Part 19 (1/2)

All felt themselves in the presence of a new art.” In ten years Italian opera reached its full growth, thanks chiefly to a composer of genius, Monteverde, whose _Ariane_ caused an audience of more than six thousand persons to burst into sobs on its first representation.

The art of singing had marched side by side with dramatic music and attained its height almost at once. A famous soprano, Vittori, threw the public into almost inconceivable transports. ”Many persons were suddenly forced to loosen their garments in order to breathe, so suffocated were they with emotion.”

Everywhere musical theatres were erected. The large cities built several; Venice alone had five, and this number was not sufficient. The opera was given in palaces and private salons; ”Bologna possessed more than sixty private theatres, without mentioning the convents and colleges.” The clergy were caught in the whirlwind; monks and nuns chanted operas, cardinals became stage managers of scenes, a future pope wrote librettos. It was an epidemic, a frenzy, and Italy did not go mad with impunity. In its beginning, the opera is responsible for grave disorders, both nervous and moral; it became _too_ much of a pa.s.sion.

Mazarin already possessed this taste before his establishment in France.

He wished to initiate his adopted country into the joys, almost to be dreaded, which had so suddenly enriched human life, and he brought from Italy one after the other four Italian troupes, the first in 1645, the last a short time before his death.

The result was easy to predict. A spectacle patronised by the Cardinal became a matter of politics. Applauded by the partisans of the minister, derided by his adversaries, the Italian opera met with so strong an opposition that it was necessary to renounce it for the time, but the lesson was not lost.

French composers heretofore devoted to ballets and masquerades had not received unheedingly the revelation of the dramatic style; their ambition was also aroused to express the tempests of the soul, and they began to grope along the new path.

The attempt was not at once successful; but their efforts familiarised the public with the idea of a musical language of pa.s.sion. In 1664, the song was considered the natural interpreter of love. Moliere fixes the date in his _Princesse d'Elide_, in which Moron does not succeed in gaining the ear of Philis because he speaks, instead of singing his declaration. Philis flees and Moron cries out: ”Behold how it is: if I had been able to sing, I should have done better. Most women of to-day only let themselves be courted through the ears; this is the reason that the entire world has become musical, and one can succeed with the fair only by making them listen to little songs and verses. I must learn to sing like others.”

It was indeed somewhat different in 1671, when French opera arrived on the scene.[188] It had hardly seen the light when it became, as a result of the a.s.sociation of Quinault with Lulli, a counsellor of voluptuousness.

While the decorations and the dances charmed the eyes, as the ”machines”

amused by their complications, the words and music, outdoing the _Princesse d'Elide_,[189] murmured unceasingly with the same caressing languor that no youthful beings have the right, for any motive whatever, to deny to themselves the duty of loving. ”Yield, give yourselves up to transports,” chants a chorus of _Amadis_. The thirteen ”lyrical tragedies” given by Quinault and Lulli from 1673 to 1686 are all constructed upon this one theme. They gave expression to the one single idea; ”Yield! surrender yourselves!” and resulted in producing a certain eloquence from their monotony. When these lyrics are played on the piano,[190] a better means of hearing them failing, one cannot but feel that in spite of their insipidity the continuous appeal to the senses might produce in the end, particularly in the atmosphere of a theatre, a strong effect.

[Ill.u.s.tration: =JEAN BAPTISTE DE LULLI= After a contemporary print by Bonnart]

Moralists recognised this. All will remember the violent attack of Boileau upon the opera. To-day we consider this attack as having been too narrowly virtuous, even a little ridiculous. It can be explained, however, in considering what a novelty it was to see people seized with nervous attacks and fits of weeping while listening to singing. Was it the ”loose morals” of Quinault which caused these? Was it the new music?

In either case, the worthy Boileau was excusable for his alarm.

France had not yet reached the point of excitability which existed in Italy. The French are not a sufficiently musical race for this; but in a less degree, the country submitted to the extraordinary power of the dramatic style. It is known through Mme. de Sevigne that if the French listeners did not invariably ”burst into sobs” or ”suffocate with emotion,” more than one auditor, including herself, wept silently in hearing the fine pa.s.sages.

Fas.h.i.+on also swayed affairs, and we know of what fas.h.i.+on is capable in France.

Saint Evremond has written a comedy ent.i.tled _The Operas_. In the list of _dramatis personae_, one reads: ”Mlle. Crisotine become mad through the hearing of operas. Tirsolet, a young man from Lyons, also became mad through operas.” A third person relates that ”nothing else is spoken of in Paris. Women and even young children knew the operas by heart, and there is hardly a house in which entire scenes are not sung.” How nearly France and Italy are approached in this. The Louvre party caught the fas.h.i.+on, the courtiers, being eager to imitate the King, a great admirer of Lulli.

It had happened that Louis remarked during the rehearsals of _Alceste_ ”that if he were at Paris when the opera should be played, he would go every day.” ”This phrase,” adds Mme. de Sevigne ”is worth a hundred thousand francs to Baptiste.”[191] This was no affectation on the part of the King; he really loved music, as can be recognised through unmistakable signs. Louis XIV. had throughout his life the taste and more than a taste for music; to which he added a longing to be himself a performer, a desire that can never be satisfied with the most skilled professional entertainments. As a youth, he played the guitar and took part in ensemble playing. As a man, he found that he had a good voice, and knew how to use it in amateur reunions.

It can even be said that he sang not only at suitable but also at unsuitable moments: the day after the death of his son, the Grand Dauphin, the ladies of the Palace heard with surprise the King singing opera prologues. During his later years, when it was difficult to amuse him, Mme. de Maintenon organized musicales in her salon and Louis always enjoyed these. One evening when she subst.i.tuted vespers[192] for the scores of Lulli, the King made no criticism and even intoned the vespers. Provided it was music, all kinds were good; but the King showed a certain predilection for the kind which he had seen created, already so rich in new emotions and which bore rare promise for the future of the artistic world, and the monarch possessed all the qualities needed to enjoy it profoundly.

The reader cannot fail to perceive through the witness of his frequent bursts of tears that Louis was of a nervous disposition, somewhat concealed under the cold and calm exterior which he had imposed upon himself. In advancing age, this tendency to tears became almost a malady. Mme. de Maintenon, in a letter dated 1705, writing to a friend of the ”vapours” of the King and of his sombre humour, makes the remark that he is ”sometimes overcome with weeping which he cannot restrain.”

He was a sensualist to whom themes of love were always attractive.

”Yield! Surrender!” the King never ceased to repeat on his own behalf to the pretty women of his Court. For the rest, Quinault and Lulli made him choose the subjects for their operas; and Louis had therefore a responsibility for the voluptuousness which exhaled from their works.

Dramatic music has now established itself. The civilised world discovers with delight that this art has an unlimited capacity for expressing pa.s.sion, and all the pa.s.sions, even the highest, the purest, and this latter includes love. It has also been recognised that music can speak in its own words outside of the theatre, in a symphony, in a simple sonata, and that there exists no art so benevolent, so reposeful, and so rea.s.suring to troubled souls. In spite of this, in spite of all, moralists have never been willing to throw down their weapons before music. Emanuel Kant was clearly hostile to it; he said, ”It enervates man,”[193] and he turned away his disciples from its joys. Tolstoi has been unkind to it in the _Kreutzer Sonata_.

All forces can become dangerous; it depends on the ”use made of them,”[194] and also upon the souls which receive the impulse; they must be of the calibre to support its force.

The action of music upon French society has never, so far as I know, been methodically studied in relation to its effects, both physical and moral. If a historian be found, he will issue from the psychological laboratories, scientifically equipped, in which the observer conceals the physician: on this condition only can he speak with authority.

[Ill.u.s.tration: =BOILEAU= After the painting by H. Rigaud]

The Grande Mademoiselle cared but little for music. Nevertheless she extols Lulli in her _Memoires_: ”He makes the most beatific airs in the world.” The glory of Baptiste touched her because he was ”her own,”

arriving from Italy some time before the Fronde. ”He came to France with my late uncle the Chevalier de Guise. I had prayed him to bring me an Italian, with whom I could speak and learn the language.”

Lulli was only a boy of thirteen at the time that he was brought to France. Between the Italian lessons, he filled the office of cook.

Later, admitted among the violins of Mademoiselle, it is related that he was chased away for having satirised his mistress in song. This recalls other events: