a plan, which is advocated by the strongest
organizations in the city that have the
interests of the poor at heart, to have con-
certs in Central Park every night, or
perhaps every other night, this summer.
Not a bad idea.
*
Of the hundreds, I might almost say
thousands, of pianists I have known, the
two greatest have been the two humblest
—Rubinstein and Paderewski—says Alex-
ander McArthur, in the Etude. Fifth and
tenth rate artists only go about holding
their noses in the air, boasting of their ex-
ploits and of their superiority over their
colleagues. The great artist is great be-
cause, in the words of Socrates, "he knows
that he knows nothing." " I don't need
to practice Op. 53 (Beethoven); I know it
thoroughly. It is only a waste of time to
practice it more," said a pupil once to Ru-
binstein. One of his saddest expressions
came over Rubinstein's face, for there was
never a master that lived as he did in the
work of his pupils. "Don't you?" he said,
slowly. '' Well, you are eighteen and I
am sixty. I have been half a century
practicing that sonata, and I need still to
practice it. I congratulate you." From
that time on Rubinstein took no further
interest in that pupil, for to disappoint
Rubinstein once in an art truth was to dis-
appoint him for ever.
*
If the men in America who imagine
that their brains need prodding would
substitute music for whiskey as a prodder,
they would be amazed at results.
Unless a man has the mind and nerves
of a saurian there is more stimulus for his
brain in an hour's good—or moderately
bad—music than in all the whiskey from
the corn of two mules' ploughing.
Music searches all through the queer
convolutions of our gray thinking machin-
ery. It seeks out the sleepy places and
stirs them up. It makes the worn and
soggy brain a new and active worker again.
The man who wrote the Declaration of
Independence played upon the violin. He
played very often and very well. He did
not drink whiskey. Who knows what this
nation owes to the old fiddle of Monticello?
*
Miss Carrie S. Pierman met with her
usual success in the piano recital given by
her recently in the concert hall of the
Broad Street Conservatory of Music at
1331 South Broad street, Philadelphia.
Miss Pierman has quietly risen to be a
great pianist, and displays that fine artis-
tic training that is characteristic of all Mr.
Gilbert Raynold Combs' pupils. Not only
was her conception broad and original, her
technique faultless, her tones mellow and
pure, but in the Godowsky, Zarembski
and Schumann numbers she displayed
great depth of feeling and mastered great
technical difficulties with brilliancy, as
well as clearness and smoothness.
*
No better proof that appreciation of art
in every form is growing in this great city
of ours is needed than the annual report
of the Metropolitan Museum, just sub-
mitted, which records an increase of fifty
thousand in the number of visitors last
year. This is due, unquestionably, to the
Sunday attendance. And what an argu-
ment it is for the opening of our libraries
and other public institutions of an educa-
tional character on that day. No one can
visit an art museum or library without
getting a purer and better idea of life and
an enlarged understanding.
*
Some wiseacre has discovered that M is
a very important letter in music, for a
number of composers' names begin with it
—Mozart, Mehul, Meyerbeer, Mendels-
sohn, Marschner, Methfessel, Milloecker,
Mascagni, Massenet, Morlachi, Merca-
dante, Metra, Molique, Meyer-Hellmund.
But how about the letter B ? There we
have Bach, Beethoven, Brahms, Bulow,
Byrd, Busoni, Bungert, Bull, Bruckner,
Brodsky, Brillenbasse, Breitkopf & Hartel,
Brassin, Braham, Borodin, Bononcini,
Boito, Boieldieu, Boekelmann, Boetius,
Boccherini, Blechinstrumente, Bizet, Bese-
kirskij, Berlioz, Benediktiner, Bellini,
Begleitstimmen, Becvarovsky, Bargiel,
Balfe, Balakireff, and Bagby.
*
Ebenezer Prout, the well-known English
theorist and editor, recently said that
Bach, like Shakespeare and the Bible, is in-
exhaustible. He went on to say that every
three weeks he played through the whole
of the forty-eight preludes and fugues,
discovering new beauties each time that
he had missed before. Bach is certainly
the musician's musician. Once that cer-
tain peculiarities of construction, so differ-
ent from the modern romantic and drama-
tic school, are understood, the player de-
lights in delving in the polyphonic mys-
teries of the great master, and rejoices in
the rich treasures of harmonic beauty hid-
den there from the casual student.
*
Mr. Barry Pain, the writer, says that re-
cently, after a hard bout of adverse criti-
cism, he went to a palmist for the sake of
hearing a few pleasant things, and when
he came away from the palmist's estab-
lishment he understood why palmistry was
such a paying profession. Actors, sing-
ers and other sensitive people ought to
follow this ^example. When in the blues
go to a palmist.
*
Ingerbond Von Bronsart is the name of
one of the best known women composers
in Germany. She has done what few
women have done, written three operas.
Mme. Bronsart has spent the greater por-
tiotfcof her life in Germany, but was born
in St. Petersburg, of Swedish parents.
She studied with Liszt and is an excellent
pianist.
What a feast there is in store for our
good friends in the English metropolis.
We note that among the soloists engaged
for the spring season of the London Phil-
harmonic Society are: D'Albert, Gabrilo-
witsch, Moszkowski, Pancera, Rosenthal,
Zeisler, Adamowski, Gregorowitsch, Such,
Dvorak and Saint-Satins.
*
Mile. Anna Hegner, a sister of the well-
known pianist, Otto Hegner, has just made
her debut as a violinist in concert-rooms,
both at Bale and in Carlsruhe, with great
success, the critics being unanimous in ac-
knowledging her exceptional gifts. The
young lady is only fifteen years of age and
a native of Bale.
*
Eugene D'Albert's one act opera " Die
Albresie " will be brought out this month
at the Royal Opera House at Munich.