New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1914-01-12
Harold Bauer Plays Dance
Music at AeOlian
Hall Recital.
ANCIENT AND NEW
FORMS IDEALIZED
Some Reflections on the Much
Discussed Step al Home
and Abroad.
by ~. r.. KRFiIBIEI.


was as large as the room would hold.
| Small wonder. II good Bishop coke had
lived till now he might still repeat that
| we are living. We are dwelling, in
! grand and awful time but !, would
have been the expression of his own pious
soul rather than a fair description of to-
day. Dryden came nearer The contem-
porary popular notion some $50 wears ago,
when he wrote that II was
! "A very merry, dancing, drinking.
Laughing. quaifing and unthinkine time.
The world is gone dance mad. and only
! the stern moraltsts are stopping To think
! that possibly we are dancing on a vol
cano." There is no desire to attribute
dsngeuuousness to Mr.. Bauer I'm saying
| that to announce a programme Of dances
was an ingenious conccit. II would have
been ingenious and also beautiful had no
one ever thought of tangos. turkey trots
and the other geological friskings which
have been lifted out of the slums into
our drawing rooms Mr.. Bauer certainly
had no thought OF such things IN his
mind, even II a tango appeared among
his pieces. His programme was made up
of compositions which. when they were
related to the dance at all. were ideaiiza-
lions of the dance rhythms which have
PLAYED important roles I'm the develop
ment OF extended forms OF the classical
era or have been made vehicles of roman
tic expression. Chronoogically, the list
reached from the time Of Bach down to
to-day. II was a little surprising to note
the entire absence of examples from the
French school Of the time of Louis NV
in which the dance was made an element
OF artistic music, for in Couperin, Ia
meau and their colleagues are TO be
found the highest exemplars OF the
dance forms united in the suite when
i'm turn provided the germ for the SYM
phony. Ravers "Pavane" harked back
to still earlier period-the Elzabethan
but it's harmonic idom was that of to-
day 1t is a beautiful example Of the
dance which was full OF state and
anclentry' idealzed in special sense by
the employment OF the most modern har-
mony
In Bachs suite in 6 minor (Which
marked high water in the artistic
achievements Of the afternoon were DIS
closed some of the old companions of the
Pavan-after the Prelude, an Allemande.
a Corranto, Saraband, Gavotte ana
Gigue-but they had all yielded up much
OF their primal purpose to become music
as such, that is, an expression of tonal
beauty existing for its own sake, and
not for the sake Of the dance. After this
came Schumann's Observation-Disclosures
set of character sketches which are
dances only through the grace of Their
fantastic title. The composer never in
tended that they should be thought of
as dances. They are in sense COM
panion piece to the better known
"Carnavai" compared with which
Schumann wrote to Clara Week
they were "as faces TO masks For
him they had an intimate significance
which he never betrayed beyond writing
10 his love when she was on a concert
trip to Vienna that there were many
bridal thoughts in them, and that they
had been suggested by the most de-
licious excitement that he could re-
member. In later letter he added: THE
whole story is a Polterdbend, and now
YOU can imagine it all from the begin
ming" Still later he writes that he had
lust discovered that the hour of mid
night is struck by the last note. \ Pol
ferabend is the eve OF German wedding
day. with its more or less lively merri-
ment. The little pieces reflect the two
contrasting characters which Schumann
recognized in himself. and which he per-
sonified as Florestan and Eusebius-two
OF the members of his imaginary band OF
Davidites who made war against the
Philistines i'm art. only in metaphoricai
and poetica sense, as the measures which
the Young heroes of progress played for
the old giants of conservatism, are the
Observation-Disclosures" dances.
IL is scarcely necessary TO expound
Chopin's "Tarantelle" and the Polonaise
i'm + sharp minor; they belong to the con-
cert room. not che ballroom. SO does
Cesar Franck's "Danse lente" and the
first of Brahms's Hungarian Dances dn
G minor, No. l. Of the first book, which
also were in Mr.. Bauer's scheme. though
q Magyar familiar with polite drawing
rooms might be able to accommodate his
czardas to Brahmss artistic transcription.
Pieces composed for the dance. or adapt
ed TO the exercise. were the group of
Lander, by Schubert. and the minuet by
beethoven; possibly. also, the Fandango
by Granados.
Unqualifedly vulgar is all the music
which has fallen under this writer's OBJ
servation in connection with perform
ances OF the much mooted Tango. This
much II is within his province 10 say.
1t is nine-tenths mere noise, vitalized by
the barbaric rhythmical propulsion
which il received from its black ere
ators. Under Spanish influences grace
full melcdic formulas have been super
imposed on the negro rhythm. with the
result that the Habanera, or DANA, OF
South America has become thing OF
real musical loneliness. In the form OF
Habanera. which is called the Tango
in Argentina, this loneliness is paired
with gracefulness and decorum in the
dance. In Santo Domingo as trav-
eller whose observations were often
quoted in the articles on Afro-Ameri-
can Folksongs printed In The Trib-
une last summer says. the dance, there
called Mcringuo. is utterly lascivious
and obscene The influence of Span
ish refinement was obvious in the
composition by Alexander Lew. which
Mr.. Bauer played and which was received
with the same applause-no more. no legs.
no different in character-as the other
pieces Perhaps II its melody and har-