THE NATIONAL LYRIC DRAMA.
ON reviewing the coarse of things called new operas, produced chiefly on the English stage within the last ten years or so, one might be almost tempted to inquire whether there is any real connexion between music and truth of sentiment or passion ; for, having at length, with French assistance, sunk utterly into "the realms of nonsense," we find the art still as bustling and active as if it were the exponent of matters addressed to the feeling and imagination—" the bosoms and business " of men. There is therefore, we take it, an empirical system of operatic composition, the pattern of which being once drawn, may be imitated ad infinitum, and so much the more easily in that there is no waiting for inspiration—no hesitation for plan or contrivance, but the whole pro- ceeds with the coolness and mechanical precision of ordinary manu- facture. The sum and substance of this art seems to lie in getting together a good stock of quadrille subjects, and, having instrumented them with piquant effects for the horn, flute, violoncello, &c., to set the orchestra going, and then bring in the sentences of any given libretto ; adhering strictly to conventions for the introduction of song, concerted piece, or chorus,—now begioing to sing without any tune, and now stopping to talk without any sense. This method will suit any subject, whether fairy, historical, or legendary, or a mixture of them all, as managers may prefer. The scenery may be of one sera, the costume of another, the manners and morals of our own day. We may see King Edward the Third drinking punch in a cellar, and marrying his fa- vourite Salisbury to Miss Overtry—who is certainly related to SHAK- SPERE'S Mistress Overdone. We may see a rabble of character.— sailors, sheriffs, &e. unknown to FROISSART--M short, such an opera as Mr. BALM'S Geraldine ; of which it is no recommendation to be told that it has succeeded in Paris. The Parisian manager appears to have calculated, and perhaps rightly, upon the public as a herd of monstrous fools, who would go and stare at his incongruities for one night, and then send their friends. And when we remember what grave mistakes, what solemn farces in dramatic music, have received the fiat of the Parisians, as a contempo- rary ludicrously calls it, we may judge of the value of the decisions of that theatre-shoaling people. Did they not sit out hundreds of repre- sentations of the wearisome Huguenots, and the almost as tedious Robert the Devil?—pieces that in London, where the public have not as yet buried all their senses in their eyes, would scarcely ran six nights. Here, if an opera does not please, the falling-off, after a few representa- tions, is palpable, however laudatory the critiques of the journals : the audience, if they find themselves in a humdrum state, conclude the work a failure, and the composer's affair is not mended by one gentle- man clapping in the boxes. The most melancholy thing in life— deeper than the " melancholy of Moor-ditch," or of a Methodist ser- mon—is the excitement, the sound, and show of an opera, without the gratification. Mr. WORDSWORTH'S party in a parlour, " all silent and all damn'd," is nothing to it.
There is ever comfort to be taken from the prospect of improvement when things are at the worst; and we confess that we can see no " lower deep " than Geraldine. Not that Mr. "LUSE is a worse musician than he was, or has descended beneath himself, except inas- much as he is involved with and responsible for the absurdities of M. SCRIBE. But M. SCRIBE, it is plain, is no METAeTASIO—DO author of libretti, no poet-musician. He first, in Gustavus, produced the plot of an opera as involved and complicated in the movements of its nume- rous characters as the most elaborate play ; and now be gives us a medley that defies "all human probabilities and historical associations." So writes one of Mr. BALFE'S critics, who nevertheless finds something to admire in the setting of this piece. Although it is evident that M. SCRIBE has much to seek in his musi- cal dramas,—wholly unaware that simplicity of construction, a design in which the situations are naturally evolved from one main incident, forms the best material for music, the composer naturally falling in with his art where the sentiment becomes too impassioned for ordinary Lan- guage,—although of this M. SCRIBE knows nothing, we cannot easily acquit Mr. BALFE for being ignorant of it. An opera is a work of a single head—not of one man who brings a story, and another who supplies a bundle of quadrille tunes. The operas that have suffered of late seasons on the score of bad books involve the reproach of the composers, who misunderstood their craft in accepting them. Amidst the general straining after effect—the consultations of ma- nagers, scene-painters, ballet-masters, and composers, that have preceded each new trial of the public patience in operatic composition—most strange does it appear, that the only source of true effect, new idea, has been overlooked. The attachment to precedent is as great in the theatres as in the law-courts. The curtain has risen any time these ten years upon a chorus of soldiers drinking—or a village-fete: then runs in the landlady of the inn, according to ancient custom, to announce the arrival of some distinguished stranger : the rest of the business may be extemporized: the scenery, the tableaux, the effects, follow in due course. Meantime, Young Rapid seems to have been engaged to lead the orchestra. Such is the eternal whirl of the violins and the general din of the instrumentation, that the senses are mystified, the judgment is confused,—a very necessary process, as every itinerant manager knows : but at last comes the question, what is it all about ?
That there is somewhat radically wrong in the present state of the English lyric stage, no one will deny. Managers have been ruined, actors put on half-salaries, and the entire musical energy of the nation has languished, without any approach to the true cause of the evil, or attempt to reform it except by the occasional remonstrances of the press. We know well that the days of ARNE and SHIELD are not to be restored in this age of orchestral experience, when we have before us the models of MOZART, BEETHOVEN, and WEBER. Yet, though Com- pelled to follow in the wake of grand discoveries and systems of com- bination, the real genius has still room for orignality, if he bestow the colouring of individuality upon his work. Let the composer get a good libretto : let it have some grains of sense and probability—some situa- tions of an affecting or humorous nature. Let him throw overboard all conventions and precedents, and dare to think for himself. Let him ponder on the rationale of quick fiddling, and consider the delicate affinities subsisting between the voices of instruments and the expres- sion of passion. Let his chorus be collected for some purpose ; and if lie has the genius for melody, the mastery of instrumentation, the know- ledge of mankind, and the other rare qualities that form the dramatic composer, he will produce a fine work.
But, after all this, he must take a theatre, and bring it out for himself: for no manager will listen to the voice of nature when put into com- petition with the old resources—the scenery, the costume, the dances, the tableaux, and the quick fiddling.
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