THEATRES AND MUSIC.
The Opera season is drawing to a close, and no novelty can now be ex- pected at either house. Mr. Lumley, however, produced the variety of a morning concert on Wednesday, in the concert-room of his theatre. The performers were the staff of the establishment, with Sontag at their head; and the an- nouncement of her appearance drew one of the most crowded and fashionable audiences of the London season. Madame Sontag sang four pieces in widely different styles, and showed herself to be as charming in the concert-room as on the stage. The first was a grace- ful Italian romance called " La Zingers," composed for her bytDoni- zetti; which she gave with captivating archness, and that richness and yet delicacy of embellishment for which she is unrivalled. In Ger- man music she gave the famous scene of Der Freischistz, "W ie Nahte Illlr der Schlummer "; a soliloquy which, on the stage, demands vehemence of gesture and vocal bursts indicative of strong passion : but these Madame Sontag evidently conceived to be out of place in the concert-room; for she avoided every appearance of dramatic action, and subdued the whole tone of her performance; thus rendering it, perhaps, less effective than if she had given it all the force of stage representation, hut, as one of the morning journals has remarked, more consistent with propriety. The expression of the scene, though thus kept down in the more violent passages, was full of discrimination and truth, and its execution was of unsurpassable beauty. Equally beautiful was her execution of Haydn's air in the Creation, With verdure clad "; a piece of pure description, full of charming freshness; and nothing was more remarkable in her performance of it than her scrupulous fidelity to the author's text. In Meyerbeer's " Robert, toi que j'aime," on the contrary, she indulged in the florid style of embellishment which the composition evidently demands. Her whole performances justified her old reputation of being the most accomplished concert-singer of her day. In this capacity Madame Sontag's powers will soon be generally appre- ciated throughout the country; as, besides being engaged to sustain the principal soprano part at the Birmingham Festival, she is, under Mr. Lumley's auspices, to make the tour of the provinces and of Scotland and. Ireland, during the autumn. At Covent Garden, the Prophite continues to be performed to great houses and with unabated success. We have seen it a second time, and find, as we expected, that it improves on better acquaintance. Mario is greatly improved, both in the energy of his action and in his vocal execu- tion. The whole music is performed with increased precision and smooth- ness; and its effects, consequently, are more easily felt and understood. But we still think that the dramatic defects of the piece Are an obstacle to its obtaining the popularity of the Huguenots.
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