MUSICAL EXPERIENCES AND IMPRESSIONS.

AT A GIRL’S SCHOOL—THE TONIC SOL-FA METHOD—PAYING AT THE DOOR—FLORAL OFFERINGS—DOROTHISIS.

Last Tuesday, when turning over my invitations, I found a card addressed to me, not in my ancestral title of Di Bassetto, but in the assumed name under which I conceal my identity in the vulgar business of life. It invited me to repair to a High School for Girls in a healthy south-western suburb, there to celebrate the annual prize-giving with girlish song and recitation. Here was exactly the thing for a critic. “Now is the time,” I exclaimed to my astonished colleagues, “to escape from our stale iterations of how Mr. Santley sang ‘The Erl King,’ and Mr. Sims Reeves ‘Tom Bowling’; of how the same old orchestra played Beethoven in C minor or accompanied Mr. Henschel in Pogner’s ‘Johannistag’ song, or Wotan’s ‘Farewell’ and ‘Fire Charm.’ Our business is to look with prophetic eye past these exhausted contemporary subjects into the next generation—to find out how much beauty and artistic feeling is growing up for the time when we shall be obsolete fogies, mumbling anecdotes of the funerals of our favourites.” Will it be credited that the sanity of my project and the good taste of my remarks were called in question, and that I was absolutely the only eminent critic who went to the school!

I found the school on the margin of a common, with which I have one ineffaceable association. It is not my custom to confine my critical opinions to the columns of the Press. In my public place I am ever ready to address my fellow-citizens orally until the police interfere. Now, it happens that once, on a fine Sunday afternoon, I addressed a crowd on this very common for an hour, at the expiry of which a friend took round a hat, and actually collected sixteen shillings and ninepence. The opulence and liberality of the inhabitants were thus very forcibly impressed on me; and when, last Tuesday, I made my way through a long corridor into the crowded schoolroom, my first thought, as I surveyed the row of parents, was whether any of them had been among the contributors to that memorable hatful of coin. My second was whether the principal of the school would have been pleased to see me had she known of the sixteen and ninepence.

When the sensation caused by my entrance had subsided somewhat, we settled down to a performance which consisted of music and recitation by the rising generation, and speechification by the risen one. The rising generation had the best of it. Whenever the girls did anything, we were delighted; whenever an adult began, we were bored to the very verge of possible endurance. The deplorable member of Parliament who gave away the prizes may be eloquent in the House of Commons; but before that eager, keen, bright, frank, unbedevilled, unsophisticated audience he quailed, he maundered, he stumbled, wanted to go on and couldn’t, wanted to stop and didn’t, and finally collapsed with a few remarks to the effect that he felt proud of himself, which struck me as being the most uncalled-for remark I ever heard, even from an M.P. The chairman was self-possessed, not to say hardened. He quoted statistics about Latin, arithmetic and other sordid absurdities, specially extolling the aptitude of the female mind since 1868 for botany. I incited a little girl near me to call out “Time” and “Question,” but she shook her head shyly, and said “Miss—— would be angry;” so he had his say out. Let him deliver that speech next Sunday on the common, and he will not get 16s. 9d. He will get stoned.

But the rest of the programme was worth a dozen ordinary concerts. It is but a few months since I heard Schubert’s setting of “The Lord is my Shepherd” sung by the Crystal Palace Choir to Mr. Manns’ appropriate and beautiful orchestral transcript of the accompaniment; but here a class of girls almost obliterated that memory by singing the opening strain with a purity of tone quite angelic. If they could only have kept their attention concentrated long enough, it might have been equally delightful all through. But girlhood is discursive; and those who were not immediately under the awful eye of the lady who conducted, wandered considerably from Schubert’s inspiration after a time, although they stuck to his notes most commendably. Yet for all that I can safely say that if there is a little choir like that in every High School the future is guaranteed. We were much entertained by a composition of Jensen’s, full of octaves and chords, which was assaulted and vanquished after an energetic bout of fisticuffs by an infant pianist, who will not be able to reach the pedals for years to come.

I need hardly say that my remarks about the Tonic Sol-fa have brought letters upon me insisting on the attractive simplicity of the notation, and even inviting me to learn it at once. This reminds me of a sage whom I consulted in my youth as to how I might achieve the formation of a perfect character. “Young man,” he said, “are you a vegetarian?” I promptly said “Yes,” which took him aback. (I subsequently discovered that he had a weakness for oysters.) “Young man,” he resumed, “have you mastered Pitman’s shorthand?” I told him that I could write it very nearly as fast as longhand, but that I could not read it; and he admitted that this was about the maximum of human attainment in phonography. “Young man,” he went on, “do you understand phrenology?” This was a facer, as I knew nothing about it, but I was determined not to be beaten, so I declared that it was my favourite pursuit, and that I had been attracted to him by the noble character of his bumps. “Young man,” he continued, “you are indeed high on the Mount of Wisdom. There remains but one accomplishment to the perfection of your character. Are you an adept at the Tonic Sol-fa system?” This was too much. I got up in a rage, and said, “Oh, d—the Tonic Sol-fa system!” Then we came to high words, and our relations have been more or less strained ever since. I have always resolutely refused to learn Tonic Sol-fa, as I am determined to prove that it is possible to form a perfect character without it.

The other evening I went to the Wind Instrument Society’s concert at the Royal Academy of Music in Tenterden Street. Having only just heard of the affair from an acquaintance, I had no ticket. The concert, as usual, had been kept dark from me; Bassetto the Incorruptible knows too much to be welcome to any but the greatest artists. I therefore presented myself at the doors for admission on payment as a casual amateur. Apparently the wildest imaginings of the Wind Instrument Society had not reached to such a contingency as a Londoner offering money at the doors to hear classical chamber music played upon bassoons, clarionets, and horns; for I was told that it was impossible to entertain my application, as the building had no licence. I suggested sending out for a licence; but this, for some technical reason, could not be done. I offered to dispense with the licence; but they said it would expose them to penal servitude. Perceiving by this that it was a mere question of breaking the law, I insisted on the secretary accompanying me to the residence of a distinguished Q.C. in the neighbourhood, and ascertaining from him how to do it. The Q.C. said that if I handed the secretary five shillings at the door in consideration of being admitted to the concert, that would be illegal. But if I bought a ticket from him in the street, that would be legal. Or, if I presented him with five shillings in remembrance of his last birthday, and he gave me a free admission in celebration of my silver wedding, that would be legal. Or, if we broke the law without witnesses and were prepared to perjure ourselves if questioned afterwards (which seemed to me the most natural way), then nothing could happen to us. I cannot without breach of faith explain which course we adopted; suffice it that I was present at the concert.

I went to the Prince of Wales’ Theatre on Wednesday afternoon to hear the students of the Royal College of Music.... I am sorry to say that the bad custom of bouquet-throwing was permitted; and need I add that an American prima donna was the offender? What do you mean, Madame——, by teaching the young idea how to get bouquets shied? After the manner of her countrymen this prima donna travels with enormous wreaths and baskets of flowers, which are handed to her at the conclusion of her pieces. And no matter how often this happens, she is never a whit the less astonished and delighted to see the flowers come up. They say that the only artist who never gets accustomed to his part is the performing flea who fires a cannon, and who is no less dismayed and confounded by the three-hundredth report than by the first. Now, it may be ungallant, coarse—brutal even; but whenever I see the fair American thrown into raptures by her own flower-basket, I always think of the flea thrown into convulsions by his own cannon. And so, dear but silly American ladies, be persuaded, and drop it. Nobody except the very greenest of greenhorns is taken in; and the injury you do to your own artistic self-respect by condescending to take him in is incalculable. Just consider for a moment how insanely impossible it is that a wreath as big as a cart-wheel could be the spontaneous offering of an admiring stranger. One consolation is, that if the critics cannot control the stars, they can at least administer the stripes.

Last Saturday evening, feeling the worse for want of change and country air, I happened to voyage in the company of an eminent dramatic critic as far as Greenwich. Hardly had we inhaled the refreshing ozone of that place ninety seconds when, suddenly finding ourselves opposite a palatial theatre, gorgeous with a million gaslights, we felt that it was idiotic to have been to Wagner’s Theatre at Bayreuth and yet be utterly ignorant concerning Morton’s Theatre at Greenwich. So we rushed into the struggling crowd at the doors, only to be informed that the theatre was full. Stalls full, dress circle full; pit, standing room only. As the eminent dramatic critic habitually sleeps during performances, and is subject to nightmare when he sleeps standing, the pit was out of the question. Was there room anywhere? we asked. Yes, in a private box or in the gallery. Which was the cheaper? The gallery, decidedly. So up we went to the gallery, where we found two precarious perches vacant at the side. It was rather like trying to see Trafalgar Square from the knife-board of an omnibus half-way up St. Martin’s Lane; but by hanging on to a stanchion, and occasionally standing with one foot on the seat and the other on the backs of the people in the front row, we succeeded in seeing as much of the entertainment as we could stand.

The first thing we did was to purchase a bill, which informed us that we were in for “the entirely original pastoral comedy-opera in three acts, entitled ‘Dorothy,’ which has been played to crowded houses in London 950, and (still playing) in the provinces 788 times.” This playbill, I should add, was thoughtfully decorated with a view of the theatre showing all the exits, for use in case of a reduction to ashes during performing hours. From it we further learnt that we should be regaled by an augmented and powerful orchestra; that the company was “No. 1”; that—— believes he is now the only HATTER in the county of Kent that exists on the profits arising solely from the sale of HATS and CAPS; and so on. Need I add that the eminent one and I sat bursting with expectation until the overture began. I cannot truthfully say that the augmented and powerful orchestra proved quite so augmented or so powerful as the composer could have wished; but let that pass; I disdain the cheap sport of breaking a daddy-long-legs on a wheel (butterfly is out of the question, it was such a dingy band). My object is rather to call attention to the condition to which 788 nights of Dorothying have reduced the unfortunate wanderers of “No. 1 Company.” I submit to the manager of these companies that in his own interest he should take better care of No. 1. Here are several young persons doomed to spend the flower of their years in mechanically repeating the silliest libretto in modern theatrical literature, set to music which must pall somewhat on the seven hundred and eighty-eighth performance.

As might have been expected, a settled weariness of life, an utter perfunctoriness, an unfathomable inanity pervaded the very souls of “No. 1.” The tenor, originally, I have no doubt, a fine young man, but now cherubically adipose, was evidently counting the days until death should release him from the part of Wilder. He had a pleasant speaking voice; and his affability and forbearance were highly creditable to him under the circumstances; but Nature rebelled in him against the loathed strains of a seven-hundred-times repeated rôle. He omitted the song in the first act, and sang “Though born a man of high degree,” as if with the last rally of an energy decayed and a willing spirit crashed. The G at the end was as a vocal earthquake. And yet methought he was not displeased when the inhabitants of Greenwich, coming fresh to the slaughter, encored him. The baritone had been affected the other way; he was thin and worn; and his clothes had lost their lustre. He sang “Queen of my heart” twice in a hardened manner, as one who was prepared to sing it a thousand times in a thousand quarter-hours for a sufficient wager. The comic part, being simply that of a circus clown transferred to the lyric stage, is better suited for infinite repetition; and the gentleman who undertook it addressed a comic lady called Priscilla as “Sarsaparilla” during his interludes between the haute-école acts of the prima donna and tenor, with a delight in the rare aroma of the joke, and in the roars of laughter it elicited, which will probably never pall. But anything that he himself escaped in the way of tedium was added tenfold to his unlucky colleagues, who sat out his buffooneries with an expression of deadly malignity. I trust the gentleman may die in his bed; but he would be unwise to build too much on doing so. There is a point at which tedium becomes homicidal mania.

The ladies fared best. The female of the human species has not yet developed a conscience: she will apparently spend her life in artistic self-murder by induced Dorothisis without a pang of remorse, provided she be praised and paid regularly. Dorothy herself, a beauteous young lady of distinguished mien, with an immense variety of accents ranging from the finest Tunbridge Wells English (for genteel comedy) to the broadest Irish (for repartee and low comedy), sang without the slightest effort and without the slightest point, and was all the more desperately vapid because she suggested artistic gifts wasting in complacent abeyance. Lydia’s voice, a hollow and spectral contralto, alone betrayed the desolating effect of perpetual Dorothy; her figure retained a pleasing plumpness akin to that of the tenor; and her spirits were wonderful, all things considered. The chorus, too, seemed happy; but that was obviously because they did not know any better. The pack of hounds employed darted in at the end of the second act, evidently full of the mad hope of finding something new going on; and their depression when they discovered it was “Dorothy” again, was pitiable. The Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals should interfere. If there is no law to protect men and women from “Dorothy,” there is at least one that can be strained to protect dogs.

George Bernard Shaw (1856).