Arthur Johnstone

"King Olaf."

December 2, 1898.

Mr. Edward Elgar seems to owe his fame almost entirely to those autumn festivals which are so important a feature of musical life in this country. An organist, with a turn for serious composition, occupying a post in some city where one of those festivals is periodically held, is favourably placed with a view to getting a hearing for the productions of his musical genius; and Mr. Elgar was, and so far as we know is still, organist at St. George's Roman Catholic Church in Worcester. His career as a festival composer dates from 1890, in which year his overture "Froissart" was produced at the Worcester Festival. Three years later a choral work—"The Black Knight"—was brought to a hearing in the same city, apparently with advantageous results to Mr. Elgar's reputation, for since that time he has devoted much of his energy to composition. The cantata performed yesterday evening for the first time in Manchester seems to have been the fourth of Mr. Elgar's important choral works. When first performed at the Hanley Festival two years ago it attracted much attention, and was hailed by many writers for the press as a work for the Leeds Festival—generally considered the most important event of the kind in the country. The work composed for Leeds and produced there last October was called "Caractacus." It is in general style similar to "King Olaf," while naturally representing a later stage in the composer's development. In both works one notes the same dramatic instinct, the same unconventional treatment, the same faculty of genuine thematic invention, and the same unmistakeable gift for orchestration. As this composer gains in experience it does not seem, as with many others, that his inventive powers become exhausted, but that, on the contrary, they ripen and develop. "Caractacus" is obviously a finer work in every way than "King Olaf." Now, all these facts make Mr. Elgar a very interesting person. The qualities enumerated above—gift for thematic invention, ingenious and telling orchestration, unconventional treatment, and so forth—are extremely rare and valuable. It is quite possible for a composer to have a long and successful career without possessing any one of them, and it is therefore very natural that a composer who does possess them should be hailed with enthusiasm. But, unfortunately, they are not the only qualities necessary to a composer of extended choral works, and Mr. Elgar, who rises so far above mere feeble conventionalities in his actual music, is not free from the common but most mischievous delusion that almost anything will suffice by way of "verses for music." He throws away the resources of his remarkable art upon a text that is in places unfit for any kind of musical treatment, and is, on the whole, hopelessly rambling, incoherent, and tiresome. One becomes interested in a dramatic episode where a bride seems on the point of murdering her bridegroom with a dagger that gleams in the moonlight. But the narrative wanders away to other subjects; a fresh heroine, with quite different affairs and interests, occupies attention, and one hears nothing more of the lady with the dagger. No doubt, the title "Scenes from" the Saga of King Olaf seems to justify such procedure, but it does not prevent the interest from flagging or the general impression left by the work from being fragmentary and incoherent. The best of the music is at the beginning, where there is an extremely fine chorus, "The Challenge of Thor," containing various musical elements all truly expressive and fraught with the same primitive and racy vigour. The more important of the elements in question are the Hammer music, the Iceberg music, the Thunder and Lightning music, and the strains which carry the defiance of Christianity by the old Norse religion. The most effective, too, of the solos is the long tenor recitative following the great chorus. At the words "listening to the wild winds wailing" a highly original and interesting strain begins to be heard in the accompaniment. But the promise of these fine things is not well carried out in the latter part of the work. Everywhere the difficulties are very formidable, and in a good many cases they were too much for the chorus, who, except in "The Challenge of Thor," did not sing in a very free or expressive manner. Nor did they always take their leads with precision; but, in a complex work abounding in accompaniment figures with such puzzling cross-rhythms, these defects were excusable. The cantata did not seem to make any great impression on the audience; but we should expect to find, if ever Mr. Elgar were so fortunate as to obtain a really good subject and a good book, and especially a subject and book thoroughly adapted to his remarkable dramatic powers, that he would produce something of lasting value.

The "Enigma Variations."

February 9, 1900.

The style of composition called "Variations" is a striking example of a primitive form that has proved imperishable. Sir Hubert Parry has pointed out that the fundamental idea of variations in instrumental music is co-ordinate with the canto fermo and counterpoint of the early choral composers. Each system resulted from an attempt at giving form and unity to a composition by repeating a theme over and over again, each time in some new aspect, or with fresh ornamentation; though the effect obtained by winding ingenious counterpoint for other voices about an unchanging canto fermo is, of course, very different from the tricking out of the melody itself. In choral music the canto fermo system almost died out when maturer principles of structure were discovered; but variation-form has never fallen into disuse at any period since its invention. It has been used by all the great masters, and by many of them as a vehicle for great and splendid ideas. General progress from the mechanical to the imaginative marks the successive stages through which the form has passed. One great reason for its vitality is that it admits of treatment in every possible style. Variations may be melodic, or contrapuntal, or harmonic. A superficial composer can make them by simply worrying his theme, a profound composer by developing the musical ideas that are in it. Bach's were mainly contrapuntal, Mozart's mainly melodic—one may even say melismatic—and Beethoven made variations of every kind, in his later works obtaining results of undreamed-of grandeur from the form. But the later Beethoven has never really been followed by any mortal in the austere and wonderful path that he struck out for himself, though Brahms and others have obtained a few hints from him. The originator of modern romantic variations was Schumann, whose "Etudes Symphoniques" revealed a fresh source of life in the form, that has proved less austerely inaccessible than Beethoven's; Brahms, TchaÏkovsky, and many others having obviously derived inspiration from it. Mr. Elgar stands in a peculiar relation to the modern masters of variation-form. He seems to be much preoccupied with the curious idea of musical portraiture, which, again, owes its existence to Schumann. The miniature of Chopin occurring in Schumann's "Carnaval" was the first, and perhaps remains to this day the best, example in its kind, and the sketch of Mendelssohn forming No. 24 of the same composer's "Album for the Young" is also a recognisable piece of musical portraiture. Mr. Elgar has carried out the idea in an extended scale in these variations. His theme, which he calls "enigma," has no eccentricity. It is a rather march-like strain in regular form, having three sections, the last of which is a repetition of the first, with fresh harmony and instrumentation. There are nominally fourteen variations;—including the finale, actually thirteen, for No. 10, described as intermezzo, is not a variation. Each of the variations, and the intermezzo, bears initials, or a nickname, which are commonly assumed to represent the composer's friends. Why any such thing should be assumed we do not know. It is both possible and allowable to portray persons who are not one's friends, and some of Mr. Elgar's portraits seem to us extremely severe and satirical. One of the early numbers, in particular, gives a vivid impression of a very unsympathetic personality, garrulous, querulous, trivial, meanly egotistic, and rather ape-like. The composer does well to let the identity of the original remain shrouded in mystery. The variations are grouped according to the usual principles of contrast, and they are all extremely effective. However much the composer may call his theme an enigma—Berlioz called his variation-theme in an early symphony idÉe fixe—one can scarcely escape the impression that it represents the temperament of the artist, through which he sees his subjects; for that, and nothing else, is what forms the connecting link between any series of portraits by the same hand. Wonderful ingenuity is shown in varying the relation in which the theme stands to the musical picture. During the first part of the work, down to the end of the sixth variation, the attitude of the audience seemed rather reserved. But a change began to be noticeable at the seventh variation, called "Troyte," an impetuous presto movement that shows a hitherto unsuspected kind of energy. Nor did the attention flag at all during the noble and serene harmonies of the ensuing Allegretto. The richly-organised "Nimrod," forming No. 9, leads to the dainty and tripping "Dorabella" Intermezzo, which has no connection with the theme. The eleventh variation, headed "G.R.S.," is another demonstration of abundant vigour, and the following "B. G. N." has for leading feature a fine lyrical melody for 'cello. No. 13 obviously has reference to someone on a sea voyage, the "prosperous voyage" theme from Mendelssohn's "Meeresstille" overture being heard amid delicate suggestions of distant sea sound. In the very extended finale there is some powerful polyphonic writing, and the movement ends with a repetition of the theme in augmentation, forcibly declaimed by the heavy brass to the accompaniment of the full orchestra. The audience seemed rather astonished that a work by a British composer should have had other than a petrifying effect upon them. They applauded with the energy that the composer's imaginative power and masterly handling of the orchestra deserve. Dr. Richter signalled to Mr. Elgar, who was seated among the audience, and he thereupon mounted the stage and received an enthusiastic greeting from the public. The striking success of this composition reminds us of the following passage occurring at the end of an article by Sir Hubert Parry written some years ago:—"It is even possible that, after all its long history, the variation still affords one of the most favourable opportunities for the exercise of their genius by composers of the future."

"Cockaigne."

October 25,
1901.

Dr. Elgar's more recent compositions seem to require nearly as much talking about as Wagner's. But, be it observed, that is not the composer's fault, but is the result of the primitive stage at which not only the bulk of our musical public but many of our "leading musicians" still find themselves, as regards understanding the poetic import of a musical work. On two occasions in recent years a work full of slaughter and frenzy, of barbarous revelry and sensuality, of glittering and blaring pageantry, and ending with annihilation—a work the powerful appeal of which lies precisely in the fact that it is the most powerful existing expression in music of everything most un-Christian and anti-Catholic—has been performed without public protest in a British Cathedral. We here refer, of course, to the "Symphonie PathÉtique." Dr. Elgar is another composer whose music means something; but what chance is there for us to understand him? One quails before the task of discussing in a concert notice all the questions to which such a work as the "Cockaigne" overture gives rise. First let us state, without stopping to give reasons, that we think it worth hearing and worth studying. If any previously existing overture is to be mentioned in order to indicate the type to which "Cockaigne" belongs, it must obviously be "Meistersinger." The humorous element is somewhat more prominent than in "Meistersinger," and the general tone and colouring of the two works are utterly dissimilar. But that the composer of "Cockaigne" had "Meistersinger" in mind is rendered practically certain by one particular point—the use of a Londoner theme and of the same theme in diminution for the youthful Londoner, in exact analogy with Wagner's symbols for the Meistersingers and the apprentices. Again the opening bustle, giving way to a love-scene, suggests "Meistersinger," and so does the polyphonic elaboration of the middle part. But there is a great difference between following Wagner's procedure and borrowing his musical ideas. To some slight extent in the E flat section, and more particularly in the harmony thereof, we find the Wagner flavour. For the rest, while the procedure seems at any rate to be based on Wagner's, we find the materials used and the character of the artistic result achieved to be entirely different from Wagner's. There are seven musical elements in "Cockaigne," the significance of which may be roughly indicated as follows:—(1) Bustle of the streets; (2) a virile personal note; (3) companionship and interchange of ideas between two sweethearts; (4) pert children playing their pranks; (5) military band episode; (6) impressions on passing from the street into a church; (7) new phases of street-bustle music. Musical symbols of very considerable plastic force are invented for these things, and are woven into a powerful and entertaining tone-picture with that mastery of the orchestra which no one can now refuse to recognise in Dr. Elgar. He always works with definite lines, and does not seem to care much for those atmospheric effects in which certain moderns, such as Richard Strauss, are so strong. The music has a far wider range of ideas and emotions than would be possible in a poem occupying the same time in delivery. It gives us impressions of London by day and by night, impressions that are partly realistic and partly antiquarian, following the flight of the imagination with absolute freedom, forming a sort of musical parallel to Henley's "London Voluntaries."

And lo! the wizard hour
Whose shining silent sorcery hath such power!
Still, still the streets, between their carcanets
Of linking gold, are avenues of sleep.
But see how gable ends and parapets
In gradual beauty and significance
Emerge! And did you hear
That little twitter-and-cheep,
Breaking inordinately loud and clear
On this still spectral exquisite atmosphere?
'Tis a first nest at matins! And behold
A rakehell cat—how furtive and acold!
A spent witch homing from some infamous dance—
Obscene, quick-trotting, see her tip and fade
Through shadowy railings into a pit of shade!

And if this is effective, does not a certain sonnet of Wordsworth's exist to prove that an aspect of London may furnish a magnificent poetic inspiration? It should be remembered that there is originality in emotion as well as in ideas and in devices; and this is where we find Dr. Elgar strong—perhaps stronger than any other British composer. Besides the technical ability to express himself in music, he has originality of emotion. He takes us into regions where music never took us before. As to his use of Wagner's procedure, that was also Beethoven's procedure in some of his finest works. In fact, it is the procedure of everyone for whom music is a language, such as it has tended more and more to become ever since Beethoven's time. The history of music in the nineteenth century is the history of something growing constantly more articulate.

No doubt some persons would like to ask—Should we have known all this, or any of it, about the significance of the "Cockaigne" music had there been no programmes? The answer is, Probably not. But the beauty of an artistic design illustrating a certain subject may often be perceived when one cannot make out what the subject is. In such a case the subject is not "all nonsense." It is the stimulating cause of the beautiful design, and it is very natural for those who find the design beautiful to like to know what it is all about. It is a mistake to think that a definite play of the imagination has nothing to do with musical composition. It has very much to do with it. The kind of music with no underlying play of fancy is only too familiar.

The name "Cockaigne" occurs in some form in old English, French, Italian, and Spanish literature, meaning "the land of delights." The fancied connection with "Cockney" is of much later date. Henry S. Leigh's "Carols of Cockayne" (1869) shows the recognition of the word in the sense of "Cockneydom." There is said to be a connection between "Cockney" and the French "coquin," and if that is so the appropriation of "Cockaigne" as correlative of "Cockney" is justified by community of origin, all these words being derived from the stem of coquere (to cook). No doubt "coquin" originally meant "cook's boy" or "loafer in a cook-shop," and "Cockney" at first meant something of the same sort. At the same time there hangs about the word "Cockaigne" a certain proverbial suggestiveness, derived from the time when it was used in the sense of "land of delights," the etymology being forgotten. It thus has a peculiar appropriateness as the title of Dr. Elgar's genial and largely humoristic tone-picture.

Birmingham Festival.

October 3, 1900

"The Dream of Gerontius," Cardinal Newman called his poem, with exquisite modesty. How that poem may stand in the estimation of those who share Cardinal Newman's point of view in regard to religious matters is perhaps an important question, but not one with which musical, or any artistic, criticism is concerned. For nothing is more certain about art than that it is subservient to a person's view of life. Artistic or Æsthetic criticism must be humble, and must abstain from trespassing on the ground of faith and morals. Indirectly, indeed, Æsthetics may have a bearing on these more serious subjects. For is it not written of religious doctrines, "By their fruits ye shall know them"?—and nothing else is in so complete a sense a "fruit" of a religion as a work of art arising therefrom. Nevertheless, the function of Æsthetics is not to commend or blame a view of life, but rather to enquire with what eloquence, with what sincerity, with what measure of convincing power the artist expounds his ideas and communicates his feelings, whatever those ideas and feelings may be. With these reflections I find it necessary to premise my notes on Edward Elgar's new work. The reflections are rather solemn, but the new work is very solemn. It is deeply and intensely religious; it is totally unconventional, and must be discussed in an unconventional manner. First, then, let me state a point of difference from all that I have experienced in listening to other oratorios and sacred cantatas, and, I may say, all other musical works with words made by one person and music by another. The point is that this music, on the whole, is apt to bring home to the listener the greatness of the poem. The composer has not merely chosen from the poem such material as suited him. He has expounded the poem musically, and to the task of expounding it he has brought what may be described without inflation as the resources of modern music. We shall doubtless hear of plagiarism from "Parsifal," and there is indeed much in the work that could not have been there but for "Parsifal." But it is not allowable for a modern composer of religious music to be ignorant of "Parsifal." One might as well write for orchestra in ignorance of the Berlioz orchestration as write any serious music in ignorance of the Wagnerian symbolism. Edward Elgar does nothing so affected as to ignore the development which, for good or for evil, the language of music underwent at the hands of Wagner. His orchestral prelude, however, reverts to an earlier Wagnerian type. It gives a forecast of the whole story in such wise that at the end of it the imagination has to be carried back. We have the last agony of the sick man, his death, and passage to the unseen. The symbols, though employed in the Wagnerian manner, are, nevertheless, thoroughly original, taking us into an atmosphere and a world absolutely remote from all that is Wagnerian. When the voice of Gerontius (assigned to a tenor solo) enters we are carried back to the death-bed—to the prayers of Gerontius and his companions. A series of choruses with intervening and accompanying passages for the solo voice is devoted to the King of Terrors. Here the music touches the various notes in the gamut of feeling, from the agony of terrors to serene confidence. After the parting of Gerontius, with the words "Novissima hora est," a new voice enters, that of the Priest (baritone), chanting "Proficiscere, anima Christiana." Among the supplications for the departed is a chant three times repeated, each of the two parts ending with a choral "Amen" that bears a tender echo of the mediÆval "Cantus fictus." An extended section of chorus and semi-chorus bring the first part of the cantata to a peaceful and prayerful ending.

In the second part the soul of Gerontius is winging its way towards the celestial regions, holding colloquy with an angel. There is a Dantesque passage in which a chorus of demons is overheard by the pair—the soul and the angel. Gerontius is encouraged by the angel. Echoes of earthly voices, praying for the departed soul, are borne up from the earth, and in the end the soul of Gerontius is affectionately delivered over to Purgatory by the angel, there to wait suffering indeed, but in resignation and in the assurance of salvation.

Naturally the prevalent poetic note in such a work is the mystical exaltation, now of the contrite sinner, now of the aspiring saint. The chief climax is reached, not at the end, but in the hymn of the Angels, "Praise to the Holiest in the Height," recurring before the departure to Purgatory. But the whole work sings "Praise to the Holiest in the Height and in the Depth." A powerfully contrasting note is heard in the death-agony of Gerontius and, above all, in the chorus of demons occurring in the second part. Here a comparison with Berlioz is simply inevitable—for Edward Elgar's dramatic power admits of comparison with the great masters. His demons are much more terrible than those of Berlioz, who was a materialist in the profound sense—not, that is, in virtue of more or less shifting beliefs, but of unalterable temperament. Infinitely remote from that of Berlioz is the temperament revealed in Edward Elgar's music, which, like parts of the poem, fairly merits the epithet "Dantesque."

"Ever since the far-off times of the great madrigal composers England has played but a modest part in the concert of the great musical powers. For the products of the musical mind it has depended almost entirely on importation, and has exported nothing but works of a lighter order." Such are the words with which the German author of the "Gerontius" programme, specially written for this Festival, introduces his subject. The economic metaphor is ingenious. It does not imply too much or justify the state of things to which it refers. Rightly or wrongly, Germany and the Continent of Europe in general did not feel that serious English music was a thing to be taken seriously, and to that fact the writer refers with ingenious delicacy, going on to say that about the turn of the century a change began to be noticeable. Everyone conversant with musical affairs knows how that change was brought about, though not everyone on our own side of the Channel cares to admit what he knows. It is in the main to Edward Elgar—a man who has done his best work living quietly in the Malvern hills, without official position of any kind, remote from social distraction and the strife of commercialism—that the change is due. The presentation of so lengthy a work as the "Dream of Gerontius" at a Rhine Festival has a kind of significance that the English musical public would do well to consider. The programme is much more carefully selected than at our own festivals, the idea being not at all that it should contain "something for all tastes," but that it should be characteristic of musical art as it now stands, giving only the most typically excellent of newer compositions, and of older compositions only those upon which it is felt that contemporary genius had been more particularly nourished. It is not accidental that on the present occasion the names of Handel, Mendelssohn, Schumann are absent while Bach is very abundantly represented; Beethoven's name figures in connection with the most modern in feeling of all his works (the C minor Symphony), and Liszt's with his revolutionary "Faust" Symphony. Nor is it accidental that the preference is given to Strauss among German and Elgar among English composers. For those are the men who really carry the torch, and the Germans are not to be deceived in such matters.

The performance of "Gerontius" yesterday evening had a good many features of special interest. Full justice was done to the instrumental part of the work by the magnificent Festival orchestra of a hundred and twenty-seven performers. Those peculiar qualities of the imagination which make of Dr. WÜllner, jun., by far the best representative of Gerontius as yet found were once more demonstrated, and the part of the Angel was given by Miss Muriel Foster with the wonderfully beautiful and genuine voice that has long been recognised as her most remarkable gift, and with considerably greater and more expressive eloquence than any previous experience might have led one to expect from her. In the bass parts of the Priest and the Angel of Death Professor Messchaert sang with wonderful dramatic power, and the semi-chorus, seated in a line before the orchestra, acquitted themselves almost to perfection in the delicate task that they have to perform throughout the death-bed scene. I have already expressed the view that the final section of the first part, beginning with the Priest's "proficiscere, anima Christiana," is the point at which one first becomes conscious of actual genius in the composition; but now, after further study and another complete hearing of the work, I am not quite satisfied with that statement. Perhaps at that point a good many listeners first become clearly conscious of the composer's genius. But on looking back at the extraordinary eloquence and beauty of the musical symbolism in the prelude and death-agony of Gerontius, one perceives that the quietus which comes to the spirit in the scene following Gerontius's death is merely a climax in a process that really begins with the first notes. The heavenly calm at the opening of the second part I realised yesterday more thoroughly than ever before. Splendid as the treatment of the hymn "Praise to the Holiest in the Height" is, the final section is not so completely adequate as the rest. The truth is that the composer there found himself in presence of a task hopelessly beyond the powers of any mortal except Bach. In the "Sanctus" heard on Sunday evening the shining circles of the heavenly choir are, as it were, made audible to the ears of mortals. Bach could only do it once, and no other composer could do it at all. Elgar gives a beautiful and grandly conceived hymn of the Church Triumphant, and with that we may well rest satisfied. He is in the main a dramatic composer, and, in those cases where he enters the domain of purely religious music, he gravitates back rather to Palestrina, with his "souls like thin flames mounting up to God," than to the greater and serener spirit of Bach.

In subject, though not in treatment, this oratorio—the first performance of which in Manchester will be given this evening—is closely akin to the morality play "Everyman." Gerontius is not a historical character, but a typical person, belonging to no particular age or country. He is further like Everyman in being a layman, who has lived in the world, as distinguished from the Church, and in being just a plain, well-meaning man, without very great or shining qualities. The poem on which the oratorio is founded begins, at a later stage than "Everyman," with the death-bed scene, and does not end with the death of Gerontius's mortal part, but peers wistfully into the world beyond, and "under the similitude of a dream," tells much of what holy men have imagined about the experiences of Christian souls going to their account under the guidance of angels.

In the oratorio the utterances of Gerontius are assigned to a tenor soloist, who in the first part has to deliver the broken phrases of the sick man "near to death," and in the second the delicately restrained raptures of the soul that "feels in him an inexpressive lightness and a sense of freedom," as he gradually becomes conscious of the angelic presence that is bearing him along towards the heavenly regions. The only other soloist in the first part is the Priest (bass), who delivers the solemn "Proficiscere, anima Christiana, de hoc mundo," as the soul of Gerontius quits the body. In the second part the second and third soloists represent, one the Guiding Angel (mezzo-soprano) and the other the Angel of the Agony (bass), who, at the most solemn moment of the oratorio, is recognised by the Soul as "the same who strengthened Him, what time he knelt, lone in the garden shade bedewed with blood." The semi-chorus in the first part is the group of "assistants," or friends gathered about the dying man's bed. The function of the chorus in the first part is not defined, but it may be taken as voicing the prayers and aspirations of other faithful souls, aware of Gerontius's case and sympathising with him. In the second part the chorus is now of "angelicals," now of demons. The semi-chorus again represents the voices of friends on earth, which at one point are imagined as again becoming audible to the Soul, and also takes part in certain phases of the great hymn "Praise to the Holiest in the Height," where the vocal harmony falls into as many as twelve parts.

Those who are to hear this music to-day for the first time should beware of judging it by false standards. Let them be prepared for the fact that from beginning to end there is not a particle of anything in the least like Handel or Mendelssohn. Without the slightest intention of doing anything revolutionary, but simply following the bent of his own genius, the composer here brushes aside the conventions of oratorio very much as Wagner brushed aside the conventions of opera, and justifies himself just as thoroughly in so doing. To hear the "Gerontius" music is to become acquainted with by far the most remarkable and original personality that has arisen in musical Britain since the days of Purcell. One might trace the manifestations of that originality in the harmony, that always shows a touch both sensitive and sure, in the orchestration and interplay of chorus and semi-chorus, in the amazing sweetness and depth of feeling that sounds in the Angel (mezzo-soprano solo) music, in the force and truth of musical expression which, for the most part, extends even to elements of minor importance in the work. But for the present these broad indications must suffice, and we will only add the warning that the music is powerful, subtle, and of manifold significance, not to be judged in too great a hurry, and yielding up the best of its secrets only to those who listen repeatedly and study between.

Originality is disadvantageous to a composer at first in two ways. The more obvious is that listeners find the music speaking to them in an unknown or partially unknown tongue, and are displeased; and the less obvious, that players and singers cannot, as a rule, do justice to an unfamiliar style. When it is a case of winning recognition for something new and original a thoroughly adequate rendering is half the battle. Such a rendering carries with it a sense of enjoyment and satisfaction in the performers, and there is always a chance that this may to some extent communicate itself to the public; whereas in the other case the embarrassment of the performers will certainly communicate itself, and the audience attribute everything unsatisfactory to the unknown or insufficiently guaranteed composer. In Elgar's "Gerontius" the originality is strong and unmistakeable, and the performers find their technical skill severely taxed. But fortunately the composer has a clear head; he knows the technique of each instrument and he never miscalculates. Performers therefore find their task, though often difficult, is always possible and, further, that the result is always satisfactory. For Elgar has an ear; he is a man of tone, and does not care for music that looks well on paper but sounds rather muddy. These points, known to those who for some time past have taken a close interest in Elgar's work, made it possible to hope that the Manchester performance of his great oratorio would be a striking success, and perhaps even throw a new light on the merits of the composition; and it can scarcely be questioned that the experience of yesterday evening fulfilled those hopes. It was doubtless the most carefully prepared of the performances that have been given thus far in this country. Dr. Richter was, for various reasons, peculiarly anxious that it should go well; Mr. Wilson made up his mind some time ago that whatever conscientious work could do to secure a worthy performance should be done; the hopes and endeavours of choir-master and conductor were seconded by the choir in an admirable spirit; and, though it seems that for some time the usual difficulties of an unfamiliar style were felt, not a trace of any such thing was to be observed in the performance, the remarkably willing and energetic style in which the choral singers had grappled with their task bearing its proper fruit in a rendering that sounded spontaneous and unembarrassed, as though the singers were sure of the notes and could give nearly all their attention to phrasing, expression, and dynamic adjustments. In the highest degree remarkable, too, was the orchestral performance. Passages of such peculiar difficulty as the rushing string figures, that represent the strains of heavenly music overheard by the Soul and the Angel as they approach the judgment-seat, came out with much greater distinctness than we have ever heard before, and we had a similar impression at many other points in the performance, which was as delicate as it was precise in detail and broad in style. But experience of all the complete performances yet given induces us to think that the difference between thorough success and ordinary half-success with this oratorio depends more on the semi-chorus than on any other point, and this is where the pre-eminence of last night's rendering, among all yet given in this country, is most unquestionable. Though not placed in front of the orchestra—as they should have been and, we hope, will be next time,—this group of twenty picked singers was really excellent. The voices blended well, and their combined tone was clearly distinguishable from the larger choir's. At the notoriously dangerous points, such as the re-entry with the "Kyrie" after the invocation of "angels, martyrs, hermits, and holy virgins," there was no hint of embarrassment, and they played their part as a slightly more delicate choral unit with absolute success in the litany and throughout the marvellous concluding chorus of the first part, where, as the original analysis suggested, the noble pedal-point harmonies symbolise the swinging of golden censers, as the supplications of the friends and of the church rise up to the throne of God. Among the astonishingly new kinds of musical eloquence obtained in this work by the interplay of chorus and semi-chorus it is worth drawing special attention to the tenor and alto unison in the semi-chorus on p. 108 (we quote from the second edition). The passage is not difficult, but to realise the particular effect of tone as well as it was realised yesterday shows exquisite adjustment.

As principal soloist Mr. John Coates had an enormously difficult task, which he performed about as well as was possible with the vocal material that has been assigned to him by nature. All that thorough knowledge of the part, together with high artistic intelligence, could do was done. His voice did not break on the high B flat (p. 33), and he seemed to be well disposed, notwithstanding his recent illness. Though it is usually said that Elgar writes better for orchestra than for choir, and better for choir than for the solo voice, he was very finely inspired when he conceived the part of the mezzo-soprano Angel. The opening arioso, "My work is done," is a most lovely song, to which the haunting "Alleluia" phrase forms a kind of refrain. But even this—one of the very few detachable things in the oratorio—is not the best of the Angel's music. It is surpassed by the other song, "Softly and gently, dearly ransomed Soul," where the dropping of the Soul down into the waters of Purgatory is accompanied by music of quite unearthly sweetness and tenderness. These are things which make it seem almost a shame to discuss this work in any purely technical aspect. Miss Brema made the Angel's part one of the few entirely satisfactory features of the first performance, and again yesterday her nobly expressive style did full justice to the marvellous beauty of the music. Mr. Black was vocally irreproachable in the part of the Priest who speeds the parting soul of Gerontius, and again as the Angel of the Agony in the second part.

In reference to a musical composition the word "dramatic" has sometimes to be used in a sense different from "theatrical." Thus the two great Passions by Bach—the "St. Matthew" and the "St. John"—both have a dramatic element so strong that at certain points the music becomes altogether dramatic. Yet no sane person ever called it theatrical, in the sense of unfit for a church. By "dramatic" in such cases one means two things—(1) having thematic material that is conceived with a certain vividness, in reference to a particular situation or mood of feeling; (2) developed according to procedure that does not sacrifice the vividness to formal or structural considerations. In this sense, then, we call Elgar's "Gerontius" a dramatic composition from beginning to end. To find fault with it for the absence of choral climax in the manner of Handel and Mendelssohn is as much out of place as it would be with Wagner's "TannhÄuser." On the other hand, we do not agree with the criticism that "Gerontius" is Wagnerian music. In two places there is a brief and faint suggestion of "Parsifal," first in the sostenuto theme for cor anglais and 'celli that enters in the fifty-second bar of the Prelude and recurs in some form at several points in the course of the work, and secondly in a recurrent phrase for strings at the entry of the recitative assigned to the Angel of the Agony—and to some extent throughout that recitative, which vaguely recalls "Parsifal." The other elements we find to be unlike Wagner and unlike every other composer but Elgar. These elements it is convenient to classify, not according to the usual technical or formal principle, but according to a dramatic principle. One notes, in the first place, four main categories—(1) the purely human; (2) the ecclesiastical; (3) the angelic; (4) the demonic. The Prelude opens with the symbols of Judgment and Prayer. Next the "slumber" theme enters, to be joined at the fourteenth bar by the "Miserere." The note of feeling contracts and sinks towards utter abasement, which reaches the lowest point in the cor anglais theme with tremolando accompaniment. But now the sick man's despair finds expression in a loud cry, which is answered in the majestic and ringing tones that remind him to face death hopefully. A quite new musical element enters with the Andantino theme, developed at some length, and informs the penultimate section of the noble tone-poem, which continues till a brief reprise of the slumber theme suggests the passing of the soul. New phases of the Judgment theme connect the Prelude with the opening recitative, and here the imagination has to be carried back, as usual after the Prelude of a dramatic composition, which as a rule epitomises a good part of the action. It is evident, then, that the Prelude is concerned only with the first two of the categories above enumerated—that is to say, with the purely human and the ecclesiastical, and not at all with the angelic or demonic. Of the angelic music the principal elements, in addition to those already mentioned, are the various phases of the great hymn "Praise to the Holiest in the Height." The extraordinary demon music would in itself offer material for an essay. Here we can only touch on a few obvious features—the upward rushing semiquaver figure in chromatic fourths, which is grotesque and rat-like; the three-part figure for strings in quavers which is first heard with the words "Tainting the hallowed air," but belongs more particularly to "in a deep hideous purring have their life"; the terrific fugato "dispossessed, thrust aside, chuck'd down"; the sinister and ominous four-note theme "To every slave and pious cheat"; the motif of demonic pride, p. 83; and the sarcastic prolongation of the last word in "He'll slave for hire." The long chorus formed of these elements is a welter of infernal but most eloquent sound, the enormous technical difficulties all of which were completely mastered yesterday.

To-day, when Elgar's new Oratorio "The Apostles" was first publicly performed, was a sufficiently striking contrast with the corresponding day in the Festival of three years ago that witnessed the production of the same composer's "Gerontius." On that earlier occasion the interest both of performers and public was languid. That Elgar's music was difficult and harassing to perform was generally known, while the merit of it was regarded as doubtful. The upholders of British musical orthodoxy, with their faith in the saving virtues of eight-part counterpoint, shook their heads, the choral singers found their work disconcerting, and the public doubted whether the composer was anything more than an eccentric. The three intervening years have placed Elgar's reputation on a very different footing. Vague hostility towards the unusual and the unknown has given way almost universally to the recognition that he is one of the great originals in the musical world of to-day; and he thus compels attention even in those who instinctively dislike both his particular methods and the kind of general atmosphere into which his religious art transports the listener.

In "The Apostles" Elgar adheres completely to those principles which were exemplified by "Gerontius" first among works of British origin. That is to say, the music is continuous, as in Wagnerian musical drama. There is no such thing in the work as a detachable musical "number"—whether air, song, chorus, concerted piece, march, or anything else. The composer has musical symbols corresponding to ideas, feelings, moods, aspects of nature or personality, religious conceptions or aspirations, animated scenes of popular life, phases of local and national custom, exhortations of the angels, suggestions of the devil, mystical rapture, rebellious despair; and he uses those symbols in the manner of a language. There is no mechanical work, no carrying out of architectural schemes with lifeless material. Everything in the score is vivified by the idea. The composition heard to-day consists of the first and second parts of the projected oratorio. In the first part there are three scenes—"The Calling of the Apostles," "By the Wayside," and "By the Sea of Galilee"; in the second part four scenes—"The Betrayal," "Golgotha," "At the Sepulchre," and "The Ascension." After the prologue and the narrator's opening recitative, the setting forth of the Apostles' calling begins with the changing of the Temple watch at dawn, the watchmen on the roof as they salute the rising sun being conceived as the unconscious heralds of Christ's kingdom on earth. Here the musical treatment is stamped with the utmost grandeur, and points of amazingly vivid and picturesque detail are successively made, the curious Oriental Melismata of the watchman's cry, accompanied by the Shofar (Hebrew trumpet of ram's horn), giving way to the psalm within the Temple, between the phrases of which is heard the brazen clangour of the opening gates, while the air is flooded with the rushing music of harps. For the psalm an old Hebrew melody is used. So rich in matter is the text of the oratorio that I cannot attempt here even to give an outline of it, but must refer readers to Canon Gorton's booklet "An Interpretation of the Libretto" (Novello and Co.). There will be found an account of the sources from which the composer took his text, and in particular the justification for his view of Judas as a man who intended not to betray his Master to destruction but to force His hand, to make Him declare His power and establish His earthly kingdom forthwith—a view for which there would seem to be patristic authority.[2] The oratorio is not theological; it is a dramatisation of the Gospel story that may be compared with Klopstock's "Messiah." After the introductory sections, broadly expounding the scheme of Redemption as accepted by the entire Christian world, but not enforcing any particular doctrine, all the stress is laid on the individuality of the persons—the Apostles, the Magdalene, and the Mother of Christ—and on the collective character of the groups, such as the women who are scandalised at the ministrations of the Magdalene and the mob which cries "Crucify Him!" As an accompaniment of the drama we have the mystical chorus of angels commenting on the progress of earthly affairs and giving utterance to the sweet, passionless jubilation of sinless beings after the Ascension. To those who are acquainted with "Gerontius" it is almost needless to say that the composer is at his best in rendering the music of the heavenly choir. His marvellous faculty of finding music that matches the words inevitably, so that once heard the associations seem to have been long known, is here repeatedly illustrated. Perhaps the most absolutely perfect examples occur at the words "What are these wounds in Thine hands?" and in the recurrent "Alleluia" phrase.

Elgar's austerity is more strongly pronounced in "The Apostles" than in "Gerontius," and so, too, is his audacity in using the special resources of the modern dramatic orchestra to expound a religious theme. The old pompous oratorio manner he has left an immeasurable distance behind him. He sticks at nothing in his determination to cut down to the quick of human nature, to reject all abstractions and conventions and illustrate an idea or fact of religious experience in its relation to actual flesh and blood. The sinister parts of the oratorio recall by their general tone, atmosphere, and colouring the scene in Klopstock's "Messiah" in which an avenging angel carries the soul of Judas up to Golgotha and there shows him the results of his work. Mighty as the music is, it is all strictly illustrative, and so the centre of gravity remains in the text.

Some time must elapse yet before anyone can offer a confident estimate of "The Apostles" as a work of art. It will possibly be found to stand to "Gerontius" in something like the relation of Beethoven's Ninth Symphony to his Seventh, the later work being of greater depth and significance but less perfectly finished.

Elgar's most recent oratorio, "The Apostles," which will be heard by the Manchester public for the first time this evening, stands in much the same relation to recent works in oratorio form by other composers as one of the later musical dramas by Wagner holds to the kind of opera that was in vogue when he began to write. According to current ideas, justified by the practice of many well-known composers, an oratorio comes into existence by some such process as the following. A composer casts about for a subject, either being guided in his choice by consideration of what is in some manner appropriate to the particular occasion, or simply taking a story from the Bible that has not been used before, or not too frequently before, for musical purposes. He then either obtains the services of a librettist or himself arranges a libretto setting forth the chosen story. In the drawing up of the libretto the most important matter is the engineering of "opportunities" for the composer—here an effective air for the principal personage, there a chorus with scope for effective contrapuntal writing, everywhere due regard for the well-varied interest which the public loves, and, at the end of a part, provision for an effective Finale. But some recognised kind of musical opportunity is always the chief matter. No one cares much about the subject except in so far as it provides the musical opportunity of an accepted kind. It is a case of chorus, air, concerted piece, march, air for another sort of voice, and Finale, with connecting recitatives as a necessary evil, and the whole thing standing or falling according as the composer seizes the said opportunities and turns them to account in the accepted manner, or neglects or fails to do that. For so long a time has that kind of oratorio been regarded by the general public as the only possible kind, that even now immense numbers of persons discuss works like "Gerontius" and "The Apostles" on the old lines. That a musician should have a mind, and a message to which notes and chords are subservient, is an idea so new as to be disquieting, if not at once dismissed as absurd. People are so much accustomed to say that they never did care about the subject of a musical work; that no sensible person does; that if the music is pretty the work is good; and there is an end of the matter. Yet now comes a composer and makes the subject the chief thing, writing music that gives no one the slightest encouragement to take interest in it apart from the subject—in short, displaying the most complete indifference to everything that used to be expected of a composer, and giving us all to understand that, in a religious work, if the music does not in some clear manner contribute to the exposition of the subject, it is not justified at all. In this respect "Gerontius" and "The Apostles" are alike. People can take them or leave them, but they cannot make them out to be pretty music, such as one can enjoy without "bothering about" the subject. For Elgar so orders that we have to enjoy with the head and the heart or not at all. He will not allow us to enjoy simply with the nerves or by recognising approved kinds of musical rhetoric.

Whatever Elgar may do in the future, he can never approach a more weighty subject than is expounded in the two parts of "The Apostles," which make up the oratorio in its present form. This deals with the calling of the Apostles and with some of the most important incidents in the life of the Redeemer during His ministry. Everyone intending to hear the work should read the short and clear account given in Canon Gorton's "Interpretation of the Text." The writer is remarkably successful in bringing out the profound consistency and psychological insight which distinguish this oratorio text so very sharply from most others. Attention may be drawn specially to the characterisation of the three Apostles, John, Peter, and Judas, expounded mainly on pages 13 and 15. Canon Gorton also shows us the sources from which some of the most fruitful ideas and telling symbols of the oratorio have been derived. The music exemplifies a further development along the lines indicated by "Gerontius." In the resources which he calls into play the composer is a thorough-going modern. His orchestra is of great size, and he does not scorn the specially modern instruments or the modern tendency to group and subdivide in an elaborate and subtle fashion. In the quality of his absolute musical invention he shows himself to be neither a classic nor a romantic, but a psychological musician. His thematic web is the exact analogue of the emotional and imaginative play to which the exposition of the story gives rise from point to point, and it thus partakes of the nature of language. The composer cares nothing for accepted views as to what is in accordance with the proper dignity of oratorio; but, trusting to his conception as a whole to ennoble every part, he allows himself to be here and there extremely realistic, very much as the great religious painters have done. He works on a great scale; in the handling of musical symbols he is not dismayed by tasks that might well be considered impossible, and he thus reminds one of the compliment which Erasmus paid to Albrecht DÜrer—"There is nothing that he cannot express with his black and white—thunder and lightning, a gust of wind, God Almighty and the heavenly host."

A faultless rendering of "The Apostles" is not to be expected. The same thing has been said of "Gerontius," and the score of the later work yet more obviously transcends the powers of the best endowed and disciplined musical forces to render it in a manner which "leaves nothing to be desired." All hope of reaching the end of their task with a feeling of complacency must be abandoned by the choir, orchestra, soloists, and conductor who undertake to perform "The Apostles," which, in point of technical difficulty, is a "Symphonie Fantastique" and Mass in D combined. Still, in a relative sense, a rendering may be satisfactory—in the sense that it has the root of the matter in it, not that it is faultless in every detail,—and in that sense we should call the rendering of yesterday highly satisfactory. The general intonation of the choir was better than on any previous occasion, all the delicate fluting rapture of the celestial choruses at the end sounding wonderfully sweet and showing not the least trace of fatigue. The orchestral playing was more subtle than at Birmingham, and it seemed to afford a better justification of the composer's extraordinary colour schemes. It would be hard to suggest a better representation for any of the solo parts. As at Birmingham, Mr. Ffrangcon Davies gave the words of the Redeemer with admirable dignity, and here and there with a trumpet tone in his voice that might have reminded an Ammergau pilgrim of the late Joseph Mayer. As the Narrator and the Apostle John Mr. Coates gave a rendering worthy of his Gerontius earlier in the season. In the parts for women's voices Miss Agnes Nicholls and Miss Muriel Foster once more proved their immeasurable superiority to singers of the "star" order in music of real poetic quality. Mr. Black gave a most telling interpretation of the part of Judas, which, as in the Passion Play at Oberammergau, has greater dramatic significance than any other. All the solo parts, except the Redeemer's, are in certain sections so much interwoven with each other and with the chorus that the combined result overpowers the individual interest, though in the parts of the Magdalene and of Judas there are also important independent developments. There can be no question as to the general excellence of the rendering, and the audience was on the same enormous scale as when "Gerontius" was given in November; but the reception was very different. There was applause, of course, yesterday, but no scene of great enthusiasm such as the earlier and simpler oratorio evoked. Some persons seem to be of opinion that the comparative reserve of the public was caused by the extreme solemnity of the subject; that they were really impressed by the music, but in such a manner that there was no inclination to be demonstrative. In this there may be some truth; but, "The Apostles" being unquestionably much more austere and difficult to understand than "Gerontius," we are inclined to accept the simpler explanation that the audience did not like it so well.

It seems impossible to deny that the music of "The Apostles" represents in many important respects an advance upon the earlier oratorio. The poetic theme of the whole work is incomparably more ambitious, and the musical invention is in more respects than one of greater power. In regard to this point the obvious case to take is Mr. Jaeger's example 3 (Novello's edition), "Christ, the Man of Sorrows," that being the motif of which more frequent and varied use is made than any other. Here we find unmistakable progress. In its simplest form the theme is more intense and more profound in feeling than any in "Gerontius," and furthermore the manner in which the significance of it develops throughout the work, up to the Ascension phrase, where it occurs in its most expanded form, though not for the last time, shows a great advance in the composer's art. Again, the interest of the "Apostles" music is much more varied. All the symbolism having reference to Christ in solitude makes a most powerful appeal to the imagination; and the opening of the Temple gates at dawn is a scene of astonishingly graphic force and bold design. In the second part the tragedy of the Passion is given in four scenes of tremendous intensity, and then, in the section headed "At the Sepulchre," we begin to become aware of the spirit which is Elgar's most rare and wonderful possession. "And very early in the morning," says the text, "they came unto the sepulchre at the rising of the sun." Thereupon are heard the watchers singing an echo of the music from the great sunrise scene at the beginning. After a dozen bars the fluting notes of a celestial chorus begin gliding in, and then we have an example of that naÏf mediÆvalism at which the second part of "Gerontius" here and there hints. A kind of unearthly exhilaration begins to sound in the music. The Resurrection has brought a new fact into a sorrowful world. It is a sublime adventure, at news of which heaven and earth bubble into song. Throughout all the rest of the work the composer creates that sense of the multitudinous which belongs to parts of the hymn "Praise to the Holiest" in the earlier oratorio. But the angelic rapture that accompanies the Resurrection and Ascension in the "Apostles" is far greater and more wonderful. The heavenly strain is repeated in so many different ways that the air seems to be full of it, and it never loses the angelic character by becoming militant or assertive. It remains to the end an efflorescence of song—the sinless, strifeless, untiring, sweetly fluting rapture of the heavenly choir, mixing or alternating with the more substantial tones of holy men and women on earth. Elgar can also render for us the grief of angels. This he does in a page of unparalleled beauty, describing how Peter, after denying his Master, went out and wept bitterly. This page alone might well save the composition from ever being forgotten.

The less convincing parts of the oratorio are sections ii. and iii., especially those parts devoted to the Beatitudes and the conversion of the Magdalene. It is obviously a work the secrets of which are to be penetrated only with the aid of many hearings and much study. At present we are disposed to regard "Gerontius" as the more perfect work of art, though the individual beauties of the "Apostles" are greater and more wonderful. Nearly everything in the later oratorio is stronger. The symbols of the Church show an advance upon the corresponding parts of "Gerontius" scarcely less remarkably than the symbols of the heavenly choir. The strange Old Testament element connected with the Temple service again shows imaginative power of quite a new kind, wonderfully enriching the background of the composition, and the tragic force of the "Passion" scenes is immensely greater than anything in "Gerontius." But with our present degree of knowledge we miss in the "Apostles" that crowning artistic unity which prompted us to describe "Gerontius" as a pearl among oratorios.

Sir Edward Elgar's most recent Overture, "In the South," has a picturesqueness, or rather a kind of graphic power, arising from far-reaching play of the imagination. In thematic invention it is perhaps more strongly stamped with Elgar's originality than any other work. Its whole tone, atmosphere, and colouring are something essentially new in music, the only hint of any other composer's influence occurring in the viola solo, which bears a faint suggestion of Berlioz's "Harold in Italy." But, being a secondary element in the latter part of the Overture, it is to be regarded merely as that kind of reference which in music is as allowable as it is in literature. The grandioso theme beginning in A flat minor, which was suggested by the Roman remains of La Turbie, is so striking that it has already acquired a good many nicknames. The "steam-roller" theme, it has been called; elsewhere, the "seven-league-boot" theme, the "Jack the Giant-killer," and, among Germans, the "SiebentÖter" theme. In any case it is a most extraordinary piece of musical expression, of a kind scarcely ever foreshadowed by any other composer, except once or twice by Beethoven, who first sought and found the musical symbol of great historic or cosmic forces, or of the emotion stirred in the human consciousness by the play, or after-effects, of such forces. One thing remains to be said about this Overture. The composer's procedure is a compromise between the old procedure by way of thematic development and the newer by way of dramatic suggestion, and he does not always succeed completely in the fusion of the two, as, for example, Beethoven does in his greater "Leonora"; but here and there he permits the feeling to arise that the one is interfering with the other. In particular, the composition is open to the charge of a certain weakness in thematic development; but that does not prevent it from being, as a whole, a very striking, beautiful, and original tone picture. Dr. Richter's interpretation very finely revealed all the strong points. He saved three minutes of the composer's own time by taking the vivace sections at a somewhat quicker tempo. As at Covent Garden last March, Mr. Speelman played the incidental viola solo with marvellous beauty of tone.

To the Coronation Ode I listened with great curiosity, remembering the ordinary fate that overtakes patriotic composers and wondering what Sir Edward Elgar would make of the subject. I find that he has let himself be inspired by the nymph of the same spring whence flowed those two delightful Tommy Atkins marches known as "Pomp and Circumstance." It is popular music of a kind that has not been made for a long time in this country—scarcely at all since Dibdin's time. At least one may say that of the best parts, such as the bass solo and chorus "Britain, ask of thyself," and the contralto solo and chorus "Land of hope and glory." The former is ringing martial music, the latter a sort of Church parade song having the breath of a national hymn. It is the melody which occurs as second principal theme of the longer "Pomp and Circumstance" march, which I beg to suggest is as broad as "God Save the King," "Rule Britannia," and "See the Conquering Hero," and is perhaps the broadest open-air tune composed since Beethoven's "Freude schÖner GÖtterfunken." Moreover, it is distinctively British—at once beefy and breezy. It is astonishing to hear people finding fault with Elgar for using this tune in two different compositions. I find it most natural in a composer, to whom music is a language in which, desiring to say exactly the same thing again, one has no choice but to say it in the same notes. Besides, such tunes are composed less frequently than once in fifty years. How then can one blame Elgar for not composing two in six months? The chorus enjoyed themselves over it, and so did the audience. As to the sentimental parts of the Ode, frankly I find them uninspired.