Page:The Spirit of French Music.djvu/116

 As will be readily imagined, I am thinking only of the greatest musicians; no one will suppose that I allude to the abominably degenerate Italian or pseudo-Italian school of to-day. I am thinking of the great musicians, and of them at their moments of inspiration, of genius. Take that celebrated passage in William Tell, with which one of the sublime scenes of that work opens; "His days which they have dared to number." It is a model of fitting declamation; the grief and remorse of a proud soul tortured by the shame of weakness could not possibly be expressed in accents of greater strength, conviction, or dignity. Moreover the phrase is given out like an incomparable vocal rocket; it is one of the most marvellous tenor phrases that can be found. What a spell it weaves!

Frenchmen, even southern Frenchmen, cannot do that. They have tried and failed. They always will fail. It is a matter of sensibility, of race. The Muette de Portici, a work famous in its day, the nearest to Rossini that we have, enables us to put our finger on this truth. It is Rossini, Rossini with something mechanical about it. It has the necessary swing, but not the spell, not the inward deep musicality. The velvet softness, the grace, the sweetness and charm have faded out of it. It is delicate but dry.

Similarly, that extreme vigour of dramatico-musical movement, that captivating vivacity in what I would call the scenic arrangement of music, these are charms that our composers might try in vain to realise to the same degree as do Rossini and Verdi in their finest works. In these great masters such qualities may be traced to a certain manner of feeling, an inward energy. Our musicians could never even try to catch that style without appearing absurd, insincere, exaggerated,