The works that precede the "Trois Poemes
juives," the first of his compositions in which the racial gesture is
consciously made, do not really represent the man as he is. No doubt,
the brilliant and ironic scherzo of the C-sharp minor Symphony, whose
verve and passion and vigor make the composer of "L'Apprenti sorcier"
seem apprentice indeed, is already characteristic of the composer of the
string quartet and the suite for viola and piano. But much of the
symphony is derivative. One glimpses the influence of Liszt and
Tchaikowsky and Strauss in it. So too with the opera "Macbeth," written
a few years after the composition of the symphony, when the composer was
twenty-four. Despite the effectiveness of the setting it gives the
melodrama cleverly abstracted from Shakespeare's tragedy by Edmond
Flegg, the score bears a still undecided signature. One feels that the
composer has recently encountered the personalities of Moussorgsky and
Debussy. No doubt, one begins to sense the proper personality of Bloch
in the delicate coloring of the two little orchestral sketches
"Hiver-Printemps," in the mournful English horn against the harp in
"Hiver," in the chirruping hurdy-gurdy commencement of "Printemps."
Unfortunately, the cantilena in the second number still points backward.
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