The reception of the “Lohengrin” selection, too, was unmistakably favourable. The delicately fragile orchestration of the sweetly melodic prelude, followed by the bright and attractive rhythmical phrases of the bridal chorus, caused a bewildered, pleased surprise among the audience, who had expected something totally different. The “music of the future was noise and fury,” so said the leading English musical journal, and this authority counted for something; but the “Lohengrin” prelude was very inaccurately described, if that had been included, and Wagner felt pleased and contented at the impression which the first performance of any of his music had created in this country.
On the “Ninth Symphony,” that colossal work, Richard Wagner expended commensurate pains. I remember how surprised the vocalists were at the rehearsal, when he stopped them, inquiring did they understand the meaning of what they were singing, and then he briefly explained in emphatic language what he thought about it. The bass solo was especially odd: the vocalist was taking it as though it were an ordinary ballad, when Wagner burst in fiery song, natural and falsetto, illustrating how it should go, singing the whole of the solo of Mr. Weiss (the bass vocalist) in such a decided, clean cut manner that it was impossible for the singer to help imitating him, and with marked effect too. As for the band, that rehearsal was a revelation to them. That symphony was a stupendous work, yet the conductor knew it by heart and was conducting without score. They felt they were in the hands of a man whose artistic soul was fired with enthusiasm; his earnestness infected them; they caught it quickly and responded with a zealousness that only sympathetic artists can put forth, ably supported by Sainton, whom the Prince Consort complimented to Wagner as a splendid “Chef d’attaque.” The concert performance created, too, such a stir that even the most violent of all the anti-Wagner critics spoke of it as an “intellectual and elevated conception.” This concert placed Wagner permanently in the heart of his band; they loved to be under the command of such an earnest art worker and yielded willingly to his inspirations.
