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CHAPTERS OF OPERA
CHAPTERS OF OPERA
Being Historical and Critical Observations And Records Concerning the Lyric Drama in New York from Its Earliest Days Down to The Present Time by Musical Editor of "The New York Tribune"; Author of "How To Listen To Music," "Studies In The Wagnerian Drama," "Music And Manners In The Classical Period," "The Philharmonic Society Of New York," etc., etc. To MARIE—WIFE and Who have shared with the Author many of the Experiences described in this book. "Joy shared is Joy doubled." —GOE
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PREFACE
PREFACE
The making of this book was prompted by the fact that with the season 1907-08 the Metropolitan Opera House in New York completed an existence of twenty-five years. Through all this period at public representations I have occupied stall D-15 on the ground floor as reviewer of musical affairs for The New York Tribune newspaper. I have, therefore, been a witness of the vicissitudes through which the institution has passed in a quarter-century, and a chronicler of all significant musical things whic
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AUTHOR'S NOTE TO THIRD EDITION
AUTHOR'S NOTE TO THIRD EDITION
For the purposes of a new and popular edition of this book, the publishers asked the author to continue his historical narrative, his record of performances, and his critical survey of the operas produced at the two chief operatic institutions of New York, from the beginning of the season 1908-1909 down to the close of the season 1910-1911. This invitation the author felt compelled to decline for several reasons, one of which (quite sufficient in itself), was that he had already undertaken a wor
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CHAPTER I
CHAPTER I
The Introduction of Italian Opera in New York English Ballad Operas and Adaptations from French and Italian Works Hallam's Comedians and "The Beggar's Opera" The John Street Theater and Its Early Successors Italian Opera's First Home Manuel Garcia The New Park Theater and Some of Its Rivals Malibran and English Opera The Bowery Theater, Richmond Hill, Niblo's and Castle Gardens...
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CHAPTER II
CHAPTER II
Of the Building of Opera Houses A Study of Influences The First Italian Opera House in New York Early Impresarios and Singers Da Ponte, Montressor, Rivafinoli Signorina Pedrotti and Fornasari Why Do Men Become Opera-Managers? Addison and Italian Opera The Vernacular Triumphant...
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CHAPTER III
CHAPTER III
Manuel del Popolo Vicente Garcia "Il Barbiere di Siviglia" Signorina Maria Garcia's Unfortunate Marriage Lorenzo da Ponte His Hebraic Origin and Checkered Career "Don Giovanni" An Appeal in Behalf of Italian Opera...
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CHAPTER IV
CHAPTER IV
More Opera Houses Palmo's and the Astor Place Signora Borghese and the Distressful Vocal Wabble Antognini and Cinti-Damoreau An Orchestral Strike Advent of the Patti Family Don Francesco Marty y Torrens and His Havanese Company Opera Gowns Fifty Years Ago Edward and William Henry Fry Horace Greeley and His Musical Critic James H. Hackett and William Niblo Tragic Consequences of Canine Interference Goethe and a Poodle A Dog-Show and the Astor Place Opera House...
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CHAPTER V
CHAPTER V
Max Maretzek His Managerial Career Some Anecdotes "Crotchets and Quavers" His Rivals and Some of His Singers Bernard Ullmann Marty Again Bottesini and Arditi Steffanone Bosio Tedesco Salvi Bettini Badiali Marini...
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CHAPTER VI
CHAPTER VI
Operatic Warfare Half a Century Ago The Academy of Music and Its Misfortunes A Critic's Opera and His Ideals A Roster of American Singers Grisi and Mario Annie Louise Cary Ole Bull as Manager Piccolomini and Réclame Adelina Patti's Début and an Anniversary Dinner Twenty-five Years Later A Kiss for Maretzek...
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CHAPTER VII
CHAPTER VII
Colonel James H. Mapleson A Diplomatic Manager His Persuasiveness How He Borrowed Money from an Irate Creditor Maurice Strakosch Musical Managers Pollini Sofia Scalchi and Annie Louise Cary Again Campanini and His Beautiful Attack Brignoli His Appetite and Superstition...
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CHAPTER VIII
CHAPTER VIII
The Academy's Successful Rival Why It Was Built The Demands of Fashion Description of the Theater War between the Metropolitan and the Academy of Music Mapleson and Abbey The Rival Forces Patti and Nilsson Gerster and Sembrich A Costly Victory...
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CHAPTER IX
CHAPTER IX
The First Season at the Metropolitan Opera House Mr. Abbey's Singers Gounod's "Faust" and Christine Nilsson Marcella Sembrich and Her Versatility Sofia Scalchi Signor Kaschmann Signor Stagno Ambroise Thomas's "Mignon" Madame Fursch-Madi Ponchielli's "La Gioconda"...
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CHAPTER X
CHAPTER X
The Season 1883-1884 at the Academy of Music Lillian Nordica's American Début German Opera Introduced at the Metropolitan Opera House Parlous State of Italian Opera in London and on the Continent Dr. Leopold Damrosch and His Enterprise The German Singers Amalia Materna Marianne Brandt Marie Schroeder-Hanfstängl Anton Schott, the Military Tenor Von Bülow's Characterization: "A Tenor is a Disease"...
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CHAPTER XI
CHAPTER XI
First German Season Death Struggles of Italian Opera at the Academy Adelina Patti and Her Art Features of the German Performances "Tannhäuser" Marianne Brandt in Beethoven's Opera "Der Freischütz" "Masaniello" Materna in "Die Walküre" Death of Dr. Damrosch...
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CHAPTER XII
CHAPTER XII
The Season 1885-1886 End of the Mapleson Régime at the Academy of Music Alma Fohström The American Opera Company German Opera in the Bowery A Tenor Who Wanted to be Manager of the Metropolitan Opera House The Coming of Anton Seidl His Early Career Lilli Lehmann A Broken Contract Unselfish Devotion to Artistic Ideals Max Alvary Emil Fischer...
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CHAPTER XIII
CHAPTER XIII
Second and Third German Seasons The Period 1885-1888 More about Lilli Lehmann Goldmark's "Queen of Sheba" First Performance of Wagner's "Meistersinger" Patti in Concert and Opera A Flash in the Pan at the Academy of Music The Transformed American Opera Company Production of Rubinstein's "Nero" An Imperial Operatic Figure First American Performance of "Tristan und Isolde" Albert Niemann and His Characteristics His Impersonation of Siegmund Anecdotes A Triumph for "Fi
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CHAPTER XIV
CHAPTER XIV
Wagnerian High Tide at the Metropolitan Opera House 1887-1890 Italian Low Water Elsewhere Rising of the Opposition Wagner's "Siegfried" Its Unconventionality "Götterdämmerung" "Der Trompeter von Säkkingen" "Euryanthe" "Ferdinand Cortez" "Der Barbier von Bagdad" Italo Campanini and Verdi's "Otello" Patti and Italian Opera at the Metropolitan Opera House...
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CHAPTER XV
CHAPTER XV
End of the German Period 1890-1891 Some Extraordinary Novelties Franchetti's "Asrael" "Der Vasall von Szigeth" A Royal Composer, His Opera and His Distribution of Decorations "Diana von Solange" Financial Salvation through Wagner Italian Opera Redivivus Ill-mannered Box-holders Wagnerian Statistics...
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CHAPTER XVI
CHAPTER XVI
The Season 1891-1892 Losses of the Stockholders of the Metropolitan Opera House Company Return to Italian Opera Mr. Abbey's Expectations Sickness of Lilli Lehmann The De Reszke Brothers and Lassalle Emma Eames Début of Marie Van Zandt "Cavalleria Rusticana" Fire Damages the Opera House Reorganization of the Owning Company...
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CHAPTER XVII
CHAPTER XVII
An Interregnum Changes in the Management Rise and Fall of Abbey, Schoeffel, and Grau Death of Henry E. Abbey His Career Season 1893-1894 Nellie Melba Emma Calvé Bourbonism of the Parisians Massenet's "Werther" 1894-1895 A Breakdown on the Stage "Elaine" Sybil Sanderson and "Manon" Shakespearian Operas Verdi's "Falstaff"...
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CHAPTER XVIII
CHAPTER XVIII
The Public Clamor for German Opera Oscar Hammerstein and His First Manhattan Opera House Rivalry between Anton Seidl and Walter Damrosch The Latter's Career as Manager Wagner Triumphant German Opera Restored at the Metropolitan "The Scarlet Letter" "Mataswintha" "Hänsel und Gretel" in English Jean de Reszke and His Influence Mapleson for the Last Time "Andrea Chenier" Madame Melba's Disastrous Essay with Wagner "Le Cid" Metropolitan Performances 1893-1897...
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CHAPTER XIX
CHAPTER XIX
Beginning of the Grau Period Death of Maurice Grau His Managerial Career An Interregnum at the Metropolitan Opera House Filled by Damrosch and Ellis Death of Anton Seidl His Funeral Characteristic Traits "La Bohème" 1898-1899 "Ero e Leandro" and Its Composer...
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CHAPTER XX
CHAPTER XX
Closing Years of Mr. Grau's Régime Traits in the Manager's Character Débuts of Alvarez, Scotti, Louise Homer, Lucienne Bréval and Other Singers Ternina and "Tosca" Reyer's "Salammbô" Gala Performance for a Prussian Prince "Messaline" Paderewski's "Manru" "Der Wald" Performances in the Grau Period...
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CHAPTER XXI
CHAPTER XXI
Beginning of the Administration of Heinrich Conried Season 1903-1904 Mascagni's American Fiasco "Iris" and "Zanetto" Woful Consequences of Depreciating American Conditions Mr. Conried's Theatrical Career His Inheritance from Mr. Grau Signor Caruso The Company Recruited The "Parsifal" Craze...
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CHAPTER XXII
CHAPTER XXII
Conried's Administration Concluded 1905-1908 Visits from Humperdinck and Puccini The California Earthquake Madame Sembrich's Generosity to the Suffering Musicians "Madama Butterfly" "Manon Lescaut" "Fedora" Production and Prohibition of "Salome" A Criticism of the Work "Adriana Lecouvreur" A Table of Performances...
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CHAPTER XXIII
CHAPTER XXIII
Oscar Hammerstein Builds a Second Manhattan Opera House How the Manager Put His Doubters to Shame His Earlier Experiences as Impresario Cleofonte Campanini A Zealous Artistic Director and Ambitious Singers A Surprising Record but No Novelties in the First Season Melba and Calvé as Stars The Desertion of Bonci Quarrels about Puccini's "Bohéme" List of Performances...
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CHAPTER XXIV
CHAPTER XXIV
Hammerstein's Second Season Amazing Promises but More Amazing Achievements Mary Garden and Maurice Renaud Massenet's "Thaïs," Charpentier's "Louise" Giordano's "Siberia" and Debussy's "Pelléas et Mélisande" Performed for the First Time in America Revival of Offenbach's "Les Contes d'Hoffmann," "Crispino e la Comare" of the Ricci Brothers, and Giordano's "Andrea Chenier" The Tetrazzini Craze Repertory of the Season Considering the present state of Italian opera in New York City (I
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CHAPTER II
CHAPTER II
The first opera house built in New York City opened its doors on November 18, 1833, and was the home of Italian Opera for two seasons; the second, built eleven years later, endured in the service for which it was designed four years; the third, which marked as big an advance on its immediate predecessor in comfort and elegance as the first had marked on the ramshackle Park Theater described by Richard Grant White, was the Astor Place Opera House, built in 1847, and the nominal home of the precio
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CHAPTER III
CHAPTER III
The beginnings of Italian opera in America are intimately associated with two men who form an interesting link connecting the music of the Old World with that of the New. These men were Manuel del Popolo Vicente Garcia and Lorenzo Da Ponte. The opera performed in the Park Theater on November 29, 1825, when the precious exotic first unfolded its petals in the United States, was Rossini's "Il Barbiere di Siviglia." In this opera Garcia, then in his prime, had created, as the French say, the rôle o
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CHAPTER IV
CHAPTER IV
"His wit was not so sharp as his chin, and so his career was not so long as his nose," says Richard Grant White of the impresario who, ten years after the failure of the Italian Opera House, made the third effort to establish Italian opera in New York of which there is a record. The man with a sharp chin and long nose was Ferdinand Palmo. He was the owner of a popular restaurant which went by the rather tropical name "Café des Milles Colonnes," and was situated in Broadway, just above Duane Stre
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CHAPTER V
CHAPTER V
Of the operatic managers of fifty years ago Max Maretzek was the only one with whom I was personally acquainted, and it was not until near the close of his career that he swam into the circle of my activities or I into his. He died on September 17, 1897. His last years were spent in a home on Staten Island, and the public heard nothing about him after the memorable concert given for his benefit at the Metropolitan Opera House on February 12, 1889, the occasion being set down as the fiftieth anni
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CHAPTER VI
CHAPTER VI
Fifty-one years ago the center of operatic activity had shifted to the Academy of Music, at Fourteenth Street and Irving Place, and there it remained until the Metropolitan Opera House was built. From the opening of the Academy in 1854 to the opening of the Metropolitan in 1883 the former had no rival as an establishment, though the rivalry between managers and singers was the liveliest that New York has ever seen during the first decade of the time. For twenty years Burton's Theater revived its
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CHAPTER VII
CHAPTER VII
Memories are crowding upon me, and I find there is much still to be said about the Academy of Music, and the operatic folk whom it housed between 1854 and 1886. Just now the incidents which have been narrated about the banquet given in honor of the twenty-fifth anniversary of Adelina Patti's début recall other characteristic anecdotes of Colonel Mapleson, who managed the Academy of Music from 1878 to the end of the disastrous season of 1885-'86. When Mapleson and Abbey were drawing up their forc
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CHAPTER VIII
CHAPTER VIII
Not the chronicler of musical doings but the historian of society should discuss the genesis of the Metropolitan Opera House, which came twenty-five years ago to displace the Academy of Music as the home of grand opera in New York. In the second of these "Chapters of Opera" I cited the Metropolitan Opera House as the last illustration of the creative impulse which springs from the growth of wealth and social ambition, and stated that it marked the decay of the old Knickerbocker régime, and its a
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CHAPTER IX
CHAPTER IX
Twenty-five years ago there was no opera in the current repertory comparable in popularity with "Faust." If I am told that neither is there to-day I shall neither gainsay my informant nor permit the fact to give me heartburnings in spite of my attitude toward the modern lyric drama. To that popularity Mme. Nilsson contributed a factor of tremendous puissance. No singer who is still a living memory was so intimately associated in the local mind with Gounod's masterpiece as she, whose good fortune
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CHAPTER X
CHAPTER X
Colonel Mapleson and the stockholders of the Academy of Music and their friends were little disposed to yield to the new order of things without a struggle. The Academy was refurnished and a season of Italian opera begun on the same night on which Mr. Abbey opened his doors. Colonel Mapleson's company comprised Mmes. Patti, Gerster, Pappenheim, Pattini, and Josephine Yorke, and Signori Falletti, Nicolini, Perugini, Cherubini, Vicini, Lombardini, and Caracciolo. The performances were like those t
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CHAPTER XI
CHAPTER XI
After German opera began at the Metropolitan Opera House it endured seven years. It was only at the outset that it had the opposition of what had been the established régime of Italian opera at the Academy of Music, but it was pursued throughout its career by desultory enterprises and hampered greatly by the fact that the stockholders were never unitedly and enthusiastically in favor of it or the principles of art which it represented. Throughout the period there was a hankering for the fleshpot
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CHAPTER XII
CHAPTER XII
The season 1885-86 witnessed the collapse of the Italian opposition at the Academy of Music, but also the rise of an institution in its place, which, had it commanded a higher order of talent and been more intelligently administered, might have served the lofty purposes set for the German opera. This was the American Opera Company, which, after an extremely ambitious beginning, made a miserable end a season later, leaving an odor of scandal, commercial and artistic, which infected the atmosphere
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CHAPTER XIII
CHAPTER XIII
The incidents of the early history of the Metropolitan Opera House come to me in such multitude that I find it difficult to apportion seasons and chapters in this record. Later, it may be, when the new order of things shall have been established, and again given place to the old, the relation may make more rapid progress. I have already devoted much space to the second German season, but there are a few details which deserve special consideration. The first of these (if the reader will accept th
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CHAPTER XIV
CHAPTER XIV
In this chapter I purpose to tell the story of a period of three years, from 1887 to 1890, and in order to cover the ground I shall leave out what appertains to the repetition of works incorporated in the repertory of the Metropolitan Opera House during the preceding three seasons. The period was an eventful one and marked the high-water of achievement and also of popularity of the German régime, but also the beginning of the dissatisfaction of the boxholders, which resulted two years later in a
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CHAPTER XV
CHAPTER XV
The season of 1890-91 was full of incidents, some exciting, some amusing, but they were all dwarfed by the announcement which came in the middle of January that the directors of the Metropolitan Opera House had concluded a contract of lease with Henry E. Abbey (or Abbey and Grau) under which opera was to be given in the next season in Italian and French. The alleged reason was that Mr. Abbey was willing to assume all risk of failure for the same subvention which the stockholders as individuals w
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CHAPTER XVI
CHAPTER XVI
The figures which I have printed showing a loss to the stockholders of the Metropolitan Opera House on opera account year after year during the German period, do not tell the whole story of the financial condition into which the Metropolitan Opera House Company (Limited) had fallen. This condition had much to do with creating a desire on the part of the stockholders for a change of policy. The first German season cost the stockholders only about $42,000 above the amount realized from the box ass
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CHAPTER XVII
CHAPTER XVII
For the reasons set forth at the close of the last chapter there was no opera at the Metropolitan Opera House in the season of 1892-93, but the fall of the latter year witnessed the beginning of a new period, full of vicissitudes. With many brilliant artistic features, it was still experimental to a large extent on its artistic side, the chief results of its empiricism being the restoration of German opera in the repertory on an equal footing with Italian and French. It also brought the largest
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CHAPTER XVIII
CHAPTER XVIII
In marshaling, in the preceding chapter, the chief incidents of the period with which I am now concerned I set down the restoration of German performances at the Metropolitan Opera House as the most significant. There was a strong influence within the company working to that end in the person of M. Jean de Reszke, who, though the organization was not adapted to such a purpose, nevertheless strove energetically to bring about a representation of "Tristan und Isolde" in the supplementary spring se
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CHAPTER XIX
CHAPTER XIX
From 1896 to the end of the season 1902-03 Maurice Grau was in name as well as in fact the monarch of the operatic world of America. For a brief space he also extended his reign to Covent Garden, but the time was not ripe for that union of interests between London and New York which has so long seemed inevitable, and his foreign reign was short. So was his American dictatorship; but while it lasted it was probably the most brilliant operatic government that the world has ever known from a financ
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CHAPTER XX
CHAPTER XX
There now remained four years of Mr. Grau's administration at the Metropolitan Opera House. They were years of great activity, during which the fortunes of the manager and the institution rose steadily. Mr. Grau was no more of a sentimentalist in art than Mr. Abbey had been. He was quiet, undemonstrative, alert, and wholly willing to let the public dictate the course of the establishment. Outwardly he was always calm, urbane, neither communicative nor secretive. I sat behind him during all the y
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CHAPTER XXI
CHAPTER XXI
A prologue dealing with other things may with propriety accompany this chapter, which is concerned with the history of the Metropolitan Opera House under the administration of Mr. Heinrich Conried. It is called for by the visit which Pietro Mascagni made to the United States in the fall of 1902. Signor Mascagni came to America under a contract with Mittenthal Brothers, theatrical managers, whose activities had never appreciably touched the American metropolis nor the kind of entertainment which
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CHAPTER XXII
CHAPTER XXII
A visit from Engelbert Humperdinck to attend the first German performance of his "Hänsel und Gretel" on November 25th, a strike of the chorus which lasted three days, a revival of Goldmark's "Königin von Saba" which had been the chief glory of the second German season twenty years before, and the squandering of thousands of dollars and so much time that nearly all of the operas in the repertory suffered for lack of rehearsals on a single production of Strauss's operetta "Der Zigeunerbaron," were
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CHAPTER XXIII
CHAPTER XXIII
Before the close of the season 1905-06 at the Metropolitan Opera House, Mr. Oscar Hammerstein, who was building a large theater in Thirty-fourth Street, between Eighth and Ninth avenues, announced that the building would be called the Manhattan Opera House, that it would be exclusively his property and under his management, and that it was to be devoted to grand opera. It is no reflection on Mr. Hammerstein to say that many who have been prompt and generous in their recognition of his achievemen
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CHAPTER XXIV
CHAPTER XXIV
The prospectus which Mr. Hammerstein published for his second season was magnificently grandiloquent in its promises, but the season itself marvelous in its achievements. Eight operas "never produced in this city or country," "masterpieces of the most celebrated composers," which were his "sole property," were to be brought forward, in addition to many familiar works. He announced the engagement of "the greatest sopranos, mezzo sopranos, contraltos, barytones, and bassos of the operatic world."
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APPENDIX I
APPENDIX I
Season 1908-1909 The twenty-fourth regular subscription season of grand opera at the Metropolitan Opera House began on November 16th, 1908, and ended on April 10th, 1909. The subscription was for one hundred regular performances in twenty weeks, on Monday, Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday evenings, and Saturday afternoons. In their prospectus the directors, Messrs. Giulio Gatti-Casazza and Andreas Dippel, announced a change of plan in respect of the Saturday night performances which had been give
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APPENDIX II
APPENDIX II
The third season of opera under the sole direction of Mr. Oscar Hammerstein at the Manhattan Opera House, New York, began on November 9th, 1908, and lasted twenty weeks until March 27th, 1909. During this period there were five regular performances each week. Had there been no deviation from the rule there would have been one hundred representations, but advantage was taken of occasions which seemed auspicious to give extra performances, and therefore there were also representations on Thanksgiv
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