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THE MUSIC TRADE REVIEW
' The poor are of greater worth in all re- lost its bloom and flexibility, and, though
spects,' a poet has said, which is possibly talent may survive, the adequate means of
an exaggeration; but certainly they are expressing it are no longer present. Every
not of less worth, and it is wrong for
French music to treat them with such year in opera and on the concert stage we
hear old singers who were once more or
contempt.
"Take even the chef-d'oeuvres of French less famous, and disappointment is none
musical art, and how many of them can we the less real because it is concealed under
call national, especially popular? What is good nature and tolerance. What has be-
there in common between our masters and
the masses? What is there national in come of Maurel's voice? He is an exqui-
Faust or Manon or Sigurd? What do they site actor, and it is a perpetual delight to
express of the national sentiment, and how note the wonderful play of expression—but
much do they give to the people? Russian his singing voice? There are no birds in
music, on the other hand, delights in prac- last year's nests. As for prima donnas—
tising this commerce with the people, this
giving and receiving, Democratic and social, but the subject is too painful for discus-
or—using older and better terms—frater- sion.
nal and compassionate, Russian music ad-
mits, indeed invites, the masses to partici-
pate in the realization of the ideal and the
expression of beauty."
M. Bellaigue distinguishes between the
historical music of Moussagarski and the
legendary, symbolic and picturesque school
which, in a sense, does for the Russian
spirit what Wagner did for the Teutonic.
He praises both and predicts an interna-
tional success for the modern Russian com-
posers.
jt
TT is an unfortunate fact that after a cer-
tain age talent degenerates instead of
progresses. Father Time is more cruel
than picture books represent him to be;
he not only whitens hair and plants wrin-
kles, but he destroys nerve and brain tis-
sue, and perches on the tombstone of de-
cayed talent as well as over the grave of
lifeless flesh. Of all artists, the musical
interpreter is treated most cruelly by Time,
and of all artists the musical interpreter is
most ignorant of this fact. The singer
has yet to be discovered who is willing to
admit that her days of usefulness are over;
the human nightingale grown old still
sings to the stars, and, deaf to her owl-
screeching, still dreams of the days of her
youth and her triumphs, living on her past
reputation and not upon her present merits.
Age is an incurable disease, and it is
only through conventionality that we af-
fect to admire its attributes. It is youth
alone that deserves to be married to inter-
pretative art; youth and—let it be boldly
added—beauty. Youth with physical ugli-
ness has undoubtedly won success, but the
ugliness is always accepted under protest.
And there is a physiological reason for
this preference. It may be stated as a
generalization that comeliness of feature as
well as grace and proportion in body is a
sign of health, of fitness for existence; and
that ugliness is a sign of disease, of unfit-
ness for existence. Our admiration for
beauty is at base the same feeling which
causes birds to select for mates those that
have the most gorgeous plumage; and the
preference has produced the types. We
may pretend that beauty has nothing to
do with our admiration for this or that
singer, but instinct is stronger than pro-
test, and physiology is the foundation of
aesthetics.
*
IN interpretative art we may do without
* beauty—under secret protest—but we
cannot do without youth. An old singer is
a singer only by courtesy; the voice has
M. ALVAREZ.
In the absence of a law protecting art
from time, is there cruelty in telling a
singer that age has robbed him of his
voice? Say he is earning his bread and
butter, and that he was once famous;
must we placidly listen to the ghost of his
former self and bear our pains because he
gave our ancestors pleasure? And what of
the aged singers who insist upon appearing
as Juliet, Isolde and Marguerite, vocally
and physically decrepit, with a mere sug-
gestion of a former glory? And the time-
touched concert singers who sing of youth,
love and fairyland with a Meg Merrilies
harshness of voice and stiff angularity of
gesture? Must we bow to the leathery
mummy because it once contained the soul
of a Pharoah? Shed tears of delight over
the funeral jars because they contain the
trachea and lungs of a dead nightingale?
j*
[TOW much would be saved to art and to
1 *• human dignity if a singer were gifted
enough to discover when she grows old,
and, securely grasping this J truth, grace-
fully retire into private life. Farewell
concerts would then cease to be a mockery,
and youth might have the chances that are
now denied it. Happily age is not a crime,
and in civilized countries no one is pun-
ished by being compelled to eat his time-
smitten relatives; but old age and young
art will never agree even though all regis-
ters of births were destroyed. Art some-
times demands sacrifices, and what nobler
sight could there be than a singer looking
out for his first grey hair or first crow's
foot, and then gracefully vanishing into
oblivion ? What is heard with pain might
be looked at with pleasure,
but an operatic and concert
stage haunted by Strul-
bugs is as sad to the eye
as it is agonizing to the
ear. " I will retire while
I am victor, lest old age
should suddenly smite,
and I appear in feebleness
before the people."
PEW
balladmongers
* possess the power to
write words which set
themselves to music, as is
the case in Edgar Allan
Poe's "Annabel Lee," but
they are probably capable
of turning out better work
than the sorry stuff usually
found in songs. There
are, we think, two reasons
why song words are poor.
The first is the composer's
inability to discriminate
between good and bad
verse; and the second is the
present method of remun-
erating the writer for his
work. In both cases the
musical publishers could
remedy the evil. As re-
gards the composer, they
could insist upon selecting
the words themselves, and
employing somebody with
a knowledge of v e r s e
would insure the rejection of all dog-
gerel and balderdash.
But it can be safely asserted that a
change of the kind indicated will not re-
form song-words unless the musical pub-
lishers alter their method of remunerating
the verse writer.
At the present time it is usual to
pay him a small compensation for his lines,
while the composer is given a royalty on
every copy sold, which, in the event of a
success, brings him a considerable sum of
money.
Now, if the words are really good
words, the verse writer deserves a royalty
quite as much as the musical composer.
If musical publishers let it be known that
they would give a royalty on song-words,
it would very probably result in the en-
couragement of capable verse writers to
turn their talents in this direction. And
the benefit thus afforded the concert goers,
and lovers of m.usjc would be yery con-
siderable.