César Cui offers in most respects a complete contrast to the composer ofPrince Igor. It is true that he shares with Borodin the lyrical, rather than the declamatory, tendency in operatic music, but whereas the latter is a follower of Glinka in his close adherence to the national style, we find in the music of César Cui a strong blend of foreign influences. As in Tchaikovsky’s dramatic works we discern from first to last some traces of his earliest love in music—the Italian opera—so in Cui’s compositions we never entirely lose sight of hisFrench descent. Cui’s position as a composer must strike us as paradoxical. The first disciple to join Balakirev, and always a staunch supporter of the new Russian school, we might naturally expect to find some strong, progressive, and national tendency in his music. We might suppose that he would assume the virtue of nationality even if he had it not. But this is not the case. The French element, combined, curiously enough, with Schumann’s influence, is everywhere predominant. Nevertheless, Cui has been a distinct force in the evolution of modern Russian music, for to him is generally attributed the origin of that “second generation” of composers with whom inspiration ranks after the cult of form, and “the idea” becomes subordinate to elaborate treatment. This tendency is also represented by Glazounov in his early work, and still more strongly by Liadov and one or two composers for the pianoforte.
Cui was born at Vilna, in Poland, in 1835. His father had served in Napoleon’s army, and was left behind during the retreat from Moscow in 1812. He afterwards married a Lithuanian lady and settled down as teacher of French in the Vilna High School. Here Cui received his early education. He showed a precocious musical talent and, besides learning the pianoforte, picked up some theoretical knowledge fromMoniuszko; but he never—as is sometimes stated—received regular instruction from the Polish composer. Except for what he owed in later life to Balakirev’s guidance, Cui is actually thatrara avis, a self-taught composer.
From the time he entered the School of Military Engineering in 1850, until he passed out with honours in 1857, Cui had no time to devote to his favourite pursuit. On obtaining officer’s rank he was appointed sub-Professor of Fortification, and lecturer on the same subject at the Staff College and School of Artillery. Among his pupils he reckoned the present Emperor, Nicholas II. Cui has now risen to be a Lieut.-General of Engineers and President of the I. R. M. S. At first his military appointments barely sufficed to keep him, and when he married—early in life—he and his wife were obliged to add to their income by keeping a preparatory school for boys intended eventually for the School of Engineering. Here Cui taught all day, when not lecturing in the military schools; while his nights were largely devoted to the study of harmony, and afterwards to composition and musical criticism. Very few of the Russian composers, with their dual occupations to fulfil, have known the luxury of an eight hours’ day.
Cui first met Balakirev in 1856, and was introduced by him to Dargomijsky. His earliestoperatic attempt, a work in one act entitledThe Mandarin’s Son, was a very slight composition in the style of Auber. An opera composed about the same time (1858-1859) on Poushkin’s dramatic poemThe Captive in the Caucasuswas a much more ambitious effort. Many years later—in 1881—Cui considered this work worth remodelling, and he also interpolated a second act. The patch is rather obvious, butThe Captive in the Caucasusis an interesting work to study, because it reveals very clearly the difference between Cui’s earlier and later styles. Cui’s reputation as an operatic composer actually began, however, with the performance ofWilliam Ratcliff, produced at the Maryinsky Theatre, St. Petersburg, in February 1869, under the direction of Napravnik, on the occasion of Mme. Leonova’s benefit. A composer who is also a critic is certainly at a disadvantage in many respects. Cui, who contributed during the ’sixties a whole series of brilliant—and often mercilessly satirical—articles to the Russian press,[43]gave his adversaries an excellent opportunity to attack him for inconsistency whenRatcliffmade its appearance. Cui’s literary precepts do undoubtedly move somewhat in advance of his practice as a composer, andRatcliffconforms in very fewrespects to the creed of the new Russian school as formulated by him in his well-known articles “La Musique en Russie.” That is to say, instead of following the example of Dargomijsky inThe Stone Guest, Cui to a great extent replaces free-recitative by arioso; while at the same time the absence of such broad and flowing melody as we find in the operas of Glinka, Borodin, and Tchaikovsky placesWilliam Ratcliffin a position midway between declamatory and lyric opera. Some of the hostile criticisms showered upon this work are not altogether unjust. The subject of Heine’s early tragedy, the outcome of his “Sturm und Drang” period, is undoubtedly crude and sensational; even in Plestcheiev’s fine translation it was hardly likely to be acceptable to a nation who was beginning to base its dramatic traditions on the realistic plays of Gogol and Ostrovsky, rather than upon the romanticism of Schiller’s “Robbers,” and kindred dramas. The music is lacking in realistic power and certainly makes no pretensions to fulfil Dargomijsky’s dictum that “the note must represent the word.” Although the action ofWilliam Ratclifftakes place across the border, neither the sentiment nor the colour of the music would satisfy a Scottish composer. But Cui’s critics show a lack of perception when they neglect to praise the grace and tenderness whichcharacterise his heroine Mary, and the sincerity and warmth of emotion which occasionally kindles and glows into passion as in the love-duet between William and Mary in the last act.
The public verdict which began by echoing that of the critics, with the inimical Serov at their head, afterwards became more favourable, andWilliam Ratcliff, when produced in 1900 by the Private Opera Company in Moscow, was received with considerable enthusiasm.
Tchaikovsky, writing of this opera in 1879, says: “It contains charming things, but unfortunately it suffers from a certain insipidity, and from over-elaboration in the development of the parts. It is obvious that the composer has spent a long time over each individual bar, and lovingly completed it in every detail, with the result that his musical outline has lost its freedom and every touch is too deliberate. By nature Cui is more drawn towards light and piquantly rhythmic French music; but the demands of ‘the invincible band,’ which he has joined, compel him to do violence to his natural gifts and to follow those paths of would-be original harmony which do not suit him. Cui is now forty-four years of age and has only composed two operas and two or three dozen songs. He was engaged for ten years upon his operaRatcliff. It is evident that the work was composed piecemeal, hence the lack of any unityof style.” This criticism contains a germ of carefully observed truth. The score ofWilliam Ratcliff, which looks deceptively simple and seems to be packed with dance rhythms in the style of Auber (Leslie’s song in Act II. for instance might be a chansonette from “Fra Diavolo”), shows on closer examination rather a tiresome succession of harmonic surprise tricks, intended perhaps to draw attention from themes which have not in themselves an impressive dramatic quality. At the same time, only prejudice could ignore the true poetry and passion expressed in the love scenes between William and Mary.
William Ratcliffwas followed by a series of admirable songs which indicated that Cui’s talent as a vocal composer was rapidly maturing. A new opera, in four acts, entitledAngelo,[44]was completed and performed in St. Petersburg in February 1876, under the direction of Napravnik, the occasion being the benefit of the great baritone Melnikov. The book ofAngelois based upon a play of Victor Hugo—a tale of passionate love; of rivalry between two beautiful and contrasting types of womanhood; of plotted revenge, and final atonement, whenTisbe saves the life of her rival at the expense of her own. The scene is laid in Padua during the middle of the sixteenth century. This work is generally regarded as the fruit of Cui’s maturity. The subject is more suited to his temperament than Heine’s “Ratcliff,” and lends itself to the frequent employment of a chorus. Here Cui has been very successful, especially in the lighter choruses written in Italian dance rhythms, such as the tarantella “The moon rides in the clear bright sky,” in the third act, and the graceful valse-like chorus “Far o’er the sea.” The love duet between Catarina and Rodolfo is preferred by many to the great love duet inRatcliff. Cui, whose heroines are more convincing than his male types, has found congenial material in Catarina and Tisbe, who have been described as “Woman in Society and Woman outside it”; thus combining in two typical personalities “all women and all womanhood.” There is power, too, in the purely dramatic moments, as when Ascanio addresses the populace. The opera concludes with a fine elegiac chorus, in which the character of the period and locality—mediæval Italy, tragic and intense—is not unsuccessfully reflected.
InAngelaCui made a supreme effort to achieve breadth of style and to break through the limitations he had imposed upon himself by adoptingthe methods and peculiarities of such composers as Schumann and Chopin. But this effort seems to have been followed by a speedy reaction. After the appearance ofAngelohis manner becomes more distinctly finical and artificial. His military duties and his literary work made increasing demands on his time, and the flow of inspiration dropped below its highest level. Songs and miniatures for pianoforte were now his chief preoccupation, and, greater undertakings being perhaps out of the question, he became absorbed in the cult of small and finished forms, and fell increasingly under the influence of Schumann. It was at this time that he wrote the additional act forThe Captive in the Caucasus, to which reference has already been made. Here the contrast between the simplicity and sincerity of his first style, and the formal polish and “preciousness” of his middle period, is very pronounced. The use of local colour inThe Captive in the Caucasusis not very convincing. Cui is no adept in the employment of Oriental themes, and the Caucasus has never been to him the source of romantic inspiration it has proved to so many other Russian poets and composers.
Another four-act operaThe Saracen, the subject taken from a play by the elder Dumas entitled “Charles VII. chez ses grands Vasseaux,” was first performed at the Maryinsky Theatrein St. Petersburg in 1899, and revived by the Private Opera Company at Moscow in 1902. The subject is gloomy and highly dramatic, with sensational elements almost as lurid as anything inWilliam Ratcliff. The interest of the opera fluctuates between the love of the King for Agnes Sorel—two figures which stand out in relief from the dark historical background of that period, when Jeanne d’Arc was fighting the battles of her weak and indolent sovereign—and the domestic affairs of the saturnine Count Saverny and his wife Bérangère; complicated by the inner drama which is carried on in the soul of the Saracen slave Jakoub, who is in love with the Countess, and finally murders her husband at her instigation. As usual, Cui is most successful in the purely lyrical numbers—the love scenes between the King and Agnes Sorel. Here the music, almost effeminately tender, has that touching and sensuous quality which caused a celebrated French critic to write of Cui as “the Bellini of the North.” The “berceuse,” sung, strangely enough, by the harsh Count de Saverny as he keeps watch over the King’s son on the threshold of his bed-chamber, is a strikingly original number which should be better known in the concert-room.
Le Flibustier, composed between 1888-1889, was dedicated to that distinguished amateurthe Countess Mercy-Argenteau, whose influence counted for so much in Cui’s later musical development. This work, written to a French libretto from a play by Jean Richepin, was originally produced at the Opéra Comique, Paris, in 1894. It is described as a “Comédie lyrique en trois actes.” It is frankly French in style and contains some graceful and effective music, but lacks the natural emotion and ardour which inRatcliffandAngeloatone for some limitations of expression and for the lack of unity of style.
An opera in one act,Mam’selle Fifi, based upon Guy de Maupassant’s well-known tale of the Franco-Prussian war, was produced by the Private Opera Company at the Hermitage Theatre in the autumn of 1903. The work was well received by the public. The scene is laid in a chateau near Rouen which is occupied by a detachment of Prussians and their commanding officers. Bored by their life of inaction, the officers induce some young women from Rouen to come and amuse them. They entertain them at dinner, and sub-lieutenant von Eirich (nicknamed Mam’selle Fifi) pays attention to the patriotic Rachel; but while at table he irritates her to such a degree by his insulting remarks and vulgar jokes that she seizes a knife and stabs him mortally in the throat. Afterwards she makes her escape. Kashkin says: “The musicof this opera flows on smoothly in concise declamatory scenes, only interrupted from time to time by the chorus of officers, and the light-hearted songs of Amanda. Rachel’s aria introduces a more tragic note. The music is so closely welded to the libretto that it appears to be an essential part of it, clothing with vitality and realism scenes which would otherwise be merely the dry bones of opera.”
While I was in Russia in the spring of 1901, Cui played to me a “dramatic scene,” or one-act opera, entitledA Feast in Time of Plague. It proved to be a setting of a curious poem by Poushkin which he pretended to have translated from Wilson’s “City of the Plague.” Walsingham, a young English nobleman, dares to indulge in “impious orgies” during the visitation of the Great Plague. The songs of the revellers are interrupted at intervals by a funeral march, as the dead-cart goes its round to collect its victims. Cui has set Poushkin’s poem word for word, consequently this little work is more closely modelled upon Dargomijsky’sThe Stone Guestthan any other of his operas. When I heard the work, I was under the impression that it was intended only as a dramatic cantata, but it was afterwards produced as an opera at the New Theatre, Moscow, in the autumn of 1901. The song sung by Walsingham’s mistress, Mary (“Time was”), which is Scotch incharacter, has considerable pathetic charm, and struck me as the most spontaneous number in the work, which, on the whole, seems an effort to fit music not essentially tragic in character to a subject of the gloomiest nature.
In summing up Cui’s position as a composer, I must return to my assertion that it is paradoxical. First, we may conclude from the preponderance of operatic music and songs that Cui is more gifted as a vocal than as an instrumental composer; that, in fact, he needs a text to bring out his powers of psychological analysis. But when we come to examine his music, the methods—and even the mannerisms—of such instrumental composers as Chopin and Schumann are reflected in all directions. A style obviously founded on Schumann will necessarily lack the qualities which we are accustomed to regard as essential to a great operatic style. Cui has not the luminous breadth and powerful flow of simple and effective melody which we find in the older type of opera; nor the pre-eminent skill in declamation which is indispensable to the newer forms of music-drama. His continuous use of arioso becomes monotonous and ineffective, because, with him, the clear edges of melody and recitative seem perpetually blurred. This arises partly from the fact that Cui’s melody, though delicate and refined, is not strongly individual. He is nota plagiarist in the worst sense of the word, but the influences which a stronger composer would have cast off at maturity seem to obtain a stronger hold on him as time goes on. His talent reminds me of those complex recipes for pot-pourri which we find in the day-books of our great-grandmothers. It is compounded of many more or less delightful ingredients: French predilections, Schumannesque mannerisms, some essence distilled from the grace and passion of Chopin, a dash of Russian sincerity—a number of fragrant and insidious aromas, in which the original element of individuality is smothered in the rose leaves and lavender winnowed from other people’s gardens. Then there is a second perplexing consideration which follows the study of Cui’s music. Possessed of this fragrant, but not robust, talent, Cui elects to apply it to themes of the ultra-romantic type with all their grisly accompaniments of moonlit heaths, blood-stained daggers, vows of vengeance, poison-cups, and the rest. It is as though a Herrick were posing as a John Webster. Surely in these curious discrepancies between the artist’s temperament and his choice of subject and methods of treatment we find the reason why of all Cui’s operas not one has taken a permanent hold on the public taste in Russia or abroad. And this in spite of their lyrical charm and graceful workmanship.
Cui is now the sole remaining member of“the invincible band” who originally gathered round Balakirev for the purpose of founding a national school of music. He is now in his eightieth year, but still composes and keeps up his interest in the Russian musical world. Within the last three years he has published a four-act opera on the subject of Poushkin’s tale, “The Captain’s Daughter.”[45]
ACONTEMPORARYcritic has pointed to Rimsky-Korsakov and Tchaikovsky as having, between them, built up Russian music to its present proud condition, “constructing their majestic edifice upon the everlasting foundation laid by Glinka.” Making some allowance for grandiloquence of language, this observation is particularly true as applied to Rimsky-Korsakov, for not only was he consistently true to the national ideal in all his works, but during his long activity as a teacher he trained a whole group of distinguished musicians—Liadov, Arensky, Ippolitov-Ivanov Grechyaninov, Tcherepnin, Stravinsky—who have all added their stones to the building up of this temple of Russian art. At the same time, we must regard Rimsky-Korsakov as the last of those national composers who chose to build with exclusively local materials and in purely Russian style. The younger generation are shaping their materials under more varied influences. Rimsky-Korsakov, therefore, standsout in the history of Russian opera as one of the most distinguished and distinctively racial composers of that circle to whom we owe the inauguration of the national school of music in Russia.
The subject of this chapter was born in the little village of Tikvin, in the government of Novgorod, on March 6th, 1844, and, until he was twelve years old, he continued to live on his father’s estate, among the lakes and forests of northern Russia, where music was interwoven with every action of rustic life. His gifts were precocious; between six and seven he began to play the pianoforte, and made some attempts at composition before he was nine. It was almost a matter of tradition that the men of the Korsakov family should enter the navy; consequently in 1856, Nicholas Andreivich was sent to the Naval College at St. Petersburg, where he remained for six years. Not without difficulty he managed to continue his pianoforte lessons on Sundays and holidays with the excellent teacher Kanillé. The actual starting point of his musical career, however, was his introduction to Balakirev and his circle. From this congenial companionship Rimsky-Korsakov was abruptly severed in 1863, when he was ordered to sea in the cruiser “Almaz.” The ship was absent on foreign service for three years, during which she practically made theround of the world. While on this voyage Rimsky-Korsakov wrote and revised a Symphony, Op. 1 in E Minor, and surely never was an orchestral work composed under stranger or less propitious conditions. Balakirev performed this work at one of the concerts of the Free School of Music in the winter of 1866. It was the first symphony ever composed by a Russian, and the music, though not strong, is agreeable; but like many other earlyopusnumbers it bears evidence of strong external influences.
In the chapters dealing with Balakirev and his circle I have given a picture of the social and artistic conditions in St. Petersburg to which the young sailor returned in the autumn of 1865. In common with other members of this school, Rimsky-Korsakov’s musical development at this time was carried on as it wereà rebours, Schumann, Berlioz, Liszt and Glinka being his early ideals and models. During the years of his pupilage with Balakirev, he composed, besides his first symphony, the Symphonic Picture “Sadko,” a Fantasia on Servian Themes, the Symphony with an Oriental programme entitled “Antar,” and the operaThe Maid of Pskov, now usually given abroad under the title ofIvan the Terrible. In his “Chronicle of my Musical Life” Rimsky-Korsakov shows clearly that after passing through a phase ofblind idolatry for Balakirev and his methods, he began, largely by reason of his orderly, industrious, and scrupulously conscientious nature, to feel the need of a more academic course of training. He realised the defects in his theoretical education most keenly when, in 1871, Asanchievsky, who had just succeeded Zaremba as Director of the St. Petersburg Conservatoire, offered him a post as professor of practical composition and also the direction of the orchestral class. Urged by his friends, and prompted by a certain self-assurance which he asserts was born of his ignorance, Rimsky-Korsakov accepted the post, being permitted at the same time to remain in the naval service. Although he had composed “Sadko,” “Antar,” and other attractive and well-sounding compositions, he had worked, so far, more or less intuitively and had not been grounded in the particular subjects which form the curriculum of a musical academy. Probably it mattered much less than his scrupulous rectitude prompted him to suppose, that he felt unfit to lecture uponrondo-form, and had his work as a conductor yet to learn. The main thing was that he brought a fresh, breezy, and wholly Russian current of thought into the stuffy atmosphere of pedantic classicism which must have been engendered under Zaremba’s directorate.[46]Indeed, according to his own modest account, things seem to have gone well with the orchestral and instrumentation classes. From this time, however, began that strong reaction in favour of classicism and “the schools,” upon which his progressive friends looked with dismay; to them his studies appeared merely the cult of musical archæology—a retrogressive step to be deeply deplored. On the other hand Tchaikovsky hailed it as a sign of grace and repentance. “Rimsky-Korsakov,” writes the composer of the “Pathetic” symphony to N. von Meck, in 1877, “is the one exception (in the matter of conceit and stiff-necked pride) to the rest of the new Russian school. He was overcome by despair when he realised how many profitable years he had lost and that he was following a road which led nowhere. He began to study with such zeal that during one summer he achieved innumerable exercises in counterpoint and sixty-four fugues, ten of which he sent me for inspection.” Rimsky-Korsakov may have felt himself braced and strengthened bythis severe course of musical theory; it may have been a relief to his extremely sensitive artistic conscience to feel that henceforward he could rely as much on experience as on intuition; but his remorse for the past—supposing him ever to have felt the sting of such keen regret—never translated itself into the apostasy of his earlier principles. After the sixty-four fugues and the exhaustive study of Bach’s works, he continued to walk with Berlioz and Liszt in what Zaremba would have regarded as the way of sinners, because in his opinion it coincided with the highway of musical progress, as well as with his natural inclinations. He knew the forms demanded by his peculiar temperament. Genius, and even superior talent, almost invariably possess this intuition. No one should have known better than Tchaikovsky that in spite of well-intentioned efforts to push a composer a little to the right or the left, the question of form remains—and will always remain—self-selective. Rimsky-Korsakov, after, as before, his initiation into classicism, chose the one path open to the honest artist—musician, painter, or poet—the way of individuality.
In 1873 Rimsky-Korsakov, at the suggestion of the Grand Duke Constantine, was appointed Inspector of Naval Bands, in which capacity he had great opportunities for practicalexperiments in instrumentation. At this time, he tells us, he went deeply into the study of acoustics and the construction and special qualities of the instruments of the orchestra. This appointment practically ended his career as an officer on the active list, at which he must have felt considerable relief, for with all his “ideal conscientiousness” it is doubtful whether he would ever have made a great seaman. The following letter, written to Cui during his first cruise on the “Almaz,” reveals nothing of the cheery optimism of a true “sea-dog”; but it does reveal the germ of “Sadko” and of much finely descriptive work in his later music. “What a thing to be thankful for is the naval profession,” he writes; “how glorious, how agreeable, how elevating! Picture yourself sailing across the North Sea. The sky is grey, murky, and colourless; the wind screeches through the rigging; the ship pitches so that you can hardly keep your legs; you are constantly besprinkled with spray, and sometimes washed from head to foot by a wave; you feel chilly, and rather sick. Oh, a sailor’s life is really jolly!”
But if his profession did not benefit greatly by his services, his art certainly gained something from his profession. It is this actual contact with nature, choral in moments of stress and violence, as well as in her milder rhythmicmoods, that we hear in “Sadko” the orchestral fantasia, and inSadkothe opera. We feel the weight of the wind against our bodies and the sting of the brine on our faces. We are left buffeted and breathless by the elemental fury of the storm when the Sea King dances with almost savage vigour to the sound of Sadko’sgusslee, or by the vehement realism of the shipwreck in “Scheherezade.”
Of his early orchestral works, “Sadko” displays the national Russian element, while the second symphony, “Antar,” shows his leaning towards Oriental colour. These compositions prove the tendency of his musical temperament, but they do not show the more delicate phases of his work. They are large and effective canvases and display extraordinary vigour and much poetical sentiment. But the colour, although laid on with science, is certainly applied with a palette knife. We must go to his operas and songs to discover what this artist can do in the way of discriminating and exquisite brush-work. In speaking of Korsakov’s work, it seems natural to drop into the language of the studio, for, to me, he always appears as a descriptive poet, or still more as a landscape painter who has elected music for his medium. Gifted with a brilliant imagination, yet seeing with a realist’s vision, he is far more attracted to what is capable of definite expression than towardsabstract thought. Lyrical he is; but more in the sense of Wordsworth than of Shelley. With a nature to which the objective world makes so strong an appeal, impassioned self-revelation is not a primary and urgent necessity. In this respect he is the antithesis of Tchaikovsky. The characteristic vein of realism which we have found in all our Russian composers, and most strongly marked in Moussorgsky, exists also in Korsakov; but in his case it is controlled by an almost fastidious taste, and a love of beautiful details which sometimes stifle the fundamental idea of his work. From these preliminary remarks you will have formed for yourselves some idea as to the spirit in which this composer would approach the sphere of dramatic music.
He came to it first by way of Russian history. TheMaid of Pskov(“Pskovityanka”[47]) was completed in 1872, and performed in St. Petersburg in January, 1873. The cast was a remarkably good one: Ivan the Terrible—Petrov; Michael Toucha—Orlov; Prince Tokmakov—Melnikov; Olga—Platonova; Vlassievna—Leonova. Napravnik was the conductor. Opinions as to its success vary greatly, but the early fate of the work does not seem to have been happy, partly because, as Stassovsays, the public, accustomed only to Italian opera, were incapable of appreciating this attempt at serious historical music-drama, and partly because the opera suffered severely at the hands of the critics and the Censor.
InThe Maid of Pskov(“Ivan the Terrible”) Rimsky-Korsakov started under the influence of Dargomijsky’sThe Stone Guest, to the theory of which all the new Russian school at first subscribed. Afterwards Rimsky-Korsakov, like Tchaikovsky, alternated between lyrical and declamatory opera and occasionally effected a union of the two styles. InThe Maid of Pskovthe solo parts consisted at first chiefly of mezzo-recitative of a somewhat dry quality, relieved by great variety of orchestral colour in the accompaniments. The choruses, on the other hand, were very national in style and full of melody and movement. The work underwent many revisions before it appeared in its present form. In 1877 the composer added the Overture to the Prologue and the Entr’actes. At this time he was assisting to edit the “monumental” edition of Glinka’s operas which the master’s sister Liudmilla Shestakov was bringing out at her own expense. “This occupation,” says Rimsky-Korsakov, “proved to be an unexpected schooling, and enabled me to penetrate into every detail of Glinka’s structural style.” The first revision ofThe Maid of Pskovand theediting ofA Life for the TsarandRusslanwere carried on simultaneously. Therefore it is not surprising that Rimsky-Korsakov set himself to polish and tone down many youthful crudities which appeared in the original score of his own opera. Cui, Moussorgsky and Stassov, although at first they approved his resolution to revise the work, showed some disappointment at the results; while the composer’s wife deeply regretted its first form. It was evident to all that what the work had gained in structure and technical treatment it had lost in freshness and lightness of touch. In 1878 the composer offered it once more, in this revised edition, to Baron Kistner, Director of the Imperial Opera, but without success. The work was laid aside until 1894, when it was again re-modelled and revived by the initiative of an amateur society at the Panaevsky Theatre, St. Petersburg, in April 1895. In this version it was mounted at the Imperial Opera House, Moscow, when Shaliapin appeared in the part of Ivan the Terrible. On this occasion the opera was preceded by the PrologueBoyarinya Vera Sheloga, composed in 1899. Its reception was extremely enthusiastic, and in the autumn of 1903—thirty years after its first performance—it was restored to the repertory of the St. Petersburg Opera.
The subject ofThe Maid of Pskovis taken from one of Mey’s dramas, dealing with an episodefrom the history of the sixteenth century when Ivan the Terrible, jealous of the enterprise and independence of the twin cities of Pskov and Novgorod, resolved to humble their pride and curtail their power. Novgorod fell; but the awful doom of Pskov was mitigated by the Tsar’s discovery that Olga, who passes for the daughter of Prince Tokmakov, the chief magistrate of the city, was in reality his own natural child, the daughter of Vera Sheloga whom he had loved in youth, and for whose memory the tyrant could still feel some spark of affection and some pangs of remorse. One of the finest moments in the opera is the summoning of theVêche, or popular assembly, in the second act. The great city of mediæval Russia, with all it contained of characteristic energy, of almost Elizabethan vigour and enterprise, is set before us in this musical picture. The stress and anger of the populace; the fine declamatory monologue for Prince Tokmakov; the song sung by Michael Toucha, Olga’s lover, who leads the rebellious spirits of Pskov; the impressive knell of the tocsin calling the citizens to attend theVêche—all unite to form a dramatic scene worthy to compare with the finale of Glinka’sRusslan and Liudmilla, or with theSlavsia(the chorus of acclamation) which makes the Kremlin ring inA Life for the Tsar. Russians, as everyone knows who has lived in theircountry, have a passion for bells, and often reproduce their effects in their music: witness the orchestral prelude “Dawn Breaking over Moscow” in Moussorgsky’sKhovanstchinaand the familiar Overture “1812” by Tchaikovsky. The bell effects inThe Maid of Pskovare extraordinarily moving. Recalling, as it does, traditions of political liberty and free speech, this bell—so I have been told—appeared in the eyes of the Censor the most objectionable and revolutionary character in the whole opera. The scenes in which the old nurse Vlassievna takes part—aNiankais so much a part of domestic life in Russia that no play or opera seems complete without one—are full of quiet humour and tenderness. The love-music for Michael and Olga is graceful rather than passionate, more warmth and tenderness being shown in the relations between the young girl and the Tsar, for whom she has an instinctive filial feeling. Psychologically the later scenes in the opera, in which we see the relentless and superstitious heart of Ivan gradually softening under the influence of paternal love, interest and touch us most deeply. In 1899 Rimsky-Korsakov added, at Shaliapin’s request, the aria now sung by the Tsar in his tent, in the last act. This number reveals much of Ivan’s strange and complex nature; in it he is alternately the despot, the remorseful lover, and the weary oldman aching for a daughter’s tenderness. Cheshikin points out the remarkable effect which the composer produces at the end of this solo, where the key fluctuates between B flat major and G minor, with the final cadence in D major, giving a sense of weakness and irresolution appropriate to Ivan’s weariness of body and soul. The final scene in the opera, in which the death of Olga snatches from the wretched Tsar his last hope of redemption through human love, has but one fault: that of almost unendurable poignancy.
With the accession of Alexander III. in 1881 began a more encouraging period for Russian composers. The Emperor showed a distinct predilection for native opera, and particularly for the works of Tchaikovsky. A series of musical events, such as the raising of the Glinka monument at Smolensk by national subscription (1885), Rubinstein’s jubilee (1889), the publication of Serov’s critical works, and the public funeral accorded to Tchaikovsky (1893), all had his approval and support, and in some instances were carried out entirely at his own expense. Henceforth the repertory of Russian music-dramas was not permitted to languish, and after the death of Tchaikovsky, the Directorate of the Opera Houses seems to have turned to Rimsky-Korsakov in the expectation of at least one novelty in each season. Consequently his achievement in this sphere of music farexceeds that of his immediate predecessors and contemporaries, amounting in all to thirteen operatic works. Of this number, none can be said to have been really a failure, and only one has dropped completely out of the repertory of the two capitals and the provinces, although some are undoubtedly more popular than others. To speak in detail of all these works would require a volume devoted to the subject. I propose, therefore, to give a brief account of the greater number, devoting a little more space to those which seem most likely ever to be given in this country.
The two operas which follow in 1879 and 1880, while possessing many features in common with each other, differ wholly in character fromThe Maid of Pskov. InA Night in MayandThe Snow Maiden(“Sniegourochka”) the dramatic realism of historical opera gives place to lyrical inspiration and the free flight of fancy.A Night in Mayis taken from one of Gogol’s Malo-Russian tales.The Snow Maiden: a Legend of Springtideis founded upon a national epic by the dramatist Ostrovsky. Both operas offer that combination of legendary, picturesque and humorous elements which always exercised an attraction for Rimsky-Korsakov’s musical temperament. In both works he shows that he has attained to a supreme mastery of orchestration, and theaccompaniments in every instance go far to atone for his chief weakness—a certain dryness of melodic invention, except where the style of the melody coincides with that of the folk tune.A Night in Mayreveals the composer as a humorist of delicate and fantastic quality. Rimsky-Korsakov’s humour is entirely native and individual, having nothing akin to the broad, saturnine, biting wit of Moussorgsky, nor to the vigorous humour of Borodin’s comic villains Eroshka and Skoula, inPrince Igor. Rimsky-Korsakov can be sprightly, fanciful, and arch; his humour is more often expressed by witty orchestral comments upon the text than by the melodies themselves.
The first performance ofA Night in Maytook place at the Maryinsky Theatre, St. Petersburg, in January 1880, but it was soon withdrawn from the repertory and only revived in 1894, at the Imperial Mikhaïlovsky Theatre. In 1896 it was given at the Folk Theatre, in Prague; and produced for the first time in Moscow in 1898. Besides being more lyrical and melodious in character thanThe Maid of Pskov, this opera shows evidences of Rimsky-Korsakov’s intervening studies in the contrapuntal treatment of the choruses and concerted numbers. The scene ofA Night in May, as in several of Gogol’s tales, is laid near the village of Dikanka in Little Russia. Levko(tenor), the son of the Golova or Headman of the hamlet, is in love with Hanna (mezzo-soprano), but his father will not give consent to the marriage, because he admires the girl himself. In the first act Levko is discovered serenading Hanna in the twilight. Presently she emerges from her cottage and they sing a love duet. Then Hanna asks Levko to tell her the legend of the old deserted manor house that stands beside the mere. He appears reluctant, but finally relates how once a Pan (a Polish gentleman) dwelt there with the Pannochka, his fair daughter. He was a widower, and married again, but his second wife proved to be a witch who caused him to turn his daughter out of the house. The girl in despair drowned herself in the mere and became a Roussalka. She haunted the lake at night, and at last, catching her stepmother perilously near the edge of the water, she lured her down into its depths. Levko tells his sweetheart that the present owner wants to erect a distillery on the site of the mansion and has already sent a distiller there. The lovers then say good-bye and Hanna re-enters her cottage. Next follows an episode in which the village drunkard Kalenik (baritone) tries to dance theGopakwhile the village girls sing a chorus of mockery. When the stage is empty the Headman (bass) appears and sings a song to Hanna in which,while he implores her to listen to his love, he tells her that she ought to be very proud to have him for a suitor. Hanna, however, will have nothing to say to him. Levko, who has overheard this scene and wishes to teach his father the lesson “of leaving other people’s sweethearts alone,” points him out to some woodcutters on their way home from work and encourages them to seize him and hold him up to ridicule. The Headman, however, pushes them aside and makes his escape. The act ends with a song for Levko and the chorus of woodcutters.
In the second act the curtain rises on the interior of the Headman’s hut, where, with his sister-in-law and the Distiller, he is discussing the fate of the old manor house. Levko and the woodcutters are heard singing their impertinent song outside the house. The Headman, beside himself with rage, rushes out and catches one of the singers, who is dressed in a sheepskin coat turned inside out. Now follows a farcical scene of tumult; the singer escapes, and the Headman, by mistake, shuts up his sister-in-law in a closet. There is a general hue and cry after the culprit and the wrong people are continually being arrested, including the village drunkard Kalenik. In the last act Levko is discovered singing a serenade to the accompaniment of the Little-Russianbandourabefore the haunted manor house by the mere. Apparently the wraith of the Pannochka appears at one of the windows. Then the Roussalki are seen on the edge of the lake, where they sit weaving chaplets of water-plants. At the request of the Pannochka-Roussalka, Levko leads the choral dances with hisbandoura. Afterwards the Pannochka rewards him by giving him a letter in which she orders the Headman not to oppose Levko’s marriage with Hanna. When the dawn breaks, the Headman, accompanied by the Scrivener, the Desyatsky (a kind of village superintendent) and others, arrive upon the scene, still in search of the culprit, who proves to be his own son. Levko gives the letter to his father, who feels obliged to consent to the young people’s marriage. Hanna with her girl friends now come upon the scene and the opera ends with a chorus of congratulations to the bride and bridegroom.
Perhaps the most graceful of all Rimsky-Korsakov’s early operas isThe Snow Maiden, in the music of which he has reflected the indelible impressions of a childhood spent amid sylvan surroundings. There is something of the same vernal impulsion in pages ofThe Snow Maidenof which we are conscious in Wagner’s Forest Murmurs. What a profound loss to the poetry of a nation is the disappearance of its forests! It is not only the rivers which growdrier and poorer for the ruthless wielding of the axe. None of Korsakov’s operas show a greater profusion of little lyrical gems than this one, which embodies the Slavonic legend of the spring. The Snow Maiden is the daughter of jolly King Frost and the Fairy Spring. She is brought up by her parents in the solitary wintry woods, because envious Summer has foretold her death when the first ray of sunlight and love shall touch her icy beauty. But the child is attracted by the songs of the shepherd Lel, whom she has seen sporting with the village girls in the meadows. She longs to lead a mortal’s life, and her parents unwillingly consent, and confide her to a worthy peasant couple who promise to treat her as a daughter. The Fairy Spring bids her child to seek her should she be in trouble—“you will find me by the lake-side in the valley and I will grant your request whatever it may be” are the parting words of her mother. Then the Snow Maiden begins her sad mortal existence. She admires the gay shepherd, who does not respond to her fancy. Mizgyr, a young Tatar merchant, falls madly in love with her, and for her sake deserts his promised bride Kupava. The passionate Kupava appears at the Court of the king of Berendei and demands justice. The fickle lover makes but one defence: “O, Tsar,” he says, “if you could but see the Snow Maiden.” Atthis juncture she appears, and the King, beholding her beauty, cannot believe that she is heartless. He promises her hand and rich rewards to any one of his young courtiers who can woo and win her before the next sunrise. In a wonderful forest scene we are shown the arcadian revels of the people of Berendei. Lel makes love to the deserted Kupava; while Mizgyr pursues the Snow Maiden with his passionate addresses. The wood-spirits interfere on her behalf and Mizgyr gets lost in the forest. The Snow Maiden sees Lel and Kupava wandering together under the trees and endeavours to separate them, but in vain. In her trouble she remembers her mother and seeks her by the lake-side. The Fairy Spring appears, and moved by her daughter’s entreaties, she accords her the power to love like a mortal. When the Snow Maiden sees Mizgyr again she loses her heart to him, and speaks of the new, sweet power of love which she feels stirring within her. But even as she speaks, a ray of sunlight pierces the clouds, and, falling on the young girl, melts her body and soul into the rising spring waters. Mizgyr, in despair, kills himself, and the opera closes with a song of thanksgiving to the Midsummer Sun.
The poetical death-scene of the Snow Maiden; Kupava’s passionate love song and her incantation to the bees; the pastoral songs of theshepherd Lel; the folk-song choruses; sometimes with accompaniments for thegusslee; the fairy scene in the forest and the return of the birds with the flight of winter—these things cannot fail to charm those who have not altogether outgrown the glamour of the world’s youth with its belief in the personification of natural forces. This opera is truly national, although it deals with legendary rather than historical events. This, however, as M. Camille Bellaigue points out, does not mean that its nationality is superficial or limited. Speaking of the wonderful scene in the palace of the King of Berendei, where he is seen sitting on his throne surrounded by a company of blind bards singing solemn airs to the accompaniment of their primitive harps, the French critic says: “Such a chorus as this has nothing in common with the official chorus of the courtiers in old-fashioned opera. In the amplitude and originality of the melody, in the vigour of the arpeggio accompaniment, in the exotic savour of the cadence and the tonality, we divine something which belongs not merely to the unknown but to infinitude.... But there is something which the music of Rimsky-Korsakov expresses with still greater force and charm, with an originality which is at once both stronger and sweeter, and that is the natural landscape, the forms and colours, the very faceof Russia itself. In this respect the music is something more than national, it is to a certain extent native, like the soil and sky of the country.”[48]
In 1889 Rimsky-Korsakov began a fourth opera, the history of which is connected with the co-operative tendency that distinguished the national school of musicians. The composition of collective works was, I believe, one of Balakirev’s early ideals; the Paraphrases, a set of clever variations on a childish theme, dedicated to Liszt by Borodin, Cui, Liadov and Rimsky-Korsakov, and the Quartet in honour of Balaiev are examples of this spirit of combination. In 1872 Gedeonov, then Director of the Opera, proposed that Borodin, Moussorgsky, Cui and Rimsky-Korsakov should each undertake one act of a ballet-opera for a plot of his own providing, entitledMlada. The music was written, but lack of funds prevented the enterprise from being carried out, and each composer utilised the material left on his hands in his own way. Rimsky-Korsakov incorporated his share with the fantastic scenes ofA Night in May. In 1889, however, he took up the subject once more andMladawas completed by the autumn of the same year. Produced at the Maryinsky Theatre in October 1892, it failed to win thesuccess it undoubtedly deserved. In the opera the part of Prince Mstivoy was taken by Stravinsky, and that of the Czech minstrel, Liumir, by Dolina. In the ballet, the Shade of Mlada was represented by the famousballerinaPetipa, and the Shade of Cleopatra by Skorsiouka. The subject is taken from the history of the Baltic Slavs in the ninth century; but although in this work he returns to an historical episode, the composer does not go back to the declamatory style ofThe Maid of Pskov. Cheshikin considers thatMladais highly effective from the theatrical point of view. Moreover, the old Slavonic character of the music is cleverly maintained throughout, the ordinary minor scale being replaced by the “natural minor” (the Æolian Mode). The scenes representing the ancient Pagan customs of the Slavs are highly picturesque and, except on the grounds of its expensive setting, it is difficult to understand why this work should have passed out of the repertory of the Russian opera.
The most distinctly humorous of all Rimsky-Korsakov’s operas is theChristmas Eve Revels, a subject also treated by Tchaikovsky under the title ofCherevichekand re-published asLe Caprice d’Oxane. The composer, as we have seen, rarely went outside his own land for literary material. But even within this circle of national subjects there exist many shadesof thought and sentiment. Gogol’s characters differ widely from those portrayed in such a legend as “Sadko.” The Malo-Russian and Cossack population are more vivacious, and also more dreamy and sentimental, than the Great Russians. In fact the difference between the inhabitants of the Ukraine and those of the government of Novgorod is as great as that between a southern Irishman and a Yorkshireman, and lies much in the same directions.
TheChristmas Eve Revelsopens with an orchestral introduction, “The Holy Night,” descriptive of the serene beauty of the night upon which the Christ Child came into the world to put all the powers of darkness under his feet. It is based upon two calm and solemn themes, the first rather mystical in character, the second of child-like transparency. But with the rising of the curtain comes an entire change of sentiment, and we are immediately brought into an atmosphere of peculiarly national humour. This sudden change from the mystical to the grotesque recalls the Russian miracle plays of the Middle Ages. The moon and stars are shining on a Little-Russian village; the hut of Choub the Cossack occupies the central position. Out of the chimney of one of the huts emerges the witch-woman Solokha, riding upon a broomstick. She sings a very old “Kolyadka,” or Christmas song. Now the Devil appears uponthe scene to enjoy the beauty of the night. These shady characters confide their grievances to each other. Solokha has a weakness for the Cossack Choub, but her son Vakoula the Smith is making love to Choub’s beautiful daughter Oxana, and this is a great hindrance to her own plans, so she wishes to put an end to the courtship if possible. To-night Choub is going to supper with the Sacristan and Vakoula is sure to take that opportunity of visiting his sweetheart, who is, however, deaf to all his entreaties. The Devil has his own grudge against Vakoula, because he has drawn a caricature of his satanic majesty upon the wall of the village church. The Devil and the Witch decide to help each other. They steal the moon and stars and fly off, leaving the village plunged in darkness. Ridiculous complications occur. Choub and the Sacristan go out, but wander round in a circle, and after a time find themselves back at the Cossack’s hut, where Vakoula is making love to Oxana. In the darkness Vakoula mistakes Choub for a rival lover and drives him out of his own courtyard. Matters are set right by the return of the moon and stars, who have managed to escape from the Devil and his companion.
RIMSKY-KORSAKOV From a portrait by Repin0RIMSKY-KORSAKOVFrom a portrait by Repin
In the end Oxana declares she will only accept Vakoula on condition that he presents her with a pair of the Empress’s shoes. TheSmith departs upon this unpromising errand. Thanks to his Cossack friends he finds his way into the palace. During the festivities of the evening, the Cossacks are called upon to perform their national dances in order to amuse the Court. The Empress, in high good humour, is informed of Vakoula’s quest, and good-naturedly gives him her shoes. He returns in triumph to his native village and marries his capricious beauty.
Although Rimsky-Korsakov had apparently abandoned the original operatic theories of the new school, Dargomijsky’s methods must still have exercised some attraction for him, for in 1897 he set Poushkin’s dramatic duologueMozart and Salieriwithout making the least change in the text, and dedicated it to the memory of the composer ofThe Stone Guest. Its production by the Private Opera Company at Moscow, in 1898, was memorable for a wonderful interpretation by Shaliapin of the part of Salieri. Mozart (tenor) was sung by Shkafer, the conductor being Esposito. The same artists sang in the work when it was given in St. Petersburg in the following year. InMozart and Salieri, which is not called an opera but merely a dramatic scene, we have melodic recitative without any relapse into cantilena. The declamation of the two musical heroes is relieved and embellished by apt commentsheard in the accompaniments. For instance, when Salieri speaks of a “simple scale,” a scale is heard in the orchestra; when he mentions an organ, a pedal point is introduced into the accompaniment. This sounds extremely naïve, but in reality this miniature music-drama is remarkably clever as regards craftsmanship and musical repartee. The style of the work is completely in keeping with the period—the eighteenth century—and excellent imitations of Mozart’s style occur when the master sits down to the piano and plays two tiny movements,allegretto sempliceandgrave.
Rimsky-Korsakov wrote one more work in a similar style toMozart and Salieri, the Dramatic Prologue in one actBoyarinya Vera Sheloga, which was really intended to precedeThe Maid of Pskovand elucidate the history of Olga, the heroine of that opera. The little work was first performed in this way by the Private Opera Company at Moscow in 1898. It tells in fuller detail the story of the two sisters Vera and Nadejda Nassonov, to which Prince Tokmakov refers in his conversation with Matouta in the first act ofThe Maid of Pskov, and introduces the Boyard Ivan Sheloga and Vlassievna, the faithful nurse of the orphaned Olga. The work contains a charming lullaby sung by Vera to her little daughter. This number is publishedapart from the Prologue and has become extremely popular with amateur singers.
Sadko, A Legendary Opera(Opera-bylina), in seven tableaux, composed between 1895-1896, is a compromise between lyrical and declamatory opera so skilfully effected that this work has come to be regarded as the perfect fruit of Rimsky-Korsakov’s maturity, and the most complete exposition of his artistic creed. The work was produced by the Private Opera Company at Moscow in December, 1897, and introduced to St. Petersburg by the same company in the following year.
Sekar-Rojansky, a young tenor possessed of a beautiful fresh voice, created the title rôle. The work was received with extraordinary enthusiasm, and shortly afterwards the Directorate of the Imperial Operas, who had at first refused to consider it, took up the opera and staged it with great magnificence. A. M. Vaznietsov, brother of the artist who painted the frescoes of the cathedral of Kiev, was sent to Old Novgorod and other parts of northern Russia to make sketches for the scenery. The archæological details and the landscapes on the margin of Lake Ilmen were faithfully reproduced. The first performance took place at the Maryinsky Theatre in January, 1901, under Napravnik’s direction; on this occasion Davidov impersonated the hero.
At the outset of his career, Rimsky-Korsakov was attracted by this legend of the eleventh century belonging to the Cycle of Novgorod. Sadko is a poor but adventurous minstrel, often referred to in the folk-songs as “the nightingale of Novgorod.” He does not win his renown by chivalrous actions and prowess in the field, like Ilya Mouramets and the heroes of the Cycle of Kiev. The Novgorodians were an energetic but commercial race. Sadko, driven to desperation by poverty, lays a wager against the rich merchants of Novgorod that he will catch gold-fish in Lake Ilmen. The merchants stake their goods, the minstrel all he has—a far more valuable asset—“his dare-devil head,” as the legends say. How Sadko charms the Sea King by his singing and playing upon thegusslee, how he secures the gold-fish and, with them, all the wealth of Novgorod, is told in the ballad of Nejata, the young minstrel. After a while Sadko grows restless in spite of his good fortune. He sets sail with his fleet of merchant vessels in search of fresh adventures. The ships are overtaken by a tempest, and it becomes necessary to propitiate the wrath of the Sea King. Lots are cast, and the unlucky one invariably falls to Sadko. It is characteristic of the astute merchant-hero that he cheats in every possible way in order to avert his doom! Finally, he is cast overboard and drifts awayupon a plank, clinging to his cherishedgusslee: a pagan Jonah; a Slavonic Arion. His adventures at the bottom of the seas; the Sea King’s welcome to his virtuoso-guest; his efforts to marry Sadko to one of his daughters; the procession of these beautiful sea-maidens—some three hundred in number—demanding of Sadko a judgment far more difficult and delicate than anything Paris was called upon to pronounce; the cleverness with which Sadko extricates himself from the difficult situation, by selecting the only plain lady of the party, so that there is no risk of permanently falling in love with her and forgetting his wife in Novgorod; the wild glee of the Sea King at the playing of the famous minstrel, and his dance, which imperils the earth and can only be stopped by the shattering of the preciousgusslee; Sadko’s return to his faithful and anxious wife—all these incidents are set forth in the opera with a Wagnerian luxury of stage accessories and scenic effects.
As regards structure,Sadkocombines—as I have said—the lyrical and declamatory elements. It is pre-eminently a national opera in which the composer has conveyed a truthful picture of the customs and sentiments of an archaic period. InSadkowe find many melodies completely modal in character. The Sea Queen’s slumber song in the seventh scene is Dorian,Sadko’s aria in the fifth scene is Phrygian, and so on. The song of Nejata has an accompaniment for harps and pianino which gives the effect of thegusslee.
Besides the national element, Rimsky-Korsakov introduces characteristic songs of other countries. In the scene in which Sadko generously restores to the merchants the goods won from them in his wager, keeping only a fleet of merchant vessels for himself, he requests some of the foreign traders to sing the songs of their distant lands. The Varangian guest sings a song in a brisk, energetic rhythm, quite Scandinavian in character; the Venetian complies with a graceful barcarolle, while the Indian merchant charms the audience with an Oriental melody of rare beauty. The musical interest ofSadkois in fact very great.
If there is any truth in the suggestion that Rimsky-Korsakov composedMozart and Salieriand dedicated it to Dargomijsky as a kind of recantation of certain Wagnerian methods, such as a limited use ofleitmotifsto which he had had recourse inSadko, then his return to the purely lyrical style in his ninth opera,The Tsar’s Bride(Tsarsky Nievesta), may equally have been a kind of apology to the memory of Glinka. But it seems far more probable that he worked independently of all such ideas and suited the musical style to thesubject of the opera.The Tsar’s Bride, in three acts, was produced by the Private Opera Company at Moscow in 1899, Ippolitov-Ivanov being the conductor. From Moscow it travelled first to the provinces, and reached St. Petersburg in the spring of 1900. As it is perhaps the most popular of all Rimsky-Korsakov’s operas, and one that is likely to find its way abroad, it is advisable to give some account of the plot. It is based on one of Mey’s dramas, the subject of which had temporarily attracted Borodin some twenty years earlier. The Oprichnik Gryaznoy falls madly in love with Martha, the beautiful daughter of a merchant of Novgorod named Sobakin; but she is betrothed to the Boyard Lykov. Gryaznoy vows she shall never marry another, and procures from Bomely, court-physician to Ivan the Terrible, a magic potion which is to help his cause. His former mistress Lioubasha overhears the conversation between the Oprichnik and Bomely. She makes a desperate effort to win Gryaznoy back to her, but in vain. In the second act the people are coming away from vespers and talking about the Tsar’s choice of a bride. Martha, with two companions, comes out of the church. While she is standing alone, two men emerge from the shadow of the houses, one of whom is Ivan the Terrible in disguise. He gazes intently at Martha and then goes hisway, leaving her vaguely terrified. Meanwhile Lioubasha has been watching Martha from a window. Then she in her turn goes to Bomely and asks him for some potion that will injure her rival. He replies that he will give her what she requires, but the price of it will be a kiss from her lips. Reluctantly she consents. In the third act, Lykov and Gryaznoy are seated at table with the merchant Sobakin, who has just informed them that the wedding of Lykov and Martha must be postponed. Lykov asks Gryaznoy what he would do in his place if by any chance the Tsar’s choice should fall upon Martha. The Oprichnik gives an evasive answer. Meanwhile, in one of the cups of mead poured out by the host, he drops his magic potion, and when Martha joins them at table he offers it to her to drink. Suddenly the maidservant rushes in with the news that a deputation of boyards has arrived, and a moment later Maliouta enters to announce that the Tsar has chosen Martha to be his bride. In the final scene, which takes place in an apartment in the Tsar’s palace, Sobakin is seen bewailing his daughter’s illness. Gryaznoy enters with an order from Ivan to inquire after her health. The Oprichnik believes that her illness is caused by the potion he administered. Presently Maliouta with the rest of the Oprichniki come upon the scene. Gryaznoy informs Marthathat her former suitor Lykov, having confessed to the fiendish design of poisoning her, has been executed by order of the Tsar. Martha gives a cry and becomes unconscious. When she comes to herself her mind is affected, and she mistakes Gryaznoy for her lover Lykov, calling him “Ivan” and speaking caressingly to him. Gryaznoy now sees that his plot for getting rid of Lykov has been a failure. Touched by Martha’s madness he is prepared to give himself up to Maliouta for judgment; but the latter gives him an opportunity of inquiring into the deception played upon him by Bomely. Lioubasha now comes forward and confesses that she changed the potion. Gryaznoy stabs her and then imploring Martha’s forgiveness, quits the scene, while the poor mad girl, still mistaking him for her lost lover, cries after him “Come back to-morrow, my Ivan.”
The music ofThe Tsar’s Brideis melodious; and the orchestration, though simpler than is generally the case with Rimsky-Korsakov, is not lacking in variety and colour. Though by no means the strongest of his operas, it seems to exercise a great attraction for the public; possibly because its nationalism is less strenuously demonstrated than in some of its predecessors.
The Legend of Tsar Saltan, of his Son the famous and doughty Warrior, Prince GvidonSaltanovich, and of the beautiful Tsarevna Liebed(the Swan-queen), an opera in four acts with a Prologue, the libretto drawn from Poushkin’s poem of the same title, was produced by the Private Opera Company in Moscow in December 1906. Previously to the first performance of the work, an orchestral suite consisting of three of the entr’actes was played in St. Petersburg at one of the concerts of the I. R. M. S. The work follows the model ofSadkorather than that of purely lyrical operas. Here Rimsky-Korsakov makes a more extended and systematic use of theleitmotif. The leading characters, Saltan, Militrissa, Tsarevna Liebed and the Sea Rovers, have their characteristic themes, but a number of minor motives are used in connection with particular sentiments and even to represent various natural objects. The story, which is too long to give in all its details, deals with the adventures of Tsar Saltan and the Three Sisters; the two elders—recalling the story of Cinderella—are jealous of the youngest Militrissa who marries the Tsar’s son, and during Saltan’s absence from home they revenge themselves upon her by sending a false message announcing that she has borne her husband a daughter instead of a son. The tale offers a strange mixture of the fantastic and the realistic. The opera is remarkable for its fine orchestral numbers and the novelty andbrilliancy of its instrumentation, and for the free use of folk melodies.[49]
In his eleventh opera,Servilia, Rimsky-Korsakov makes one of his rare excursions in search of a subject outside Russian folk-lore or history. The libretto is based upon a drama by his favourite author Mey, but the scene of the plot is laid in Rome. InServiliaRimsky-Korsakov returns once more to the declamatory style, as exemplified inMozart and Salieri, without, however, entirely abandoning the use of theleitmotif. The first performance of the work took place at the Maryinsky Theatre in the autumn of 1902. Servilia’s passionate love for the Tribune Valerius Rusticus, from which she suddenly turns on her conversion to Christianity in the last act of the opera, offers considerable opportunities for psychological delineation. But “the inward strife between her pagan passion and ascetic instincts,” says Cheshikin, “is not enacted on the stage; it takes place chiefly behind the scenes and thespectator is shown only the result.” It is not surprising that the success of the opera does not lie in the delineation of the heroine but in certain interesting details, and especially in the skilful use of local colour. The Hymn to Athena in the first act; the Anacreontic song for Montanus in the second act (in the Mixolydian), with its characteristic figures of accompaniment for flute; the Dance of the Mænads; and a graceful Spinning-song for female voices in the third act, are the most successful numbers in the work. On the whole,Serviliais regarded by Russian critics as a retrograde step afterSadkoandTsar Saltan.
Kastchei the Immortalis described as “a legend of the autumn” in one act and three scenes, with uninterrupted music throughout. The sketch of the libretto was given to the composer by E. M. Petrovsky and is a free adaptation of a very old fairy tale. The opera was produced by the Private Opera Company in Moscow in 1902, and aroused a good deal of comment in consequence of several new procedures on the part of the composer, revealing a more decisive tendency to follow in the steps of Wagner. The charge of imitation is based upon the use ofleitmotifsand also upon the content of the libretto, in which, as in many of Wagner’s operas, the idea of redemption plays a prominent part. Kastcheievna, the daughter of the wickedwizard Kastchei, is redeemed by intense suffering from her own jealous fury, when she lets fall a tear, in the crystal sphere of which Kastchei has enclosed his own fate. But Rimsky-Korsakov does not give us merely an internal drama in the Wagnerian sense, for we see enacted upon the stage the wholly external drama of the rescue of the unhappy Tsarevna, spell-bound by the evil Kastchei, at the hands of Ivan Korolevich. The opera ends with the downfall of the barriers which shut out the gloomy, autumnal, sin-oppressed kingdom of Kastchei from the happier world outside. “This symbolism,” says Cheshikin, “may be taken in its widest acceptation; but in anything which is freed from a despotic power, our public is prepared to see a social tendency which is to their taste and they applaud it with satisfaction.”Kastcheichanced to be the opera which was represented in St. Petersburg (in March, 1905) at the moment when Rimsky-Korsakov was expelled from his professorship at the Conservatoire in consequence of his frank criticisms of the existing bureaucracy, and each representation was made the occasion of an ovation in his honour. The opera contains many fine moments, such as the fierce chorus—a kind oftrepak—sung by the snow-spirits at the close of the first act; the two contrasting love-duets, one which Ivan Korolevich sings withKastcheievna, and a later one in which the Tsarevna takes part, in the third act; and the sinister slumber-song which the unhappy Tsarevna is forced to sing for Kastchei, while wishing that his sleep was the sleep of death, is distinguished for its marked originality. As regards harmony, Rimsky-Korsakov inKastcheiindulges in a good deal that is piquant and unusual; there is much chromaticism in the fantastic scenes and a general tendency to what one critic describes as “studied cacophany,” which is unusual in the work of this composer.Kastcheistands out as one of the most Wagnerian among Russian operas.
Pan Voyevodewas completed in 1903, and produced by the Private Opera Company in St. Petersburg in October, 1904. The scene of the libretto is laid in Poland about the beginning of the seventeenth century, and the story concerns the love affairs of Chaplinsky, a young nobleman, and Maria, a poor orphan girl of good family. While out hunting, Pan Voyevode—governor of the district—sees Maria and loses his heart to her. At his command the lovers are separated by force, and the Voyevode declares his intention of marrying Maria. Yadviga, a rich widow, who has claims upon the Voyevode, determines to prevent the marriage at any cost. She takes counsel with a sorcerer, from whom she procures poison. The preparationsfor the wedding are all made, and the Voyevode is entertaining his friends at a banquet, when Yadviga appears, an uninvited guest, to warn him that Chaplinsky and his friends are coming to effect the rescue of Maria. At the banquet Maria sings the “Song of the Swan,” but its yearning sadness oppresses the Voyevode and his guests. Suddenly the injured lover bursts into the hall with his followers and a wild scuffle ensues. In the last act, Chaplinsky having been taken prisoner and condemned to death, the interrupted festival recommences. In the meantime Yadviga has poured poison into Maria’s goblet. Needless to say that in the end the cups get changed and it is the Voyevode who drinks the fatal potion. Maria, after a prayer by his dead body, orders the release of Chaplinsky and all ends happily.
Pan Voyevodegives occasion for a whole series of Polish dances, a Krakoviak, a Kazachok, or Cossack dance, a Polonaise, and a Mazurka. The incantation scene, when Yadviga seeks the sorcerer, and the Song of the Swan are favourite numbers in the work.Pan Voyevodewas produced in Moscow in 1905 under the conductorship of Rachmaninov.