A Popular History of the Art of Music

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[Illustration: Fig. 82.

FREDERIC CHOPIN.]

Much pleased with his success in Vienna, Chopin returned to Warsaw,
and after some months, set out for London, by way of Paris. Here his
fortune varied somewhat. At first he found it impossible to secure a
hearing, his only acquaintances being a few of his exiled
fellow-countrymen, who were there. At length one evening a friend
took him to a reception at the Rothschild's, and in this cultivated
society he found appreciative listeners to his marvelous playing. From
that time on he remained in Paris, only leaving it when his health
made it necessary to visit the south of France. He very seldom
appeared in public. His touch was not sufficiently strong to render
his playing effective in a large hall.

The whole of the Chopin genius is summed up in his early works, which
he took with him on his visit to Vienna. All his later works are in
some sense repetitions. The ideas and the treatment are new, but the
principles underlying are the same, and rarely, if ever, does he reach
a higher flight than in some of these earlier works. His most
celebrated innovation was that of the Nocturne, a sentimental
cantilena for the pianoforte, in which a somewhat Byronic sentiment is
expressed in a high-bred and elegant style. The name "nocturne" was
not original with Chopin--the Dublin pianist, John Field, having
published his first nocturnes in 1816. Field himself derived the name
from the prayers of the Roman Church which are made between midnight
and morning. The name, therefore, implies something belonging to the
night--mysterious, dreamy, poetic. In Field's there is little of this,
aside from the name; the melodies are plain and the sentiments
commonplace. With Chopin, however, it is entirely different. In some
instances the treatment for the piano is very simple, as in the
popular nocturne in E flat, already mentioned; but in other cases he
exercises the utmost freedom, and very carefully trained fingers are
needed to perform them successfully. This is the case, for example, in
the beautiful nocturne in G, Opus 37, No. 2, where the passages in
thirds and sixths are extremely trying; also in the very dramatic
nocturne in C minor, Opus 48.

Chopin's place in the Pantheon of the romantic school is that of the
popularizer of pianoforte sentiment. His compositions, by whatever
name they may be called, are essentially lyric pieces, songs, ballads
and fanciful stories in rhyme. The subjects are frequently tender or
sad, sometimes morbid--in short, Byronic. The treatment is always
graceful and high-bred, and the contrasts strong. The melodies are
embroidered with a peculiar kind of _fioratura_, which he invented
himself, founded upon the Italian embellishment of that kind--a
delicate efflorescence of melody, which, when perfectly done, is
extremely pleasing. The names applied to the different compositions
such as Ballade, Scherzo, Prelude, Rondo, Sonata, Impromptu, have only
a remote reference to the nature of the piece. Occasionally the entire
composition is morbid and unsatisfactory to a degree. These belong to
the later period of his life, when he was in poor health. He is a
woman's composer. In his strongest moments there is always an
effeminate element. In this respect he is exactly opposite to Schumann
and Beethoven, whose works, however delicate and refined, have always
a manly strength. Chopin made the most important modifications in the
current way of treating the piano. In this part of his activity he
seemed to realize the possibilities of the instrument, in the same way
that Paganini had recognized those of the violin. His passages, while
based upon those of Hummel, nevertheless produced effects of which
Hummel was totally incapable. Chopin is the originator of the extended
_arpeggio_ chord, of the chromatic sequences of the diminished
sevenths with passing notes, and cadenza forms derived from them. He
is thoroughly French in his views of "changing notes," as, for
instance, in the accompaniment to the impromptu in A flat, Opus 29.
His influence upon the general progress of musical development is to
be traced in the works of Liszt, especially in the later pianoforte
works, and in a large number of less gifted imitators, like Doehler.

V.

Aside from Wagner, the most remarkable figure of this century is that
of Franz Liszt, who was born at Raiding, in Hungary, 1811, and died at
Bayreuth, 1886. His father, Adam Liszt, was an official in the
imperial service, and a musical amateur, capable of instructing his
son in piano playing. At the age of nine he made his first public
appearance, with so much success that several noblemen guaranteed the
money to enable him to pursue his studies for six years in Vienna.
Here he became a pupil of Czerny, Salieri and Randhartinger. He made
the acquaintance of Schubert, and upon one occasion played before
Beethoven, who kissed him, with the prophecy that he would make his
mark. His first appearance as a composer was in a set of variations on
a waltz by Diabelli, the same for which Beethoven wrote the
thirty-three variations, Opus 120. Liszt's variation was the
twenty-fourth in the set to which Beethoven did not contribute. It was
published in 1823, when he was twelve years old. The same year he went
to Paris, his father hoping to enter him at the Conservatory, in spite
of his foreign origin; but Cherubini refused to receive him, so he
studied with other composers. His operetta of "_Don Sanche_" was
performed at the _Academie Royale_ in 1825, and was well received. At
this time he was in the height of his youthful success in Paris,
tall, slender, with long hair and a most free and engaging
countenance, with ready wit and unbounded tact. He performed marvels
upon the piano, such as no one else could attempt. His repertory at
this time seems to have consisted of pieces of the old school. In 1827
he lost his father, and being thrown upon his own resources, he began
his concert tour. He appeared in London in 1827, his piece being the
Hummel concerto. Three years later he played in London again, his
number being the Weber _Concertstueck_.

There was something weird and magnetic about his playing. He was very
tall, about six feet two inches, slender, with piercing eyes, very
long arms, but small hands; he played without notes, and amid the most
frightful difficulties of execution kept his eyes fixed upon this,
that or the other person in the audience. He moved about at the piano
very much in the exciting passages, not, apparently, on account of the
difficulty of overcoming technical obstacles, but simply from innate
fire and excitement. As for technical difficulties, they did not
exist. Everything that the piano contained seemed to be at his
service, and the only regret was that the instrument was not better
able to respond to his demand. In the _fortissimo_ passages his tone
was immense, and his _pianissimos_ were the most delicate whispers. In
these his fingers glided over the keys with inconceivable lightness
and speed, and the tone fell upon the ear with a delicate tracery with
which no particular was lost by reason of speed or lightness. This
wonderful control of the instrument stood him in equal stead with his
own compositions, especially adapted to his own style of playing; or
with the works of the old school, which he transfigured as they had
never been played before; or the last sonatas of Beethoven, which at
that time were a sealed book to most musicians. These, indeed, he did
not play in public, but in private. The essential novelties of the
Liszt technique were the _bravura_ cadenzas. The other sensational
features, such as carrying the melody in the middle range of the piano
with surrounding embroidery, the rapid runs and the extravagant
climaxes, were all more or less common to the three representative
virtuoso piano writers of this epoch--Liszt, Chopin and Thalberg.

A careful study of all the circumstances and influences surrounding
Liszt at the time, leads to the conclusion that his ideas of the
possibilities of the pianoforte were matured very gradually, not
reaching their complete expression in the operatic fantasias before
about 1834 or 1835. His early appearances were in pieces of the old
school, and there is nothing more to be found in contemporary accounts
of his playing than admiration for its superior fire and delicacy.
Upon the appearance of Paganini, however, this was changed. The
temporary eclipse, which this brilliant apparition made of the rising
Liszt, led him to new studies in original directions. Thus arose the
transcriptions of the Paganini caprices in 1832, and the composition
of his own "Studies for Transcendent Execution," in the same or the
following year. Farther sensational improvements were probably the
result of the Thalberg contest in Paris during 1835.

Liszt's influence may be inferred from such incidents as the
following: In 1839 there was a movement on foot to erect a monument to
Beethoven at Bonn, but after some months' solicitation the committee
found it impossible to realize the desired sum, or anything
approaching it. Whereupon Liszt wrote them to give themselves no
further uneasiness, for he himself would be responsible for the entire
amount, about $10,000. This large sum he raised by his own exertions,
and paid over, and a monument was unveiled with brilliant ceremonies
in 1845. One of the performances upon that occasion was that of the
Beethoven fifth concerto, which Liszt himself played. Concerning this
memorable performance Berlioz himself writes: "The piano concerto in E
flat is generally known for one of the better productions of
Beethoven. The first movement and the _Adagio_, above all, are of
incomparable beauty. To say that Liszt played it, and that he played
it in a fashion grand, fine, poetic, yet always faithful, is to make a
veritable pleonasm, and there was a tumult of applause, a sound of
trumpets, and _fanfares_ of the orchestra, which must have been heard
far beyond the limits of the hall. Liszt immediately afterward mounted
the desk of the conductor to direct the performance of the symphony in
C minor, which he made us hear as Beethoven wrote it, including the
entire _scherzo_, without the abridgment, as we have so long been
accustomed to hear at the Conservatory at Paris; and the finale, with
the repeat indicated by Beethoven. I have always had such confidence
in the taste of the correctors of the great masters that I was very
much surprised to find the symphony in C minor still more beautiful
when executed entirely than when corrected. It was necessary to go to
Bonn to make this discovery."

In 1849 a new epoch was opened in the history of this remarkable man.
The grand duke of Weimar invited him to assume the direction of his
musical establishment, including the opera. The salary was absurdly
small--$800 or $1,000 a year. This, however, cut no figure in Liszt's
mind, for he had always been singularly open-handed, yet at same time
prudent. From his successful concert tours he had put by funds, 20,000
francs for his aged mother, and 20,000 francs for each of the three
children he had by the Countess D'Agoult (known in literature as
Daniel Stern), and he considered that the position would afford him an
opportunity of developing his own talent for composition, and at the
same time of affording a hearing for important new works, which, on
account of their novelty and originality, were impossible of
performance in the theaters of large cities. The repertory of the
Weimar opera, from this time on, was most extraordinary. Here were
produced for the first time Wagner's "Flying Dutchman,"
"_Tannhaeuser_," and "_Lohengrin_," "_Benvenuto Cellini_," of Berlioz,
Schumann's "_Genoveva_" and "_Mannfred_," and Schubert's "Alfonso and
Estrella." Here were produced, also, the best of the operas of
previous generations. Every master work of this sort Liszt revised
with the greatest care, giving endless patience to every detail, and
supplementing the resources of the theater, when insufficient, by
"guests" from the great operas in the capital. Thus the musical
establishment at Weimar became a sort of Mecca, to which all the
musicians of the world gathered, especially the young and energetic in
the pursuit of knowledge, and creative artists seeking a hearing or
fresh inspiration. From an artistic standpoint, nothing more beautiful
than the life of Liszt at Weimar could be desired. Besides these
operatic performances and his symphony concerts, he gathered about him
a succession of young virtuosi pianists. These had lessons, more or
less formally, some of them for many years. Liszt never received money
for lessons, and took no pupils but those whom he regarded as
promising, or who were personally attractive to himself. About 1850
the American, Dr. William Mason, was there, and for two years
following. The class at this time contained the well known names of
Rubinstein, Carl Klindworth, Pruckner, Tausig, Joachim Raff, and Hans
von Buelow. From this time on there is scarcely a concert pianist in
the world who did not spend a few months or longer with Liszt at
Weimar. Nor did his influence stop here. He produced a constant
succession of important works, and conducted concerts and festivals in
Hungary, and in different parts of Germany and France. Everywhere his
inspiring presence and his keen insight were prized above all ordinary
resources.

There is not space here to sketch in detail his singular and trying
relations to that self-conscious genius, Wagner, who, when absconding
to Zurich, sent the score of "_Lohengrin_" to Liszt. It can be
imagined with what force the elevated and noble beauty of this
epoch-marking work appealed to a genius so sensitive as Liszt. He not
only produced the opera with great care, but prepared the public for
it by means of extended articles in important journals in Leipsic,
Berlin and Paris. From this time on, Liszt became the good angel of
Wagner. There are few records in the annals of music more creditable
than the letters of Liszt to Wagner. He took charge of his business in
Germany, exercised his wholly unique and commanding influence to
secure performances of Wagner's operas, sent him money out of his own
purse, and secured some from his friends. More than this, he greeted
every new work of Wagner's with an appreciation as generous and noble
as it was intelligent and fine.

About 1852 Liszt commenced his symphonic poems. In these he avails
himself of two of Wagner's suggestions. Much is made of the leading
motive, and the orchestration is handled in a sonorous and brilliant
manner, which Berlioz and Wagner first introduced. The works are very
effective and original. Certain ones of them have become almost
classic, like "The Preludes" and "_Tasso_." He also wrote a number of
large choral works, among them his "Legend of the Holy Elizabeth," the
"Graner Mass," etc.

[Illustration: Fig. 83.

LISZT AS ABBE.

(Grove.)]

There is hardly a province of musical composition in which Liszt did
not distinguish himself. The orchestral compositions number about
twenty. There are several important arrangements, such as Schubert
marches, Schubert's songs, "Rakoczy March," and a variety of
arrangements for pianoforte and orchestra, including two concertos,
the Weber Polacca in E, and the Schubert fantasia. The pianoforte
compositions are extremely numerous. Of the original pieces there are
perhaps one hundred. Of important arrangements, such as the _etudes_
from Paganini, the organ preludes and fugues from Bach, Schubert
marches, etc., there are thirty or forty. Of the operatic fantasias
there are perhaps a hundred or more. There are fifteen Hungarian
Rhapsodies, and a large number of transcriptions of vocal pieces (of
songs alone there are upwards of a hundred). Of masses and psalms
about twenty. Two oratorios, several cantatas, about sixty original
songs for single voice and piano, and very many other writings of a
literary and musical kind. In 1865 Liszt left Weimar for several
years, and resided in Rome, where he began to take holy orders.

[Illustration: Fig. 84.

FRANZ LISZT.]

In the closing years of Wagner's life, after the Bayreuth festival
theater had been inaugurated, Liszt was a central figure, and there
are few large cities in Europe which he did not visit for the sake of
encouraging important productions of the Wagnerian works. Thus, taken
as a composer, a performer, a conductor, and an appreciative friend of
art, his name is one which deserves to be revered as long as the
history of music in the nineteenth century is remembered.

Fig. 84 represents him as he appeared in the last years of his life.
The portrait of Liszt as abbe is taken from Grove's Dictionary.
Neither of these last pictures gives an adequate idea of the sweetness
of his expression. While the profile in middle life was sharp and
clearly cut, as we see it in the abbe picture, and while in old age
the mouth assumed a stern and set expression in repose, his smile was
extremely winning, and the habitual expression of his face in
conversation one of amiability and kindness.

[Illustration]

CHAPTER XXXVI.

MENDELSSOHN AND SCHUMANN.

I.

One of the most fortunate personalities among modern composers was
Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy (1809-1847), who was born in Berlin, the
grandson of Moses Mendelssohn, the famous Jewish philosopher. The
father of Felix was a banker, and his mother a woman of a very sweet
and amiable disposition. The children of Abraham Mendelssohn were
baptized in the Christian faith in order to escape in some degree the
prejudice against the Jewish race. Felix, having a strong inclination
to music, at an early age made great progress in it. His first concert
appearance was made at the age of ten, in which he played the piano
part in a trio by Woelfl, and was very much applauded. As early as his
twelfth year he began systematically to compose, and being naturally
of methodical habits, which were still further encouraged by his
father and mother, he kept an accurate record of his works, which at
the last filled forty-four folio volumes, the most of the pieces being
dated, and the place given where they were written. In the year 1820
he composed between fifty and sixty movements, of almost every sort,
songs, part songs, pieces for organ, piano, strings and orchestra, as
well as a cantata, and a little comedy for voices and a piano. In the
summer of 1820, the whole family made a tour of Switzerland, and a
very large number of pieces were composed at this time. In this same
year he made a more important concert appearance with Aloys Schmitt,
in which he played with Schmitt a duet for two pianos. This continued
exercise in composition was not entirely of an abstract nature, for
the Mendelssohn family were accustomed to have reunions on Sunday
evenings, when these pieces were played. For occasions like this he
wrote several small operas, and his talent was encouraged in every way
by his parents, and by his very judicious teacher, the celebrated
Zelter. When he was scarcely more than twelve years old, Zelter had
him play before Goethe, and a trio of the boy's was also played, after
which he was sent to play in the garden while his seniors discussed
his prospects. Thus the boy grew up under the most favorable
circumstances possible, his father being a wise and careful man, who,
although not a musician, thoroughly sympathized with the artistic aims
of his son; and his mother also encouraged him to more serious
efforts. Even at this early age he was a prolific composer of
orchestral music, the year 1824 being that of the composition of the
symphony in C minor, now known as No. 1, but in Mendelssohn's
catalogue marked the thirteenth of his compositions. In this year
Moscheles passed through Berlin on his way to London, and made the
acquaintance of Mendelssohn. At the Sunday morning music in the
Mendelssohn house, Moscheles recalls the performance of Felix's C
minor quartette, D major symphony, a concerto by Bach, played by
Fanny, and a duet for two pianos. In the same year Spohr came to
Berlin, and a little later Hiller, both of whom speak of
Mendelssohn's playing as something very remarkable. His celebrated
octette for strings, Opus 20, was composed in 1825. This was the first
of his works which has retained its popularity. The year following he
composed the overture to "The Midsummer Night's Dream," one of the
most remarkable pieces of the early romantic school. In this the
fairy-like music of Titania and her elves is charmingly contrasted
with the folk songs and the absurd bray of the transformed Bottom. He
had already written an opera "_Camacho_," which had been submitted to
Spontini, the musical director of Berlin, but it was never performed.
He entered at the University and attended the lectures of Hegel and
Carl Ritter, the geographer, but for mathematics he had no talent. Two
folio volumes of notes of the lectures of Hegel and Ritter are
preserved from the years 1827 and 1828. His overture to "The Calm Sea
and Prosperous Voyage" was written in 1828. In the year following he
started on a long journey of three years, carefully planned by his
father, in which all the countries of Europe were to have been visited
successively, and observations made on civilization and society. His
first appearance before an English audience was at a Philharmonic
concert, May 25, 1828, when he conducted his symphony in C minor and
improvised on the piano. He was received with the utmost applause.
Five days later he played the _Concertstueck_ of Von Weber, and, which
was a great innovation at that time, with no music before him. His
letters from London are very charming indeed. At a concert later, his
overture to "The Midsummer Night's Dream" was performed with great
success; this was the beginning of his English popularity, lasting all
the rest of his life.

The first of his "Songs without Words" was published in 1830, having
been originally composed for his sister Fanny. In this simple act he
opened a new chapter of the literature for the piano. The form of the
song without words had already been given in Field's nocturnes, the
first of which were published in 1816; but Mendelssohn, by giving it
the title, "_Song_, without Words," put the hearer in a different
relation to the composition--that of seeking to find in the work a
poetic suggestion in addition to pleasing melody and finely modulated
harmony. This, also, is extremely characteristic of the romantic
epoch, in which music has its origin in poetry. He had already written
a number of those charming _capriccios_, in which the piano is treated
with light staccato changing chords, such as Von Weber had suggested
nearly twenty years earlier in his "_Moment Capriccio_," but which no
writer brought to such perfection as Mendelssohn. These two styles of
pianoforte writing--the fairy-like _scherzo_, and the "Song without
Words," are Mendelssohn's specialties, in which no other writer can be
compared with him. He also wrote a number of concertos for piano and
orchestra, and one for violin, in which these two elements are very
strong features. Without having the effective passage work of
Thalberg, Liszt or Chopin, or the bold originality of Schumann,
Mendelssohn was an extremely original and pleasing pianoforte writer.
During his life, especially in the later part of it, he was somewhat
over-estimated; but at the present time, through the emergence of
Schumann from the obscurity into which Mendelssohn's reputation cast
him, the works of Mendelssohn are often underestimated. He opened a
new chapter in tone-poetry, popularizing pianoforte sentiment.

The famous G minor concerto for the piano was first produced in Munich
in 1831. In the same year he went to Paris, where many of his works
were performed and others were composed. The next year he was in
London again, when the Hebrides overture was produced and the first
book of "Songs without Words" was published. He also played the organ
at several of the churches, and excited general admiration by his
vigorous style. He is said to have been the first to play a Bach pedal
fugue in England, certainly the first to play any of the important
ones. In 1833 he was settled at Duesseldorf, as musical director of the
church and two associations. There he immediately instituted a reform
in the music of the church, and in the character of the selections for
concert. In the church there were masses by Beethoven and Cherubini,
motettes by Palestrina, and cantatas by Bach. The next year his
oratorio of "St. Paul" was begun. In 1837 he was married to a very
charming lady--Miss Cecilia Jeanrenaud, daughter of a clergyman of the
Reformed Church at Frankfort. Very soon after the wedding he was in
London and Birmingham, where he conducted "St. Paul" and commenced to
prepare the libretto for his oratorio of "Elijah." Among the Bach
fugues which he played in London on the organ at this time were the D
major, the G minor, the E major, the C minor and the short E minor.
His pedal playing was very highly esteemed.

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