The talking machine world (Jan-June 1928)

Each month W. Braid White will suggest methods of stimulating retail sales of h igh -class music Creating a Record Demand for Finest Music THE other day I had the privilege of listening to the Victor Talking Machine Co.'s electric recording by the Philadelphia Orchestra, under Stokowski, of Cesar Franck's Symphony. It is not necessary for me to tell readers that the playing is wonderful enough, in half a dozen places, to make one catch one's breath, but it is probably quite necessary to say something about this little, quite, obscure Franco-Belgian who today is as famous as during his life he was ignored. To-day every one who pretends to care for good music knows all about Cesar Franck, yet his one symphony, composed in 1887, three years before his death, and' only once performed in Paris during his life, reached New York only in 1899, when he had already been dead for nine years. Today, however, Frederick Stock, Leopold Stokowski, Toscanini, Alfred Hertz, Pierre Monteux, Koussevitsky, Gabrilowitsch, Walter Damrosch, in fact all our conductors and all their orchestras, know that they can always depend on a full house when the Cesar Franck symphony is in order. Famous violinists like Kreisler and Thibaud play, with their pianist colleagues, the Franck piano-violin sonata constantly. Famous string quartets like the Flonzaley, the London, the Musical Arts of New York, the Lener of Budapest, play the magnificent Franck Quartet with great joy. The lovely musical setting to the poem written upon the Sermon on the Mount, and known as "The Beatitudes," composed for chorus, solo voices, organ and orchestra, is often performed by the great choral societies which now happily are to be found in all parts of the land. Cesar Franck has come into his own. The man who in 1890 went to his grave without a mark of official respect, despite his professorship at the Paris Conservatoire, is today honored by music lovers the world over. Outside the church of Ste. Clotilde, where for many years he played the organ, stands now a memorial preserving forever one of his characteristic attitudes at the keyboards, with one hand hovering over the stop knobs and one foot on the pedalboard. Cesar Franck, dead, has been raised to the musical Olympus. Firm in His Ambition He was born in Liege, of recent world-war fame, five years (1822) before the death of Bee Cesar Franck's Symphony thoven. His father tried his best to turn the precocious youth into a piano virtuoso, so that he might turn his talents to the immediate betterment of the family income ; and to this end insisted on the boy's withdrawal from the Paris Conservatoire, where he had already taken a special prize in piano playing and second prizes for fugue composition and for organ. Fortunately for music, the young Cesar Franck could not put his heart into concert playing. He preferred to devote himself to teaching, so that he might have time to compose, and his father was obliged to give in. The young man further asserted his independence a few years later when he married a young actress, and withdrew from the family circle to set up for himself as teacher and organist. This was in 1848, during the revolution of that year, and the bridal party had to climb over the barricades which the revolutionists had thrown up in the streets, in order to reach the church where the ceremony was performed. Franck now settled down to that steady routine of hard work as teacher, organist and composer to which the rest of his quiet life was devoted. He became organist of Ste. Clotilde in Paris, in the year 1858 and remained at that post until his death thirty-two years later. In 1872, rather to his own surprise, he was appointed to the vacant post of Professor of Organ at the great Conservatoire, which, as a Government institution under the Ministry of Fine Arts, occupies a dominating position in the artistic and social life of all France. The Man Forgotten Franck ought to have been made professsor of composition, for he was by all odds the biggest musical thinker in France during the mid and late nineteenth century, but official jealousy prevented this. Probably no modern composer has been so completely ignored during his lifetime as this modern little man 'Papa Franck.' . Some of the younger and more radical musicians of his time, however, could not overlook his genius, and it was chiefly through the importunities of young fellows like Vincent D'Indy, Gabriel Pierne, Chausson and Guy Ropartz that he was induced to start a private class in composition at his modest apartment. Here, the modern school of French Intelligent p r omotion of sales of good music means more substantial success for the retailer Large European Gramophone Company desires the services of FIRST-CLASS ELECTRICAL RECORDING ENGINEER One with vast experience. Must be first-class man to make headquarters England, with occasional trips to European Continent as chief of recording department. Reply in strictest confidence, giving particulars of past experience and, if possible, a few sample records of achievements, stating salary required, to Box No. 1640, "Talking Machine World," 420 Lexington Avenue, New York. music was indubitably founded, that school which today stands so distinguished, so clear and clean in a sea of hazy vagueness and trumpery noise. Nearly all Franck's works were public failures on their first performance. The Beatitudes had to be given at a private recital at his home, when none of the big-wigs came, though all were invited. The Symphony was given against the will of the players of the members of the Conservatoire's orchestra and the perfunctory performance was received in the most chilling manner by the audience. Only during the last few months of his life did the Quartet, his veritable swan-song, at its first hearing strike a responsive note in the breasts of the distinguished gathering which heard it at a concert of the Societe Nationale de Musique. This was his first public success and he was then sixty-nine ! No composer ever came so late to artistic maturity and none was artistically so strong, youthful, and filled with power at an advanced ageas was Cesar Franck when he died. An accident with which he met whilst crossing a busy Paris street, when he was knocked down by the pole of a horse omnibus (this was in 1890), gradually led, although he refused to suspend his work until the very end, to an attack of pleurisy which in turn brought about his death. He passed away on the eighth of November, 1890. The Symphony The symphony, considering everything, is probably the finest of his works. By common consent it has been given a place in what may be called the "classical" succession. Its beauties are a perfect mirror of the composer's nature, for they are mystical, religious and other-worldly, for the most part, yet lighted from time to time by a gleam of quiet, very human jollity, which comes out vigorously in the delightful finale. Readers to whom these random remarks have suggested the desirability of learning more about ' Cesar Franck's symphony will find that the Victor Co. has induced Mr. Stokowski to preface the performance with, some verbal explanations illustrated at the piano. To what Mr. Stokowski has said let me just add that there are three movements only, the second being a combination of Adagio and Scherzo. The first movement begins with a mysterious question, works out into a mood of answering resolution, but ends with the question again asked, and unanswered. The second movement is a lovely meditation broken in the middle by a fairy-like Scherzo-interlude. The finale is a vigorous jolly assertion, interrupted by the questionings of the earlier themes, but ultimately asserting itself over all doubts and emerging triumphantly. The listener will not fail to notice particularly Franck's deliberate tying together of his movements by the persistent re-introduction of the earlier themes in the later movements. There is not a dull bar in the whole lovelywork. Some years ago Columbia meritoriously brought out this symphony, when to do so was a real act of courage and faith, and when the old process of recording involved olmost hopeless difficulties. Electric recording has now made easy what once was tremendously hard. None the less, however, should we praise Victor for its faith in the American people's love for good music. Incorporation M. Goldsmith's Music Co., Brooklyn, N. Y., was recently incorporated at Albany with a capital stock of $1,000. 40