Charles-Camille Saint-Saëns was born October 9th, 1835, in Paris. He lives to-day (1915) in possession of all his powers as an artist and a witty pamphleteer. In some respects Saint-Saëns may be dubbed a musical Voltaire. A master of all the forms peculiar to symphonic music, he has never succeeded in endowing his work with any quality save clarity and brilliance. One would almost think at times that he deliberately stifled emotional elements in himself of which he disapproved. There is scarcely any department of music for which he has not written. Symphonies, chamber music, songs, operas and a ballet, and all this in quantity. Saint-Saëns, too, has undeniably lofty musical standards. Prolific, like Massenet, too prolific, in fact, for the subtle, sensitive taste of our time, Saint-Saëns seems rather to defy the public than to make any effort to please. His skill as a technician and his extraordinary abilities as a virtuoso have won him immediate recognition with musicians. In examining the whole of his work, there are only four orchestral pieces which have enduring qualities. These are the four symphonic poems in which Saint-Saëns pays an eloquent tribute to the form espoused by his friend Franz Liszt. Of these, the finest isPhaëton. Strange to say, the best known of this tetralogy of masterpieces is not the best. Beside the magnificently picturesquePhaëtontheDanse macabreseems a drab and inelegant humoresque. AfterPhaëton,Le Rouet d'Omphalemust be given the place of distinction in the long list of Saint-Saëns's compositions.In it the composer has given us a witty delineation of the irresistible powers of seduction of a truly feminine woman. The delicate orchestral texture entirely made up of crystalline timbres marks Saint-Saëns as one of the surest and most skillful manipulators of the modern orchestra since Wagner. As is characteristic of many French composers, there is a remarkable economy of means. Small aggregations of instruments achieve brilliant and compelling sonorities.
In the operatic field, Saint-Saëns is not happy. Here all of his reactionary neo-classicism found its full vent, and we are shocked to see a musician of Saint-Saëns's taste and intelligence employing the pompous conventionalities of the opera of 1850. 'Samson and Delilah,' however, has found its way into the répertoire no doubt on account of its fluent melodic structure and its agreeable exoticism. No matter what his technical excellences, one is conscious, with Saint-Saëns, of a certain sterility. Sometimes his music is so imitative of the classics as to be absolutely devoid of any reason for being. Bach and Mendelssohn are his great influences and Liszt and Berlioz have had a great part in the formation of his orchestral technique. M. Schuré remarks aptly: 'One notices with him a subtle and lively imagination, a constant aspiration to strength, to nobility, to majesty. From his quartets and his symphonies are to be detached grandiose moments and rockets of emotion which disappear too quickly. But it would be impossible to find the individuality which asserts itself in the ensemble of his works. One does not feel there the torment of a soul or the pursuit of an ideal. It is the Proteus, multiform and polyphonic, of music. Try to seize him, and he changes into a siren. Are you under the charm? He undergoes a change into a mocking bird. You believe that you have got him at last, then he climbs into the clouds like a hypogriff. His own nature is best discerned in certain witty fantasies ofa skeptical and mordant character, like theDanse macabreand theRouet d'Omphale.' When one considers that Saint-Saëns has been before the public ever since the sixties, a period in which musical evolution has undergone the most rapid and surprising changes, it is not strange that he eludes characterization. He is a musician who has, as Mr. Schuré so aptly says, refused to set himself the narrow and rocky path of an ideal. He has consistently avoided extremes. Side by side with Saint-Saëns the modernist, the champion of the symphonic poem, is Saint-Saëns the anti-Wagnerian. He is one of the great pillars, however, in the remarkable edifice of French symphonic music.
With Romain Bussine, in 1872, Saint-Saëns founded the Société Nationale, an organization which was to have the most far-reaching influence on the development of French music. Like Lalo, Saint-Saëns worked for a sort of protective tariff to keep French symphonic music from being overwhelmed by the more experienced Teuton neighbors. As a pamphleteer and propagandist, Saint-Saëns is full of verve and always has the last word. He was one of the first to appreciate Wagner, but later, feeling that the popularity of the master of Bayreuth might overwhelm young French composers, he withdrew his sympathetic allegiance.
Édouard-Victor-Antoine Lalo was born in Lille in 1822. This modest, aristocratic, and noble-minded musician has scarcely enjoyed his just due even in this late day. He died, exhausted, in 1892. His whole artistic career was ill-fated. His opera,Le Roi d'Ys, and his balletNamounawere both indifferently successful if not absolute failures. It is doubtful if Lalo ever recovered from the disappointment and overwork that attended the composition and production ofNamouna. Without hesitation we should characterize these two works as his most important. There is an excellent symphony in G minor, a concerto for 'cello, theSymphonieEspagnolefor violin and orchestra, and a concerto for piano, all of an equally lofty musical texture. It is difficult to class Lalo with any group of musicians. He was mildly influenced by Wagner, as were all young musicians of his time, and yetLe Roi d'Ysis absolutely his own. Lalo came of Spanish parentage. It is probable that a certain sort of atavism is responsible for the constant suggestion of the subtle monotony of Spanish rhythms in his music. He is too distinct a Latin to be overwhelmed by Wagner.
It is very probable that Lalo will never be genuinely popular. TheSymphonie Espagnoleis in the répertoire of every virtuoso violinist. The same may be said of the concerto for 'cello, and yet it is doubtful if the layman of symphonic concerts would complain were he never again to hear anything of Lalo. This is due to a certain aristocratic aloofness, and emotional reserve, and an ever-present sense of proportion dear only to the élite.
Lalo's influence was not in itself far-reaching. A sincere, splendidly developed artist, he had none of the qualities that make disciples. As one of a group of musicians, however, that were to play an important rôle in saving French music from foreign domination and in finding an idiom characteristic and worthy of a country possessed of the artistic traditions of France, Lalo cannot be overestimated. As a member of the Armingaud quartet he worked fervently to create a taste for symphonic music. His own dignified symphonic productions supplemented this necessary work of propaganda, for it must not be forgotten that for almost a century before the advent of César Franck there was no French symphonic music. The French genius, insofar as it expressed itself in music at all, turned rather to the historical opera so pompously fashioned, or the witty and amusing opéra comique. Lalo must be considered with Saint-Saëns and Franckas one of the pioneers in making a regenerate Parisian taste. His life is colorless and offers little to the critic in interpretation of his musical ideals. Lalo composed silently, with conviction, and without self-consciousness. He was singularly without theories. Concrete technical problems absorbed him, and in the refinement and nobility of his music is to be found the most eloquent essay upon the rôle of an artist who seeks sincere self-expression rather than general recognition.
As a leaven to the frivolous musical tastes prevalent in the French capital before the last three decades Lalo has played his part nobly. He will always be admired by all sincere musicians. His art is complete, devoid of mannerisms, plastically perfect, and yet without the semblance of dryness. In his symphony one will observe an unerring sense of form, an exquisite clarity of orchestration, and a happy choice of ideas suitable for development,Le Roi d'Ysis scarcely a masterpiece. The text is constructed from a pretty folk-story, is not very dramatic and occasionally gives one the impression of amateurishness and puerility. The music is exquisite and makes one regret that Lalo could not have found other and more suitable vehicles for his dramatic genius.Namounais a sparkling, colorful ballet. When it was revived some years ago, a more propitious public enthusiastically revised the adverse verdict of 1882.
Little may be said of Benjamin Godard (1849-95) except that he wrote much, too much perhaps, in nearly all forms: symphonies (with characteristic titles, such as the 'Gothic,' 'Oriental,'Symphonie légendaire), concertos for violin and for piano, orchestral suites, dramatic overture, symphony, a lyric scene, chamber music, piano pieces, over a hundred songs, etc. Few of these are heard nowadays, even in France perhaps. Neither are his operas,Pédro de Zalaméa(1884),Jocelyn(1888),Dante et Béatrice(1890),Ruy Blas(1891),La Vivandière(1895), andLes Guelfes(1902).Jocelyn—and, indeed, its composer—are perpetuated by the charmingly sentimentalBerceuse, beloved of amateur violinists. Godard studied composition with Reber and violin with Vieuxtemps at the Conservatoire. He won thegrand prixfor composition awarded by the city of Paris with the dramatic symphony 'Tasso.' This, like theSymphonie légendaire, employs a chorus and solo voices in combination with the orchestra.
Two composers, noted especially for their organ works, should be mentioned in conclusion: Alexandre Guilmant (born 1837) and Charles-Marie Widor (born 1845). Both made world-wide reputations as virtuosos upon the organ, the former in theTrinité, the latter inSt. Sulpicein Paris. Guilmant has travelled over the world and received the world's plaudits; Widor has remained in Paris while droves of pupils from all over the globe have gone back to their homes and have spread his fame. Both have composed copiously for the organ, Guilmant more exclusively so, also editing and arranging a great deal for his instrument. Widor has written two symphonies, choral works, chamber music, and piano pieces, songs, etc., even a ballet,La Korrigane, two grand operas,NertoandLes Pêcheurs de St. Jean, a comic opera and a pantomime,Jeanne d'Arc. He is César Franck's successor as professor of organ at the Conservatoire, and since 1891 has taken Dubois' place in the chair of composition.
C. C.