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Updated: May 19, 2025
The gay capital was thronged with great singers, the traditions of whose artistic ability compare favorably with those of a more recent period. The witty and beautiful Sophie Arnould, who had a train of princes at her feet, was the principal exponent of Gluck's heroines, while Mile. La-guerre was the mainstay of the Piccinists.
The second act of this work has been called one of the most astonishing productions of the human mind. The public began to show signs of fickleness, however, on the production of the "Alceste." On the first night a murmur arose among the spectators: "The piece has fallen." Abbé Arnaud, Gluck's devoted defender, arose in his box and replied: "Yes! fallen from heaven."
After a struggle with himself Gluck decided to bear the thirst a little longer. He put the bottle to the child's lips, and it drank all but a few drops. Then it got up and ran down the hill. All kinds of sweet flowers began to grow on the rocks, and crimson and purple butterflies flitted about in the air. At the end of another hour, Gluck's thirst was almost unbearable.
At the end of the first act the curtain fell amid the profoundest silence. The Hasseites shrugged their shoulders, and even Gluck's warmest adherents felt undecided what to say of this severe Doric music, which disdained all the coquetries of art, and rejected all superfluous embellishment.
Thus do the stately shades pass by without grief and without joy in the Elysian Fields, to the dignified sounds of Gluck's melodies. November, 1879. Stay! As I now behold thee remain thou evermore in my memory!
Sophie Arnould appeared with no less success in Gluck's operas of "Orphée" and "Alceste" than in the first, and rose again to the topmost wave of court favor. When "Orphée" was at rehearsal at the opera-house, it became the fashion of the great court dignitaries and the young chevaliers of the period to attend.
When it came to the mug's turn to be made into spoons, it half broke poor little Gluck's heart; but the brothers only laughed at him, tossed the mug into the melting pot, and staggered out to the alehouse, leaving him, as usual, to pour the gold into bars, when it was all ready. When they were gone, Gluck took a farewell look at his old friend in the melting pot.
She had "created" Gluck's Iphigénie en Aulide and the composer had said of her, "If it had not been for the voice and elocution of Mlle. Arnould, my Iphigénie would never have been performed in France." In her youth she had interested not only Marie Antoinette but also the King, and she had been the object of Mme. de Pompadour's suspicion and Mme. du Barry's rage.
The word in time slunk into the dictionaries of musical terms as descriptive of a drone bass. Many of Gluck's ballet airs bear the title, Musette. Perhaps the bass was even performed on a bag-pipe.... "Mal frequenté" in Parisian argot has a variety of significations; in this particular instance it suggested apaches to me.
The frequent movement in octaves imparts a nobility and dignity to her expression which are altogether absent in the words. The paraphrase of the words of the air from Gluck's Orphee is amusing enough as a jeu d' esprit, but surely cannot be taken seriously. Hanslick seems to have misapprehended the music; it does not express grief, and is not intended to.
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