THE LAUREATE OF OUR LIBRETTISTS.

Mr. W. S. Gilbert

If an account were taken of the amount of pleasure caused to the British people by its public men, Mr. William Schwenck Gilbert would be in the first class, for hardly any writer of the century, if any at all, has caused as much hearty healthy laughter, and caused it by such perfectly legitimate means. When a hardened playgoer thinks of the long series of thoroughly happy Gilbert “first nights” whose success is mainly due to the brilliant wit and inexhaustible humour of the author of the immortal “Bab Ballads,” he cannot help a deep feeling of gratitude, and it is likely that even the dramatic critics would subscribe largely towards a testimonial to the great laugh-winner of the age. Mr. Gilbert, no doubt, has one thing against him: he has falsified the popular saying, “Laugh and grow fat,” for were it true we should be the luckiest nation of the earth. Save in this one respect, one can find nothing but kindly words to utter concerning the writer who, in “His Excellency,” has produced a work well worthy of the long-accorded title of “the laureate of our librettists.”

DR. CARR'S MUSIC.

If it was Dr. Osmund Carr’s misfortune that he has followed Sir Arthur Sullivan’s collaboration with Mr. Gilbert, it has been no less his evil fate to be reminded of it to his disadvantage by every critic who has undertaken to write upon the subject: and it was, therefore, perhaps inevitable that he should have been volubly informed that his production is only a rather good imitation of Sullivan. Now this is very unfair to the composer, who is here practically blamed for the consistency of Mr. Gilbert’s style. It is not that Dr. Carr has imitated Sullivan, but that Mr. Gilbert is still Mr. Gilbert, and that any music set to the rhythms of that writer must necessarily remind one of former music set to precisely the same rhythms. Had Mozart followed Sir Arthur Sullivan as piper to Mr. Gilbert’s poet it would probably have been said that he had imitated Sullivan in a very superior sort of manner.

For consider the very peculiar construction of Mr. Gilbert’s lyrics and patter songs—

It is clear that it would be possible to set the first three lines of this stanza to the opening bars of “Rule Britannia”; but then it would no longer be a patter-song, the essence of which consists in fitting each syllable as nearly as possible to one note. Now, if this kind of music is fitted tightly like a glove upon a very marked rhythm—such as this is—the difference between one patter-song and another set to these words would—superficially, at all events—be very slight indeed. So remarkable is the truth of this observation, that, for the last two or three of the Gilbert-Sullivan series, Sullivan himself must have grown quite accustomed to the accusation that he freely imitated himself. And nobody thought of casting the blame on Mr. Gilbert! Take, for example, Sir Arthur Sullivan’s old setting of Mr. Burnand’s version of “Cox and Box,” as brilliant a little production, in its own humorous way, as any musician of Sullivan’s then years has achieved. It has no more likeness to Dr. Carr’s setting of Mr. Gilbert’s new book than had “Haddon Hall,” by Sullivan himself, to any of the Gilbert-Sullivan series—a fact which should be borne in mind.

Dr. Osmond Carr

As to Dr. Carr’s own personal work upon this libretto, it must at once be acknowledged that it great deal of it is very pretty and very piquant; more often it strikes one as peculiarly appropriate. Harold’s song in the first act, for example, “Though I’m a soldier, all pugnacity,” makes you feel, in spite of its extreme simplicity and its complete lack of surprise, that it is exactly what the situation demands; and the ballet music for the Hussars in the second act is extremely and gaily pretty. Christina’s Bee song, “A hive of bees, as I’ve heard say,” sung to guitar accompaniment, is not a very striking or original melody, but, at all events, it has a sense of humour and freshness about it. Dr. Carr has been widely informed that he has no great sense of humour, and it is true that in this respect, in this gift of minor musical humour, he ranks very far behind Sir Arthur Sullivan, whose delicate orchestral jests were, in their way, real discoveries. As a Handelian light mimic, it rôle in which Sullivan succeeded admirably in his “Cox and Box,” Dr. Carr is scarcely less successful. Erling’s song, “When I bestow my bosom’s store,” which belongs to this category, has a decided finish and pretty polish about it which shows its composer’s musicianly gifts perhaps at their best. He is no less good in a quick Handelian chorus, at the beginning of the first finale, in which the chorus hammers out a response to two indignant questioners—

In this brief composition Dr. Carr shows a quality of energy which he would do well to cultivate. In fact, if he will take himself seriously, and resolutely reject commonplace devices, commonplace symmetries, trusting to his own ear and to his own inspiration rather than to the ear of the world, he will succeed better than the public dreams of now. He has musicianly gifts, but he starts handicapped in the race. Whoever will undertake the composition of Mr. Gilbert’s libretti must be prepared to risk the comparison from which Sullivan himself was not delivered. Mr. Gilbert has a strong and virile hand; his books are eminently muscular and unless the music can overshadow the book partially, it is certain that the world will regard that music as a handmaiden, rather than as a companion of the libretto. The inevitable result will be that Mr. Gilbert’s own idea of writing comic opera rather than drama will come to naught. The play will be the thing: the music—nothing. It would be absurd, of course, to claim that Dr. Carr’s interesting score deserves the praise that has in the past been accorded to Sir Arthur Sullivan’s scores; it is Dr. Carr’s first essay, and he is about as unlike Sir Arthur Sullivan as most men could easily be who undertake to set it book by Mr. Gilbert. If he needs encouragement he also deserves it, for his was no light task to undertake, no light risk to run. Utter failure itself would have been pardonable, and Dr. Carr has by no means utterly failed.

Page modified 16 October 2020