The sun., 1903-08-02
LoVDON'S PLAYS AND MUSIC.
RICHARD STRAUSS, FOR I'LL OR
GOOD, A MUSICAL ENCRANTER.

6WUUp a MDSAtAL ENGhANI Ell.
mis- Powers THOSE OF q Modern Merlin
Arthur Synions's New Play AbOut
Tristan and Is0lde-A New Theatrical
alxlt by Bernard shaw and other
Pieces Produced by the stage Society.
In Mr.. W. B. Yeats's newly published
volume, ideas OF Good and Evil" there
appears this characteristic passage: Have
not poetry and music arisen, as II seems,
out Of the sounds the enohanters made to
help their imagination to enchant, TO charm.
10 bind with n spell themselves and the
paasers by2 These very words. chief
part Of all praises Of music or poetry, still
cry to us their origin" The Irish mystic
poet Is writing Of magic and could not
help applying his words to Richard Strauss.
who whether for Ill or good is a musical
snohanter. perhaps the initiator OF new
art-musical symbols. After hearing again
his "Till Eulenspiegel' at a supplementary
concert Of the festival. and conducted by
the composer, was more than ever i'm
pressed by the idea that Strauss is divert
Ing music into psychologist channels, mould
ing It's plastic forms into shapes that are
vital. 30 intense is their personal appeal.
Since primitive man howled his lays to
the moon the art OF music has become In
every age more and more deinitive; even
the classic masters were not content to
play alone with tonal arabesques, but
sought to impress upon their bars def
mite mood. In Beethoven the passion for
circulating his meanings literally re-
created music. When Wagner found that
he had nothing new to say, he resorted
to an old device--he welded his music to
words.
Richard Strauss has now taken up the
chain, the last links Of which were SO pa
tiently forged by Franz Liszt. He has
at his command all the old enchantments
Of music: he can WOO and ravish the ear
and command the tempests; but this is not
enough. He would have his art still more
definite. his message still more articulate.
He 10 a thinker. a philosopher as well as a
poet. and deeply religious in the cosmical
sense; he purposes no less task than the
complete subjugation of mems imagination
by his art. He is the modern Merlin, and
whether for good or evil-for who may
care to say?-his powers are those Of a
musical enohanter. Notes, phrases. groups,
movements. masses Of tone, no longer oc-
cupy the same relative position in his works,
they are no longer merely sensuous SYM
bols, but the actual symbols Of language
we must hasten to learn, a new speech
which relates in wonderful tones wonder
full things. TschaIkowsky aimed at this
defniteness, but his passionate. emotional
nature clouded the workings OF his intellect
Strauss, too, has had the seven devils OF
Hensuality In his mansion, but has exor-
cised them by sheer force OF q great spirit.
ual nature-the man is a spirtualist, q
seer in the broader meanings Of those much
degraded terms. The vision OF approaching
death In his Don Quixote' could have beer
conceived only by one for whom life. the uni,
verse itself were symbols. the living gar
ment by which we apprehend the Deity
the Eternal Enohanter.
In our shrewd categories OF things In.
tellectual and things emotional, we par
tition on too sharply brain and feeling
soul and body. Life is not proposition
by Euclid; nor is art. 1t Is one Of the func.
tions OF music to make US feel, another
to make us think; the greatest masters
have been those who made US both feel
huu lh OhO VINld tAOKcub 1Ukb
Beethoven has done. Wagner has done
and now Riohard Strauss. You cannot
call his music frigidly intellectual, as ia
often the music OF Brahms, nor does it
relapse Into such debauohes Of frenetio
passion as Tschaikowsky's-th imperial
intellect Of Strauss controls his tempera-
ment. He is, like Nietysche, lyric phil
osopher. but never. like Nietxsche, will he
allow the problems OF Life and art to over
throw his reason. In the thunders OF his
SCORES, I seom to hear the annunoiation
OF the now dispensation OF new Evangel
of art. which shall preach the beauty OF
the soul and the beauty OF the body; life
on the other side Of good and evil.
Richard Platt, a young American pianist
made his London debut at tho supple
mentary Strauss concert. He played
Beethoven's C minor concerto, Liszt's
Hungarian Fantasia and some Ch opin
pieces. Perhaps the most interesting
feature Of this concert was the solo per-
sormance in the stalls OF the only Vladimir
de Pachmann, the unique "Chopinzee, !"
and in some Of his music Chopin's greatest
living interpreter. He sat between Arthur
SynlOLS, IUc POSt, GHd oONo"oNy' tilC
piano virtuoso. who endeavored both to
subdue this demon Of caprice. When Mr.
Platt played Chopin. De Paohmann's eye
brows disappeared into his hair, his shoul-
ders assumed an expression OF dodging
n landslide. When the pianist essayed
Beethoven, De Pac!mann became gay
He nodded his head approvingly, spoke
in many languages his praise. and was
generally a spectacle for gods and men,
Liszt did not please him, for Lszt is his
Especially" he thinks.
He. himself, has been playing exquisitely
at his recitas and behaving In public az
we'll as can be expected. There is no such
luscious piano touch as HIS 1t is as full Of
tender color, melting color, as wood violet
and as perf'lmed. His technique is fault
less and he has the old magic when he plays
the nocturnes, preludes, valses mazurkas
esudes and several Of the ballades; but the
greater Chopin is sealed book for this Ko'
bold Of the keyboard And he irritates one
still by his perverse bedevilling Of rhythms
Just as a child disembowcls it's doll anc
spills upon the floor the springs and saw
dust. so De- Paohmann delights in pulling
apart the tender organism Of a Chopin
maz,rka and maliciously exposing it tc
his audience.