The Unseen World, and Other Essays | ||
XII.
PAINE'S "ST. PETER."
FOR music-lovers in America the great event of the season has been the performance of Mr. Paine's oratorio, "St. Peter," at Portland, June 3. This event is important, not only as the first appearance of an American oratorio, but also as the first direct proof we have had of the existence of creative musical genius in this country. For Mr. Paine's Mass in D—a work which was brought out with great success several years ago in Berlin—has, for some reason or other, never been performed here. And, with the exception of Mr. Paine, we know of no American hitherto who has shown either the genius or the culture requisite for writing music in the grand style, although there is some of the Kapellmeister music, written by our leading organists and choristers, which deserves honourable mention. Concerning the rank likely to be assigned by posterity to "St. Peter," it would be foolish now to speculate; and it would be equally unwise to bring it into direct comparison with masterpieces like the "Messiah," "Elijah," and "St. Paul," the greatness of which has been so long acknowledged. Longer familiarity with the work is needed before such comparisons, always of somewhat doubtful value, can be profitably undertaken. But it must at least be said, as the net result of our impressions derived both from previous study of the score and from hearing, the performance at Portland, that Mr. Paine's
In our limited space we can give only the briefest description of the general structure of the work. The founding of Christianity, as illustrated in four principal scenes of the life of St. Peter, supplies the material for the dramatic development of the subject. The overture, beginning with an adagio movement in B-flat minor, gives expression to the vague yearnings of that time of doubt and hesitancy when the "oracles were dumb," and the dawning of a new era of stronger and diviner faith was matter of presentiment rather than of definite hope or expectation. Though the tonality is at first firmly established, yet as the movement becomes more agitated, the final tendency of the modulations also becomes uncertain, and for a few bars it would seem as if the key of F-sharp minor might be the point of destination. But after a short melody by the wind instruments, accompanied by a rapid upward movement of strings, the dominant chord of C major asserts itself, being repeated, with sundry inversions, through a dozen bars, and leading directly into the triumphant and majestic chorus, " The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of heaven is at hand." The second subject, introduced by the word "repent" descending through the interval of a diminished seventh and contrasted with the florid counterpoint of the phrase, "and believe the glad tidings of God," is a masterpiece of contrapuntal writing, and, if performed by a choir of three or four hundred voices, would produce an overpowering effect. The divine call of Simon Peter and his brethren is next described in a tenor recitative; and the acceptance of the glad tidings is expressed in an aria, "The spirit of the Lord is upon
The second scene is carried out to somewhat greater length, corresponding nearly to the last half of the first part of "Elijah," from the point where the challenge is given to the prophets of Baal. In the opening passages of mingled recitative and arioso, Peter is forewarned that he shall deny his Master, and his half-indignant remonstrance is sustained, with added emphasis, by the voices of the twelve disciples, pitched a fourth higher. Then Judas comes, with a great multitude, and Jesus is carried before the high-priest. The beautiful F-minor chorus, "We hid our faces from him," furnishes the
The second part of the oratorio begins with the crucifixion and ascension of Jesus. Here we must note especially the deeply pathetic opening chorus, "The Son of Man was delivered into the hands of sinful men," the joyous allegro, "And on the third day he rose again," the choral, "Jesus, my Redeemer, lives," and the quartet, "Feed the flock of God," commenting upon the command of Jesus, "Feed my lambs." This quartet has all the heavenly sweetness of Händel's "He shall feed his flock," which it suggests by similarity of subject, though not by similarity of treatment; but in a certain quality of inwardness, or religious meditativeness, it reminds one more of Mr. Paine's favourite master, Bach. The choral, like the one in the first part and the one which follows the scene of Pentecost, is taken from the Lutheran Choral Book, and arranged with original harmony and instrumentation, in accordance with the custom of Bach, Mendelssohn, and other composers, "of introducing into their sacred compositions the old popular choral melodies which are the peculiar offspring of a religious age." Thus the noblest choral ever written, the "Sleepers, wake," in "St. Paul," was composed in 1604 by Prætorius, the harmonization and accompaniment only being the work of Mendelssohn.
In "St. Peter," as in "Elijah," the second part, while forming the true musical climax of the oratorio, admits of a briefer description than the first part. The wave of emotion answering to the sensuously dramatic element having partly spent itself, the wave of lyric emotion gathers fresh strength, and one feels that one has reached the height of spiritual exaltation, while, nevertheless,
After the preaching of Peter, and the sweet contralto aria, "As for man, his days are as grass," the culmination of this scene comes in the D-major chorus, "This is the witness of God." What follows, beginning with the choral, "Praise to the Father," is to be regarded as an epilogue or peroration to the whole work. It is in accordance with a sound tradition that the grand sacred drama of an oratorio should conclude with a lyric outburst of thanksgiving, a psalm of praise to the Giver of every good and perfect gift. Thus, after Peter's labours are ended in the aria, "Now as ye were redeemed," in which the twelve disciples and the full chorus join, a duet for tenor and soprano, "Sing unto God," brings us to the grand final chorus in C major, "Great and marvellous are thy works, Lord God Almighty."
The cadence of this concluding chorus reminds us that one of the noteworthy points in the oratorio is the character of its cadences. The cadence prepared by the 6/4 chord, now become so hackneyed from its perpetual and wearisome repetition in popular church music, seems to be especially disliked by Mr. Paine, as it occurs but once or twice in the course of the work. In the great choruses the cadence is usually reached either by a pedal on the tonic, as in the chorus, "Awake, thou that sleepest," or by a pedal on the dominant culminating in a chord of the major ninth, as in the final chorus; or
The pleasant little town of Portland has reason to congratulate itself, first, on being the birthplace of such a composer as Mr. Paine; secondly, on having been the place where the first great work of America in the domain of music was brought out; and thirdly, on possessing what is probably the most thoroughly disciplined choral society in this country. Our New York friends, after their recent experiences, will perhaps be slow to believe us when we say that the Portland choir sang this new work even better, in many respects, than the Handel and Haydn Society sing the old and familiar "Elijah"; but it is true. In their command of the pianissimo and the gradual crescendo, and in the precision of their attack, the Portland singers can easily teach the Handel and Haydn a quarter's lessons. And, besides all this, they know how to preserve their equanimity under the gravest persecutions of the orchestra; keeping the even tenour of their way where a less disciplined choir, incited by the excessive blare of the trombones and the undue scraping of the second violins, would be likely to lose its presence of mind and break out into an untimely fortissimo.
No doubt it is easier to achieve perfect chorus-singing with a choir of one hundred and twenty-five voices than with a choir of six hundred. But this diminutive size, which was an advantage so far as concerned the technical excellence of the Portland choir, was decidedly a disadvantage so far as concerned the proper rendering of the more massive choruses in "St. Peter." All the greatest choruses—such as Nos. 1, 8, 19, 20, 28, 35,
We cannot speak with so much satisfaction of the performance of the orchestra. The instrumentation of "St. Peter" is remarkably fine. But this instrumentation was rather clumsily rendered by the orchestra, whose doings constituted the least enjoyable part of the performance. There was too much blare of brass, whine of hautboy, and scraping of strings. But in condonation of this serious defect, one must admit that the requisite amount of rehearsal is out of the question when one's choir is in Portland and one's orchestra in Boston; besides which the parts had been inaccurately copied. For a moment, at the beginning of the orchestral lament,
In conclusion we would say a few words suggested by a recent critical notice of Mr. Paine's work in the "Nation." While acknowledging the importance of the publication of this oratorio, as an event in the art-history of America, the writer betrays manifest disappointment that this work should not rather have been a symphony,[1] and thus have belonged to what he calls the "domain of absolute music." Now with regard to the assumption that the oratorio is not so high a form of music as the symphony, or, in other words, that vocal music in general is artistically inferior to instrumental music, we may observe, first, that Ambros and Dommer—two of the most profound musical critics now living—do not sustain it. It is Beanquier, we think, who suggests that instrumental music should rank above vocal, because it is "pure music," bereft of the fictitious aids of language and of the emotional associations which are grouped about the peculiar timbre of the human voice.[2] At first the suggestion seems plausible; but on analogous grounds we might set the piano above the orchestra, because the piano gives us pure harmony and counterpoint, without the adventitious aid of variety in timbre. And it is indeed true
Rightly considered, the question between vocal and instrumental music amounts to this, What does music express? This is a great psychological question, and we have not now the space or the leisure requisite for discussing it, even in the most summary way. We will say, however, that we do not see how music can in any way express ideas, or anything but moods or emotional states to which the ideas given in language may add determination and precision. The pure symphony gives utterance to moods, and will be a satisfactory work of art or not, according as the composer has been actuated by a legitimate sequence of emotional states, like Beethoven, or by a desire to produce novel and startling effects, like Liszt. But the danger in purely instrumental music is that it may run riot in the extravagant utterance of emotional states which are not properly concatenated by any normal sequence of ideas associated with them. This is sometimes exemplified in the most modern instrumental music.
Now, as in real life our sequent clusters of emotional states are in general determined by their association with our sequent groups of intellectual ideas, it would seem
We are not inclined to deny that in structural beauty —in the symmetrical disposition and elaboration of musical themes—the symphony has the advantage. The words, which in the oratorio serve to give definite direction to the currents of emotion, may also sometimes hamper the free development of the pure musical conception, just as in psychical life the obtrusive entrance of ideas linked by association may hinder the full fruition of some emotional state. Nevertheless, in spite of this possible drawback, it may be doubted if the higher forms of polyphonic composition fall so very far short of the symphony in capability of giving full
But to pursue this interesting question would carry us far beyond our limits. Whatever may be the decision as to the respective claims of vocal and instrumental music, we have every reason for welcoming the appearance, in our own country, of an original work in the highest form of vocal music. It is to be hoped that we shall often have the opportunity to "hear with our ears" this interesting work; for as a rule great musical compositions are peculiarly unfortunate among works of art, in being known at first hand by comparatively few persons. In this way is rendered possible that pretentious kind of dilettante criticism which is so common in musical matters, and which is often positively injurious, as substituting a factitious public opinion for one that is genuine. We hope that the favour with which the new oratorio has already been received will encourage the author to pursue the enviable career upon which he has entered. Even restricting ourselves to vocal music, there is still a broad field left open for original work. The secular cantata—attempted in recent times by Schumann, as well as by English composers of smaller calibre—is a very high form of vocal music; and if founded on an adequate libretto, dealing with some supremely grand or tragical situation, is capable of being carried to an unprecedented height of musical elaboration. Here is an opportunity for original achievement, of which it is to be hoped that some gifted and well-trained composer, like the author of "St. Peter," may find it worth while to avail himself.
June, 1873.
The Unseen World, and Other Essays | ||