Chapters Of Opera

DigiCat Publishing presents to you this special edition of "Chapters of Opera" (Being historical and critical observations and records concerning the lyric drama in New York from its earliest days down to the present time) by Henry Edward Krehbiel. DigiCat Publishing considers every written word to be a legacy of humankind. Every DigiCat book has been carefully reproduced for republishing in a new modern format. The books are available in print, as well as ebooks. DigiCat hopes you will treat this work with the acknowledgment and passion it deserves as a classic of world literature.

"Chapters of Opera" by Henry Edward Krehbiel. Published by Good Press. Good Press publishes a wide range of titles that encompasses every genre. From well-known classics & literary fiction and non-fiction to forgotten−or yet undiscovered gems−of world literature, we issue the books that need to be read. Each Good Press edition has been meticulously edited and formatted to boost readability for all e-readers and devices. Our goal is to produce eBooks that are user-friendly and accessible to everyone in a high-quality digital format.

A passage from the book... The making of this book was prompted by the fact that with the season 1907-08 the Metropolitan Opera House in New York completed an existence of twenty-five years. Through all this period at public representations I have occupied stall D-15 on the ground floor as reviewer of musical affairs for The New York Tribune newspaper. I have, therefore, been a witness of the vicissitudes through which the institution has passed in a quarter-century, and a chronicler of all significant musical things which were done within its walls. I have seen the failure of the artistic policy to promote which the magnificent theater was built; the revolution accomplished by the stockholders under the leadership of Leopold Damrosch; the progress of a German régime, which did much to develop tastes and create ideals which, till its coming, were little-known quantities in American art and life; the overthrow of that régime in obedience to the command of fashion; the subsequent dawn and development of the liberal and comprehensive policy which marked the climax of the career of Maurice Grau as an operatic director, I have witnessed since then, many of the fruits of wise endeavor and astute management frittered away by managerial incapacity and greed, and fad and fashion come to rule again, where for a brief, but eventful period, serious artistic interest and endeavor had been dominant.

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Henry Edward Krehbiel (March 10, 1854 - March 20, 1923) was an American music critic and musicologist who was music editor for The New York Tribune for more than forty years. Along with his contemporary New York critics Richard Aldrich, Henry Finck, W. J. Henderson, and James Huneker, he was part of the first generation of American critics to establish a uniquely American school of criticism. A critic with a strong bend towards empiricism, he frequently sought out first hand experiences, accounts and primary sources when writing; drawing his own conclusions rather than looking to what other writers had already written. A meliorist, Krehbiel believed that the role of criticism was largely to support music that uplifted the human spirit and intellect, and that criticism should serve not only as a means of taste making but also as a mode to educate the public.