Bantock is a man of quite another kidney. The son of a London doctor, he has always exerted himself for the benefit of his fellow countrymen. In his younger days as conductor of the New Brighton Orchestra he devoted himself largely to the performance of English music. The present writer, among many others, has to acknowledge that his first chance was offered him by Bantock. At the present time he wields great influence as head of the Midland School of Music at Birmingham. Bantock's work is characterized by fluent expression and vivid coloring. His early experiences have given him an almost uncanny touch in the orchestra. Perhaps no one knows better than he how to 'score heavily' by 'scoring lightly.' In his choice of subjects he leans somewhat toward the exotic and oriental. From his long list of compositions it is only possible to select the orchestral works 'Sappho,' the 'Pierrot of the Minute,' 'The Witch of Atlas,' 'Fifine at the Fair'; and his vocal-and-orchestral works 'Omar Khayyám,' 'The Fire Worshippers,' the six sets of 'Songs of the East,' and the nine 'Sappho' fragments.
Hamish MacCunn (b. 1868) and Edward German (b. 1868),[79]the one a Scot and the other a Welshman, are both more particularly identified with the theatre. MacCunn's early orchestral poems, such as 'The Land of the Mountain and the Flood' and 'The Ship o' the Fiend,' at once brought him wide recognition. Their fine poetical qualities are well known. A large portion of his time, however, has been devoted to operatic conducting and composition. In the latter field he has to his credit such works as 'Jennie Deans' and 'Diarmid.' But, though MacCunn is known to all as an able, brilliant musician, he has had to pay the penalty of hisassociation with that musical Cinderella, English Opera.
German, on the other hand, though never aiming at the sun, has once or twice hit a star. He succeeded Sullivan at the Savoy and made successes with 'The Emerald Isle,' 'Merrie England,' 'A Princess of Kensington,' and elsewhere with 'Tom Jones.' His incidental music to 'Henry VIII' and 'Nell Gwyn' has been liked into dislike. But German has done a great deal more than this. No account of him would be complete that did not mention his 'Welsh Rhapsody,' his 'Rhapsody on March Themes,' his 'Gypsy Suite,' and his 'Overture to Richard III.'
There is no denying the power, the wide ability, or the technical resource of Ethel Mary Smyth. Judged by her music alone one would say that she was only thenom de guerreof a strong masculine personality saturated with Teutonism. This, however, is only a pleasing fancy. As a fact, the terrific earnestness of her music could never have come from the brain of a mere man. Opera is her stronghold, and her greatest victory therein a fine Cornish drama, 'The Wreckers.'
Neither Walford Davies nor Charles Wood has produced music in great quantity. Both have led somewhat secluded lives; the one as organist of The Temple, and the other as a Cambridge don.
Davies is a man of fastidious taste, a first-class organist and contrapuntist, and a profound student of Bach, Browning, and The Bible. It is said that his coy muse sometimes furls her pinions at the approach of a too red-blooded humanity. However that may be, she has inspired him with at least one subtle and delicately beautiful work, 'Everyman.'
Charles Wood is an Irishman from Armagh, a fine scholarly musician and probably the best all-round theorist in the country. He has a strong interest in the folk-song of his native land and has written a set oforchestral variations on the tune, 'Patrick Sarsfield.' One of his best things is his string quartet in A minor. In the realm of choral music his 'Ballad of Dundee' may be selected for mention. He has at any rate one great song to his credit—'Ethiopia saluting the colors.'
Arthur Hinton's (b. 1869) work, which is appreciated on both sides of the Atlantic, includes some elaborate pianoforte music, a two-act opera, 'Tamara,' a couple of symphonies, the orchestral suite 'Endymion,' and a good deal of chamber music. His compositions are characteristic of the group to which he belongs. A certain delight in clean, finished workmanship and an incisiveness of expression are their main features.
Arthur Somervell has been throughout his life one of the standard-bearers of the English revival. And he has kept the banner flying both by his enthusiasm for folk-music and by his own compositions. His graceful, refined songs are sung and liked everywhere. Of these perhaps the best known is his cycle from Tennyson's 'Maud.' Among his larger works one may mention his 'Normandy' variations for pianoforte and orchestra and his recent symphony 'Thalassa.' For some years past Somervell has been the official mainspring which keeps the clock of elementary musical education ticking.
One of the most admirable features of the later phases in the English musical renaissance is the quickened and deepened interest shown both in English musical history and in the general topic of musical æsthetics. For the first time since the days of Hawkins and Burney investigators have begun an elaborate search in college, cathedral, and secular libraries. The existence of a vast store of madrigals, of church and instrumental music was scarcely suspected even by professional musicians; and the treasure when unearthed came as a revelation to musical England.
In the field of musical æsthetics there has been anequally remarkable activity. And it is noteworthy that a number of men who have devoted their lives to purely musical composition have also produced elaborate studies either of the technique, the history, or the psychology of their art. Of these we may name six: Wallace, McEwen, Walker, Tovey, Macpherson, and Buck.
William Wallace is, like MacCunn, a Scot from Greenock. His mental growth had its roots in the stiff classical sub-soil of a public school, and then pushed its way up through the rocks of a university medical course till it flowered in the sweet open air of the R.A.M. composition class. Hence his mind, which almost needs the threefold pormanteau-word 'musiterific' to describe it. Wallace was the first Englishman to write a symphonic poem, and he has made this form something of a specialty. The best known of his six are 'The Passing of Beatrice' and 'Villon.' Of these the latter has been played everywhere, and the present writer has had to satisfy more than one puzzled American enquirer as to how the author of 'Maritana'[80]could possibly have written it! Some of Wallace's songs, for instance 'Son o' Mine,' have acquired a popularity in England almost too great for public comfort. In the field of literature he has produced two remarkable studies in the development of the musical sense—'The Threshold of Music' and 'The Musical Faculty.'
John Blackwood McEwen is, like Wallace, a Scotsman. Furthermore he has the same mental and physical homes—Glasgow University, the R.A.M., and London. He has produced much symphonic and chamber music all characterized by a severe self-criticism, impeccable workmanship, and at times a certain Scottish exaltation. His quartets in A minor and C minor are excellent. Of his symphonic poems the border ballad 'Grey Galloway' can hold up its head in any company. He is an untiring enquirer into musical fundamentalsand, of his five published volumes, the most valuable is 'The Thought in Music.'
Both Ernest Walker and Donald Francis Tovey are university men. The former, who is organist of Balliol College, Oxford, has been much applauded for his songs and chamber music. He has also rendered great and lasting service by his admirable 'History of Music in England.'
Tovey—the distinguished occupant of the Reid Chair of Music in Edinburgh—is a sort of musical Francis Bacon. Few of the English tales as to his learning and memory would be believed if printed in America. The most credible is that he is able to play the sketch-books of Beethoven by heart. His pamphlets of severely analytical criticism have, in a way, set a new standard in this kind; while his work in connection with the eleventh edition of the 'Encyclopædia Britannica' has had the happiest results. Though a very able theorist and historian, Tovey is by no means that alone. He has written a good deal of chamber music, a concerto for pianoforte and orchestra and, one hears, an opera. It is difficult to place these works. Some of the older musicians have hailed them as greatly instinct with the spirit of Mozart, Beethoven, and Brahms, while some of the younger men have catalogued them rather as compilations from those three masters. The composer's own views, throwing a terrific weight onto his isolated notes and phrases, seem to make of music a burden almost too heavy to bear. However this may be, it is quite certain that Tovey has not yet shot his last bolt.
With Stewart Macpherson and Percy C. Buck we may close this list of composer-authors. The former, in addition to a considerable amount of published music, has printed ten volumes, mostly on the technique of composition: the latter, besides his music, has written two valuable works—'The Organ' and 'The First Year at the Organ.' Naturally the greater part of theliterary work in connection with this movement has been done by scholars who are not themselves composers. Most of these men have been in close touch with the leaders of the renaissance; but, even when their work has been purely archæological, it has, so to speak, cleft the rock and released a fountain of inspiration for their creative brethren.
Henry Davey's 'History of English Music' is a pioneer work embodying the results of long and patient research. Its combative determination to claim honor for the honorable is beyond praise. A similar work, less scholarly but equally patriotic, is Ernest Ford's 'Short History of Music in England.' Barclay Squire (of the British Museum), has, with his brother-in-law J. A. Fuller Maitland, done much to revive the national pride in Purcell and to spread an accurate knowledge of the earlier Elizabethan and Jacobean composers. Fuller Maitland himself, apart from his claims as editor of 'Grove' (2d ed.) and as a contributor to the 'Oxford History of Music,' always used his distinguished position atThe Timesto further the best interests of English music. To this list we may add the names of three other scholar-musicians all associated with the 'Oxford History of Music': W. H. Hadow, the brilliant editor of the work and at present principal of the Armstrong College; H. E. Wooldridge; and (the late) Edward Dannreuther, whose life-span stretched from personal contact with Richard Wagner to patient and sympathetic intercourse with the youngest school of English musicians.
In the special field of instrumental construction and development we have Rev. F. W. Galpin, with his scholarly and delightful volume 'Old English Instruments of Music,' and Kathleen Schlesinger. Of Miss Schlesinger's painstaking and accurate scholarship her country has by no means made the acknowledgment it deserves.
In the realm of more general musical æsthetics andcriticism many names might be mentioned. We must content ourselves with those of Ernest Newman, whose profound works on 'Gluck' and 'Wagner' are discussed everywhere, and E. J. Dent, who has studied certain phases of Mozart's work and has published a classical volume on 'Scarlatti.'
Though it is somewhat outside our special topic, some reference must be made here to the English researches into Greek music. For the first time since the Germans began to inspissate the gloom, a ray or two of light has been allowed to fall upon this difficult subject. In particular D. B. Monro, with his volume 'The Modes of Ancient Greek Music,' has shown that it is not an essential of this study that the reader should always have the sensation of swimming in glue. Since his day Cecil Torr has published a clever work on the same topic; while H. S. Macran and Abdy Williams have both written on Aristoxenus.
This concludes the list of original writers, but, before leaving the subject, a word must be spared for the vast improvement that has appeared during the past few years in the translation of foreign musical texts into English. The value of the work of such men as Claude Aveling, Frederick Jameson, and Paul England can only be appreciated by a comparison of their translations with those of their predecessors. One may add that there is now a persistent cry in the London press for fine English finely sung, and this demand—though not always gratified—is kept before the public by such patriotic critics as Robin Legge, Edwin Evans, and Henry Cope Colles.
Finally, before passing on to the third group, we may here conveniently place together the small band of theatrical composers who have succeeded Sullivan. Musical comedy and the money that comes from writing it are the very sour grapes of the average English symphonist. One and all they applaud what they call 'genuinecomic opera' (meaning Offenbach or anyone else that isoldanddead), but decry its much brighter, cleaner, and more musical descendant. The ludicrous snobbery of English life draws a wide black line between the two classes of composer; and the stupidest Mus. Doc. that ever drowned a choir would probably rather have his daughter run off with the butler than marry a musical comedy composer. Nine times out of ten the theatrical man's revenge is that it is he and not the Mus. Doc. that has the butler. For, even under present conditions, the theatre alone in England offers a composer-conductor the chance of an honorable livelihood.
During Sullivan's lifetime he and Gilbertwerecomic opera; and, though the Savoy cap was tried on such diversely shaped heads as A. C. Mackenzie, Ernest Ford, Edward Soloman, and J. M. Barrie, it never really fitted any of them. Cellier alone—brother of Sullivan's conductor—made a success (elsewhere) with his charming work, 'Dorothy.' We have already mentioned that, after Sir Arthur's death, German completed his unfinished opera, 'The Emerald Isle,' and continued to employ his easy brilliant talents in that field. A later attempt to run a miniature grand opera, written by an Italian (Franco Leoni) but sung in English, was defeated by the two gods of fog, musical and meteorological.
Toward the end of the century theatre-land began to shift westward and northward into the Piccadilly Circus and Shaftesbury Avenue district. The new form of entertainment came into its own, and—if one may quote the words of an eminent Russian violinist—'Musical comedy at Daly's became the top-thing.' Of the men who have been providing the music for the London theatres we may mention four—Jones, Monckton, Talbot, and Rubens.
Sidney Jones's music has been played all the worldover. In 'The Geisha,' 'San Toy,' and many other works he has had the opportunity of exercising his delicate taste and his really very musical mind. He has written more than one extended finale that is a comic opera masterpiece; while the alternate sparkle and quaint tenderness of his melodies are quite irresistible.
Of recent years Lionel Monckton has had the biggest finger in the musical comedy pie. And deservedly so. He owes his present distinguished position mainly to his inexhaustible fund of original melody. Many of these tunes are, in their way, perfect. Their special excellence is lightness, vigor, rhythmic variety and constructional power. If the present writer were subpœnaed before the Court of the Muses to give evidence as to the best tunes made in the past fifteen years he would testify, among others, for Monckton. The Folk-Song Society of 2500 will probably explain him as a solar-myth.
Howard Talbot[81]and Paul Rubens may be bracketed together. The former, though a New Yorker born, has lived his musical life in London. And his charming talent is shown in the many works of which he is either whole-or part-author. Of these the most popular are perhaps 'A Chinese Honeymoon,' 'The Arcadians,' and 'The Mousmé.' Rubens may be specially noticed for his Sullivanesque power of associating his music intimately with his literary text. Not that his music has anything in common with Sullivan's. But the special faculty of making the two things appear one is common to both composers. Rubens nearly always writes his own lyrics and thus, in a delightful manner, revives and vindicates the theory and practice of Greek poetic composition.
With the turn of the century the folk-song movement had sunk deep into the English mind, where it still rests as an anchor for many of their hopes. Accordinglyin this period we find men, like Vaughan Williams, who either base their music entirely on actual folk-song or invent tunes in close spiritual alliance with its ideals. In either case the result is a genuine development of folk-music. On the technical side this group is marked by a much more decided tendency to refuse the highly organized German technique as necessary to its salvation. This again is largely due to an open-minded reconsideration of musical æsthetics, forced upon composers by the special harmonic and melodic features of folk-song. The matter is too large for discussion here; but it is satisfactory to note that more than one Englishman who passed through his student-days with the reputation of a wrong-headed jackass has been able to base his honor on his alleged stupidities.
During recent years there is some change to be noted in the material side of English musical conditions. Apparently there is less love for the oratorio; and therefore less scope for writing it. This symptom of musical life is common to America and England. It is easy to diagnose the reasons. In England they are two: first, on the part of the audience, the dislike of prolonged boredom; and, second, on the part of the composer, an indignant hatred of the organized corruption associated with choral music. The latter point cannot be dealt with here, though it is a common theme of talk among English composers. The musician's compensation is to be found in the extraordinary system of 'choral competitions' and 'festivals' which now honeycomb England with their sweetness. These, beginning with Miss Wakefield's celebrated gathering in Cumberland, have spread all over the country and now offer composers large opportunities for the performance of part-songs and the smaller sort of choral works. The best and highest aims of these English festivals are summarized for Americans in the 'Norfolk Festival' of the LitchfieldCounty Choral Union founded by Mr. and Mrs. Stoeckel to honor the memory of Robbins Battell.
On the side of actual orchestral opportunity the English composer of to-day is undoubtedly more favored than his American brother. There are more orchestras there; and they are more ready to do native works. The conditions are not perfect by any means, but they are better there than here. As far as the publication of serious music goes the English composer's position is hopelessly bad. He has to contend against ignorance, apathy, and a short-sighted financial timidity far beyond American credence. In addition to that he often has to fight hard against his own seniors who—themselves comfortably off—deny that music, when written, has any commercial existence. A certain London firm, in order to encourage its poorer and younger clientèle to take example thereby, continually cites the readiness of one of its older wealthy composers to take $25 for a choral work. Words can go no further.
It is unnecessary to specify the names of the great English publishing houses which have associated themselves with the English revival. Suffice it to say that they have always been at hand, ready to lighten the burden and the pocket of the composer. But it would not be fair to ignore the firm of Stainer and Bell, which was founded—under a directorate of distinguished musicians—with the prime object of dealing honorably with the composer. The existence of this firm is, in its way, a landmark; or rather a lighthouse for composers who have long had to beat up in the straits of chicanery and dishonesty. Nor must we omit to mention the present extended activity of the Society of Authors. Though founded by Sir Walter Besant some fifty years ago for the special protection of literary men, it has recently formed a sub-committee of composers under the chairmanship of Sir Charles V. Stanford. It is now known as The Society of Authors, Playwrights,and Composers and, among the last-named workers, has already done valuable service.
The number of composers who might be mentioned in this group is, of course, very large. Now that music has almost risen to the level of golf and horse-racing as a national pastime, it employs the brains of many. The list, we fear, must be ruthlessly pruned. But it will be pruned so as to leave the more prominent branches and even some of the buds visible to the American reader. Of his charity he may be asked to surmise what the author well knows, that some young Englishmen of great original powers are forced by circumstance to spend their days in teaching little girls the fiddle, while others who scarcely condescend below grand opera might just as well be employed on some wholly uninspired task—such as the writing of these pages.
Ralph Vaughan Williams—though he is the most characteristically English of this group—is a Welshman. Large both in body and mind, he has always kept before himself and his fellows a singularly noble ideal. It may safely be said of him that he has never trimmed his course even half a point from what he considered his duty. The music that comes from this simple and courageous mind is naturally of the most earnest—perhaps a little awkward at times, but always deeply sincere. His aims and his outlook are peculiarly national. Let us try to exemplify this. To a fresh-water people like the Americans the attempts of Rubinstein, Wagner, and others to illustrate 'the sea' in music may not appear particularly unsuccessful: to a sea-loving race like the English they are simply puny and ridiculous. Williams has taken this subject, and, in his choral 'Sea Symphony' (words by Walt Whitman), has actually caught up the sounds of the sea as the English hear them. This is a new and a great achievement. Again in his 'London' symphony he has somehow managed to express in sound a thing not hithertoexpressed—the poetry both tragic and comic which dwells in that most wonderful of all towns. In Williams's larger works there is always, quite apart from their actual length, something vast, shadowy, and almost primeval. His landscape is always bathed in a pearly, translucent haze. The subjects loom up and disappear with a suddenness natural in England but unnatural elsewhere. It is as if a Turner canvas had been translated into sound. Of Williams's other works, many of which are directly inspired by the folk-music of which he is an ardent collector, one may mention the orchestral 'Norfolk Rhapsodies,' 'In the Fen Country,' 'Harnham Down,' and 'Boldrewood'; the 'Five Mystical Songs' for baritone, chorus, and orchestra; the beautiful cantata 'Willow-wood' for baritone, female chorus, and orchestra; the six songs, 'On Wenlock Edge,' for tenor voice, string quartet, and pianoforte; and, last, his music to 'The Wasps.'
Samuel Coleridge-Taylor (1875-1912) and William Young Hurlstone (1876-1906) both died while still young. The one was an African, the other a pure Englishman. Both died leaving an example to their friends of modesty and cultured simplicity. As far as technique went they could probably have both given Vaughan Williams ninety yards start in a hundred and beaten him. But, in any more serious race, the handicap would probably have had to be reversed. Their sailing-orders as students were perhaps merely to keep the ship's head on Beethoven and Brahms. But, in the case of Taylor, the powerful lode-stone of Dvořák's genius spoilt the compass-readings and drew his ship nearer and nearer to 'the coast of Bohemia.' Of his work the best-known by far is his 'Hiawatha,' the first performance of which at the R.C.M. was heard by at least three members of the first group of composers—Sullivan, Stanford, and Parry. After 'Hiawatha' may be mentioned his cantata 'A Tale of OldJapan,' his 'Bamboula Rhapsodic Dance' (written for Norfolk, Conn.), and his violin 'Ballade' and 'Concerto.' In Hurlstone's case a constant physical weakness prevented the true development of his really great musical powers. The best of his refined work is found in his sonatas, trios, and quartets. Most of these have been or are now being published in London.
Joseph Holbrooke (b. 1878) is from the land of Cockaigne. His purposeful character and his invincible habit of saying in public what most composers only think in private have made him theenfant terribleof London musical life. In output, energy, and material-command he is probably unsurpassed by any living composer. A strong, blistering style and a constant determination to call his 16-inch guns into action have procured for him many (musical) enemies. He is blessed with a great sense of humor and a very complete knowledge of the way to express it in music. His orchestral variations on 'Three Blind Mice' should be played everywhere. Holbrooke has enjoyed very exceptional opportunities in the way of dramatic performance and full-score publication. This is not to be regretted; especially when one considers the usual disadvantages of the English composer under these two heads. He has written a large quantity of songs and chamber music—some of it for the most curious combinations.[82]Among his larger works one may select his operas 'The Children of Don' and 'Dylan'; his 'Queen Mab' and 'The Bells'; and his 'illuminated' choral symphony 'Apollo and the Seaman.'
Percy Grainger (b. 1883)—pianist, composer, arranger, friend of Grieg, etc.—comes from Australia; and, if that country had not produced him, the concert-agents of the world would have had to invent him. His playing is wonderful. He never writes a dull note,and he ranges from the Faroe Islands to the Antipodes. He crosses no sea but as a conqueror. Folk-song is his battleship and quaint diatonic harmony his submarine. 'Molly on the Shore,' 'Father and Daughter,' 'Mock Morris,' 'Händel in the Strand,' and 'I'm Seventeen Come Sunday' all attest the 'certain liveliness' of his very happy gifts. He has been applauded by thousands and sketched by Sargent. What he will do next nobody knows—but it is sure to be successful.
Cyril Scott[83]was born, apparently, in the 'Yellow Book.' His slim Beardsleyesque nature seems to be always moving through an elegant exotic shadow-world, beckoned on by his own craving yet fastidious mind. At Pagani's he sits mysteriously in a black stock and cameo. A strange personality, distinguished and uneasy! Certain crippling theories of rhythm and development have at times bent the flight of his muse. His 'Aubade,' Pianoforte Concerto, and Ballad for baritone and orchestra, 'Helen of Kirkconnell,' are notable.
Gustav von Holst[84]for all his name, is English born and bred. Skegness gave him to the world: he has all the energy and tenacity of the east-coast man. The main features of his music are an extremely modern and comprehensive method of handling his subjects, great warmth and variety of orchestral color, and (occasionally it must be confessed) excessive length. His successes have been striking and well deserved. Among his best-known productions are his Moorish work 'In the Street of the Ouled Nails,'[85]his orchestral suites 'Phantastes,' and 'de Ballet,' and (more particularly) his elaborate vocal and orchestral works, such as 'The Cloud Messenger' and 'The Mystic Trumpeter.' A large part of von Holst's time has been given to the composition of Hindu opera on a vast scale; and, as we havealready hinted, composers who take up opera in England have to pay penalties. Among others who have been mulcted in this way are Nicholas Gatty (with three operas, 'Greysteel,' 'Duke or Devil,' and 'The Tempest'); Rutland Boughton (with his scheme of open-air choral drama on the Arthurian legends); J. E. Barkworth (with 'Romeo and Juliet' set directly to Shakespeare's text); George Clutsam, Colin McAlpin, and Alec Maclean.
Norman O'Neill and Balfour Gardiner may be honorably mentioned as among the very few young English composers who ever picture the Goddess of Music as not swathed in crêpe. O'Neill's compositions are manifold. Among the most successful are his capital numbers written as incidental music to 'The Blue Bird.' Gardiner has a shorter list, but all his works have a delightfully boyish and open-air spirit. We may mention his orchestral pieces 'English Dance,' 'Overture to a Comedy,' and 'Shepherd Fennel's Dance.'
One of the most prominent traits in the musical make-up of the young English composer is his persistent cry for loud, complex orchestral expression. Holbrooke was the one who started him on this trail; and now his constant prayer seems to be:
'O mihi si linguæ centum sint, oraque centum.'
Above this school Frank Bridge (b. 1879) stands head and shoulders. What the others do well he does better; and, if they ever attempt to follow him there, he always has a 'best' waiting for them. Though he is quite unknown outside England, one has no hesitation in saying that his superior as a plastic orchestral artist would be hard to find. Among his best works are his three orchestral impressions of 'The Sea,' his two 'Dance Rhapsodies,' and his beautiful symphonic poem 'Isabella.' In chamber music he has been very successful, more especially in the 'Fancy' or 'Phantasy' form recentlyrevived in England. His 'Three Idylls' for string quartet are both charming and distinguished.
Round Bridge's name may be grouped, for convenience of placing, the names of York Bowen, who has written everything from symphonies and sonatas to a waltz on Strauss'sEin Heldenleben; A. E. T. Bax, whose activities are in some measure the musical counterpart of the 'Celtic twilight' school of poetry; W. H. Bell, the author of 'Mother Cary' and the 'Walt Whitman' symphony; Hamilton Harty, whose 'Comedy Overture,' 'With the Wild Geese,' and 'The Mystic Trumpeter' are all much played in England; and Hubert Bath. To the last-named composer we English owe a debt for his constant refusal to worship the muse with a cypress-branch. His gay, sprightly choral ballads, such as 'The Wedding of Shon Maclean' and 'The Jackdaw of Rheims,' bring him friends wherever they are heard. Bath has also made a specialty of accompanied recitation-music. He has produced nearly two dozen of these pieces; but in this field Stanley Hawley with his fifty-one published compositions easily leads the way. Almost all the musicians mentioned in this paragraph have been before the public at some time or other as conductors. Harty and Bridge in particular have shown themselves to be possessed of very strong gifts in this line.
It is perhaps premature to criticize the very latest swarms of orchestral composers that have issued from the musical bee-hives of London. Certain of them, however, show considerable promise and, in some cases, a rather alarming tendency to soar after the queen-bees of continental hives. This they will probably outgrow as their summer days increase. Among the most recent to try their wings are P. R. Kirby (a Scotsman from Aberdeen), Eugène Goosens, Jr. (with his symphonic poem 'Perseus'), and Oskar Borsdorf (with his dramatic fantasy 'Glaucus and Ione').
Among the members of the third group who have shown special excellence in the realm of chamber music B. J. Dale stands preëminent. The first performance of his big sonata in D minor made musical London hold its breath. He has written a great deal of music for the viola (as discovered by Lionel Tertis), and has even defied fate by composing a work for six violas. Dale's powers are very great, and he has probably a good deal to say yet. Richard Walthew and T. F. Dunhill have both an honorable record in chamber music. Both, too, have written on the topic. The former, who, is also a prolific song-writer, has published a volume on 'The Development of Chamber Music'; while the latter, in addition to his many-sided activities, has produced a tactful treatise for students entitled 'Chamber Music.' To the list of those who are specially devoted to this form of composition one may add the names of J. N. Ireland and James Friskin, neither of whom has yet had an opportunity adequate to his undoubted talents.
Naturally, at all times there has been a considerable literature of organ music in England. Almost all the composers mentioned above have written for the instrument. But, among those more specially identified with it and with church music, are W. Wolstenholme, who has more than sixty published compositions; Ernest Halsley, also with a long list; Lemare, whose transcriptions are so well known; T. Tertius Noble; C. B. Rootham; and Alan Gray. James Lyon, the Liverpool organist, has a lengthy record of the most varied sort, from orchestral, vocal, and organ works to church services and technical treatises. A. M. Goodhart, of Eton, has a similar weighty basketful. He has made a specialty of the 'choral ballad.'
We have already given the names of many English song writers. Here there are two groups of Richmonds in the field; those who write for the shop-ballad public,and those who do not. Most of the 'do nots' have naturally already been dealt with among the more serious composers; though the two spheres of activity by no means always coincide. The following short list—covering practically three generations—includes some of both sorts, but excludes the names of composers already mentioned: Stephen Adams, Frances Allitsen, Robert Batten, A. von Ahn Carse, Coningsby Clarke, Eric Coates, Noel Johnson, Frank Lambert, Liza Lehmann, Herman Löhr, Daisy McGeoch, Alicia A. Needham, Montague Phillips, John Pointer, Roger Quilter, Landon Ronald (principal of the Guildhall School of Music), Wilfred Sanderson, W. H. Squire, Hope Temple, Maude V. White, Haydn Wood, and Amy Woodforde-Finden.
Before closing this highly compressed sketch of the English musical renaissance an apology must be made for a double omission. First, the whole subject of English opera has been ignored as too complex and difficult for treatment. The activities of Carl Rosa, Moody-Manners, Beecham, and others have therefore to be left almost unnoticed. Second, no list has been attempted of the many fine executants produced by England in the past generation. In actual accomplishment some of these have been second to none in the world; though unfortunately their connection with the men of the English revival has often been slight or non-existent. On the other hand, some of the first of these artists have stood, and do now stand, in a very close relationship with the composers. And this mutual sympathy has often had happy results. One can scarcely imagine Stanford's Irish songs without Mr. Plunket Greene to sing them.
The reader who has travelled so far with the author should have by now a fairly clear idea of musical conditions and achievements on the other side. It is hoped that he will not regard his experiences merely as a forty-five-years' sojourn 'in darkest England.' He cantake the writer's word for it that there is plenty of light shining there. But, what with the fogs in the North Sea, the Channel, and the Atlantic, the rays seldom get beyond the coastguard.
C. F.