Punch or The London charivari: Punch or The London charivari (2.1842)

42 PUNCH, OR THE LONDON CHARIVARI.

ELENA U BERT I.
" A grand tragic opera "—all Italian except
the words, and all music except the monotonous
recitatives and the bad singing of the inferior
performers—has its attractions for dilettanti who
adore Mercadante, and for genuine play-goers
who worship the name of Kemble. Thus it hap-
pened that Covent Garden Theatre was, last Sa-
turday night, crammed from the lower regions
upwards.

Those who are conversant witli the choice
Italian of Guicciardini, Maehiavelli, Sismondi,
&c, must be aware that an amusement pretty
generally indulged in during the middle ages was
especially popular—or more correctly de-popular
—amongst the Guelphs and Ghibellines ; namely,
that of cutting throats. The latter, having been
the tories of the times, usually had the best of it;
so that the whigs, or Guelphs, got their hair cut
with their heads attached at an awful rate ;
though, thank Heaven, enough of them was left

several bars of a C natural on the syllables
■■a Fa-a-a-a-" which would seem intermina-
ble if it did not drop down an octave on " ther."
After that all three set to work upon a trio, and
when they are exhausted with the stamping and
gesticulative as well as vocal exertion it requires,
the chorus comes on to give them breathing time
and to arrest Siyifredo ; whom they afterwards
sentence to solos for the rest of his life ; con-
demning him to solitary confinement with as
little remorse as if they were caging a bull-finch.

Boemondo and Ubaldo open the second act, in
order that Elena might come on to plead to
them for her father's life. This they agree to
spare if she will marry the Count, and after some
hesitation Miss ULerli consents. Ubaldo is in
raptures, and raves as follows : —

Ah, more warm—more wild each day,
Shall my passion burn before thee ;
Fair as saint of poet's lay,
How shall lover blest adore thee?
&c. &c.

Trying, one would suppose, to increase the con-
tempt she already feels for him, by singing the

to lound a House of Brunswick, and to cause the mogt m nonsense it would be possible for a
descent of the present reign—so here s the : man with'out brailis to utter_
Queen ! God bless her ! not forgetting her hus- The next gcene_a very magnificent one-is
band-cousin and the princely babies !-with the chieflv 0CCupied by a procession, a chorus, and a

honours, " Hip, hip, hip, huzza ! " (You are to
know, excellent reader, that we are writing upon
egged sherry, which our dear Judy has, in the
warmth of her heart, and from the coldness of
the night, made somewhat potent—which fully
accounts for the logical flow of ideas that so co-
herently mix up a tragic opera, with cut-throats,
Mercadante, and our beloved monarch. Well,
one more glass ; then revenons a nos moutons,
and to that lamb of innocent suffering Elena
Uberti.)

The plot, of the opera is founded upon one of
those cut-throat's anecdotes which so plentifully
enliven the pages of Italian history, is seasoned
with a few dashes of treachery, and interspersed
with the usual modicum of despair and love.
When the first scene is displayed, we behold
Count Ubaldo di Collulto seated in the stage atti-
tude for despondency ; his elbow resting on a
table, his fingers tightly grasping his wig, with-
out any regard to the curls. There is a chorus
of burly men, wdio shout as loud as their lungs
will let them, so as to afford the Count their
tender consolation But Ubaldo dismisses them
because, perhaps, they make such a horrible din.

Count Guido Sanvitale now introduces himself
by exclaiming " Friend of my bosom," and prov-
ing his woi'ds by inflicting upon Ubaldo a severe
l ug. He is also in the doldrums; a gentleman
and a viceroy, named Boemondo, liaving threat-
ened to bestow his daughter upon him, he unpo-
litely declares <:his eovil abhors" the poor girl ; for
which, however, he has some excuse, for he is
going to marry Elena Uberto that very night.
Now this is the damsel who has caused Ubaldo's
dumps, and the two lovers of the same lady
mingle their griefs in a duet.

In the next scene the heroine appears. Though
her father, a Guelph, is banished, she is in
ecstasies, for she is going to be married, and ex-
presses her delight in a scena which contains
several braces of shakes and roulades enough to
drown one up to the ears in liquid strains poured
forth from the viols of an obligato accompani-
ment. Elena's solo is soon duetised, by the en-
trance of her father, who, at considerable risk of
his neck, has come to ask her how she does ; but
before she has time to tell him, even iu semi-
quavers, on comes Ubaldo—having kindly waited
till S'xjifredo, the father, hus secreted himself.

Ubaldo's business is simply to intimate that
Elena must not marry his bosom friend, Guido,
but himself. She declines the honour ; and he,
without more ado, summons his retainers to force
her away. The abduction is immediately com-
menced, but interrupted. " Who bars Ubaldo's
way?" inquires the Count ; whereupon Siyifredo
appears to answer the question, by giving vent to

quarrel—the last between Guido and Ubaldo,
which ends in smoke, and finishes the act.

Guido and Elena next go through a most
affecting scene. Here some mutual recrimina-
tion takes place in two-four time agitato, which,
when they come to an agreement to marry each
other's rivals, subsides into a soothing six-eight ;
but ends with a coda uncommonly forte in com-
mon time.

In the next and last scene the time changes
again : it is night, and an exquisite represent-
ation of a cathedral is presented to us. Guidu's
marriage procession appears, and Elena is there
to witness it. To her it is by no means an agree-
able sight, and she vents her feelings in poignant
recitative during the performance of a hymn in
the interior of the cathedral. When the hymn is
over, the catastrophe begins. Elena learns that,
although she has promised her hand against her
will to Ubaldo, yet her father has been murdered
by order of the viceroy Boemondo. Upon this

screech on the fifth of the key to end it, form the
specification upon which the Italian maestri have
taken out their patent for setting everything tc
music, " either for tragedy, comedy, pastoral,
scene indivisible, or poem unlimited.''

For this reason the music of " Elena Uberti "
would answer a great deal better for a ballet or
a lyrical comedy (it being of so light and flippant
a character), than for the grave and exalted de-
partment of tragedy. ■ The duet which opens
the third act, for example, between Elena and
her lover, when each is doomed from circum-
stances to marry another, is of a precisely simi-
lar character, and makes nearly the same im-
pression upon the hearer as the scena in the
first act, in which Elena gives way to all the an-
ticipations of happiness and love (the aria of
which is by Pacini.) In short the music is no more
in accordance with the story than that belonging
to the "Beggar's Opera."

Miss Adelaide Kemble gave a new proof of
her umipproached proficiency by making Mer-
cadante more than endurable. The first scena
was a masterpiece of the vocal art. Of the other
performers we have no space to speak, which is
very lucky for some of them.

The manner in w hich the opera is put upon
the stage must be characterised as superb. The
costume is correct, and in accordance with the
times ; at least we are bound so to believe, for
the manager hints as much. At all events it
is gorgeous. The scenery is beyond all praise.
In fact the worst portions of this "grand tragic
opera" are the music and words.

LITERARY INTELLIGENCE.

We understand that Dr. Snooks S. 0. F. T.
has determined to publish his elegant treatise on
"Snow-balls."' It is to be hot-pressed, and in-
stead of being bound in cloth will be neatly done
up in flannel.

It is expected that Mr. Dionysius Dilworth
will dedicate his essay on the " Sliding Scale," to
the members of the Seating club.

Pitts the spirited publisher of little St. Andrew
Street, Seven Dials, is preparing for publication
another edition of " All round my Hat." In
she steals her husband-expectant's dagger— order to meet the rage for illustration he has

stabs herself in the key of E major, and the cur
tain falls to these poetical words in chorus :—
" Ab ! stay thine haid ! Too lute !

'Tis done !''

which, with our other quotation, maybe taken
as an honest sample of the c' bold, disjointed
chat " in which this grand tragic opera is
chanted.

To the learned in the works of the best opera-
tic writers, a * grand tragic opera " by Merca-
dante, Donizetti, or Pacini, must suggest the idea
of a symphony of Beethoven played upon a Ger-
man flute, or a Weber overture arranged for a
one-handed accordion. The monotonous man-
nerism of these composers—their constant repe-
tition of the same phrases, their eternal choice
of the same keys, the poverty of their accom-
paniments—causes the amateur to guess pretty
nearly what he is going to hear before he enters
the theatre, whether it is to be a tragic or a
comic opera. In Elena Uberti there are, during
the progress of its really well-constructed plot,
some situations in which the heroine is placed
where opportunities for the musical expression of
the deepest, most intense, emotion occur ; but are
made use of by Mercadante as opportunities for
the display of the common-place prettinesses,
which are always tuned by him and his
class to the same pitch ; the seldom varying
recitative, followed by an andante, with the
everlasting arpeggio accompaniment ; the alle-
gro in short notes and common time, with
the never-failing contra-tempo passage for the
orchestra ; the working-up movement to intro-
duce the coda and the double forte, with the

added a very tasteful vignette of a hat a la Van-
dyke, that is to say, going up into a point in the
centre. It will be objected that this is an
anachronism, but Pitts was never a man who
stood upon trifles.

TAKING A PORTRAIT.

We have heard it whispered that a gentleman
moving in the Penny-a-line circles contemplates
publishing a complete collection of accidents that
have appeared from his pen during the last few-
months. This will be a most interesting work of
fiction, and from the known playfulness of the
writer's fancy a rich treat may be looked for.

The little anonymous volume on the character
of " Old Gooseberry" has not yet appeared. It
is said to embrace some curious disclosures ou the
subject of sparkling champagne, which is chiefly
advertised as Walker's.

London : Bradbury 3c EvanB, Printers. iVhilefrian.