LIVERPOOL FESTIVAL.

EVERY third year the Festivals of Norwich, Worcester, and Liverpool recur, and in the same order; an unfortunate one as far as regards Liverpool. We start with the noble and beautiful ball at Norwich, and its vast and well-disciplined band. At Worcester, we come to a building yet more amp'e and more beautiful--not only large and lofty, as well as exquisite in decoration, but so well adapted for the transmission of sound, that the best Quality of every voice and instrument comes out. At Liverpool, we sink in every respect—from strength to weakness, from grandeur to meanness, from a cathedral to a parish-church, (the one best fitted for a musical performance having been refused by the Rector,) from an orchestra filled almost with London instrumentalists to one of which the outline even is scarcely Metropolitan. LINDLEY is the principal violoncello, of course, but next to him is seated a country player; CROUCH, LUCAS, HATTON, BONNER, BINFIELD, PHILLIPS, LAVENU, who were all at Norwich. are all absent. There we saw WAGSTAFF, MORALT, DAVIS, and HILL, at the two first viola stands ; here the name of a Liverpool player stands at the very head of' the violas, while Dr. CAMIDGE elbows FRANCOIS CRAMER. These worthy gentlemen are esteemed in their respective neighbourhoods, and perhaps really are, respectable players; but their performance necessarily wants the finish which results from constant collision with the best artists, and the unity of impulse which is imparted by constant association in the same orchestra.

St. Peter's Church, in which the Festival is held, was stripped of its pews and pulpit, and fitted up with rows of benches fronting the orchestra; which, though as well laid out as the nature of the building would admit, was still radically bad. The front row was fourteen feet from the floor of the church ; the principal singers were therefore placed eight feet too high. The elevation of the orchestra was so much flattened, that though the chorus was thrust aloft till their heads touched the ceiling, even the heads of the instrumental performers were scarcely visible from the area of the church. The product of a band so placed was harshness and roughness—there was no room for the expansion, tempering, or mixing its various sounds; and, of course, the worst part of every voice and instrument came out. Precisely similar was the ease at Manchester ; and just so it must always be when the rules of proportion are violated, by the attempt to crowd large numbers into a small space.

The less of M AMMAN, who had been engaged at this as well as the Manchester Festival, threw a heavy cloud over this meeting. She was its great, its sole attraction. With the exception of MENDELSSOHN'S new Oratorio, the Selections were trite and vulgar. lslatabeate was the excuse—MALIBRAN was to be the atonement; she occupied all the thoughts, she absorbed all the attention of the managers—she would supply all their deficiencies and hide all their defects. Herm the loss of Masitiame was, to them, the loss of all—they had no other resource. To the threadbare compilations which the scheme contains she was to have given interest; into these dull masses and shapeless lumps she was to have breathed life and spirit. But her magic power withdrawn, they appear only in their native dulness and deformity. The Selections for the Liverpool Festival exhibit all the vulgarity of a Covent Garden Oratorio bill, without the noisy excitement which its performance was intended to provoke. It is really mar vellous how the inhabitants of a town so distinguished for refinement as woll as public-spirit, can suffer themselves to be insulted by a series of old London Oratorio bills, arranged with an especial reference o the gallery, and at which even the noisy. tenants of the Covent Omelets Olympus have long turned up their noses. The following povtion, like many other parts of the Liverpooi scheme, can now be found (in London) only at some " Grand Selection of Sacred Music," to be performed at Zion Chapel, or its the Yorkshire Stingia Music Saloon ; admittance one shilling. " Martin Luther's Hymn, accompanied on the Trumpet by Mr. HARPER"—the Liverpool scheme certainly contains one important addition, viz. that this celebrated hymn " will be accompanied on the Organ, and has been arranged for a full orchestra, by Sir GEORGE SMART." Too bad !

The first morning's performance was at St. Luke's; and consisted merely of the service of the Church performed Cathedralfashion, with the interspersion of some so-called anthems. Here was an opportunity to display the-power and majesty of English church music,—a good organ, a large and well-trained resident chorus, and the best English singers : yet even here the same hankering after stale mediocrity was visible. The great ones of the English school were passed over—no demand was made on the stores Which PURCELL, GIBBONS, BLOW, CROFT, or BATT'SHILL, could have furnished ; but the reputation of our national church music was left to be sustained by GREATOREX, KENT, and NARES. In order to give additional grandeur (must we call it ?) to NARES ill C, some ingenious wight actually perpetrated an accompaniment of trumpets and trombones. To these pieces were added the very stale and stupid verse from one of MARCELLO'S Psalms, (and no foreign composer has suffered greater injustice from the ignorance and indolence of selecters,) called "0 Lord, our Governor;' and an anthem compiled from one of MOZART'S Masses, demanding for its proper performance an instrumental band,—whose services, albeit, were dispensed with. To whom the merit of this morning's arrangement belongs, we know not—on this point the usual vehicles of information are dumb—perhaps the parish clerk.

A selection from HANDEL'S Solomon was performed on Wednesday morning. Of this oratorio our opinion was given on its revival at Exeter Hall. It is most unequal in its parts, alternately rising to sublimity and sinking to vulgarity. Here, therefore, justice to the author requires that the latter should be oxeluded; and the task of selection is rendered more easy, as the oratorio contains not the history of a single and great event, but a succession of scenes, only connected as far as its hero is associated with them. One of the most beautiful of these is that portion of the work usually termed "The Passions ;" the least (musically) interesting is the brawl between the two women about the child : yet did the perverse ingenuity employed in making this morning's selection reject the first and retain the last of these scenes !

The " Miscellaneous Act" was miscellaneous indeed. Some pains seemed to have been taken to arrange its materials in the most incongruous position possible. An opera bravura after a funeral anthem, and the sacrifice of Abraham's son followed by that of Jephtba's daughter—the former in Italian, the latter in English. Other words stood in this succession

" Oh fatal day ! how low the mighty lie !

'Where, Israel, is thy glory fled ? Spoil'd of thy arms and sunk in infamy,

How cans% thou raise again thy drooping head ? Let the bright Seraphim, in burning row Their loud uplifted angel trumpets blow!"

It is no very pleasant employment to point out these outrages on good taste; but it is the only way to put an end to them. Every person of common sense, musical or unmusical, must see and condemn them : and it is the especial duty of all who are able to estimate the power and value of music as a means of exciting the purest and noblest feelings of the heart, to denounce all these attempts to degrade it in the public estimation. Let us borrow an illustration from a sister art. At Worcester as well as at Norwich, we were introduced into a gallery in which all that was most graceful, majestic, sublime in the art of sculpture, was ranged side by side : there stood the Apollo, the Venus, the Laocoon. At Liverpool, they were shivered to fragments, for the purpose of being compounded afresh : an arm from the one was cemented to the leg of another, and attached to the body of a third : a hideous and mishapen image was thus compounded of the very elements of symmetry and beauty—all was mutilation and distortion. " The Christian's Prayer" was the only piece given entire : no wonder that it failed to produce any impression, for we never heard a composition of equal excellence so ill performed, the vocal and instrumental talent of the band taken into account. The principal parts were ill understood, and therefore ill executed : the beautiful solo, "Almighty Father, heaven's high Lord," was sung by Mrs. KNYVETT, Mrs. Woon and Madame CARADORI being listeners : the tenor parts were divided between BENNETT and BRAHAM, each of whom, in this music, is inferior to HOBBS. Some of the movements were taken almost in jig time. In addition to the petition with which the Christian's Prayer concludes, we offered up a fervent one that we might never again bear so charming a composition murdered in a similar way. A fragment also of Israel in Egypt was given, with some of the interpolated recitations, which, we again repeat, are not HANDEL'S, and bear no affinity either in words or music to the real oratorio. If they did, their addition would have been not only defensible but proper, for HANDEL himself made no scruple of appropriating whatever suited his purpose. The perseverance hi this attempt to pass off counterfeit for sterling coin, must be exposed until the practice shall be given up.

The selection of this morning having comprised only such commonplace airs as " Gratins agimus," " Let the bright Seraphim," and the like, it will only be necessary to mention one lady's singing, and that because of her recent return to England. And seldom have we heard any thing of its kind more perfect in every way than Mrs. Woon's manner of singing "If guiltless blood." Her voice was as rich, as sweet, as briliiant as ever; her expression touching because nativral, and her manner pure and unadorned. We never heard this song better sung.

The strength of the Orchestra was as follows.

8 Violins 36 Trebles II Violas '28 Altus 6 Violoncellos 2.8 Tenors

5 Double Basses 38 Basses 21 Wind Instruments

The chorus was chiefly supplied by the Liverpool Choral Society : and though the stupendous power which we lately heard at Norwich was wanting, there was no deficiency of skill, and no want of precision. A better-disciplined choir we never heard ; and their state of training reflects the highest credit on Mr. II OLDEN, their superintendent. Here again we were made to feel that the impulse to musical taste will be given—is given—by the masses. The "lower orders "arc familiarizing themselves with all that is sublime and beautiful in music; and we shall see the fruit of their extended knowledge in the gradual ascent of musical taste to the class immediately above them. Whether it will reach the Aristocracy, remains to be seen : we doubt whether we shall live to see it.

All, too, that has depended on the Committee, in reference to the arrangements only incidentally connected with the music, has been done well. Its members, as far as we have seers of them, are not only men of business, but men of accomplished and refined habits : every thing bespeaks activity, forethought, and also liberality—they are not seeking by every paltry means bow they shall screw an additional shilling out of each auditor, but a feeling of gentlemanly courtesy pervades all that they do.

The Evening Concerts demand little notice. The place in which they are held is one of the Minor Theatres; and is quite unsuited to the wants and unlike the character of so prosperous and public-spirited a town as Liverpool. The songs and concerted pieces (of the latter there were few) were, as usual, the London favourites of the season. The selections were more decidedly English than at Norwich ; and the few Italian pieces might well have been spared, since they were of the poorest quality.

There is one feature in this Festival which must not be passed ever in silence—the exclusion of the name of MOZART from the programme. No other evidence of the careless indifference or bad taste of its compiler or compilers need be given than this. We bad Peeeeee, and Net:minim, and GUGL IELMI —but not a niche could be found for MOZART! Verily, in all that concerns music, the Liverpool taste is at a tremendous discount. This ought not to be. With the materials which the place itself supplies, it ought to take an elevated and not the lowest place, nor submit any more to the reproach of ignorance or indolence. MENDELSSOHN'S Oratorio was to be performed on Friday ; but time will not allow us to enter into any detail of its contents or examination of its character. These must, of necessity, be reserved for next week's paper. We have attended the rehearsals, the first act having been tried on Monday and the second on Wednesday night : but we are unwilling to judge of such a work from a first trial—in which, of course, the current of musical feeling was perpetually interrupted by the detection and correction of errors both of the copyist and the performers. For the present, we must refer our readers to the cursory view which we gave of its contents and character in a former number; which, somehow or other, turns out to be correct.

The Festival, considering the gloom which MALIBRAN'S death threw over its commencement, has been well attended; the num 4Q. s hers in the Church and the Theatre increasing with every succeeding performance. But the great feature of the week is the Fancy-ball with which its festivities close. This takes place at the Town-hall; which is not, as at Norwich and Birmingham, one vast room, but a suite of spacious apartments—a sort of splendid Mansionhouse. Here is every thing that can give splendour to a scene so gay: there is no need, as at Manchester, to convert a street into an entertaining-room, and by the help of calico and paint clothe dark and dirty walls with a transient brilliancy : the spacious and beautiful saloons of the Liverpool civic palace seem the fit place for this class of enchantments. No wonder that here the fondest affections of the beautiful and the gay centre, or that Liverpool boasts of the display of beauty, grace, wealth, and taste, to be enjoyed on Friday night.