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The most esteemed masters of the French school, such as Massenet, Reyer, Chausson, and Vincent d'Indy, had to seek refuge in the Théâtre de la Monnaie at Brussels before they could get their works received at the Opera in Paris. And the classical composers fare no better.
Saint-Saëns, Massenet, and Bizet, with Bemberg, Vidal and Duparc the song-writers, together with a little group of the younger school, d'Indy, Charpentier and their set, were gathered together to prepare a festival for Prince Gregoriev, showering on him attentions of every kind; and laboring tirelessly to convince him of their admiration and their "sympathetic appreciation."
Christophe was delighted. But when he looked at the bills of the Parisian theaters, he saw the names of Meyerbeer, Gounod, Massenet, and Mascagni and Leoncavallo names with which he was only too familiar: and he asked his friends if all this brazen music, with its girlish rapture, its artificial flowers, like nothing so much as a perfumery shop, was the garden of Armide that they had promised him.
The first, as we have seen, under the guidance of such men as Bizet, Delibes, and Massenet, has approached so near to the confines of grand opera, that it is often difficult to draw the line between the two genres The second, under the influence of Offenbach, Hervé, and Lecocq, has shrunk into opéra bouffe, a peculiarly Parisian product, which, though now for some reason under a cloud, has added sensibly to the gaiety of nations during the past thirty years.
He dined with us the other night, the Metternichs, and twenty-five other people, among whom were Auber and Massenet. In the boudoir, before dinner, he spied a manuscript which Auber had brought that afternoon. He took it up, looked at it, and said, "C'est tres joli!" and laid it down again. Was that not wonderful, that he could remember it all the time during the dinner?
It was the hour of pleasure, when the inhabitants threw off their sun-begotten sloth and thronged the cafés and public gardens and promenades. On the Rambla, once the bed of a river, the military bands played waltz music, and the favourite operas, and hot blood moved faster to the unfailing enchantment of the Habernera, and the newest works of Massenet and Charpentier.
I have brought up this question only to make clear that when I proclaim his great musical importance, I am guided solely by my artistic conscience and that my sincerity cannot be suspected. One word more. Massenet had many imitators; he never imitated anyone.
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