The expectations aroused by the announcement were woefully disappointed. There were nights of wondrous brilliancy and of extraordinary splendor in nearly every department. Some of the refulgence came from the new ambitions with which M. de Reszke and Mr. Seidl inspired the organization. The season had no prouder moments than those filled with the performances of "Tristan" and "Lohengrin" vouchsafed the subscribers to the regular subscription; but it had no deeper gloom than that which settled upon the subscribers to the special German season on most of the occasions set apart for them. The fate of "Fidelio" was utterly grievous; two representations of "Tristan" filled their souls with indignation instead of gratitude; there is no saintly intercession which could have won redemption for "Tannhäuser." The performances of "Tristan" and of the Italian "Lohengrin" at which Nordica, Brema, and the brothers de Reszke sang were brilliantly successful, but in each case the regular performance was made to precede that set apart for the German subscription. The circumstance would alone have sufficed to arouse suspicion that the management was at least willing to discriminate against the special Thursday nights, and the suspicion was wrought into conviction by the disparity between the performances of the two subscriptions. If it was the purpose of Abbey & Grau to put German opera on trial their method looked very unfair. "The drama for its own sake as an art work, and not for the sake of the singer" is a fundamental principle of German art, but it can only maintain its validity with the help of adequate performances. Saving the four singers who sang in Italian and French as well as German (Mme. Nordica, Miss Brema, and the brothers de Reszke), the German singers of 1895-96 were woefully inefficient, and the German season was an indubitable failure.
I shall append a list of performances of the operas presented in the seasons covered by this chapter and its predecessor, and its perusal will, I think, enforce even upon a careless reader the fact that, in spite of the shortcomings to which I have called attention, the administration of Abbey & Grau yet marked a gigantic step in the direction of dramatic sanity and sense over the lists which prevailed in the period when this story began. In the consulship of Mapleson the repertory might have been turned into verse quite as dramatic as most of that of the opera books. Thus: