The First Violin. Fothergill Jessie

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      You have sung that song before, gnädiges Fräulein?”

      “No. I have heard it once. I have not seen the music before.”

      “So!” He bowed slightly, and turning once more to the others, said:

      “We will begin the next chorus. ‘Chorus of the Damned,’ Now, meine Herrschaften, I would wish to impress upon you one thing, if I can, that is – Silence, meine Herren!” he called sharply toward the tenors, who were giggling inanely among themselves. “A chorus of damned souls,” he proceeded, composedly, “would not sing in the same unruffled manner as a young lady who warbles, ‘Spring is come – tra, la, la! Spring is come – lira, lira!’ in her mamma’s drawing-room. Try to imagine yourself struggling in the tortures of hell” – (a delighted giggle and a sort of “Oh, you dear, wicked man!” expression on the part of the young ladies; a nudging of each other on that of the young gentlemen), “and sing as if you were damned.”

      Scarcely any one seemed to take the matter the least earnestly. The young ladies continued to giggle, and the young gentlemen to nudge each other. Little enough of expression, if plenty of noise, was there in that magnificent and truly difficult passage, the changing choruses of the condemned and the blessed ones – with its crowning “Weh!” thundering down from highest soprano to deepest bass.

      “Lots of noise, and no meaning,” observed the conductor, leaning himself against the rail of the estrade, face to his audience, folding his arms and surveying them all one after the other with cold self-possession. It struck me that he despised them while he condescended to instruct them. The power of the man struck me again. I began to like him better. At least I venerated his thorough understanding of what was to me a splendid mystery. No softening appeared in the master’s eyes in answer to the rows of pretty appealing faces turned to him; no smile upon his contemptuous lips responded to the eyes – black, brown, gray, blue, yellow – all turned with such affecting devotion to his own. Composing himself to an insouciant attitude, he began in a cool, indifferent voice, which had, however, certain caustic tones in it which stung me at least to the quick:

      “I never heard anything worse, even from you. My honored Fräulein, my gnädigen Herren, just try once to imagine what you are singing about! It is not an exercise – it is not a love song, either of which you would no doubt perform excellently. Conceive what is happening! Put yourself back into those mythical times. Believe, for this evening, in the story of the forfeited Paradise. There is strife between the Blessed and the Damned; the obedient and the disobedient. There are thick clouds in the heavens – smoke, fire, and sulphur – a clashing of swords in the serried ranks of the angels: can not you see Michael, Gabriel, Raphael, leading the heavenly host? Can not some of you sympathize a little with Satan and his struggle?”

      Looking at him, I thought they must indeed be an unimaginative set! In that dark face before them was Mephistopheles at least —der Geist der stets verneint– if nothing more violent. His cool, scornful features were lighted up with some of the excitement which he could not drill into the assemblage before him. Had he been gifted with the requisite organ he would have acted and sung the chief character in “Faust” con amore.

      “Ach, um Gotteswillen!” he went on, shrugging his shoulders, “try to forget what you are! Try to forget that none of you ever had a wicked thought or an unholy aspiration – ”

      (“Don’t they see how he is laughing at them?” I wondered.)

      “You, Chorus of the Condemned, try to conjure up every wicked thought you can, and let it come out in your voices – you who sing the strains of the blessed ones, think of what blessedness is. Surely each of you has his own idea! Some of you may agree with Lenore:

      “‘Bei ihm, bei ihm ist Seligkeit,

      Und ohne Wilhelm Holle!’

      “If so, think of him; think of her – only sing it, whatever it is. Remember the strongest of feelings:

      “‘Die Engel nennen es Himmelsfreude

      Die Teufel nennen es Höllenqual,

      Die Menschen nennen es – Liebe!’

      “And sing it!”

      He had not become loud or excited in voice or gesticulation, but his words, flung at them like so many scornful little bullets, the indifferent resignation of his attitude, had their effect upon the crew of giggling, simpering girls and awkward, self-conscious young men. Some idea seemed vouchsafed to them that perhaps their performance had not been quite all that it might have been; they began in a little more earnest, and the chorus went better.

      For my own part, I was deeply moved. A vague excitement, a wild, and not altogether a holy one, had stolen over me. I understood now how the man might have influence. I bent to the power of his will, which reached me where I stood in the background, from his dark eyes, which turned for a moment to me now and then. It was that will of his which put me as it were suddenly into the spirit of the music, and revealed me depths in my own heart at which I had never even guessed. Excited, with cheeks burning and my heart hot within me, I followed his words and his gestures, and grew so impatient of the dull stupidity of the others that tears came to my eyes. How could that young woman, in the midst of a sublime chorus, deliberately pause, arrange the knot of her neck-tie, and then, after a smile and a side glance at the conductor, go on again with a more self-satisfied simper than ever upon her lips? What might not the thing be with a whole chorus of sympathetic singers? The very dullness which in face prevailed revealed to me great regions of possible splendor, almost too vast to think of.

      At last it was over. I turned to the direktor, who was still near the piano, and asked timidly:

      “Do you think I may join? Will my voice do?”

      An odd expression crossed his face; he answered, dryly:

      “You may join the verein, mein Fräulein– yes. Please come this way with me. Pardon, Fräulein Stockhausen – another time. I am sorry to say I have business at present.”

      A black look from a pretty brunette, who had advanced with an engaging smile and an open score to ask him some question, greeted this very composed rebuff of her advance. The black look was directed at me – guiltless.

      Without taking any notice of the other, he led Anna and me to a small inner room, where there was a desk and writing materials.

      “Your name, if you will be good enough?”

      “Wedderburn.”

      “Your Vorname, though – your first name.”

      “My Christian name – oh, May.”

      “M – a —na! Perhaps you will be so good as to write it yourself, and the street and number of the house in which you live.”

      I complied.

      “Have you been here long?”

      “Not quite a week.”

      “Do you intend to make any stay?”

      “Some months, probably.”

      “Humph! If you wish to make any progress in music, you must stay much longer.”

      “It – I – it depends upon other people how long I remain.”

      He smiled slightly, and his smile was not unpleasant; it lighted up the darkness СКАЧАТЬ