In the days when horse cars were "rapid transit" in New York City, when women's skirts swept the streets (and street cleaners didn't), when bicycles were built for two, and bustles were made of wire, Victor Herbert, genial Irish-American born in Dublin, was writing the songs which have kept America singing for more than forty years.

This is the story of a man who brought real musicianship and genius to the comic opera of his day and thus bridged the gap between Tin Pan Alley "balladry" and the classic art song. It is the story of more than thirty gay operettas which entertained America in the '90's and in the new century, many of these—Naughty Marietta, The Red Mill, Eileen, Babes in Toyland, to name but four—as well-known and liked today as they were forty years ago.

America still listens to Ah, Sweet Mystery of Life, Italian Street Song, March of the Toys, Gypsy Love Song, Kiss Me Again, The Isle of Our Dreams, and scores of others. In Herbert's day, America heard these sparkling melodies on the stage, where the gayest children of the theatre danced and sang their way to fame: Alice Nielsen, the rougish street gamin who climbed by way of light opera eventually to the Metropolitan; Emma Trentini, the little Italian girl of the glorious high voice; madcap Fritzi Scheff, who left grand opera to become Queen of light opera.

The story begins in Dublin, birthplace of Victor's grandfather, brilliant Samuel Lover, best remembered as the author of Rory O'More and composer of The Low-Backed Car. It takes us to Germany where Victor studied music, in the days of the gay singing of carefree students in city streets and children dancing the old harvest dances in country villages. It brings us finally to New York, where in the '80's Victor's wife, Therese Herbert-Foerster, sang Wagnerian opera while Victor played first cello in the orchestra at the Metropolitan.

As we read this story of the gay "minstrel for the million" we feel that, like his music, he cannot die or grow old. We go with Victor as with some charming friend on all his rambles through the haunts of the brilliant but reckless Bohemia where most of his personal life was lived. We meet Walter Damrosch, Mary Garden, Antonin Dvorak, Theodore Thomas, Anton Seidl, critics Krehbiel, Mason, Huneker, scores of others. With them we chuckle at Victor's robust jokes, roar at his amusing pranks, listen respectfully to his remarks on music, note his opinions in Irish politics. Sometimes there is a peep behind the scenes at moments of sorrow, and we sigh; but generally we are made to laugh or smile, for Victor Herbert was a true troubadour, who left dull care behind when he stepped into the limelight of the world, which was his stage.

From the dust jacket

 

The story of a man who brought real musicianship and genius to the comic opera of his day and thus bridged the gap between Tin Pan Alley "balladry" and the classic art song. It is also the story of more than thirty gay operettas which entertained America in the 90's — as well as known and liked today as they were forty years ago.

From the dust jacket of Gilbert and Sullivan: Masters of Mirth and Melody