The Sun.
London, England, 1860-10-01 00:00:00

CRYSTAL PALACE.

Madame Clara Novello possesses as good a right
to take a formal adieu of the English public as
either Madame Grisi or Madame Jenny Lind.
Though not our Grisi—her dramatic powers hav-
ing never been on a par with her vocal talent—.

she is undoubtedly in some respects our Jenny Lind.
In sacred music, above all, she has shone with a

lustre scarcely less bright than that of the gifted
Scandinavian. Here, indeed, Madame Novello
has scarcely known a superior. She has

helped, in company with Mr. Sims Reeves, to
maintain the pre-eminence of her nation in the
highest department of the musical art. When

Mendelssohn was invited by the Philharmonic
directors to recommend the two most accomplished

singers in Germany, with a view to their engage-
ment for the concerts of our great " classical"
society, he named two Englishwomen ( then at
Lepsic) as the very best he knew. One of these was
Madame (then Miss Clara) Novello. The compli-
ment was not ill-placed, for it may be safely affirmed
that, with the one exception we have named, Ger-
many never gave birth to an exponent of sacred
music at all comparable to this lady—and that
one, by the way, being a Swede, can
hardly be cited as a case in point. The physical
endowments of Madame Novello are such that,
even without her admirable musical capacity and
thorough experience, she could not have failed to
earn distinction among contemporary vocalists ;
but with those qualities to set off the endowments
of nature, she ]gas been able to reach the highest
attainable position. This is not the time, however,
to review the history of her career, or to discuss at
length and in detail the peculiarities of her talent.
She has bid farewell to the Crystal Palace, it is
true ; but we have reason to believe that, after
a tour in the provinces, which commences
to-day in association with Herr Molique (the
composer of "Abraham"), Madame Anna
Molique, the clever pianist (his daughter),
and the London Glee and Madrigal Union (director,
Mr. Land)—it is intended to hold a grand concert
in,the metropolis, at which her last notes in public
may be heard by her countless London admirers.
This is as at should be. Meanwhile it is enough to
state that the performances of " The Creation" and
" The Messiah" at Sydenham, under the guidance of
Mr. Benedict—with a band and chorus-2,000 strong
and some of the most eminent of our sob singers)
(Messrs. Wilbye Cooper and Weiss in " The Crea-
tion ;" Mme. Sainton-Dolby, Messrs. Wilbye Cooper
and Santley in "The Messiah"), were attended by
uiultltudes almvot us large as Rocked to the memor-
able exhibitions at the " Handel Festivals" of 1857
and 1859; that in both oratorios Madame Novello
took the whole of the soprano music ; and that
she never on any previous occasion we can recall
sang more divinely. It was a melancholy reflec-
tion that those purely devotional airs, from which
the simplicity of Haydn shines out with undis-
turbed serenity, would no more be heard from the
same lips ; that " With verdure clad," "On mighty
pens," and the not less beautiful, because ter-
restial, music of Eve (Part III.) including the
flowing and melodious " Graceful consort," would
henceforth be separated from avoice so sympathetic
and a style so faultless that, accustomed for
many years as we have been to their association
with Haydn's oratorio, it is hard to think of one
except in union with the other. Still more deeply
felt and universal must have been the regret that
those solemn, profound, and touching strains which
place " The Messiah" apart from all other orato-
rios—" Come unto Him," " How beautiful are the
feet," and, last and most transcendant, "I know
that my Redeemer liveth"—would never again be
uttered by one hitherto unsurpassed—nay, perhaps,
unrivalled, if not in their poetical conception, at least
in their vocal delivery ; that those songs of aspira-
tion and comfort would in future cease to find their
way to the hearts of the crowd through the me-
dium of a voice which brephes religion in every
accent, which cannot, if it would, inspire a theatri-
cal emotion, and which now, at the very time that
it is about to be hushed to our ears, has lost none of
its incomparable sonority, none of its silvery bright-
ness, none of its clear and penetrating tone.
There could have been but one conviction in the
minds of the vast crowd assembled on Saturday
afternoon in and about the great central transept
of the Crystal Palace, one firmly rooted and logi-
cally derived conviction—viz., that there was no
evident reason why Madame Novello should take
her leave at all. With voice and resources wholly
with a style made perfect by practice
uwailexperience—added to a vigorous earnestness
iinachPioruednts among her recent acquirements, and
warrants the belief that her retirement from the
profession that she has so long adorned is as much
a matter of regret to Madame Novello as to her
English patrons—why, it might be asked, should
she abruptly quit the scene of her many legi-
timate successes ? That, however, is her own
business ; it is for her to choose, and
for the public to hope that her mantle may
descend on the shoulders of a worthy successor.
After the final "Amen," loud, general, and pro-
tracted cheering, further enhanced by waving of
hats and handkerchiefs, accompanied Madame No-
vello's gradual retreat from the orchestra. The
heartiness
of the leave-taking on the part of the
public was almost worth the sacrifice of taking
leave on that of the songstress, of whose undimi-
nished popularity it was a signal recognition.