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all his early German experience and training, with all his substantial
Teutonic technical foundation gained thereby, he was first and last a
Celt in spirit. Over the heavy bog of German harmony and
counterpoint his sensitive fancy danced like restless thistledown,
following the lightest whimsey of the breeze and the most tremulous
maneuverings of shadow-play. In his more powerful tone painting it
is the elements, rather than the passions, that command him. The
old nature-worship which is so ineradicable an element of the
psychic constitution of the Celt, and which leads him to commune
with the innumerable and elusive hosts of the land of faery, never
forsook the soul of MacDowell, or ceased to direct the course of his
genius. Impatient of the restraints of the outer world, and of its
weight of poetry-quenching affairs and transactions, his spirit hurried
ever to a communion with the moods and mysteries of nature, and to
that corresponding dream-world of intensified nature-perceptions
within the soul to which these are the appointed and the alluring
gateway. MacDowell's dream-world was directly conjoined with that
of 'Fiona Macleod,' whose subjective nature-pictures offer a close
literary parallel to the tone-pictures of the composer. These two
traversed the same region, which is that of the psychic perceptions,
but the account of it brought back by MacDowell presents one
striking fundamental difference from all accounts rendered by poetry-
making Celts who have remained upon their native soil. In the
American the soul no longer cries out from under an age-long
burden of poverty and oppression; the heartache and the world-
weariness have been sloughed off in the new-world birth. No outcry
of the heart is the music of MacDowell, but an eager self-
surrendering to the interpretation of the facts and moods of nature,
the rocking of a lily-pad on cool waters, the lonely drift of an
iridescent iceberg, the mad sudden impact of a hurrying gust. Often
are these interpretations of an almost uncanny intimacy, so subtle
and sensitive is their touch.
The 'Indian Suite' (opus 48) has been the most frequently heard of
MacDowell's orchestral works, which have, as a class, been
somewhat overshadowed by the piano compositions. In it the
composer has touched but lightly upon his Indian thematic sources,
building from his own fertile imagination a work of substantial
character in five movements, depicting his conception of various
phases of Indian life. The fourth movement, a dirge, has won great
favor through its sheer imaginative beauty, but the work as a whole
has not proved wholly convincing, and is far less true to the Indian
than the sonatas are to the Gaelic genius. It represents, however, a
matured mastery of orchestration and the formal presentation of
ideas. An earlier orchestral suite (opus 42) is a less notable work,
reflecting the influence of Raff, and is seldom heard. 'The Saracens'
and 'The Lovely Alda,' two colorful orchestral fragments from a once-
projected 'Roland' symphony, are not infrequently heard, and with
pleasure, but, while characteristic of the composer's genius, are
scarcely representative of it. An earlier 'Hamlet and Ophelia' overture
has fared rather less well.
II
One of the rocks upon which the high character of modern American
music is founded is the art-activity of Edgar Stillman-Kelley (b. April
14, 1857). While he has not given forth his compositions in rapid
succession or in great quantity, he has, nevertheless, struck a series
of telling blows for the honor and dignity of creative musical art in
America. Especially is this true in view of the fact that he has
formulated, maintained and promulgated definite ideals of music
throughout a period which has been characterized mainly, in this
respect, by confusion and groping, and, too frequently, even by
grovelling. In a post-Wagnerian period in which vacillation, obscurity,
and disorder have reigned throughout a large part of the musical
world, he has steadily advanced the standard of lucidity, order, and
faith. Lofty in imagination, of a high sense of beauty, and at the same
time exceptional in scholarship and breadth of intellectual vision, he
combines qualities which must necessarily single him out as a leader
of importance in the musical movement to which America has given
birth. The same qualities have also fitted him to exercise a
beneficent influence, in certain directions, upon more recent and
newly appearing phases of native musical evolution. It has been
Stillman-Kelley's fate that both his name and his influence have
outdistanced the general knowledge of his works. Two
circumstances may be held accountable for this: the fact that he has
given out no quantity of works in small forms through which his
music might become accessible to music-lovers everywhere through
the universal medium of the piano, and the further fact that it is
particularly in just such forms as Stillman-Kelley has produced that,
as a nation, we are slow in giving our own composers a wide
hearing. The American symphony, on American programs, must
wait, first, and perhaps rightfully, upon the classics, and, second, and
often with bitter wrong, upon the sensational European novelties of
the hour.
The thought can almost be ventured that Stillman-Kelley was the first
composer to use the post-Wagnerian harmonic vocabulary without
the result sounding like Wagner. If a heroic instinct for thematic
development in the face of the harmonic orgies of the time
contributed to this achievement, it was secondary to a contribution of
even greater distinction. This more original contribution may be
termed the application of a geometrical poetic sense to the new
harmony. Of the tyrant that enslaved the composers of the time
Stillman-Kelley promptly made himself the master. Out of the new
material he generated for his use harmonic motives, symmetrical
blocks of harmony, bearing a particular relation to his thematic
material, and, by the application of these well-defined and well-
rounded harmonic motives to his formal structure, he attained, at a
stroke, the employment of the new medium, the preservation of
clarity and order, and thereto a new musical personality. He did not
recede to an archaic classical purism and offer the familiar excuse of
those who found in Wagner the ruination of pure music. He
advanced bravely on to the dangerous ground of the new territory
and made it his own without sacrificing the fundamental classical
character of his ideals and without losing his wits.
The 'Aladdin' suite has perhaps been less infrequently heard than
Stillman-Kelley's other orchestral works. In this work the composer
availed himself of certain Chinese themes, of which he made a
characteristically thorough study while in San Francisco (and which
resulted also in his widely known song 'The Lady Picking
Mulberries'). This suite is in the composer's most genial vein and is a
tour de force of piquant orchestration. Its movements depict 'The
Wedding of Aladdin and the Princess,' 'A Serenade in the Royal Pear
Garden,' 'Flight of the Genie with the Palace,' and 'The Return and
Feast of the Lanterns.'
III
Among the most earnest and advanced leaders of American music
stands Arne Oldberg (b. 1874), a musical personality of the highest
nobility and idealism, and a consummate master of his art.
Unquestionably as fully equipped master of thematic development in
the cyclic forms as America has produced, his loftily conceived
chamber music and orchestral works present themselves in a
spiritual and technical serenity, artistic authenticity and
completeness, which baffle the critical beholder. Indeed, it is with the
music-makers who wrote before relentless Beethoven forced the
skyey goddess down into the world-struggle that Oldberg has the
closest spiritual kinship. Never since Mozart has music been more
bafflingly 'absolute' than in the bulk of his works in orchestral and
chamber music, and piano forms. The appearance of these works,
so modern from the standpoint of thematic and formal development
in this epoch, seems to call for a revision of modern musical
psychology and philosophy. Much of modern 'pure' music is too
dramatic to endure a comparison in this respect, or else too
philosophical and too deeply involved in the world-problem. To
Brahms' technical system that of Oldberg more nearly corresponds
than to any other.
The two quintets for piano and strings (opera 16 and 24) present a
joyous and upspringing lyricism all but unknown to the music of the
day, together, especially in the latter and more mature work, with a
thematic involution that would be appalling were it not for the
exuberant spontaneity of their inspiration. A string quartet in C minor
(opus 15) is a less complete revelation of the composer's powers. A
woodwind quintet in E flat major (opus 18), on the other hand, is a
miracle of gladness and of grave and haunting loveliness.
The first symphony, 'Youth and Life' (opus 25), is highly characteristic
of the buoyancy, the nervous energy, and the imaginative fertility of
the composer. The second, 'The Four Seasons' (opus 30), is a
delicate balance, within the classical form, of romanticism,
impressionism, and symbolism. It is romanticism that predominates,
however, although such distinct impressions as those of wintry blasts
and falling autumn leaves are happy and noteworthy features of the
work. The languor and sun-warmed luxuriance of mid-summer finds
poignant and beautiful expression. The third symphony, in B minor
(opus 60), seems to be less well known than the others. The fourth
symphony, 'North, East, South, West' (opus 64), was received with
enthusiasm when produced under the direction of the composer at a
meeting of the Litchfield County Choral Union, on June 6, 1911.
Hadley indulges in a little aboriginal Americanism in the 'South' and
'West' movements, though his only definitely discernible 'nationalism'
lies in his inherent temperamental character. The four symphonies
reveal a constantly progressive growth in modern harmonic vision
and in orchestral mastery. The only American composer to enter the
field of symphonic conducting as a profession, Hadley, in his
technical development, has made the most of his contact with the
orchestra.
There are three overtures, 'Hector and Andromache,' the jubilant 'In
Bohemia,' and one of sombre character to Stephen Phillips' 'Herod.'
A tone-poem, 'Salome,' finds him at his nearest to Strauss in ideals,
even if not in style. His most recent orchestral work, produced in
1914, is entitled 'Lucifer.' From earlier days are several 'Ballet
Suites,' an 'Oriental Suite' and a 'Symphonic Fantasie.' The still more
recent 'Culprit Fay,' after Rodman Drake's poem, has won various
and deserved honors. Hadley's one grand opera, 'Safie,' dating from
his incumbency as opera conductor in Mainz, Germany, was
produced there on April 4, 1909, but has not been heard in America.
There are songs in great number and variety, several cantatas, a
number of works in different small forms, and considerable church
music.
Mr. Converse has made two heroic ventures onto the still unwon but
yielding field of American grand opera. 'The Pipe of Desire,' with text
by George E. Barton, a one-act opera, is in mood a reflection from
the poets of the Celtic twilight. It was given a special production of
three performances in Boston, in 1906, and experienced a brief
revival, in March, 1910, at the Metropolitan Opera House in New
York, and in the following January in Boston. A second opera, in
three acts, 'The Sacrifice,' dealing with a romantic Spanish-
Californian subject, is regarded as showing a marked advance in
operatic style. It was produced by the Boston Opera Company in
March, 1911, with a measure of success, but the scope of its
bearings has not yet been extended. Mr. Converse's most recent
large work was the composition of the music for the 'Pageant and
Masque of St. Louis,' May 28-31, 1914, a broad and vigorous piece
of writing. In general, his music is of strong fibre, harmoniously and
melodically and warm in color, though his style has not yet broken
wholly away from its academic moorings. For several years after
1902 he served as instructor and professor in the musical
department of Harvard University.
IV
A very substantial and influential personality in American musical life
is that of Ernest R. Kroeger, who was born in St. Louis, Mo., August
10, 1862, and whose activities have ever since been identified with
that city. The list of his published compositions is enormous and
comprises works in many forms. As is the case with most American
composers, his orchestral and chamber music works remain in
manuscript, and consist of three 'symphonic overtures,'
'Sardanapalus,' 'Hiawatha,' and 'Atala,' the first Oriental in character,
the two latter Indian, overtures on the subjects of 'Thanatopsis' and
'Endymion,' a 'Lalla Rookh' suite, two string quartets, and, for piano
with strings, a trio, quartet, and quintet.
Leaning somewhat more heavily upon the classic than the romantic
aspects of German tradition, the work of Rubin Goldmark (b. 1872)
makes serious claim to a place of high regard in the field of
American music. While having had the advantages of European
study, Goldmark also reflects a measure of the considerable
influence exerted by Dvořák upon composition in America, having
been one of those under the guidance of the Bohemian composer
during his period of teaching in New York. In so far as this influence
is discernible in one of Goldmark's well-defined musical personality,
it is to be sought in the general nature of his musical ideals, and only
very slightly in the specific Americanism encouraged by Dvořák
(1841-1904). A firm emotional texture, gained by warmth of both
harmony and melody, and a virility arising from a marked rhythmic
sense characterize Goldmark's music. His creative impulse is guided
more by emotional sincerity and verity than by the element of charm,
though it is not without moments of tender and limpid beauty.
Brockway did, in fact, give out a quantity of small works, songs and
piano compositions, on his return to America, all of which, it may be
said, reveal a sensitive and truly poetic musical nature, capable of
lifting itself well up through the dense and earthy atmosphere of
technique into the realm of poetic perception and expression. The
outcome of his return to large forms it is a bit early to predict. The
knowledge of a manuscript quintet for strings and piano, and a piano
concerto, under his highest opus numbers, 36 and 37, adumbrates
an auspicious future for his expression in large forms. Meanwhile a
suite for 'cello and piano (opus 35) has been given out, and an
admirable cantata, 'Sir Olaf,' has been heard. From his earlier
portfolio credit is to be given him for the beautiful violin sonata (opus
9) and the significant 'Ballade' and 'Sylvan Suite' (op. 11 and 19),
both for orchestra.
V
Generations of composers succeed each other quickly in America
with, however, but the flimsiest of boundaries, chronological and
artistic. We now come to a group of composers, in general slightly
younger than those already considered, who in the romantic and
neo-classical fields may be regarded as 'runners up,' whose 'arrival'
is well under way and who press hard for the highest rank and
honors in their field in the national and even in the international
musical life. No order of precedence will be attempted in making
note of their achievements, as none has been made hitherto with a
few exceptions in favor of seniority and fame.
One of the staunchest and most uncompromising upholders of a
severe classical ideal is Daniel Gregory Mason (b. 1873). With
sureness, if not over-rapidly, he has developed a mode of expression
singularly lucid, symmetrical and thorough in its formal unfoldment.
Thoughtful in the extreme, modest in the nature and statement of his
themes, he seeks the source of power in completeness and
symmetry of outline, in the bringing of his themes to the fullest and
most rounded development, and in clarity of harmonic structure. Not
even the strictest of classicists, in these days, can wholly escape the
influence of the romantic epoch, and if a sympathy with the ideals of
Schumann has in a measure qualified Mason's musical outlook in
the first instance, it has yielded to a stronger leaning to the artistic
creed of Brahms. Some of the composer's pages bear a marked
Brahms-like aspect. These earlier influences have been broadened
and enriched in Mason's later work by a studious devotion to the
music of César Franck and of Vincent d'Indy, the composer having
studied with the latter in 1902 and later. These latter influences have
produced a very evident effect upon his harmonic scheme, which
presents a conservative use and treatment of thoroughly modern
resources, though with a characteristic avoidance of anything
approaching to the harmonic sensationalism of much latter day
music. In all ways, in fact, Mason's music is a protest against the
sensational tendency of the time.