M U SIC.
THE COMING OPERA SEASON.
ON May 5th, for the first time since the War, a company of German operatic artists will be heard in London : a solemn thought. For those who have had the privilege of hearing them in their own country since the War know that they need expect no deterioration from the days of Nikisch and Richter. Herr Bruno Walter is famous all over Germany, especially for his conducting at the Munich operatic festivals, which are the highest possible test.
The list of singers makes an imposing array. Among them we recognize the well-known names of Gertrud Selma Kurz (who was lately heard at the Albert Hall), Eliza- beth Schumann, Jaques Urlus, and Richard Mayr. All these are tried artists of magnificent technique and tone—qualities we could do with a little more of here in England, and in every way we shall have much to learn from them.
During the first fortnight we shall hear two cycles of The Ring, three performances of Tristan, and two of Salome. It is announced in the prospectus that the company's repertoire includes both Ariadne and Der Rosenkavalier, and it is to be hoped that later on we may hear these beautiful works, both of them belonging to the second and more satisfactory period of Strauss's career as a composer. However, it will be inter- esting to hear Salome again, after so great a lapse of time, though the delicious sound of the orchestral writing bas by now ceased to obscure the essential commonplaceness of the themes. Those who heard Ackte in the name-part may be dubious about any other singer, but there seems every reason to suppose that Fraulein Goeta Ljungberg, whose name is new to us, will surpass the expectations of the doubters. A more detailed discussion of the music must be left to a later occasion.
Performances of Der Rosenkavalier are the more' to be solicited as we have among the singers two of its most famous interpreters—Faulein Schumann, whose acting and singing in the part of the Marschallin can only be called exquisite and Herr Mayr, whose performance as the Baron Ochs, is one of the most finished things we have ever heard.
In the depths of the rather dreary list of Italian operas that are to follow from the third week onwards, Mozart's Don Giovanni makes a little oasis, but it is depressing to note that as the opera will be performed during the Italian season, we shall presumably not hear Herr Mayr in the part of Leporello- a role in which he is well known.
It is likewise a cause for distress that every opera of Verdi's (including the almost unknown Macbeth) should be in the repertoire except the most beautiful of all, Othello. The omission seems quite inexplicable. The rest of the list does not bear inspection, with its repetition of Puccini and early Verdi, interspersed by Wolf-Ferrari's surely negligible Jewels of the Madonna and the ubiquitous Pagliacci.
But let us be thankful for a mercy that is certainly not small, and look forward to at any rate a fortnight of unalloyed
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