The morning journal-courier., 1908-10-26


 design or color according to the most modern Ideas, Is peculiarly stately and spacious. the great depth of the Bai- reuth stage especially landing itself to effects of this kind, Some of the dresses. too, might with advantage be a little more subtle in color than it Ia the custom to have them at Baireuth; they seem to think that blue. for ex- ample, is just blue, and that one blue Is as good as another. A more beau tiful blue could easily be got for Fricka's cloak, and a more beautiful red for Wotsns. Perhaps. however, the management is aiming at quasi historical accuracy, and would hold that these somewhat dun and unlus- trous colors are more in keeping with the supposed state of the arts of weav. ing and dyeing in the mythical times in which the dramas are set After all. Mrs Wotsn could hardly have gone shopping for the latest art shades.
 One sometimes has doubts as to the complete success of the plan of sink ing the orchestra. Its invisibility Is, of course. a great advantage, but the plan of putting 1t SO much below and under the stage certainly has its de fects as well as It's virtues. It tones down the heavy brass in such way that at it's loudest it Is never offen- sive fo the ear. Those who are used to the Ride of the Valkyries. for ex- ample only as if Is played in English concert rooms with q clamor of brass as coarse and ugly as raw beef. would be surprised to hear how mellow It can sound here without losing any of its savagery. on the other hand, the Baireuth arrangement deprives the trumpet of It's most trumpet-like qual- ity--that magnifcently stirring. pene' trating timber that seems to send all the blood in olIr body beating in the veins of the temples,
 With the strings and wood wind the plan as whole works well never have I heard a more ravishing string tone, But it is undeniahle that in the general softening that the Baireuth arrangement gives to the orchestral tone some of the finer parts of the score are inaudhle except to those who cit in the very front seats. Time after time during the performances missed details that knew to he in the score. When the voices arc at their loudest. particularly those of the men, they often drown the orchestra; and even when Alhericl1 was murmuring tho "Tarnheln" spell 1t was hard, where [ sat. to hear properly the n1ys- torious theme that accompanies if in the orchestra During "The Valkyric" we had what seemed to he conclusive evidence that when the singers are at their full force the orchestra must be partly inaudible even to them, Mad anne IefIier- Burkard, who was playing Sieglindo. made a slight error in mod uation In the love-duet, and then to evoryone's ama2ement, sang the next ten bars or SO nearly at whole semltone sharp There was nothing wrong with her voice. She evidently had no doubt whatever that she was singing the melody at its proper pitch; and take it that this would have been impossible had she been able to hear the orchestra beneath her,
 The performances have varied somewhat in merit but In ono respect at any rate they have been incompara- hlo, It is no paradox to say that yI,,,l .l ,,.1y 4 Ia been plenty of it---has been done on the stage, the greatest singer and al most the greatest actor throughout thn four days has been the orchestra Ii is, to begin with, q wonderfully rich instrument of 126 men, While the strings are about the umber--seventy '-at which they stand in a first class English orchestra, the wood wind is slightly increased h every department there are eleven horns. five trumpets. eleven tromhones and tubas and sev. en harps The brass, of course, IS tempered by being sunk so far from the open sounding space, and. how ever loud 1t is, 1t never once sounds harsh The harps are a constant de- light; one realized for the first time the full beauty of the scoring in the pas- sages in which they occur
 l3ut far beyond oven the strength and the sensuous lovelIness of the or. cilestra s the poetry of is playing. It is an actor with the rest, and an actor who never fails to be at the height of perfection no matter what failures it's colleagues make; 1t weeps, and laughs, aud moans, and laments, and rages with almost as definite an articulation os ibe singers on the stage Some of the playing, for sheer beauty has been