LONDON

Tetrazzini, who has come to be called “La Tetrazzini," has been taken up by the arms of London's opera public. The eager ones have brought camp stools to the doors of Covent Garden and there they have pitched their tents and waited for the doors to open and for the curtain to rise. And then they have shouted so that after the regular season of Italian Opera some concerts had to be arranged wherein this singer could repeat her operatic arias. The management of Covent Garden has secured her services for four consecutive

seasons.

The first of the series of London Symphony Orchestra concerts, conducted by Dr. Hans Richter, took place at Queen's Hall. The popular conductor led the orchestra through a programme comprising Mozart, Brahms, Wagner and Tschaikowsky.

The thirteenth season of Promenade Concerts at Queen's Hall came to a conclusion recently. By means of a circular it was pointed out that a great effort had been made to present works by native composers, particularly compositions by musicians hitherto unknown.

Teatro dal Verme. "Marcella," Umberto Giordano's new opera, was given its first hearing at the Teatro Lirico. The story of this work deals with the experience of a young working girl of prepossessing appearance, who encounters a tragic fate in a big city. This is summed up in the form of a “modern idyll,” and the three acts of the opera deal with the phases of her love and abandonment. The music is lauded for its delicate sentiment and for its melodious treatment of its subject. The principal singers concerned in the production were the tenor De Lucia and the soprano, Gemma Bellincioni, both of whom achieved success. The composer, Giordano, did not appear in response to the calls of the public. The mounting of the opera was scenically effective.

PARIS

The details of receipts and running expenses of the theatres subventioned by the government have been set forth by the Fine Arts Department budget: Particulars are reprinted below, but the most astonishing item is the fact that Gailhard, who terminates his reign at the Paris Grand Opera with the end of the present year, retires from his post showing net profits of about $20 for the entire term of musical dictator at this important institution.

The subscriptions to the Grand Opéra for the last season amounted to $273,428, while the total receipts for the 187 performances realized $627,751, an average of nearly $3,357. The operas which drew the largest houses were in the order named: "Ariane," "Faust," "Salammbo," "Samson et Dalila" and the "Meistersinger." Those giving the poorest returns were "L'Etranger," "Sigurd," "Freyschütz," "Armide" and "Paillasse."

The report gives the salaries paid. Among the leading singers, Mlle. Breval receives $1,500 a month; Mlle. Grandjean, $12,000 a year; Mme. Heglon, $8,640 a year; Mlles. Lindsay, Hatto, Demougeot and Verlet, $3,600 a year; Mlle. Féart, $4,000 a year; Mlle. Borgo, $2,000 a year.

Among the men, Alvarez receives $1,600 a month; Delmas and Affre, $16,800 a year; Scaramberg, $18,400 a year; Noté, $11,000 a year; Gresse, $6,000 a year; Muratore and Bartet, $4,800 a year. The ballet is an important part of the opera in Paris, and we find salaries of $6,400, $6,000, $2,400; three of $1,000; $860, two of $720; $680; two of $600 and many from $480 to $360.

The report states that "the artists of the Opéra are perhaps too highly paid for the services they render," and gives as examples that Affre sang forty-nine times for his $16,800, Mlle. Breval fortynine times, Mlle. Borgo only nine times for $2,000, Mlle. Verlet twenty-two times for $3,600, Mlle. Merentie eleven times for $1,600, and Mlle. Hatto sixteen times for $3,600.

The success of the Opéra Comique last season far exceeded that of any previous year; in fact, the figures show practically a full house for every performance. This brilliant record is not merely due to increased takings by old favorites, but the new works produced have attracted high average receipts. Thus "Louise" averaged $1,480, "Pelleas et Mélisande" $1,610, and the classic works, "Orphée," $1,713; "Iphigénie en Tauride," $1,683. "Manon" proved the greatest attraction and was played twenty-six times to an average of $1,729.

The monthly expenses for the singers are $8,700 for the men and $6,740 for the women, while the ballet costs $981. The highest paid singer is M. Clément, who receives $1,500 a month. Miss Mary Garden is the highest paid among the women singers, receiving $1,400 a month.

Among specially engaged artists, Mme. Caron and Mme. Litvinne each received $200 for a performance, Mme. Raunay, $120, and lle. Georgette Leblanc, $100.

The profits for the season, after deducting expenses for scenery, etc. (about $34,000), amount to approximately $26,000.

The various concert halls of this city are deemed inadequate or acoustically so bad that some new home for concert-givers is longed for; and rumor has become current that a new concert hall is planned to be erected on the site of the former Cirque des Champs Elysees. This

project is to employ three and one-half millions of francs, of which sum only three millions have been raised. Like rumors arise almost every month.

The opera season's first novelty, Xaver Leroux's "Le Chemineau," was performed at the OpèraComique and proved to be a work of ephemeral value. The libretto follows the drama by Jean Richepin closely, but what was logical and obvious in the play becomes cloudy and unreasonable in the opera libretto. The music is praised as containing some virile themes, but the style. on the other hand, is rather reminiscent of Massenet and of the Italian school. What it seems to lack is characteristic finesse, while it abounds in orchestral tuttis. If the work was cordially received this may be largely attributed to the work of Conductor Rühlmann and to the baritone, Dufrenne, who created the title role.

Massenet is diligently working at the composition of "Bacchus," which is intended for performance at the Grand Opera. He has also completed a brief ballet, "Espada," for Monte Carlo.

SCHWERIN

At the Hoftheater here "Sawriti," the posthưmous opera of Hermann Zumpe, was given its first performance. Zumpe was formerly conductor in Schwerin, so the performance was a testimonial to the affection and esteem in which this musician's memory is still held. The work is praised for its sincerity. and the music grows more effective as the work proceeds. At the close there was enthusiastic appreciation expressed by the audience. Munich and Brauschweig will surely produce this opera, but it remains to be seen whether the other German opera houses will put this work into their repertoires.

The Manuscript Music Society of
Philadelphia.

The Manuscript Music Society opened its seventeenth season with a private concert recently. As Bruno Oscar Klein had been invited to be the guest of the evening, the programme was largely given over to groups of his songs sung by Perley Dunn Aldrich, and a most interesting quintet for soprano, violin, 'cello, horn and piano rendered by Marie Kunkle Zimmerman, Frederick E. Hahn, W. A. Schmidt, Anton Horner and Philip H. Goepp. Local composers represented during the evening were Mr. Hahn by some of his string quartet writings and Frank G. Cauffman by a Legende scored for two violins, viola, 'cello

and piano. Besides Mr. Goepp as president of the Society, the following officers were elected: Vice-President, Kate H. Chandler; Secretary, Samuel J. Riegel; Treasurer, Franklin E. Cresson; Librarian, Perley Dunn Aldrich. Additional members of the Board: W. W. Gilchrist, John W. Pommer, Jr., Frank G. Cauffman and Mrs. Bessie E. Colley.

Correspondence.

PHILADELPHIA, PA., Dec. 4, 1907.

To the Editor of THE NEW MUSIC REVIEW:
New York City.

Dear Sir: I read with extreme interest the letter of Mr. Hawley in the November issue, and your reply, and note with pleasure the attitude you take in regard to preserving the works of the great masters as they were written. But I should like to inquire whether the reason the extra measure was inserted was because the skip from F-sharp to A-flat is an augmented second, or whether some other "flaw" was found by Mr. Schwencke. I was always taught that an interval is named from the number of degrees it contains. Now, it seems to me that the interval from F to A contains three degrees (if I have not lost the art of counting), therefore I should call it a third, whether the notes be sharp, flat, or natural. It seems to me that the omission of the measure gives rather a startling effect that savors of Strauss or Mahler,-(and Bach,-notice the great Fantasie in G-minor, in which Bach must have had a premonition of what the music of to-day was to be), which was probably a little too much for the worthy pedant. Was not the measure inserted rather to avoid the seeming "false relation" between the A-natural in one of the upper voices in the twenty-second measure, and the A-flat in the bass of the following measure? It may be noticed, in passing, that Gounod uses the inserted measure in his adaptation of the prelude to his "Ave Maria." Notwithstanding that, the measure seems to me to mar, rather than improve, the "rhythmic flow," as the rhythm through that passage is a rhythm of four measures, which the inserted measure destroys.

Very sincerely yours,
ROLLO F. MAITLAND,
F. A. G. O.

I.-FORM AND CONTENT.

Our study of the Pathétique Sonata has shown how closely Beethoven followed the models of Haydn and Mozart, at the same time infusing into them a new spirit. The first movement of that sonata does not differ materially in form from the first movement of Mozart's G-minor Symphony, discussed in Article IX., yet Beethoven takes us into a new world, far removed from that world of pure impersonal beauty in which Mozart dwelt. Beethoven is the man struggling, fighting, working out his own individuality, learning through bitter experience; Mozart is the artist not so much turning his own experience into music, as creating outside himself imperishable works of an almost superhuman beauty. In many of Beethoven's works there is this same regularity of form coupled with freedom of expression. The brusqueness of his style led his contemporaries to think him an iconoclast; and it was not till many years after works like the fifth symphony were produced that the public began to understand how orthodox they are.

This free individual expression, now a characteristic of art generally and evident enough in all phases of human life-this assertion of the personal point of view-began with Beethoven and has been increasing ever since his day, until we now have music in which certain phrases or themes no longer please us as

(b) Largo e mesto.

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etc.

etc.

This change was perhaps only a part of that more general transformation of society by which the composer, who had previously been subject to the favor of princely patrons, became an independent individual, living in direct contact with the public at large. Music, thus freed and given an independent existence, became an expressive art and took deeper root in human experience. It lost, in this process, something of that calm, ethereal beauty it had possessed, but it gained greatly in expressiveness. In Beethoven's hands it became plastic; he enlarged the range of harmonic combinations far beyond that of Mozart, and created themes that were of wider application to human feeling. In illustration of this there will be found in Figure 1 (a) a quotation from the slow movement of Beethoven's piano sonata, op. 2, No. 2, and in (b) a quotation from the slow movement of his sonata, op. 10, No. 3. These should be compared with the theme from Mozart's piano sonata in Figure 1 in the November number. The difference between the themes of Beethoven and that of Mozart is in their content rather than in their form.

The purpose of Mozart's theme is beauty; the purpose of Beethoven's themes is expressiveness, the conveyance of deep emotion. They are lacking in one essential quality of

melodic beauty, namely, outline, or curve.1 These two quotations are not representative of Beethoven's lyric genius, for he has left us many fine melodies, but they reveal a general tendency of his to seek in music an outlet for his deepest thoughts and feelings, and to sacrifice, if necessary, that beauty of outline that characterises Mozart's finest tunes.

II. BEETHOVEN'S STYLE.

One peculiarity of Beethoven's music, due to his constant search after expressiveness rather than mere formal symmetry, is a unity and conciseness of style notably superior to that of Mozart. Many of his themes lack the perfect balance of phrases, in exact thesis and antithesis, found in Mozart's, their structure resulting rather from a logical development of the leading motive, which, by a favorite device of his, presses on, in constant repetition and with increasing vigor, to an emotional climax. The contrast between this method of treating a theme and the method of Mozart may be seen in Figure 2.

FIGURE II.

(a) From Mozart's G-minor Symphony.

(b) From Beethoven's first piano Sonata.

In the quotation from Mozart's symphony it will be observed that the two-measure phrases exactly balance each other, but that the second is, furthermore, a somewhat trivial figure. One feels in listening to the whole theme that the real significance of it lies in the opening phrase, and this conclusion is justified by ref erence to the development section of the movement, where the composer altogether discards the second phrase. The style of this theme is. therefore, largely dictated by the convention of perfect phrase balance. The style of the two Beethoven themes, on the contrary, is vigorous and terse. The outward symmetry is dictated by the inner sense.

In the sonata theme Beethoven presses home his idea with greater and greater intensity until the climax is reached, after which the tension is gradually abated; in the theme from the string quartet an almost identical method is pursued. For a further illustration of the terseness of Beethoven's style reference may be made to the development sections of this sonata and string quartet, where most interesting use is made of the short motives from which these themes are derived. These methods of writing give evidence of the fine economy Beethoven continually displays. There is, in his music, nothing redundant-no unnecessary word—and it is this quality of style that produces such an effect of life and vigor.

Beethoven carries out these methods in whole movements, and even in complete symphonies. We have already seen how, in the Pathétique Sonata, a theme in the finale is derived from one in the first movement, but a much more interesting example of the process may be found in the fifth symphony.