There was, in the first chorus of the
'Antigone,' one sublime ascent (and once repeated) that rang to heaven: it
might have entered into the music of Jubal's lyre, or have glorified the
timbrel of Miriam. All the rest, tried by the deep standard of my own
feeling, that clamors for the impassioned in music, even as the daughter
of the horse-leech says, 'Give, give,' is as much without meaning as most
of the Hebrew chanting that I heard at the Liverpool synagogue. I advise
Mr. Murray, in the event of his ever reviving the 'Antigone,' to make the
chorus sing the Hundredth Psalm, rather than Mendelssohn's music; or,
which would be better still, to import from Lancashire the Handel chorus-
singers.
But then, again, whatever change in the music were made, so as to 'better
the condition' of the poor audience, something should really be done to
'better the condition' of the poor chorus. Think of these worthy men, in
their white and skyblue liveries, kept standing the whole evening; no
seats allowed, no dancing; no tobacco; nothing to console them but
Antigone's beauty; and all this in our climate, latitude fifty-five
degrees, 30th of December, and Fahrenheit groping about, I don't pretend
to know where, but clearly on his road down to the wine cellar. Mr.
Murray, I am perfectly sure, is too liberal to have grudged the expense,
if he could have found any classic precedent for treating the chorus to a
barrel of ale.
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