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Ponder a moment her singing in Thais. The converted Thais, about to betake herself desertward with the insistent monk, has a solo to sing. The solo is Massenet, simon-pure Massenet, the idol of the Paris midinette. Miss Garden, with a defective voice, a defective technique, exalts and magnifies that passage till it might be the noblest air of Handel or of Mozart.
And singing Massenet in the sitting room of her cottage!" "What does it all mean? Do you understand?" "Yes, but it has taken me long enough! But how could we have guessed ...?" Although they had never seen her except on the screen, they had not the least doubt that this was she.
Of Massenet's later works none has been more successful than 'Le Jongleur de Notre Dame' , which, besides winning the favour of Paris, has been performed at Covent Garden and in many German towns with much success. Here we find Massenet in a very different vein from that of 'Manon, or indeed any of his earlier works.
In gallant phrases the Frenchmen, Massenet and Saint-Saens, paid their respects to the greatest interpreter of the greatest of composers; Rafael could decipher what was in Italian, scenting the sweet perfume of Latin adulation despite the fact that he scarcely knew the language. A sonnet by Illica moved him actually to tears.
The work is divided into four scenes: a palm-girt well outside the city of Magdala, the house of Mary and Martha, Golgotha, and the garden of Joseph of Arimathea, where occurs what a noted French critic in writing about the first performance described as 'l'apparition très réussie de Jésus. In 'Chérubin' Massenet returned to his more familiar manner.
Massenet has told us that he borrowed right and left from his unpublished score, La Coupe du Roi de Thulé. That is what Gluck did with his Elena e Paride which had little success. I may as well confess that one of the ballets in Henry VIII came from the finale of an opéra-comique in one act.
The Abbé Prévost's famous romance had already been treated operatically by Auber, but his 'Manon Lescaut' was never really a success, and had been laid upon the shelf many years before Massenet took the story in hand.
Meanwhile he gave Massenet the texts for Marie-Madeleine and Le Roi de Lahore, and these two works created a great stir in the operatic world. We had dreams of historical opera, for we were quite without the prejudice against this form of drama which afflicts the present school.
Back again in the Palais, cooled and made receptive to music by the joyous quarter of an hour in the buffet, we heard Mme. Gautier sing "Le Cid," by Massenet, and the Princess Tekau accompany her effectively on the piano. A solo de piston, a violin, a flute, all played by Tahitians, entertained us, and then came the fun. M. X was down for a monologue. Who could it be?
He blushed scarlet as he thought of her laughing up her sleeve. Miss Wilkinson played the piano and sang in a rather tired voice; but her songs, Massenet, Benjamin Goddard, and Augusta Holmes, were new to Philip; and together they spent many hours at the piano. One day she wondered if he had a voice and insisted on trying it. She told him he had a pleasant baritone and offered to give him lessons.
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