Raff's symphony in F minor, surnamed "Zur Herbstzeit" ("In the Autumn"), performed at last Saturday's concert, is the third of four symphonic poems devoted to the description of the seasons by the prolific German composer. The fourth, "Winter," was finished by Raff shortly before his death, and is still in the hands of the publisher. Of the general features of Raff's style we had a recent opportunity of speaking in connexion with the performance of his oratorio The World's End at Leeds. Like that work, the "Autumn" symphony displays a mixture of classical and modern tendencies. The formal development of the four movements does not essentially differ from established rules; each of them has, on the other hand, a more or less elaborate programme in the shape of a subtitle attached to it. In the first section, allegro moderato, the programme is sufficiently vague. It purports to render "feelings and impressions" as does, indeed, every other piece of music, ancient or modern, good or bad. Neither is there anything to show - if we except perhaps a certain subdued tone of orchestral colour - that those impressions and feelings are roused by autumn rather than by any other season of the year. In the second movement, which stands in place of the scherzo, the pictorial element gains greater prominence. Here, however, again there is little connexion between what it intended to be and what is actually depicted. The title "Gespenster Reigen," or dance of spectres, would suggest all manner of ghastly things. What we hear is a very graceful dance measure charmingly scored. There is, among other things a delightful figure first given out by the flutes and repeated in succession by oboes and strings; in another place we seem to hear the trembling of dead leaves in the breezes of autumn. But what all this has to do with the dancing of spectres it is not easy to discover. Even the well-worn col legno effect loses its usual ghastly associations from the manner in which it is here used. The third movement, surnamed "Elegy," is a melodious "Lied ohne Worte," which would be more agreeable if it were shorter. In the final allegro, Raff has taken for his theme the incidents of a hunt - the start, the halt, the run, the killing of the deer and the return home That in such a movement repeated horn-calls and rapid rhythms prevail is almost a matter of course. Raff uses these and other familiar materials of the same kind with great skill, but it can scarcely be said that his piece does in any material point differ from innumerable other hunts which have passed across the operatic stage or through the orchestra both before and after Weber's Der Freischütz gave a certain finality to the musical treatment of such matters. To sum up, Raff's "In the Autumn" proves little more than that at the time of writing its composer's talent had reached the season of the sere and yellow leaf. There are in it few of the graphic touches which so admire in the Leonora and Im Walde symphonies, and the value of the music in an abstract sense is not sufficient to atone for this decline of pictorial interest. Of the performance it is impossible to speak too favorably. It was worthy of the traditions of these concerts.
