Chapter IX: Part 9

Marie was a successful composer of light music for orchestra. The one composition which has survived is _La Cinquantaine_, a sentimental piece for orchestra which is also famous in adaptations for violin and piano, or cello and piano. Marie described this work as an “air in the old style.” It is in three-part song form. The first and third parts consist of a light, delicate little air; the middle section is in a slower and statelier style.

Martini il Tedesco

Jean Paul Égide Martini—sometimes called “Il Tedesco” or “The German” to distinguish him from Padre Martini the famous 18th century Italian composer and theorist—was born in Freistadt, in the Palatinate, on September 1, 1741. His real name is Schwarzendorf. After completing the study of the organ and serving for a while as church organist, he won a prize for a military march for the Swiss Guard. For many years he was an officer of a Hussar regiment. During this military service he completed an opera, _L’Amoureux de quinze ans_ (successfully introduced in Paris in 1771) and a considerable amount of band music. After leaving the army, he served as music director for the Prince of Condé and the Comte d’Artois; as conductor at the Théâtre Feydeau in Paris; and as Inspector and teacher of composition at the Paris Conservatory. He died in Paris on February 10, 1816.

The composer of twelve operas, some church music and many songs, Martini is today remembered for a single song—the eloquent and tender love melody, “_Plaisir d’amour_,” written originally for voice and harp, and arranged by Berlioz for voice and orchestra. Since Berlioz’ time it has enjoyed numerous instrumental adaptations. Effective use of the song, as recurring theme music, was made in the American motion picture starring Irene Dunne and Charles Boyer, _Love Affair_ (1939).

Pietro Mascagni

Pietro Mascagni was born in Leghorn, Italy, on December 7, 1863. He studied music with private teachers in Leghorn, then for several years attended the Milan Conservatory. In 1884 he was appointed conductor of the municipal band in Cerignola. Meanwhile in 1880 he had completed his first opera, _Pinotta_. Success as composer came later in 1890 with the world première of the opera, _Cavalleria Rusticana_ in Rome. A sensation when first introduced, _Cavalleria Rusticana_ made the rounds of the world capitals to enjoy a triumph experienced by few operas before or since. Mascagni wrote many operas after that. Though he enjoyed varying degrees of success with _L’Amico Fritz_ in 1891 and _Iris_ in 1898, he never again duplicated the acclaim given _Cavalleria Rusticana_; and it is still the only one of his operas performed in the world’s foremost opera houses. As he himself once said sadly: “It is a pity I wrote _Cavalleria_ first. I was crowned before I became king.” Mascagni made many tours as a conductor. He visited the United States in 1902 in performances of several of his operas, and South America in 1911. In 1929 he succeeded Toscanini as musical director of La Scala in Milan. Identifying himself closely with the Fascist regime—even to the point of writing an opera, _Nerone_, glorifying Mussolini—Mascagni was subjected to considerable abuse and attack after World War II. He was deprived of his property and other assets. The last year of his life was lived in poverty and disrepute in a small hotel room in Rome, where he died on August 2, 1945.

_Cavalleria Rusticana_ is a one-act opera, libretto by Giovanni Targioni-Tozzetti and Guido Menasci based on a short story by Giovanni Verga. The setting is Sicily in the latter part of the 19th century. Turiddu, a soldier, is in love with Lola, wife of Alfio, a teamster. But he has also conducted an illicit affair with Santuzza. When Turiddu rudely rejects Santuzza, she finds revenge by revealing to Alfio the love intrigue existing between Lola and Turiddu. In the duel that follows Alfio kills Turiddu.

The most celebrated single excerpt from the opera is the melodious Intermezzo for orchestra which accompanies the departing townspeople as they leave church after the Easter services. This music is radiant with the holiness and serenity of the Easter holiday.

Other popular excerpts include the lovely Siciliana, “_O Lola bianca_,” a tenor aria which is sung offstage and breaks into the middle of the opening orchestral prelude; this is a serenade by Turiddu to Lola, sung to harp accompaniment. Santuzza’s passionate aria, “_Voi lo sapete_” is the one in which she first discloses to Alfio that his wife and Turiddu are lovers. Turiddu’s deeply emotional aria, “_Addio alla madre_” is his poignant farewell to his mother just before he engages in the duel in which he meets his doom.

Jules Massenet

Jules Massenet was born in Montaud in the Loire region of France on May 12, 1842. He entered the Paris Conservatory when he was nine, subsequently winning prizes in fugue and piano playing and, in 1863, the Prix de Rome. Four years later his first opera, _La Grand’ Tante_, was produced in Paris. During the Franco-Prussian War he was a member of the National Guard. After the war, he achieved recognition as a composer with his incidental music to _Les Érynnies_, an oratorio _Marie Magdaleine_, and an opera _Le Roi de Lahore_. In 1878 he was elected to the Académie des Beaux-Arts, the youngest man ever to receive this honor, and was appointed professor of composition at the Paris Conservatory. He held the latter post until his death with outstanding distinction. His most significant operas appeared between 1880 and 1900, and included _Hérodiade_ (1881), _Manon_ (1884), _Le Cid_ (1885), _Werther_ (1892), _Thaïs_ (1894) and _Sapho_ (1897). He died in Paris on August 13, 1912.

A style that had lyrical charm, tender feelings, and poetic content placed Massenet with the foremost French composers for the lyric theater. The same qualities are found to a large degree in his instrumental compositions, and endow them with their immense audience appeal. He had a vein of tenderness that was his uniquely, often contrasting this with striking passion and intensity. A master of many different moods and emotions, he was able to convey them in music that is suave and polished in the best French tradition.

_Alsatian Scenes_ (_Scènes alsaciennes_) is one of Massenet’s most popular orchestral compositions. It is the seventh of his suites for orchestra and was written in 1881. For each of its four movements the composer provided an explicit program. About the first movement, “Sunday Morning” (“_Dimanche matin_”) the composer writes: “I recall with particular delight the Alsatian village Sunday morning at the hour of divine service; the streets deserted, the houses empty except for the elderly ones who sun themselves before their doors. The church is full, and the sacred hymns are heard at intervals in passing.” “The Tavern” (“_Au cabaret_”) is described as the happy meeting place of his friends “with its little windows framed with lead, garlanded with hops and roses.... ‘Ho, Schmidt, some wine!’ And the songs of the forest rangers going to shooting matches. Oh, the joyous life and the gay companions!” “Under the Linden Trees” (“_Sous les tilleuls_”) depicts pictorially “the edge of the fields on a Sunday afternoon, the long avenue of linden trees, in the shadow of which, hand in hand, quietly talks a pair of lovers.” The suite ends with “Sunday Evening” (“_Dimanche soir: Air alsacien, Retraite française_”). “In the market place, what noise, what movement! Everyone at the doorsteps, groups of young gallants in the streets, and dances which embody in rhythm the songs of the country. Eight o’clock! The noise of the drums, the blare of the trumpets—’tis the retreat! The French retreat! And when in the distance the sound of the drum died down, the women called their children in the street, the old men relighted their big old pipes, and to the sounds of violins the dance is joyously recommenced in smaller circles, with couples closer.”

The ballet music for _Le Cid_ is strikingly appealing for its exotic melodies and lambent orchestral colors. This opera, text by Louis Gallet and Edouard Blau, is based on Corneille’s tragedy; its première performance took place in Paris on November 30, 1885. The setting is 12th century Burgos, in Spain, where Rodrigo called Le Cid, or The Conqueror, kills Chimène’s father in a duel. She seeks vengeance but is unable to carry it out because she has fallen in love with him. The ballet music appears in the second scene of the second act. A public square is alive and colorful with dancing crowds, and six dances are performed in rapid succession, some with melodic and rhythmic material derived by Massenet from Spanish folk sources. These are the dances: “_Castillane_,” a highly rhythmic dance found in the Castille region of Spain; “_Andalouse_,” a sinuous, gypsy-like dance from Andalusia; “_Aragonaise_,” a dance popular in the Aragon district; “_Aubade_,” a gentle lyrical section; “_Catalane_,” a dance popular in Catalonia; “_Madrilène_,” a two-part dance from Madrid, the first quiet and introspective, the second dynamic; and “_Navarraise_,” a dance from Navarre.

The popular “_Élégie_,” a plangent melody muted in its grief, comes from the incidental music to _Les Érynnies_ with which Massenet first won acclaim in 1873. The play, by Charles Marie Leconte based on Aeschylus, was produced with Massenet’s music at the Odéon in Paris. Here the “_Élégie_” appeared as “_Invocation_,” scored for string orchestra. Later on Massenet arranged this section for cello and piano, and it was upon this occasion that he renamed the piece _Élégie_. It was later on also transcribed for violin and piano, and adapted into a song with lyrics by E. Gallet.

Three other sections from _Les Érynnies_ have almost as much emotional appeal as the _Élégie_, but in varied moods. The “Entr’acte” is a passionate song for unison violins over a disturbed accompaniment. “Grecian Dance” begins with a vivacious dance tune for two flutes in thirds. A slow dialogue ensues between oboes and clarinets, in which the main subject has an Oriental identity. A fast section brings this movement to a close. “_Scène religieuse_” is a graceful, at times solemn, minuet in which a solo cello provides the main melody.

The famous opera _Manon_ (1884) has two delightful dance episodes that are particularly well known, a gavotte and a minuet. _Manon_ was based on the famous tale of Abbé Prévost, _L’Histoire du chevalier des Grieux et de Manon Lescaut_, adapted by Henri Meilhac and Philippe Gille. Its setting is France in the 18th century, and in the spirit of that place and time Massenet recreated two old-world dances, both of them appearing in the first scene of the third act, during a festival-day celebration in Paris. Before the curtain goes up, the graceful music of the minuet is heard in the orchestra as an entr’acte. After the rise of the curtain, and the appearance of Manon, she expresses her hedonistic philosophy of life in a gavotte (“_Obéissons quand leur voix appelle_”). This gavotte is often heard in an exclusively instrumental arrangement.

The _Phèdre Overture_ (1876) is another of Massenet’s frequently performed orchestral compositions. The music closely follows the action of the Racine tragedy, in which Phedre—daughter of King Minos and wife of Theseus—falls in love with Theseus’ son, Hippolytus, who fails to respond to her passion. The overture begins in a gloomy mood, forecasting ominously the imminent tragedy awaiting Phedre and Hippolytus. Phedre’s grief over her unreciprocated love is suggested by a passionate subject for clarinet; a second equally passionate melody brings us the picture of Hippolytus sent to his doom by an irate father. Violins in unison now bring us a rapturous melody speaking of Phedre’s love, while a fiery dramatic section that follows tells of the doom awaiting Hippolytus at the hands of Neptune.

_Picturesque Scenes_ (_Scènes pittoresques_) is the fourth of Massenet’s suites for orchestra, completed in 1873. There are four short, tuneful sections: “March” (“_Marche_”), “Air de Ballet,” “Angelus” and “Bohemian Festival” (“_Fête bohème_”). The religious music of the third movement, “Angelus,” with its solemn tolling of bells, is the most popular section of this suite, frequently performed separately from the other movements.

Second only to the “_Élégie_” in popularity among Massenet’s best-loved melodies is the “Meditation” which comes from the opera _Thaïs_. This excerpt is an orchestral entr’acte with violin obbligato heard just before the first scene of the second act. The opera, libretto by Louis Gallet based on the novel of Anatole France, describes the degradation of Athanaël, a Cenobite monk, because of his unholy passion for Thaïs, a courtesan. The radiant music of the “Meditation” describes Thaïs’ renunciation of a life of pleasure for one of the spirit.

Robert McBride

Robert Guyn McBride was born in Tucson, Arizona, on February 20, 1911. As a boy he learned to play the clarinet and saxophone. He later played both instruments in various dance orchestras. In 1933 he was graduated from the University of Arizona, and a year after that received there his Master’s degree. Having studied the oboe in college, he played that instrument with the Tucson Symphony for several years. Then, after additional study of the piano, composition and voice, he joined the music faculty of Bennington College in Vermont in 1935, holding this post eleven years. During this period he received a Guggenheim Fellowship. In 1942, the American Academy of Arts and Letters awarded him a prize for creating a “new idiom in American music.” McBride has made successful use of jazz, popular and folk elements in serious chamber-music and orchestral compositions.

The _Mexican Rhapsody_ (1936) is one of McBride’s best known works for orchestra. He wrote it in Arizona while studying at the University. It was first presented in Tucson in a two-piano arrangement, then in its definitive orchestral version, and finally as a choreographic presentation. McBride here makes a colorful and freshly conceived presentation of four Mexican folk songs familiar to many: “_El Rancho Grande_,” “_Jarabe_” (or “Hat Dance”), “_Cuatro Milpas_,” and “_La Cucaracha_.”

McBride has written several interesting compositions in a jazz style. One of the best is the _Strawberry Jam_ (1942). This is a caricature of a jazzband jam session, but with the utilization of modern harmonies and symphonic orchestration. _Stuff in G_, for orchestra (1942), is in the racy, tuneful style of Tin Pan Alley, while _Swing Stuff_ (1941) brings to the symphonic orchestra the improvisational devices and techniques and the beat of Swing music.

Harl McDonald

Harl Mcdonald was born in Boulder, Colorado, on July 27, 1899. His music study took place in Redlands, California and at the University of Southern California. The winning of prizes from the American Federation of Music Clubs for two orchestral works enabled him to go to Europe and attend the Leipzig Conservatory. In Germany, his symphonic fantasy, _Mojave_, was successfully introduced by the Berlin State Opera Orchestra. After returning to the United States he was appointed in 1926 to the music faculty of the University of Pennsylvania, where he later became professor of music, and finally head of the music department. At the University he conducted various choral groups which appeared with the Philadelphia Orchestra. From 1939 until his death he was manager of the Philadelphia Orchestra, which introduced many of his orchestral compositions. McDonald wrote four symphonies, a two-piano concerto, a violin concerto, and various suites and tone poems for orchestra. He died in Princeton, New Jersey, on March 30, 1955.

The _Children’s Symphony_ was a work intended to teach children something about symphonic form through melodies they knew and loved. The form of the symphony is adhered to—in the presentation of two themes, their development, and recapitulation. Simple and unsophisticated, this symphony makes ideal listening for children, but there is enough charm here to provide considerable enjoyment to older people as well. In the first movement, McDonald uses for his two main themes, “London Bridge” and “Baa Baa Black Sheep.” In the second movement we hear “Little Bo Peep” and “Oh, Dear, What Can the Matter Be?”; in the third, “Farmer in the Dell” and “Jingle Bells”; and in the finale, “Honey Bee” and “Snow Is Falling On My Garden.”

_Rhumba_, for symphony orchestra, is the third movement of McDonald’s Symphony No. 2 (1935). But this movement (which in the symphony displaces the conventional scherzo) is so popular that it is often played apart from the rest of the work. The symphony itself was inspired by the turbulent 1930’s, with its labor conflicts, breadlines, unemployment, and depression. _Rhumba_ injected a gay note into these somber proceedings, attempting to interpret “the passionate search after good times and diversions, and the restless pursuit of intoxicated pleasures,” as the composer explained. McDonald goes on to say that he here used the rumba rhythm because he liked it and because it seemed to him to be the pulse of those times.

Felix Mendelssohn

Felix Mendelssohn-bartholdy was born in Hamburg, Germany, on February 3, 1809. His grandfather was the famous philosopher, Moses Mendelssohn; his father, a successful banker. Both were of Jewish origin. When Felix was still a boy, however, his immediate family was converted to Protestantism, the occasion upon which they added the name of “Bartholdy” to their own to distinguish them from the other members of their family. A pupil of Ludwig Berger and Karl Friedrich Zelter, Felix was extraordinarily precocious in music. When he was seven and a half he made a successful appearance as pianist in Berlin; by the time he was twelve he had already written operas and symphonies; and in his seventeenth year he produced an unqualified masterwork in the _Overture to A Midsummer Night’s Dream_. In 1827, one of his operas was produced in Berlin, but by that time he had already completed thirteen symphonies and a library of chamber music as well.

In 1829, Mendelssohn conducted in Berlin the first performance of Bach’s _Passion According to St. Matthew_ to be given since Bach’s own day. This concert became a powerful influence in reviving interest in Bach’s music, which at that time had been languishing in both neglect and obscurity. A few weeks after Mendelssohn had directed a repeat performance, he made his first trip to England where he led the première of a new symphony and was made honorary member of the Royal Philharmonic. A tour of Scotland that followed immediately was the inspiration for his overture, _Fingal’s Cave_.

In 1833, Mendelssohn served as musical director of the city of Duesseldorf. He held this post only six months. Much more significant was his engagement as the principal conductor of the Gewandhaus Orchestra in Leipzig in 1835 which, during the five years of his leadership, was elevated to a position of first importance among the world’s symphony orchestras.

In 1841, Mendelssohn became head of the music department of a projected Academy of Arts in Berlin. This appointment did not prevent him from visiting England where he was received with an adulation accorded to no foreign musician since Handel. Returning to Berlin he found that the Academy of Arts project had been abandoned. He was now made Kapellmeister to the King, an honorary post allowing him complete freedom of activity and movement. During the next few years he conducted concerts of the Gewandhaus Orchestra, and paid two more highly successful visits to England. He was also instrumental in helping to found the Leipzig Conservatory in 1843. Always of delicate health and sensibilities, Mendelssohn collapsed at the news that his beloved sister, Fanny, died in 1847. He died in Leipzig soon after that, on November 4, 1847.

The finest qualities of German Romantic music can be found in Mendelssohn. He had the Romantic’s partiality for fantasy and the supernatural, together with the lightness of touch with which to create such worlds through music. He had the Romantic’s gift for translating natural scenes, landscapes and lyric poetry into sensitive tone pictures. He had a most winning lyricism and graceful harmonic and orchestral gift, and he never lacked the ability to charm and enchant his listeners with the most tender and lovable musical expression. Other composers may have written profounder or more emotionally stirring music than Mendelssohn; but no one could be more ingratiating, sensitive, or refined. Some of Mendelssohn’s serious symphonic works are so full of the most wonderful melodies and beguiling moods that they have the universal appeal of semi-classics.

The concert overture, _Fingal’s Cave_, or as it is also sometimes known, _Hebrides Overture_, op. 26 (1832) was inspired by the composer’s visit to the Scottish Highlands in 1830. The opening theme in lower strings and bassoons suggests the roll of the waves at the mouth of a cave, a melody that came to the composer while visiting the caves of Staffa. This idea is developed, then a second beautiful melody unfolds in cellos and bassoons.

The orchestral suite, _A Midsummer Night’s Dream_, op. 61 is derived from the incidental music comprising thirteen numbers which Mendelssohn wrote for a Potsdam production of the Shakespeare comedy in 1843; the Overture, however, was a fruit of the composer’s youth, having been written in 1826. The magic world of fairies and elves which Mendelssohn projected so delicately in his youthful overture is preserved in many of the numbers he wrote seventeen years later. The Overture, op. 21, is initiated with four sensitive chords, and proceeds with fleeting, diaphanous music for strings with which we are suddenly plunged in fairyland. The main thematic material to follow comprises a haunting song for horn, a romantic episode for woodwind and strings, and a sprightly fairy dance for strings.

Three other musical sections from this incidental music, and basic to the orchestral suite, are famous. The “Nocturne” is a broad, moody song for horns. The “Scherzo”—like the Overture—is a picture of the world of fairies, gnomes and elves, though in a more energetic and spirited vein. The “Wedding March” is now one of the most frequently played pieces of wedding music, second in popularity only to Wagner’s wedding music from _Lohengrin_; it first became popular as wedding music at the nuptials of the English Princess in London in 1858. A trumpet fanfare leads to the dignified march melody which is twice alternated with melodious trio sections.

“On Wings of Song” (“_Auf Fluegeln des Gesanges_”), op. 34, no. 2 (1834) is Mendelssohn’s best-known song, a melody of incomparable loveliness and serenity. The poem is by Heine. Franz Liszt transcribed it for piano; Joseph Achron for violin and piano; Lionel Tertis for viola and piano. It has also enjoyed various orchestral transcriptions.

_Ruy Blas_, op. 95 (1839)—like _Fingal’s Cave_—is a concert overture for orchestra; here the inspiration is the drama of Victor Hugo. Four solemn bars for wind instruments lead to the principal subject, first violins and flutes; clarinets, bassoons, and cellos later offer the second contrasting staccato theme.

The _Spinning Song_ and the _Spring Song_ are both instrumental favorites, and both come from the _Songs Without Words_ (_Lieder ohne Worte_), for solo piano. The form of “song without words” is a creation of Mendelssohn: a brief composition of such essentially lyric character that it is virtually a “song” for the piano. Mendelssohn wrote forty-eight such pieces gathered in eight books. The _Spinning Song_ in C major appears in op. 67 as the fourth number (1844). This is a tender melody placed against a rhythmic background suggesting the whirring of a spinning wheel. The _Spring Song_ in A major is surely one of the most familiar tonal pictures of the vernal season to be found in the semi-classical literature; it appears in op. 62 (1842) as the concluding number. Both the _Spinning Song_ and _Spring Song_ appear in all kinds and varieties of transcriptions.

The stirring _War March of the Priests_ is a number from the incidental music for Racine’s drama, _Athalie_, op. 74 (1843); this incidental music was first performed with the Racine play in Berlin in 1845.

Giacomo Meyerbeer

Giacomo Meyerbeer was born in Berlin, Germany, on September 5, 1791. His name, at birth, was Jakob Liebmann Beer. When Meyer, a rich relative, left him a legacy, he decided to change his name to Meyerbeer; some years later upon initiating a career as composer of Italian operas he Italianized his name. His music study took place with Clementi, Zelter, Anselm Weber and Vogler, the last of whom encouraged him to write his first opera, _Jephtha’s Vow_ (_Jephtha’s Geluebde_), a failure when first performed in Munich in 1812. A second opera, performed in Stuttgart, was also a failure; Meyerbeer now seriously entertained the thought of abandoning composition altogether. The noted Viennese composer and teacher, Antonio Salieri, however, convinced him what he needed was more study. This took place in Italy where for several years Meyerbeer assimilated Italian traditions of opera. His first endeavor in this style was _Romilda e Costanza_, a success when introduced in Padua in 1817. During the next few years Meyerbeer wrote several more operas, some of them on commission, and became one of Italy’s most highly regarded composers for the stage. In 1826, Meyerbeer settled in Paris where association with composers like Cherubini and Halévy, made him impatient with the kind of operas he had thus far created. In 1831, with _Robert le Diable_, he entered upon a new artistic phase in which Italian methods, procedures and traditions were discarded in favor of the French. _Robert le Diable_, produced at the Opera on November 21, 1831 was a sensation. Meyerbeer continued writing operas in the French style for the remainder of his life. These are the operas by which he is most often represented in the world’s opera theaters: _Les Huguenots_ (1836), _Le Prophète_ (1849), and _L’Africaine_ (1865). Meyerbeer died in Paris on May 2, 1864.

Meyerbeer was an exponent of drama in the grand style, his finest operas being filled with big climactic scenes, elaborate stage effects, and eye-filling visual displays. But he also had a pronounced dramatic gift, one which evoked from Wagner the highest admiration; and a pronounced expressiveness of lyricism.

_L’Africaine_ (_The African_) is Meyerbeer’s last opera, and many regarded it as his best. He completed it in 1864 just before his death, and its world première at the Paris Opera took place posthumously on April 28, 1865. The text, by Eugène Scribe, is set in Lisbon and Madagascar in the 15th century. The main action concerns the love of Selika, an African queen, for the Portuguese explorer, Vasco da Gama; Da Gama in turn is loved by Inez, daughter of Don Diego. Selika offers the explorer a secret route to the land of which she is queen, Madagascar, and with which Da Gama becomes enraptured. But when Inez appears, he abandons Selika for her, and leaves the magic island. Heartbroken, Selika kills herself by breathing the deadly fragrance of a manchineel tree.

The opera’s most popular excerpt is Vasco da Gama’s rapturous tenor aria from the fourth act in which he describes the beauty of Madagascar, “_O Paradis_.” Another vocal favorite is the baritone ballad of Nelusko, slave of Selika, “_Adamastor, roi des vagues profondes_”; as he steers the ship bearing Selika and Vasco da Gama to Madagascar he sings of Adamastor, monarch of the sea, who sends ships to their doom on treacherous reefs.

The _Coronation March_ (_Marche du couronnement_)—music of pomp and circumstance—comes from the opera _Le Prophète_, first performed at the Paris Opéra on April 16, 1849. Eugène Scribe’s libretto is based on an actual historical episode in 16th century Holland centered around the Anabaptist uprising, with John of Leyden, leader of the Anabaptists, as the principal character. In Act four, scene two, John is being crowned king outside the Muenster Cathedral. As a magnificent royal procession enters the Cathedral, the music of the _Coronation March_ matches in splendor and grandeur the visual majesty of this scene. Another popular musical excerpt for orchestra from this opera is Prelude to Act 3, a colorful and rhythmic Quadrille that leads into the opening scene of that act, providing the lively musical background for a ballet and ice-carnival skating scene. Liszt made a technically brilliant transcription for the piano of this Quadrille music.

_Les Huguenots_ (_The Huguenots_) was first performed at the Paris Opéra on February 29, 1836, the year it was completed; the libretto was by Eugène Scribe and Émile Deschamps. In 16th century Touraine and Paris, Raoul, a Huguenot nobleman, has saved the life of Valentine, daughter of the Catholic leader, St. Bris. She falls in love with Raoul, but the latter repudiates her, believing her to be the mistress of Count de Nevers. When he discovers he has been mistaken, Raoul risks his life to see her. During this visit he overhears a Catholic plot to massacre the Huguenots. After Raoul and Valentine get married, they are both murdered in the massacre—Valentine by her own father.

The Overture to _Les Huguenots_ is built almost entirely from the melody of the famous Lutheran chorale, _Ein’ feste Burg_, which in the opera itself served as the musical symbol for militant Protestantism. The outstanding individual excerpts from the opera include Raoul’s beautiful romance from Act 1 describing the woman he has saved, “_Plus blanche que la blanche hermine_”; the rhapsodic description in the second act of the Touraine countryside by Marguerite de Valois, betrothed to Henry IV of Navarre, “_O beau pays de la Touraine_”; and in the fourth act the stirring “Benediction of the Swords,” (“_Gloire au grand Dieu vengeur_”) with which the Catholics are blessed by three monks on the eve of their holy war against the Huguenots.

The exciting _Torch Dance_, No. 1, in B-flat is not from one of Meyerbeer’s operas. It was written in 1846 for the wedding of the King of Bavaria, and originally was scored for brass band. It is now most frequently heard in orchestral adaptations. Meyerbeer subsequently wrote two other _Torch Dances_: the second in 1850 for the wedding of Princess Charlotte of Prussia, and the third in 1853 for the wedding of Princess Anne of Prussia.

Karl Milloecker

Karl Milloecker was born in Vienna, Austria, on May 29, 1842. His father, a jeweler, wanted him to enter the family business, but from his childhood on, Karl was drawn to music. After studying music with private teachers, he attended the Conservatory of the Gesellschaft der Musikfreunde. Meanwhile, in his sixteenth year, he supported himself by playing the flute in a theater orchestra. When his music study ended, he became conductor of a theater in Graz in 1864; there his first operetta was produced one year later. In 1866 he was back in Vienna, and from 1869 to 1883 he was principal conductor at the Theater-an-der-Wien where most of his famous operettas were produced including _Countess Du Barry_ (_Graefin DuBarry_) in 1879, _The Beggar Student_ (_Der Bettelstudent_) in 1882, _Gasparone_ in 1884, and _Poor Jonathan_ (_Der arme Jonathan_) in 1890. Milloecker died in Baden, near Vienna, on December 31, 1899.

Milloecker’s most famous operetta is _The Beggar Student_ (_Der Bettelstudent_), which was first produced at the Theater-an-der-Wien in Vienna on December 6, 1882, and after that enjoyed highly successful performances at the Casino Theater in New York in 1883, and the Alhambra in London in 1884. The scene is Cracow, Poland; the time, 1704. General Ollendorf, spurned by Laura, evolves an elaborate plot to avenge himself. He finances the impoverished student, Symon, dresses him up as a lord, and sends him off to woo and win Laura. Only after the wedding does the General reveal the fact that Symon is a beggar. Just as disgrace faces the young man, he becomes involved in a successful maneuver to restore the rejected Polish king to his throne. Thus he acquires wealth and a title, and is welcomed with pride and love by Laura and her mother. Potpourris and selections from this tuneful operetta always include the principal waltz melody which comes as a first act finale, “_Ach ich hab’ sie ja nur auf die Schulter gekuesst_.” Other delightful excerpts include Symon’s mazurka, “_Ich knuepfte manche zarte Bande_,” his lament “_Ich hab’ kein Geld_,” and the second act duet of Symon and Laura, “_Ich setz den Fall_.”

Moritz Moszkowski

Moritz Moszkowski was born in Breslau, Germany, on August 23, 1854. He received his musical training at three leading German Conservatories: the Dresden Conservatory, the Stern Conservatory and Kullak Academy in Berlin. He began a career as pianist in 1873, touring Europe with outstanding success. He also achieved recognition as a teacher of the piano at the Kullak Academy. In 1897, he went into retirement in Paris where he lived for the remainder of his life. In 1899 he was elected a member of the Berlin Academy. Towards the end of his life his financial resources were completely depleted, and his fame as composer, pianist, and teacher had long been eclipsed. He died in poverty and obscurity in Paris on March 4, 1925.

Though he wrote operas, ballets, suites, concertos and a symphony, Moszkowski was at his best—and is most famous today—for his lighter music in a Spanish idiom. Typical of his music in this style were the rhythmic _Bolero_, op. 12, no. 5, for piano solo; the languorous and haunting _Guitarre_, op. 45, no. 2, for piano solo (transcribed by Pablo de Sarasate for violin and piano); and the dashing _Malagueña_, from the opera _Boabdil_.

But his most celebrated compositions are the delightful _Spanish Dances_, opp. 12, and 65, two books of pieces for piano solo or piano duo, which have been arranged for orchestra. The most popular are the first in C major, the second in G minor, and the fifth (a bolero) in D major. While none of these dances can be accepted as authentic Spanish music—actually they are only a German Romantic’s conception of what Spanish music is—they make most effective use of Spanish dance rhythms.

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart was born in Salzburg, Austria, on January 27, 1756. The son of Leopold, Kapellmeister at the court of the Salzburg Archbishop, Wolfgang Amadeus disclosed his remarkable musical powers at a tender age. He began composition at the age of five, completed a piano sonata at seven, and a symphony at eight. Taught the harpsichord, also very early in his childhood, he revealed such phenomenal abilities at improvisation and sight reading that he was the wonder and awe of all who came into contact with him. His ambitious father exhibited this formidable prodigy for several years before the crowned heads of Europe; and wherever he appeared the child was acclaimed. Goethe said: “A phenomenon like that of Mozart remains an inexplicable thing.” In Milan in 1770 he was commissioned to write an opera _Mitridate, rè di Ponto_, successfully performed that year. In Bologna he became the only musician under the age of twenty to be elected a member of the renowned Accademia Filarmonica. And in Rome he provided dramatic evidence of his extraordinary natural gifts by putting down on paper the entire complex score of Allegri’s _Miserere_ after a single hearing.

As he outgrew childhood he ripened as a composer, gaining all the time in both technical and creative powers. But he was a prodigy no more, and though he was rapidly becoming one of the most profound and original musicians in Europe he was unable to attract the adulation and excitement that had once been his. Between 1772 and 1777, as an employee in the musical establishment of the Salzburg Archbishop, he was treated like a menial servant. The remarkable music he was writing all the time passed unnoticed. Finally, in 1782, he made a permanent break with the Archbishop and established his home in Vienna where he lived for the remainder of his life. Though he received some important commissions, and enjoyed several triumphs for his operas, he did not fare any too well in Vienna either. He had to wait several years for a court appointment, and when it finally came in 1787 he was deplorably underpaid. Thus he lived in poverty, often dependent for food and other necessities of life on the generosity of his friends. And yet the masterworks kept coming in every conceivable medium—operas, symphonies, sonatas, quartets, concertos, choral music and so forth. A few people in Vienna were aware of his prodigious achievements, and one of these was Joseph Haydn who called him “the greatest composer I know either personally or by name.” During the last years of his life Mozart was harassed not only by poverty but also by severe illness. Yet his last year was one of his most productive, yielding his last three symphonies, the _Requiem_, the opera _The Magic Flute_ (_Die Zauberfloete_), the _Ave Verum_, and a remarkable piano concerto and string quintet. He died in Vienna on December 5, 1791 and was buried in a pauper’s grave with no tombstone or cross for identification.

Through his genius every form of music was endowed with new grandeur, nobility of expression and richness of thought. He was a technician second to none; a bold innovator; a creator capable of plumbing the profoundest depths of emotion and the most exalted heights of spirituality. Yet he could also be simple and charming and graceful, in music remarkably overflowing with the most engaging melodies conceived by man, and characterized by the most exquisite taste and the most consummate craftsmanship. Thus Mozart’s lighter moods in music are often also endowed with extraordinary creative resources and original invention; yet they never lose their capacity to delight audiences at first contact.

The music Mozart wrote directly for popular consumption were the hundred or so _Dances_ for orchestra: _Country Dances_, _German Dances_, _Minuets_. The greatest number of these consist of the _German Dances_. These are lively melodies in eight-measure phrases and with forceful peasant rhythms. Some of the best _German Dances_ are those in which Mozart utilized unusual orchestral resources or instruments to suggest extra-musical sounds. _The Sleighride_ (_Die Schlittenfahrt_), K. 605, in C major, simulates the sound of sleigh bells in the middle trio section, sounded in the tones A-F-E-C. _The Organgrinder_ (_Der Leiermann_), K. 602, imitates the sound of a hurdy-gurdy. In _The Canary_ (_Der Kanarienvogel_), K. 571, flutes reproduce the chirping of birds.

The _Country Dance_, or _Contretanze_, is sometimes regarded as the first modern dance, forerunner of the quadrille. Structurally and stylistically these are very much like _German Dances_ with a peasant-like vitality and earthiness. Here, too, Mozart sometimes realistically imitates non-musical sounds as in _The Thunder Storm_ (_Das Donnerwetter_), K. 534, in which the role of the timpani suggests peals of thunder.

Mozart’s most popular Minuet—indeed, it is probably one of the most popular minuets ever written—comes from his opera _Don Giovanni_, libretto by Lorenzo da Ponte, and first performed in Prague in 1787. The hero of this opera is, to be sure, the Spanish nobleman of the 17th century whose escapades and licentious life finally bring him to doom at the hands of the statue of the Commandant come to life to consign him to the fires of hell. The Minuet appears in the fifth scene of the first act. Don Giovanni is the gracious host of a party held in his palace, and there the guests dance a courtly minuet while Don himself is making amatory overtures to Zerlina.

In a lighter mood, also, is the _Eine kleine Nachtmusik_ (_A Little Night Music_), K. 525, a serenade for string orchestra (1787). This work is consistently tuneful, gracious, charming. The first movement has two lilting little melodies, which are presented and recapitulated with no formal development to speak of. The second movement is a Romance, or Romanza, a poetic song contrasted by two vigorous sections; the main thought of this movement is then repeated between each of these two vigorous parts. After that comes a formal minuet, and the work ends with a brisk and sprightly rondo.

Mozart’s popular _Turkish March_—in the pseudo Turkish style so popular in Vienna in his day—comes out of his piano Sonata in A major, K. 331 (1778), where it appears as the last movement. This march is extremely popular in orchestral transcription.

Modest Mussorgsky

Modest Mussorgsky was born in Karevo, Russia, on March 21, 1839. When he was thirteen he entered the cadet school of the Imperial Guard in St. Petersburg, from which he was graduated to join the Guard regiment. In 1857 he met and befriended several important Russian musicians (including Balakirev and Stassov) under whose stimulus he decided to leave the army and become a composer. Until now his musical education had been sporadic, having consisted of little more than some piano lessons with his mother and a private teacher. He now began an intensive period of study with Balakirev, under whose guidance he completed a _Scherzo_ for orchestra which was performed in St. Petersburg in 1860, as well as some piano music and the fragments of a symphony. Associating himself with Balakirev, Rimsky-Korsakov, Borodin, and Cui he now became a passionate advocate of musical nationalism, becoming the fifth member of a new school of Russian music henceforth identified as “The Mighty Five” or “The Russian Five.” In 1863, with serfdom abolished in Russia, he lost the outside financial resources he had thus far enjoyed as the son of a landowner. To support himself he worked for four years as a clerk in the Ministry of Communications; in 1869 he found employment in the forestry department. During this period music had to be relegated to the position of an avocation, but composition was not abandoned. He completed the first of his masterworks, the orchestral tone poem, _A Night on the Bald Mountain_, in 1866. A lifelong victim of nervous disorders, melancholia and subsequently of alcoholism, his health soon began to deteriorate alarmingly; but despite this fact he was able to complete several works of crowning significance in 1874 including his folk opera, _Boris Godunov_, and his _Pictures at an Exhibition_, for piano. After 1874 his moral and physical disintegration became complete; towards the last months of his life he gave indications of losing his mind. He died in St. Petersburg on March 28, 1881.

As one of the most forceful and original members of the “Russian Five” Mussorgsky’s greatest works certainly do not lend themselves to popular distribution. His writing is too individual in its melodic and harmonic construction; and his works show too great a tendency towards musical realism to make for palatable digest. However, several of the folk dances in his operas are strikingly effective for their rhythmic pulse and national colors and are by no means as elusive in their appeal as the rest of his production.

Mussorgsky’s masterwork is his mighty folk opera, _Boris Godunov_, where we encounter one such delightful dance episode, the Polonaise. _Boris Godunov_, libretto by the composer based on a Pushkin drama, traces the career of the Czar from the years 1598 to 1605, from his coronation to his insanity and death. The Polonaise occurs in the first scene of the third act. At the palace of a Polish landowner, handsomely costumed guests perform this festive courtly dance in the adjoining garden. The première of _Boris Godunov_ took place in St. Petersburg on February 8, 1874.

Two orchestral dances can also be found in another of Mussorgky’s folk operas, _The Fair at Sorochinsk_, which was not introduced until October 26, 1917, in St. Petersburg. The libretto was by the composer based on Gogol’s story, _Evenings on a Farm Near Dikanka_. Tcherevik, a peasant, wants his daughter to marry Pritzko, whereas the peasant’s wife is partial to the pastor’s son. However, when the pastor’s son compromises the peasant’s wife she realizes that Pritzko is, after all, the right man for her daughter. In the third act of this opera comes the lively _Hopak_, or _Gopak_, a folk dance with two beats to a measure.

Folk dances of a completely different nature—more oriental and exotic than the previously discussed Russian variety—will be found in _Khovanschina_, a musical drama with libretto by the composer and Stassov; this opera was first given, in an amateur performance, in St. Petersburg on February 21, 1886. Here the setting is Moscow during the reign of Peter the Great, and the plot revolves around the efforts of a band of radicals known as the Streltsy who try to overthrow the Czar. Prince Ivan Khovantsky, who is in league with the Streltsy, is murdered by assassins, and the insurrection is suppressed. But before the leaders of the Streltsy can destroy themselves they are given an official pardon by the Czar. A high moment in this opera comes with the _Dances of the Persian Slaves_, which takes place in the first scene of the fourth act. At the country house of Khovantsky, the Prince is being entertained by an elaborate spectacle, the main attraction of which is the sinuous, Corybantic dancing of the Persian slaves.

Almost as popular as these Persian dances are the Prelude to the first act and an entr’acte between the first and second scenes from this opera; these two episodes for orchestra are highly atmospheric, graphic in the pictures of Russian landscapes. The first act Prelude has been named by the composer, _Dawn on the Moskava River_. This is a subtle tone picture made up of a folk melody and five variations. The entr’acte offers another kind of landscape, this time a bleak one describing the vast, lonely plains of Siberia.

Ethelbert Nevin

Ethelbert Woodbridge Nevin was born in Edgeworth, Pennsylvania, on November 25, 1862. A precocious child in music, he wrote his first piano piece when he was eleven. A year later he wrote and had published a song that became exceedingly popular, “Good Night, Good Night Beloved.” After studying music with private teachers, he went to Berlin in 1884, studying for two years with Hans von Buelow and Karl Klindworth. He returned to the United States in 1886. Soon after that he made his formal American concert debut as pianist with a program on which he included some of his own compositions. By 1890 he decided to give up his career as a virtuoso and to concentrate on being a composer. In 1891 he completed _Water Scenes_, a suite for the piano in which will be found one of the most popular piano pieces by an American, “Narcissus.” In 1892 and again 1895 Nevin traveled extensively through Europe and Morocco. In 1897 he settled in New York City where he wrote one of the best-selling art songs by an American, “The Rosary.” In 1900 Nevin went to live in New Haven. During the last year of his life he was a victim of depressions which he tried to alleviate through excessive drinking. He died of an apoplectic stroke in New Haven, Connecticut, on February 17, 1901.

“Mighty Lak a Rose” and “The Rosary” are Nevin’s two most famous art songs; they are also among the most popular art songs written in America. “Mighty Lak a Rose” was one of Nevin’s last compositions, written during the closing months of his life. He never lived to see the song published and become popular. The song is a setting of a poem by Frank L. Stanton, and is described by John Trasker Howard (Nevin’s biographer) as “probably the simplest of all his songs ... [with] a freshness and whimsical tenderness that make its appeal direct and forceful.”

“The Rosary,” words by R. C. Rogers, was an even greater success. From 1898 to 1928 it sold over two and a half million copies of sheet music. When Nevin had finished writing this song in 1898, he invited the singer Francis Rogers to dinner, after which he handed him a scribbled piece of music paper. “Here is a song I just composed,” he told Rogers. “I want you to sing it at your concert next week.” Rogers deciphered the notes as best he could while Nevin played the accompaniment from memory. The little audience listening to this first informal presentation of “The Rosary” was enthusiastic, but one of its members insisted it would be impossible for Rogers to memorize the song in time for the concert the following week. The guest bet Nevin a champagne supper for all present that the song would not be on Rogers’ program. He lost the bet. The following week, on February 15, 1898, Rogers introduced the song at the Madison Square Concert Hall.

The _Water Scenes_, suite for piano, op. 13 is remembered principally because one of its movements is “Narcissus,” often considered one of the most popular compositions ever written in this country. Nevin himself provided information about the origin of “Narcissus.” “I remembered vaguely that there was once a Grecian lad who had something to do with the water and who was called Narcissus. I rummaged about my old mythology and read the story over again. The theme, or rather both themes, came as I read. I went directly to my desk and wrote out the whole composition. Afterwards, I rewrote it and revised it a little. The next morning I sent it to my publishers. Until the proofs came back to me I never tried it on the piano. I left almost immediately for Europe and was surprised when a publisher wrote to me of the astonishing sale of the piece.” During Nevin’s lifetime, the piece sold over 125,000 copies of sheet music, and was heard throughout America both in its original piano version (a favorite repertory number of piano students and budding piano virtuosos) and in transcriptions. It went on to circle the globe. As Vance Thompson wrote: “It was thrummed and whistled half around the world. It was played in Cairo as in New York and Paris; it was played by orchestras, on church organs, and on the mouth harps of Klondike miners; it became a mode, almost a mania.”

The other movements of _Water Scenes_ are: “Barcarolle,” “Dragon Fly,” “Water Nymph,” “At Twilight,” and “Ophelia.” Each is a sensitive piece of tone painting, as lyrical and as unashamedly sentimental as the beloved “Narcissus.”

Otto Nicolai

Otto Nicolai was born in Koenigsberg, Germany, on June 9, 1810. After completing his music study with Zelter and Bernhard Klein, he came to Paris in 1830 where he remained three years. In Berlin he completed several works for orchestra, and some for chorus. In 1834 he went to Italy where he was organist in the Prussian Embassy at Rome and became interested in opera. From 1837 to 1838 he was principal conductor at the Kaerthnerthor Theater in Vienna. Then he returned to Italy to devote himself to the writing of operas, the first of which, _Rosmonda d’Inghilterra_ was a failure when produced in Turin in 1838. His second opera, however, was a major success when first given in Turin in 1840: _Il Templario_ based on Sir Walter Scott’s _Ivanhoe_; it was produced in Naples and Vienna. In 1841 Nicolai came to Vienna to serve for six years as Kapellmeister to the court. During this period, in 1842, he helped to found the renowned Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra. In 1847 he came to Berlin to become conductor of the Domchor. It was here that he completed the work upon which his reputation rests, the comic opera, _The Merry Wives of Windsor_ (_Die lustigen Weiber von Windsor_). He died in Berlin of an apoplectic stroke on May 11, 1849, only two months after the première performance of his famous comic opera.

_The Merry Wives of Windsor_ (_Die lustigen Weiber von Windsor_) is Nicolai’s only opera to survive; and its overture is his only work for orchestra which retains its popularity. The opera received a highly successful première in Berlin on March 8, 1849. Its libretto, by Hermann Salomon Mosenthal, is based on Shakespeare’s comedy and follows that play with only minor modifications. Falstaff’s cronies (Bardolph, Pistol and Nym) are omitted; only slight reference is made to the love of Anne and Fenton; and considerable attention is paid to Falstaff’s comical amatory overtures to Mistresses Ford and Page.

The overture opens with a slow introduction in which a flowing melody is given against a high G in the violins. This melody is repeated by several different sections of the orchestra, then treated in imitation. The main part of the overture is made up of two vivacious melodies, the second of which, in the violins, is intended to depict Mistress Page. The development of both themes is in a gay mood, with a robust passage in F minor representing Falstaff. The overture concludes with an animated coda.

From the opera itself come three melodious vocal selections, prominent in all orchestral potpourris: Falstaff’s drinking song, a long time favorite of German bassos, “_Als Bueblein klein_”; Fenton’s serenade to Anne Page, “_Horch, die Lerche singt in Haim_”; and Mistress Page’s third-act ballad of Herne the Hunter.

Siegfried Ochs

Siegfried Ochs was born in Frankfort on the Main, Germany, on April 19, 1858. While studying medicine, he attended the Berlin High School for Music. Then deciding upon music as a life’s career, he continued his music study with private teachers and became a protégé of Hans von Buelow. In 1882 he founded the Philharmonic Choir of Berlin, one of Germany’s most celebrated choral groups. He remained its conductor even after it merged with the chorus of the Berlin High School for Music in 1920. Ochs died in Berlin on February 6, 1929.

Ochs wrote several comic operas, song cycles, and some choral music. A semi-classical favorite is the set of orchestral variations on the well-known German folk song, “_Kommt ein Vogel_.” These variations are each in the style of a famous composer—Bach, Mozart, Beethoven, Wagner, Johann Strauss II, and so on; and each variation shows a remarkable skill, and a winning wit, in mimicking the individual creative mannerisms and idiosyncrasies of each composer.

Jacques Offenbach