Musical Criticisms Part 11

Again, in the finale, his marvellous accuracy and fine phrasing enabled the hearers to enjoy every _nuance_ of the composition, notwithstanding a tendency to hurry that was perceptible at certain points. The tremendous "Don Juan" fantasia, for pianoforte alone, gave Mr. Rosenthal an opportunity of exhibiting his technical powers in one of the most audacious _bravura_ compositions that exist. In many persons the fine frenzy that rages through the middle and latter parts of this piece awakens no sympathy. It has, nevertheless, a legitimate place in the Palace of Art, being nothing more than the logical development to the highest possible point of the _bravura_ style that originated with Liszt. The latter of the two variations on "_La ci darem_"--that section which precedes the entry of the champagne song--is the most bewildering and repugnant part of the piece to the general public. For that reason, and also on account of its heart-breaking difficulties, the variation in question is often omitted. But Mr. Rosenthal omitted nothing yesterday.

He hurled forth the Dionysiac declaration of war against all the chilly conventions and proprieties, the priggeries and pruderies of Mrs.

Grundy, that forms the real content of the piece, with that technical power in which he is surpa.s.sed by no living performer. After many recalls he was constrained to play once more; and, by way of the sharpest possible contrast, he gave Chopin's Berceuse, bringing out all the delicate moonshine filigree of the right-hand part with infinite subtlety.

[Sidenote: =Paderewski.=

_October 29, 1902._]

The recital given yesterday evening at the Free Trade Hall seems to have been the last of Mr. Paderewski's art that we are likely to hear for some time. He is not expected to visit Manchester again during the next few years, and the occasion therefore seems fitting for a more general discussion of his playing than is usual in a simple notice of a recital.

No doubt Mr. Paderewski is, on the whole, the most distinguished executive musician now before the public. The Paderewski "craze" in England and America is not a mere matter of fashion and folly, but is shared by experts and brethren of the craft, many of whom are irresistibly fascinated by Mr. Paderewski's playing, even while they disapprove of much that he does. Why will he insist on using a pianoforte with so hard a tone? Why is the skelp of his hand on the keys so frequently audible from the most distant point of the hall, as a sound quite separate from the musical notes? Why does he never play Bach? Why does he always play Liszt's second Rhapsodie? Such are a few among the searchings of heart to which Mr. Paderewski's public performances give rise, and to none of them--probably--is there a complete and satisfactory answer. The shallow-toned instrument admits of greater clearness in the ba.s.s, and has a more scintillating kind of brilliancy in the upper octaves, and Mr. Paderewski, who likes all pa.s.sage-work a little staccato, naturally favours it. The rage of his "con gran bravura" lends greater charm to his _grazioso_ style, by the principle of contrast--a point on which he often lays emphasis by rapid alternations of the two styles. Iteration of show pieces, such as the second Rhapsodie, is excusable in a pianist who is incessantly touring the two worlds and playing to all sorts and conditions of men by land and by sea. As to the Bach question we know nothing. He may even have played Bach in other parts of the world. Mr. Paderewski's distinguishing quality is a certain extraordinary energy--not merely a one-sided physical, or even a two-sided physical and intellectual, energy; it is of the fingers and wrists, of the mind, the imagination, the heart, and the soul, and it makes Mr. Paderewski the most interesting of players, even though to the extreme kind of specialist, absorbed in problems of tone-production, he is not the most absolute master of his instrument at the present day. His art has a certain princely quality. It is indescribably _galant_ and _chevaleresque_. He knows all the secrets of all the most subtle dancing rhythms. He is a reincarnation of Chopin, with almost the added virility of a Rubinstein. No wonder such a man fascinates, bewilders, and enchants the public! Greatly surpa.s.sed by Busoni in the interpretation of Beethoven, by Pachmann in the touch that persistently draws forth roundness, sweetness, and fulness of tone, and by G.o.dowsky in the mastery of intricate line and the power of sucking out the very last drop of melody from every part of a composition, Paderewski still remains the most brilliant, fascinating, and successfully audacious of present-day musical performers, and in preferring him the general public is probably right, though the keen student of the pianoforte in particular may learn more from G.o.dowsky, and the earnest lover of the musical cla.s.sics in general, more from Busoni.

The programme of yesterday's recital was on the usual lines, except in regard to the Paganini Variations by Brahms, of which a selection from the two volumes were played with astounding dash and incisiveness. The unfamiliar Fantasia by Schumann was made perhaps a little more interesting than any other player could have made it. Beethoven's C sharp minor Sonata was given in a manner typical of Mr. Paderewski's Beethoven renderings, except that there happens to be nothing in the first and second movements that is alien to his Slavonic temperament.

The finale, belonging to that element in Beethoven which appeals to a more broadly based human nature, sounded flimsy. The Chopin and Liszt pieces were all splendidly done. The long-continued demonstrations of enthusiasm in the latter part of the recital led to three additional pieces, namely, a Nocturne of the performer's own composition, the inevitable Rhapsodie aforementioned, and Chopin's A flat Waltz, with a mixture of double and triple time.

[Sidenote: =G.o.dowsky.=

_March 17, 1903._]

It is a little difficult to do justice to the qualities of Mr.

G.o.dowsky's pianoforte playing without at the same time saying too much and making claims that are not justified by the facts. It must be remembered that there is no Liszt or Rubinstein at the present day.

Those men were giants--mighty personalities who dominated the musical world, being essentially great as well as good players. The present generation has no such personality among solo performers. Talents that come to the top show a specialising tendency, and it is no longer possible to say that so-and-so is the greatest pianist of the age. One can only say that Mr. Busoni is the greatest musician who now plays pianoforte solos in public, and Mr. Paderewski is the most brilliant performer on the pianoforte, and Mr. G.o.dowsky the most absolute expert in tone production on the same instrument. It is not to be denied that, taking Mr. G.o.dowsky's art as a whole, and thus including musical conception, one finds it imposing. He never comes within a measurable distance of bad style: he always gives an essentially good rendering of anything that he undertakes to perform. But what one princ.i.p.ally admires is not his mind, imagination, or temperament, but simply his hands--his warm, subtle, and preternaturally deft wrists and fingers. Having apparently been warned that the peculiar acoustic of the hall has a tendency to make any pianoforte sound as if the pedal were down nearly all the time, he yesterday avoided the bewilderingly elaborate style of which he has made a speciality. But, in addition to the flawless perfection of all the pa.s.sage work, there was abundant opportunity in the series of pieces by Beethoven, Chopin, and Liszt to admire that marvellous control of tone which often enables him to reveal fresh melody in quite familiar compositions. The pieces that were least affected by the cross reverberations of the hall were the Etude in extended chords and the C sharp minor Scherzo by Chopin. On the other hand, no one who has not heard Mr. G.o.dowsky under more favourable circ.u.mstances can imagine, from the experience of yesterday evening, the magical effect of his performance in the G sharp minor Etude in thirds for the right hand. In playing the exquisite F minor Concert Etude by Liszt he deliberately kept the tone down to a minimum, to avoid the buzz and confusion as far as possible. Liszt's transcription of the "Tannhauser" Overture was used for the display piece that audiences expect at the end of a recital. It is characteristic of Mr. G.o.dowsky that his favourite amus.e.m.e.nt is making rearrangements of Chopin's Etudes--the "G.o.dowsky Bedevilments," Mr. Huneker calls them. These include the celebrated combination of the two G flat Etudes, where the left hand has to play the one in the first book while the right plays the legato and staccato improvisation from the second volume, and another in which three Etudes in A minor are brought together contrapuntally. Though they are all of course anathema to the purist, the ingenuity displayed in some of these things is so prodigious that no one interested in pianoforte playing can well be indifferent to them.

[Sidenote: =Lamond.=

_December 15, 1903._]

Mr. Frederic Lamond's strongest points as a pianist are not those which the wider public most readily appreciates. He is not one of the pianistic experts in the narrower sense, like Messrs. Pachmann and G.o.dowsky, for whom neat fingering and smooth tone-production are much more important than musical interpretation. Mr. Lamond is before all things a virile player. His style is broad and a little severe. He lacks the peculiar grace and charm of Mr. Paderewski in the treatment of dancing rhythm no less obviously than that faculty, akin to a j.a.panese juggler's, which enables Mr. Pachmann to bring from the pianoforte a tone more smooth and sweet than was ever before imagined possible. Mr.

Lamond's qualities are entirely different. Plastic force, technical and imaginative grasp of the greater composers' greater ideas, a deep and powerful but rather rough tone--these are the characteristics of his playing, and they are characteristics better appreciated in Germany than in this country, where music-lovers think too much of the merely smooth and the merely deft and the "sweetly pretty." It is rather surprising that neither of his recent performances in Manchester should have included any example of Beethoven, of whose greater Sonatas Mr. Lamond is now probably the best living interpreter, with the possible exception of Mr. Busoni. He was of course quite right to play plenty of Liszt, but it may be regretted that he gave so much of the later Liszt--who, conscious of himself as the world-famous magician of the piano, often improvised on rather poor themes, as if to show that any theme, however weak, could be made interesting by his transcendental style of ornamentation--rather than the earlier Liszt who wrote things of such power and eloquence as the "Mazeppa" Etude. Mr. Lamond's mind seems recently to have been running on Liszt's Tarantelle Fantasias. He played the "Venezia e Napoli" Tarantelle at the Halle Concert and the "Muette de Portici" Tarantelle yesterday--both pieces which are chiefly of interest as proving that Liszt could improvise effectively upon any conceivable sort of thematic material. It would have been much more interesting to hear the "Mazeppa," which Mr. Lamond played in the composer's presence and to his evident satisfaction when last he was in London, a few months before his death in 1886, or some piece in that pregnant early manner. His best performance yesterday was in Chopin's A flat Polonaise--a composition of such excellence that, hackneyed as it is, it cannot in a good rendering fail to give pleasure. Mr. Lamond did full justice to the majestic beauty of the themes, which are all absolutely good, and brought out the famous _ba.s.so ostinato_ section in some respects better than we have heard it done since Rubinstein's death. He did not adopt any of the revised versions of the left-hand octave pa.s.sages favoured by certain distinguished modern performers. On the other hand, he did adopt Rubinstein's version of the ending, with the unexpected and telling chord of C major just before the final phrase. In Rubinstein's F minor Barcarolle--so interesting in rhythm, so original in colouring--Mr. Lamond was not entirely successful, his temperament apparently not furnishing a key to the vein of lyrism in which the piece is conceived. Yet in Liszt's "Liebestraum" he was perfect, though one might have expected that his Beethovenish tastes would have rebelled against the hothouse atmosphere of the composition.

The opening performance of Schumann's "Carnaval" was powerful and distinguished, but too broad in style to be in keeping with the sub-t.i.tle "Scenes mignonnes." On neither of these recent occasions has Mr. Lamond played anything of his own, though he has composed plenty of effective stuff for his instrument. He is beyond all question by far the most distinguished pianist of British extraction that has yet arisen.

CHAPTER XI.

VIOLIN-PLAYING.

[Sidenote: =Ysaye.=

_November 8, 1900._]

Two complete Concerti, each in the orthodox three movements, exhibited the distinguished Belgian master's style, first in strictly cla.s.sical then in more florid and more highly coloured modern music. Of concerti by the great Bach for a single solo violin only two are extant. One, in A minor, has been frequently played here in recent years by Dr. Joachim and Mr. Brodsky. The other, in E major, is comparatively unfamiliar.

Perhaps the accompaniment, which in the original score is for strings alone, has been considered rather meagre, and the extremely simple form of the concluding Rondo may also have been regarded as unsatisfactory.

For Mr. Ysaye's performance of the E major Concerto the accompaniment has been strengthened with an organ part written by Mr. Gevaert, Princ.i.p.al of the Conservatoire de Musique in Brussels, and it can scarcely be questioned that the work as he presents it is beautiful, interesting, and highly satisfactory as a concert piece. The most characteristic part is the middle movement, which, as in Bach's Sonata for the same instrument and in the same key, is in Chaconne form, with a ba.s.s theme that wanders freely through different keys, while the upper strings play a descent and the solo instrument embroiders. A most powerful and telling performance was given of this n.o.ble Adagio, the accompaniment being a.s.signed to a small group of orchestral players together with the organ, and the soloist devoting all the resources of his art to bringing out the delicate figuration of the upper voice with ineffably sweet tone and subtle phrasing. The first movement is remarkable for such wealth of thematic development as one scarcely expects to find in a work composed so long before Beethoven's time, and the finale brings the work to a close upon a note of simple and hearty feeling. If strong contrast with the style of Bach was desired, the Saint-Saens concerto was well chosen for the second example of violin music. Rich in colouring and surcharged with sensuous delights, the modern Frenchman's composition pa.s.ses along on its triumphant career, like some fine lady, radiant in natural beauty and superbly attired, witty, graceful, charming, and in every way effective--perhaps all the more effective for being a little heartless. In the performance of this music Mr. Ysaye was altogether in his glory. His astonishing warmth and depth of tone lent fresh eloquence to such new phase of the solo part.

He made his instrument sing his Andantino theme with ravishing sweetness, and his overwhelming technical power enabled him to revel in the rushing and flying pa.s.sages of the Mephistophelean finale.

Everything was magnificent, including even the harmonies in the Coda of the slow movement, and the Concerto ended in a blaze of triumph. There is only one fault to be found with Mr. Ysaye, namely, that he makes everything sound modern.

[Sidenote: =Ysaye and Busoni.=

_February 6, 1902._]

If another and older master of the violin is commonly described--as it were, _emeritus_--as greatest living violinist, it is unquestionably to Mr. Ysaye that the t.i.tle belongs in its full sense. Unparalleled warmth, richness, and bouquet of tone, added to sovereign mastery of technique and a marvellous temperament, full of fiery energy and yet apparently incapable of exaggeration--such are the most obvious qualities of Mr.

Ysaye's art. He is not a genuine cla.s.sic, like Joachim. Bach and Beethoven he plays in virtue of infallible artistic _savoir vivre_; but he is obviously in fuller sympathy with a Sonata or Concerto by Saint-Saens, a Suite by Vieuxtemps, or a Fantasia by Wieniawski. Yet that artistic _savoir vivre_ is so complete that it is nearly always impossible to find specific fault with his renderings of the cla.s.sics.

This was the case yesterday in the Bach Sonata, which headed the programme. Each of the four movements declared the mastery of the string player, no less than of the pianist, Mr. Busoni--real kindred spirits of Bach and Beethoven. The Vieuxtemps Suite, too, was given with such beauty of tone that the superficiality of the composition was entirely disguised, the slow movement sounding almost as though Bach had written it. In the concluding sonata--a late work by Saint-Saens--it is scarcely necessary to say that the violin-playing was perfect. Perhaps some of the listeners remembered a performance by the same violinist of Saint-Saens's Third Concerto at a Halle Concert not long ago. Again yesterday we were treated to such playing as bewilders the senses and seemed to place the transcendental cleverness of the French composer on a level with the real imaginative power of greater men. Mr. Ysaye was extremely well disposed--in fact, quite at his best--and was rapturously applauded. As an extra piece he gave Beethoven's Romance in G, the rendering being above criticism.

Utterly dissimilar as Messrs. Ysaye and Busoni are in temperament and artistic character, they meet as master musicians, and the a.s.sociation is in the highest degree interesting. The one is all sense and the other all spirit, and one feels that only the immensely high accomplishment of both makes the a.s.sociation possible. Mr. Busoni's solo was that most capricious and austere Sonata, Beethoven's 109th work. It was all incomparably well rendered, and the Variations in the last movement, which ultimately spin themselves into a kind of Fantasia, were a prodigious revelation of technical power. It is long since such a pianoforte performance has been heard in this city--a performance stamped by austere beauty and lofty ideality, and free from all earthly elements. What other pianist at the present day, we venture to ask, could give us such a thing?

[Sidenote: =Kubelik.=

_November 5, 1902._]

Popularity such as Mr. Jan Kubelik, the young Bohemian violinist, at present enjoys makes it very difficult to criticise his performance. He has not to meet the same conditions as other violinists. Thousands of persons who care little or nothing for music attend his recitals merely because he is a recognised society pet, and he commands a fee that makes it impossible for orchestral societies to engage him. The restrictions imposed by this state of things are obvious. He can only play with pianoforte accompaniment, or with none at all; he is obliged to adhere almost entirely to music that is light in style and of only secondary artistic worth, and during a certain proportion of each recital he has to give himself up entirely to sensationalism. Thus, after hearing him play through three complete recital programmes, we do not feel qualified to express more than a very fragmentary opinion upon his art. That he has all the ordinary technique of the instrument at his fingers' ends is a notorious fact. His tone is never remarkable for volume, but often for sweetness. His truth of intonation in the midst of intricate pa.s.sage-work is remarkable, and gives the sense of hearing a rare kind of satisfaction. His memory seems to be entirely trustworthy, and his manner is free from affectation; but as to his musical conception, we can only say that it is quite adequate to the interpretation of such a charming piece of light, racy, and popular music as Grieg's third Sonata. The one sc.r.a.p of Bach that he played yesterday--the unaccompanied Prelude in E major--was not specially well done, and how he plays Beethoven, Mozart, or any of the great masters we do not know at all. His most _recherches_ effects of tone Mr. Kubelik seems to hold in reserve for the encore pieces. In the allegretto movement of the Grieg Sonata--a most tenderly homesick and lovesick little northern Romance--he did not let his violin sing with all the sweetness of which it is capable, as was afterwards shown in the arrangement of Schubert's "Ave Maria" and in an unpublished Serenade by the performer's friend and compatriot Drdla--both played as extra pieces at the end of the recital.

Virtuoso music, in the rendering of which Mr. Kubelik is well known to be a great expert, was represented in yesterday's recital by the following pieces:--Wieniawski's Fantasia on Themes from Gounod's "Faust," Paganini's caprice "I Palpiti," Bazzini's "Ronde des Lutins,"

the last-named played among the encore pieces. We do not, as a rule, care for the Fantasia on operatic airs, but Wieniawski's "Faust"

Fantasia is written with such wonderful ingenuity and musical skill that it cannot be placed in the same category with the mere strings of tunes with perfunctory accompaniments and connecting sections that such pieces usually are. The Variation on the waltz theme, with the melody in harmonics and the rushing accompaniment figure in the ordinary tone of the instrument, is a marvel of successful audacity. It so happens, too, that the rendering of this almost impossible Variation was the most brilliant thing in yesterday's recital.

[Sidenote: =Kreisler.=

_November 6, 1902._]

We live in an age that seems likely to be known in the future as the period of star violinists. It is curious to note how the musical world ill.u.s.trates the saying "It never rains but it pours." At one period we have a long string of pianistic infant prodigies. Hoffmann, Hegner, Hambourg--they come rapidly to the front, one after another, growing ever younger and younger, and nearly always beginning with "h." Next we break into the period of youthful violinists, beginning with "k."

Kubelik, Kocian, Kreisler come tumbling over each other's heel, each one causing embarra.s.sment to the critics for lack of any stronger terms of commendation than were bestowed upon the last. It is true the string players are not of such tender years as were the pianists on their first appearance. The youngest of the violin prodigies was Bronislav Hubermann, who not many years ago shook his elf-locks at the Philharmonic Society of Vienna and more nearly succeeded in turning the heads of that august, formidable, and severely critical body than might have been thought possible. For the present we are mainly concerned with Mr. Kreisler, who is not so desperately youthful, but is a mature and military-looking man, though he is commonly reckoned among the players of the new school, or the rising generation. His programme yesterday was open to some of the same objections as Mr. Kubelik's on Tuesday evening.

It included nothing from the major prophets of music, the most important piece being Tartini's "Trillo del Diavolo" Sonata--no doubt one of the best examples of that school which grew up in Italy soon after the perfecting of the violin at the end of the seventeenth century. In a well-contrasted style was the only other piece in more than one movement that he played, namely, Vieuxtemps' second Concerto. In the rendering of these pieces one noted a peculiarly incisive manner of giving full value to all the detail of the figuration, and also a singing tone of rich and strangely penetrating quality. Mr. Kreisler's style is in sharp contrast with Mr. Kubelik's. Instead of caressing the instrument and coaxing the tone out of it, he wrestles with it and plucks out the heart of its mystery. Nor does he seem to care for the sputtering Paganinities so dear to the heart of Mr. Kubelik. His pieces in the second part of the programme were a rather Mozartian Larghetto from a Sonata by Nardini (an eighteenth-century Italian); a "Tambourin" by Leclair (an eighteenth-century Frenchman), much modernised in the arrangement; a bagatelle called "L'Abeille," by Franz Schubert of Dresden--not, of course, the famous Schubert, but a violinist who died some twenty-five years ago; an arrangement by Marcello Rossi of the "Song without Words"

in F, by Tchakovsky; and, finally, the Allegretto grazioso from the same Nardini Sonata, played as an encore piece. "L'Abeille"--a clever show-piece in perpetual motion triplets, played with a mute on the bridge--was encored and repeated.

CHAPTER XII.

MUSIC IN THE 19th CENTURY.

[Sidenote: =Mr. J. A. Fuller Maitland's English Music in the 19th century.=

_May 20, 1902._]

As applied to Parry, Stanford, or Mackenzie, we are instructed, the reproach of being "academic" has absolutely no aptness whatever. These worthy dons are creative artists of the highest possible order, to be cla.s.sed with Bach, Beethoven, and Wagner, and it thus appears that about the middle of the century British music arose like the lark, soaring at once to the topmost airs of the welkin; that to find a parallel for the revelation of genius during the fifty ensuing British years one has to range over two German centuries! Not even Beethoven is to be excepted from the list of things that were matched by our professorial larks, swans, giants, heroes, angels, and demiG.o.ds! Now all this represents a rather deplorable state of things. Why is it--I cannot help asking once more--that at the present time in this country so much worse nonsense is written about music than about drama, literature, or any other kindred subject? A great stir was recently made by the production of "Paolo and Francesca," yet no admirer of Mr. Stephen Phillips has thought it necessary to call him the equal of Shakespeare. There is certainly this excuse for Mr. Fuller Maitland, that in the London press of recent years much extravagance of the opposite kind has appeared--excessive and, in a few cases, positively brutal detraction of Parry and Stanford and their school--and perhaps the chief blame for the hysterical nonsense of supporters lies within certain opponents who have attacked without regard either for the facts of the case or even for common decency. In any case a state of things has been brought about in which one party howls "Incompetent humbug!" while the other shrieks "Genius of the highest order!"

In the meantime what about the truth and the critical currency? And is it not a pity that Mr. Fuller Maitland should have missed the opportunity afforded to him by the writing of this history to put off controversial frenzy and return to a more judicial spirit? We that have to do with the musical world are all perfectly well aware--whether we describe Parry and Stanford as "academic" or protest against that epithet--that they are men of high distinction who have played a leading and brilliant part in the English musical revival and generally have deserved well of the musical republic. For my part, while fully recognising their eminence both in talent and character, I am of opinion that their claims to regard as absolute creative artists are habitually overstated by their supporters in the press. The appearance of Parry created a considerable stir. His imposing grasp of choral polyphony was something new in English music. His great intelligence, his wide sympathy and geniality, his virility and industry--all these qualities united to arouse enthusiastic hopes. But, as Mr. Fuller Maitland writes on page 185, "with the pa.s.sage of years the group of composers will fall into truer and truer perspective." There has already been a considerable pa.s.sage of years since those first compositions, but the early enthusiastic estimate has not been justified. Outside the circle of his pupils and personal friends no one now seems to care very much for his music. Here in the North of England concert societies find that the public admiration of it is a rapidly vanishing quant.i.ty. Three years ago his "Job" and "Blest Pair of Sirens" were given here, but ever since that occasion his name has been something of a terror to our concert societies. A frequent experience in regard to Parry's music is that, whereas a first hearing impresses in virtue of ma.s.siveness and energy or of striking and unconventional dramatic touches, second and subsequent hearings are discouraging. "Job" is the most favourable case among the choral and orchestral works that I have heard. It is thoroughly artistic in conception and unconventional in treatment. Moreover, the lyrical interlude of the shepherd-boy's song helps along the early part very happily, and Mr. Plunket Greene is always eloquent in the "Lamentations." Nevertheless, I found the second hearing a sad experience. Now the impression that there is something wrong with Parry's music--notwithstanding all the learning, resource, wide sympathies, intelligence, and so forth that it shows--is undoubtedly a very general one. To find any person not personally attached to the composer taking up one of his works, great or small, is exceedingly rare. The composer's personal popularity is great, but outside the charmed circle no one seems ready to spend a shilling in hearing his stuff or to risk a shilling in giving it. Mr. Fuller Maitland says that the provincial choral societies are faithful to Parry, and this may be true in some cases. To a society in the habit of occupying themselves with the cantatas of Dr. Gaul I could imagine Parry would seem the seventh heaven of art. But in the great centres or in any place where there are ardent souls not to be deceived as to what is genuine in music a revival of interest in Parry seems to me very improbable.

At his worst, _e.g._, in "King Saul," he appeals; at his best, _e.g._, in the "Soldier's Tent" (song with orchestral accompaniment), he almost persuades. But the horrors of the empty tone ma.s.ses hurled at one's head in the "Saul" choruses, or of the purple patches of Wagnerian orchestration a.s.sociated with inept vocal phrases in the princ.i.p.al monologue of the same oratorio--those horrors are so very genuine, whereas the charm of such a song as the "Soldier's Tent," where the composer keeps comparatively well to the point and scores with comparative aptness, is still somewhat doubtful. A remark of Mr. Fuller Maitland's helps me to a possible explanation of the something wrong. He commends the "delicate humour" of "When icicles hang by the wall" in Parry's English Lyrics. Now I have certainly never heard that song, but I must have read it somewhere, for I distinctly remember the humorous and expressive accompaniment at the words "coughing drowns the parson's saw." It also comes back to me that other pa.s.sages, such as all that eight-part counterpoint at the end of "Blest Pair of Sirens," look exceedingly well on paper. Possibly, then, the key to the mystery is that Parry's music is a.n.a.logous to those plays which read well but act badly. Perhaps the way to enjoy it is to read it and admire the fertility of device while taking great care never to hear it, and so escape the consciousness of the fact that the actual wine of that music as it flows forth is not quite the genuine thing; that, notwithstanding notable fulness of body, the quality is gritty, the flavour somewhat acrid and inky, the bouquet artificial and multifariously compounded.