The sun. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1833-1916, 1903-04-05

of those Of Alexander Georges with those
OF Strauss. The manner IN altogether
diderent. but the artistic principle IL the
same. In these songs the music OF the
voice parts Ia almost impalpable. Its
melodic form In so ethereal. 30 woven into
the thought Of a spoken reading OF the
text, that we lose all sense OF the phrase.
all consciousness OF the systole and diastole
Of rhythm which make for US the tangible
! outline Of melody. The whole song be-
! comes for us not tune. but harmonic en-
vironment. a surrounding body OF etheric
tone-tints. In which we live and from which
we breathe into our very souls terse and
vibrating consciousness Of the inwardness
I OF the poem.
Can these songs be called musical In the
1 older sense7 Are these poems set to music
or are they rather music set to poetry!
Neither. for they are simply methods OF
reading poems. sublimated. superheated.
superethercal methods. The song OF to-
day IL literary thing, and II nightly
troubles thosc who persist in regarding
the words as mere pegs on which to hang
the tunes. You cannot comprehend Hahn's
-Infe!icite' or Richard Strauss's 'Ruhe.
meine Scele' that way. and singers who
! try TO sing them from that point OF view
F, fail dismally.
You cannot treat these songs from with
out toward the centre. You must begin
az the kernel and work your way to the
surface. The music is only the outer skin
Of the whole thing Mathilde Marchesi
: tells her pupils to study the text first, to
+ learn to read 1t express.vely without the
music before attempting to study the music
at ALL Then. when the melody Is learned,
the reading OF IL will follow that which has
! previously been given to the text alone
1 1t IL n literary effect which is sought.
! When We turn to the broad domain Of in
| strumental music we are confronted with
! the most extensive view Of the literary
/ movement in the tone art. Absolute music
used to be music for it's own sake, music in
! which one was not asked to discover mean
4 ings, but TO observe the beauty Of the
| thenlatc conceptions and their working
| out. The most abstract music was that OF
| the polyphonic period, when the inter-
| weaving Of subject and answer and the
drawing together OF the threads OF thought
! in the stretto Of a master fugue occupied
the attention Of the music lover.
The ensuing classical period, as every
| music lover knows, was devoted to the de-
velopment Of the sonata form. and then
began that romantic period In which the
literary flavor Of music with a purpose
outside OF its own domain began to COM
mand attention. The movement was started
| by Schumann and Lszt, but many inter-
esting foreshadowings Of II had been seen.
, Almost from the beginning musicians tried
| to tell stories in tones and the naive descrip-
| tive pieces OF Kuhnau look less absurd
, in the light Of Richard Strauss than they
did in that OF Beethoven.
'Ubinam centrum sumus2' Where have
we arrived? And whittier are we going?
Many thousands Of pages Of good paper
have been covered with learned arguments
| against the continuance OF music on the
path toward pure literature, for on that
path 1t certainly Is treading. But what
| has been accomplished Hanslick has
proved to his own satisfaction that music
cannot express anything at all. being but
! a mere wreathing Of arabesques Of tone.
and Ambros had demonstrated with mathe-
/ NAUTICAL precision the precise point at which
music must call in the aid Of poetry for
| the expression OF definite ideas. Wagner
showed that Beethoven's ninth symphony
! touched the limit OF the communicative
power OF absolute music and In it's last move
ment confessed it's inability to proceed
| further without the assistance Of speech.
| Indeed. Wagner showed to his own convic-
ton that the mission OF absolute music
was ended and that In the future only the
lyric drama as modelled by him could crafty
the yearning Of humanity for an intellectual
/ art.
| But all these doctrinaires are put to con-
1 fusion by the practice Of composers. Who
/ Is writing music for music's sake at the
present time? Felix Weingartner sent US
a mediocre symphony in E fiat, which
! apparently had no literary aspirations.
| Dvordk writes just plain symphonies and
chamber music But what Is to be said
! Of the works Of Tschaikowsky? There lie
a tale in nearly every one Of them. The
| Frenchmen have the thought Of the de-
cadent poem or the opera comique in all
| their work. Germany Is dominated by
| Strauss, who not only tells stories, but dis
clsses and philosophers In music and lays
down propositions to be demonstrated with
! theorems and trimmed with corollaries.
| In short. wherever we look to-day we
find composers treating music as an ex-
/ pository art. II must have a subject. and
tHdt buDycSt iuubt NC ouSsiuc VI itcch' we
| are invited to hear q musical discourse on
! that subject, with heads represented by
leading themes. deductions unprecedented
by developments Of the themes, and con-
illusions laid before us In the shape Of final
results Of the working out Of harmonic
. plans.
We ore no longer asked to consider music
purely as tonal architecture. Composers
! scorn to direct our attention to the musical
( pregnancy of their themes, big with melodic
ideas to be brought to birth amid the war
| ring dissonances Of the free fantasia. They
! no longer asl, US to feast Of cross-rhythms,
! Of unexpected resolutions. OF marvellous
/ melodc calculations. Of sunset splendors
! Of orchestration.
! These are but means to an end, and that
end Is the communication Of thoughts
! antecedent to the music. and not to be
, learned from IL. Elemental principles can
not be overthrow by composers. no matter
! how great. The musical master has not
yet lived who wrote an overture to Romeo
and Juliet and communicated his title TO
us without using language. No musician
III