VIENNA.

ON the occasion of the consecration of the new cross which has been mounted on the steeple of the Wieden parish church, M. GlÖggle, the director of the choruses, showed that he could combine musical devotion with patriotic feeling. After the celebration of high mass, during which Haydn’s Nelson’s Mass and Cherubini’s Graduale were performed, the consecration commenced. There were eight trumpeters (together with kettle-drummers) who, after flourishing for some time, played ‘God save the Emperor,’ from the steeple. After which, Haydn’s Te Deum was given in the church; and the choir, with the accompaniment of the organ and the trumpets, repeated the national anthem.

M. Lachner, kapellmeister to the court, lately gave a concert here, for the purpose of producing some of his most recent compositions; at which a symphony was performed, which may rank with the best productions of living composers. The brilliant instrumentation of the first movement, the charming andante, the scherzo fugato, constantly increasing in interest, as well as the grand finale, sufficiently manifested that the clever composer knew how to employ the rich store of his ideas and to follow the best models. The introduction to the oratorio, Moses, is conceived in the noblest style, and is a composition of real genius; its principal feature is a chorus of exquisite effect, which was admirably sung. If M. Lachner brings the oratorio to a conclusion with the genius and skill which characterize the introduction, he will have accomplished a work which alone will entitle him to a place among the most celebrated German composers.

We are in anticipation of a rich treat at a concert to be given by a musical family, lately arrived here from Russia, and who have already acquired considerable fame by their distinguished abilities. Their name is Koutsky, and the members are Eugenia, a singer; Anton and Stanislaus, pianists (the former a pupil of Field’s); and Carl and Apollino, violinists.

BERLIN.

An operetta by C. Blum, entitled Baldrian und Rosa, and founded upon a fairy-tale, was lately produced here: it is altogether an insignificant trifle, containing, however, an occasional pretty little song, in the waltz form.

On the 18th of November, Gretry’s Richard LÖwenherz (Richard Coeur de Lion) was reproduced, after a lapse of many years; but the manner in which it was got up was anything but satisfactory; it was, in fact, a disgrace to the management. Irene, too, has been given again, with improved success; and on the 5th of December, Spontini’s Nurmahal was once more brought forward for the dÉbut of a Mlle. Stephan, as Namuna. Beyond a very fine voice, this young lady has at present but few recommendations; she is as yet but a hot-house plant; had she only been kept back half a year, and received proper instruction, she might have been listened to with pleasure: as it was, her dÉbut was premature.

On the 7th of December, M. Blume appeared, for the first time since his return to Berlin, in the character of Don Juan, with his wonted success.

It is understood that Kapellmeister Marschner, from Hamburgh, will soon be here to bring out his opera, Hans Heiling. Mlle. Schneider, the daughter of our kapellmeister, has lately arrived, and Mad. Schroeder Devrient is shortly expected.

The concerts which have been given in aid of the fund for the widows of the members of the orchestra, have been very attractive. At the first, M. Mendelssohn conducted a symphony of his own composition, which was well received. On the 28th of November a concert was given at the garrison church, by M. Bach, music-director. The selection consisted chiefly of his own compositions; there were, however, two sacred songs by Bernhard Klein, sterling compositions, and finely sung by Mad. Turrschmied. The concert was unfortunately less productive than would probably have been the case had the weather been less severe.

The King of Prussia has appointed Meyerbeer Maestro di Capella to the court. Till now no such office existed here, but the place has been created expressly for M. Meyerbeer, in testimony of the king’s admiration of his Robert le Diable.

DRESDEN.

A musical entertainment was given here a few weeks since by M. FÜrstenau, the flute-player; in addition to whose performances, a solo was played upon the flute by his son, eight years of age. The vocal pieces were given by Mad. Schroeder Devrient, and MM. Babnigg, Vestri, and Zegi.

On the 18th of November, M. Molique, music-director to the Court at Stuttgart, played at the theatre some variations for the violin, of his own composition, upon Themas from Die Stumme, and upon Swiss airs. He is stated to combine in his playing, the best points of the German schools; his style is quiet, delicate, and tasteful, and he has, at the same time, uncommon mechanical dexterity; his tone is rich and full, and his octaves and tenths exquisitely pure; his staccato is perfect, and his adagio grand and full of expression.

MUNICH.

At the last concert of the musical academy here, the overture to Samori, by Vogler, and Weber’s Jubilee overture, were very excellently performed. Mlle. Schechner and M. Pellegrini distinguished themselves in the vocal pieces; Mlle. Violanda DÜlken, from the Conservatoire at Paris, sang variations of Pacini; M. Menter played a solo on the violoncello; and Mad. Bohrer on the piano-forte.

STUTTGART.

The grand musical society which gave the Messiah so effectively last year, has considerably improved, not only in number, but also in excellence; and their recent performance of Judas Maccabeus was certainly one of the most perfect the work has ever undergone.

PESTH.

A young virtuoso on the piano-forte, Joseph Rigg, has been playing at the theatre here with very great success. He performed the first movement of a concerto of Hummel, and some variations of Czerny, with precision, sweetness, and great execution.

MILAN.

At the Teatro alla Scala, a new opera by Mercadante, called Ismalia Ossia Morte ed Amore, the Libretto by Romanelli, made a fiasco; nothing in the whole opera, save the choruses, gave satisfaction; his Donna Caritea, however, was well received, and Mlle. Vial, from Munich, who sustained the principal character, was much applauded. The principal singers here are, prime donne, Antonia Vial, Teresa Melas, Isabella Fabrica (contralto in male characters); tenore, Giuseppe Binaghi; bassi, Gio. Giordani and Filippo Spada. All of them good singers, say the Milanese, with the addition, ‘di secondo ordine.’ Thus it is when people are accustomed to hear always such singers as Pasta, Rubini, Donzelli, Lablache, Tamburini, &c.

At the Cannobiano, Generali’s somewhat old but still beautiful operetta, Adelina, has been reproduced, with Emma Albertazzi, an English lady, as Adelina; her voice is agreeable, and her style of singing not bad; her pronunciation and acting, however, are but indifferent.

The company which is to perform at La Scala during the carnival, includes the names of Tosi and Pallazesi, principal soprani; Terese Cecconi, first contralto; Reina and Pedrazzi, principal tenors; and Zuchelli and Giordani, first basses. The season will open with Donizetti’s Fausta, which has hitherto been heard only at the St. Carlo, Naples; to that will succeed a new opera, written expressly for the carnival by the young Maestro, Ricci, and called Fernando Cortez; the third is to be Caterina di Guisa, which Coccia is now employed in composing; and Mercadante is engaged to bring out a fourth, of which the name is not yet known.

Amongst the company at the Carcano are Balfe[19] and his wife, Mad. Albertini, Madlle. Michel; the tenor, Bonfigli, and the buffo, Cambiagio. This theatre will open on the 26th of December, with the Capuletti e Montecchi of Bellini.

ROME.

Teatro Valle.—The new opera buffa, Il Disertore Svizzero, by the Neapolitan maestro, Lauro Rossi, was given here with great success. The young maestro—for he is only twenty-two years of age, composed his first opera four years ago, for the Teatro Nuovo at Naples, and this is already his fourth; it is a lively and pleasing production. The prima donna, Anna del Serre, and MM. Giorgio Ranconi, Salvi, and Lauretti, contributed their utmost towards its favourable reception.

BOLOGNA.

From recent accounts, the principal singers here were Mesds. Malibran, Schoberlechner, Bonetti, Rafaella, and Venier, all prime donne; M. Pedrazzi, tenore; and Marcolino and Porto, bassi. On the 3rd of October, Donizetti’s Anna Bolena was given, and on the 13th and 16th, La Gazza Ladra, on which occasion the delightful Malibran enchanted her audience by the exquisite manner in which she sustained the part of Ninetta.

TURIN.

The contralto, Carolina Vietti, a native of this place, and pupil of the Academia Filarmonica, lately made her dÉbut at this theatre as Zadig, in Vaccaj’s Zadig ed Astarte; she gave fair promise, and received much encouragement.

NAPLES.

Madame Malibran’s performance in this city has been one continued and splendid triumph: at first, the cognoscenti of Naples were inclined to question the justice of the unbounded praises that have been lavished on this astonishing songstress, and to receive her with sang froid, and weigh her pretensions with all the coolness of determined critics; but she had no sooner opened her mouth than all this was instantly converted into an enthusiasm of applause and admiration, to which the oldest frequenters of the Opera remember no parallel. For seventeen nights the theatre was crowded at double prices, notwithstanding the subscribers’ privileges were on most of these occasions suspended, and although Otello, La Cenerentola, La Gazza Ladra, and pieces of that description, were the only ones offered to a public, long since tired even of the beauties of Rossini, and proverbial for its love of novelty. But her grand triumph of all, was on the night when she took her leave of the Neapolitan audience in the character of Ninetta: nothing can be imagined superior to the spectacle afforded by the immense theatre of St. Carlo, crowded to the very ceiling, and ringing with acclamations and applause. Six times, after the fall of the curtain, Madame Malibran was called forward to receive the reiterated applauses and adieux of an audience, which seemed unable to bear the idea of a final separation from its new idol, who had only strength and spirits left to kiss her hand to the assembled multitude, and indicate, by graceful and expressive gestures, the degree to which she was overpowered by fatigue and emotion. The scene did not even end within the walls of the theatre; a crowd of the most enthusiastic rushed from all parts of the house to the stage-door, and as soon as Madame Malibran’s sedan came out, escorted it with loud acclamations to the Palazzo Barbaja, and renewed their salutations as the charming songstress ascended the steps. Nothing can prove more decidedly how strong an impression Malibran made upon the Neapolitans, than the fact, that the next opera which was performed was received with the most mortifying coolness, though the opera itself, Donizetti’s Esule di Roma, is a standard favourite in Naples, and its various revivals, for ten years past, have been till now successful, although Lablache made his first appearance in it on his return to his native city, and Ronzi de Begnis, whose voice, action, and style, have all improved considerably during her long retreat from the stage, performed the principal female character.

CONSTANTINOPLE.

The reform which the emperor has been so industriously and zealously promoting in the manners and customs of the Turks, will soon be as complete in musical as it already is in military affairs. The Turkish, or rather Arabic music, has given way to that of Europe, and scarcely anything of melody or harmony is now heard in Constantinople that has not been imported from Italy. At four o’clock in the afternoon, at the moment of Yindy, the time when the public functionaries among the Ottomans retire from business, a band of wind instruments is daily heard traversing the interval between the courts of the new palace. This band is called the ‘Band of the Agas of the Seraglio,’ and consists entirely of young Turks who have become able performers, under the instruction of M. Donizetti, brother of the composer. At first, the combinations of European harmony, and the overtures of Rossini, were torture to the ears of all good Mussulmen, but they begin, at length, to be somewhat reconciled by use, and their holy horror at whatever proceeds from the Giaours of the West is not proof against the charms of ‘Di Tanti Palpiti,’ and numerous other melodies of Rossini, &c.

NOVARA.

The Maestro Pietro Generali, a composer of some popularity in his time, died lately in this city, of which he had been, for six years past, Maestro di Capella. Most accounts of this master have been in error, both as to his real name, and in stating him to have been a native of Rome. His name was Pietro Mercandetti, and he was born at Masserano, near Vercelli, in Piedmont; but he went to Rome with his father when very young, and studied music in that city, under an old singer belonging to the Sistine chapel. He had a happy turn for music, made a very rapid progress, and for a short time enjoyed a brilliant reputation. His success would have been greater if he had given himself less up to the dominion of his passions, and led a more regular life. During the latter years of his dramatic career many of his compositions were ill received by the public; this disgusted him with the theatre. His pecuniary means were very precarious, and feeling the necessity of making some provision for approaching age, he returned to his native country, and succeeded in attaining, as mentioned above, the situation of Maestro di Capella, at Novara. One opera of his, Adelina, has been performed both in London and Paris; and it has been said, that if Generali’s works had been more long-lived, many of Rossini’s melodies would lose their claim to originality.

DOUAY.

A society has been established here for some months, under the title of ‘SocietÉ d’Emulation;’ the object of which is, to give the amateurs of this city and its environs an opportunity of hearing their compositions—which would otherwise probably have been doomed to remain for ever in the privacy of portfolios—performed in full orchestra. A band was quickly raised among the amateurs and professors, to the no small satisfaction of the young composers, and it may be hoped not without a fair chance of benefit to the art itself. The success of the inauguration concert surpassed the expectation of those most interested. Mr. E. de C., already favourably known as the author of a collection of romances, produced an overture, an aria for a contralto voice, a waltz without accompaniments, and a romance or two, all distinguished by a happy flow of melody, and an easy style of instrumentation, and all much and deservedly applauded. An overture and chorus by Mr. A. T., and an air with variations, for the horn, by Mr. C. C., formed part of the selection. Institutions of this nature cannot be too much encouraged.

BERGAMO.

It is a curious fact, but no less true, that by far the greater part of the celebrated tenor singers of the present and the last age, have been natives of this province. The three brothers Bianchi, David, father and son, Viganoni, Nozzari, Donzelli, Bordogni, Marchetti, Trezzini, Bonetti, Pasini Bolognesi, (a great singer, but a still greater drinker, who, when he had ruined his voice with brandy, blew out his brains because he could sing no longer,) and last, certainly not least, Rubini and his brothers, were all born in the State of Bergamo. It would be useless to seek here for basses; still more so for sopranos, for, indeed, the Bergamese are sometimes compared to birds, of whom the males only sing.

PARIS.

Mr. Field, the celebrated pianist, and most distinguished pupil of Clementi, is in this city, and proposes to give a public concert on the 25th of December. His success cannot be for an instant doubtful; for, besides ranking deservedly high as a composer, he is, perhaps, the sweetest and most beautiful performer on the pianoforte now in existence. There is in his style that inexpressible charm with which we used formerly to be so delighted when hearing Clementi, Dussek, and some other distinguished members of a school which now can hardly be said to exist but in the recollection of a few. Mr. Field represents that school in all its glory. To look at his hands, which scarcely seem to move; to contemplate the calmness of his countenance while playing, one would be tempted to suppose he was performing nothing but the easiest music in the world; while the fact is, that the greatest, the most complicated difficulties, are really no difficulties at all to him. Under Mr. Field’s fingers the piano is no longer a mere piece of mechanism; it sings, and seems as competent to produce sustained tones, as though it were played with a bow. Touched by this exquisite performer, it is a real musical instrument, and no longer a mere theatre for the exhibition of tours de force, the use to which the kind of talent possessed by a majority of what are called the greatest artists of the present day nearly confines it.

ThÉÂtre Italien.—Although the performance of La Straniera satisfied the Parisian critics, as it had already those of London,[20] how little claim Bellini has to the rank as a composer which his Italian flatterers have assigned him! The beauty of the scenery and decorations, added to the singing of Grisi, Rubini, and more especially Tamburini, gave it a popularity which lasted through several repetitions. It was followed by Il Pirata, this by Donizetti’s Anna Bolena, and the latter by MosÈ in Egitto. Otello and Don Giovanni are announced, in the latter of which the three female characters are to be performed by the two sisters Grisi and Mad. Tadolini, and the part of Don Juan by Tamburini. But for the singing and acting of Rubini, the Pirata would have been a complete failure. Mdlle. Doulx, a young lady who has obtained some reputation at the Conservatoire for the purity of her voice and the facility of her execution, selected the part of Imogene for her dÉbut: the choice was a bad one, because the qualifications necessary to make a good representative of Imogene are exactly the reverse of those which Mdlle. Doulx is said to possess: Imogene requires energy rather than grace; tone and volume of voice rather than agility in running divisions. It was impossible, however, to judge what the young lady might have done under other circumstances, for she was in a state of such dreadful alarm, especially during the first act, that not a note could be heard from her lips, and it appeared at times as if she could not support herself on the stage.

In Anna Bolena, Giudetta Grisi was no substitute for Mad. Pasta; little was attended to, and nothing applauded but Rubini’s Percy. His aria in the second act, notwithstanding its length and the fatigue of the singer, was vociferously encored. The revival of MosÈ in Egitto has been very successful, but owes its success chiefly to the singing of Tamburini and Rubini, whose duet, ‘Parlar, spiegar,’ is one of the most finished exhibitions of the vocal art ever witnessed. Boccabadati was so ill on the first night, that her part, Elcia, has been since taken by Giudetta Grisi.

We had occasion recently to be present at a practice of the pupils educated in the Conservatoire of Classical Music, under the direction of M. Choron, and observed several circumstances, both in the system pursued by that professor, and its practical results, that appeared to us remarkable. The first thing that struck us was the extreme difficulty which must have attended the attempt to make a whole mass of people sing as an individual. At the first blush one would suppose the thing impracticable, but the patience first of the professor, and subsequently of his scholars themselves, has achieved a victory over obstacles that might have been pronounced, until the contrary was proved by the fact, insurmountable. The success of M. Choron’s system of teaching ought to attract the attention of Government the more strongly because he has had for pupils only children taken promiscuously from a population at once poor, and, unfortunately, ill-disposed towards music and the arts in general. From this circumstance some judgment may be formed of what his success would have been had his system been applied to scholars of a more select kind.

One of the most remarkable sights in Mr. Choron’s school are some children, the eldest only five years old, whom the professor obliges to listen constantly to music, with the intention of accustoming their ears to harmonic sensations. He watches with extreme care the development of their infant faculties, and observes every day a progress so sensible, as to encourage the hope that the result will be an organization entirely musical. It is to be hoped that Government will comprehend that so much devotion and intelligence deserves to be encouraged, and that it will enable the establishment directed by M. Choron to extend its efforts as widely as it formerly did, by restoring to it that assistance of which it ought never to have been deprived.