DICTIONARY OF MUSIC - El Atril

186 GLUCK GLUCK
school accused him of composing operas in which
there was ' little melody, little nature, and little
elegance or refinement. ' They
declared that the
noise of his orchestra ' was necessary to drown his
clumsy modulations ; that his accompanied recitative
was notliing but an overloaded imitation
to his melodies.' In short they denied him the
possession qf any creative genius whatever. They
might as well have denied the existence of the
sun—but passion invariably blinds its votaries.
The Abbe Arnaud, on the other hand, met the
systematic disparagement of Marmontel and La
Harpe with his I'rof&sskm de foi en, iniisique ;
an excellent treatise on musical testhetics, though
little more tlian a paraplirase of the celebrated
dedication whicli Gluck himself had prefixed to
the score of ' Alceste.' This statement of the
great reformer's principles is well worth tran-
scribing.
When I undertook to set the opera of 'Alceste' to
music (he begins), I resolved to avoid all those abuses
which had crept into Italian opera through the mistaken
vanityofaingersand the unwise cotnplianceof composers,
and which had retidered it wearisome and ridicuhius,
instead of being, as it once was, the grandest and most
imposing stage of modern times. I endeavoured to reduce
i music to its proper unction, that of seconding poetry by
enforcing tlie expression of the sentiment, and tlie interest
of the situatiinis, without interrupting tlie action, or
wealiening it by superfluous ornament. My idea was
that the relation of music to poetry was much the same
as tliat of hacmonious.colouring and well-disposed light
and shade to an accurate drawing, which animates tlie
figures witliout altering their outlines. I have tlierefore
been very careful never to interrupt a singer in the lieat
of a dialogue in order to introduce a tedious ritornelle,
nor to stop him in tlie middle of a piece either for the
purpose of displaying the flexibility of his voice on some
favourable vowel, or that the orchestra might give him
time to take breath before a long-sustained note.
Furthermore, I have not thought it right to hurry
through the second part of a song if the words happened
to be the most im|iortant of the whole, in order to repeat
the lirst part regularly four times over ; or to finish the
air where the sense do"s not end in order to allow the
singer to exhibit his power of varying the passage at
ple.tsure. In fact, iiiy object was to putan end to abuses
against which good taste and good sense have long
protested in vain.
My idea was that the overture ought to indicate the
3ub.iectand prepare the.spectators for the character of the
piece tliey are about to see ; that the instruments ought
to he introduced in proportion to the degree of interest
and passion in the words ; and that it was necessary
above all to avoiil making too great a disparity between
the recitative and theair of a dialogue, so as not to break
the sense of a period or awkwardly interrupt the movement
and animation of a scene. I also thought that my
chief endeavour should be to attain a grand simplicity,
and consequently I ha\'e avoided making a parade of
difficulties at the' cost of clearness ; I have set no value
on novelty as such, unless it was naturally suggested by
1 Gluck wa3 the flr.^t tr. introduce cymbala and the' Groase caisse '
or big drum into the orcljewtra.
the situation and suited to the expression ; in short
there was no rule which I did not consider myself bound
to .sacrifice for the sake of etlect.
It can never be out of place to recall such
precepts as these— precepts which will be worth
following to the end of time. Gluck himself
bore them carefully in mind in composing his
of the Italian ' recitativo obbligato '
; that his
choruses were less dramatic than those of Kameau
; and that his duets were borrowed, and
badly borrowed, from the ' duetti a dialogo ' which
he had heard in Italy. They could not forgive
wliat Marmontel calls his ' harsh and rugged
harmony, the incoherent modulations, mutilations,
and incongruities contained in his airs,'
but they were most offended by his ' ' Iphigcnie en Tauride, ' produced in Paris (in four
acts) with immense success, May 18, 1779. It
is the highest and most complete expression of
his genius. Amongst its many beauties must
be sjiecilied the air of Thoas ; the airs ' Je
t'implore et je ' tremble (borrowed from
want of
care in choosing his subjects, in carrying out
his designs, and giving completeness and finish
' Telemacco
'), ' malheuieuse Iphigenie ' (originally
written for ' La Clemenza di Tito '),
' Unis des
la plus tendre enfance, ' sung by Py lades ; and,
beyond all, the sleep of Orestes—the heartbreaking
remorse of the deceitful parricide, the
spirited choruses, and the barbarous Scythian
dances. These passages all glow with colour,
though the means by which the effect is produced
are of the simplest kind. By this chefd'muvre
Gluck amply vindicated his su])eriority
Iphigenie en Tauride
over Piccinni, whose '
(.Tan. 2.3, 1781) could not make way against
that of his rival.
The last work which Gluck composed for the
Opera in Paris was ' Echo et Narcisse ' (Sept.
21, 1779). Though not very successful it was
revived in August 17S0, and one of the airs,
and the ' hymne
a I'Amour,' have since been
introduced into 'Orphce. ' It was, however,
with ' Les Danaides ' tliat Gluck intended to
close his laborious career ; but an apoplectic
seizure comjielled him to relinquish the task,
and he transferred the libretto to his pupil
Salieri. He then retired to Vienna, where he
passed his last years in the enjoyment of the
position secured by his fame and his lai-ge
fortune, until a second stroke of apoplexy
carried him off, Nov. 15, 1787.
The authorities for this sketch of Gluck's
career, and for the notices of the most remark-
able passages in his operas, are various liistorical
documents, and the biographies and critiques of
Leblond (Memoires pour servir a Vhistoire de la
Rivolution opirSe dans la Musique 2mr M. le
Ch£vaHcr Glue!:, 1781, translated into German
by J. G. Siegmeyer, Berlin, 1823) ; F. J. Riedel
{Ueber die MusHc des Hitters Chrisloph rem
Gluck, vcrsehiedene Sehriften, Vienna, 1775);
Miel, Solie, Anton Schmid {Chr. W. Sitter
von Gluck, Leipzig, 1854) ; Fetis, Hector Berlioz
(/? trovers Chants) ; Ad. Adam (Derniers Sou-
venirs) ; Desnoiresterrcs (Gluck et Piccinni,
Paris, 1872), etc. For more minute details the
reader is referred to Schmid's work, which is
most complete as regards the catalogue of
Gluck's com]iositions. [Besides the authorities
already named, mention must be made of A. B.
Marx's Gluck und die Oper (Berlhi, 1862) ;
C. H. Ritter's Refm-m der Oper durch Gluck
und Richard Wagner (Brunswick, 1884) ; A.