New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1918-09-01

duction that weeks before the date had
been announced $4,000 was sent to tho
Don ONCE OF the theatre by Bohemian
c,tizens Of New York to buy seats" for
tie premiere
ne opera Is strung on an extremely
slender thread of probability. The
lover OF the play agrees for money To
renouncee his claim upon the hand OF
we maiden who loves him. He barter,
ms pride. But the written contract
conta MS the stipulation that she shall
marry no one but "the son Of Micha."
There is a "son of .Mcha" for whom a
marriage broker wishes to procure tho
pretty maid and her pretty ducats, but
ne is lout who shutters in his speech
and is obsessed also ry an impeachment
OF the mind. Though the others do not
know 1t Hans the hero Of the story, is
also q son of Micha"--of the same
M'cha; indeed, though he is doing
menlal service in the home of the
pretty Marie, having departed from the
house of his father in the adjoining
village when that father provided him
with an unamiable stepmother. After
ms seemingly heartless conduct had
made Marie fearful, and then so angry
and desperate that she decides to
sacrifice her love and marry the "son
OF Micha" out of spite, Hans discloses
ms identity and claims his bride, leav-
ing the BOBBY, who was an unwilling
rival playing the part of trained
bear in a travelling show into which
he had been lured by the wiles of q
tightrope dancer. That is all. Dances
MI the gaping interstices in the first
two acts of the play, and farcical
episode, in which the peripatctic noun
tebanks appear, those of the third act
This episode is quite unworthy of the
comedy, but the dances are its bright
est spots. No damsels with gauze
sKlrts these dancers, pirouetting and
smirking, but lusty men and women. in
bodices and ample skirts of brilliant
colors and stout shoes, which come
down u on the floor with rhythmical
clatter mat sets ones blood to coursino
wildly. The polka in the first act be-
gins with pretty pantomime and ends
IN wild whirl, with waving kerchiefs
ana flying skirts, with caps thrown into
me ar and maidens lifted high as the
spectators bleak into loud huzzas at
the end.
Z. Bohemian
Opera
The music of Ole Verkaufte
Braut" roots as l have intimated in
the style of the Italian opera buffa
and frequently sounds like a Mozar-
team utterance. This reference I in
tend shall go to the forms emploved
and also to the direct tunefulness of
the score. Much of the dialogue.
which was originally spoken, is carried
on in recitative which is frankly old
1ashloned, though some of the singers
at this performance sought to achieve
greater naturalness of effect by oc
caslonally dropping into the speaking
voice. A useless proceeding. It is
peter to keep every element of the
lyric drama in the realm of idealitv
which is its home. But the old forms
Il mean the buffo songs, solo and en-
sen.ble) of the Mozartean period and
the perpetual gush of vocal melody
sound strange in the work of a com
poser who was a devotee of Wagner
and his methods. ~The Bartered
Bride" was written in 1866. when
Smetana must have been familiar
with "Tannhauser," ~Lohengrin" and
Tristan" Like Bizet he had to en-
dure the accusation of being a Wag
nerlte In his opera, but it is doubtful
II score of persons of the thousands
VINO listened with ingenious delight
to the music on this occasion could
nave pointed out anything in it as the
1rult OF Wagnerian suggestion. Wha,
tnere was of such fruit lay in the
flowing flood Of instrumental tune
which buoyed up the vocal melody
and flashed and eddied and threw its
ghtterlng Shay above and around its
contours most caressingly and bewitch-
lAgiy This is the kind of Magnetism
which r be found also in Verdi's