Front matter
Reading edition
Longmans, Green, and Co.
91 and 93 Fifth Avenue, New York London and Bombay 1904
Copyright, 1904, By Longmans, Green, and Co.
All rights reserved
THE UNIVERSITY PRESS, CAMBRIDGE, U. S. A.
TO MY FRIEND AND COLLEAGUE, JAMES HUNEKER.
Dear James:
Beside the ebon Styx The brood harmonious wanders slow. A backward gaze on earth they fix, And ask, "Where doth dear Music go?" I fancy Palestrina stares, And good Scarlatti gasps for breath, While Handel, with his figured airs, Bemoans poor Music's early death. Old Haydn shakes his long peruke, And Mozart wags his pendant cue, As both record their soft rebuke: "What is it that these moderns do?" Alone in all that troubled throng One moves with calm, unruffled brow; For still Sebastian's voice is strong To say, "'Twas I who taught them how." So when the storms discordant brew, You smile at me across the house; For well you know there's nothing new, Not even (pardon!) in your Strauss. Except, perhaps, a fine disguise Of leading motives, wood and strings, Which make a score look wondrous wise, And seem to mean to many things. So weave your fancies; I'll weave mine; And let them wander, dark or bright. The Lords of Art have graven fine; Perchance we both discern aright.
W. J. H. August, 1904.
CONTENTS
Page
PARSIFALIA 1
I. A Pure Fool in the New World 1
II. Ethics and Æsthetics 13
III. The National Religious Drama 27
DER RING DES NIBELUNGEN 39
I. A Futile God and a Potent Devil 39
II. The Woman and the Serpent 55
III. Back-worlds Gods and Over-Woman 69
ISOLDE'S SERVING-WOMAN 85
RICHARD STRAUSS 98
I. The Historical Survey 98
II. The Æsthetic View 121
III. What does It All Mean? 139
IV. Strauss and the Song Writers 156
AUX ITALIENS 168
I. Italian Opera of To-day 168
II. The Classic of the Unprogressive 185
THE ORATORIO OF TO-DAY 195
NOTE 211
Modern Musical Drift