Theodore Thomas Matinee: 1st

Erroneous date given for the concert as December 5; correction published 12/05/74, p. 2. Description of Gade’s symphony.

Brief preview of program and participants.  

“There were two great musical events yesterday, in which the orchestra of Mr. Theodore Thomas occupied the principal part. A large audience, principally composed of ladies, filled Steinway Hall in the afternoon, and the musical bill of Mr. Thomas was as follows:--Gade’s first symphony in C minor, opus 5, a very enjoyable and, in the most superficial sense of the word, yet of an evanescent nature; Raff’s unsatisfactory setting of Bach’s Chaconne, in which the magnificent string orchestra of Mr. Thomas was shown to advantage and in which old Father Bach looked like Washington in fancy dress; the third and best of Beethoven’s, ‘Leonora,’ overtures, superbly played; a stupid rhapsody of Raff and a coronation march by Svendsen. The soloists were Miss Emma Cranch, a fair, agreeable mezzo soprano, who sang Handel’s ‘Lascia chio pianga,’ and an aria from ‘Clemenza di Tito,’ one that reveals more than any other the peculiarities of the genius of Mozart, and Mr. S. E. Jacobsohn, a violinist of more than ordinary merit, and whose rendering of Ernst yesterday, with piano accompaniment, was full of artistic beauty. Miss Cranch answered an encore in the Mozart selection with a very pretty morceau of Arthur S. Sullivan, and made a very favorable impression.” [The second event took place in the evening at the Brooklyn Academy of Music].

“Theodore Thomas gave his first matinée of the season on Saturday at Steinway Hall, and had a good audience. The programme was as follows [lists program].

Here at least everything was good, and a genuine artistic taste presided over the arrangement of the feast. The Symphony is the first and probably the best of Gade’s important orchestral compositions; the second and third movements never fail to delight the listener, and the entire work is fresh and spirited. The arrangement of the Bach Chaconne impressed us still more favorably on this occasion than it did at the recent performance by the New-York Philharmonic Society, for it owes a great deal of its effect to that close agreement among the strings in which this band is without a rival. Raff’s new Rhapsodie is a delightful romanza in the same style which he has treated so successfully in his best known symphonies, and Svendsen’s Coronation March is an impressive composition of gorgeous color and noble style.

Miss Cranch, who made at this concert her first public appearance in New-York, is a singer of whom we have great expectations. She has a delicious contralto voice, not quite full enough in the lower tones, but splendid in the upper register. It is strong, sweet, sympathetic, and true. Her singing is firm, simple, and regulated by unvarying good taste. There are some accomplishments of the vocalist yet to be added to it, but there are no bad habits to be unlearned. Her greatest defect at present is a lack of animation. There was too little passion in the familiar aria from Handel’s ‘Rinaldo,’ and two [sic] little dramatic expression in the selection from Mozart’s ‘La Clemenza di Tito.’ Being recalled after this, she brought a little Slumber Song of Arthur Sullivan’s and sang it charmingly.

Mr. Jacobsohn played the beautiful Nocturne by Ernst with great delicacy and smoothness, and displayed some of the best qualities of his art in the difficult ‘Hungarian Melody’ by Hauser.”

“Season after season Mr. Thomas, by slow and gradual approaches, draws nearer to the consummation so much desired by all real music lovers—the founding of a regular and frequent series of winter concerts at reasonable prices. What with the evening concerts and attendant rehearsals, it is now possible to enjoy his performances twice a month, and if the present series of matinées should be continued, once a week besides. It is a little unfortunate that the series should have opened precisely in the holiday weeks. Between the tea-taking fair who on Saturday afternoon thronged the lighted salons of the avenue, and the busy purchasers of infantile knick-knackery on Broadway, a fair share of Mr. Thomas’s usual friends were otherwise engaged, and the show of faces in the hall was discouragingly small. But better luck next time, or rather time after next, when the candles are all burned out, the bonbons all popped, the little indigestions duly physicked, and the little stockings restored to their legitimate use.

To those who were on hand on Saturday the programme was a most enjoyable one. Gade’s fine, sonorous, highly-colored, and romantic symphony in C minor and Bach’s ‘Chaconne’ were the orchestral numbers of the first part. The latter composition, adapted for grand orchestra by Joachim Raff, is a fair illustration of the modern system of working up scores intended for one form of instrumental execution into an entirely different one not contemplated by the composer. The result in this case is interesting. The quaint yet stately grace and dignity of the courtly old dance measure gets, it must be confessed, strangely transformed and sentimentalized in the rich, dramatic, and rather noisy instrumentation of the modern composer. There was in especial one clashing climax, in which the good old master was made to sound perceptibly like Wagner, which we feel sure would have made his venerable full-bottomed wig to bristle with dismay.

The new Rhapsodie (evening) by Raff is pervaded by the same [creamy?], romantic tone and graceful orchestration as the Lenore symphony, but it has less clearness and precision of form and definiteness of musical thought. The Beethoven Lenore overture No. 3 was as good as ever, and Svendsen’s new Coronation March, to our thinking, not good at all. It was, prentiously Wagneresque with hardly a trace of the splendid musical invention which redeems so much of Wagner’s eccentricity. It is a capital notion of Thomas to make these frequent raids into the yet unknown forests and wilds of northern melody; but he will bring back fairer booty next time.

Mr. Jacobsohn played two violin solos by Ernst very sweetly and correctly, and last but not least in our enumeration Miss Emma Cranch sang the Lascia ch’io pianga of Handel and Parto ma tu ben mio of Mozart, besides a pretty ballad with harp accompaniment, as an encore. This young lady, who comes among us from the West, made a highly favorable impression, though rather by organ than method. Her voice is a strong, rich, vibratory, and flexible contralto, very even and pure throughout, and with a sympathetic warmth and color in it which make it a delight to listen to. She sings carefully and with general correctness, but with a still somewhat crude method, and a sluggishness and lack of warmth in expression which detract from the effect of her superb organ. Her phrasing, too, shows some marked faults, as in the undue prolongation of the first syllable fa in the Lascia ch’io pianga, her first air, to the utter destruction of the rhythm.”