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Music in Vienna.

BENEDICK of Padua, remarking how a man loves the meat in his youth that he cannot endure in his age, anticipated the sad result of modern inquiry into the causes of artistic growth and decline. Beyond some such empirical formula as this our critical philosophy has not attained. No comprehensive theory of the dynamics of æsthetic evolution has yet been propounded. Partial explanations of local phenomena have indeed been offered by disciples of the Camel school, who consider that man's moral consciousness is the most perfect engine of discovery and the proper criterion of truth. Thus Schelling showed that the inevitable path of genius in painting was from greatness to grace. Thus the late Mr. Buckle explained that Italy was the mother of art because contact with nature's sublimer aspects had exalted the creative faculties of the people. So Mr. Ruskin has demonstrated that the Venetians surpassed in colour because they worshipped God. It would spoil such brilliant generalizations to verify them by the vulgar test of facts. We may suspect that Michel Angelo followed Angelico, that Rubens succeeded Velvet Breughel; but Schelling's postulate must not be attacked. Holland bred ten painters where picturesque Spain bred one, while sublime Switzerland can only boast her solitary Calame; but let Mr. Buckle's profundity be unimpeached. The fasti of the city of the Lagunes relate how Titian and Veronese were given to the delights of the old Italian Adam, how they adored their models too much and the Madonna not at all; yet we cannot part with Mr. Ruskin's beautiful dogma that "the roots of the moral power of the Venetians" lay less in their maulsticks than in their faith,—with his elevated fact that their ateliers were homes of piety and their easels scenes of prayer.

Be these things as they may, we shall hardly advance beyond Benedick's generalization unless we can extend and systematize our knowledge of the outward circumstances which tend to bring about the rise and fall of art. Perhaps the evidence which might lighten our darkness is not extant, nor in the nature of things ever will be. Under such conditions we shall never, except by chance, stumble on the legislative or domestic devices likely to improve our artistic prospects. It is still uncertain whether modern methods of publicity and reward—in the case, for instance, of painting-do not tend to destroy genius and debauch taste. Competent French authorities allege that we have partly to thank our picture exhibitions if instead of M. Ingres we have got M. Courbet, instead of Sir Joshua Reynolds, Mr. Whistler. Our systems of encouragement for music and musicians are open to similar question. Referring to

this head, we proceed to speak of one of the few apposite cases where effect may be traced to cause, and propter identified with post. The details narrated will naturally lead to the special subject of the present paper.

Bohemia has long been reputed to be the paradise of music. When Vienna rejected Mozart, Prague received him with open arms. "Die Böhmen verstehen mich," said he, and rewarded their intelligence by composing Don Giovanni expressly for their capital city. Although it is now felt that the notion of such Bohemian supremacy may rest on tradition rather than contemporary fact, a certain importance still attaches, in German circles at least, to the musical verdicts of Prague. Bohemia's solid claim to such repute belongs to the last century. The Thirty Years' War was followed by the moral death of the Czech people. Two Hapsburg Emperors had extirpated the better part of the nation by battle or on the scaffold, and driven the rest into exile. The spoil of the victims was distributed by the imperial executioners amongst their supporters and favourites, amongst whom the Catholic clergy claimed and received a lion's share. Monasteries were founded, churches built. The Jesuits and other religious orders piled up vast palaces that glittered with all the splendours of rococo decoration, and cathedrals that blazed with incrusted marbles, mosaics, scagliola, frescoes, and gold. In these gorgeous temples of sensuous and holiday worship the crystal psalmody of Palestrina and Allegri seemed too primitive and too feeble of effect. To the lust of the eye was married the lust of the ear. The church borrowed the resources of the stage; the plaintive choir of early faith became an operatic chorus; prelates bowed and prayed, acolytes flung about the perfumed smoke to an accompaniment of trumpets, bassoons, and violins. Thus the orchestra grew to be an indispensable element in every spiritual foundation. Most establishments maintained musical schools on their own account. Some monasteries were very academies of music; there were few which did not lodge a Bartolomeo or Angelico of the melodious art. The monastery of Osseg was said to contain twenty instrumentalists of the first rank. Such was the musical fame of these communities that the composer Astorga made one of them the last asylum of his romantic life, while Sebastian Bach rejoiced in the society of the Bohemian monks. Out of doors the religious foundations maintained or encouraged village schools for music. Another circumstance added to the demand for players on every sort of instrument. The great nobles of Bohemia, the Hartigs, the Czernins, the Mannsfelds, the Thuns, affected all the appurtenances and symbols of that royalty from which they considered themselves to differ but in degree. The Emperor had his orchestra, and the Prince or Count must have one too. There was the more inducement to this in days when regular performances in theatres and concert-rooms were comparatively rare. Mozart's letters make enthusiastic mention of the private orchestra of his friend and host Count Thun. Contemporary writers, amongst others our own Burney, give curious details on the subject. It seems that in Prague livery-servants were expected to play some

instrument: the artists who delighted Mozart's ears with a skilful rendering of his last quartet had brushed the composer's coat in the morning and blacked his boots.

These performers came from the village schools. Between his lay and ecclesiastical patrons the musical idea of the little Czech peasant soon learned to shoot; for every boy with respectable talent was sooner or later taken into a monastery, or educated at some nobleman's expense. No wonder if authors of those days declared that the Bohemians surpassed even the Italians in singing and playing, and wrote in raptures of the finished style, the brio, the ensemble, displayed by the amateur executants of the University of Prague. Before the end of the last century the ecclesiastical reforms of Joseph II., entailing as they did the abolition of so many religious foundations and corporations, struck a blow from which monks and music suffered alike. The monasteries which survived ceased to be homes of art, church orchestras declined, while a new educational code paralyzed the general cultivation of music in the village schools, by suspending or narrowing the salaries of the teachers. At the same time the great nobles began to dismiss their instrumentalists, partly, perhaps, because the requisite staff could no longer be procured from their estates, partly on account of the confusion, the pressure on property and purse, the consequent need of economy, which followed the outbreak of the French Revolution. And then music in Bohemia fell almost suddenly from its palmy state. In the beginning of the present century the mischief was so complete, that even in Prague itself a good orchestra could no longer be got together. Attempts were made to stem the tide, but in vain; so that in more recent years the musical importance of Prague sank below that of Leipzig and even Vienna. The Bohemian capital no longer maintains a regular philharmonic society, or quartet party: the Cecilia Society has been dissolved, the Sophienakademie threatens to follow its example. Nothing of the old musical Bohemia now remains but the Conservatoire of Prague, which furnishes the orchestras of Europe with artists whose skill shows that the musical faculties of the people are not yet dead.

If the above sketch explains the decline of art, the facts which it narrates by no means suggest the methods of restoration. Monasteries will never again be homes of music, and Czernins and Thuns will never again have private bands of butlers and shoeblacks. That equivalent shapes of encouragement should hereafter arise is not very likely. The day is distant enough when there will be truth in the absurd statement of Oulibicheff (based on an exaggerated and modern application of the older authorities above cited,) that "in Bohemia you constantly hear classical music played even amongst the peasantry!" Meanwhile there is no doubt that the Czechs are still potentially musicians. Like all other Slaves, they are capable, under culture, of most melodious results. No one can doubt this who is familiar with the style of performance proper to the matchless Military Chapels of Austria, which are chiefly recruited from

the Czech and other branches of the Slave population of the empire. It may be doubted if on trial of executive skill before a competent jury, any of the great European string orchestras would bear the palm from the best of these bands. The general standard of excellence is incredibly high, but amongst the chapels which cannot be surpassed may be named those of the "Hoch und Deutschmeister " Infantry, of the "King of the Belgians," of the (late) "King of Prussia's" Hussars: noting that the last performs marvellously when in movement, and would probably do as well even at full gallop. Splendour and roundness of voice, precision of ensemble, the neatest and crispest execution in difficulties of detail, faultless intonations, vigorous accent, above all a certain nobility and maestria of style befitting

Sonorous metal blowing martial sounds

such are the characteristics of these unrivalled bands. Nothing is more surprising than the beauty of the tone emitted from the throats of instruments which in every other country preserve a painful and “earshattering" clang; while the volume of tone produced is as remarkable as the timbre. In such respects an Austrian band is to any other what a fiddle by Vuillaume or Foster is to a violin by Straduarius or Amati, what Rubini and Lablache were to Dr. Gunz and M. Faure. The artists, it should be observed, are no mere hornists or trumpeters, but also players on stringed instruments. In places of public entertainment the military bands often give alternate pieces of "harmony" and "smite" music, as Germans say. The cornet is a contrabasso, the ophicleide roars like any sucking dove, and becomes a tenor, the trombones are sharp violins. No wonder if the performance of such men has a soul of melody and harmony, which will in vain be sought amongst half-drilled and mercenary machines. The music played, if not generally of the sort we call classical, is good in its kind, and well adapted to display the powers of instruments and executants.

As a general rule, the Austrian abhorrence of the intellectual breaks out even in the artistic fancies of the people. Amongst symptoms of this tendency may be noticed the persistence with which the caterers to Swabian tastes banish from their musical programmes whatever smacks of a classic origin. In Berlin and Dresden, if hardly in Munich and Stuttgard, there are gardens and halls where the burghers with their wives and daughters, amidst clouds of tobacco, and the fumes of meat and beer, cheaply listen to the masterpieces of Beethoven and Mozart. Now, in Vienna, symphonies and overtures are caviare to the general. At the Volksgarten or Weghuber's, the audience will hardly tolerate the tunes of a popular opera, unless they be set for dancing, the only art in which the Austrians are proficient. It may not be denied that the dance music of Vienna, both in form and execution, is altogether sui generis, and well worth the notice of an educated ear. Some of the greatest musicians who have resided in the Imperial city have stooped to this branch of com

position. Hummel and Schubert did not disdain to play waltzes and quadrilles while their friends danced: Liszt is never more unapproachable than in his impromptu waltzes and polkas. The first string orchestra for dance music is that of the younger Strauss, who knows how to wield the bâton, plays well on the violin, and is a versatile though unequal composer. English waltzes and polkas, when not stolen from foreign sources, seem to be written less to accompany flying feet, than to tempt feeble fingers; and success in art does not often follow a road like this. The Austrian composer seldom thinks of the piano. His pieces will generally be well scored, daintily instrumented, besides being admirably suited to their special vocation. If Strauss is not always well inspired, and seldom hits the original rhythms, the intense and sustained melodies which flow from the pen of his rival of St. Petersburg and Peterhof, the Polish Gungl, yet in his happiest moments he abounds in graceful and sparkling themes. True Viennese as he is, he expresses that polished vivacity and healthy animalism breathed by the atmosphere of the Danubian Capua. Never mind if his sentiment is mostly skin-deep, if he discourses not deep passion, but sugary seduction. As soon as his bow glides over the strings, you would like to dance with Salian vigour, and you say with the rest, nunc pede libro pulsanda tellus. Terpsichore seems to be the greatest of the sacred nine, when you are listening to an orchestra which is as notable for smooth and mellow tone, distinct accentuation, and swan-like steadiness of movement, as that of Strauss.

In the Opera House, Viennese tastes are equally simple, and, so to speak, eminently southern. In the old Swabian times neither the Alcestis, nor the Nozze di Figaro, nor Don Giovanni pleased much. Salieri and Martin were preferred to Mozart and Glück. The Teutonic masterpieces now attract special audiences, much as they do in London; but the habitués of the Kärnthner Thor Theatre, high and low, prefer the rhythmical melodies of Italy to the contrapuntal devices of Germany. The object of theatrical managers is to attract audiences, so that from the supply we may more or less safely argue the nature of the demand. The statistics occasionally furnished by newspapers show that the operas of Verdi are the most seductive which can be offered to a German public; and if this is the case in Hamburg and Berlin, it is eminently so in Vienna. An opera by Wagner is sometimes put on the stage, but the Zukunftsmusik is abhorred by the Viennese,-be they outsiders or professors. The Afrikänerin was, of course, mounted last season, but the universal verdict was most unfavourable. The Opera House of the Kärnthner Thor, which will shortly be supplanted by the splendid edifice now rising to completion, is the house which witnessed the triumphs of Rossini forty years ago. There may be nearly three hundred subscription performances in the yearly season, and the cost of a box on the grand tier for alternate nights is about one hundred pounds. The best boxes above and below are in the hands of the nobility, but the middle classes are not systematically excluded from all the more desirable parts of the

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