A curious
episode may be noted sometimes. As soon as the singing has ceased and
the curtain begins to descend, a number of people begin to applaud.
But the full-blooded Wagnerites wait until the last chord of the
orchestra has died away before they join in. The volume of applause is
then suddenly multiplied three or four times, to the bewilderment of
novices, who do not understand what it all means. It simply means that
the concluding strains of Wagner's acts, are usually among the most
beautiful measures in the whole opera, which it is a pity and a shame
to mar by premature applause.
I have often wondered why people, who put on their overcoats during
the final measures, are not ashamed thus to advertise their utter lack
of artistic sensibility and indifference to other people's feelings.
Nor can one wonder, in view of such facts, that the late King of
Bavaria preferred to have opera given when no other spectator was in
the house, or that the present Emperor of Germany is beginning to
follow his example.
Wagner does not merely ask his interpreters to scorn the usual methods
of securing cheap applause, but he himself avoids them in his
compositions with a heroic conscientiousness.
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