Repertoire

“ The répertoire of this society comprises all the symphonies of the classical masters, overtures of every school, oratorios, selections from operas and religious music, choruses with and without accompaniment, pieces for the orchestra alone, ode-symphonies and instrumental solos. ”

“ The regent produces an infinitely diverse spectacle, where stage and ground floor, actor and audience are one, and he himself is poet, director and hero of the play at the same time. How delightful when, as with the king, the directrice is at the same time the hero's lover and the heroine of the piece, when one catches a glimpse of the muse in her, it fills the poet with holy passion, and his lyre attunes to gentle heavenly melodies. ”

“ Most of the music played is composed by the conductor, who conducts with the bow of his violin. No, Sir, that is not enough to do for an audience in the intervals. I warn you that the whole question of intervals will come up soon, and the cleverest manager will be the one who does most to make them amusing. But that's another matter. My scheme for you is to provide more than mere amusement, it is to enable your theatre to partake of some of the quality and some of the success of the great picture newspapers. ”

“ Will not a filthy play with a blast of a trumpet sooner call thither a thousand than an hour’s tolling of the bell bring to a sermon a hundred? Nay, even here in the City, without it be at this place and some other ordinary audience where you shall find a rehearsal of company, whereas if you visit to the Theatre the Curtain and other places of players in the City you shall on the Lord’s Day have their places with many other that I cannot reckon so full as possible they can throng. ”

“ Exceptional instances apart, the actor who is speaking or being spoken to, or who is singing a song, should stand well to the front of the stage. Not only does this let you make the best use of your voice, but it helps you, what is more important, to rivet the attention of the audience.
6. Keep up a keen personal interest in the play. If you are in the chorus, your job is not solely to help in the singing and to show off a picturesque costume, but to assist in focussing the interest on the central incident. ”

“ Study your music exhaustively beforehand so that at the rehearsal you may know definitely just what you are going to do with each selection and may be able to give pointed directions as to its rendition. This will enable you to look at your performers most of the time, and the freedom from the score thus allowed will make your conducting very much more effective and will enable you to stir your singers out of their state of inertia very much more quickly. ”

“ Perhaps the manager of the opera may have some new star whom he wishes to bring to the notice of the public in the most flattering manner possible. Perhaps it is some singer unknown to that city whom he wants to give a flattering reception. If so, the machinery is at once set in motion.
Men and women are scattered through the house, and each one has his instructions to assist in the applause, the "bravos," the encores, and probably the flowers that are sent up to the stage. The favorite is brought before the curtain and a spontaneous (?) ”

“ The audience which gathered at these performances—composed of princes, illustrious men in every department of science and culture, and prominent musicians from all parts of the world—was one of which any composer might have been proud, while the representation itself marked an epoch in musical history, and promulgated a new system of laws destined to affect operatic composition ever after. ”

“ In what sequence were these performances given? How long did a play remain in repertory? How long were the rehearsal periods for new plays? How many roles did an actor have to command at one time? Where were new plays first presented? In essence, all these questions can be contained in one all-embracing question: [2] How did an acting company market its wares? for let us remember that in the Elizabethan theater we find one of the earliest examples of theater as a commercial enterprise. ”

“ But in the scale of emotion and excitement the theatre comes next to fighting, whether you be the author of the play or opera to be given for the first time before the greatest and most critical audience in the world, or the actor, or actress, or singer, who has not yet been heard or seen and of whom wonders are expected on the great night. ”

“ If we are to make a drama of energy, of extravagance, of phantasy, of musical and noble speech, we shall need an appropriate stage management. Up to a generation or two ago, and to our own generation, here and there, lingered a method of acting and of stage-management, which had come down, losing much of its beauty and meaning on the way, from the days of Shakespeare. ”

“ In this manner, music and representation support each other delightfully: the impression made upon the audience by the representation, is a fine preparation for the music that succeeds; and the impression made by the music, is a fine preparation for the representation that succeeds. It appears to me clear, that, by some such contrivance, the modern drama may be improved, so as to enjoy the advantage of the ancient chorus without its slavish limitation {285}of place and time. And as to music in particular, I cannot figure any plan that would tend more to its improvement. ”

“ As they act they make up their play. The theater becomes the spot that seems a good place—either spiritually, physically, or by force of tradition—in which to give the play. In time comes a division of labor. One of the actors begins to specialize on the play. This actor studies how he can develop the form of the play to make better use of the theater; and then, with some leader among the actors, he begins to speculate on how to change the theater in order to give more scope to the playwright and to the player who interprets him. ”

“ Following the example of the illustrious model, whose style we consider it no humility, but rather an audacity, to imitate, we will suppose the recital to be made some time after the event has occurred, and we will imagine some veteran stage manager giving directions for, or superintending the rehearsal of, a grand dramatic representation of one of the grandest and—if we may be allowed the privilege of a literary smasher in coming a word—the dramaticest battles in English history. ”

“ How the instrument lives and answers to his every touch, sending forth in turn utterances tender, sad, wild, and joyous! The audience once more hold their breath to catch the dying tones, as the melody, so rich, so beautiful, so full of pathos, is drawing to a close. ”

“ Among the various contending works on Shakespearean stage production the one subject that is invariably neglected is this repertory system. And yet, an understanding of how a theatrical company goes about the business of presenting its plays is a necessary step in working out a theory of staging. Who sees the show and who pays the bill more often determine the possibilities of production than other high-minded considerations. To know what the Elizabethan repertory system was and how it operated requires the answers to certain basic questions: How many performances was a play likely to receive? ”

“ Now, let us say we have finally perfected the play. They know the lyrics, they know the numbers, they know the "business" that occurs during the dialogue, and they know the "business" of the ensembles. By this time the play has actually taken form, and it is time to rehearse it with the scenery. When the scenery is added, both the ensemble and the principals who do the numbers all report in their practice clothes. Insist upon that. This insures their getting right down to business without "stalling," as nearly all people on the professional or amateur stage are disposed to do. ”

“ This inclination of the audience to sing along with the actors so prevails with them that I have sometimes known the performer on the stage to do no more in a celebrated song than the clerk of a parish church, who serves only to raise the psalm, and is afterwards drowned in the music of the congregation. Every actor that comes on the stage is a beau. ”

“ The change of etiquette brought about by the phenomenal popularization of the moving picture theater has doubtless had something to do with this change in the attitude of our audiences; the spread of musical knowledge and the far greater intelligence concerning musical performance manifested by the average audience of today as compared with that of fifty years ago is also partly responsible ”

“ It was on the stage and through the literature of the stage that, during the most brilliant era of its intellectual activity, the genius of the English people, for the most part, sought expression. The drama thus became the representative and the embodiment of all that was strongest and most characteristic 127in the national life. In it we find the great mental and moral movements of the time gathered up and made vocal; to it we turn for the fullest and richest manifestation of the national mind. ”

“ But the procession has reached the theatre, in which already there are ladies seated, and in a few moments the building is filled with an audience to which any orator would be proud to speak. There is music as the audience rustles and murmurs into its place with eager expectation. ”

“ TO THE members of an audience attending a theatrical performance it may appear as though the actors were the entire show and the only principals concerned with the carrying on of the affair. Of course the man in the box office, the ticket taker, and the ushers have been in evidence, and there is the orchestra and its leader. ”

“ When the repertory system becomes more universal, and broadens out on the wide healthy lines of providing entertainment for all classes of people and giving smaller proportion of time, say one day in seven, to the cranks and pulpiteers of the drama, we shall find the repertory theatres getting a greater hold on local patriotism, and one by one growing stronger in good work and higher ambitions, until at last they unite into what will be in truth, as well as in name, a national theatre.
285 There is one thing in which I heartily agree with the expressed opinions of many well-known actors. ”

“ I believe the principles governing certain touches can be so thoroughly learned and assimilated that when the player sees a certain passage, he knows at once what touch is required to express it. A great actor illustrates what I mean—he knows how to employ his features and body to express the thought of his lines. When you go to the Theatre Français in Paris, you know every member of the company is thoroughly trained in every phase of his art. ”

“ Before I speak of the opera, let me say a word or two on the plays.
There is no country in which the theatre has so great a hold on the public as in France; no country in which the successful dramatist has so high a fame; no country perhaps in which the state of the stage so faithfully represents the moral and intellectual condition of the people. ”

“ Well, every one has his or her own peculiar idea of study and rehearsal, but the true artist always arrives at the same result, with the aid of a clever stage manager and musical conductor. When a part is handed to me, generally six weeks before the opening night, I read it through carefully, picture myself in different positions in the several scenes, and then I separate the music from the dialogue and study the music first. ”

“ Get us properties, and tricking for our fairies. IV, 4, 78.
“Properties” for stage purposes was in use much earlier than Shakespeare’s time, and has remained in the vocabulary of the theatre until the present day. In its technical theatrical signification, such as the above quotation, it refers to any portable article whether costume, furniture, or weapons required during the acting of the play. In Elizabethan times the properties used were few and simple; they consisted of things that were absolutely necessary, thus giving a realistic appearance to the performance. ”

“ In cases where the singer has to select numbers for a symphonic concert and to be accompanied by an orchestra, there is a mine of wealth, not yet exhausted, in the operas of the older classic composers. ”

“ A perfect theatrical performance must harmonise the work of many men. The dramatist, the actors main and minor, the stage-manager, the scene-painter, the costumer, the leader of the orchestra, must all contribute their separate talents to the production of a single work of art. ”

“ COMPANY. THE opera, or music drama, in which, in lieu of the ordinary forms of speech, music and song are used to give elevated expression to thought, is the most extensive, and, to nearly all lovers of melody, the most charming, of musical compositions. In its construction several of the other forms of music are most pleasingly united. ”

“ Actors tell us that there is an indescribable inspiration which comes from the orchestra, the footlights, the audience, which it is impossible to feel at a cold mechanical rehearsal. There is something in a great sea of expectant faces which awakens the ambition and arouses the reserve of power which can never be felt except before an audience. ”

“ Patrons of opera and concert will have noticed that many great singers, when emitting the voice, incline the body slightly forward toward the audience, as if feeling more assured that their voices would carry to the listeners, or as if striving to get upon a more intimate footing with them. ”

“ The resources of a theater which could place so many actors on the stage at once, and attempt the illusion of clouds and angels, bringing into play the machinery of transformation scenes, and enriching the whole with a varied accompaniment of music, must have been considerable. ”

“ The necessity for a peroration, or strong finish, is recognized in music, the drama, and everything presented before an audience. Most band selections end in a crash, the majority of instruments working at full capacity. ”

“ But the play lets go this hold, such as it is, on reality, and becomes a mere stage convention as it crosses the footlights; a convention which is touching, indeed, far too full of pathos, human in its exaggerated way, but no longer to be mistaken, by the least sensitive of hearers, for great or even fine literature. ”