E. Belfort Bax January 1909
Source: New Age, 14 January 1909, p. 43;
Transcribed: by Ted Crawford.
I have been looking with expectation every week in the various letters which have appeared on the Weber-Debussy controversy for one mention of the one great romantic masterpiece on which the fame of Weber really rests. That “Oberon” and “Euryanthe” and the sonatas contain nothing, or at least very little, of any permanent musical value may be perfectly true; and if Weber had written nothing else, his fame would probably be as dead to-day as that of, say, Dussek, or any ordinary capelmeister. But there is one work and one alone, which will always ensure Weber’s immortality, and that is “Freischütz.” Surely not even Mr. Herbert Hughes will call in question the genuine romantic inspiration of Weber’s great masterpiece.
E. BELFORT BAX.