46 ON THE PRESENT STATE OF THE OPERA IN LONDON. 



more generally useful to enter into the discussion of particulars 

 than to reason on abstract principles, I will proceed to give my im- 

 pressions on the present state of the opera in England ; requesting 

 the indulgence of the musician, to whom I may appear to pass su- 

 perficially over matters demanding a deeper and fuller investigation, 

 while I may possibly weary the general reader on points to which 

 he feels a total indifference. 



When Spontini, on his return from England, was requested to 

 publish, in one of the musical journals at Berlin, an account of the 

 state of music in this country, he replied that the art was at so low 

 an ebb in England that he considered it unworthy the trouble of 

 criticism ; and this opinion has been spread pretty widely on the 

 continent by other foreign musicians of equal celebrity. Although 

 I admit that there is ample ground for censure, I cannot but con- 

 sider this sweeping condemnation as more severe than we actually 

 deserve ; but, accustomed as the Germans are to a high degree of 

 excellence with a comparative dearth of means, they are naturally 

 astonished to find mediocrity in a city which affords, perhaps, 

 greater facilities for the attainment of musical excellence than any 

 other. Now we, on the contrary, are apt to flatter ourselves that 

 our opera presents a model of perfection, and to look down on the 

 German houses as deficient in that important desideratum a prima 

 donna. The truth would seem to lie between these conflicting opi- 

 nions, each country possessing advantages not to be found in the 

 other, although the sole impediment to our capability of exhibiting 

 the united excellencies of both may fairly be attributed to the in- 

 ferior amount of musical knowledge possessed by the English pub- 

 lic. Criticisms of a high order may, indeed, be found in Baker's 

 Quarterly Musical Journal, the Spectator, Sec.,* but these publica- 

 tions are either unknown beyond the circle of the professionally 

 musical world, or are unintelligible or uninteresting to the public 

 at large. Perhaps it may not be considered as too sanguine to in- 

 dulge the hope that the following remarks, appearing in a periodi- 

 cal so deservedly popular and so generally interesting as the Ana- 

 lyst, may attract the attention of those who, if not altogether, have 

 it largely in their power to remedy the defects, and remove the 

 stigma under which we now labour. 



In regard to the orchestra, the foreign critic is instantly and for- 



* We hope that in Music our own Journal will, in future, be found de- 

 serving of that praise which, in its other departments, — without vanity be it 

 spoken — ^it has obtained from those whose praise is most valuable — Eds. 



