that interior truth which all art seeks to reveal, and whose beauty and
grace appear in painting and sculpture. The interpreters of that harmony
are sounds, which are related to music as colors to painting, and the
fullest expression is given to them by instrumental combination. The human
voice in respect of the art is valuable as an instrument, and in
suppleness may exceed mechanical contrivances; wherefore one readily
understands why a mighty chorus is introduced in the finale of the
grandest symphony, that the whole effect may be duly crowned, and the
appeal to the heart be assured by the union of human sounds. But with such
an effect words have nothing to do. The charm of the foreign opera to us
Americans is, that the full music of the Masters is received with
syllables meaning to us no more than the fa-sol-la of the gamut. The
reason of this is very evident. If the poetry be good it has a rhythm and
cadence of its own which resembles music, but in respect of art belongs to
poetry and not to music. Arbitrarily united with melody the words obtrude
a meaning which the music may not suggest, though the capacity of fine
music is equal to any words. The beauty of Schubert's songs is their
completeness. They are lyrics, and the words are only an addition. Those
who heard Rakemann play the translated serenade will remember that the
instrumentation produced the whole effect of the song. If the music be
fine, it gives all the sentiment of the words in its own way. It is like
painting a statue to unite them. Sometimes, indeed, one feels that both
are written from the same mood in the grandest minds. The mysterious
charms of Goethe's song of Mignon, to which Beethoven wrote the music, is
that the song is the expression of the same awe-struck yearning which
wails and thunders through the music of the master. In the melody alone
all the wild vagueness and dim aspiration of the song are manifest, and
only because the union is perfect is the impression uniform. Should
Wilhelm Meister be lost to literature the blossom of Mignon's life would
still bloom in the music.
The same necessity which divided art into the arts ordains their practical
separation. Because they are divisions of one their impression is similar.
They work to the same end, but each has a way. To complete the harmony,
the soprano, and the tenor, and the bass, must all strictly observe their
parts. So must the arts. It is a mournful degradation when the composer
would make his sounds, colors, as those who heard the battle of Waterloo
symphony will not soon forget. Without his interference, the relation
between his art and the rest will be preserved. In his symphony he is the
spiritual significance of the Apollo and the Iliad; and the graceful,
romantic songs of Mozart are in the drops of poetry scattered upon the old
drama, and in the infinite, tender beauty of Raphael's pictures. Yet this
is a likeness as between woods and waters, and with which we have nothing
to do.
If a reply be sought to the question, why the grandest compositions of
this art are more generally impressive than the efforts of the pure
science, it may be reached in various ways. The old masters, doubtless,
obeyed an unconscious instinct in joining words to their music. Then, as
now, the art was in its young years, and the words served as a dictionary
to the student. Merely as a dictionary, for the deep significance of the
thing could not be apprehended until that was thrown aside, and the
scholar read and spoke and lived in that high language as in his daily
speech. The best American critic of the art says, speaking of the Messiah,
"Feeling that it was time now to do something more worthy his genius, and
more fitting his years, as he was getting old, he resolved to draw from
all the sources of his art, and put forth all his power, to make an
eloquent exposition of his faith in music, and interpret the Bible thus to
the hearts of all men." And yet, hitherto, have not the sublime fragments
he culled from the Bible served as expositors of the Oratorio? The Messiah
is the celebration, in Handel's way, of the great things of his life,
which, more or less, are the remarkable experience of all men, and which
receive the grandest verbal expression in the Bible. Having this same
confession to make, and obeying a different means from Moses and the
apostles, a means which few could understand, what remained but to
transcribe the sublimest verbal record men knew, and tell them that that
was a free translation of his thought. So, in later times, Beethoven
replied to one who asked the meaning of a sonata, "Read Shakespeare's
Tempest." With the masses and operas of modern times the case is the same.
Genius, which is plenitude of power, adapts itself to all facts. It will
receive the outline of a story and weave upon it a wonderful web, which
the story shall interpret. But an opera of Mozart's reveals to the
voiceless player its whole magnificence. Trilling Prima Donnas and silvery
Italian are the addenda and vocabulary. They are the "this is the man,
this the beast" written under the picture. The severe beauty of the art is
immediately injured by any encroachment upon the others. The highest
praise awarded to the most successful of such attempts is that of
imitation. Haydn would represent the growing of grass and the budding of
trees--a beautiful conceit, but a false perception of his art. Art has
little to do with imitation. The best portrait is not the fac-simile of a
face, but the suggestion of a character. Music has not to do with form but
thought. The Germans derive no more pleasure from the songs of their
masters than we who may not know their language.
The second question is that of persons who do not understand the claims of
music to the dignity of an art, whom pleasant old songs pleasantly lull to
sleep after dinner; to whom comes no voice of the art separate from all
things else, but which stands before him silent and veiled, while an
interpreter converses. Often these songs are beautiful ballads, and so
have a peculiar grace. If the music is appropriate and simple and
melodious it is enough, and henceforth, to such, no artist who does not
play tunes is more than a quack; and the complaint of the man who sat
hearing Ole Bull for an hour, and then departed because he was so long
tuning his fiddle, is the most general criticism upon his performance. But
the old Scotch and Irish airs, which endear these songs to us, were
doubtless, at some remote period, the wordless singings of maternal love
over the rocking-cradle. They become readily united with words as a help
to the memory, and as imparting facility of expression. Those who have
heard "Auld Robin Gray," "Robin Adair," and the airs which Moore has
gratefully accompanied with words, played on summer evenings, with flutes
and horns, then realize that the impression lies in that which the words
shadow. This fact is recognized in modern music by the introduction of
songs without words--by the composition and performance, with more or less
success, of Beethoven's symphonies, where most of all words are at fault.
The pleasure of him to whom these profound compositions reveal a meaning
is more private and enchanting than any he knows. He is very well content
to be called enthusiastic, for his presence along justifies the
performance of such works. When he meets at the concert-room those who are
enraptured with Donizetti, yet who come to do homage to Beethoven, he is
reminded that Beethoven would not see Rossini, holding him as one who
debased the art; and it seems to him like Jesus calling upon the Jews to
become as little children. Everybody reads Shakespeare, but few know what
the word means. The theatre is crowded to hear Macready's "Hamlet," but it
is to see Macready, not to study the drama. When he is gone the play
remains; and though it is spoken by stupid men, their dulness cannot
affect its profundity and strength. That is the test of art, that it
transcends its instruments; and the artist at his piano realizes the soul,
though not the effect of the symphony which has spoken to him so loudly
from the orchestra.
The music written at this day is gymnastics for the instrument, rather
than worthy offerings upon the altar of art. It is a perverse separation
of the art and the science. It requires an accurate knowledge of the
instrument that it may surprise, and so win applause for the performer;
not that it may the better serve music, whether it has auditors or not.
Few things could have more deeply pained a worthy musician than the last
concert of Max Bohrer. Such profound knowledge of the power of the
instrument, such utter ignorance of its intention. It seemed to groan in
despair, that he, who knew its changes so well, could not awaken it to
melody, but, with solemn conceit, show that he did know them, and gain
approbation for that knowledge. Knoop, with the same exact science, showed
a hearty reverence for art, and reverently withdrew himself and his
violoncello. Castellan's voice was so full that her person was necessarily
forgotten. One would not do injustice to the voice; that is frequently the
instrument for which fine music is written; but in view of the art, it is
an instrument only. Its deeper effect upon many minds springs from its
humanity, from that part of it of which nothing can be said, and which the
coal-man has as well as Malibran. This constitutes its occasional
superiority of influence, but cannot impart to it the effect and artistic
manifestation which instruments produce. When the full force of both is
united, as in the symphony mentioned, the grandest musical expression
appears.
The winter has been full of finer musical experience than we have yet had.
With Ole Bull, Vieuxtemps, and Knoop, Castellan and Damoreau--the
Beethoven symphonies and German overtures of the Philharmonic Society, the
art has reached a point hitherto unattained. Yet this is partly deceptive.
Most persons heard Ole Bull from curiosity, and the symphonies from
fashion. Such music and such artists have no permanent hold of the heart
here. The pianos are covered with the songs of Donizetti; and Max Bohrer
takes, generally, a higher rank than Knoop. The student of art does not
regard these noble artists and fine music as the dawning of the art among
us, but as brighter stars flashing across the sky, while still the east is
dark. Europe has made these artists and this music after many centuries.
In the bosom of a church, full of profound spiritual experiences, this
music has been nurtured, and artistic devotion has streamed upon these
men. The necessity of this hoary antiquity to the development of art we
cannot readily determine. Our painters and sculptors must flock to Italy,
and lie down in the shadows of those old fanes, before they are willing to
announce their claim to be servants of the art. Our poets sing in
self-defence the majesty and grandeur of primeval America, and drink
deeply at the stream of letters that flows from the Past. Had foreign
literature been cut off from us, we should have had few writers of poetry,
and Mr. Griswold's book had been a valuable duodecimo and not a heavy
octavo. Our chief poets are cultivated men. Poetry with us is the
recreation of elegant scholars. Mr. Percival announces that he writes
poetry in more than a hundred ways; and the few young men who seem to
advance first claims to the dignity of poets, by their fresh expression,
need the overshadowing of Time to make them artists. How especially is
this so with music. We have no native artists and few hearty students. The
societies which introduce to us the finest music are German, our musical
teachers are Germans and Italians, our opera is Italian. Of this no
complaint is to be made. The nation is content with a foreign fragrance,
as the individual students are content to live in Rome and send home to us
the ideas of an old mythology wrought into statues. Art is the flower of
life. The man will build his house, then he will have pictures and a
piano. The claims of the interior life will surely be heard at last, and
art will follow. Yankees and Wall Street govern now, Niagara by-and-by.
The prophecies of our American literature, with which the literary
anniversaries are annually eloquent, are sure. Contemplating the healthy
seed which they represent, we need not fear for the flower. But the
literature and art will be American only in respect of culture. The German
music is an universal song, sung in a provincial dialect. The immortality
of the classics is the universality of their truth. English and Italian
art are the several ways that nations regard the same thing. The soul of
music, as of painting and poetry, is always one. The foreigner is no
longer a foreigner when he hears the music he loves; and silent under its
spell, lovers, for the first time, meet. In the Louvre or the Vatican will
not the traveller see his home?
Yet in our present backwoods life let me not omit to notice the wonderful
artist whom we have recently seen. The genius of Ole Bull is so delicate
and profound that we must speak of it modestly, but with certainty. It is
not to be estimated by comparison. The height assures us of its loftiness,
not by the inferior summits below it, but by the wide, full sunlight and
the free winds that flow around it and rest upon it. The perception of
genius is so sure that we need not attempt to define what it is. Every
artist, full of its power, shows something more than the last. Like
beauty, it will not be measured, but every beautiful person shames our
analysis and philosophy of beauty. Yet the impression of genius is always
the same, and its appearance in any one individual makes real to us all
the rest. Until we heard Ole Bull, Paganini was a fabulous being of whom,
as of Orpheus and Amphion, strange stories were told, which seemed rather
prophecies of musical possibility than the history of actual
accomplishment. Henceforth Paganini is a household god, and the old Pagans
loom more distinctly through the misty centuries and wear something of the
aspect of reality.
To us, children of a seventy years' nation, plucking the full blossom of
European musical culture, the appearance of Ole Bull was like a new star
in the sky. Few had predicted its shining. At most, there was a faint
hope, in some minds, that we should yet see a worthy minister of art, in
honoring whom we should fitly reverence the Masters. Yet it was a hope too
faint and limited to inspire confidence in our manager to secure to
himself a fair portion of the ample harvest nodding for so sharp a sickle.
When he appeared, that wild Norwegian bravery, subdued by a reverence for
art and deepened by commanding originality, the shouting theatre, the
crowded tabernacle, the press for once speaking confidently in one tone,
the silent joy of hearts to whom this was the first vision of
genius--these announced a triumph. The ecstatic musical festivals of
Europe, the pilgrimages of artists more royally surrounded than the
progress of kings, we now understood.
The chief value of Ole Bull is that he introduces us more nearly to art.
It is the prerogative of genius to illustrate that; therefore he stood
before us as one who had in rapt hours pierced a little further into the
mystery which envelops life like an atmosphere and came to recite his
vision. He had detected some of those fine sunbeams that make the air
golden and give it warmth, and painted them for us as well as he could.
Yet in his music there was the same melancholy strain, varied by wonderful
and wild freaks, like the hysterics of the gods, that hitherto so
emphatically characterizes the works of genius. Throughout his
compositions there was the want of unity which expressed aspiration not
fulfilment, scattered stones of a fairer temple than men have seen, which
also are all works of art hitherto, yet each so fair that for these the
old shrines are deserted, and here men worship. One perceived that the
performance was the least part of the man. It was not his height and
limit, a faint beacon-light, rather, trembling over the waters, marking
the shore of a wide land, with deep ravines and towering mountains and
endless woods fringing depthless seas, and yet a light so bright that we
thought the sun was rising. For the genius which enables one to illustrate
art is universal power, whose expression is inadequate because thought is
quicker than execution. Every work of art represents an era past. Only the
whole character of the artist is the present flower of his life. It is no
matter of surprise that Ole Bull practises little, that his compositions
are unique. A deep rhythm, a subdued, infinite harmony pervades them. The
rugged Norway shows in them its influence upon the artist. The rocks and
glens and forests of his fatherland are not painted, but their spiritual
significance floats through his music, modified and moulded by the
individuality of the man. All this appears in his aspect. As he advances,
the strong, composed grace of his appearance, deferential not to
individuals but to the mind which shall receive the song of his
inspiration, destroys conventional ideas of grace, as Mont Blanc might
destroy them. His tall, compact figure well becomes a priest of art. Out
of his eyes shines the reflection of the perpetual fire of which all
artists are the ministers and which communicates energy and warmth to his
action. With a slight, respectful motion of the head and violin-bow
towards the orchestra, the respect of Olympian power, he draws from them
the first notes of the symphony; then, leaning his head upon his
instrument caressingly, as if he gratefully heard at once what he is about
to unfold to the audience, he draws his bow. Then that violin expresses
with intense passion the undefined yearnings that haunt the private heart.
It entreats and restrains. Its wildness harmonizes with the deep unrest of
a great aspiring soul. Its solemn movement is like the progress of a brave
man to an unknown destiny, and as the last yet distinct cadence floats
away into the stillness, it is as if a dove disappeared in heaven. At his
second concert he played an adagio of Mozart. It was full of tender
delicacy and the graceful imagination that makes all his music romance.
All this the artist felt, and every tone that followed his bow was
exquisite. Then was it seen how all genius meets. It was as if the
composer lay in the violin and sang the song anew, as if Raphael recited
one of Shakespeare's sonnets.
With what has been said about the man one who realizes the genius has
little to do. The music was not false, and that is his language. There has
been stern opposition and prejudice and ill-will; but so we must all bring
our gifts to the altar, and they who have not gold gifts must tender
swine.
Not the least of his offices is that he has enabled us to appreciate
Vieuxtemps. They will not be compared by the reverent worshipper at the
shrine of art. The plant needs the sunshine and the dew. It was pleasant
to feel that genius abides in one man and realize that one star differeth
from another in glory. Surely the firmament of art is wide enough and yet
deep enough to contain many planets.
Yet the artists are but messengers whom we send before into the
undiscovered country. They return and sing to us songs familiar in the
Eldorado of our hope, yet of which we have learned no note. Afloat upon
the depthless sea we loose doves and ravens, who bear back to us olive
boughs and flowers which we cannot analyze, but whose form and fragrance
make our homes beautiful. When the first shock of delighted wonder is past
we receive great men as the present attainment of an illimitable Nature,
as the Earth receives the light of stars, unnoticed save of wandering
lovers, and sweeps undisturbed on its way. If sometimes we are warped from
our sphere by the apparition of noble persons, wise men presently recover
themselves and serve with a milder and firmer persistence their own
nature. The way is made clearer by these bright lights, universal nature
is fairer that there are so many single stars; but they must be only stars
in our heaven and fires on our hearth, nor turn out the heart by inserting
themselves in the bosom.
G.W.C.
XIII
CONCORD, _Friday evening, May 10th, 1844._
Since our arrival here I have been busy enough. From breakfast at 6 to
dinner at 12-1/2, hard at work, and all the afternoon roaming over the
country far and near. When we came the spring was just waking, now it is
opening like a rose-bud, with continually deepening beauty. The
apple-trees in full bloom, making the landscape so white, seem to present
a synopsis of the future summer glory of the flower-world.
Our farm lies on one of the three hills of Concord. They call it
Punkatassett. Before us, at the foot of the hill, is the river; and the
slope between holds a large part of the Captain's orchard. Among the hills
at one side we see the town, about a mile away; and a wide horizon all
around, which Elizabeth Hoar tells me she has learned is the charm of
Concord scenery. The summit of the hill on which we are is crowned with
woods, and from a clearing commands a grand prospect. Wachusett rises
alone upon the distance, and takes the place of the ocean in the
landscape. There is a limitation in the prospect if one cannot see the sea
or mountains. The Blue Hill, in a measure, supplies that want at West
Roxbury. Otherwise the landscape is a garden which only pleases. We are
much pleased with our host and his family. He is that Capt. Nathan Barrett
to whom Messrs. Pratt and Brown came for seed, and who raises a good deal
of seed for Ruggles, Nourse and Mason. We go into all work. The Captain
turns us out with the oxen and plough, and we do our best. Already I have
learned a good deal. The men are very courteous and generous.
Indeed, I am disposed to think it just the place we wanted. As yet I see
no reason to doubt it. It is so still a life after the city, and after the
family at Brook Farm. I am glad to be thrown so directly and almost alone
into nature, and am more ready than ever to pay my debt in a human way by
learning the names of her beautiful flowers and the places where they
blossom. We study Botany daily, and have thus far kept pace with the
season. I have found here the yellow violet, which I do not remember at
West Roxbury. Already we have the rhodora and the columbine, which you
have probably found. And with our afternoons surrendered to the meadows
and hills, and our mornings to the fields, we find no heavy hours; but
every Sunday surprises us. I am to bed at 9, and rise at 4-1/2 or 5. I
practise the Orphic, which says: "Baptize thyself in pure water every
morning when thou leavest thy couch," which I more concisely render, Wash
betimes.
For the last three evenings I have been in the village, hearing Belinda
Randall play and sing. With the smallest voice she sings so delicately,
and understands her power so well, that I have been charmed. It was a
beautiful crown to my day, not regal and majestic, like Frances O.'s in
the ripe summer, but woven of spring flowers and buds. Last night I saw
her at Mr. Hoar's, only herself and Miss E. Hoar, G.P. Bradford, Mr. and
Mrs. Emerson, and myself and Mr. Hoar. She played Beethoven, sang the
"Adelaide Serenade," "Fischer Madchen," "Amid this Green Wood." I walked
home under the low, heavy, gray clouds; but the echo lingered about me
like starlight.
We have a piano in the house, and a very good one. It was made by Currier,
and is but a few years old. The evenings do not all pass without reminding
me of the flute music of the last summer, and making me half long to hear
it again. Yet I am too contented to wish to be back at the Farm. The
country about us is wilder than there; but I need now this tender severity
of nature and of friendship. With John Hosmer, Isaac, Geo. Bradford, and
Burrill, I am not without some actual features of the Farm as I knew it.
When I shall see you I cannot say. I shall not willingly break the circle
of life here, though occasion will make me willing enough.
Let me not remain unmentioned to my friends at Brook Farm and in the
village; and when you can _ungroup_ yourself for an hour paint me a
portrait of the life you lead.
Yr friend,
G.W.C.
XIV
CONCORD, _May 24th, '44._
My dear Friend,--I heard of you at Ole Bull's concert, and have
sympathized with you in your delight. I was in Worcester that evening, and
had hoped to have come down to Boston and heard him once more. But so many
were listening with that pleasure which can come but once, and I knew so
many must try in vain to hear, that I was content others should then
express that admiration which lies so deeply in my heart. But who of all
heard? Was it not as if he walked above the earth, and of his sublime
conversation you heard now and then the notes? Did not the singular beauty
of the man unite with his performance to make the completest musical
festival you have had?