Bateman and Harrison Wednesday Popular Concert: 16th

"Steinway Hall.--The last popular concert of the Wednesday series takes place to-night at this establishment. Mr. Harrison has given these charming entertainments throughout the season with unfailing regularity, and he withdraws them now only that entertainments of a larger character may take their place. After to-night the [sic] Wednesday will be devoted to oratorio, with musical forces much larger than we have yet had in such works, and with the completeness and certainty which may always be predicted under Mr. Harrison's calm and unfailing management. To-night, therefore, is the last opportunity of hearing Mme. Parepa in a miscellaneous entertainment. She will sing--as she did last Wednesday--a selection of grand pieces from the most accepted oepras of the day. Her rendering of them, we may safely say, will be perfect, for Mme. Parepa is not afflicted by trifles. Mr. Mills will play two operatic fantasies, and Mr. Carl Rosa will do the same. The orchestra, under Mr. Theodore Thomas, will contribute its very important quota to the occasion, and Mr. Colby will preside at the piano."

“The last of the Wednesday popular concerts at Steinway Hall attracted a fashionable, refined and fair sized audience last evening. The people realize the magnitude of the task undertaken by Mr. Harrison in those popular concerts, and the value of the success which has attended them. Managers of opera of any description, of theatres during a dramatic season, of even minstrel halls, have a greater variety of materials at their command, and thereby a better chance of drawing good houses, than a concert organizer. The latter has a hard task before him to attract the same people night after night with music alone, divested of the dramatic effects, mise en scene, &c., of the lyric stage. Fully aware of those difficulties, Mr. Harrison strove to overcome them by engaging the best orchestra, the best vocalists and the best solo instrumentalists he could find in the city, by constantly bring forward novelties and affording native talent an opportunity of asserting itself in public, while the highest foreign talent was secured. His success is a sufficient proof of the high standard which those concerts have reached and the advancement of the divine art in the metropolis. Last night the programme was operatic, and orchestra, vocalist, violinist and pianist combined to render it in the most effective manner. The Wednesday popular concerts will be succeeded by oratorio performance got up on a grand scale. The Harmonic Society, with the best soloists and a large orchestra, are engaged by Mr. Harrison for this oratorio enterprise. The Sunday and Monday concerts still continue."

“The fact that manager Harrison has given successfully his ‘Fifteenth [sic] Wednesday Popular Concert’ proves how worthy these Concerts are of their name. There are still other Concert series directed by Mr. Harrison – the Sunday Matinée and the Monday Soirée in Brooklyn. It is besides announced that on Sunday next will be given a Twenty-sixth Sacred Concert. Thus it will be seen Mr. Harrison is quite as busy and as prosperous as any Manager of Concerts possibly can be; indeed, almost beyond precedent. Credit, is due him for a brave and generous venture, and for the positive musical benefit which so many of his Concerts, the Sunday series particularly have been.

The last Parepa Concert was, in respect of programme, perhaps a trifle too popular. It is just possible to amuse the public successfully with something better than the old orchestra and violin solo stock of variations; and surely we have heard enough variations. But we ought not, perhaps, criticize a popular concert too exactingly. There is a taste that rallies its legion never weary of hearing milk-and-water–instrumental dilutions of Verdi, and all the favorite crew of melodious composers. We certainly owe these lyrical genii no grudge: they are good and sweet as occasion requires, and will charm the million from now to doomsday. We merely protest against their over-doing; for there is a large portion of the public that have out-grown the susceptibility of being bewitched by a popular composer heard for the thousandth time, or a popular violinist who plays said popular composer for the thousandth time. It is just but to say, however, that Mr. Harrison’s concerts are, for the greater part, worthy of high praise.  He has assembled a company of the best available artists, and it can hardly be said that they are unequal to any good demand. Madame Parepa’s fine expression, the other night, of Meyerbeer’s favorite aria, ‘Robert toi que j’aime,’ may be readily instanced in proof. Nothing can exceed the beauty and purity of her higher notes; and in some of the most charming qualities of a vocalist she is, indeed, without a rival. The Grand Piano Duo on the theme of Don Juan, as performed by Messrs. S. B. Mills and G. W. Colby, was one of the best features of recent popular concerts. It was an undemonstrative ornamentation a great and beautiful theme, and served to distinguish that definite and delicate torch which makes the playing of Mr. Mills always impressive, if never altogether cordial and inspired.”