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The Longy Club Season Sixteen, 1915 – 1916 The First Concert The first concert of the Longy Club’s sixteenth season began with a concert on the evening of Nov. 18, 1915, in Jordan Hall, Boston. The Monitor, in commenting on the first work on this program, gives a nice introduction of the season to its readers. Each year those who follow the work of Mr. Longy and his associates note with pleasure the increased attendance at the concerts of the club. The faithful have watched the evolution of the audiences from scattering few almost surrounded by empty seats to such an assemble as greeted the club last night, where the empty seats were scattered. A large part of these newcomers to the concert must be those who are finding for the first time the attractiveness of the wood wind instrument, when played by artists such as Mr. Longy and his confreres of the Boston Symphony Orchestra. A glance at the programs of former years will show a surprising number of “first times” noted. Mr. Longy has done more than Boston yet appreciates in making new music known here. Rare is the concert that does not bring forward at least one new piece. Some of these, failing to find the approval of the public, go back on the shelves, but others, like the Raff sinfonietta that began the program last night, are placed in the repertoire of the club. The piece in question has been played twice before, the last time some five or six years ago, and it will no doubt delight other audiences in the future.1 1 “Longy Club in First Concert of the 16th Season,” Boston Monitor, Nov. 19, 1915. 1 The Transcript agreed with this evaluation of the Raff. Raff is always tuneful, always melodic; he writes for the ear rather than for the visual sense or the intellect, and his pleasing and happy music deserves occasional resurrection.2 The second work on this concert was the Brahms Trio, Op. 114, for clarinet, cello and piano. It is difficult for readers today to understand why, but both the critics and the public of the early 20th century did not yet fully appreciate Brahms. Mr. Longy introduced a trio of Brahms for the first time at these concerts which met with only a moderate degree of approval. [Monitor] ….. Brahms wrote his clarinet trio at Ischl in 1891, after a period of great mental depression, when he thought gloomily about death. This perhaps accounts somewhat for the elegiac tone of the composition.3 ….. Brahms’s Trio…is typical of the Brahms we all know, and, except in certain moods, some of us dread. [Transcript] The final work on this concert was new to Boston, the Paul Juon Divertimento, Op. 51, for flute, oboe, clarinet, horn, bassoon and piano. Here was a work all the Boston critics were attracted to. …a “Divertissement” by Paul Juon, that immediately took its rightful place as a welcome addition to the program stock of the club. Juon is the Russian who has built on his Moscow foundation a superstructure of German musical ideas that has well night hidden underlying Slavic. So this sextet…sounds more German than Russian and becomes at times almost an exercise in counterpoint. Counterpoint, however, is Juon’s delight, so each instrument in turn had its neat and delicate pattern to weave in the fabric of tone and in turn its theme of warmth and beauty to announce. [Monitor] ….. C. W., “Familiar and Unfamiliar Music for Wind Choir from the Longy Club,” Boston Transcript, Nov. 19, 1915. 3 “Longy Club Gives First Concert of its Season,” Boston Herald, Nov. 19, 1915. 2 2 Paul Juon’s divertissement is the sort of musical bonbon that owes its inspiration to things like Tschaikowsky’s “Nut Cracker Suite.” The motives are Slavic, or at moments distinctly oriental. The fourth of the five numbers…is possibly the most original and charming. A waltz in groundwork, it is full of strange broken rhythms, presumably Russian, and is altogether fascinating.4 ….. His music is to be respected for its solid workmanship, which is often lightened by a whimsical fancy, but it is not easy to trace in his music that we have heard any suggestion of his native country. [Herald] ….. The most interesting “number” on the programme was the new “Divertissement,” by Juon, played…with a keen appreciation of its sturdy workmanship, its occasional graces and vivacities and its pulsing, attractive rhythms. In it as in the whole programme, the club kept to its familiar standards. Its works are the reward of its faith. [Transcript] The Second Concert The second concert of the sixteenth season was given on the evening of Jan. 20, 1916. The first work on this program was the Woollett Quintet for flute, oboe, clarinet, horn and bassoon, which the Post called, “conventional and undistinguished,”5 but which the Advertiser described as “delightful and well worth a second hearing.”6 For the traditional solo work, Longy introduced his own daughter, Renee, joined by the club’s accompanist, Mr. de Voto, in a work for two pianos by Enesco. Although this was her first appearance as a pianist, the Advertiser mentions that she had a local reputation as a “successful exponent in another form of art – that of eurythmics.” As for her piano skills, the Transcript observes, The music, generally speaking, far more brilliant than inspired, gave Miss Longy little opportunity to make a very personal impression, but so far “Longy Club in First Concert,” Boston Post, Nov. 19, 1915. “Concert by Longy Club,” Boston Post, Jan. 21, 1916. 6 A. E. W., “Longy Club, Boston Advertiser, Jan. 21, 1916. 4 5 3 as one could gather she plays with surprising strength of wrist and finger, occasional sonority, still more surprising in so young a girl, the true French vivacity.7 After three songs by mezzo-soprano, Mrs. A. Roberts Barker, the wind ensemble concluded the program with the Chanson et Danses of d’Indy. Although Vincent d’Indy is a serious and thoughtful composer with a reputation of not caring in the least to please the public ear, the Chanson et Danses deserve more than a passing mention. The first contains music of elevated beauty and poignancy, the second is exquisite in the simplicity of its style and the remarkable effects attained with a small group of instruments. [Advertiser] The Third Concert The final concert of this season was given on the evening of March 9, 1916, and began with a new work, the Sextette, Op. 33, Nr. 3, by the English composer, Joseph Holbrooke, for flute, oboe, clarinet, horn, bassoon and piano. The critics were unanimous in declaring this a poor work. Themes not without possibilities are advanced, but the development is strangely desultory, scrappy, inconsequential. Most of it is boresome. There is bold play to make the audience sit up on the last movement, with a syncopated circus theme that should delight the heart of a comic opera maker.8 ….. …discursive and uninteresting…. Its chief fault is the disjointed feeling produced by unskilled blending of piano and other instruments…. The themes are clumsily developed and the ideas spread too thin.9 ….. The sextet for wind instruments is a prize composition. Yet it is uninspired music. The three movements are all of generous length. The first is pastoral in character, the second is melancholy contemplative nature, in the third there is an attempt at playfulness, a display of obvious humor, “New Music by Enesco,” Boston Transcript, Jan. 21, 1916. “Longy Club Recital,” Boston Globe, March 10, 1916. 9 “Longy Club in Last Concert of the Season,” Boston Herald, March 10, 1916. 7 8 4 reminiscent of Sir Edward Elgar in a facetious moment…. The work as a whole lacks distinction, originality, melodic richness.10 The second work performed was the Serenade, Op. 77 [incorrectly titled in the program given the audience!], for flute, violin and viola by Max Reger. All the critics liked this work, the Monitor calling it, “a piece of writing of surpassing skill and pleasing invention.” The Globe heard, A welcome relief from his usually turgid, pompous style. This miniature in the folk vein, with a slow movement with Mendelssohnish sentiment is gracefully pleasing, fresh with sweet buccolic airs. The final composition on this concert was the Perilhou, Divertissement for twelve winds. The Herald called this work, “agreeable, spontaneous.” Of this performance, the Monitor also mentions, “horn playing of a quality like this is seldom heard anywhere.” 10 “Longy Club Gives its Final Concert of Season,” Boston Herald, March 10, 1916. 5