19 APRIL 1851, Page 9

Mr. Hull*, at his sixth monthly concert, on Wednesday evening,

brought forward Haydn's Passione. Of this celebrated work it is related that it was written "to order." A priest of Cadiz having conceived the idea of a series of instrumental movements to be performed by an orches- tra in the cathedral of that city during the solemnities of the 1E017 Week, employed Haydn to execute his design ; and, notwithstanding its com- mercial origin, the music furnished by Haydn turned out the grandest and most pathetic of all his ecclesiastical works. The church was hung with black, and darkened ; the Bishop, from the pulpit, pronounced in succession the seven last words of Jesus on the cross, adding to them some appropriate reflections. At the end of each, he descended and threw himaPlf on his knees before the altar, while Haydn's solemn strains, re- sounding through the edifice, sustained the tone of feeling excited by the words of the Bishop. Some time afterwards, Haydn gave this music the form it now bears. Taking the orchestral score as a foundation, he reared upon it the vast superstructure of a quartett for solo voices intermingled with choruses, for which Italian words were written. One or two of the move- ments are included in Latrobe's great collection of Sacred Music published in:London above thirty years ago ; but the public are now indebted to Mr. Hullah for the opportunity of hearing the entire work in English. The performance was sufficient to make the audience understand the charac- ter of the music and feel its beauties. The solo parts were admirably sung by Mrs. Endersohn, Miss William; Mr. Lockey, and Mr. Whitworth ; and the firmness and precision of the chorus showed careful and success- ful training. Among its other merits, this music has that of comparative facility of execution. The passages lie so well for the different voices, flow with such melodious smoothness, and unite in such broad and simple masse; that their full effect is produced without straining or any painful effort. We do not, indeed, know any music, of so grand a description, more completely adapted to social performance round the pianoforte. Mr. Hullah produced another novelty, of a very different kind; a " Tantum Ergo" composed by Rossini for an ecclesiastical solemnity at Bologna, in 1847. It is theatrical, trite, noisy, and without a vestige of earnestness or feeling—the dregs of an exhausted genius. We could al- most suppose that Mr. Hullah meant it as a contrast or a foil to the grand and simple music of Haydn. The rest of Mr. Hullah's concert consisted of a repetition, for the second time, of the selection from Gounod's Mass, performed at a pre- vious concert ; and of Mendelssohn's well-known Sacred Cantata, " Lauda Sion." The execution of Gounod's music was even clearer and smoother than before, and confirmed the favourable impression made by I the first hearing.

On the same night, this young composer was himself undergoing the author's great ordeal—the first representation of his first piece. His lvera, Sappho, was produced at the Grand Opera, and, as we learn from the hair; journal; with complete success ; Madame Viardot representing the heroine with all the splendour of her genius. But, whatever M. Gounod's future triumphs may be in his own country, he will not likely forget that the first time any of his music was publicly performed, was at Bt. Martin's Hall in London.