Private Musical Afternoon

“To Edmund Schermerhorn‘s, at 3 ½, for one of his charming musical afternoons. Picked orchestra of 20, Rietzel conductor, Overture to Der Freyschütz. I have heard that magical work less effectively rendered by an orchestra of 100—Romance in F, for violin, with orchestra, Beethoven, Wieniawski. Very lovely. Haydn, quartette in D major, Wieniawski, Brandt, Matzka, & Bergner. Superlatively Haydnesque, i.e., healthy, fluent, spontaneous, & beautiful. ‘Introduction,’ Lohengrin (orchestra) quite handsome. ‘Cello Adagio, Goltermann, exquisitely played by good old Bergner, & much applauded. Notturno, Zelter (orchestra)—well enough, & ‘Fantasie on Russian airs’ by Wieniawski. Being called out & encored he gave us his version of the threadbare old ‘Carnival of Venice.’ Do not remember to have heard, in all my life, anything like this performance.  It was prestidigitation & not music at all, but it was wonderful. The violin yelped like a puppy, & meowed like a cat—whistled like a blackbird—jingled like castanets—squeaked like mice—brayed like a corral of donkeys & produced long melodic phrases in attenuated tones, just within the limit of audibility, like the notes of some microscopic Gryllus—if there be such a creature. It was a marvelous specimen of worthless & unartistic dexterity.”