THE FOUNDING OF GERMAN OPERA AT THE
METROPOLITAN—DEATH OF MY FATHER
The Metropolitan Opera House was built in 1882 by a group of rich New
Yorkers who, feeling themselves shut out by the older aristocracy who
owned the old Academy of Music and occupied all the boxes at the Italian
Opera seasons of Colonel Mapleson, determined to have an opera of their
own. They leased their new house for the inaugural season of 1883-84 to
Abbey, Schoeffel, and Grau, a firm of theatrical speculators and
managers who had made a name for themselves by the tours of Mary
Anderson and other celebrated “stars” of Europe and America.
The Metropolitan Opera stockholders had appointed as architect a man
whose reputation had been made in building churches, but who knew
nothing of theatrical or operatic requirements, or of the latest
developments in Europe in the construction of the stage and modern stage
appliances. As a result, the stage arrangements were of the most clumsy
description. Great walls, many feet thick, ran beneath the stage from
the front to the rear, thereby precluding the possibility of a
“transformation” scene in which one set of scenery could sink into the
ground while the other descended from above. The parquet floor was
placed so low that the orchestra pit, which was supposed to be an
imitation (but was not) of the sunken orchestra at Bayreuth, had to be
placed still lower and in consequence the conductor was perched on a
kind of pulpit high in the air so that the singers could see him. He had
to gesticulate wildly upward toward the singers and downward toward the
abyss in which the orchestra fiddled without being able properly to see
his gestures. Besides this, the orchestra, being so far from the stage,
was almost inaudible to the singers, and this often resulted in the most
disastrous dropping of the pitch, especially in the concerted numbers.
Years later and at huge expense some of these faults of construction
were corrected.
For their season Abbey, Schoeffel, and Grau engaged a large number of
operatic stars, including Nilsson, Patti, Sembrich, Trebelli, and many
others of distinction, but there was absolutely no artistic head of the
enterprise nor any one who had had any real managerial experience with
grand opera, and in consequence all these stars stepped on each other’s
feet and trains and the confusion was incredible. Good performances were
an accident, as the principal artists usually deemed it beneath their
dignity to attend rehearsals, and the season ended in failure and the
bankruptcy of Abbey, Schoeffel, and Grau. Colonel Mapleson, the astute
manager of the Academy of Music, rubbed his hands with glee at this
downfall of what he called “the new yellow brewery on Broadway.” The
directors of the Metropolitan were at a loss what to do with their
elephant. Their president was James Roosevelt, an uncle of Hilborn
Roosevelt who was then president of the New York Symphony Society and
who was a stanch and devoted friend of my father’s. He suggested to his
uncle that my father be appointed as director and that a season of opera
in German be inaugurated, as Italian opera was evidently on the wane and
Wagner, especially, on the ascendant.
The directors thought well of this scheme and accordingly made an
arrangement with my father under which he should become director of the
opera for the season 1884-85 and that he should engage a company of
German singers of which, however, Madame Materna must be one, as she had
sung with great success at the Theodore Thomas Festival of the preceding
year and they wanted some name already known in America to head the list
of singers.
This meant a complete revolution in operatic affairs, as until then
Italian opera had been the only fashionable form of musical
entertainment. Opera in German was rather looked down upon and Wagner’s
genius was as yet too imperfectly known or recognized to exercise much
influence on the opera-going folks of that time.
My father was to receive a salary of ten thousand dollars, for which he
was to act as manager and also as musical conductor of the season. The
salary was certainly not large, even for those days, but my father was
glad to get it and at the same time to carry out the dream of his life,
the introduction of the Wagner music-dramas to America, and to sweep
away forever the artificial and shallow operas of the old Italian school
with which Mapleson, Max Strakosh, and others had until then principally
fed our public.
He sailed for Europe in May and returned in August with all his
contracts made, including Madame Materna, to whom he had to pay a
thousand dollars a night, as she had gotten wind of the dictum of the
Metropolitan Opera House directors that under all circumstances she must
be one of the company.
Among the singers were Marianne Brandt, one of the greatest dramatic
mezzo-sopranos and contraltos of our times, and Anton Schott, a typical
German “heroic tenor,” with whom Bülow had had his famous altercation at
Hanover a few years before at a “Lohengrin” performance. Schott had sung
_Lohengrin’s_ “Farewell to the Swan” out of tune and this had so
irritated Bülow, who was conducting, that he turned on the unfortunate
tenor and said to him: “You are not a Knight of the Swan, but a Knight
of the Swine.” Schott, as an ex-officer in a Hanoverian regiment, deemed
his honor as an officer insulted, demanded an apology or a duel, and as
the irate von Bülow would grant him neither the one nor the other, Bülow
had to resign his post as director of the Royal Opera, while Schott
remained triumphant in his position.
For the youthful lyric soprano rôles my father had engaged Madame
Seidl-Kraus, the wife of Anton Seidl and possessor of a voice of great
purity and simple appeal. The coloratura rôles were sung by Madame
Schroeder-Hanfstangel, a truly great artist, with the real _bel canto_
of the Italian school, whom Gounod had admired so greatly that he
invited her to Paris to sing _Marguerite_ in “Faust” at the Grand Opera.
The other singers possessed both the virtues and the failings of the
German Opera School of that time. They were very amenable to ensemble
work, carrying out the dramatic side of their rôles with real ability,
forming an excellent ensemble, and tireless in rehearsing, but their
singing was sometimes faulty and not equal to the naturally beautiful
tone emission of the best Italian singers.
The stage-manager, Wilhelm Hock, was one of the best in Germany and his
management of the movements of great crowds on the stage, as for
instance in “Lohengrin” on the arrival of _Lohengrin_ and the _Swan_,
the building of the barricades in “Massaniello,” the Coronation Scene in
Meyerbeer’s “Le Prophète,” was a revelation to our public. The orchestra
was, of course, that of the New York Symphony Society, and my father
infused the entire ensemble with such an ideal of perfection that during
many of the performances, especially in “Lohengrin,” “Le Prophète,”
“Fidelio,” and “Walküre,” the public seethed with excitement and
enthusiasm. There had been an “improvised” performance of “Walküre” at
the Academy of Music under the German conductor Neuendorf a few years
before. The _Brunhilde_ had been sung by Madame Pappenheim, possessor of
a glorious voice, but the rest of the cast had been woefully deficient.
Insufficient rehearsals and ignorance of the music of Wagner on the part
of the conductor had also prevented this performance from making any
impression or giving any real idea of the beauties of the work.
The performance under my father included Madame Materna as _Brunhilde_,
who had created the rôle in Bayreuth in ’76 and who was then at the very
height of her glorious vocal powers; Madame Seidl-Kraus, an exquisite
and pathetic _Sieglinde_; Anton Schott, a vigorous and highly dramatic
_Siegmund_; and Staudigl as _Wotan_. Staudigl was a son of the famous
old Viennese bass with whom he had studied, singing with such good
results that he made as fine an impression in concert and oratorio as in
opera. The first barytone was Adolf Robinson, who had begun his career
with my father in Breslau and whose warm impassioned _bel canto_ won
instant recognition here.
There was no professional opera claque at the Metropolitan in those days
such as is now maintained by some of the singers and conductors who, in
rivalry with each other, foolishly spend their money in the hiring of
twenty to fifty husky men, under a well-trained leader, who stand at the
side of the balconies and family circle and clap with the machine-like
regularity of a steel hammer in an iron foundry in order to produce so
and so many recalls after an act. In those days this was not necessary.
The public applauded wildly and shouted themselves hoarse of their own
free will, and the papers almost unanimously pronounced the performances
an artistic revolution, and said that such dramatic truth and ensemble
work had but seldom before been presented in such a convincing way on
the operatic stage of New York.
During the entire winter I lived in a sea of excitement and of joy at
seeing my father’s genius at last so universally recognized. But my
anxiety was also very great. I was with him constantly, from morning
until night, and could see that the labor of carrying everything
entirely on his shoulders, the effort of organizing an artistic whole
out of the many different elements, was overwhelming. The rehearsals
often lasted all day and I do not think that I missed a rehearsal or a
performance during the entire season. Sometimes I would timidly implore
my father to put some of the work, especially the managerial part, on
other shoulders, but he would not listen, saying that the responsibility
was his and that he could not delegate what he conceived to be his
solemn duty as one representing German art in a foreign country to any
one else.
In the meantime, the directors, after deliberating on their future
course, decided that opera in German had come to stay and offered my
father a contract for the following year in which, however, with what
they conceived to be real business methods, they reduced his salary to
eight thousand dollars but offered him a share in any possible profits.
Money matters were to my father always so unimportant as far as he was
concerned, that I think he would have signed a contract in which he
bound himself to pay eight thousand dollars a year to the Metropolitan
Opera House for the privilege of maintaining Wagnerian opera there. He
accepted their proposition and was happy in the evident security of
opera in German for many years to come. During this winter he would not
give up his beloved Symphony and Oratorio Societies, and he always
insisted that the weekly Thursday-evening rehearsals with the chorus of
the Oratorio Society were a rest for him from operatic affairs.
During one of these rehearsals in February 1885 (I think we were
preparing the “Requiem” of Verdi) he suddenly complained of feeling ill
and I rushed from the piano toward him, and together with some of the
singers we carried him to a cab and brought him home.
Pneumonia set in and he was too worn with the gigantic struggles of the
winter to withstand it. During this terrible week of illness the opera
had to be kept going and I conducted “Walküre” and “Tannhäuser” without
much difficulty. They had been so splendidly rehearsed by my father and
had been performed several times; I knew them by heart, and artists,
chorus, and orchestra gave me the most affectionate and willing
assistance. I have therefore never claimed much credit for what many
kind friends at that time considered an extraordinary feat.
The season had only one more week to run, but my father had made
arrangements for a short tour comprising Chicago, Boston, and
Philadelphia.
On February 15 he died and left me numb and overwhelmed by the terrible
responsibilities which began to press in upon me. Even at this late date
I cannot bear to write of my loss. Our relations had become so close and
intimate, and during the last years he had so often leaned on me with
such sweet confidence. I had always looked up to him as my ideal of a
man and musician, and it seemed to me that I could never smile again.
The last performances at the Metropolitan immediately after his death
were conducted by John Lund, a highly talented chorus master who has
since made his home in America, but there were so many immediate
necessities crowding in upon me that I had no opportunity for indulging
in quiet grief. Events moved with incredible and terrible swiftness. The
contracts for the tour had to be met. My father’s estate was technically
liable, although he left literally no money. There was no one to assume
the responsibility of taking the company on tour except poor me, and I
accordingly set forth, together with the entire company of about a
hundred and fifty members, on a special train of the West Shore Railroad
for Chicago on Saturday afternoon of February 21. We were to open with
“Tannhäuser” at the Columbia Theatre on the following Monday evening.
During this trip the worst blizzard of the year struck our train. We
were completely snowed in and the road, which was at that time a rather
lame rival of the New York Central, was so ill-equipped with means to
shovel us out that instead of arriving on Sunday evening, we did not get
into Chicago until Monday at eight P. M., the hour at which the
performance was to have begun. My dear brother Frank, who had come on
from Denver to meet me in Chicago and to discuss future plans, boarded
our train a little while out of Chicago and told me that not only was
the house sold out, but all had determined to wait until we arrived and
chivalrously to “see us through.” The mayor of the city had made an
excited speech from the proscenium box in which he was sitting and said
that Chicago must help a young man like myself who had so courageously
undertaken to carry on the great work of his father.
When we arrived at the station the company were quickly bundled into
cabs and omnibuses. Luckily the scenery had been sent on ahead, but the
costume and property trunks were on our train, and the work of
transferring them and getting out the “Tannhäuser” costumes and
properties was agonizing.
Materna and I were the first to arrive at the theatre, and we were
marched through the auditorium from the front entrance by the local
manager who wished to give this ocular demonstration of our presence.
The audience cheered.
Behind the scenes the confusion was incredible. The trunks with the wigs
could not be found, nor the trunks with the footwear, and _Tannhäuser_
and the other singers of the Wartburg, together with the noble lords and
ladies, appeared on the stage in a most remarkable combination of
costumes, mediæval and modern. But it made no difference. I began the
overture after ten o’clock. The audience cheered themselves hoarse.
The trunk containing Materna’s costume as _Elizabeth_ was not hurled on
the stage until just before the beginning of the second act. It made no
difference. When she appeared in all her smiling radiance and sang “Dich
Theure Halle” the audience again went mad with delight, and so on until
the curtain finally fell at one-thirty in the morning.
Ever since that terrible but wonderful evening I have had a soft spot in
my heart for Chicago, and during the many years I have never lost the
friendship of that remarkable city. Even to-day, every now and then, an
old gray-headed or bald-headed citizen of Chicago comes to me and says:
“Do you remember that first performance of ‘Tannhäuser’ at the Columbia
Theatre in February, 1885?”
The success was so great that we extended our season an extra week,
during which I produced for the first time “La Dame Blanche” by
Boieldieu.
We finished our tour with a week in Boston, where we had a similarly
enthusiastic reception, and especially “Walküre” and “Lohengrin” made a
profound impression. There I produced (for the first time in America, I
think) Gluck’s “Orpheus,” in which Marianne Brandt gave a glorious and
touching impersonation of the title-rôle. It is characteristic of the
audacity of youth that I should have given two new performances of
operas which were rehearsed and produced while we were on tour, “La Dame
Blanche” and “Orpheus.” But as the principal rôles had been sung by most
of our artists in Germany, these two operas being in the regular
repertoire of every German opera-house, the feat was not so
extraordinary. The performances were good in ensemble and gave great
pleasure to the audience.
My farewell performance in Boston was a Saturday matinée of the
“Walküre” with Materna as _Brunhilde_. In the morning the orchestra
struck. We had made arrangements to send the entire company to New York
on one of the large Fall River steamers, but they vowed that they would
not go by steamer and insisted on being sent by train. I was equally
determined to send them by water. The steamers were palatial, the
weather excellent spring weather, and there was no valid reason for
objecting. When they persisted in their demands I told them that I would
consider them as having broken their contracts, that I would not pay
them their salaries for the week, and would give the “Walküre”
performance accompanied on two pianos, by John Lund and myself. This
was, of course, a crazy bluff, but it worked and they decided to accept
passage by steamer.
At the close of the third act of “Walküre,” when Materna as _Brunhilde_
had snuggled into the artificially deep hollow of the rocky couch which
sustained her bulky form and on which she was to begin her slumber of
years until the hero, _Siegfried_, should awaken her, and when Staudigl
(_Wotan_) had disappeared in the flames, I suddenly noticed, while
conducting the beautiful monotony of the last E-major chords of the Fire
Charm, that the grass mats just below _Brunhilde’s_ couch had caught
fire, and that just as the curtain was descending slowly on the last
bars a Boston fireman with helmet on his head and bucket in his hand
quietly came out from the wings and poured a liberal dose of water on
the flames. The thing happened so late and so quickly that there was no
panic. The people went mad with enthusiasm and Materna, Staudigl, and I
had to bow our farewells many, many times. Just after one of these
recalls I noted the little fireman standing in the wings and saying: “Be
jabbers, I ought to come out too.”
“So you should,” I said, and with that took him by one hand and Materna
by the other and thus we dragged him before the footlights where, with
true Hibernian sense of humor, he bowed right and left with a delighted
grin on his face.
Thus ended my first opera tour.
While I was on tour the directors of the Metropolitan Opera House met to
consider their future policy, and, in view of the success of the opera
in German inaugurated by my father, they decided to continue on the same
lines. Curiously enough they appointed a young man as director of the
opera who had never had any managerial or musical experience in his
life. His name was Edmund C. Stanton. He was a relative of one of the
directors and had acted as recording secretary for the Board of
Directors. He was tall, good-looking, with gentle brown eyes, always
well groomed, of a kindly disposition and the most perfect and courtly
manners which indeed never failed him and which were about all that he
had left at the end of his seven years’ incumbency, at which time the
German opera crumbled to dust as a natural result of his curious
ignorance and incompetency in matters operatic. The directors at the
same time very generously appointed me as his assistant and as second
conductor, granting me a salary which was large enough to enable me to
support my mother and my father’s family decently. This was naturally a
great relief to me and I determined to strain every nerve to show myself
worthy of such confidence and generosity.