Camille Saint Saens - Musical Memories

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Some Spanish singers give a similar impression, through singing
interminable grace notes beyond notation. Their art is intermediate
between the singing of the birds and of man. It is not a higher art.

In certain quarters they marvel at the progress made in the last thirty
years. The architects of the Fifteenth Century must have reasoned in the
same way. They did not appreciate that they were assassinating Gothic
art, and that after some centuries we would have to revert to the art of
the Greeks and Romans.

CHAPTER X

THE ORGAN

When hairy Pan joined reeds of different lengths and so invented the
flute which bears his name, he was, in reality, creating the organ. It
needed only to add to this flute a keyboard and bellows to make one of
those pretty instruments the first painters used to put in the hands of
angels. As it developed and gradually became the most grandiose of the
instruments, the organ, with its depth of tone modified and increased
tenfold by the resonance of the great cathedrals, took on its religious
character.

The organ is more than a single instrument. It is an orchestra, a
collection of the pipes of Pan of every size, from those as small as a
child's playthings to those as gigantic as the columns of a temple. Each
one corresponds to what is termed an organ-stop. The number is
unlimited.

The Romans made organs which must have been simple from the musical
standpoint, though they were complicated in their mechanical
construction. They were called hydraulic organs. The employment of water
in a wind instrument has greatly perplexed the commentators.
Cavaille-Coll studied the question and solved the problem by
demonstrating that the water compressed the air. This system was
ingenious but imperfect, since it was applicable only to the most
primitive instruments. The keys, it seems, were very large, and were
struck by blows of the fist.

Let us leave erudition for art and primitive for perfected instruments.
By the time of Sebastian Bach and Rameau the organ had taken on its
grandiose character. The stops had multiplied and the organist _called_
them by means of registers which he drew out or pushed back at will. In
order to give greater resources, the builder multiplied the keyboards.
Pedals were introduced to help out the keyboards. At that time Germany
alone had pedals worthy of the name and worth while in playing an
interesting bass part. In France and elsewhere the rudimentary pedals
were only used for certain fundamental notes or in prolonged _tenutos_.
No one outside of Germany could play Sebastian Bach's compositions.

Playing on the old instruments was fatiguing and uncomfortable. The
touch was heavy and, when one used both the pedals and the keyboards, a
real display of strength was necessary. A similar display was necessary
to draw out or push back the registers, some of which were beyond the
player's reach. In short, an assistant was necessary, in fact several
assistants in playing large organs like those at Harlem or Arnheim in
Holland. It was almost impossible to modify the combinations of stops.
All nuances, save the abrupt change from strong to soft and vice versa,
were impossible.

It remained for Cavaille-Coll to change all this and open up new fields
of usefulness for the organ. He introduced in France keyboards worthy of
the name, and he gave to the higher notes, through his invention of
harmonic stops, a brilliancy they had lacked. He invented wonderful
combinations which allow the organist to change his combinations and to
vary the tone, without the aid of an assistant and without leaving the
keyboard. Even before his day a scheme had been devised of enclosing
certain stops in a box protected by shutters which a pedal opened and
closed at will; this permitted the finest shadings. By different
processes the touch of the organ was made as delicate as that of the
piano.

For some years the Swiss organ-makers have been inventing new facilities
which make the organist a sort of magician. The manifold resources of
the marvellous instrument are at his command, obedient to his slightest
wish.

These resources are prodigious. The compass of the organ far surpasses
that of all the instruments of the orchestra. The violin notes alone
reach the same height, but with little carrying power. As for the lower
tones, there is no competitor of the thirty-two-foot pipes, which go two
octaves below the violoncello's low C. Between the _pianissimo_ which
almost reaches the limit where sound ceases and silence begins, down to
a range of formidable and terrifying power, every degree of intensity
can be obtained from this magical instrument. The variety of its timbre
is broad. There are flute stops of various kinds; tonal stops that
approximate the timbre of stringed instruments; stops for effecting
changes in which each note, formed from several pipes, bring out
simultaneously its fundamental and harmonic sounds; stops which serve to
imitate the instruments of the orchestra, such as the trumpet, the
clarinet, and the cremona (an obsolete instrument with a timbre peculiar
to itself) and the bassoon. There are celestial voices of several kinds,
produced by combinations of two simultaneous stops which are not tuned
in perfect unison. Then we have the famous _Vox Humana_, a favorite with
the public, which is alluring even though it is tremulous and nasal, and
we have the innumerable combinations of all these different stops, with
the gradations that may be obtained through indefinite commingling of
the tones of this marvellous palette.

Add to all this the continual breathing of the monster's lungs which
gives the sounds an incomparable and inimitable steadiness. Human
beings were used for a long time to fill these lungs--blowers working
away with hands and feet. We do much better now. The great organ in
Albert Hall, London, is supplied with air by steam which assures the
organist an inexhaustible supply. Other instruments use gas engines
which are more manageable. Then, there is the hydraulic system, which is
very powerful and easily used, for one has only to pull out a plug to
set the bellows in motion.

These mechanical systems, however, are not entirely free from accidents.
I discovered that fact when I was concluding the first part of the
_Adagio_ in Liszt's great _Fantaisie_ in the beautiful Victoria Hall in
Geneva. The pipe which brought in the water burst and the organ was
mute. I have always thought, perhaps wrongly, that malice had something
to do with the accident.

This Liszt _Fantaisie_ is the most extraordinary piece for the organ
there is. It lasts forty minutes and the interest is sustained
throughout. Just as Mozart in his _Fantaisie et Sonate in C minor_
foresaw the modern piano, so Liszt, writing this _Fantaisie_ more than
half a century ago, appears to have foreseen the instrument of a
thousand resources which we have to-day.

Let us have the courage to admit, however, that these resources are only
partly utilized as they can or should be. To draw from a great
instrument all its possibilities, to begin with, one must understand it
thoroughly, and that understanding cannot be gained over night. The
organ, as we have seen, is a collection of an indefinite number of
instruments. It places before the organist extraordinary means of
expressing himself. No two of these instruments are precisely alike. The
organ is only a theme with innumerable variations, determined by the
place in which it is to be installed, by the amount of money at the
builder's disposal, by his inventiveness, and, often, by his personal
whims. As a result time is required for the organist to learn his
instrument thoroughly. After this he is as free as the fish in the sea,
and his only preoccupation is the music. Then, to play freely with the
colors on his vast palette, there is but one way--he must plunge boldly
into improvisation.

Now improvisation is the particular glory of the French school, but it
has been injured seriously of late by the influence of the German
school. Under the pretext that an improvisation is not so good as one of
Sebastian Bach's or Mendelssohn's masterpieces, young organists have
stopped improvising.

That point of view is harmful because it is absolutely false; it is
simply the negation of eloquence. Consider what the legislative hall,
the lecture room and the court would be like if nothing but set pieces
were delivered. We are familiar with the fact that many an orator and
lawyer, who is brilliant when he talks, becomes dry as dust when he
tries to write. The same thing happens in music. Lefebure-Wely was a
wonderful improviser (I can say this emphatically, for I heard him) but
he left only a few unimportant compositions for the organ. I might also
name some of my contemporaries who express themselves completely only
through their improvisations. The organ is thought-provoking. As one
touches the organ, the imagination is awakened, and the unforeseen rises
from the depths of the unconscious. It is a world of its own, ever new,
which will never be seen again, and which comes out of the darkness, as
an enchanted island comes from the sea.

Instead of this fairyland, we too often see only some of Sebastian
Bach's or Mendelssohn's pieces repeated continuously. The pieces
themselves are very fine, but they belong to concerts and are entirely
out of place in church services. Furthermore, they were written for old
instruments and they apply either not at all, or badly, to the modern
organ. Yet there are those who think this belief spells progress.

I am fully aware of what may be said against improvisation. There are
players who improvise badly and their playing is uninteresting. But many
preachers speak badly. That, however, has nothing to do with the real
issue. A mediocre improvisation is always endurable, if the organist has
grasped the idea that church music should harmonize with the service and
aid meditation and prayer. If the organ music is played in this spirit
and results in harmonious sounds rather than in precise music which is
not worth writing out, it still is comparable with the old glass
windows in which the individual figures can hardly be distinguished but
which are, nevertheless, more charming than the finest modern windows.
Such an improvisation may be better than a fugue by a great master, on
the principle that nothing in art is good unless it is in its proper
place.

[Illustration: The Madeleine where M. Saint-Saens played the organ for
twenty years]

During the twenty years I played the organ at the Madeleine, I
improvised constantly, giving my fancy the widest range. That was one of
the joys of life.

But there was a tradition that I was a severe, austere musician. The
public was led to believe that I played nothing but fugues. So current
was this belief that a young woman about to be married begged me to play
no fugues at her wedding!

Another young woman asked me to play funeral marches. She wanted to cry
at her wedding, and as she had no natural inclination to do so, she
counted on the organ to bring tears to her eyes.

But this case was unique. Ordinarily, they were afraid of my
severity--although this severity was tempered.

One day one of the parish vicars undertook to instruct me on this point.
He told me that the Madeleine audiences were composed in the main of
wealthy people who attended the Opera-Comique frequently, and formed
musical tastes which ought to be respected.

"Monsieur l'abbe," I replied, "when I hear from the pulpit the language
of opera-comique, I will play music appropriate to it, and not before!"

CHAPTER XI

JOSEPH HAYDN AND THE "SEVEN WORDS"

Joseph Haydn, that great musician, the father of the symphony and of all
modern music, has been neglected. We are too prone to forget that
concerts are, in a sense, museums in which the older schools of music
should be represented. Music is something besides a source of sensuous
pleasure and keen emotion, and this resource, precious as it is, is only
a chance corner in the wide realm of musical art. He who does not get
absolute pleasure from a simple series of well-constructed chords,
beautiful only in their arrangement, is not really fond of music. The
same is true of the one who does not prefer the first prelude of the
_Wohltemperirte Klavier_, played without gradations, just as the author
wrote it for the harpsichord, to the same prelude embellished with an
impassioned melody; or who does not prefer a popular melody of character
or a Gregorian chant without any accompaniment to a series of dissonant
and pretentious chords.

The directors of great concerts should love music themselves and should
lead the public to appreciate it. They should not allow the masters to
be forgotten, for their only fault was that they were not born in our
times and they never dreamed of attempting to satisfy the tastes of an
unborn generation. Above all, the directors should grant recognition to
masters like Joseph Haydn who were in advance of their own times and who
seem now and then to belong to our own.

The only examples of Joseph Haydn's immense work that the present
generation knows are two or three symphonies, rarely and perfunctorily
performed. This is the same as saying that we do not know him at all. No
musician was ever more prolific or showed a greater wealth of
imagination. When we examine this mine of jewels, we are astonished to
find at every step a gem which we would have attributed to the invention
of some modern or other. We are dazzled by their rays, and where we
expect black-and-whites we find pastels grown dim with time.

Of Haydn's one hundred and eighteen symphonies, many are simple trifles
written from day to day for Prince Esterhazy's little chapel, when the
master was musical director there. But after Haydn was called to London
by Salomon, a director of concerts, where he had a large orchestra at
his disposal, his genius took magnificent flights. Then he wrote great
symphonies and in them the clarinets for the first time unfolded the
resources from which the modern orchestra has profited so abundantly.
Originally the clarinet played a humble role, as the name indicates.
_Clarinetto_ is the diminutive of _clarino_, and the instrument was
invented to replace the shrill tones that the trumpet lost as it gained
in depth of tone.

Old editions of Haydn's symphonies show a picturesque arrangement, in
that the disposition of the orchestra is shown on the printed page.
Above, is a group made up of drums and the brass. In the center is a
second group--the flutes, oboes and bassoons, while the stringed
instruments are at the bottom of the page. When clarinets are used, they
are a part of the first group. This pretty arrangement has,
unfortunately, not been followed in the modern editions of these
symphonies. In the works written in London the clarinet has utterly
forgotten its origins. It has left the somewhat plebeian world of the
brasses and has gained admittance to the more refined society of the
woods. Haydn, in his first attempts, took advantage of the beautiful
heavy tones, "_chalumeau_," and the flexibility and marvellous range of
a beautiful instrument.

During his stay in London Haydn sketched an _Orfeo_ which he never
completed, as the theatre which ordered it failed before it was
finished. Only fragments of the work remain, and, fortunately enough,
these have been engraved in an orchestra score. These fragments are
uneven in value. The dialogue, or recitative, which should bind them
together was lost and so we are unable to judge them fairly. Among the
fragments is a brilliant aria on Eurydice which is rather ridiculous,
while another on Eurydice dying is charming. We also find music for
mysterious _English horns_; it is written as for clarinets in B flat and
reaches heights which are impossible for the instrument we now know as
the English horn. There is also a beautiful bass part. This has been
provided with Latin words and is sung in churches. This aria was
assigned to a Creon who does not appear in the other fragments. One
scene shows Eurydice running up and down the banks pursued by demons.
Another depicts the death of Orpheus, killed by the Bacchantes. This
score is a curiosity and nothing more, and a reading causes no regret
that the work was not completed.

Like Gluck, Joseph Haydn had the rare advantage of developing
constantly. He did not reach the height of his genius until an age when
the finest faculties are, ordinarily, in a decline. He astounded the
musical world with his _Creation_, in which he displayed a fertility of
imagination and a magnificence of orchestral richness that the oratorio
had never known before. Emboldened by his success he wrote the
_Seasons_, a colossal work, the most varied and the most picturesque in
the history of ancient or modern music. In this instance the oratorio is
no longer entirely religious. It gives an audacious picture of nature
with realistic touches which are astonishing even now. There is an
artistic imitation of the different sounds in nature, as the rustling of
the leaves, the songs of the birds in the woods and on the farm, and the
shrill notes of the insects. Above all that is the translation into
music of the profound emotions to which the different aspects of nature
give birth, as the freshness of the forests, the stifling heat before a
storm, the storm itself, and the wonderful sunset that follows. Then
there is a huntsman's chorus which strikes an entirely different note.
There are grape harvests, with the mad dances that follow them. There is
the winter, with a poignant introduction which reminds us of pages in
Schumann. But be reassured, the author does not leave us to the rigors
of the cold. He takes us into a farmhouse where the women are spinning
and where the peasants are drawn about the fire, listening to a funny
tale and laughing immoderately with a gaiety which has never been
surpassed.

But this gigantic work does not end without giving us a glimpse of
Heaven, for with one grand upward burst of flight, Haydn reaches the
realms where Handel and Beethoven preceded him. He equals them and ends
his picture in a dazzling blaze of light.

This is the sort of work of which the public remains in ignorance and
which it ought to know.

But all this is not what I started out to say. I wanted to write about a
delicate, touching, reserved and precious work by the same author--_The
Seven Words of Christ on the Cross_. This work has appeared in three
forms--for an orchestra and chorus, for an orchestra alone, and for a
quartet. When I was a young man, they used to say in Paris that this
work was originally written for a quartet, then developed for an
orchestra, and, finally, the voices were added.

Chance took me to Cadiz, once upon a time, and there I was given the
true story of this beautiful piece of work. To my astonishment I learned
that it had been first performed in the city of Cadiz. They even spoke
of a competition in which Haydn won the prize, but there was never any
such contest. The work was ordered from the author, but the question is
who ordered it. Two religious circles, the Cathedral and the Cueva del
Rosario, both lay claim to the initiative. I have gone over all the
evidence in this dispute which is of little interest to us, for the only
interest is the origin of the composition. There is not the slightest
doubt that the _Seven Words_ was written in the first place for an
orchestra in 1785, and its destination, as we shall see, was settled by
the author himself.

In his _Memoires pour la Biographie et la Bibliographie de l'ile de
Cadix_, Don Francisco de Miton, Marquis de Meritos, relates that he
corresponded with Haydn and ordered this composition which was to be
performed at the Cathedral in Cadiz. According to his account Haydn said
that "the composition was due more to what Senor Milton wrote than to
his own invention, for it showed every motif so marvellously that on
reading the instructions he seemed to read the music itself."

If the Marquis was not boasting, we must confess that the ingenuous
Haydn was not so ingenuous as has been thought, and that he knew how to
flatter his patrons.

In 1801 Breitkopf and Haertel published the work with the addition of
the vocal parts at Leipzig. This edition had a preface by the author in
which he said:

About fifteen years ago, a cure at Cadiz engaged me to write some
passages of instrumental music on the Seven Words of Christ on the
Cross. It was the custom at that time to play an oratorio at the
Cathedral during Holy Week, and they took great pains to give as
much solemnity as possible. The walls, the windows and the pillars
of the church were hung in black, and only a single light in the
centre shone in the sanctuary. The doors were closed at mid-day and
the orchestra began to play. After the opening ceremonies the
bishop entered the pulpit, pronounced one of the "Seven Words" and
delivered a few words inspired by it. Then he descended, knelt
before the altar, and remained there for some time. This pause was
relieved by the music. The bishop ascended and descended six times
more and each time, after his homily, music was played. My music
was to be adapted to these ceremonies.

The problem of writing seven _adagios_ to be performed
consecutively, each one to last ten minutes, without wearying the
audience, was not an easy one to solve, and I soon recognized the
impossibility of making my music conform to the prescribed limits.

The work was written and printed without words. Later the
opportunity of adding them was offered, so the oratorio which
Breitkopf and Haertel publish to-day is a complete work and, so far
as the vocal part is concerned, entirely new.

The kind reception which it has received among amateurs makes me
hope that the entire public will welcome it with the same kindness.

Haydn feared to weary his hearers. Our modern bards have no such vain
scruple.

Michel Haydn, Joseph's brother and the author of some highly esteemed
religious compositions, has been generally credited with the addition of
the vocal parts to the _Seven Words_. Joseph Haydn did not say that this
was the case, but it would seem that if he did the work himself he would
have said so in his preface.

This vocal part, however, adds nothing to the value of the work. And it
is of no great consequence who the author of the arrangement for the
quartet was. At the time there were many amateurs who played on
stringed instruments. They used to meet frequently and everything in
music was arranged for quartets just as now everything is arranged for
piano duets. Some of Beethoven's sonatas were arranged in this form. The
piano killed the quartet, and it is a great pity, for the quartet is the
purest form of instrumental music. It is the first form--the fountain of
Hippocrene. Now instrumental music drinks from every cup and the result
is that many times it seems drunk.

To return to the _Seven Words_. Their symphonic form is the only one
worth considering. They are eloquent enough without the aid of voices,
for their charm penetrates. Unlike the _Creation_ and the _Seasons_ they
do not demand extraordinary means of execution, and nothing is easier
than to give them.

The opera houses are closed on Good Friday, and it used to be the custom
to give evening concerts, vaguely termed "Sacred Concerts," because
their programmes were made up wholly or in part of religious music. This
good custom has disappeared and with it the opportunity to give the
public such delightful works as the _Seven Words_, and so many other
things which harmonize with the character of the day.

At one of these Sacred Concerts, Pasdeloup presented on the same evening
the _Credo_ from Liszt's _Missa Solemnis_ and the one from Cherubini's
_Messe du Sacre_. Liszt's _Credo_ was received with a storm of hisses,
while Cherubini's was praised to the skies. I could not help thinking--I
was somewhat unjust, for Cherubini's work has merit--of the people of
Jerusalem who acclaimed Barrabas and demanded the crucifixion of Jesus.

To-day Liszt's _Credo_ is received with wild applause--Victor Hugo did
his part-while Cherubini's is never revived.

CHAPTER XII

THE LISZT CENTENARY AT HEIDELBERG (1912)

The Liszt centenary was celebrated everywhere with elaborate
festivities, perhaps most notably at Budapest where the _Missa Solemnis_
was sung in the great cathedral--that alone would have been sufficient
glory for the composer. At Weimar, which, during his lifetime, Liszt
made a sort of musical Mecca, they gave a performance of his deeply
charming oratorio _Die Legende von der Heiligen Elisabeth_. The festival
at Heidelberg was of special interest as it was organized by the General
Association of German Musicians which Liszt had founded fifty years
before. Each year this society gives in a different city a festival
which lasts several days. It admits foreign members and I was once a
member as Berlioz's successor on Liszt's own invitation. Disagreements
separated us, and I had had no relation with the society for a number
of years when they asked me to take part in this festival. A refusal
would have been misunderstood and I had to accept, although the idea of
performing at my age alongside such _virtuosi_ as Risler, Busoni, and
Friedheim, in the height of their talent, was not encouraging.

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