MY RECOLLECTIONS
The Master, Jules Massenet
The Master, Jules Massenet
MY RECOLLECTIONS
BY
JULES MASSENET
(1842-1912)
THE AUTHORIZED TRANSLATION DONE AT THE
MASTER'S EXPRESS DESIRE
BY HIS FRIEND
H. VILLIERS BARNETT
Authorized Translator of
H. S. H. the Prince of Monaco's Autobiography:
La CarriÈre d'un Navigateur
colophon
BOSTON
SMALL, MAYNARD & COMPANY
PUBLISHERS
Copyright, 1919,
By SMALL, MAYNARD & COMPANY
(INCORPORATED)
TO
LUCY ARBELL
CONSUMMATE DRAMATIC ARTIST
AND
GREATEST CONTRALTO SINGER
OF OUR TIME
IN AFFECTIONATE ADMIRATION
I DEDICATE
THIS ENGLISH VERSION
OF HER
BELOVED MASTER'S BOOK
"ChÈre amie, gardez aussi sa rÉligion, et qu'elle vous conduise, ferme et courageuse, au milieu des cahots de la vie, jusq'au paradis des arts."
FOREWORD
I have been often asked whether I put together the recollections of my life from notes jotted down from day to day. To tell the truth I did, and this is how I began the habit of doing so regularly.
My mother—a model wife and mother, who taught me the difference between right and wrong—said to me on my tenth birthday:
"Here is a diary." (It was one of those long-shaped diaries which one found in those days at the little Bon MarchÉ, not the immense enterprise we know now.) "And," she added, "every night before you go to bed, you must write down on the pages of this memento what you have seen, said, or done during the day. If you have said or done anything which you realize is wrong, you must confess it in writing in these pages. Perhaps it will make you hesitate to do wrong during the day."
How characteristic of an unusual woman, a woman of upright mind and honest heart this idea was! By placing the matter of conscience among the first of her son's duties, she made Conscience the very basis of her methods of teaching.
Once when I was alone, in search of some distraction I amused myself by foraging in the cupboards where I found some squares of chocolate. I broke off a square and munched it. I have said somewhere that I am greedy. I don't deny it. Here's another proof.
When evening came and I had to write the account of my day, I admit that I hesitated a moment about mentioning that delicious square of chocolate. But my conscience put to the test in this way conquered, and I bravely recorded my dereliction in the diary.
The thought that my mother would read about my misdeed made me rather shamefaced. She came in at that very moment and saw my confusion; but directly she knew the cause she clasped me in her arms and said:
"You have acted like an honest man and I forgive you. All the same that is no reason why you should ever again eat chocolate on the sly!"
Later on, when I munched other and better chocolate, I always obtained permission.
Thus it came about that from day to day I have always made notes of my recollections be they good or bad, gay or sad, happy or not, and kept them so that I might have them constantly in mind.
CONTENTS
| CHAPTER | | PAGE |
| | FOREWORD | xii |
| I | My Admission to the Conservatoire | 1 |
| II | Youthful Years | 11 |
| III | The Grand Prix de Rome | 20 |
| IV | The Villa Medici | 29 |
| V | The Villa Medici (CONTINUED) | 37 |
| VI | The Villa Medici (CONTINUED) | 43 |
| VII | My Return To Paris | 53 |
| VIII | My Debut at the Theater | 63 |
| IX | The Days After the War | 74 |
| X | Joy and Sorrow | 82 |
| XI | My Debut at the OpÉra | 93 |
| XII | The Theaters in Italy | 103 |
| XIII | The Conservatoire and the Institute | 114 |
| XIV | A First Performance at Brussels | 123 |
| XV | The AbbÉ Prevost at the OpÉra-Comique | 136 |
| XVI | Five Collaborators | 148 |
| XVII | A Journey to Germany | 161 |
| XVIII | A Star | 173 |
| XIX | A New Life | 186 |
| XX | Milan—London—Bayreuth | 199 |
| XXI | A Visit To Verdi—Farewell To Ambroise Thomas | 208 |
| XXII | Work! Always Work! | 217 |
| XXIII | In the Midst of the Middle Ages | 231 |
| XXIV | FROM ChÉrubin to ThÉrÈse | 242 |
| XXV | Speaking of 1793 | 254 |
| XXVI | FROM Ariane to Don Quichotte | 267 |
| XXVII | A SoirÉe | 278 |
| XXVIII | Dear Emotions | 288 |
| XXIX | Thoughts After Death | 302 |
ILLUSTRATIONS
| The Master, Jules Massenet | Frontispiece |
| PAGE |
| Massenet at Égreville | 44 |
| One of the last portraits of Massenet | 68 |
| Mme. Pauline Viardot | 84 |
| Titta Ruffo, Caruso and Chaliapine | 110 |
| The Forum from the First Act of Roma (See page 300) | 154 |
| Posthumia (Roma) (See page 297) | 170 |
| Lucy Arbell | 212 |
| Persephone in Ariane | 244 |
| Queen Amahelly (Bacchus) | 268 |
| DulcinÉe (Don Quichotte) | 282 |
| Facsimile of Massenet's Reply to an Invitation to Visit America | 296 |
MY RECOLLECTIONS
CHAPTER I
MY ADMISSION TO THE CONSERVATOIRE
Were I to live a thousand years—which is hardly likely—I should never forget that fateful day, February 24, 1848, when I was just six years old. Not so much because it coincided with the fall of the Monarchy of July, as that it marked the first steps of my musical career—a career which, even yet, I am not sure was my real destiny, so great is my love for the exact sciences!
At that time I lived with my parents in the Rue de Beaune in an apartment overlooking the great gardens. The day promised to be fine, but it was very cold.
We were at luncheon when the waitress rushed into the room like a maniac. "Aux armes, citoyens!" she yelled, throwing rather than placing the plates on the table.
I was too young to understand what was going on in the streets. All I can remember is that riots broke out and that the Revolution smashed the throne of the most debonair of kings. The feelings which stirred my father were entirely different from those which disturbed my mother's already distracted soul. My father had been an officer under Napoleon Bonaparte and a friend of Marshal Soult, Duke of Dalmatia. He was all for the Emperor, and the atmosphere of battles suited his temperament. My mother, on the other hand, had experienced the sorrows of the first great revolution, which dragged Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette from their throne, and thrilled with worship for the Bourbons.
The memory of that exciting meal remained the more deeply fixed in my mind because on the morning of that historic day, by the light of tallow candles (wax candles were only for the rich) my mother for the first time placed my fingers on the piano.
In order best to introduce me to the knowledge of this instrument, my mother—she was my music teacher—stretched along the keyboard a strip of paper upon which she wrote the notes corresponding to each of the black and white keys, with their position on the five lines. It was most ingenious; no mistake was possible.
My progress on the piano was so pronounced that three years later, in October, 1851, my parents thought I ought to apply at the Conservatoire for the entrance examination to the piano classes.
One morning that month we went to the Rue de Faubourg-PoissonniÈre. The Conservatoire National de Musique was there then, and it remained there until it was moved to the Rue de Madrid. The large room we entered—like all the rest in the place at that time—had walls painted a bluish gray, spotted with black. A few old benches were the only furniture in this anteroom.
M. FerriÈre, a harsh, severe looking man—he was one of the upper employees—came out to call the candidates by flinging their names into the crowd of relatives and friends that accompanied them. It was like summoning the condemned to execution. Then he gave each candidate the number of his turn before the jury which had already assembled in the rooms where the sessions were held.
This room was intended for examinations and was a sort of small theater with a row of boxes and a circular gallery in the Consulate style. I confess that I have never entered that room without feeling emotion. I have always fancied that I saw, seated opposite in a first-tier box, as in a black hole, Bonaparte, the First Consul, and Josephine, the sweet companion of his early years. He with his forceful, handsome face; she with her kind and gentle glances, for both used to come to such occasions. By her visits to this sanctuary dedicated to Art and by bringing him, so preoccupied with many cares, good and noble Josephine seemed to wish to soften his thoughts and to make them less stern by contact with the youth who some day perforce would not escape the horrors of war.
From the time of Sarette, the first director, until recently, all the examinations for classes in the institution, both tragedy and comedy, were held in this same small hall, but it should not be confused with the hall so well known as the Salle de la SociÉtÉ des Concerts du Conservatoire.
The organ class was also held there several times a week for at the back, hidden behind a large curtain, was a great organ with two keyboards. Beside that old, worn, squeaky instrument was the fateful door through which the pupils came on to the platform that formed the small stage. Again, this same small hall, for many a year, was the judgment seat for the award of prizes for musical composition known as the Prix de Rome.
But to return to the morning of October 9, 1851. When all the youngsters had been informed of the order in which we must take our examinations, we went into an adjoining room which led into the hall through the "fateful" door, and which was only a sort of dusty, disordered garret.
The jury whose verdict we had to face was composed of HalÈvy, Carafa, Ambroise Thomas, several professors of the school, and the director, who was also the president of the Conservatoire, Monsieur Auber. We rarely said just Auber when we spoke of this French master, the most eminent and prolific of all who made the opera and opÉra-comique of that time famous.
At this time Monsieur Auber was sixty-five. He was universally respected and everyone at the Conservatoire adored him. I shall always remember his pleasing, unusually bright black eyes, which remained the same until his death in May, 1871.
May, 1871! We were then in open insurrection, almost in the last throes of the Commune ... and Monsieur Auber, still faithful to his beloved boulevard near the Passage de l'OpÉra—his favorite walk—met a friend also in despair over the terrible days we were passing through, and said to him, in an accent of utter weariness,
"Ah! I have lived too long!" Then he added, with a slight smile, "One should never abuse anything."
In 1851—the date when I became acquainted with Monsieur Auber—he had already lived a long time in his old mansion in the Rue St. George, where I remember having been received soon after seven in the morning, the master's work was finished by that time, the hour at which he gave himself to the calls he welcomed so simply.
Then he went to the Conservatoire in a tilbury which he ordinarily drove himself. At sight of him one was instantly reminded of the opera La Muette de Portici, which had exceptional good luck, and which was the most lasting success before Robert le Diable made its appearance at the OpÉra. To speak of La Muette de Portici is to be vividly reminded of the magical effect which the duet in the second act, Amour sacre de la patrie, produced on the patriots in the audience when it was produced at the ThÉÂtre de la Monnaie at Brussels. In very truth it gave the signal for the revolution which broke out in Belgium in 1830 and which brought about the independence of our neighbors on the north. The whole audience was wild with excitement, and sang the heroic strain with the artists, repeating it again and again without stopping. What master can boast of a success like that in his own career?
When my name was called, all of a tremble, I made my appearance on the stage. I was only nine years old and I had to play the finale of Beethoven's Sonata, Opus 29. What ambition!
They stopped me in the usual way after I had played two or three pages. I was utterly embarrassed as I heard Monsieur Auber's voice calling me before the jury. To get down from the stage, I had to descend two or three steps. I paid no attention to them and would have gone head first if Monsieur Auber had not kindly called out, "Take care, my little man." Then he immediately asked me where I had studied so well. After replying with some pride that my mother had been my only teacher, I went out, absolutely bewildered, almost at a run, but entirely happy. He had spoken to me!
Next morning my mother received the official notice. I was a pupil at the Conservatoire.
At this time there were two teachers of the piano at the great school—Mamontel and Laurent. There were no preparatory classes. I was assigned to Laurent's class, and I remained there two years while I continued my classical studies at college. At the same time I took sol-fa lessons from M. Savard who was excellent.
Professor Laurent had been Premier Prix de piano under Louis XVIII. Then he was a cavalry officer, but left the army to become a professor in the Royal Conservatoire of Music. He was goodness itself, realizing the ideal of that quality in the fullest sense of the word. He placed entire confidence in me.
M. Savard was an extraordinarily erudite man. He was the father of one of my pupils, a Grand Prix de Rome, now the director of the Conservatoire at Lyons. (What a number of my old pupils are or have been directors of conservatoires!) His heart was as large as his learning was extensive. It is pleasant to recall that when I wanted to work at counterpoint, before I entered the class in fugue and composition—Ambroise Thomas was the professor—M. Savard was quite willing to give me lessons. I went to his house to take them, and every evening I went down from Montmartre where I lived to Number 13, Rue de la Vielle-Estrpade, behind the Pantheon.
What wonderful lessons I had from that simple, learned man! How courageous I was as I walked the long way I had to go to his house from which I returned each evening about ten o'clock full of the wise and learned advice he had given me!
As I said, I made the trip on foot. I did not even ride on the top of an omnibus in order to set aside sou by sou the price I would have to pay for my lessons. I had to follow this system; the shade of Descartes would have congratulated me.
But note the delicacy of that charitable-hearted man. When the day came for him to take what I owed him, M. Savard told me that he had some work for me—the transcription for a full orchestra of the military band accompaniment to Adolphe Adam's mass, and he added that the work would net me three hundred francs!!...
His purpose was obvious, but I did not see it. It was not till long afterwards that I understood that M. Savard had thought of this way of not asking me for money—by making me think that the three hundred francs represented the fee for his lessons; that, to use a fashionable phrase, they "compensated" him.
After all the years which have gone since he was no more, my heart still says to that master, to that charming, admirable soul, "Thank you!"
CHAPTER II
YOUTHFUL YEARS
When I took my seat on the benches of the Conservatoire, I was rather delicate and not very tall. This was the excuse for the drawing which the celebrated caricaturist Cham made of me. He was a great friend of the family and often came to spend the evening with my parents. They had many talks which the brilliant craftsman enlivened with his sprightly and witty enthusiasms, seated around the family table lighted by the dim light of an oil lamp. (Kerosene was scarcely known and electricity had not come into use for lighting.)
We used to drink a sweet syrup on such occasions, for this was before a cup of tea was the fashionable drink.
I was often asked to play, so that Cham had every opportunity to draw my profile. He represented me as seated on five or six folios of music with my hands in the air, scarcely reaching the keyboard. This was obviously an exaggeration, but there was enough truth in it to show that it was founded on fact.
I often went with Cham to see a lovely and lovable friend of his in the Rue Tarranne. Naturally I was asked to "play the piano." I remember that on one evening when I was asked to play I had just received third place in a prize competition both on the piano and in solfeggio, and to prove it I had two heavy bronze medals inscribed "Conservatoire impÉrial de musique et de dÉclamation." It is true that they listened to me no better on this account, but I was affected by the honor nevertheless.
Some years later, in the natural course of events, I learned that Cham had secretly married the beautiful lady of the Rue Tarranne. As he was somewhat embarrassed by the marriage, he did not send announcement cards to his friends, much to their surprise. When they asked him about it, he replied, wittily,
"Of course I sent announcements.... They were anonymous."
In spite of my mother's extreme watchfulness, I escaped from home one evening. I knew that they were giving Berlioz's L'Enfance du Christ at the OpÉra-Comique and that the great composer was to conduct. I could not pay my way in, but I had an irresistible desire to hear the work, especially as it was a creation of Berlioz's, who aroused the enthusiasm of all our young people. So I asked my companions who sang in the children's chorus to take me in and let me hide among them. I must confess that I secretly wanted to get behind the scenes of a theater.
As might be imagined, my escapade rather upset my mother. She waited up for me until after midnight ... she thought I was lost in this vast Paris.
Needless to say that, when I came in abashed and shamefaced, I was well scolded. I bore up under two storms of tears—if it is true that a woman's wrath, like the rain in the forests, falls twice; still, a mother's heart cannot bear anger forever—and I went to bed made easy on that scare. Nevertheless I could not sleep. I recalled all the beauties of the work I had just heard and before my mind's eye I saw again the tall and impressive figure of Berlioz as he directed the superb performance in masterly style.
My life ran on happily and industriously, but this did not last. The doctors ordered my father to leave Paris, as the climate did not agree with him, and to take treatment at Aix-les-Bains in Savoy. My mother and father followed this advice and went to ChambÉry taking me with them. My artistic career was interrupted, but there was nothing else for me to do.
I stayed at ChambÉry for two long years; still the life there was not monotonous. I passed the time in classical studies, alternating with diligent work on scales and arpeggios, sixths and thirds, as if I were going to be a fiery pianist. I wore my hair ridiculously long, as was the style with every virtuoso, and this touch of resemblance harmonized with my dreams. It seemed to me that wild locks of hair were the complement of talent.
Between times I took long rambles through the delightful country of Savoy which was still ruled by the King of PiÉmont; sometimes I went to the Dent de Nicolet, sometimes as far as Les Charmettes, that picturesque dwelling made famous by Jean Jacques Rousseau's stay there.
During my enforced rustication I found, by sheer accident, some of Schumann's works which were then little known in France and still less in PiÉmont. I shall always remember that everywhere I went I did my share by playing a few pieces on the piano. I sometimes played that exquisite thing entitled Au Soir and that brought me one day this singular invitation, "Come and amuse us with your Schumann with its detestable false notes." It is unnecessary to repeat my childish outburst at these words. What would the good old people of Savoy say if they could hear the music of to-day?
But the months went on, and on, and on ... until one morning, before the first signs of day-break had come over the mountains, I escaped from the paternal homestead and started for Paris without a sou or even a change of clothes. For Paris, the city with every artistic attraction, where I should see again my dear Conservatoire, my masters, and the "behind the scenes," for the memory of them was still with me.
I knew that in Paris I should find my good older sister, who, in spite of her modest means, welcomed me as though I were her own child and offered me board and lodging; a very simple lodging and a very frugal table, but made so delightful by the magic of greatest kindliness that I felt exactly as though I were in my own home.
Imperceptibly my mother forgave me for running away to Paris.
What a good devoted creature my sister was! Alas! she died January 13, 1905, just as she was glorying in attending the five hundredth performance of Manon, which took place the very evening of her death. Nothing can express the sorrow I felt.
In the space of two years I had made up for the time I had lost in Savoy and I had won a prize. I was awarded a first prize on the piano, as well as one in counterpoint and fugue, on July 26, 1859.
I had to compete with ten of my fellow students and by chance my name was number eleven in the order. All the contestants were shut up in the foyer of the concert hall of the Conservatoire to wait until their names were called.
For a moment Number Eleven found himself alone in the foyer. While waiting for my turn, I studied respectfully the portrait of Habeneck, the founder and the first conductor of the orchestra of the SociÉtÉ des Concerts. A red handkerchief actually blossomed in his left buttonhole. If he had become an officer of the Legion of Honor and had several orders to accompany that, he certainly would have worn, not a rosette, but a rose.
Then I was called.
The test piece was the concerto in F minor by Ferdinand Hiller. At the time it was pretended that his music was so like that of Niels Gade that they would think it was Mendelssohn's.
My good master M. Laurent stayed close to the piano. When I had finished—concerto and sight reading—he threw his arms about me without thought of the public which filled the hall and I felt my face grow moist from his dear tears.
Even at that age, I was apprehensive about success, and during my whole life I have always fled from public rehearsals and first nights, thinking it better to learn the worst ... as late as possible.
I raced all the way home, running like a gamin, but I found no one there, for my sister had gone to the prize contest. However I did not stay long, for I finally decided to go back to the Conservatoire. I was so excited that I ran all the way. At the corner of the Rue Sainte-CÉcile I met my boon companion Alphonse Duvernoy, whose after career as a teacher and composer was most successful, and I fell into his arms. He told me what I might have known already, that Monsieur Auber had announced the decision for the jury, "Monsieur Massenet is awarded the first prize on the piano."
One of the jury was Henri Ravina, a master who was one of the dearest friends I ever had, and my thoughts go out to him in affectionate gratitude.
I scarcely touched the ground in getting from the Rue BergÈre to the Rue de Bourgogne where my excellent master M. Laurent lived. I found my old professor at lunch with several generals who had been his comrades in the army.
He had hardly caught sight of me when he held out two volumes to me: the orchestral score of Le Nozze di Figaro, dramma giocoso in quarti atti. Messo in musica dal Signor W. Mozart.
The binding bore the arms of Louis XVIII and the following superscription in gold letters: Menus plaisirs du Roi. École royale de musique et de dÉclamation. Concours de 1822. Premier prix de piano dÉcernÉ À M. Laurent.
My honored master had written on the first page:
"Thirty-seven years ago I won, as you have done, my child, the prize for the piano. I do not think that there is any more pleasing gift I could give you than this with my sincerest friendship. Go on as you have begun and you will be a great artist.
"This is the opinion of the jury which to-day awarded you this fine reward.
"Your old friend and professor,
"LAURENT."
It was indeed a fine thing for an honored professor to speak like this to a youth who had hardly begun his career.
CHAPTER III
THE GRAND PRIX DE ROME
So I had won the first prize on the piano. I was doubtless as fortunate as I was proud, but it was out of the question for me to live on the memory of this distinction. The necessities of life were pressing, inexorable, and they demanded something more real and above all more practicable. I really could not go on accepting my dear sister's hospitality without contributing my personal expenses. So to ease the situation I gave lessons in solfeggio and on the piano in a poor little school in the neighborhood. The returns were small, but the labor was great. Thus I drew out a precarious and often difficult existence. I was offered the post of pianist in one of the large cafÉs in Belleville; it was the first cafÉ to provide music, a scheme invented to hold the customers, if not to distract them. The place paid me thirty francs a month!
Quantum mutatus.... Like the poet I may say, "What changes since that time?" To-day even the young pupils have only to enter a competition to get their pictures in the papers and at the very outset of their careers they are anointed great men. All this is accompanied by Bacchanalian lines and they are fortunate if in their exalted triumph they do not add the word "colossal." That is glory; deification in all its modesty. In 1859 we were not glorified in any such way.
But Providence—some called it Destiny—watched over me.
A friend, who to my great joy is still living, got me better lessons. He was not like so many friends I met later, who are ever in need of one's assistance; those who slink away when you want to be comforted in poverty; the friends who are always pretending that they defended you last night against malevolent attacks in order to show you their fine opinions, but at the same time torturing you by repeating the wounding words directed at you. I must add, however, that I have had truly genuine friendships, as I have found in my hours of weariness and discouragement.
The ThÉÂtre-Lyrique was then on the Boulevard du Temple and it gave me a place in its orchestra as kettle-drummer. Then, good Father Strauss, the orchestra leader at the OpÉra balls, let me play the bass drum, the kettle-drums, the tam-tam, and all the rest of the resonant instruments. It was dreadfully tiring to sit up every Saturday from midnight until six in the morning, but all told I managed to make eighty francs a month. I felt as rich as a banker and as happy as a cobbler.
The ThÉÂtre-Lyrique was founded by the elder Alexander Dumas as the ThÉÂtre-Historique, and was established by Adolphe Adam.
I was living at the time at No. 5, Rue de MÉnilmontant, in a huge building, almost a city in itself. My neighbors on the floor, separated only by a narrow partition, were the clowns—both men and women—of the Cirque NapolÉon which was near our house.
From my attic window I was able to enjoy—for nothing of course—whiffs from the orchestra which escaped from the popular concerts that Pasdeloup conducted in the circus every Sunday. This happened whenever the audience packed in the overheated hall shouted loudly for air and they opened the casement windows on the third floor to satisfy them.
From my perch—that is the only thing to call it—I applauded with feverish joy the overture of Tannhauser, the Symphonie Fantastique, in short the music of my gods: Wagner and Berlioz.
Every evening at six o'clock—the theater began very early—I went by the way of the Rue des FossÉs-du-Temple, near my house, to the stage door of the ThÉÂtre-Lyrique. In those days the left side of the Boulevard du Temple was one unbroken line of theaters. Consequently I went along the back of the Funambules, the Petit-Lazari, the DÉlassements-Comiques, the Cirque ImpÉrial and the GaÎtÉ. Those who did not know that corner of Paris in 1859 can have no idea of it.
The Rue des FossÉs-du-Temple, on which all the stage doors opened, was a sort of wonderland where all the supers, male and female, from all the theaters waited in great crowds on the dimly lighted pavements. The atmosphere was full of vermin and microbes. Even in our ThÉÂtre-Lyrique the musicians' dressing room was only an old stable in which the horses used in historical plays were kept.
Still, my delight was too great for words and I felt that I was to be envied as I sat in the fine orchestra which Deloffre conducted. Ah! those rehearsals of Faust! My happiness could not be expressed when, from my own little corner, I could leisurely devour with my eyes our great Gounod who managed our work from the stage.
Many times later on when we came out, side by side, from the sessions of the Institute—Gounod lived in the Place Malesherbes—we talked over the time when Faust—now past its thousandth performance—was such a subject for discussion and criticism in the press, while the dear public—which is rarely deceived—applauded it.
Vox Populi, vox Dei!
I also remember that while I was in the orchestra I assisted at the performances of Reyer's La Statue, a superb score and a tremendous success.
I can still see Reyer in the wings during the performances eluding the firemen and smoking interminable cigars. It was a habit he could not give up. One day I heard him tell about being in AbbÉ Liszt's room in Rome. The walls were covered with religious pictures—Christ, the Virgin, and the Saints—and he blew out a cloud of smoke which filled the room. In reply to his witty excuses about incommoding the "august persons," he drew the following reply from the great abbÉ. "No," said Liszt, "it is always incense."
For six months, under the same conditions of work, I substituted for one of my fellows in the orchestra at the ThÉÂtre-Italien.
As I had heard the admirable Mme. Miolan-Carvalho in Faust—excellent singing—I now heard the tragediennes like Penco and Frezzolini and such men as Mario, Graziani, Delle Sedie, and the buffo Zucchini.
The last is no longer alive and our great Lucien FugÈre of the OpÉra-Comique of to-day reminds me of him almost exactly. There is the same powerful voice and the same perfect artistic comedy.
But the time for the competition of the Institute approached. During our residence en loge at the Institute we had to pay for our meals for twenty-five days and also the rent of a piano. I got out of that difficulty as best I could; at any rate I forestalled it. All the same the money I had been able to put aside was insufficient and acting on the advice of a friend (giving and acting on advice are two entirely different things) I went to a pawnshop and pawned my watch ... a gold one. It had adorned my fob since the morning of my first communion. Alas! it must have been light weight, for they offered me only ... sixteen francs!!! This odd sum, however, enabled me to pay for my meals.
But the charge for the piano was so exorbitant—twenty francs!—that I couldn't afford it. I did without it much more easily, for I have never needed its help in composing.
I would have hardly imagined that my neighbors would have bothered me so by their pounding on their pianos and by their singing at the top of their lungs. It was impossible to divert my thoughts or to escape their noise, as I had no piano, and, in addition, the corridors of our garrets were unusually reverberant.
On my way to the Saturday sittings of the AcadÉmie des Beaux-Arts I often cast a sad glance at the grated window of my cell; it can be seen from the Cour Mazarine to the right in a recess. Yes, my glance is sad, for I left behind those old bars the dearest and most affecting recollections of my youth, and because they cause me to reflect on the unhappy times in my long life.
In the trial competition in 1863 I was examined first and I kept the same place in the choral work. The first test was in the large hall of the École des Beaux-Arts which is entered from the Quai Malaquais.
The final decision was made the next day in the hall used for the regular sittings of the AcadÉmie des Beaux-Arts.
My interpreters were Mme. Van den Heuvel-Duprez, Roger and BonnehÉe, all three from the OpÉra. With such artists I had to triumph. And that is what happened!
I went in first—there were six competitors—and as at that time one could not listen to the work of the other candidates—I went wandering haphazard down to the Rue Mazarine ... on the Pont des Arts ... and, finally, in the square court of the Louvre where I sat down on one of the iron seats.
I heard five o'clock strike. I was very anxious. "All must be over by now," I said to myself. I had guessed right, for suddenly I saw under the arch three people chatting together and recognized Berlioz, Ambroise Thomas and Monsieur Auber.
Flight was impossible. They were in front of me almost as if they barred my escape.
Ambroise Thomas, my beloved master, came towards me and said, "Embrace Berlioz, you owe him a great deal for your prize."
"The prize," I cried, bewildered, my face shining with joy. "I have the prize!!!" I was deeply moved and I embraced Berlioz, then my master, and finally Monsieur Auber.
Monsieur Auber comforted me. Did I need comforting? Then he said to Berlioz pointing to me,
"He'll go far, the young rascal, when he's had less experience!"
CHAPTER IV
THE VILLA MEDICI
The winners of the Grand Prix de Rome for 1863 in painting, sculpture, architecture, and engraving, were Layraud and Monchablon, Bourgeois, Brune and Chaplain. Custom decreed—it still does—that we should all go to the Villa Medici together and should visit Italy. What a changed and ideal life mine now was! The Minister of Finance sent me six hundred francs and a passport in the name of Napoleon III, signed by Drouyns de Luys, Minister of Foreign Affairs.
I then met my new companions and we went to pay the formal calls on the members of the Institute before our departure for the AcadÉmie de France at Rome.
On the day after Christmas, in three open carriages, we started to pay our official calls which took us into every quarter of Paris where our patrons lived.
The three carriages, crowded with young men, real rapins, I had almost said gamins, mad with success and intoxicated by thoughts of the future, made a veritable scandal in the streets.
Nearly all the gentlemen of the Institute sent out word that they were not at home—to avoid making a speech. M. Hirtoff, the famous architect, who lived in the Rue Lamartine, put on less airs and shouted out to his servant from his bedroom, "Tell them I'm not in."
I recall that of old the professors accompanied their pupils as far as the starting place of the diligences in the Rue Notre-Dame-des-Victoires. One day as the heavy diligence with the students packed on the rear—the cheapest places which exposed them to all the dust of the road—was about to start on the long journey from Paris to Rome, M. Couder, Louis Philippe's favorite painter, was heard to say impressively to his special pupil, "Above all don't forget my style." This was a delightfully naÏve remark, but it was touching nevertheless. He was the painter of whom the king said, after he had given him an order for the museum at Versailles, "M. Couder pleases me. His drawing is correct; his coloring satisfies, and he is not dear."
Oh, the good, simple times, when words meant what they seemed to and admiration was just without that deifying bombast that is so readily heaped on one to-day!
I broke the custom and went on alone after making arrangements to meet my comrades on the road to Genoa where I would overtake them driving an enormous coach drawn by five horses. My plans were first to stop at Nice, where my father was buried, and then to go to embrace my mother who was living at Bordighera. She had a modest villa in a pleasant location in a forest of palms overlooking the sea. I spent New Year's with my mother, the anniversary of my father's death, hours filled to overflowing with tenderness. All too soon I had to leave her, for my joyous comrades awaited me in their carriage on the road of the Italian La Corniche. My tears turned to laughter. Such is youth!
Our first stop was at Loano about eight o'clock in the evening.
I have confessed that I was almost gay and this is true. Nevertheless I was a prey to indefinite thoughts; I felt myself almost a man, henceforth to be alone in life. I pondered over such thoughts, too reasonable perhaps for my years, while Italy's blossoming mimosas, lemon trees and myrtles threw around me their sweet disturbing odors. What a pleasant contrast it was for me who until then had only known the sour smell of the faubourgs of Paris, the trampled grass of their fortifications, and the perfume—I mean perfume—of my beloved wings of the stage.
We spent two days in Genoa visiting the Campo-Santo, the city's cemetery, so rich in the finest marble monuments, reputed to be the most beautiful in Italy. After that who can deny that self-esteem survives after death?
Next I found myself one morning on the Place du DÔme at Milan walking with my companion Chaplain, the famous engraver of medallions, and later my confrÈre at the Institute. We shared our enthusiasms before the marvellous cathedral of white marble dedicated to the Virgin by that terrible partisan leader Jean Galeas Visconti as a repentance for his life. "In that epoch of faith the world covered itself with white robes," thus spake Bossuet whose weighty eloquence comes back to me.
We were completely carried away by Leonardo da Vinci's "Last Supper." We found it in a large hall which the Austrian soldiers had used as a stable and they had cut a door—Horrors! Abomination of abominations!—in the central panel of the picture.
The masterpiece is gradually fading away. In time it will have entirely disappeared, but it is not like "La Giaconda" easier to carry away than the wall thirty feet high on which it is painted.
We went through Verona and made the obligatory pilgrimage to the tomb of Juliet, the beloved of Romeo. That excursion satisfies the inmost feelings of every young man in love with Love. Then Vienza, Padua, where, while I was looking at Giotto's paintings on the story of Christ, I had an intuition that Mary Magdalene would occupy my life some day, and then Venice!
Venice! One might have told me that I still lived although I would not have believed it, so unreal were the hours I passed in that matchless city. As we had no Baedeker—his guide was too costly for us—it was only through a sort of divination that we discovered all the wonders of Venice without directions.
My companions admired a painting by Palma Vecchio in a church whose name they did not know. How was I to find it among the ninety churches in Venice? I got into my gondola alone and said to my "barcaiollo" that I was going to Saint Zacharie; but I did not find the picture, a Santa Barbara, so I had him take me to another saint. A new deception! As this kept repeating and threatened never to end, my gondolier laughingly showed me another church—All Saints—and said to me, mockingly, "Go in there; you'll surely find yours."
I pass over Pisa and Florence which I shall describe in detail later.
When we came near the Papal territory, we decided to add a picturesque touch to our journey and instead of entering Rome in the conventional way by Ponte-Moll, the ancient witness of the defeat of Maxentius and the glorification of Christianity, we took a steamer from Leghorn to Civitta Vecchia. It was the first sea voyage that I went through ... almost decently, thanks to some oranges which I kept in my mouth all the time.
At last we reached Rome by the railroad from Civitta Vecchia to the Eternal City. It was the pensionnaires' dinner hour and they were nonplussed at seeing us, for we had deprived them of a holiday in going to meet our coach on the Flammian Way. Our welcome was spontaneous. A special dinner was hastily got together and this started the jokes practised on newcomers, who were called "Les Affreux Nouveaux."
As a musician I was instructed to go bell in hand to call dinner through the numerous walks of the Villa Medici, now plunged in darkness. As I did not know the way, I fell into a fountain. Naturally the bell stopped ringing and the boarders, who were listening to the sound and rejoicing in the fun, burst into hearty laughter at the sudden cessation of the noise. They understood what had happened and came to fish me out.
I had paid my first debt, the debt of entrance to the Villa Medici. Night was to bring other trials.
The dining room of the pensionnaires, which I found so pleasant the next day, was transformed into a den of bandits. The servants, who ordinarily wore the green livery of the Emperor, were dressed as monks with short blunderbusses across their shoulders and with pistols in their belts. Their false noses were modeled by a sculptor and were painted red. The pine table was stained with wine and covered with dirt.
Our seniors wore proud and haughty looks, but this did not prevent them, at a given signal, from telling us that while the food was simple, all lived in the most fraternal harmony. Suddenly, after a discussion of art which was carried on facetiously, there was a hub-bub and amid frightful shouts all the plates and bottles went flying through the air.
At a signal from one of the supposed monks there was instant silence and we heard the voice of the oldest pensionnaire, Henner, saying gravely, "Here all is harmony."
It was well that we knew we were the butts for jokes. I was a little embarrassed. I did not dare to move, and I sat with my head down, staring at the table, where I read the name of Herold, the author of the PrÉ aux Clercs, cut with a knife when he was a pensionnaire at this same Villa Medici.
CHAPTER V
THE VILLA MEDICI
As I had foreseen and gathered from the meaning looks which the pensionnaires exchanged, another joke, the masterpiece of the hazing, was arranged for us. We had hardly left the table when the pensionnaires wrapped themselves in the huge capes that were fashionable in Rome at the time and obliged us, before we went to rest in the rooms assigned to us, to take a constitutional (Was it really necessary?) to the Forum, the ancient Forum which all our memories of school recalled to us.
We knew nothing of Rome by night, or by day for that matter, but we walked on surrounded by our new school fellows who acted as guides. It was a January night and very dark, and favorable for the schemes of our cicerones. When we got near the Capitol, we could scarcely distinguish the outlines of the temples in the hollows of the famous Campo Vaccino. Their reproductions in the Louvre are still one of the masterpieces of Claude Lorrain.
In those days, under the rule of His Holiness Pope Pius IX, no official excavations had been begun even in the Forum. The famous place was only a heap of stones and shafts of columns buried in the weeds on which herds of goats browsed. These pretty creatures were watched over by goatherds in large hats and wrapped in great black cloaks with green linings, the ordinary costume of the peasant of the Roman campagna. They were armed with long pikes to drive off the wild cattle which splashed about in the Ostian marshes.
Our companions made us cross the ruins of the basilica of Constantine. We could just make out the immense coffered vaults. Our admiration changed to fright when we found ourselves a moment later in a place entirely surrounded by walls of indescribably colossal proportions. In the middle of this place was a large cross on a pedestal formed by steps—a sort of Calvary. When I reached this point, I could no longer see my companions and on turning back I found that I was alone in the middle of the gigantic amphitheater of the Colosseum in a silence which seemed frightful to me.
I tried to find a way which would lead me back to the streets where some late but complacent passerby might direct me to the Villa Medici. But my search was in vain. I was so exasperated by my fruitless attempts that I fell on one of the steps of the cross overcome by weariness. I cried like a child. It was quite excusable, for I was worn out with exhaustion.
Finally, daylight appeared. Its rays showed me that I had gone round and round like a squirrel in a cage and had come across nothing save the stairways to the upper tiers. When one thinks of the eighty tiers which in the time of Imperial Rome held a hundred thousand spectators, this round of mine could easily have been endless for me. But the sunrise was my salvation. After a few steps I was happy to see that, like Little Tom Thumb lost in the woods, I was following the path which would take me on the right road.
I reached the Villa Medici at last and took possession of the room which had been reserved for me. The window looked out on the Avenue du Pincio; my horizon was the whole of Rome and ended in the outlines of the dome of St. Peter's at the Vatican. The Director, M. Schnetz, a member of the Institute, took me to my room. He was tall and he had willingly wrapped himself in a capacious dressing gown and had put on a Greek cap bedizened, like the gown, with magnificent gold tassels. M. Schnetz was the last of that generation of great painters which had a special reverence for the country about Rome. His studies and pictures were conceived in the midst of the Sabine brigands. His strong, determined appearance made his hosts in his adventurous wanderings respect and fear him. He was a perfect father to all the children of the AcadÉmie de France at Rome.
The bell for luncheon sounded. This time it was the real cook who rang it and not I who had been so kindly given the duty the evening before. The dining room had taken on its comfortable every-day appearance. Our companions were positively affectionate. The servants were no longer the pseudo monks we had seen at the first meal. I learned that I had not been the only one to be hoaxed.
The Carnival festivities at Rome were just ending with their wild bacchanalian revelries. While they were not so famous as those of Venice, they had, nevertheless, just as much dash and life. Their setting was altogether different—more majestic if not more appropriate. We all participated in a large car built by our architects and decorated by our sculptors. We spent the day in throwing confetti and flowers at all the lovely Roman girls, who replied with bewitching smiles from their palace balconies on the Corso. Surely when Michelet wrote his brilliant and poetic study La Femme, the sequel to his L'Amour, he must have had in his mind's eye, as we saw them in life, these types of rare, sparkling and fascinating beauty.
What changes have taken place in Rome since such careless freedom and gaiety were the usual thing! The superb Italian regiments march on this same Corso to-day, and the rows of shops for the most part belong to German shopkeepers.
Progress! How many are thy blows!
One day the Director told us that Hippolyte Flandrin, the famous leader of the religious movement in Nineteenth Century Art, had reached Rome the night before and wanted to meet the students.
I little thought that forty-six years later I should recall this visit in the speech I would deliver as president of the Institute and the AcadÉmie des Beaux Arts.
In this speech I said:
"On the Pincio, opposite the AcadÉmie de France, is a small bubbling fountain shaped like an ancient vase, which, beneath a bower of green oaks, stands out against the horizon with its fine lines. There, when after thirty-two years he returned to Rome a great artist, Hippolyte Flandrin, before he entered the temple, dipped his fingers as in a holy font and crossed himself."
The sorrow stricken arts to which he had contributed so much went into mourning at almost the very moment we were getting ready to go to thank him officially for his consideration of us. He lived in the Piazza della Spagna, near the Villa Medici where he wanted to be. In the church of Santa Luigi della Francese we laid on his coffin wreaths of laurel from the garden of the Villa, which, as a student, he had loved so well. He was a comrade at the Villa of his beloved musician Ambroise Thomas, whom he saw for the last time at the height of his glory....
Some days later FalguiÈre, Chaplain and I started for Naples, by carriage as far as Palestrina, on foot to Terracina, at the southern end of the Pontian marshes, then again by carriage to Naples!...
CHAPTER VI
THE VILLA MEDICI
What never to be forgotten times they were for youthful artists, when we shared our enthusiasms for all we saw in these pleasantly picturesque villages—a picturesqueness which has certainly gone by now.
Our lodgings were in the most primitive inns. I remember that one night I was greatly disturbed by the feeling that my neighbor in the garret had set the miserable hovel on fire. FalguiÈre had the same idea too. It was only imagination. It was the bright starlight shining through the dilapidated ceiling.
As we passed through the woods of Subiacco, a shepherd's zampogna (a sort of rustic bagpipe) sounded a burst of melody which I presently noted down on a bit of paper loaned me by a Benedictine monk in a neighboring monastery. These measures became the first notes of Marie-Magdeleine, the sacred drama which I was already planning for my first venture.
I still have the sketch Chaplain made of me at the moment.
As was the custom in the olden times of the pensionnaires of the Villa Medici, we lodged in Naples at the Casa Combi, an old house overlooking the Quay Santa Lucia. The fifth floor was reserved for us. It was an old ruin with a pink rough-cast front and windows framed in mouldings shaped in small figures and cleverly painted, like those one sees all over Italy as soon as one crosses the Var.
A vast room held our three beds. As for the dressing room and the rest, they were on the balcony, where, according to the local custom, we hung our clothes to dry.
In order to travel as comfortably as possible, we had rigged ourselves out at Rome with three suits of white flannel with blue stripes.
Risum teneatis, as that delightful poet Horace would have said. First, listen to this.
Massenet at Egreville
Massenet at Egreville
From the moment of our arrival at the station in Naples we were watched with surprising perseverance by the gendarmes. In addition, the passersby observed us with the utmost astonishment. We were intensely curious and wondered what the reason was for all this. We did not have long to wait. Our landlady, Marietta, told us that the Neapolitan convicts wore almost exactly the same costume. The laughter which greeted this revelation led us to complete the resemblance. So we went to the CafÉ Royal in the Piazza S. Ferdinando, the three of us dragging our right legs as if they were fastened to a ball and chain as the convicts were.
We almost lived in the galleries of the Borbonico Museum during our first days in Naples. The most wonderful of the discoveries in the ruins of Herculanum, Pompeii, and their neighbor Stabies had been placed there. We were astonished at it all, enraptured, charmed by endless and ever new discoveries.
In passing I must recall our dutiful ascent of Vesuvius, whose plume of smoke we could see in the distance. We came back carrying our burned shoes in our hands and with our feet wrapped in flannel which we had bought at Torre del Greco.
We took our meals at Naples on the seashore on the Quay Santa Lucia, almost opposite our house. For twelve grani, about eight sous, we had an exquisite soup of shellfish, fish fried in an oil which had been used for that purpose for two or three years at least, and a glass of Capri wine.
Then, there were walks to Castellamare at the end of the Gulf of Naples, where we enjoyed a wonderful view; and to Sorrento so rich in orange trees that the arms of the city are interwoven in the form of a crown of orange leaves. At Sorrento we saw where Tasso was born—the famous Italian poet, the immortal author of "Jerusalem Delivered."
A simple terra cotta bust decorates the front of this half ruined house! Thence to Amalfi, once almost the rival of Venice in the size of its commerce.
If Napoleon got the itch through handling the gun sponge of a dirty artilleryman, we owe it to the truth to state that the morning after we passed the night in the place all three of us were covered with lice. We had to have our heads shaved, which added to our resemblance to convicts.
We were somewhat consoled for this adventure by sailing to Capri. We left Amalfi at four o'clock in the morning, but we did not reach Capri until ten at night. The island is delightful and the views bewitching. The top of Mount Solaro is 1800 feet above the sea and about nine and a half miles around. The view is one of the most beautiful and extensive in all Italy.
We were overtaken by a frightful storm on our way to Capri. The boat was loaded with a large quantity of oranges and the wild waves swept over everything to the great despair of the sailors who outshouted each other in calling on St. Joseph, the patron saint of Naples.
There is a pretty legend that St. Joseph, grieved by the departure of Jesus and the Virgin Mary for Heaven, ordered his Son to come back to him. Jesus obeyed and came back with all the saints in Paradise. The Virgin came back, too, to the conjugal roof escorted by eleven thousand virgins. When the Lord saw Paradise depopulated in this way and not wanting to put St. Joseph in the wrong, he declared that the latter was the stronger and so Heaven was repopulated by his permission. The veneration of the Neapolitans for St. Joseph is surprising, as the following detail illustrates.
In the Eighteenth Century the streets of Naples were hardly safe, and it was dangerous to pass through them at night. The king had lanterns placed at the worst corners to light the passersby, but the birbanti broke them as they found they interfered with their nocturnal deeds. Whereupon some one was struck with the idea of placing an image of St. Joseph beside each lantern, and thereafter they were respected to the great joy of the people.
To be in and live in Capri is the most ideal existence that one can dream of. I brought back from there page after page of the works which I intended to write later.
Autumn saw us back in Rome.
At that time I wrote my beloved master Ambroise Thomas as follows:
"Last Sunday Bourgault got up an entertainment to which he invited twenty TranstÉvÉrins and TranstÉvÉrines—plus six musicians, also from the TranstÉrvÈre. All in costume!
"The weather was fine and the scene was simply wonderful when we were in the 'Bosco,' my sacred grove. The setting sun lighted up the old walls of ancient Rome. The entertainment ended in FalguiÈre's studio, lighted a giorno, our doing. There the dance became so captivating and intoxicating that we finished vis-À-vis to the TranstÉvÉrines in the final salturrele. They all smoked, ate, and drank—the women especially liked our punch."
One of the greatest and most thrilling periods of my life was now at hand. It was Christmas Eve. We arranged an outing so that we might follow the midnight masses in the churches. The night ceremonies at Sainte Marie Majeure and at Saint Jean de Latran impressed me most. Shepherds with their flocks, cows, goats, sheep and pigs were in the public square, as if to receive the benediction of the Savior, recalling in this way His birth in a manger. The touching simplicity of these beliefs really affected me and I entered Sainte Marie Majeure accompanied by a lovely goat which I embraced and which did not want to leave me. This in no way astonished any of the crowd of men and women packed in that church, kneeling on those beautiful Mosaic pavements, between a double row of columns—relics taken from the ancient temples.
The next day—a day to be marked with a cross—on the staircase with its three hundred steps which leads to the church of Ara Coeli, I passed two women, obviously fashionable foreigners. I was especially charmed by the appearance of the younger. Several days later I was at Liszt's who was preparing for his ordination, and I recognized among the famous master's visitors the two women whom I had seen at Ara Coeli.
I learned almost at once that the younger had come to Rome with her family on a sightseeing trip and that she had been recommended to Liszt so that he might select for her a musician capable of directing her studies. She did not want to interrupt them while she was away from Paris. Liszt at once proposed me. I was a pensionnaire at the AcadÉmie de France and was supposed to work there, so that I did not want to devote my time to lessons. The young girl's charm, however, overcame my reluctance.
You may have already guessed that this beautiful girl was the one who was to become my wife two years later, the ever-attentive, often-worried companion of my life, the witness of my weaknesses as well as of my bursts of energy, of my sorrows and my joys. With her I have gone up the steps of life, already long, but not so steep as those which led to Ara Coeli, that altar of the skies which recalls to Rome the pure and cloudless celestial abodes, which have led me along a way sometimes difficult and where the roses have been gathered in the midst of thorns. But is not life always so?
