MADAME CATALANI.

We have lived long enough to remember (barely indeed) the reception which MARA met on her appearance in this country. We recollect more freshly the enthusiasm with which BILLINGTON was followed, and the wonder CATALANI excited, is the latest impression upon our minds. The rising estimation which attended these three great singers is one of the strongest proofs we know of the growing cultivation and ardor for the science of music, for certainly the sensation created was in a progressively increasing proportion, while probably, the real merits of the objects were in an inverse ratio. We have already said so much of CATALANI in our description of MARA and BILLINGTON, that our direct observations will necessarily appear shorter than they ought to be, and yet we shall find it impossible to escape tautology. The reader will therefore do us the justice to call to mind that our criticism has been, from a necessity incident to the subject, comparative.

In the first requisite-INTONATION, CATALANI was as deficient as any pre-eminent singer we ever knew, a circumstance the more surprising, because we believe failure is more incident to thin voices, than to organs of such power, as MADAME CATALANI's. Her fausse note was about Eb, we say about, for in the fluctuation of pitch to which the concerts of this country are subject, it is impossible to fix a tone very definitively. Perhaps her general tune was affected by the force with which she was accustomed to sing, though it is hard to distinguish between her failure in the execution of passages, and in the more simple parts of her performance, because she excelled so far in airs of agility, and indulged so continually in the introduction of most elaborate and difficult ornaments, that she may almost be said to have had no cantabile or plain style. Whatever was the cause, she varied from the pitch frequently, although to common hearers the defect was lessened by the prodigious volume and richness of her tone, and by the rapidity with which she skimmed along the liquid surface of florid notation. We are inclined to suspect that this lady was seduced from the practice of plain notes too early, a deviation, which all who are guilty of it, repent too late. It is indeed a mistake that can never be atoned.

CATALANI was a singer for the Italian stage alone, and fitted for no other department of vocal science. Her CONCEPTION was purely

B b

theatrical, and when thus considered, her style, as far as style was concerned, was certainly grand and imposing. There are few instances of more vivid intellectual expression, more chastely yet more effectively embodied and delivered, than in some of the high efforts of MADAME CATALANI. Nor was her range confined to the great style, though there her forte lay. In the lighter parts, such as Susanna, in Mozart's Nozze di Figaro, and Aristea, in Il Fanatico per la Musica, which were alike excellent. The playfulness with which she could invest the character of her ornaments contributed in no small degree to the effect. She was a florid singer and nothing but a florid singer, whether grave or airy, in the church, orchestra, or upon the stage. But she could give an intellectual design, and set the stamp of mind upon these beautiful coruscations of her brilliant fancy, and nothing has tended more to convince us of the possibility of marking distinctly the passion, to illustrate which the ornament may be applied, than the manner of gracing which CATALANI could at pleasure adopt. It will not be stepping far out of our way should we say, that the construction, boundless as it is, of ornament, is more limited than the execution, and that the manner of doing the passage, of accenting, retarding, quickening, enforcing, or softening the notes renders it pathetic or pleasing at the will and frequently according the physical powers of the singer. Of such a kind do we esteem the capital intellectual variety which CATALANI exercised over this department of her art, and while she showered her gracos in more extreme and wanton profusion than any other singer we ever heard, there was nevertheless a general characteristic expression very delightfully defined, over almost all she did. From this general acknowledgment we must except the airs with variations, which it was at once her honour and her disgrace to have introduced into practice in England. We use this phrase of double interpretation, because her chiefest display of agility was manifested in these efforts. "O dolce concento" and "Nel cor piu non mi sento" as she sung them, are at one and the same time the most beautiful speci mens of simple, pathetic, and lively melodies converted into the most exuberantly florid songs of execution. Such a means of evincing her particular talent, shewed her extraordinary facility, praçtice, and acquirement in the very worst possible way. It was giving life to her execution by the commission of a suicide upon her taste and judgment. MADAME CATALANI seems in this instance to

66

have regarded the voice as an instrument. So poor a notion deprives the voice of its highest attributes, the voice being the finest of instruments, with the additional quality of giving force, feeling, and effect to all the images and passions which language is able to convey. Hence it happens that no application of vocal power can be deemed legitimate, which has not the expression of some sentiment or passion for its primary object and impulse. The selection of such airs as "Nel cor" for such a purpose was therefore doubly erroneous.-It degraded the vox humana to mere instrumentation, and it perverted and polluted the most exquisite specimen of genuine feeling to this vile purpose, when a harpsichord lesson or a fiddle concerto would have answered the purpose. Yet strange to tell, it was in these very songs that CATALANI drew more rapturous applause and perhaps more of the approbation of the entire mass of the public than from any other source. So true is it, our appetite for novelty and the pleas sure of surprise generally carry by storm and bear down the more fixed and settled habits and defences of real science and sound taste.

The most genuine means of affecting her auditors however that Madame CATALANI possessed, are to be found in the natural volume, richness and resulting grandeur of her tone, and in the energy and force with which she poured forth the overwhelming torrent of her voice. No band was sufficiently powerful to cover it, no nerves strong enough to resist its influence. The first notes of such a recitative as "Vittima scenturata," overwhelmed and astonished the faculties as it were by a blow. The tone was felt through every fibre, and had she sung from the midst of a multitude, there is no one who would not have exclaimed at once, this must be CATALANI.Her compass was from G to F. It was scarcely less in extent than BILLINGTON'S, but the quality of voice was essentially different. BILLINGTON'S was bird-like or flutey, but CATALANI's was full, rich, and magnificent beyond any other voice we ever heard. It bore no resemblance to any instrument, except we could imagine the tone of the musical glasses to be magnified in volume to the same gradation of power, then perhaps there might exist some similitade. Such was its ductility, it was equal in its bearings and qualities, whether exerted with much or little force; there were neither breaks nor differences, it was alike from top to bottom, varying only in quantity. Over this astonishing natural organ she had illimitable controul. She could vary its production through every degree

from the smallest perceptible sound to the loudest and most magnificent swell; she could increase and diminish the tone either in a long protracted duration of sweetness long-drawn out, or she could apportion the same degrees in rapid alternation. It was indeed a favorite ornament with her to produce a sort of imitation of the swell and fall of a bell, not indeed "swinging slow with sullen roar", but sweeping through the air with the most delightful undulation, thus essaying the effect of mere tone, for such a trial of skill was combined with no mental association that could at all assist the expression in the indiscriminate way in which she applied it. She was however indebted (as all singers must be) to this faculty for some of the finest effects of her performance. The rapid and forceful production of powerful tone in the Italian recitative of PUCITTA We have quoted above, may certainly be ranked with the grandest of her efforts. Again in her oratorio singing (by an immeasurable abyss lower than any other part of her performance) she gave a beautiful illumination to more than one of the sentences of the recitative in HANDEL'S Messiah, beginning "There were shepherds abiding in the field," by this power of swelling and of keeping a protracted note exquisitely soft. It was an effort of art simply, which we have never heard exceeded particularly in the close of one of them, "And they were sore afraid." The truth is, that she could play with her voice at pleasure. In that respect she resembled, nay she exceeded Mr. BRAHAM. She could do any thing. Yet she failed to touch the heart for want of that governing tact which directs the possessor to the path that leads to the sympathy of others. The faculty is peculiar; it assimilates itself in our mind with what is called fine taste, which is sometimes seen where least expected, and sometimes absent where its presence would be surely anticipated. We have no other name for it than the one we borrow from the French.

Mere English critics are not competent judges of the power of CATALANI'S elocution. No one indeed who has not resided abroad or been a constant attendant upon the Italian Theatre, who has not mixed with the natives of that country, and learned to acquaint himself with their peculiarities of expression, can be a judge sufficiently skilled in the several requisites, or sufficiently liberalized, to pronounce upon her excellencies or defects in this essential particular. Elocution in singing rises infinitely beyond simple articula tion, as it becomes the vehicle of mental impressions. English and

Italian notions of the expression of various passions differ very materially, and we consider the ideas of this great actress not only to have. been purely Italian, but also moulded by the Italian theatre alone. Upon the stage her personification was however more grand than touching. Her main defect in our eyes was the want of tenderness and pathos. She sometimes over-awed, but she never warmed or melted the heart. MARA was certainly the sovereign of expression; BILLINGTON fell short of the grandeur and magnificence of CATALANI, but her deficiency arose out of the natural difference of voice; the shade between CATALANI and MARA was intellectual; CATALANI'S natural organ we apprehend to have been more calculated for the expression of passion than that of MARA, but the conception ennobling whatever it lighted upon, was wanting. The oratorio singing of CATALANI was the lowest of the three. She literally had no apprehension of the true expression of English words, or the sentiments they represented. "Holy, holy Lord," and "I know that my Redeemer liveth," from her lips invoked no warmer adoration, inspired no livelier faith in an English bosom. Yet CATALANI possessed strong feelings of devotion, and perhaps entertained the most extreme veneration for the Deity, the firmest belief and the most fervent piety of any singer that ever lived. She never entered a church or a theatre to perform without solemnly offering up a prayer for her success. When therefore we reason upon her failing to awaken the sympathy of her auditors we can only attribute it to the radical difference in the manner of expressing the same ideas that obtains between the natives of foreign countries and of our own. MARA was very early in life in England, and a large portion of the character of her mental acquirements is probably to be traced to that age; CATALANI on the contrary had made all her associations before she came hither. Again, there may be, perhaps, a nearer approxima. tion in natural constitution between the Germans and the English, than between the more ardent natives of southern climates, and the inhabitants of the " penitus toto divisos orbe Britannos." All therefore that we must say specifically of CATALANI's elocution in singing, is, that she was articulate, forcible, and powerful, occasionally light, pleasing, and playful, but never awfully grand, or tenderly touching to the degree that the art may be carried, or that MARA, actually with less power of voice, did attain. We consider CATALANI below BILLINGTON in the latter quality. In sCIENCE she was so