MU SIC.
MLLE. LANDI.
IN his suggestive volume recently noticed in these columns Mr. Ffrangeon Davies urges upon singers with eloquence and cogency the need of using their brains and cultivating their intelligences. The best voice in the world, without brains at the back of it, remains but an inefficient instrument of persuasion and interpretation. But this does not exhaust the list of desirable qualities. Temperament and charm—. it is hard to draw a hard-and-fast line between the two, yet the distinction will, we think, be readily admitted—. remain to be added to complete the equipment of that rare bird, the perfect singer. Such paragons have seldom emerged above the artistic horizon ; but now and again we encounter one who approximates more or less closely to the ideal, and if a plebiscite of enlightened judges were to be taken at the moment, it is more than probable that the name of Mlle. CamillI Landi would stand at the head of the poll. The English concert-going public has taken a considerable time in making up its mind as to her merits, partly because of her comparatively infrequent appearances, partly because her methods and choice of music are not always calculated to conciliate the English public. Some purists, for example, would doubtless still say that she was addicted to the tremolo, confounding that unquestioned vice with the legitimate pulsa- tion of tone which is so effective in moments of emotional or dramatic intensity. Be this as it may, the attendance at her last recital, and the large number of musicians in the audience, revealed the agreeable fact that the circle of her admirers is no longer confined to a handful of cognoscenti, but embraces all sections of the musical world. This is an eminently satisfactory state of affairs, for Mlle. Landi is not only a great singer, but she has never displayed any special readiness to sing down to the level of her audience.
Her first appearance before a large London audience was in 1893, when she sang at an orchestral concert given by the late Sir Charles Halle with his famous Manchester band ; and she then chose to be heard in Berlioz's "La Captive." The choice was characteristic, for though "La Captive" is the greatest of Berlioz's detached songs, it must have been wholly unfamiliar to ninety-nine out of a hundred of her hearers, and, for the rest, is so steeped in an atmosphere of exotic romance as to render its full appreciation by a British audience almost impossible. Still, some of those present must have read Berlioz's Memoirs, in which he tells the story of its composition,—how Victor Hugo's Orientates was lent him by a fellow-student at Subiaco when, as the winner of the Prix de Rome, he was studying at the Villa Medici; how the book opened at the poem in question, and he heard the music immediately and scribbled it down, with the result that the Director of the Villa a month afterwards complained that wherever he went, "in the garden, on the terrace or in the corridors, one hears people singing, grunting or growling le long du mur sombre . . . le sabre du Spahi . . . Je ne suis pas Tartare." Anyhow, Mlle. Landi triumphed, and few of those who were present in St. James's Hall thirteen years ago will ever forget the impression created by her singing. Since that date few seasons have elapsed in which she has not sung in London, but her visits have never been so irequent as to blunt the edge of appreciation. One year, it is true, in an unexpected spirit of concession, she appeared at the Ballad Concerts, but seemed quite out of her element, and made little impression on an audience accustomed to cruder methods and more direct appeals. But her reputation and her repertory have steadily increased, and of late years she has travelled widely on the Continent and won resounding success in Germany, perhaps for the very reason that she is so conspicuously endowed with the qualities in which German singers are so signally lacking. In intelligence, breadth, and dramatic intensity the best German singers have never been to seek ; but, as one of their own best critics, Moritz Hauptmann, said of a famous German prima donna, they have been at times inclined to sacrifice beauty to character, and the elegance and distinction of Mlle. Landi's singing, her perfect control of her resources, and her mastery of the niceties of technique would naturally appeal with additional force to those who are more accustomed to be impressed than fascinated by native vocalists. It is impossible in her case, again, to overlook the advantages derived from her origin, her training, and her experience. Of Italian origin, inheriting musical talent on both sides, she assimilated during her residence in Paris the best traditions of what is generally admitted to be the finest contemporary school of artistic singing. An admirable linguist, at home in four languages, she is thus enabled to sing nearly all the music that counts in the tongue for which it was composed; while her travels have afforded her specially favourable oppor- tunities for enlarging the boundaries of her repertory, for it a singer wishes, e.g., to learn a Russian song, it can be better learned in Russia than in London. The career of the travelling virtuoso may be difficult, or, indeed, impossible, to reconcile with that of the creative composer, but it certainly offers peculiar advantages to the interpreter, given intelligence and the capacity of taking pains. The singers who have counted have always remained students, ready to assimilate new ideas without forgetting Verdi's maxim, tornianto all' antico ; and if only as a practical exemplification of this conception of self-culture, Mlle. Lan.di's programmes are invariably stimulating and suggestive. At her last recital the composers represented ranged from Bach to settings of the latest effusions of the French decadent Muse ; from Haydn to Max Roger, compared with whom Richard Strauss is reported to have declared himself to be a "thoroughgoing classic." This catholicity of taste also found expression in the choice of songs by Handel and Gluck, Brahms, Hugo Wolf, and Saint-Saens. It would be incorrect to say that the singer was equally successful in all that she attempted. Mlle. Landi is always artistic, but not invariably convincing. Her taste is exquisite, but it is superior to her judgment. She has all the virtues, but some of the limita- tions, of the French school, to which, after all, she is most closely related. Her voice sounds fuller and more beautiful when she is singing in French than in any other language, and this may account for the fact that after singing a song from Bach's cantata, "The Strife between Phoebus and Pan," in German with an excellent accent, she chose to sing two of Brahms's lieder with viola accompaniment, including the beautiful Geistliches Wiegenlied, to a French version. This, however, may be due to that waywardness which is so often the defect of a pronounced individuality. Thus we see that Mlle. Landi is announced to sing the Dichterliebe at her next concert. This, at best, is a tour de force which can only be partially justified by results, much as in the case of Madame Sarah Bernhardt's impersonation of Hamlet. Of one thing we feel pretty sure, that it would never have received the sanction of either Schumann or Heine, and we can only hope that it will not lead to such artistic reprisals as the singing of the Frauenliebe und Leben cycle by Dr. Whllner, Mr. Plunket Greene, or Mr. David Bispham. This episode, however, is quite characteristic of Mlle. Lanai, in whose attitude towards the public there always mingles a certain engaging element of defiance, the result, no doubt, of a serene and perfectly intelligible confidence in her ability to realise her intentions. "I am going to sing you this song," she seems to say to her audience, "not to please you or to fall in with conventional standards, but simply to show you how I think it ought to be sung " ; and the result, nine times out of ten, is BO distinguished and delightful, so attractive alike to the ear and the mind, that the most fastidious hearer finds little or nothing to cavil at. For Mlle. Landi is quite capable of making even an educational Blue-book sound fascinating, if she took it into her head to recite it to music. She is a consummate disease, on whose lips the delirious maunderings of decadent poets— phrases like /a sonorite de /mauve and les hallebardes de spleen —assume an impressiveness and a charm that almost persuade rational people out of the conviction that they are listening to highly coloured nonsense. In her ability to glorify songs of flimsy texture and trivial significance by charm of voice, elegance of style, and easy mastery of technique Mlle. Landi recalls the exploits of de Soria—so happily described in du Maurier's Trilby—and of Madame Conneau. Those delight- ful singers, however, acting no doubt on Napoleon's maxim, ii faut se borner, were only great in their limited grooves. Mlle. Landi, equally admirable in the serious literature and the belles-lettres of the art, is perhaps the only singer living who by the tones of her voice and her artistic temper reminds middle-aged amateurs of that incomparable artist, the late
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