Music Trade Review

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THE MUSIC TRADE REVIEW
progress of the season may continue to the
end. Everybody hopes that it will. The
Philadelphia performances have been very
successful this year, although this has not
always been the experience of the company
there. This season the great artists of the
company have been able to interest the
Philadelphia public, even after its own
season. The Ellis company, with Mme.
Melba as the principal attraction, will be
in Philadelphia again next winter. But
Maurice Grau will probably be more active
there than he has ever been before. The
performances will be more frequent. The
announcement that the Maurice Grau com-
pany will give more performances there
than ever before has been received with an
interest which is favorable to their success.
* * T H E Anglo-American Alliance in Mu-
* sic"—that is what the biggest mili-
tary band festival ever known in this city
is to be called. It will be held at the Sev-
enth Regiment Armory, on March 25, un-
der the direction of Lieut. Daniel Godfrey,
the crack English band leader.
Three bands the largest of their kind in
the world, will unite under Lieut. Godfrey's
magic baton. One will be American, the
Seventh Regiment Band, of ninety-eight
pieces; one Scotch, the Fifth Royal Scots;
and one English, the British Guards. In
all something like 300 instruments of every
kind and size will help to swell the chorus
of American and English friendship.
The feature of the festival will be a
"Nautical Fantasia," typical of England's
prowess on the sea and the United States'
glorious victories in the late war, arranged
by Lieut. Godfrey. Two new marches will
be heard, too, one by an American and the
other by an English composer.
Cable despatches told of the sailing of
Lieut. Godfrey and his bandsmen from
Liverpool Saturday on the Lucania. The
Britishers are due in New York to-day.
They will be welcomed by the British Con-
sul and several representative Englishmen,
as well as by Ernest Neyer, bandmaster of
the Seventh Regiment.
Lieut. Godfrey ranks every bandmaster
in the United States not only in length
of service—he has been bandmaster for
forty years in the Grenadier Guards—
but also in the fact that he wears shoulder
straps and has a commission in the British
army. Here the bandmaster is a non-com-
missioned officer, ranking only as sergeant.
*
T H R O U G H the generosity of Mr. Grau
*• and the artists of the Metropolitan
Opera House, a memorial performance
will be given in honor of the late Anton
Seidl, on the evening of March 23rd. In
order to enable most of the leading artists
to appear, the following program has been
arranged: "Lohengrin," first act, "Die
Walktire," second act and " Gotterdam-
merung," last scene. The proceeds of the
performance will be placed in a trust com-
pany to be applied to the benefit of Mr.
Seidl's widow during her life, and after-
ward to the founding of a permanent
memorial to the deceased conductor, the
precise nature of which will not be deter-
mined until the financial result of the
undertaking is ascertained.
*
OIDNEY LANIER'S essays on music,
^
poetry and other topics, collected and
put together by Mrs. Lanier, have recently
been published by Scribner & Sons. To
readers of The Review it is hardly neces-
sary to say that Lanier was a skilled mu-
sician and a gifted poet and pre-eminently
fitted therefore to write intelligently and
interestingly on this subject. The volume,
although it is only a collection of scattered
essays, and not a coherent work, has its
chief interest in its opening paper on music
and poetry.
Here Lanier begins by
enunciating several principles which he
afterwards expounds.
1. " That music is the characteristic art
form of the modern time, as sculpture is of
the antique and painting is of the mediaeval
time.
2. "That this is necessarily so, in conse-
quence of certain relations between uncon-
ventional musical tones and the human
spirit, particularly the human spirit in its
present stage of growth.
3. "That this growth indicates a time
when the control of masses of men will be
more and more relegated to each unit
thereof, when the law will be given from
within the bosom of each individual,—not
from without,—and will rely for its sanc-
tions upon desire instead of repugnance.
4. "That in intimate connection with
this change in man's spirit there proceeds
a change in man's relations to the unknown,
whereby (among other things) that rela-
tion becomes one of love rather than of
terror.
5. " That music appears to offer condi-
tions most favorable to both these changes
and that it will, therefore, be the reigning
art until they are accomplished, or, at least,
greatly forwarded."
Music is man's most successful mode of
communing with God, Mr. Lanier very in-
geniously sets forth in his first essay.
There is here much which suggests
thought, and one regrets deeply that the
thesis has not been more fully developed.
Lanier, who '' had his ear at the shell of
the world," and wrote exquisitely while
living bravely, could have elucidated this
theory as few moderns would be able to do.
Is not this fine and inspiring? " One
hears all about the world nowadays that
art is wholly unmoral; that art is for art's
sake; that art has nothing to do with good
or bad behavior. These are the cries of
clever men, whose cleverness can imitate
genius so aptly as to persuade many that
they have genius and whose smartness can
preach so incisively about art that many
believe them to be artists. But such catch-
words will never deceive the genius, the
true artist. The artist loves beauty su-
premely: because the good is beautiful, he
will clamber continually towards it, through
all possible sloughs, over all possible ob-
stacles, in spite of all possible falls. This
is the artist's creed. Now, just as music
increases in hearty acceptance among men,
so will this true artistic sense of the love
of morality spread, so will the attractive-
ness of all that is pure and lovely grow in
power, and so will the race progress to-
wards that time when law will cease to rely
upon terror for its sanction, but depend
wholly upon love and desire."
*
T H E prosperity of the present season at
1
the Metropolitan is certain to have its
effects on the policy of the Maurice Grau
Opera Company next season, and the most
marked change in the company's program
is likely to be its movements outside of
New York. Maurice Grau is just now en-
gaged in making plans for a visit to San
Francisco next autumn before the New
York performances are given. His present
idea is to take the entire company to San
Francisco, and after the season there return
to Chicago, appearing in some of the West-
ern cities on the way eastward. Then the
Chicago season would follow in the cus-
tomary fashion before the Metropolitan
was opened. So ambitious an undertaking
has not been attempted since the last visit
of Her Majesty's Opera Company to the
Pacific coast, under the direction of Col.
J. H. Mapleson. That proved to be a
highly successful enterprise, with Adelina
Patti and Etelka Gerstcr as the stars of the
company. The result of the season was a
profit of about $80,000, which is said to be
the fortune that Col. Mapleson possesses
to-day after his years of active work as an
impresario. Mme. Melba sang last year in
San Francisco and Charles Ellis will again
take his company thither for a season of
three weeks this spring. But these ven-
tures are scarcely comparable to the under-
taking proposed by Mr. Grau. The ex-
pense involved in it may well be under-
stood in view of the fact that he will take
not only all the eminent singers of the or-
ganization but also all the costumes and
scenery necessary for the best performances
of the operas. It will cost a small fortune
merely to take the company and the neces-
sary accessories to San Francisco apart
from the other expenses. Yet the opinion
to-day is that the venture will certainly
meet with financial success.
*
T H E concert of the students of Wm. M,
* Semnacher's Institute of Music, which
occurred at Carnegie Chamber Music Hall
on Feb. 15th, afforded ample proof of the
superior instruction received at this insti-
tution. The pupils, without exception,
were above the average in ability, many of
them surprised by their advanced technic
and individuality of expression. Of course,
those clever child pianists, Bessie and
Mamie Silberfeld, were the favorites of
the evening. They were heard in solo and
ensemble numbers, and won a well de-
served measure of approbation. Miss Pau-
line Semnacher and William Serrmacher,
the former on the piano and the latter on
the violin, played classical numbers with
mature musical instinct.
*
T H E Castle Square Opera Co. are doing-
* some commendable work in the mat-
ter of giving openings to equipped aspir-
ants to operatic occupation. If the debu-
tants show talent they are given opportu-
nities to develop it. Every week or so
some new singer is tried, generally at the