Opera Books
THE OPERA
EDITED BY
ALBERT HILLERY BERGH
VOLUME IV.
1909
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Herbert.
Victor Herbert was
born in Dublin, Ireland, February 1, 1859. He is the grandson of Samuel
Lover, the well-known Irish novelist. When only seven years old Herbert
was sent to Germany to study music, and became a ‘cellist, playing in
the Court Orchestra at Stuttgart, and with many other leading European
organizations.
In 1886 he came to this country as solo ‘cellist in the
Metropolitan Opera Company, and afterwards played first ‘cello and
was assistant conductor for Theodore Thomas and Anton Seidl.
Mr. Herbert became bandmaster of the famous Twenty-second Regiment
Band in 1894, but was soon. called to Pittsburg as conductor of the
Pittsburg Orchestra. Ten years later he organized his own orchestra,
which has toured the country successfully.
For some time past Mr. Herbert has given a great deal of his time
to supplying the scores for comic operas. Hecomposed Prince Ananias,
The Serenade and The Viceroy for the Bostonians; The
Wizard of the Nile, The Idol’s Eye, and The Ameer for Frank
Daniels; Cyrano de Bergerac for Francis Wilson; The
Fortuneteller and The Singing Girl for Alice Neilsen;
Babette and Mlle. Modiste for Fritzi Scheff, and Dolly
Dollars
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for Luiu Glaser. He also composed the music of Babes in Toyland, It
happened in Nordland, and The Prima Donna, and is the
composer of numerous songs and instrumental pieces.
Opera by Herbert.
Libretto by Harry B. Smith.
Characters: Kibosh, the Wizard of the Nile; Cheops, the prophet of
the weather; Ptolemy, King of Egypt; Simoona, his queen; Princess
Cleopatra; Ptarmigan, her lover; her women attendants; Abydos, the Greek
servant of the wizard; pages, workmen, courtiers, slaves and Egyptians.
Place, Egypt. Time, 53 B. C. First produced at Wilkes-Barre, Pa.,
in 1895.
The story concerns the adventures of Kibosh, a pseudo necromancer,
who is wandering through Egypt on a tour with Abydos, his Greek servant.
Just at this time Ptolemy, the King, has invested all the surplus money
of the royal treasury in desert lands throughout Egypt and adjacent to
it. He has done this through the inducement of Cheops, the prophet of
the weather, who predicted that the Nile’s annual overflow would be
unusually great and would fertilize the desert as never before. The
prophecies of Cheops always go by contraries, so that instead of an
extra flood there is a drouth. To punish him for his mistake, the King
orders Cheops to be beheaded, but that gentleman is not at all
disconcerted and continues to enjoy himself, even in face of the fact
that his hours are said to be numbered. Meanwhile Ptolemy, on the other
hand, does not
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enjoy life, for he is badly henpecked by his gracious queen, Simoona,
who sees to it that he is kept in an unquiet state.
While the preparations for Cheops’ execution are going on
Cleopatra’s barge appears coming down the river, but instead of bringing
the Princess it contains the wandering magician, Kibosh, who has stolen
the barge while Cleopatra and her maidens have gone ashore to gather
lotos blossoms. Kibosh and Abydos, his factotum, are sentenced to be
decapitated for having stolen the Princess’ boat, but as the axe is
about to fall on his luckless head Kibosh remarks with a tone of deep
regret that with him will perish the great secret of the Nile’s overflow.
On hearing this the King is alarmed, stops the execution and entreats
Kibosh to try his skill on the river. He promises that if the
necromancer can bring on a flood he shall be spared—nay, he shall also
have every sort of honor; also the hand of the Princess Cleopatra, at
present a young girl who has never even heard a word of love. She and
her maidens enter, twining garlands. Kibosh is presented to her as a
prospective husband. As the Princess can only receive a lover’s
addresses in the presence of witnesses, there is an embarrassing time
for Kibosh. He is then asked to fulfil his compact, and to cast a spell
on the river. Knowing himself to be a fakir, he tries to put off this
trial of skill, but is compelled to do something, so he goes through an
incantation. It happens that the river actually does rise, though, of
course, this is from natural causes. He takes the credit and claims the
reward. He and the Princess are carried in triumph to the palace. But
Cleopatra’s music teacher, Ptarmigan, has been making love to her,
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dignity and {curiosity,} allows him to love her on the even days, and to
be merely her teacher on the odd ones. Abydos, the Greek servant, also
loses his heart to the Princess.
The second act shows that the Nile has flooded the land, so that
the people have to fly. The King and court are seen on the roof of the
palace with such bad colds that Kibosh is condemned to be executed for
overdoing his part, but he cannot be found. Presently he appears in a
boat, takes refuge in a palm tree and is captured. Tortures are to be
applied, but he is released upon divulging Cleopatra’s plot to elope
with Ptarmigan. Just now the land speculations are succeeding, and again
Kibosh asks for the hand of the Princess. Heis loaded with honors,
pending the marriage; and now Abydos is jealous and brings about an
explosion with Kibosh’s magic that sets fire to the Queen’s apartments.
Then Kibosh loses all credit and is sentenced to be buried in one of the
Pyramids.
The third act shows the interior of the pyramid. Ptarmigan, who has
been appointed one of the workmen to wall up Kibosh, is at work when
Cleopatra comes to tell him that at last she has found out what love is.
He is charmed, thinking she cares for him, but she shows a medallion of
Marc Antony that she has fallen in love with Abydos and pages now come
and take the places of the mummies, and try to release Kibosh after
frightening him. The King comes to see the progress of events, stays too
long, and when he tries to go finds the entrance sealed up. But the
courtiers miss him and come to the rescue. Stone-cutters are near; they
open the pyramid, and the King, having found what it means
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to be walled up, pardons Kibosh, who with Abydos resumes his voyage,
while Cleopatra says she is going to Rome to find the original of the
medallion, but in the meantime Ptarmigan may love her if he likes.
Opera by Herbert in a
prologue and three acts. Libretto by Glen MacDonough.
Characters: Alan, nephew of Barnaby; Jane, Barnaby’s niece; TJncle
Barnaby, a rich miser; the widow Piper; Contrary Mary; Tom Tom, her
eldest son; Gill, who helps Jack; Bo-Peep; Red Riding-Hood; Sallie
Waters; Curly Locks; Miss Muffett; Simple Simon; Peter; Tommy Tucker;
Jack; Boy Blue; Bobby Shaftoe; Roderigo; Gonzorgo; Hilda; Gertrude; the
Master Toymaker; Grumio; Inspector Marmaduke; Max.
Place, Toyland. Time, the present. First produced at Chicago in
1903.
Uncle Barnaby, a wicked old man, plots to get the money of his two
wards, Alan and Jane, the babes of the story. He tries first to drown
them, but they are rescued. Then he tries to lose them in a
spider-haunted forest, but they are saved by a fairy who appeared to
them as a moth caught in. a spider web, and whom they set free. Next
they turn up in Toyland, where they see all sorts of wonders, including
a toymaker, who seeks to put life into toys, and succeeds only in
filling them with evil spirits, so that they turn upon him and try to
destroy him. This time the fairy saves the children by a volcanic
eruption, and when the opera ends their fortune is restored and they are
delivered from the wicked uncle.
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Opera in three acts by
Herbert. Libretto by Harry B. Smith.
Characters: Babette; Mondragon; Marcel, a painter; Baltazar;
Vinette, his daughter; Van Tympel, a clockmaker; Eva, his wife; the King
of France; Guzman, a Spanish officer; Schnapps, a tavern-keeper; Captain
Walther; Sebastian; Jan; Quentin; Margot; Greta; Joan; a Coachman; a
Footman; Mile. de la Motte; Mlle. de Rohan; Mlle. Fontanges; Marquis de
Villette; Count de Coufville; Due do St. Michel; François; Henri;
Gaston; Jacques; Laurent; Teresa; Katrina.
Place, Belgium and France. Time, the Eighteenth Century. First
produced at Washington, D. C., in 1903.
The story of Babette begins in Belgium, in a village full of
quaint characters and pretty girls. Chief of all is Babette, a dainty
maiden, who is the official letter-writer of the village. She is in
love, and is loved in return. Marcel, an artist, is the lucky man, but
he fails under her displeasure on account of a misunderstanding through
which it appears that he loves another in the village. Babette becomes a
strolling player, and with two companions has many adventures, the chief
of which carries the story to the court of Versailles, where, disguised,
she makes love to the beauties surrounding Louis XIV, and picks quarrels
with the courtiers. She later appears as her own self, and with her
voice and her grace charms the monarch into bestowing favors upon her
and Marcel, with whom she has become reconciled.
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Opera by Herbert.
Libretto by Henry Blossom.
Characters: “Con” Kidder; “Kid” Conner; Jan van Borken; Franz;
Willem; Captain Doris van Damm; the Governor of Zeeland; Joshua
Pennefeather; Gretchen; Bertha; Tina; Countess de la Tere; Flora; Dora;
Lena; Anna; Phyllis; iMiadge.
Place, Holland. Time, Nineteenth Century. First produced at New
York in 1906.
This is one of the few light operas brought out on the American
stage, which, from the first, seems smooth in action, and contain music
and text all through exactly suited to each other. “Con” and “Kid,” two
Americans on a European tour, get stranded in a small Dutch town at the
chief inn. They try to escape the admission that they cannot pay their
bill by climbing out of a window, hoping to sneak off. But the
burgomastar catches them. as they are in the act of escaping, and sends
them to jail. However, the innkeeper is merciful and says they may work
out their bill by taking the places of two servants. “Con” becomes an
interpreter, and “Kid” is made a waiter. The young men hear tales of the
burgomaster’s severity with his daughter, and, in their American way of
impulse to relieve distress, and also to pay their own grudge against
that official, they set about saving the girl from a marriage with the
Governor to whom the father would give her. They promise to help her to
elope with her chosen sweetheart, van Damm. But the innkeeper,
overhearing this plan, tells the burgomaster, who locks his daughter up
in the Red Mill, and
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tells her she will be kept there until the governor comes to marry her.
Franz and the sheriff are sent to guard the place. The Americans find
they can’t reach the girl through the door, so they swing on the mill
wheel to the top of the building.
“Con” snatches the girl, holding her firmly about the waist with
one arm while clinging to the wheel with the other, and thus the two are
carried down on the other side to the ground.
It is a “thrilling” rescue of old-time significance, and gives
opportunity for a splendid piece of stage “business.”
The next act shows the burgomaster’s home on the day set for the
wedding, but the bride is gone; her father is furious, offers a reward
of many gulden for her, and telegraphs to The Hague for Sherlock Holmes
and Dr. Watson to help him find her. In the disguise of Italian
organ-grinders “Con” and “Kid,” who have found the telegram, appear on
the scene in the characters of the great detective and his friend. For
so-called political reasons they order the sheriff’s arrest and the
release of Gretchen’s lover, Doris. But meantime the Governor arrives.
Finding there is no Gretchen to meet him, he is quite delighted to marry
her aunt, a lady with plenty of money. Then the Americans restore her to
her own lover, who turns out to be heir to a great English property. The
identity of the detective and his companion is made known. “Con” gets
Tina, the innkeeper’s daughter, and everyone is made very happy.
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Opera by Herbert.
Libretto by Henry Blossom, Jr.
Characters: Colonel Dutois; Cap. Bordenane; Lieut. Armand; Lieut.
Gaston de Randal; Lieut. Prosper Rousseau; Lieut. Eugene de Beaumont;
Mons. Beaurivage; Herr Max Gundeifinger; Signor Guiseppi Ciucicini;
Baron de Pombal; first Waiter; second Waiter; Mother Justine; Mlle.
Athené; Margot; Mlle. Mathilde; Mile. Desirée; the Dancer; the Duchess
de Montrose; Countess Hélène; Marquise du Perrifonds; Celéste; Mignon;
Clairette; Bébe.
Place, Paris. Time, the present. First produced at New York in
1908.
The plot of this opera is slight, but the music is charming. There
is nothing tawdry about it, and there is no vaudeville, no coarseness.
Mlle. Athenée, a leading prima donna in Paris, meets with an accident to
her motor car while out driving. The mishap can be rectified; and
meanwhile she goes into a nearby café chantant to wait. There she finds
the performers are being rehearsed by their director. Among them she
notices the soprano, who has a bad cold. Feeling sorry for her when she
is unable to sing her part well, Mlle. Athenée offers to take her place.
The director, after trying and being satisfied with the stranger’s voice,
agrees to this. A song written by a young officer, Lieut. Armand,
otherwise the Count de Fontenne, is to be sung, the director having, for
a consideration, agreed to introduce it. Athenée sings the song from the
manuscript, and does it so well that its author falls in love with her
and her voice, and she also loses her heart to him.
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At this time a man comes into the café in an intoxicated state. He
is a person who has loaned Atbenée’s father a good deal of money, and
now he is not too drunk to recognize her. lie, too, has been attracted
by her, and when, after the concert is over, and the guests gone, they
are left together, he locks her with himself into the hall and tries to
compel her to receive his advances. She struggles with him and manages
to force him to a door, through which she has just pushed him when the.
Lieutenant and others, having heard the noise, return. She hinders the
Lieutenant from doing anything that would cause the Captain to challenge
him. All this time Lieutenant Armand has been betrothed to the Countess
Hélène, but that young lady finally elopes with another officer, and
Armand is left free to seek Athenée.
Opera by Herbert.
Libretto by Harry B. Smith.
Characters: Musette; Irma; Fresco; Count Berezowski; Sandor;
Captain Ladislas; Boris; Mlle. Pompon; Vananka; Rafael; General Korbay;
Wanda; Etelka; Vera; Matosin; Waldemar; Lieutenant Aimir; Lieutenant
Timar; Jan; Paul; a violinist; a pianist, a trombone player; first
detective; second detective; a wounded Hussar.
Place, Hungary. Time, the present. First produced at New York in
1908.
As the opera opens Count Berezowski finds that a certain ballet
master at the opera house in Buda Pesth has a young girl as his pupil
who has fallen heir to a large fortune. The Count, who is in need of
money,
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conceives the idea of securing this fortune by marrying the heiress.
Fresco, the ballet master, helps him to carry out this plan, and
provides an opportunity for him to pay his addresses to the girl. But
Irma has already lost her heart and promised her hand to Captain
Ladislas, of the Hungarian Hussars. She and the Captain lay plans for
her escape. Irma, as a disguise, is to assume her brother’s dress and
pass for him. When she quits the ballet school she tries to put the
master off the track by leaving a note for him in which she declares
that she cannot endure the situation and means to commit suicide. Fresco
has read the note and is bemoaning her loss when Miusette, a gypsy
fortune-teller, comes in. Musette looks so startlingly like Irma that
Fresco at once conceives a plan for passing her off with the Count as
the heiress he seeks. The father of Musette helps this idea along, as
does also Boris, Rafael and Vananka, some of the gypsies of the troupe.
But Sandor, another of the tribe, loves Musette and plans to help her to
escape. Preparations for the wedding are begun, but in the midst of
these Musette, helped by Sandor, manages to elude attention and gets
safely away.
Meantime, Irma as Fedor, her brother, appears. Fresco now, having
missed Musette, seizes on Irma and persuades her to become the Count’s
betrothed in place of the gypsy. Further complications arise when Mlle.
Pompon arrives. She is a singer who falls in love with each of the men
in turn, and manages to set the lovers of Musette and Irma to fighting
on her account for the possession of Irma as Fedor. The real Fedor is at
this time in disgrace for having deserted from the army. As his sister
is sustaining his character she is arrested for
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him and her situation is perilous. In the last act all this is happily
arranged. Ladislas confesses that the supposed edor is his own little
lady-love, Irma. The General becomes magnanimous, and brings about the
forgiveness of everyone, thus bringing the whole to a happy end.
Opera in three acts by
Herbert. Libretto by Joseph D. Redding.
Characters: Natoma; Barbara; Lieutenant Paul :Merrill; Don
Francisco; Father Peralta; Alvarado; Pico; Kagama; Jose Castro; Chiquita;
a Voice.
Place, Island of Santa Cruz and town of Santa Barbara. Time, 1820,
under the Spanish Regime. First produced at Philadelphia, and afterwards
at New York in 1911.
The plot deals with the passion of Natoma for Paul Merril, a young
naval lieutenant, who has met and made love to her while visiting what
was then still Spanish California.
The American forgets Natoma, the poor Indian girl, in a more
attractive love for Barbara, the daughter of old Don Francisco. With the
assistance of two rogues a Spaniard, Alvardo, tries to abduct Barbara
while the fiesta of Santa Barbara is being celebrated. Natoma watches,
and, during a tragic “dagger dance” with the Indian, Kagama, she stabs
Alvardo. The dance comes to a stop as Alvardo falls dead. Father Peralta
appears in the doorway of the church while Paul and his soldiers are
drawing their swords. The people fall on their knees. Natoma drops her
dagger, and staggering toward the church, falls at the feet of the
priest, who protects her from the vengeance of the crowd.
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In the third act the priest summons the acolytes, and orders them
to open the church door. Natoma stands upon the steps of the altar,
facing the body of the church, which rapidly fills. Don Francisco and
Barbara seat themselves near the altar. Paul and his brother officers
are seated opposite to them. At the end of an imposing chorale, the
priest mounts the pulpit, and in a few words recalls the festal day and
the commission of a crime, he declares that punishment must follow. The
voices of nuns are heard in the distance singing a hymn of triumph. The
doors of the convent garden open as the nuns enter.
Natoma turns and looks at the priest, who bows his head. Slowly she
descends the steps and walks down the main aisle to the point where
Barbara and Paul are seated. Then she pauses as though under the spell
of some superior power. Barbara and Paul, coming from their respective
pews, kneel in the aisle in front of Natoma. Then Natoma turns and walks
out through the garden door as the orchestra strikes up an Indian chant
of fate. Natoma has understood the hopelessness of her own love. She is
converted and seeks comfort in the cloister.
The opera, in its entirety, can scarcely be classed as a work of
genius, but the score certainly exhibits genuine musicianship in the
excellence of its harmonized and orchestral themes. Mr. Herbert again
exhibits in Natoma his exceptional capacity as a stage craftsman,
and he has not neglected the opera-goer’s demands for effective songs,
ensembles and choruses. Moreover, he has proved himself in this opera an
expert in orchestration, which is brilliant and varied, and reveals a
surprising individuality of musical style.
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Opera in one act by
Herbert. Libretto by Grant Stewart, adapted from a French play by A.
Decourceles and L. Thiboust.
Characters: Madeleine; Nichette; the Duc D’Esterre; Didier; the
Chevalier de Mauprat; De Fontanges.
Place, Paris. Time, 1760. First produced at New York in 1914.
It is New Year’s day in Paris, about the year 1760. The scene is
the salon of Madeleine Fleury, the favorite diva of the day, and the
room is full of costly New Year’s gifts that have been laid at her feet.
Madeleine herself, buoyantly happy at the dawning of another year of
triumph, invites the Chevalier de Mauprat to dine with her, but he
laughingly declines, having promised to dine with his mother.
The Duc D’Esterre, Madeleine’s chief admirer arrives with a
magnificent gift, but, to her intense chagrin, he, too, refuses to dine
with her, having promised to dine with his mother—a promise he cannot
break. She pleads, cajoles, demands, but all in vain; and at last she
even threatens to invite his rival, de Fontanges. with whom he is to
fight a duel the following day. The Duc D’Esterre, however, is firm in
his refusal, and Medeleine, now thoroughly piqued, writes, inviting de
Fontanges. An answer comes, declining the honor, as he is dining with
his mother, and Madeleine’s maid, Nichette, to whom she turns as a last
resort, also declines for the same reason.
Beside herself with chagrin, Madeleine gives way to a burst of
hysterical passion, discharges all her servants and throws herself on
the sofa in a fit of passionate
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weeping. At this point, Didier, a poor painter, arrives with a portrait
of Madeleine’s mother that he has been renovating. He and Madeleine have
been friends from childhood, and finding her so upset, he soothes her.
Hereminds her of her girlhood, of their early struggles and youthful
ambitions, and brings her gradually to a gentle frame of mind. He
invites her to dine with him and his mother, but she gratefully declines.
Nichette, restored to favor, returns, having obtained permission
from her mother to dine with Madeleine rather than that she should be
left alone, but Madeleine sends her back, saying she will not be alone.
The portrait of her mother in on the table and, as Madeleine sits facing
it, a ray of the setting sun lights up her mother’s face. Madeleine, too,
is dining with her mother.
In Madeleine, as in his best comic operas, Mr. Herbert has
proved himself a master of orchestral coloring. He introduces novel
orchestral effects, and his harmonies and rhythms are both pleasing and
piquaint. The composer has endeavored to reflect the operatic story in
his music, and has adapted the score to the conversational style of the
librettist. The songs that can be classed as “lyrics,” are therefore not
especially numerous, but those that have been introduced are
delightfully melodious. The final scene of the opera is made most
effective by the exquisite orchestration of a very simple theme.
Last updated April 23, 2007