At Home.
It is with regret we announce the death of E. S. Bonelli, head of the San Francisco Conservatory of Music.
Herbert L. Clarke, declared by John Philip Sousa to be the finest cornetist in the world, has retired from active band work.
Mr. Louis Arthur Russell gave a performance of The Messiah in Newark. The soloists and most of the choir were his own pupils.
An exceedingly resplendent performance of Mozart’s Magic Flute marked the opening of the Metropolitan opera season in New York.
Victor Maurel, the famous baritone, who was formerly a member of the Metropolitan Opera Company, will appear in the rô1e of Napoleon in a Viennese light opera.
The St. Louis Orchestra Club, under the direction of Mr. Frank Gecks, has eighty-five members. Practically all of the orchestral instruments are represented.
The Riverside Symphony Orchestra of Riverside, California, played an Adagio Caprice for strings by the conductor, B. Roscoe Shryock, at the first concert of this season.
T. Tertius Noble, the organist of York Minster, England, who is now touring America with success, has made over 1,000 appearances in organ recitals in Europe.
George E. Shea, the American singer, has received the distinguished honor known as “Palms Academiques,” entitling him to become “Officer d’Academie” of France.
In March the Chicago Madrigal Club will perform Mr. Louis Victor Saar’s new choral work under the direction of Mr. D. A. Clippinger. The composition won the recent prize offered by the Madrigal Club.
Reports received regularly from Miss Elsie Rulon, Press Secretary of the National Federation of Musical Clubs, indicate a surprising activity in this rapidly developing work.
The Mu Phi Epsilon Sorority of Combs Broad Street Conservatory in Philadelphia, has recently started a musical paper to be called The Leading Note. Although confined mostly to Conservatory news items, papers of this sort have an interesting field and may do much good.
The Motet Choral Society of Washington, gave a very successful concert in December, under the direction of Otto Terney Simon. Choral compositions of Glinka, Liszt, Bantock and Elgar were given.
Fritz Kreisler’s appearance With the Boston Symphony at Carnegie Hall, New York, resulted, according to one critic, in an “Ideally perfect rendering” of the Beethoven concerto. There are few violinists now on the concert stage to equal Kreisler.
The Liberty Bell petition is now on view in San Francisco. It is now nearly a mile long, and it is hoped that when the petition is sent to the Mayor of Philadelphia it will contain a million signatures. However, there is little chance of a petition being granted as it is said that a new crack has been discovered in the bell, and the experts do not advise that the bell should be moved from its present resting place.
In spite of the fact that the Metropolitan Opera Company of New York has refused to sanction Oscar Hammerstein’s efforts to produce opera in English in that city, the enterprising impresario declares his intention of going ahead. It will be remembered that Hammerstein is under contract to give the Metropolitan a clear field in the production of opera in New York for some years.
Scotti created some comment at a recent performance of Pagliacci in New York by singing the prolog in evening dress instead of in the costume of the clown, whose part he takes when the curtain goes up. He believes that he was justified in this by the fact that Victor Maurel, at whose suggestion the prolog was added, recommends it, and also by the fact that the words of the prolog are philosophical in character, and not at all in keeping with the rô1e of the poor ignorant clown of the opera. He has decided, however, not to repeat the experiment in future performances of I Pagliacci
Musicians of Cincinnati are mourning the loss of Clara Baur, the founder of the Cincinnati Conservatory of Music. Miss Baur
was born in Würtemburg, Germany, about seventy years ago. Her musical studies commenced at the Stuttgart Conservatory, and were continued later in Paris under Professor Feisst. The Conservatory in Cincinnati was begun in a very modest way, but gradually the force of Miss Baur’s remarkable personality made itself felt, and the institution grew under her care to be one of the foremost in the country. Commenced in 1867, it is the second oldest music school in America, the first being the New England Conservatory in Boston. Miss Baur took a very active part in the musical life of Cincinnati, and her place can never be filled. Moreover, the work done at the Conservatory has borne fruit all over the country as a large number of those who are carrying on the sterling work of musical education in America have received their instruction under Miss Baur’s guidance, and have given ample proof of the fact that she not only taught music, but filled her students with the high ideals and lofty spirit that inspired her own work. It is satisfactory to know that the work commenced by her will be carried on by her sister, Miss Bertha Baur.
Abroad.
It is reported that Mme. Cosima Wagner is seriously ill in Bayreuth.
Eugen d’Albert’s new opera, Chains of Love, has been successfully produced in Vienna.
Mariano Perosi, a brother of the famous composer of church music, has just completed an opera entitled Jenny.
Albert Spalding, the American violinist, has met with large success in a recent tour of Southern France.
The opera Konig Harlekin, by the Australian composer, G. H. Clutsam, has met with a cordial reception in Berlin.
The London Chronicle reports that the Sultan of Turkey sent his private orchestra to play in the hospitals and other buildings where the wounded are being treated.
A new symphony by Sir Hubert Parry, principal of the Royal College of Music, London, has been successfully produced in London.
An effort is being made in Waterford, Ireland, to raise enough money to erect a monument to Vincent Wallace, the composer of Maritana and Lurline, who was born there.
Professor August Reinhard, well known for his compositions for reed organ (harmonium), died upon his eighty-first birthday, Nov. 27th, 1912.
A new opera house has been opened in Berlin, located in the part of the city known as Charlottenburg. It is to be used for the presentation of opera for the people at popular prices.
The widow of Joachim Raff, the composer of the famous Cavatina, etc., has just died in Munich at the age of eighty-six
Arnold Schonberg, who enjoys the distinction of being the most discordant of all modern composers, says that he found his inspiration in the works of Gustav Mahler.
The fee received by the publishers of Elgar’s Violin Concerto for each performance, according to their own statement, amounts to about $37.50. At least two-thirds of this are handed over to the composer.
Parsifal is to be given at La Scala, Milan, in February. It is interesting to note that the work has been translated into Italian. We shall probably have to wait a long time before the Metropolitan Opera Co. presents Parsifal in English in New York.
In the latter part of December two notable personages gave a concert in Berlin. They were Ferrucio Busoni and Max Reger. Busoni played compositions by Reger, and Reger conducted compositions of Busoni.
The death at Brussels is announced of Joseph Wieniawski at the age of seventy-five. He was a brother of the celebrated violinist of that name, and was a pianist and composer of distinction.
A well-dressed thief, posing as an artist, stole jewelry and money to the value of about $6000 at a fashionable hotel in Ems, Germany, while a confederate held the guests in the drawing-room enthralled with his playing. The London Musical Observer heads the paragraph recording this information, “Orpheus with his Loot.”
Mr. Lemare, father of the celebrated organist, Edwin H. Lemare, has just completed fifty years continuous service as organist at Holy Trinity Church. In order to mark their appreciation, the members of the congregation presented him with a purse of fifty sovereigns ($250), on his seventy-second birthday.
Dr. Leopold Damrosch, father of Walter Damrosch and Frank Damrosch, in addition to his splendid work for music in America, left a reputation behind him in Germany. The Orchestra Society of Breslau, founded by Dr. Damrosch, has just been celebrating its fiftieth anniversary.
A unique festival performance was recently given at the Royal Opera in Vienna in honor of Thomas Koschat, the composer of Verlassen (Forsaken), who has completed a term of forty-five years as a member of the chorus of the Royal Opera. The festival was attended by the Archduke Franz Ferdinand, heir to the throne of Austria-Hungary.
Cesar Thompson, the famous Belgian violinist, has declared in an interview that he would like to have an international law against the exploitation of infant “prodigies.” He believes that the custom of exploiting children in this way is a menace to the child and an obstacle in the pathway of the art of music.
Sir Hubert Parry, the distinguished English composer, is said to be contemplating the formation of a chamber music club “at which members will be assured of finding the ingredients of a trio or a quartet, much as a golfer is assured of a game if on putting in an appearance at his club without a partner he may play a round with a professional.”
Among the effects of the late Mme. Lina Ramann, who died recently at Munich, have been found a number of hitherto unpublished letters and documents relative to Franz Liszt. Lina Ramann intended to write a biography of Liszt in which these papers were to be included. They have been willed to Arthur Seidl of Dessau, who will complete the work Mme. Ramann began.
The Grand Ducal Conservatory of Weimar, an institution in which Franz Liszt was very much interested, and one which boasts of many distinguished pupils, is just now celebrating its fortieth anniversary by giving a series of chamber music concerts tracing the history of its development from Melchior Franck to Franck and Reger.
If the Europeean (sic) critics are to be believed, a new star is to arise in the operatic firmment (sic) in the person of Carlisle Kawbawgun, a full-blooded Chippewa Indian. He is the son and heir of the late chief of the tribe, and is a graduate of the Carlisle Indian School, and Yale School of Medicine. At the present time he is appearing in vaudeville, but he is going to renounce it to study opera in Berlin.
An American resident in Berlin has invented a piano with fifty-three notes to the octave. It is said to be as playable as the piano we are accustomed to, and the advantage gained is that the well-tempered scale is done away with. It is said that Busoni, Strauss, Debussy and other musicians are much interested in the experiment, but there seems to be reason to doubt whether the instrument will ever become practicable.
An impressive memorial service was held in Westminster Abbey in honor of the late Whitelaw Reid, United States Ambassador to Great Britain. The special music for the occasion was under the direction of Sir Frederick Bridge, organist at the Abbey, who was assisted by the full choir of the Chapel Royal. The organ was supplemented by trumpets and drums. The anthem was Wesley’s He Will Swallow Up Death in Victory, and the hymn was Let Saints on Earth in Concert Sing. Before the service Beethoven’s Funeral March from the Sonata in A flat and a march composed by Purcell for the funeral of Queen Mary in 1694 was played, and at the conclusion of the ceremony the dead march from Saul and Chopin’s Marche Funebré were rendered. There was accommodation at the Abbey for twenty-two hundred people, but there were not enough seats for all who applied.
The famous “Crystal Palace” in London, according to a French authority, is to be torn down at last. It has seen some notable gatherings in its day, and has been one of the principal “playgrounds” of London—in fact of all England. Its musical associations are very numerous. The great Handel festivals have been given there for many years. Sir Arthur Sullivan gave orchestral concerts there, and his work was carried on for a long time by Sir August Manns—that genial, helpful friend of young British composers. Sir George Grove, the compiler of the famous dictionary, was for many years its musical director. The Crystal Palace was built for the Universal Industrial Exhibition of 1851. It is a huge edifice of glass and contains what was at one time the largest organ in the world. It is rather remote from the centre of things in London, and for some years has been struggling manfully against its fate.
