Page:A Dictionary of Music and Musicians vol 4.djvu/431

WEBER. rather than objective, the artistic forms constantly evolving themselves in obedience to the arbitrary direction of the imagination. Hence arose two alterations of position, both of great importance in opera, the one between the instrumental and vocal parts of the music; the other, and principal one, between the poetry and the music. From this time forward the instrumental music disputes precedence with the singing, and claims equality with it as a means of dramatic characterisation. This led to a predominance of general mood over specific emotion, a subordination of the dramatic individual to the species, and a preponderance of colour over drawing. Formerly, too, the poem merely sketched out the main features of the plot, which the music filled in in accordance with its own laws; now the poet claimed a voice in the construction of the musical forms. These tendencies, if logically carried out, involve the absolute destruction of the present forms of opera, but this the Romanticists did not intend. All they contemplated was such an admixture of these decomposing elements as should impart new life and additional charm to the existing form. There was a certain sense of unrest, a chiaro-scuro, a foreboding kind of feeling about their music which made it admirably adapted for representing the supernatural.

In Silvana, Weber had already trenched upon the domain of romantic opera, in the sense in which we have just expounded it, but had not yet found adequate musical expression for German romanticism. Next came Spohr's Faust in 1813, and Zemire und Azor in 1818. In both these the subjects are conceived with earnestness, and a dreamy twilight tone runs through the whole, so that they undoubtedly possess some of the distinguishing marks of the romantic opera; but Spohr's music is much too rounded off in form, and too polished, and he had a positive aversion to anything popular. Nor had he sufficient versatility and flexibility, boldness, or vis comica. Strictly speaking, therefore, he is only half a romanticist. Freischütz was a revelation; from the date of its production there was no question as to what a romantic opera really was.

Kind did not draw on his own invention for the libretto. The history of the subject is still incomplete, but we know that the story can be traced back as far as the 17th century. It was published in the beginning of the 18th, in a book called 'Unterredungen vom Reiche der Geister,' of which a second edition appeared in Leipzig in 1731. The statement there made, that the occurrence took place in a town of Bohemia in 1710, carries no weight. From this book Johann August Apel took the story, and published it as a narrative called 'Der Freischütz, a legend of the people' (1810), handling it so cleverly that it again became popular. In 1819 Gerle took it up and wrote 'Den braunen Jager.' In 1821 it was turned into a tragedy by Count von Reisch, and performed Aug. 17, 1821, at Wurzburg, two months after the first performance of the opera in Berlin. Kind mainly followed Apel: his poem, with explanatory notes, ran through two editions in 1822 and a third in 1823 (Göschen). Twenty years later he prepared the last edition for his 'Freischütz-book,' and added to it a mass of cognate matter by no means uninteresting.

Apel's story has been more read again lately, and finding how much Kind borrowed from it, people have been apt to disparage both him and his libretto. Ambros's remarks on this point, for instance, are most unjust. Neither originality of ideas nor literary skill are so important to a librettist as the faculty of arranging his materials in a really dramatic form. This Kind had in a high degree, and it ought to be sufficient. His own alterations and additions, too, are most successful, having the threefold advantage of conducing to the musical development, suiting Weber's special gifs, and hitting the ideal of German national opera. The parts of Caspar, Aennchen, and the Hermit, are entirely his own, while that of Agathe is greatly strengthened, and Samiel is brought forward to meet the requirements of the music. The motives and action of the plot also diverge considerably from Apel's romance. Caspar being jealous of Max, tries to engage him in a compact with Satan, but the Evil One is frustrated by the pure-minded and devout Agathe, and in her stead Caspar becomes the victim. Thus Kind contrived a happy termination instead of Apel's tragic one. The plot, as it now stands,—its main interest centred in a couple of true-hearted lovers, living in an honest forester's cottage, on a background of German forest, with all its delights and all its weird associations, lit up now by sunbeams glinting on a frolicsome peasantry, now by lurid flashes revealing the forms of the powers of darkness appeals with irresistible attraction to every German heart. The most important point in the opera, however, and the secret of its success, is the strongly-marked religious element which at once raised it to an altogether higher level than any prior opera, and gave it a kind of sacred character. During the War of Freedom a spirit of religious enthusiasm had taken hold of the people of Germany, and become so far a ruling passion that any one who succeeded in giving expression to it in music was sure of striking home to the national heart. Looked at from this point of view, the part of the hermit, Kind's own invention, acquires considerable significance. The opening of the opera was originally intended to be quite different from what it is now. The curtain drew up on a forest scene with a hermit's cell, having close by a turf altar with a cross or image at the back, covered with white roses. The hermit praying before the altar sees in a vision the Prince of Darkness lying in wait to