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CHOPIN

AND

OTHER MUSICAL ESSAYS

 BY THE SAME AUTHOR. 

 SPAIN AND MOROCCO. 12mo, $1. 25. 

 THE PACIFIC COAST SCENIC TOUR. Illustrated. 8vo, $2. 50. 

 CHOPIN, AND OTHER MUSICAL ESSAYS. 12mo, $1. 50. 

 WAGNER AND HIS WORKS. With Portraits. Two Volumes. Crown 8vo, $4. 00. 

CHOPINANDOTHER MUSICAL ESSAYS

BYHENRY T. FINCKAUTHOR OF "ROMANTIC LOVE AND PERSONAL BEAUTY"

NEW YORKCHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS1894

COPYRIGHT, 1889, BYCHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS

TROW'SPRINTING AND BOOKBINDING COMPANY, NEW YORK. 

RESPECTFULLY DEDICATED TO

MRS. JEANNETTE M. THURBER

CONTENTS

 PAGE

I. CHOPIN, THE GREATEST GENIUS OF THE PIANOFORTE, 1

II. HOW COMPOSERS WORK, 59

III. SCHUMANN, AS MIRRORED IN HIS LETTERS, 111

IV. MUSIC AND MORALS, 141

V. ITALIAN AND GERMAN VOCAL STYLES, 183

VI. GERMAN OPERA IN NEW YORK, 233

I

CHOPIN

THE GREATEST GENIUS OF THE PIANOFORTE

Leipsic, the centre of the world's music trade, exports about onehundred thousand dollars' worth of music to America every year. I donot know how much of this sum is to be placed to the account ofChopin, but a leading music dealer in New York told me that he soldthree times as many of Chopin's compositions as of any other romanticor classical composer. This seems to indicate that Chopin is popular. Nevertheless, I believe that what Liszt wrote in 1850, a year afterthe death of Chopin--that his fame was not yet as great as it would bein the future--is as true to-day as it was forty years ago. Chopin'sreputation has been constantly growing, and yet many of his deepestand most poetic compositions are almost unknown to amateurs, not tospeak of the public at large. A few of his least characteristic piecesare heard in every parlor, generally in a wofully mutilated condition, but some of his most inspired later works I have never heard playedeither in private or in the concert hall, although I am sure that ifheard there they would be warmly applauded. 

There is hardly a composer concerning whom so many erroneous notionsare current as concerning Chopin, and of all the histories of music Ihave seen that of Langhans is the only one which devotes to Chopin anamount of space approximately proportionate to his importance. One ofthe most absurd of the misconceptions is that Chopin's genius was bornin full armor, and that it did not pass through several stages ofdevelopment, like that of other composers. Chopin did displayremarkable originality at the very beginning, but the apparentmaturity of his first published works is due to the fact that hedestroyed his earliest efforts and disowned those works which areknown as posthumous, and which may have created confusion in someminds by having received a higher "opus" number than his last works. 

Another misconception regarding Chopin is that his latest works aremorbid and unintelligible. The same charge was brought by philistinesagainst the best works of Beethoven, Schumann, and Wagner. The fact isthat these last works are of an almost matchless harmonic depth andoriginality, as superior to his earlier works as Wagner's last musicdramas are to his first operas. I make this comparison with Wagneradvisedly because, although I have the most exalted notions ofWagner's grandeur and importance, I do not for a moment hesitate tosay that in his own sphere Chopin is quite as original and has beenalmost as revolutionary and epoch-making as Wagner. Schumann was thefirst to recognize the revolutionary significance of Chopin's style. "Chopin's works, " he says, "are cannons buried in flowers;" and inanother place he declares that he can see in "Chopin's G minorNocturne a terrible declaration of war against a whole musical past. "Chopin, himself, modest as he was in his manners, wrote to his teacherElsner, in 1831, when he was twenty-two years of age: "Kalkbrennerwill not be able to break my perhaps bold but noble determination tocreate a new epoch in art. "

Now, why has the world been so slow in recognizing that Chopin standsin the very front rank of creative musicians? One reason doubtless isthat he was so quiet and retiring in his personal disposition. Hisstill, small voice was lost in the din of musical warfare. He warmlydefended the principles of the romantic school, if necessary, and haddecided opinions of other musicians, especially of the popularpianists of his day who vitiated the public taste with their showpieces; but he generally kept them to himself or confided them only tohis friends, whom he even occasionally implored to keep them secret. Had he, like Richard Wagner, attacked everybody, right and left, whostood in the way of the general recognition of his genius, his causewould have doubtless assumed greater prominence in the eyes of thepublic, even though the parlor piano does not afford so muchplay-ground for warfare as the operatic stage. 

The chief reason, however, why musical authorities have so longhesitated to acknowledge that Chopin is one of the very greatestexplorers and pioneers in the domain of their art, is to be found inwhat, for want of a better term, may be called æsthetic Jumboism. Whenthe late lamented Jumbo was in New York he attracted so much attentionthat his colleagues, although but little inferior in size, had "noshow" whatever. Everybody crowded around Jumbo, stuffing him withbushels of oranges and apples, while the other elephants were entirelyignored. As elephants are intelligent animals, is it not probable thatPilot, the next in size to Jumbo, went mad and had to be shot becausehe was jealous of the exclusive attentions bestowed on his rival? Inæsthetics, this Jumboism, this exaggerated desire for mammothdimensions, seems to be a trait of the human mind which it isdifficult to eradicate. It is a suggestive fact that the morbid, shamæstheticism which prevailed in England a few years ago, chose for itssymbol the uncouth sunflower. And many who know that a sunflower isless beautiful and fragrant than a violet, will nevertheless, onvisiting a picture gallery, give most of their attention to the largecanvases, though the smaller ones may be infinitely more beautiful. Itcannot be said that the critics of art or literature follow thepopular disposition to measure genius with a yard-stick; but in musicthere seems to be a general tendency to do this. Liszt remarks, apropos, in his work on Chopin: "The value of the sketches made byChopin's extremely delicate pencil has not yet been acknowledged andemphasized sufficiently. It has become customary in our days to regardas great composers only those who have written at least half a dozenoperas, as many oratorios, and several symphonies. "

Even Schumann, and Elsner, Chopin's teacher, seem to have beenaffected a little by this irrational way of looking at music. Schumann, in a complimentary notice of Chopin's nocturnes, expresseshis regrets that the composer should confine himself so strictly tothe pianoforte, whereas he might have influenced the development ofmusic in all its branches. He adds, however, on second thought, that"to be a poet one need not have written ponderous volumes; one or twopoems suffice to make a reputation, and Chopin has written such. "Elsner who was unusually liberal in his views of art, and whodiscovered and valued his pupil's originality long before Schumanndid, nevertheless bowed before the fetish of Jumboism in so far as towrite to Chopin in Paris that he was anxious, before he departed thisVale of Tears, to hear an opera from his pen, both for his benefit, and for the glory of his country. Chopin took this admonition to heartsufficiently to ask a friend to prepare for him a libretto; but thatis as far as the project ever went. Chopin must have feltinstinctively that his individual style of miniature painting would beas ineffective on the operatic stage, where bold, _al fresco_ paintingis required, as his soft and dreamy playing would have been had hetaken his piano from the parlor and placed it in a meadow. 

Besides Chopin's abhorrence of musical warfare and his avoidance ofthe larger and more imposing forms of the opera, symphony, andoratorio, there were other causes which retarded the recognition ofhis transcendent genius. The unprecedented originality of his style, and the distinct national coloring of his compositions, did not meetwith a sympathetic appreciation in Germany and Vienna, when he firstwent there to test his musical powers. Some of the papers indeed had agood word for him, but, as in the case of Liszt and later ofRubinstein, it was rather for the pianist than for the composer. Onhis first visit to Vienna he was greatly petted, and he found it easyto get influential friends who took care that his concerts should bea success, because he played for their benefit, asking no pecuniaryrecompense. But when, some years later, he repeated his visit, andtried to play for his own pecuniary benefit, the influential friendswere invisible, and the concert actually resulted in a deficit. 

Chopin's letters contain unmistakable evidence of the fact that, withsome exceptions, the Germans did not understand his compositions. Athis first concert in Vienna, he writes, "The first allegro in the Fminor concerto (not intelligible to all) was indeed rewarded with'Bravo!' but I believe this was rather because the audience wished toshow that they appreciated serious music than because they were ableto follow and appreciate such music. " And regarding the fantasia onPolish airs he says that it completely missed its mark: "There wasindeed some applause by the audience, but obviously only to show thepianist that they were not bored. " The ultra-Germans, he writes inanother letter, did not appear to be quite satisfied; and he relatesthat one of these, on being asked, in his presence, how he liked theconcert, at once changed the subject of conversation, obviously inorder not to hurt his feelings. In a third letter, in which he giveshis parents an account of his concert in Breslau, in 1830, he saysthat, "With the exception of Schnabel, whose face was beaming withpleasure, and who patted me on the shoulder every other moment, noneof the other Germans knew exactly what to make of me;" and he adds, with his delicious irony, that "the connoisseurs could not exactlymake out whether my compositions really were good or only seemed so. "

Criticisms culled from contemporary newspaper notices and othersources emphasize the fact that the Germans were at that time blind tothe transcendent merits of Chopin's genius. The professional critics, after their usual manner, found fault with the very things which weto-day admire most in him--the exotic originality of the style, andthe delightful Polish local color in which all his fabrics are "dyedin the wool, " as it were. How numerous these adverse criticisms were, may best be inferred from the frequency with which Schumann defendedChopin in his musical paper and sneered at his detractors. "It isremarkable, " he writes, "that in the very droughty years preceding1830, in which one should have thanked Heaven for every straw ofsuperior quality, criticism, which it is true, _always lags behindunless it emanates from creative minds_, persisted in shrugging itsshoulders at Chopin's compositions--nay, that one of them had theimpudence to say that all they were good for was to be torn topieces. " In another article, after speaking in the most enthusiasticterms of Chopin's trio, in which "every note is music and life, " heexclaims, "Wretched Berlin critic, who has no understanding for thesethings, and never will have--poor fellow!" And seven years later, in1843, he writes, with fine contempt for his critical colleagues, that"for the typical reviewers Chopin never did write, anyway. " And this, be it remembered, was only six years before Chopin's death. 

Not a few of the composers and composerlings of the period joined theprofessional critics in their depreciation of Chopin's works. Fieldcalled his "a talent of the sick chamber. " Moscheles, while admittingChopin's originality, and the value of his pianistic achievements, confessed that he disliked his "harsh, inartistic, incomprehensiblemodulations, " which often appeared "artificial and forced" tohim--these same modulations which to-day transport us into the seventhheaven of delight! Mendelssohn's attitude toward Chopin was somewhatvacillating. He defended him in a letter against his sister'scriticisms, and assured her that if she had heard some of Chopin'scompositions "as he himself played them" for him, she too would havebeen delighted. He adds that Chopin had just completed "a mostgraceful little nocturne, " of which he remembered much, and was goingto play it for his brother Paul. Nevertheless, he did not recommendthe pupils at the Leipsic Conservatory to study Chopin's works, andvarious utterances of his are on record showing that he had a decidedartistic antipathy for the exotic products of Chopin's pen. To giveonly one instance. In one of the letters to Moscheles, first printedin _Scribner's Magazine_ for February, 1888, he complains that "a bookof mazurkas by Chopin, and a few new pieces of his are so manneredthat they are hard to stand. "

I have dwelt so much on the attitude of the Germans toward Chopin, because I am convinced that in this attitude lies one of the mainreasons why no one has hitherto dared to place him in the front rankof composers, side by side with Bach, Beethoven, and Wagner. For theGermans are the _tonangebende_ (the standard-setting) nation in musicto-day, and, as there seems to be a natural antipathy between theSlavic and the Teutonic mind, the Germans are apt, like Mendelssohn, to regard as mannerism what is simply the exotic fragrance whichbetrays a foreign nationality. The ultro-Teutons still persist intheir depreciation of Chopin. In the latest edition of Brockhaus's"Conservations-Lexicon" we read, apropos to Chopin's larger works, that "he was deficient in the profounder musical attainments"(!) Dr. Hanslick, generally considered the leading German critic of theperiod, in a 534-page collection of criticisms, discussing twentyconcert seasons in Vienna, has only about half a dozen and by nomeans complimentary references to Chopin. And even the late LouisEhlert, in his appreciative essay on Chopin, comes to the conclusionthat Chopin is certainly not to be ranked with such giants as Bach andBeethoven. This is Teutonism, pure and simple. No doubt Chopin is, insome respects, inferior to Bach and Beethoven, but in other respectshe is quite as unquestionably superior to them. He wrote no mammothsymphonies, but there is a marvellous wealth and depth of ideas in hissmaller works--enough to supply half a dozen ordinary symphony andopera writers with ideas for a lifetime. His works may be compared tothose men of genius in whose under-sized bodies dwelt a gigantic mind. 

Schumann appears to have been the only contemporary composer who didnot underrate Chopin. Whether he would have gone so far as to rank himwith the greatest of the German composers, I cannot say, for he avoidsdirect comparisons. But if imitation is the sincerest form offlattery, then Schumann flattered Chopin more than any other master, for his pianoforte works are much more in the manner of Chopin than ofBach or Beethoven. I do not mean direct imitation, but thatunconscious adoption of Chopin's numerous innovations in the treatmentof the piano and of musical style, which are better evidence ofinfluence than the borrowing of an idea or two. He himself testifiedto the "intimate artistic relations" between him and Chopin. Moreover, his praise of Chopin is always pitched in such a high keythat it would seem as if praise could no higher go. It was he whofirst proclaimed Chopin's genius authoritatively, and to this fact heoften referred subsequently, with special pride. The very firstarticle in his volumes of criticisms is devoted to Chopin's variationson "La Ci Darem', " published as "opus 2. " In those days, Schumann usedto give his criticisms a semi-dramatic form. On this occasion herepresents his _alter ego_, Eusebius, as rushing into the room with anew composition, and the exclamation "Hats off, gentlemen! a genius!"He then analyzes the variations in glowing poetic language andrapturously exclaims at the end that "there is genius in every bar. "And this was only one of the _early_ works of Chopin, in which he hasby no means attained his full powers. Of another quite early work, thesecond concerto, he writes that it is a composition "which none of uscan approach except it be with the lips to kiss the hem;" and lateron, the Preludes, the most inspired of his works, led Schumann toexclaim that Chopin "is and remains the boldest and noblest artisticspirit of the time. "

Schumann would have found it difficult to induce any of his countrymento endorse his exalted opinion of Chopin, but the Hungarian Lisztjoined hands with him heartily, and pronounced Chopin "an artist ofthe first rank. " "His best works, " he says, "contain numerouscombinations of which it must be said that they did nothing less thancreate an epoch in the treatment of musical style. Bold, brilliant, enchanting, his pieces _conceal their depth behind so much grace, their erudition behind so much charm_, that it is difficult toemancipate one's self from their overpowering magic and estimate themaccording to their theoretic value. This fact is already recognized bysome competent judges, and it will be more and more generally realizedwhen the progress made in art during the Chopin epoch is carefullystudied. "

That Elsner, Chopin's teacher, detected his pupil's originality, hasalready been stated. Fortunately he allowed it a free rein instead oftrying to check and crush it, as teachers are in the habit of doing. But there are some passages in Chopin's early letters which seem toindicate that the general public and the professional musicians in hisnative Poland were not so very much in advance of the Germans inrecognizing his musical genius. Liszt doubts whether Chopin's nationalcompositions were as fully appreciated by his countrymen as the workof native poets; and Chopin writes to a friend, apropos of his secondconcert at Warsaw: "The _élite_ of the musical world will be there;but I have little confidence in their musical judgment--Elsner ofcourse excepted. " Elsewhere he complains of a patriotic admirer whohad written that the Poles would some day be as proud of Chopin as theGermans were of Mozart. And when in addition to this the editor of alocal paper told him he had in type a sonnet on him, Chopin wasgreatly alarmed, and begged him not to print it; for he knew that suchhomage would create envy and enemies, and he declared that after thatsonnet was published he would not dare to read any longer what thepapers said about him. 

Chopin's want of confidence in the judgment of his countrymen showedthat, after all, the national Polish element in his compositions wasnot the main cause why they were not rated at once at their truevalue. It was their novelty of form, harmonic depth and freedom ofmodulation, that made them for a long time cavïare to the general. This was again proved when he went to Paris. Chopin was a Pole only onhis mother's side, his father having been a Frenchman, who hademigrated to Poland. It might have been supposed, therefore, thatthere would be a French element in Chopin's genius which would make itpalatable to the Parisians. But this did not prove to be the case. Inthe remarkable group of musicians, poets, and artists who wereassembled at that time in Paris, and who mutually inspired oneanother--a group which included Liszt, Meyerbeer, Hiller, Mendelssohn, Berlioz, Heine, George Sand, the Countess D'Agoult, Delacroix, etc. --there were no doubt not a few who knew what a raregenius their friend Chopin was. George Sand wrote in herautobiography: "He has not been understood hitherto, and to thepresent day he is underestimated. Great progress will have to be madein taste and in the appreciation of music before it will be possiblefor Chopin's work to become popular. " Heine also wrote that hisfavorite pianist was Chopin, "who, however, " he adds, "is more of acomposer than a virtuoso. When Chopin is at the piano I forget allabout the technical side of playing and become absorbed in the sweetprofundity, the sad loveliness of his creations, which are as deep asthey are elegant. Chopin is the great inspired tone-poet who properlyshould be named only in company with Mozart, Beethoven, and Rossini. "

But aside from these select spirits and a small circle of aristocraticadmirers, mostly Poles, Chopin was not understood by the Paris public. At first he could not even make his living there, and was inconsequence on the point of emigrating to America when a frienddragged him to a _soirée_ at Rothschild's, where his playing was somuch admired that he was at once engaged as a teacher by severalladies present. In a very short time he became the fashionable teacherin aristocratic circles, where his refined manners made himpersonally liked. As he refused to take any but talented pupils, teaching was not so irksome to him as it might have been. Neverthelessone cannot but marvel at the obtuseness of the Parisians who put intothe utilitarian harness an artist who might have enchanted them everyevening with a concert, had their taste been more cultivated. He _did_play once, when he first arrived, but the receipts did not even meetthe expenses, and the audience received his work so coldly that hisartistic sensibilities were wounded, and he did not again appear inpublic for fourteen years. Occasionally he played for the selectaristocratic circles into which he had been introduced; but even herehe did not often meet with the genuine appreciation and sympathy whichthe artist craves. "Whoever could read in his face, " says Liszt, "could see how often he felt convinced that among all these handsome, well-dressed gentlemen, among all the perfumed, elegant ladies, notone understood him. "

As for the French critics they seem to have been as obtuse as theirGerman colleagues. To give only one instance: M. Fétis, author of thewell-known musical dictionary, states in his article on Chopin, thatthis composer is overrated to-day, and his popularity largely due tothe fact that he is fashionable. And in his article on Heller, heasserts, more pointedly still, that "the time will undoubtedly comewhen the world will recognize that Heller, much more than Chopin, isthe modern poet of the pianoforte. " In this opinion Fétis probablystands alone; but many who have not studied Chopin's deepest workscarefully, are still convinced that the pianoforte compositions ofMozart, Beethoven, and Schumann, are of greater importance thanChopin's. So far am I from sharing this opinion that if I had tochoose between never again hearing a pianoforte piece by any or all ofthose composers, or never again hearing a Chopin composition, I shoulddecide in favor of Chopin. Some years ago I expressed my conviction, in _The Nation_, that Chopin is as distinctly superior to all otherpiano composers as Wagner is to all other opera composers. Adistinguished Cincinnati musician, Mr. Otto Singer, was horrified atthis statement, and wrote in _The Courier_, of that city, that itcould only have been made by "a patriotically inclined Frenchman or aconsumptive inhabitant of Poland;" adding that "he would readily yieldup possession of quite a number of Chopin's bric-à-brac for Schumann'ssingle 'Warum. '" I am neither a patriotic Frenchman nor a consumptivePole, and I am a most ardent admirer of Schumann; nevertheless Iuphold my former opinion, and my chief object in this essay is toendeavor to justify it. 

All authorities, in the first place, admit that Chopin created anentirely new style of playing the pianoforte. Many have pointed outthe peculiarities of this style--the use of extended and scatteredchords, the innovations in fingering which facilitate _legato_playing, the spray of dainty little ornamental notes, the use of thecapricious _tempo rubato_, and so on. But it has not been madesufficiently clear by any writer how it was that Chopin became theWagner of the pianoforte, so to speak, by revealing for the first timethe infinite possibilities of varied and beautiful tone-colorsinherent in that instrument. To understand this point fully, it isnecessary to bear in mind a few facts regarding the history of thepianoforte. 

The name of pianoforte was given about a century and a half ago to aninstrument constructed by the Italian Cristofori, who devised amechanism for striking the strings with hammers. In the olderinstruments--the clarichords and harpsichords--the strings were eithersnapped by means of crow's quills, or pushed with a tangent. The newhammer action not only brought a better tone out of the string, butenabled the pianist to play any note loud or soft at pleasure; hencethe name _piano-forte_. But the pianoforte itself required many yearsbefore all its possibilities of tone-production were discovered. Theinstruments used by Mozart still had a thin short tone, and there wasno pedal for prolonging it, except a clumsy one worked with theknee--a circumstance which greatly influenced Mozart's style, and islargely responsible for the fact that his pianoforte works are hardlyever played to-day in the concert hall. For, as the tone could not besustained, it was customary in Mozart's time to hide its meagre frameby means of a great profusion of runs and trills, and other ornaments, with which even the slow movements were disfigured. Under thecircumstances, these ornaments were justifiable to some extent, butto-day they seem not only in bad taste, but entirely superfluous, because our improved instruments have a much greater power ofsustaining tones. 

Czerny, the famous piano teacher, touched in his autobiography on thepeculiarities of Mozart's style. Beethoven, who gave Czerny somelessons on the piano, made him pay particular attention to the_legato_, "of which, " says Czerny, "he was so unrivalled a master, butwhich at that time--the Mozart period, when the short staccato touchwas in fashion--_all other pianists thought impossible_. Beethoventold me afterwards, " he continues, "that he had often heard Mozart, whose style from his use of the clavecin, the pianoforte being in histime in its infancy, was not at all adapted to the newer instrument. Ihave known several persons who had received instruction from Mozart, and their playing corroborated this statement. "

In view of these facts, we can understand why Beethoven did not likeMozart's pianoforte works as well as those of Clementi, in which therewas more _cantabile_, and which required more fulness of tone in theexecution; and we can understand why even so conservative a critic asLouis Ehlert should exclaim, apropos of Chopin's "entirely newpianoforte life, " "How uninteresting is the style of any previousmaster (excepting Beethoven) compared with his! What a litany ofgone-by, dead-alive forms! What a feelingless, prosaic jingle! Ifanyone should, without a grimace, assure me sincerely that he can playpianoforte pieces by Clementi, Dussek, Hummel, and Ries, with realenjoyment even now, I will esteem him as an excellent man--yes, a veryhonest one; but I will not drink wine with him. "

Were it not for what I have ventured to call the fetish of Jumboism, Iam convinced that Professor Ehlert would have written Mozart's name inthis last sentence in place of Clementi's. By excepting Beethovenalone from the list of "uninteresting" composers preceding Chopin, he_implicitly_ condemns Mozart; but he does not dare to do so_explicitly_, although such a confession would not have affectedMozart's greatness in other departments of music, which is undeniable. Indeed, if Professor Ehlert had been perfectly sincere I am not quitesure that he would have excepted Beethoven's sonatas. Although theyteem with great and beautiful ideas, these sonatas are not reallyadapted to the intrinsic nature of the pianoforte, and hence fail toarouse the enthusiasm of those whose taste has been formed by theworks of Chopin and Schumann. It was no doubt an instinctive antipathyto Beethoven's unpianistic style (if the adjective be permissible), which prevented Chopin from admiring Beethoven as deeply as he didsome other composers, whom he would have admitted to be his inferiors. And Beethoven himself does not seem to have regarded his pianoforteworks with the same satisfaction as his other compositions. At least, he wrote the following curious sentence in a corner of one of hissketch books in 1805; "Heaven knows why my pianoforte music alwaysmakes the worst impression on me, especially when it is played badly. "He must have felt that his ideas found a much more appropriate andadequate expression in the orchestra than on the piano. Not being aradical innovator he did not, in his treatment of the pianoforte, gobeyond Clementi; and so it remained for Chopin to show the world thatthe pianoforte, if properly treated, will yield tones whose exquisitesensuous beauty can hardly be surpassed by any combination oforchestral instruments. 

The two principal means by which he accomplished these reforms werethe constant employment of the pedal, and the use of extended andscattered chords, in place of the crowded harmonies and the massivemovements of the older accompaniments. 

Very few pianists seem to comprehend the exact function and importanceof the pedal. Many will be surprised to hear that the word "touch, "which they suppose refers to the way the keys are struck by thefingers, has quite as much to do with the feet--that is, the use ofthe pedal--as with the fingers. No matter how thoroughly a pianist mayhave trained his fingers, if he does not use the pedal as it was usedby Chopin and Schumann, he cannot reveal the poetry of theircompositions. In one of his letters Chopin notes that Thalberg played_forte_ and _piano_ with the pedals, not with his hands, and somepiano bangers do so still; but every pianist who deserves the nameknows that loudness and softness must be regulated by the hands (andvery rarely the left-side pedal). Yet even among this better class ofpianists the notion seems to prevail that the main object of theright-side pedal is to enable them to prolong a chord or to prevent aconfusion of consecutive harmonies. This is one of the functions ofthe pedal, no doubt, but not the most important one. The chief serviceof the pedal is _in the interest of tone-color_. Let me explain. 

Every student of music knows that if you sing a certain tone into apiano (after pressing the pedal), or before a guitar, the strings inthese instruments which correspond to the tone you sing will vibrateresponsively and emit a tone. He also knows that when you sound asingle note, say G, on the violin or piano, you seem to hear only asimple tone, but on listening more closely you will find that it isreally a compound tone or a complete chord, the fundamental tone beingaccompanied by faint overtones, which differ in number and relativeloudness in different instruments, and to which these instruments owetheir peculiar tone-color. 

Now when you press the pedal of a pianoforte on striking a note you donot only prolong this note, but its vibrations arouse all the noteswhich correspond to its overtones, and the result is a rich deeptone-color of exquisite sensuous beauty and enchanting variableness. Hence, whenever the melodic movement and harmonic changes are not toorapid, a pianist should press the pedal _constantly_, whether he playsloudly or softly; because it is only when the damper is raised fromthe strings that the overtones can enrich and beautify the sound bycausing their corresponding strings to vibrate in sympathy with them. Those who heard Schumann play say that he used the pedal persistently, sometimes twice in the same bar to avoid harmonic confusion; and thesame is true of Chopin, concerning whose playing an English amateursays, after referring to his _legatissimo_ touch: "The wide arpeggiosin the left hand, _maintained in a continuous stream of tone_ by thestrict legato and fine and constant use of the damper pedal, formed anharmonious substructure for a wonderfully poetic _cantabile_. "

I have italicised and emphasized the words _maintained in a continuousstream of tone_, because it calls attention to one of the numerousresemblances between the style of Chopin and that of Wagner, who inhis music dramas similarly keeps up an uninterrupted flow of richlycolored harmonies to sustain the vocal part. Schumann relates that hehad the good fortune to hear Chopin play some of his études. "And heplayed them very much _à la Chopin_, " he says: "Imagine an Æolian harpprovided with all the scales, commingled by an artist's hand into allmanner of fantastic, ornamental combinations, yet in such a way thatyou can always distinguish a deeper ground tone and a sweet continuousmelody above--and you have an approximate idea of his playing. Nowonder that I liked best those of the études which he played for me, and I wish to mention specially the first one, in A flat major, a poemrather than an étude. It would be a mistake to imagine that he allowedeach of the small notes to be distinctly audible; it was rather asurging of the A flat major chord, occasionally raised to a new billowby the pedal; but amid these harmonies a wondrous melody asserteditself in large tones, and only once, toward the middle of the piece, a tenor part came out prominently beside the principal melody. Afterhearing this étude you feel as you do when you have seen a ravishingpicture in your dreams and, half awake, would fain recall it. "

Now it is obvious that such dreamy Æolian-harp-like harmonies couldnot have been produced without Chopin's novel and constant use of thepedal. And this brings out the greatest difference between the new andthe old style of playing. In the pianoforte works of Mozart andBeethoven, and even in those of Weber, which mark the transition fromthe classical to the romantic school, there are few passages thatabsolutely require a pedal, and in most cases the pieces sound almostas well without as with pedal; so that, from his point of view, and inhis days of staccato playing, Hummel was quite right in insisting thata pianist could not be properly judged until he played without thepedal. But as regards the romantic school of Chopin, Schumann, Lisztand their followers, it may be said with equal truth that a pianist'suse of the pedal furnishes the supreme test of his talent. If he hasnot the delicacy of ear which is requisite to produce the "continuousstream of tone" in Chopin's compositions, without the slightestharmonic confusion, he should leave them alone and devote himself toless poetic composers. 

An amusing anecdote illustrates visibly how helpless Chopin would havebeen without his pedal. He was asked one evening at a party in Paristo play. He was quite willing to do so but discovered to his surprisethat the piano had no pedals. They had been sent away for repairs. Inthis dilemma a happy thought occurred to Liszt, who happened to bepresent. He crawled under the piano, and, while Chopin was playing, worked the mechanism to which the pedals ought to have been attachedso cleverly that they were not missed at all! He stooped that hisfriend might conquer. 

The fact that Chopin in his later works, often omitted the sign forthe pedal on his MSS. Must not be held to indicate that he did notwish it to be constantly used. In his earlier works he carefullyindicated where it should be employed, but subsequently he appears tohave reasoned rightly that a pianist who needs to be told where thepedal ought, and where it ought not, to be employed, is notsufficiently advanced in culture to play his works at all, and hadtherefore best leave them alone. 

Chopin's remarkable genius for divining the mysteries of thepianoforte enabled him, as it were, to anticipate what is acomparatively recent invention--the middle pedal which is chiefly usedto sustain single tones in the bass without affecting the rest of theinstrument. The melancholy "F sharp minor Prelude, " for example, cannot be played properly without the use of this middle pedal. Inanother prelude, we have an illustration of how the pedal must oftenbe used in order to help in forming a chord which cannot be stretched. And this brings us to the second important innovation in the treatmentof Chopin's pianoforte--the constant use of scattered and extendedchords. 

Karasovski relates that Chopin, a mere boy, used to amuse himself bysearching on the piano for harmonies of which the constituent noteswere widely scattered on the keyboard, and, as his hands were toosmall to grasp them, he devised a mechanism for stretching his hands, which he wore at night. Fortunately, he did not go so far as Schumann, who made similar experiments with his hands and thereby disabled oneof them for life. What prompted Chopin to search for these widelyextended chords was his intense appreciation of tonal beauty. To-dayeverybody knows how much more beautiful scattered, and widely extendedharmonies are than crowded harmonies; but it was Chopin's genius thatdiscovered this fact and applied it on a large scale. Indeed, so novelwere his chords, that at first, many of them were deemed unplayable;but he showed that if his own system of fingering was adopted, theywere not only playable, but eminently suited to the character of theinstrument. The superior beauty of scattered intervals can bestrikingly demonstrated in this way. If you strike four or fiveadjacent notes on the piano at once, you produce an intolerablecacophony. But these same notes can be so arranged by scattering themthat they make an exquisite chord in suspension. Everything depends onthe arrangement and the wideness of the intervals. Chopin's fancy wasinexhaustible in the discovery of new kinds of scattered chords, combined into harmony by his novel use of the pedal; and in this wayhe enriched music with so many new harmonies and modulations that hemust be placed, as a harmonic innovator, on a level with Bach andWagner. 

These remarks apply especially to Chopin's later compositions; but hispeculiarities are already distinctly traceable in many of his earlierworks; and Elsner, his teacher, was sufficiently clear-sighted andfrank to write the following words: "The achievements of Mozart andBeethoven as pianists have long been forgotten; and their pianofortecompositions, although undoubtedly classical works, must give way tothe diversified artistic treatment of that instrument by the modernschool. " Mr. Joseph Bennett quotes this sentence in his Biography ofChopin, and adds an exclamation point in brackets after it, toexpress his surprise. Mr. Bennett is considered one of the leadingLondon critics; yet I must say that I have never seen so muchignorance in a single exclamation point in brackets. Note thedifference between Elsner and Bennett. Elsner adds to the sentencejust quoted, that the _other_ works of Mozart and Beethoven--theirsymphonies, operas, quartets, etc. , "will not only continue to live, but will, perhaps, remain unequalled by anything of the present day. "This is genuine discriminative criticism, which renders unto Cæsarwhat is Cæsar's due: whereas, Mr. Bennett is guided by the vicious oldhabit of fancying that because Mozart and Beethoven are great masters, therefore they must be superior to everybody in everything. Is it notabout time to put an end to this absurd Jumboism in music?

The fact is, we are living in an age of division of labor andspecialism; and those who, like Robert Franz and Richard Wagner, devote themselves to a single branch of music have a better chance ofreaching the summit of Parnassus than those who dissipate theirenergies in too many directions. Chopin was the pianoforte genius _parexcellence_, and in his field he stands above the greatest of theGerman composers, whatever their names. Mendelssohn once wrote to hismother that Chopin "produces effects on the piano as novel as those ofPaganini on the violin, and he performs marvels which no one wouldhave believed to be possible. " Mendelssohn benefited to a slightextent by Chopin's example, but he did not add anything new to thetreatment of the pianoforte. Nor does even Liszt mark an advance onChopin from a purely pianistic point of view. Paradoxical as it mayseem, Liszt, the greatest pianist the world has known, was really aborn _orchestral_ composer. He was never satisfied with the piano, butconstantly wanted to convert it into an orchestra. His innovationswere all in the service of these orchestral aspirations, and hence itis that his rhapsodies, for example, are much more effective in theirorchestral garb than in their original pianoforte version. The same istrue of many of Rubinstein's pianoforte works--the Bal Masqué, forinstance, which always has such an electric effect on Mr. TheodoreThomas's audiences. Not so with Chopin. Liszt remarks, somewhere, thatChopin might have easily written for orchestra, because hiscompositions can be so readily arranged for it. I venture to differfrom this opinion. Chopin's Funeral March has been repeatedly arrangedfor orchestra--first by Reber at Chopin's funeral (when Meyerbeerregretted that he had not been asked to do this labor of love); andmore recently by Mr. Theodore Thomas. Mr. Thomas's version is veryclever and effective, yet I very _much_ prefer this sublime dirge onthe piano. In a small room the piano has almost as great a capacityfor dynamic shading as the orchestra has in a large hall; and, as Ihave just pointed out, one who knows how to use the pedal can securean endless (almost orchestral) variety of tone-colors on the piano, thanks to the hundreds of overtones which can be made to accompany thetones played. Chopin spoke the language of the piano. His pieces areso idiomatic that they cannot be translated into orchestral languageany more than Heine's lyrics can be translated into English. Chopinexhausted the possibilities of the pianoforte, and the piano exhauststhe possibilities of Chopin's compositions. 

The innovations of Chopin which I have so far alluded to, have been tosome extent adopted by all modern composers, and the more they haveadopted them the more their works ingratiate themselves in the favorof amateurs. But there is another epoch-making feature of Chopin'sstyle, which is less easy, especially to Germans, because it is aSlavic characteristic; I mean the _tempo rubato_. This is a phrasemuch used among musicians, but if pressed for an exact definition, fewwould be able to give one. Let us see first what Chopin'scontemporaries have to say of the way in which he himself treats it. Chopin visited England in 1848, and on June 21 gave a concert inLondon. Mr. Chorley, the well-known critic, wrote a criticism on thisoccasion for "The Athenæum, " in which he says: "The delicacy of M. Chopin's tone and the elasticity of his passages are delicious to theear. He makes a free use of _tempo rubato_, leaning about within hisbars more than any player we recollect, but still subject to apresiding sentiment of measure, such as presently habituates the earto the liberties taken. In music not his own, we happen to know he canbe as staid as a metronome; while his Mazurkas, etc. , lose half thatwildness if played without a certain freedom and license--impossibleto imitate, but irresistible if the player at all feels the music. This we have always fancied while reading Chopin's works:--we are nowsure of it after hearing him perform them. "

Moscheles wrote to his wife that Chopin's "_ad libitum_ playing, which, with the interpreters of his music degenerates into offencesagainst correct time, is, in his own case, merely a pleasingoriginality of style. " He compares him to "a singer who, littleconcerned with the accompaniment, follows entirely his feelings. "Karasovski says that Chopin "played the bass in quiet, regular time, while the right hand moved about with perfect freedom, now followingthe left hand, now . . . Going its own independent way. 'The left hand, 'said Chopin, 'must be like an orchestral conductor; not for a momentmust it be uncertain and vacillating. '" Thus his playing, free fromthe fetters of _tempo_, acquired a unique charm; thanks to this_rubato_, his melody was "like a vessel rocked upon the waves of thesea. "

The world suffered a great loss when a band of ignorant soldiers foundthe bundles of letters which Chopin had written from Paris to hisparents, and used them to feed the fire which cooked their supper. Butit lost a still greater treasure when Chopin tore up the manuscript ofhis pianoforte method, which he began to write in the last years ofhis life, but never finished. In it he would no doubt have given manyvaluable hints regarding the correct use of the _rubato_. In theabsence of other authentic hints beyond the one just quoted, Lisztmust be depended upon as the best authority on the subject; for it iswell known that Liszt could imitate Chopin so nicely that his mostintimate friends were once deceived in a dark room, imagining thatChopin was playing when Liszt was at the piano. "Chopin, " Lisztwrites, "was the first who introduced into his compositions thatpeculiarity which gave such a unique color to his impetuosity, andwhich he called _tempo rubato_:--an irregularly interrupted movement, subtile, broken, and languishing, at the same time flickering like aflame in the wind, undulating, like the surface of a wheat-field, likethe tree-tops moved by a breeze. " All his compositions must be playedin this peculiarly accented, spasmodic, insinuating style, a stylewhich he succeeded in imparting to his pupils, but which can hardly betaught without example. As with the pedal, so with the _rubato_, Chopin often neglected to mark its use in later years, taking it forgranted that those who understood his works would know where to applyit. 

Perhaps the importance of the _rubato_ in Chopin cannot be morereadily realized than by his concession that he could never play aViennese waltz properly, and by the fact that sometimes, when he wasin a jocular mood, he would play one of his mazurkas in strict, metronomic time, to the great amusement of those who had heard himplay them properly. 

When Liszt speaks of the _tempo rubato_ as a unique characteristic ofChopin's style, he must not be understood too literally. As a matterof fact, the _rubato_ is too important an element of expression not tohave been partially anticipated in the works of some of Chopin'spredecessors, just as Wagner's leading motives had imperfectprototypes in the works of some preceding composers. As early as 1602, the Italian, Caccini, describes what he calls the "Stile Nobile, inwhich the singer, " he says, "emancipates himself from the fetters ofthe measure, by prolonging or diminishing the duration of a note byone-half, according as the sense of the word requires it. " But it isprobable that the Italian singers of that period, as to-day, usedthis kind of _rubato_ merely to display the beauty of their voice on aloud high note, and not, like Chopin, for the sake of emphasizing apathetic or otherwise expressive note or chord. 

Of the Germans it may be said that, as a rule, they had, untilrecently, no special liking for the _tempo rubato_. Dr. Hanslick, theeminent Viennese critic, referred to it thirty years ago, as "a morbidunsteadiness of _tempo_. " Mendelssohn, who always liked a "nice, swift_tempo_, " repeatedly expressed his aversion to Chopin's _rubato_. Nevertheless, traces of it may be found in the rhythms of theclassical school. Although Mozart's _tempo_ in general was as strictand uniform as that of a waltz in the ball-room, in playing an adagiohe appears to have allowed his left hand some freedom of movement forthe sake of expression (see Jahn I. , 134). Beethoven, according toSeyfried, "was very particular at rehearsals about the frequentpassages in _tempo rubato_;" and there are other remarks bycontemporaries of Beethoven which indicate that although he wrote inthe classical style, in his playing and conducting he often introduceda romantic _rubato_. Still, in the majority of his compositions, thereis no room for the _rubato_, which cannot be said to have found a homein German music till it was assimilated by the Schumann school, underthe influence of Chopin. Since then, it has leavened the spirit ofmodern music in a manner which has never been sufficiently emphasized. I am convinced that even Richard Wagner was, unconsciously, influencedby it through Liszt; for one of the chief peculiarities of his styleis a sort of dramatic _rubato_ which emancipates his music from thetyranny of the strict dance measure. In his essay on the properinterpretation of Tannhäuser, Wagner declares that the division ofmusic into regular measures, or bars, is merely a mechanical means forenabling the composer to convey his ideas to the singer. As soon asthe singer has grasped the idea, he says, the bar should be thrownaside as a useless incumbrance, and the singer, ignoring strict time, should be guided by his feelings alone, while the conductor shouldfollow and preserve harmony between him and the orchestra. 

It might be said that this dramatic _rubato_ is something differentfrom Chopin's _rubato_. _Rubato_ literally means "robbed, " and it isgenerally supposed that the peculiarity of Chopin's style consistedsimply in this, that he prolonged certain notes in a bar at theexpense of the others--robbing from one what he gave to his neighbor. But this is a very inadequate conception of the term. Chopin's_rubato_ means much more than this. It includes, to a large extent, the frequent unexpected changes of time and rhythm, together with the_ritardandos_ and _accelerandos_. It includes, secondly, those uniquepassages, first conceived by Chopin, where the right hand has to playirregular groups of small notes--say twenty-two, while the left handplays only twelve; or nineteen, while the left plays four--passages inwhich Chopin indicated as clearly as Wagner did in the words justquoted that the musical bar is a mere mechanical measure which doesnot sufficiently indicate the phrasing of the romantic or dramaticideas that lie beyond the walls of a dance-hall. 

There is a third peculiarity of Chopin's style which may be includedunder the name of _rubato_, namely, his habit of "robbing" the note, not of its duration, but its _accent_. Every student of music knowsthat the symphony and sonata are called "idealized dance forms, "because they are direct outgrowths of the dances that were cultivatedoriginally in Italy, France, and Germany. Now, one peculiarity ofthese dances is the fact that the accent always falls on the firstbeat of each bar. This is very appropriate and convenient for dancing, but from an artistic point of view, it is decidedly monotonous. Hence, Chopin conferred a vast benefit on modern art by introducing thespirit of Slavic music, in which the accent often falls on other beatsbeside the first. These regular accents produce the effect of thevariable _tempo rubato_, and it is to them that Chopin's works largelyowe their exotic, poetic color. As they open up new possibilities ofemotional expression, they have been eagerly appropriated by othercomposers and have leavened all modern music. To Chopin, therefore, chiefly belongs the honor of having emancipated music from themonotony of the Western European dance-beat by means of the _temporubato_ in its varied aspects. 

But, it was not merely in the accent of the dance forms, that heintroduced an agreeable innovation; he was one of the giants who helpedto create a new epoch in art, by breaking these old forms altogether, and substituting new ones better suited to modern tastes. And here wecome across one of the most ludicrous misconceptions which have beenfostered concerning Chopin by shallow critics, and which brings us backagain for a moment to the question of Jumboism. I do not know whetherhe was a German or a French critic who first wrote that Chopin, although great in short pieces, was not great enough to master thesonata form. Once in print, this silly opinion was repeated parrot-likeby scores of other critics. _How_ silly it is may be inferred from thefact that such third-rate composerlings as Herz and Hummel were able towrite sonatas of the most approved pattern--and that, in fact, _any_person with the least musical talent can learn in a few years to writesonatas that are absolutely correct as regards form. And yet we areasked to believe that Chopin, one of the most profound and originalmusical thinkers the world has ever seen, could not write a correctsonata! _Risum teneatis amici_! Chopin not able to master the sonataform? The fact is, _the sonata form could not master him_. He feltinstinctively that it was too artificial to serve as a vehicle for theexpression of poetic thought; and his thoroughly original geniustherefore created the more plastic and malleable shorter forms whichhave since been adopted by composers the world over. The few sonataswhich Chopin wrote do not deviate essentially from the orthodoxstructure, but one feels constantly that he was hampered in hismovements by the artificial structure. Though they are full of genius, like everything he composed, he did not write them _con amore_. Concentration is one of Chopin's principal characteristics, and thesonata favors diffuseness. Too much thematic beating out is the bane ofthe sonata. A few bars of gold are worth more than many square yards ofgold leaf; and Chopin's bars are solid gold. Moreover, there is noorganic unity between the different parts of the sonata, whatever mayhave been said to the contrary. The essentially artificial character ofthe sonata is neatly illustrated by a simile used by Dr. Hanslick inspeaking of Chopin. "This composer, " he said, "although highly andpeculiarly gifted, was never able to unite the fragrant flowers whichhe scattered by handfuls, into beautiful wreaths. " Dr. Hanslick intendsthis as censure. I regard it as the greatest compliment he could havepaid him. A wreath may be very pretty in its way, but it is artificial. The flowers are crushed and their fragrance does not blend. How muchlovelier is a single violet or orchid in the fields, unhampered bystrings and wires, and connected solely with its stalk and thesurrounding green leaves. Many of Chopin's compositions are so shortthat they can hardly be likened unto flowers, but only to buds. Yet isnot a rosebud a thousand times more beautiful than a full-blown rose?

One more consideration. The psychology of the sonata form is false. Men and women do not feel happy for ten minutes as in the openingallegro of a sonata, then melancholy for another ten minutes, as inthe following adagio, then frisky, as in the scherzo, and finally, fiery and impetuous for ten minutes as in the finale. The movements ofour minds are seldom so systematic as this. Sad and happy thoughts andmoods chase one another incessantly and irregularly, as they do in thecompositions of Chopin, which, therefore, are much truer echoes of ourmodern romantic feelings than the stiff and formal classical sonatas. And thus it is, that Chopin's habitual neglect of the sonata form, instead of being a defect, reveals his rare artistic subtlety andgrandeur. It was natural that a Pole should vindicate for music thisemotional freedom of movement, for the Slavic mind is especially proneto constant changes of mood. Nevertheless, as soon as Chopin had shownthe way, other composers followed eagerly in the new path, and in thepresent day the sonata may be regarded as obsolete. Few contemporarycomposers have written more than one or two--merely in order to showthat they can do so if they want to; and even Brahms, the high priestof the conservatives, has, in his later period, devoted himself moreand more exclusively to shorter modern forms in his pianoforte music. 

Strictly speaking, Chopin was not the first who tried to get away fromthe sonata. Beethoven, though he remained faithful to it, felt itsfetters, as is shown by his numerous poetic licenses. Schubert wrote"Moments Musicals, " Mendelssohn, "Songs without Words, " Weber, Polonaises, and Field, Nocturnes. But these were merely straws whichindicated in which direction Chopin's genius would sweep the field andclear the musical atmosphere. His polonaises and nocturnes are vastlysuperior to those of Weber and Field; and his poetic preludes, hisromantic ballads, his lovely berçeuse, his amorous mazurkas, are newtypes in art which have often been imitated but never equalled. Onlyin one field did Chopin have a dangerous rival among his predecessors, namely, in the Waltz. Weber's "Invitation to the Dance" is the sourceof the modern idealized waltz, because it was not written for the feetalone, but also for the heart and the imagination. Like Chopin'swaltzes, it contains chivalrous passages, amorous episodes, and subtlechanges of movement. And it seems as if the fact that there was lessroom for formal and emotional innovations in the waltz than in theother forms, had somewhat affected Chopin's imagination. For, althoughthe most popular of his works, his waltzes are, with a few exceptionsin which the _rubato_ prevails, less characteristic than his otherpieces. Nevertheless, they are charming, every one of them. But theyare fairy dances--mortals are too clumsy to keep time to them. 

Next to the waltzes in popularity come the polonaises; and they fullydeserve their popularity. Liszt has given us a charming description ofthe polonaise as it was formerly danced in Chopin's native country. Itwas less a dance than a promenade in which courtly pomps andaristocratic splendor were on exhibition. It was a chivalrous but notan amorous dance, precedence being given to age and rank, before youthand beauty. And whereas, in other dances, the place of honor isalways given to the fair sex, in the polonaise the men are in theforeground. In a word, the polonaise represents, both in its subjectand the style of music, the masculine side of Chopin's genius. 

The feminine side is chiefly embodied in the mazurkas and thenocturnes. It has been said that the highest genius must combinemasculine with feminine traits, and it is a remarkable fact that theworks of two of the most spontaneous composers--Chopin andSchubert--are often characterized by an exquisite feminine tendernessand grace; as if, seeing that women have not done their duty ascomposers, they had tried to introduce the feminine spirit in music. Yet it is unfair to place too much emphasis on this side of theirgenius. In their bolder moments, Chopin and Schubert are thoroughlymasculine. 

It seems strange at first sight that the mazurkas, these exquisitelove poems, should be so much less popular than the waltzes, for theyare quite as melodious and much easier--although here, as elsewhere, Chopin often introduces a few very difficult bars in an otherwise easycomposition, as if to keep away bunglers. Perhaps the cause of theircomparative neglect is, that they are so thoroughly Polish in spirit;unless they are played with an exotic _rubato_, their fragrancevanishes. There is more local color in the mazurkas than in any ofhis other works. The Mazurs are musically a highly gifted nation, andChopin was impressed early in life with the quaint originality oftheir melodies. No doubt some of his mazurkas are merely artisticsettings of these old love songs, but they are the settings of aninspired jeweller. If we can judge by the number of pieces of eachclass that he wrote, the mazurka was Chopin's favorite form. Even onhis death-bed he wrote one. It was his last effort, and he was tooweak to try it over on the piano. It is of heart-rending sadness, andexquisite pathos. Perhaps it was a patriotic rather than an æstheticfeeling which led him thus to favor the mazurka. His love for hiscountry was exceeded only by his devotion to his art. "Oh, how sad itmust be to die in a foreign country, " he wrote to a friend in 1830;and when, soon afterward, he left home he took along a handful ofPolish soil which he kept for nineteen years. Shortly before his deathhe expressed a wish that it should be strewn in his coffin--a wishwhich was fulfilled; so that his body rested on Polish soil even inParis. 

A countless number of exquisite melodic rhythmic and harmonic detailsin the mazurkas might be dwelt upon in this place, but I will onlycall attention to the inexhaustible variety of ideas which makes eachof them so unique, notwithstanding their strong family likeness. Theyare like fantastic orchids, or like the countless varieties of hummingbirds, those "winged poems of the air, " of which no two are alikewhile all resemble each other. 

The nocturnes represent the dreamy side of Chopin's genius. They aresufficiently popular, yet few amateurs have any idea of theirunfathomable depth, and few know how to use the pedal in such a way asto produce the rich uninterrupted flow of tone on which the melodyshould float. Most pianists play them too fast. Mozart and Schumannprotested against the tendency to take their slow pieces too fast, andChopin suffers still more from this pernicious habit. Mendelssohn in"A Midsummer Night's Dream, " and Weber in "Oberon, " have given usglimpses of dreamland, but Chopin's nocturnes take us there bodily, and plunge us into reveries more delicious than the visions of anopium eater. They should be played in the twilight and in solitude, for the slightest foreign sound breaks the spell. But just as dreamsare sometimes agitated and dramatic, so some of these nocturnes arecomplete little dramas with stormy, tragic episodes, and the one in Csharp minor, _e. G. _, embodies a greater variety of emotion and moregenuine dramatic spirit on four pages than many popular operas on fourhundred. 

One of Chopin's enchanting innovations, which he introducedfrequently in the nocturnes, consists in those unique and exquisite_fioriture_, or dainty little notes which suddenly descend on themelody like a spray of dew drops glistening in all the colors of therainbow. No less unique and original are the exquisite modulationsinto foreign keys which abound in the nocturnes, as, indeed, in allhis works. Schucht calls attention to the fact that in his very opus 1Chopin permits himself a freedom of modulation which Beethoven rarelyindulged in. But this is a mere trifle compared with the works of hislast period. Here we find a striking originality and boldness ofmodulation that has no parallel in music, except in Wagner's lastmusic-dramas. Now we have seen that Moscheles, and othercontemporaries of Chopin, found his modulations harsh anddisagreeable; and doubtless there are amateurs to-day who regard themin the same way. It seems, indeed, as if musical people must bedivided into two classes--those who find their chief delight in melodypure and simple, and those who think that rich and varied harmony isthe soul of music. Chopin fortunately wrote for both classes. Italyhas produced no melodist equal to him, and Germany only one--FranzSchubert. No one has written melodies more soulful than those of thenocturne, opus 37, No. 2, the second ballad, the études, opus 10, No. 3; opus 25, No. 7, etc. I distinctly remember the thrill with which Iheard each of these melodies for the first time; but it was a deeperemotion still which I felt when I played for the first time thesublimest of his nocturnes--the last but one he wrote--and came acrossthat wonderful modulation from five sharps to four flats, and, lateron, the delicious series of modulations in the fourth and fifth barsafter the Tempo Primo. I realized then that modulation is a deepersource of emotional expression than melody. 

In speaking of Chopin's melancholy character, the nocturnes are oftenreferred to as illustrations of it. They do, indeed, breathe a spiritof sadness, but the majority represent, as I have said, the dreamyside of his genius. The real anguish of his heart is not expressed inthe nocturnes but in the preludes and études, strange as these namesmay seem for such pathetic effusions of his heart. The étude, opus 10, No. 6, seems as if it were in a sort of double minor; as much sadderthan ordinary minor, as ordinary minor is sadder than major. Chopinhad abundant cause to be melancholy. He inherited that nationalmelancholy of the Poles which causes them even to dance to tunes inminor keys, and which is commonly attributed to the long-continuedpolitical oppression under which they have suffered. But, apart fromthis national trait, Chopin had sufficient personal reasons forwriting the greater part of his mazurkas and his other pieces inminor keys. Like other men of genius, he keenly felt the anguish ofnot being fully appreciated by his contemporaries. Moreover, althoughhe was greatly admired by the French and Polish women in Paris, andwas even conceded a lady-killer, he was, in his genuine affairs of theheart, thrice disappointed. His first love, who wore his engagementring when he left Warsaw, proved faithless to the absent lover, andmarried another man. The second love deceived him in the same way, preferring a Count to a genius. And his third love, George Sand, afterapparently reciprocating his attachment, for a few years, not onlydiscarded him, but tried to justify her conduct to the world, bygiving an exaggerated portraiture of his weaknesses, in her novel"Lucrezia Floriani. "

Nevertheless, it was in one respect fortunate for the world thatGeorge Sand was Chopin's friend so long, for we owe to her facile penmany interesting accounts of Chopin's habits and the origin of some ofhis compositions. The winter which he spent with her on the Island ofMajorca was one of the most important in his life, for it was herethat he composed some of those masterpieces, his preludes--a wordwhich might be paraphrased as Introductions to a new world of musicalemotion. There is a strange discrepancy in the accounts which Lisztand George Sand give of the Majorca episode in Chopin's life. Lisztdescribes it as a period of calm enjoyment, George Sand as one ofdiscomfort and distress. As she was an eye-witness, her testimonyappears the more trustworthy, especially as it is borne out by thecharacter of the preludes which he composed there. There are amongChopin's preludes a few which breathe the spirit of contentment andgrace, or of religious grandeur, but most of them are outbreaks of thewildest anguish and heart-rending pathos. If tears could be heard, they would sound like these preludes. Two of the saddest--those in Bminor and E minor--were played by the famous organist Lefebure Wely, at Chopin's funeral services. But it is useless to specify. They areall jewels of the first water. 

Some years ago I wrote in "The Nation" that if all pianoforte music inthe world were to be destroyed, excepting one collection, my voteshould be cast for Chopin's preludes. If anything could induce me tomodify that opinion to-day, it would be the thought of Chopin'sétudes. I would never consent to their loss. Louis Ehlert, speaking ofChopin's F Major ballad, says he has seen even children stop in theirplay and listen to it enraptured. But, in the études I mentioned amoment ago, there are melodies which, I should think, would tempt evenangels to leave their happy home and indulge, for a moment, in theluxury of idealized human sorrow. There is in these twenty-sevenétudes, as in the twenty-five preludes, an inexhaustible wealth ofmelody, modulation, poetry and passion. One can play them every dayand never tire of them. Of most of them one might say what Schumannsaid of one--that they are "poems rather than studies;" and muchsurprise has been expressed that Chopin should have chosen such amodest and apparently inappropriate name for them as "studies. " Now, Ihave a theory on this subject: I believe it was partly an ironicintention which induced Chopin to call some of his most inspiredpieces "studies. " Pianists have always been too much in the habit oflooking at their art from purely technical or mechanical points ofview. They looked for mere five-finger exercises in Chopin's études, and finding at the same time an abundance of musical ideas, they weresurprised. It did not occur to them that Chopin might have intendedthem also as studies in musical composition--studies in melody, harmony, rhythm and emotional expression. I believe he did so intendthem; and finding that his contemporaries did not take his idea, heprobably laughed in his sleeve, and exclaimed, "_O tempora!_"

This conjecture seems the more plausible, from the fact that there wasa pronounced ironic and comic vein in Chopin's character. The accountsof his melancholy, in fact, like those of his ill-health, have beentoo much exaggerated. He was often in a cheerful mood. Sometimes hewould amuse himself for a whole evening playing blind-man's buff withthe children. As a mere child he had formed the habit of mimicking andcaricaturing pianists and other distinguished men. Liszt oftensuffered from this mischievous habit, but he did not complain, andeven seemed to enjoy it. Of Chopin's wit, two specimens may be cited. A rich Parisian one day invited him to dinner, with the intention ofgetting him to entertain the guests afterward. In this case, however, the host had reckoned without the guest, for, when asked to play, Chopin exclaimed, "But, my dear sir, I have eaten so little. " Theother instance occurs in one of his letters, where he says of thepianist Aloys Schmitt, that he was forty years old, and hiscompositions eighty--a _bon mot_ worthy of Heine. 

There was much, indeed, in common between Chopin and Heine. Nothing ismore characteristic of Heine than the way in which he works up oursentimental feelings only to knock us on the head with a comic orgrotesque line at the end. Similarly, Chopin, after improvising forhis friends for an hour or two, would suddenly rouse them from theirreveries by a _glissando_--sliding his fingers from one end of thekey-board to the other. In almost all of Chopin's or Heine's poemsthere is this peculiar mixture of the sad and the comic veins--evenin the scherzos, which represent the gay and cheerful moods ofChopin's muse. 

Another point between these two poets is their elegance of style, andtheir ironic abhorrence of tawdry sentimentality and commonplace. Heine is the most elegant and graceful writer of his country, andChopin the most elegant and graceful of all composers. Not a redundantnote or a meaningless bar in all his compositions. Heine owed hisformal finish to French influences, but Chopin did not need them, forthe Poles are as noted as the French for elegance and grace. Heavoided not only the modulatory monotony of the classical school, but, especially, the commonplace endings which marred so many classicalcompositions. "All's well that ends well, " is a rule that wasgenerally ignored by composers till Chopin taught them its value andeffect. Chopin's pen always stopped when his thoughts stopped, and henever appends a meaningless end formula as if to warn the audiencethat they may now put on their hats. On the contrary, some of hislater compositions, especially of the last period, end with exquisiteminiature poems, connected in spirit with the preceding music and yetdistinct--separate inspirations. I refer, especially, to the endingsof his last two nocturnes and to the final bars of the mazurka, opus59, No. 3. 

George Sand has given us a vivid sketch of Chopin's conscientiousnessas a composer. "He shut himself up in his room for entire days, " shesays, "weeping, walking about, breaking his pen, repeating andchanging a bar a hundred times, and beginning again next day withminute and desperate perseverance. He spent six weeks over a singlepage, only to go back and write that which he had traced at the firstessay. " As regards his creativeness, George Sand says that "itdescended upon his piano suddenly, completely, sublimely, or it sangitself in his head during his walks, and he made haste to hear it byrushing to the instrument. " I have already mentioned the fact thatwhen he wrote his last mazurka he was too weak to try it on the piano. In one of his letters he speaks of a polonaise being ready in hishead. These facts indicate that he composed mentally, although, nodoubt, during the improvisations, many themes occurred to him which heremembered and utilized. When he improvised he did not watch thekey-board, but generally looked at the ceiling. Already as a youth heused to be so absorbed that he forgot his meals; and, in the street, he was often so absent-minded that he very narrowly escaped being runover by a wagon. Visions of female loveliness and patrioticreminiscences inspired many of his best works. Sometimes the picturesin his mind became so vivid as to form real hallucinations. Thus itis related that one evening when he was alone in the dark, trying overthe A major polonaise which he had just completed, he saw the dooropen and in marched a procession of Polish knights and ladies inmediæval costumes--the same, no doubt, that his imagination hadpictured while he was composing. He was so alarmed at this vision thathe fled through the opposite door and did not venture to return. Another illustration of the relations between genius and insanity. 

The foregoing remarks on Chopin's compositions suffice, I think, toshow how absurd is the prevalent notion that he is the composer forthe drawing-room, and that his pieces reflect the spirit offashionable Parisian society. They do, perhaps, in their elegant form, but certainly not in their spirit. The frivolous aristocratic circlesthat heard Chopin could never have comprehended the depth of hisemotional life. The pianists for them, the real drawing-room composerswere Kalkbrenner, and Field, and Thalberg, with their operaticfantasias. Chopin is the composer for the few, and he is the composer_par excellence_ for musicians. From him they can get more ideas, andlearn more as regards form, than from anyone else, except Bach andWagner. In comparing his last works with his first, and noting theirprogress, the mind tries in vain to conceive where he would have ledthe world had he lived eighty instead of forty years. One thing iscertain: he would have probably written more for other instruments. His pianoforte concertos belong to his early period, and betray a lackof experience in the treatment of the orchestra. But he wrote twopieces of chamber music which have never been excelled--a 'cellosonata and a trio. The 'cello sonata was the last of his larger works, and in my opinion it is superior to any of the 'cello sonatas ofMendelssohn, Brahms, and even Beethoven and Rubinstein. The trio, though an earlier work, is, like the 'cello sonata, admirably adaptedto the instruments for which it is written. I once belonged to anamateur trio club. Our tastes naturally differed on many points, butin one thing we all agreed: we always closed our entertainment withthis Chopin trio. It was the climax of the evening's enjoyment. Yet, only a few years ago, the leader of one of the principal chamber musicorganizations in New York admitted to me that he had never heard ofthis trio!--an incident which vividly illustrates the truth of myassertion that Chopin's genius is still far from being esteemed at itsfull value. 

II

HOW COMPOSERS WORK

Forty years ago Robert Schumann complained that the musical criticshad so much to say about singers and players, while the composer wasalmost entirely ignored. To-day this reproach could hardly be made, for although vocalists still receive perhaps a disproportionate shareof attention, compositions, new and old, are also discussed at greatlength in the press. Nevertheless, I believe that the vast majority ofthose who attend an operatic performance in New York, and aredelighted with "Siegfried" or "Faust, " have but vague and shadowynotions as to the way in which such an opera is composed. My objecthere is to illustrate the way composers work, and to prove that thecreating of an opera is perhaps the most difficult and marvellousachievement of the human intellect. 

Professor Langhans notes, in his history of music, that in the MiddleAges, as late as Luther's time, it took two men to compose thesimplest piece of music: one who conceived the melody, and the otherwho added the harmonic accompaniment. The theoretical writer, Glareanus, deliberately expressed his opinion, in 1547, that it mightbe _possible_ to unite these two functions in one person, but that onewould rarely find the inventor of a melody able to work it outartistically. We have made much progress in music within these threehundred years, and to-day every composer is not only expected toinvent his own harmonies and accompaniments to his melodies, but, since Wagner set the example, composers are beginning to consider itincumbent on them to write their own librettos; and, what is moreremarkable, if we examine biographies of musicians carefully we findthat, even _before_ Wagner, not a few composers assisted in thepreparation of their operatic texts; and this remark applies even tosome of the Italian composers, who were proverbially carelessregarding their librettos. Rossini was, perhaps, too indolent todevote much attention to his texts, and he was apt to postpone eventhe _musical_ work to the last moment, so that he sometimes had to belocked up in his room by his friends, to enable him to finish hisscore by the date named in his contract. Yet it is worthy of note thatduring the composition of what Rossini's admirers commonly regard ashis best and most characteristic work--the "Barber of Seville"--helived in the same house with his librettist. "The admirable unity ofthe 'Barber, ' in which a person without previous information on thesubject could scarcely say whether the words were written for themusic or the music for the words, may doubtless, " as Mr. SutherlandEdwards suggests, "in a great measure be accounted for by the factthat poet and musician were always together during the composition ofthe opera; ready mutually to suggest and to profit by suggestions. "

"Donizetti, " the same writer informs us, while at the Bologna Lyceum, "occupied himself not only with music, but also with drawing, architecture, and even poetry; and that he could turn out fair enoughverses for musical purposes was shown when, many years afterward, hewrote--so rapidly that the word 'improvise' might here be used--forthe benefit of a manager in distress, both words and music of a littleone-act opera, called 'Il Campanello' founded on the 'Sonnette deNuit' of Scribe. Donizetti also arranged the librettos of 'Betty' and'The Daughter of the Regiment, ' and of the last act of 'Lucia' he notonly wrote the words but designed the scenes. "

Concerning Verdi, Arthur Pougin says: "It is not generally known that, virtually, Verdi is himself the author of all his poems. That is tosay, not only does he always choose the subject of his operas, but, inaddition to that, he draws out the sketch of the libretti, indicatesall the situations, constructs them almost entirely as far as regardsthe general plan, brings his personages and his characters on thestage in such a way that his _collaborateur_ has simply to follow hisindications to bring the whole together, and to write the verses. "

One of Verdi's poetic assistants was Francesco Piave, who supplied theverses for "La Traviata, " "Ernani" and several other of his operas. Hewas, Pougin informs us, "a tolerably bad poet, quite wanting ininvention, " but he had the most important quality (from Verdi's pointof view) "of effacing himself completely, of putting aside every kindof personal vanity and of following entirely the indications and thedesires of the composer, cutting out this, paring down that, shortening or expanding at the will of the latter--giving himself up, in short, to all his exigencies, whatever they might be. "

A question having arisen some years ago, as to the origin of thelibretto of "Aida, " the author of it, M. Du Locle, wrote to a Romanpaper that the first idea of the poem belongs to the celebratedEgyptologist, Mariette Bey. He adds: "I wrote the libretto, scene byscene, phrase by phrase, in French prose, at Busseto, under the eye ofthe maestro, who took a large share in the work. The idea of thefinale of the last act, with its two stages, one above the other, belongs especially to him. "

The libretto for Verdi's last work, "Otello, " was prepared by Boïto, who had previously assisted him in rearranging his "Simon Boccanegra, "and who also wrote the poem of "La Gioconda" for Ponchielli. Boïto isa thorough believer in Wagner's doctrine that every composer shouldwrite his own opera books, and he followed this rule in hisinteresting opera "Mefistofele. "

Mozart was altogether too careless in accepting librettos unworthy ofhis genius. Yet occasionally he took the liberty to improve the stuffthat was submitted to him. As the learned librarian, Herr Pohl, remarks, "In the 'Entführung' it is interesting to observe thealterations in Bretzner's libretto which Mozart's practicalacquaintance with the stage has dictated, to the author's greatdisgust. Indeed, _Osmin_, one of the most original characters, isentirely his own creation, at Fischer's suggestion. "

Weber resembled Wagner, among other things, in the habit of carryingplans for operas in his head for many years. Thus we read that whileon the look out for a subject for an opera he and Dusch hit upon "DerFreischütz, " a story by Apel, then just published. At the time, however, it did not get beyond the beginning; and not till seven yearslater did Weber begin the work which made his reputation, a work whichin Dresden, where it was first produced, has had already more than athousand performances, and which even in London was at one timeplayed simultaneously at three theatres. When he finally did begin hiswork on the "Freischütz" the libretto he used was by another author, Herr Kind, a man of considerable dramatic ability, but who--perhapsfor that very reason--was subsequently so mortified by the fact thatWeber's superior genius caused his music to receive the lion's shareof the public's attention, that he refused to write another librettofor him. This was unfortunate, for, as ill luck would have it, Weberfell into the hands of a Leipsic blue stocking, Wilhelmine von Chezy, whose literary gifts were not of the most brilliant order. Shesubmitted several subjects to him, from which he selected "Euryanthe;"but her sketch proved so unsatisfactory that he altered it entirelyand compelled her to work it over nine times before he wassufficiently satisfied with it to set it to music. The libretto forhis last opera, "Oberon, " was prepared for him in London, but thesubject, as usual, was his own choice and was based on Wieland'sfamous poem of that name. Weber's rare artistic conscientiousness isindicated by the fact that at this time, although he felt that his endwas approaching, he set to work to learn the English language in orderto avoid mistakes in adapting his melodies to the accent of the wordsand the spirit of the text. 

Having now caught a glimpse of the manner in which the greatcomposers find subjects for their operas, and elaborate them, with orwithout the assistance of poets, we may go on to consider the sourcesof the musical inspiration which provides appropriate melodies andharmonies for these texts. Experience shows conclusively that the mostpowerful stimulant of the composer's brain is _the possession of areally poetic and dramatic text_. To take only one instance--it surelycannot be a mere coincidence that the best works of four greatcomposers--Spohr, Berlioz, Gounod, and Schumann, are based on thestory of "Faust. " And Schumann, in one of his private letters, indicates very clearly why his "Faust" is such an inspiredcomposition. Speaking of a performance of this work he says: "Itappeared to make a good impression--better than my 'Paradise andPeri'--no doubt in consequence of the superior grandeur of the poemwhich aroused _my_ powers also to a greater effort. "

More significant still are the words which Weber wrote to Fran vonChezy when she was writing the libretto for "Euryanthe;" which heintended to make better than all his previous works. "When you beginto elaborate the text, " he wrote; "I entreat you by all that is sacredto task me with the most difficult kinds of metre, unexpected rhythms, etc. , which will force my thoughts into new paths and draw them out oftheir hiding-places. "

In one of his theoretical essays, Wagner emphasizes the value of agood poem in kindling the spark of inspiration in a composer's mind byexclaiming: "Oh, how I adore and honor Mozart because he found itimpossible to compose for his 'Titus' as good music as for his 'DonJuan, ' or for his 'Così fan Tutte' as good music as for 'Figaro. '"Mozart, he adds, always wrote music, but _good_ music he could onlywrite when he was inspired, and when this inspiration was supplied bya subject worthy of being wedded to his muse. 

No doubt Wagner was right in maintaining that Mozart's operas containhis best music. Where among all his purely instrumental works isanything to be found as inspired as the music in the scenes where theghostly statue nods at _Don Juan_, and subsequently where it entershis room and clutches his hand in its marble grasp? I venture to addthat even Beethoven, although he is not generally regarded as anoperatic composer _par excellence_, and although his fame chieflyrests on his symphonies and other instrumental works, neverthelesscomposed his most inspired music in connection with his one opera"Fidelio. " I refer to the third "Leonora" overture, and to the musicin the prison scene, where the digging of the grave is depicted in theorchestra with a realism worthy of Wagner, and where the music when_Leonora_ levels her pistol at the villain reaches a climax asthrilling as is to be found in any dramatic work, musical or literary. Obviously, it was the intensely dramatic situation which here inspiredBeethoven to the grandest effort of his genius. 

It has often been asserted that the best numbers in "Fidelio" weredirectly inspired in Beethoven by the emotional exaltation resultingfrom one of his unhappy love affairs. Mr. Thayer doubts this story, because he could not find anything in Beethoven's sketch-bookscorroborating it; but even if it should be a myth, there are many wellauthenticated facts which show that Beethoven, like other composers, owed many of his best ideas to the magic influence of love instimulating his mental powers. He dedicated thirty-nine compositionsto thirty-six different women, and it is well known that he wasconstantly falling in love, had made up his mind several times tomarry, and was twice refused. Female beauty always made a deepimpression on him, and Marx relates that "even in his later years hewas fond of looking at pretty faces, and used to stand still in thestreet and gaze after them with his eyeglasses till they were out ofsight; if anyone noticed this he smiled and looked confused, but notannoyed. His little Werther romance he had lived at an early age inBonn. In Vienna, he is said to have had more than one love affair andto have made an occasional conquest which would have been difficultif not impossible to many an Adonis. "

Weber's "Freischütz" doubtless owes much of its beauty to the factthat it was written but a few months before the composer's marriage. In one of his letters to his betrothed he writes, "Yesterday Icomposed all the forenoon and thought of you _very often_, for I wasat work on a scene of _Agatha_, in which I still cannot attain all thefire, longing, and passion that vaguely float before me. " And his sontestifies that Weber's love influenced all his work at the time. "Itwas the reason, " he says, "that Weber took to heart, above everythingelse, the part of _Aennchen_, in which he saw an embodiment of hisbride's special talent and characteristics, and it was under thefostering stimulus of this warm feeling that he allowed those parts ofthe opera in which _Aennchen_ appears to ripen first. The first notewhich he wrote down for the 'Freischütz' belongs in the duo between_Aennchen_ and _Agatha_. " He adds that his father, while composing, actually saw his bride in his mind's eye, and heard her sing hismelodies, and accordingly as this imaginary vocalist nodded approvalor shook her head, he was led to retain or reject certain musicalideas. 

Schumann's letters contain a superabundance of evidence showing howlove suggested to him immortal musical thoughts. "I have discovered, "he writes to his bride, "that nothing transports the imagination soreadily as expectation and longing for something, as was again thecase during the last few days, when I was awaiting a letter from you, and meanwhile composed whole volumes--strange, curious, solemnthings--how you will open your eyes when you play them. Indeed, I amat present so full of musical ideas that I often feel as if I shouldexplode. " This was in 1838, two years before his marriage. "Schumannhimself admits, " as Professor Spitta remarks, "that his compositionsfor the piano written during the period of his courtship reveal muchof his personal experiences and feelings, and his creative work of1840 is of a very striking character. In this single year he wroteover a hundred songs, the best he ever gave to the world, and, " asProfessor Spitta continues, "when we look through the words of hissongs, it is clear that here, more than anywhere, love was theprompter--love that had endured so long a struggle, and at lastattained the goal of its desires. This is confirmed by the 'Myrthen, 'which he dedicated to the lady of his choice, and the twelve songsfrom Rückert's 'Springtime of Love'--which were written conjointly bythe two lovers. "

The gay and genial Haydn appears to have been as great a favorite ofwomen as Beethoven, and he doubtless owed some of his inspirations totheir influence upon his susceptible heart. "He always consideredhimself an ugly man, " Herr Pohl writes, "and could not understand howso many handsome women fell in love with him; 'at any rate, ' he usedto say, 'they were not tempted by my beauty, ' though he admitted thathe liked looking at a pretty woman, and was never at a loss for acompliment. "

Everybody has heard of the marvellous effect produced on Berlioz'sardent imagination by the _Juliet_ of Miss Smithson. He relates in hismemoirs that an English critic said that after seeing Miss Smithson in_Juliet_ he had cried out, "I will marry that woman, and write mygrandest symphony on this play. " "I did both things, " he adds, "but Inever said anything of the sort. " It is in "Lelio" that the story ofhis love is embodied; and other compositions of his might be mentionedwhich were simply the overflow of his passions. 

Poor Schubert, who enjoyed little of the fame and less of the fortunethat were due him during his brief life, and who was as unattractivein personal appearance as Haydn and Beethoven, does not seem to havecared as much for women as most other composers. Nevertheless he felldeeply in love with a countess, who, however, was too young toreciprocate his feelings. But one day she asked him why he neverdedicated any of his compositions to her, whereupon he replied, "Whyshould I? Are not all my compositions dedicated to you?" This was asneat a compliment as Beethoven once made Frau von Arnim--an incidentwhich also gives us a glimpse of his manner of composing. One eveningat a party Beethoven repeatedly took his note-book from his pocket andwrote a few lines in it. Subsequently, when he was alone with Frau vonArnim, he looked over what he had written and sang it; whereupon heexclaimed: "There, how does that sound? It is yours if you like it; Imade it for you, you inspired me with it; _I saw it written in youreyes_. "

Many similar cases might be cited, showing that although women mayhave done little for music from a creative point of view, they areindirectly responsible for many of the most inspired products of thegreat composers. And the moral of the story is that a young musician, as soon as he has secured a good poetic subject for a song or anopera, should hasten to fall in love, in order to tune hisheart-strings and devotions to concert pitch. And a patriotic wagmight, perhaps, be allowed to maintain that, as America has morepretty girls than any other country in the world, it is easier to fallin love here than elsewhere, and that there is, therefore, no excusewhatever for American composers if they do not soon lead the world inmusical inspiration. 

Feminine beauty, however, is not the only kind of beauty that arousesdormant musical ideas and brings them to light. The beauty of natureappeals as strongly to musicians as to poets, and is responsible formany of their inspirations. When Mendelssohn visited Fingal's Cave, hewrote a letter on one of the Hebrides, inclosing twenty bars of music"to show how extraordinarily the place affected me, " to use his ownwords. "These twenty bars, " says Sir George Grove, "an actualinspiration, are virtually identical with the opening of the wonderfuloverture which bears the name of 'Hebrides' or 'Fingal's Cave. '" Andan English admirer of Mendelssohn, who had the honor of entertaininghim in the country, notes how deeply he entered into the beauty of thehills and the woods. "His way of representing them, " he says, "was notwith the pencil; but in the evenings his improvised music would showwhat he had observed or felt in the past day. The piece which hecalled 'The Rivulet, ' which he wrote at that time, for my sisterSusan, will show what I mean; it was a recollection of a real, actualrivulet. 

"We observed" he continues, "how natural objects seemed to suggestmusic to him. There was in my sister Honora's garden a pretty creepingplant, new at that time, covered with little trumpet-like flowers. Hewas struck with it, and played for her the music which (he said) thefairies might play on those trumpets. When he wrote out the piece hedrew a little branch of that flower all up the margin of the paper. "In another piece, inspired by the sight of carnations, they found thatMendelssohn intended certain arpeggio passages "as a reminder of thesweet scent of the flower rising up. "

Mozart, as many witnesses have testified, was especially attuned tocomposition by the sight of beautiful scenery. Rochlitz relates thatwhen he travelled with his wife through picturesque regions he gazedattentively and in silence at the surrounding sights; his features, which usually had a reserved and gloomy, rather than a cheerfulexpression, gradually brightened, and then he began to sing, or ratherto hum, till suddenly he exclaimed: "If I only had that theme onpaper. " He always preferred to live in the country, and wrote thegreater part of his two best operas, "Don Juan, " and "The MagicFlute, " in one of those picturesque little garden houses which are sooften seen in Austria and Germany. In one of these airy structures, heconfessed, he could write more in ten days than he could in hisapartments in two months. 

Berlioz relates somewhere that the musical ideas for his "Faust" cameto him unbidden during his rambles among Italian hills. Weber'smelodies are so much like fragrant forest flowers that one feels surebefore being told that he came across them in the woods and fields. His famous pupil, Sir Julius Benedict, relates that Weber took asgreat delight in taking his friends to see his favorite bits oflandscape, as he did in composing a fine piece of music; and he addsthat "this love of nature, and principally of forest life, may explainhis predilection, in the majority of his operas, for hunting chorusesand romantic scenery. "

Richard Wagner conceived most of his vigorous and eloquent leadingmelodies during his rambles among the picturesque environs ofBayreuth, or the sublime snowpeaks of Switzerland. How he elaboratedthem we shall see later on. Of Beethoven's devotion to nature manycurious anecdotes are told by his contemporaries. A harp manufacturernamed Stumpff met him in 1823 and wrote an account of his visit in"The Harmonicon, " a London journal, in which occurs this passage:"Beethoven is a capital walker and delights in rambling for hoursthrough wild, romantic scenery. I am told, indeed, that he hassometimes been out whole nights on such excursions, and is oftenabsent from home for several days. On the way to the valley [theHellenenthal, near the Austrian Baden] he often stopped to point outthe prettiest views, or to remark on the defects of the new buildings. Then he would go back again to his own thoughts and hum to himself inan incomprehensible fashion; which, I heard, was his fashion ofcomposing. "

Professor Klöber, a well-known artist of that period, who paintedBeethoven's portrait, relates that he often met Beethoven during hiswalks near Vienna. "It was most interesting to watch him, " he writes;"how he would stand still as if listening, with a piece of music paperin his hands, look up and down and then write something. Dont had toldme when I met him thus not to speak or take any notice, as he would bevery much embarrassed or very disagreeable. I saw him once, when I wastaking a party to the woods, clambering up to an opposite height fromthe ravine which separated us, with his broad-brimmed felt hat tuckedunder his arm; arrived at the top, he threw himself down full lengthand gazed long into the sky. "

Another contemporary of Beethoven, G. F. Treitschke, gives us aninteresting glimpse of Beethoven's manner of creating and improvising. Treitschke had been asked to write the text for a new aria that was tobe introduced in "Fidelio" when that opera was revived at Vienna in1814. Beethoven called at seven o'clock in the evening and asked howthe text of the aria was getting on. Treitschke had just finished it, and handed it to him. Beethoven read it over, he continues, "walked upand down the room, humming as usual, instead of singing--and openedthe piano. My wife had often asked him in vain to play; but now, putting the text before him, he began a wonderful improvisation, which, unfortunately, there were no magic means of recording. Fromthis fantasy he seemed to conjure the theme of the aria. Hours passedbut Beethoven continued to improvise. Supper, which he intended toshare with us, was served, but he would not be disturbed. Late in theevening he embraced me and, without having eaten anything, hurriedhome. The following day the piece was ready in all its beauty. "

This anecdote appears to indicate that Beethoven sometimes composed atthe piano. Meyerbeer, it is said, always composed at his instrument, and there is a story that he used to jot down the ideas of othercomposers at the opera and concerts, and, by thinking and playingthese over, gradually evolve his own themes. It is rather moresurprising to hear, from Herr Pohl, that Haydn sketched all hiscompositions at the piano. The condition of the instrument, he adds, had its effect upon him, beauty of tone being favorable toinspiration. Thus he wrote to Artaria in 1788: "I was obliged to buy anew forte-piano, that I might compose your clavier sonatasparticularly well. " "When an idea struck him he sketched it out in afew notes and figures; this would be his morning's work; in theafternoon he would enlarge this sketch, elaborating it according torule, but taking pains to preserve the unity of the idea. "

Weber's son relates that it was his father's habit to sit at thewindow on summer evenings and jot down the ideas that had come to him, during his solitary walks, on small pieces of music paper, of which alarge number were usually lying on his table. "No piano, " he adds, "was touched on these occasions, for his ears spontaneously heard afull orchestra, played by good spirits, while he wrote down his neatlittle notes. " And Weber himself remarks in one of his essays that, "the tone poet who gets his ideas at the piano is almost always bornpoor, or in a fair way of delivering his faculties into the hands ofthe common and commonplace. For these very hands, which, thanks toconstant practice and training, finally acquire a sort of independenceand will of their own, are unconscious tyrants and masters over thecreative power. How very differently does _he_ create whose _inner_ear is judge of the ideas which he simultaneously conceives andcriticises. This mental ear grasps and holds fast the musical visions, and is a divine secret belonging to music alone, incomprehensible tothe layman. "

Mozart had already learned to compose without a piano when he was onlysix years old; and, as Mr. E. Holmes remarks, "having commencedcomposition without recourse to the clavier, his powers in mentalmusic constantly increased, and he soon imagined effects of which theoriginal types existed only in his brain. "

Schumann wrote to a young musician in 1848: "Above all things, persistin composing mentally, without the aid of the instrument. Turn overyour melodic idea in your head until you can say to yourself: 'It iswell done. '" Elsewhere he says: "If you can pick out little melodiesat the piano, you will be pleased; but if they come to youspontaneously, away from the piano, you will have more reason to bedelighted, for then the inner tone-sense is aroused to activity. Thefingers must do what the head wishes, and not _vice versa_. " And againhe says: "If you set out to compose, invent everything in your head. If the music has emanated from your soul, if you have felt it, otherswill feel it too. "

Schumann had discovered the superiority of the mental method ofcomposing from experience. In a letter dated 1838 he writes concerninghis "Davidstänze:" "If I ever was happy at the piano it was when Icomposed these pieces;" and it was well known that up to 1839 "he usedto compose sitting at the instrument. " We have also just seen howBeethoven practically composed one of his "Fidelio" arias at thepiano. Nor was this by any means an isolated instance. To cite onlyone more case: Ries relates that one afternoon he took a walk withBeethoven, returning at eight o'clock. "While we were walking, " hecontinues, "Beethoven had constantly hummed, or almost howled, up anddown the scale, without singing definite notes. When I asked him whatit was, he replied that a theme for the last allegro of the sonata hadcome into his head. As soon as we entered the room, he ran to thepiano, without taking off his hat. I sat down in a corner, and he hadsoon forgotten me. For at least an hour he now improvised impetuouslyon the new and beautiful finale of the sonata [opus 57]. " Another ofBeethoven's contemporaries, J. Russell, has left us a vividdescription of Beethoven when thus composing at the piano, orimprovising: "At first he only struck a few short detached chords, asif he were afraid of being caught doing something foolish; but he soonforgot his surroundings, and for about half an hour lost himself in animprovisation, the style of which was exceedingly varied, andespecially distinguished by sudden transitions. The amateurs weretransported, and to the uninitiated it was interesting to observe howhis inspirations were reflected in his countenance. He revelled ratherin bold, stormy moods than in soft and gentle ones. The muscles of hisface swelled, his veins were distended, his eyes rolled wildly, hismouth trembled convulsively, and he had the appearance of an enchantermastered by the spirit he had himself conjured. "

Russell was probably one of the witnesses of whom Richard Wagnerremarked, in his essay on Beethoven, that they have testified to theincomparable impression which Beethoven made by his improvisations atthe piano. And Wagner adds the following suggestive words: "Theregrets that there was no way of writing down and preserving theseinstantaneous creations cannot be regarded as unreasonable, even incomparing these improvisations with the master's greatest works, if webear in mind the fact, taught by experience, that even _less_ giftedmusicians, whose written compositions are not free from stiffness andinelegance, sometimes positively amaze us by the quite unexpected andfertile inventiveness which they display while improvising. "

A similar remark was made by De Quincey, in pointing out thespontaneous origin of some of his essays: "Performers on the organ, "he says, "so far from finding their own _impromptu_ displays to fallbelow the more careful and premeditated efforts, on the contrary haveoftentimes deep reason to mourn over the escape of inspirations andideas born from the momentary fervors of inspiration, but fugitive andirrevocable as the pulses in their own flying fingers. "

By way of illustrating this thesis a few more cases may be cited. Mozart used to sit up late at night, improvising for hours at thepiano, and, according to one witness, "these were the true hours ofcreation of his divine melodies, " a statement which, however, we shallpresently see reason to modify somewhat. Schubert never improvised inpublic like Mozart, but only "in the intervals of throwing on hisclothes, or at other times when the music within was too strong to beresisted, " as Mr. Grove remarks. What an inestimable privilege it musthave been to witness the spontaneous overflow of so rich a genius asSchubert! And once more, Max Maria von Weber writes that his father'simprovisations on the piano were like delightful dreams. "All who hadthe good fortune to hear him, " he says, "testify that the impressionof his playing was like an Elysian frenzy, which elevates a man abovehis sphere and makes him marvel at the glories of his own soul. "

In reading such enthusiastic descriptions--and musical biographies arefull of them--we cannot but echo De Quincey and Wagner in regrettingthat there has been no shorthand method of taking down and preservingthese wonderful improvisations of the great masters. Futuregenerations will be more favored, if Mr. Edison's improved phonographfulfils the promises made of it. For by simply placing one of theseinstruments near the piano it will be possible hereafter to preserveevery note and every accent and shade of expression, and reproduce itsubsequently at will. And not only will momentary inspirations be thuspreserved, but musicians will no longer be compelled to do all themanual labor of writing down their compositions, but will be able tofollow the example of those German professors, who when they wish towrite a book, simply engage a stenographer to take down theirlectures, which they then revise and forward to the publisher. True, the orchestration will always have to be done by the master's ownhands, but in other respects musicians of the future will be asgreatly benefited as men of letters by the new phonograph which, it ispredicted, will create as great a revolution in social affairs as thetelegraph and railroad did when first introduced. 

The charm of improvisation lies, of course, in this, that we hear acomposer creating and playing at the same time. This very fact, however, ought to make us cautious not to overestimate the value ofsuch improvisations. For we all know how a great genius can investeven a commonplace idea with charm by his manner of expressing orrendering it. It is probable, therefore, that in most cases theseimprovisations, if noted down and played by _others_, would not makeas deep an impression as the regularly written compositions of thegreat masters. It is with music as with literature. Schopenhauer saysthat there are three classes of writers: The first class, which isvery numerous, never think at all, but simply reproduce echoes of whatthey have read in books. The second class, somewhat less numerous, think only while they are writing. But the third class, which is verysmall, only write _after_ thinking and because their thoughts clamorfor utterance. 

If we apply this classification to music we see at once thatimprovising comes under the second head: improvising is thinking orcomposing while playing. But the greatest musical ideas are thosewhich are conceived entirely in the mind, which needs no pen or pianomechanically to stimulate its creative power. Of this there can be noquestion, whatever. With an almost absolute unanimity we find that thegreatest composers conceived their immortal ideas in the open air, where there was no possibility of coaxing them out of an instrument. And not only is the bare outline thus composed mentally, but the wholecomposition with all its involved harmonies and varied orchestralcolors is present in the composer's mind before he puts it down onpaper. The composition of "Der Freischütz" affords a remarkableconfirmation of this statement. Weber began to compose this operamentally on February 23, but did not write down a single note beforethe second of July. That is, he kept the full score of this wonderfulwork in his brain for more than four months, and, as his son remarks, "there is not a number in it which he did not work over ten times inhis mind, until it sounded satisfactory and he could say to himself'That's it, ' and then he wrote it down rapidly without hesitation andalmost without altering a note. "

This power of elaborating a musical score in the mind, and hearing itinwardly, is a gift which unmusical people find it difficult tocomprehend, and which even puzzles many musical people. Yet it is apower which all students of music ought to possess; and, like othercapacities, it can be easily cultivated and strengthened. 

A comparison with two other senses will throw some light on thematter. Most of us can, by thinking fixedly of some appetizing dish, recall its flavor sufficiently to start a nerve current and stimulatethe salivary glands. The image of the flavor, so to speak, makes themouth water. What do we do when we go to a restaurant and look overthe bill of fare? We simply, on reading the list, recall a faintgastronomic image, as it were, of each dish, and the one which is mostvivid, owing to the peculiar direction of the appetite, decides ourchoice. 

The sense of sight presents many curious analogies. Mr. Galton, in his"Inquiries into Human Faculty, " gives the results of a series ofinvestigations which show that there are great differences amongpersons of distinction in various kinds of intellectual work in thepower of recalling to the mind's eye clear and distinct images of whatthey have seen. Some, for instance, in thinking of the breakfasttable, could see all the objects--knives, plates, dishes, etc. , in themental picture as bright as in the actual scene, and in theappropriate colors; others could recall only very dim or blurredimages of the scene, or none at all; and all stages, from the highestto the lowest visualizing power, were represented in the letters hereceived on the subject. 

Sometimes these mental images are as vivid as the actual images, oreven more vivid. Everybody has heard the story of Blake, who, when hewas painting a portrait, only required one sitting, becausesubsequently he could see the model as distinctly as if he wereactually sitting in the chair. Mrs. Haweis wrote to Mr. Galton thatall her life she has had at times a waking vision of "a flight of pinkroses floating in a mass from right to left, " and that before herninth year they were so large and brilliant that she often tried totouch them; and their scent, she adds, was overpowering. 

Much has been written regarding the remarkable feats of Zuckertort andBlackburn who can play as many as sixteen to twenty games of chess atonce, and blindfolded. Of course the only way they can do this is byhaving in the mind a clear picture of each chess-board, with all thefigures arranged in proper order. 

Mr. Galton says he has among his notes "many cases of persons mentallyreading off scores when playing the pianoforte, or manuscripts whenthey are making speeches;" and he knows a lady, the daughter of aneminent musician, who often imagines she hears her father's playing. "The day she told me of it, " he says, "the incident had againoccurred. She was sitting in her room with her maid, and she asked themaid to open the door that she might hear the music better. The momentthe maid got up the music disappeared. "

It is obvious that this case, like that of the eminent painter justreferred to, borders closely on the hallucinations of the insane, andBlake _did_ become insane subsequently. But usually there is nothingabnormal or pathologic in the power of mentally recalling sights orsounds, and it would be well if everybody cultivated this power. Mr. Galton mentions an electrical engineer who was able to recall formswith great precision, but not color. But after some exercise of hiscolor memory he became quite an adept in that, too, and declared thatthe newly-acquired power was a source of much pleasure to him. 

In music most of us have the power of recalling a simple melody; andwho has not been tormented at times by an unbidden melody persistentlyhaunting his ears until he was almost ready to commit suicide? But torecall a melody at will _with any particular tone-color_, _i. E. _, toimagine it as being played by a flute, or a violin, or a horn, is muchless easy; and still more difficult is it to hear two or more notes_at once_ in the mind, that is to recall harmonies. It is for thisreason that people of primitive musical taste care only for operaswhich are full of "tunes. " These they can whistle in the street and behappy, while the harmonies and orchestral colors elude theircomprehension and memory. Consequently they call these works "heavy, ""scientific, " or "intellectual;" whereas if they took pains to educatetheir musical imaginations, they would soon revel in the magicharmonies of modern operas, with their infinite variety of gorgeousorchestral colors. 

Every student of music should carefully heed Schumann's advice. "Exercise your imagination, " he says, "so that you may acquire thepower of remembering not only the melody of a composition, but alsothe harmonies which accompany it. " And again he says, "You must notrest until you are able to understand music on paper. " I rememberthat, as a small boy, I used to wonder at my father, who often sat ina corner all the evening looking over the score of an opera orsymphony. And I was very much surprised at the time when he informedme that this simple reading of the score gave him almost as vivid apleasure as if he heard it with full orchestra. This power of hearingmusic with the eyes, as it were, is common to all thorough musicians, and is, of course, most highly developed in the great composers. Schumann even alludes to the opinion, which some one had expressed, that a thorough musician ought to be able, on listening for the firsttime to a complicated orchestral piece, to _see_ it bodily as a scorebefore his eyes. He adds, however, that this is the greatest feat thatcould be imagined; and I, for my part, doubt whether even themarvellously comprehensive mind of a musical genius would be able toaccomplish it. 

These facts illustrate the manner in which composers, being virtuosiof the musical imagination, are able to elaborate mentally, and keepin the memory, a complete operatic or symphonic score, just as, forexample, Alexander Dumas, when he wished to write a new novel, used tohire a yacht and sail on Southern waters for several days, lying onhis back--which, by the way, is an excellent method of starting atrain of thought--and thus arranging all the details of the plot inhis mind. 

The exact way in which _original_ ideas come into the mind is, ofcourse, a mystery in music as in literature. Every genius passesthrough a period of apprenticeship, in which he _assimilates_ thediscoveries of his predecessors, reminiscences of which make up thebulk of his early works. Everybody knows how Mozartish, _e. G. _, Beethoven's first symphony is, and how much in turn Mozart's earlyworks smack of Haydn. Gradually, as courage comes with years, thegifted composer sets out for unexplored forests and mountain ranges, attempting to scale summits which none of his predecessors had trod. Isay, as courage comes, for in music, strange to say, it requires muchcourage to give the world an entirely new thought. An originalcomposer needs not only the courage that is common to all explorers, but he must invariably come back prepared to face the accusation thathis new territory is nothing but a howling wilderness of discords. This has been the case quite recently with Wagner, as it was formerlywith Schumann, Beethoven, Mozart, the early Italian composers, andmany others, including even Rossini, who certainly did not deviatevery far from the beaten paths. Seyfried relates that when Beethovencame across articles in which he was criticised for violatingestablished rules of composition, he used to rub his hands gleefullyand burst out laughing. "Yes, yes!" he exclaimed, "that amazes them, and makes them put their heads together, because they have not seen itin any of their text-books. "

Fortunately for their own peace of mind, the majority of the minorcomposers never get beyond a mere rearrangement of remembered melodiesand modulations. Their minds are mere galleries of echoes. They writefor money or temporary notoriety, and not because their brains teemwith ideas that clamor for utterance. The pianist Hummel was one ofthis class of composers. But whatever his short-comings, he had atleast, as Wagner admits, the virtue of frankness. For when he wasasked one day what thoughts or images he had in his mind when hecomposed a certain concerto, he replied that he had been thinking ofthe eighty ducats which his publisher had promised him!

Yet even the greatest composers cannot always command new thoughts atwill, and it is therefore of interest to note what devices some ofthem resorted to rouse their dormant faculties. Weber's only pupil, Sir Julius Benedict, relates that Weber spent many mornings in"learning by heart the words of 'Euryanthe, ' which he studied until hemade them a portion of himself, his own creation, as it were. Hisgenius would sometimes lie dormant during his frequent repetitions ofthe words, and then the idea of a whole musical piece would flashupon his mind, like the bursting of light into darkness. "

I have already referred to the manner in which Weber, while composingcertain parts of the "Freischütz, " got his imagination into the properstate of creative frenzy by picturing to himself his bride as if shewere singing new arias for him. Now, in one of Wagner's essays thereis a curious passage which seems to indicate that Wagner habituallyconjured his characters before his mental vision and made them sing tohim, as it were, his original melodies. He advises a young composerwho wishes to follow his example never to select a dramatic characterfor whom he does not entertain a warm interest. "He should divest himof all theatrical apparel, " he continues, "and then imagine him in adim light, where he can only see the expression of his eyes. If thesespeak to him, the figure itself is liable presently to make amovement, which will perhaps alarm him--but to which he must submit;at last the phantom's lips tremble, it opens its mouth, and asupernatural voice tells him something that is entirely real, entirelytangible, but at the same time so extraordinary (similar, forinstance, to what the ghostly statue, or the page _Cherubin_ toldMozart) that it arouses him from his dream. The vision hasdisappeared; but his inner ear continues to hear; an idea hasoccurred to him, and this idea is a so-called musical _motive_. "

As this passage implies, and as he has elsewhere explained at length, Wagner looked on the mental process of composing as somethinganalogous to dreaming--as a sort of clairvoyance, which enables amusician to dive down into the bottomless mysteries of the universe, as it were, thence to bring up his priceless pearls of harmony. According to the Kant-Schopenhauer philosophy, of which Wagner was adisciple, objects or things in themselves do not exist in space andtime, which are mere forms under which the human mind beholds them. Wecannot conceive anything except as existing either in space or intime. But there is one exception, according to Wagner, and that isharmony. Harmony exists not in time, for the time-element in music ismelody; nor does it exist in space, for the simultaneousness of tonesis not one of extension or space. Hence our harmonic sense is nothampered by the forms of the mind, but gives us a glimpse of things asthey are in themselves--a glimpse of the world as a superior spiritwould behold it. And hence the mysterious superterrestrial characterof such new harmonies as we find in the works of Wagner andChopin--which are unintelligible to ordinary mortals, while to theinitiated they come as revelations of a new world. 

Without feeling the necessity of accepting all the consequences ofWagner's mystical doctrine, which I have thus freely paraphrased, noone can deny that the attitude of a composer in the moment ofinspiration is closely analogous to that known as clairvoyance. Thecelebrated vocalist, Vogel, tells an anecdote of Schubert which showsstrikingly how completely this composer used to be transported toanother world, and become oblivious of self, when creating. On oneoccasion Vogel received from Schubert some new songs, but beingotherwise occupied could not try them over at the moment. When he wasable to do so, he was particularly pleased with one of them, but as itwas too high for his voice, he had it copied in a lower key. About afortnight afterwards they were again making music together, and Vogelplaced the transposed song before Schubert on the desk of the piano. Schubert tried it through, liked it, and said, in his Vienna dialect, "I say, the song's not so bad; _whose is it?_" so completely, in afortnight, had it vanished from his mind. Grove recalls the fact thatSir Walter Scott once similarly attributed a song of his own to Byron;"but this was in 1828, after his mind had begun to fail. "

There is no reason for doubting Vogel's story when we bear in mind theenormous fertility of Schubert. He was unquestionably the mostspontaneous musical genius that ever lived. Vogel, who knew himintimately, used the very word _clairvoyance_ in referring to hisdivine inspirations, and Sir George Grove justly remarks that, "Inhearing Schubert's compositions, it is often as if one were broughtmore immediately and closely into contact with music itself, than isthe case in the works of others; as if in his pieces the stream fromthe great heavenly reservoir were dashing over us, or flowing throughus, more directly, with less admixture of any medium or channel, thanit does in those of any other writer--even of Beethoven himself. Andthis immediate communication with the origin of music really seems tohave happened to him. No sketches, no delay, no anxious period ofpreparation, no revision appear to have been necessary. He had but toread the poem, to surrender himself to the torrent, and to put downwhat was given him to say, as it rushed through his mind. "

Schubert was the most omnivorous song composer that ever lived. Hecould hardly see a poem--good, bad, or indifferent, without being atonce seized by a passionate desire to set it to music. He sometimeswrote half a dozen or more songs in one day, and some of themoriginated under the most peculiar circumstances. The serenade, "Hark, hark, the lark, " for instance, was written in a beer garden. Schuberthad picked up a volume of Shakespeare accidentally lying on thetable. Presently he exclaimed, "Such a lovely melody has come into myhead, if I only had some paper. " One of his friends drew a few staveson the back of a bill of fare, and on this Schubert wrote hisentrancing song. "The Wanderer, " so full of original details, waswritten in one evening, and when he composed his "Rastlose Liebe, ""the paroxysm of inspiration, " as Grove remarks, "was so fierce thatSchubert never forgot it, but, reticent as he often was, talked of ityears afterward. "

These stories remind one of an incident related by Goethe, who one daysuddenly found a poem spontaneously evolved in his mind, and socomplete that he ran to the desk and wrote it diagonally on a piece ofpaper, fearing it might escape him if he took time to arrange thepaper. 

In a word, Schubert _improvised with the pen_, and he seems to havebeen an exception to Schopenhauer's rule, that the greatest writersare those whose thoughts come to them before writing, and not whilewriting. Nevertheless, it must be admitted that much of the musicwhich Schubert composed in this rapid manner is poor stuff; andalthough his short songs are generally perfect in their way, hislonger compositions would have gained very much had he taken thetrouble to think them out beforehand, or to revise and condense themafterward, which he very rarely did. 

With a strange perversity and persistency, musical students and thepublic have been led to believe that the surest sign of suprememusical inspiration is the power to dash off melodies as fast as thepen can travel. Weber relates in his autobiographic sketch that hewrote the second act of one of his early operas in ten days, and adds, significantly, that this was "one of the many unfortunate results ofthe wonderful anecdotes about great masters, which make a deepimpression on youthful minds, and incite them to imitation. "

Mozart has always been pointed to by preference to show how a reallygreat master shakes his melodies from his sleeves, as it were. Yet, onreading Jahn's elaborate account of Mozart's life and works, nothingstrikes one more than the emphasis he places on the amount ofpreliminary labor which Mozart expended on his compositions, before hewrote them down. It appears to be a well-authenticated fact thatMozart postponed writing the overture to "Don Giovanni, " until themidnight preceding the evening when the opera was to be performed inpublic; and that at seven o'clock in the morning, the score was readyfor the copyist, although he had been drinking punch and was so sleepythat his wife had to allow him to doze for two hours, and kept himawake the rest of the time by telling him funny stories. But thisincident loses much of its marvellous character, when we bear in mindthat Mozart, according to his usual custom, must have had every bar ofthe overture worked out in his head, before he sat down to commit itto paper. This last labor was almost purely mechanical, and for thisreason, whenever he was engaged in writing down his scores, he notonly worked with amazing rapidity, but did not object to conversation, and even seemed to like it; and on one occasion when at work on anopera, he wrote as fast as his hands could travel, although in oneadjoining room there was a singing teacher, in another a violinist, and opposite an oboeist, all in full blast!

Mozart himself tried to correct the notion, prevalent even in his day, that he composed without effort--that melodies flowed from his mind aswater from a fountain. During one of the rehearsals of "Don Giovanni, "at Prague, he remarked to the leader of the orchestra: "I have sparedneither pains nor labor in order to produce something excellent forPrague. People are indeed mistaken in imagining that art has been aneasy matter to me. I assure you, my dear friend, no one has expendedso much labor on the study of composition as I have. There is hardly afamous master whose works I have not studied thoroughly andrepeatedly. "

Jahn surmises, doubtless correctly, that the reason why Mozarthabitually delayed putting down his pieces on paper, was because thisprocess, being a mere matter of copying, did not interest him so muchas the composing and creating, which were all done before he took upthe pen. "You know, " he writes to his father, "that I am immersed inmusic, as it were, that I am occupied with it all day long, that Ilike to study, speculate, reflect. " He was often absent-minded andeven followed his thoughts while playing billiards or nine pins, orriding. Like Beethoven, he walked up and down the room, absorbed inthought, even while washing his hands; and his hair-dresser used tocomplain that Mozart would never sit still, but would jump up everynow and then and walk across the room to jot down something, or touchthe piano, while _he_ had to run after him holding on to his pigtail. 

Allusion has been made to the fact that it was almost always in theopen air that new ideas sprouted in Mozart's mind, especially when hewas travelling. Whenever a new theme occurred to him he would jot itdown on a slip of paper, and he always had a special leather bag forpreserving these sketches, which he carefully guarded. These sketchesdiffer somewhat in appearance, but generally they contained the melodyor vocal part, together with the bass, and brief indications of themiddle parts, and here and there mention of a special instrument. This was sufficient subsequently to recall the whole composition tohis memory. In elaborating his scores he hardly ever made anydeviations from the original conception, not even in theinstrumentation; which seems the more remarkable when we reflect thathe was the originator of many new orchestral combinations, the beautyof which presented itself to his imagination before his ears had everheard them in actuality. These new tone-colors, as Jahn remarks, existed intrinsically in the orchestra as a statue does in the marble;but it remained for the artist to bring them out; and that Mozart wasbound to have them is shown by the anecdote of a musician whocomplained to him of the difficulty of a certain passage, and beggedhim to alter it. "Is it possible to play those tones on yourinstrument?" Mozart asked; and when he was told it was, he replied, "Then it is your affair to bring them out. "

Beethoven's way of mental composing appears at first sight to differwidely from Mozart's. But if we had as many specimens of Mozart'spreliminary sketches as we have of Beethoven's, the difference wouldperhaps appear less pronounced, and would to a large extent resolveitself into the fact that Beethoven did not trust his memory so muchas Mozart did, and therefore put more of his _tentative_, or roughsketches, on paper. He always carried in his pockets a few loosesheets of music paper, or a number of sheets bound together in anote-book. If his supply gave out accidentally, he would seize uponany loose sheet of paper, or even a bill of fare, to note down histhoughts. In a corner of his room lay a large pile of note-books, intowhich he had copied in ink his first rough pencil-sketches. Many ofthese sketch-books have been fortunately preserved, and they are amongthe most remarkable relics we have of any man of genius. They proveabove all things that rapidity of work is not a test of musicalinspiration, and that Carlyle was not entirely wrong when he definedgenius as "an immense capacity for taking trouble. " In the "Fidelio"sketch-book, for example, sixteen pages are almost entirely filledwith sketches for a scene which takes up less than three pages of thevocal score. Of the aria, "O Hoffnung, " there are as many as eighteendifferent versions, and of the final chorus, ten; and these are notexceptional cases by any means. As Thayer remarks: "To follow arecitative or aria through all its guises is an extremely fatiguingtask, and the almost countless studies for a duet or terzet are enoughto make one frantic. " Thayer quotes Jahn's testimony that theseafterthoughts are invariably superior to the first conception, andadds that "some of his first ideas for pieces which are now among thejewels of the opera are so extremely trivial and commonplace, that onewould hardly dare to attribute them to Beethoven, were they not inhis own handwriting. "

On the other hand these sketch-books bear witness to the extremefertility of Beethoven's genius. Thayer estimates that the number ofdistinct ideas noted in them, which remained unused, is as large asthe number which he used; and he refers to this as a commentary on theremark which Beethoven made toward the close of his life: "It seems tome as if I were only just beginning to compose. " And Nottebohm, whohas studied these sketch-books more thoroughly than any one else, thinks that if Beethoven had elaborated all the symphonies which hebegan in these books we should have at least fifty instead of nine. 

The sketch-books show that Beethoven was in the habit of working atseveral compositions at the same time; and the ideas for these are sojumbled up in his books that he himself apparently needed a guide tofind them. At least, when ideas belonging together are widelyseparated he used to connect them by writing the letters VI over thefirst passage and DE over the second. He also used to write the word"better" in French on some pages, or else the figures 100, 500, 1, 000, etc. , probably, as Schindler thinks, to indicate the relative value ofcertain ideas. 

When his mind was in a creative mood, Beethoven was as completelyabsorbed (or "absent-minded, " as we generally say) as Mozart. This isillustrated by an amusing trait described by his biographers. "Beethoven was extremely fond of washing. He would pour waterbackwards and forwards over his hands for a long time together, and ifat such times a musical thought struck him and he became absorbed, hewould go on until the whole floor was swimming, and the water hadfound its way through the ceiling into the room beneath" (Grove). Consequently, as may be imagined, he not infrequently had trouble withhis landlord. He was constantly changing his lodgings, and alwaysspent the summer in the country, where he did his best work. "In thewinter, " he once remarked to Rellstab, "I do but little; I only writeout and score what I have composed in the summer. But that takes along time. When I get into the country I am fit for anything. "

On account of his deafness, Beethoven affords a striking instance ofthe power musicians have of imagining novel sound effects which theynever could have heard with their ears. In literature we blame awriter who, as the expression goes, "evolves his facts from his innerconsciousness;" but in music this proceeding is evidence of thehighest genius, because music has only a few elementary "facts" orprototypes, in nature. Beethoven was deaf at thirty-two. He neverheard his "Fidelio, " and for twenty-five years he could hear musiconly with the inner ear. But musicians are in one respect morefortunate than painters. If Titian had lost his eyesight, he couldnever have painted another picture; whereas Beethoven after losing hisprincipal sense still continued to compose, better than ever. Mr. Thayer even thinks that from a purely artistic point of viewBeethoven's deafness may have been an advantage to him; for itcompelled him to concentrate all his thoughts on the symphonies in hishead, undisturbed by the harsh noises of the external world. And thathe did not forego the _delights_ of music is obvious from the factthat the pleasure of creating is more intense than the pleasure ofhearing; and is, moreover illustrated by the great delight he felt inhis later years when he read the compositions of Schubert (for hecould not hear them) and found in them the evidence of genius, whichhe did not hesitate to proclaim. 

In considering Beethoven's deafness, it is well to bear in mind thewords of Schopenhauer: "Genius is its own reward, " he says. "If welook up to a great man of the past we do not think, How fortunate heis to be still admired by all of us; but, How happy he must have beenin the immediate enjoyment of a mind the traces of which refreshgenerations of men. " Schumann, Weber, and others, repeatedly testifyin their letters to the great delight they felt in creating; and atthe time when he was arranging his "Freischütz" for the piano, Weberwrote, more forcibly than elegantly, that he was enjoying himself likethe devil. 

I have already stated that Weber, like Beethoven, generally got hisnew ideas during his walks in the country; and riding in an opencarriage seems to have especially stimulated his brain, as it didMozart's. The weird and original music to the dismal Wolf's-Glen scenein the "Freischütz" was conceived one morning when he was on his wayto Pillnitz, and the wagon was occasionally shrouded in dense clouds. 

A curious story is told by a member of Weber's orchestra, showing howa musical theme may be sometimes suggested by incongruous andgrotesque objects. He was one day taking a walk with Weber in thesuburbs of Dresden. It began to rain and they entered a beer gardenwhich had just been deserted by the guests in consequence of the rain. The waiters had piled the chairs on the tables, pell mell. At sight ofthese confused groups of chairs and tables Weber suddenly exclaimed, "Look here, Roth, doesn't that look like a great triumphal march?Thunder! hear those trumpet blasts! I can use that--I can use that!"In the evening he wrote down what his imagination had heard, and itsubsequently became the great march in "Oberon. "

Some psychological interest also attaches to the remark with whichWeber's son prefaces this story--namely that Weber was constantlytransmuting forms and colors into sounds; and that lines and formsseemed to stimulate his melodic inventiveness pre-eminently, whereassounds affected his harmonic sense. 

My subject is by no means exhausted, but for fear of fatiguing thereader with an excess of details I will close with a few factsregarding Richard Wagner's method of composing. I am indebted forthese facts to the kindness of Herr Seidl, of the Metropolitan OperaHouse in New York, who was Wagner's secretary for several years, andhelped him prepare "Götterdämmerung" and "Parsifal" for the press. 

Like his famous predecessors, Wagner always carried some sheets ofmusic paper in his pocket, on which he jotted down with a pencil suchideas as came to him on solitary walks, or at other times. These hegave to his wife, who inked them over and arranged them in piles. Inthese sketches the vocal part was always written out in full, whilethe orchestral part was roughly indicated in two or more additionalstaves. Frau Cosima has preserved most of these sketches, and theywill doubtless some day be reproduced in fac-simile, like some ofBeethoven's. 

Whenever Wagner was in the mood for composing he would say to HerrSeidl, "Bring me my sketches. " Then he would retire to his composingroom, to which no one was ever admitted, not even his wife andchildren. At lunch-time, the servant would bring something to theante-room, without being allowed to see the master in his sanctum. HowWagner conducted himself there is not known, except that strange vocalsounds, and a few passionate chords on the piano would occasionallyreach the ears of neighbors. Wagner appears to have used his pianojust as Beethoven did his, even after he had become deaf:--as a sortof lightning-rod for his fervent emotions. 

Much nonsense has been written concerning the fact that Wagner used towear gaudy costumes of silk and satin while he was composing, and thathe had colored glass in his windows, which gave every object amysterious aspect. He was called an imitator of the eccentric King ofBavaria, and some went so far as to declare him insane. But in truth, Wagner was simply endeavoring to put himself into an atmosphere mostfavorable for dramatic creation. We all know how much clothes help tomake a man, in more than one sense; and any one who has ever takenpart in private theatricals will remember how much the costume helpedhim to get into the proper frame of mind for interpreting his rôle. This was all that Wagner aimed at in wearing his mediæval costumes;and the wonderful realism and vividness of his dramatic conceptionscertainly more than justify the unusual methods he pursued to attainthem. 

After elaborating the melodic, harmonic, and rhythmic details of hisscores, Wagner considered his main task done, and the orchestrationwas completed down-stairs in his music room. In his earliest operasWagner did not write his scenes in their regular order, but took thosefirst which specially proffered themselves. Of the "Flying Dutchman, "for instance, he wrote the spinning chorus first, and he was delightedto find on this occasion, as he himself says, that he could stillcompose after a long interruption. He used a piano but rather tostimulate and correct than to invent. In his later works the piano isabsolutely out of the question. He wrote the music, scene after scene, following the text; and the conception of the whole score is soabsolutely orchestral that the piano cannot even give as faint anotion of it as a photograph can give of the splendors of a Titian. Wagner, as he himself tells us, was unable to play his scores on thepiano, but always tried to get Liszt to do that for him. 

It is possible that some of my readers have never seen a fullorchestral score of "Siegfried" or "Tristan. " If so, I advise them togo to a music store and look at one as a matter of curiosity. Theywill find a large quarto volume, every page of which represents onlyone line of music. There are separate staves for the violins, violas, cellos, double basses, flutes, bassoons, clarinets, horns, tubas, trombones, kettle-drums, etc. , each family forming a quartette initself, and each having its own peculiar emotional quality. Inconducting an opera the Kapellmeister has to keep his eye and ear atthe same time on each of these groups, as well as on the vocal partsand scenic effects. If this requires a talent rarely found amongmusicians, how very much greater must be the mind which created thiscomplicated operatic score! No one who tries to realize what thisimplies, and remembers that Wagner wrote several of his best musicdramas among the mountains of Switzerland, years before he could dreamof ever hearing the countless new harmonies and orchestral tone-colorswhich he had discovered, can deny, I think, that I was right inmaintaining that the composing of an opera is the most wonderfulachievement of human genius. 

III

SCHUMANN

AS MIRRORED IN HIS LETTERS

Clara Schumann, the most gifted woman that has ever chosen music as aprofession, and who, at the age of sixty-nine, still continues to beamong the most fascinating of pianists, placed the musical world underadditional obligations when she issued three years ago the collectionof private letters, written by Schumann between the ages of eighteenand thirty (1827-40), partly to her, partly to his mother, and otherrelatives, friends, and business associates. She was prompted to thisact not only by the consciousness that there are many literary gems inthe correspondence which should not be lost to the world, but by thethought that more is generally known of Schumann's eccentricities thanof his real traits of character. Inasmuch as a wretched script was oneof the most conspicuous of these eccentricities, it is fortunate thathis wife lived to edit his letters; but even she, though familiar withhis handwriting during many years of courtship and marriage, was notinfrequently obliged to interpolate a conjectural word. Schumann hada genuine vein of humor, which he reveals in his correspondence as inhis compositions and criticisms. He was aware that his manuscript wasnot a model of caligraphy, but, on being remonstrated with, hepassionately declared he could not do any better, promising, however, sarcastically that, as a predestined diplomat, he would keep anamanuensis in future. And on page 245 begins a long letter to Clarawhich presents a curious appearance. Every twentieth word or so isplaced between two vertical lines, regarding which the reader is keptin the dark until he comes to this postscript: "In great haste, owingto business affairs, I add a sort of lexicon of indistinctly writtenwords, which I have placed within brackets. This will probably makethe letter appear very picturesque and piquant. The idea is not sobad. Adio, clarissima Cara, cara Clarissima. " Then follows the"lexicon" of twenty words, including his own signature. 

Although, in a semi-humorous vein, Schumann repeatedly alludes inthese letters to the "foregone conclusion" that they will some day beprinted, there is hardly any indication that such a thought was everin his mind while writing them. They are, in fact, full of confidencesand confessions, some of which he could not have been very ambitiousto see in print; such as his frequent appeals for "more ducats, "during his student days, and his sophistically ingenious excuses forneeding so much money, placed side by side with his frank admissionthat he had no talent for economy, and was very fond of cigars, wine, and especially travelling. In one of the most amusing of the letters, he advances twelve reasons why his mother should send him about $200to enable him to see Switzerland and Italy. As a last, convincingargument, he gently hints that it is very easy for a student inHeidelberg to borrow money at 10 per cent. Interest. He got the moneyand enjoyed his Swiss tour, mostly on foot and alone; but in Italyvarious misfortunes overtook him--he fell ill, his money ran out, andhe was only too glad to return to Heidelberg in the same condition aswhen he had first arrived there, on which occasion the state of hispurse compelled him to make the last part of the journey from Leipsicon foot. 

On this trip he enjoyed that unique emotional thrill of the German, the first sight of the Rhine, with which he was so enchanted that hewent to the extreme forward end of the deck, smoking a good cigargiven him by an Englishman: "Thus I sat alone all the afternoon, revelling in the wild storm which ploughed through my hair, andcomposing a poem of praise to the Northeast wind"--for Schumann oftenindulged in poetic efforts, especially when inspired to flights offancy by his favorite author, Jean Paul. 

At Heidelberg, which he called "ein ganzes Paradies von Natur, " hespent one of the happiest years of his life. Student life at this townhe thus compares with Leipsic:

"In and near Heidelberg the student is the most prominent andrespected individual, since it is he who supports the town, so thatthe citizens and Philistines are naturally excessively courteous. Iconsider it a disadvantage for a young man, especially for a student, to live in a town where the student only and solely rules andflourishes. Repression alone favors the free development of a youth, and the everlasting loafing with students greatly limitsmany-sidedness of thought, and consequently exerts a bad influence onpractical life. This is one great advantage Leipsic has overHeidelberg--which, in fact, a large city always has over a smallone. . . . On the other hand, Heidelberg has this advantage, that thegrandeur and beauty of the natural scenery prevent the students fromspending so much of their time in drinking; for which reason thestudents here are ten times more sober than in Leipsic. "

Schumann himself, as we have said, was fond of a glass of good wine. On his first journey, at Prague, he tells us, the Tokay made himhappy. And in another place he exclaims, "Every day I should like todrink champagne to excite myself. " But, though of a solitarydisposition, he did not care to drink alone, for "only in the intimatecircle of sympathetic hearts does the vine's blood become transfusedinto our own and warm it to enthusiasm. " Schumann's special vice wasthe constant smoking of very strong cigars; nor does he appear to havedevoted to gastronomic matters the attention necessary to nourish suchan abnormally active brain as his. At one time he lived on potatoesalone for several weeks; at another he saved on his meals to get moneyfor French lessons; and although he took enough interest in a good_menu_ to copy it in a letter, he repeatedly laments the time which isuselessly wasted in eating. Such tenets, combined with his smokinghabit, doubtless helped to shatter his powers, leading finally to thelunatic asylum and a comparatively early death. 

His frequent fits of melancholy may also perhaps be traced in part tothese early habits. Though probably unacquainted with Burton, he heldthat "there is in melancholy sentiments something extremely attractiveand even invigorating to the imagination. " Attempts were frequentlymade by his friends to teach him more sociable habits. Thus, atLeipsic, "Dr. Carus's family are anxious to introduce me toinnumerable families--'it would be good for my prospects, ' theythink, and so do I, and yet I don't get there, and in fact seldom goout at all. Indeed, I am often very leathery, dry, disagreeable, andlaugh much inwardly. " That his apparent coldness and indifference tohis neighbors and friends were due chiefly to his absorption in hisworld of ideas, and his consequent want of sympathy with theartificial usages of society, becomes apparent from this confession, written to Clara in 1838:

"I should like to confide to you many other things regarding mycharacter--how people often wonder that I meet the warmest expressionsof love with coldness and reserve, and often offend and humiliateprecisely those who are most sincerely devoted to me. Often have Iqueried and reproached myself for this, for inwardly I acknowledgeeven the most trifling favor, understand every wink, every subtletrait in the heart of another, and yet I so often blunder in what Isay and do. "

In these melancholy moods nature was his refuge and consolation. He objected to Leipsic because there were no delights ofnature--"everything artificially transformed; no valley, no mountain, where I might revel in my thoughts; no place where I can be alone, except in the bolted room, with the eternal noise and turmoil below. "Although he had but a few intimate friends, he was liked by all thestudents, and even enjoyed the name of "a favorite of the Heidelbergpublic. " One of his intimate friends was Flechsig, but even of him heparadoxically complains that he is too sympathetic: "He never cheersme up; if I am occasionally in a melancholy mood, he ought not to bethe same, and he ought to have sufficient humanity to stir me up. That I often need cheering up, I know very well. " Yet he was as oftenin a state of extreme happiness and enjoyment of life and histalents. He even, on occasion, indulged in students' pranks. On hisjourney to Heidelberg he induced the postilion to let him take thereins: "Thunder! how the horses ran, and how extravagantly happy Iwas, and how we stopped at every tavern to get fodder, and how Ientertained the whole company, and how sorry they all were when Iparted from them at Wiesbaden!!" At Frankfort, one morning, hewrites: "I felt an extraordinary longing to play on a piano. So Icalmly went to the nearest dealer, told him I was the tutor of ayoung English lord who wished to buy a grand piano, and then Iplayed, to the wonder and delight of the bystanders, for three hours. I promised to return in two days and inform them if the lord wantedthe instrument; but on that date I was at Rüdesheim, drinkingRüdesheimer. " In another place he gives an account of "a sceneworthy of Van Dyck, and a most genial evening" he spent with somestudents at a tavern filled with peasants. They had some grog, and atthe request of the peasants one of the students declaimed, andSchumann played. Then a dance was arranged. "The peasants beat timewith their feet. We were in high spirits, and danced dizzily amongthe peasant feet, and finally took a touching farewell of the companyby giving all the peasant girls, Minchen, etc. , smacking kisses onthe lips. "

Were women, like men, afflicted with retrospective jealousy, Schumann's widow, in editing these letters, would have received a pangfrom many other passages revealing Schumann's fondness for the fairsex. He allowed no good-looking woman to pass him on the streetwithout taking the opportunity to cultivate his sense of beauty. Afterhis engagement to Clara he gives her fair warning that he has the"very mischievous habit" of being a great admirer of beautiful womenand girls. "They make me positively smirk, and I swim in panegyrics onyour sex. Consequently, if at some future time we walk along thestreets of Vienna and meet a beauty, and I exclaim, 'Oh, Clara! seethis heavenly vision, ' or something of the sort, you must not bealarmed nor scold me. " He had a number of transient passions before hediscovered that Clara was his only true love. There was Nanni, his"guardian angel, " who saved him from the perils of the world andhovered before his vision like a saint. "I feel like kneeling beforeher and adoring her like a Madonna. " But Nanni had a dangerous rivalin Liddy. Not long, however, for he found Liddy silly, cold as marble, and--fatal defect--she could not sympathize with him regarding JeanPaul. "The exalted image of my ideal disappears when I think of theremarks she made about Jean Paul. Let the dead rest in peace. "

Several of his flames are not alluded to in this correspondence. Onhis travels he appears to have had the habit of noting down in hisdiary the prevalence and peculiarities of feminine beauty. Hecomplains that from Mainz to Heidelberg he "did not see a singlepretty face. " Yet, as a whole, the Rhine maidens seem to have won hisadmiration:

"What characteristic faces among the lowest classes! On the west shoreof the Rhine the girls have very delicate features, indicatingamiability rather than intelligence; the noses are mostly Greek, theface very oval and artistically symmetrical, the hair brown; I did notsee a single blonde. The complexion is soft, delicate, with more whitethan red; melancholy rather than sanguine. The Frankfort girls, on theother hand, have in common a sisterly trait--the character of German, manly, sad earnestness which we often find in our quondam freecities, and which toward the east gradually merges into a gentlesoftness. Characteristic are the faces of all the Frankfort girls:intellectual or beautiful few of them; the noses mostly Greek, oftensnub-noses; the dialect I did not like. "

The English type of beauty appears to have especially won hisapproval. "When she spoke it sounded like the whispering of angels, "he says of an Englishwoman, "as pretty as a picture, " whom he met. Elsewhere he says, laconically: "On the 24th I arrived at Mainz withthe steamer, in company with twenty to thirty English men and women. Next day the number of English increased to fifty. If I ever marry, itmust be an English woman. " Some years later, however, with thefickleness of genius, he writes about Ernestine, the daughter of arich Bohemian Baron, "a delightfully innocent, childish soul, tenderand pensive, attached to me and to everything artistic by the mostsincere love, extremely musical--in short, just the kind of a girl Icould wish to marry. " He did become engaged to her, but the followingyear the engagement was dissolved; and soon after this he discoveredthat his artistic admiration for Clara Wieck had assumed the form oflove. Although her father opposed their union several years, onaccount of Schumann's poverty, the young couple often met, and notonly in the music-room. In 1833 he writes to his mother regardingClara: "The other day, when we went to Connewitz (we take a two orthree hours' walk almost daily), I heard her say to herself, 'Howhappy I am! how happy!' Who would not like to hear that! On this roadthere are a number of very useless stones in the midst of thefootpath. Now, as it happens in conversation that I more frequentlylook up than down, she always walks behind me and gently pulls my coatat every stone, lest I may fall. "

It was most fortunate for Schumann that his bride and wife was one ofthe greatest living pianists. For, owing to the accident to his hand, though he could still improvise, he could not appear in public tointerpret his own compositions, which depended so much for theirsuccess on a sympathetic performance, since they differed so greatlyfrom the prevalent style of Hummel and the classical masters, thateven so gifted a musician as Mendelssohn failed to understand them. But Clara made it the task of her life to secure him recognition, andthis was an additional bond that united their souls. "When you aremine, " he writes, "you will occasionally hear something new from me; Ibelieve you will often inspire me, and the mere fact that I shall thenfrequently hear my own compositions will cheer me up;" and: "YourRomance showed me once more that we must become man and wife. Everyone of your thoughts comes from my soul, even as I owe all my musicto you. " To Dorn he writes that many of his compositions, includingthe Noveletten, the Kreisleriana, and the Kinderscenen, were inspiredby Clara; and it is well known that his love became the incentive tothe composition, in one year, of over a hundred wonderful songs--hisprevious compositions, up to 1840, having all been for the pianoalone. In the last letter of this collection he says: "Sometimes itappears to me as if I were treading entirely new paths in music;" andthere are many other passages showing that he realized well that thevery things which his contemporaries criticised and decried aseccentric and obscure (Hummel, _e. G. _, objects to his frequent changesof harmony and his originality!), were really his most inspiredefforts. Though he never allowed the desire for popularity toinfluence his work, yet he occasionally craves appreciation. "I amwilling to confess that I should be greatly pleased if I could succeedin composing something which would impel the public, after hearing youplay it, to run against the walls in their delight; for vain wecomposers are, even though we have no reason to be so. " It must havegiven him a strange shock when an amateur asked him, at one of hiswife's concerts in Vienna, if he also was musical!

In her efforts to win appreciation for her husband, Clara was noblyassisted by Liszt. Just like Wagner, Schumann was not at first veryfavorably impressed with Liszt, owing to the sensational flavor of hisearly performances. But he soon changed his mind, especially whenLiszt played some of his (Schumann's) compositions. "Many things weredifferent from my conception of them, but always '_genial_, ' andmarked by a tenderness and boldness of expression which even hepresumably has not at his command every day. Becker was the only otherperson present, and he had tears in his eyes. " And two days later:"But I must tell you that Liszt appears to me grander every day. Thismorning he again played at Raimund Härtel's, in a way to make us alltremble and rejoice, some études of Chopin, a number of the Rossinisoirées, and other things. " Of other contemporary pianists Hummel, "ten years behind the time, " and Thalberg, whom he liked better aspianist than as composer, are alluded to. Yet he writes in 1830 thathe intends going to Weimar, "for the sly reason of being able to _callmyself_ a pupil of Hummel. " Wieck, his father-in-law, he esteemedgreatly as teacher and adviser, but it offended him deeply that Wieckshould have followed the common error of estimating genius with ayard-stick, and asked where were his "Don Juan" and his "Freischütz?"His enthusiasm for Schubert, Chopin, and especially for Bach, findsfrequent expression. Bach's "Well-Tempered Clavichord" he declares ishis "grammar, and the best of all grammars. The fugues I haveanalyzed successively to the minutest details; the advantage resultingfrom this is great, and has a morally bracing effect on the wholesystem, for Bach was a man through and through; in him there isnothing done by halves, nothing morbid, but all is written for timeeternal. " Six years later: "Bach is my daily bread; from him I derivegratification and get new ideas--'compared with him we are allchildren, ' Beethoven has said, I believe. " One day a caller remarkedthat Bach was old and wrote in old-fashioned manner: "But I told himhe was neither old nor new, but much more than that, namely, eternal. I came near losing my temper. " Concerning the unappreciativeMendelssohn, he writes to Clara:

"I am told that he is not well disposed toward me. I should feel sorryif that were true, since I am conscious of having preserved noblesentiments toward him. If you know anything let me hear it onoccasion; that will at least make me cautious, and I do not wish tosquander anything where I am ill-spoken of. Concerning my relationstoward him as a musician [1838], I am quite aware that I could learnof him for years; but he, too, some things of me. Brought up undersimilar circumstances, destined for music from childhood, I wouldsurpass you all--that I feel from the energy of my inventive powers. "

Concerning this energy he says, some time after this, when he hadjust finished a dozen songs: "Again I have composed so much that I amsometimes visited by a mysterious feeling. Alas! I cannot help it. Icould wish to sing myself to death, like a nightingale. "

One of the most interesting bits of information contained in thiscorrespondence is that, when quite a young man, Schumann commenced atreatise on musical æsthetics. In view of the many epoch-makingthoughts contained in his two volumes of collected criticisms, it isvery much to be regretted that this plan was not carried out. On onequestion of musical psychology light is thrown by several of theseletters. Like many other composers, it seems that Schumann often, ifnot generally, had some pictorial image or event in his mind incomposing. "When I composed my first songs, " he writes to Clara, "Iwas entirely within you. Without such a bride one cannot write suchmusic. " "I am affected by everything that goes on in theworld--politics, literature, mankind. In my own manner I meditate oneverything, which then seeks utterance in music. That is why many ofmy compositions are so difficult to understand, because they relate toremote affairs; and often significant, because all that's remarkablein our time affects me, and I have to give it expression in musicallanguage. " One of the letters to Clara begins: "Tell me what the firstpart of the Fantasia suggests to you. Does it not bring many picturesbefore your mind?" Concerning the "Phantasiestücke" he writes: "Whenthey were finished I was delighted to find the story of Hero andLeander in them. . . . Tell me if you, too, find this picture fitting themusic. " "The Papillons, " he says once more, are intended to be amusical translation of the final scene in Jean Paul's "Flegeljahre. "

Believers in telepathy will be interested in the following additionalinstance of composing with a visual object in mind: "I wrote to youconcerning a presentiment; it occurred to me on the days from March24th to 27th, when I was at work on my new composition. There is aplace in it to which I constantly recurred; it is as if some onesighed, 'Ach, Gott!' from the bottom of his heart. While composing, Iconstantly saw funeral processions, coffins, unhappy people indespair; and when I had finished, and long searched for a title, theword 'corpse-fantasia' continually obtruded itself. Is not thatremarkable? During the composition, moreover, I was often so deeplyaffected that tears came to my eyes, and yet I knew not why and had noreason--till Theresa's letter arrived, which made everything clear. "His brother was on his death-bed. 

 * * * * *

The collection of Schumann's letters so far under consideration metwith such a favorable reception that a second edition was soon calledfor, and this circumstance no doubt promoted the publication of asecond series, extending to 1854, two years before Schumann's saddeath in the lunatic asylum near Bonn. This second volume includes aconsiderable number of business letters to his several publishers. Inone of these he confides to Dr. Härtel his plan of collecting andrevising his musical criticisms, and publishing them in two volumes. But as this letter was, a few months later, followed by a similar oneaddressed to the publisher Wigand, who subsequently printed theessays, it is to be inferred that Breitkopf & Härtel, though assuredof the future of Schumann's compositions, doubted the financial valueof his musical essays--an attitude pardonable at a time when there wasstill a ludicrous popular prejudice against literary utterances by amusician. In 1883, however, after Wigand had issued a third edition ofthe "Collected Writings on Music and Musicians" (which have also beentranslated into English by Mrs. Ritter), Breitkopf & Härtel atoned fortheir error by purchasing the copyright. 

Schumann's letters to his publishers show that he used to suggest hisown terms, which were commonly acceded to without protest. For hisfamous quintet he asked twenty louis d'or, or about $100; for"Paradise and the Peri, " $500; the piano concerto, $125; Liederalbum, op. 79, $200; "Manfred, " $250. He frequently emphasizes his desire tohave his compositions printed in an attractive style, and in 1839writes to Härtel that he cannot describe his pleasure on receiving the"Scenes of Childhood. " "It is the most charming specimen of musicaltypography I have ever seen. " The few misprints he discovers in it hefrankly attributes to his MS. In a letter to his friend Rosen hewrites that "it must be a deucedly comic pleasure to read mySanskrit. " But his musical handwriting appears to have been nearer toSanskrit than his epistolary, if we may judge by the specimenfac-similes printed in Naumann's "History of Music. "

The promptness with which all the leading music publishers of Germanyissued complete editions of Schumann's vocal and pianofortecompositions, as soon as the copyright had expired, shows howprofitable they must be. But during his lifetime it was quiteotherwise, and in a letter to Kossmaly he adduces the following fourreasons for this state of affairs: "(1) inherent difficulties of formand contents; (2) because, not being a virtuoso, I cannot perform themin public; (3) because I am the editor of my musical paper, in which Icould not allude to them; (4) because Fink is editor of the otherpaper, and would not allude to them. " Elsewhere he remarks, concerningthis rival editor: "It is really most contemptible on Fink's part notto have mentioned a single one of my pianoforte compositions in nine[seven] years, although they are always of such a character that it isimpossible to overlook them. It is not for my name's sake that I amannoyed, but because I know what the future course of music is to be. "It was in behalf of this tendency that he toiled on his paper, whichat first barely paid its expenses, having only 500 subscribers severalyears after its foundation. And he not only avoided puffing his owncompositions, but even inserted a contribution by his friend Kossmalyin which he was placed in the second rank of vocal composers! Yet, though he printed the article, he complains about it in a privateletter: "In your article on the Lied, I was a little grieved that youplaced me in the _second_ class. I do not lay claim to the first, butI think I have a claim to a place of _my own_, and least of all do Iwish to see myself associated with Reissiger, Curschmann, etc. I knowthat my aims, my resources, are far beyond theirs, and I hope you willconcede this and not accuse me of vanity, which is far from me. "

Many of the letters in the present collection are concerned with theaffairs of Schumann's paper, the _Neue Zeitschrift für Musik_, detailing his plans for removing it to a larger city than Leipsic, andthe atrocious red-tape difficulties and delays he was subjected towhen he finally did transfer it to Vienna. Although the paper wasexclusively devoted to music, the _Censur_ apparently took three orfour months to make up its mind whether the state was in danger or notfrom the immigration of a new musical periodical. The editor confessesthat he did not find as much sympathy as he had expected in Vienna;yet the city--as he writes some years later at Düsseldorf--"continuesto attract one, as if the spirits of the departed great masters werestill visible, and as if it were the real musical home of Germany. ""Eating and drinking here are incomparable. You would be delightedwith the Opera. Such singers and such an _ensemble_ we do not have. ""The admirable Opera is a great treat for me, especially the chorusand orchestra. Of such things we have _no conception_ in Leipsic. Theballet would also amuse you. " "A more encouraging public it would bedifficult to find anywhere; it is really too encouraging--in thetheatre one hears more applause than music. It is very merry, but itannoys me occasionally. " "But I assure you confidentially that longand alone I should not care to live here; serious men and affairs arehere in little demand and little appreciated. A compensation for thisis found in the beautiful surroundings. Yesterday I was in thecemetery where Beethoven and Schubert are buried. Just think what Ifound on Beethoven's grave: _a pen_, and, what is more, a steel pen. It was a happy omen for me and I shall preserve it religiously. " OnSchubert's grave he found nothing, but in the city he found Schubert'sbrother, a poor man with eight children and no possessions but anumber of his brother's manuscripts, including "a few operas, fourgreat masses, four or five symphonies, and many other things. " Heimmediately wrote to Breitkopf & Härtel to make arrangements for theirpublication. 

It is anything but complimentary to the discernment of Viennesepublishers and musicians of that period that, eleven years afterSchubert's death, another composer had to come from Leipsic and giveto the world the works of a colleague who not only had genius of thepurest water, but the gift of giving utterance to his musical ideas ina clear style, intelligible to the public. Schubert died in 1828, andin 1842 Schumann could still write to one of his contributors: "It istime, it seems to me, that some one should write something weighty inbehalf of Schubert; doesn't this tempt you? True, his larger works arenot yet in print. But his vocal and pianoforte compositions sufficefor an approximate portrait. Consider the matter. Do you know hissymphony in C? A delightful composition, somewhat long, butextraordinarily animated, in character entirely new. " To a Belgianfriend who intended to write an article on the new tendencies inpianoforte music, he wrote: "Of older composers who have influencedmodern music I must name above all Franz Schubert. . . . Schubert's songsare well known, but his pianoforte compositions (especially those forfour hands) I rate at least equally high. "

Of the numerous criticisms of well-known composers contained in thiscorrespondence, a few more may be cited. They are mostly favorable intone, but concerning the "Prophète" he writes: "The music appears to mevery poor; I cannot find words to express my aversion to it. ""Lortzing's operas meet with success--to me almost incomprehensible. "To Carl Reinecke he writes that he is "no friend of song-transcriptions(for piano), and of Liszt's some are a real abomination to me. " Hecommends Reinecke's efforts in this direction because they are freefrom pepper and sauce _à la_ Liszt. Nevertheless, those of Liszt'ssong-transcriptions in which he did not indulge in too much bravuraornamentation are models of musical translation, and the collection offorty-two songs published by Breitkopf & Härtel should be in everypianist's library. "Of Chopin, " he writes in 1836, "I have a new ballad[G minor]. It seems to me to be his most enchanting (though not most_genial_) work; I told him, too, that I liked it best of all hiscompositions. After a long pause and reflection he said: 'I am glad youthink so, it is also my favorite. ' He also played for me a number ofnew études, nocturnes, mazurkas--everything in an incomparable style. It is touching to see him at the piano. You would be very fond of him. Yet Clara is more of a _virtuoso_, and gives almost more significanceto his compositions than he does himself. "

Brendel having sent him some of Palestrina's music, he writes that "itreally sounds sometimes like music of the spheres--and what art at thesame time! I am convinced he is the greatest musical genius Italy hasproduced. " Nineteen years previous to this he had written fromBrescia: "Were not the Italian language itself a kind of eternal music(the Count aptly called it a long-drawn-out A-minor chord), I shouldnot hear anything rational. Of the ardor with which they play, you canform no more conception than of their slovenliness and lack ofelegance and precision. " Handel appears to be mentioned only once inall of Schumann's correspondence ("I consider 'Israel in Egypt' theideal of a choral work"), but Bach is always on his tongue. Thefollowing is one of the profoundest criticisms ever written: "Mozartand Haydn knew of Bach only a few pages and passages, and the effectwhich Bach, if they had known him in all his greatness, would have hadon them, is incalculable. The harmonic depth, the poetic and humorousqualities of modern music have their source chiefly in Bach:Mendelssohn, Bennett, Chopin, Hiller, all the so-called Romanticists(I mean those of the German school) _approximate in their music muchcloser to Bach than to Mozart_. "

To Wagner there are several references, betraying a most remarkablestruggle between critical honesty and professional jealousy. Thus, in1845, Schumann writes to Mendelssohn of "Tannhäuser:"

"Wagner has just finished a new opera--no doubt a clever fellow, fullof eccentric notions, and bold beyond measure. The aristocracy isstill in raptures over him on account of his 'Rienzi, ' but in realityhe cannot conceive or write four consecutive bars of good or evencorrect music. What all these composers lack is the art of writingpure harmonies and four-part choruses. The music is not a straw betterthan that of 'Rienzi, ' rather weaker, more artificial! But if I shouldwrite this I should be accused of envy, hence I say it only to you, asI am aware that you have known all this a long time. "

But in another letter to Mendelssohn, written three weeks later, herecants: "I must take back much of what I wrote regarding'Tannhäuser, ' after reading the score; on the stage the effect isquite different. I was deeply moved by many parts. " And to HeinrichDorn he writes, a few weeks after this: "I wish you could see Wagner's'Tannhäuser. ' It contains profound and original ideas, and is ahundred times better than his previous operas, though some of themusic is trivial. In a word, he may become of great importance to thestage, and, so far as I know him, he has the requisite courage. Thetechnical part, the instrumentation, I find excellent, incomparablymore masterly than formerly. "

Nevertheless, seven years later still, he once more returns to theattack, and declares that Wagner's music, "apart from the performance, is simply amateurish, void of contents, and disagreeable; and it is asad proof of corrupt taste that, in the face of the many dramaticmaster-works which Germany has produced, some persons have thepresumption to belittle these in favor of Wagner's. Yet enough ofthis. The future will pronounce judgment in this matter, too. " PoorSchumann! His own opera, "Genoveva, " was a failure, while "Tannhäuser"and "Lohengrin" were everywhere received with enthusiasm. This was aquarter of a century ago; and the future _has_ judged, "Tannhäuser"and "Lohengrin" being now the most popular of all works in theoperatic repertory. 

What caused the failure of Schumann's only opera was not a lack ofdramatic genius, but of theatrical instinct. He believed that in"Genoveva" "every bar is thoroughly dramatic;" and so it is, as mighthave been expected of the composer of such an intensely emotional andpassionate song as "Ich grolle nicht" and many others. But Schubert, too, could write such thrilling five-minute dramas as the "Erlking"and the "Doppelgänger, " without being able to compose a successfulopera. Like Schumann, he could not paint _al fresco_, could notcommand that bolder and broader sweep which is required of an operaticcomposer. It is characteristic of Schumann that he did not write anopera till late in life, whereas born operatic composers have commonlybegun their career with their specialty. Indeed, it was only ten yearsbefore he composed his opera that Schumann wrote to a friend: "Youought to write more for the voice. Or are you, perhaps, like myself, who have all my life placed vocal music below instrumental, and neverconsidered it a great art? But don't speak to anyone about this. "Oddly enough, less than a year after this he writes to another friend:"At present I write only vocal pieces. . . . I can hardly tell you what adelight it is to write for the voice as compared with instruments, andhow it throbs and rages within me when I am at work. Entirely newthings have been revealed to me, and I am thinking of writing anopera, which, however, will not be possible until I have entirelyfreed myself from editorial work. "

Like other vocal composers, Schumann suffered much from the lack ofsuitable texts. In one letter he suggests that Lenau might perhaps beinduced to write a few poems for composers, to be printed in "TheZeitschrift:" "the composers are thirsting for texts. " In severalother letters we become familiar with some of his plans which werenever executed, owing, apparently, to the shortcomings of thelibrettists. One of these was R. Pohl, who in all earnestness sentSchumann a serious text in which the moon was introduced as one of thevocalists! Schumann mildly remonstrated that "to conceive of the moonas a person, especially as singing, would be too risky. " So theproject of "Ritter Mond" was abandoned, and it is to be regretted thatSchumann did not reject his "Genoveva" libretto, which was largelyresponsible for the failure of the opera. 

One project of Schumann's is mentioned which it is to be very muchregretted he never carried out. "I am at present [1840] preparing anessay on Shakspere's relations to music, his utterances and views, themanner in which he introduces music in his dramas, etc. , etc. --anexceedingly fertile and attractive theme, the execution of whichwould, it is true, require some time, as I should have to read thewhole of Shakspere's works for this purpose. " His object was to sendthis to Jena as a dissertation for a Doctor's degree, with which hehoped to soften the heart of the obdurate Wieck, who opposed hismarriage with Clara, and at the same time to make an impression on thepublic. Schumann had had painful experience of the fact that forgenius itself there is little recognition in Germany unless it has ahandle to its name--a "von" or a "Herr Doctor. " Clara, however, lovedhim for his genius, and for the impassioned pieces and songs he wroteto express his admiration of her and of woman in general; and, likeother German men of genius, he had his reward--after death. "No tonepoet, " says Naumann, "has been more enthusiastic in the praise ofwoman than Robert Schumann; he was a second Frauenlob. This wasacknowledged by the maidens of Bonn, who, at his interment, filled thecemetery, and crowned his tomb with innumerable garlands. "

IV

MUSIC AND MORALS

Although music in the complex harmonic form known to us is only a fewcenturies old, simple rhythmic melodies were sung, or played onvarious instruments, by all the ancient civilized nations, and aresung or played to-day by African and Australian savages who have nevercome into contact with civilization. And what is more, the remarkableinfluence which music has in arousing human emotions has beenappreciated at all times. 

Tourists relate that in some of the inland countries of Africa, scarcely any work is done by the natives except to the sound of music;and Cruikshank, speaking of the coast negroes, says it is laughable toobserve the effect of their rude music on all classes, old and young, men, women, and children. "However employed, whether passing quietlythrough the street, carrying water from the pond, or assisting in somegrave procession, no sooner do they hear the rapid beats of a distantdrum, than they begin to caper and dance spontaneously. The bricklayerwill throw down his trowel for a minute, the carpenter leave hisbench, the corn grinder her milling stone, and the porter his load, tokeep time to the inspiriting sound. "

Dr. Tschudi, in his fascinating work on Peru, describes two of themusical instruments used by the Indians, and their emotional function. One is the Pututo, "a large conch on which they perform mournfulmusic, as the accompaniment of their funeral dances. " The other iscalled Jaina, and is a rude kind of clarionet made from a reed. "Itstone, " says Tschudi, "is indescribable in its melancholy, and itproduces an extraordinary impression on the natives. If a group ofIndians are rioting and drinking, or engaged in furious conflicts witheach other, and the sound of the Jaina is suddenly heard, the tumultceases, as if by a stroke of magic. A dead stillness prevails, and alllisten devoutly to the magic tones of the simple reed; tones whichfrequently draw tears from the eyes of the apathetic Indians. "

If the untutored primitive man can be thus overpowered by the charm ofsuch simple music, we can hardly wonder at the extravagant powerascribed to this art by the ancient civilized nations. The fairy taleof Orpheus, who tamed wild animals and moved rocks and trees with hissinging and playing, and the story of the dolphin that was attractedby Arion's song and carried him safely across the sea, are quite assignificant as if they were true stories, for they show that theGreeks were so deeply moved by music that they could readily imagineit to have a similar effect on animals, and even on inanimate objects. Almost three thousand years ago, Homer represented Achilles as"comforting his heart with the sound of the lyre, " after losing hissweet Briseis; "stimulating his courage and singing the deeds of theheroes. " And, as Emil Naumann fancies, there is a moral underlying themyth of the siren; "for, as Homer elsewhere suggests, noble and manlymusic invigorates the spirit, strengthens wavering man, and inciteshim to great and worthy deeds, whereas false and sensuous musicexcites and confuses, robs man of his self-control, till his passionsovercome him as the waves overwhelmed the bewitched sailor wholistened to the voice of the charmer. "

At a later period in Greek history, the philosophers, including Platoand Aristotle, continued to attribute to music power so great, that wecan only understand them if we bear in mind that with the Greeks theword music was a comprehensive term for all the arts presided over bythe Muses, and that, even when music in our sense is alluded to bythem, the reference is at the same time to the poetry which was almostalways associated with music, and made its meaning and expression moredefinite. Thus, we can realize how Terpander could, by the power ofhis song, reconcile the political factions in Sparta, and how Platocould write, in the "Republic, " that "any musical innovation is fullof danger to the state and ought to be prevented. " He looked uponmusic as a tonic which does for the mind what gymnastics do for thebody; and taught that only such music ought to be tolerated by thestate as had a moral purpose, while enervating forms should besuppressed by the law makers. 

Yet, after making due allowance for the fact that the word music wasused in this comprehensive sense, enough remains to show that thepower of music proper, the power of rhythmic melody, was profoundlyappreciated by the Greeks. If they had not felt how greatly musicintensifies and quickens the emotions, they would not have wedded alltheir poetry to it, nor have resorted to it on all solemn and festiveoccasions; nor would the Pythagoreans have found anyone willing tobelieve in their doctrine that music has power to control thepassions. "They firmly believed, " says Naumann, "that sweet harmonyand flowing melody alone were capable of restoring the even balance ofthe disturbed mind, and of renewing its harmonious relations with theworld. Playing on the lyre, therefore, formed part of the dailyexercises of the disciples of the renowned philosopher, and none daredseek his nightly couch without having first refreshed his soul at thefount of music, nor return to the duties of the day without havingbraced his energies with jubilant strains. Pythagoras is said to haverecommended the use of special melodies as antidotal to specialpassions, and indeed, it is related of him that on a certain occasionhe, by a solemn air, brought back to reason a youth who, maddened bylove and jealousy, was about setting fire to the house of hismistress. "

Similar marvellous powers were ascribed to music by the other nations. The Chinese have an old saying that "Music has the power to makeHeaven descend upon earth. " This art was constantly kept under rigidsupervision by the government, and 354 years before Christ, one of theEmperors issued a special edict against weak, effeminate music; towhich, therefore, a demoralizing influence was obviously attributed. The Japanese, we read, likewise "revere music and connect it withtheir idol worship, " and in olden times it seems to have had even apolitical function, for it is said that "formerly an ambassador, inaddressing a foreign court to which he was accredited, did not speak, but sang his mission. " The Hindoos, again, attributed supernaturalpower to music. Some melodies had the power, as they believed, tobring down rain, others to move men and animals, as well as lifelessobjects. The fact that they traced the origin of music to the godsshows in what esteem they held it; and their quaint story of the16, 000 nymphs and shepherdesses, each of whom invented a new key andmelody in her emulous eagerness to move the heart and win the love ofthe handsome young god Krishna, shows that the amorous power of musicwas already understood in those days. 

Once more, the exalted notions which the ancient Hebrews had of thedignity and importance of music, is indicated by the fact that, according to Josephus, the treasures of Solomon's Temple (which wasalso a great school of music) included 40, 000 harps and psalteries ofpure copper, and 200, 000 silver trumpets. In the schools of theprophets, musical practice was an essential item. During the period ofcaptivity the Israelites at first gave way to despondency, exclaiming, "How shall we sing the Lord's song in a strange land?" "But by and bythey would take down their harps again from the willow bows and seeksolace for the sorrows of the long exile in recalling the loved melodyof their native land, and the sacred psalmody of their desolatedtemple" (McClintock and Strong). There was hardly an occasion arisingabove the commonplace events of everyday life, when the ancientHebrews did not resort to music. Trumpets were used at the royalproclamations and at the dedication of the Temple. There were dolefulchants for funeral processions; joyous melodies for bridalprocessions and banquets; stirring martial strains to incite couragein battle and to celebrate victories, religious songs, and domesticmusic for private recreation and pleasure; and even "the grapegatherers sang as they gathered in the vintage, and the wine-presseswere trodden with the shout of a song; the women sang as they toiledat the mill, and on every occasion the land of the Hebrews, duringtheir national prosperity, was a land of music and melody. " Andfinally, the therapeutic value of music and its power to stimulate thecreative faculties were recognized. The prophets composed their songsand uttered their prophecies to the sound of musical instruments, andDavid drove out the evil spirit from Saul, as we read in the Bible:"And it came to pass when the spirit from God was upon Saul, thatDavid took a harp and played with his hands. So Saul was refreshed, and was well, and the evil spirit departed from him. "

The preceding facts sufficiently illustrate the effects of music onthe emotions and morals of ancient and primitive nations. Now, withinthe Christian era music has made enormous strides in its evolution asan art, and it seems therefore reasonable to infer that its emotionaland moral power has also increased. Yet, strange to say, a tendencyhas manifested itself of late, in many quarters, to flatly deny theemotional and moral potency of music. The late Richard Grant White, for instance, in a series of articles on the Influence of Music, in"The Atlantic Monthly, " comes to the conclusion that "a fineappreciation of even the noblest music is not an indication of mentalelevation, or of moral purity, or of delicacy of feeling, or even(except in music) of refinement of taste. " "The greatest, keenestpleasure of my life, " he adds, "is one that may be shared equally withme by a dunce, a vulgarian, or a villain;" and he ends by asserting, dogmatically, that a taste for music has no more to do with our mindsor morals than with our complexions or stature. Dr. Hanslick, theeminent critic and professor of musical history in the University ofVienna, goes even farther. "There can be no doubt, " he says, "thatmusic had a much more direct effect on the ancient nations than it hason us. " To-day, "the feelings of the layman are affected most, thoseof an educated artist least, by music. " "The moral influence of tonesincreases in proportion as the culture of mind and characterdecreases. The smaller the resistance offered by culture, the moredoes this power strike home. It is well known that _it is on savagesthat music exerts its greatest influence_. "

Let us briefly test these sceptical paradoxes in the light of mediævalhistory and modern biography. Is it only among the ancient andprimitive people, and among the musically uneducated, that the divineart exerts an emotional influence? St. Jerome evidently did not thinkso. He believed, at any rate, that music can exert a _demoralizing_influence, and he taught that Christian maidens should know nothing ofthe lyre and the flute. The eminent divine was guided in this matterby the same process of illogical reasoning of which, later, thePuritans were guilty when they banished music from the churches. Inview of the fact that music was used to heighten the charms of wantonRoman festivities or Pagan rites, St. Jerome condemned the art itself, ignorant of the fact that music can never be immoral in itself, butonly through evil associations. St. Augustine took a different view ofmusic from St. Jerome. When he first heard the Christian chant atMilan he exclaimed: "Oh, my God! When the sweet voice of thecongregation broke upon mine ear, how I wept over Thy hymns of praise. The sound poured into mine ears and Thy truth entered my heart. Thenglowed within me the spirit of devotion; tears poured forth, and Irejoiced. " Here we have an illustration of how music intensifies andexalts the emotions of educated men. St. Augustine's devotion "glowedwithin him" when he heard the music. It is for this power that thechurch has always employed music as a hand-maid; and thoseecclesiastics who would to-day banish it arbitrarily from the church, know not what a valuable ally they are blindly repulsing in thesedays of religious scepticism. As Mr. Gladstone very recently remarked:"Ever since the time of St. Augustine, I might perhaps say of St. Paul, the power of music in assisting Christian devotion has been uponrecord, and great schools of Christian musicians have attested andconfirmed the union of the art with worship. "

But the greatest musical enthusiast in the ranks of mediæval churchmenwas Martin Luther. To judge by the extraordinary influence which musichad on him, Luther must doubtless be classed among the lowest ofsavages, if Dr. Hanslick is right in saying that it is on savages thatmusic exerts its greatest influence. He wrote a special treatise onmusic, in which he placed it next to theology. "Besides theology, " hewrote in a letter to the musician Senfel, "music is the only artcapable of affording peace and joy of the heart like that induced bythe study of the science of divinity. The proof of this is that thedevil, the originator of sorrowful anxieties and restless troubles, flees before the sound of music almost as much as he does before theWord of God. This is why the prophets preferred music before all theother arts . . . Proclaiming the Word in psalms and hymns. . . . My heart, which is full to overflowing, has often been solaced and refreshed bymusic when sick and weary. "

Luther had a good voice and a knowledge of musical composition. Heplayed the flute and the lute, and in church he introducedcongregational singing, in which the people took an active part inworship by means of the chorales. It is related that, as a child, heused to sing with other boys in the street in winter, for his dailybread, and that on one occasion, Frau Cotta frantically rushed fromher house on hearing his pleading tones, took him in, and gave him awarm meal. Later in life, when he was an Augustine monk, he oftenchased away his melancholy and temptations by playing on his lute, andthe story goes that "one day, after a self-inflicted chastisement, hewas found in a fainting condition in his cell, and that his cloisteredbrethren recalled him to consciousness by soft music, well knowingthat music was the balsam for all wounds of the troubled mind of their'dear Martinus. '"

Coming to more recent times, we find that some of the greatestcomposers and other men of genius were "savages, " judged by Dr. Hanslick's standard. 

When Congreve wrote that "music hath charms to soothe the savagebreast, " did he not mean to imply that educated people are notaffected by it? Take the case, for instance, of that old barbarian, Joseph Haydn, and note how he was affected by the "Creation" when heheard it sung. "One moment, " he said to Griesinger, "I was as cold asice, and the next I seemed on fire, and more than once I feared Ishould have a stroke. " Another "savage, " Cherubini, when he heard aHaydn symphony for the first time, was so greatly excited by it thatit forcibly moved him from his seat. "He trembled all over, his eyesgrew dim, and this condition continued long after the symphony wasended. Then came the reaction. His eyes filled with tears, and fromthat instant the direction of his work was decided. " (Nohl. )

Similar incidents might be quoted from the biographies of almost allthe great composers. Berlioz, in his essay on Music, after referringto the story of Alexander the Great, who fell into a delirium at theaccents of Timotheus, and the story of the Danish King Eric, "whomcertain songs made so furious that he killed some of his bestservants, " dwells on the inconsistency of Rousseau, who, whileridiculing the accounts of the wonders worked by ancient music, nevertheless, "seems in other places to give them enough credence toplace that ancient art, which we hardly know at all, and which hehimself knew no better than the rest of us, far above the art of ourown day. " For himself, Berlioz believed that the power of modern musicis of at least equal value with the doubtful anecdotes of ancienthistorians. "How often, " he says, "have we not seen hearers agitatedby terrible spasms, weep and laugh at once, and manifest all thesymptoms of delirium and fever, while listening to the masterpieces ofour great masters. " He relates the case of a young Provençal musician, who blew out his brains at the door of the Opéra after a secondhearing of Spontini's "Vestale, " having previously explained in aletter, that after this ecstatic enjoyment, he did not care to remainin this prosaic world; and the case of the famous singer Malibran, who, on hearing Beethoven's Fifth Symphony for the first time, at theConservatoire, "was seized with such convulsions that she had to becarried out of the hall. " "We have in such cases, " Berlioz continues, "seen time and again, serious men obliged to leave the room to hidethe violence of their emotions from the public gaze. " As for thosefeelings which Berlioz owed personally to music, he affirms thatnothing in the world can give an exact idea of them to those who havenot experienced them. Not to mention the moral affections that the artdeveloped in him, and only to cite the impressions received at themoment of the performance of works he admired, this is what he says hecan affirm in all truthfulness: "While hearing certain pieces ofmusic, my vital forces seem at first to be doubled; I feel a deliciouspleasure, in which reason has no part; the habit of analysis itselfthen gives rise to admiration; the emotion, growing in the directratio of the energy and grandeur of the composer's ideas, soonproduces a strange agitation in the circulation of the blood; myarteries pulsate violently; tears, which usually announce the end ofthe paroxysm, often indicate only a progressive stage which is tobecome much more intense. In this case there follow spasmodiccontractions of the muscles, trembling in all the limbs, a totalnumbness in the feet and hands, partial paralysis of the optic andauditory nerves. I can no longer see, I can hardly hear: vertigo . . . Almost swooning. . . . " Such was the effect of music on Berlioz. 

As in a matter of this sort personal testimony is of more value thananything else, I may perhaps be permitted to refer to some of my ownexperiences. I have often been in the state of mind and body sovividly described by Berlioz, except as regards the numbness of theextremities and the partial paralysis of the sensory nerves. Hundredsof times I have enjoyed that harmless æsthetic intoxication which Ibelieve to be more delicious to the initiated than the sweet delightsof an opium eater--a musical intoxication which does not only fill thebrain with floods of voluptuous delight, but sends thrills down thespinal column and to the very finger-tips, like so many electricshocks. As a boy, every experience of this sort fired my imaginationwith ambition, and led to all sorts of noble resolutions, some ofwhich, at any rate, were carried into execution. The deepestimpression ever made on me by any work of art was at Munich, ten yearsago, when I heard for the first time Wagner's "Tristan and Isolde, "which I was already familiar with through the pianoforte score. Theperformance began at six o'clock, and I had had nothing to eat sincenoon. It lasted till eleven o'clock, and one might imagine that, afterall this emotional excitement, I must have been ravenously hungry. SoI was; but without the slightest affectation, I was horrified at themere thought of indulging in such a coarse act as eating afterenjoying such ravishing music. So I hurried back to the hotel, eagerto get into my room and indulge in a long fit of weeping; and not awink did I sleep that night, the most passionate scenes from the operahaunting me persistently, and almost as vividly as if I had been backin the theatre. 

Indeed, it was the irresistible power of Wagner's music that firstmade me go to Europe, and that changed the whole current of my life. After graduating from Harvard I had only a few dollars in my pocket;but instead of trying to find employment and earn my daily bread, Irecklessly borrowed $500 of a good-natured uncle and went to Europe, for the sole purpose of attending the first Bayreuth Festival. I hadabout four hundred dollars when I arrived in Bayreuth, and of these Ispent two hundred and twenty-five dollars for tickets for the threeseries of Nibelung performances, not knowing what would become of meafter the remaining one hundred and seventy-five dollars was spent. Itwas several weeks before the performances, and Wagner had given strictorders that no one, without exception, should be admitted to therehearsals. But I was not to be so easily baffled, and one afternoon Isneaked into the lobby and succeeded in catching some wonderfulorchestral strains by applying my ear to a keyhole. But my pleasurewas short-lived. An attendant espied me and summarily ordered me offthe premises, despite my humble entreaties and attempts at bribery. Inow resolved to make a personal appeal to Wagner; so, a few dayslater, as he was entering the theatre, arm in arm with Wilhelm, Iboldly walked up to him and told him I had bought tickets to all theperformances, but was very anxious to attend the rehearsals, addingthat I represented a New York and a Boston journal. At the mention ofthe word newspaper, a frown passed over his face, and he said, ratherabruptly, "I don't care much about newspapers. I can get along withoutthem. " But, in a second, a smile drove away the frown and he added: "Ihave given orders that no one shall be admitted. However, you havecome a long way--and as I have found it necessary to make someexceptions, I will admit you too. " He then asked for my card and toldme I would be admitted by mentioning my name to the doorkeeper. Thathe did not bear any deep resentment against me for unfortunately beinga newspaper man, he showed the next day, by walking up to me andasking me if I had succeeded in getting in. 

I mention these incidents because I think they help to disprove thenotion that modern music has less power over the actions and feelingsof men than primitive and ancient music. It was the wild enthusiasminspired in me by Wagner's earlier operas that led me irresistibly toBayreuth, and I really would have been willing to toil as a slave foryears rather than miss this festival. And my experience was that ofhundreds who had saved up their pennies for this occasion, or hadformed pools and drawn lots if the sum was too small. I met three menin Bayreuth who had scraped together enough money for a third-classtrip from Berlin, but not enough to pay for a complete Nibelung ticketfor each. So they took turns and each heard his share of the Trilogy. The artists, moreover, the greatest in Germany, were prompted by theirenthusiasm to give their services at this festival without anypecuniary compensation. Such actions are more eloquent of deep feelingthan any words could be. How trivial are those ancient _myths_ aboutArion and Orpheus compared with this modern _fact_--the building ofthe Bayreuth Theatre with the million marks contributed by Wagner'sadmirers in all parts of the world!

It is easy to see how Prof. Hanslick fell into the error of imaginingthat music exerts its greatest influence on savages. He probablyinferred this from the fact that savages are more obviously excited byit, and gesticulate more wildly, than we do. But this does not provehis point. Savages are more _demonstrative_ in their expression of_all_ their emotions than we are; but this does not indicate thattheir emotions are _deeper_. On the contrary, as the poet has told us, it is the shallow brooks and the shallow passions that murmur; "thedeep are dumb. " It is a rule of etiquette in civilized society torepress any extravagant demonstration of feeling by gestures; and thisis the reason why we are apparently less affected by music thansavages. Yet, how difficult it is even to-day to repress the muscularimpulses imparted by gay music, is seen in the irresistible desire todance which seizes us when we hear a Strauss waltz played with thetrue Viennese swing; and in the provoking habit which some people haveof beating time with their feet. Would anyone assert that a man whothus loudly beats time with his boots is more deeply affected by themusic than you or I who keep quiet? Fiddlesticks! He shows just thecontrary. If he had as delicate and intense an appreciation of themusic as you have, he would know that the noise made by his bootsutterly mars the purity of the musical sound, and jars on refined earslike the filing of a saw. If demonstrativeness is to be taken as atest of feeling, then the ignorant audiences who stamp and roar overthe vulgar horse-play in a variety show have deeper feelings than theeducated reader who, in his room, enjoys the exquisite works of humorof the great writers without any other expression than a smile. 

Granted, then, that music has as much power to move our feelings asever, if not more, and bearing in mind that feeling is the chiefspring of action, does it not follow that music affects our _moral_conduct, making us more refined and considerate in our dealings withother people? Not necessarily and obviously, it seems, for there areauthorities who, while conceding the emotional sway of music, denythat it has any positive moral value. The eminent critic, Prof. Ehrlich, takes this sceptical attitude, in his "History of MusicalÆsthetics. " If music, and art in general, has power to soften thehearts of men, how is it, he asks, that the citizens of Leipsic didnot come to the rescue of the last daughter of the great Bach, butallowed her to live in abject poverty? And how is that, in Florenceand Rome, some of the greatest patrons of art were princes who wereextremely unscrupulous in their manner of getting rid of theirenemies? Other instances might be added to those given by Prof. Ehrlich. African tourists say that the Dahomans, although passionatelyfond of singing and of instrumental music, are probably the most cruelof all negroes. Nero, the cruelest of emperors, is said to haveregaled his ears with music after setting fire to Rome; and you haveall heard the story of the two famous prima donnas whose vicioustemper and jealousy drove them to a tooth and nail contest on thestage, right before the public. Everybody knows, furthermore, what alot of scamps and vagabonds are included in the number of so-calledmusic teachers, and what irregular lives some composers have led. 

At first sight, these facts look formidable and discouraging; but theyare nothing of the sort. If anyone asserted that music is _a moralpanacea_, an infallible cure for all vices, these facts would, ofcourse, be fatal to his argument; but no one would be so foolish as tomake such an extravagant claim in behalf of music. Music may be, anddoubtless is, a moral force, but it is not strong enough to overcomeall the various demoralizing forces that counteract it; hence, it mustoften fail to show triumphant results. If we take the cases justcited, and examine them separately, we see that they are delusive. Isit not asking a good deal of the Leipsic citizens to support the poorrelatives and descendants of all the great men that city has produced?If Bach himself had lived to claim their charity, I am convinced hewould have been cared for, notwithstanding the fact that probably mostof those who love his music are poor themselves, while the public atlarge does not even understand it, and cannot, therefore, be morallyaffected by it. Similarly, the reason why the Viennese allowedSchubert to starve was not because his music failed to make themgenerous, but because he died before they had learned even tounderstand it. To-day they worship his very bones, and build Schubertmuseums and monuments. 

Again, if savages and emperors can be musical and cruel at the sametime, this only proves, as I have just said, that music is not strongenough to overcome _all_ the vicious inherited and cultivated habitsof civilized and uncivilized barbarians. As for the fighting primadonnas, it is obvious that a singer whose success is constantlydependent upon the whims of a fickle public, is more subject thanalmost any other mortal to constant attacks of envy and jealousy, sothat it is unfair not to make some allowance for temper in her case. Allowances must also be made for music teachers, who, from the verynature of their profession, rarely hear music as it ought to be, andtherefore naturally become impatient and irritable. They illustrate, not the normal, but the abnormal effects of music. Moreover, owing tothe lamentable ignorance of so many parents and pupils, theprofession of music teachers is invaded with impunity by hundreds oftramps who know so little of music that, if they tried to becomecobblers or tailors with a corresponding amount of knowledge, theywould be ignominiously kicked out of doors. Surely it is unfair to laythe sins of these vagabonds on the shoulders of music. 

Finally, as regards the moral character and temper of composers, itshould be remembered that, if some of them occasionally gave way totheir angry passion, they were generally provoked to it by theobtuseness and insulting arrogance of their contemporaries. Had thesecontemporaries honored and commended them for enlarging the boundariesof art and the sphere of human pleasures, instead of tormenting themwith cruel and ignorant criticisms, the great composers would, nodoubt, have been amiable in their public relations, as they appear tohave been almost invariably toward their friends. Wagner's pugnacityand frequent ill-temper, for instance, arose simply from the factthat, while he was toiling night and day to compose immortalmaster-works, his contemporaries not only refused to contribute enoughfor his daily bread, but assailed him on all sides with maliciouslying, stupid criticisms, with as much obvious enjoyment of thisflaying alive of a genius as if they were a band of Indians torturinga prisoner of war. Among his friends, Wagner was one of the mostgentle, tender, and kind-hearted of men, and it made him frantic tosee even a dumb animal suffer. He wrote a violent pamphlet againstvivisection, and one day missed an important train because he stoppedto scold a peasant woman who was taking to the market a basket of livefish in the agony of suffocation. I hardly know of a great composerwho, in his heart of hearts, was not gentle and generous. Bach, Handel, Haydn, Mozart, Gluck, Schubert, Beethoven, Schumann, Mendelssohn, Weber, Liszt, and a dozen others who might be named, though not without their faults, were kind and honest men, livingarguments for the ennobling effects of music. 

In no other profession can men and women be found so ready to aid acolleague in distress. Take the case of poor Robert Franz, forinstance, who lost his hearing through the whistle of a locomotive, and thereby lost his professional income, and was brought to the vergeof starvation because his stupid contemporaries (I mean ourselves)refused to buy his divine songs. Hardly had his misfortune becomeknown when Liszt, Joachim, and Frau Magnus arranged a concert tour forhis benefit which netted $23, 000, and insured him comfort for the restof his life. 

And in general, let me ask, why is it that, whenever a charitableproject is organized, musicians are invariably called upon first togive their services? Does not this amount to an eloquent and universalpresumption that musical people are generous and kind-hearted?

Nor is this the only kind of presumption indicating that musiccommonly goes hand in hand with kindness. The English in the days ofElizabeth, as Chappell tells us, "had music at dinner, music atsupper, music at weddings, music at funerals, music at night, music atdawn, music at work, music at play. He who felt not, in some degree, its soothing influence, was viewed as a morose unmusical being, whoseconverse ought to be shunned, and regarded with suspicion anddistrust. " That this was the general sentiment in England is alsoproved by the oft-quoted passage in "The Merchant of Venice, " whereShakspere notes the magic effect of music on men and animals, andconcludes with the verses--

 "The man that hath no music in himself Nor is not moved with concord of sweet sounds, Is fit for treasons, stratagems and spoils; The motions of his spirit are dull as night, And his affections dark as Erebus; Let no such man be trusted. "

This, of course, is a poetic exaggeration, for we know that there areother sources of refinement besides music, and that some of thenoblest men and women can hardly tell two tunes from one another. Nevertheless, the general presumption remains that music and jollygood-nature go together, and that music is incompatible with crime. Anexperience I once had in Switzerland brought home this fact to my mindin a forcible manner. I was taking a fortnight's tramp, all alone, andone day I came near the summit of a mountain pass where, some timepreviously, a solitary tourist had been robbed and murdered. There wasno house within five miles, and I had not met a soul that morninguntil I approached this place, when I suddenly saw a shabbily dressedman coming down the road. Not having any weapon, I could not but feelnervous, and my heart began to beat almost audibly. Presently the man, who had apparently not yet noticed me, began to sing a Tyrolesemelody. With the first notes all my fear instantly vanished, and Ibreathed freely again; for an instinctive feeling had told me that aman intent on murder and robbery would not sing. 

Such presumptions, however, although they have some weight asarguments, do not amount to full proof. Our feelings may mislead us, and cannot be accepted in lieu of facts. We must therefore confrontour problem more directly. In what manner does music affect our moralcharacter? Does it make us less inclined to murder, stealing, lying, lust, avarice, anger, hatred, jealousy, dishonesty, cruelty, and othervices? And if so, by what means?

I find among writers on Music and Morals, a curious tendency to dodgethe direct question, and indulge in side issues and digressions. Mr. Haweis, in his book on the subject, talks glibly about the training ofthe emotions, and has much to tell about the lives of the composers, but very little bearing directly on his subject. Wagner, in one of hisessays, asserts that music has as much influence on tastes and moralsas the drama itself. A frivolous and effeminate taste, he says, cannotbut affect our moral conduct. The Spartans understood this when theyforbade certain kinds of music as demoralizing. He believes that menwho are inspired by Beethoven's music make more active and energeticcitizens than those who are charmed by Rossini, Bellini, andDonizetti; and he refers to the fact that in Paris, at a certainperiod, music became more and more frivolous as the people degeneratedmorally. At the same time he is obliged to admit that this, perhaps, proves rather the effect of morals on music than of music on morals;and so our problem remains in a vague twilight. 

To gain more light on the subject, let us take a few specific cases. Does the influence of music make us less inclined to perpetratemurder, suicide, or cruel practices? Everybody has heard the story ofthe famous Italian composer and vocalist, Stradella, whose wonderfulsinging in an oratorio made such a profound impression on two men whohad been hired to murder him, that they not only spared him, but gavehim warning that his life was in danger. This story is now regarded asa myth by some of the best authorities; but the fact that it was solong believed universally is not without significance. Take anothercase, which, though occurring in a ficticious drama, might easily betrue. Faust, in Goethe's drama, when on the point of committingsuicide, is brought back to his senses on suddenly hearing the Easterhymn. But in this case it might be said it was not the music itself, but the religious and other associations and memories awakened by it, that prevented Faust from carrying out his criminal intention. Suchassociations must always be taken into account when estimating themoral value of music; and yet they do not explain everything. Aresidue is left which must be placed to the credit of music. 

Perhaps the vice best adapted to illustrate the direct influence ofmusical culture is cruelty. If you find a boy in the back yardtorturing a cat or a dog, or bullying and maltreating his playmates, it will probably do no good to sing or play to him by way of softeninghis heart. On the contrary, he will probably not appreciate orunderstand the music at all, and the interruption will only annoy andanger him. But if you take that same boy and put him in a house wherethere is an _infectious musical atmosphere_, the chances are thatbefore long his feelings will undergo a change, and he will no longerderive any pleasure from cruelty. This pleasure is one which boysshare with savages, and the best way to eradicate it is by cultivatingthe æsthetic sensibilities. "It cannot be doubted, " says Eduard vonHartmann, in his "Philosophie des Schönen, " "that æsthetic culture isone of the most important means of softening the moral sentiments andpolishing coarse habits;" and Shelley, in his "Defence of Poetry, "says, "It will readily be confessed that those among the luxuriouscitizens of Syracuse and Alexandria who were delighted with the poemsof Theocritus were less cold, cruel, and sensual than the remnant oftheir tribe. "

Now, music seems to be better adapted to bring about a regeneration ofthe heart than even poetry, and for two reasons: In the first place, poetry can, and often does, inculcate immoral sentiments, whereasmusic, pure and simple, can never be immoral. As Dr. Johnson remarks, "Music is the only sensual pleasure without vice. " Secondly, it is inchildhood that our moral habits are formed, and it is well known thatchildren are susceptible to the influence of music at least five orten years before they can really understand poetry. The infant in armshas its impatience and anger subdued countless times by the charms ofa cradle song; and in this way music sweetens its temper, turns itsfrowns into smiles, and prevents it from becoming habitually cross andvicious. True, some young children also like to read and recitepoetry, but what delights them in this case is the _musical_ jingle ofrhyme and rhythm, rather than the specific qualities of the verse. 

Later in life, when the children go to school, they are, as experttestimony proves, beneficially affected by singing together, whichrests and refreshes the brain, and teaches them the value and beautyof co-operation. While thus singing, each child experiences the samejoyous or sad feelings as its classmates, and learns in this way thegreat moral lesson of _sympathy_. And this brings us back to what wassaid a moment ago regarding the vice of cruelty. Sympathy is thecorrelative and antidote of cruelty. If savages were not utterlydevoid of sympathy, they would not take such strange delight inwitnessing the cruel tortures they inflict upon their prisoners. Indeed, it may be asserted that almost all crimes spring from a lackof sympathy, and modified forms of cruelty. If you reflect a moment, you must admit that a man who is truly sympathetic--that is, whorejoices in his neighbor's happiness and grieves over hismisfortunes--can be neither ungenerous, nor deceitful, nor covetous, nor jealous, nor ferocious, nor avaricious, etc. ; and one need nottherefore be a pantheist to agree with Schopenhauer, that Mitleid, orsympathy, is the basis of all virtues. If, therefore, it can be shownthat music is a powerful agent in developing this feeling of sympathy, its far-reaching moral value will become apparent. And this can bedone easily. 

Rousseau named his collection of songs "The Consolations of theMiseries of my Life;" Shakspere called music "The food of love;" andChopin, in one of his letters to a friend, after referring to hisfirst love affair, adds, "How often I relate to my piano everything Ishould like to communicate to you. " Similar remarks might be quoted bythe score from the letters of composers and other great men devoted tomusic, showing that music is valued like a personal friend who isalways ready to sympathize with our joys and sorrows. And when a realmusic-lover comes across a beautiful new piece, how he bubbles overwith enthusiasm to play or sing it to his friends, and let them sharethe pleasure; his own being doubled thereby! I know of no other artthat so vividly arouses this unselfish feeling, this desire forsympathetic communion. Indeed, music is the most unselfish of all thearts. A poem is generally read in solitude, and a picture can be seenby only a few at a time; but a concert or opera may be enjoyed by5, 000 or more at a time--the more the merrier. I have already statedthat in public schools music helps to develop a sympathetic feeling ofmutual enjoyment. And why is it that music, ever since the days of theancient Hebrews and Greeks, has been always provided at politicalmeetings and processions, at picnics, dances, funerals, weddings--inshort, at all social and public gatherings? Obviously, because it hasthe power of uniting the feelings of many into one homogeneous andsympathetic wave of emotion. It has a sort of _compulsive_ force whichhurries along even those who are sluggish or unwilling. Plato, in hisRepublic, gives the curious advice that, at meetings of older peoplewine should be distributed, in order to make them more pliable andreceptive to the counsel of sages. Many would object to such a riskypolicy, which, moreover, can well be dispensed with, since music hasquite as much power as wine to arouse a sympathetic and enthusiasticstate of mind at a public assembly, and without any danger ofdisastrous consequences. It is the special function of music tointensify all the emotions with which it is associated. It inflamesthe courage of an army of soldiers marching on to defend theircountry, their homes and families. It exalts the religious feelings ofchurch-goers, and makes them more susceptible to the minister's moralcounsels. Is it not absurd to say that such an art has no moral value?One of the most eloquent of modern preachers, the late Henry WardBeecher, went so far as to admit that "In singing, you come intosympathy with the Truth as you perhaps never do under the preaching ofa discourse. "

The Rev. Dr. Haweis also bears testimony to the moral value of music, in the following words: "I have known the Oratorio of the Messiah drawthe lowest dregs of Whitechapel into a church to hear it, and duringthe performance sobs have broken forth from the silent and attentivethrong. Will anyone say that for these people to have their feelingsfor once put through such a noble and long-sustained exercise as that, could be otherwise than beneficial? If such performances of bothsacred and secular music were more frequent, we should have lessdrunkenness, less wife-beating, less spending of summer gains, lesswinter pauperism. People get drunk because they have nothing else todo; they beat their wives because their minds are narrow, their tastesbrutal, their emotions, in a word, ill-regulated. "

These remarks suggest one of the most important moral functions ofmusic--that of _weaning the people from low and demoralizingpleasures_. In proportion as the masses are educated to anappreciation of the subtle and exquisite pleasures afforded by thefine arts, and especially by music, will they become indifferent to, and abhor, exhibitions which involve cruelty to man and animals, suchas dog-fights, boxing-matches, dangerous and cruel circus tricks, executions of criminals, etc. The pleasure derived from such brutalexhibitions is the same in kind as that which prompts savages to flayalive their prisoners of war. And the morbid pleasure which so manyapparently civilized people take in reading in the newspapers, columnafter column, about such brutal sports, is the survival of the sameunsympathetic feeling. I am convinced that no one who reallyappreciates the poetic beauty of a Schubert song or a Chopin nocturnecan read these columns of our newspapers without feelings of utterdisgust. And I am as much convinced as I am of my own existence, thata man who derives more pleasure from good music than from these vulgarcolumns in the newspapers, is morally more trustworthy than those whogloat over them. Music can impart only good impulses; whereas, we hearevery day of boys and men who, after reading a dime novel or thepolice column in a newspaper, were prompted to commit the crimes andindulge in the vices they had read about. Hence, if people could beweaned from the vulgar pleasure of reading about crimes and scandals, and taught instead to love innocent music, can any one doubt that theywould be morally the better for it? Just as a tendency to drunkennesscan best be combated by creating a taste for harmless light wines andbeer in place of coarse whiskey and gin, so a love of demoralizingand degrading amusements can best be eradicated by educating thepoetic and musical sensibilities of the masses. Why are the lowerclasses in Germany so much less brutal, degraded, and dangerous thanthe same classes in England? Obviously, because, after their day'slabor, they do not drink poisonous liquor in a dirty den of crime, butgo to sip a few glasses of harmless beer in a garden while listeningto the merry sounds of music. 

Men _will_ have, and _must_ have, their pleasures. Social reformersand temperance agitators could not make a greater mistake than byfollowing the example of the Puritans and tabooing _all_ pleasures. They ought to distinguish between those that have a tendency to excessand vice, and those that are harmless and ennobling, encouraging thelatter in every possible way. And first among those that should beencouraged is music, because it is always ennobling, and can beenjoyed simultaneously by the greatest number. Its effect is welldescribed in Margaret Fuller's private journal: "I felt raised aboveall care, all pain, all fear, and every taint of vulgarity was washedout of the world. " I think this is an extremely happy expression. Female writers sometimes have a knack of getting at the heart of aproblem by instinct, more easily than men with their superiorreasoning powers. "Every taint of vulgarity washed out of the world bymusic. " That is precisely wherein the moral power of music lies; forvulgarity is the twin sister of vice. It is criminal to commit amurder; it is vulgar to gloat over the contagious details of it inbooks and newspapers. But how rampant vulgarity still is, and how rareæsthetic culture, is shown by the fact that two-thirds of theso-called news in many of our daily papers consist of detailed reportsof crimes in all parts of the world, which are eagerly read byhundreds of thousands, while our concert halls have to be filled withdead-heads. 

There is one more way in which music affects our moral life, to whichI wish to call attention, namely, through its value as a tonic. Nooperatic manager has ever thought of advertising his performances as atonic, yet he might do so with more propriety than the patent medicinevenders whose grandiloquent advertisements take up so much space inour newspapers. Plato, in the "Laws, " says that "The Gods, pitying thetoils which our race is born to undergo, have appointed holy festivalsin which men rest from their labors. " Lucentio, in "The Taming of theShrew, " advances the same opinion in more definite and pungent terms:

 "Preposterous ass! that never read so far To know the cause why music was ordain'd! Was it not to refresh the mind of man After his studies, or his usual pain?"

There can be no doubt whatever that music has the most remarkableeffect, not only on our minds, but on our bodies. Physiologists tellus that different kinds of mental activity are carried on in differentparts of the brain, and that, in order to recover from fatigue, weneed not rest altogether, but merely take up some other kind of work. Hundreds of times I have found that, however much I may be fatigued bya day's brain work, I can play all the evening, or attend a concert oropera, without in the least adding to my fatigue. On the contrary, inmost cases it disappears altogether, the music acting on the mind as asurf bath does on the body. Like many others, I have found that thebest way to cure a headache is to attend an orchestral concert. Itworks like a charm. It stirs up the circulation in the brain as abrisk walk does in the body. Even brain disease is eased in this way. The power of music even to cure insanity altogether, was frequentlymaintained in ancient and mediæval times. This claim is doubtlessexaggerated, yet there is more than a grain of truth in it. There canbe no doubt that violent maniacs can be calmed, and melancholy onescheered and soothed, by music. To get an authoritative opinion on thissubject, I wrote to Dr. Hammond. He answered: "I know of no cases ofinsanity that have been cured by music, but I have seen many cases inwhich music has quieted insane persons, exerting the same calminginfluence that it does on most of us when we are irritated by pettyannoyances. "

"When we are irritated by petty annoyances. " It is then that musicbecomes a medicine and a moral tonic. Writers on ethics have, hitherto, too much overlooked the moral importance of health. Wherethere is a lack of health, we rarely find any moral sweetness oftemper. The vices may be small and peevish, but in their aggregatethey are enough to poison the happiness of the household. If a mancomes to ruin from drink and the crimes it leads him to commit, wecall him immoral. But is he not also immoral if, from excess of workand worry, and wilful neglect of exercise, rest, and recreation, hebreaks down and beggars his family, becoming a burden to them insteadof a help? I think he is, and that, instead of pitying such a man, weshould censure him. Ignorance of the laws of hygiene, physical andmental, is no valid excuse. He can buy a book on the subject for onedollar. But he does not even need to do that. Music, we read inShakespere, has the power of "killing care and grief of heart, " andwhat he needs, therefore, is to hear some good music every evening, athome or at the opera. This will draw the blood from the over-workedpart of his brain to another part, and by thus relieving it of thetormenting persistency of worrying thoughts and business cares, enable him to enjoy refreshing, dreamless sleep afterward. In this waymusic may help to restore his health, cure his dyspepsia, and sweetenhis moral temper. 

In America, more than anywhere else, is music needed as a tonic, tocure the infectious and ridiculous business fever which is responsiblefor so many cases of premature collapse. Nowhere else is so much timewasted in making money, which is then spent in a way that contributesto no one's happiness--least of all the owner's. We Americans are inthe habit of calling ourselves the most practical nation in the world, but the fact is it would be difficult to find a nation less practical. For, what is the object of life? Is it to toil like a galley slave andnever have any amusements? Every nation in Europe, except the English, knows better how to enjoy the pleasures of life than we do. Ourso-called "practical" men look upon recreation as something useless, whereas in reality it is the most useful thing in the world. Recreation is re-creation--regaining the energies lost by hard work. Those who properly alternate recreation with work, economize theirbrain power, and are therefore infinitely more practical than thosewho scorn or neglect recreation. 

The utility and the moral value of refined pleasures is notsufficiently understood. It should be proclaimed from the housetopsevery day. Bread and butter to eat, and a bed to sleep in, are not theonly useful things in the world, but, in the words of Shelley, "Whatever strengthens and purifies the affections, enlarges theimagination, and adds spirit to sense, is useful. " Music is usefulbecause it does this, and it is useful in many other ways. Singingstrengthens the lungs, playing the muscles, and both stimulate themind. Milton, Schiller, George Sand, Alfieri, and other geniuses havetestified that music aroused their creative faculties; and inBeaconsfield's "Contarini" occurs this passage: "I have a passion forinstrumental music. A grand orchestra fills my mind with ideas. Iforget everything in the stream of invention. " Furthermore, music is astepping-stone to social success. A gifted amateur is welcomed at onceinto circles to which others may vainly seek admission for years; anda young lady with a musical voice has a great advantage in the periodof courtship. But most important of all is the moral value of music asan _ennui_ killer. _Ennui_ leads to more petty crimes than anythingelse; and a devotee of music need never suffer a moment's _ennui_. There are enough charming songs and pieces to fill up every sparemoment in our lives with ecstatic bliss, and to banish all temptationto vice. It is in reference to similar pleasures that Sir JohnLubbock, in his essay on the "Duty of Happiness, " exclaims: "It iswonderful, indeed, how much innocent happiness we thoughtlessly throwaway. " The art of enjoying life is an accomplishment which few havethoroughly mastered. 

V

ITALIAN AND GERMAN VOCAL STYLES

Why is it that most persons are more interested in vocal than ininstrumental music? Obviously because, as Richard Wagner remarks, "thehuman voice is the oldest, the most genuine, and the most beautifulorgan of music--the organ to which alone our music owes itsexistence. " And not only is the sound or quality of the human voicemore beautiful than that of any artificial instrument, but it iscapable of greater variation. Although a good artist can producevarious shades of tone on his instrument, yet every instrument has awell-defined characteristic _timbre_, which justifies us in speaking, for instance, of the majestic, solemn trombone, the serene flute, theamorous violoncello, the lugubrious bassoon, and so on. The humanvoice, on the other hand, is much less limited in its powers of tonaland emotional coloring. It is not dependent for its resonance on arigid tube, like the flute, or an unchangeable sounding-board, likethe violin or the piano, but on the cavity of the mouth, which can beenlarged and altered at will by the movements of the lower jaw, andthe soft parts--the tongue and the glottis. These movements change theovertones, of which the vowels are made up, and hence it is that thehuman voice is capable of an infinite variety of tone-color, comparedwith which Wagner admits that even "the most manifold imaginablemixture of orchestral colors must appear insignificant. "

Notwithstanding that the superiority of the voice is thus conceded, even by the greatest magician of the orchestra, we daily hear thecomplaint that the good old times of artistic singing are gone by, andhave been superseded by an instrumental era, in which the voice merelyplays the part of the second fiddle and is maltreated by composers, who do not understand its real nature. So far is this opinion from thetruth that it must be said, contrariwise, that it is only within thelast century--I might almost say the last half century--that composershave begun fully to recognize the true function of the human voice andits principal advantage over instruments. 

What is this advantage? It is the power of articulating, of unitingpoetry with music, _definite words with indefinite tones_. Everyinstrument, as I have just said, has a characteristic emotionaltone-color. But the emotions expressed by them are vague andindefinite. A piece of instrumental music can express an eager, passionate yearning for something, but it cannot tell what thatsomething is--whether it is the ardent longing of an absent lover, orthe heavenward aspiration of a religious enthusiast. The vocalist, onthe other hand, can clearly tell us the object of that longing byusing definite words. And by thus arousing reminiscences in thehearer's mind, and adding the charm of poetry to that of music, hedoubles the power and impressiveness of his art. 

Now, a very brief sketch of the history of solo singing will show thatthis special advantage of the human voice over instruments was, if notentirely overlooked, at least considered of secondary importance inpractice, until Gluck and Schubert laid the foundations for a newstyle, in which the distinctively _vocal_ side of singing hasgradually become of greater importance than the instrumental side; aswe see in the music-dramas of Wagner, and the Lieder, or parlor-songs, of Schumann, Franz, Liszt, and others. 

Although _folk-song_ appears to be as old as the human race, thehistory of _artistic_ song, or song written by professional composersfor the concert hall, can be traced back only about three centuries. Before that time vocal music was generally polyphonic, that is, forseveral voices; and a contrapuntal style of music had been introducedinto Italy from the Netherlands, which was so complicated andartificial that the poetic text had no chance whatever of assertingits rights and being understood. Now, the modern opera, which wasoriginated about three hundred years ago by a number of Florentineamateurs, although it sprang from a desire to revive the ancient Greekdrama, in which music was united with poetry, represents at the sametime a reaction against this unintelligible Netherland style. The newopera at first went to the opposite extreme, making the distinctdeclamation of the text its principal object and neglecting vocalornamentation, and even melody, on purpose. The famous vocalist andteacher, Caccini, although he taught his pupils how to sing trills androulades, declared that they were not essential to good singing, butmerely a means of tickling the ear, and, therefore, generally to beavoided. He taught the Italian singers how to express the passions, and reproduce the meaning of the words they sang--an art which, according to the Roman, Pietro della Valle, was not previously knownto them. 

The dry declamation of the first Italian operas, however, was notsupported by a sufficiently rich accompaniment to be enjoyable afterthe first sense of novelty had passed away; and even the giftedMonteverde's ingenious innovations in instrumental coloring and inthe free use of expressive discords, could not ward off a secondreaction, in favor of song pure and simple, which set in withScarlatti, the founder of the Neapolitan school, whose first opera wasproduced a little over two centuries ago. From this time dates thesupremacy, in Italy, of the _bel canto_, or beautiful song, which, however, gradually degenerated into mere circus music in which everyartistic aim was deliberately sacrificed to sensuous tone-revelry andagility of execution, the voice being treated as a mere instrument, without any regard for its higher prerogative of interpreting poetryand heightening its effects. 

This period of Italian song prevailed throughout Europe until the timeof Rossini. And in all the annals of music there is nothing quite sostrange as the extraordinary craze which existed during this time for_the instrumental style of vocalism_. A special class of singers--themale sopranists--was artificially created, in order to secure the mostdazzling results in brilliant, ornamental vocalization. Various kindsof trills, grace notes, runs, and other species of _fioriture_, orvocal somersaults, were introduced in every song, in such profusionthat the song itself was at last barely recognizable; and this kind ofstuff the audiences of that time applauded frantically. Everybody hasheard of the vulgar circus tricks performed by the most famous of thesopranists, Farinelli--how at one time he beat a famous Germantrumpeter in prolonging and swelling his notes, and how, at anothertime, he began an aria softly, swelled it by imperceptible degrees tosuch an astounding volume, and then decreased it again in the same wayto pianissimo, that the public wildly applauded him for five minutes. Thereupon, Dr. Burney relates, he began to sing with such amazingrapidity that the orchestra found it difficult to keep up with him. Dr. Dommer justly comments on this story that, for such racing with anorchestra, a singer would be hissed to-day by musical people. 

It was not only quick and animated songs that were thus overloadedwith meaningless embroideries by the sopranists and the prima donnasthat followed them. Slow movements, which ought to breathe a spirit ofmelancholy, appear to have been especially selected as background forthese vocal fireworks. I need not dwell on the unnaturalness of thisstyle. To run up and down the scale wildly and persistently in singinga slow and sad song, is as consistent as it would be for an orator togrin and yodle while delivering a funeral oration. 

A question might be raised as to how far the great Italian composersare responsible for this degradation of the vocal art to the level ofthe circus. The public, it might be argued, wanted the florid styleof song; and if Rossini and Donizetti had refused to write in thestyle admired by them, they would have been neglected in favor ofother and less gifted composers. I do not agree with this reasoning. Rossini and Donizetti have revealed enough genius in some of theirsparkling melodies to make it probable that, if they had not so oftenstooped to the level of a taste corrupted by the sopranists, theymight have raised the public to a higher standard of musical taste. Rossini, in fact, _did_ introduce many reforms in Italian opera. Heenriched the orchestral accompaniments, removed some of thesuperfluous arias, and for the first time wrote leading solo parts forthe bass--an innovation for which he was violently attacked, on theludicrous conservative ground that the bass could only be properlyused as a basis of harmonies. But Rossini's greatest merit lies inthis, that he refused to write for the sopranists, and would not evenlet them sing in those of his operas which were brought out under hisown supervision. Furthermore, to prevent the singers from spoiling hismelodies with their florid additions, "he supplied his owndecorations, and made them so elaborate that the most skilled adornerwould have found it difficult to add to them" (Edwards). For thusemancipating the composers from the tyranny of the singers Rossinideserves great credit, and still greater honor is due him for havingshown, in his "William Tell, " which he wrote for Paris, and in whichhe discarded the florid style, that when he _did_ have a public whichappreciated simplicity of style and dramatic propriety in music, hisgenius was equal to the occasion. It is a great pity that he did notwrite several more operas in the style of "William Tell, " for it isthe only one of his works which has preserved a portion of its formerpopularity in Paris and elsewhere, thanks to its regard for dramaticpropriety. 

Like the composers, the singing teachers in Italy consented to adapttheir method to the universal clamor for decorative, florid singing. The audiences did not seem to care at all _what_ was sung to them, aslong as it was sung with sensuous beauty of tone, and facility ofexecution; consequently sensuous beauty of tone and facility ofexecution were almost the only things that the teachers aimed at. Thisis illustrated by an anecdote concerning the famous teacher Porporaand his pupil Caffarelli, which, although doubtless exaggerated, nevertheless describes the situation graphically. Porpora, it isrelated, gave Caffarelli a page of exercises to which he confined himfor five years. And at the end of that time he exclaimed: "You havenothing more to learn! Caffarelli is the first singer in the world!"

As if facility of execution or technical skill were not the merebeginning of vocal culture--the fashioning of the instrument, as itwere, with which the singer must subsequently learn the higher arts ofexpressing human emotions in tones, of phrasing intelligently, and ofpronouncing distinctly, so that the poetic qualities of the text maybe appreciated. 

In looking over specimens of the vocal music written by Porpora andhis contemporaries, we find passages in which a single syllable isextended over one hundred and fifty-eight, and even a hundred andseventy-five, notes. A more atrocious maltreatment of the text, andmisconception of the true function of the human voice, could not beimagined. As Mr. H. C. Deacon remarks, "The passages in much of themusic of that date, especially that of Porpora, are reallyinstrumental passages . . . And possessing but little interest beyondthe surprise that their exact performance would create. " People didnot ask themselves whether it was worth while for singers to gothrough the most arduous training for five years, for the sake oflearning to execute runs which any fiddler or flute-player could learnto play in a few weeks. Look at the fioriture which, to this day, Mme. Patti sings in "Lucia, " "Semiramide, " etc. She is the only livingbeing who can sing them with absolute correctness and smoothness. Notanother singer can do it--whereas _every member of her orchestra canplay them at sight_. Does not this show, once and for all, that thisstyle of singing (which still has numerous admirers) is instrumental, is unvocal, unsuited to the human voice, and should be abandonedforever? Rossini showed his real opinion of it by writing his best andmost mature work in a different style; and Verdi has done the same in"Aida" and "Otello, " in which there is hardly a trace of colorature, while the style often approaches to that of genuine dramatic song. 

The colorature or florid style, however, is only one of the varietiesof Italian song. Side by side with it there has always been acharming, melodious _cantabile_, which in the later period of Italianopera gradually got the ascendancy. This _cantabile_ is often ofexquisite beauty, and gives Italian and Italianized singers a chanceto show off the mellow qualities of their voices to the bestadvantage. The very word _cantabile_ emphasizes, by antithesis, theunvocal character of the old florid style. _Fioritura_ meansembroidery, while _cantabile_ means "song-like. " But now, note how thesins of one period are visited on the next. The evils of the floridstyle did not terminate with its supremacy. They cast a shadow before, which prevented the real nature of human song from being discoveredeven after the vocal style had become more simple and rational. Duringthe period in which the vocalists were in the habit of singing from adozen to a hundred or more notes to a single syllable of the text, they, as well as the public, had become so indifferent to the wordsand their poetic meaning, that this habit could not at once be alteredwhen the _cantabile_ style came more into vogue. The singers continuedto be careless in regard to pronunciation of the words, and the operalibretti were so very silly that the public really did not carewhether the singers spoke their words correctly and distinctly or not. Hence even the _cantabile_ style of Italian song continued to be moreor less instrumental in character--telling the audience little moreabout the text than the flute or the violins told them about it. 

Mrs. Wodehouse, in her article on song in Grove's "Dictionary of Musicand Musicians, " calls attention to the injurious action of Italianopera on the English School by breeding indifference to the text. "From Handel's time until a very recent date, " she says, "Italianoperas and Italian songs reigned supreme in England; Italian singersand Italian teachers were masters of the situation to the exclusion ofall others. And the habit thus contracted of hearing and admiringcompositions in a foreign and unknown tongue, engendered in theEnglish public a lamentable indifference to the words of songs, whichreacted with evil effect both on the composer and the singer. Concerned only to please the ears of his audience, the composerneglected to wed his music to words of true poetic merit; and thesinger quickly grew to be careless in his enunciation. Of how manysingers, and even of good ones, may it not fairly be affirmed that atthe end of the song the audience has failed to recognize itslanguage?"

These remarks are quite as applicable to America as to England. Wehear singers every week to whom we can listen attentively for fiveminutes without being able to tell what language they are singing in. Most of these singers were trained by the Italian method: And yet weare told every day that this Italian method, which has so littleregard for the distinctively vocal side of singing, is the only truemethod for the voice. It is time to call a halt in this matter, timeto ask if the Italian method is really the one best adapted forteaching pupils to sing in English. That it is the best and onlymethod for singing in Italian, and for interpreting the style hithertocultivated by the Italians, no one will deny. But whether it is theproper method for those who wish to sing in English, French, orGerman, and to devote themselves to the modern dramatic style, isquite another question, which must be, partly at least, answered inthe negative. 

A careful examination of the situation, leaving aside all nationalprejudice, will show us that each of the two principal methods, asexemplified by Italian and German singers, has its dark and itsbright side, and that the cosmopolitan American style of the futureought to try to combine the advantages of both, while avoiding theirshortcomings. The dark side of Italian singing has been sufficientlydwelt upon; let us now consider the bright side. 

Italy owes much of her fame as the cradle of artistic song and "TheLord's own Conservatory, " to climatic and linguistic advantages. Thanks to the mild climate, men and women can spend most of their timein the open air, and their voices are not liable to be ruined byconstantly passing from a dry, overheated room into the raw and chillyair of the streets. The Italians are a plump race, with well-developedmuscles, and their vocal chords share in the general muscular healthand development; so that the average voice in Italy has a much widercompass than in most other countries; and an unctuous ease ofexecution is readily acquired. Their language, again, favors Italiansingers quite as much as their climate. It abounds in the mostsonorous of the vowels, while generally avoiding the difficult U, andthe mixed vowels Ö and Ü, as well as the harsh consonants, which arealmost always sacrificed to euphony. And where the language hesitatesto make this sacrifice, the vocalists come to the rescue andfacilitate matters by arbitrarily changing the difficult vowel orconsonant into an easy one. In this they are encouraged by theteachers, who habitually neglect the less sonorous vowels and maketheir pupils sing all their exercises on the easy vowel A. No wonder, then, that the tones of an Italian singer commonly sound sweet: hemakes them up of nothing but pure sugar. Characterization, dramaticeffect, variety of emotional coloring, are all bartered away forsensuous beauty of tone; and hence the distinctive name for Italiansinging--_bel canto_, or beautiful song--is very aptly chosen. 

Now, sensuous beauty of tone is a most desirable thing in music. Wagner's music, _e. G. _, owes much of its tonic charm to his fineinstinct for sensuous orchestral coloring, and Chopin's works losehalf their characteristic beauty if played on a poor piano, or by onewho does not know how to use the pedal in such a way as to produce acontinuous stream of rich saturated sound. Hence the Italians deservefull credit for the attention they bestow on sensuous beauty of tone, even if their means of securing it may not always be approved. Nordoes this by any means exhaust the catalogue of Italian virtues. As arule, Italian singers have a better ear for pitch, breathe morenaturally, and execute more easily than German and French singers, whose guttural and nasal sounds they also avoid. The differencebetween the average Italian and German singers is well brought out byDr. Hanslick, in speaking of the Italian performances which formerlyused to alternate with the German operas in Vienna: "Most of ourItalian guests, " he says, "distinguish themselves by means of thethorough command they have over their voices, which in themselves areby no means imposing; our German members by powerful voices, which, however, owing to their insufficient training, do not produce half theeffect they would if they had been subjected to the same amount oftraining. With the Italians great certainty and evenness throughoutthe rôle; with the Germans an unequal alternation of brilliant andmediocre moments, which seems partly accidental. "

It is this element of accident and uncertainty that lowers the valueof many German singers. Herr Niemann, for instance, has moments--and, indeed, whole evenings--when his voice, seemingly rejuvenated, notonly rises to sublime heights of dramatic passion, but possesses raresensuous beauty; while on other occasions the sound of his voice isalmost unbearable. Niemann, of course, is fifty-eight years old, butmany of the younger German singers too often have their badquarter-hours; and even Lilli Lehmann--whom I would rather hear for myown pleasure than any other singer now on the stage--emitsoccasionally a disagreeable guttural sound. Nothing of the sort inMme. Patti, whom Niemann no doubt is right in pronouncing the mostperfect vocalist, not only of this period, but of all times. I, for mypart, have never cared much for the _bel canto_ as such, because it isso often wasted on trashy compositions. Yet, when I heard Mme. Pattifor the first time in New York, I could not help indulging in thefollowing rhapsody: "The ordinary epithets applicable to a voice, suchas sweet, sympathetic, flexible, expressive, sound almost toocommonplace to be applied to Patti's voice at its best, as it was whenshe sang the _valse_ Ombra Leggiera from 'Dinora, ' and 'Home, SweetHome. ' Her voice has a natural sensuous charm like a Cremona violin, which it is a pleasure to listen to, irrespective of what she happensto be singing. It is a pleasure, too, to hear under what perfectcontrol she has it; how, without changing the quality of the sound, she passes from a high to a low note, from piano to forte, graduallyor suddenly, and all without the least sense of effort. Indeed hernotes are as spontaneous and natural as those of a nightingale; andthis, combined with their natural sweetness and purity, constitutestheir great charm. " A few months later, when Patti gave one of herinnumerable farewell performances, I was again forced to admit thatshe is the greatest of living lyric sopranos, but took the liberty toexpress my conviction that "the charm of her voice is almost as purelysensuous as the beauty of a dewdrop or a diamond reflecting theprismatic colors of sunlight. "

Patti, in a word, is the incarnation of the Italian style. Her voiceis flawless as regards beauty of tone, and spontaneity and agility ofexecution. Moreover, she avoids the small vices common to most Italiansingers, such as taking liberties with the time and the sentiment ofthe piece for the sake of prolonging a trill or a loud final highnote, and so on. At an early stage in her career she followed thecustom of the time, and lavished such an abundance of uncalled-forscales and trills and arpeggios and staccatos on her melody, that evenRossini entered a sarcastic protest; but in her later years she hasconscientiously followed the indications of the composers. At the sametime, she has shown more and more anxiety to win laurels as a dramaticsinger. But here the vocal style which she has exclusively cultivatedhas proved an insuperable obstacle. Although free from the smallervices of the Italian school, she could not overcome the great andfatal shortcoming of that school--the maltreatment of the poetic text. She could not find the proper accents required in operas where thewords of the text are as important as the melody itself; and she hasfailed therefore to give satisfaction even in such works as "Faust"and "Aïda, " which are intermediate between the old-fashioned opera andthe music-drama proper. I have been often surprised to hear howPatti, so conscientious in other respects, slights her texts, obliterating consonants and altering vowels after the fashion of theItalian school. Having neglected to master the more vigorous vowelsand expressive consonants, she cannot assert her art in dramaticworks. Her voice, in short, is _merely an instrument_. "Bird-like" isan epithet commonly applied to it by admirers. Is this a compliment? Adubious one, in my opinion. The nightingale's voice is very sweet, nodoubt, but it is no better than a flute. A bird cannot pronounce wordsand sing at the same time. The human voice alone can do that--canalone combine poetry and music, uniting the advantage of both in oneeffect. 

On the other hand, have you ever heard anyone compare the voices ofLehmann, Materna, Sucher, or Malten to a bird's voice? Of course not;and the reason is obvious. The point of view is different. AlthoughLilli Lehmann's voice is almost as mellow in timbre as Patti's, andmuch richer and warmer, we never think of it as a bird-like or vagueinstrumental tone, but as a medium for the expression of definitedramatic emotion. And herein lies the chief difference between theItalian and the German schools. _An Italian adores singing for its ownsake, a German as a means of definite emotional expression. _

Now, whether we look at nations or at individuals, we always findthat simple beauty of tone and agility of execution in artisticsinging are appreciated sooner than emotional expression and dramaticcharacterization. Hence it is that the Italian school came before theGerman school. Even in Germany, a few generations ago, the Italianschool was so predominant that German composers of the firstrank--Gluck, Weber, and Beethoven--found it difficult to assert theirinfluence against it. In Vienna, during the season of 1823, theRossini furore was so great that none but Rossini's operas were sung;and in Germany almost everyone of the three dozen big and littlepotentates supported his own Italian operatic company. To-day you lookin vain through Germany or Austria for a single Italian company. Thefew Italian operas that have remained on the repertory are sung inGerman translations by German singers, and all of these operastogether hardly have as many performances in a year as a single one ofWagner's. 

Here is a revolution in taste which may well excite our astonishment, and arouse our curiosity as to how it was brought about. It wasbrought about by the courage and perseverance of a few composers who, instead of stooping down to the crude taste of the _fioriture_-lovingpublic, elevated that taste until it was able to appreciate the poeticand dramatic side of music; and it was brought about with theassistance of German singers, notwithstanding the great disadvantages, climatic and linguistic, under which these labor in comparison withItalian singers. 

Although the Germans are a more robust nation than the Italians, withmore powerful muscles and voices, their climate is against them, leading to frequent throat troubles which endanger the beauty of thevoice. Hence, the gift of mellow, supple song does not come to them sospontaneously as to the Italians. About a thousand years ago, anItalian compared the singing of some German monks to the noise made bya cart rattling down a frozen street; and even Luther compared thesinging in cathedrals and monasteries at his time to the "braying ofasses. " At a more recent period, Frederick the Great, on hearing ofthe proposed engagement of a German singer, exclaimed: "What! hear aGerman singer! I should as soon expect to derive pleasure from theneighing of my horse!" Beethoven knew that the chief reason why hecould not compete with Rossini on the stage was the lack of goodGerman singers. He often lamented the inferiority of the German to theItalian singers, and one day exclaimed to the organist Freudenberg:"We Germans have no sufficiently cultivated singers for the part of_Leonora_; they are too cold and feelingless. The Italians sing andact with their whole souls. " Nevertheless, Beethoven refused to adapthis music to the style of the Italian singers--fortunately; for, ifhe had, it would now be as obsolete as most of Rossini's andDonizetti's. 

When Berlioz made his famous tour in Germany, matters had somewhatimproved, to judge from the following remarks in his "À TraversChants:" "They say that the Germans sing badly; that may seem true ingeneral. I will not broach the question here, whether or not theirlanguage is the reason of it, and whether Mme. Sontag, Pischek, Tichatschek, Mlle. Lind, who is almost a German, and many others, donot form magnificent exceptions; but, upon the whole, German vocalistssing, and do not howl; the screaming school is not theirs; they makemusic. " Nevertheless, about the same time, Liszt complained that aperfect training of the voice such as he admired in Viardot Garcia, had almost become a legend of the past; and only eight years ago, anexcellent German critic, Martin Plüddemann, wrote that "Germany hasmany good orchestras and not a few excellent pianists, even amongamateurs; but a city of 100, 000 inhabitants seldom has ten vocalistswhose voices are tolerable, and of these two or three at most deservethe name of artists. "

When Richard Wagner made his preparation for the great Nibelungfestival in 1876, he had the greatest difficulty in securing asufficient number of competent interpreters for the different rôlesof the trilogy, though he had all the German opera companies to choosefrom. His private letters and essays are full of lamentationsregarding the rarity of singers able to interpret, not only his works, but those of Weber, Gluck, or Mozart. Good singers, he says in oneplace, are so rare that the managers have to pay their weight in goldand jewelry. But the cause of this, he continues, is not the lack ofgood voices, but their improper training in the wrong direction. German teachers have tried to adapt the voices of their pupils to theItalian _canto_, which is incompatible with the German language. "Hitherto, " he says in another place, "the voice has been trainedexclusively after the model of Italian songs; there was no other. Butthe character of Italian songs was determined by the general spirit ofItalian music, which, in the time of its full bloom, was bestexemplified by the sopranists, because the aim of this music was mereenjoyment of the senses, without any regard for genuine depth offeeling--as is also shown by the fact that the voice of young manhood, the tenor voice, was hardly used at all at this period, and later onlyin a sopranistic way, as falsetto. Now, the spirit of modern music, under the undisputed leadership of German genius, especiallyBeethoven, has succeeded in first rising to the true dignity of art, by bringing within the sphere of its incomparable expressiveness, notonly what is agreeable to the senses, but also an energeticspirituality and emotional depth. " Evidently, he concludes, a singertrained in the spirit of the old-fashioned, merely sensuous music, isunable to cope with modern dramatic music, and the result is thefailure and premature collapse of so many promising singers, who mighthave become great artists had they been rationally instructed. 

Misinformed or prejudiced critics have told us countless times thatWagner assigned the voice a secondary place in his works because hecared less for it than for the orchestra, and did not understand itsnature and uses. The fact is that no one can read his essays, especially those on Schnorr von Carolsfeld, and on Actors andVocalists, without being impressed with his unbounded admiration forthe voice, and his practical knowledge of its highest functions andcorrect use. As a vocal teacher, Wagner has perhaps never had anequal. A few words from him regarding tone emission, breathing, orphrasing, have often sufficed to show to a singer that a passage whichhe had considered unsingable, was really the easiest thing in theworld, if only the poetic sense were properly grasped and the breatheconomized. It is difficult to realize how much of their art andpopularity the greatest dramatic singers of the period owe to Wagner'spersonal instruction. Materna, Malten, Brandt, Tichatschek, Schnorrvon Carolsfeld, Niemann, Vogl, Winkelmann, Betz, Scaria, Reichmann, and many others have had the benefit of his advice; and if Wagnercould have carried out his plans of establishing a college of dramaticsinging at Bayreuth--a plan which was frustrated by the lack offunds--the cause of dramatic art would have gained immeasurably. Wespeak with scornful contempt of the Viennese of a former generation, who allowed a rare genius like Schubert to starve; but posterity willlook back with quite as great astonishment on the sluggishness of ageneration which did not eagerly accept the offer of the greatestdramatic composer of all times, to instruct gratuitously a number ofpupils in his own style and those of Gluck, Mozart, and Weber. 

Leaving out of consideration the instructions which they personallyreceived from Wagner, the greatest dramatic singers of the time may beregarded as self-made men and women. Experience taught them their art, other teacher they had none; for it is only within a few years that afew teachers have begun to realize that the old methods of instructionare partly incorrect, and partly insufficient for the demands ofcontemporary art. Such teachers as Mme. Viardot-Garcia and Mme. Marchesi have done much good, and trained many excellent lyricvocalists; but Mme. Marchesi herself admits that the great demandto-day is for dramatic, and not for lyric, singers. Formerly, it wasthe _bravura_ singer who bought dukedoms with his shekels; to-day, with the solitary exception of Patti, it is the _dramatic_ soprano ortenor that gets from $500 to $1, 000 a night. When will teachers andpupils wake up and recognize the new situation? When will Americangirls cease flocking by the hundreds to Milan to learn such rôles as_Lucia_ or _Amina_, for which there is now no demand, either in Europeor America, if we except the wild Western audiences to which EmmaAbbott caters. A good _Elsa_ or _Brünnhilde_ will get an engagementten times sooner than a good _Lucia_; and young vocalists whose voiceshave not sufficient volume and power to cope with German dramaticmusic, will do well to devote their attention to the better class ofFrench operas, for which there is a growing demand, as the Frenchstyle has always been much more like the German than like the Italian, owing to the great attention paid by French composers, especiallysince the days of Gluck, to vigorous declamation and distinctenunciation. Wagner especially recommends the works of the olderFrench schools as a preparation for his own more difficult operas. 

Director Stanton, of the Metropolitan Opera House, in New York, isobliged every summer to make a trip to Germany and look about fordramatic singers wherewith to replenish his casts. As a number ofAmerican singers have already won fame here and abroad, the time nodoubt will come when he will be able to find the dramatic singers heneeds at home, and when opera in English will have supplanted foreignopera, so far as the language is concerned. But until that happy epocharrives every aspirant to operatic honors cannot be too strongly urgedto begin his or her studies by learning the French and Germanlanguages. Almost all the greatest singers of the century have beenable not only to sing but to speak in several languages. Above allthings, students of song should learn to speak their own language. Mr. H. C. Deacon remarks that "no nation in the civilized world speaks itslanguage so abominably as the English. . . . Familiar conversation iscarried on in inarticulate smudges of sound which are allowed to passcurrent for something, as worn-out shillings are accepted asrepresentatives of twelvepence. . . . When English people begin to studysinging, they are astonished to find that they have never learned tospeak. "

Mr. Deacon's strictures do not apply in all their force to Americans, for the average American speaks English more distinctly than theaverage Englishman; yet there is room for vast improvement in theenunciation of our singers. Now, the great value of the German styleto English students lies in this, that it emphasizes above all thingsthe importance of correct and distinct speech in song. Julius Hey, ofMunich, who has just published a vocal method which will mark an epochin the teaching of singing, devotes the whole of his first volume toan analysis of the elements of speech, and to exercises in speaking. The second and third volumes contain vocal exercises for male andfemale voices, while the fourth volume, which has just appeared, discusses the special characteristics of the German dramatic method, and gives detailed instructions for the development and training ofeach variety of voice, together with an appendix in which some of themost popular operatic rôles are analyzed and described. It is a bookwhich no teacher or student who wishes to keep abreast of the timescan afford to be without. 

Although Herr Hey is a disciple of Wagner, he is a cosmopolitanadmirer of all that is good in every style of the past and present. Inthe elaborate scheme for the establishment of a conservatory in Munichwhich Wagner submitted to King Ludwig, he dwells on the fact thatevery student of song, whatever his ultimate aims, should beinstructed in Italian singing, in conjunction with the Italianlanguage. Herr Hey, too, admits that there is no branch of the Italianmethod which the German teachers can afford to ignore. In the emissionof a mellow tone, the use of the portamento, in the treatment ofscales, of trills, and of other ornaments, and in facile vocalizationin general, all nations can learn from the Italians. But the Italianmethod does not go far enough. It does not meet the demands of themodern opera and the modern music-drama. It delights too much incomfortable solfeggios, in linked sweetness long drawn out, which soonpalls on the senses. The modern romantic and dramatic spirit demandsmore characteristic, more vigorous, more varied accents than Italiansong supplies. These dramatic accents are supplied by the Germanmethod, and in this chiefly lies its superiority over the Italianmethod. 

Herr Hey uses a very happy comparison in trying to show the badconsequences of relying too much on the Italian principles of vocalinstruction which have been current until lately in Germany as in allother countries. Students, he says, are taught to fence with a littlewalking-cane, and when it comes to the decisive battle they areexpected to wield a heavy sword. A most happy illustration this, Irepeat, for it indicates exactly what vocal teachers of the old schoolare doing. They choose the easiest of the vowels and the easiestmelodic intervals, and make the pupils exercise on those constantly, ignoring the more difficult ones; and the consequence is, that when, subsequently, the pupils are confronted with difficult intervals in adramatic rôle, they sing them badly and make the ludicrous protestthat the composer "doesn't know how to write for the voice;" and whenthey come across difficult vowels they either change them into easierones, and thus make the text unintelligible, or else they emit a crudetone because they have never learned to sing a sonorous U, I, or E(Latin). 

The German principle, on the other hand, is that all vowels (and theGerman language has a greater number of them than the Italian) must becultivated equally, the difficult ones all the more because they aredifficult. Herr Hey has found in practice that not only can the vowelswhich at first sound dull and hollow, like U, be made as sonorous as A(Ah), but that, by practising on U, the A itself is rendered moresonorous than it can ever become by exclusive practice on it alone. Not only does the German method in this way secure a greater varietyof sonorous vowel sounds, useful for the expression of differentdramatic moods, but the registers are equalized, and there is a greatgain in the power and endurance of the voice, which is of immenseimportance to-day in grand opera. 

Prof. Stockhausen, the distinguished vocal teacher, recently remarkedin the _Frankfurter Zeitung_ that "the _mezza voce_ is the naturalsong, the constant loud singing being only a struggle with unequalweapons against our modern orchestra. " No doubt he is right. But theorchestra has become such an important factor in modern opera thatmusicians would be unwilling to have it reduced in size--the tendencybeing, in fact, the other way; and at the same time opera is such anexpensive luxury that it can only be made to pay in a very largetheatre, which obliges the singers to have stentorian voices. Consequently, the German method, which develops the power and thesonority of the voice on _every_ vowel, is the method of the future, all the more because the English language, which is the world languageof the future, is even more difficult for vocal purposes than theGerman, and calls for similar treatment. 

In the treatment of consonants, the German method marks a stillgreater advance on the Italian method. Professor Ehrlich thinks thatthe reason why Italians care so much for melody and so little forharmony is because they are too indolent to make the mental effortwhich is required to follow a complicated harmonic score. They are, certainly, too lazy to pronounce any harsh or difficult consonants, and the Italian language therefore presents a picture of sadeffeminate degeneracy compared with the more vigorous Latin and evenSpanish. Now the English language and the English character have muchmore of German vigor and masculine strength than of the Italian_dolce far niente_: hence, the English vocal style of the future willhave to be modelled after the German style, which, instead of shirkingdifficult consonants boldly tackles and utilizes them. It will neverbe possible to sing so sweetly in the English and German languages asin Italian; but it is possible to sing with much more vigor, dramaticdefiniteness, and variety of emotional expression. 

At the same time, the harshness of the consonants in German andEnglish song must not be too much emphasized. Wagner has shown in hismusic-dramas, and Hey in his vocal method, that by means of a properdivision of syllables and correct articulation, the harshness ofconsonants can be toned down as much as is desirable. On thedesirability and effectiveness of strong consonants Liszt has someadmirable remarks in speaking of the Polish language, which is notedfor its melodious beauty, although it bristles with consonants: "Theharshness of a language, " he says, "is by no means always conditionedby the excessive number of consonants, but rather by the way in whichthey are united; one might almost say that the weak, cold color ofsome languages is due to the lack of characteristic and stronglyaccented sounds. It is only an unharmonious combination of dissimilarconsonants that offends a refined ear. The frequent return of certainwell-united consonants gives shading, rhythm, and vigor to language;whereas the predominance of vowels produces a certain pallor in thecoloration, which needs the contrast of darker tints. "

Those who are always ready to insist on the superiority of the Italianlanguage for song, would do well to ponder these remarks of Liszt, whoknew what he was talking about, as he spoke a number of modernlanguages fluently. And when they have done that, they should procurea few of Wagner's later vocal scores and note the extremely ingeniousmanner in which he has made the peculiarities of German consonantssubservient to his dramatic purposes. I refer especially to his use ofalliteration--the repetition of a consonant in the same or inconsecutive lines. This not only insures a smooth, melodious flow, butenables the composer to heighten the effect of any situation bychoosing consonants that harmonize with it. What, for instance, couldbe more delightfully descriptive than the words sung by the threeRhine daughters as they merrily swim and gambol under the water in"Rheingold:"

 "Weia! Waga! Woge, du Welle, Walle zur Wiege! Wagalaweia! Wallala, weiala, weia!"

One need only look at this, without understanding the language, tofeel the rhythmic motion of the water, and imagine the song of themerry maidens. Again, in the famous love duo in the "Walküre, " notethe repetition of the liquid consonants, the l's and m's, which givethe sound such a soft and sentimental background. Does it not seemincredible that the Italian operatic composers should have ignoredsuch poetic means of deepening the emotional color of their songs?

But this is by no means all. In the same scene in "Rheingold" to whichreference has just been made, the ugly Nibelung _Alberich_ appearspresently and tries to catch one of the lovely maidens. But they eludehis grasp and he angrily complains that he slips and slides on theslimy soil. Note the slippery character of these sounds:

 "Garstig glatter Glitschriger Glimmer! Wie Gleit ich aus! Mit Händen und Füssen Nicht fasse noch halt'ich Das schlecke Geschlüpfer. "

_There_ is a real Volapük for you--a world language which all canunderstand, for it is onomatopoetic realism. 

Of course it is not "beautiful;" but is that a reasonable objection?What would you say to an artist who painted dramatic battle-scenes, but made all the soldiers' faces as pretty as he could and adornedwith sweet smiles? _That_ is precisely what the Italian operacomposers have done in stage music; and it is because Wagner taughtthe singer to express not only _sweet_ sentiments but _all_ dramaticemotions, whether harsh or agreeable, that his new style marks anepoch in the evolution of the art of singing. At the same time, eventhese harsher passages in Wagner's vocal music are not really ugly, that is, disagreeable to the ear, _when properly sung_. Just as ahomely face becomes attractive when it expresses a vivid emotion, sothe harshest vocal measures in the realistic music-drama become asource of enjoyment if they are sung _with expression_. 

Unfortunately, there are only a few artists as yet who havesufficiently caught Wagner's intentions to be able to sing in thismanner. Carl Hill, who created the part of the magician _Klingsor_ atthe Parsifal Festival, in 1882, was one of these exceptions. Hereflected the spirit of the gruesome text assigned to him so admirablythat Wagner was delighted; but afterward he complained that Hill'sfine impersonation was not so widely appreciated as it deserved to be;and why? Apparently, because _Klingsor's_ melodic intervals were notpleasing, nor his sentiments sympathetic. 

We must conclude from this that, in regard to dramatic singing, manyopera-goers are still a good deal like the honest Scotchman who, onhis first visit to a theatre, climbed on the stage and administeredthe villain of the play a sound thrashing; or, like the Boweryaudiences, which applaud the good man in the play, no matter how badlyhe acts, and hiss the villain, though he be a second Salvini. 

Until operatic audiences begin to understand that singing iscommendable in proportion as it gives realistic expression, not onlyto sweet and pleasing moods, but to various kinds of dramatic emotion, the full grandeur and value of Wagner's vocal style cannot beappreciated. A real epicure does not care to eat cakes and candy allthe time; he loves olives and caviare too. These may be acquiredtastes, but all taste for high art is acquired. And the time is, apparently, not very distant when Wagner's realistic vocal style willno longer be caviare even to the public at large, but will be moreenjoyed--even when it gives expression to emotions of anger, jealousy, and revenge--than the cloying, sugar-coated melodies of Bellini andRossini, or those meaningless embroideries which even some of the bestof the older Italians (Tosi, for example) regarded as the mostbeautiful part of song. 

The great enthusiasm frequently shown at performances of Wagner'soperas in other countries as well as in Germany, seems to argue thatthe public at large _has_ already entered into the real spirit andmeaning of the Wagnerian style of singing. But numerous experienceslead me to believe the contrary. Allow me to quote, for example, anextract from one of those letters, abusive or censorious, whichmusical editors receive almost daily. "Is it not undeniable, " writes acorrespondent, "that as long as the world lasts, one of its greatestdelights will consist in listening to the music furnished by the humanvoice? The more highly cultivated, pure, sweet, and flexible thevoice, the more the enjoyment derived. And is it not equally true thatWagner's style of music discourages singing of this sort, or, in fact, singing of any sort? Are not the principal features of Wagner's operasthe orchestra, acting, and general _mise-en-scène_, and does notsinging, pure and simple, have but little part in it?"

If the writer of these questions had asked them in Wagner's presence Ibelieve that Wagner would have jumped up and boxed his ears. Nothingso irritated him as this notion that the singing in his operas issubordinate to the orchestra, or, in other words, that he puts thestatue in the orchestra and the pedestal on the stage. As early as1850, he complained to Liszt about his friend Dingelstedt, who, in hisarticle on the first performance of "Lohengrin, " had expressed asimilar opinion. And many years later, in writing of Schnorr vonCarolsfeld's wonderful impersonation of _Tristan_, he begs the readerto note that the last act of this work contains "an exuberance oforchestral devices, such as no simple instrumental composer has everhad occasion to call into use. Then assure yourself, " he continues, "that this complete gigantic orchestra, considered from an operaticpoint of view, is, after all, only related as _accompaniment_ to the'solo' part represented by the monologue of the vocalist, who lies onhis couch; and infer from this the significance of Schnorr'simpersonation, if I call to witness every conscientious spectator atthose Munich performances, that, from the first bar to the last, theattention and interest of all was centred on the vocalist actor, waschained to him, and never allowed a single word of the text to escapethrough a momentary absence of mind; and that the orchestra, ascompared with the singer, completely disappeared, or, more correctlyspeaking, seemed to be a constituent part of his song. "

I have never had the privilege of hearing Schnorr, but I heard Scariarepeatedly at Bayreuth and Vienna, and he always impressed on me, inthe manner here described by Wagner, the supreme importance of thevocal part in his scores. Not a word of the text was lost, and in themost difficult intervals his voice was always beautifully andsmoothly modulated. He enabled me to realize for the first time, thetruth of what Wagner said regarding his vocal style, in the followingwords: "In my operas there is no difference between phrases that are'declaimed' and 'sung, ' but my declamation is at the same time song, and my song declamation. " Scaria's method also afforded an eloquentillustration of the wonderful manner in which, in Wagner's vocalstyle, the melodic accent always falls on the proper rhetorical accentof each word of the text, which is one of the secrets of clearenunciation. He emphasized important syllables by dwelling on them, thus producing that dramatic _rubato_ which Wagner considered of suchgreat importance in his operas that, when he brought out "Tannhäuser"in Dresden, he actually had the words of the text copied into theparts of all the orchestral players, in order that they might be ableto follow these poetic licenses in the dramatic phrasing of thesinger. This dramatic _rubato_ is, of course, a very different thingfrom the freedom which Italian singers often allow themselves onfavorable high notes, which they prolong, not in order to emphasize anemotion but to show off the beauty and sustaining power of theirvoices. 

Scaria, unfortunately, was never heard in opera in this country. Butwe have had Materna and Niemann and Brandt and Fischer, and Alvaryand Lehmann, who have given us correct ideas of the German vocalstyle. Surely no one can say, on listening to Lehmann's _Brünnhilde_, or Fischer's _Hans Sachs, _ or Alvary's _Siegfried_, that the vocalpart is inferior in beauty or importance to the orchestral. WhenAlvary sang _Siegfried_ for the first time in New York, he presented acreditable but uneven impersonation, not having sufficiently masteredthe details of the acting to feel quite at ease, and not being able tohusband his vocal resources for the grand duo at the close. But at theend of the season, at the eleventh performance, he had become afull-fledged _Siegfried_, acting the part as by instinct, while hisvoice was as fresh at the close of the opera as at the beginning: thusaffording a striking proof of Wagner's assertion, that the greatestvocal difficulties of his rôles can be readily mastered if the singerwill only take the pains to enter thoroughly into the spirit of thetext and the dramatic situations. Alvary spent a whole year inlearning this rôle, availing himself of the hints given him by HerrSeidl, who has the Wagnerian traditions by heart; and to-day he might, if he felt so inclined, amass wealth and win honor by travelling aboutEurope and singing nothing but this one rôle. Vienna and Brussels madestrenuous efforts to entice him away from New York after his greatsuccess as _Siegfried_. 

This success is the more gratifying and encouraging because, previously, he had been only a second-rate singer. It was hisconscientious and prolonged study of the German vocal style thatenabled him to win his present lucrative and honorable position. Ifthere were a few more young singers like him the operatic problem mightbe considered solved, for it is the rarity of well-trained singers thatcauses all the financial embarrassment in our opera-houses. They are soscarce, that as soon as one is discovered he is hurried on the stage, after a year's hasty preparation, and if his untrained voice soon givesout--as it must under the circumstances--the blame is laid on Wagner'sshoulders. But, as Mme. Lucca remarks, "neither Wagner nor any othercomposer spoils the voice of any one who knows how to sing. " She thinksthat at least six years of faithful study are necessary to develop thevoice in accordance with artistic principles. Herr Hey is somewhat morelenient, three years of thorough training sufficing, in his opinion, asa preparation for the stage. Much, of course, depends on individuals, and the number of hours given to study every day. In the old Italianvocal schools, two centuries ago, the pupils were kept busy six oreight hours a day, devoting one hour to difficult passages, another totrills and to accuracy of intonation, others to expression, tocounterpoint, composition and accompaniment, etc. They often practisedbefore a mirror in order to study the position of the soft parts in themouth, and to avoid grimaces; and sometimes they sang at places wherethere was a good echo, so as to hear their own faults, as if some oneelse were singing. Yet, as we have seen, the main stress was laid onagility of technical execution, whereas the modern German method, without in the least neglecting technique, calls upon pupils to devotemore attention to the principles of soulful expression and dramaticaccentuation. A singer who wishes to appear to advantage as _Euryanthe_or _Lohengrin_ or _Tristan_ must not only be entirely familiar with hisown vocal parts but he ought to be as familiar with the orchestralscore as the conductor himself: for, only then, can he acquire thatease which is necessary for producing a deep impression. As he has notthe conductor's advantage of looking on the printed score whilesinging, he must therefore have an excellent memory. As Dr. Hanslickremarks, "the artists who sing 'Tristan and Isolde' by heart, if theydo nothing more than sing the notes correctly, deserve our most sincereadmiration. That they can do to-day what seemed almost impossibletwenty years ago is indeed Wagner's achievement, an achievement whichhas hardly been noted hitherto. " Let me add that in modern Germanmusic, _everything_ is difficult to the singer--the consonants of thelanguage, the unusual intervals and accents, the necessity of beingactor and singer at the same time, etc. Hence we ought to be charitableand condone an occasional slip. But the average opera-goer in thiscountry is anything but charitable. If one of these dramatic singers, thus hampered by difficulties, makes the slightest lapse from tonalbeauty (which may be even called for) he is judged as unmercifully asif he were a representative of the _bel canto_, whose art consists in amere voice without emotion--_vox et præterea nihil_. This is as unfairas it is to judge Wagner's dramas by the music alone, and is, indeed aconsequence of this attitude. 

It has been too much the habit in America and in England to sneer atGerman singers; and it is customary if a German singer has a goodmellow voice to attribute that to his Italian method, while hisshortcomings are ascribed to the German method. This, again, is asabsurd as it is unjust; for, as I have endeavored to show, the realGerman method, by insisting on an equal treatment of all the vowels, develops a richer and more sonorous voice than the Italian method;and, indeed, the reason why powerful dramatic voices are so rare amongItalians, is because of their one-sided preference, in theirexercises, for the easiest vowels. 

When Mendelssohn travelled in Italy he noted that there were very fewgood singers at the opera-houses, and that one had to go to Londonand Paris to find them. To-day few of them can be found even in Londonand Paris; and, indeed, I could easily show, by giving lists of thefamous singers of the past and present, that the Italians constitute asmall minority as compared with the German, French, and Scandinaviansingers of the first rank. The custom so long followed by singers ofall nationalities of adopting Italian stage names has confused thepublic on the subject. And, finally, I could name a dozen Germansingers who have won first-class honors in Italian opera; but where isthere an Italian _Tannhäuser_ or _Brünnhilde_ or _Wotan_? All honor, therefore, to the versatility of German singers, who, like LilliLehmann, for instance, can sing _Norma_ and _Isolde_ equally well. 

And still more honor to the German composers who have restored thetrue function of song. Everybody knows that in the popular songs, orfolk songs, of _all_ nations, including the Italian, the words arequite as important as the melody. It was only in the artificial songsof the Netherland school and the Italian opera composers that thevoice was degraded to the function of a mere inarticulate instrument;and it remained for Wagner, following the precedence of Gluck, torestore it to its rank as the inseparable companion of poetry. Andwhat led him to do this was not abstract reflection but artisticinstinct and experience. He does not even claim the honor of havingoriginated the true vocal style, but confesses with pride that it wasa _woman_, Frau Schroeder-Devrient, who first revealed to him thehighest possibilities of dramatic singing, and he boasts that he wasthe only one that learned this lesson of the great German singer, anddeveloped the hints regarding the correct vocal style unconsciouslygiven by her. 

It must not be forgotten, however, that side by side with themusic-drama and partly preceding it, another form of vocal music grewup in Germany, which in a very similar manner restored the voice toits true sphere as the wedded wife of poetry. I refer, of course, tothe _Lied_, or parlor song, to which, indeed, I might have devotedthis whole essay, quite as well as to the music-drama, if there wereanything in Italian music that might have been compared to the songsof Schubert, Schumann, Franz, Brahms, Liszt, Rubinstein, etc. 

As Sir George Grove poetically puts it, in Schubert's songs "the musicchanges with the words as a landscape does when the sun and cloudspass over it. And in this Schubert has anticipated Wagner, since thewords in which he writes are as much the absolute basis of his songsas Wagner's librettos are of his operas. " Liszt, too, notes somewherethat Schubert doubtless exerted an indirect influence on thedevelopment of the opera by means of the dramatic realism whichcharacterizes the melody and accompaniment of his parlor songs (suchas the "Erl King, " the "Doppelgänger, " etc. )--a realism which becomesstill more pronounced in Schumann, Franz, and Liszt, in whose songsevery word of the poem colors its bar of music with its specialemotional tint, instead of merely serving, as in the old _bel canto_, as an artificial and meaningless scaffolding for the construction andexecution of a melody. 

This parallel evolution of the parlor song and the music-drama cannotbe too strongly emphasized: for the same tendency being followed by somany of the greatest geniuses (some of whom are not Germans) affordscumulative evidence of the fact that the German style (which, as Ihave explained, includes all that is valuable in the Italian method)is the true vocal style, the style of the future, the style whichcosmopolitan American art will have to adopt. I have been told thatsince the revival of German opera in New York, the Italian teachers inthe city have lost many of their pupils. Obviously, if they wish toregain them they will have to adopt the best features of the Germanmethod, just as the Germans have adopted all that is good in theItalian method. It cannot be denied that the pupils turned out by theaverage vocal teachers are quite unable to sing a Franz or even aSchubert song correctly and with proper emotional expression. Now, itis evident, as Ehlert says, that "that art of singing which abideswith the _bel canto_ and is unable to sing Bach, Beethoven, andSchumann, has not attained to the height of their period. It becomesits task to adapt itself to these new circumstances, to renounce thecomfortable solfeggios and acquire the poetic expression that theyaccept. "

The famous tenor Vogl, a contemporary of Schubert, wrote in his diarythe following significant words: "Nothing shows so plainly the want ofa good school of singing as Schubert's songs. Otherwise, what anenormous and universal effect must have been produced throughout theworld, wherever the German language is understood, by these trulydivine inspirations, these utterances of a musical clairvoyance! Howmany would have comprehended, probably for the first time, the meaningof such expressions as 'Speech and Poetry in Music, ' 'Words inHarmony, ' 'ideas clothed in music, ' etc. , and would have learned thatthe finest poems of our greatest poets may be enhanced and eventranscended when translated into musical language. " It is humiliatingto be obliged to confess that good schools of singing, the absence ofwhich Vogl deplored, are still lamentably rare, although he himself, by his example, did much to develop the correct method. We have justseen how Wagner obtained valuable hints from Schroeder-Devrient. Similarly, we find that Schubert learned from his friend Vogl, whoalone at first could sing his songs properly, and by showing that they_could_ be sung encouraged Schubert in developing his original style. 

It seems to me that these facts ought to be extremely gratifying andencouraging to students of vocal music, because they refute the notionthat vocalists can only be interpretative and not creative, and theirfame and influence, therefore, merely ephemeral. On the contrary, theycan, like Vogl and Schroeder-Devrient, even aspire to guide composersand help to mark out new paths in art: which surely, ought to be moregratifying to their pride than the cheap applause which the sopranistsand prima donnas of the _bel canto_ period used to receive for themeaningless colorature arias which they compelled the enslavedcomposers to write, or manufactured for themselves. And there isanother way in which singers of the new style can become creative. Chopin speaks in one of his letters of a violoncellist who played acertain poor piece so remarkably well that it actually appeared to begood music. Similarly, a good vocalist (like Fräulein Brandt, forinstance, who is very clever in this respect) can put so much art andfeeling into the weaker parts and episodes of songs and operas as tomake them entertaining where they are naturally tiresome. When webear in mind these high possibilities of singing, we must admit thatthere is no nobler profession than that of a conscientious vocalist--aprofession without which some of the deepest feelings that stir thehuman soul would remain unknown to the world. 

VI

GERMAN OPERA IN NEW YORK

Perhaps it is not generally known that Mr. Theodore Thomas some yearsago entertained the project of reviving German opera in New York, in amanner that should eclipse all previous operatic enterprises in thiscountry. It was his intention to give in the leading American cities aseries of performances of Wagner's Nibelung Tetralogy, and he lookedforward to this as the crowning achievement of his busy life. Foryears he never gave a concert without having at least one Wagnerselection on the programme, no matter how much some of the critics andpatrons protested. In 1884 he considered the public sufficientlyweaned of Italian sweets to stand a strong dose of Wagner; so heimported the three leading singers of the Bayreuth festivals--Materna, Winkelmann, and Scaria--for a number of festival concerts. Theextraordinary success of these concerts seemed to indicate that thetime was ripe for a complete theatrical production of Wagner's latermusic-dramas, and Mr. Thomas was already elaborating his plans when anaccident frustrated them and took the whole matter out of his hands. 

This accident was the signal failure of Italian opera at theMetropolitan Opera House during the first season of its existence. AsMr. Abbey lost over a quarter of a million dollars by this disaster, no other manager could be found willing to take his place and riskanother fortune. Since Mr. Abbey's company included several of themost popular artists--Nilsson, Sembrich, Scalchi, Campanini, DelPuente, etc. , and his repertory embraced the usual popular operas, theconclusion seemed inevitable that the public wanted a complete change. Dr. Damrosch was accordingly appealed to at the eleventh hour, and hehastened to Germany and brought over a company that scored animmediate success, surprising even to those who had long advocated theestablishment of a German opera in New York. And this success becamestill more pronounced in the following seasons, when a better companywas secured, with Herr Seidl as conductor. 

Perhaps it is fortunate that Mr. Thomas's project was never realized. Had he succeeded, New York and several other cities would no doubthave enjoyed a series of interesting Wagner performances for one ortwo seasons; but after the first curiosity had been satisfied, it isvery likely that the enterprise would have come to an end for lack offunds. For it is a well-established fact that grand opera, if givenwith the best singers, artistic scenery, and an orchestra of sixty toone hundred men, cannot be made self-supporting, however generouslythe public may contribute to it. The Paris opera is kept afloat bymeans of an annual subsidy of eight hundred thousand francs, and theimperial opera-houses of Berlin and Vienna, although similarlyendowed, are burdened with large annual deficits which have to becovered by additional contributions from the imperial exchequers. NewYork can hardly claim so large a public interested in high-class operaas Vienna and Berlin; hence it would be unreasonable to expect thatgrand opera should fare better here. It was, therefore, one of themost lucky accidents in the history of American music that theMetropolitan Opera House was built, in opposition to the Academy ofMusic, by a number of the richest people in New York, who had made uptheir minds to spare no cost to make it successful and to annihilatethe rival house. Having once built the new opera-house, it becamenecessary to continue giving in it the only kind of opera adapted tothe vast dimensions of its auditorium, unless the stockholders shouldbecome willing to pay the high annual rent without any return at all. And thus German opera has been established in New York, if not for alltime, at least for years to come. 

The fact cannot be too much emphasized that, properly speaking, thereis _no deficit_ at the Metropolitan Opera House. True, the totalexpenses of the operatic season of 1886-1887 were about four hundredand forty-two thousand dollars, and the receipts only two hundred andthirty-five thousand dollars, thus necessitating an assessment of twothousand five hundred dollars on each stockholder. But it must beborne in mind that this assessment simply represents the sum that thestockholders paid for their boxes. As there were forty-fivesubscription nights, and as each box holds six seats, the price ofeach was nine dollars, which can hardly be deemed too much for thebest seats in the house, considering that outsiders have to pay tendollars for these same seats, or sixty dollars for a box. A large partof the assessment (about one thousand dollars for each stockholder)would remain for covering the general expenses of the building(including the mortgage bonds), even if no opera were given at all;and surely the box-holders would be foolish if they refused to pay theextra sum (four dollars and eighty-eight cents for each seat), whichinsures them forty-five evenings of social and musical entertainment. To persons of their wealth this extra sum is, after all, a meretrifle; and it enables them to bask in the proud consciousness oftaking the place, in this country, of royalty abroad in supporting aform of art that has always been considered pre-eminentlyaristocratic. 

Some of the stockholders make no secret of the fact that they wouldvery much prefer Italian to German opera, which is Sanskrit to them;and every year, at the directors' meetings, the question of revivingItalian opera is warmly debated. There is also a considerable numberof amateurs, editors, and correspondents who are eagerly waiting forsome signs showing that German opera is losing ground, so that theymay raise a war-whoop in behalf of Italian opera. But the powers thatrule the destinies of the Metropolitan Opera House are too wise toheed the arguments of these prophets. They know that Italian opera cannever again be successfully revived in New York, and that the onlyalternative for the present lies between German opera and no opera atall. Signor Angelo and Mr. Mapleson were as unsuccessful in their lastefforts in behalf of Italian opera as Mr. Abbey. And although Mme. Patti fared better at her last appearance, it was only because a largenumber of people believed that she _really_ was singing in New Yorkfor the last time; for when she returned a fortnight later for_another_ "farewell, " the sale of seats was so small that the spoiledprima donna refused to sing, and only one performance was giveninstead of two. 

The lovers of vocal tight-rope dancing and threadbare orchestralaccompaniments who insist that Wagner is merely a fashion, and thatere long there will be a return to the saccharine melodies of Rossiniand Bellini, show thereby that they have never studied the history ofthe opera. This history teaches a curious lesson, viz. , that operaswhich had a great vogue at one time and subsequently lost theirpopularity can _never_ be galvanized into real life again. What hasbecome of the threescore and more operas of Donizetti, and the fortyof Rossini--some of which for years monopolized the stage socompletely the world over that Weber and Beethoven were ignored evenin Vienna and the German capitals? They are dead, and all efforts torevive them have been futile. These operas had sprung into _sudden_popularity, whereas "Fidelio, " "Euryanthe, " "Lohengrin, " and"Tannhäuser, " which for years had to fight for every inch of ground, are now masters of the situation, and gaining in popularity everyyear. And this brings us to the second lesson taught by the history ofthe opera--that the works that thus had to _fight_ their way into thehearts of the public are the immortal operas that are sure to gainmore and more favor as years go by. Moreover, the statistics of Germanopera-houses show that Wagner's operas, from the "Flying Dutchman" tothe "Nibelung's Ring, " have been gaining in popularity and frequencyof repetition, year by year, with a constancy that might almost beexpressed with mathematical exactness by means of a _crescendo_: