Download The Longy Club Season Sixteen, 1915 – 1916 The First Concert The

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
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“Longy Club in First Concert of the 16th Season,” Boston Monitor, Nov. 19, 1915.
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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.
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“Longy Club Gives First Concert of its Season,” Boston Herald, Nov. 19, 1915.
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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.
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A. E. W., “Longy Club, Boston Advertiser, Jan. 21, 1916.
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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.
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“Longy Club in Last Concert of the Season,” Boston Herald, March 10, 1916.
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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.”
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“Longy Club Gives its Final Concert of Season,” Boston Herald, March 10, 1916.
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