Chapter 20
[Footnote 221: It published, in eleven volumes, the ancient works that it performed. Before this experiment there had been the _Concerts historiques de Fétis_, preceded by lectures, which were inaugurated in 1832, and failed; and these were followed by Amédée Méréaux's _Concerts historiques_ in 1842-1844.]
In 1853, Louis Niedermeyer founded in Paris an _École de musique religieuse et classique_, which strove "to form singers, organists, choir-masters, and composers of music, by the study of the classic works of the great masters of the fifteenth, sixteenth, and seventeenth centuries." This school, subsidised by the State, was a nursery for some real musicians. It reckoned among its pupils some noted composers, conductors, organists, and historians; among others, M. Gabriel Fauré, M. André Messager, M. Eugène Gigout, and M. Henry Expert. M. Saint-Saëns was a professor there, and became its president. Nearly five hundred organists, choir-masters, and professors of music of the Conservatoire and other French colleges were trained there. But this school, serious in intention, and a refuge for the classic spirit in the midst of the prevailing bad taste, did not trouble itself about influencing the public, and, in fact, almost ignored it.
Lamoureux attempted in 1873 to perform the great choral works of Bach and Händel; and in 1878 the celebrated French organist, M. Alexandre Guilmant, ventured to give concerts at the Trocadéro for the organ and orchestra, which were devoted to religious music of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. But the deplorable acoustics of the concert-room had a prejudicial effect on the works that were performed there; and the public did not respond very warmly to M. Guilmant's efforts, and seemed from the first only to find an historical interest in the masterpieces, and to miss their depth and life altogether.
Then a pupil of Franck's, M. Henry Expert, who began his admirable works on Musical History in 1882, laid the foundation of the _Société J.S. Bach_, in order to spread the knowledge of ancient music written between the twelfth and eighteenth centuries. And he succeeded in interesting in his undertaking, not only the principal French musicians, such as César Franck, Saint-Saëns, and Gounod, but also foreigners, such as Hans von Bülow, Tschaikowsky, Grieg, Sgambati, and Gevaert. Unhappily this society never got farther than arranging what it wanted to do, and only sketched out the plans that were realised later by Charles Bordes.
The general public were not really interested in the art of the old musicians until the _Association des Chanteurs de Saint-Gervais_ was founded in 1892 by Charles Bordes, the choirmaster of the church of Saint-Gervais. The immediate success and the noisy renown of the Society were due to other things besides the talent of its conductor, who combined with a lively artistic intelligence both common-sense and energy and a remarkable gift for organisation--it was due partly to the help of favourable circumstances, partly to the surfeit of Wagnerism, of which I have just spoken, and partly to the birth of a new religious art, which had sprung up since the death of César Franck round the memory of that great musician.
It is not my intention here to write an appreciation of César Franck's genius, but it is not possible to understand the musical movement in Paris of the last fifteen years if one does not take into account the importance of his teaching. The organ class at the Conservatoire, where in 1872 Franck succeeded his old master Benoist, was for a long time, as M. Vincent d'Indy says, "the true centre for the study of Composition at the Conservatoire. Many of his fellow-workers could never bring themselves to look upon him as one of themselves, because he had the boldness to see in art something other than the means of earning a living. Indeed, César Franck was not of them; and they made him feel this." But the young students made no mistake about the matter. "At this time," M. d'Indy also tells us,[222] "that is to say from 1872 to 1876, the three courses of Advanced Musical Composition were given by three professors who were not at all fitted for their work. One was Victor Massé, a composer of simple light operas and a man with no understanding of a symphony, who was very frequently ill and had to entrust his teaching to one of his pupils; another was Henri Reber, an oldish musician with narrow and dogmatic ideas; and the third was François Bazin, who was not capable of distinguishing in his pupil's fugues a false answer from a true one, and whose highest title to glory is derived from a composition called _Le Voyage en Chine_. So it is not surprising that César Franck's teaching, founded on that of Bach and Beethoven, but admitting, as well, imagination and all new and liberal ideas, did, at that time, draw to him all young minds that had lofty ambitions and that were really in love with their art. And so, quite unconsciously, the master attracted to himself all the sincere and artistic talent that was scattered about the different classes of the Conservatoire, as well as that of his outside pupils."
[Footnote 222: The following information was given by M. Vincent d'Indy at a lecture held on 20 February, 1903, at the _École des Hautes Études sociales_--a lecture which later became a chapter in M. d'Indy's book, _César Franck_ (1906).]
Among those who received his direct teaching[223] were Henri Duparc, Alexis de Castillon, Vincent d'Indy, Ernest Chausson, Pierre de Bréville, Augusta Holmes, Louis de Serres, Charles Bordes, Guy Ropartz, and Guillaume Lekeu. And if to these we add the pupils in the organ classes, who also came under his influence, we have, among others, Samuel Rousseau, Gabriel Pierné, Auguste Chapuis, Paul Vidal, and Georges Marty; and also the virtuosi who were for some time intimate with him, such as Armand Parent and Eugène Ysaye, to whom Franck dedicated his violin sonata. And if one thinks, too, of the artists who, though not his pupils, felt his power--artists such as Gabriel Fauré, Alexandre Guilmant, Emmanuel Chabrier, and Paul Dukas--one may see that nearly the whole musical generation of Paris of that time took its inspiration from César Franck. And it was largely with the intention of perpetuating his teaching that his pupils, Charles Bordes and Vincent d'Indy, and his friend, Alexandre Guilmant, founded in 1894, four years after his death, the _Schola Cantorum_, which has kept his memory alive ever since.
"Our revered father, Franck," said Vincent d'Indy, in a speech, "is in some ways the grandfather of the _Schola Cantorum_; for it is his system of teaching that we apply and try to carry on here."[224]
[Footnote 223: A complete list may be found in M. d'Indy's book.]
[Footnote 224 2: _Tribune de Saint-Gervais_, November, 1900.]
The influence of Franck was twofold: it was artistic and moral. On the one hand he was, if I may so put it, an admirable professor of musical architecture; he founded a school of symphony and chamber-music such as France had never had before, which in certain directions was newer and more daring than that of the German symphony writers. And, on the other hand, he exercised by his own character a memorable influence over all those who came into contact with him. His profound faith, that fine, indulgent, and calm faith, shone round him like a glory. The Catholic party, who were awakening to new life in France just then, tried, after his death, to identify his ideals with their own. But this was, as we have said elsewhere,[225] to narrow Franck's mind; for its great charm lay in its harmonious union of religion and liberty, which never limited its artistic sympathies to an exclusive ideal. The composer's son, M. Georges César-Franck, has in vain protested against this monopoly of his father, and says:
"According to certain writers, who wish to reduce everything to a dead level and deduce all things from a single cause, César Franck was a mystic whose true domain was religious music. Nothing could be wider of the mark. The public is given to generalisations, and is too easily gulled. They will judge a composer on a single work, or a group of works, and class him once and for all.... In reality, my father was a man of all-round accomplishments. As a finished musician, he was master of every form of composition. He wrote both religious and secular music--melodies, dances, pastorales, oratorios, symphonic poems, symphonies, sonatas, trios, and operas. He did not confine his attention to any particular kind of work to the exclusion of other kinds; he was able to express himself in any way he chose."[226]
But as what was really religious in him found itself in agreement with a current of thought that was rather powerful at that time, it was inevitable that this one side of his genius should be first brought to light, and that religious music should be the first to benefit by his work. And also one of the early manifestos[227] of the _Schola Cantorum_ dealt with the reform of sacred music by carrying it back to great ancient models; and its first decision was as follows: "Gregorian chant shall rest for all time the fountain-head and the base of the Church's music, and shall constitute the only model by which it may be truly judged."[228]
[Footnote 225: See the Essay on _Vincent d'Indy_.]
[Footnote 226: _Revue d'histoire et de critique musicale_, August-September, 1901.]
[Footnote 227: "The _Schola Cantorum_ aims at creating a modern music truly worthy of the Church" (First number of the _Tribune de Saint-Gervais_, the monthly bulletin of the _Schola Cantorum_, January, 1895).]
[Footnote 228: The Schola had in mind here the vigorous work of the French Benedictines, which had been done in silence for the past fifty years; it was thinking, too, of the restoration of the Gregorian chant during 1850 and 1860 by Dom Guéranger, the first abbot of Solesmes, a work continued by Dom Jausions and Dom Pothier, the abbot of Saint-Wandrille, who published in 1883 the _Mélodies Grégoriennes_, the _Liber Gradualis_, and the _Liber Antiphonarius_. This work was finally brought to a happy conclusion by Dom Schmitt, and Dom Mocqucreau, the prior of Solesmes, who in 1889 began his monumental work, the _Paléo-graphie Musicals_, of which nine volumes had appeared in 1906. This great Benedictine school is an honour to France by the scientific work it has lately done in music. The school is at present exiled from France.]
They added to this, however, music _à la Palestrina_, and any music that conformed to its principles or was inspired by its example. Such archaic ideas would certainly never create a new kind of religious music, but at least they have helped to restore the old art; and they received their official consecration in the famous letter written by Pope Pius X on the Re-form of Sacred Music.
The achievement of an artistic ideal so restricted as this would not have sufficed, however, to assure the success of the _Schola Cantorum_, nor establish its authority with a public that was, whatever people may say, only lukewarm in its religion, and that would only interest itself in the religious art of other days as it would in a passing fashion. But the spirit of curiosity and the meaning of modern life began to weigh little by little with the Schola's principles. After singing Palestrinian and Gregorian chants at the Church of Saint-Gervais during Holy Week, they played Carissimi, Schütz, and the Italian and German masters of the seventeenth century. Then came Bach's cantatas; and their performance, given by M. Bordes in the Salle d'Harcourt, attracted large audiences and started the cult of this master in Paris. Then they sang Rameau and Gluck; and, finally, all ancient music, sacred or secular, was approved. And so this little school, which had been consecrated to the cult of ancient religious music, and had made so modest a beginning,[229] developed into a School of Art capable of satisfying modern wants; and in 1900, when M. Vincent d'Indy became president of the _Schola_, it was decided to move the school into larger premises in the Rue Saint-Jacques.
The programme of this new school was explained by M. Vincent d'Indy in his Inauguration speech on 2 November, 1900, and showed how he based the foundations of musical teaching upon history.
"Art, in its journey across the ages, is a microcosm which has, like the world itself, successive stages of youth, maturity, and old age; but it never dies--it renews itself perpetually. It is not like a perfect circle; it is like a spiral, and in its growth is always mounting higher. I believe in making students follow the same path that art itself has followed, so that they shall undergo during their term of study the same transformations that music itself has undergone during the centuries. In this way they will come out much better armed for the difficulties of modern art, since they will have lived, so to speak, the life of art, and followed the natural and inevitable order of the forms that made up the different epochs of artistic development."
[Footnote 229: When Charles Bordes opened the first _Schola Cantorum_ in the Rue Stanislas he was without help or resources, and had exactly thirty-seven francs and fifty centimes in hand. I mention this detail to give an idea of the splendidly courageous and confident spirit that Charles Bordes possessed.]
M. d'Indy claims that this system may be applied as successfully to instrumentalists and singers as to future composers. "For it is as profitable for them to know," he says, "how to sing a liturgic monody properly, or to be able to play a Corelli sonata in a suitable style, as it is for composers to study the structure of a motet or a suite." M. d'Indy, moreover, obliged all students, without distinction, to attend the lectures on vocal music; and, besides that, he instituted a special class to teach the conducting of orchestras--which was something quite new to France. His object, as he clearly said, was to give a new form to modern music by means of a knowledge of the music of the past.
On this subject he says:
"Where shall we find the quickening life that will give us fresh forms and formulas? The source is not really difficult to discover. Do not let us seek it anywhere but in the decorative art of the plain-song singers, in the architectural art of the age of Palestrina, and in the expressive art of the great Italians of the seventeenth century. It is there, and _there alone_, that we shall find melodic craft, rhythmic cadences, and a harmonic magnificence that is really new--if our modern spirit can only learn how to absorb their nutritious essence. And so I prescribe for all pupils in the School the careful study of classic forms, because _they alone_ are able to give the elements of a new life to our music, which will be founded on principles that are sane, solid, and trustworthy."[230]
[Footnote 230: _Tribune de Saint-Gervais_, November, 1900.]
This fine and intelligent eclecticism was likely to develop a critical spirit, but was rather less adapted to form original personalities. In any case, however, it was excellent discipline in the formation of musical taste; and, in truth, the _École Supérieure de musique_ of the Rue Saint-Jacques became a new Conservatoire, both more modern and more learned than the old Conservatoire, and freer, and yet less free, because more self-satisfied. The school developed very quickly. From having twenty-one pupils in 1896, it had three hundred and twenty in 1908. Eminent musicians and professors learned in the history and science of music taught there, and M. d'Indy himself took the Composition classes.[231] And in its short career the _Schola_ may already be credited with the training of young composers, such as MM. Roussel, Déodat de Séverac, Gustave Bret, Labey, Samazeuilh, R. de Castéra, Sérieyx, Alquier, Coindreau, Estienne, Le Flem, and Groz; and to these may be added M. d'Indy's private pupils, Witkowski, and one of the foremost of modern composers, Alberic Magnard.
[Footnote 231: There are actually nine courses of Composition at the _Schola_--five for men and four for women. M. d'Indy takes eight of them, as well as a mixed class for orchestra.]
Outside the influence that the School exercises by its teaching, its propaganda by means of concerts and publications is very active. From its foundation up to 1904 it had given two hundred performances in one hundred and thirty provincial towns; more than one hundred and fifty concerts in Paris, of which fifty were of orchestral and choral music, sixty of organ music, and forty of chamber-music. These concerts have been well attended by enthusiastic and appreciative audiences, and have been a school for public taste. One does not look for perfect execution there,[232] but for intelligent interpretations and a thirst for a fuller knowledge of the great works of the past. They have revived Monteverde's _Orfeo_ and his _Incoronazione di Poppea_, which had been forgotten these three centuries; and it was following an interest created by repeated performances of Rameau at the _Schola_[233] that _Dardanus_ was performed at Dijon under M. d'Indy's direction, _Castor et Pollux_ at Montpellier under M. Charles Bordes' direction, and that in 1908 the Opera at Paris gave _Hippolyte et Aricie_. Branches of the _Schola_ have, been started at Lyons, Marseilles, Bordeaux, Avignon, Montpellier, Nancy, Épinal, Montluçon, Saint-Chamond, and Saint-Jean-deLuz.[234] A publishing house has been associated with the School at Paris; and from this we get Reviews, such as the _Tribune de Saint-Gervais_; publications of old music, such as the _Anthologie des maîtres religieux primitifs des XVe, XVIe, et XVIIe siècles_, edited by Charles Bordes; the _Archives des maîtres de l'orgue des XVIe, XVIIe, et XVIIIe siècles_, edited by Alexandre Guilmant and André Pirro; the _Concerts spirituels de la Schola_, the new editions of _Orfeo_, and the _Incoronazione di Poppea_, edited by M. Vincent d'Indy; and publications of modern music, such as the _Collection du chant populaire_, the _Répertoire moderne de musique vocale et d'orgue_, and, notably, the _Édition mutuelle_, published by the composers themselves, whose property it is.
[Footnote 232: The orchestra is mainly composed of pupils; and, by a generous arrangement, the financial profits from rehearsals and performances are divided among the pupils who take part in them, and credited to their account. And so besides the exhibitioners the _Schola_ has a great number of pupils who are not well off, but who manage by these concerts to defray almost the entire expenses of their education there. "The concerts serve more especially as aesthetic exercises for the pupils, and as a means of according them teaching at small expense to themselves." I owe this information and all that precedes it to the kindness of M. J. de la Laurencie, the general secretary of the _Schola_, whom I should like to thank.]
[Footnote 233: The _Schola_ has even performed, in an open-air theatre, Ramcau's _La Guirlande_.]
[Footnote 234: One may add to this list the choral societies of Nantes and Besançon, which are bodies of the same order as the _Chanteurs de Saint-Gervais_. And we may also attribute to the influence of the _Schola_ an independent society, the _Société J.S. Bach_, started in Paris by an old _Schola_ pupil, M. Gustave Bret, which, since 1905, has devoted itself to the performance of the great works of Bach. It is not one of the least merits of the _Schola_ that it has helped to form good amateur choirs of the same type as the choral societies of Germany.]
And all this shows such a marvellous activity and gives evidence of such whole-hearted enthusiasm that I cannot bring myself to join issue with the critics who have lately attacked the _Schola_, though their attacks have been in some degree merited. Pettiness is to be found even in great artists, and imperfection in every human work; and defects reveal themselves most clearly after a victory has been won. The _Schola_ has not escaped the critical periods that accompany growth, through which every work must pass if it is to triumph and endure. Without doubt, the sudden illness and premature retirement of the founder of the work, M. Charles Bordes, deprived the _Schola_ of one of its most active forces--a force that was perhaps necessary for the school's successful development. For this man had been the school's life and soul, and retired, worn out by the heavy labours which he had borne alone during ten years.[235]
[Footnote 235: M. Charles Bordes did not even then give up his labours altogether. Though obliged to retire to the south of France for his health's sake, he founded, in November, 1905, the _Schola_ of Montpellier. This _Schola_ has given about fifteen concerts a year, and has performed some of Bach's cantatas, scenes from Rameau's and Gluck's operas, Franck's oratorios, and Monteverde's _Orfeo_. In 1906 M. Bordes organised an open-air performance of Rameau's _Guirlande_. In January, 1908, he produced _Castor et Pollux_ at the Montpellier theatre. The man's activity was incredible, and nothing seemed to tire him. He was planning to start a dramatic training-school at Montpellier for the production of seventeenth and eighteenth century operas, when he died, in November, 1909, at the age of forty-four, and so deprived French art of one of its best and most unselfish servants.]
But M. d'Indy, like a courageous apostle, has continued the direction of the _Schola_ with a firm hand and unwearying care, despite his varied activities as composer, professor, and _Kapellmeister_; and he is one of the surest and most reliable guides for a young school of French music. And if his mind is rather given to abstractions, and his moods are sometimes rather combative, and certain prejudices (which are not always musical ones) make him lean towards ideals of reason and immovable faith--and if at times his followers unconsciously distort his ideas, and try to dam the stream which flows from life itself, I am convinced it is only the passing evidence of a reaction, perhaps a natural one, against the exaggerations they have encountered, and that the _Schola_ will always know how to avoid the rocks where revolutionaries of the past have run aground and become the conservatives of the morrow. I hope the _Schola_ will never grow into the kind of aristocratic school that builds walls about itself, but will always open wide its doors and welcome every new force in music, even to such as have ideals opposed to its own. Its future renown and the well-being of French art can only thus be maintained.
* * * * *
4. _The Chamber-Music Societies_
On parallel lines with the big symphony concerts and the new _conservatoires_, societies were formed to spread the knowledge of, and form a taste for, chamber-music. This music, so common in Germany, was almost unknown in Paris before 1870. There was nothing but the Maurin Quartette, which gave five or six concerts every winter in the Salle Pleyel, and played Beethoven's last quartettes there. But these performances only attracted a small number of artists;[236] and so far as the general public was concerned the _Société des derniers quartuors de Beethoven_ had the reputation for devoting itself to a singular and incomprehensible kind of music that had been written by a deaf man.