Bob’s
World of
J. Massenet

Reviews — The New York Times

From the New York Times - February 21, 1912

‘CENDRILLON’ THE FAIRY OPERA, GIVEN
First Performance Here of Massenet’s Work,
with Miss Teyte as Cinderella.
MARY GARDEN THE PRINCE
An Excellent Representation of an Agreeable
but Not Exciting Work - Mmes. Berat and Dufau.

Cendrillon                              Maggie Teyte
Mme. de la Haltière                Louise Berat
The Prince                              Mary Garden
The Fairy                                Meanie Dufau
Noémie                                  Mabel Reigelman
Dorothée                                Marie Cavan
Pandolfe                                 Hector Dufranne
The King                                 Gustave Huberdeau
Dean of the Faculty                 Francesco Daddi
Master of Amusements            Desire Defrere
The Prime Minister                   Constantin Nicolay
Voix du Heraut                        Charles Meyer
Premiere Danseuse Etoile         Rosina Galli
General Musical Director Cleofonte Campanini

     Mr. Dippel, carrying on the Massenet tradition that he inherited from Mr. Hammerstein, who invented it and developed it as an operatic manager with so much success, produced Massenet’s “Cendrillon” at the second performance of the Chicago-Philadelphia Opera Company of the evening at the Metropolitan Opera House. It was the first performance in New York, though it had been given earlier in the Winter by Mr. Dippel’s company both in Chicago and in Philadelphia. New York, however, came perilously near hearing it twice, about eight years ago, on the visit of the New Orleans Opera Company that gave a few performances at the Casino and then faded away. “Cendrillon” was announced, but the company had dissolved before the dates were reached.
      The audience was large, though far from as large as that which greeted the company at its first appearance last week. It gave evidence of pleasure at the performances that did not break through the boundary line of decorum or even rise often to the pitch of enthusiasm.
     The special department of statistical science devoted to Massenet shows that “Cendrillon” is his fifteenth opera, and the eleventh of his operas to be heard in New York. It has already a respectable age in the tale of the prolific French composer’s works, for it was first produced in Paris on May 24, 1899. It is called on the title page a “Fairy Tale in Four Acts and Six Tableaux,” the intention being doubtless to disabuse any who might expect to hear a “grand opera,” or even an “opéra comique,” of the idea that they would find either in this work. The librettist was Henri Cain, who has since won fame as a dramatist, but who up to that time had not even attempted an operatic libretto. The two collaborators have denied that they were in the least turned toward this fairy tale as a subject for operatic treatment by the great success of “Hänsel und Gretel,” that made its appearance not long before “Cendrillon,” though M. Adolphe Jullien, a keen observer, remarks that “Massenet generally knows which way the wind is blowing, and never tries to go counter to it,” and remembers that he was shrewdly suspected of finding the suggestion for “La Navarraise” in the great success of “Cavalleria Rusticana.”
                                                      Based on Fairy Tale
     The point is of little moment, especially as there can be no suggestion of any similarity of means or method of treatment between the German and the French fairy opera. “Cendrillon” is of course based on the tale of Charles Perrault, the delightful seventeenth century story teller, to whom the world owes so much for its fairy tales. It appears in the opera that Cinderella’s real name is Lucette; that her wicked stepmother is Mme. de la Haltière, and her own father M. Pandolfe. Everything in the story takes its familiar course till after Cinderella’s return from the ball at which she has had so brilliant a success. The stepmother and step-sisters, furious at their failure to attract the notice of Prince Charming, indulge in high words, and M. Pandolfe, wearied of the strife in his home, announces his intention of leaving it with his daughter and withdrawing to his old farm. But Cinderella, disheartened, in despair of ever seeing the Prince again, steals out of the house to die under the Fairies’ Oak Tree. Thither comes also the Prince, likewise in despair of ever seeing Cinderella again, who had escaped so suddenly at the stroke of 12; and he, too, is seeking death. Though unaware of each other’s presence, both invoke Fairy Godmother to the same effect, and she, seeing the two so near and each intending to die for each other, parts the curtain of verdure that separates them, and as they are united puts them to sleep with her magic wand.
     In the last act, Cinderella, no longer a servant in her step-mother’s house, is in the country watched by her solicitous father. She is recovering from a long illness, troubled by many strange dreams about fairies, slippers, and the Prince, that came upon her after he had found her lying unconscious under the oak tree. Then comes the trial to discover the owner of the glass slipper left behind at the ball by the damsel who had so enraptured the Prince, and the triumph of Cinderella, whom alone it fits.
     “Cendrillon” is untroubled by symbolism, allegory, mysticism, or any other of the modern operatic “arrière pensées.” It is frankly a fairy story, most innocently set to music, and its characters are the good and bad old friends of the tale, who act exactly as they do there and represent nothing else but themselves. The librettist has had, perhaps, to elaborate some of the incidents of “Cinderella” a good deal to make an opera out of the story. Some of them are spread a little thin. The story finds its climax in the third act in the reunion of the two lovers under the fairy godmother’s wand; and the last act, representing the search for the owner of the glass slipper, its success, and the second reunion of the lovers, makes a rather perfunctory ending to correspond with the tradition of the fairy story. And yet a fairy story must end in this way, and they must life happily forever after! M. Pandolfe turns to the audience and says, “Here all ends well, you see,” and the chorus gives the old-fashioned epilogue. “And so we end our play. We have all done our best to entice you away into fairyland blest.”
                                                      Has a Human Interest.
     But with all its simplicity of motives, “Cendrillon” has a human interest, even adult human interest, and a real charm. The librettist was skillful in his elaboration of the characters, motives, and situations provided for him by the delightful Perrault, and has given a succession of scenes, vivacious, pathetic, tender, and mirthful, always sympathetic; and he has also, naturally, taken thought of the possibilities of spectacular treatment which the scenes at court and the doings of the fairies suggest. The spectacle, in truth, has to bear a considerable part in maintaining the interest of this opera. “Cendrillon” is another and a conspicuous example added to many presented before of Massenet’s mastery of his trade of operatic composition. He had, it must be confessed, little inspiration to put into this work. There is nothing in this music that bears any sign that it was beating at his heart, clamoring at the portals of his soul, for utterance to the world. Massenet, however, is one who “hath a mint of phrases in his brain,” and its coinage is reasonably sound. The dexterity and skill with which he has written this music, with which he has made it express the characters and fit the situations, the variety, contrast, effectiveness, appropriateness that it all has, are something to admire. It is music which has, perhaps, at no point any sweeping power or real intensity, any vivid emotional force, any really great beauty of any sort. With all its finish and efficiency of workmanship, there is almost something sketchy about much of it. And yet it is agreeable, and almost always has something characteristic, something that engages and interests the listener, and is not unworthy of his attention.
     There is little attempt to express the naîveté of childhood, that might be expected to have suggested itself to the composer as a means to his end in treating this fairy tale. Nor has Massenet sought to embody in it any of that folk song element that is so conspicuous in “Hänsel und Gretel,” and that gives that fairy opera so much of its distinctive charm.
     On the other hand, he has taken advantage of numerous opportunities for pleasing and picturesque musical episodes, diversion from the main course of the drama. There is the little concert for lute, viola d’amore and crystal flute, which fails to charm the Prince at the onset of the second act, though it has a quaint old-world flavor. There are pleasing orchestral movements - somewhat lacking in pungency and flavor, notwithstanding some interesting rhythmic traits - when the various delegations of doctors, courtiers, noble daughters, players of the “mandola” - a larger mandolin - the Florentine dancer, enter to do their best to move and divert the Prince. The courtiers all unite to dance the “rigadoon,” also pleasantly.
                                                    Comic Scenes are Lively.
     Massenet’s comic scenes are bustling and lively, as in the opening of the opera, where the stepmother is scolding the servants, and where the messengers come with the ball dresses; and there is humor in the condescending phrases of pity when the courtiers have failed to make the Prince take notice. The fairy music is delicate and graceful without having any way distinct originality; it recalls in a way Mendelssohn and Berlioz, whose methods have become traditional. The Fairy Queen, after the fashion of most fairy queens, is addicted to florid song, and has many brilliant passages of this sort to sing. And this at least, is one point that gives “Cendrillon” an unusual distinction among modern operas, whose composers have, as one man, rejected vocal coloratura as a means of expression.
     Much of the music that Cinderella has to sing is tender, simple in outline, appropriate to the gentle and winning personality that is represented. Where Massenet most leaves a void is in his musical expression of the ardent passion of the Prince and of Cinderella for each other. Perhaps he found a hurtling vehemence, even a contained intensity of emotion, misplaced in these situations. At all events there is little glow of passion in the music at the meeting of Prince Charming and Cinderella at the ball - even when they are discreetly left alone - and again in their second meeting under the fairies’ oak tree, and the brief moment that brings them together at the end.
     One thing that never fails the composer is his find and sensitive feeling for orchestral color, the power to present his music in an orchestral garb that seems the inevitable vesture of his ideas. And so in this work in which the stroke is always so light, the hand so sketchily free, the orchestration is light, fluent, transparent, and at the same time abounding in the fortunate touches in which he is so facile.
                                                      A Good Performance.
     The performance of “Cendrillon” was good; it might have gone with somewhat more spirit, and vigor, but it reflected credit upon Mr. Dippel’s organization and especially emphasized his possession in the company of a number of excellent women singers who had not before been heard in opera here. Chief among these was Miss Maggie Teyte, the Cendrillon. She doubtless has stronger rôles; but she could hardly have been introduced to the New York operatic public under more prepossessing circumstances. She is admirably adapted for the part in both appearance and voice. It calls for no profound histrionic art; but it needs innate grace and simplicity and charm, a certain wistful eagerness and sincerity of pathos. Exactly these qualities she showed in a way to win the heart. She sang the music with equal success. Her voice had been heard here earlier in the season in a song recital. It sounded to even better advantages in this opera. It is a voice of light quality, with a more than usual penetration and carrying power, more than usual expressiveness and color. It has beauty, and it is used with fine art of vocalism that rejoices the judicious ear.
     Miss Garden took the part of Prince Charming, written for a soprano voice. Her valorous press agents have been giving assurance that the part, while not so long as that of Cendrillon, is more “effective.” By some strange miscalculation of its significance, Miss Garden did not succeed even in making it seem so. She seldom fails to perceive and to utilize the dramatic possibilities that are offered her. She makes a sufficiently striking figure of the Prince; she represents his profound impassivity and indifference to all that is intended to beguile him. But when Cinderella appears - she “whom he has seemed to be expecting,” according to the directions of the score - the pose, the mask, hardly change. There is little of ecstasy in his gaze, little of adoration in his tones when he is with her, little of “feverish anxiety” at her loss when she flees. It is a pity that Miss Garden’s great resource of facial play and of all the shades of emotional suggestion are not more profitably employed. The music seems to be comparatively favorable for her voice, and she succeeds in singing it better than she does some other music.
     Mr. Dufranne is admirably fitted with the part of M. Pandolfe, which he presents with a rich and unctuous humor, with a heartiness and humanity that are most sympathetic. He is a fine figure of a French gentleman of the olden time. And his singing of the music is excellent. His voice, especially after his first scene, sounded noble, rich, and of a finely modulated power.
     The newcomers in the cast among the women singers are welcome additions. Louise B‚rat, as the wicked stepmother, is an excellent comedienne, who makes the most of the opportunities that fall to her, and she is, moreover, an excellent singer. Miss Jennie Dufau has a difficult task in the Fairy Godmother. There is need of a light and brilliant coloratura soprano voice, of a skillful and spontaneous manner of singing, and in these respects, while her art is not of the highest in a most exacting field, it is quite acceptable. Miss Mabel Riegelman and Miss Marie Cavan are well placed as the two hateful step-sisters.
     “Cendrillon” is difficult opera to mount, and Mr. Dippel’s forces cope with it with a good deal of success. The architectural splendors of the palace might be more splendid and there might be a greater gorgeousness in the scenes which call for spectacular display. The representation of the great oak tree where the fairies dwell has a striking solidity and spaciousness. There are a number of transformations that call for expert management of scenery and lights, and these were made successfully.
     There must, as always, be praise for Mr. Campanini’s vigilant, spirited, and well-finished reading of the score and for the excellence of the musical ensemble and the singing of the chorus.

Last updated December 30, 2006