When Love is gone.(Soprano, or Tenor.)[Listen]C.B. HAWLEY.musicCopyright, 1894, by G. Schirmer.The mind has a thousand eyes,The heart but one;Yet the light of a whole life diesWhen love is gone, when love is gone.
[Listen]
C.B. HAWLEY.
music
Copyright, 1894, by G. Schirmer.
The mind has a thousand eyes,The heart but one;Yet the light of a whole life diesWhen love is gone, when love is gone.
To the stencil-plate chivalry of the lyrics of the ubiquitous F.E. Weatherby and John Oxenford, the song-status of England can blame a deal of its stagnation. It is not often that these word-wringers have enticedAmerican composers. One of the few victims is John Hyatt Brewer, who was born in Brooklyn, in 1856, and has lived there ever since.
Brewer made his début as a six-year-old singer, and sang till his fourteenth year. A year later he was an organist in Brooklyn, where he has held various positions in the same capacity ever since, additionally busying himself as a teacher of voice, piano, organ, and harmony. His studies in piano and harmony were pursued under Rafael Navarro. Counterpoint, fugue, and composition he studied under Dudley Buck.
In 1878 Brewer became the second tenor and accompanist of the Apollo Club, of which Mr. Buck is the director. He has conducted numerous vocal societies and an amateur orchestra.
Of his cantatas, "Hesperus" is a work of the greatest promise and large performance.
For male voices Brewer has written a cantata called "The Birth of Love." Its fieryending is uncharacteristic, but the beautiful tenor solo and an excellent bass song prove his forte to lie in the realm of tenderness. Brewer's music has little fondness for climaxes, but in a tender pathos that is not tragedy, but a sort of lotos-eater's dreaminess and regret, he is congenially placed. Smoothness is one of his best qualities.
Out of a number of part songs for men, one should mark a vigorous "Fisher's Song," a "May Song," which has an effective "barber's chord," and "The Katydid," a witty realization of Oliver Wendell Holmes' captivating poem. His "Sensible Serenade" has also an excellent flow of wit. Both these songs should please glee clubs and their audiences.
For women's voices Brewer has written not a little. The best of these are "Sea Shine," which is particularly mellow, and "Treachery," a love-scherzo.
For the violin there are two pieces: one,in the key of D, is a duet between the violin and the soprano voice of the piano. It is full of characteristic tenderness, full even of tears. It should find a good place among those violin ballads of which Raff's Cavatina is the best-known example. Another violin solo in A is more florid, but is well managed. The two show a natural aptitude for composition for this favorite of all instruments.
For full orchestra there is a suite, "The Lady of the Lake," also arranged, for piano and organ. It is smooth and well-tinted. A sextet for strings and flute has been played with favor.
Brewer's chief success lies along lines of least resistance, one might say. His Album of Songs (op. 27) is a case in point. Of the subtle and inevitable "Du bist wie eine Blume," he makes nothing, and "The Violet" forces an unfortunate contrast with Mozart's idyl to the same words. But "Meadow Sweet" is simply iridescent withcheer, a most unusually sweet song, and "The Heart's Rest" is of equal perfection.
The best-abused composer in America is doubtless Reginald de Koven. His great popularity has attracted the search-light of minute criticism to him, and his accomplishments are such as do not well endure the fierce white light that beats upon the throne. The sin of over-vivid reminiscence is the one most persistently imputed to him, and not without cause. While I see no reason to accuse him of deliberate imitation, I think he is a little too loth to excise from his music those things of his that prove on consideration to have been said or sung before him. Instead of crying, "Pereant qui ante nos nostra cantaverunt," he believes in a live-and-let-live policy. But ah, if De Koven were the only composer whose eraser does not evict all that his memory installs!
De Koven was born at Middletown, Conn., in 1859, and enjoyed unusual advantages formusical study abroad. At the age of eleven, he was taken to Europe, where he lived for twelve years. At Oxford he earned a degree with honors. His musical instructors include Speidel, Lebert, and Pruckner, at Stuttgart, Huff the contrapuntist at Frankfort, and Vannucini, who taught him singing, at Florence. He made also a special study of light opera under Genée and Von Suppé. He made Chicago his home in 1882, afterward moving to New York, where he served as a musical critic on one of the daily papers for many years.
De Koven has been chief purveyor of comic opera to his generation, and for so ideal a work as "Robin Hood," and such pleasing constructions as parts of his other operas ("Don Quixote," "The Fencing Master," "The Highwayman," for instance), one ought to be grateful, especially as his music has always a certain elegance and freedom from vulgarity.
Of his ballads, "Oh, Promise Me" has a few opening notes that remind one of "Musica Proibita," but it was a taking lyric that stuck in the public heart. His setting of Eugene Field's "Little Boy Blue" is a work of purest pathos and directness. His version of "My Love is Like a Red, Red Rose" is among the best of its countless settings, and "The Fool of Pamperlune," the "Indian Love Song," "In June," and a few others, are excellent ballad-writing.
Victor Harris is one of the few that selected New York for a birthplace. He was born here April 27, 1869, and attended the College of the City of New York, class of 1888. For several of his early years he was well known as a boy-soprano, whence he graduated into what he calls the "usual career" of organist, pianist, and teacher of the voice. In 1895 and 1896 he acted as the assistant conductor to Anton Seidl in the BrightonBeach summer concerts. He learned harmony of Frederick Schilling.
Harris is most widely known as an accompanist, and is one of the best in the country. But while the accompaniments he writes to his own songs are carefully polished and well colored, they lack the show of independence that one might expect from so unusual a master of their execution.
Except for an unpublished one-act operetta, "Mlle. Maie et M. de Sembre," and a few piano pieces, Harris has confined himself to the writing of short songs. In his twenty-first year two of unequal merits were published, "The Fountains Mingle with the River" being a taking melody, but without distinction or originality, while "Sweetheart" has much more freedom from conventionality and inevitableness.
A later song, "My Guest," shows an increase in elaboration, but follows the florid school of Harrison Millard's once so popular rhapsody, "Waiting." Five songs are grouped into opus 12, and they reach a much higher finish and a better tendency to make excursions into other keys. They also show two of Harris' mannerisms, a constant repetition of verbal phrases and a fondness for writing close, unbroken chords, in triplets or quartoles. "A Melody" is beautiful; "Butterflies and Buttercups" is the perfection of grace; "I Know not if Moonlight or Starlight" is a fine rapture, and "A Disappointment" is a dire tragedy, all about some young toadstools that thought they were going to be mushrooms. For postlude two measures from the cantabile of Chopin's "Funeral March" are used with droll effect. "Love, Hallo!" is a headlong springtime passion. Two of his latest songs are "Forever and a Day," with many original touches, and a "Song from Omar Khayyám," which is made of some of the most cynical of the tent-maker's quatrains. Harris has given themall their power and bitterness till the last line, "The flower that once has blown forever dies," which is written with rare beauty. "A Night-song" is possibly his best work; it is full of colors, originalities, and lyric qualities. Opus 13 contains six songs: "Music when Soft Voices Die" has many uncommon and effective intervals; "The Flower of Oblivion" is more dramatic than usual, employs discords boldly, and gives the accompaniment more individuality than before; "A Song of Four Seasons" is a delicious morsel of gaiety, and "Love within the Lover's Breast" is a superb song. Harris has written some choric works for men and women also. They show commendable attention to all the voice parts.
To N.N.H.Song from Omar Khayyám.[Listen]VICTOR HARRIS, Op. 16, No. 3.musicCopyright, 1898, by Edward Schuberth & Co.Oh! threats of Hell and hopes of Paradise!One thing at least is certain—ThisLife flies,One thing is certain, and the rest is Lies!The Flower that once has blown for ever, for ever dies.
To N.N.H.
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VICTOR HARRIS, Op. 16, No. 3.
music
Copyright, 1898, by Edward Schuberth & Co.
Oh! threats of Hell and hopes of Paradise!One thing at least is certain—ThisLife flies,One thing is certain, and the rest is Lies!The Flower that once has blown for ever, for ever dies.
One of the most prominent figures in American musical history has been Dr. William Mason. He was born in Boston, January 24, 1829, and was the son of Lowell Mason, that pioneer in American composition.Dr. William Mason studied in Boston, and in Germany under Moscheles, Hauptmann, Richter, and Liszt. His success in concerts abroad and here gave prestige to his philosophy of technic, and his books on method have taken the very highest rank.
His pedagogical attainments have overshadowed his composition, but he has written some excellent music. As he has been an educational force in classical music, so his compositions show the severe pursuit of classic forms and ideas. His work is, therefore, rather ingenious than inspired, and intellectual rather than emotional. Yale made him Doctor of Music in 1872.
Another composer whose studies in technic have left him only a little inclination for creation is Albert Ross Parsons, who was born at Sandusky, O., September 16, 1847. He studied in Buffalo, and in New York under Ritter. Then he went to Germany, where he had a remarkably thorough schoolingunder Moscheles, Reinecke, Richter, Paul, Taussig, Kullak, and others. Returning to this country, he has busied himself as organist, teacher, and an editor of musical works. What little music he has composed shows the fruit of his erudition in its correctness.
Such men as Doctor Mason and Mr. Parsons, though they add little to the volume of composition,—a thing for which any one should be thanked on some considerations,—yet add great dignity to their profession in this country.
Arthur, a younger brother of Ethelbert Nevin, shows many of the Nevinian traits of lyric energy and harmonic color in his songs. He was born at Sewickley, Pa., in 1871. Until he was eighteen he had neither interest nor knowledge in music. In 1891 he began a four years' course in Boston, going thence to Berlin, where his masters were Klindworth and Boise. A book of four graceful "May Sketches" has been published, "Pierrot'sGuitar" being especially ingenious. There are two published songs, "Were I a Tone" and "In Dreams," both emotionally rich. In manuscript are a fine song, "Free as the Tossing Sea," and a well-devised trio.
A successful writer of songs is C. Whitney Coombs. He was born in Maine, in 1864, and went abroad at the age of fourteen. He studied the piano with Speidel, and composition with Seiffritz, in Stuttgart, for five years, and pursued his studies later in Dresden under Draessecke, Janssen, and John. In 1887 he became organist at the American Church in that city, returning to America in 1891, since which time he has been an organist in New York.
In 1891 his publication begins with "My Love," an excellent lilt on lines from the Arabian. Among his many songs a few should be noted: the "Song of a Summer Night" is brilliant and poetic, and "Alone" is marked by some beautiful contramelodiceffects; his "Indian Serenade" is a gracious work.
J. Remington Fairlamb has been a prolific composer. He was born at Philadelphia, and at fourteen was a church organist. He studied at the Paris Conservatoire and in Italy; was appointed consul at Zurich by President Lincoln, and while in Stuttgart was decorated by the King of Wurtemburg with the "Great Gold Medal of Art and Science" for a Te Deum for double chorus and orchestra. Of Fairlamb's compositions, some two hundred have been published, including much sacred music and parts of two operas. A grand opera, "Leonello," in five acts, and a mass are in manuscript.
Frank Seymour Hastings has found in music a pleasant avocation from finance, and written various graceful songs. He has been active, too, in the effort to secure a proper production of grand opera in English.
Dr. John M. Loretz, of Brooklyn, is aveteran composer, and has passed his opus 200. He has written much sacred music and several comic operas.
A prominent figure in New York music, though only an occasional composer, is Louis Raphael Dressler, one of the six charter members of the Manuscript Society, and long its treasurer. His father was William Dressler, one of the leading musicians of the earlier New York, where Mr. Dressler was born, in 1861. Dressier studied with his father, and inherited his ability as a professional accompanist and conductor. He was the first to produce amateur performances of opera in New York. His songs are marked with sincerity and spontaneity.
Richard Henry Warren has been the organist at St. Bartholomew's since 1886, and the composer of much religious music in which both skill and feeling are present. Among his more important works are two complete services, a scene for barytonesolo, male chorus, and orchestra, called "Ticonderoga," and a powerful Christmas anthem. Warren has written also various operettas, in which he shows a particular grasp of instrumentation, and an ability to give new turns of expression to his songs, while keeping them smooth and singable. An unpublished short song of his, "When the Birds Go North," is a remarkably beautiful work, showing an aptitude that should be more cultivated.
Warren was born at Albany, September 17, 1859. He is a son and pupil of George W. Warren, the distinguished organist. He went to Europe in 1880, and again in 1886, for study and observation. He was the organizer and conductor of the Church Choral Society, which gave various important religious works their first production in New York, and, in some cases, their first hearing in America, notably, Dvôrák's Requiem Mass, Gounod's "Mors et Vita," Liszt's Thirteenth Psalm, Saint-Saëns' "The Heavens Declare,"Villiers Stanford's "God is Our Hope and Strength," and Mackenzie's "Veni, Creator Spiritus." Horatio Parker's "Hora Novissima" was composed for this society, and Chadwick's "Phœnix Expirans" given its first New York performance.
A prominent organist and teacher is Smith N. Penfield, who has also found time for the composition of numerous scholarly works, notably, an overture for full orchestra, an orchestral setting of the eighteenth psalm, a string quartette, and many pieces for the organ, voice, and piano. His tuition has been remarkably thorough. Born in Oberlin, Ohio, April 4, 1837, he studied the piano in Germany with Moscheles, Papperitz, and Reinecke, the organ with Richter, composition, counterpoint, and fugue with Reinecke and Hauptmann. He had also a period of study in Paris.
Another organist of distinction is Frank Taft, who is also a conductor and a composer.His most important work is a "Marche Symphonique," which was performed by the Boston Symphony Orchestra. He was born in East Bloomfield, New York, and had his education entirely in this country, studying the organ with Clarence Eddy, and theory with Frederic Grant Gleason.
A young composer of many graceful songs is Charles Fonteyn Manney, who was born in Brooklyn in 1872, and studied theory with William Arms Fisher in New York, and later with J. Wallace Goodrich at Boston. His most original song is "Orpheus with His Lute," which reproduces the quaint and fascinating gaucheries of the text with singular charm. He has also set various songs of Heine's to music, and a short cantata for Easter, "The Resurrection."
An ability that is strongly individual is that of Arthur Farwell, whose first teacher in theory was Homer A. Norris, and who later studied under Humperdinck in Germany. Among his works are an elaborate ballade for piano and violin, a setting of Shelley's "Indian Serenade," and four folk-songs to words by Johanna Ambrosius, the peasant genius of Germany. Among others of his published songs is "Strow Poppy Buds," a strikingly original composition.
A writer of numerous elegant trifles and of a serious symphony is Harry Patterson Hopkins, who was born in Baltimore, and graduated at the Peabody Institute in 1896, receiving the diploma for distinguished musicianship. The same year he went to Bohemia, and studied with Dvôrák. He returned to America to assist in the production of one of his compositions by Anton Seidl.
Very thorough was the foreign training of Carl V. Lachmund, whose "Japanese Overture" has been produced under the direction of Thomas and Seidl, in the former case at a concert of that society at which many important native works have had their only hearing, the Music Teachers' National Association. Lachmund was born at Booneville, Mo., in 1854. At the age of thirteen he began his tuition at Cologne, under Heller, Jensen, and Seiss; later he went to Berlin to study with the Scharwenkas, Kiel, and Moskowski. He had also four years of Liszt's training at Weimar. A trio for harp, violin, and 'cello was played by the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra, and a concert prelude for the piano was much played in concerts in Germany. Before returning to America, Lachmund was for a time connected with the opera at Cologne.
To the composer potentially a writer of grand operas, but barred out by the absolute lack of opening here, the dramatic ballad should offer an attractive form. Such works as Schubert's "Erl-King" show what can bedone. Henry Holden Huss has made some interesting experiments, and Fred. Field Bullard has tried the field.
FREDERICK FIELD BULLARD.
Bullard's setting of Tennyson's almost lurid melodrama in six stanzas, "The Sisters," has caught the bitter mixture of love and hate, and avoided claptrap climaxes most impressively.
"In the Greenwood" (op. 14) is graceful, and "A June Lullaby" has a charming accompaniment of humming rain. Bullard has set some of Shelley's lyrics for voice and harp or piano, in opus 17. "From Dreams of Thee" gets a delicious quaintness of accompaniment, while the "Hymn of Pan" shows a tremendous savagery and uncouthness, with strange and stubborn harmonies. Full of the same roborific virility are his settings to the songs of Richard Hovey's writing, "Here's a Health to Thee, Roberts," "Barney McGee," and the "Stein Song." These songs have an exuberance of the roistering spirit, alongwith a competence of musicianship that lifts them above any comparison with the average balladry. Similarly "The Sword of Ferrara," with its hidalgic pride, and "The Indifferent Mariner," and the drinking-song, "The Best of All Good Company," are all what Horace Greeley would have called "mighty interesting." Not long ago I would have wagered my head against a hand-saw, that no writer of this time could write a canon with spontaneity. But then I had not seen Bullard's three duets in canon form. He has chosen his words so happily and expressed them so easily, and with such arch raillery, that the duets are delicious. Of equal gaiety is "The Lass of Norwich Town," which, with its violin obbligato, won a prize in theMusical Recordcompetition of 1899.
HYMN OF PAN.[Listen]Words byPERCY BYSSHE SHELLEY.Music byFRED. FIELD BULLARD,Op. 17, No. 4.musicmusic continuedCopyright, 1894, by Miles & Thompson.From the forests and highlands I come, I come;From the river-girt islands,Where waves are dumb;From the forests and highlands,From the river-girt islands,I come, I come, I come.The wind in the reeds and the rushes,The bees in the bells of thyme,The birds in the myrtle bushes,The....A FRAGMENT.
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music
music continued
Copyright, 1894, by Miles & Thompson.
From the forests and highlands I come, I come;From the river-girt islands,Where waves are dumb;From the forests and highlands,From the river-girt islands,I come, I come, I come.The wind in the reeds and the rushes,The bees in the bells of thyme,The birds in the myrtle bushes,The....
A FRAGMENT.
Bullard was born at Boston, in 1864. He studied chemistry at first, but the claims of music on his interest were too great, and in 1888 he went to Munich, where he studiedwith Josef Rheinberger. After four years of European life he returned to Boston, where he has taught harmony and counterpoint along rather original lines. He is a writer with ideas and resources that give promise of a large future. His scholarship has not led him away from individuality. He is especially likely to give unexpected turns of expression, little bits of programmism rather incompatible with the ballad form most of his songs take. The chief fault with his work is the prevailing dun-ness of his harmonies. They have not felt the impressionistic revolt from the old bituminous school. But in partial compensation for this bleakness is a fine ruggedness.
Of his other published songs, "At Daybreak" shows a beautiful fervor of repression. "On the Way" is redeemed by a particularly stirring finish. In opus 8, "A Prayer" is begun in D minor and ended in D major, with a strong effect of suddenexaltation from gloom. "The Singer" begins also in sombre style with unusual and abrupt modulations, and ends in a bright major. "The Hermit" is likewise grim, but is broad and deep. It uses a hint of "Old Hundred" in the accompaniment.
Opus 11 couples two dramatic ballads. In this form of condensed drama is a too-little occupied field of composition, and Bullard has written some part songs, of which "In the Merry Month of May," "Her Scuttle Hat," and "The Water Song" are worth mentioning. "O Stern Old Land" is a rather bathetic candidate for the national hymnship. But his "War Song of Gamelbar," for male voices, is really a masterwork. Harmonists insist on so much closer compliance with rules for smoothness in vocal compositions than in instrumental work, that the usual composer gives himself very little liberty here. Bullard, however, has found the right occasion for wild dissonances, and has daredto use them. The effect is one of terrific power. This, his "Song of Pan" and "The Sisters" give him a place apart from the rest of native song-writers.
With all reverence for German music, it has been too much inclined of late to domineer the rest of the world, especially America. A useful counter-influence is that of Homer A. Norris, who has stepped out of the crowd flying to Munich and neighboring places, and profited by Parisian harmonic methods.
HOMER A. NORRIS.
His book, "Practical Harmony," imparts a, to us, novel method of disarming the bugaboo of altered chords of many of its notorious terrors. He also attacks the pedantry of music "so constructed that it appeals to the eye rather than the ear,—paper-work," a most praiseworthy assault on what is possibly the heaviest incubus on inspiration. In a later work on "Counterpoint" he used for chapter headings Greek vases and otherdecorative designs, to stimulate the ideal of counterpoint as a unified complexity of graceful contours.
Norris was born in Wayne, Me., and became an organist at an early age. His chief interest has been, however, in the theory of music, and he studied with G.W. Marston, F.W. Hale, and G.W. Chadwick, as well as Emery. In deciding upon foreign study he was inspired to choose France instead of Germany. This has given him a distinct place.
After studying in Paris for four years under Dubois, Godard, Guilmant, and Gigout, he made his home in Boston, where he has since confined himself to the teaching of composition.
As yet Mr. Norris has composed little, and that little is done on simple lines, but the simplicity is deep, and the harmonies, without being bizarre, are wonderfully mellow.
His first song, "Rock-a-bye, Baby," he sold for twelve printed copies, and it is said tohave had a larger sale than any cradle-song ever published in this country. His song, "Protestations," is tender, and has a violin obbligato that is really more important than the voice part. The song, "Parting," is wild with passion, and bases a superb melody on a fitting harmonic structure. I consider "Twilight" one of the best American songs. It gets some unusual effects with intervals of tenths and ninths, and shows a remarkable depth of emotion.
In the larger forms he has done a concert overture, "Zoroaster" (which, judging from an outline, promises many striking effects), and a cantata, "Nain," which has the sin of over-repetition of words, but is otherwise marked with telling pathos and occasional outbursts of intensely dramatic feeling.
Perhaps his most original work is seen in his book of "Four Songs for Mezzo-Voice." The first is Kipling's "O Mother Mine," with harshnesses followed by tenderest musings;the second is a noble song, "Peace," with an accompaniment consisting entirely of the slowly descending scale of C major; a high-colored lilt, "The World and a Day," is followed by a Maeterlinckian recitative of the most melting pathos. This book is another substantiation of my belief that America is writing the best of the songs of to-day.
Peace.[Listen]Edward Rowland Sill.Homer A. Norris.musicmusic continuedCopyright, 1900, by H.B. Stevens Co. International copyright secured.Used by permission of H.B. Stevens Co., Boston, owners of the copyright.'Tis not in seeking,'Tis not in endless striving,Thy quest is found:Thy quest is found.Be still and listen;Be still and drink the quiet of all aroundNot for thy crying,Not for thy loud beseeching,Will peace draw near:Will peace draw near:Rest with palms folded,Rest with thine eyelids fallenLo! peace is here.
[Listen]
Edward Rowland Sill.Homer A. Norris.
music
music continued
Copyright, 1900, by H.B. Stevens Co. International copyright secured.
Used by permission of H.B. Stevens Co., Boston, owners of the copyright.
'Tis not in seeking,'Tis not in endless striving,Thy quest is found:Thy quest is found.Be still and listen;Be still and drink the quiet of all aroundNot for thy crying,Not for thy loud beseeching,Will peace draw near:Will peace draw near:Rest with palms folded,Rest with thine eyelids fallenLo! peace is here.
One of the best-esteemed musicians in Boston, G.E. Whiting has devoted more of his interest to his career as virtuoso on the organ than to composition. Not many of such works as he has found time to write have been printed. These include an organ sonata, a number of organ pieces, a book of studies for the organ, six songs, and three cantatas for solos, chorus, and orchestra, "A Tale of the Viking," "Dream Pictures," and "A Midnight Cantata."
Whiting was born at Holliston, Mass., September 14, 1842. At the age of five, he began the study of music with his brother.At the age of fifteen, he moved to Hartford, Conn., where he succeeded Dudley Buck as organist of one of the churches. Here he founded the Beethoven Society. At the age of twenty he went to Boston, and after studying with Morgan, went to Liverpool, and studied the organ under William Thomas Best. Later he made a second pilgrimage to Europe, and studied under Radeck.
For many years he has lived in Boston as a teacher of music and performer upon the organ. In manuscript are a number of works which I have not had the privilege of seeing: two masses for chorus, orchestra, and organ, a concert overture, a concerto, a sonata, a fantasy and fugue, a fantasy and three études, a suite for 'cello and piano, and a setting of Longfellow's "Golden Legend," which won two votes out of five in the thousand dollar musical festival of 1897, the prize being awarded to Dudley Buck.
Of his compositions H.E. Krehbiel in1892 recorded the opinion that they "entitled him to a position among the foremost musicians in this country." He is an uncle of Arthur Whiting.
G.W. Marston's setting of the omnipresent "Du bist wie eine Blume" is really one of the very best Heine's poem has ever had. Possibly it is the best of all the American settings. His "There Was an Aged Monarch" is seriously deserving of the frankest comparison with Grieg's treatment of the sameLied. It is interesting to note the radical difference of their attitudes toward it. Grieg writes in a folk-tone that is severe to the point of grimness. He is right because it isein altes Liedchen, and Heine's handling of it is also kept outwardly cold. But Marston has rendered the song into music of the richest harmony and fullest pathos. He is right, also, because he has interpreted the undercurrent of the story.
Bodenstedt's ubiquitous lyric, "Wenn derFrühling auf die Berge steigt," which rivals "Du bist wie eine Blume" in the favor of composers, has gathered Marston also into its net. He gives it a climax that fairly sweeps one off his feet, though one might wish that the following and final phrase had not forsaken the rich harmonies of the climax so completely.
This song is the first of a "Song Album" for sopranos, published in 1890. In this group the accompaniments all receive an attention that gives them meaning without obtrusiveness. "The Duet" is a delicious marriage of the song of a girl and the accompanying rapture of a bird.
A captivating little florid figure in the accompaniment of a setting of "Im wunder-schönen Monat Mai" gives the song worth. "On the Water" is profound with sombreness and big simplicity. "The Boat of My Lover" is quaintly delightful.
Marston was born in Massachusetts, at thelittle town of Sandwich, in 1840. He studied there, and later at Portland, Me., with John W. Tufts, and has made two pilgrimages to Europe for instruction. He played the organ in his native town at the age of fifteen, and since finishing his studies has lived at Portland, teaching the piano, organ, and harmony. From the start his songs caught popularity, and were much sung in concert.
Marston has written a sacred dramatic cantata, "David," and a large amount of church music that is very widely used. He has written also a set of quartettes and trios for women's voices, and quartettes for men's voices.
Possibly his best-known song has been his "Could Ye Come Back to Me, Douglas," which Mrs. Craik called the best of all her poem's many settings.
Only Marston's later piano pieces are reallyklaviermässig. So fine a work as his "Gavotte in B Minor" has no need to consider theresources of the modern instrument. It has a color scheme of much originality, though it is marred by over-repetition. "A Night in Spain" is a dashing reminiscence, not without Spanish spirit, and an "Album Leaf" is a divertissement of contagious enthusiasm.
Autograph of G.W. Marston
Ariel's songs, from "The Tempest," are given a piano interpretation that reaches a high plane. There is a storm prologue which suggests, in excellent harmonies, the distant mutter of the storm rather than a piano-gutting tornado. "Full Fathoms Five Thy Father Lies" is a reverie of wonderful depth and originality, with a delicious variation onthe good old-fashioned cadence. Thence it works up into an immensely powerful close. A dance, "Foot it Featly," follows. It is sprightly, and contains a fetching cadenza.
One of the most prolific writers of American song is Clayton Johns. He is almost always pleasing and polished. While he is not at all revolutionary, he has a certain individuality of ease, and lyric quality without storm or stress of passion. Thus his settings of seven "Wanderlieder" by Uhland have all the spirit of the road except ruggedness.
His setting of "Du bist wie eine Blume" is extremely tender and sweet.
Two of Johns' best successes have been settings of Egyptian subjects: "Were I a Prince Egyptian" and Arlo Bates' fine lyric, "No Lotus Flower on Ganges Borne." The latter is a superb song of unusual fire, with a strong effect at the end, the voice ceasing at a deceptive cadence, while the accompaniment sweeps on to its destiny in the original key. He has also found a congenial subject in Austin Dobson's "The Rose and the Gardener." He gets for a moment far from its florid grace in "I Looked within My Soul," which has an unwonted bigness, and is a genuineLied.
In later years Johns' songs have been brought out in little albums, very artistically got up, especially for music (which has been heinously printed, as a rule, in this country). These albums include three skilfully written "English Songs," and three "French Songs," "Soupir" taking the form of melodic recitative. Opus 19 is a group of "Wonder Songs," which interpret Oliver Herford's quaint conceits capitally.
Opus 26 collects nine songs, of which "Princess Pretty Eyes" is fascinatingly archaic. It is good to see him setting two such remotely kindred spirits as Herrick and Emily Dickinson. The latter has hardly beendiscovered by composers, and the former is too much neglected.
Johns has also written a few part songs and some instrumental works, which maintain his characteristics. A delightful "Canzone," a happy "Promenade," and "Mazurka" are to be mentioned, and a number of pieces for violin and piano, among them a finely built intermezzo, a berceuse, a romanza that should be highly effective, and a witty scherzino. He has written for strings a berceuse and a scherzino, which have been played by the Boston Symphony Orchestra, and certain part songs, as well as a chorus for female voices and string orchestra, have been sung in London.
Johns was born at New Castle, Del., November 24, 1857, of American parents. Though at first a student of architecture, he gave this up for music, and studied at Boston under Wm. F. Apthorp, J.K. Paine, and W.H. Sherwood, after which he went to Berlin, where he studied under Kiel, Grabau, Raif, and Franz Rummel. In 1884 he made Boston his home.
If San Francisco had found some way of retaining the composers she has produced, she would have a very respectable colony. Among the others who have come east to grow up with music is William Arms Fisher, who was born in San Francisco, April 27, 1861. The two composers from whom he derives his name, Joshua Fisher and William Arms, settled in Massachusetts colony in the seventeenth century. He studied harmony, organ, and piano with John P. Morgan. After devoting some years to business, he committed his life to music, and in 1890 came to New York, where he studied singing. Later he went to London to continue his vocal studies. Returning to New York, he took up counterpoint and fugue with Horatio W. Parker, and composition and instrumentation with Dvôrák. After teaching harmony for several years, hewent to Boston, where he now lives. His work has been almost altogether the composition of songs. A notable feature of his numerous publications is their agreeable diversion from the usual practice of composers, which is to write lyrics of wide range and high pitch. Nearly all his songs are written for the average voice.
His first opus contains a setting of "Nur wer die Sehnsucht kennt," which I like better than the banal version Tschaïkowski made of the same words. The third opus contains three songs to Shelley's words. They show something of the intellectual emotion of the poet. The first work, "A Widow Bird Sate Mourning," is hardly lyrical; "My Coursers Are Fed with the Lightning" is a stout piece of writing, but the inspired highfalutin of the words would be trying upon one who arose to sing the song before an audience. This, by the way, is a point rarely considered by the unsuccessful composers, and the words whichthe singer is expected to declare to an ordinary audience are sometimes astounding. The third Shelley setting, "The World's Wanderer," is more congenial to song.
Opus 5 is entitled "Songs without Tears." These are for a bass voice, and by all odds the best of his songs. An appropriate setting is Edmund Clarence Stedman's "Falstaff's Song," a noteworthy lyric of toss-pot moralization on death. His song of "Joy" is exuberant with spring gaiety, and some of his best manner is seen in his "Elégie," for violin and piano. He has also written a deal of church song.
A venerable and distinguished teacher and composer is James C.D. Parker, who was born at Boston, in 1828, and graduated from Harvard in 1848. He at first studied law, but was soon turned to music, and studied for three years in Europe under Richter, Plaidy, Hauptmann, Moscheles, Rietz, and Becker. He graduated from the conservatory at Leipzig, and returned to Boston in 1845.
His "Redemption Hymn" is one of his most important works, and was produced in Boston by the Handel and Haydn Society in 1877. He also composed other works for orchestra and chorus, and many brilliant piano compositions.
An interesting method of writing duets is that employed in the "Children's Festival," by Charles Dennée. The pupil plays in some places the primo, and in others the secondo, his part being written very simply, while the part to be played by the teacher is written with considerable elaboration, so that the general effect is not so narcotic as usual with duets for children. Dennée has written, among many works of little specific gravity, a "Suite Moderne" of much skill, a suite for string orchestra, an overture and sonatas for the piano and for the violin and piano, as well as various comic operas. He wasborn in Oswego, N.Y., September 1, 1863, and studied composition with Stephen A. Emery.
A composer of a genial gaiety, one who has written a good minuet and an "Evening Song" that is not morose, is Benjamin Lincoln Whelpley, who was born at Eastport, Me., October 23, 1863, and studied the piano at Boston with B.J. Lang, and composition with Sidney Homer and others. He also studied in Paris for a time in 1890. He has written a "Dance of the Gnomes," that is characteristic and brilliantly droll, and a piano piece, called "Under Bright Skies," which has the panoply and progress of a sunlit cavalcade.
Ernest Osgood Hiler has written some good music for the violin, a book of songs for children, "Cloud, Field, and Flower," and some sacred music. He studied in Germany for two years.
Most prominent among Chicago's composers is doubtless Frederic Grant Gleason, who has written in the large forms with distinguished success. The Thomas Orchestra has performed a number of his works, which is an excellent praise, because Thomas, who has done so much for American audiences, has worried himself little about the American composer. At the World's Fair, which was, in some ways, the artistic birthday of Chicago, and possibly the most important artistic event in our national history, some of Gleason's works were performed by Thomas' organization, among them theVorspielto an opera, "Otho Visconti" (op. 7), for which Gleason wrote both words and music.
FREDERIC GRANT GLEASON.
ThisVorspiel, like that to "Lohengrin," is short and delicate. It begins ravishingly with flutes and clarinets and four violins, pianissimo, followed by a blare of brass. After this introductory period the work runsthrough tenderly contemplative musing to the end, in which, again, the only strings are the four violins, though here they are accompanied by the brass and wood-winds and tympani, the cymbals being gently tapped with drumsticks. The introduction to the third act of the opera is more lyrical, but not so fine. Another opera is "Montezuma" (op. 16). Gleason is again his own librettist. Of this opera I have been privileged to see the complete piano score, and much of the orchestral.
Montezuma, Act III, Introduction[Listen]Frederic Grant GleasonmusicEXCERPT FROM AN ORCHESTRAL SCORE BY MR. GLEASON.[Enlarge]
[Listen]
Frederic Grant Gleason
music
EXCERPT FROM AN ORCHESTRAL SCORE BY MR. GLEASON.
[Enlarge]
In the first act Guatemozin, who has been exiled by Montezuma, appears disguised as an ancient minstrel and sings prophetically of the coming of a god of peace and love to supplant the terrible idol that demands human sacrifice. This superbly written aria provokes from the terrified idolaters a chorus of fear and reproach that is strongly effective. The next act begins with an elaborate aria followed by a love duetof much beauty. A heavily scored priests' march is one of the chief numbers, and like most marches written by the unco' learned, it is a grain of martial melody in a bushel of trumpet figures and preparation. The Wagnerianleit-motifidea is adopted in this and other works of his, and the chief objection to his writing is its too great fidelity to the Wagnerian manner,—notably in the use of suspensions and passing-notes,—otherwise he is a very powerful harmonist and an instrumenter of rare sophistication. A soprano aria with orchestral accompaniment has been taken from the opera and sung in concert with strong effect.
Another work played at the World's Fair by Thomas, is a "Processional of the Holy Grail." It is scored elaborately, but is rather brilliant than large. It complimentarily introduces a hint or two of Wagner's Grail motif.
The symphonic poem, "Edris," was alsoperformed by the Thomas Orchestra. It is based upon Marie Corelli's novel, "Ardath," which gives opportunity for much programmism, but of a mystical highly colored sort for which music is especially competent. It makes use of a number of remarkably beautiful motives. One effect much commented upon was a succession of fifths in the bass, used legitimately enough to express a dreariness of earth.
This provoked from that conservative of conservatives, the music copyist, a patronizing annotation, "Quinten!" to which Gleason added "Gewiss!" A series of augmented triads, smoothly manipulated, was another curiosity of the score.
Possibly Gleason's happiest work is his exquisite music for that most exquisite of American poems, "The Culprit Fay." It is described in detail in Upton's "Standard Cantatas," and liberally quoted from in Goodrich' "Musical Analysis." While I haveseen both the piano and orchestral scores of this work (op. 15), and have seen much beauty in them, my space compels me to refer the curious reader to either of these most recommendable books.
Gleason has had an unusual schooling. He was born in Middletown, Conn., in 1848. His parents were musical, and when at sixteen he wrote a small matter of two oratorios without previous instruction, they put him to study under Dudley Buck. From his tuition he graduated to Germany, and to such teachers as Moscheles, Richter, Plaidy, Lobe, Raif, Taussig, and Weitzmann. He studied in England after that, and returned again to Germany. When he reappeared in America he remained a while at Hartford, Conn., whence he went to Chicago in 1876. He has lived there since, working at teaching and composition, and acting as musical critic of the ChicagoTribune. An unusually gifted body of critics, dramatic, musical, and literary,has worked upon the Chicago newspapers, and Gleason has been prominent among them.
Among other important compositions of his are a symphonic cantata, "The Auditorium Festival Ode," sung at the dedication of the Chicago Auditorium by a chorus of five hundred; sketches for orchestra, a piano concerto, organ music, and songs.
As is shown by the two or three vocal works of his that I have seen, Gleason is less successful as a melodist than as a harmonist. But in this latter capacity he is gifted indeed, and is peculiarly fitted to furnish forth with music Ebling's "Lobgesang auf die Harmonie." In his setting of this poem he has used a soprano and a barytone solo with male chorus and orchestra. The harmonic structure throughout is superb in all the various virtues ascribed to harmony. The ending is magnificent.
A work completed December, 1899, forproduction by the Thomas Orchestra, is a symphonic poem called "The Song of Life," with this motto from Swinburne:
"They have the night, who had, like us, the day;We whom the day binds shall have night as they;We, from the fetters of the light unbound,Healed of our wound of living, shall sleep sound."
The first prominent musician to give a certain portion of his program regularly to the American composer, was William H. Sherwood. This recognition from so distinguished a performer could not but interest many who had previously turned a deaf ear to all the musical efforts of the Eagle. In addition to playing their piano works, he has transcribed numerous of their orchestral works to the piano, and played them. In short, he has been so indefatigable a laborer for the cause of other American composers, that he has found little time to write his own ideas.
WILLIAM H. SHERWOOD.
Sherwood will be chiefly remembered as a pianist, but he has written a certain amount of music of an excellent quality. Opera 1-4 were published abroad. Opus 5 is a suite, the second number of which is an "Idylle" that deserves its name. It is as blissfully clear and ringing as anything could well be, and drips with a Theokritan honey. The third number of the suite is called "Greetings." It has only one or two unusual touches. Number 4 bears the suggestive title, "Regrets for the Pianoforte." It was possibly written after some of his less promising pupils had finished a lesson. The last number of the suite is a quaint Novelette.