DR. HANS RICHTER.
(_October 20, 1897._)
The genius of musical interpretation is a phenomenon of modern times.
Beethoven marks the end of that great symphonic period which begins with
Haydn, and though seventy years before the production of Beethoven's
greatest symphony, Joseph Haydn had been drilling the little Esterhazy
orchestra and trying to secure satisfactory performances, yet to the end
of Beethoven's time the most important orchestras were usually filled up
with amateurs for those special occasions on which a symphony was to be
performed. It seems certain that the notion of a rendering actually
corresponding to a symphonic composer's ideal intentions never dawned on
musicians as a practical possibility till long after the greatest of
symphonic composers was dead and buried.
Beethoven, no less than Sebastian Bach, often wrote for the future--not
even for the next generation, but for the distant future. And
Mendelssohn, who re-discovered Sebastian Bach and did so much to stir up
the lethargy of his musical contemporaries and re-awaken interest in
the great works of the past--did not Mendelssohn announce, as a general
principle for the guidance of conductors, that they should beware of
slow _tempi_, and take everything at a good pace, so that the faults of
phrasing might not be too obvious?
The very terms in which the recommendation was couched show that
Mendelssohn was not unconscious of the faults that marred the best
orchestral playing of his time; but being of a mild, easy-going
disposition, he was not the man to expect impossibilities--such is the
ordinary musician's term for any exertion a little out of his ordinary
routine. It was reserved for a more masterful mind to expect
impossibilities, and to obtain them.
When the works of Wagner began to attract attention, consternation fell
on all the old-fashioned conductors of Germany, the "Pig-tails" as
Wagner never wearied of calling them. Life was not worth living, they
felt, if they had to deal with such scores, and then lamentations were
reinforced by the bandsmen, who found that countless passages written by
Wagner were impossible of performance.
But it so happened, as if by a special Providence, that along with
Wagner certain performing musicians, who were not so easily frightened,
had been ripening towards their life's task. From Liszt and Von Bülow
presently came demonstrations of the fact that Wagner's music was not so
impossible as at first thought to be, though requiring a method of
interpretation different from that of the "Pig-tails." In 1869 appeared
Wagner's pamphlet "On Conducting," just three years after his first
meeting with Hans Richter, and, whatever may be thought of the style of
that pamphlet, it is beyond question that it marks the beginning of a
new era in the history of orchestral music. Besides Richter, all modern
conductors of world-wide reputation--Bülow, Levi, Seidl, Weingartner and
Richard Strauss--were found in the same school. They learned from Wagner
how to play Beethoven, and their method has revolutionised the musical
world.
Now that Bülow is gone, the acknowledged leader and master of them all
is Hans Richter, the incarnate genius of musical interpretation.
To Richter's influence and example, far more than to anything else that
could be named, is due that prodigious improvement in the standard of
orchestral performance all over the world, which is the most notable
feature in the history of music during the past thirty years.
Principally owing to Richter's matchless combination of artistic
enthusiasm, practical mastery, and genial good sense, we now hear things
that musical prophets and wise men, such as Beethoven desired to hear
and had not heard.
Hans Richter belongs to a German family of musicians. He was born at
Raab, in Hungary, in 1843, and, after a good musical grounding, entered
the Conservatorium at Vienna in 1859. He chose the horn as his principal
instrument, but his gift for playing musical instruments was so
prodigiously strong that in the course of a few years he acquired the
technical control of all the more important instruments in the
orchestra, besides pianoforte and organ.
One of the earliest appointments that he held was that of principal
horn-player at the Imperial Opera in Vienna. After quitting the
Conservatorium he continued his studies under Sechter, the celebrated
contrapuntist, and thus when the great opportunity of his life came he
approached his task with magnificent and perhaps unparalleled resources,
in respect of practical and theoretical knowledge. The opportunity came
in 1866--Wagner, then living in Switzerland, wanted a competent musician
to help him in preparing the score of "Meistersinger" for the press.
To Vienna, then, as now, the metropolis of the musical world, he
forwarded the request that such a musician should be found and
despatched to him at Triebschen, near Lucerne. The choice fell on
Richter, and thus the two great men, the exact complements of each other
as regards their artistic power became acquainted. Richter took up his
residence in Wagner's house; the great composer, who possessed a
Napoleonic eye for talent, at once appreciated the immense powers of his
youthful colleague, and an alliance sprang up between the two men which
only terminated at Wagner's death.
Trial performances with orchestras brought together from the musicians
of Zürich and Lucerne quickly convinced the Wagnerian circle of
Richter's genius for selecting, training and conducting an orchestra,
while the preparation of the "Meistersinger" score was carried out to
the composer's complete satisfaction. Those who examined the fair copy
of Richter's handwriting which was on view at the Musical and Theatrical
Exhibition of 1892 in Vienna can testify to the marvellous neatness as
well as to the technical correctness and good style of Richter's
manuscript. It should be remembered, too, that the score of
"Meistersinger" was at that time by far the most intricate in existence,
and is even now only surpassed in elaborate complexity by "Tristan."
But not only with the preparation of the score was Richter concerned.
Long before Wagner had put the final touches to "Meistersinger," Richter
had taken the solo and choral parts to Munich, and had there personally
trained the singers who were to take part in the first production. The
style was so new and so perplexing to the musicians of the day that
Richter encountered apparently insuperable obstacles at every turn.
Nevertheless, everything was carried through to a brilliantly successful
issue, and the first performance of "Meistersinger," which took place at
Munich in June, 1868, was really the first great triumph of the
Wagnerian cause. Though Bülow was at the conductor's desk, it is
unquestionable that the labour of Hercules, which was necessary to bring
the work to a first hearing, was performed in the main by Richter.
At the sixth performance the representative of Kothner fell ill, and, at
the last moment, Richter stepped into the breach, donned the costume of
Kothner, and sang and acted the part with great success. No wonder a
distinguished critic should have said that Wagner's "Meistersinger" has
become part of Richter's flesh and blood.
He prepared the score; he trained all the singers and players for the
first performance; he has conducted countless brilliant representations
of the entire work, and on one occasion, at any rate, he enacted one of
the characters. The qualities exhibited by Richter in connection with
the production of "Meistersinger" caused him to be appointed
fellow-director with Bülow at the Royal Opera in Munich, and when Bülow
resigned in the following year Richter stood alone in that post.
The impatience of the King of Bavaria to have Wagner's immense
"Nibelung" trilogy performed was the cause of a premature attempt to
present "Rheingold" before the extraordinary _mise-en-scène_ required by
that work was ready. Rather than take part in an unworthy rendering,
Richter tendered his resignation and quitted the brilliant post to which
he had been so recently appointed. Thus early did Richter show the stuff
of which he was made. He had absolutely nothing else in view. He simply
had to look about for employment, and we next find him in Paris, working
in combination with Pasdeloup, who was engaged in a scheme for bringing
out "Rienzi" at the Théatre Lyrique. The scheme came to nothing, but the
authorities of the Théatre de la Monnaie in Brussels, who had heard of
Richter's fame, invited him to come and superintend the first production
of "Lohengrin" in French which they were preparing.
With "Lohengrin" in Brussels he was no less successful than with
"Meistersinger" in Munich. Though at first everyone found the music
"impossible," on March 21st, 1870 a magnificent performance was
achieved. As an example of the difficulties with which Richter had to
contend in preparing for that performance, it may be mentioned that he
found the choral singers at the theatre incapable of rendering their
parts, and had to teach them, note by note, like children. Yet in the
public performance there was no trace of these miseries, everything went
with freedom and spontaneity, and ever since the first production under
Richter "Lohengrin" has been a great feature of the Brussels repertory.
After fulfilling his engagement in Brussels, Richter returned to
Triebschen, near Lucerne, where he found Wagner just finishing that
colossal work, the "Ring of the Nibelung." It seems almost incredible
that in addition to their gigantic labours in bringing what was almost a
new art into existence, these remarkable men should have found means at
this period of devoting much time to the study of Beethoven's string
quartets. Richter took part regularly in the quartet playing, and he
considers these hours during which he was initiated by Wagner into the
deepest mysteries of Beethoven's art among the most valuable of his
experiences. In the same year, 1870, Wagner finished his "Siegfried
Idyll," a lovely _aubade_ that was written in honour of his infant son's
birthday. Richter had been entrusted with the task of getting together a
small orchestra in Lucerne, and of rehearsing the new work with them. On
the appointed day the musicians assembled on the steps of the villa at
Triebschen and performed the piece under Richter's direction to the
delight of the Wagner household, among whom the "Siegfried Idyll" is
generally known as the "Treppenmusik" (from "Treppe," a stair or flight
of steps).
The following year Richter accepted an invitation to Buda-Pesth, and
there he remained until, in 1875, he was appointed conductor at the
Imperial Opera in Vienna, a post that he still (in 1897) holds. Thus
the Austrian Capital became for the second time his home and the centre
of his activity, and, indeed, those who know him well, know that in
spite of all cosmopolitan experiences, Richter is "ein echter Wiener"--a
true child of Vienna.
The next "labour of Hercules" was the bringing out of Wagner's trilogy,
the "Ring of the "Nibelungs" with which the Bayreuth theatre was
inaugurated in 1876. During the rehearsals Wagner sat on the stage
directing the actors and Richter stood at the conductor's desk.
Now that the work has become familiar we have lost all standard for
estimating the task which Richter undertook and once more carried
through to a brilliantly successful conclusion.
That vast scene which occupies four evenings in performance he seemed to
have at his fingers' ends. Such was the impression made by Richter upon
all who were concerned, either actively, or merely as spectators and
listeners, in the inaugural Festival of 1876 at Bayreuth that they
recognised him as a new phenomenon in the world of art.
The period of modern orchestral conducting may be said to date from that
occasion. It was then brought home to everyone that conducting was a
great art worthy of independent cultivation. The public began to take an
interest in the style of different conductors, and to show some
sensitiveness as regards interpretations of the great masters. The era
of the "Pig-tails" had come to an end.
In 1877 Richter came with Wagner to London, and ever since that year the
"Richter Concerts" have been a regular institution in this country. In
Vienna, the city of his adoption, he is conductor, not only at the
opera, but also of the Philharmonic Concerts, and latterly of the music
in the Imperial Chapel.
Of late years Richter has conceived a certain dislike to the theatre,
where he finds his work beset with small worries. He is coming to regard
the concert-hall more and more as his special sphere of activity. Upon
Richter's art as a conductor a good-sized book might be written. Here I
can attempt no more than to enumerate a few of his qualities:--Practical
knowledge of the technique belonging to all the more important
instruments; mastery of musical theory in all its branches; an unerring
rhythmical sense; judgment and insight with regard to every possible
musical style, enabling him always to find the right tempo for any
movement or section of a movement (the most important and most difficult
thing for a conductor); mastery of the principles discovered by Wagner
respecting orchestral dynamics, such as the necessity of equably
sustained tone without crescendo or diminuendo, as a basis to start upon
the conditions determining proper balance of strings and wind, the
nature of a round-toned _piano_ delivery (to be studied from first-rate
singers), the manner of producing long crescendos and diminuendos, also
of producing a true _piano_ and a true _forte_ (Wagner having pointed
out that old-fashioned orchestras never played anything but
mezzo-forte); mastery of Wagner's system of phrasing, his far-reaching
investigations with regard to _cantabile_ passages, his treatment of
_fermate_, his distinction between the naïf _allegro_ and the poetic
_allegro_; mastery and practical realisation of all Wagner's other
ideas concerning musical interpretation or public performances, a
subject in which Wagner took a far more deep, expert and fruitful
interest than any other of the great composers.
Finally, Richter is distinguished from most other conductors by his
personal behaviour at the conductor's desk. He is free from antics;
every movement has significance and every attitude has dignity.