The Complete Opera Book Part 64

"Martha" teems with melody. The best-known airs are "The Last Rose of Summer" and _Lionel's_ "M'appar" (Like a dream). The best ensemble piece, a quintet with chorus, occurs near the close of Act III.--"Ah!

che a voi perdoni Iddio" (Ah! May Heaven to you grant pardon). The spinning-wheel quartet in Act II is most sprightly. But, as indicated, there is a steady flow of light and graceful melody in this opera.

Almost at the very opening of Act I, _Lady Harriet_ and _Nancy_ have a duet, "Questo duol che si v'affana" (Of the knights so brave and charming). Bright, clever music abounds in the Richmond fair scene, and _Lionel_ and _Plunkett_ express their devotion to each other in "Solo, profugo, reietto" (Lost, proscribed, a friendless wanderer), and "Ne giammai saper potemmo" (Never have we learned his station).

Then there is the gay quartet when the two girls leave the fair with their masters, while the crowd surrounds _Sir Tristan_ and prevents him from breaking through and interfering. It was in this scene that the ba.s.s singer Castelmary, the _Sir Tristan_ of a performance of "Martha" at the Metropolitan Opera House, February 10, 1897, was stricken with heart failure and dropped dead upon the stage.

A capital quartet opens Act II, in the farmhouse, and leads to the spinning-wheel quartet, "Di vederlo" (What a charming occupation).

There is a duet between _Lady Harriet_ and _Lionel_, in which their growing attraction for each other finds expression, "Il suo sguardo e dolce tanto" (To his eye, mine gently meeting). Then follows "Qui sola, vergin rosa" ('Tis the last rose of summer), the words a poem by Tom Moore, the music an old Irish air, "The Groves of Blarney," to which Moore adapted "The Last Rose of Summer." A new and effective touch is given to the old song by Flotow in having the tenor join with the soprano at the close. Moreover, the words and music fit so perfectly into the situation on the stage that for Flotow to have "lifted" and interpolated them into his opera was a master-stroke. To it "Martha" owes much of its popularity.

[Music: 'Tis the last rose of summer, left blooming alone,]

There is a duet for _Lady Harriet_ and _Lionel_, "Ah! ride del mio pianto" (She is laughing at my sorrow). The scene ends with another quartet, one of the most beautiful numbers of the score, and known as the "Good Night Quartet," "Dormi pur, ma il mio riposo" (Cruel one, may dreams transport thee).

Act III, played in a hunting park in Richmond forest, on the left a small inn, opens with a song in praise of porter, the "Canzone del Porter" by _Plunkett_, "Chi mi dira?" (Will you tell me). The pieces de resistance of this act are the "M'appar"; a solo for _Nancy_, "Il tuo stral nel lanciar"

[Music]

(Huntress fair, hastens where); _Martha's_ song, "Qui tranquilla almen poss'io" (Here in deepest forest shadows); and the stirring quintet with chorus.

[Music]

In Act IV there are a solo for _Plunkett_, "Il mio Lionel perira"

(Soon my Lionel will perish), and a repet.i.tion of some of the sprightly music of the fair scene.

It is not without considerable hesitation that I have cla.s.sed "Martha"

as a French opera. For Flotow was born in Teutendorf, April 27, 1812, and died in Darmstadt January 24, 1883. Moreover, "Martha," was produced in Vienna, and his next best-known work, "Alessandro Stradella," in Hamburg (1844).

The music of "Martha," however, has an elegance that not only is quite unlike any music that has come out of Germany, but is typically French. Flotow, in fact, was French in his musical training, and both the plot and score of "Martha" were French in origin. The composer studied composition in Paris under Reicha, 1827-30, leaving Paris solely on account of the July revolution, and returning in 1835, to remain until the revolution in March, 1848, once more drove him away.

After living in Paris again, 1863-8, he settled near Vienna, making, however, frequent visits to that city, the French capital, and Italy.

During his second stay in Paris he composed for the Grand Opera the first act of a ballet, "Harriette, ou la Servante de Greenwiche." This ballet, the text by Vernoy and St. George, was for Adele Dumilatre.

The reason Flotow was entrusted with only one of the three acts was the short time in which it was necessary to complete the score. The other acts were a.s.signed, one each, to Robert Bergmuller and edouard Deldevez. Of this ballet, written and composed for a French dancer and a French audience, "Martha" is an adaptation. This accounts for its being so typically French and not in the slightest degree German.

Flotow's opera "Alessandro Stradella" also is French in origin. It is adapted from a one-act _piece lyrique_, brought out by him in Paris, in 1837. Few works produced so long ago as "Martha" have its freshness, vivacity, and charm. Pre-eminently graceful, it yet carries in a large auditorium like the Metropolitan, where so many operas of the lighter variety have been lost in s.p.a.ce.

Charles Francois Gounod

(1818-1893)

The composer of "Faust" was born in Paris, June 17, 1818. His father had, in 1783, won the second prix de Rome for painting at the ecole des Beaux Arts. In 1837, the son won the second prix de Rome for music, and two years later captured the grand prix de Rome, by twenty-five votes out of twenty-seven, at the Paris Conservatoire. His instructors there had been Reicha in harmony, Halevy in counterpoint and fugue, and Leseur in composition.

Gounod's first works, in Rome and after his return from there, were religious. At one time he even thought of becoming an abbe, and on the t.i.tle-page of one of his published works he is called Abbe Charles Gounod. A performance of his "Messe Solenelle" in London evoked so much praise from both English and French critics that the Grand Opera commissioned him to write an opera. The result was "Sapho," performed April 16, 1851, without success. It was his "Faust" which gave him European fame. "Faust" and his "Romeo et Juliette" (both of which see) suffice for the purposes of this book, none of his other operas having made a decided success.

"La Redemption," and "Mors et Vita," Birmingham, England, 1882 and 1885, are his best-known religious compositions. They are "sacred trilogies." Gounod died, Paris, October 17, 1893.

In Dr. Theodore Baker's _Biographical Dictionary of Musicians_ Gounod's merits as a composer are summed up as follows: "Gounod's compositions are of highly poetic order, more spiritualistic than realistic; in his finest lyrico-dramatic moments he is akin to Weber, and his modulation even reminds of Wagner; his instrumentation and orchestration are frequently original and masterly." These words are as true today as when they were written, seventeen years ago.

FAUST

Opera, in five acts, by Gounod; words by Barbier and Carre.

Produced, Theatre Lyrique, Paris, March 19, 1859, with Miolan-Carvalho as _Marguerite_; Grand Opera, Paris, March 3, 1869, with Christine Nilsson as _Marguerite_, Colin as _Faust_, and Faure as _Mephistopheles_. London, Her Majesty's Theatre, June 11, 1863; Royal Italian Opera, Covent Garden, July 2, 1863, in Italian, as "Faust e Margherita"; Her Majesty's Theatre, January 23, 1864, in an English version by Chorley, for which, Santley being the _Valentine_, Gounod composed what was destined to become one of the most popular numbers of the opera, "Even bravest heart may swell" ("_Dio possente_"). New York, Academy of Music, November 26, 1863, in Italian, with Clara Louise Kellogg (_Margherita_), Henrietta Sulzer (_Siebel_), f.a.n.n.y Stockton (_Martha_), Francesco Mazzoleni (_Faust_), Hannibal Biachi (_Mephistopheles_), G. Yppolito (_Valentine_), D.

Coletti (_Wagner_). Metropolitan Opera House, opening night, October 22, 1883, with Nilsson, Scalchi, Lablache, Campanini, Novara, Del Puente.

CHARACTERS

FAUST, a learned doctor _Tenor_ MePHISTOPHeLeS, Satan _Ba.s.s_ MARGUERITE _Soprano_ VALENTINE, a soldier, brother to Marguerite _Baritone_ SIEBEL, a village youth, in love with Marguerite _Mezzo-Soprano_ WAGNER, a student _Baritone_ MARTHA SCHWERLEIN, neighbour to Marguerite _Mezzo-Soprano_

Students, soldiers, villagers, angels, demons, Cleopatra, Las, Helen of Troy, and others.

_Time_--16th Century.

_Place_--Germany.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Copyright photo by Dupont

Plancon as Mephistopheles in "Faust"]

Popular in this country from the night of its American production, Gounod's "Faust" nevertheless did not fully come into its own here until during the Maurice Grau regime at the Metropolitan Opera House.

Sung in French by great artists, every one of whom was familiar with the traditions of the Grand Opera, Paris, the work was given so often that William J. Henderson cleverly suggested "Faustspielhaus" as an appropriate subst.i.tute for the name of New York's yellow brick temple of opera; a _mot_ which led Krehbiel, in a delightful vein of banter, to exclaim, "Henderson, your German jokes are better than your serious German!"

Several distinguished singers have been heard in this country in the role of _Faust_. It is doubtful if that beautiful lyric number, _Faust's_ romance, "Salut! demeure chaste et pure" (Hail to the dwelling chaste and pure), ever has been delivered here with more exquisite vocal phrasing than by Campanini, who sang the Italian version, in which the romance becomes "Salve! dimora casta e pura."

That was in the old Academy of Music days, with Christine Nilsson as _Marguerite_, which she had sung at the revival of the work by the Paris Grand Opera. The more impa.s.sioned outbursts of the _Faust_ role also were sung with fervid expression by Campanini, so great an artist, in the best Italian manner, that he had no Italian successor until Caruso appeared upon the scene.

Yet, in spite of the _Faust_ of these two Italian artists, Jean de Reszke remains the ideal _Faust_ of memory. With a personal appearance distinguished beyond that of any other operatic artist who has been heard here, an inborn chivalry of deportment that made him a lover after the heart of every woman, and a refinement of musical expression that clarified every role he undertook, his _Faust_ was the most finished portrayal of that character in opera that has been heard here. Jean de Reszke's great distinction was that everything he did was in perfect taste. Haven't you seen _Faust_ after _Faust_ keep his hat on while making love to _Marguerite_? Jean de Reszke, a gentleman, removed his before ever he breathed of romance. Muratore is an admirable _Faust_, with all the refinements of phrasing and acting that characterize the best traditions of the Grand Opera, Paris.

Great tenors do not, as a rule, arrive in quick succession. In this country we have had two distinct tenor eras and now are in a third. We had the era of Italo Campanini, from 1873 until his voice became impaired, about 1880. Not until eleven years later, 1891, did opera in America become so closely a.s.sociated with another tenor, that there may be said to have begun the era of Jean de Reszke. It lasted until that artist's voluntary retirement. We are now in the era of Enrico Caruso, whose repertoire includes _Faust_ in French.

Christine Nilsson, Adelina Patti, Melba, Eames, Calve, have been among the famous _Marguerites_ heard here. Nilsson and Eames may have seemed possessed of too much natural reserve for the role; but Gounod's librettists made _Marguerite_ more refined than Goethe's _Gretchen_.

Patti acted the part with great simplicity and sang it flawlessly. In fact her singing of the ballad "Il etait un roi de Thule" (There once was a king of Thule) was a perfect example of the artistically artless in song. It seemed to come from her lips merely because it chanced to be running through her head. Melba's type of beauty was somewhat mature for the impersonation of the character, but her voice lent itself beautifully to it. Calve's _Marguerite_ is recalled as a logically developed character from first note to last, and as one of the most original and interesting of _Marguerites_. But Americans insisted on Calve's doing nothing but _Carmen_. When she sang in "Faust" she appeared to them a _Carmen_ masquerading as _Marguerite_.

So back to _Carmen_ she had to go. Sembrich and Farrar are other _Marguerites_ identified with the Metropolitan Opera House.

Plancon unquestionably was the finest _Mephistopheles_ in the history of the opera in America up to the present time--vivid, sonorous, and satanically polished or fantastical, as the role demanded.

Gounod's librettists, Michel Carre and Jules Barbier, with a true Gallic gift for practicable stage effect, did not seek to utilize the whole of Goethe's "Faust" for their book, but contented themselves with the love story of _Faust_ and _Marguerite_, which also happens to have been entirely original with the author of the play, since it does not occur in the legends. But because the opera does not deal with the whole of "Faust," Germany, where Gounod's work enjoys great popularity, refuses to accept it under the same t.i.tle as the play, and calls it "Margarethe" after the heroine.

As reconstructed for the Grand Opera, where it was brought out ten years after its production at the Theatre Lyrique, "Faust" develops as follows:

There is a brief prelude. A _ff_ on a single note, then mysterious, chromatic chords, and then the melody which Gounod composed for Santley.

Act I. _Faust's_ study. The philosopher is discovered alone, seated at a table on which an open tome lies before him. His lamp flickers in its socket. Night is about turning to dawn.

_Faust_ despairs of solving the riddle of the universe. Aged, his pursuit of science vain, he seizes a flask of poison, pours it into a crystal goblet, and is about to drain it, when, day having dawned, the cheerful song of young women on their way to work arrests him. The song dies away. Again he raises the goblet, only to pause once more, as he hears a chorus of labourers, with whose voices those of the women unite. _Faust_, beside himself at these sounds of joy and youth, curses life and advancing age, and calls upon Satan to aid him.