THE BIRMINGHAM MUSICAL FESTIVAL.

The Birmingham music-meeting which has just terminated deserves especial notice, less on account of any novelties that have been produced, than of the completeness of all its arrangements, the unprecedented ex- celletce with Which many of the greatest masterpieces both sacred

and secular have been performed, and the remarkable success of its results.

The absolute novelties, indeed, though exceedingly interesting, have occupied but a small space in the general plan. They consisted of the two relics of Mendelssohn of which we lately gave some account,—the fragments of his oratorio Christus, and of his opera Larely ; a motett, also by Mendelssohn ; and an anthem by Dr. Wesley. A relative novelty was Beethoven's great Choral Symphony, never before performed at a pi o- vineial concert, and with which even the Metropolitan public have as yet but little acquaintance. The subject of the Christus we have already described in speaking of it as a published work. Each particular portion fully realized the expecta- tions we had formed from a perusal of the printed score ; but the injury done by its fragmentary character to its effect as a whole was greater than we had anticipated. Before any one part of the subject was sufficiently developed and the mind allowed to dwell long enough upon it; a sudden transition was made, without the smallest pause, to something which must have been separated from it in the author's mind by a wide in- tervaL Thus, after the first fragment, which relates to the Nativity and terminates with a joyful chorale of praise and adoration, we are brought at once into the heart of the scene where Jesus is dragged by a furious multitude before the judgment-seat of Pilate ; and the lamentation of the people who followed him as he was led to crucifixion is succeeded with equal abruptness by a grand choral hymn of thanksgiving for the con- summation of man's redemption,—a morceau probably intended to con- clude the work. All this made the performance disjointed, and some- what unsatisfactory ; though several portions bad an unspeakable grandeur and beauty. The scene in which the multitude extort from Pilate the sentence of death, carries dramatic music to its highest pitch. The chorus of two words only, " Crucify him !" reiterated by the min- gled voices of men and women in tones of frantic eagerness growing more and more vehement with every repetition, is the most vivid picture that music can paint of the fierce passions of a mob. There is something like it, though less intense, in the same composer's St..Patil ; but we think that the chorus " Daughters of Zion, weep for yourselves and your chil- dren," is, for deeply mournful expression, without a parallel in that or any other oratorio. The performance of this chorus was exquisite ; the wailing cry of the female voices must have gone to the heart of every hearer.

The fragment of Iorely, performed at' one of the evening concerts, was, as we formerly mentioned, intended to be the finale to the first act of the opera ; and, though not in itself unconnected, yet it laboured under the great disadvantage of having no antecedents, and of wanting those scenic accessories which are necessary to make theatrical music effective and even intelligible. On. the stage, the betrayed and deserted maiden, re- pairing at midnight to a haunted spot on the banks of the Rhine and holding unearthly converse with the unseen spirits of the stream, forms a picture in which the eye must share as well as the ear ; and we must have witnessed the damsel's wrongs in order to sympathize with her grief and be moved by her desperate cries for retribution and vengeance. Moreover, the purely dramatic character of the music impairs its efffict in the concert-room. In the heroine's part, Mendelssohn has thought more about truth and force of passionate expression than of pretty melody. Leonora frequently screams rather than sings, emitting for bars together a series of notes in the highest part of the scale, and uttered with the voice strained to its utmost power : but to make this natural and effective, the singing should be accompanied with phrensied vehemence of gesticulation and action. The fair cantatrice to whom the scene was allotted—Madame Clara Novello—was fully aware of all this; so much so, that she ex- claimed to some of her friends, "I detest the part !"—explaining, how- ever, when they held up their hands at her phrase, that she did not mean it in a sense at all derogatory to Mendelssohn, but to her own powers.

The motett, "Saviour of Sinners," is one of Mendelssohn's late compo- sitions; and is so much in the style of our great English ecclesiastical masters, whose works he greatly admired, that it might almost be called.

an anthem. It is a chorus with a semi-chorus of eight solo voices ; and the voices being those of Clara Novelle, Castellan, Dolby, Williams, Reeves, Lockey, Weiss, and Formes, it may be imagined with what clear- ness and purity the fine harmonies were delivered. It is worthy of Men- delssohn, and, with an organ accompaniment only, would be a valuable addition to our store of cathedral music. We cannot say so much for the- anthem by Dr. Wesley ; who, though admitted to be, as an organist, a worthy son of the great Samuel Wesley, displays little genius as a com- poser. His anthem is clearly and solidly written, but is entirely con- ventional, and exhibits no inventive power. It passed of4 accordingly, with little notice.

But the body and soul of the Birmingham Festival were the great ora- torios, Elijah, The Creation, The Messiah, and Samson : such was the order in which they were performed on the four mornings of the festival—

Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday. -At this time of day, it would be idle to speak of these works in any other than general

terms. The Messiah maintains, and probably will always maintain, its undeniable supremacy. Next to it, Samson has been the most suc- cessful of Handel's works ; having had the greatest number of per-

formances from his own time down to the present. Many critics"

prefer the Israel in Egypt, which is a series of stupendous double choruses, unrelieved by a single air of any note. Samson has more va-

riety, and, notwithstanding its gross faults as a literary work, much dra-

matic interest. It contains many fine airs, and its choruses yield in gran- deur only to those in The Messiah and one or two in Israel in Egypt. As

now performed by the Sacred Harmonic Society, and at the Birmingham

Festival, its faults have been lessened by large and judicious excision ; and the new orchestral parts, (on the plan of those by Mozart in The Mes- siah,) added by Mr. Costa, have wonderfully heightened the beauty of the music, without interfering with Handel's own designs or diminishing the clearness and simplicity of his effects. The manner in which Elijah has been universally received in this country has shown how congenial it is to the taste and feelings of the English people. And as for The Creation, it seems destined to live for ever in pristine freshness and beauty.

Of all these glorious works, we can say without hesitation, that we have never before heard them so finely performed. Particular parts, the exclusive property of unrivalled artists, may have been surpassed ; but the completeness and excellence of the choral and orchestral bands have been, we think, unprecedented. If their numbers have not much exceeded the scale of former festivals, the care taken in the selection of every indivi- dual, both in London and the country, has been unusual, and the result proportionately happy. In the alto part of the vocal harmony there is now a large infusion of female contralto voices, singing of course in uni- son with the men, but greatly enriching and mellowing the sound. Mr. Costa has also made several important improvements in the construction and arrangement of the orchestra ; which it would require too many words to make intelligible.

For the leading parts, there has been the most powerful array of vocal talent that could possibly be obtained. Jenny Lind " was married and could not come," Sontag was gone to America, • Lablache was setting out for Russia, and Mario's demand was exorbitant. But there was Viardot Garcia, whose unrivalled intelligence and feeling make some vocal defects appear insignificant ; Clara Novello, the most gifted in vocal power and the most highly cultivated by education of all our English songstresses ; the sweet and graceful Castellan ; our admirable contraltos, Miss Dolby and Miss Williams ; Tamberlik, Formes and Belletti, stars of the Italian stage ; Reeves and Lockey, our leading tenors, each admirable in his way ; and Weiss, an excellent bass and a sound musician.

With such a choice, there was no difficulty in finding fitting performers for every part of the music, both sacred and secular ; and the distribution on the whole was very judicious. Madame Viardot had too little to do, and we believe would gladly have done more ; but what she did was of the highest importance. In Elijah, she sang the part of Queen Jezebel, and by her intensely tragic expression, produced the same electrifying ef- fect as when she appeared in it at Norwich. In the air in which a celestial being utters the denunciation, " Wo unto them who forsake him ! de- struction shall fall on them !" she gave a new and beautiful reading to the words, by uttering them with an expression of deep sadness. After the performance, a professional friend of high authority took her to task, and told her that she ought to have delivered this curse with a stern and minatory accent. " No," she said in reply ' • " I felt that an angel, even as the messenger of the wrath of God, should have pity." Madame Clara Novello had. the principal soprano passages in the oratorios, and for beau-. ty of voice and purity of style left nothing to be desired ; what she did leave to be desired was a higher tone of feeling. In the great air in Elijah, for example, " Hear ye Israel," though she sang it admirably, she did not rise to the lofty earnestness of Jenny Lind, She was more com- pletely successful in The Creation : " On mighty wings " was superb, and " With verdure clad " was warbled as deliciously as possible. Formes was seldom other than excellent : his Elijah wanted the sustained grandeur of Staudigl's, but on the whole it was a fine performance. Sims Reeves gathered laurels :. he betrayed his usual faults, but they were lost among his high qualities. Ilia opening of The Messiah,, in vocal power and ener- gy of declamation, was only second to that of Braham himself; and his "Total eclipse" in Samson had much of Braham's pathetic expression. The other singers we have named lost none of their metropolitan reputa- tion.

The evening concerts comprised more music of a high and classical character than is usual at provincial festivals. Besides Beethoven's Choral Symphony, several other fine symphonies and overtures were played ; one of the concerts included the fragment of .Lorely, and another the Walpurgie Night.

The pecuniary results of the festival have not been equalled for many years. The Town-hall—boast of Birmingham and grandest of concert- rooms—has always been full, both at the morning and evening perform- ance ; and on Thursday, the Messiah day, there was a crowd surpassing anything we have ever seen there. On that and every other day the audiences were composed not only of the moat respectable inhabitants, belonging to the middle ranks, of the town and country for many miles round, but of the nobility and gentry of Warwickshire and the adjoining counties. Lord Leigh, the President of the Festival, and his family, were regular in their attendance from beginning to end. The pecuniary result of the musical portion of the Festival, in comparison with the two preceding, was this--In 1846, 10,1701. 9s. 3d. ; in 1840, 8,9621. Is. hi. ; in 1852, 10,7511. Too much praise cannot be given to those members of the Committee who more immediately superintended the arrangements, particularly Mr. Ledsam the chairman and Mr. Mason the orchestral steward, for their sedulous attention to the accommodation and comfort of the public.