Harrison Oratorio Concert: 1st: The Seasons

“To hear Haydn’s Seasons at Steinway Hall, where I had reserved seats. It was my first experience, for many a long year, of that much loved composition, and the old memories came freshly back, reinforced by a multitude of beautiful points that seemed new. The work as a whole, is unhappily an anticlimax in design, or the music of winter must be cold and dreary after that of summer and spring--and in execution too. Haydn seems to have got a little tired of it as he neared its end. I think it is so with many of his works. But each of these four parts is admirable and delightful in its degree, and the first is almost absolutely perfect. The opening chorus (‘Come gentle Spring’) and the finale of the 2^nd part (the summer evening chorus--die Abendgloche usw.) are matchless. The existence of so noble and beautiful a work, one may well reckon among the blessings to be remembered on Thanksgiving Day, as a let off against much that is bad—a comfort in trouble.”

"Opening of the Oratorio Season—Sudden Death of One of the Audience.

The Oratorio season commenced at Steinway Hall last night before the largest audience of the season. Haydn’s beautiful work, ‘The Seasons,’ was given by Mme. Parepa-Rosa, soprano; G. Simpson, tenor; J. R. Thomas, baritone, and the Harmonic Society, with orchestra and organ. There is a freshness and charming unaffected simplicity, united to the highest dramatic effect, about Haydn’s works that must render them ever popular. In ‘The Seasons,’ the interest of the music never flags, and the poet Thompson has a faithful interpreter of his exquisite verses. Of course this work is less sublime than the ‘Creation,’ for, as the composer himself said, ‘in the Creation the characters are angels, in the Seasons they are peasants.’ The most striking choruses are ‘Come, Gentle Spring,’ ‘God of Light; and the storm, hunting and laughing wine choruses. The artistes acquitted themselves very well lst night. The conductor spoiled some of the choruses by taking them too slow, and judicious pruning of the recitations was needed. . . .”

[Remainder of article describes the death of an audience member by heart attack during the performance, which Mr. Harrison, the manager, handled so discreetly that the audience did not realize that anything had happened.]

“Last night an immense audience assembled to hear a capital performance of Haydn's picturesque masterpiece ‘The Seasons.’ Though, from, the first to last, this work is a marvel of musical science, it had a ready reception and hearty acceptance—thanks to the beauty and melody that shines through Haydn's profoundest compositions. Interpreted as it was last evening, vocally, by the Harmonic Society, and instrumentally by Mr. Theodore Thomas’ full orchestra, with a mingled fire and delicacy, it at once put the audience in full sympathy with the composer. It is difficult to name which of the seasons—Spring, Summer, Autumn or Winter—has been treated fondest by Haydn; as a whole the work is one on which the most ambitious composer might have been content to rest his fame. Perhaps the best testimony to the genius which it embodies it is found in the rapt attention of such a crowd as that which greedily listened to every number and every note last night. Possibly few were able to appreciate the really wonderful richness of the orchestral introduction to Autumn – anyhow ‘they could not choose but hear.’ The applause throughout was hearty. In tone and phrasing the instrumental portion of the work could not have been much better. The chorus was generally approvable, but in the special numbers, ‘Hark! The deep tremendous voice,’ and ‘Hark, hark the mountains resound,’ were wanting in sustained vigor. The favorite vocal pieces were the florid numbers that called out the full force of Mme. Rosa's rich voice – which to-day stands without a superior in this order of music – and Mr. Simpson and Mr. J. R. Thomas. The double air, ‘O, Welcome Now’ and ‘How Pleasing,’ by Mme. Parepa appeared to be enjoyed with feverish eagerness.”

“If last night is to be taken as a fair sample of the oratorio season at Steinway Hall, Mr. Harrison will be rewarded for his enterprise in bringing out six of the greatest sacred compositions of the masters of the musical art by a most gratifying success. The hall was crowded and the audience was appreciative. Yet, of the six oratorios which are embraced in the series announced, Haydn’s Seasons is certainly the least effective and, perhaps we may add, the least meritorious. It is a labored work; Haydn devoted to it the greater part of two years (1799—1801); the numbers did not glow spontaneously from his fertile brain; and it is said that the final decline of his physical and mental strength dated from the painful care he bestowed upon it, though he lived several years after its completion. Hence we miss in it much of the inspiration which irradiates his Creation and his other masterpieces. This is owing principally, no doubt, to the barren and prosaic text. The words were arranged from Thomson’s poem, and the arranger succeeded in leaving out almost every spark of poetry, and producing a dead level of Miss Nancyism which must have been the despair of the composer. The music, of course, under such circumstances, could not but lack variety. It is nearly all pretty; it is full of the joyousness which was Haydn’s great characteristic; it betrays the hand of a master and the soul of a genius; it sometimes touches the verge of grandeur, but it is never really sublime, and by the side of the Creation, the Messiah, or the Samson it is almost dwarfed. Still, in the mirthful season of Thanksgiving, it is especially appropriate, and it was listened to last night with almost unqualified pleasure.

This performance was exceedingly good. Madame Parepa Rosa was in fine voice and executed the music of ‘Cheerful Jane’ with the purity and good taste which place her at the head of all our oratorio singers. The best thing she did was the famous song in the Fourth Part, ‘A Wealthy Lord who Long had Loved,’ into which she had an opportunity of throwing her favorite arch expression, to the great delight of her listeners. In the various trios her magnificent voice and finished vocalization were delightful to hear. Mr. Simpson and Mr. J. R. Thomas were also good, the latter gentleman’s rendering of the air at the beginning of Part Second, ‘From out the Fold,’ being especially worthy of praise, though in some other airs he was rather tame. The chorus, by the New York Harmonic Society, was excellent in the ‘Welcome, gentle sleep,’ and in the last finale, although in this it had to contend with the racket made by one or two hundred ill bred people who went trooping out of the hall, to the great annoyance of the rest of the audience. The hunting chorus was also well given, except in the middle portion of it; and the remainder of the work which fell to the share of the Society was satisfactorily performed, barring an occasional uncertainty on the part of the tenors. The female voices, however, at times sounded weak, the ladies being placed too low, so that they had to sing through the orchestra. The horns were very bad. The other instruments were excellent, and Mr. Ritter, who led both orchestra and chorus, showed himself a competent conductor. Mr. E. J. Connolly played the organ. He had no chance for display, but he was thoroughly efficient.”

“Graham is enthusiastic about The Seasons heard by him Thursday night for the first time. He is not far from insight into the difference between this kind of music and the inane spasmodic stuff of modern opera on which he has been brought up. May his perceptions go on growing clearer! Blindness to the distinction between Haydn and Verdi is a calamity and grave deprivation to any man who is at all capable of feeling the power of music, but such blindness is epidemic among opera-goers,—amazing and incredible as it seems—How any man—but no matter. The clock strikes one!”

Review dated Dec. 3.

“This [The Seasons] is the least interesting of Haydn’s two Oratorios, and it is difficult to imagine anything more barren and dead that the text, which is from Thomas with all the poetry eliminated.  Yet, being Haydn’s, the music cannot fail of being always fresh, sunny and healthful; breathing of Spring-time and violets, and green banks ‘where on the wild thyme blows;’ or, if of sorrow, at all, it is a pure, trustful grief, a gentle, innocent sadness, like that of Nature herself. The music too has another claim upon our attention, for it is the inspiration of the master’s declining years, and we know that, to him, the bird-songs and murmur of waters must have sounded faintly and afar. And so we are attentive and pleased, if not satisfied, though it is hard to realize that the same hand which penned this pretty music produced those sublime choruses, ‘Let there be light,’ and ‘The Heavens are telling.’ Mr. Ritter was conductor of orchestra, and the performance was a very successful one.”