Gounod, the greatest living musician of France is descended from a
family of artists. His grandfather, a very distinguished enchaser, bore
the title of “sword cutler to the king,” and as such occupied an
apartment in the Louvre buildings, a favor which was granted to only
artists of renown. His son, Jean François Gounod, who was born about
1760, was a painter of considerable talent. He was a pupil of Lépicié,
and he and Carle Vernet, who occupied the same studio, competed at the
Académie des Beaux-Arts for the “Prix de Rome.” Carle Vernet obtained
the first prize at this concours in 1782, and Jean François Gounod
carried off the second in 1783. The latter, however, devoted himself
especially to engraving, in order that he might always live with his
father who was getting old and needed all his care and attention.
J. F. Gounod was serious, melancholy and quite original in character, as
was shown by his conduct on the death of his father, who lived to be
over ninety years of age. This loss was a great grief to him, and in the
hope of diverting his mind and driving off melancholy, he undertook a
tramp to Versailles. He had very little money in his pocket. However,
being fatigued by his journey he entered a public house and went to bed.
He remained several days at Versailles, but, far from being relieved of
his sad thoughts, he was so overwhelmed by them that he dreaded to
return to his rooms in the Louvre, where he had witnessed his father
breathe his last. He wrote to a friend to say that he should not return
to Paris, but intended to start immediately for Italy; he begged him to
go to his room, take from his secretary all the money he might find
there, and bring it to him at Versailles, receiving at the same time his
adieux. Once in possession of his money, Gounod, who disliked
encumbrance of any sort, furnished himself with a light carpet bag, and
with this baggage set off on a journey which was at that time very long
and very difficult. He travelled all over Italy, remaining there four or
five years; then he returned to Paris, and to his rooms where nothing
had been disturbed, and resumed work as if he had left it only the
evening before.
One of J. F. Gounod’s friends has written the following lines concerning
him: “M. Gounod has made a reputation in engraving. He has produced
little and his income could scarcely have been enough to suffice him.
Nevertheless, he liked to work and engraving offered him the quiet and
deliberation which suited his disposition. In general he spoke but
little. When he was obliged to quit the Louvre, he was quite helpless in
regard to the great confusion which always characterized his apartment;
it was one mass of books, pasteboard, drawings and articles of all sorts
scattered about, including a dismembered skeleton, whose bones were all
pretty effectually separated from each other. Fortunately one of his
cousins undertook to transfer for him everything that was transferable,
otherwise Gounod would have abandoned all. He concluded to marry, for it
was absolutely necessary that somebody should aid him in finding himself
again. He was, nevertheless, a good and excellent man. His wife was
charming, a very good musician, and it was she who educated her son. He
was getting along in years when he married, and at his death this son
was still very young.”
Very young indeed, for the future author of “Faust,” “Roméo et Juliette”
and “Mireille,” Charles Gounod, was scarcely five years old when he lost
his father, whom he had not learned to know. Like Hérold, like Adam,
like Halévy, Charles Gounod was born at Paris, where he first saw the
light June 17, 1818. His mother, a woman of fine character and high
intelligence, neglected nothing that could contribute to his literary
and artistic education. She was his first music teacher. He began very
young to feel an intense love for this art, which he was to make
illustrious. A pupil of the Saint Louis lyceum, he was already an
excellent pianist while still pursuing his classical studies at this
establishment, and before completing these studies he took up a course
of harmony with the famous theoretician, Reicha. He took the degree of
bachelor when he was little more than sixteen years old, and was
admitted to the Conservatoire in the class of counterpoint and fugue
directed by Halévy, and soon after in the composition class of Lesueur,
one of the greatest masters that ever glorified the French school. In
the following year Gounod took part in the concours of the Institute for
the “Prix de Rome,” and carried off without opposition a second grand
prize. He was thus exempted from the military service, since the rules
of the “Concours de Rome” established at that time this exemption for
any pupil having obtained a prize before the age of twenty. This was in
1837, and Gounod was only nineteen.
At the close of this same year Lesueur died, and Gounod passed under the
instruction of Paër, with whom he finished his studies. In 1838 he
presented himself again at the Institute, this time without success, but
in 1839 he carried off a brilliant first prize with a cantata entitled
“Fernand,” the words of which were written by the marquis de Pastoret.
This first prize was almost unanimously awarded to him, twenty-five
votes out of twenty-seven being in his favor. He left at once for Rome
and there devoted himself almost exclusively for three or four years, to
the study and composition of religious music, being especially charmed
and influenced by the works of the great Palestrina. In 1841 he had
performed in the Saint-Louis-des Français church, on the occasion of the
fête of king Louis-Philippe, a grand orchestra mass, with contralto and
tenor solos. Towards the end of the following year he made a trip
through Germany, pausing for a time in Vienna, where he gave in the
Saint Charles church a Requiem mass which produced upon its hearers a
most profound impression. Some idea of the effect produced may be had
from an account addressed to one of the Paris papers of the day, and
which seemed invested with a spirit of prophecy: “On All Soul’s Day”
said this writer, “there was performed at the Saint Charles church a
Requiem, a quite recent work by M. Charles Gounod. One recognizes in
this composition not only a very marked musical talent which has already
obtained by its assiduity and experience a high degree of independence,
but one sees in it also a great and wholly individual comprehension,
which breaks away from the beaten tracks in order to create new forms.
In the melodic phrases there are things which deeply touch and impress
the hearer, things which disclose a grandeur of conception become very
rare in our day, and which engrave themselves ineffaceably upon the
soul, things which would do honor to any musician, and which seem to
point to a great future. The solos were sung perfectly, and the choruses
as well as the orchestra likewise deserve praise. M. Gounod directed in
person the performance of his work.”
It is plain that the pace of the young musician was not that of an
ordinary artist, and that his first steps were directed toward glory,
for rarely does one hear such praise accorded a composer of twenty-five
years.
Meanwhile Gounod, already haunted by an idea which was long to pursue
him, had dreamed of bidding farewell, not to his art, but to the world,
and had seriously considered taking ecclesiastic orders. His mind
possessed by this fancy, he had, during the latter part of his stay at
Rome, left the villa Médécis, where at that time the French school was
established, and had retired to the seminary. As soon as he returned to
Paris, he entered as precentor the Missions Etrangères, where he wore
the long robe and costume of the conventual house, and his resolution
seemed thenceforth so certain that it was accepted as an accomplished
fact. Indeed a special sheet, the _Revue et Gazette Musicale_, published
the following under date of Feb. 15, 1846: “M. Gounod, composer and
former winner of the grand Institute prize, has just taken orders.” From
this moment, Gounod was called “l’Abbé Gounod,” just as, sixty years
before, his master Lesueur was called “l’Abbé Lesueur,” when he became
precentor of the Metropolitan church. There was this difference,
however, that Lesueur had never desired to become a priest, but
according to the usage then in vogue at the Notre Dame church, Paris, he
was obliged, in order to fulfill the functions of precentor, to don the
priestly garb. Gounod, on the other hand, seemed to have made up his
mind to a religious life, since in 1846 a publisher brought out a series
of religious choruses entitled “Offices of Holy Week, by the Abbé
Charles Gounod.”
In his retreat Gounod continued to occupy himself with religious music,
and in 1849 he had performed at the Saint Eustache church a grand solemn
mass which was very well received. At this moment he seemed absolutely
lost to profane art, and as he was brought very little before the
public, people began to forget about him, when there appeared in the
London Athenæum early in 1851, an article which was immediately
republished in the _Revue et Gazette Musicale_ of Paris, and which
contained an enthusiastic eulogium on several of Gounod’s compositions
recently performed at a concert at St. Martin’s Hall. “This music,” said
the writer, “brings before us no other composer ancient or modern,
either by the form, the melody or the harmony. It is not new in the
sense of being bizarre or whimsical; it is not old, if old means dry and
stiff, the bare scaffolding, with no fine construction rising behind it;
it is the work of an accomplished artist, it is the poetry of a new
poet. * * * * * That the impression produced upon the audience was great
and real there can be no doubt, but it is the music itself, not its
reception, which to our minds presages for M. Gounod an uncommon career;
for if there be not in his works a genius at once true and new, then
must we go back to school and relearn the alphabet of the art and of
criticism.”
This article fell like a thunderclap on Paris, where people were
scarcely giving Gounod a thought. A very distinguished French musical
critic, Louis Viardot, was then in London with his wife, the worthy and
noble sister of Malibran. This Athenæum article was attributed to him,
not without reason, I think, and it was soon known that Mme. Viardot,
whose experience, taste and musical knowledge everyone knows, was struck
by the music of the young master, and that she was far from concealing
her admiration for a talent so pure, so elegant and so exquisite.
Excited by such a success Gounod at once renounced his orders, and
entered without more delay upon the militant career of the art
interrupted for so many years. He soon produced in public a pretty
symphony in E flat, which, performed in a remarkable manner by the Saint
Cecilia Society, then a worthy rival of that of the Conservatoire, won
him the congratulations and sincere encouragement of the critics. Then,
thanks to the assistance of Mme. Viardot, he was charged with writing
for the _Opéra_ the score of a work in three acts, “Sapho,” the libretto
of which had been confided to a young poet, Emile Angier, who was
likewise in the morning of his career, and likewise destined for glory,
and in this work the great artist whom we have just named, was to take
the principal rôle. Notwithstanding all, “Sapho” was not well received
by the public, or at least only moderately so and scarcely achieved more
than what is called in France a success of esteem. Yet the work was an
exceedingly good one, but the first step on a stage so important as that
of the _Opéra_ is so difficult for a young composer to make! It must be
said, however, that if the work as a whole was not judged entirely
satisfactory, especially in regard to the scenic effects, etc., it
presented a value which a fastidious critic stated in these terms: “The
opera of “Sapho,” without being a good dramatic work, is the work of a
distinguished musician who has style and lofty tendencies. M. Gounod has
perfectly seized and happily rendered all the lyric parts of the subject
which he has treated, but he has been less happy in trying to express
the conflict of passions and the contrast of characters.” Certain pages
in the score of “Sapho” were remarked as being quite individual in
flavor, and the public were especially delighted with the beautiful song
of the young shepherd, “Brontez le Thym, Brontes mes chêvres,” as well
as the admirable couplets of “Sapho,” of a character so melancholy, and
an inspiration so full of a delicate poetry. The work was performed on
the 16th of April, 1851.
A year later the Comédie-Française produced a tragedy by Pousard,
“Ulysse,” for which Gounod had written a number of beautiful choruses,
redolent with the perfume of antiquity and full of a manly energy. Very
soon the young composer appeared again at the _Opéra_ with a grand work
in five acts called “La Nonne Sanglante,” the libretto of which,
although signed by the names of Scribe and Germain Delavigne, was
absolutely devoid of interest. He made a mistake in accepting this
libretto, previously refused by several of his colleagues, among others
Meyerbeer and Halévy, and which could not excite his inspiration.
Notwithstanding some remarkable bits, some vigorous and beautiful
scenes, the score of “La Nonne Sanglante” was really only secondary in
value, and the work achieved a very mild success when it was produced
Oct. 18, 1854, with Mlles. Werthermber, Poinsot and Dameron, MM.
Gueymard, Depassio and Merly for interpreters. Its career was short, and
it only lived through eleven performances. Gounod had not yet found his
vein.
But better fortune was in store for him, and after a few years of
silence he began the series of his successes by giving to the
_Théâtre-Lyrique_, then very flourishing and very brilliant under the
direction of M. Carvalho, “Le Médécin Malgré Lui.” The libretto of this
had been arranged for _Opéra Comique_ by MM. Jules Barbier and Michel
Carré, who had preserved the greater part of Molière’s prose. Although
from a general point of view the comic sentiment may not be the dominant
quality of his talent, yet that quality is far from lacking in Gounod,
as is proved by “Le Médécin Malgré Lui,” which remains one of the most
curious and most original of his attempts. In this work, which was
performed Jan. 15, 1858, the composer revived with a rare cleverness the
old forms of French music, while adding thereto the most ingenious and
most piquant artifices of the modern science, and by clothing the whole
with his masterly style he produced a work of a very unique color,
flavor and character. “Le Médécin Malgré Lui,” which the public received
with marked favor, seemed to prepare the great day of Gounod’s artistic
life. Fourteen months after the appearance of this work, that is to say,
on March 19, 1859, the composer gave to the same theatre the work which
was to establish his fame upon a fixed basis. The reader of course
divines that I refer to “Faust,” that masterpiece which can boast of
such a brilliant, prolonged and universal success, and which will
remain, perhaps, the author’s best title to the remembrance and
recognition of posterity.
But let it not be supposed that the triumphal career of “Faust” was not
confronted at the outset with difficulties and obstacles which appeared
insurmountable. When it was carried by the authors to the
_Théâtre-Lyrique_, there was in preparation at the Porte Saint Martin
theatre another drama built on Goethe’s poem, and bearing the same name.
M. Carvalho told Gounod that it would be necessary to await the result
of the “Faust” at the Porte Saint Martin, for if that work won a
success, it would be very difficult and very hazardous to offer another
“Faust” to the public. So they waited, and the drama not proving a
success, it was decided to proceed with the study of the opera. Gounod’s
“Faust” was presented in the form styled in France _Opéra Comique_, that
is to say, the singing parts being interspersed with spoken dialogue.
(It was not until later when “Faust” passed into the repertoire of the
_Opéra_ that this dialogue was replaced by recitatives.) The rôle of
Marguerite was first given to Mme. Ugalde, but Mme. Carvalho having
expressed a desire to take the rôle, after becoming acquainted with the
music, the authors transferred it to her and consoled Mme. Ugalde by
giving her the part of Mélodine in Victor Massé’s opera, “La Fée
Carabosse,” which was being mounted at the same time. The rehearsals of
“Faust” were very laborious. M. Carvalho, disconcerted by the new and
daring character of the music, and by the poetic sentiment revealed in
it, which he judged incompatible with stage requirements, picked a
quarrel with the composer, declared his score too much developed, and
constantly demanded new cuts and changes. Gounod, made uneasy by this
lack of confidence, had yielded to several of these demands and had
already consented to several suppressions, when at last M. Carvalho came
to him one day with a proposition to suppress the beautiful final scene
in the garden, fearing that this quiet scene, with no outburst or noise
of any kind, would seem cold to the public and fail to produce an
effect. This time Gounod, who had faith in his work and was conscious of
its value, stood fast and immovable, declaring he would rather withdraw
his score than to yield this point and consent to such a sacrifice. In
short, after a whole series of combats and discussions of this sort,
which were renewed daily, the work was finally brought out. Truth
compels the confession that it was not fully understood at first; that
the critics stood hesitating and undecided in the presence of a work so
new in form, and that the public itself was of two minds regarding the
value of the work, some applauding with enthusiasm while others harshly
criticised. It is certain that the first reception was more cold and
reserved than could have been desired, but gradually people began to
understand and appreciate the beauties abounding in this exquisite
score, and at last its success was complete, brilliant and
incontestable, spreading first throughout France, then over Europe, then
over the entire world, where “Faust” is to-day, and long has been,
considered a great masterpiece, and its author’s best work. “Faust” has
been played in all countries and translated into all languages. It is
one of the first French works which Italy, before then so hostile and
impenetrable to French music, has applauded with a sort of furor. In
Germany, where for a number of years Spohr’s “Faust” reigned supreme, it
was received in a triumphal manner, and completely dethroned the latter.
It excited enthusiasm, not only in Vienna, Berlin, Dresden, Hamburg,
Baden, Leipsic, Frankfort, Stuttgart and Darmstadt, not only in Milan,
Rome, Venice, Naples, Florence, Genoa, Parma and Bologna, but in London,
Moscow, St. Petersburg, Varsovie, Copenhagen, Stockholm, Brussels,
Amsterdam, Madrid, Barcelona, Lisbon, etc., and even finally crossed the
seas and became popular in the two Americas. It is perhaps the first
work by a French composer which had such a rapid, complete and universal
success. In Paris, “Faust” had been played more than four hundred times
at the _Théâtre-Lyrique_ when the _Opéra_ signified a desire to
appropriate it. The authors consented; but certain modifications were
necessitated by this change of scene, and first of all the spoken
dialogue had to be suppressed and replaced by recitatives. These changes
effected, the work made its appearance at the _Opéra_ March 3, 1869, and
there continued its successful career, counting five hundred
performances in the space of eighteen years. The five hundredth was
given on the 4th of November, 1887, and the six hundredth took place in
the beginning of the year 1892, so that in Paris alone, “Faust” has
already reached its thousandth performance. Such a success is without
parallel in the annals of the theatre in France.
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