The Girls Own Paper, Vol. VIII, No. 357, October 30, 1886 | Page 9

listening to music to call the attention of our many readers to the performances going on so frequently in all parts of the world, and now we persuade ourselves that there may be some to whom a short account of the various and varied forms, to which our attention as audience is most frequently invited, would be of interest, even though they have some knowledge of the subject already; and that there may be others to whom these very incomplete sketches may appear as information, and as an incentive to further investigation.
For our first sketch we have chosen the oratorio, for it is undoubtedly the highest form of musical dramatic art, and is founded upon and contains the greatest and deepest truths of the Christian life. As regards the actual music forms employed, we find, indeed, similar ones in the operas, such as the various forms of recitative, the aria, the duet, and the chorus, and even the scena; but in the sacred works, who are the heroes and heroines? Are they not the instruments of the Divine power, the messengers of the good tidings? And what are the subjects? Are they not the struggles, the trials, the victories of noble souls? With such sacred characters, with such lofty thoughts, the composers of the oratorio, dealing, not with the semblance of truth that the opera contains, but with the truth itself, are bound to express their feelings and emotions in the grandest and most perfect thoughts.
Purely sentimental ideas, and the whole list of passions and struggles in human existence, rather form the basis of opera than the proper subjects for oratorio, and the modern attempts to transform the sacred ideal into the region of operatic and dramatic realism seem to fall singularly short of expectation. To our minds, the strongest period in the history of oratorio was the time of Handel and Bach, and writers of to-day have yet to graft on to their work the more careful study, and the strengthening influence of these noble masterpieces in stronger cuttings, to make the struggling young plant a healthy and beautiful tree. Let us progress, by all means, but true progression is but the joining of all that is good in the preceding age with all the fresh beauty God bestows upon us in this our day.
We seem to be comparing or contrasting the secular form opera and the sacred oratorio, and it is interesting to know that the origin of both may be traced back to the same source--viz., early miracle plays and moralities. For some time after the introduction of Christianity into Eastern Europe, the new converts seem to have retained their fondness for the heathen practice used in religious, as in secular, celebrations of theatrical representations, which were chiefly upon mythological subjects, and all of which angered and distressed the priests of the new religion. However, the latter soon found out that it was necessary to reach the minds of these people through their more acutely trained senses and the medium of their old traditions, and thus in these early ages the dramatic element worked its way into the church worship. Spiritual plays were arranged by the priests in all parts of Christianised Europe, who chose scenes and stories from both Old and New Testaments, and from the lives of the saints and holy men. The plays were acted upon a stage, usually erected under the choir of the church. As women were not permitted to appear, priests took all the characters, male and female. We learn, from many reliable sources, that these sacred representations had a great effect upon the pious worshippers.
In the course of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, and chiefly in the west of Europe, profane elements crept in amongst the holy legends, and these religious entertainments also developed so greatly, that hundreds of actors would be engaged in representations lasting over several days, whilst the eager audiences were so large that the churches could not contain them, and the stage had to be erected in the market-places, and out of doors.
The direction passed more and more into the hands of the laity, who employed jongleurs, histrions, and strolling vagabonds, whose acting included gross buffoonery, and whose profanity completely choked the religious growth first implanted by these miracle plays. The stages, it should be explained, were of curious construction, being divided into three stories, the upper one containing the heavenly characters, the middle one being for the people upon earth, and the lowest for the denizens of hell.
At the beginning of the sixteenth century the whole Catholic world was influenced by those reforms so necessary to the Christian Church of that time, and so bravely contended for and gained by Luther. The demoralisation which weakened all the church's fabric was deeply deplored by the Catholic