What hurt Gretry was his unbounded conceit, with which Offenbach, to his
credit, was never afflicted. As an indication of this, he dared to write
in his advice to young musicians:
"Those who have genius will make opera-comique like mine; those who have
talent will write opera like Gluck's; while those who have neither
genius nor talent, will write symphonies like Haydn's."
However, he tried to make an opera like Gluck's and in spite of his
great efforts and his interesting inventions, he could not equal the
work of his formidable rival.
* * * * *
Although he was not a great musician, Offenbach had a surprising natural
instinct and made here and there curious discoveries in harmony. In
speaking of these discoveries I must go slightly into the theory of
harmony and resign myself to being understood only by those of my
readers who are more or less musicians. In a slight work, _Daphnis et
Chloe_, Offenbach risked a dominant eleventh without either introduction
or conclusion--an extraordinary audacity at the time. A short course in
harmony is necessary for the understanding of this. We must start with
the fact that, theoretically, all dissonances must be introduced and
concluded, which we cannot explain here, but this leading up to and away
from have for their purpose softening the harshness of the dissonance
which was greatly feared in bygone times.
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