Musical Memories Part 14

By adding still another third we have the dominant eleventh. Offenbach used this, but it has played but a small part since then. Beyond that we cannot go, for a third more and we are back to the basic note, two octaves away.

But innovations in harmony are rare in Offenbach's work. What makes him interesting is his fertility in invention of melodies and few have equaled him in this. He improvised constantly and with incredible rapidity. His ma.n.u.scripts give the impression of having been done with the point of a needle. There is nothing useless anywhere in them. He used abbreviations as much as he could and the simplicity of his harmony helped him here. As a result he was able to produce his light works in an exceedingly short time.

He had the luck to attach Madame Ugalde to his company. Her powers had already begun to decline but she was still brilliant. While she was giving a spectacular revival of _Orphee aux Enfers_, he wrote _Les Bavards_ for her. He was inspired by the hope of an unusual interpretation and he so surpa.s.sed himself that he produced a small masterpiece. A revival of this work would certainly be successful if that were possible, but the peculiar merits of the creatrix of the role would be necessary and I do not see her like anywhere.

It is strange but true that Offenbach lost all his good qualities as soon as he took himself seriously. But he was not the only case of this in the history of music. Cramer and Clementi wrote studies and exercises which are marvels of style, but their sonatas and concertos are tiresome in their mediocrity. Offenbach's works which were given at the Opera-Comique--_Robinson Crusoe_, _Vert-Vert_, and _Fantasio_ are much inferior to _La Chanson de Fortunio_, _La Belle Helene_ and many other justly famous operettas. There have been several unprofitable revivals of _La Belle Helene_. This is due to the fact that the role of Helene was designed for Mlle. Schneider. She was beautiful and talented and had an admirable mezzo-soprano voice. The slight voice of the ordinary singer of operetta is insufficient for the part. Furthermore, traditions have sprung up. The comic element has been suppressed and the piece has been denatured by this change. In Germany they conceived the idea of playing this farce seriously with an archaic stage setting!

Jacques Offenbach will become a cla.s.sic. While this may be unexpected, what doesn't happen? Everything is possible--even the impossible.

CHAPTER XXII

THEIR MAJESTIES

Queen Victoria did me the honor to receive me twice at Windsor Castle, and Queen Alexandra paid me the same honor at Buckingham Palace in London. The first time I saw Queen Victoria I was presented to her by the Baroness de Caters. She was the daughter of Lablache and had one of the most beautiful voices and the greatest talent that I have ever known. This charming woman had been left a widow and so she became an artist, appearing in concerts and giving singing lessons. At the time of which I speak she was teaching Princess Beatrice, now the mother-in-law of the King of Spain. In all the glory of the freshness of youth, the Princess was endowed with a charming voice which the Baroness guided perfectly. The Princess received Madame de Caters and myself with a gracefulness which was increased by her unusual bashfulness. Her Majesty, in the meantime, was finishing her luncheon. I was somewhat apprehensive through having heard of the coldness which the Queen affected at this sort of audience, so I was more than surprised when she came in with both hands extended to take mine and when she addressed me with real cordiality. She was very fond of Baroness de Caters and that was the secret of the reception which put me at my ease at once.

Her Majesty wanted to hear me play the organ (there is an excellent one in the chapel at Windsor), and then the piano. Finally, I had the honor of accompanying the Princess as she sang the aria from _Etienne Marcel_.

Her Royal Highness sang with great clearness and distinctness, but it was the first time she had sung before her august mother and she was frightened almost to death. The Queen was so delighted that some days later, without my being told of it, she summoned to Windsor, Madame Gye, wife of the manager of Covent Garden,--the famous singer Albani--to ask to have _Etienne Marcel_ staged at her own theatre. The Queen's wish was not granted.

I returned to Windsor seventeen years later, in company with Johann Wolf, who was for many years Queen Victoria's chosen violinist. We dined at the palace, and, if we did not enjoy the distinction of sitting at the royal table, we were nevertheless in good company with the young princesses, daughters of the Duke of Connaught. We were lodged at a hotel for the honor of sleeping at the Castle was reserved for very important personages--an honor which need not be envied, for the sleeping apartments are really servants' rooms. But etiquette decrees it.

Dinner was over, and princes in full uniform and princesses in elaborate evening dress stood about, waiting for her Majesty's appearance. I was heartbroken when I saw her enter, for she was almost carried by her Indian servant and obviously could not walk alone. But once seated at a small table, she was just as she had been before, with her wonderful charm, her simple manner and her musical voice. Only her white hair bore witness to the years that had pa.s.sed. She asked me about _Henri VIII_, which was being given for the second time at Covent Garden, and I explained to her that in my desire to give the piece the local color of its times I had been ferreting about in the royal library at Buckingham Palace, to which my friend, the librarian, had given me access. And I also told how I had found in a great collection of ma.n.u.scripts of the Sixteenth Century an exquisitely fine theme arranged for the harpsichord, which served as the framework for the opera--I used it later for the march I wrote for the coronation of King Edward. The Queen was much interested in music in general and she appeared to be especially pleased in this discussion. His Highness the Duke of Connaught wrote me that she had spoken of it several times.

The musical library at Buckingham Palace is most remarkable and it is a pity that access to it is not easier. Among other things, there are the ma.n.u.scripts of Handel's oratorios, written for the most part with disconcerting rapidity. His _Messiah_ was composed in fifteen days! The rudimentary instrumentation of the time made such speed possible, yet who is there to-day who could write all those fugue choruses with such speed? The fugue manner, which seems laborious to us, was current at the time and they were practised in it. The library also contains works of Handel's contemporaries, which are executed with the same mastery. We cannot say whether they were written with the same rapidity as Handel's, but it is easy to see that there was a general ability to do so, just as now it is a matter of common attainment to produce complicated orchestral effects, the possibility of which the old masters had no conception. What made Handel superior to his rivals was the romantic and picturesque side of his works; probably also, his prodigious and unvarying fertility.

The last word has been said about Queen Victoria, yet the peculiar charm which radiated from her personality cannot be too highly praised. She seemed the personification of England. When she pa.s.sed on, it seemed as though a great void were left. All King Edward's splendid qualities were necessary to take her place, combined with the effect of the world's surprise at discovering a great king where they had expected to see only a brilliant prince who had been a constant lover of pomp and pleasure.

I was later admitted to Buckingham Palace to play with Josef Hollman, the violinist, before Queen Alexandra. We both were eager for this opportunity which we were told was impossible. The Queen was very busy, and, in addition, she was in mourning for the successive deaths of her father and mother, the King and Queen of Denmark. Suddenly, however, we learned that she would receive us. She was pale and appeared to be feeble, but she received us with the utmost cordiality. She spoke to me about her mother, whom I had seen at Copenhagen with her sisters the Empress Dowager of Russia, and the Princess of Hanover whom politics deprived of a crown which was hers by right. I have a very pleasant recollection of this visit. I do not know how it happened but I remained speechless at this lead from the Queen. She brought the subject up a second time and my timidity still prevented my responding. I ought to have had many things to say to one so obviously eager to listen. This Queen of Denmark, with her eighty years, was the most delightful old lady imaginable. Erect, slight, alert of mind and unfaltering of speech, she reminded me vividly of my maternal great-aunt, that extraordinary woman, who gave me my first notions of things and directed my hand on the keys so well.

A singer whom I had never seen or heard of, but of whom I had heard poor reports, had written Queen Louise that I wanted to accompany her to court. The Queen asked me if I knew her and if what she had written was true. My surprise was so great that I could not repress a start, which I followed by an exclamation of denial, which appeared to amuse her greatly. "I did not doubt it," she said, "but I'm not sorry to be sure."

Queen Alexandra was accompanied by Lady Gray, her great friend, and the hereditary princess of Greece. After M. Hollman and I had played a duet, she expressed a desire to hear me play alone. As I attempted to lift the lid of the piano, she stepped forward to help me raise it before the maids of honor could intervene. After this slight concert she delivered to each of us, in her own name and in that of the absent king, a gold medal commemorative of artistic merit, and she offered us a cup of tea which she poured with her royal and imperial hands.

Other queens have also received me--Queen Christine of Spain and Queen Amelie of Portugal. After Queen Christine had heard me play on the piano, she expressed a desire to hear me play the organ, and they chose for this an excellent instrument made by Cavaille-Coll in a church whose name I have forgotten. The day was fixed for this ceremony, which would naturally have been of a private character, when some great ladies lectured the indiscreet queen for daring to resort to a sacred place for any purpose besides taking part in divine services. The queen was displeased by this remonstrance and she responded by coming to the church not only not incognito, but in great state, with the king (he was very young), the ministers and the court, while hors.e.m.e.n stationed at intervals blew their trumpets. I had written a religious march especially for this event, and the Queen kindly accepted its dedication to her. I was a little fl.u.s.tered when she asked me to play the too familiar melody from _Samson et Dalila_ which begins _Mon coeur s'ouvre a ta voix_. I had to improvise a transposition suited for the organ, something I had never dreamt of doing. During the performance the Queen leaned her elbow on the keyboard of the organ, her chin resting on one hand and her eyes upturned. She seemed rapt in exstasy which, as may be imagined, was not precisely displeasing to the author.

The press of the day printed delightful articles about the scene, but with no pretense to accuracy. I had nothing to do with that in any way.

Her Majesty Queen Amelie of Portugal once honored me in a distinctive manner. She received me alone without any of her ladies of honor, which allowed her to dispense with all etiquette and to have me sit in a chair near her. In this intimate way she entertained me for three-quarters of an hour asking questions on all sorts of subjects. I had the chance to tell her how the oriental theme of the ballet in _Samson_ had been given to me years before by General Yusuf, and to give her many details of that interesting personage of whom she had heard her uncles speak.

"I am going to leave you," she said at last, "but not because I want to.

If one conscientiously practices the _metier_ of being a queen, one doesn't always find it amusing."

What would that unhappy woman have said, could she have foreseen the calamities that were to befall her!

In Rome I had the honor to be invited to a musicale at Queen Margharita's. The great drawing-rooms were filled with great ladies laden down with family jewels of fabulous value. All the music was terribly serious. Now this kind of music does not make for personal acquaintance, especially as all these great people were victims of a boredom they did their best to conceal. Afterwards the two queens wanted to talk to me. Queen Helene, who is a violinist, told me that her children were learning the violin and the cello, an arrangement I praised highly, for the exclusive devotion to the piano in these later days has been the death of chamber music and almost of music itself.

In my gallery of sovereigns I cannot forget the gracious Queen of Belgium. I have always seen her, however, in company with her august husband, and this story would become interminable if I were to include "Their Majesties" of the sterner s.e.x--the Emperor of Germany, the Kings of Sweden, Denmark, Spain, Portugal....

As I have had more to do with princes than with sovereigns, my tongue sometimes slips in talking to the latter. As I excused myself one day for addressing the Queen of Belgium as "Highness," she replied, with a smile, "Don't apologize; that recalls good times."

She told me of the time when she and the king, then only heirs apparent, used to go up and down the Mediterranean coast in a little two-seated car. It was during this period that I had the honor of meeting them at the palace of his Serene Highness the Prince of Monaco, and of having charming and interesting personal conversation with them, for the king is a savant and the queen an artist.

CHAPTER XXIII

MUSICAL PAINTERS

Ingres was famous for his violin. A single wall separated the apartment where I lived during my childhood and youth from the one where the painter Granger, one of Ingres's pupils, with his wife and daughter, lived. Granger painted the _Adoration of the Wise Men_ in the church of Notre Dame de Lorette. I have played with the gilt paper crown which his model wore when posing as one of the three kings. My mother and Mlle.

Granger (who later became Madame Paul Meurice) both loved painting and became great friends. They copied together Paul Delaroche's _Enfants d'Edouard_ at the Louvre, a picture which was the rage at that time. My mother's paintings, in an admirable state of preservation, may be seen at the museum at Dieppe.

I was introduced to Ingres when I was five years old through the Granger family. The distance from the Rue du Jardinet, where we lived, to the Quai Voltaire was not far, and we often went like a procession--the Grangers, my great-aunt Ma.s.son, my mother and I--to call upon Ingres and his wife, a delightfully simple woman whom everyone loved.

Ingres often talked to me about Mozart, Gluck, and all the other great masters of music. When I was six years old, I composed an Adagio which I dedicated to him in all seriousness. Fortunately this masterpiece has been lost. As I already played, and rather nicely for my years, some of Mozart's sonatas, Ingres, in return for my dedication, presented me with a small medallion with the portrait of the author of Don Juan on one side, and this inscription on the other: "To M. Saint-Saens, the charming interpreter of the divine artist."

He carelessly omitted to add the date of this dedication, which would have increased its interest, for the idea of calling a knee-high youngster of six "M. Saint-Saens" was certainly unusual.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Ingres, the painter famous for his violin]

In addition to the calls I paid him, when I was older I often met the great painter at the house of Frederic Reiset, one of his most ardent admirers. They made much of music in that household and we often heard there Delsarte, the singer without a voice, whom Ingres admired very much. Delsarte and Henri Reber were, in fact, his musical mentors, and, in spite of his pretence of being a great connoisseur, he was in reality their echo. He affected, for example, the most profound contempt for all modern music, and would not even listen to it. In this respect he reflected Reber. Reber used to say quietly in his far-away nasal voice, "You've got to imitate somebody, so the best thing to do is to imitate the ancients, for they are the best." However, he undertook to prove the contrary by writing some particularly individual music, when he thought he was imitating Haydn and Mozart. Some of his works, in their perfection of line, their regard for details, their purity and their moderation remind one of Ingres's drawings which express so much in such a simple way. And Ingres, as well, although he tried to imitate Raphael, could only be himself. Reber would have been worthy of comparison with the painter, if he had had the power and productiveness which distinguish genius.

What about Ingres's violin? Well, I saw this famous violin for the first time in the Montaubon Museum. Ingres never even spoke to me about it. He is said to have played it in his youth, but I could never persuade him to play even the slightest sonata with me. "I used to play," he replied to my entreaties, "the second violin in a quartet, but that is all."

So I think I must be dreaming when I read, from time to time, that Ingres was more appreciative of compliments about his violin-playing than those about his painting. That is merely a legend, but it is impossible to destroy a legend. As the good La Fontaine said:

"Man is like ice toward truth; He is like fire to untruth."

I do not know whether Ingres showed talent for the violin in his youth or not. But I can state positively that in his maturity he showed none.

Gustave Dore was also said to be famous on the violin, and his claims to consideration were far from inconsiderable. He had acquired a valuable instrument, on which he used to play Berlioz's _Concertos_ with a really extraordinary facility and spirit. These superficial works were enough for his musical powers. The surprising things about his execution was that he never worked at it. If he could not get a thing at once, he gave it up for good and all.

He was a frequent attendant at Rossini's salon, and he belonged to the faction which supported melody and opposed "learned scientific music."

His temperament and mine hardly seem compatible, but friendship, like love, has its inexplicable mysteries, and gradually we became the best of friends. We lived in the same quarter and we visited each other frequently. As we almost never were of the same opinion about anything, we had interminable arguments, entirely free from rancor, which we thoroughly enjoyed.

I finally became the confidant of his secret sorrows, and his innermost griefs. He was endowed with a wonderful visual memory, but he made the mistake of never using models, for in his opinion they were useless for an artist who knew his _metier_. So he condemned himself to a perpetual approximation, which was enough for ill.u.s.trations demanding only life and character, but fatal for large canva.s.ses, with half or full sized figures. This was the cause of his disappointments and failures which he attributed to malevolence and a hostility, which really did exist, but which took advantage of this opportunity to make the painter pay for the exaggerated success of the designer that had been extravagantly praised by the press from the beginning. He laid himself open to criticism through his abuse of his own facility. I have seen him painting away on thirty canva.s.ses at the same time in his immense studio. Three seriously studied pictures would have been worth more.

At heart this great overgrown jovial boy was melancholy and sensitive.

He died young from heart disease, which was aggravated by grief over the death of his mother from whom he had never been separated.

I dedicated a slight piece written for the violin to Dore. This was not lost as the one to Ingres was, but it would be entirely unknown had not Johannes Wolf, the violinist of queens and empresses, done me the favor of placing it in his repertoire and bringing his fine talent to its aid.

Hebert was the most serious of the painter-violinists. Down to the end of his life he delighted in playing the sonatas of Mozart and Beethoven, and, from all accounts, he played them remarkably. I can say this only from hearsay, for I never heard him. The few times that I ever saw him at home in my youth, I found him with his brush in hand. I saw him after that only at the Academie, where we sat near each other, and he always greeted me cordially. We talked music from time to time, and he conversed like a connoisseur.