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tHE MUSIC TRADE REVIEW
TELEPHONE
NUMBER.
1745.--EIOHTEENTH
STREET.
The musical supplement to The Review is
published on the first Saturday of each month.
TT is gratifying to lovers of skilled piano
*• playing and to Mr. Rosenthal's friends
that he has again come among us, appar-
ently in the full tide of health and
strength. It will be remembered that his
plans for last season were entirely broken
up by a serious illness which at one time
threatened to prove fatal. After hearing
Mr. Rosenthal in three recitals—on Oct.
26, 29, and on Tuesday last, when his pro-
gram included numbers by Beethoven,
Field, Weber, Schytte, Chopin, Schubert,
Schoezer, Joseffy, and some numbers by
the composer himself, we are constrained
to admit that Mr. Rosenthal has not only
entirely recovered a full measure of health,
but that the great reputation attained dur-
ing his previous tour is destined to be con-
siderably augmented this year. His tech-
nical achievements are extraordinary.
While the outlines of his work are laid
simply and clearly, there is an individual-
ity in his performances that cannot easily
be forgotten. He not only excels in bril-
liancy and astounding technique, but in
the lighter numbers, which may be charac-
terized as musical poems, he is heard at his
best. There was dash, spirit, vitality, au-
thority in all of his playing. There was
grace, symmetry, finish in it.
Mr. Rosenthal will appear in additional
recitals on Nov. 5, 17 and 19, and his first
appearance with orchestra will be made on
Nov. 9 and 10, at the opening concerts
here of the Symphony Orchestra, when
two different concerts will be presented.
He will give seventy-five recitals in all
during his present tour of the United
States.
day for American singers seems to
be dawning. From all sides come re-
ports of triumphs achieved by sopranos
and contraltos who were born in New Eng-
land, the sunny South or the boundless
West, and who practised their solfeggios
in academies, small in size but large in
name. These singers are lyric and dra-
»matic. With the determination and
optimism of their race they surmount all
difficulties. They learn to speak academic
French, the Tuscany brand of Italian, and
German of the purest, such as tradition
says is spoken only within sight -of the
towns of Celle and Lehrte. They acquire
all the finesse of diction for the sentimental
chansons of France, and the clear phrasing
for the lieder of Germany. Bel Canto is
an open book to them, and they have no
difficulty to win ovations at La Scala and
San Carlo. They become possessed of all
the virtues—and vices, too, sometimes—of
the declamatory mode for Wagner inter-
pretations, and are personae gratae at
Wahnfried.
Once upon a time such successes abroad just returned from Europe and had seen
were not only gratifying; they were neces- the French histrion in this play. The so-
sary if the artists were patriotic, and called "copying" referred to by the
longed for the approval of their com- critics was purely fancy, and entirely un-
patriots. For with the stamp of Europe founded. The critic of the critics devotes
they were accepted without comment.
two columns to an analysis of the notices
Things are beginning to change now. which appeared in the different papers and
The tales of triumphs still come by cable then proceeded to give the dramatic writ-
from capitals and continents in the Old ers a dose of their own medicine very suc-
World, but there are as many from opera- cessfully and very properly it seems to us.
houses and concert-rooms in our own land. We give a few of the closing paragraphs
We are becoming emancipated, thank the which apply as pertinently to musical as
Muses! We are learning to value our own to dramatic criticism :
impressions and to rely on our own judg-
"Critics should at all times," says the
ment. A new era in art has begun.
critic of the critics, "encourage such great
*
undertakings by bestowing praise where-
A LVAREZ, the tenor, will be heard, ever it is possible to do so, and by deliver-
**• after all, in New York this winter, ing censure in no harsh, intentionally cruel
although it will be in concert and not in words.
opera. So the tenor will not have the un-
'' The presentation of the greatest play
usual experience of coming to this coun- of the period, the risking of almost a for-
try from France only to appear in the cities tune upon its production, the bestowal of
outside of New York. The three great months of earnest study and tireless en-
tenors of the operatic world to-day are deavor in its preparation—all this, which
Jean de Reszke, Van Dyck and Alvarez, an actor-manager does for us, is not a
and this winter they will all be heard crime to be punished with contemptuous,
here within a short time. MM. de Reszke cruel criticism, but a great and lofty effort
and Van Dyck will be heard regularly, for the stage that merits approbation, and
but M. Alvarez will have to stand or fall deserves, even when applying to it in judg-
by his appearances in concert. He will ment the inexorable rules of art, as kindly
sing three times in Philadelphia, instead consideration as can be brought to bear
of giving the one performance originally upon it.
announced.
Philadelphia thought that
" T h e actor, even the veteran, smarts
was contemptuous of its dignity. There under the stroke of the critics' whip, as
is no positive announcemant yet as to Wal- does the thoroughbred under the gentlest
ter Damrosch's intention to settle there in touch of the rider's spur. Yet the average
charge of a symphony orchestra for which critic seems to feel it his right—by whom
a wealthy woman is said to have subscribed given ?—to lash and drive at the actor as
$40,000. It is not thought probable that though he were utterly lacking in sen-
he will, as the direction of such an orches- sibility."
tra in its earlier stages would leave little
*
time for the work of composition to which T OHENGRIN recently had its 400th per-
he is just now devoting himself. His •*-' formance in Berlin. The first one
orchestra has lost some of its men to the was given there on January 23, 1859. It
Boston Symphony, but it remains to-day took the opera 26 years to gain a record
practically the organization that it has of 200 performances. That number was
always been, and a better card could not reached on October 1, 1885. On that night
be found outside of the Boston Symphony Albert Niemann sang the title role, just as
Orchestra. Mr. Damrosch will use his he had done in the 50th and 100th per-
orchestra for the operatic performances, formances. The second 200 performances
and many circumstances would be favor- were given in 13 years, just half the time
able to the foundation of the Philharmonic required when the opera was younger. It
in Philadelphia if he cared to undertake it. was only six years ago that the 300th per-
With Mr. Damrosch in charge of a Phila- formance was given. Albert Niemann
delphia orchestra and New York sending sang Lohengrin 131 times. The role of
to Boston for one of its conductors, while the Herald was sung until 1870 by a tenor.
a second from that city comes to give a
*
series of concerts here, the interchange of HP HE RE is a vast difference between the
musicians would not be without its anom-
*• status of present day musicians and
alous features.
those who practiced the art thirty or forty
*
years ago. Formerly singers and players
A clever criticism of the critics appeared were treated simply as servants. Music
^ * quite recently in the Herald of this was then a luxury, and only obtainable at
city. The writer, anxious to learn- of a the hands of the rich. As soon, however,
certain play produced by an eminent actor, as musicians were able to address the
took up the papers the morning after the masses their position grew less servile.
production and studied the verdict of the History tells many stories of the oppression
critics with the result that the diversity which obtained among the rank and file
of opinions expressed, many unfriendly in during what is often styled the "golden
spirit, plunged him into a hopeless quan- age of music." Haydn, for instance, was
dry. He was informed that this eminent treated by Prince Esterhazy merely as an
actor had copied wholesale from a Parisian ordinary attendant; and, previous to his
who appeared in the same role, and the entering the royal household, he had served
duplicating process was explained.
as lackey-boy to Porpora the singing
Now it happened that this writer had master. Mozart, again, was regarded as a