Music
OlgaSamaroff is not conspicuous for her bad piano-playing. There are a great many others, as prominent as Mme. Samaroff, as popular in their own way, who make just as much noise when they play—pianists who seem to exert an odd vigilance lest music enter in for a moment. Mme. Samaroff played Beethoven’s E-flat piano concerto with the Chicago Symphony. This work is unique in its bombast, causing one to blush for the composer. The soloist appeared in an ample gown of scorched orange, with slippers of scarlet, and gave the work its traditional beating. The eye suffered only less than the ear.
But the excellent Claussen, taking part in a Wagner program, swept away all pettiness. She liberated emotions that Wagner alone can touch, when adequately interpreted. Here is no prima donna, but an artist who sings. Her voice is a brimming-over of loveliness; her emotional power becomes inevitable, for she sings in phrases of beauty—a living beauty that moves to tears. Hers is an art that pervades and satisfies ... something to be treasured.
Vocalists are generally peacocks—usually moulting. It is a great event to discover a singing artist, for when the lack is neither a matter of intelligence nor of intensity, it often happens that the musician uses a voice thatcould never perjure itself as beautiful. Julia Claussen gives a feeling of utter security. No sensibility is wounded or left asleep.
Samaroff is not to be blamed, individually; although what she represents is not an art, but a menace, for it is always applauded, copied, and taught to the youth. Sonority and power in tone-masses are never obtained by blows upon the piano-keys, or by waving the arms over the head. The piano is capable of infinite shading and many kinds of tone, from mighty chords and fierce tumult to delicatetonal weavings and vague states of calm, from crystalline brilliance to low-sung intimate melodies; and there are certain artists now living who listen closely, hear these strange secrets, and bring them out for other ears. Olga Samaroff, apparently, like her Chicago audience, is aware chiefly of the difference between loud and soft.
Herman Schuchert.