New-York tribune., 1918-12-12
Music
A Witch's Orgy Without Witch.
cry in a Prokofieff
Composition
By H. E. Krehbiel

IL was made quite obvious by the
concerts of the Russian Symphony Or
chestra at Carnegie Hall on Tuesday
evening and yesterday afternoon that
sensational exploitation of the most
recent arrival from the country of the
Oossack and Tartar and Slav had been
undertaken in the expectation of reviv-
ing or maintaining an interest in the
music OF the muscovite and his family.
Inc manifestation of the spirit of that
music, as exemplitied in the compost
tlons and performances of Mr.. Proko-
feff, We think, worked an injury to the
cause which hitherto has seemed to
underle the activities of Mr.. Alt
schuler's orchestra and it's. supporters.
Mr.. Prokofief's pieces have been con-
'rlputlons not to the art of music. but
10 national 1--WE shall not yet say ra-
clal) pathology and pharmacopaia. AS
such they were not only not needed.
Iney were distinctly unwelcome, for
germany, since it came under the
sway or moral and political degenera-
Cion, has provided quite as much mu-
As the companion of the Russian
Gorky we have had the German Rich
ara strauss, who has gone on from
year TO year increasing his dose of the
stuff which he hoped the people of
The world Ito use a smile emploved
by the most recent editor of wThe
Arabian Nights'D would buy for rea
sons analogous to the purposes for
which Jenkins's Elixir used to be taken
by old gentlemen.
This, we know, is plain talk, but it
seems to be demanded in rebuke of a
tendency to make a popular appeal
with what we are constrained to cali
hlthy music, which reached climax at
yesterdays concert. We do not refer
particularly to the pianoforte solos
composed and played by Mr.. Prokofeff,
Tor they, we are sure, invite their own
damnatlon, because there is nothing in
them to hold attention. The curiosity
which they irritate is satisfied in mo-
ment, and thereafter they are bore.
They pursue no aesthetic purpose, strive
for no recognizable ideal, proclaim no
means fol. Increasing the expressive
potency of music. They are simply
peverse. They die the death of abor-
tions. The challenge to indignant pro-
test, not only against Mr.. Prokofieff,
-AA' NAie.'SiAUiCl do Wclls was JuP So
called symphonic picture "Hyrcus noe
turnus." Why do these Russians give
US so much witch music? Liadoff's
"Baba Yaga," which we have often heard
and heard again Tuesday night, has
grotesquerie lightened with amiable
humor. This new piece is sheerly
bestial in its assaults upon the ear,
fancy and intellectual decency. The
passage from a Russian poem which it
is supposed to illustrate is palpable
theft from the scene on the Brocken
in Goethe's "Faust." The familiar ele-
ments are there in turn-the flying
witches, the will-o'-the -wisps which
Mephistopheles compels to act as
guides, the screechowl and the buck
goat, in the description of which
Goethe is forced to the use of dashes
instead of words.
They crowd and push they roar and c1atter
They whirl and whistle. pull and chatter
They shine and spirit, and stink and burn!
Goethe wrote the score because he
found it necessary to his poetic and
philosophical scheme; but after it was
done, as he told Eckermann, he was
glad that he had used up his Northern