It is suggestive to note that the earliest recognized function of music,
before it had learned to enslave itself to mere sensuous enjoyment, was
similar in spirit to that which its latest reformer demands for it in
the art of the future. The glory of its birth then shone on its brow. It
was the handmaid and minister of the religious instinct. The imagination
became afire with the mystery of life and Nature, and burst into the
flames and frenzies of rhythm. Poetry was born, but instantly sought the
wings of music for a higher flight than the mere word would permit. Even
the great epics of the "Iliad" and "Odyssey" were originally sung or
chanted by the Ilomerido, and the same essential union seems to have
been in some measure demanded afterward in the Greek drama, which, at
its best, was always inspired with the religious sentiment. There
is every reason to believe that the chorus of the drama ofÆschylus,
Sophocles, and Euripides uttered their comments on the action of the
play with such a prolongation and variety of pitch in the rhythmic
intervals as to constitute a sustained and melodic recitative. Music at
this time was an essential part of the drama. When the creative genius
of Greece had set toward its ebb, they were divorced, and music was only
set to lyric forms. Such remained the status of the art till, in the
Italian Renaissance, modern opera was born in the reunion of music and
the drama. Like the other arts, it assumed at the outset to be a mere
revival of antique traditions. The great poets of Italy had then passed
way, and it was left for music to fill the void.
The muse, Polyhymnia, soon emerged from the stage of childish
stammering. Guittone di Arezzo taught her to fix her thoughts in
indelible signs, and two centuries of training culminated in the
inspired composers, Orlando di Lasso and Pales-trina. Of the gradual
degradation of the operatic art as its forms became more elaborate and
fixed; of the arbitrary transfer of absolute musical forms like the
aria, duet, finale, etc., into the action of the opera without regard to
poetic propriety; of the growing tendency to treat the human voice like
any other instrument, merely to show its resources as an organ; of
the final utter bondage of the poet to the musician, till opera became
little more than a congeries of musico-gymnastic forms, wherein the
vocal soloists could display their art, it needs not to speak at length,
for some of these vices have not yet disappeared. In the language of
Dante's guide through the Inferno, at one stage of their wanderings,
when the sights were peculiarly mournful and desolate--
"Non raggioniam da lor, ma guarda e passa."
The loss of all poetic verity and earnestness in opera furnished the
great composer Gluck with the motive of the bitter and protracted
contest which he waged with varying success throughout Europe, though
principally in Paris. Gluck boldly affirmed, and carried out the
principle in his compositions, that the task of dramatic music was to
accompany the different phases of emotion in the text, and give them
their highest effect of spiritual intensity. The singer must be the
mouthpiece of the poet, and must take extreme care in giving the full
poetical burden of the song. Thus, the declamatory music became of
great importance, and Gluck's recitative reached an unequaled degree of
perfection.
The critics of Gluck's time hurled at him the same charges which are
familiar to us now as coming from the mouths and pens of the enemies of
Wagner's music. Yet Gluck, however conscious of the ideal unity between
music and poetry, never thought of bringing this about by a sacrifice
of any of the forms of his own peculiar art. His influence, however, was
very great, and the traditions of the great _maestro's_ art have
been kept alive in the works of his no less great disciples, Méhul,
Cherubini, Spontini, and Meyerbeer.
Two other attempts to ingraft new and vital power on the rigid and
trivial sentimentality of the Italian forms of opera were those of
Rossini and Weber. The former was gifted with the greatest affluence
of pure melodiousness ever given to a composer. But even his sparkling
originality and freshness did little more than reproduce the old forms
under a more attractive guise. Weber, on the other hand, stood in the
van of a movement which had its fountain-head in the strong romantic and
national feeling, pervading the whole of society and literature. There
was a general revival of mediaeval and popular poetry, with its balmy
odor of the woods, and fields, and streams. Weber's melody was the
direct offspring of the tunefulness of the German _Volkslied_, and so
it expressed, with wonderful freshness and beauty, all the range
of passion and sentiment within the limits of this pure and simple
language. But the boundaries were far too narrow to build upon them the
ultimate union of music and poetry, which should express the perfect
harmony of the two arts. While it is true that all of the great German
composers protested, by their works, against the spirit and character
of the Italian school of music, Wagner claims that the first abrupt and
strongly-defined departure toward a radical reform in art is found in
Beethoven's Ninth Symphony with chorus. Speaking of this remarkable leap
from instrumental to vocal music in a professedly symphonic composition,
Wagner, in his "Essay on Beethoven," says: "We declare that the work of
art, which was formed and quickened entirely by that deed, must present
the most perfect artistic form, i.e., that form in which, as for the
drama, so also and especially for music, every conventionality would
be abolished." Beethoven is asserted to have founded the new musical
school, when he admitted, by his recourse to the vocal cantata in the
greatest of his symphonic works, that he no longer recognized absolute
music as sufficient unto itself.
In Bach and Handel, the great masters of fugue and counterpoint; in
Rossini, Mozart, and Weber, the consummate creators of melody--then,
according to this view, we only recognize thinkers in the realm of pure
music. In Beethoven, the greatest of them all, was laid the basis of the
new epoch of tone-poetry. In the immortal songs of Schubert, Schumann,
Mendelssohn, Liszt, and Franz, and the symphonies of the first four,
the vitality of the reformatory idea is richly illustrated. In the
music-drama of Wagner, it is claimed by his disciples, is found the full
flower and development of the art-work.
William Richard Wagner, the formal projector of the great changes whose
details are yet to be sketched, was born at Leipsic in 1813. As a child
he displayed no very marked artistic tastes, though his ear and memory
for music were quite remarkable. When admitted to the Kreuzschule of
Dresden, the young student, however, distinguished himself by his very
great talent for literary composition and the classical languages. To
this early culture, perhaps, we are indebted for the great poetic power
which has enabled him to compose the remarkable libretti which have
furnished the basis of his music. His first creative attempt was a
blood-thirsty drama, where forty-two characters are killed, and the few
survivors are haunted by the ghosts. Young Wagner soon devoted himself
to the study of music, and, in 1833, became a pupil of Theodor Weinlig,
a distinguished teacher of harmony and counterpoint. His four years of
study at this time were also years of activity in creative experiment,
as he composed four operas.
His first opera of note was "Rienzi," with which he went to Paris
in 1837. In spite of Meyerbeer's efforts in its favor, this work was
rejected, and laid aside for some years. Wagner supported himself by
musical criticism and other literary work, and soon was in a position
to offer another opera, "Der fliegende Hollander," to the authorities of
the Grand Opera-House. Again the directors refused the work, but were so
charmed with the beauty of the libretto that they bought it to be
reset to music. Until the year 1842, life was a trying struggle for the
indomitable young musician. "Rienzi" was then produced at Dresden, so
much to the delight of the King of Saxony that the composer was made
royal Kapellmeister and leader of the orchestra. The production of
"Der fliegende Hollander" quickly followed; next came "Tanhäuser"
and "Lohengrin," to be swiftly succeeded by the "Meistersinger von
Nürnberg." This period of our _maestro's_ musical activity also
commenced to witness the development of his theories on the philosophy
of his art, and some of his most remarkable critical writings were then
given to the world.
Political troubles obliged Wagner to spend seven years of exile in
Zurich; thence he went to London, where he remained till 1861 as
conductor of the London Philharmonic Society. In 1861 the exile
returned to his native country, and spent several years in Germany and
Russia--there having arisen quite a _furore_ for his music in the latter
country. The enthusiasm awakened in the breast of King Louis of Bavaria
by "Der fliegende Holländer" resulted in a summons to Wagner to settle
at Munich, and with the glories of the Royal Opera-House in that
city his name has since been principally connected. The culminating
art-splendor of his life, however, was the production of his stupendous
tetralogy, the "Ring der Nibelungen," at the great opera-house at
Baireuth, in the summer of the year 1876.