oint seems old-fashioned
and formal by comparison! The four constituents, the wild laughter of
the shakes of the wood-wind, the slashing figure of the strings, the
galloping figure of the bass, the Ride theme--had these been used by
any one save Wagner the result would have been unendurably wooden. But
Wagner had unlimited harmonic resources at his disposal; and he had
the determination and the gift to achieve perfect truth in his
delineation of a storm. Delineation, I say, for here we have drawing
as well as colour. Of colour there is plenty: notice, for example, the
use of the brass against the descending chromatics; but the colour is
mainly harmonic. In a sense Wagner was not an innovator: so long as
the methods of his mighty predecessors served him he sought no
others--effects, whether of orchestration or of melody, were to him
simply means: never for a second was he beguiled into regarding them
as ends; and every musician knows that plenty of them came at his
call, more readily and spontaneously than in the case of any of the
later musicians.

It is worth looking at the plan of this Ride--which is, be it
remembered, only the prelude to the gigantic drama which is to follow.
After the ritornello the main theme is announced, with a long break
between the first and second strains; and again a break before it is
continued. Then it sounds out in all its glory, terse, closely gripped
section to section, until the Valkyries' call is heard; purely
pictorial passages follow; the theme is played with, even as Mozart
and Beethoven played with their themes, and at the last the whole
force of the orchestra is employed, and his object is attained--he has
given us a picture of storm such as was never done before, and he has
done what was necessary for the subsequent drama--made us feel the
tremendous might of the god of storms. A few of my readers may know
Handel's "Horse and his Rider" chorus--how he piles mass on mass of
tone until in the end we seem to see a whole irresistible sea rushing
over Pharaoh and his host. Wagner does a thing perfectly analogous;
but as I have remarked with regard to Weber and Mendelssohn and their
picturesque music, where Handel, having painted his tremendous
picture, had achieved his end and was satisfied and left off, is just
the point where Wagner begins what to him is much the more important
thing, the drama. The omnipotent master of Valhalla comes on apace:
the storm is a mere indication of wha