Aufführungsbesprechung London, Coventgarden Theatre: „Der Freischütz“ von Carl Maria von Weber

London. August 1st. 1825.

TO THE EDITOR.

SIR,
I CANNOT refrain from addressing you, although totally unused to this species of correpondence, upon that part of your article "On the State of Music in London," in the last Number of the Quarterly Review, which relates to Weber and his compositions. The paragraph I wish particularly to allude to is the following, at page 197:–"if we had before believed that the music of Der Freischütz was purely dramatic, and with the exception fo the overture, depended on its connection with the mysical structure of the opera for effect, we were more than ever convinced of the justness of such a judgment from the result of Mr. Hawes’s concert. Nearly all that was not irresistibly ridiculous, was supremely dull!!" Can any thing more forcibly illustrate the unjustness, nay the cruelty (I speak feelingly on this subject, Mr. Editor,) of performing music expressly written for the stage, at a concert, totally detached from its story–severing, as it were, the soul of the music from the body, and thus rendering it liable to such a critique as the above. The foregoing extract (and more before it), which, if not intended for absolute condemnation, is at least "damning with faint praise," I consider as its greatest possible panegyric. It proves the composer to have entered so thoroughly, heart and mind, into the sprit of the subject, as to have completely identified the two; so much so, that either without the other is comparatively nothing. The music (and such music) appears to have flowed spontaneously as the story unfolded. M. Von Weber, as far as we know him, is purely a dramatic composer, and as such ranks (in my estimation as an artist), second to few, ifany, that have preceded him. It will be time enough to judge of him as an instrumental, or even as a chamber or concert vocal composer, when he shall have presented us with a grand symphony for instruments, or a grand scena for the voice detached from, and independent of any dramatic work, or at least of any dramatic work so strikingly characteristic as those we are already acquainted | with. The difference between Weber and the generality of modern dramatic composers is, that he writes to his story only, and that so intently, that the music cannot with safety, or at least with propriety or justice, in a critical point of view, be separated from it; while others, on the contrary, turn all their attention to general effect, their first and indeed almost only aim being to hit upon a pretty melody that shall please the pulic, and be sung here or there, or every where, and with equal effect. Nay not unfrequently is the music composed first, and adapted (as well as may be) to words afterwards: somthing similar to the anecdote we have of Rossini (page 37 of his Life), where his indolence leading him to write two duets to the same words, he immediately afterward converts one of them into a trio, in the words of which it is not unlikely the sentiment (if they had any sentiment at all) was as different as possible. The contrary of this system, as I have already observed, forms, in my opinion, Weber’s greatest eulogy, and leads me to repeat, that it is unfair, that it is unjust to perform such operas at a concert in the first place, and more particularly so to form and write a critical opinion and judgment on the merits of the music so performed in the second.

I remain, Sir, your’s, &c.
AN ADMIRER OF CONSISTENCY.

Our Correspondent will admit, we trust, if he will take the trouble to turn to volume 6, page 381 et seq. that we have been at least as anxious as himself to do justice to the merits of M. Von Weber. His sentiments indeed are almost a transcript of our own. For the rest, there is hardly a shade of difference in opinion between us. He will easily apprehend why we have omitted the P.S. of his letter, and we assure him we have not the slightest acquaintance with the persons to whom he alludes, and were influenced only by the wish to do justice to merit. The manner, we could defend were it necessary. At the same time we are much obliged by his comments.–THE EDITOR.