Beethoven Association

In Manhattan, the Beethoven Association* gave a concert. Sedate and grave was the music heard, the august, the decorous, the lovely works of the great masters of yesterday--Schubert, Schumann, Haydn. One departure from classicism was made--the rendering of Chausson's Chanson Perpetuelle by Mme. Stanley, supported by a stringed quartet. "Very bad," said Critic Deems Taylor of this departure. But for the works august, sedate, all critics had praise. The chamber music of Haydn was the piece de resistance. Next to the master, Beethoven, the darling of those who attend the Society's concerts is that same Croatian Kapellmeister, who, when about to compose, donned white tie, stiff shirt, suave black coat and worked by candlelight that the formality so delicately affected in his person might with an equal scrupulousness be reflected in his urbane compositions.

Koussevitzky

On the platform of Carnegie Hall, Manhattan, stood a tall Russian. He had sparkling eyes, thin hands, greying hair, a tailor. He was Serge Koussevitzky, new conductor of the Boston Symphony Orchestra, making his Manhattan debut. With uncommon dignity he turned his back on the notable company assembled in that hall, raised his arms. Rank on rank behind him stood, sat, lounged, the many who had come to see whether the Boston Symphony had any chance of regaining the haughty place it held before Dr. Karl Muck went to Fort Oglethorpe under the Espionage act in 1917, whether it were true that this conductor was a "hypnotist," whether he could interpret Debussy, whether he wagged his head. They noted that he had a good back. They noted that every now and then, when he wanted to indicate a sudden pianissimo, he shot his left hand into the air, palm flat, in the way of one who hoists a heavy tray or thrusts a torch aloft. For the rest, his gestures were continent. He led Debussy's Nuages; Honegger's Pacific 231, Scriabin's Poem of Ecstacy. Like a storm of white hail came the clapping. With inexorable courtesy, Koussevitzky bowed and bowed.

Serge Alexandrovitch Koussevitzky was born in 1874 in Vyshny Volotchk, Russia. He gained admission to the Moscow Conservatory by promising to study the double bass, an instrument much needed at the moment in the conservatory orchestra. Out of the belly of that bull fiddle he brought such music as no Russian, perhaps no other man, had ever brought before. When learning to conduct he grouped chairs about him in the positions players would occupy in actual performance, conducted voiceless symphonies, ghosts responding. He made his first appearance in Berlin, conducted with success in London, Paris, other European capitals. He came to the Boston Symphony to take the place of able Pierre Monteux.

Puccini

As it must to all men, Death came to Giacomo Puccini, famed composer, at Brussels, Belgium, where he had gone for radium treatment for tumor of the throat. Weakened by the treatment, he died of a heart attack. While he lay dying, his opera Madame Butterfly was being presented at the Costanza Theatre, Rome. On the day of his death, his opera La Boheme was presented at the Metropolitan Opera House, Manhattan, where, after the third act, Chopin's Funeral March was played by the orchestra. In Italy, Premier Mussolini announced that Puccini's funeral would be paid for by the Italian Government. Puccini had just been appointed to the Senate.

Incomparably the most popular of contemporary composers, Puccini was born at Lucca, Italy, 1858. His father, his grandfather, his great-grandfather had all composed music. He attracted attention when his one-act opera Le Villi was successfully performed at La Scala, Milan. His next work, Edgar, was a failure; but he won note with Manon Lescaut, and international fame with La Boheme. Tosca and Madame Butterfly followed. The Girl of the Golden West, based on a drama by David Belasco, produced at the Metropolitan with Caruso and Emmy Destinn, did not long survive,* nor did the three short operas Il Tabarro, Suor Angelica, Gianni Schicchi, given their premiere at the Metropolitan six years ago. These latter failures could detract little from his fame. Tosca, La Boheme, Madame Butterfly, Manon Lescaut are part of the regular repertoire of every opera company. Wherever a fiddle scrapes, his songs are heard. He left behind him an unfinished opera Turandot.

Toscanini

One night in 1886 they were giving Aida at the Rio de Janeiro Opera House. A new conductor had the baton. He showed nervousness; the great house stirred uneasily. He bungled a pianissimo passage, he brought in his strings raggedly; a sinister sibilant flew round the galleries. "Hiss-sss-sss" went the fine senhorinas, "sss-sss-sss" went the fierce senhores. Distraught, unmanned, hearing a crooked death in every venomous 'sss, that new conductor broke his baton over his knee, fled weeping from the house. From his lowly place among the cellos rose up then a young Italian, scuttled to the dais, raised his bow for silence. He did not look at the score; he knew it by heart. So came to fame Arturo Toscanini, now hailed as Italy's "greatest conductor."

Last week in Manhattan, at the home of Mrs. Vincent Astor, met the Board of Directors of the Philharmonic Society.* Chairman Clarence H. Mackay made announcements. He said that Arturo Toscanini had agreed to conduct the Philharmonic Orchestra in a series of concerts next year. He added that Willem Mengelberg, tiny Dutch giant of the baton, had been reengaged for three years; that Wilhelm Furtwaeengler, German conductor, will shortly appear in a guest engagement. Toscanini has not been heard in the U. S. since 1920, when he toured the country with his La Scala orchestra, gave a series of concerts which were lavishly heralded, created a sensation with interpretation of Beethoven's Ninth Symphony. Before the War, he conducted for seven years at the Metropolitan Opera House, Manhattan, directing with equal aplomb Russian, French, German, Italian opera. He produced Dukas' Ariane et Barbe-Bleu, Moussorgsky's Boris Godounov; revived Gluck's Orfeo and Armide, Weber's Euryanthe. His feats of memory have become legend. Never has he been seen to use a score. In his head are over 100 operas, in addition to an enormous concert repertoire. When the jealous ask, "Why does he not use a score?" they answer themselves "Bravado." It is not bravado. Toscanini is so nearsighted that he cannot read a note that is more than half a foot under his nose. Long before ever his great night in Rio de Janeiro, he scraped his big fiddle with no white sheets propped up before him. "Where is your music?" asked the conductor one day. "Under the seat of my trousers," replied Toscanini.

* The Beethoven Association of New York was founded by Harold Bauer, pianist. Its members include many famed musical artists. Its purpose, in general, is to stimulate public interest in classical music, in particular to present the works of Beethoven in all forms, especially those least often heard. Large are its box-office receipts. These proceeds it has devoted to such good works as shall abet the fame of Beethoven, paying for the publication of Arthur Wheelock Thayer's Life of Beethoven in its first English version, contributing to the New York Public Library a valuable collection of works relating to the Master, giving a large sum toward the erection of a new Festspielhaus at Salzburg, Germany. * In the U. S. * The Directors, beside Mr. Mackay, are: Frederic A. Juilliard, Marshall Field, Otto H. Kahn, Charles Triller, Alvin W. Krech, Arthur Judson, Nicholas Murray Butler, Scipione Guidi, Mrs. E. H. Harriman, Thomas L. Leeming, L. E. Manoly, Frank L. Polk, D. Edward Porter, Walter W. Price, Elihu Root, Charles H. Sabin, Nelson S. Spencer, Maurice Van Praag. Mrs. Vincent Astor is the Chairman of the Executive Committee on the Auxiliary Board.