The Sun.
London, England, 1864-08-01 00:00:00

THE SUN, LONDON, MONDPY EVENING, AUGUST 1, 1864.

THE ROY IL ITALIAN OPERA.

Brilliant Close th. Season on Saturday,
On Saturdays aug last Mr. Gye brought to a
magnificent termination the most resplendent season
the Royal Italian O's:era has yet enjoyed at this
great lyrical establishment. Seventeen years have
now elapsed since Covent Garden Theatre first
became transformed into a lyrical establishment.
Upwards of eight years ago its radiant, though
often anxiously developed, career as such, was
suddenly interrupted—after some half a dozen sea-
sons had threatened (but happily only threatened)
destruction to Her Majesty's—eight years ago the
career ~f the Royal Italian, we say,wes suddenly in-
terrupted in the March of 186 by the thenceforth
doubly memorable conflagration. A conflagration
doubly memorable, for this reason, that from its
ashes rose the scheme of the Royal Italian Opera at
Covent-garden, not only with a new lease of life as the
phrase is, but with evidences of a reinvigoration that
have ever since then gone on increasing. Of the
substantial reality of this complete rehabilitation of
the project—after the fire—under Mr. Gye's direc-
tion—the annals of the Royal Italian Opera at
Covent- garden have afforded abundant illustration.
But the fact that it has really been as we are here re-
lating it to have been, has never yet had happier
illustration than during the lapse of the season just
now brought to a close. Between the opening
night of the Royal Italian at Covent-garden during
the present year of grace,lB64, on Tuesday, the 29th
of March, and the closing night of the season on the
30th of July, namely, only last Saturday, the suc-
cessful conduct of the establishment by Mr. Gye has
been altogether unmistakeable. The brilliancy of this
success, we perceive, is already beginning to be attri-
buted, now to this, now to that particular item in
the ample repertoire of the establishment. The con-
tinued popularity of the youngest na6stro among
operatic composers—the encreaeing merits, both
vocal and histrionic, of the youngest prima donna
upon the lyrical stage of Europe—the splendour of
a Novelty—the magnificence of a Revival—now
this, now that, we find to have been already speci-
fied as the secret of this exceptional success of Mr.
Gye's during the present season. According to our
judgment, however, that success is really and
truly attributable to the judicious combination
of them all under the skilful guidance
of his direction. His skill as an Operatic Director
being derived from a very rare combination,
in his instance, of enterprise, discrimi-
nation, and experience. That M. Gounod's
genius, as the composer of "Faust," hes
nevertheless, had something to do with the pe-
culiar success achieved by the "Royal Italian" in
1861, is attested plainly enough by the circumstance
that the nights of the season have been those set
apart for the performance of his tragic masterpiece.
Equally undeniable is it that Madlle. Patti, the
Patti, Adelina Patti that is, the darling
prima donna of all the great capitals of
Christendom, has shared with M. Gounod in
winning an exceptional radiance for the season
which ended on Saturday—a genuine furor (one
noticeable even in her career!) having been excited by
the fair cantatrice through her representation of tt e
Marguerite. I The substitution in " Faust" of Mdlle.
Adelina Patti for Madlie. Pauline. Lucca, in truth,
was so felicitous as a change for the better that the
mention of it as such could hardly be deemed even
by Madlle. Lucca herself, as in any way invidious.
Another delightful peculiarity of the season
brought to a close on Saturday was that of Signor
Mario being in better eoice this year than he has
been in for a very long while past—Mario on one or
two nights, indeed, singing almost, we had said, as
finely as ever he did in his life! Then, too, at the
commencement of the season we had very vivid
hopes held out to us that in Madlle. Emilia Lag.
grua, (" Emilia in England ") there filed at length
been discovered a legitimate successor to La Diva,
that imperial prima donna who, for a full quarter of
a century held her own against all comers, she
whose European name was given so ridiculously
this season as " Mrs Griei," in the Royal Academy
catalogue ! The splendour of Maddlo Lsgrua's
singing
to have and
been
actingin
her aiE
EiNt
Exonr
eme a,
something
r 12Iei
exceptional however,
and apart—insomuch so that the hopes of her assured
triumph as Grisi's successor faded out gradually
as the public came to recognise with increasing
regret her more and mere obvious deficiencies
as Donna Anna in " Don Giovanni," as Desde-
monna in " °cello," and in two of the many Leonoras
of the lyrical drama, the Leonora of" La Favorite,"
and the Leonora of "Un Ballo in Masehera."
kaother " flash in the pan," among the apparent
hits of this last season at Covent-garden, the pros
found but fleeting sensation produced by Herr
Wachtel's C above the line might almost be men-
tioned as having been—only that our so mentioning
it would be little less than an act of ingratitude.
The physical capabilities of the young German
tenor are indubitably great, however—they are, in
truth, so remarkable of their kind, that a noble
career is manifestly yet within reach of his attain.
meat ! Only—that great career of his has still to
be commenced. A single cheat note can hardly
be depended upon for the achievement of a repute..
tion. That the new German basso profondo, Herr
Schmidt, obtained this year a triumph less dazzling,
no doubt, but more enduring, than that won for a
while by his tenor compatriot, may be
credited, even by those who failed to witness
it themselves, when we remark that the name of
Herr Schmidt is still associated among opera.goers
(now that the season is over) with the great names
of Formes, Staudigl, and—Lablache I As for the
novelties promised in 1864 et Covent-garden, it is
curiously noteworthy that two among them were
apparently struck out of the manager's scheme for
the season by an afterthought—one of these by
reason of a doubtful success, the other by reason of
an unmistakeable triumph achieved at the rival
Opera House. The former of these (a veritable
Novelty) being the production of Nicolai's " Merry
Wives of Windsor" (for the which Mr. Gye judi-
ciously substituted " Stradella")•—the latter being
simply a Revival (a projected revival that Mr.
Gye, quite as wisely perhaps, passed by alto-
gether) namely, Beethoven's wondrous " Fide-
lio ! Any mere dry enumeration here of
the operas actually performed this season
at the Royal Italian, or of the various and gifted
artistes who took part in those same performances
would be simply tedious and idle. Sufficient
will it be to mention as facts
especially worthy of
mention in the History of the Opera, hero in Eng.
land, that the increasing love for, and appreciation
of, the highest class of music among our fellow-coun-
trymen has never been more signally attested than
they havebeen this season at Covent Garden by the
densely crowded houses that have there, tight
after night, week after week, rewarded Mr Gye's
enterprise! Nay, more than once, by the genuine
enthusiasm manifested by those vast audiences, audi-
ences hitherto regarded as constitutionally unde-
monstrative. Under the direction of the master-
baton of Mr Costa,the noble orchestra and the superb
choruses of the Royal Italian Opera have never on
any previous occasion displayed greater efficiency.
And, in this according to his wont, the manager or
ohpaverearteicsedrvireedcttohre playing of his best card to the veryof the establishment may be said to
last—to wit, that radiant, dazzling, resplendent
" Etoile du Nord," the magnificence of the represen-
tation of which towards the close of the season of
1864 on the stage of Covent-garden, not unfittingly
'marked—as if in tribute to the Great Composer's
memory—the year saddened by the Death of that
Giant of Sweet Sounds, the wonderful Muyerbeer !
To how many other great operatic um.
posers, however, has not the Royal Ita-
lian paid the noblest of ail tributes dur-
ing this past season—that noblest of all tributes
being, of course, the fitting performance of their
masterpieces !
In this way, due homage has been
with
paid not only to the genius of Meyerbeer, but,
Rossini„him, and, among others, to the genius of Rossi„
of Auber, of Gounod, of Mozart, of Verdi, of Bellini
of Donizetti : In the mere mechanical ordering of
the various departments of so huge and complex an
establishment as that of the Royal Italian Opera, the
Director has:in 1864 given fresh evidence of that
skill which is alone to be acquired by assiduous care
combined with very lengthened experience. And in
the conduct of this mechanical ordering of the whole
b the satisfaction of all parties during an un.
usually busy season, a twasoa that must at tunes,