The Press.
London, England, 1854-03-04 00:00:00

SOHO.

AT this theatre on Tuesday Mr. Henry Nicholls
played the part of Hamlet before an evidently select
and critical audience, which he gradually conciliated
and ultimately conquered by his intelligence and
excellent taste. Mr. Nicholls was already known to
the public as an able reader of Shakspeare, hut we
confess we were not prepared for this exhibitic n of
his aptitude as a Shakspearian actor. His fine voice
and promising physique were usad and not abused
in realising a just conception of the poet's meaning;
and, if it is scarcely possible now to be original in a
part which has been so thoroughly commented upon
and elaborated, yet the selection of readings by Mr.
Nicholls was almost invariably correct, and was
rendered with characteristic expression and vigour.
In the first act of the play we thought him a little
wanting in natural ease, but this impression passed
away as the tragedy advanced. In the play scene
and the rant over the grave of Ophelia he exhibited
natural passion. If we note any other deficiency it
is chiefly of that conscious ideality which is requisite
to render the sublime self-communings and defensive
sarcasms of the distracted prince. It would be in-
vidious, however, to lay stress upon these partial
abatements to a general excellence, or to infer from
them any discouragement to the career which we
believe to be open to Mr. Nicholls, and which we
shall watch with considerable interest. Of the other
actors by whom Mr. Nicholls was supported we may
single out Mr. West, who performed the First
Gravedigger with judgment and fidelity to nature.

Two RENTERS' SHARES in the Theatre Royal
Drury lane were put up for sale at the Auction Mart
by Mr. G. Robins on Tuesday. The original cost
was 5001. each, the possessors being entitled to an an-
nual dividend at the rate of 2s. 6d. each night of per-
formance, but which is now reduced to is. 3d. per
night, entitled also to free admission upon all occa-
sions, transferable or saleable annually ; held for a
period of about forty years. The shares sold for
forty eight guineas each,

ghtsir.

211

L'ETOILE DU NORD.
SCRIBE AND NEYERBEEIeS NEW THREE•ACT COMIC

OPERA, " THE NORTHERN STAR."
(From our own Correspondent.)
To descend from the sublimity of lyric tragedy to
the commonplace of operatic comedy even the
warmest admirers of Meyerbeer's genius pronounced
to be an impossibility, when it was first announced
to musical Europe that the composer was engaged
with the evergreen Scribe in the concoction of a

comic opera. The musician has passed through the
ordeal of a transformation of his style triumphantly.
A congress of celebrities from the chief capitals col-
lected at the Opera Comique in Paris on Thursday,
the 16,h of February, were unanimously of opinion
that Meyerbeer has matured a masterpiece. A more
lively, poetic, and dramatic production has never
been heard and in this instance the success is

solely due to thu music, the librettist having been sin-
gularly unfortunate in his subject. It may be readily
imagined that no amount of ingenuity could invest
with stage sympathy the characters of Peter the

Great and of Catherine. Catherine in the first act

is but a smart soubrette ; in the second she is a

theatrical conscript ; and in the last act a second-
hand Lucia ; whilst Peter is alternately a bully, a
drunkard, and a sentimental spooney. The other
parts iu the drama, save a stolid Cossack, are next to
nonentities. But Scribe, if he has failed in indi-

vidualities, is still supreme in striking situations. He
makes his point in each act, and supplies the com-
poser with the opportunities of display of varied
emotion. In the music, therefore, is the interest of
the Etoile do Nord concentrated—there are scenes

for smiles—there are moments for tears; and every
where the hand of the master is felt. The ani

oration and piquan !y of the musical inspiration are
so continuous that the hearer involuntarily ex lams,
"Is this the composer who has depicted the conflict
of the good and evil with such superhuman power
in the Robert—who has painted the religious strug-
gles of an epoch in the Huguenots—who has deve-
loped the impulses of fanaticism in Tht Prophet ?"
It is so, however, and the careful amateurs who
will examine closely those three great works must
come to the conclusion that therein may be traced
the type which has enabled Meyerbeer to be hand in
hand with the Tragic and Comic Muse. Analyse the
music assigned to the minstrel Rainibaut in the
Robert, listen to the strains of the Page and to the
trio for three sopranos in the Queen's gardens in the
Huguenots, and, above all, remark the structure of
the trio for three basses in the tent scene of the
Profhite, and the quaintness of the duet between
Fides and Berthe, and then, summing up the con-
ceits, oddities, and prettinesses of these cited pieces,
will it not be seen that to Meyerbeer all forms are
familiar, because the instincts of art effect are with
him irresistible ?

The career of every great composer, as of every
distinguished painter, is one of change and progress.
Meyerbeer, before he established his own formula of
composition, went through every school. Under
Vogler he was a fugue-spinner and an organist. He
began with oratorio-writing, God and Nature and
The Daughter of Jephtha being his earliest works.
Will ho finish as he began? The directors of the
next Birmingham Festival are anxiously waiting for a
reply to this question. In the sacred school he has
yet to win glory. After being a dry disciple of
Vogler, Meyerbeer was found to be a pianist of the
Hummel model. Next it is seen that ho fails in a
comic opera at Vienna at the age of nineteen. Now,
at sixty, he is triumphant therein at Paris. The
hearing of Rossini's works in Italy caused a com-
plete revolution in his style. He abandoned the
rich harmonic combination of his fatherland for the
melodic flow and elegance of the southern sky.
After the run of his Margherita d'Anjou he wrote the
Esule di Granata for the contralto l'isaroni and the
Titan of basses Lablache. Then, in 1 42-1, came the
Crociato in Egitto, in which his original powers
were undeniably indicated, and, after a lapse of six
years, taking a final farewell of the voluptuous
Italian school, Robert the Devil startled the world
with its daring innovation and novelty. Here the
great composer became truly himself—all imitations
ceased—he nrginated a new and transcendentally
fine form for the lyric stage. His individuality was
fixed, and it became the model in turn of all those
ordinary talents in the domain of art who can only
faintly copy the broad lines of demarcation which
separate invention from imitation. Such progres-
sive transformations of ideas and forms of composers
do not pass muster without severe controversy.
Meyerbeer has met with bitter and uncompro-
mising opponents, but time has proved the Dem.
racy of his system, which, accepted even in Italy,
has shown how absurd are antipathies in art—how
useless it is to attempt to confine the limits of lyric
composition to one invariable style.
In the Etoile du Nord Meyerbeer has laboured at
the same profound calculations of effects which dis.
tinguish his other masterpieces. His preparations

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212

for a climax are marked with extraordinary skill and
ingenuity ; and his endless variety in. forms, has
enabled him to be constant in his surprises. Eyery
body is aware that he wrote for Berlin an occasional
opera called The Camp of Siksia, in honour of
Frederick the Great. This opera he subsequently
arranged for Vienna, under the title of Vtelka, for
Jenny Lind and Staudigl. The manager of the
Prussian Opera Comique was extremely desirous of
producing The Camp of Silesia for Mme. Ugalde,
but Meyerbeer, being of opinion that the interest of
the work was centered in Germany only, declined to
allow it to be produced. Scribe, however, supplying
him with the libretto of L'Etoile du Nord, he contem-
plated for a moment the embodiment of The Camp
of Silesia music in the new piece. Gradually aban-
doning this notion, he eventually only retained the
overture, the gipsy rondo with tamborine accom-
paniment in the first act, a portion of the military
couplets and finale of the second act, and the trio
for voice and two flutes warbled by Lind at the
London concerts so frequently. Thus the propor-
tions of The Northern Star are those of an original
work, as there are no less than twenty-six pieces,
twenty of which are new.
The overture opens with a solemn and stately
march, with rich modulations, a theme of deliciously
dreamy interest being interwoven, ear-haunting ever
afterwards, inasmuch as it is reiterated with consum-
mate skill during the opera, the subject of which
being military enables Meyerbeer, in a brilliant
final movement of the overture, to resort to a military
band behind the scenes to increase the sonority of
the ordinary orchestra, over which manoeuvres, with
infinite tact and animation, M. Tilmant. In the
introduction the hearer is soon satisfied that it is
Meyerbeer who is in the field. A tenor air for the
pastrycook, who afterwards becomes a general, and
couplets for the belligerent Catherine, who subse-
quently is crowned Empress, a drinking chorus to
"Finland" (for Scribe cuts Saardam for no earthly
reason, unless it be that Jullien began his Pietro it
Grande in Holland), and a quaint air for Prascovia
(Mlle. Lefebvre), "Ah ! que j'ai peur," complete an
effective introduction. The entrance of a band of
savage Cossacks has suggested the composition of an
air for the bass (badly sung by Hermann-Leon), " En-
fants de l'Ukraine," of singular wildness. The rondo by
which the Cossacks are induced to quit the village is
one of the most charming of inspirations. Its effect
upon the public as sung by Mlle. Duprez was elec-
trical. A dramatic duet between Peter and Catherine,
with the vocal trumpet phrases of the latter, and a
duo of lamentation for two sopranos, in which one
mocks the grief of the other, are both replete with
interest and liveliness. The finale of the first act
consists of a prayer and barcarolle, sung by Catherine,
whose voice is heard, in charming cadenzas, dying
in the distance, as the boat with the soldiers is rowed
off. The second act is still more interesting and
powerful in the musical pieces. The couplets for
the glorification fist of cavalry and then of infantry
overflow with militia', and melodious comicality, and
exci,e the utmost enthusiasm. A broad chorus of
conspirators (against the Czar), a quintet of sur-
passing beauty, in which are intermingled a trio, and
a duo for vivandieres of startling piquancy and origin-
ality, lead to a massive and imposing finale, three
marches, with separate bands, being associated with
a picturesque power that only a Meyerbeer could
conceive. The instrumentation throughout this act
exhibits novel combinations as delightful for the ears
of the tyro as they are instructive for the study of
the professor. The phrases are well voiced with all
their originality; and that is the highest success a
composer can achieve. The colossal climax arrived
at by Meyerbeer is accomplished by the most inge-
nious gradations. In the last act, after a romance
for Peter of surpassing beauty, there are a comic
trio and a buffo duo preparatory to Catherine's mad
scene, which is the trio for voice and two flutes;
and then, in the finale, the composer, to restore
the reason of the heroine, resumes the themes
of the first act. If the composer has contrived
to maintain the furore of the audience to the last
moment, he has to thank himself. The poet has
nearly swamped him, as the coronation of the Em-
press in the presence of an Empress also sprung
from the people was perilous for the Parisian pro
pensities for ridicule. That the Etoile du Nord
may gain in dramatic interest with a better cast than
that of the Opera Comique can be readily granted.
The characters of Catherine and Peter have yet to
be "created." Mlle. Duprez is too weak for the part
of Catherine. A Viardot in the second and last acts
would perhaps upset the theory that the Russian
Empress cannot be made an interesting heroine.
And
the same remarks will apply to the part of Peter,
which is played with energy, but without intelligence,
by Battaille. Still, the constancy of the rehearsals
gave the chic to the opera, and it established how a
body of mediocrities as principals may be drilled to
produce a most satisfactory result—a fact that must
not be lost sight of by the Royal Italian Opera
authorities here when they mount the opera even with
their great resources.