"You have done wrong; for the very fact that you have rejected your own efforts is no bad proof of your talent. One learns music as a boy, because Papa and Mama will have it so; thereupon one goes to jingling and to fiddling without mercy; but imperceptibly the sense grows more susceptible to music. Perhaps the half-forgotten Thema of a little song, now differently sung, was the first original thought; and this embryo, laboriously nourished from extraneous sources, grew to a giant, that absorbed all about it and converted it into its own marrow and blood! Ha! how is it possible even to allude to the thousand ways in which one comes to composing! It is a broad thoroughfare, where all jostle along and shout and scream: We are initiated! we are at the goal! Through the ivory door one enters the realm of dreams: few get even once to see the door, and still fewer pass through! It looks adventurous here. Mad shapes flit to and fro, but they have character - some more than others. They do not let themselves be seen upon the thoroughfare; only behind the ivory door are they to be found. It is hard to come out from this kingdom; as before Alcina's castle, monsters guard the way — it whirls it spins round-many dream out the dream in the kingdom of dreams -they melt away into a dream they cast no shadow more, else would they by the shadow become conscious of the ray that penetrates this kingdom: but a few only, awakened from the dream, rise up and walk through the realm of dreams - they come to the truth the highest moment arrives: the contact with the eternal, the unspeakable! Behold the sun; it is the Trichord, out of which the accords, like stars, shoot down and weave you about with fiery threads-enveloped chrysalislike in fire you lie there, until the Psyche wings her way aloft into the sun." -- With these last words he sprang up, and cast his eyes and his hand upwards. Then he sat down again and quickly drained the glass that had been filled for him. A pause ensued, which I might not interrupt, for fear of turning the extraordinary man off his track. At last he went on more calmly : "When I was in the kingdom of dreams, a thousand pangs and terrors racked me! It was night and I was frightened by the grinning larvæ of the monsters, that stormed in upon me and now plunged me into the abyss of the sea, now bore me aloft in the air. Then bright rays flashed through the night, and the rays were tones, which encircled me with lovely clearness - I awoke from my pains and saw a great, clear Eye, that looked into an organ and as it looked, there came forth tones, that glimmered and intertwined in noble accords, such as I had never before conceived of. Melodies streamed up and down, and I swam in this stream and wanted to go under: then the Eye looked at me and held me up over the roaring waves.— - It became night again; then two colossi in shining harness came upon me: Ground-tone and Quint (fifth)! they tore me aloft, but the Eye smiled: 'I know what fills thy breast with longing; the soft, tender youth, Tierce (third), will step between the colossi; thou wilt hear his sweet voice, behold me again, and my melodies will be thine."" I sat in a glorious valley, and listened how the flowers sang to one another. Only a sunflower was silent and mournfully inclined her closed calix to the earth. Invisible bands drew me towards her she raised her head-the calix opened and out of it the Eye flashed upon me. And now the tones, like rays of light, proceeded from my head to the flowers, which eagerly sucked them in. Greater and greater grew the leaves of the sunflower flames streamed from them they enveloped me -the Eye had vanished and I was in the flower cup." At these last words he sprang up and hurried with swift, youthful steps out of the chamber. In vain I waited for his return; so I resolved to go to the city. [To be concluded in our next.] OLD MAN'S SONG.* FROM THE GERMAN OF RUCKERT. Stern life for me bath frosted The house-roof o'er; But warmth enough remaineth The Winter's breath has whitened Yet flows the blood, as redly, At th' heart's good core. The cheek's young bloom hath fleeted, The roses have retreated, All retreated, One by one. Where have they all retreated? Are all the joyous streams of One soft rill through my bosom Are all the nightingales in The woods grown dumb? "Lord of the house," it singeth, "Make fast the door, And let the world, the old one, Shut out the frosty breath of And only to sweet dreamings J. S. D. *This Song has been set to music for a bass voice, by FRANZ SCHUBERT. SINI Now for a very opposite type. At the head of the new Italian line stands unquestionably Ros-the strongest, most original, most creative, elegant, accomplished, of all the masters of Italian opera; though never very deep, and seldom going to the heart, as do Bellini, Donizetti, and many others who have shown much feebler genius. But he is a miracle of exhaustless, sparkling invention. He never lacks ideas, and does not hug a few happy inspirations through opera after opera, until his melodies seem bedridden, as we mnst painfully confess to find it the case with more than one production of the author of "Lucrezia Borgia," and "Lucia di Lammermoor." His melodies all come out fresh, felicitous, and to the point; as natural and obvious as they are brilliant. No other composer could carry along such a weight of ornament, and not seem cold and barren and sophisticated. His instrumentation is always rich; his overtures are complete forms of art. Bellini, Donizetti, Verdi, have produced none that deserved the name, in comparison with his. There is no end to his variety in opera; that is, within his plane of spiritual experience, which of course is not the highest. The "Barber of Seville," suggested by Mozart's "Marriage of Figaro," is the most elegant, bewitching, graceful, and refined specimen of musical comedy that we possess. It is a whole library of the brightest, fancifullest, most original and piquant tunes, such as haunt the streets, and are a part of the treasured gaiety of all lovers of music and bright life. There is a fine, hearty epicureanism about it. Everything in it sounds familiar to one who never heard it as a whole before; and everything is as bright as a laughing child's face in the morning. The author of the barber's song, Largo al Factotum, has contributed his part to the good cheer of mankind. His "Otello," the most florid and elaborate of all operas in its melodies, and taxing the most arduous reach of the most flexible of voices, has all that passionate, consuming fire in it, both of ambition and of love, that is demanded by the subject. It adds the Moorish to the Italian sun. How exquisite the melody of Desdemona, in the last part, where she sings the ballad of Isaura at her harp! And there is even religious beauty in the prayer, Deh calma o ciel ! His "William Tell," opening upon you in the overture with one of the richest tone-landscapes ever composed, shows how readily he caught so much of the spirit of the German music as is due to the wild scenery of that country and of Switzerland. His "Semiramide" is all gold and purple, full of Oriental pomp and splendor, -regal, imperial in its every suggestion. ROSSINI marks a new era in the course of modern music. First there was the simple PlainSong of the Gregorian times. Next the artificial, monkish, scholastic refinements upon those few old themes, working them through all the fantastic, barren complication of fugues and canons, till that art culminated and was inspired in old SEBASTIAN BACH, the type of scientific, learned music. Then, with the revival of letters, the dawn of popular and religious freedom, and the rise of the Opera, came the great German music of expression, with the great line of masters, HANDEL, HAYDN, MOZART, and, deepest, most, prophetic of them all, BEETHOVEN. But the nineteenth century was growing more and more material. It was the age of machinery. Dazzling successes, of the Napoleonic sort, inflamed men. Superficial talent and mere tact grew rampant; genius was kept back in the shade. Art grew melodramatic. The music of effect became more popular than the music of expression. ROSSINI was the master-mind and founder of the school; himself a man of genius, though the school be false and dangerous. His operas drove out Beethoven's music in his own Vienna, the musical capital of the globe. From Beethoven to Rossini, what a step! Here is a music infinitely more popular at first. It strikes at once; charms everybody; is full of beauty and of brilliancy, inexhaustible in fancy, and taxing only the senses of the hearer. It is not guilty of any mysticism; you can hardly define any sentiment to which it appeals; and you are not left under the spell of any feeling except that of having been most agreeably entertained. No restless longing haunts you; no lofty aspiration fires you; you are in no mood to go alone, after it. The influence of the music passed off with its own short hour; and it is exceedingly convenient, sometimes, to have had a genial spirit to converse with, who does not ask to be remembered, or to hold any lien upon your future states of mind or action. It is music which delights you; which is sure of its effect; which goes boldly and pleasantly up to everybody, but influences, changes, nobody. It is the music of the Senses. It puts the nerves into fine tune; it makes pleasure beautiful, and amusement graceful and refined, and justifies leisure unto itself. Such a ready flow of quaint, delicious melodies as this mercurial Italian has! Such a free dashing off of each extempore conceit! Such a happy working up of all to produce the best effect; and such a cunning way withal of getting round the ambitious singers, by ornamenting his airs so highly beforehand, that they can find no flourish or appogiatura more to add! And more than all, such a man-of-the-world's knowledge of the average capacity and taste of men! Such a genial bonhommie!-such an exquisite tact! His music is polite and arch and witty, and in all ways very witching. But has it any sentiment beyond the enjoyment of to-day's existence? Shall it not be classed among the luxuries? - by which we mean not an unworthy element in its place. It is, indeed, a very proper luxury, that should belong to everybody; the wholesome consciousness of life in every nerve!-the joy of clear, fresh, harmonious sensations !-one of the best conditions, surely, of the sound heart and mind. Reader! have you ever seen the portraits of BEETHOVEN and ROSSINI hanging side by side? There you beheld the two extremes of modern music, and the faces were as strongly marked. Wide and catholic is the world of music which could accommodate at once that rapt, inwardlooking, earnest, perhaps sullen, and yet unspeakably tender face, with the mass of forehead, like a thunder-cloud, frowning over the halfclosed eyes, the inward listening, but the physically deaf! - and this jovial, full-blooded, nonchalant, mercurial epicure of the great day of trade and luxury and fashion! One a prophet, caught up with celestial visions, burning with great passion and great faith; the other emphatically a man of the world! One a still magnetic mover of human destinies; the other, a contented denizen of the actual, dallying pleasantly through paths which all frequent, and overflowing with good nature towards all the world! ROSSINI is the master-spirit of this modern music, decidedly without a rival. He has done more, perhaps, than any composer who ever lived, to popularize music, to educate the ear of all mankind; and in the impulse he has given to the ambitious experimenting with all the outward means and mechanism and appliances of the art, though carried to excess by wonder-working virtuosos, he is but opening the transition from the limited to the more universal schools of Art which shall come after, when the new and greater sentiment of a race united in true brotherhood and joy shall need a greater music for its utterance.Sartain's Magazine. Robert Schumann's Musical Life-Maxims. XLIV. But how does one become musical? Dear child, the main thing, a sharp ear and a quick power of comprehension, comes, as in all things, from above. But the talent may be improved and elevated. This you may do, not by shutting yourself up all day like a hermit, practising mechanical studies; but by living, manysided musical intercourse; and especially by constant familiarity with orchestra and chorus. XLV. Listen attentively to all Songs of the People; they are mines of most beautiful melodies, and open for you glimpses into the character of different nations. XLVI. Exercise yourself early in reading music in the old cleffs. Otherwise, many treasures of the past will remain locked against you. XLVII. Reflect early on the tone and character of different instruments; try to impress the peculiar coloring of each upon your ear. XLVIII. Do not neglect to hear good Operas. XLIX. Reverence the Old, but meet the New also with a warm heart. Cherish no prejudice against names unknown to you. LI. In judging of a composition, distinguish whether it belongs to the artistic category, or only aims at dilettantish entertainment. Stand up for those of the first sort; but do not worry yourself about the others. LII. “Melody” is the watchword of the Dilettanti, and certainly there is no music without A week in London during the season, is an event not to be afterwards forgotten by a musical devotee. Nearly all the great artists of the earth are there gathered together, and oratorio, opera, and concert, follow each other in rapid and bewildering succession. Tempted by the announcement in the Times, of great works and distinguished artists to be listened to, the British Channel once crossed, my friend F- and I left Paris one evening, and the next morning found ourselves amid the smoke and fog of London. Smoke and fog were forgotten when we were seated in the Covent Garden opera house, listening to Mozart's delicious "Flauto Magico.”—The music which the great composer has put into the mouth of the High Priest Sarastro, is entitled to rank among his finest creations. Solemn and grand, broad in its developments and pure in its forms, one feels in every phrase as if allowed to assist at the mysteries of Isis, awed, and as it were seated under the very shadow of the great temple. Herr FORMES, with his noble voice and imposing manner, gave great effect to the rôle which he assumed, and impressed me most vividly. Mme. ANNA ZERR sang the part of the Queen of Night. Her voice, which is a soprano of remarkable range in the upper register, is extremely well. suited to the music written for this rôle. Her first aria: A soffrir son destinata, suffered from the memories of Jenny Lind, which cluster about the ears of any one who has listened to her admirable rendering; but the staccato cadence in the aria of the second act was astonishing as a piece of vocalization, and if her intonation were always exact, and her manner a little more graceful, she would be really a fine singer. RONCONI's Papageno, although a little too exaggerated sometimes in its buffoonery, was extremely clever, and MARIO as the prince Tamino, moved me, as he always does, by his sympathetic voice. Mme. CASTELLAN as Pamina sang extremely well, and her duet with Papageno was encored with great enthusiasm. What a delight to listen to the limpid and graceful melodies of Mozart, when a few days before one has quailed beneath the empty noise of M. Halevy's saxophones, drums and trombones, heaped one upon the other without pity, in his five act nullity, the "Juif Errant." Our next entertainment was a concert at the Hanover Square Rooms, given by Mr. LINDLEY SLOPER, of which the gems were a quartet of Mozart, (in G) performed by SIVORI, Joachim, HILL and PIATTI. Sivori pleased me much more than last year, when I heard him play a solo, in which his affectation and grimace destroyed any pleasure one could have had from his wonderful execution. Mozart seemed to sober him, and he played his part simply and earnestly. After this we had Mendelssohn's Ottetto. Here Joachim took the first violin, Sivori the second, Piatti first violoncello, and Bottesini played the second 'cello part on the double bass a feat which I suppose no one else would attempt. MELLON and WATSON played || the other two violins; HILL and BLAGROVE the altos. JOACHIM is incontestably a great artist. His manner is large and without affectation. He is said to play Mendelssohn's music better than any one else; indeed that great master preferred his rendering of the violin concerto to that of any other artist. In the Ottetto he showed his great qualities enough to give F- and myself infinite pleasure, and we regretted much not to have had time to pay him a visit, as he invited us to do, when we might perhaps have had a better opportunity of judging. Having truly enjoyed this excellent concert in the morning, we betook ourselves in the evening to Exeter Hall, where we heard Handel's ora torio of "Israel in Egypt" performed by an orchestra and chorus, 700 in number, under the able direction of COSTA. It is only in England that Handel can be heard in perfection. His mighty choruses need such masses of sound to give them their due effect, that unless there are great means at command it is difficult to feel their sublimity. Here we had the one thing needful, and the power displayed almost took away one's breath; it was not noise, it was mighty sound, too majestic to be painful, too sonorous to do aught save awe the listener. The next morning we attended an extra concert given by ELLA who pretends to be the leader of classical music in London - and if judged by this effort, does not fulfil his task; for with the exception of the sonata in F for piano and violin of Beethoven, played by Mme. PLEYEL and VIEUXTEMPS-the programme was filled with modern music of rather inferior quality. In Mme. Pleyel I was profoundly disappointed. I had heard a great deal of her, and was prepared to find not only the most brilliant execution, but also the qualities of a great artist, namely, respect for the music of the great masters, and simplicity in the manner of interpreting their im mortal works. What was my astonishment to hear this sonata in Fa, of which I knew every note by heart, given to the public with affected retardandos and accelerandos, with interpolated ornaments; in short, just in the manner in which it should not be played;- violinist and pianist rivalling each other in Pleyel-ising and Vieux temps-ising Beethoven. Such sins as these are even with difficulty pardoned, when an artist is interpreting the works of a cotemporary, who can if need be rise up and defend himself, but when committed against the mighty dead are unpardonable, and ought to be held up to public censure. Instead of this, a critic in the Times the next day, has the impudence to assure us that "if Beethoven had taken the trouble to mark all the shades of rendering, ornaments, &c., &c., which he intended in this sonata, he would doubtless have given us the new version of Pleyel and Vieuxtemps." This man does not know that men like Beethoven not only feel all they wish to say and write, but also say it and write it so that "he who runs may read "—and that artists who permit themselves such falsifications, are untrue to their mission and do great harm to art in every way. But enough of this; we ended our musical enjoyments in London by the crowning glory of the whole the Choral Symphony of Beethoven, magnificently performed by the orchestra and chorus of the New Philharmonic Society, under the potent "baton" of BERLIOZ, at Exeter Hall on Wednesday June 9th. Berlioz pretends to be the child of the Ninth Symphony. This is his climax of art. This is what he himself would date from. Whether his pretentions are just or not, he has made it his peculiar study, and no one is better capable of drilling an orchestra and chorus in its intricacies and difficulties than the said Hector Berlioz. Being the first time I had ever heard this mighty work of art, I hardly dare to say what my impressions were. Such as they are, I would state them with the utmost modesty. Any one who is at all versed in the music of the greatest of composers, can at least enter with deep interest and delight into the first three movements, especially the Scherzo and Andante. The Scherzo, brilliant and rapid, peculiarly Beethovenish, carries you along in its flight, without effort, and leaves you almost breathless at the end. The Andante, one of Beethoven's most sublime inspirations, seems an epitome of all his great qualities. The deep tenderness, the feeling for nature expressed here as divinely as in the Pastoral Andante, the illimitable grandeur, in short all that he revealed to us in the realms of art, seemed to me, even on this first hearing, to be epitomised and concentrated in a magnificent whole. How I long to hear it again, and again! Then came the last movement, about which I stay my pen. I did not understand it, and reverently stand in hope and faith, that its secrets may at some future day be revealed to me. It is acknowledged even by those who know it best, to be the most obscure of Beethoven's productions, the most difficult to be understood; and it would be folly to try even to form one's thoughts upon it after a first hearing. One other work of art, of quite a different nature must be mentioned, as having been produced on this same evening, namely: extracts from the "Faust" of Berlioz, his last and most complicated work, led by the composer himself. I had been long anxious to hear some of his Ode Symphonies, and never before have been able so to do. We had a Pastoral chorus, Recitative and Air of Faust, the Hungarian March, and the dance of Sylphs and Gnomes conjured up by Mephistopheles to lull his victim into a sleep full of enchanting visions. The march, which was encored, seemed to both F and myself fitter as a theme for a Polka than for the place which it holds. It was finely worked up and splendidly scored. A part of the air of Mephistopheles in which he conjures the Spirits of Air around him, impressed me; and the dance of the Sylphs, struck me as the most fairy-like thing I ever listened to. The orchestration was magical; violins with sordines, harps, and whiffs of rapidly passing sounds from clarinets, oboes and flutes; nothing could be more spiritual. But here again it was the genius of the orchestra - it was not the power of Mendelssohn, who in his overture to the Midsummer Night's Dream, or his Scherzo in the Quintet in A, sends you by the force of his idea far away into the realms of Fairy Land, and makes the air alive with tiny shapes more brilliant than the rainbow. The music of Berlioz is generally vague, the ideas when more familiarized of little value in themselves, but so scored, that as the coloring in the pictures of the great painters of the Venitian school shuts the eyes to defects of drawing or subject, so Berlioz by his marvellous comprehension of orchestral effects makes one forget to demand a strict account of the value of the simple idea. Musical Review. P. Album für die Jugend. XL. Clavierstücke, von ROBERT SCHUMANN. Op. 63. Schuberth & Co. Hamburg and New York. pp. 62. Price, $3. We are almost afraid to say how much we have been charmed by the (to us) newly discovered little gems in this collection. It is truly an Album of fresh, original, most beautiful flowers of musical poesy for young students of the piano. We have seen nothing for a long time that has made such new and such decided claims on our attention. It is a fresh musical experience, a sort of beginning the musical life over again with the child's first delight and wonder, to make acquaintance with these little pieces. The beauty of it is, that there is nothing common-place about them; they are not dry exercises; they are real live musical thoughts, each simple and unique, and perfectly embodied in a little form, that wins you as surely as you fairly notice what it is. You may try one of them over listlessly, slurring over the at first strange harmonies, not careful to preserve the individual parts distinct, and reckless of the signs of expression, and perhaps find nothing in it; for the very reason that there is nothing in it that admits of being slighted; every note and sign stands there for something, and you must play it over till you win from it the composer's meaning, when you will surely feel that you have won what is a "thing of beauty" and "a joy forever." 66 Observe, they are very little pieces; - too brief and unpretending, it would seem, to warrant many words about them. But little as they are, they embody in their series so much variety of beauty, both of thought and form, they show so much real invention, they are so characteristic, and indicate such a fresh well-spring of musical genius where they came from, that they seem to bring you into acquaintance with the leading features and the peculiar spirit of Schumann. He is revealed here in miniature as perfectly as Mendelssohn is in his Songs without Words." If only for this reason, our more enterprising musical students should seek them with avidity; for Schumann is very far from being known to us otherwise. In our concerts few attempts have been made to interpret to us his larger works, and these have scarcely been successful. Our Boston Musical Fund Orchestra have again and again rehearsed publicly his first symphony. But that was written when the wealth and vigor of his imagination were too much beyond proportion with his mastery of form; the impression was one of power, but still confused and strange. And we hear always such reports of his strangeness mingled with the poeans of his German admirers, that one naturally suspects a straining after novelties of effect and fears the affectation of genius. But it is also ground of great confidence in him that as he goes on he grows clearer. His Second Symphony is a great ad vance upon the first in this respect. His later Songs, though at first trial their accompaniments may seem to bristle with far-fetched, doubtful harmonies, suspensions, &c., yet are sure to win you to a sense of their pure and genuine beauty, if you trust them until they become familiar. For the sake, therefore, of getting some distinct perception of ROBERT SCHUMANN, of the most remarkable musical man or musical problem in Germany to-day, we hope our best lovers of music will procure this little Album for Youth. Those most musically cultivated will find that here is something new to interest them. But for the young, for students it is primarily designed. It is a series of little pieces, which while they exercise the fingers, also nourish the sentiment and quicken the imagination of music. They are lessons in style, in form, in the fine organic structure of musical thought. And we cannot doubt that they must fully answer their end. While simple enough for a child, and sure to interest as they grow familiar, they at the same time gently and imperceptibly initiate him into an easy thoughtfulness and refinement of manner that belongs to the best classics of the Art. Such lessons tend to make the early tastes and habits pure and above temptation from mere superficial clap-trap. This Album is the work for which the "Maxims," which we have been giving to our readers from time to time of late, were intended. They were to be interspersed among the little pieces, each of which is an example of a certain form, style or mode of treatment of a theme. They begin very simple and progress in difficulty; though each is simple of its kind. Each piece has a name that well indicates its character; there are "Spring Songs," "Winter Songs," "Chorals," plain and figural, "Peoples' Songs;" there is the "Poor Orphan Child," the "Song of the Reaper," "Echoes from the Theatre," "Mignon," "Sheherazade," "Northern Song," &c. And there is a specimen of a "Little Fugue," and a "Canonical Song." There are several marked only by three stars, as if identified with some choice spot in the author's memory, and their beauty well warrants the supposition. The book, which is printed in Germany, though the publishers have also a branch of their establishment in New York, (Schubert and Co. 257 Broadway,) is attractive to the eye, and has a pictorial title page, on which some of the subjects of the music are artistically illustrated. XXV. Etudes formant l'Expression. Op. 47. STEPHEN HELLER. New York: Schubert & Co. These studies are by one of the most genial and graceful of the piano forte writers of the day. They form (in two cahiers or numbers) the "first degree" of the "first section" of what the publishers style at the head of the title page a "Gradus ad Parnassum pour Piano." The other "degrees " are Thirty Studies preparatory to Classic and Modern Works;" "Twenty-five Etudes Romantiques;" and "Twenty-four Characteristic Studies in all the Major and Minor Keys;" all by HELLER. The second "section" " consists of "Exercises and Studies, by JACQUES SCHMITT, for the acquirement of a brilliant execution." These first numbers of the series we have read through with great pleasure. They are a progressive course of studies, not difficult, and not common-place, and carefully fingered. But there is a refined style and sentiment about them all, which redeems them from the dry category of mere finger gymnastics. One can even enjoy them after the little poems of Schumann's "Album," they have so much character. Indeed we recommend both of these works on the ground that they are products of real musical thought, and not of mere musical routine, like most of the exercises put into the hands of learners. We thank the publishers for a real addition to our stock. American Church Organ Voluntaries. By H. S. CUTLER, Organist at Grace Church, and A. N. JOHNSON, Organist at the Park street Church, Boston. Published by A. N. Johnson, 36 School St. pp. 95. The design of the editors of this work is: "to furnish amateurs with a collection of Voluntaries, which may be played at sight by those whose opportunities for studying the works of the great masters, such as Bach, Rink, Schneider, &c., have been limited." At the same time, we are glad to see that they have given in the latter part of the book some specimens of these masters; for if the opportunities to study them have been limited, there can be no better service done to amateurs than to facilitate their access to these models. As we understand the editors, they wish to furnish a set of easy voluntaries, carefully arranged beforehand, to take the place of the crude and bungling "improvisations" SO called, to which half-educated organists are too much tempted to resort in their inability to master the difficult "classics" of their instrument. To this end they have furnished about forty opening and twelve concluding voluntaries, all of good medium length, and some, even of the original ones, possessing considerable beauty. The preface contains a description of several of the best organs in the Boston churches and halls. Little Eva; Uncle Tom's Guardian Angel. Poetry by JOHN G. WHITTIER. Music by MANUEL EMILIO. Price 25 cts. Boston: John P. Jewett & Co. The words to this little song are sweet and worthy to embalm the pleasant recollections of many thousands of readers of "Uncle Tom's Cabin." The music is a flowing and pathetic melody, quite in the Italian vein, with an easy and pretty accompaniment. No doubt, the song will be very generally sought and sung. Dwight's Journal of Music. BOSTON, JULY 10, 1852. GLUCK. The performance of the noble overture to Iphigenia in Aulis, at the last Summer Afternoon Concert, led us to hunt up the Fantasie-Stücken of that eccentric genius, HOFFMANN, and to translate therefrom his imaginary interview with the Chevalier, or as they say in German, "Ritter Gluck." We are not without suspicion that some one of our friends had already translated and published the same thing somewhere, some years ago. But we could not find it, which is the excuse for our hasty version. Another time we shall give such account as we can glean of the life and works of GLUCK,- a composer, who should be much more known among us, and whose lofty dramatic works are by many regarded as only second to Mozart's. Literary Musicians. The present is evidently the age of criticism. The power of learning, knowledge and reflection, far exceeds in all the arts the power of spontaneous, original creation. The artists themselves are critics. Once the musician lived in his world of music, unburdening his soul in tones, which are a universal language, with small power to write or talk about it, and little versed in any logic but such as you find in old Bach's fugues and the development of musical themes. But to-day the musician is a creature of to-day: he has a theory of his art, he criticizes his work even in the performance, he finds his way into the newspapers, he journalizes, he analyzes his compeers, he speculates about the music of the Future, and by words as well as deeds would fain herald some new Era in Art. It is a curious fact that the half dozen new men who just now occupy the foreground of musical notoriety in Europe, have distinguished themselves also in the field of literary criticism of their Art. LISZT, of whose subtile faculty in that line our read ers have lately been convinced by the translation in our columns of his Reminiscences of Chopin, has written several books. He is now established as chapel-master at the Court of Weimar, where he evidently aspires to build up a Medicean era for Music, as Goethe did for general art and poetry. As if he felt a power and mission to make a mark more permanent upon mankind than that of a mere wonderful pianist, whose charm is spent on those who hear him play, he appears to be animated by a large aspiration to found a great national progressive school of Art, the glory of Germany and the kindred nations, himself being a Hungarian. At Weimar he brings out (plainly with some partiality) the great compositions of one and another artist, which indicate any new and original direction in Art, as the operas of BERLIOZ and SCHUMANN, and more especially of RICHARD WAGNER. He has written a book about Wagner, in which he takes the ground that Wagner is the greatest musical genius of the age, and that his operas mark a greater reformation in the lyric drama than those of Gluck in his day. Liszt has also published a volume, unfolding a pet plan he has for what he calls a Goethe-Stiftung, or " Goethe Institute," for the distribution of prizes in all the Arts, including Music. RICHARD WAGNER, chapel-master at Dresden, whence he was expelled for a time in 1848 as a political reformer, and uncle to the prima donna, Joanna Wagner, is also as busy with his æsthetic and critical speculations, as with his operatic He has recently published an essay in two or three volumes on the Opera and Drama, in which he endeavors to show that we have had no proper Opera as yet, and to lay down the true canons of dramatic music. He is also a frequent contributor to the musical papers in Germany. scores. ROBERT SCHUMANN, whom some even of those trained up in the wisdom of the fathers, of Bach and Handel and Mozart and Beethoven, declare to be a greater genius than Mendelssohn, was the founder of the "New Musical Journal at Leipsic." And HECTOR BERLIOZ, by some regarded as the last word in musical composition, is one of the first authorities as critic, in which function he has plied his pen continually. We might mention others, but these are the great names, perhaps just now the greatest in the field of actual musical creation. Germany is also full of writers, critics, historians, theorists in this art, who many of them also are composers of some consequence, but whom we chiefly know as wriThese come not properly within the scope of our remark. ters. N. E. School of Design for Women. We had the pleasure last week of a brief visit to this institution, which is in the "full tide of successful experiment" in Thorndike's Building, Summer St. Some hours had been set apart for visitors by invitation, when the principal products of the School were gathered together for inspection. It has been in existence only nine months, and now numbers about sixty scholars, all or most of whom are preparing to earn their livelihood by the graceful arts here taught. Several of the young ladies have already executed designs to order. The first class, or beginners, have been pursuing under the guidance of Miss Clarke, the elementary course of exercises, first introduced by Mr. Whitaker, the former teacher, in the com nation of lines, curves and angles, in any given numbers, into such symmetrical figures as ther own ingenuity may dictate. This is somethi like combining and working up the motives i strict musical composition, or Counterpoint. I sharpens invention, quick perception of relations &c., from the very outset, while the hand is quiring freedom, certainty and firmness in all the elementary details of the process. Thus manual routine and free play of the inventive faculty go hand in hand from the first lesson. This class had been practising two months and we were astonished, as we think most visitors must be, at the nove and beautiful, and sometimes exceedingly complex harmonies of form produced by nearly al the pupils; of course, some would look more st and timid and mechanical, while others wouk have the easy grace and decision of native talent: some would show more and some less natural sense of beauty. But few could look through their exercise books without surprise at so many rich varieties of arabesque and Gothic ornamental work. Others were drawing scrolls, shading and color ing, under the direction of Mr. Bellows, the present principal teacher of the school. Other were drawing upon stone, under the same teacher, and some very clever specimens of lithography have been elicited. Three young ladies were de voting themselves to wood-engraving, under the tuition of Mr. Baker. They were furnished with tasteful drawings by Billings, and seemed quite expert in the use of the graver. The first practical fruits of the elementary course in designing, first alluded to, were seen in a great variety of original patterns, plain and colored, for calicoes, mouslin-de-laines, &c., some of which have attracted the eye of manufacturers. But what most astonished us was the activity developed in quite a number of the ladies young in the drawing and coloring of original patterns for house paper. Some of these were truly rich and elegant, and we were pleased to see that they had looked to nature, to the graceful forms of leaves and vines and flowers, in great part, the elementary hints of their designs. Lessons in Botany, by a young lady, a graduate of the Nor mal School at Newton, form a part of the course. for We are no critical authority in these matters. and can more easily praise the achievements than point out the short-comings of this busy nursery of artists; but we can safely say that the "School of Design" is stimulating into activity a class of faculties, which, as the example spreads, will do much to surround our homes with beauty and promote a general æsthetic culture. Ornamental designing, though a humble, is a most important province of Art, and affords a very useful and respectable sphere to much fine talent, accompanied by fine sentiment, which is too good for mere utilitarian drudgery, while it has not quite the force to make its mark upon the world in the higher forms of Painting and Sculpture. ORGANS IN BOSTON. Messrs. Cutler and Johnson, in the Preface to their new collection of Voluntaries say: "In order to give the legitimate effect of a fugue, an organ possessing considerable variety and power is essential. In this respect, Boston is more highly favored than any other city in this country, in proportion to its population. Of the ninety-eight places of public worship in Song, Duet. Florida Grand March- Duet, 7 Pianos (!!) Air Swiss-Trio, 7 Pianos (!!!) Home, Sweet Home-Variations, Flute and Piano. And so on. A rarer selection of music, on a grander scale of performance, is scarcely to be met with even in the world's great musical capitals. A Trio on seven pianos, we suppose, means that three young ladies played at each piano; that is, it was a piece for six hands, multiplied by seven. This was truly magnifique, and shows that music goes ahead in those regions with a full and triumphant consciousness that "this is a great country." Classical it was certainly, inasmuch as it was given in classes; but then there was no pedantic "old-fogey-ism" of Handel, Haydn, Mozart or Beethoven about it; the music was all of a newer and more original type. But hear the letter-writer again : "If any were not put into raptures on this occasion, it was because they had no music in their souls. We were especially surprised at the perfect time. We suppose that during the evening almost every young lady in the school had a hand at the music; and, whether it were one at a time, or twenty-one at a time, it was the same thing; the time was perfect." Musical Intelligence. Local. The feature in the Fourth Afternoon Concert was the Overture, by GLUCK, to Iphigenia in Aulis. That was an overture! — so clear, so full of marrow, each musical idea so interesting, and so distinctly developed, and the whole so deeply dramatic in its suggestion! Surely that was the opening to a noble tragedy! It is a masterpiece of delicious instrumentation. If it did not excite all that loud applause which follows solos and polkas, we are sure that it was inwardly applauded and enjoyed by many of the audience, and we hold the orchestra bound to give us another and another hearing of it, till it shall fairly be appreciated. This is a part of our musical birth-right, which has by some accident strangely been withheld from us Bostonians until now. The Andante to Haydn's "Surprise" Symphony was finely rendered, especially the pianissimo; but this was an old story compared to that Symphony in E flat, partly given before, and which we are glad to hear will soon be presented entire. The selections for the brass instruments were better than usual. That solemn old Chorale was just the thing for them; and the piece from Meyerbeer's "Camp of Silesia was quite stirring. Give us more Chorales, if you wish to edify us. London. MDLLE. CLAUSS. Of her morning concert, June 19th, the Athenæum says: "It exhibited that remarkable young artist as competent to perform music in every style and of every difficulty. Her programme included specimens by Bach, Beethoven, Mendelssohn, Chopin and Thalberg;-wider range being hardly conceivable, since the head and hand that can master compositions by the first and the last named writers must also be equal to the more level and melodious productions of Dussek, Hummell, &c., who occupy the intermediate space. All that Mdlle. Clauss wants is what time, and time alone, can give. She is a little rash sometimes in trusting to her memory; every now and then she faulters, too, but this merely because she is not sufficiently hardened in explaining her meaning. Her intentions are never doubtful-her readings are never dull- and her feeling is singularly deep for one so young, because it is so simple. The little more grandeur, fancy and pathos which might still be added will come all the sooner because she does not attempt to counterfeit them. In short, last Saturday's performance, though not without its imperfections, has deepened the conviction that at no distant period Malle. Clauss may stand alone among female pianists - and approached by very few of the number." CHAMBER CONCERTS. Herr Molique, at his first concert, played a MS. Sonata of his own, for piano and violin. Chorley speaks of it as "containing too much of every thing," as "extreme in its demands on the ear by reason of the closely intricate science with which it is conducted onwards and its subjects are knit together," but as 66 excellent because of its first thoughts, which have vigor, character and contrast." The Andante, he says, " contains something like a new form" and but for its "over-solicitous complication" might have been numbered among Andantes of the first class.- So difficult was it as to tax to the uttermost Herr Hallé, the most accomplished classical pianist of the day. At the sixth of Ella's MUSICAL UNIONS, Beethoven's Trio in C minor, for strings alone, was "led with great nobility of tone and style" by Vieuxtemps. Hallé played Beethoven's third Sonata (op. 29), "to perfection." And there was a Quartet by Mozart, No. 6. The novelty at the fifth meeting of the QUARTET ASSOCIATION was a Quartet, specified as the Op. 122 of an amateur, Mr. Lodge Ellerton. The same critic says: "The composition, though agreeable, is fade and indistinct;"it is creditable to its writer "according to his order," though "not stout enough to abide exposure' by the side of Mozart, &c. MADAME PLEYEL's second concert was a remarkable exhibition of those qualities in which she excels, -brilliancy and lightness of execution (not excluding power) and exquisite taste in the rendering of sentimental music by composers of the second order. Further, no one besides herself can produce any effect in playing with the tremendous difficulties which Thalberg, Liszt, and Prudent have accumulated in their arrangements and operatic fantasias. Then, she has never played more solid and expressive movements, by such deeper writers as Beethoven and Mendelssohn, so much after Lady Grace's fashion, otherwise so soberly:- for all which reasons she has never pleased us so much as on Thursday morning. As a vocalist of "credit and renown," Madame TaccaniTasca, who appeared on the occasion, claims a word. Her manner is a somewhat uncomfortable mixture of the frivolity of the old and the exaggeration of the new schools. Her voice is no longer pleasing.-Athenæum. 6 While the Sacred Harmonic Society is preparing Dr. Spohr's second Oratorio, Calvary,' for performance on Monday week, the London Sacred Harmonic Society announces Handel's Athaliah' as in rehearsal. This Oratorio, it may be noted, contains some of its composer's most delicious writing for a contralto voice,- some of his opera songs and choruses have been transformed by him from secular to sacred uses. Madame Otto Goldschmidt has left London for the Continent. The Stockholm papers report a new act of great munificence on her part. She has transmitted to the Government a sum of fifty thousand piastres 10,000l. sterling-to be employed in the creation of free primary schools in those localities wherein the number of those establishments is below the wants of the population. A second series of Music and Manners in Germany,' by Mr. Henry F. Chorley, is in preparation. In this a revised portion of the writer's former work having a simitar title will be incorporated for the purpose of giving completeness to a series of pictures and notices of the art in Germany, illustrating the period closed by the death of Mendelssohn and the Revolutions of 1848. From the French papers we learn that a complete Catalogue of Beethoven's works with critical remarks has been recently issued by M. Lenz, a Russian amateur. NEW ORGAN VOLUNTARIES. JUST PUBLISHED, American Church Organ Voluntaries. CAREFULLY ARRANGED expressly for the use of Organ ists who have not had sufficient experience to extemporise with ease, by H. S. CUTLER, Organist at the Church of the Advent, and A. N. JOHNSON, Organist at Park Street Church, Boston. These Voluntaries are mostly arranged in close harmony, and can readily be played at sight by those who can play common church music. They are specially adapted to American church service with regard to length, &c. and are sufficient in number to enable any Organist to use them ex clusively if desired. Price $1. Forwarded by mail, postage free, for $1.25. Published by 14 tf A. N. JOHNSON, 36 School St., opposite City Hall. EVA. LITTLE NEW & BEAUTIFUL MUSIC & POETRY. LITTLE EVA, UNCLE TOM'S GUARDIAN ANGEL. A Song composed and Dedicated to Mrs. HARRIET BEECHER STOWE, author of Uncle Tom's Cabin. Poetry by JOHN G. WHITTIER; Music by MANUEL EMILIO. This is one of the most beautiful compositions, both poetical and musical, ever published in the country, and we predict for it a popularity as wide-spread, as has been that of the thrilling and beautiful story upon which it is founded. Price 25 cents. For sale by the principal Book and Music Dealers in the country. Published by HESE CONCERTS will take place EVERY FRIDAY, containing four tickets, at 50 cents a package, can be obtained at the usual places, and at the door on the afternoons of the Concerts, where single tickets at 25 cents each, may also be had. 10 tf G. SCHNAPP, Leader, 364 Tremont St. BOSTON MUSIC HALL. [OTICE is hereby given that the BOSTON MUSIC HALL ASSOCIATION are ready to receive applications for the use of their HALL and LECTURE ROOM, (entrance on Bumstead Place and on Winter Street,) by Religious Societies, for the purpose of regular worship on Sundays, after the 15th of November next. NOTI NEW LINE ENGRAVING. 66HE DESTRUCTION OF THE TOWER OF BABEL, and Dispersion of the Races," engraved by Prof. THAETER, after the celebrated Frescoe painting by WILLIAM VON KAULBACH in the New Museum at Berlin. Specimens for subscription may be seen for a few days at 12 3t N. D. COTTON'S, 13 Tremont Row. THE NEW JUVENILE SINGING BOOK. HE PESTALOZZIAN SCHOOL SONG BOOK, containing a Complete Elementary Course, (in which a large number of Popular Airs and Tunes, arranged to be sung by note, are employed as progressive exercises,) a large collection of SCHOOL SONGS, together with a full variety of HYMNS and SACRED TUNES, for the devotional exercises of Schools. By GEO. W. PRATT, Teacher in the State Normal Schools, and J. C. JOHNSON, Author of Juvenile Oratorios, &c. This work is on an entirely new plan, and is believed to be a great improvement upon any Juvenile work heretofore published. A copy for examination will be sent by mail, postage paid, upon the receipt of twenty-five cents. Published by A. N. JOHNSON, 36 School St., Boston. A. N. JOHNSON respectfully informs his friends that he has taken the new store No. 36 School Street, (a short distance from his former location in the Tremont Temple,) where he will keep a full assortment of Music, Singing Books, Piano Fortes, Reed Organs, Melodeons, &c. &c. Orders by mail promptly executed. 1 tf DEPOT FOR Homœopathic Books & Medicines ; HYDROPA TUNCER & WELLS' Publications on Phrenology [YDROPATHIC BOOKS; Phonographic and Phonotypic and Physiology, &c.; Writings of EMANUEL SWEDENBORG, Theological and Philosophical; Barometers, Thermometers, &c. For sale, wholesale and retail, by Apr. 10. tf OTIS CLAPP, 23 School St. |