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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6833f05 --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,3 @@ +* text=auto +*.txt text +*.md text diff --git a/4939-h.zip b/4939-h.zip Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..9bfcc2a --- /dev/null +++ b/4939-h.zip diff --git a/4939-h/4939-h.htm b/4939-h/4939-h.htm new file mode 100644 index 0000000..564b2f2 --- /dev/null +++ b/4939-h/4939-h.htm @@ -0,0 +1,9852 @@ +<!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01 Transitional//EN"> +<HTML> +<HEAD> + +<META HTTP-EQUIV="Content-Type" CONTENT="text/html; charset=iso-8859-1"> + +<TITLE> +The Project Gutenberg E-text of Chopin: The Man and His Music, by James Huneker +</TITLE> + +<STYLE TYPE="text/css"> +BODY { color: Black; + background: White; + margin-right: 10%; + margin-left: 10%; + font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; + text-align: justify } + +P {text-indent: 4% } + +P.noindent {text-indent: 0% } + +P.poem {text-indent: 0%; + margin-left: 10%;} + +P.letter {text-indent: 0%; + margin-left: 10% ; + margin-right: 10% } + +P.footnote {font-size: 80%; + text-indent: 0% ; + margin-left: 0% ; + margin-right: 0% } + +P.block {text-indent: 4% ; + margin-left: 10% ; + margin-right: 10% } + +P.intro {font-size: 90% ; + text-indent: -5% ; + margin-left: 5% ; + margin-right: 0% } + +P.finis { font-size: larger ; + text-align: center ; + text-indent: 0% ; + margin-left: 0% ; + margin-right: 0% } + +</STYLE> + +</HEAD> + +<BODY> + + +<pre> + +Project Gutenberg's Chopin: The Man and His Music, by James Huneker + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Chopin: The Man and His Music + +Author: James Huneker + +Posting Date: June 14, 2010 [EBook #4939] +Release Date: January, 2004 +First Posted: April 1, 2002 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK CHOPIN: THE MAN AND HIS MUSIC *** + + + + +Produced by John Mamoun <mamounjo@umdnj.edu> with help +from Charles Franks and the Online Distributed Proofreaders +website. + + + + + + +</pre> + + +<BR><BR> + +<H1 ALIGN="center"> +CHOPIN: THE MAN AND HIS MUSIC +</H1> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +by +</H3> + +<H2 ALIGN="center"> +James Huneker +</H2> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<H2 ALIGN="center"> +TABLE OF CONTENTS +</H2> + +<BR> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> + PART I.—THE MAN.<BR> +</H3> + +<TABLE ALIGN="center" WIDTH="80%"> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top" WIDTH="10%">I. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top" WIDTH="90%"> +<A HREF="#chap01">POLAND:—YOUTHFUL IDEALS</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">II. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap02">PARIS:—IN THE MAELSTROM</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">III. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap03">ENGLAND, SCOTLAND AND FERE LA CHAISE</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">IV. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap04">THE ARTIST</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">V. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap05">POET AND PSYCHOLOGIST</A></TD> +</TR> + +</TABLE> + +<BR><BR> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> + PART II.—HIS MUSIC.<BR> +</H3> + +<TABLE ALIGN="center" WIDTH="80%"> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top" WIDTH="10%">VI. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top" WIDTH="90%"> +<A HREF="#chap06">THE STUDIES:—TITANIC EXPERIMENTS</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">VII. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap07">MOODS IN MINIATURE: THE PRELUDES</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">VIII. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap08">IMPROMPTUS AND VALSES</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">IX. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap09">NIGHT AND ITS MELANCHOLY MYSTERIES: THE NOCTURNES</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">X. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap10">THE BALLADES: FAERY DRAMAS</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XI. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap11">CLASSICAL CURRENTS</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XII. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap12">THE POLONAISES: HEROIC HYMNS OF BATTLE</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XIII. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap13">MAZURKAS: DANCES OF THE SOUL</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XIV. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap14">CHOPIN THE CONQUEROR</A></TD> +</TR> + +</TABLE> + +<TABLE ALIGN="center" WIDTH="80%"> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top" WIDTH="10%"> </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top" WIDTH="90%"> +<BR> +<A HREF="#biblio">BIBLIOGRAPHY</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top"> </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#books">BOOKS BY JAMES HUNEKER</A></TD> +</TR> + +</TABLE> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap01"></A> +<H2 ALIGN="center"> +PART I.—THE MAN +</H2> + +<BR><BR> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +I. POLAND:—YOUTHFUL IDEALS +</H3> + +<P> +Gustave Flaubert, pessimist and master of cadenced lyric prose, urged +young writers to lead ascetic lives that in their art they might be +violent. Chopin's violence was psychic, a travailing and groaning of +the spirit; the bright roughness of adventure was missing from his +quotidian existence. The tragedy was within. One recalls Maurice +Maeterlinck: "Whereas most of our life is passed far from blood, cries +and swords, and the tears of men have become silent, invisible and +almost spiritual." Chopin went from Poland to France—from Warsaw to +Paris—where, finally, he was borne to his grave in Pere la Chaise. He +lived, loved and died; and not for him were the perils, prizes and +fascinations of a hero's career. He fought his battles within the walls +of his soul—we may note and enjoy them in his music. His outward state +was not niggardly of incident though his inner life was richer, +nourished as it was in the silence and the profound unrest of a being +that irritably resented every intrusion. There were events that left +ineradicable impressions upon his nature, upon his work: his early +love, his sorrow at parting from parents and home, the shock of the +Warsaw revolt, his passion for George Sand, the death of his father and +of his friend Matuszynski, and the rupture with Madame Sand—these were +crises of his history. All else was but an indeterminate factor in the +scheme of his earthly sojourn. Chopin though not an anchorite resembled +Flaubert, being both proud and timid; he led a detached life, hence his +art was bold and violent. Unlike Liszt he seldom sought the glamor of +the theatre, and was never in such public view as his maternal admirer, +Sand. He was Frederic Francois Chopin, composer, teacher of piano and a +lyric genius of the highest range. +</P> + +<P> +Recently the date of his birth has been again discussed by Natalie +Janotha, the Polish pianist. Chopin was born in Zelazowa-Wola, six +miles from Warsaw, March 1, 1809. This place is sometimes spelled +Jeliasovaya-Volia. The medallion made for the tomb by Clesinger—the +son-in-law of George Sand—and the watch given by the singer Catalan! +in 1820 with the inscription "Donne par Madame Catalan! a Frederic +Chopin, age de dix ans," have incited a conflict of authorities. +Karasowski was informed by Chopin's sister that the correct year of his +birth was 1809, and Szulc, Sowinski and Niecks agree with him. Szulc +asserts that the memorial in the Holy Cross Church, Warsaw—where +Chopin's heart is preserved—bears the date March 2, 1809. Chopin, so +Henry T. Finck declares, was twenty-two years of age when he wrote to +his teacher Elsner in 1831. Liszt told Niecks in 1878 that Karasowski +had published the correct date in his biography. Now let us consider +Janotha's arguments. According to her evidence the composer's natal day +was February 22, 1810 and his christening occurred April 28 of the same +year. The following baptismal certificate, originally in Latin and +translated by Finck, is adduced. It is said to be from the church in +which Chopin was christened: "I, the above, have performed the ceremony +of baptizing in water a boy with the double name Frederic Francois, on +the 22d day of February, son of the musicians Nicolai Choppen, a +Frenchman, and Justina de Krzyzanowska his legal spouse. God-parents: +the musicians Franciscus Grembeki and Donna Anna Skarbekowa, Countess +of Zelazowa-Wola." The wrong date was chiselled upon the monument +unveiled October 14, 1894, at Chopin's birthplace—erected practically +through the efforts of Milia Balakireff the Russian composer. Janotha, +whose father founded the Warsaw Conservatory, informed Finck that the +later date has also been put on other monuments in Poland. +</P> + +<P> +Now Chopin's father was not a musician, neither was his mother. I +cannot trace Grembeki, but we know that the Countess Skarbek, mother of +Chopin's namesake, was not a musician; however, the title "musician" in +the baptismal certificate may have signified something eulogistic at +that time. Besides, the Polish clergy was not a particularly accurate +class. But Janotha has more testimony: in her controversy with me in +1896 she quoted Father Bielawski, the present cure of Brochow parish +church of Zelazowa-Wola; this reverend person consulted records and +gave as his opinion that 1810 is authentic. Nevertheless, the biography +of Wojcicki and the statement of the Chopin family contradict him. And +so the case stands. Janotha continues firm in her belief although +authorities do not justify her position. +</P> + +<P> +All this petty pother arose since Niecks' comprehensive biography +appeared. So sure was he of his facts that he disposed of the +pseudo-date in one footnote. Perhaps the composer was to blame; +artists, male as well as female, have been known to make themselves +younger in years by conveniently forgetting their birthdate, or by +attributing the error to carelessness in the registry of dates. Surely +the Chopin family could not have been mistaken in such an important +matter! Regarding Chopin's ancestry there is still a moiety of doubt. +His father was born August 17, 1770—the same year as Beethoven—at +Nancy, Lorraine. Some claim that he had Polish blood in his veins. +Szulc claims that he was the natural son of a Polish nobleman, who +followed King Stanislas Leszcinski to Lorraine, dropping the Szopen, or +Szop, for the more Gallic Chopin. When Frederic went to Paris, he in +turn changed the name from Szopen to Chopin, which is common in France. +</P> + +<P> +Chopin's father emigrated to Warsaw in 1787—enticed by the offer of a +compatriot there in the tobacco business—and was the traditional +Frenchman of his time, well-bred, agreeable and more than usually +cultivated. +</P> + +<P> +He joined the national guard during the Kosciuszko revolution in 1794. +When business stagnated he was forced to teach in the family of the +Leszynskis; Mary of that name, one of his pupils, being beloved by +Napoleon I. became the mother of Count Walewski, a minister of the +second French empire. Drifting to Zelazowa-Wola, Nicholas Chopin lived +in the house of the Countess Skarbek, acting as tutor to her son, +Frederic. There he made the acquaintance of Justina Krzyzanowska, born +of "poor but noble parents." He married her in 1806 and she bore him +four children: three girls, and the boy Frederic Francois. +</P> + +<P> +With a refined, scholarly French father, Polish in political +sentiments, and an admirable Polish mother, patriotic to the extreme, +Frederic grew to be an intelligent, vivacious, home-loving lad. Never a +hearty boy but never very delicate, he seemed to escape most of the +disagreeable ills of childhood. The moonstruck, pale, sentimental calf +of many biographers, he never was. Strong evidence exists that he was +merry, pleasure-loving and fond of practical jokes. While his father +was never rich, the family after the removal to Warsaw lived at ease. +The country was prosperous and Chopin the elder became a professor in +the Warsaw Lyceum. His children were brought up in an atmosphere of +charming simplicity, love and refinement. The mother was an ideal +mother, and, as George Sand declared, Chopin's "only love." But, as we +shall discover later, Lelia was ever jealous—jealous even of Chopin's +past. His sisters were gifted, gentle and disposed to pet him. Niecks +has killed all the pretty fairy tales of his poverty and suffering. +</P> + +<P> +Strong common sense ruled the actions of Chopin's parents, and when his +love for music revealed itself at an early age they engaged a teacher +named Adalbert Zwyny, a Bohemian who played the violin and taught +piano. Julius Fontana, one of the first friends of the boy—he +committed suicide in Paris, December 31, 1869,—says that at the age of +twelve Chopin knew so much that he was left to himself with the usual +good and ill results. He first played on February 24, 1818, a concerto +by Gyrowetz and was so pleased with his new collar that he naively told +his mother, "Everybody was looking at my collar." His musical +precocity, not as marked as Mozart's, but phenomenal withal, brought +him into intimacy with the Polish aristocracy and there his taste for +fashionable society developed. The Czartoryskis, Radziwills, Skarbeks, +Potockis, Lubeckis and the Grand Duke Constantine with his Princess +Lowicka made life pleasant for the talented boy. Then came his lessons +with Joseph Elsner in composition, lessons of great value. Elsner saw +the material he had to mould, and so deftly did he teach that his +pupil's individuality was never checked, never warped. For Elsner +Chopin entertained love and reverence; to him he wrote from Paris +asking his advice in the matter of studying with Kalkbrenner, and this +advice he took seriously. "From Zwyny and Elsner even the greatest ass +must learn something," he is quoted as having said. +</P> + +<P> +Then there are the usual anecdotes—one is tempted to call them the +stock stories of the boyhood of any great composer. In infancy Chopin +could not hear music without crying. Mozart was morbidly sensitive to +the tones of a trumpet. Later the Polish lad sported familiarly with +his talents, for he is related to have sent to sleep and awakened a +party of unruly boys at his father's school. Another story is his +fooling of a Jew merchant. He had high spirits, perhaps too high, for +his slender physique. He was a facile mimic, and Liszt, Balzac, Bocage, +Sand and others believed that he would have made an actor of ability. +With his sister Emilia he wrote a little comedy. Altogether he was a +clever, if not a brilliant lad. His letters show that he was not the +latter, for while they are lively they do not reveal much literary +ability. But their writer saw with open eyes, eyes that were disposed +to caricature the peculiarities of others. This trait, much clarified +and spiritualized in later life, became a distinct, ironic note in his +character. Possibly it attracted Heine, although his irony was on a +more intellectual plane. +</P> + +<P> +His piano playing at this time was neat and finished, and he had +already begun those experimentings in technique and tone that afterward +revolutionized the world of music and the keyboard. He being sickly and +his sister's health poor, the pair was sent in 1826 to Reinerz, a +watering place in Prussian Silesia. This with a visit to his godmother, +a titled lady named Wiesiolowska and a sister of Count Frederic +Skarbek,—the name does not tally with the one given heretofore, as +noted by Janotha,—consumed this year. In 1827 he left his regular +studies at the Lyceum and devoted his time to music. He was much in the +country, listening to the fiddling and singing of the peasants, thus +laying the corner stone of his art as a national composer. In the fall +of 1828 he went to Berlin, and this trip gave him a foretaste of the +outer world. +</P> + +<P> +Stephen Heller, who saw Chopin in 1830, described him as pale, of +delicate health, and not destined, so they said in Warsaw, for a long +life. This must have been during one of his depressed periods, for his +stay in Berlin gives a record of unclouded spirits. However, his sister +Emilia died young of pulmonary trouble and doubtless Frederic was +predisposed to lung complaint. He was constantly admonished by his +relatives to keep his coat closed. Perhaps, as in Wagner's case, the +uncontrollable gayety and hectic humors were but so many signs of a +fatal disintegrating process. Wagner outlived them until the Scriptural +age, but Chopin succumbed when grief, disappointment and intense +feeling had undermined him. For the dissipations of the "average +sensual man" he had an abiding contempt. He never smoked, in fact +disliked it. His friend Sand differed greatly in this respect, and one +of the saddest anecdotes related by De Lenz accuses her of calling for +a match to light her cigar: "Frederic, un fidibus," she commanded, and +Frederic obeyed. Mr. Philip Hale mentions a letter from Balzac to his +Countess Hanska, dated March 15, 1841, which concludes: "George Sand +did not leave Paris last year. She lives at Rue Pigalle, No. +16...Chopin is always there. Elle ne fume que des cigarettes, et pas +autre chose" Mr. Hale states that the italics are in the letter. So +much for De Lenz and his fidibus! +</P> + +<P> +I am impelled here to quote from Mr. Earnest Newman's "Study of Wagner" +because Chopin's exaltation of spirits, alternating with irritability +and intense depression, were duplicated in Wagner. Mr. Newman writes of +Wagner: "There have been few men in whom the torch of life has burned +so fiercely. In his early days he seems to have had that gayety of +temperament and that apparently boundless energy which men in his case, +as in that of Heine, Nietzsche, Amiel and others, have wrongly assumed +to be the outcome of harmonious physical and mental health. There is a +pathetic exception in the outward lives of so many men of genius, the +bloom being, to the instructed eye, only the indication of some subtle +nervous derangement, only the forerunner of decay." The overmastering +cerebral agitation that obsessed Wagner's life, was as with Chopin a +symptom, not a sickness; but in the latter it had not yet assumed a +sinister turn. +</P> + +<P> +Chopin's fourteen days in Berlin,—he went there under the protection +of his father's friend, Professor Jarocki, to attend the great +scientific congress—were full of joy unrestrained. The pair left +Warsaw September 9, 1828, and after five days travel in a diligence +arrived at Berlin. This was a period of leisure travelling and living. +Frederic saw Spontini, Mendelssohn and Zelter at a distance and heard +"Freischutz." He attended the congress and made sport of the +scientists, Alexander von Humboldt included. On the way home they +stopped at a place called Zullichau, and Chopin improvised on Polish +airs so charmingly that the stage was delayed, "all hands turning in" +to listen. This is another of the anecdotes of honorable antiquity. +Count Tarnowski relates that "Chopin left Warsaw with a light heart, +with a mind full of ideas, perhaps full of dreams of fame and +happiness. 'I have only twenty kreuzers in my pockets,' he writes in +his note-book, 'and it seems to me that I am richer than Arthur +Potocki, whom I met only a moment ago;' besides this, witty +conceptions, fun, showing a quiet and cheerful spirit; for example, +'May it be permitted to me to sign myself as belonging to the circle of +your friends,—F. Chopin.' Or, 'A welcome moment in which I can express +to you my friendship.—F. Chopin, office clerk.' Or again, 'Ah, my most +lordly sir, I do not myself yet understand the joy which I feel on +entering the circle of your real friends.—F. Chopin, penniless'!" +</P> + +<P> +These letters have a Micawber ring, but they indicate Chopin's love of +jest. Sikorski tells a story of the lad's improvising in church so that +the priest, choir and congregation were forgotten by him. +</P> + +<P> +The travellers arrived at Warsaw October 6 after staying a few days in +Posen where the Prince Radziwill lived; here Chopin played in private. +This prince-composer, despite what Liszt wrote, did not contribute a +penny to the youth's musical education, though he always treated him in +a sympathetic manner. +</P> + +<P> +Hummel and Paganini visited Warsaw in 1829. The former he met and +admired, the latter he worshipped. This year may have seen the +composition, if not the publication of the "Souvenir de Paganini," said +to be in the key of A major and first published in the supplement of +the "Warsaw Echo Muzyczne." Niecks writes that he never saw a copy of +this rare composition. Paderewski tells me he has the piece and that it +is weak, having historic interest only. I cannot find much about the +Polish poet, Julius Slowacki, who died the same year, 1849, as Edgar +Allan Poe. Tarnowski declares him to have been Chopin's warmest friend +and in his poetry a starting point of inspiration for the composer. +</P> + +<P> +In July 1829, accompanied by two friends, Chopin started for Vienna. +Travelling in a delightful, old-fashioned manner, the party saw much of +the country—Galicia, Upper Silesia and Moravia—the Polish +Switzerland. On July 31 they arrived in the Austrian capital. Then +Chopin first began to enjoy an artistic atmosphere, to live less +parochially. His home life, sweet and tranquil as it was, could not +fail to hurt him as artist; he was flattered and coddled and doubtless +the touch of effeminacy in his person was fostered. In Vienna the life +was gayer, freer and infinitely more artistic than in Warsaw. He met +every one worth knowing in the artistic world and his letters at that +period are positively brimming over with gossip and pen pictures of the +people he knew. The little drop of malice he injects into his +descriptions of the personages he encounters is harmless enough and +proves that the young man had considerable wit. Count Gallenberg, the +lessee of the famous Karnthnerthor Theatre, was kind to him, and the +publisher Haslinger treated him politely. He had brought with him his +variations on "La ci darem la mano"; altogether the times seemed +propitious and much more so when he was urged to give a concert. +Persuaded to overcome a natural timidity, he made his Vienna debut at +this theatre August 11, 1829, playing on a Stein piano his Variations, +opus 2. His Krakowiak Rondo had been announced, but the parts were not +legible, so instead he improvised. He had success, being recalled, and +his improvisation on the Polish tune called "Chmiel" and a theme from +"La Dame Blanche" stirred up much enthusiasm in which a grumbling +orchestra joined. The press was favorable, though Chopin's playing was +considered rather light in weight. His style was admired and voted +original—here the critics could see through the millstone—while a +lady remarked "It's a pity his appearance is so insignificant." This +reached the composer's ear and caused him an evil quarter of an hour +for he was morbidly sensitive; but being, like most Poles, secretive, +managed to hide it. +</P> + +<P> +August 18, encouraged by his triumph, Chopin gave a second concert on +the same stage. This time he played the Krakowiak and his talent for +composition was discussed by the newspapers. "He plays very quietly, +without the daring elan which distinguishes the artist from the +amateur," said one; "his defect is the non-observance of the indication +of accent at the beginning of musical phrases." What was then admired +in Vienna was explosive accentuations and piano drumming. The article +continues: "As in his playing he was like a beautiful young tree that +stands free and full of fragrant blossoms and ripening fruits, so he +manifested as much estimable individuality in his compositions where +new figures and passages, new forms unfolded themselves." This rather +acute critique, translated by Dr. Niecks, is from the Wiener +"Theaterzeitung" of August 20, 1829. The writer of it cannot be accused +of misoneism, that hardening of the faculties of curiousness and +prophecy—that semi-paralysis of the organs of hearing which afflicts +critics of music so early in life and evokes rancor and dislike to +novelties. Chopin derived no money from either of his concerts. +</P> + +<P> +By this time he was accustomed to being reminded of the lightness and +exquisite delicacy of his touch and the originality of his style. It +elated him to be no longer mistaken for a pupil and he writes home that +"my manner of playing pleases the ladies so very much." This manner +never lost its hold over female hearts, and the airs, caprices and +little struttings of Frederic are to blame for the widely circulated +legend of his effeminate ways. The legend soon absorbed his music, and +so it has come to pass that this fiction, begotten of half fact and +half mental indolence, has taken root, like the noxious weed it is. +When Rubinstein, Tausig and Liszt played Chopin in passional phrases, +the public and critics were aghast. This was a transformed Chopin +indeed, a Chopin transposed to the key of manliness. Yet it is the true +Chopin. The young man's manners were a trifle feminine but his brain +was masculine, electric, and his soul courageous. His Polonaises, +Ballades, Scherzi and Etudes need a mighty grip, a grip mental and +physical. +</P> + +<P> +Chopin met Czerny. "He is a good man, but nothing more," he said of +him. Czerny admired the young pianist with the elastic hand and on his +second visit to Vienna, characteristically inquired, "Are you still +industrious?" Czerny's brain was a tireless incubator of piano +exercises, while Chopin so fused the technical problem with the poetic +idea, that such a nature as the old pedagogue's must have been +unattractive to him. He knew Franz, Lachner and other celebrities and +seems to have enjoyed a mild flirtation with Leopoldine Blahetka, a +popular young pianist, for he wrote of his sorrow at parting from her. +On August 19 he left with friends for Bohemia, arriving at Prague two +days later. There he saw everything and met Klengel, of canon fame, a +still greater canon-eer than the redoubtable Jadassohn of Leipzig. +Chopin and Klengel liked each other. Three days later the party +proceeded to Teplitz and Chopin played in aristocratic company. He +reached Dresden August 26, heard Spohr's "Faust" and met capellmeister +Morlacchi—that same Morlacchi whom Wagner succeeded as a conductor +January 10, 1843—vide Finck's "Wagner." By September 12, after a brief +sojourn in Breslau, Chopin was again safe at home in Warsaw. +</P> + +<P> +About this time he fell in love with Constantia Gladowska, a singer and +pupil of the Warsaw Conservatory. Niecks dwells gingerly upon his +fervor in love and friendship—"a passion with him" and thinks that it +gives the key to his life. Of his romantic friendship for Titus +Woyciechowski and John Matuszynski—his "Johnnie"—there are abundant +evidences in the letters. They are like the letters of a love-sick +maiden. But Chopin's purity of character was marked; he shrank from +coarseness of all sorts, and the Fates only know what he must have +suffered at times from George Sand and her gallant band of retainers. +To this impressionable man, Parisian badinage—not to call it anything +stronger—was positively antipathetical. Of him we might indeed say in +Lafcadio Hearn's words, "Every mortal man has been many million times a +woman." And was it the Goncourts who dared to assert that, "there are +no women of genius: women of genius are men"? Chopin needed an outlet +for his sentimentalism. His piano was but a sieve for some, and we are +rather amused than otherwise on reading the romantic nonsense of his +boyish letters. +</P> + +<P> +After the Vienna trip his spirits and his health flagged. He was +overwrought and Warsaw became hateful to him, for he loved but had not +the courage to tell it to the beloved one. He put it on paper, he +played it, but speak it he could not. Here is a point that reveals +Chopin's native indecision, his inability to make up his mind. He +recalls to me the Frederic Moreau of Flaubert's "L'Education +Sentimentale." There is an atrophy of the will, for Chopin can neither +propose nor fly from Warsaw. He writes letters that are full of +self-reproaches, letters that must have both bored and irritated his +friends. Like many other men of genius he suffered all his life from +folie de doute, indeed his was what specialists call "a beautiful +case." This halting and irresolution was a stumbling block in his +career and is faithfully mirrored in his art. +</P> + +<P> +Chopin went to Posen in October, 1829, and at the Radziwills was +attracted by the beauty and talent of the Princess Elisa, who died +young. George Sand has noted Chopin's emotional versatility in the +matter of falling in and out of love. He could accomplish both of an +evening and a crumpled roseleaf was sufficient cause to induce frowns +and capricious flights—decidedly a young man tres difficile. He played +at the "Ressource" in November, 1829, the Variations, opus 2. On March +17, 1830, he gave his first concert in Warsaw, and selected the adagio +and rondo of his first concerto, the one in F minor, and the Potpourri +on Polish airs. His playing was criticised for being too delicate—an +old complaint—but the musicians, Elsner, Kurpinski and the rest were +pleased. Edouard Wolff said they had no idea in Warsaw of "the real +greatness of Chopin." He was Polish, this the public appreciated, but +of Chopin the individual they missed entirely the flavor. A week later, +spurred by adverse and favorable criticism, he gave a second concert, +playing the same excerpts from this concerto—the slow movement is +Constance Gladowska musically idealized—the Krakowiak and an +improvisation. The affair was a success. From these concerts he cleared +six hundred dollars, not a small sum in those days for an unknown +virtuoso. A sonnet was printed in his honor, champagne was offered him +by an enthusiastic Paris bred, but not born, pianist named Dunst, who +for this act will live in all chronicles of piano playing. Worse still, +Orlowski served up the themes of his concerto into mazurkas and had the +impudence to publish them. +</P> + +<P> +Then came the last blow: he was asked by a music seller for his +portrait, which he refused, having no desire, he said with a shiver, to +see his face on cheese and butter wrappers. Some of the criticisms were +glowing, others absurd as criticisms occasionally are. Chopin wrote to +Titus the same rhapsodical protestations and finally declared in +meticulous peevishness, "I will no longer read what people write about +me." This has the familiar ring of the true artist who cares nothing +for the newspapers but reads them religiously after his own and his +rivals' concerts. +</P> + +<P> +Chopin heard Henrietta Sontag with great joy; he was ever a lover and a +connoisseur of singing. He advised young pianists to listen carefully +and often to great singers. Mdlle. de Belleville the pianist and +Lipinski the violinist were admired, and he could write a sound +criticism when he chose. But the Gladowska is worrying him. "Unbearable +longing" is driving him to exile. He attends her debut as Agnese in +Paer's opera of that title and writes a complete description of the +important function to Titus, who is at his country seat where Chopin +visits him betimes. Agitated, he thinks of going to Berlin or Vienna, +but after much philandering remains in Warsaw. On October 11, 1830, +following many preparations and much emotional shilly-shallying, Chopin +gave his third and last Warsaw concert. He played the E minor concerto +for the first time in public but not in sequence. The first and last +two movements were separated by an aria, such being the custom of those +days. Later he gave the Fantasia on Polish airs. Best of all for him, +Miss Gladowska sang a Rossini air, "wore a white dress and roses in her +hair, and was charmingly beautiful." Thus Chopin; and the details have +all the relevancy of a male besieged by Dan Cupid. Chopin must have +played well. He said so himself, and he was always a cautious +self-critic despite his pride. His vanity and girlishness peep out in +his recital by the response to a quartet of recalls: "I believe I did +it yesterday with a certain grace, for Brandt had taught me how to do +it properly." He is not speaking of his poetic performance, but of his +bow to the public. As he formerly spoke to his mother of his pretty +collar, so as young man he makes much of his deportment. But it is all +quite in the role; scratch an artist and you surprise a child. +</P> + +<P> +Of course, Constantia sang wonderfully. "Her low B came out so +magnificently that Zielinski declared it alone was worth a thousand +ducats." Ah, these enamored ones! Chopin left Warsaw November 1, 1830, +for Vienna and without declaring his love. Or was he a rejected suitor? +History is dumb. He never saw his Gladowska again, for he did not +return to Warsaw. The lady was married in 1832—preferring a solid +certainty to nebulous genius—to Joseph Grabowski, a merchant at +Warsaw. Her husband, so saith a romantic biographer, Count Wodzinski, +became blind; perhaps even a blind country gentleman was preferable to +a lachrymose pianist. Chopin must have heard of the attachment in 1831. +Her name almost disappears from his correspondence. Time as well as +other nails drove from his memory her image. If she was fickle, he was +inconstant, and so let us waste no pity on this episode, over which +lakes of tears have been shed and rivers of ink have been spilt. +</P> + +<P> +Chopin was accompanied by Elsner and a party of friends as far as Wola, +a short distance from Warsaw. There the pupils of the Conservatory sang +a cantata by Elsner, and after a banquet he was given a silver goblet +filled with Polish earth, being adjured, so Karasowski relates, never +to forget his country or his friends wherever he might wander. Chopin, +his heart full of sorrow, left home, parents, friends, and "ideal," +severed with his youth, and went forth in the world with the keyboard +and a brain full of beautiful music as his only weapons. +</P> + +<P> +At Kaliz he was joined by the faithful Titus, and the two went to +Breslau, where they spent four days, going to the theatre and listening +to music. Chopin played quite impromptu two movements of his E minor +concerto, supplanting a tremulous amateur. In Dresden where they +arrived November 10, they enjoyed themselves with music. Chopin went to +a soiree at Dr. Kreyssig's and was overwhelmed at the sight of a circle +of dames armed with knitting needles which they used during the +intervals of music-making in the most formidable manner. He heard Auber +and Rossini operas and Rolla, the Italian violinist, and listened with +delight to Dotzauer and Kummer the violoncellists—the cello being an +instrument for which he had a consuming affection. Rubini, the brother +of the great tenor, he met, and was promised important letters of +introduction if he desired to visit Italy. He saw Klengel again, who +told the young Pole, thereby pleasing him very much, that his playing +was like John Field's. Prague was also visited, and he arrived at +Vienna in November. There he confidently expected a repetition of his +former successes, but was disappointed. Haslinger received him coldly +and refused to print his variations or concerto unless he got them for +nothing. Chopin's first brush with the hated tribe of publishers begins +here, and he adopts as his motto the pleasing device, "Pay, thou +animal," a motto he strictly adhered to; in money matters Chopin was +very particular. The bulk of his extant correspondence is devoted to +the exposure of the ways and wiles of music publishers. "Animal" is the +mildest term he applies to them, "Jew" the most frequent objurgation. +After all Chopin was very Polish. +</P> + +<P> +He missed his friends the Blahetkas, who had gone to Stuttgart, and +altogether did not find things so promising as formerly. No profitable +engagements could be secured, and, to cap his misery, Titus, his other +self, left him to join the revolutionists in Poland November 30. His +letters reflect his mental agitation and terror over his parents' +safety. A thousand times he thought of renouncing his artistic +ambitions and rushing to Poland to fight for his country. He never did, +and his indecision—it was not cowardice—is our gain. Chopin put his +patriotism, his wrath and his heroism into his Polonaises. That is why +we have them now, instead of Chopin having been the target of some +black-browed Russian. Chopin was psychically brave; let us not cavil at +the almost miraculous delicacy of his organization. He wrote letters to +his parents and to Matuszyriski, but they are not despairing—at least +not to the former. He pretended gayety and had great hopes for the +future, for he was living entirely on means supplied him by his father. +News of Constantia gladdened him, and he decided to go to Italy, but +the revolution early in 1831 decided him for France. Dr. Malfatti was +good to him and cheered him, and he managed to accomplish much social +visiting. The letters of this period are most interesting. He heard +Sarah Heinefetter sing, and listened to Thaiberg's playing of a +movement of his own concerto. Thalberg was three years younger than +Chopin and already famous. Chopin did not admire him: "Thalberg plays +famously, but he is not my man...He plays forte and piano with the +pedals but not with the hand; takes tenths as easily as I do octaves, +and wears studs with diamonds." +</P> + +<P> +Thalberg was not only too much of a technician for Chopin, but he was +also a Jew and a successful one. In consequence, both poet and Pole +revolted. +</P> + +<P> +Hummel called on Frederic, but we hear nothing of his opinion of the +elder man and his music; this is all the more strange, considering how +much Chopin built on Hummel's style. Perhaps that is the cause of the +silence, just as Wagner's dislike for Meyerbeer was the result of his +obligations to the composer of "Les Huguenots." He heard Aloys Schmitt +play, and uttered the very Heinesque witticism that "he is already over +forty years old, and composes eighty years old music." This in a letter +to Elsner. Our Chopin could be amazingly sarcastic on occasion. He knew +Slavik the violin virtuoso, Merk the 'cellist, and all the music +publishers. At a concert given by Madame Garzia-Vestris, in April, +1831, he appeared, and in June gave a concert of his own, at which he +must have played the E minor concerto, because of a passing mention in +a musical paper. He studied much, and it was July 20, 1831, before he +left Vienna after a second, last, and thoroughly discouraging visit. +</P> + +<P> +Chopin got a passport vised for London, "passant par Paris &. Londres," +and had permission from the Russian Ambassador to go as far as Munich. +Then the cholera gave him some bother, as he had to secure a clean bill +of health, but he finally got away. The romantic story of "I am only +passing through Paris," which he is reported to have said in after +years, has been ruthlessly shorn of its sentiment. At Munich he played +his second concerto and pleased greatly. But he did not remain in the +Bavarian capital, hastening to Stuttgart, where he heard of the capture +of Warsaw by the Russians, September 8, 1831. This news, it is said, +was the genesis of the great C minor etude in opus 10, sometimes called +the "Revolutionary." Chopin exclaimed in a letter dated December 16, +1831, "All this caused me much pain—who could have foreseen it!" and +in another letter he wrote, "How glad my mamma will be that I did not +go back." Count Tarnowski in his recollections prints some extracts +from a diary said to have been kept by Chopin. According to this his +agitation must have been terrible. Here are several examples: +</P> + +<P> +"My poor father! My dearest ones! Perhaps they hunger? Maybe he has not +anything to buy bread for mother? Perhaps my sisters have fallen +victims to the fury of the Muscovite soldiers? Oh, father, is this the +consolation of your old age? Mother, poor suffering mother, is it for +this you outlived your daughter?" +</P> + +<P> +"And I here unoccupied! And I am here with empty hands! Sometimes I +groan, suffer and despair at the piano! O God, move the earth, that it +may swallow the humanity of this century! May the most cruel fortune +fall upon the French, that they did not come to our aid." All this +sounds a trifle melodramatic and quite unlike Chopin. +</P> + +<P> +He did not go to Warsaw, but started for France at the end of +September, arriving early in October, 1831. Poland's downfall had +aroused him from his apathy, even if it sent him further from her. This +journey, as Liszt declares, "settled his fate." Chopin was twenty-two +years old when he reached Paris. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap02"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +II. PARIS:—IN THE MAELSTROM +</H3> + +<P> +Here, according to Niecks, is the itinerary of Chopin's life for the +next eighteen years: In Paris, 27 Boulevard Poisonniere, to 5 and 38 +Chaussee d'Antin, to Aix-la-Chapelle, Carlsbad, Leipzig, Heidelberg, +Marienbad, and London, to Majorca, to 5 Rue Tronchet, 16 Rue Pigalle, +and 9 Square d'Orleans, to England and Scotland, to 9 Square d'Orleans +once more, Rue Chaillot and 12 Place Vendeme, and then—Pere la Chaise, +the last resting-place. It may be seen that Chopin was a restless, +though not roving nature. In later years his inability to remain +settled in one place bore a pathological impress,—consumptives are +often so. +</P> + +<P> +The Paris of 1831, the Paris of arts and letters, was one of the most +delightful cities in the world for the culture-loving. The molten tide +of passion and decorative extravagance that swept over intellectual +Europe three score years and ten ago, bore on its foaming crest Victor +Hugo, prince of romanticists. Near by was Henri Heine,—he left +Heinrich across the Rhine,—Heine, who dipped his pen in honey and +gall, who sneered and wept in the same couplet. The star of classicism +had seemingly set. In the rich conflict of genius were Gautier, +Schumann, and the rest. All was romance, fantasy, and passion, and the +young men heard the moon sing silvery—you remember De Musset!—and the +leaves rustle rhythms to the heart-beats of lovers. "Away with the +gray-beards," cried he of the scarlet waistcoat, and all France +applauded "Ernani." Pity it was that the romantic infant had to die of +intellectual anaemia, leaving as a legacy the memories and work of one +of the most marvellous groupings of genius since the Athens of +Pericles. The revolution of 1848 called from the mud the sewermen. +Flaubert, his face to the past, gazed sorrowfully at Carthage and wrote +an epic of the French bourgeois. Zola and his crowd delved into a moral +morass, and the world grew weary of them. And then the faint, fading +flowers of romanticism were put into albums where their purple +harmonies and subtle sayings are pressed into sweet twilight +forgetfulness. Berlioz, mad Hector of the flaming locks, whose +orchestral ozone vivified the scores of Wagnerand Liszt, began to sound +garishly empty, brilliantly superficial; "the colossal nightingale" is +difficult to classify even to-day. A romantic by temperament he +unquestionably was. But then his music, all color, nuance, and +brilliancy, was not genuinely romantic in its themes. Compare him with +Schumann, and the genuine romanticist tops the virtuoso. Berlioz, I +suspect, was a magnified virtuoso. His orchestral technique is supreme, +but his music fails to force its way into my soul. It pricks the +nerves, it pleases the sense of the gigantic, the strange, the +formless, but there is something uncanny about it all, like some huge, +prehistoric bird, an awful Pterodactyl with goggle eyes, horrid snout +and scream. Berlioz, like Baudelaire, has the power of evoking the +shudder. But as John Addington Symonds wrote: "The shams of the +classicists, the spasms of the romanticists have alike to be abandoned. +Neither on a mock Parnassus nor on a paste-board Blocksberg can the +poet of the age now worship. The artist walks the world at large +beneath the light of natural day." All this was before the Polish +charmer distilled his sugared wormwood, his sweet, exasperated poison, +for thirsty souls in morbid Paris. +</P> + +<P> +Think of the men and women with whom the new comer associated—for his +genius was quickly divined: Hugo, Lamartine, Pere Lamenais,—ah! what +balm for those troubled days was in his "Paroles d'un +Croyant,"—Chateaubriand, Saint-Simon, Merimee, Gautier, Liszt, Victor +Cousin, Baudelaire, Ary Scheffer, Berlioz, Heine,—who asked the Pole +news of his muse the "laughing nymph,"—"If she still continued to +drape her silvery veil around the flowing locks of her green hair, with +a coquetry so enticing; if the old sea god with the long white beard +still pursued this mischievous maid with his ridiculous love?"—De +Musset, De Vigny, Rossini, Meyerbeer, Auber, Sainte-Beuve, Adolphe +Nourrit, Ferdinand Hiller, Balzac, Dumas, Heller, Delacroix,—the Hugo +of painters,—Michelet, Guizot, Thiers, Niemcevicz and Mickiewicz the +Polish bards, and George Sand: the quintessence of the Paris of art and +literature. +</P> + +<P> +The most eloquent page in Liszt's "Chopin" is the narrative of an +evening in the Chaussee d'Antin, for it demonstrates the Hungarian's +literary gifts and feeling for the right phrase. This description of +Chopin's apartment "invaded by surprise" has a hypnotizing effect on +me. The very furnishings of the chamber seem vocal under Liszt's +fanciful pen. In more doubtful taste is his statement that "the glace +which covers the grace of the elite, as it does the fruit of their +desserts,...could not have been satisfactory to Chopin"! Liszt, despite +his tendency to idealize Chopin after his death, is our most +trustworthy witness at this period. Chopin was an ideal to Liszt though +he has not left us a record of his defects. The Pole was ombrageux and +easily offended; he disliked democracies, in fact mankind in the bulk +stunned him. This is one reason, combined with a frail physique, of his +inability to conquer the larger public. Thalberg could do it; his +aristocratic tournure, imperturbability, beautiful touch and polished +mechanism won the suffrage of his audiences. Liszt never stooped to +cajole. He came, he played, he overwhelmed. Chopin knew all this, knew +his weaknesses, and fought to overcome them but failed. Another +crumpled roseleaf for this man of excessive sensibility. +</P> + +<P> +Since told of Liszt and first related by him, is the anecdote of Chopin +refusing to play, on being incautiously pressed, after dinner, giving +as a reason "Ah, sir, I have eaten so little!" Even though his host was +gauche it cannot be denied that the retort was rude. +</P> + +<P> +Chopin met Osborne, Mendelssohn—who rather patronized him with his +"Chopinetto,"—Baillot the violinist and Franchomme the 'cellist. With +the latter he contracted a lasting friendship, often playing duos with +him and dedicating to him his G minor 'cello Sonata. He called on +Kalkbrenner, then the first pianist of his day, who was puzzled by the +prodigious novelty of the young Pole's playing. Having heard Herz and +Hiller, Chopin did not fear to perform his E minor concerto for him. He +tells all about the interview in a letter to Titus: "Are you a pupil of +Field's?" was asked by Kalkbrenner, who remarked that Chopin had the +style of Cramer and the touch of Field. Not having a standard by which +to gauge the new phenomenon, Kalkbrenner was forced to fall back on the +playing of men he knew. He then begged Chopin to study three years with +him—only three!—but Elsner in an earnest letter dissuaded his pupil +from making any experiments that might hurt his originality of style. +Chopin actually attended the class of Kalkbrenner but soon quit, for he +had nothing to learn of the pompous, penurious pianist. The Hiller +story of how Mendelssohn, Chopin, Liszt and Heller teased this grouty +old gentleman on the Boulevard des Italiens is capital reading, if not +absolutely true. Yet Chopin admired Kalkbrenner's finished technique +despite his platitudinous manner. Heine said—or rather quoted +Koreff—that Kalkbrenner looked like a bonbon that had been in the mud. +Niecks thinks Chopin might have learned of Kalkbrenner on the +mechanical side. Chopin, in public, was modest about his attainments, +looking upon himself as self-taught. "I cannot create a new school, +because I do not even know the old," he said. It is this very absence +of scholasticism that is both the power and weakness of his music. In +reality his true technical ancestor was Hummel. +</P> + +<P> +He played the E minor concerto first in Paris, February 26, 1832, and +some smaller pieces. Although Kalkbrenner, Baillot and others +participated, Chopin was the hero of the evening. The affair was a +financial failure, the audience consisting mostly of distinguished and +aristocratic Poles. Mendelssohn, who disliked Kalkbrenner and was +angered at his arrogance in asking Chopin to study with him, "applauded +furiously." "After this," Hiller writes, "nothing more was heard of +Chopin's lack of technique." The criticisms were favorable. On May 20, +1832, Chopin appeared at a charity concert organized by Prince de la +Moskowa. He was lionized in society and he wrote to Titus that his +heart beat in syncopation, so exciting was all this adulation, social +excitement and rapid gait of living. But he still sentimentalizes to +Titus and wishes him in Paris. +</P> + +<P> +A flirtation of no moment, with Francilla Pixis, the adopted daughter +of Pixis the hunchback pianist—cruelly mimicked by Chopin—aroused the +jealousy of the elder artist. Chopin was delighted, for he was +malicious in a dainty way. "What do you think of this?" he writes. +"<I>I</I>, a dangerous seducteur!" The Paris letters to his parents were +unluckily destroyed, as Karasowski relates, by Russian soldiers in +Warsaw, September 19, 1863, and with them were burned his portrait by +Ary Scheffer and his first piano. The loss of the letters is +irremediable. Karasowski who saw some of them says they were tinged +with melancholy. Despite his artistic success Chopin needed money and +began to consider again his projected trip to America. Luckily he met +Prince Valentine Radziwill on the street, so it is said, and was +persuaded to play at a Rothschild soiree. From that moment his +prospects brightened, for he secured paying pupils. Niecks, the +iconoclast, has run this story to earth and finds it built on airy, +romantic foundations. Liszt, Hiller, Franchomme and Sowinski never +heard of it although it was a stock anecdote of Chopin. +</P> + +<P> +Chopin must have broadened mentally as well as musically in this +congenial, artistic environment. He went about, hobnobbed with +princesses, and of the effect of this upon his compositions there can +be no doubt. If he became more cosmopolitan he also became more +artificial and for a time the salon with its perfumed, elegant +atmosphere threatened to drug his talent into forgetfulness of loftier +aims. Luckily the master-sculptor Life intervened and real troubles +chiselled his character on tragic, broader and more passionate lines. +He played frequently in public during 1832-1833 with Hiller, Liszt, +Herz and Osborne, and much in private. There was some rivalry in this +parterre of pianists. Liszt, Chopin and Hiller indulged in friendly +contests and Chopin always came off winner when Polish music was +essayed. He delighted in imitating his colleagues, Thalberg especially. +Adolphe Brisson tells of a meeting of Sand, Chopin and Thalberg, where, +as Mathias says, the lady "chattered like a magpie" and Thalberg, after +being congratulated by Chopin on his magnificent virtuosity, reeled off +polite phrases in return; doubtless he valued the Pole's compliments +for what they were worth. The moment his back was presented, Chopin at +the keyboard was mocking him. It was then Chopin told Sand of his +pupil, Georges Mathias, "c'est une bonne caboche." Thalberg took his +revenge whenever he could. After a concert by Chopin he astonished +Hiller by shouting on the way home. In reply to questions he slily +answered that he needed a forte as he had heard nothing but pianissimo +the entire evening! +</P> + +<P> +Chopin was never a hearty partisan of the Romantic movement. Its +extravagance, misplaced enthusiasm, turbulence, attacks on church, +state and tradition disturbed the finical Pole while noise, reclame and +boisterousness chilled and repulsed him. He wished to be the Uhland of +Poland, but he objected to smashing idols and refused to wade in +gutters to reach his ideal. He was not a fighter, yet as one reviews +the past half century it is his still small voice that has emerged from +the din, the golden voice of a poet and not the roar of the artistic +demagogues of his day. Liszt's influence was stimulating, but what did +not Chopin do for Liszt? Read Schumann. He managed in 1834 to go to +Aix-la-Chapelle to attend the Lower Rhenish Music Festival. There he +met Hiller and Mendelssohn at the painter Schadow's and improvised +marvellously, so Hiller writes. He visited Coblenz with Hiller before +returning home. +</P> + +<P> +Professor Niecks has a deep spring of personal humor which he taps at +rare intervals. He remarks that "the coming to Paris and settlement +there of his friend Matuszynski must have been very gratifying to +Chopin, who felt so much the want of one with whom to sigh." This +slanting allusion is matched by his treatment of George Sand. After +literally ratting her in a separate chapter, he winds up his work with +the solemn assurance that he abstains "from pronouncing judgment +because the complete evidence did not seem to me to warrant my doing +so." This is positively delicious. When I met this biographer at +Bayreuth in 1896, I told him how much I had enjoyed his work, adding +that I found it indispensable in the re-construction of Chopin. +Professor Niecks gazed at me blandly—he is most amiable and +scholarly-looking—and remarked, "You are not the only one." He was +probably thinking of the many who have had recourse to his human +documents of Chopin. But Niecks, in 1888, built on Karasowski, Liszt, +Schumann, Sand and others, so the process is bound to continue. Since +1888 much has been written of Chopin, much surmised. +</P> + +<P> +With Matuszysnki the composer was happier. He devoutly loved his +country and despite his sarcasm was fond of his countrymen. Never an +extravagant man, he invariably assisted the Poles. After 1834-5, +Chopin's activity as a public pianist began to wane. He was not always +understood and was not so warmly welcomed as he deserved to be; on one +occasion when he played the Larghetto of his F minor concerto in a +Conservatoire concert, its frigid reception annoyed him very much. +Nevertheless he appeared at a benefit concert at Habeneck's, April 26, +1835. The papers praised, but his irritability increased with every +public performance. About this time he became acquainted with Bellini, +for whose sensuous melodies he had a peculiar predilection. +</P> + +<P> +In July, 1835, Chopin met his father at Carlsbad. Then he went to +Dresden and later to Leipzig, playing privately for Schumann, Clara +Wieck, Wenzel and Mendelssohn. Schumann gushes over Chopin, but this +friendliness was never reciprocated. On his return to Paris Chopin +visited Heidelberg, where he saw the father of his pupil, Adolphe +Gutmann, and reached the capital of the civilized world the middle of +October. +</P> + +<P> +Meanwhile a love affair had occupied his attention in Dresden. In +September, 1835, Chopin met his old school friends, the Wodzinskis, +former pupils at his father's school. He fell in love with their sister +Marie and they became engaged. He spoke to his father about the matter, +and for the time Paris and his ambitions were forgotten. He enjoyed a +brief dream of marrying and of settling near Warsaw, teaching and +composing—the occasional dream that tempts most active artists, +soothing them with the notion that there is really a haven of rest from +the world's buffets. Again the gods intervened in the interest of +music. The father of the girl objected on the score of Chopin's means +and his social position—artists were not Paderewskis in those +days—although the mother favored the romance. The Wodzinskis were +noble and wealthy. In the summer of 1836, at Marienbad, Chopin met +Marie again. In 1837, the engagement was broken and the following year +the inconstant beauty married the son of Chopin's godfather, Count +Frederic Skarbek. As the marriage did not prove a success—perhaps the +lady played too much Chopin—a divorce ensued and later she married a +gentleman by the name of Orpiszewski. Count Wodzinski wrote "Les Trois +Romans de Frederic Chopin," in which he asserts that his sister +rejected Chopin at Marienbad in 1836. But Chopin survived the shock. He +went back to Paris, and in July 1837, accompanied by Camille Pleyel and +Stanislas Kozmian, visited England for the first time. His stay was +short, only eleven days, and his chest trouble dates from this time. He +played at the house of James Broadwood, the piano manufacturer, being +introduced by Pleyel as M. Fritz; but his performance betrayed his +identity. His music was already admired by amateurs but the critics +with a few exceptions were unfavorable to him. +</P> + +<P> +Now sounds for the first time the sinister motif of the George Sand +affair. In deference to Mr. Hadow I shall not call it a liaison. It was +not, in the vulgar sense. Chopin might have been petty—a common +failing of artistic men—but he was never vulgar in word or deed. He +disliked "the woman with the sombre eye" before he had met her. Her +reputation was not good, no matter if George Eliot, Matthew Arnold, +Elizabeth Barrett Browning and others believed her an injured saint. +Mr. Hadow indignantly repudiates anything that savors of irregularity +in the relations of Chopin and Aurore Dudevant. If he honestly believes +that their contemporaries flagrantly lied and that the woman's words +are to be credited, why by all means let us leave the critic in his +Utopia. Mary, Queen of Scots, has her Meline; why should not Sand boast +of at least one apologist for her life—besides herself? I do not say +this with cynical intent. Nor do I propose to discuss the details of +the affair which has been dwelt upon ad nauseam by every twanger of the +romantic string. The idealists will always see a union of souls, the +realists—and there were plenty of them in Paris taking notes from 1837 +to 1847—view the alliance as a matter for gossip. The truth lies +midway. +</P> + +<P> +Chopin, a neurotic being, met the polyandrous Sand, a trampler on all +the social and ethical conventions, albeit a woman of great gifts; +repelled at first he gave way before the ardent passion she manifested +toward him. She was his elder, so could veil the situation with the +maternal mask, and she was the stronger intellect, more +celebrated—Chopin was but a pianist in the eyes of the many—and so +won by her magnetism the man she desired. Paris, artistic Paris, was +full of such situations. Liszt protected the Countess d'Agoult, who +bore him children, Cosima Von Bulow-Wagner among the rest. +Balzac—Balzac, that magnificent combination of Bonaparte and Byron, +pirate and poet—was apparently leading the life of a saint, but his +most careful student, Viscount Spelboerch de Lovenjoul—whose name is +veritably Balzac-ian—tells us some different stories; even Gustave +Flaubert, the ascetic giant of Rouen, had a romance with Madame Louise +Colet, a mediocre writer and imitator of Sand,—as was Countess +d'Agoult, the Frankfort Jewess better known as "Daniel Stern,"—that +lasted from 1846 to 1854, according to Emile Faguet. Here then was a +medium which was the other side of good and evil, a new transvaluation +of morals, as Nietzsche would say. Frederic deplored the union for he +was theoretically a Catholic. Did he not once resent the visit of Liszt +and a companion to his apartments when he was absent? Indeed he may be +fairly called a moralist. Carefully reared in the Roman Catholic +religion he died confessing that faith. With the exception of the Sand +episode, his life was not an irregular one, He abhorred the vulgar and +tried to conceal this infatuation from his parents. +</P> + +<P> +This intimacy, however, did the pair no harm artistically, +notwithstanding the inevitable sorrow and heart burnings at the close. +Chopin had some one to look after him—he needed it—and in the society +of this brilliant Frenchwoman he throve amazingly: his best work may be +traced to Nohant and Majorca. She on her side profited also. After the +bitterness of her separation from Alfred de Musset about 1833 she had +been lonely, for the Pagello intermezzo was of short duration. The De +Musset-Sand story was not known in its entirety until 1896. Again M. +Spelboerch de Lovenjoul must be consulted, as he possessed a bundle of +letters that were written by George Sand and M. Buloz, the editor of +"La Revue des Deux Mondes," in 1858. +</P> + +<P> +De Musset went to Venice with Sand in the fall of 1833. They had the +maternal sanction and means supplied by Madame de Musset. The story +gives forth the true Gallic resonance on being critically tapped. De +Musset returned alone, sick in body and soul, and thenceforth absinthe +was his constant solace. There had been references, vague and +disquieting, of a Dr. Pagello for whom Sand had suddenly manifested one +of her extraordinary fancies. This she denied, but De Musset's brother +plainly intimated that the aggravating cause of his brother's illness +had been the unexpected vision of Sand coquetting with the young +medical man called in to prescribe for Alfred. Dr. Pagello in 1896 was +interviewed by Dr. Cabanes of the Paris "Figaro" and here is his story +of what had happened in 1833. This story will explain the later +behavior of "la merle blanche" toward Chopin. +</P> + +<P> +"One night George Sand, after writing three pages of prose full of +poetry and inspiration, took an unaddressed envelope, placed therein +the poetic declaration, and handed it to Dr. Pagello. He, seeing no +address, did not, or feigned not, to understand for whom the letter was +intended, and asked George Sand what he should do with it. Snatching +the letter from his hands, she wrote upon the envelope: 'To the Stupid +Pagello.' Some days afterward George Sand frankly told De Musset that +henceforth she could be to him only a friend." +</P> + +<P> +De Musset died in 1857 and after his death Sand startled Paris with +"Elle et Lui," an obvious answer to "Confessions of a Child of the +Age," De Musset's version—an uncomplimentary one to himself—of their +separation. The poet's brother Paul rallied to his memory with "Lui et +Elle," and even Louisa Colet ventured into the fracas with a trashy +novel called "Lui." During all this mud-throwing the cause of the +trouble calmly lived in the little Italian town of Belluno. It was Dr. +Giuseppe Pagello who will go down in literary history as the one man +that played Joseph to George Sand. +</P> + +<P> +Now do you ask why I believe that Sand left Chopin when she was bored +with him? The words "some days afterwards" are significant. I print the +Pagello story not only because it is new, but as a reminder that George +Sand in her love affairs was always the man. She treated Chopin as a +child, a toy, used him for literary copy—pace Mr. Hadow!—and threw +him over after she had wrung out all the emotional possibilities of the +problem. She was true to herself even when she attempted to palliate +her want of heart. Beware of the woman who punctuates the pages of her +life with "heart" and "maternal feelings." "If I do not believe any +more in tears it is because I saw thee crying!" exclaimed Chopin. Sand +was the product of abnormal forces, she herself was abnormal, and her +mental activity, while it created no permanent types in literary +fiction, was also abnormal. She dominated Chopin, as she had dominated +Jules Sandeau, Calmatta the mezzotinter, De Musset, Franz Liszt, +Delacroix, Michel de Bourges—I have not the exact chronological +order—and later Flaubert. The most lovable event in the life of this +much loved woman was her old age affair—purely platonic—with Gustave +Flaubert. The correspondence shows her to have been "maternal" to the +last. +</P> + +<P> +In the recently published "Lettres a l'etrangere" of Honore de Balzac, +this about Sand is very apropos. A visit paid to George Sand at Nohant, +in March 1838, brought the following to Madame Hanska: +</P> + +<P CLASS="block"> + It was rather well that I saw her, for we exchanged + confidences regarding Sandeau. I, who blamed her to the last + for deserting him, now feel only a deep compassion for her, as + you will have for me, when you learn with whom we have had + relations, she of love, I of friendship. +</P> + +<P CLASS="block"> + But she has been even more unhappy with Musset. So here she + is, in retreat, denouncing both marriage and love, because in + both she has found nothing but delusion. +</P> + +<P CLASS="block"> + I will tell you of her immense and secret devotion to these + two men, and you will agree that there is nothing in common + between angels and devils. All the follies she has committed + are claims to glory in the eyes of great and beautiful souls. + She has been the dupe of la Dorval, Bocage, Lamenais, etc.; + through the same sentiment she is the dupe of Liszt and Madame + d'Agoult. +</P> + +<P> +So let us accept without too much questioning as did Balzac, a reader +of souls, the Sand-Chopin partnership and follow its sinuous course +until 1847. +</P> + +<P> +Chopin met Sand at a musical matinee in 1837. Niecks throttles every +romantic yarn about the pair that has been spoken or printed. He got +his facts viva voce from Franchomme. Sand was antipathetic to Chopin +but her technique for overcoming masculine coyness was as remarkable in +its particular fashion as Chopin's proficiency at the keyboard. They +were soon seen together, and everywhere. She was not musical, not a +trained musician, but her appreciation for all art forms was highly +sympathetic. Not a beautiful woman, being swarthy and rather heavy-set +in figure, this is what she was, as seen by Edouard Grenier:— +</P> + +<P CLASS="block"> + She was short and stout, but her face attracted all my + attention, the eyes especially. They were wonderful eyes, a + little too close together, it may be, large, with full + eyelids, and black, very black, but by no means lustrous; they + reminded me of unpolished marble, or rather of velvet, and + this gave a strange, dull, even cold expression to her + countenance. Her fine eyebrows and these great placid eyes + gave her an air of strength and dignity which was not borne + out by the lower part of her face. Her nose was rather thick + and not over shapely. Her mouth was also rather coarse and her + chin small. She spoke with great simplicity, and her manners + were very quiet. +</P> + +<P> +But she attracted with imperious power all that she met. Liszt felt +this attraction at one time—and it is whispered that Chopin was +jealous of him. Pouf! the woman who could conquer Franz Liszt in his +youth must have been a sorceress. He, too, was versatile. +</P> + +<P> +In 1838, Sand's boy Maurice being ill, she proposed a visit to Majorca. +Chopin went with the party in November and full accounts of the +Mediterranean trip, Chopin's illness, the bad weather, discomforts and +all the rest may be found in the "Histoire de Ma Vie" by Sand. It was a +time of torment. "Chopin is a detestable invalid," said Sand, and so +they returned to Nohant in June 1839. They saw Genoa for a few days in +May, but that is as far as Chopin ever penetrated into the promised +land—Italy, at one time a passion with him. Sand enjoyed the subtle +and truly feminine pleasure of again entering the city which six years +before she had visited in company with another man, the former lover of +Rachel. +</P> + +<P> +Chopin's health in 1839 was a source of alarm to himself and his +friends. He had been dangerously ill at Majorca and Marseilles. Fever +and severe coughing proved to be the dread forerunners of the disease +that killed him ten years later. He was forced to be very careful in +his habits, resting more, giving fewer lessons, playing but little in +private or public, and becoming frugal of his emotions. Now Sand began +to cool, though her lively imagination never ceased making graceful, +touching pictures of herself in the roles of sister of mercy, mother, +and discreet friend, all merged into one sentimental composite. Her +invalid was her one thought, and for an active mind and body like hers, +it must have been irksome to submit to the caprices of a moody, ailing +man. He composed at Nohant, and she has told us all about it; how he +groaned, wrote and re-wrote and tore to pieces draft after draft of his +work. This brings to memory another martyr to style, Gustave Flaubert, +who for forty years in a room at Croisset, near Rouen, wrestled with +the devils of syntax and epithet. Chopin was of an impatient, nervous +disposition. All the more remarkable then his capacity for taking +infinite pains. Like Balzac he was never pleased with the final +"revise" of his work, he must needs aim at finishing touches. His +letters at this period are interesting for the Chopinist but for the +most part they consist of requests made to his pupils, Fontana, Gutmann +and others, to jog the publishers, to get him new apartments, to buy +him many things. Wagner was not more importunate or minatory than this +Pole, who depended on others for the material comforts and necessities +of his existence. Nor is his abuse of friends and patrons, the Leos and +others, indicative of an altogether frank, sincere nature. He did not +hesitate to lump them all as "pigs" and "Jews" if anything happened to +jar his nerves. Money, money, is the leading theme of the Paris and +Mallorean letters. Sand was a spendthrift and Chopin had often to put +his hands in his pocket for her. He charged twenty francs a lesson, but +was not a machine and for at least four months of the year he earned +nothing. Hence his anxiety to get all he could for his compositions. +Heaven-born geniuses are sometimes very keen in financial transactions, +and indeed why should they not be? +</P> + +<P> +In 1839 Chopin met Moscheles. They appeared together at St. Cloud, +playing for the royal family. Chopin received a gold cup, Moscheles a +travelling case. "The King gave him this," said the amiable Frederic, +"to get the sooner rid of him." There were two public concerts in 1841 +and 1842, the first on April 26 at Pleyel's rooms, the second on +February 20 at the same hall. Niecks devotes an engrossing chapter to +the public accounts and the general style of Chopin's playing; of this +more hereafter. From 1843 to 1847 Chopin taught, and spent the +vacations at Nohant, to which charming retreat Liszt, Matthew Arnold, +Delacroix, Charles Rollinat and many others came. His life was +apparently happy. He composed and amused himself with Maurice and +Solange, the "terrible children" of this Bohemian household. There, +according to reports, Chopin and Liszt were in friendly rivalry—are +two pianists ever friendly?—Liszt imitating Chopin's style, and once +in the dark they exchanged places and fooled their listeners. Liszt +denied this. Another story is of one or the other working the pedal +rods—the pedals being broken. This too has been laughed to scorn by +Liszt. Nor could he recall having played while Viardot-Garcia sang out +on the terrace of the chateau. Garcia's memory is also short about this +event. Rollinat, Delacroix and Sand have written abundant souvenirs of +Nohant and its distinguished gatherings, so let us not attempt to +impugn the details of the Chopin legend, that legend which coughs +deprecatingly as it points to its aureoled alabaster brow. De Lenz +should be consulted for an account of this period; he will add the +finishing touches of unreality that may be missing. +</P> + +<P> +Chopin knew every one of note in Paris. The best salons were open to +him. Some of his confreres have not hesitated to describe him as a bit +snobbish, for during the last ten years of his life he was generally +inaccessible. But consider his retiring nature, his suspicious Slavic +temperament, above all his delicate health! Where one accuses him of +indifference and selfishness there are ten who praise his unfaltering +kindness, generosity and forbearance. He was as a rule a kind and +patient teacher, and where talent was displayed his interest trebled. +Can you fancy this Ariel of the piano giving lessons to hum-drum +pupils! Playing in a charmed and bewitching circle of countesses, +surrounded by the luxury and the praise that kills, Chopin is a much +more natural figure, yet he gave lessons regularly and appeared to +relish them. He had not much taste for literature. He liked Voltaire +though he read but little that was not Polish—did he really enjoy +Sand's novels?—and when asked why he did not compose symphonies or +operas, answered that his metier was the piano, and to it he would +stick. He spoke French though with a Polish accent, and also German, +but did not care much for German music except Bach and Mozart. +Beethoven—save in the C sharp minor and several other sonatas—was not +sympathetic. Schubert he found rough, Weber, in his piano music, too +operatic and Schumann he dismissed without a word. He told Heller that +the "Carneval" was really not music at all. This remark is one of the +curiosities of musical anecdotage. +</P> + +<P> +But he had his gay moments when he would gossip, chatter, imitate every +one, cut up all manner of tricks and, like Wagner, stand on his head. +Perhaps it was feverish, agitated gayety, yet somehow it seemed more +human than that eternal Thaddeus of Warsaw melancholy and regret for +the vanished greatness and happiness of Poland—a greatness and +happiness that never had existed. Chopin disliked letter writing and +would go miles to answer one in person. He did not hate any one in +particular, being rather indifferent to every one and to political +events—except where Poland was concerned. Theoretically he hated Jews +and Russians, yet associated with both. He was, like his music, a +bundle of unreconciled affirmations and evasions and never could have +been contented anywhere or with any one. Of himself he said that "he +was in this world like the E string of a violin on a contrabass." This +"divine dissatisfaction" led him to extremes: to the flouting of +friends for fancied affronts, to the snubbing of artists who sometimes +visited him. He grew suspicious of Liszt and for ten years was not on +terms of intimacy with him although they never openly quarrelled. +</P> + +<P> +The breach which had been very perceptibly widening became hopeless in +1847, when Sand and Chopin parted forever. A literature has grown up on +the subject. Chopin never had much to say but Sand did; so did Chopin's +pupils, who were quite virulent in their assertions that she killed +their master. The break had to come. It was the inevitable end of such +a friendship. The dynamics of free-love have yet to be formulated. This +much we know: two such natures could never entirely cohere. When the +novelty wore off the stronger of the two—the one least in love—took +the initial step. It was George Sand who took it with Chopin. He would +never have had the courage nor the will. +</P> + +<P> +The final causes are not very interesting. Niecks has sifted all the +evidence before the court and jury of scandal-mongers. The main quarrel +was about the marriage of Solange Sand with Clesinger the sculptor. Her +mother did not oppose the match, but later she resented Clesinger's +actions. He was coarse and violent, she said, with the true +mother-in-law spirit—and when Chopin received the young woman and her +husband after a terrible scene at Nohant, she broke with him. It was a +good excuse. He had ennuied her for several years, and as he had +completed his artistic work on this planet and there was nothing more +to be studied,—the psychological portrait was supposedly +painted—Madame George got rid of him. The dark stories of maternal +jealousy, of Chopin's preference for Solange, the visit to Chopin of +the concierge's wife to complain of her mistress' behavior with her +husband, all these rakings I leave to others. It was a triste affair +and I do not doubt in the least that it undermined Chopin's feeble +health. Why not! Animals die of broken hearts, and this emotional +product of Poland, deprived of affection, home and careful attention, +may well, as De Lenz swears, have died of heart-break. Recent gossip +declares that Sand was jealous of Chopin's friendships—this is silly. +</P> + +<P> +Mr. A. B. Walkley, the English dramatic critic, after declaring that he +would rather have lived during the Balzac epoch in Paris, continues in +this entertaining vein: +</P> + +<P CLASS="block"> + And then one might have had a chance of seeing George Sand in + the thick of her amorisms. For my part I would certainly + rather have met her than Pontius Pilate. The people who saw + her in her old age—Flaubert, Gautier, the Goncourts—have + left us copious records of her odd appearance, her perpetual + cigarette smoking, and her whimsical life at Nohant. But then + she was only an "extinct volcano;" she must have been much + more interesting in full eruption. Of her earlier career—the + period of Musset and Pagello—she herself told us something in + "Elle et Lui," and correspondence published a year or so ago + in the "Revue de Paris" told us more. But, to my mind, the + most fascinating chapter in this part of her history is the + Chopin chapter, covering the next decade, or, roughly + speaking, the 'forties. She has revealed something of this + time—naturally from her own point of view—in "Lucrezia + Floriana" (1847). For it is, of course, one of the most + notorious characteristics of George Sand that she invariably + turned her loves into "copy." The mixture of passion and + printer's ink in this lady's composition is surely one of the + most curious blends ever offered to the palate of the epicure. +</P> + +<P CLASS="block"> + But it was a blend which gave the lady an unfair advantage for + posterity. We hear too much of her side of the matter. This + one feels especially as regards her affair with Chopin. With + Musset she had to reckon a writer like herself; and against + her "Elle et Lui" we can set his "Confession d'un enfant du + siecle." But poor Chopin, being a musician, was not good at + "copy." The emotions she gave him he had to pour out in music, + which, delightful as sound, is unfortunately vague as a + literary "document." How one longs to have his full, true, and + particular account of the six months he spent with George Sand + in Majorca! M. Pierre Mille, who has just published in the + "Revue Bleue" some letters of Chopin (first printed, it seems, + in a Warsaw newspaper), would have us believe that the lady + was really the masculine partner. We are to understand that it + was Chopin who did the weeping, and pouting, and "scene"-making + while George Sand did the consoling, the pooh-poohing, + and the protecting. Liszt had already given us a + characteristic anecdote of this Majorca period. We see George + Sand, in sheer exuberance of health and animal spirits, + wandering out into the storm, while Chopin stays at home, to + have an attack of "nerves," to give vent to his anxiety (oh, + "artistic temperament"!) by composing a prelude, and to fall + fainting at the lady's feet when she returns safe and sound. + There is no doubt that the lady had enough of the masculine + temper in her to be the first to get tired. And as poor Chopin + was coughing and swooning most of the time, this is scarcely + surprising. But she did not leave him forthwith. She kept up + the pretence of loving him, in a maternal, protecting sort of + way, out of pity, as it were, for a sick child. +</P> + +<P CLASS="block"> + So much the published letters clearly show. Many of them are + dated from Nohant. But in themselves the letters are dull + enough. Chopin composed with the keyboard of a piano; with ink + and paper he could do little. Probably his love letters were + wooden productions, and George Sand, we know, was a fastidious + critic in that matter. She had received and written so many! + But any rate, Chopin did not write whining recriminations like + Mussel. His real view of her we shall never know—and, if you + like, you may say it is no business of ours. She once uttered + a truth about that (though not apropos of Chopin), "There are + so many things between two lovers of which they alone can be + the judges." +</P> + +<P> +Chopin gave his last concert in Paris, February 16, 1848, at Pleyel's. +He was ill but played beautifully. Oscar Commettant said he fainted in +the artist's room. Sand and Chopin met but once again. She took his +hand, which was "trembling and cold," but he escaped without saying a +word. He permitted himself in a letter to Grzymala from London dated +November 17-18, 1848, to speak of Sand. "I have never cursed any one, +but now I am so weary of life that I am near cursing Lucrezia. But she +suffers too, and suffers more because she grows older in wickedness. +What a pity about Soli! Alas! everything goes wrong with the world!" I +wonder what Mr. Hadow thinks of this reference to Sand! +</P> + +<P> +"Soli" is Solange Sand, who was forced to leave her husband because of +ill-treatment. As her mother once boxed Clesinger's ears at Nohant, she +followed the example. In trying to settle the affair Sand quarrelled +hopelessly with her daughter. That energetic descendant of "emancipated +woman" formed a partnership, literary of course, with the Marquis +Alfieri, the nephew of the Italian poet. Her salon was as much in vogue +as her mother's, but her tastes were inclined to politics, +revolutionary politics preferred. She had for associates Gambetta, +Jules Ferry, Floquet, Taine, Herve, Weiss, the critic of the "Debats," +Henri Fouquier and many others. She had the "curved Hebraic nose of her +mother and hair coal-black." She died in her chateau at Montgivray and +was buried March 20, 1899, at Nohant where, as my informant says, "her +mother died of over-much cigarette smoking." She was a clever woman and +wrote a book "Masks and Buffoons." Maurice Sand died in 1883. He was +the son of his mother, who was gathered to her heterogeneous ancestors +June 8, 1876. +</P> + +<P> +In literature George Sand is a feminine pendant to Jean Jacques +Rousseau, full of ill-digested, troubled, fermenting, social, +political, philosophical and religious speculations and theories. She +wrote picturesque French, smooth, flowing and full of color. The +sketches of nature, of country life, have positive value, but where has +vanished her gallery of Byronic passion-pursued women? Where are the +Lelias, the Indianas, the Rudolstadts? She had not, as Mr. Henry James +points out, a faculty for characterization. As Flaubert wrote her: "In +spite of your great Sphinx eyes you have always seen the world as +through a golden mist." She dealt in vague, vast figures, and so her +Prince Karol in "Lucrezia Floriana," unquestionably intended for +Chopin, is a burlesque—little wonder he was angered when the precious +children asked him "Cher M. Chopin, have you read 'Lucrezia'? Mamma has +put you in it." Of all persons Sand was pre-elected to give to the +world a true, a sympathetic picture of her friend. She understood him, +but she had not the power of putting him between the coversof a book. +If Flaubert, or better still, Pierre Loti, could have known Chopin so +intimately we should possess a memoir in which every vibration of +emotion would be recorded, every shade noted, and all pinned with the +precise adjective, the phrase exquisite. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap03"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +III. ENGLAND, SCOTLAND AND PERE LA CHAISE. +</H3> + +<P> +The remaining years of Chopin's life were lonely. His father died in +1844 of chest and heart complaint, his sister Emilia died of +consumption—ill-omens these!—and shortly after, John Matuszynski +died. Titus Woyciechowski was in far-off Poland on his estates and +Chopin had but Grzymala and Fontana to confide in; they being Polish he +preferred them, although he was diplomatic enough not to let others see +this. Both Franchomme and Gutmann whispered to Niecks at different +times that each was the particular soul, the alter ego, of Chopin. He +appeared to give himself to his friends but it was usually surface +affection. He had coaxing, coquettish ways, playful ways that cost him +nothing when in good spirits. So he was "more loved than loving." This +is another trait of the man, which, allied with his fastidiousness and +spiritual brusquerie, made him difficult to decipher. The loss of Sand +completed his misery and we find him in poor health when he arrived in +London, for the second and last time, April 21, 1848. +</P> + +<P> +Mr. A. J. Hipkins is the chief authority on the details of Chopin's +visit to England. To this amiable gentleman and learned writer on +pianos, Franz Hueffer, Joseph Bennett and Niecks are indebted for the +most of their facts. From them the curious may learn all there is to +learn. The story is not especially noteworthy, being in the main a +record of ill-health, complainings, lamentations and not one signal +artistic success. +</P> + +<P> +War was declared upon Chopin by a part of the musical world. The +criticism was compounded of pure malice and stupidity. Chopin was +angered but little for he was too sick to care now. He went to an +evening party but missed the Macready dinner where he was to have met +Thackeray, Berlioz, Mrs. Procter and Sir Julius Benedict. With Benedict +he played a Mozart duet at the Duchess of Sutherland's. Whether he +played at court the Queen can tell; Niecks cannot. He met Jenny +Lind-Goldschmidt and liked her exceedingly—as did all who had the +honor of knowing her. She sided with him, woman-like, in the Sand +affair—echoes of which had floated across the channel—and visited him +in Paris in 1849. Chopin gave two matinees at the houses of Adelaide +Kemble and Lord Falmouth—June 23 and July 7. They were very recherche, +so it appears. Viardot-Garcia sang. The composer's face and frame were +wasted by illness and Mr. Solomon spoke of his "long attenuated +fingers." He made money and that was useful to him, for doctors' bills +and living had taken up his savings. There was talk of his settling in +London, but the climate, not to speak of the unmusical atmosphere, +would have been fatal to him. Wagner succumbed to both, sturdy fighter +that he was. +</P> + +<P> +Chopin left for Scotland in August and stopped at the house of his +pupil, Miss Stirling. Her name is familiar to Chopin students, for the +two nocturnes, opus 55, are dedicated to her. He was nearly killed with +kindness but continually bemoaned his existence. At the house of Dr. +Lyschinski, a Pole, he lodged in Edinburgh and was so weak that he had +to be carried up and down stairs. To the doctor's good wife he replied +in answer to the question "George Sand is your particular friend?" "Not +even George Sand." And is he to be blamed for evading tiresome +reminders of the past? He confessed that his excessive thinness had +caused Sand to address him as "My Dear Corpse." Charming, is it not? +Miss Stirling was doubtless in love with him and Princess Czartoryska +followed him to Scotland to see if his health was better. So he was not +altogether deserted by the women—indeed he could not live without +their little flatteries and agreeable attentions. It is safe to say +that a woman was always within call of Chopin. +</P> + +<P> +He played at Manchester on the 28th of August, but his friend Mr. +Osborne, who was present, says "his playing was too delicate to create +enthusiasm and I felt truly sorry for him." On his return to Scotland +he stayed with Mr. and Mrs. Salis Schwabe. +</P> + +<P> +Mr. J. Cuthbert Hadden wrote several years ago in the Glasgow "Herald" +of Chopin's visit to Scotland in 1848. The tone-poet was in the poorest +health, but with characteristic tenacity played at concerts and paid +visits to his admirers. Mr. Hadden found the following notice in the +back files of the Glasgow "Courier": +</P> + +<P CLASS="block"> + Monsieur Chopin has the honour to announce that his matinee + musicale will take place on Wednesday, the 27th September, in + the Merchant Hall, Glasgow. To commence at half-past two + o'clock. Tickets, limited in number, half-a-guinea each, and + full particulars to be had from Mr. Muir Wood, 42, Buchanan + street. +</P> + +<P> +He continues: +</P> + +<P CLASS="block"> + The net profits of this concert are said to have been exactly + L60—a ridiculously low sum when we compare it with the + earnings of later day virtuosi; nay, still more ridiculously + low when we recall the circumstance that for two concerts in + Glasgow sixteen years before this Paganini had L 1,400. Muir + Wood, who has since died, said: "I was then a comparative + stranger in Glasgow, but I was told that so many private + carriages had never been seen at any concert in the town. In + fact, it was the county people who turned out, with a few of + the elite of Glasgow society. Being a morning concert, the + citizens were busy otherwise, and half a guinea was considered + too high a sum for their wives and daughters." +</P> + +<P CLASS="block"> + The late Dr. James Hedderwick, of Glasgow, tells in his + reminiscences that on entering the hall he found it about one-third + full. It was obvious that a number of the audience were + personal friends of Chopin. Dr. Hedderwick recognized the + composer at once as "a little, fragile-looking man, in pale + gray suit, including frock coat of identical tint and texture, + moving about among the company, conversing with different + groups, and occasionally consulting his watch," which seemed + to be "no bigger than an agate stone on the forefinger of an + alderman." Whiskerless, beardless, fair of hair, and pale and + thin of face, his appearance was "interesting and + conspicuous," and when, "after a final glance at his miniature + horologe, he ascended the platform and placed himself at the + instrument, he at once commanded attention." Dr. Hedderwick + says it was a drawing-room entertainment, more piano than + forte, though not without occasional episodes of both strength + and grandeur. It was perfectly clear to him that Chopin was + marked for an early grave. +</P> + +<P CLASS="block"> + So far as can be ascertained, there are now living only two + members of that Glasgow audience of 1848. One of the two is + Julius Seligmann, the veteran president of the Glasgow Society + of Musicians, who, in response to some inquiries on the + subject, writes as follows: +</P> + +<P CLASS="block"> + "Several weeks before the concert Chopin lived with different + friends or pupils on their invitations, in the surrounding + counties. I think his pupil Miss Jane Stirling had something + to do with all the general arrangements. Muir Wood managed the + special arrangements of the concert, and I distinctly remember + him telling me that he never had so much difficulty in + arranging a concert as on this occasion. Chopin constantly + changed his mind. Wood had to visit him several times at the + house of Admiral Napier, at Milliken Park, near Johnstone, but + scarcely had he returned to Glasgow when he was summoned back + to alter something. The concert was given in the Merchant + Hall, Hutcheson street, now the County Buildings. The hall was + about three-quarters filled. Between Chopin's playing Madame + Adelasio de Margueritte, daughter of a well-known London + physician, sang, and Mr. Muir accompanied her. Chopin was + evidently very ill. His touch was very feeble, and while the + finish, grace, elegance and delicacy of his performances were + greatly admired by the audience, the want of power made his + playing somewhat monotonous. I do not remember the whole + programme, but he was encored for his well-known mazurka in B + flat (op. 7, No. 1), which he repeated with quite different + nuances from those of the first time. The audience was very + aristocratic, consisting mostly of ladies, among whom were the + then Duchess of Argyll and her sister, Lady Blantyre." +</P> + +<P CLASS="block"> + The other survivor is George Russell Alexander, son of the + proprietor of the Theatre Royal, Dunlop street, who in a + letter to the writer remarks especially upon Chopin's pale, + cadaverous appearance. "My emotion," he says, "was so great + that two or three times I was compelled to retire from the + room to recover myself. I have heard all the best and most + celebrated stars of the musical firmament, but never one has + left such an impress on my mind." +</P> + +<P> +Chopin played October 4 in Edinburgh, and returned to London in +November after various visits. We read of a Polish ball and concert at +which he played, but the affair was not a success. He left England in +January 1849 and heartily glad he was to go. "Do you see the cattle in +this meadow?" he asked, en route for Paris: "Ca a plus d'intelligence +que des Anglais," which was not nice of him. Perhaps M. Niedzwiecki, to +whom he made the remark took as earnest a pure bit of nonsense, and +perhaps—! He certainly disliked England and the English. +</P> + +<P> +Now the curtain prepares to fall on the last dreary finale of Chopin's +life, a life not for a moment heroic, yet lived according to his lights +and free from the sordid and the soil of vulgarity. Jules Janin said: +"He lived ten miraculous years with a breath ready to fly away," and we +know that his servant Daniel had always to carry him to bed. For ten +years he had suffered from so much illness that a relapse was not +noticed by the world. His very death was at first received with +incredulity, for, as Stephen Heller said, he had been reported dead so +often that the real news was doubted. In 1847 his legs began to bother +him by swelling, and M. Mathias described him as "a painful spectacle, +the picture of exhaustion, the back bent, head bowed—but always +amiable and full of distinction." His purse was empty, and his lodgings +in the Rue Chaillot were represented to the proud man as being just +half their cost,—the balance being paid by the Countess Obreskoff, a +Russian lady. Like a romance is the sending, by Miss Stirling, of +twenty-five thousand francs, but it is nevertheless true. The +noble-hearted Scotchwoman heard of Chopin's needs through Madame Rubio, +a pupil, and the money was raised. That packet containing it was +mislaid or lost by the portress of Chopin's house, but found after the +woman had been taxed with keeping it. +</P> + +<P> +Chopin, his future assured, moved to Place Vendome, No. 12. There he +died. His sister Louise was sent for, and came from Poland to Paris. In +the early days of October he could no longer sit upright without +support. Gutmann and the Countess Delphine Potocka, his sister, and M. +Gavard, were constantly with him. It was Turgenev who spoke of the half +hundred countesses in Europe who claimed to have held the dying Chopin +in their arms. In reality he died in Gutmann's, raising that pupil's +hand to his mouth and murmuring "cher ami" as he expired. Solange Sand +was there, but not her mother, who called and was not admitted—so they +say. Gutmann denies having refused her admittance. On the other hand, +if she had called, Chopin's friends would have kept her away from him, +from the man who told Franchomme two days before his death, "She said +to me that I would die in no arms but hers." Surely—unless she was +monstrous in her egotism, and she was not—George Sand did not hear +this sad speech without tears and boundless regrets. Alas! all things +come too late for those who wait. +</P> + +<P> +Tarnowski relates that Chopin gave his last orders in perfect +consciousness. He begged his sister to burn all his inferior +compositions. "I owe it to the public," he said, "and to myself to +publish only good things. I kept to this resolution all my life; I wish +to keep to it now." This wish has not been respected. The posthumous +publications are for the most part feeble stuff. +</P> + +<P> +Chopin died, October 17, 1849, between three and four in the morning, +after having been shrived by the Abbe Jelowicki. His last word, +according to Gavard, was "Plus," on being asked if he suffered. +Regarding the touching and slightly melodramatic death bed scene on the +day previous, when Delphine Potocka sang Stradella and Mozart—or was +it Marcello?—Liszt, Karasowski, and Gutmann disagree. +</P> + +<P> +The following authentic account of the last hours of Chopin appears +here for the first time in English, translated by Mr. Hugh Craig. In +Liszt's well-known work on Chopin, second edition, 1879, mention is +made of a conversation that he had held with the Abbe Jelowicki +respecting Chopin's death; and in Niecks' biography of Chopin some +sentences from letters by the Abbe are quoted. These letters, written +in French, have been translated and published in the "Allgemeine Musik +Zeitung," to which they were given by the Princess Marie Hohenlohe, the +daughter of Princess Caroline Sayn Wittgenstein, Liszt's universal +legatee and executor, who died in 1887. +</P> + +<P CLASS="block"> + For many years [so runs the document] the life of Chopin was + but a breath. His frail, weak body was visibly unfitted for + the strength and force of his genius. It was a wonder how in + such a weak state, he could live at all, and occasionally act + with the greatest energy. His body was almost diaphanous; his + eyes were almost shadowed by a cloud from which, from time to + time, the lightnings of his glance flashed. Gentle, kind, + bubbling with humor, and every way charming, he seemed no + longer to belong to earth, while, unfortunately, he had not + yet thought of heaven. He had good friends, but many bad + friends. These bad friends were his flatterers, that is, his + enemies, men and women without principles, or rather with bad + principles. Even his unrivalled success, so much more subtle + and thus so much more stimulating than that of all other + artists, carried the war into his soul and checked the + expression of faith and of prayer. The teachings of the + fondest, most pious mother became to him a recollection of his + childhood's love. In the place of faith, doubt had stepped in, + and only that decency innate in every generous heart hindered + him from indulging in sarcasm and mockery over holy things and + the consolations of religion. +</P> + +<P CLASS="block"> + While he was in this spiritual condition he was attacked by + the pulmonary disease that was soon to carry him away from us. + The knowledge of this cruel sickness reached me on my return + from Rome. With beating heart I hurried to him, to see once + more the friend of my youth, whose soul was infinitely dearer + to me than all his talent. I found him, not thinner, for that + was impossible, but weaker. His strength sank, his life faded + visibly. He embraced me with affection and with tears in his + eyes, thinking not of his own pain but of mine; he spoke of my + poor friend Eduard Worte, whom I had just lost, you know how. + (He was shot, a martyr of liberty, at Vienna, November 10, + 1848.) +</P> + +<P CLASS="block"> + I availed myself of his softened mood to speak to him about + his soul. I recalled his thoughts to the piety of his + childhood and of his beloved mother. "Yes," he said, "in order + not to offend my mother I would not die without the + sacraments, but for my part I do not regard them in the sense + that you desire. I understand the blessing of confession in so + far as it is the unburdening of a heavy heart into a friendly + hand, but not as a sacrament. I am ready to confess to you if + you wish it, because I love you, not because I hold it + necessary." Enough: a crowd of anti-religious speeches filled + me with terror and care for this elect soul, and I feared + nothing more than to be called to be his confessor. +</P> + +<P CLASS="block"> + Several months passed with similar conversations, so painful + to me, the priest and the sincere friend. Yet I clung to the + conviction that the grace of God would obtain the victory over + this rebellious soul, even if I knew not how. After all my + exertions, prayer remained my only refuge. +</P> + +<P CLASS="block"> + On the evening of October 12 I had with my brethren retired to + pray for a change in Chopin's mind, when I was summoned by + orders of the physician, in fear that he would not live + through the night. I hastened to him. He pressed my hand, but + bade me at once to depart, while he assured me he loved me + much, but did not wish to speak to me. +</P> + +<P CLASS="block"> + Imagine, if you can, what a night I passed! Next day was the + 13th, the day of St. Edward, the patron of my poor brother. I + said mass for the repose of his soul and prayed for Chopin's + soul. "My God," I cried, "if the soul of my brother Edward is + pleasing to thee, give me, this day, the soul of Frederic." +</P> + +<P CLASS="block"> + In double distress I then went to the melancholy abode of our + poor sick man. +</P> + +<P CLASS="block"> + I found him at breakfast, which was served as carefully as + ever, and after he had asked me to partake I said: "My friend, + today is the name day of my poor brother." "Oh, do not let us + speak of it!" he cried. "Dearest friend," I continued, "you + must give me something for my brother's name day." "What shall + I give you?" "Your soul." "Ah! I understand. Here it is; take + it!" +</P> + +<P CLASS="block"> + At these words unspeakable joy and anguish seized me. What + should I say to him? What should I do to restore his faith, + how not to lose instead of saving this beloved soul? How + should I begin to bring it back to God? I flung myself on my + knees, and after a moment of collecting my thoughts I cried in + the depths of my heart, "Draw it to Thee, Thyself, my God!" +</P> + +<P CLASS="block"> + Without saying a word I held out to our dear invalid the + crucifix. Rays of divine light, flames of divine fire, + streamed, I might say, visibly from the figure of the + crucified Saviour, and at once illumined the soul and kindled + the heart of Chopin. Burning tears streamed from his eyes. His + faith was once more revived, and with unspeakable fervor he + made his confession and received the Holy Supper. After the + blessed Viaticum, penetrated by the heavenly consecration + which the sacraments pour forth on pious souls, he asked for + Extreme Unction. He wished to pay lavishly the sacristan who + accompanied me, and when I remarked that the sum presented by + him was twenty times too much he replied, "Oh, no, for what I + have received is beyond price." +</P> + +<P CLASS="block"> + From this hour he was a saint. The death struggle began and + lasted four days. Patience, trust in God, even joyful + confidence, never left him, in spite of all his sufferings, + till the last breath. He was really happy, and called himself + happy. In the midst of the sharpest sufferings he expressed + only ecstatic joy, touching love of God, thankfulness that I + had led him back to God, contempt of the world and its good, + and a wish for a speedy death. +</P> + +<P CLASS="block"> + He blessed his friends, and when, after an apparently last + crisis, he saw himself surrounded by the crowd that day and + night filled his chamber, he asked me, "Why do they not pray?" + At these words all fell on their knees, and even the + Protestants joined in the litanies and prayers for the dying. +</P> + +<P CLASS="block"> + Day and night he held my hand, and would not let me leave him. + "No, you will not leave me at the last moment," he said, and + leaned on my breast as a little child in a moment of danger + hides itself in its mother's breast. +</P> + +<P CLASS="block"> + Soon he called upon Jesus and Mary, with a fervor that reached + to heaven; soon he kissed the crucifix in an excess of faith, + hope and love. He made the most touching utterances. "I love + God and man," he said. "I am happy so to die; do not weep, my + sister. My friends, do not weep. I am happy. I feel that I am + dying. Farewell, pray for me!" +</P> + +<P CLASS="block"> + Exhausted by deathly convulsions he said to the physicians, + "Let me die. Do not keep me longer in this world of exile. Let + me die; why do you prolong my life when I have renounced all + things and God has enlightened my soul? God calls me; why do + you keep me back?" +</P> + +<P CLASS="block"> + Another time he said, "O lovely science, that only lets one + suffer longer! Could it give me back my strength, qualify me + to do any good, to make any sacrifice—but a life of fainting, + of grief, of pain to all who love me, to prolong such a life— + O lovely science!" +</P> + +<P CLASS="block"> + Then he said again: "You let me suffer cruelly. Perhaps you + have erred about my sickness. But God errs not. He punishes + me, and I bless him therefor. Oh, how good is God to punish me + here below! Oh, how good God is!" +</P> + +<P CLASS="block"> + His usual language was always elegant, with well chosen words, + but at last to express all his thankfulness and, at the same + time, all the misery of those who die unreconciled to God, he + cried, "Without you I should have croaked (krepiren) like a + pig." +</P> + +<P CLASS="block"> + While dying he still called on the names of Jesus, Mary, + Joseph, kissed the crucifix and pressed it to his heart with + the cry "Now I am at the source of Blessedness!" +</P> + +<P CLASS="block"> + Thus died Chopin, and in truth, his death was the most + beautiful concerto of all his life. +</P> + +<P> +The worthy abbe must have had a phenomenal memory. I hope that it was +an exact one. His story is given in its entirety because of its +novelty. The only thing that makes me feel in the least sceptical is +that La Mara,—the pen name of a writer on musical +subjects,—translated these letters into German. But every one agrees +that Chopin's end was serene; indeed it is one of the musical +death-beds of history, another was Mozart's. His face was beautiful and +young in the flower-covered coffin, says Liszt. He was buried from the +Madeleine, October 30, with the ceremony befitting a man of genius. The +B flat minor Funeral march, orchestrated by Henri Reber, was given, and +during the ceremony Lefebure-Wely played on the organ the E and B minor +Preludes. The pall-bearers were distinguished men, Meyerbeer, +Delacroix, Pleyel and Franchomme—at least Theophile Gautier so +reported it for his journal. Even at his grave in Pere la Chaise no two +persons could agree about Chopin. This controversy is quite +characteristic of Chopin who was always the calm centre of argument. +</P> + +<P> +He was buried in evening clothes, his concert dress, but not at his own +request. Kwiatowski the portrait painter told this to Niecks. It is a +Polish custom for the dying to select their grave clothes, yet Lombroso +writes that Chopin "in his will directed that he should be buried in a +white tie, small shoes and short breeches," adducing this as an +evidence of his insanity. He further adds "he abandoned the woman whom +he tenderly loved because she offered a chair to some one else before +giving the same invitation to himself." Here we have a Sand story +raised to the dignity of a diagnosed symptom. It is like the other +nonsense. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap04"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +IV. THE ARTIST +</H3> + +<P> +Chopin's personality was a pleasant, persuasive one without being so +striking or so dramatic as Liszt's. As a youth his nose was too large, +his lips thin, the lower one protruding. Later, Moscheles said that he +looked like his music. Delicacy and a certain aristrocratic bearing, a +harmonious ensemble, produced a most agreeable sensation. "He was of +slim frame, middle height; fragile but wonderfully flexible limbs, +delicately formed hands, very small feet, an oval, softly outlined +head, a pale transparent complexion, long silken hair of a light +chestnut color, parted on one side, tender brown eyes, intelligent +rather than dreamy, a finely-curved aquiline nose, a sweet subtle +smile, graceful and varied gestures." This precise description is by +Niecks. Liszt said he had blue eyes, but he has been overruled. Chopin +was fond of elegant, costly attire, and was very correct in the matter +of studs, walking sticks and cravats. Not the ideal musician we read +of, but a gentleman. Berlioz told Legouve to see Chopin, "for he is +something which you have never seen—and some one you will never +forget." An orchidaceous individuality this. +</P> + +<P> +With such personal refinement he was a man punctual and precise in his +habits. Associating constantly with fashionable folk his naturally +dignified behavior was increased. He was an aristocrat—there is no +other word—and he did not care to be hail-fellow-well-met with the +musicians. A certain primness and asperity did not make him popular. +While teaching, his manner warmed, the earnest artist came to life, all +halting of speech and polite insincerities were abandoned. His pupils +adored him. Here at least the sentiment was one of solidarity. De Lenz +is his most censorious critic and did not really love Chopin. The +dislike was returned, for the Pole suspected that his pupil was sent by +Liszt to spy on his methods. This I heard in Paris. +</P> + +<P> +Chopin was a remarkable teacher. He never taught but one genius, little +Filtsch, the Hungarian lad of whom Liszt said, "When he starts playing +I will shut up shop." The boy died in 1845, aged fifteen; Paul +Gunsberg, who died the same year, was also very talented. Once after +delivering in a lovely way the master's E minor concerto Filtsch was +taken by Chopin to a music store and presented with the score of +Beethoven's "Fidelio." He was much affected by the talents of this +youthful pupil. Lindsay Sloper and Brinley Richards studied with +Chopin. Caroline Hartmann, Gutmann, Lysberg, Georges Mathias, Mlle. +O'Meara, many Polish ladies of rank, Delphine Potocka among the rest, +Madame Streicher, Carl Mikuli, Madame Rubio, Madame Peruzzi, Thomas +Tellefsen, Casimir Wernik, Gustav Schumann, Werner Steinbrecher, and +many others became excellent pianists. Was the American pianist, Louis +Moreau Gottschalk, ever his pupil? His friends say so, but Niecks does +not mention him. Ernst Pauer questions it. We know that Gottschalk +studied in Paris with Camille Stamaty, and made his first appearance +there in 1847. This was shortly before Chopin's death when his interest +in music had abated greatly. No doubt Gottschalk played for Chopin for +he was the first to introduce the Pole's music in America. +</P> + +<P> +Chopin was very particular about the formation of the touch, giving +Clementi's Preludes at first. "Is that a dog barking?" was his sudden +exclamation at a rough attack. He taught the scales staccato and legato +beginning with E major. Ductility, ease, gracefulness were his aim; +stiffness, harshness annoyed him. He gave Clementi, Moscheles and Bach. +Before playing in concert he shut himself up and played, not Chopin but +Bach, always Bach. Absolute finger independence and touch +discrimination and color are to be gained by playing the preludes and +fugues of Bach. Chopin started a method but it was never finished and +his sister gave it to the Princess Czartoryska after his death. It is a +mere fragment. Janotha has translated it. One point is worth quoting. +He wrote: +</P> + +<P CLASS="block"> + No one notices inequality in the power of the notes of a scale + when it is played very fast and equally, as regards time. In a + good mechanism the aim is not to play everything with an equal + sound, but to acquire a beautiful quality of touch and a + perfect shading. For a long time players have acted against + nature in seeking to give equal power to each finger. On the + contrary, each finger should have an appropriate part assigned + it. The thumb has the greatest power, being the thickest + finger and the freest. Then comes the little finger, at the + other extremity of the hand. The middle finger is the main + support of the hand, and is assisted by the first. Finally + comes the third, the weakest one. As to this Siamese twin of + the middle finger, some players try to force it with all their + might to become independent. A thing impossible, and most + likely unnecessary. There are, then, many different qualities + of sound, just as there are several fingers. The point is to + utilize the differences; and this, in other words, is the art + of fingering. +</P> + +<P> +Here, it seems to me, is one of the most practical truths ever uttered +by a teacher. Pianists spend thousands of hours trying to subjugate +impossible muscles. Chopin, who found out most things for himself, saw +the waste of time and force. I recommend his advice. He was ever +particular about fingering, but his innovations horrified the purists. +"Play as you feel," was his motto, a rather dangerous precept for +beginners. He gave to his pupils the concertos and sonatas—all +carefully graded—of Mozart, Scarlatti, Field, Dussek, Hummel, +Beethoven, Mendelssohn, Weber and Hiller and, of Schubert, the +four-hand pieces and dances. Liszt he did not favor, which is natural, +Liszt having written nothing but brilliant paraphrases in those days. +The music of the later Liszt is quite another thing. Chopin's genius +for the pedal, his utilization of its capacity for the vibration of +related strings, the overtones, I refer to later. Rubinstein said: +</P> + +<P CLASS="block"> + The piano bard, the piano rhapsodist, the piano mind, the + piano soul is Chopin. ... Tragic, romantic, lyric, heroic, + dramatic, fantastic, soulful, sweet, dreamy, brilliant, grand, + simple; all possible expressions are found in his compositions + and all are sung by him upon his instrument. +</P> + +<P> +Chopin is dead only fifty years, but his fame has traversed the half +century with ease, and bids fair to build securely in the loves of our +great-grandchildren. The six letters that comprise his name pursue +every piano that is made. Chopin and modern piano playing are +inseparable, and it is a strain upon homely prophecy to predict a time +when the two shall be put asunder. Chopin was the greatest interpreter +of Chopin, and following him came those giants of other days, Liszt, +Tausig, and Rubinstein. +</P> + +<P> +While he never had the pupils to mould as had Liszt, Chopin made some +excellent piano artists. They all had, or have—the old guard dies +bravely—his tradition, but exactly what the Chopin tradition is no man +may dare to say. Anton Rubinstein, when I last heard him, played Chopin +inimitably. Never shall I forget the Ballades, the two Polonaises in F +sharp minor and A flat major, the B flat minor Prelude, the A minor +"Winter Wind" the two C minor studies, and the F minor Fantasie. Yet +the Chopin pupils, assembled in judgment at Paris when he gave his +Historical Recitals, refused to accept him as an interpreter. His touch +was too rich and full, his tone too big. Chopin did not care for +Liszt's reading of his music, though he trembled when he heard him +thunder in the Eroica Polonaise. I doubt if even Karl Tausig, +impeccable artist, unapproachable Chopin player, would have pleased the +composer. Chopin played as his moods prompted, and his playing was the +despair and delight of his hearers. Rubinstein did all sorts of +wonderful things with the coda of the Barcarolle—such a page!—but Sir +Charles Halle said that it was "clever but not Chopinesque." Yet Halle +heard Chopin at his last Paris concert, February, 1848, play the two +forte passages in the Barcarolle "pianissimo and with all sorts of +dynamic finesse." This is precisely what Rubinstein did, and his +pianissimo was a whisper. Von Bulow was too much of a martinet to +reveal the poetic quality, though he appreciated Chopin on the +intellectual side; his touch was not beautiful enough. The Slavic and +Magyar races are your only true Chopin interpreters. Witness Liszt the +magnificent, Rubinstein a passionate genius, Tausig who united in his +person all the elements of greatness, Essipowa fascinating and +feminine, the poetic Paderewski, de Pachmann the fantastic, subtle +Joseffy, and Rosenthal a phenomenon. +</P> + +<P> +A world-great pianist was this Frederic Francois Chopin. He played as +he composed: uniquely. All testimony is emphatic as to this. Scales +that were pearls, a touch rich, sweet, supple and singing and a +technique that knew no difficulties, these were part of Chopin's +equipment as a pianist. He spiritualized the timbre of his instrument +until it became transformed into something strange, something remote +from its original nature. His pianissimo was an enchanting whisper, his +forte seemed powerful by contrast so numberless were the gradations, so +widely varied his dynamics. The fairylike quality of his play, his +diaphanous harmonies, his liquid tone, his pedalling—all were the work +of a genius and a lifetime; and the appealing humanity he infused into +his touch, gave his listeners a delight that bordered on the +supernatural. So the accounts, critical, professional and personal +read. There must have been a hypnotic quality in his performances that +transported his audience wherever the poet willed. Indeed the stories +told wear an air of enthusiasm that borders on the exaggerated, on the +fantastic. Crystalline pearls falling on red hot velvet-or did Scudo +write this of Liszt?—infinite nuance and the mingling of silvery +bells,—these are a few of the least exuberant notices. Was it not +Heine who called "Thalberg a king, Liszt a prophet, Chopin a poet, Herz +an advocate, Kalkbrenner a minstrel, Madame Pleyel a sibyl, and +Doehler—a pianist"? The limpidity, the smoothness and ease of Chopin's +playing were, after all, on the physical plane. It was the poetic +melancholy, the grandeur, above all the imaginative lift, that were +more in evidence than mere sensuous sweetness. Chopin had, we know, his +salon side when he played with elegance, brilliancy and coquetry. But +he had dark moments when the keyboard was too small, his ideas too big +for utterance. Then he astounded, thrilled his auditors. They were rare +moments. His mood-versatility was reproduced in his endless colorings +and capricious rhythms. The instrument vibrated with these new, +nameless effects like the violin in Paganini's hands. It was ravishing. +He was called the Ariel, the Undine of the piano. There was something +imponderable, fluid, vaporous, evanescent in his music that eluded +analysis and eluded all but hard-headed critics. This novelty was the +reason why he has been classed as a "gifted amateur" and even to-day is +he regarded by many musicians as a skilful inventor of piano passages +and patterned figures instead of what he really is—one of the most +daring harmonists since Bach. +</P> + +<P> +Chopin's elastic hand, small, thin, with lightly articulated fingers, +was capable of stretching tenths with ease. Examine his first study for +confirmation of this. His wrist was very supple. Stephen Heller said +that "it was a wonderful sight to see Chopin's small hands expand and +cover a third of the keyboard. It was like the opening of the mouth of +a serpent about to swallow a rabbit whole." He played the octaves in +the A flat Polonaise with infinite ease but pianissimo. Now where is +the "tradition" when confronted by the mighty crashing of Rosenthal in +this particular part of the Polonaise? Of Karl Tausig, Weitzmann said +that "he relieved the romantically sentimental Chopin of his +Weltschmerz and showed him in his pristine creative vigor and wealth of +imagination." In Chopin's music there are many pianists, many styles +and all are correct if they are poetically musical, logical and +individually sincere. Of his rubato I treat in the chapter devoted to +the Mazurkas, making also an attempt to define the "zal" of his playing +and music. +</P> + +<P> +When Chopin was strong he used a Pleyel piano, when he was ill an +Erard—a nice fable of Liszt's! He said that he liked the Erard but he +really preferred the Pleyel with its veiled sonority. What could not he +have accomplished with the modern grand piano? In the artist's room of +the Maison Pleyel there stands the piano at which Chopin composed the +Preludes, the G minor nocturne, the Funeral March, the three +supplementary etudes, the A minor Mazurka, the Tarantelle, the F minor +Fantasie and the B minor Scherzo. A brass tablet on the inside lid +notes this. The piano is still in good condition as regards tone and +action. +</P> + +<P> +Mikuli asserted that Chopin brought out an "immense" tone in +cantabiles. He had not a small tone, but it was not the orchestral tone +of our day. Indeed how could it be, with the light action and tone of +the French pianos built in the first half of the century? After all it +was quality, not quantity that Chopin sought. Each one of his ten +fingers was a delicately differentiated voice, and these ten voices +could sing at times like the morning stars. +</P> + +<P> +Rubinstein declared that all the pedal marks are wrong in Chopin. I +doubt if any edition can ever give them as they should be, for here +again the individual equation comes into play. Apart from certain +fundamental rules for managing the pedals, no pedagogic regulations +should ever be made for the more refined nuances. +</P> + +<P> +The portraits of Chopin differ widely. There is the Ary Scheffer, the +Vigneron—praised by Mathias—the Bovy medallion, the Duval drawing, +and the head by Kwiatowski. Delacroix tried his powerful hand at +transfixing in oil the fleeting expressions of Chopin. Felix Barrias, +Franz Winterhalter, and Albert Graefle are others who tried with more +or less success. Anthony Kolberg painted Chopin in 1848-49. Kleczynski +reproduces it; it is mature in expression. The Clesinger head I have +seen at Pere la Chaise. It is mediocre and lifeless. Kwiatowski has +caught some of the Chopin spirit in the etching that may be found in +volume one of Niecks' biography. The Winterhalter portrait in Mr. +Hadow's volume is too Hebraic, and the Graefle is a trifle ghastly. It +is the dead Chopin, but the nose is that of a predaceous bird, +painfully aquiline. The "Echo Muzyczne" Warsaw, of October 1899—in +Polish "17 Pazdziernika"—printed a picture of the composer at the age +of seventeen. It is that of a thoughtful, poetic, but not handsome lad, +his hair waving over a fine forehead, a feminine mouth, large, aquiline +nose, the nostrils delicately cut, and about his slender neck a Byronic +collar. Altogether a novel likeness. Like the Chopin interpretation, a +satisfactory Chopin portrait is extremely rare. +</P> + +<P> +As some difficulty was experienced in discovering the identity of +Countess Delphine Potocka, I applied in 1899 to Mr. Jaraslow de +Zielinski, a pianist of Buffalo, New York, for assistance; he is an +authority on Polish and Russian music and musicians. Here are the facts +he kindly transmitted: "In 1830 three beautiful Polish women came to +Nice to pass the winter. They were the daughters of Count Komar, the +business manager of the wealthy Count Potocki. They were singularly +accomplished; they spoke half the languages of Europe, drew well, and +sang to perfection. All they needed was money to make them queens of +society; this they soon obtained, and with it high rank. Their graceful +manners and loveliness won the hearts of three of the greatest of +noblemen. Marie married the Prince de Beauvau-Craon; Delphine became +Countess Potocka, and Nathalie, Marchioness Medici Spada. The last +named died young, a victim to the zeal in favor of the cholera-stricken +of Rome. The other two sisters went to live in Paris, and became famous +for their brilliant elegance. Their sumptuous 'hotels' or palaces were +thrown open to the most prominent men of genius of their time, and +hither came Chopin, to meet not only with the homage due to his genius, +but with a tender and sisterly friendship, which proved one of the +greatest consolations of his life. To the amiable Princess de Beauvau +he dedicated his famous Polonaise in F sharp minor, op. 44, written in +the brilliant bravura style for pianists of the first force. To +Delphine, Countess Potocka, he dedicated the loveliest of his valses, +op. 64, No. 1, so well transcribed by Joseffy into a study in thirds." +</P> + +<P> +Therefore the picture of the Grafin Potocka in the Berlin gallery is +not that of Chopin's devoted friend. +</P> + +<P> +Here is another Count Tarnowski story. It touches on a Potocka episode. +"Chopin liked and knew how to express individual characteristics on the +piano. Just as there formerly was a rather widely-known fashion of +describing dispositions and characters in so-called 'portraits,' which +gave to ready wits a scope for parading their knowledge of people and +their sharpness of observation; so he often amused himself by playing +such musical portraits. Without saying whom he had in his thoughts, he +illustrated the characters of a few or of several people present in the +room, and illustrated them so clearly and so delicately that the +listeners could always guess correctly who was intended, and admired +the resemblance of the portrait. One little anecdote is related in +connection with this which throws some light on his wit, and a little +pinch of sarcasm in it. +</P> + +<P> +"During the time of Chopin's greatest brilliancy and popularity, in the +year 1835, he once played his musical portraits in a certain Polish +salon, where the three daughters of the house were the stars of the +evening. After a few portraits had been extemporized, one of these +ladies wished to have hers—Mme. Delphine Potocka. Chopin, in reply, +drew her shawl from her shoulders, threw it on the keyboard and began +to play, implying in this two things; first, that he knew the character +of the brilliant and famous queen of fashion so well, that by heart and +in the dark he was able to depict it; secondly, that this character and +this soul is hidden under habits, ornamentations and decorations of an +elegant worldly life, through the symbol of elegance and fashion of +that day, as the tones of the piano through the shawl." +</P> + +<P> +Because Chopin did not label his works with any but general titles, +Ballades, Scherzi, Studies, Preludes and the like, his music sounds all +the better: the listener is not pinned down to any precise mood, the +music being allowed to work its particular charm without the aid of +literary crutches for unimaginative minds. Dr. Niecks gives specimens +of what the ingenious publisher, without a sense of humor, did with +some of Chopin's compositions: Adieu a Varsovie, so was named the +Rondo, op. 1; Hommage a Mozart, the Variations, op. 2; La Gaite, +Introduction and Polonaise, op. 3 for piano and 'cello; La +Posiana—what a name!—the Rondo a la Mazur, op. 5; Murmures de la +Seine, Nocturnes op. 9; Les Zephirs, Nocturnes, op. 15; Invitation a la +Valse, Valse, op. 18; Souvenir d'Andalousie, Bolero, op. 19—a bolero +which sounds Polish!—Le Banquet Infernal, the First Scherzo, op. +20—what a misnomer!—Ballade ohne Worte, the G minor Ballade—there is +a polyglot mess for you!—Les Plaintives, Nocturnes, op. 27; La +Meditation, Second Scherzo, B flat minor-meditation it is not!—II +Lamento e la Consolazione, Nocturnes, op. 32; Les Soupirs, Nocturnes, +op. 37, and Les Favorites, Polonaises, op. 40. The C minor Polonaise of +this opus was never, is not now, a favorite. The mazurkas generally +received the title of Souvenir de la Pologne. +</P> + +<P> +In commemoration of the fiftieth anniversary of the death of Chopin, +October 17, 1899, a medal was struck at Warsaw, bearing on one side an +artistically executed profile of the Polish composer. On the reverse, +the design represents a lyre, surrounded by a laurel branch, and having +engraved upon it the opening bars of the Mazurka in A flat major. The +name of the great composer with the dates of his birth and death, are +given in the margin. Paderewski is heading a movement to remove from +Paris to Warsaw the ashes of the pianist, but it is doubtful if it can +be managed. Paris will certainly object to losing the bones of such a +genius. +</P> + +<P> +Chopin's acoustic parallelisms are not so concrete, so vivid as +Wagner's. Nor are they so theatrical, so obvious. It does not, however, +require much fancy to conjure up "the drums and tramplings of three +conquests" in the Eroica Polonaise or the F sharp major Impromptu. The +rhythms of the Cradle Song and the Barcarolle are suggestive enough and +if you please there are dew-drops in his cadenzas and there is the +whistling of the wind in the last A minor Study. Of the A flat Study +Chopin said: "Imagine a little shepherd who takes refuge in a peaceful +grotto from an approaching storm. In the distance rushes the wind and +the rain, while the shepherd gently plays a melody on his flute." This +is quoted by Kleczynski. There are word-whisperings in the next study +in F minor, whilst the symbolism of the dance—the Valse, Mazurka, +Polonaise, Menuetto, Bolero, Schottische, Krakowiak and Tarantella—is +admirably indicated in all of them. The bells of the Funeral March, the +will o' wisp character of the last movement of the B flat minor Sonata, +the dainty Butterfly Study in G flat, opus 25, the aeolian murmurs of +the E flat Study, in opus 10, the tiny prancing silvery hoofs in the F +major Study, opus 25, the flickering flame-like C major Study No. 7, +opus 10, the spinning in the D flat Valse and the cyclonic rush of +chromatic double notes in the E flat minor Scherzo—these are not +studied imitations but spontaneous transpositions to the ideal plane of +primary, natural phenomena. +</P> + +<P> +Chopin's system—if it be a system—of cadenzas, fioriture +embellishment and ornamentation is perhaps traceable to the East. In +his "Folk Music Studies," Mr. H. E. Krehbiel quotes the description of +"a rhapsodical embellishment, called 'alap,' which after going through +a variety of ad libitum passages, rejoins the melody with as much grace +as if it had never been disunited, the musical accompaniment all the +while keeping time. These passages are not reckoned essential to the +melody, but are considered only as grace notes introduced according to +the fancy of the singer, when the only limitations by which the +performer is bound are the notes peculiar to that particular melody and +a strict regard to time." +</P> + +<P> +Chopin founded no school, although the possibilities of the piano were +canalized by him. In playing, as in composition, only the broad trend +of his discoveries may be followed, for his was a manner not a method. +He has had for followers Liszt, Rubinstein, Mikuli, Zarembski, +Nowakowski, Xaver Scharwenka, Saint-Saens, Scholtz, Heller, Nicode, +Moriz Moszkowski, Paderewski, Stojowski, Arenski, Leschetizki, the two +Wieniawskis, and a whole group of the younger Russians Liadoff, +Scriabine and the rest. Even Brahms—in his F sharp major Sonata and E +flat minor Scherzo—shows Chopin's influence. Indeed but for Chopin +much modern music would not exist. +</P> + +<P> +But a genuine school exists not. Henselt was only a German who fell +asleep and dreamed of Chopin. To a Thalberg-ian euphony he has added a +technical figuration not unlike Chopin's, and a spirit quite Teutonic +in its sentimentality. Rubinstein calls Chopin the exhalation of the +third epoch in art. He certainly closed one. With a less strong +rhythmic impulse and formal sense Chopin's music would have degenerated +into mere overperfumed impressionism. The French piano school of his +day, indeed of today, is entirely drowned by its devotion to cold +decoration, to unemotional ornamentation. Mannerisms he had—what great +artist has not?—but the Greek in him, as in Heine, kept him from +formlessness. He is seldom a landscapist, but he can handle his brush +deftly before nature if he must. He paints atmosphere, the open air at +eventide, with consummate skill, and for playing fantastic tricks on +your nerves in the depiction of the superhuman he has a peculiar +faculty. Remember that in Chopin's early days the Byronic pose, the +grandiose and the horrible prevailed—witness the pictures of Ingres +and Delacroix—and Richter wrote with his heart-strings saturated in +moonshine and tears. Chopin did not altogether escape the artistic +vices of his generation. As a man he was a bit of poseur—the little +whisker grown on one side of his face, the side which he turned to his +audience, is a note of foppery—but was ever a detester of the +sham-artistic. He was sincere, and his survival, when nearly all of +Mendelssohn, much of Schumann and half of Berlioz have suffered an +eclipse, is proof positive of his vitality. The fruit of his +experimentings in tonality we see in the whole latter-day school of +piano, dramatic and orchestral composers. That Chopin may lead to the +development and adoption of the new enharmonic scales, the "Homotonic +scales," I do not know. For these M. A. de Bertha claimed the future of +music. He wrote: +</P> + +<P> +"Now vaporously illumined by the crepuscular light of a magical sky on +the boundaries of the major and minor modes, now seeming to spring from +the bowels of the earth with sepulchral inflexions, melody moves with +ease on the serried degrees of the enharmonic scales. Lively or slow +she always assumed in them the accents of a fatalist impossibility, for +the laws of arithmetic have preceded her, and there still remains, as +it were, an atmosphere of proud rigidity. Melancholy or passionate she +preserves the reflected lines of a primitive rusticity, which clings to +the homotones in despite of their artificial origin." But all this will +be in the days to come when the flat keyboard will be superseded by a +Janko many-banked clavier contrivance, when Mr. Krehbiel's oriental +srootis are in use and Mr. Apthorp's nullitonic order, no key at all, +is invented. Then too a new Chopin may be born, but I doubt it. +</P> + +<P> +Despite his idiomatic treatment of the piano it must be remembered that +Chopin under Sontag's and Paganini's influence imitated both voice and +violin on the keyboard. His lyricism is most human, while the +portamento, the slides, trills and indescribably subtle turns—are they +not of the violin? Wagner said to Mr. Dannreuther—see Finck's "Wagner +and his Works"—that "Mozart's music and Mozart's orchestra are a +perfect match; an equally perfect balance exists between Palestrina's +choir and Palestrina's counterpoint, and I find a similar +correspondence between Chopin's piano and some of his Etudes and +Preludes—I do not care for the Ladies' Chopin; there is too much of +the Parisian salon in that, but he has given us many things which are +above the salon." Which latter statement is slightly condescending. +Recollect, however, Chopin's calm depreciation of Schumann. Mr. John F. +Runciman, the English critic, asserts that "Chopin thought in terms of +the piano, and only the piano. So when we see Chopin's orchestral music +or Wagner's music for the piano we realize that neither is talking his +native tongue—the tongue which nature fitted him to speak." Speaking +of "Chopin and the Sick Men" Mr. Runciman is most pertinent: +</P> + +<P> +"These inheritors of rickets and exhausted physical frames made some of +the most wonderful music of the century for us. Schubert was the most +wonderful of them all, but Chopin runs him very close. ... He wrote +less, far less than Schubert wrote; but, for the quantity he did write, +its finish is miraculous. It may be feverish, merely mournful, cadavre, +or tranquil, and entirely beautiful; but there is not a phrase that is +not polished as far as a phrase will bear polishing. It is marvellous +music; but, all the same, it is sick, unhealthy music." +</P> + +<P> +"Liszt's estimate of the technical importance of Chopin's works," +writes Mr. W.J. Henderson, "is not too large. It was Chopin who +systematized the art of pedalling and showed us how to use both pedals +in combination to produce those wonderful effects of color which are so +necessary in the performance of his music. ... The harmonic schemes of +the simplest of Chopin's works are marvels of originality and musical +loveliness, and I make bold to say that his treatment of the passing +note did much toward showing later writers how to produce the restless +and endless complexity of the harmony in contemporaneous orchestral +music." +</P> + +<P> +Heinrich Pudor in his strictures on German music is hardly +complimentary to Chopin: "Wagner is a thorough-going decadent, an +off-shoot, an epigonus, not a progonus. His cheeks are hollow and +pale—but the Germans have the full red cheeks. Equally decadent is +Liszt. Liszt is a Hungarian and the Hungarians are confessedly a +completely disorganized, self-outlived, dying people. No less decadent +is Chopin, whose figure comes before one as flesh without bones, this +morbid, womanly, womanish, slip-slop, powerless, sickly, bleached, +sweet-caramel Pole!" This has a ring of Nietzsche—Nietzsche who +boasted of his Polish origin. +</P> + +<P> +Now listen to the fatidical Pole Przybyszewski: "In the beginning there +was sex, out of sex there was nothing and in it everything was. And sex +made itself brain whence was the birth of the soul." And then, as Mr. +Vance Thompson, who first Englished this "Mass of the Dead"—wrote: "He +pictures largely in great cosmic symbols, decorated with passionate and +mystic fervors, the singular combat between the growing soul and the +sex from which it fain would be free." Arno Holz thus parodies +Przybyszewski: "In our soul there is surging and singing a song of the +victorious bacteria. Our blood lacks the white corpuscles. On the +sounding board of our consciousness there echoes along the frightful +symphony of the flesh. It becomes objective in Chopin; he alone, the +modern primeval man, puts our brains on the green meadows, he alone +thinks in hyper-European dimensions. He alone rebuilds the shattered +Jerusalem of our souls." All of which shows to what comically +delirious lengths this sort of deleterious soul-probing may go. +</P> + +<P> +It would be well to consider this word "decadent" and its morbid +implications. There is a fashion just now in criticism to +over-accentuate the physical and moral weaknesses of the artist. +Lombroso started the fashion, Nordau carried it to its logical +absurdity, yet it is nothing new. In Hazlitt's day he complains, that +genius is called mad by foolish folk. Mr. Newman writes in his Wagner, +that "art in general, and music in particular, ought not to be +condemned merely in terms of the physical degeneration or abnormality +of the artist. Some of the finest work in art and literature, indeed, +has been produced by men who could not, from any standpoint, be +pronounced normal. In the case of Flaubert, of De Maupassant, of +Dostoievsky, of Poe, and a score of others, though the organic system +was more or less flawed, the work remains touched with that universal +quality that gives artistic permanence even to perceptions born of the +abnormal." Mr. Newman might have added other names to his list, those +of Michael Angelo and Beethoven and Swinburne. Really, is any great +genius quite sane according to philistine standards? The answer must be +negative. The old enemy has merely changed his mode of attack: instead +of charging genius with madness, the abnormal used in an abnormal sense +is lugged in and though these imputations of degeneracy, moral and +physical, have in some cases proven true, the genius of the accused one +can in no wise be denied. But then as Mr. Philip Hale asks: Why this +timidity at being called decadent? What's in the name? +</P> + +<P> +Havelock Ellis in his masterly study of Joris Karl Huysmans, considers +the much misunderstood phenomenon in art called decadence. "Technically +a decadent style is only such in relation to a classic style. It is +simply a further development of a classic style, a further +specialization, the homogeneous in Spencerian phraseology having become +heterogeneous. The first is beautiful because the parts are +subordinated to the whole; the second is beautiful because the whole is +subordinated to the parts." Then he proceeds to show in literature that +Sir Thomas Browne, Emerson, Pater, Carlyle, Poe, Hawthorne and Whitman +are decadents—not in any invidious sense—but simply in "the breaking +up of the whole for the benefit of its parts." Nietzsche is quoted to +the effect that "in the period of corruption in the evolution of +societies we are apt to overlook the fact that the energy which in more +primitive times marked the operations of a community as a whole has now +simply been transferred to the individuals themselves, and this +aggrandizement of the individual really produces an even greater amount +of energy." And further, Ellis: "All art is the rising and falling of +the slopes of a rhythmic curve between these two classic and decadent +extremes. Decadence suggests to us going down, falling, decay. If we +walk down a real hill we do not feel that we commit a more wicked act +than when we walked up it....Roman architecture is classic to become in +its Byzantine developments completely decadent, and St. Mark's is the +perfected type of decadence in art. ... We have to recognize that +decadence is an aesthetic and not a moral conception. The power of +words is great but they need not befool us. ... We are not called upon +to air our moral indignation over the bass end of the musical clef." I +recommend the entire chapter to such men as Lombroso Levi, Max Nordau +and Heinrich Pudor, who have yet to learn that "all confusion of +intellectual substances is foolish." +</P> + +<P> +Oscar Bie states the Chopin case most excellently:— +</P> + +<P CLASS="block"> + Chopin is a poet. It has become a very bad habit to place this + poet in the hands of our youth. The concertos and polonaises + being put aside, no one lends himself worse to youthful + instruction than Chopin. Because his delicate touches + inevitably seem perverse to the youthful mind, he has gained + the name of a morbid genius. The grown man who understands how + to play Chopin, whose music begins where that of another + leaves off, whose tones show the supremest mastery in the + tongue of music—such a man will discover nothing morbid in + him. Chopin, a Pole, strikes sorrowful chords, which do not + occur frequently to healthy normal persons. But why is a Pole + to receive less justice than a German? We know that the + extreme of culture is closely allied to decay; for perfect + ripeness is but the foreboding of corruption. Children, of + course, do not know this. And Chopin himself would have been + much too noble ever to lay bare his mental sickness to the + world. And his greatness lies precisely in this: that he + preserves the mean between immaturity and decay. His greatness + is his aristocracy. He stands among musicians in his faultless + vesture, a noble from head to foot. The sublimest emotions + toward whose refinement whole generations had tended, the last + things in our soul, whose foreboding is interwoven with the + mystery of Judgment Day, have in his music found their form. +</P> + +<P> +Further on I shall attempt—I write the word with a patibulary +gesture—in a sort of a Chopin variorum, to analyze the salient +aspects, technical and aesthetic, of his music. To translate into +prose, into any language no matter how poetical, the images aroused by +his music, is impossible. I am forced to employ the technical +terminology of other arts, but against my judgment. Read Mr. W. F. +Apthorp's disheartening dictum in "By the Way." "The entrancing +phantasmagoria of picture and incident which we think we see rising +from the billowing sea of music is in reality nothing more than an +enchanting fata morgana, visible at no other angle than that of our own +eye. The true gist of music it never can be; it can never truly +translate what is most essential and characteristic in its expression. +It is but something that we have half unconsciously imputed to music; +nothing that really exists in music." +</P> + +<P> +The shadowy miming of Chopin's soul has nevertheless a significance for +this generation. It is now the reign of the brutal, the realistic, the +impossible in music. Formal excellence is neglected and programme-music +has reduced art to the level of an anecdote. Chopin neither preaches +nor paints, yet his art is decorative and dramatic—though in the +climate of the ideal. He touches earth and its emotional issues in +Poland only; otherwise his music is a pure aesthetic delight, an +artistic enchantment, freighted with no ethical or theatric messages. +It is poetry made audible, the "soul written in sound." All that I can +faintly indicate is the way it affects me, this music with the petals +of a glowing rose and the heart of gray ashes. Its analogies to Poe, +Verlaine, Shelley, Keats, Heine and Mickiewicz are but critical +sign-posts, for Chopin is incomparable, Chopin is unique. "Our +interval," writes Walter Pater, "is brief." Few pass it recollectedly +and with full understanding of its larger rhythms and more urgent +colors. Many endure it in frivol and violence, the majority in bored, +sullen submission. Chopin, the New Chopin, is a foe to ennui and the +spirit that denies; in his exquisite soul-sorrow, sweet world-pain, we +may find rich impersonal relief. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap05"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +V. POET AND PSYCHOLOGIST +</H3> + +<P> +Music is an order of mystic, sensuous mathematics. A sounding mirror, +an aural mode of motion, it addresses itself on the formal side to the +intellect, in its content of expression it appeals to the emotions. +Ribot, admirable psychologist, does not hesitate to proclaim music as +the most emotional of the arts. "It acts like a burn, like heat, cold +or a caressing contact, and is the most dependent on physiological +conditions." +</P> + +<P> +Music then, the most vague of the arts in the matter of representing +the concrete, is the swiftest, surest agent for attacking the +sensibilities. The CRY made manifest, as Wagner asserts, it is a cry +that takes on fanciful shapes, each soul interpreting it in an +individual fashion. Music and beauty are synonymous, just as their form +and substance are indivisible. +</P> + +<P> +Havelock Ellis is not the only aesthetician who sees the marriage of +music and sex. "No other art tells us such old forgotten secrets about +ourselves...It is in the mightiest of all instincts, the primitive sex +traditions of the race before man was, that music is rooted...Beauty is +the child of love." Dante Gabriel Rossetti has imprisoned in a sonnet +the almost intangible feeling aroused by music, the feeling of having +pursued in the immemorial past the "route of evanescence." +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> + Is it this sky's vast vault or ocean's sound,<BR> + That is Life's self and draws my life from me,<BR> + And by instinct ineffable decree<BR> + Holds my breath<BR> + Quailing on the bitter bound?<BR> + Nay, is it Life or Death, thus thunder-crown'd,<BR> + That 'mid the tide of all emergency<BR> + Now notes my separate wave, and to what sea<BR> + Its difficult eddies labor in the ground?<BR> + Oh! what is this that knows the road I came,<BR> + The flame turned cloud, the cloud returned to flame,<BR> + The lifted, shifted steeps and all the way?<BR> + That draws around me at last this wind-warm space,<BR> + And in regenerate rapture turns my face<BR> + Upon the devious coverts of dismay?<BR> +</P> + +<P> +During the last half of the nineteenth century two men became rulers of +musical emotion, Richard Wagner and Frederic Francois Chopin. The music +of the latter is the most ravishing gesture that art has yet made. +Wagner and Chopin, the macrocosm and the microcosm! "Wagner has made +the largest impersonal synthesis attainable of the personal influences +that thrill our lives," cries Havelock Ellis. Chopin, a young man +slight of frame, furiously playing out upon the keyboard his soul, the +soul of his nation, the soul of his time, is the most individual +composer that has ever set humming the looms of our dreams. Wagner and +Chopin have a motor element in their music that is fiercer, intenser +and more fugacious than that of all other composers. For them is not +the Buddhistic void, in which shapes slowly form and fade; their +psychical tempo is devouring. They voiced their age, they moulded their +age and we listen eagerly to them, to these vibrile prophetic voices, +so sweetly corrosive, bardic and appealing. Chopin being nearer the +soil in the selection of forms, his style and structure are more naive, +more original than Wagner's, while his medium, less artificial, is +easier filled than the vast empty frame of the theatre. Through their +intensity of conception and of life, both men touch issues, though +widely dissimilar in all else. Chopin had greater melodic and as great +harmonic genius as Wagner; he made more themes, he was, as Rubinstein +wrote, the last of the original composers, but his scope was not +scenic, he preferred the stage of his soul to the windy spaces of the +music-drama. His is the interior play, the eternal conflict between +body and soul. He viewed music through his temperament and it often +becomes so imponderable, so bodiless as to suggest a fourth dimension +in the art. Space is obliterated. With Chopin one does not get, as from +Beethoven, the sense of spiritual vastness, of the overarching sublime. +There is the pathos of spiritual distance, but it is pathos, not +sublimity. "His soul was a star and dwelt apart," though not in the +Miltonic or Wordsworthian sense. A Shelley-like tenuity at times wings +his thought, and he is the creator of a new thrill within the thrill. +The charm of the dying fall, the unspeakable cadence of regret for the +love that is dead, is in his music; like John Keats he sometimes sees:— +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> + Charm'd magic casements, opening on the foam<BR> + Of perilous seas, in faery lands forlorn.<BR> +</P> + +<P> +Chopin, "subtle-souled psychologist," is more kin to Keats than +Shelley, he is a greater artist than a thinker. His philosophy is of +the beautiful, as was Keats', and while he lingers by the river's edge +to catch the song of the reeds, his gaze is oftener fixed on the +quiring planets. He is nature's most exquisite sounding-board and +vibrates to her with intensity, color and vivacity that have no +parallel. Stained with melancholy, his joy is never that of the strong +man rejoicing in his muscles. Yet his very tenderness is tonic and his +cry is ever restrained by an Attic sense of proportion. Like Alfred De +Vigny, he dwelt in a "tour d'ivoire" that faced the west and for him +the sunrise was not, but O! the miraculous moons he discovered, the +sunsets and cloud-shine! His notes cast great rich shadows, these +chains of blown-roses drenched in the dew of beauty. Pompeian colors +are too restricted and flat; he divulges a world of half-tones, some +"enfolding sunny spots of greenery," or singing in silvery shade the +song of chromatic ecstasy, others "huge fragments vaulted like +rebounding hail" and black upon black. Chopin is the color genius of +the piano, his eye was attuned to hues the most fragile and attenuated; +he can weave harmonies that are as ghostly as a lunar rainbow. And +lunar-like in their libration are some of his melodies—glimpses, +mysterious and vast, as of a strange world. +</P> + +<P> +His utterances are always dynamic, and he emerges betimes, as if from +Goya's tomb, and etches with sardonic finger Nada in dust. But this +spirit of denial is not an abiding mood; Chopin throws a net of tone +over souls wearied with rancors and revolts, bridges "salty, estranged +seas" of misery and presently we are viewing a mirrored, a fabulous +universe wherein Death is dead, and Love reigns Lord of all. +</P> + +<BR> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +II +</H4> + +<P> +Heine said that "every epoch is a sphinx which plunges into the abyss +as soon as its problem is solved." Born in the very upheaval of the +Romantic revolution—a revolution evoked by the intensity of its +emotion, rather than by the power of its ideas—Chopin was not +altogether one of the insurgents of art. Just when his individual soul +germinated, who may tell? In his early music are discovered the roots +and fibres of Hummel and Field. His growth, involuntary, inevitable, +put forth strange sprouts, and he saw in the piano, an instrument of +two dimensions, a third, and so his music deepened and took on stranger +colors. The keyboard had never sung so before; he forged its formula. A +new apocalyptic seal of melody and harmony was let fall upon it. +Sounding scrolls, delicious arabesques gorgeous in tint, martial, +lyric, "a resonance of emerald," a sobbing of fountains—as that Chopin +of the Gutter, Paul Verlaine, has it—the tear crystallized midway, an +arrested pearl, were overheard in his music, and Europe felt a new +shudder of sheer delight. +</P> + +<P> +The literary quality is absent and so is the ethical—Chopin may +prophesy but he never flames into the divers tongues of the upper +heaven. Compared with his passionate abandonment to the dance, Brahms +is the Lao-tsze of music, the great infant born with gray hair and with +the slow smile of childhood. Chopin seldom smiles, and while some of +his music is young, he does not raise in the mind pictures of the +fatuous romance of youth. His passion is mature, self-sustained and +never at a loss for the mot propre. And with what marvellous vibration +he gamuts the passions, festooning them with carnations and great white +tube roses, but the dark dramatic motive is never lost in the +decorative wiles of this magician. As the man grew he laid aside his +pretty garlands and his line became sterner, its traceries more gothic; +he made Bach his chief god and within the woven walls of his strange +harmonies he sings the history of a soul, a soul convulsed by antique +madness, by the memory of awful things, a soul lured by Beauty to +secret glades wherein sacrificial rites are performed to the solemn +sounds of unearthly music. Like Maurice de Guerin, Chopin perpetually +strove to decipher Beauty's enigma and passionately demanded of the +sphinx that defies: +</P> + +<P> +"Upon the shores of what oceans have they rolled the stone that hides +them, O Macareus?" +</P> + +<P> +His name was as the stroke of a bell to the Romancists; he remained +aloof from them though in a sympathetic attitude. The classic is but +the Romantic dead, said an acute critic. Chopin was a classic without +knowing it; he compassed for the dances of his land what Bach did for +the older forms. With Heine he led the spirit of revolt, but enclosed +his note of agitation in a frame beautiful. The color, the "lithe +perpetual escape" from the formal deceived his critics, Schumann among +the rest. Chopin, like Flaubert, was the last of the idealists, the +first of the realists. The newness of his form, his linear +counterpoint, misled the critics, who accused him of the lack of it. +Schumann's formal deficiency detracts from much of his music, and +because of their formal genius Wagner and Chopin will live. +</P> + +<P> +To Chopin might be addressed Sar Merodack Peladan's words: +</P> + +<P> +"When your hand writes a perfect line the Cherubim descend to find +pleasure therein as in a mirror." Chopin wrote many perfect lines; he +is, above all, the faultless lyrist, the Swinburne, the master of +fiery, many rhythms, the chanter of songs before sunrise, of the burden +of the flesh, the sting of desire and large-moulded lays of passionate +freedom. His music is, to quote Thoreau, "a proud sweet satire on the +meanness of our life." He had no feeling for the epic, his genius was +too concentrated, and though he could be furiously dramatic the +sustained majesty of blank verse was denied him. With musical ideas he +was ever gravid but their intensity is parent to their brevity. And it +must not be forgotten that with Chopin the form was conditioned by the +idea. He took up the dancing patterns of Poland because they suited his +vivid inner life; he transformed them, idealized them, attaining to +more prolonged phraseology and denser architecture in his Ballades and +Scherzi—but these periods are passionate, never philosophical. +</P> + +<P> +All artists are androgynous; in Chopin the feminine often prevails, but +it must be noted that this quality is a distinguishing sign of +masculine lyric genius, for when he unbends, coquets and makes graceful +confessions or whimpers in lyric loveliness at fate, then his mother's +sex peeps out, a picture of the capricious, beautiful tyrannical Polish +woman. When he stiffens his soul, when Russia gets into his nostrils, +then the smoke and flame of his Polonaises, the tantalizing despair of +his Mazurkas are testimony to the strong man-soul in rebellion. But it +is often a psychical masquerade. The sag of melancholy is soon felt, +and the old Chopin, the subjective Chopin, wails afresh in melodic +moodiness. +</P> + +<P> +That he could attempt far flights one may see in his B flat minor +Sonata, in his Scherzi, in several of the Ballades, above all in the F +minor Fantasie. In this great work the technical invention keeps pace +with the inspiration. It coheres, there is not a flaw in the +reverberating marble, not a rift in the idea. If Chopin, diseased to +death's door, could erect such a Palace of Dreams, what might not he +have dared had he been healthy? But forth from his misery came +sweetness and strength, like honey from the lion. He grew amazingly the +last ten years of his existence, grew with a promise that recalls +Keats, Shelley, Mozart, Schubert and the rest of the early slaughtered +angelic crew. His flame-like spirit waxed and waned in the gusty +surprises of a disappointed life. To the earth for consolation he bent +his ear and caught echoes of the cosmic comedy, the far-off laughter of +the hills, the lament of the sea and the mutterings of its depths. +These things with tales of sombre clouds and shining skies and +whisperings of strange creatures dancing timidly in pavonine twilights, +he traced upon the ivory keys of his instrument and the world was +richer for a poet. Chopin is not only the poet of the piano, he is also +the poet of music, the most poetic of composers. Compared with him Bach +seems a maker of solid polyphonic prose, Beethoven a scooper of stars, +a master of growling storms, Mozart a weaver of gay tapestries, +Schumann a divine stammerer. Schubert, alone of all the composers, +resembles him in his lyric prodigality. Both were masters of melody, +but Chopin was the master-workman of the two and polished, after +bending and beating, his theme fresh from the fire of his forge. He +knew that to complete his "wailing Iliads" the strong hand of the +reviser was necessary, and he also realized that nothing is more +difficult for the genius than to retain his gift. Of all natures the +most prone to pessimism, procrastination and vanity, the artist is most +apt to become ennuied. It is not easy to flame always at the focus, to +burn fiercely with the central fire. Chopin knew this and cultivated +his ego. He saw too that the love of beauty for beauty's sake was +fascinating but led to the way called madness. So he rooted his art, +gave it the earth of Poland and its deliquescence is put off to the day +when a new system of musical aestheticism will have routed the old, +when the Ugly shall be king and Melody the handmaiden of science. But +until that most grievous and undesired time he will catch the music of +our souls and give it cry and flesh. +</P> + +<BR> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +III +</H4> + +<P> +Chopin is the open door in music. Besides having been a poet and giving +vibratory expression to the concrete, he was something else—he was a +pioneer. Pioneer because in youth he had bowed to the tyranny of the +diatonic scale and savored the illicit joys of the chromatic. It is +briefly curious that Chopin is regarded purely as a poet among +musicians and not as a practical musician. They will swear him a +phenomenal virtuoso, but your musician, orchestral and theoretical, +raises the eyebrow of the supercilious if Chopin is called creative. A +cunning finger-smith, a moulder of decorative patterns, a master at +making new figures, all this is granted, but speak of Chopin as +path-breaker in the harmonic forest—that true "forest of numbers"—as +the forger of a melodic metal, the sweetest, purest in temper, and lo! +you are regarded as one mentally askew. Chopin invented many new +harmonic devices, he untied the chord that was restrained within the +octave, leading it into the dangerous but delectable land of extended +harmonies. And how he chromaticized the prudish, rigid garden of German +harmony, how he moistened it with flashing changeful waters until it +grew bold and brilliant with promise! A French theorist, Albert +Lavignac, calls Chopin a product of the German Romantic school. This is +hitching the star to the wagon. Chopin influenced Schumann; it can be +proven a hundred times. And Schumann understood Chopin else he could +not have written the "Chopin" of the Carneval, which quite out-Chopins +Chopin. +</P> + +<P> +Chopin is the musical soul of Poland; he incarnates its political +passion. First a Slav, by adoption a Parisian, he is the open door +because he admitted into the West, Eastern musical ideas, Eastern +tonalities, rhythms, in fine the Slavic, all that is objectionable, +decadent and dangerous. He inducted Europe into the mysteries and +seductions of the Orient. His music lies wavering between the East and +the West. A neurotic man, his tissues trembling, his sensibilities +aflame, the offspring of a nation doomed to pain and partition, it was +quite natural for him to go to France—Poland had ever been her +historical client—the France that overheated all Europe. Chopin, born +after two revolutions, the true child of insurrection, chose Paris for +his second home. Revolt sat easily upon his inherited aristocratic +instincts—no proletarian is quite so thorough a revolutionist as the +born aristocrat, witness Nietzsche—and Chopin, in the bloodless battle +of the Romantics, in the silent warring of Slav against Teuton, Gaul +and Anglo-Saxon, will ever stand as the protagonist of the artistic +drama. +</P> + +<P> +All that followed, the breaking up of the old hard-and-fast boundaries +on the musical map is due to Chopin. A pioneer, he has been rewarded as +such by a polite ignorement or bland condescension. He smashed the +portals of the convention that forbade a man baring his soul to the +multitude. The psychology of music is the gainer thereby. Chopin, like +Velasquez, could paint single figures perfectly, but to great massed +effects he was a stranger. Wagner did not fail to profit by his +marvellously drawn soul-portraits. Chopin taught his century the pathos +of patriotism, and showed Grieg the value of national ore. He +practically re-created the harmonic charts, he gave voice to the +individual, himself a product of a nation dissolved by overwrought +individualism. As Schumann assures us, his is "the proudest and most +poetic spirit of his time." Chopin, subdued by his familiar demon, was +a true specimen of Nietzsche's Ubermensch,—which is but Emerson's +Oversoul shorn of her wings. Chopin's transcendental scheme of technics +is the image of a supernormal lift in composition. He sometimes robs +music of its corporeal vesture and his transcendentalism lies not alone +in his striving after strange tonalities and rhythms, but in seeking +the emotionally recondite. Self-tormented, ever "a dweller on the +threshold" he saw visions that outshone the glories of Hasheesh and his +nerve-swept soul ground in its mills exceeding fine music. His vision +is of beauty; he persistently groped at the hem of her robe, but never +sought to transpose or to tone the commonplace of life. For this he +reproved Schubert. Such intensity cannot be purchased but at the cost +of breadth, of sanity, and his picture of life is not so high, wide, +sublime, or awful as Beethoven's. Yet is it just as inevitable, sincere +and as tragically poignant. +</P> + +<P> +Stanislaw Przybyszewski in his "Zur Psychologie des Individuums" +approaches the morbid Chopin—the Chopin who threw open to the world +the East, who waved his chromatic wand to Liszt, Tschaikowsky, +Saint-Saens, Goldmark, Rubinstein, Richard Strauss, Dvorak and all +Russia with its consonantal composers. This Polish psychologist—a +fulgurant expounder of Nietzsche—finds in Chopin faith and mania, the +true stigma of the mad individualist, the individual "who in the first +instance is naught but an oxidation apparatus." Nietzsche and Chopin +are the most outspoken individualities of the age—he forgets +Wagner—Chopin himself the finest flowering of a morbid and rare +culture. His music is a series of psychoses—he has the sehnsucht of a +marvellously constituted nature—and the shrill dissonance of his +nerves, as seen in the physiological outbursts of the B minor Scherzo, +is the agony of a tortured soul. The piece is Chopin's Iliad; in it are +the ghosts that lurk near the hidden alleys of the soul, but here come +out to leer and exult. +</P> + +<P> +Horla! the Horla of Guy de Maupassant, the sinister Doppelganger of +mankind, which races with him to the goal of eternity, perhaps to +outstrip and master him in the next evolutionary cycle, master as does +man, the brute creation. This Horla, according to Przybyszewski, +conquered Chopin and became vocal in his music—this Horla has mastered +Nietzsche, who, quite mad, gave the world that Bible of the Ubermensch, +that dancing lyric prose-poem, "Also Sprach Zarathustra." +</P> + +<P> +Nietzsche's disciple is half right. Chopin's moods are often morbid, +his music often pathological; Beethoven too is morbid, but in his +kingdom, so vast, so varied, the mood is lost or lightly felt, while in +Chopin's province, it looms a maleficent upas-tree, with flowers of +evil and its leaves glistering with sensuousness. But so keen for +symmetry, for all the term formal beauty implies, is Chopin, that +seldom does his morbidity madden, his voluptuousness poison. His music +has its morass, but also its upland where the gale blows strong and +true. Perhaps all art is, as the incorrigible Nordau declares, a slight +deviation from the normal, though Ribot scoffs at the existence of any +standard of normality. The butcher and the candle-stick-maker have +their Horla, their secret soul convulsions, which they set down to +taxation, the vapors, or weather. +</P> + +<P> +Chopin has surprised the musical malady of the century. He is its chief +spokesman. After the vague, mad, noble dreams of Byron, Shelley and +Napoleon, the awakening found those disillusioned souls, Wagner, +Nietzsche and Chopin. Wagner sought in the epical rehabilitation of a +vanished Valhalla a surcease from the world-pain. He consciously +selected his anodyne and in "Die Meistersinger" touched a consoling +earth. Chopin and Nietzsche, temperamentally finer and more sensitive +than Wagner—the one musically, the other intellectually—sang +themselves in music and philosophy, because they were so constituted. +Their nerves rode them to their death. Neither found the serenity and +repose of Wagner, for neither was as sane and both suffered mortally +from hyperaesthesia, the penalty of all sick genius. +</P> + +<P> +Chopin's music is the aesthetic symbol of a personality nurtured on +patriotism, pride and love; that it is better expressed by the piano is +because of that instrument's idiosyncrasies of evanescent tone, +sensitive touch and wide range in dynamics. It was Chopin's lyre, the +"orchestra of his heart," from it he extorted music the most intimate +since Sappho. Among lyric moderns Heine closely resembles the Pole. +Both sang because they suffered, sang ineffable and ironic melodies; +both will endure because of their brave sincerity, their surpassing +art. The musical, the psychical history of the nineteenth century would +be incomplete without the name of Frederic Francois Chopin. Wagner +externalized its dramatic soul; in Chopin the mad lyricism of the +Time-spirit is made eloquent. Into his music modulated the poesy of his +age; he is one of its heroes, a hero of whom Swinburne might have sung: +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> + O strong-winged soul with prophetic<BR> + Lips hot with the blood-beats of song;<BR> + With tremor of heart-strings magnetic,<BR> + With thoughts as thunder in throng;<BR> + With consonant ardor of chords<BR> + That pierce men's souls as with swords<BR> + And hale them hearing along.<BR> +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap06"></A> +<H2 ALIGN="center"> +PART II:—HIS MUSIC +</H2> + +<BR><BR> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +VI. THE STUDIES:—TITANIC EXPERIMENTS +</H3> + +<P> +October 20, 1829, Frederic Chopin, aged twenty, wrote to his friend +Titus Woyciechowski, from Warsaw: "I have composed a study in my own +manner;" and November 14, the same year: "I have written some studies; +in your presence I would play them well." +</P> + +<P> +Thus, quite simply and without booming of cannon or brazen proclamation +by bell, did the great Polish composer announce an event of supreme +interest and importance to the piano-playing world. Niecks thinks these +studies were published in the summer of 1833, July or August, and were +numbered op. 10. Another set of studies, op. 25, did not find a +publisher until 1837, although some of them were composed at the same +time as the previous work; a Polish musician who visited the French +capital in 1834 heard Chopin play the studies contained in op. 25. The +C minor study, op. 10, No. 12, commonly known as the Revolutionary, was +born at Stuttgart, September, 1831, "while under the excitement caused +by the news of the taking of Warsaw by the Russians, on September 8, +1831." These dates are given so as to rout effectually any dilatory +suspicion that Liszt influenced Chopin in the production of his +masterpieces. Lina Ramann, in her exhaustive biography of Franz Liszt, +openly declares that Nos. 9 and 12 of op. 10 and Nos. 11 and 12 of op. +25 reveal the influence of the Hungarian virtuoso. Figures prove the +fallacy of her assertion. The influence was the other way, as Liszt's +three concert studies show—not to mention other compositions. When +Chopin arrived in Paris his style had been formed, he was the creator +of a new piano technique. +</P> + +<P> +The three studies known as Trois Nouvelles Etudes, which appeared in +1840 in Moscheles and Fetis Method of Methods were published separately +afterward. Their date of composition we do not know. +</P> + +<P> +Many are the editions of Chopin's studies, but after going over the +ground, one finds only about a dozen worthy of study and consultation. +Karasowski gives the date of the first complete edition of the Chopin +works as 1846, with Gebethner & Wolff, Warsaw, as publishers. Then, +according to Niecks, followed Tellefsen, Klindworth—Bote & +Bock—Scholtz—Peters—Breitkopf & Hartel, Mikuli, Schuberth, Kahnt, +Steingraber—better known as Mertke's—and Schlesinger, edited by the +great pedagogue Theodor Kullak. Xaver Scharwenka has edited Klindworth +for the London edition of Augener & Co. Mikuli criticised the Tellefsen +edition, yet both men had been Chopin pupils. This is a significant +fact and shows that little reliance can be placed on the brave talk +about tradition. Yet Mikuli had the assistance of a half dozen of +Chopin's "favorite" pupils, and, in addition, Ferdinand Hiller. Herman +Scholtz, who edited the works for Peters, based his results on careful +inspection of original French, German and English editions, besides +consulting M. Georges Mathias, a pupil of Chopin. If Fontana, Wolff, +Gutmann, Mikuli and Tellefsen, who copied from the original Chopin +manuscripts under the supervision of the composer, cannot agree, then +upon what foundation are reared the structures of the modern critical +editions? The early French, German and Polish editions are faulty, +indeed useless, because of misprints and errata of all kinds. Every +succeeding edition has cleared away some of these errors, but only in +Karl Klindworth has Chopin found a worthy, though not faultless, +editor. His edition is a work of genius and was called by Von Bulow +"the only model edition." In a few sections others, such as Kullak, Dr. +Hugo Riemann and Hans von Bulow, may have outstripped him, but as a +whole his editing is amazing for its exactitude, scholarship, fertility +in novel fingerings and sympathetic insight in phrasing. This edition +appeared at Moscow from 1873 to 1876. +</P> + +<P> +The twenty-seven studies of Chopin have been separately edited by +Riemann and Von Bulow. +</P> + +<P> +Let us narrow our investigations and critical comparisons to +Klindworth, Von Bulow, Kullak and Riemann. Carl Reinecke's edition of +the studies in Breitkopf & Hartel's collection offers nothing new, +neither do Mertke, Scholtz and Mikuli. The latter one should keep at +hand because of the possible freedom from impurities in his text, but +of phrasing or fingering he contributes little. It must be remembered +that with the studies, while they completely exhibit the entire range +of Chopin's genius, the play's the thing after all. The poetry, the +passion of the Ballades and Scherzi wind throughout these technical +problems like a flaming skein. With the modern avidity for exterior as +well as interior analysis, Mikuli, Reinecke, Mertke and Scholtz +evidence little sympathy. It is then from the masterly editing of +Kullak, Von Bulow, Riemann and Klindworth that I shall draw copiously. +They have, in their various ways, given us a clue to their musical +individuality, as well as their precise scholarship. Klindworth is the +most genially intellectual, Von Bulow the most pedagogic, and Kullak is +poetic, while Riemann is scholarly; the latter gives more attention to +phrasing than to fingering. The Chopin studies are poems fit for +Parnassus, yet they also serve a very useful purpose in pedagogy. Both +aspects, the material and the spiritual, should be studied, and with +four such guides the student need not go astray. +</P> + +<P> +In the first study of the first book, op. 10, dedicated to Liszt, +Chopin at a leap reached new land. Extended chords had been sparingly +used by Hummel and Clementi, but to take a dispersed harmony and +transform it into an epical study, to raise the chord of the tenth to +heroic stature—that could have been accomplished by Chopin only. And +this first study in C is heroic. Theodore Kullak writes of it: "Above a +ground bass proudly and boldly striding along, flow mighty waves of +sound. The etude—whose technical end is the rapid execution of widely +extended chord figurations exceeding the span of an octave—is to be +played on the basis of forte throughout. With sharply dissonant +harmonies the forte is to be increased to fortissimo, diminishing again +with consonant ones. Pithy accents! Their effect is enhanced when +combined with an elastic recoil of the hand." +</P> + +<P> +The irregular, black, ascending and descending staircases of notes +strike the neophyte with terror. Like Piranesi's marvellous aerial +architectural dreams, these dizzy acclivities and descents of Chopin +exercise a charm, hypnotic, if you will, for eye as well as ear. Here +is the new technique in all its nakedness, new in the sense of figure, +design, pattern, web, new in a harmonic way. The old order was +horrified at the modulatory harshness, the young sprigs of the new, +fascinated and a little frightened. A man who could explode a mine that +assailed the stars must be reckoned with. The nub of modern piano music +is in the study, the most formally reckless Chopin ever penned. Kullak +gives Chopin's favorite metronome sign, 176 to the quarter, but this +editor rightly believes that "the majestic grandeur is impaired," and +suggests 152 instead. The gain is at once apparent. Indeed Kullak, a +man of moderate pulse, is quite right in his strictures on the Chopin +tempi, tempi that sprang from the expressively light mechanism of the +prevailing pianos of Chopin's day. Von Bulow declares that "the +requisite suppleness of the hand in gradual extension and rapid +contraction will be most quickly attained if the player does not +disdain first of all to impress on the individual fingers the chord +which is the foundation of each arpeggio;" a sound pedagogic point. He +also inveighs against the disposition to play the octave basses +arpeggio. In fact, those basses are the argument of the play; they must +be granitic, ponderable and powerful. The same authority calls +attention to a misprint C, which he makes B flat, the last note treble +in the twenty-ninth bar. Von Bulow gives the Chopin metronomic marking. +</P> + +<P> +It remained for Riemann to make some radical changes. This learned and +worthy doctor astonished the musical world a few years by his new marks +of phrasing in the Beethoven symphonies. They topsy-turvied the old +bowing. With Chopin, new dynamic and agogic accents are rather +dangerous, at least to the peace of mind of worshippers of the Chopin +fetish. Riemann breaks two bars into one. It is a finished period for +him, and by detaching several of the sixteenths in the first group, the +first and fourth, he makes the accent clearer,—at least to the eye. He +indicates alla breve with 88 to the half. In later studies examples +will be given of this phrasing, a phrasing that becomes a mannerism +with the editor. He offers no startling finger changes. The value of +his criticism throughout the volume seems to be in the phrasing, and +this by no means conforms to accepted notions of how Chopin should be +interpreted. I intend quoting more freely from Riemann than from the +others, but not for the reason that I consider him as a cloud by day +and a pillar of fire by night in the desirable land of the Chopin +fitudes, rather because his piercing analysis lays bare the very roots +of these shining examples of piano literature. Klindworth contents +himself with a straightforward version of the C major study, his +fingering being the clearest and most admirable. The Mikuli edition +makes one addition: it is a line which binds the last note of the first +group to the first of the second. The device is useful, and occurs only +on the upward flights of the arpeggio. +</P> + +<P> +This study suggests that its composer wished to begin the exposition of +his wonderful technical system with a skeletonized statement. It is the +tree stripped of its bark, the flower of its leaves, yet, austere as is +the result, there is compensating power, dignity and unswerving logic. +This study is the key with which Chopin unlocked—not his heart, but +the kingdom of technique. It should be played, for variety, unisono, +with both hands, omitting, of course, the octave bass. +</P> + +<P> +Von Bulow writes cannily enough, that the second study in A minor being +chromatically related to Moscheles' etude, op. 70, No. 3, that piece +should prepare the way for Chopin's more musical composition. In +different degrees of tempo, strength and rhythmic accent it should be +practised, omitting the thumb and first finger. Mikuli's metronome is +144 to the quarter, Von Bulow's, 114; Klindworth's, the same as Mikuli, +and Riemann is 72 to the half, with an alla breve. The fingering in +three of these authorities is almost identical. Riemann has ideas of +his own, both in the phrasing and figuration. Look at these first two +bars: +M/P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +[Musical score excerpt without caption: ] +</P> + +<P> +Von Bulow orders "the middle harmonies to be played throughout +distinctly, and yet transiently"—in German, "fluchtig." In fact, the +entire composition, with its murmuring, meandering, chromatic +character, is a forerunner to the whispering, weaving, moonlit effects +in some of his later studies. The technical purpose is clear, but not +obtrusive. It is intended for the fourth and fifth finger of the right +hand, but given in unison with both hands it becomes a veritable but +laudable torture for the thumb of the left. With the repeat of the +first at bar 36 Von Bulow gives a variation in fingering. Kullak's +method of fingering is this: "Everywhere that two white keys occur in +succession the fifth finger is to be used for C and F in the right +hand, and for F and E in the left." He has also something to say about +holding "the hand sideways, so that the back of the hand and arm form +an angle." This question of hand position, particularly in Chopin, is +largely a matter of individual formation. No two hands are alike, no +two pianists use the same muscular movements. Play along the easiest +line of resistance. +</P> + +<P> +We now have reached a study, the third, in which the more intimately +known Chopin reveals himself. This one in E is among the finest +flowering of the composer's choice garden. It is simpler, less morbid, +sultry and languorous, therefore saner, than the much bepraised study +in C sharp minor, No. 7, op. 25. Niecks writes that this study "may be +counted among Chopin's loveliest compositions." It combines "classical +chasteness of contour with the fragrance of romanticism." Chopin told +his faithful Gutmann that "he had never in his life written another +such melody," and once when hearing it raised his arms aloft and cried +out: "Oh, ma patrie!" +</P> + +<P> +I cannot vouch for the sincerity of Chopin's utterance for as Runciman +writes: "They were a very Byronic set, these young men; and they took +themselves with ludicrous seriousness." +</P> + +<P> +Von Bulow calls it a study in expression—which is obvious—and thinks +it should be studied in company with No. 6, in E flat minor. This +reason is not patent. Emotions should not be hunted in couples and the +very object of the collection, variety in mood as well as mechanism, is +thus defeated. But Von Bulow was ever an ardent classifier. Perhaps he +had his soul compartmentized. He also attempts to regulate the +rubato—this is the first of the studies wherein the rubato's rights +must be acknowledged. The bars are even mentioned 32, 33, 36 and 37, +where tempo license may be indulged. But here is a case which innate +taste and feeling must guide. You can no more teach a real Chopin +rubato—not the mawkish imitation,—than you can make a donkey +comprehend Kant. The metronome is the same in all editions, 100 to the +eighth. +</P> + +<P> +Kullak rightly calls this lovely study "ein wunderschones, poetisches +Tonstuck," more in the nocturne than study style. He gives in the +bravura-like cadenza, an alternate for small hands, but small hands +should not touch this piece unless they can grapple the double sixths +with ease. Klindworth fingers the study with great care. The figuration +in three of the editions is the same, Mikuli separating the voices +distinctly. Riemann exercises all his ingenuity to make the beginning +clear to the eye. +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +[Musical score excerpt] +</P> + +<P> +What a joy is the next study, No. 4! How well Chopin knew the value of +contrast in tonality and sentiment! A veritable classic is this piece, +which, despite its dark key color, C sharp minor as a foil to the +preceding one in E, bubbles with life and spurts flame. It reminds one +of the story of the Polish peasants, who are happiest when they sing in +the minor mode. Kullak calls this "a bravura study for velocity and +lightness in both hands. Accentuation fiery!" while Von Bulow believes +that "the irresistible interest inspired by the spirited content of +this truly classical and model piece of music may become a stumbling +block in attempting to conquer the technical difficulties." Hardly. The +technics of this composition do not lie beneath the surface. They are +very much in the way of clumsy fingers and heavy wrists. Presto 88 to +the half is the metronome indication in all five editions. Klindworth +does not comment, but I like his fingering and phrasing best of all. +Riemann repeats his trick of breaking a group, detaching a note for +emphasis; although he is careful to retain the legato bow. One wonders +why this study does not figure more frequently on programmes of piano +recitals. It is a fine, healthy technical test, it is brilliant, and +the coda is very dramatic. Ten bars before the return of the theme +there is a stiff digital hedge for the student. A veritable lance of +tone is this study, if justly poised. +</P> + +<P> +Riemann has his own ideas of the phrasing of the following one, the +fifth and familiar "Black Key" etude. Examine the first bar: +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +[Musical Illustration without caption] +</P> + +<P> +Von Bulow would have grown jealous if he had seen this rather fantastic +phrasing. It is a trifle too finical, though it must be confessed looks +pretty. I like longer breathed phrasing. The student may profit by this +analysis. The piece is indeed, as Kullak says, "full of Polish +elegance." Von Bulow speaks rather disdainfully of it as a Damen-Salon +Etude. It is certainly graceful, delicately witty, a trifle naughty, +arch and roguish, and it is delightfully invented. Technically, it +requires smooth, velvet-tipped fingers and a supple wrist. In the +fourth bar, third group, third note of group, Klindworth and Riemann +print E flat instead of D flat. Mikuli, Kullak and Von Bulow use the D +flat. Now, which is right? The D flat is preferable. There are already +two E flats in the bar. The change is an agreeable one. Joseffy has +made a concert variation for this study. The metronome of the original +is given at 116 to the quarter. +</P> + +<P> +A dark, doleful nocturne is No. 6, in E flat minor. Niecks praises it +in company with the preceding one in E. It is beautiful, if music so +sad may be called beautiful, and the melody is full of stifled sorrow. +The study figure is ingenious, but subordinated to the theme. In the E +major section the piece broadens to dramatic vigor. Chopin was not yet +the slave of his mood. There must be a psychical programme to this +study, some record of a youthful disillusion, but the expression of it +is kept well within chaste lines. The Sarmatian composer had not yet +unlearned the value of reserve. The Klindworth reading of this troubled +poem is the best though Kullak used Chopin's autographic copy. There is +no metronomic sign in this autograph. Tellefsen gives 69 to the +quarter; Klindworth, 60; Riemann, 69; Mikuli, the same; Von Bulow and +Kullak, 60. Kullak also gives several variante from the text, adding an +A flat to the last group in bar II. Riemann and the others make the +same addition. The note must have been accidentally omitted from the +Chopin autograph. Two bars will illustrate what Riemann can accomplish +when he makes up his mind to be explicit, leaving little to the +imagination: +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +[Illustration without caption] +</P> + +<P> +A luscious touch, and a sympathetic soul is needed for this nocturne +study. +</P> + +<P> +We emerge into a clearer, more bracing atmosphere in the C major study, +No. 7. It is a genuine toccata, with moments of tender twilight, +serving a distinct technical purpose—the study of double notes and +changing on one key—and is as healthy as the toccata by Robert +Schumann. Here is a brave, an undaunted Chopin, a gay cavalier, with +the sunshine shimmering about him. There are times when this study +seems like light dripping through the trees of a mysterious forest; +with the delicato there are Puck-like rustlings, and all the while the +pianist without imagination is exercising wrist and ringers in a +technical exercise! Were ever Beauty and Duty so mated in double +harness? Pegasus pulling a cloud charged with rain over an arid +country! For study, playing the entire composition with a wrist stroke +is advisable. It will secure clear articulation, staccato and +finger-memory. Von Bulow phrases the study in groups of two, Kullak in +sixes, Klindworth and Mikuli the same, while Riemann in alternate twos, +fours and sixes. One sees his logic rather than hears it. Von Bulow +plastically reproduces the flitting, elusive character of the study far +better than the others. +</P> + +<P> +It is quite like him to suggest to the panting and ambitious pupil that +the performance in F sharp major, with the same fingering as the next +study in F, No. 8, would be beneficial. It certainly would. By the same +token, the playing of the F minor Sonata, the Appassionata of +Beethoven, in the key of F sharp minor, might produce good results. +This was another crotchet of Wagner's friend and probably was born of +the story that Beethoven transposed the Bach fugues in all keys. The +same is said of Saint-Saens. +</P> + +<P> +In his notes to the F major study Theodor Kullak expatiates at length +upon his favorite idea that Chopin must not be played according to his +metronomic markings. The original autograph gives 96 to the half, the +Tellefsen edition 88, Klindworth 80, Von Bulow 89, Mikuli 88, and +Riemann the same. Kullak takes the slower tempo of Klindworth, +believing that the old Herz and Czerny ideals of velocity are vanished, +that the shallow dip of the keys in Chopin's day had much to do with +the swiftness and lightness of his playing. The noble, more sonorous +tone of a modern piano requires greater breadth of style and less +speedy passage work. There can be no doubt as to the wisdom of a +broader treatment of this charming display piece. How it makes the +piano sound—what a rich, brilliant sweep it secures! It elbows the +treble to its last euphonious point, glitters and crests itself, only +to fall away as if the sea were melodic and could shatter and tumble +into tuneful foam! The emotional content is not marked. The piece is +for the fashionable salon or the concert hall. One catches at its close +the overtones of bustling plaudits and the clapping of gloved palms. +Ductility, an aristocratic ease, a delicate touch and fluent technique +will carry off this study with good effect. Technically it is useful; +one must speak of the usefulness of Chopin, even in these imprisoned, +iridescent soap bubbles of his. On the fourth line and in the first bar +of the Kullak version, there is a chord of the dominant seventh in +dispersed position that does not occur in any other edition. Yet it +must be Chopin or one of his disciples, for this autograph is in the +Royal Library at Berlin. Kullak thinks it ought to be omitted, moreover +he slights an E flat, that occurs in all the other editions situated in +the fourth group of the twentieth bar from the end. +</P> + +<P> +The F minor study, No. 9, is the first one of those tone studies of +Chopin in which the mood is more petulant than tempestuous. The melody +is morbid, almost irritating, and yet not without certain accents of +grandeur. There is a persistency in repetition that foreshadows the +Chopin of the later, sadder years. The figure in the left hand is the +first in which a prominent part is given to that member. Not as noble +and sonorous a figure as the one in the C minor study, it is a distinct +forerunner of the bass of the D minor Prelude. In this F minor study +the stretch is the technical object. It is rather awkward for +close-knit fingers. The best fingering is Von Bulow's. It is 5, 3, 1, +4, 1, 3 for the first figure. All the other editions, except Riemann's, +recommend the fifth finger on F, the fourth on C. Von Billow believes +that small hands beginning with his system will achieve quicker results +than by the Chopin fingering. This is true. Riemann phrases the study +with a multiplicity of legato bows and dynamic accents. Kullak prefers +the Tellefsen metronome 80, rather than the traditional 96. Most of the +others use 88 to the quarter, except Riemann, who espouses the more +rapid gait of 96. Klindworth, with his 88, strikes a fair medium. +</P> + +<P> +The verdict of Von Bulow on the following study in A flat, No. 10, has +no uncertainty of tone in its proclamation: +</P> + +<P CLASS="block"> + He who can play this study in a really finished manner may + congratulate himself on having climbed to the highest point of + the pianist's Parnassus, as it is perhaps the most difficult + piece of the entire set. The whole repertory of piano music + does not contain a study of perpetuum mobile so full of genius + and fancy as this particular one is universally acknowledged + to be, except perhaps Liszt's Feux Follets. The most important + point would appear to lie not so much in the interchange of + the groups of legato and staccato as in the exercise of + rhythmic contrasts—the alternation of two and three part + metre (that is, of four and six) in the same bar. To overcome + this fundamental difficulty in the art of musical reproduction + is the most important thing here, and with true zeal it may + even be accomplished easily. +</P> + +<P> +Kullak writes: "Harmonic anticipations; a rich rhythmic life +originating in the changing articulation of the twelve-eights in groups +of three and two each. ... This etude is an exceedingly piquant +composition, possessing for the hearer a wondrous, fantastic charm, if +played with the proper insight." The metronomic marking is practically +the same in all editions, 152 to the quarter notes. The study is one of +the most charming of the composer. There is more depth in it than in +the G flat and F major studies, and its effectiveness in the virtuoso +sense is unquestionable. A savor of the salon hovers over its perfumed +measures, but there is grace, spontaneity and happiness. Chopin must +have been as happy as his sensitive nature would allow when he +conceived this vivacious caprice. +</P> + +<P> +In all the editions, Riemann's excepted, there is no doubt left as to +the alternations of metres. Here are the first few bars of Von +Billow's, which is normal phrasing: +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +[Musical score excerpt] +</P> + +<P> +Read Riemann's version of these bars: +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +[Musical score excerpt] +</P> + +<P> +Riemann is conducive to clear-sighted phrasing, and will set the +student thinking, but the general effect of accentuation is certainly +different. All the editors quoted agree with Von Bulow, Klindworth and +Kullak. But if this is a marked specimen of Riemann, examine his +reading of the phrase wherein Chopin's triple rhythm is supplanted by +duple. Thus Von Bulow—and who will dare cavil? +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +[Musical score excerpt] +</P> + +<P> +Riemann: +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +[Musical score excerpt] +</P> + +<P> +The difference is more imaginary than real, for the stems of the +accented notes give us the binary metre. But the illustration serves to +show how Dr. Riemann is disposed to refine upon the gold of Chopin. +</P> + +<P> +Kullak dilates upon a peculiarity of Chopin: the dispersed position of +his underlying harmonies. This in a footnote to the eleventh study of +op. 10. Here one must let go the critical valve, else strangle in +pedagogics. So much has been written, so much that is false, perverted +sentimentalism and unmitigated cant about the nocturnes, that the +wonder is the real Chopin lover has not rebelled. There are pearls and +diamonds in the jewelled collection of nocturnes, many are dolorous, +few dramatic, and others are sweetly insane and songful. I yield to +none in my admiration for the first one of the two in G minor, for the +psychical despair in the C sharp minor nocturne, for that noble drama +called the C minor nocturne, for the B major, the Tuberose nocturne; +and for the E, D flat and G major nocturnes, it remains unabated. But +in the list there is no such picture painted, a Corot if ever there was +one, as this E flat study. +</P> + +<P> +Its novel design, delicate arabesques—as if the guitar had been +dowered with a soul—and the richness and originality of its harmonic +scheme, gives us pause to ask if Chopin's invention is not almost +boundless. The melody itself is plaintive; a plaintive grace informs +the entire piece. The harmonization is far more wonderful, but to us +the chord of the tenth and more remote intervals, seem no longer +daring; modern composition has devilled the musical alphabet into the +very caverns of the grotesque, yet there are harmonies in the last page +of this study that still excite wonder. The fifteenth bar from the end +is one that Richard Wagner might have made. From that bar to the close, +every group is a masterpiece. +</P> + +<P> +Remember, this study is a nocturne, and even the accepted metronomic +markings in most editions, 76 to the quarter, are not too slow; they +might even be slower. Allegretto and not a shade speedier! The color +scheme is celestial and the ending a sigh, not unmixed with happiness. +Chopin, sensitive poet, had his moments of peace, of divine +content—lebensruhe. The dizzy appoggiatura leaps in the last two bars +set the seal of perfection upon this unique composition. +</P> + +<P> +Touching upon the execution, one may say that it is not for small +hands, nor yet for big fists. The former must not believe that any +"arrangements" or simplified versions will ever produce the aerial +effect, the swaying of the tendrils of tone, intended by Chopin. Very +large hands are tempted by their reach to crush the life out of the +study in not arpeggiating it. This I have heard, and the impression was +indescribably brutal. As for fingering, Mikuli, Von Bulow, Kullak, +Riemann and Klindworth all differ, and from them must most pianists +differ. Your own grasp, individual sense of fingering and tact will +dictate the management of technics. Von Bulow gives a very sensible +pattern to work from, and Kullak is still more explicit. He analyzes +the melody and, planning the arpeggiating with scrupulous fidelity, he +shows why the arpeggiating "must be affected with the utmost rapidity, +bordering upon simultaneousness of harmony in the case of many chords." +Kullak has something to say about the grace notes and this bids me call +your attention to Von Bulow's change in the appoggiatura at the last +return of the subject. A bad misprint is in the Von Bulow edition: it +is in the seventeenth bar from the end, the lowest note in the first +bass group and should read E natural, instead of the E flat that stands. +</P> + +<P> +Von Bulow does not use the arpeggio sign after the first chord. He +rightly believes it makes unclear for the student the subtleties of +harmonic changes and fingering. He also suggests—quite like the +fertile Hans Guido—that "players who have sufficient patience and +enthusiasm for the task would find it worth their while to practise the +arpeggi the reverse way, from top to bottom; or in contrary motion, +beginning with the top note in one hand and the bottom note in the +other. A variety of devices like this would certainly help to give +greater finish to the task." +</P> + +<P> +Doubtless, but consider: man's years are but threescore and ten! +</P> + +<P> +The phrasing of the various editions examined do not vary much. Riemann +is excepted, who has his say in this fashion, at the beginning: +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +[Musical score excerpt] +</P> + +<P> +More remarkable still is the diversity of opinion regarding the first +three bass chord groups in the fifteenth bar from the close: the bottom +notes in the Von Bulow and Klindworth editions are B flat and two A +naturals, and in the Riemann, Kullak and Mikuli editions the notes are +two B flats and one A natural. The former sounds more varied, but we +may suppose the latter to be correct because of Mikuli. Here is the +particular bar, as given by Riemann: +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +[Musical score excerpt] +</P> + +<P> +Yet this exquisite flight into the blue, this nocturne which should be +played before sundown, excited the astonishment of Mendelssohn, the +perplexed wrath of Moscheles and the contempt of Rellstab, editor of +the "Iris," who wrote in that journal in 1834 of the studies in op. +10:— +</P> + +<P> +"Those who have distorted fingers may put them right by practising +these studies; but those who have not, should not play them, at least +not without having a surgeon at hand." What incredible surgery would +have been needed to get within the skull of this narrow critic any +savor of the beauty of these compositions! In the years to come the +Chopin studies will be played for their music, without any thought of +their technical problems. +</P> + +<P> +Now the young eagle begins to face the sun, begins to mount on +wind-weaving pinions. We have reached the last study of op. 10, the +magnificent one in C minor. Four pages suffice for a background upon +which the composer has flung with overwhelming fury the darkest, the +most demoniac expressions of his nature. Here is no veiled surmise, no +smothered rage, but all sweeps along in tornadic passion. Karasowski's +story may be true regarding the genesis of this work, but true or not, +it is one of the greatest dramatic outbursts in piano literature. Great +in outline, pride, force and velocity, it never relaxes its grim grip +from the first shrill dissonance to the overwhelming chordal close. +This end rings out like the crack of creation. It is elemental. Kullak +calls it a "bravura study of the very highest order for the left hand. +It was composed in 1831 in Stuttgart, shortly after Chopin had received +tidings of the taking of Warsaw by the Russians, September 8, 1831." +Karasowski wrote: "Grief, anxiety and despair over the fate of his +relatives and his dearly-beloved father filled the measure of his +sufferings. Under the influence of this mood he wrote the C minor +Etude, called by many the Revolutionary Etude. Out of the mad and +tempestuous storm of passages for the left hand the melody rises aloft, +now passionate and anon proudly majestic, until thrills of awe stream +over the listener, and the image is evoked of Zeus hurling thunderbolts +at the world." +</P> + +<P> +Niecks thinks it "superbly grand," and furthermore writes: "The +composer seems fuming with rage; the left hand rushes impetuously along +and the right hand strikes in with passionate ejaculations." Von Bulow +said: "This C minor study must be considered a finished work of art in +an even higher degree than the study in C sharp minor." All of which is +pretty, but not enough to the point. +</P> + +<P> +Von Bulow fingers the first passage for the left hand in a very +rational manner; Klindworth differs by beginning with the third instead +of the second finger, while Riemann—dear innovator—takes the group: +second, first, third, and then, the fifth finger on D, if you please! +Kullak is more normal, beginning with the third. Here is Riemann's +phrasing and grouping for the first few bars. Notice the half note with +peculiar changes of fingering at the end. It gives surety and variety. +Von Bulow makes the changes ring on the second and fifth, instead of +third and fifth, fingers. Thus Riemann: +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +[Musical score excerpt] +</P> + +<P> +In the above the accustomed phrasing is altered, for in all other +editions the accent falls upon the first note of each group. In Riemann +the accentuation seems perverse, but there is no question as to its +pedagogic value. It may be ugly, but it is useful though I should not +care to hear it in the concert room. Another striking peculiarity of +the Riemann phrasing is his heavy accent on the top E flat in the +principal passage for the left hand. He also fingers what Von Bulow +calls the "chromatic meanderings," in an unusual manner, both on the +first page and the last. His idea of the enunciation of the first theme +is peculiar: +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +[Musical score excerpt] +</P> + +<P> +Mikuli places a legato bow over the first three octaves—so does +Kullak—Von Bulow only over the last two, which gives a slightly +different effect, while Klindworth does the same as Kullak. The heavy +dynamic accents employed by Riemann are unmistakable. They signify the +vital importance of the phrase at its initial entrance. He does not use +it at the repetition, but throughout both dynamic and agogic accents +are unsparingly used, and the study seems to resound with the sullen +booming of a park of artillery. The working-out section, with its +anticipations of "Tristan and Isolde," is phrased by all the editors as +it is never played. Here the technical figure takes precedence over the +law of the phrase, and so most virtuosi place the accent on the fifth +finger, regardless of the pattern. This is as it should be. In +Klindworth there is a misprint at the beginning of the fifteenth bar +from the end in the bass. It should read B natural, not B flat. The +metronome is the same in all editions, 160 to the quarter, but speed +should give way to breadth at all hazards. Von Bulow is the only +editor, to my knowledge, who makes an enharmonic key change in this +working-out section. It looks neater, sounds the same, but is it +Chopin? He also gives a variant for public performance by transforming +the last run in unisono into a veritable hurricane by interlocked +octaves. The effect is brazen. Chopin needs no such clangorous padding +in this etude, which gains by legitimate strokes the most startling +contrasts. +</P> + +<P> +The study is full of tremendous pathos; it compasses the sublime, and +in its most torrential moments the composer never quite loses his +mental equipoise. He, too, can evoke tragic spirits, and at will send +them scurrying back to their dim profound. It has but one rival in the +Chopin studies—No. 12, op. 25, in the same key. +</P> + +<BR> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +II +</H4> + +<P> +Opus 25, twelve studies by Frederic Chopin, are dedicated to Madame la +Comtesse d'Agoult. The set opens with the familiar study in A flat, so +familiar that I shall not make further ado about it except to say that +it is delicious, but played often and badly. All that modern editing +can do since Miluki is to hunt out fresh accentuation. Von Bullow is +the worst sinner in this respect, for he discovers quaint nooks and +dells for his dynamics undreamed of by the composer. His edition should +be respectfully studied and, when mastered, discarded for a more poetic +interpretation. Above all, poetry, poetry and pedals. Without pedalling +of the most varied sort this study will remain as dry as a dog-gnawed +bone. Von Bulow says the "figure must be treated as a double +triplet—twice three and not three times two—as indicated in the first +two bars." Klindworth makes the group a sextolet. Von Bulow has set +forth numerous directions in fingering and phrasing, giving the exact +number of notes in the bass trill at the end. Kullak uses the most +ingenious fingering. Look at the last group of the last bar, second +line, third page. It is the last word in fingering. Better to end with +Robert Schumann's beautiful description of this study, as quoted by +Kullak: +</P> + +<P CLASS="block"> + In treating of the present book of Etudes, Robert Schumann, + after comparing Chopin to a strange star seen at midnight, + wrote as follows: "Whither his path lies and leads, or how + long, how brilliant its course is yet to be, who can say? As + often, however, as it shows itself, there is ever seen the + same deep dark glow, the same starry light and the same + austerity, so that even a child could not fail to recognize + it. But besides this, I have had the advantage of hearing most + of these Etudes played by Chopin himself, and quite a la + Chopin did he play them!" +</P> + +<P CLASS="block"> + Of the first one especially he writes: "Imagine that an + aeolian harp possessed all the musical scales, and that the + hand of an artist were to cause them all to intermingle in all + sorts of fantastic embellishments, yet in such a way as to + leave everywhere audible a deep fundamental tone and a soft + continuously-singing upper voice, and you will get the right + idea of his playing. But it would be an error to think that + Chopin permitted every one of the small notes to be distinctly + heard. It was rather an undulation of the A flat major chord, + here and there thrown aloft anew by the pedal. Throughout all + the harmonies one always heard in great tones a wondrous + melody, while once only, in the middle of the piece, besides + that chief song, a tenor voice became prominent in the midst + of chords. After the Etude a feeling came over one as of + having seen in a dream a beatific picture which when half + awake one would gladly recall." +</P> + +<P CLASS="block"> + After these words there can be no doubt as to the mode of + delivery. No commentary is required to show that the melodic + and other important tones indicated by means of large notes + must emerge from within the sweetly whispering waves, and that + the upper tones must be combined so as to form a real melody + with the finest and most thoughtful shadings. +</P> + +<P> +The twenty-fourth bar of this study in A major is so Lisztian that +Liszt must have benefited by its harmonies. +</P> + +<P> +"And then he played the second in the book, in F minor, one in which +his individuality displays itself in a manner never to be forgotten. +How charming, how dreamy it was! Soft as the song of a sleeping child." +Schumann wrote this about the wonderful study in F minor, which +whispers, not of baleful deeds in a dream, as does the last movement of +the B flat minor sonata, but is—"the song of a sleeping child." No +comparison could be prettier, for there is a sweet, delicate drone that +sometimes issues from childish lips, having a charm for ears not +attuned to grosser things. +</P> + +<P> +This must have been the study that Chopin played for Henrietta Voigt at +Leipsic, September 12, 1836. In her diary she wrote: "The over +excitement of his fantastic manner is imparted to the keen eared. It +made me hold my breath. Wonderful is the ease with which his velvet +fingers glide, I might almost say fly, over the keys. He has enraptured +me—in a way which hitherto had been unknown to me. What delighted me +was the childlike, natural manner which he showed in his demeanor and +in his playing." Von Bulow believes the interpretation of this magical +music should be without sentimentality, almost without +shading—clearly, delicately and dreamily executed. "An ideal +pianissimo, an accentless quality, and completely without passion or +rubato." There is little doubt this was the way Chopin played it. Liszt +is an authority on the subject, and M. Mathias corroborates him. +Regarding the rhythmical problem to be overcome, the combination of two +opposing rhythms, Von Bulow indicates an excellent method, and Kullak +devotes part of a page to examples of how the right, then the left, and +finally both hands, are to be treated. Kullak furthermore writes: "Or, +if one will, he may also betake himself in fancy to a still, green, +dusky forest, and listen in profound solitude to the mysterious +rustling and whispering of the foliage. What, indeed, despite the +algebraic character of the tone-language, may not a lively fancy +conjure out of, or, rather, into, this etude! But one thing is to be +held fast: it is to be played in that Chopin-like whisper of which, +among others, Mendelssohn also affirmed that for him nothing more +enchanting existed." But enough of subjective fancies. This study +contains much beauty, and every bar rules over a little harmonic +kingdom of its own. It is so lovely that not even the Brahms' +distortion in double notes or the version in octaves can dull its +magnetic crooning. At times so delicate is its design that it recalls +the faint fantastic tracery made by frost on glass. In all instances +save one it is written as four unbroken quarter triplets in the +bar—right hand. Not so Riemann. He has views of his own, both as to +fingering and phrasing: +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +[Musical score excerpt] +</P> + +<P> +Jean Kleczynski's interesting brochure, "The Works of Frederic Chopin +and Their Proper Interpretation," is made up of three lectures +delivered at Warsaw. While the subject is of necessity foreshortened, +he says some practical things about the use of the pedals in Chopin's +music. He speaks of this very study in F minor and the enchanting way +Rubinstein and Essipowa ended it—the echo-like effects on the four +C's, the pedal floating the tone. The pedals are half the battle in +Chopin playing. ONE CAN NEVER PLAY CHOPIN BEAUTIFULLY ENOUGH. Realistic +treatment dissipates his dream palaces, shatters his aerial +architecture. He may be played broadly, fervently, dramatically but +coarsely, never. I deprecate the rose-leaf sentimentalism in which he +is swathed by nearly all pianists. "Chopin is a sigh, with something +pleasing in it," wrote some one, and it is precisely this notion which +has created such havoc among his interpreters. But if excess in feeling +is objectionable, so too is the "healthy" reading accorded his works by +pianists with more brawn than brain. The real Chopin player is born and +can never be a product of the schools. +</P> + +<P> +Schumann thinks the third study in F less novel in character, although +"here the master showed his admirable bravura powers." "But," he +continues, "they are all models of bold, indwelling, creative force, +truly poetic creations, though not without small blots in their +details, but on the whole striking and powerful. Yet, if I give my +complete opinion, I must confess that his earlier collection seems more +valuable to me. Not that I mean to imply any deterioration, for these +recently published studies were nearly all written at the same time as +the earlier ones, and only a few were composed a little while ago—the +first in A flat and the last magnificent one in C minor, both of which +display great mastership." +</P> + +<P> +One may be permitted to disagree with Schumann, for op. 25 contains at +least two of Chopin's greater studies—A minor and C minor. The most +valuable point of the passage quoted is the clenching of the fact that +the studies were composed in a bunch. That settles many important +psychological details. Chopin had suffered much before going to Paris, +had undergone the purification and renunciation of an unsuccessful love +affair, and arrived in Paris with his style fully formed—in his case +the style was most emphatically the man. +</P> + +<P> +Kullak calls the study in F "a spirited little caprice, whose kernel +lies in the simultaneous application of four different little rhythms +to form a single figure in sound, which figure is then repeated +continuously to the end. In these repetitions, however, changes of +accentuation, fresh modulations, and piquant antitheses, serve to make +the composition extremely vivacious and effective." He pulls apart the +brightly colored petals of the thematic flower and reveals the inner +chemistry of this delicate growth. Four different voices are +distinguished in the kernel. +</P> + +<P> +"The third voice is the chief one, and after it the first, because they +determine the melodic and harmonic contents": +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +[Musical score excerpt of 'four different voices'] +</P> + +<P> +Kullak and Mikuli dot the C of the first bar. Klindworth and Von Bulow +do not. As to phrasing and fingering I pin my faith to Riemann. His +version is the most satisfactory. Here are the first bars. The idea is +clearly expressed: +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +[Musical score excerpt] +</P> + +<P> +Best of all is the careful accentuation, and at a place indicated in no +other edition that I have examined. With the arrival of the +thirty-second notes, Riemann punctuates the theme this way: +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +[Musical score excerpt] +</P> + +<P> +The melody, of course in profile, is in the eighth notes. This gives +meaning to the decorative pattern of the passage. And what charm, +buoyancy, and sweetness there is in this caprice! It has the +tantalizing, elusive charm of a humming bird in full flight. The human +element is almost eliminated. We are in the open, the sun blazes in the +blue, and all is gay, atmospheric, and illuding. Even where the tone +deepens, where the shadows grow cooler and darker in the B major +section, there is little hint of preoccupation with sadness. Subtle are +the harmonic shifts, admirable the ever changing devices of the +figuration. Riemann accents the B, the E, A, B flat, C and F, at the +close—perilous leaps for the left hand, but they bring into fine +relief the exquisite harmonic web. An easy way of avoiding the tricky +position in the left hand at this spot—thirteen bars from the +close—is to take the upper C in bass with the right hand thumb and in +the next bar the upper B in bass the same way. This minimizes the risk +of the skip, and it is perfectly legitimate to do this—in public at +least. The ending, to be "breathed" away, according to Kullak, is +variously fingered. He also prescribes a most trying fingering for the +first group, fourth finger on both hands. This is useful for study, but +for performance the third finger is surer. Von Bulow advises the player +to keep the "upper part of the body as still as possible, as any haste +of movement would destroy the object in view, which is the acquisition +of a loose wrist." He also suggests certain phrasing in bar seventeen, +and forbids a sharp, cutting manner in playing the sforzati at the last +return of the subject. Kullak is copious in his directions, and thinks +the touch should be light and the hand gliding, and in the B major part +"fiery, wilful accentuation of the inferior beats." Capricious, +fantastic, and graceful, this study is Chopin in rare spirits. Schumann +has the phrase—the study should be executed with "amiable bravura." +There is a misprint in the Kullak edition: at the beginning of the +thirty-second notes an A instead of an F upsets the tonality, besides +being absurd. +</P> + +<P> +Of the fourth study in A minor there is little to add to Theodor +Kullak, who writes: +</P> + +<P CLASS="block"> + "In the broadest sense of the word, every piece of music is an + etude. In a narrower sense, however, we demand of an etude + that it shall have a special end in view, promote facility in + something, and lead to the conquest of some particular + difficulty, whether of technics, of rhythm, expression or + delivery." (Robert Schumann, Collected Writings, i., 201.) The + present study is less interesting from a technical than a + rhythmical point of view. While the chief beats of the measure + (1st, 3d, 5th and 7th eighths) are represented only by single + tones (in the bass part), which are to a certain extent "free + and unconcerned, and void of all encumbrance," the inferior + parts of the measure (2d, 4th, 6th and 8th eighths) are + burdened with chords, the most of which, moreover, are + provided with accents in opposition to the regular beats of + the measure. Further, there is associated with these chords, + or there may be said to grow out of them, a cantilene in the + upper voice, which appears in syncopated form opposite to the + strong beats of the bass. This cantilene begins on a weak + beat, and produces numerous suspensions, which, in view of the + time of their entrance, appear as so many retardations and + delayals of melodic tones. +</P> + +<P CLASS="block"> + All these things combine to give the composition a wholly + peculiar coloring, to render its flow somewhat restless and to + stamp the etude as a little characteristic piece, a capriccio, + which might well be named "Inquietude." +</P> + +<P CLASS="block"> + As regards technics, two things are to be studied: the + staccato of the chords and the execution of the cantilena. The + chords must be formed more by pressure than by striking. The + fingers must support themselves very lightly upon the chord + keys and then rise again with the back of the hand in the most + elastic manner. The upward movement of the hand must be very + slight. Everything must be done with the greatest precision, + and not merely in a superficial manner. Where the cantilena + appears, every melodic tone must stand apart from the tones of + the accompaniment as if in "relief." Hence the fingers for the + melodic tones must press down the keys allotted to them with + special force, in doing which the back of the hand may be + permitted to turn lightly to the right (sideward stroke), + especially when there is a rest in the accompaniment. Compare + with this etude the introduction to the Capriccio in B minor, + with orchestra, by Felix Mendelssohn, first page. Aside from a + few rallentando places, the etude is to be played strictly in + time. +</P> + +<P> +I prefer the Klindworth editing of this rather sombre, nervous +composition, which may be merely an etude, but it also indicates a +slightly pathologic condition. With its breath-catching syncopations +and narrow emotional range, the A minor study has nevertheless moments +of power and interest. Riemann's phrasing, while careful, is not more +enlightening than Klindworth's. Von Bulow says: "The bass must be +strongly marked throughout—even when piano—and brought out in +imitation of the upper part." Singularly enough, his is the only +edition in which the left hand arpeggios at the close, though in the +final bar "both hands may do so." This is editorial quibbling. Stephen +Heller remarked that this study reminded him of the first bar of the +Kyrie—rather the Requiem Aeternam of Mozart's Requiem. +</P> + +<P> +It is safe to say that the fifth study in E minor is less often heard +in the concert room than any one of its companions. I cannot recall +having heard it since Annette Essipowa gave that famous recital during +which she played the entire twenty-seven studies. Yet it is a sonorous +piano piece, rich in embroideries and general decorative effect in the +middle section. Perhaps the rather perverse, capricious and not +altogether amiable character of the beginning has caused pianists to be +wary of introducing it at a recital. It is hugely effective and also +difficult, especially if played with the same fingering throughout, as +Von Bulow suggests. Niecks quotes Stephen Heller's partiality for this +very study. In the "Gazette Musicale," February 24, 1839, Heller wrote +of Chopin's op. 25: +</P> + +<P CLASS="block"> + What more do we require to pass one or several evenings in as + perfect a happiness as possible? As for me, I seek in this + collection of poesy—this is the only name appropriate to the + works of Chopin—some favorite pieces which I might fix in my + memory, rather than others. Who could retain everything? For + this reason I have in my notebook quite particularly marked + the numbers four, five and seven of the present poems. Of + these twelve much loved studies—every one of which has a + charm of its own—the three numbers are those I prefer to all + the rest. +</P> + +<P> +The middle part of this E minor study recalls Thalberg. Von Bulow +cautions the student against "the accenting of the first note with the +thumb—right hand—as it does not form part of the melody, but only +comes in as an unimportant passing note." This refers to the melody in +E. He also writes that the addition of the third in the left hand, +Klindworth edition, needs no special justification. I discovered one +marked difference in the Klindworth edition. The leap in the left +hand—first variant of the theme, tenth bar from beginning—is preceded +by an appoggiatura, E natural. The jump is to F sharp, instead of G, as +in the Mikuli, Kullak and Riemann editions. Von Bulow uses the F sharp, +but without the ninth below. Riemann phrases the piece so as to get the +top melody, B, E and G, and his stems are below instead of above, as in +Mikuli and Von Bulow. Kullak dots the eighth note. Riemann uses a +sixteenth, thus: +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +[Musical score excerpt] +</P> + +<P> +Kullak writes that the figure 184 is not found on the older metronomes. +This is not too fast for the capriccio, with its pretty and ingenious +rhythmical transformations. As regards the execution of the 130th bar, +Von Bulow says: "The acciaccature—prefixes—are to be struck +simultaneously with the other parts, as also the shake in bar 134 and +following bars; this must begin with the upper auxiliary note." These +details are important. Kullak concludes his notes thus: +</P> + +<P CLASS="block"> + Despite all the little transformations of the motive member + which forms the kernel, its recognizability remains + essentially unimpaired. Meanwhile out of these little + metamorphoses there is developed a rich rhythmic life, which + the performer must bring out with great precision. If in + addition, he possesses a fine feeling for what is graceful, + coquettish, or agreeably capricious, he will understand how to + heighten still further the charm of the chief part, which, as + far as its character is concerned, reminds one of Etude, op. + 25, No. 3. +</P> + +<P CLASS="block"> + The secondary part, in major, begins. Its kernel is formed of + a beautiful broad melody, which, if soulfully conceived and + delivered, will sing its way deep into the heart of the + listener. For the accompaniment in the right hand we find + chord arpeggiations in triplets, afterward in sixteenths, + calmly ascending and descending, and surrounding the melody as + with a veil. They are to be played almost without + accentuation. +</P> + +<P> +It was Louis Ehlert who wrote of the celebrated study in G sharp minor +op. 25, No. 6: "Chopin not only versifies an exercise in thirds; he +transforms it into such a work of art that in studying it one could +sooner fancy himself on Parnassus than at a lesson. He deprives every +passage of all mechanical appearance by promoting it to become the +embodiment of a beautiful thought, which in turn finds graceful +expression in its motion." +</P> + +<P> +And indeed in the piano literature no more remarkable merging of matter +and manner exists. The means justifies the end, and the means employed +by the composer are beautiful, there is no other word to describe the +style and architectonics of this noble study. It is seldom played in +public because of its difficulty. With the Schumann Toccata, the G +sharp minor study stands at the portals of the delectable land of +Double Notes. Both compositions have a common ancestry in the Czerny +Toccata, and both are the parents of such a sensational offspring as +Balakirew's "Islamey." In reading through the double note studies for +the instrument it is in the nature of a miracle to come upon Chopin's +transfiguration of such a barren subject. This study is first music, +then a technical problem. Where two or three pianists are gathered +together in the name of Chopin, the conversation is bound to formulate +itself thus: "How do you finger the double chromatic thirds in the G +sharp minor study?" That question answered, your digital politics are +known. You are classified, ranged. If you are heterodox you are eagerly +questioned; if you follow Von Bulow and stand by the Czerny fingering, +you are regarded as a curiosity. As the interpretation of the study is +not taxing, let us examine the various fingerings. First, a fingering +given by Leopold Godowsky. It is for double chromatic thirds: +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +[Musical score excerpt] +</P> + +<P> +You will now be presented with a battalion of authorities, so that you +may see at a glance the various efforts to climb those slippery +chromatic heights. Here is Mikuli: +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +[Musical score excerpt] +</P> + +<P> +Kullak's is exactly the same as above. It is the so-called Chopin +fingering, as contrasted with the so-called Czerny fingering—though in +reality Clementi's, as Mr. John Kautz contends. "In the latter the +third and fifth fingers fall upon C sharp and E and F sharp and A in +the right hand, and upon C and E flat and G and B flat in the left." +Klindworth also employs the Chopin fingering. Von Bulow makes this +statement: "As the peculiar fingering adopted by Chopin for chromatic +scales in thirds appears to us to render their performance in +legatissimo utterly unattainable on our modern instruments, we have +exchanged it, where necessary, for the older method of Hummel. Two of +the greatest executive artists of modern times, Alexander Dreyschock +and Carl Tausig, were, theoretically and practically, of the same +opinion. It is to be conjectured that Chopin was influenced in his +method of fingering by the piano of his favorite makers, Pleyel and +Wolff, of Paris—who, before they adopted the double echappement, +certainly produced instruments with the most pliant touch possible—and +therefore regarded the use of the thumb in the ascending scale on two +white keys in succession—the semitones EF and BC—as practicable. On +the grand piano of the present day we regard it as irreconcilable with +conditions of crescendo legato." This Chopin fingering in reality +derives directly from Hummel. See his "Piano School." +</P> + +<P> +So he gives this fingering: +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +[Musical score excerpt] +</P> + +<P> +He also suggests the following phrasing for the left hand. This is +excellent: +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +[Musical score excerpt] +</P> + +<P> +Riemann not only adopts new fingering for the double note scale, but +also begins the study with the trill on first and third, second and +fourth, instead of the usual first and fourth, second and fifth +fingers, adopted by the rest. This is his notion of the run in +chromatic thirds: +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +[Musical score excerpt] +</P> + +<P> +For the rest the study must be played like the wind, or, as Kullak +says: "Apart from a few places and some accents, the Etude is to be +played almost throughout in that Chopin whisper. The right hand must +play its thirds, especially the diatonic and chromatic scales, with +such equality that no angularity of motion shall be noticeable where +the fingers pass under or over each other. The left hand, too, must +receive careful attention and special study. The chord passages and all +similar ones must be executed discreetly and legatissimo. Notes with +double stems must be distinguished from notes with single stems by +means of stronger shadings, for they are mutually interconnected." +</P> + +<P> +Von Bulow calls the seventh study, the one in C sharp minor, a +nocturne—a duo for 'cello and flute. He ingeniously smooths out the +unequal rhythmic differences of the two hands, and justly says the +piece does not work out any special technical matter. This study is the +most lauded of all. Yet I cannot help agreeing with Niecks, who writes +of it—he oddly enough places it in the key of E: "A duet between a He +and a She, of whom the former shows himself more talkative and emphatic +than the latter, is, indeed, very sweet, but, perhaps, also somewhat +tiresomely monotonous, as such tete-a-tetes naturally are to third +parties." +</P> + +<P> +For Chopin's contemporaries this was one of his greatest efforts. +Heller wrote: "It engenders the sweetest sadness, the most enviable +torments, and if in playing it one feels oneself insensibly drawn +toward mournful and melancholy ideas, it is a disposition of the soul +which I prefer to all others. Alas! how I love these sombre and +mysterious dreams, and Chopin is the god who creates them." In this +etude Kleczynski thinks there are traces of weariness of life, and +quotes Orlowski, Chopin's friend, "He is only afflicted with +homesickness." Willeby calls this study the most beautiful of them all. +For me it is both morbid and elegiac. There is nostalgia in it, the +nostalgia of a sick, lacerated soul. It contains in solution all the +most objectionable and most endearing qualities of the master. Perhaps +we have heard its sweet, highly perfumed measures too often. Its +interpretation is a matter of taste. Kullak has written the most +ambitious programme for it. Here is a quotation from Albert R. Parsons' +translation in Schirmer's edition of Kullak. +</P> + +<P CLASS="block"> + Throughout the entire piece an elegiac mood prevails. The + composer paints with psychologic truthfulness a fragment out + of the life of a deeply clouded soul. He lets a broken heart, + filled with grief, proclaim its sorrow in a language of pain + which is incapable of being misunderstood. The heart has + lost—not something, but everything. The tones, however, do not + always bear the impress of a quiet, melancholy resignation. + More passionate impulses awaken, and the still plaint becomes + a complaint against cruel fate. It seeks the conflict, and + tries through force of will to burst the fetters of pain, or + at least to alleviate it through absorption in a happy past. + But in vain! The heart has not lost something—it has lost + everything. The musical poem divides into three, or if one + views the little episode in B major as a special part, into + four parts (strophes), of which the last is an elaborated + repetition of the first with a brief closing part appended. + The whole piece is a song, or, better still, an aria, in which + two principal voices are to be brought out; the upper one is + in imitation of a human voice, while the lower one must bear + the character throughout of an obligato violoncello. It is + well known that Chopin was very fond of the violoncello and + that in his piano compositions he imitated the style of + passages peculiar to that instrument. The two voices + correspond closely, supplementing and imitating each other + reciprocally. Between the two a third element exists: an + accompaniment of eighths in uniform succession without any + significance beyond that of filling out the harmony. This + third element is to be kept wholly subordinate. The little, + one-voiced introduction in recitative style which precedes the + aria reminds one vividly of the beginning of the Ballade in G + minor, op. 23. +</P> + +<P> +The D flat study, No. 8, is called by Von Bulow "the most useful +exercise in the whole range of etude literature. It might truly be +called 'l'indispensable du pianiste,' if the term, through misuse, had +not fallen into disrepute. As a remedy for stiff fingers and +preparatory to performing in public, playing it six times through is +recommended, even to the most expert pianist." Only six times! The +separate study of the left hand is recommended. Kullak finds this study +"surprisingly euphonious, but devoid of depth of content." It is an +admirable study for the cultivation of double sixths. It contains a +remarkable passage of consecutive fifths that set the theorists by the +ears. Riemann manages to get some new editorial comment upon it. +</P> + +<P> +The nimble study, No. 9, which bears the title of "The Butterfly," is +in G flat Von Bulow transposes it enharmonically to F sharp, avoiding +numerous double flats. The change is not laudable. He holds anything +but an elevated opinion of the piece, classing it with a composition of +the Charles Mayer order. This is unjust; the study if not deep is +graceful and certainly very effective. It has lately become the +stamping ground for the display of piano athletics. Nearly all modern +virtuosi pull to pieces the wings of this gay little butterfly. They +smash it, they bang it, and, adding insult to cruelty, they finish it +with three chords, mounting an octave each time, thus giving a +conventional character to the close—the very thing the composer +avoids. Much distorted phrasing is also indulged in. The Tellefsen's +edition and Klindworth's give these differences: +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +[Musical score excerpt] +</P> + +<P> +Mikuli, Von Bulow and Kullak place the legato bow over the first three +notes of the group. Riemann, of course, is different: +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +[Musical score excerpt] +</P> + +<P> +The metronomic markings are about the same in all editions. +</P> + +<P> +Asiatic wildness, according to Von Bulow, pervades the B minor study, +op. 25, No. 10, although Willeby claims it to be only a study in +octaves "for the left hand"! Von Bulow furthermore compares it, because +of its monophonic character, to the Chorus of Dervishes in Beethoven's +"Ruins of Athens." Niecks says it is "a real pandemonium; for a while +holier sounds intervene, but finally hell prevails." The study is for +Kullak "somewhat far fetched and forced in invention, and leaves one +cold, although it plunges on wildly to the end." Von Bulow has made the +most complete edition. Klindworth strengthens the first and the seventh +eighth notes of the fifth bar before the last by filling in the +harmonics of the left hand. This etude is an important one, +technically; because many pianists make little of it that does not +abate its musical significance, and I am almost inclined to group it +with the last two studies of this opus. The opening is portentous and +soon becomes a driving whirlwind of tone. Chopin has never penned a +lovelier melody than the one in B—the middle section of this etude—it +is only to be compared to the one in the same key in the B minor +Scherzo, while the return to the first subject is managed as +consummately as in the E flat minor Scherzo, from op. 35. I confess to +being stirred by this B minor study, with its tempo at a forced draught +and with its precipitous close. There is a lushness about the octave +melody; the tune may be a little overripe, but it is sweet, sensuous +music, and about it hovers the hush of a rich evening in early autumn. +</P> + +<P> +And now the "Winter Wind"—the study in A minor, op. 25, No. 11. Here +even Von Bulow becomes enthusiastic: +</P> + +<P> +"It must be mentioned as a particular merit of this, the longest and, +in every respect, the grandest of Chopin's studies, that, while +producing the greatest fulness of sound imaginable, it keeps itself so +entirely and utterly unorchestral, and represents piano music in the +most accurate sense of the word. To Chopin is due the honor and credit +of having set fast the boundary between piano and orchestral music, +which through other composers of the romantic school, especially Robert +Schumann, has been defaced and blotted out, to the prejudice and damage +of both species." +</P> + +<P> +Kullak is equally as warm in his praise of it: +</P> + +<P CLASS="block"> + One of the grandest and most ingenious of Chopin's etudes, and + a companion piece to op. 10, No. 12, which perhaps it even + surpasses. It is a bravura study of the highest order; and is + captivating through the boldness and originality of its + passages, whose rising and falling waves, full of agitation, + overflow the entire keyboard; captivating through its harmonic + and modulatory shadings; and captivating, finally, through a + wonderfully invented little theme which is drawn like a "red + thread" through all the flashing and glittering waves of tone, + and which, as it were, prevents them from scattering to all + quarters of the heavens. This little theme, strictly speaking + only a phrase of two measures, is, in a certain sense, the + motto which serves as a superscription for the etude, + appearing first one voiced, and immediately afterward four + voiced. The slow time (Lento) shows the great importance which + is to be attached to it. They who have followed thus far and + agree with what has been said cannot be in doubt concerning + the proper artistic delivery. To execute the passages quite in + the rapid time prescribed one must possess a finished + technique. Great facility, lightness of touch, equality, + strength and endurance in the forte passages, together with + the clearest distinctness in the piano and pianissimo—all of + this must have been already achieved, for the interpreter must + devote his whole attention to the poetic contents of the + composition, especially to the delivery of the march-like + rhythms, which possess a life of their own, appearing now calm + and circumspect, and anon bold and challenging. The march-like + element naturally requires strict playing in time. +</P> + +<P> +This study is magnificent, and moreover it is music. +</P> + +<P> +In bar fifteen Von Bulow makes B natural the second note of the last +group, although all other editions, except Klindworth, use a B flat. +Von Bulow has common sense on his side. The B flat is a misprint. The +same authority recommends slow staccato practice, with the lid of the +piano closed. Then the hurly-burly of tone will not intoxicate the +player and submerge his critical faculty. +</P> + +<P> +Each editor has his notion of the phrasing of the initial sixteenths. +Thus Mikuli's—which is normal: +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +[Musical score excerpt] +</P> + +<P> +Klindworth fingers this passage more ingeniously, but phrases it about +the same, omitting the sextolet mark. Kullak retains it. Von Bulow +makes his phrase run in this fashion: +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +[Musical score excerpt] +</P> + +<P> +As regards grouping, Riemann follows Von Bulow, but places his accents +differently. +</P> + +<P> +The canvas is Chopin's largest—for the idea and its treatment are on a +vastly grander scale than any contained in the two concertos. The +latter are after all miniatures, precious ones if you will, joined and +built with cunning artifice; in neither work is there the resistless +overflow of this etude, which has been compared to the screaming of the +winter blasts. Ah, how Chopin puts to flight those modern men who +scheme out a big decorative pattern and then have nothing wherewith to +fill it! He never relaxes his theme, and its fluctuating surprises are +many. The end is notable for the fact that scales appear. Chopin very +seldom uses scale figures in his studies. From Hummel to Thalberg and +Herz the keyboard had glittered with spangled scales. Chopin must have +been sick of them, as sick of them as of the left-hand melody with +arpeggiated accompaniment in the right, a la Thalberg. Scales had been +used too much, hence Chopin's sparing employment of them. In the first +C sharp minor study, op. 10, there is a run for the left hand in the +coda. In the seventh study, same key, op. 25, there are more. The +second study of op. 10, in A minor, is a chromatic scale study; but +there are no other specimens of the form until the mighty run at the +conclusion of this A minor study. +</P> + +<P> +It takes prodigious power and endurance to play this work, prodigious +power, passion and no little poetry. It is open air music, storm music, +and at times moves in processional splendor. Small souled men, no +matter how agile their fingers, should avoid it. +</P> + +<P> +The prime technical difficulty is the management of the thumb. Kullak +has made a variant at the end for concert performance. It is effective. +The average metronomic marking is sixty-nine to the half. +</P> + +<P> +Kullak thinks the twelfth and last study of op. 25 in C minor "a grand, +magnificent composition for practice in broken chord passages for both +hands, which requires no comment." I differ from this worthy teacher. +Rather is Niecks more to my taste: "No. 12, C minor, in which the +emotions rise not less high than the waves of arpeggios which symbolize +them." +</P> + +<P> +Von Bulow is didactic: +</P> + +<P CLASS="block"> + The requisite strength for this grandiose bravura study can + only be attained by the utmost clearness, and thus only by a + gradually increasing speed. It is therefore most desirable to + practise it piano also by way of variety, for otherwise the + strength of tone might easily degenerate into hardness, and in + the poetic striving after a realistic portrayal of a storm on + the piano the instrument, as well as the piece, would come to + grief. +</P> + +<P CLASS="block"> + The pedal is needful to give the requisite effect, and must + change with every new harmony; but it should only be used in + the latter stages of study, when the difficulties are nearly + mastered. +</P> + +<P> +We have our preferences. Mine in op. 25 is the C minor study, which, +like the prelude in D minor, is "full of the sound of great guns." +Willeby thinks otherwise. On page 81 in his life of Chopin he has the +courage to write: "Had Professor Niecks applied the term monotonous to +No. 12 we should have been more ready to indorse his opinion, as, +although great power is manifested, the very 'sameness' of the form of +the arpeggio figure causes a certain amount of monotony to be felt." +The C minor study is, in a degree, a return to the first study in C. +While the idea in the former is infinitely nobler, more dramatic and +tangible, there is in the latter naked, primeval simplicity, the larger +eloquence, the elemental puissance. Monotonous? A thousand times no! +Monotonous as is the thunder and spray of the sea when it tumbles and +roars on some sullen, savage shore. Beethov-ian, in its ruggedness, the +Chopin of this C minor study is as far removed from the musical +dandyisms of the Parisian drawing rooms as is Beethoven himself. It is +orchestral in intention and a true epic of the piano. +</P> + +<P> +Riemann places half notes at the beginning of each measure, as a +reminder of the necessary clinging of the thumbs. I like Von Bulow's +version the best of all. His directions are most minute. He gives the +Liszt method of working up the climax in octave triplets. How Liszt +must have thundered through this tumultuous work! Before it all +criticism should be silenced that fails to allow Chopin a place among +the greatest creative musicians. We are here in the presence of Chopin +the musician, not Chopin the composer for piano. +</P> + +<BR> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +III +</H4> + +<P> +In 1840, Trois Nouvelles Etudes, by Frederic Chopin, appeared in the +"Methode des Methodes pour le piano," by F. J. Fetis and I. Moscheles. +It was odd company for the Polish composer. "Internal evidence seems to +show," writes Niecks, "that these weakest of the master's +studies—which, however, are by no means uninteresting and certainly +very characteristic—may be regarded more than op. 25 as the outcome of +a gleaning." +</P> + +<P> +The last decade has added much to the artistic stature of these three +supplementary studies. They have something of the concision of the +Preludes. The first is a masterpiece. In F minor the theme in triplet +quarters, broad, sonorous and passionate, is unequally pitted against +four-eight notes in the bass. The technical difficulty to be overcome +is purely rhythmic, and Kullak takes pains to show how it may be +overcome. It is the musical, the emotional content of the study that +fascinates. The worthy editor calls it a companion piece to the F minor +study in op. 25. The comparison is not an apt one. Far deeper is this +new study, and although the doors never swing quite open, we divine the +tragic issues concealed. +</P> + +<P> +Beautiful in a different way is the A flat study which follows. Again +the problem is a rhythmical one, and again the composer demonstrates +his exhaustless invention and his power of evoking a single mood, +viewing all its lovely contours and letting it melt away like dream +magic. Full of gentle sprightliness and lingering sweetness is this +study. Chopin has the hypnotic quality more than any composer of the +century, Richard Wagner excepted. After you have enjoyed playing this +study read Kullak and his "triplicity in biplicity." It may do you +good, and it will not harm the music. +</P> + +<P> +In all the editions save one that I have seen the third study in D flat +begins on A flat, like the famous Valse in D flat. The exception is +Klindworth, who starts with B flat, the note above. The study is full +of sunny, good humor, spiritualized humor, and leaves the most cheering +impression after its performance. Its technical object is a +simultaneous legato and staccato. The result is an idealized Valse in +allegretto tempo, the very incarnation of joy, tempered by aristocratic +reserve. Chopin never romps, but he jests wittily, and always in +supremely good taste. This study fitly closes his extraordinary labors +in this form, and it is as if he had signed it "F. Chopin, et ego in +Arcady." +</P> + +<P> +Among the various editions let me recommend Klindworth for daily usage, +while frequent reference to Von Bulow, Riemann and Kullak cannot fail +to prove valuable, curious and interesting. +</P> + +<P> +Of the making of Chopin editions there is seemingly no end. In 1894 I +saw in manuscript some remarkable versions of the Chopin Studies by +Leopold Godowsky. The study in G sharp minor was the first one +published and played in public by this young pianist Unlike the Brahms +derangements, they are musical but immensely difficult. Topsy-turvied +as are the figures, a Chopin, even if lop-sided, hovers about, +sometimes with eye-brows uplifted, sometimes with angry, knitted +forehead and not seldom amused to the point of smiling. You see his +narrow shoulders, shrugged in the Polish fashion as he examines the +study in double-thirds transposed to the left hand! Curiously enough +this transcription, difficult as it is, does not tax the fingers as +much as a bedevilment of the A minor, op. 25, No. 4, which is extremely +difficult, demanding color discrimination and individuality of finger. +</P> + +<P> +More breath-catching, and a piece at which one must cry out: "Hats off, +gentlemen! A tornado!" is the caprice called "Badinage." But if it is +meant to badinage, it is no sport for the pianist of everyday technical +attainments. This is formed of two studies. In the right hand is the G +flat study, op. 25, No. 9, and in the left the black key study, op. 10, +No. 5. The two go laughing through the world like old friends; brother +and sister they are tonally, trailing behind them a cloud of iridescent +glory. Godowsky has cleverly combined the two, following their melodic +curves as nearly as is possible. In some places he has thickened the +harmonies and shifted the "black key" figures to the right hand. It is +the work of a remarkable pianist. This is the way it looks on paper at +the beginning: +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +[Musical llustration] +</P> + +<P> +The same study G flat, op. 10, No. 5, is also treated separately, the +melody being transferred to the treble. The Butterfly octaves, in +another study, are made to hop nimbly along in the left hand, and the C +major study, op. 10, No. 7, Chopin's Toccata, is arranged for the left +hand, and seems very practical and valuable. Here the adapter has +displayed great taste and skill, especially on the third page. The +pretty musical idea is not destroyed, but viewed from other points of +vantage. Op. 10, No. 2, is treated like a left hand study, as it should +be. Chopin did not always give enough work to the left hand, and the +first study of this opus in C is planned on brilliant lines for both +hands. Ingenious is the manipulation of the seldom played op. 25, No. +5, in E minor. As a study in rhythms and double notes it is very +welcome. The F minor study, op. 25, No. 2, as considered by the +ambidextrous Godowsky, is put in the bass, where it whirrs along to the +melodic encouragement of a theme of the paraphraser's own, in the +right. This study has suffered the most of all, for Brahms, in his +heavy, Teutonic way, set it grinding double sixths, while Isidor +Philipp, in his "Studies for the Left Hand," has harnessed it to sullen +octaves. This Frenchman, by the way, has also arranged for left hand +alone the G sharp minor, the D flat double sixths, the A minor—"Winter +Wind"—studies, the B flat minor prelude, and, terrible to relate, the +last movement of the Chopin B flat minor Sonata. +</P> + +<P> +Are the Godowsky transcriptions available? Certainly. In ten years—so +rapid is the technical standard advancing—they will be used in the +curriculum of students. Whether he has treated Chopin with reverence I +leave my betters to determine. What has reverence to do with the case, +anyhow? Plato is parsed in the schoolroom, and Beethoven taught in +conservatories! Therefore why worry over the question of Godowsky's +attitude! Besides, he is writing for the next generation—presumably a +generation of Rosenthals. +</P> + +<P> +And now, having passed over the salt and stubbly domain of pedagogics, +what is the dominant impression gleaned from the twenty-seven Chopin +studies? Is it not one of admiration, tinged with wonder at such a +prodigal display of thematic and technical invention? Their variety is +great, the aesthetic side is nowhere neglected for the purely +mechanical, and in the most poetic of them stuff may be found for +delicate fingers. Astounding, canorous, enchanting, alembicated and +dramatic, the Chopin studies are exemplary essays in emotion and +manner. In them is mirrored all of Chopin, the planetary as well as the +secular Chopin. When most of his piano music has gone the way of all +things fashioned by mortal hands, these studies will endure, will stand +for the nineteenth century as Beethoven crystallized the eighteenth, +Bach the seventeenth centuries in piano music. Chopin is a classic. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap07"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +VII. MOODS IN MINIATURE:—THE PRELUDES. +</H3> + +<P> +The Preludes bear the opus number 28 and are dedicated to J. C. +Kessler, a composer of well-known piano studies. It is only the German +edition that bears his name, the French and English being inscribed by +Chopin "a son ami Pleyel." As Pleyel advanced the pianist 2,000 francs +for the Preludes he had a right to say: "These are my Preludes." Niecks +is authority for Chopin's remark: "I sold the Preludes to Pleyel +because he liked them." This was in 1838, when Chopin's health demanded +a change of climate. He wished to go to Majorca with Madame Sand and +her children, and had applied for money to the piano maker and +publisher, Camille Pleyel. He received but five hundred francs in +advance, the balance being paid on delivery of the manuscript. +</P> + +<P> +The Preludes were published in 1839, yet there is internal evidence +which proves that most of them had been composed before the trip to the +Balearic Islands. This will upset the very pretty legend of music +making at the monastery of Valdemosa. Have we not all read with sweet +credulity the eloquent pages in George Sand in which the storm is +described that overtook the novelist and her son Maurice? After +terrible trials, dangers and delays, they reached their home and found +Chopin at the piano. Uttering a cry, he arose and stared at the pair. +"Ah! I knew well that you were dead." It was the sixth prelude, the one +in B minor, that he played, and dreaming, as Sand writes, that "he saw +himself drowned in a lake; heavy, ice cold drops of water fell at +regular intervals upon his breast; and when I called his attention to +those drops of water which were actually falling upon the roof, he +denied having heard them. He was even vexed at what I translated by the +term, imitative harmony. He protested with all his might, and he was +right, against the puerility of these imitations for the ear. His +genius was full of mysterious harmonies of nature." +</P> + +<P> +Yet this prelude was composed previous to the Majorcan episode. "The +Preludes," says Niecks, "consist—to a great extent, at least—of +pickings from the composer's portfolios, of pieces, sketches and +memoranda written at various times and kept to be utilized when +occasion might offer." +</P> + +<P> +Gutmann, Chopin's pupil, who nursed him to the last, declared the +Preludes to have been composed before he went away with Madame Sand, +and to Niecks personally he maintained that he had copied all of them. +Niecks does not credit him altogether, for there are letters in which +several of the Preludes are mentioned as being sent to Paris, so he +reaches the conclusion that "Chopin's labors at Majorca on the Preludes +were confined to selecting, filing and polishing." This seems to be a +sensible solution. +</P> + +<P> +Robert Schumann wrote of these Preludes: "I must signalize them as most +remarkable. I will confess I expected something quite different, +carried out in the grand style of his studies. It is almost the +contrary here; these are sketches, the beginning of studies, or, if you +will, ruins, eagles' feathers, all strangely intermingled. But in every +piece we find in his own hand, 'Frederic Chopin wrote it.' One +recognizes him in his pauses, in his impetuous respiration. He is the +boldest, the proudest poet soul of his time. To be sure the book also +contains some morbid, feverish, repellant traits; but let everyone look +in it for something that will enchant him. Philistines, however, must +keep away." +</P> + +<P> +It was in these Preludes that Ignaz Moscheles first comprehended Chopin +and his methods of execution. The German pianist had found his music +harsh and dilettantish in modulation, but Chopin's originality of +performance—"he glides lightly over the keys in a fairy-like way with +his delicate fingers"—quite reconciled the elder man to this strange +music. +</P> + +<P> +To Liszt the Preludes seem modestly named, but "are not the less types +of perfection in a mode created by himself, and stamped like all his +other works with the high impress of his poetic genius. Written in the +commencement of his career, they are characterized by a youthful vigor +not to be found in some of his subsequent works, even when more +elaborate, finished and richer in combinations; a vigor which is +entirely lost in his latest productions, marked by an overexcited +sensibility, a morbid irritability, and giving painful intimations of +his own state of suffering and exhaustion." +</P> + +<P> +Liszt, as usual, erred on the sentimental side. Chopin, being +essentially a man of moods, like many great men, and not necessarily +feminine in this respect, cannot always be pinned down to any +particular period. Several of the Preludes are very morbid—I purposely +use this word—as is some of his early music, while he seems quite gay +just before his death. +</P> + +<P> +"The Preludes follow out no technical idea, are free creations on a +small basis, and exhibit the musician in all his versatility," says +Louis Ehlert. "No work of Chopin's portrays his inner organization so +faithfully and completely. Much is embryonic. It is as though he turned +the leaves of his fancy without completely reading any page. Still, one +finds in them the thundering power of the Scherzi, the half satirical, +half coquettish elegance of the Mazurkas, and the southern, luxuriously +fragrant breath of the Nocturnes. Often it is as though they were small +falling stars dissolved into tones as they fall." +</P> + +<P> +Jean Kleczynski, who is credited with understanding Chopin, himself a +Pole and a pianist, thinks that "people have gone too far in seeking in +the Preludes for traces of that misanthropy, of that weariness of life +to which he was prey during his stay in the Island of Majorca...Very +few of the Preludes present this character of ennui, and that which is +the most marked, the second one, must have been written, according to +Count Tarnowski, a long time before he went to Majorca. ... What is +there to say concerning the other Preludes, full of good humor and +gaiety—No. 18, in E flat; No. 21, in B flat; No. 23, in F, or the +last, in D minor? Is it not strong and energetic, concluding, as it +does, with three cannon shots?" +</P> + +<P> +Willeby in his "Frederic Francois Chopin" considers at length the +Preludes. He agrees in the main with Niecks, that certain of these +compositions were written at Valdemosa—Nos. 4, 6, 9, 13, 20 and +21—and that "Chopin, having sketches of others with him, completed the +whole there, and published them under one opus number. ... The +atmosphere of those I have named is morbid and azotic; to them there +clings a faint flavor of disease, a something which is overripe in its +lusciousness and febrile in its passion. This in itself inclines me to +believe they were written at the time named." +</P> + +<P> +This is all very well, but Chopin was faint and febrile in his music +before he went to Majorca, and the plain facts adduced by Gutmann and +Niecks cannot be passed over. Henry James, an old admirer of Madame +Sand, admits her utter unreliability, and so we may look upon her +evidence as romantic but by no means infallible. The case now stands: +Chopin may have written a few of the Preludes at Majorca, filed them, +finished them, but the majority of them were in his portfolio in 1837 +and 1838. Op. 45, a separate Prelude in C sharp minor, was published in +December, 1841. It was composed at Nohant in August of that year. It is +dedicated to Mme. la Princesse Elizabeth Czernicheff, whose name, as +Chopin confesses in a letter, he knows not how to spell. +</P> + +<BR> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +II +</H4> + +<P> +Theodore Kullak is curt and pedagogic in his preface to the Preludes. +He writes: +</P> + +<P CLASS="block"> + Chopin's genius nowhere reveals itself more charmingly than + within narrowly bounded musical forms. The Preludes are, in + their aphoristic brevity, masterpieces of the first rank. Some + of them appear like briefly sketched mood pictures related to + the nocturne style, and offer no technical hindrance even to + the less advanced player. I mean Nos. 4, 6, 7, 9, 15 and 20. + More difficult are Nos. 17, 25 and 11, without, however, + demanding eminent virtuosity. The other Preludes belong to a + species of character-etude. Despite their brevity of outline + they are on a par with the great collections op. 10 and op. + 25. In so far as it is practicable—special cases of + individual endowments not being taken into consideration—I + would propose the following order of succession: Begin with + Nos. 1, 14, 10, 22, 23, 3 and 18. Very great bravura is + demanded by Nos. 12, 8, 16 and 24. The difficulty of the other + Preludes, Nos. 2, 5, 13, 19 and 21, lies in the delicate piano + and legato technique, which, on account of the extended + positions, leaps and double notes, presupposes a high degree + of development. +</P> + +<P> +This is eminently a common sense grouping. The first prelude, which, +like the first etude, begins in C, has all the characteristics of an +impromptu. We know the wonderful Bach Preludes, which grew out of a +free improvisation to the collection of dance forms called a suite, and +the preludes which precede his fugues. In the latter Bach sometimes +exhibits all the objectivity of the study or toccata, and often wears +his heart in full view. Chopin's Preludes—the only preludes to be +compared to Bach's—are largely personal, subjective, and intimate. +This first one is not Bach-ian, yet it could have been written by no +one but a devout Bach student. The pulsating, passionate, agitated, +feverish, hasty qualities of the piece are modern; so is the changeful +modulation. It is a beautiful composition, rising to no dramatic +heights, but questioning and full of life. Klindworth writes in triplet +groups, Kullak in quintolets. Breitkopf & Hartel do not. Dr. Hugo +Riemann, who has edited a few of the Preludes, phrases the first bars +thus: +</P> + +<P> +Desperate and exasperating to the nerves is the second prelude in A +minor. It is an asymmetric tune. Chopin seldom wrote ugly music, but is +this not ugly, forlorn, despairing, almost grotesque, and discordant? +It indicates the deepest depression in its sluggish, snake-like +progression. Willeby finds a resemblance to the theme of the first +nocturne. And such a theme! The tonality is vague, beginning in E +minor. Chopin's method of thematic parallelism is here very clear. A +small figure is repeated in descending keys until hopeless gloom and +depraved melancholy are reached in the closing chords. Chopin now is +morbid, here are all his most antipathetic qualities. There is aversion +to life—in this music he is a true lycanthrope. A self-induced +hypnosis, a mental, an emotional atrophy are all present. +</P> + +<P> +Kullak divides the accompaniment, difficult for small hands, between +the two. Riemann detaches the eighth notes of the bass figures, as is +his wont, for greater clearness. Like Klindworth, he accents heavily +the final chords. He marks his metronome 50 to the half note. All the +editions are lento with alla breve. +</P> + +<P> +That the Preludes are a sheaf of moods, loosely held together by the +rather vague title, is demonstrated by the third, in the key of G. The +rippling, rain-like figure for the left hand is in the nature of a +study. The melody is delicate in sentiment, Gallic in its esprit. A +true salon piece, this prelude has no hint of artificiality. It is a +precise antithesis to the mood of the previous one. Graceful and gay, +the G major prelude is a fair reflex of Chopin's sensitive and +naturally buoyant nature. It requires a light hand and nimble fingers. +The melodic idea requires no special comment. Kullak phrases it +differently from Riemann and Klindworth. The latter is the preferable. +Klindworth gives 72 to the half note as his metronomic marking, Riemann +only 60—which is too slow—while Klindworth contents himself by +marking a simple Vivace. Regarding the fingering one may say that all +tastes are pleased in these three editions. Klindworth's is the +easiest. Riemann breaks up the phrase in the bass figure, but I cannot +see the gain on the musical side. +</P> + +<P> +Niecks truthfully calls the fourth prelude in E minor "a little poem, +the exquisitely sweet, languid pensiveness of which defies description. +The composer seems to be absorbed in the narrow sphere of his ego, from +which the wide, noisy world is for the time shut out." Willeby finds +this prelude to be "one of the most beautiful of these spontaneous +sketches; for they are no more than sketches. The melody seems +literally to wail, and reaches its greatest pitch of intensity at the +stretto." For Karasowski it is a "real gem, and alone would immortalize +the name of Chopin as a poet." It must have been this number that +impelled Rubinstein to assert that the Preludes were the pearls of his +works. In the Klindworth edition, fifth bar from the last, the editor +has filled in the harmonies to the first six notes of the left hand, +added thirds, which is not reprehensible, although uncalled for. Kullak +makes some new dynamic markings and several enharmonic changes. He also +gives as metronome 69 to the quarter. This tiny prelude contains +wonderful music. The grave reiteration of the theme may have suggested +to Peter Cornelius his song "Ein Ton." Chopin expands a melodic unit, +and one singularly pathetic. The whole is like some canvas by +Rembrandt, Rembrandt who first dramatized the shadow in which a single +motif is powerfully handled; some sombre effect of echoing light in the +profound of a Dutch interior. For background Chopin has substituted his +soul; no one in art, except Bach or Rembrandt, could paint as Chopin +did in this composition. Its despair has the antique flavor, and there +is a breadth, nobility and proud submission quite free from the +tortured, whimpering complaint of the second prelude. The picture is +small, but the subject looms large in meanings. +</P> + +<P> +The fifth prelude in D is Chopin at his happiest. Its arabesque pattern +conveys a most charming content; and there is a dewy freshness, a joy +in life, that puts to flight much of the morbid tittle-tattle about +Chopin's sickly soul. The few bars of this prelude, so seldom heard in +public, reveal musicianship of the highest order. The harmonic scheme +is intricate; Klindworth phrases the first four bars so as to bring out +the alternate B and B flat. It is Chopin spinning his finest, his most +iridescent web. +</P> + +<P> +The next prelude, the sixth, in B minor, is doleful, pessimistic. As +George Sand says: "It precipitates the soul into frightful depression." +It is the most frequently played—and oh! how meaninglessly—prelude of +the set; this and the one in D flat. Classical is its repression of +feeling, its pure contour. The echo effect is skilfully managed, +monotony being artfully avoided. Klindworth rightfully slurs the duple +group of eighths; Kullak tries for the same effect by different means. +The duality of the voices should be clearly expressed. The tempo, +marked in both editions, lento assai, is fast. To be precise, +Klindworth gives 66 to the quarter. +</P> + +<P> +The plaintive little mazurka of two lines, the seventh prelude, is a +mere silhouette of the national dance. Yet in its measures is +compressed all Mazovia. Klindworth makes a variant in the fourth bar +from the last, a G sharp instead of an F sharp. It is a more piquant +climax, perhaps not admissible to the Chopin purist. In the F sharp +minor prelude No. 7, Chopin gives us a taste of his grand manner. For +Niecks the piece is jerky and agitated, and doubtless suggests a mental +condition bordering on anxiety; but if frenzy there is, it is kept well +in check by the exemplary taste of the composer. The sadness is rather +elegiac, remote, and less poignant than in the E minor prelude. +Harmonic heights are reached on the second page—surely Wagner knew +these bars when he wrote "Tristan and Isolde"—while the ingenuity of +the figure and avoidance of a rhythmical monotone are evidences of +Chopin's feeling for the decorative. It is a masterly prelude. +Klindworth accents the first of the bass triplets, and makes an +unnecessary enharmonic change at the sixth and seventh lines. +</P> + +<P> +There is a measure of grave content in the ninth prelude in E. It is +rather gnomic, and contains hints of both Brahms and Beethoven. It has +an ethical quality, but that may be because of its churchly rhythm and +color. +</P> + +<P> +The C sharp minor prelude, No. 10, must be the "eagle wings" of +Schumann's critique. There is a flash of steel gray, deepening into +black, and then the vision vanishes as though some huge bird aloft had +plunged down through blazing sunlight, leaving a color-echo in the void +as it passed to its quarry. Or, to be less figurative, this prelude is +a study in arpeggio, with double notes interspersed, and is too short +to make more than a vivid impression. +</P> + +<P> +No. II in B is all too brief. It is vivacious, dolce indeed, and most +cleverly constructed. Klindworth gives a more binding character to the +first double notes. Another gleam of the Chopin sunshine. +</P> + +<P> +Storm clouds gather in the G sharp minor, the twelfth prelude, so +unwittingly imitated by Grieg in his Menuetto of the same key, and in +its driving presto we feel the passionate clench of Chopin's hand. It +is convulsed with woe, but the intellectual grip, the self-command are +never lost in these two pages of perfect writing. The figure is +suggestive, and there is a well defined technical problem, as well as a +psychical character. Disputed territory is here: the editors do not +agree about the twelfth and eleventh bars from the last. According to +Breitkopf & Hartel the bass octaves are E both times. Mikuli gives G +sharp the first time instead of E; Klindworth, G sharp the second time; +Riemann, E, and also Kullak. The G sharp seems more various. +</P> + +<P> +In the thirteenth prelude, F sharp major, here is lovely atmosphere, +pure and peaceful. The composer has found mental rest. Exquisitely +poised are his pinions for flight, and in the piu lento he wheels +significantly and majestically about in the blue. The return to earth +is the signal for some strange modulatory tactics. It is an impressive +close. Then, almost without pause, the blood begins to boil in this +fragile man's veins. His pulse beat increases, and with stifled rage he +rushes into the battle. It is the fourteenth prelude in the sinister +key of E flat minor, and its heavy, sullen-arched triplets recalls for +Niecks the last movement of the B flat minor Sonata; but there is less +interrogation in the prelude, less sophistication, and the heat of +conflict over it all. There is not a break in the clouds until the +beginning of the fifteenth, the familiar prelude in D flat. +</P> + +<P> +This must be George Sand's: "Some of them create such vivid impressions +that the shades of dead monks seem to rise and pass before the hearer +in solemn and gloomy funereal pomp." The work needs no programme. Its +serene beginning, lugubrious interlude, with the dominant pedal never +ceasing, a basso ostinato, gives color to Kleczynski's contention that +the prelude in B minor is a mere sketch of the idea fully elaborated in +No. 15. "The foundation of the picture is the drops of rain falling at +regular intervals"—the echo principle again—"which by their continual +patter bring the mind to a state of sadness; a melody full of tears is +heard through the rush of the rain; then passing to the key of C sharp +minor, it rises from the depths of the bass to a prodigious crescendo, +indicative of the terror which nature in its deathly aspect excites in +the heart of man. Here again the form does not allow the ideas to +become too sombre; notwithstanding the melancholy which seizes you, a +feeling of tranquil grandeur revives you." To Niecks, the C sharp minor +portion affects one as in an oppressive dream: "The re-entrance of the +opening D flat, which dispels the dreadful nightmare, comes upon one +with the smiling freshness of dear, familiar nature." +</P> + +<P> +The prelude has a nocturnal character. It has become slightly banal +from frequent repetition, likewise the C sharp minor study in opus 25. +But of its beauty, balance and exceeding chastity there can be no +doubt. The architecture is at once Greek and Gothic. +</P> + +<P> +The sixteenth prelude in the relative key of B flat minor is the +boldest of the set. Its scale figures, seldom employed by Chopin, boil +and glitter, the thematic thread of the idea never being quite +submerged. Fascinating, full of perilous acclivities and sudden +treacherous descents, this most brilliant of preludes is Chopin in +riotous spirits. He plays with the keyboard: it is an avalanche, anon a +cascade, then a swift stream, which finally, after mounting to the +skies, descends to an abyss. Full of imaginative lift, caprice and +stormy dynamics, this prelude is the darling of the virtuoso. Its +pregnant introduction is like a madly jutting rock from which the eagle +spirit of the composer precipitates itself. +</P> + +<P> +In the twenty-third bar there is curious editorial discrepancy. +Klindworth uses an A natural in the first of the four groups of +sixteenths, Kullak a B natural; Riemann follows Kullak. Nor is this +all. Kullak in the second group, right hand, has an E flat, Klindworth +a D natural. Which is correct? Klindworth's texture is more closely +chromatic and it sounds better, the chromatic parallelism being more +carefully preserved. Yet I fancy that Kullak has tradition on his side. +</P> + +<P> +The seventeenth prelude Niecks finds Mendelssohn-ian. I do not. It is +suave, sweet, well developed, yet Chopin to the core, and its harmonic +life surprisingly rich and novel. The mood is one of tranquillity. The +soul loses itself in early autumnal revery while there is yet splendor +on earth and in the skies. Full of tonal contrasts, this highly +finished composition is grateful to the touch. The eleven booming A +flats on the last page are historical. Klindworth uses a B flat instead +of a G at the beginning of the melody. It is logical, but is it Chopin? +</P> + +<P> +The fiery recitatives of No. 18 in F minor are a glimpse of Chopin, +muscular and not hectic. In these editions you will find three +different groupings of the cadenzas. It is Riemann's opportunity for +pedagogic editing, and he does not miss it. In the first long breathed +group of twenty-two sixteenth notes he phrases as shown on the +following page. +</P> + +<P> +It may be noticed that Riemann even changes the arrangement of the +bars. This prelude is dramatic almost to an operatic degree. Sonorous, +rather grandiloquent, it is a study in declamation, the declamation of +the slow movement in the F minor concerto. Schumann may have had the +first phrase in his mind when he wrote his Aufschwung. This page of +Chopin's, the torso of a larger idea, is nobly rhetorical. +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +[Musical score excerpt] +</P> + +<P> +What piano music is the nineteenth prelude in E flat! Its widely +dispersed harmonies, its murmuring grace and June-like beauty, are they +not Chopin, the Chopin we best love? He is ever the necromancer, ever +invoking phantoms, but with its whirring melody and furtive caprice +this particular shape is an alluring one. And difficult it is to +interpret with all its plangent lyric freedom. +</P> + +<P> +No. 20 in C minor contains in its thirteen bars the sorrows of a +nation. It is without doubt a sketch for a funeral march, and of it +George Sand must have been thinking when she wrote that one prelude of +Chopin contained more music than all the trumpetings of Meyerbeer. +</P> + +<P> +Of exceeding loveliness is the B flat major prelude, No. 21. It is +superior in content and execution to most of the nocturnes. In feeling +it belongs to that form. The melody is enchanting. The accompaniment +figure shows inventive genius. Klindworth employs a short appoggiatura, +Kullak the long, in the second bar. Judge of what is true editorial +sciolism when I tell you that Riemann—who evidently believes in a +rigid melodic structure—has inserted an E flat at the end of bar four, +thus maiming the tender, elusive quality of Chopin's theme. This is +cruelly pedantic. The prelude arrests one in ecstasy; the fixed period +of contemplation of the saint or the hypnotized sets in, and the +awakening is almost painful. Chopin, adopting the relative minor key as +a pendant to the picture in B flat, thrills the nerves by a bold +dissonance in the next prelude, No. 22. Again, concise paragraphs +filled with the smoke of revolt and conflict The impetuosity of this +largely moulded piece in G minor, its daring harmonics,—read the +seventeenth and eighteenth bars,—and dramatic note make it an +admirable companion to the Prelude in F minor. Technically it serves as +an octave study for the left hand. +</P> + +<P> +In the concluding bar, but one, Chopin has in the F major Prelude +attempted a most audacious feat in harmony. An E flat in the bass of +the third group of sixteenths leaves the whole composition floating +enigmatically in thin air. It deliciously colors the close, leaving a +sense of suspense, of anticipation which is not tonally realized, for +the succeeding number is in a widely divorced key. But it must have +pressed hard the philistines. And this prelude, the twenty-third, is +fashioned out of the most volatile stuff. Aerial, imponderable, and +like a sun-shot spider web oscillating in the breeze of summer, its +hues change at every puff. It is in extended harmonics and must be +delivered with spirituality. The horny hand of the toilsome pianist +would shatter the delicate, swinging fantasy of the poet. Kullak points +out a variant in the fourteenth bar, G instead of B natural being used +by Riemann. Klindworth prefers the latter. +</P> + +<P> +We have reached the last prelude of op. 28. In D minor, it is +sonorously tragic, troubled by fevers and visions, and capricious, +irregular and massive in design. It may be placed among Chopin's +greater works: the two Etudes in C minor, the A minor, and the F sharp +minor Prelude. The bass requires an unusual span, and the suggestion by +Kullak, that the thumb of the right hand may eke out the weakness of +the left is only for the timid and the small of fist. But I do not +counsel following his two variants in the fifth and twenty-third bars. +Chopin's text is more telling. Like the vast reverberation of monstrous +waves on the implacable coast of a remote world is this prelude. +Despite its fatalistic ring, its note of despair is not dispiriting. +Its issues are larger, more impersonal, more elemental than the other +preludes. It is a veritable Appassionata, but its theatre is cosmic and +no longer behind the closed doors of the cabinet of Chopin's soul. The +Seelenschrei of Stanislaw Przybyszewski is here, explosions of wrath +and revolt; not Chopin suffers, but his countrymen. Kleczynski speaks +of the three tones at the close. They are the final clangor of +oppressed, almost overthrown, reason. After the subject reappears in C +minor there is a shift to D flat, and for a moment a point of repose is +gained, but this elusive rest is brief. The theme reappears in the +tonic and in octaves, and the tension becomes too great; the +accumulated passion discharges and dissolves in a fierce gust of double +chromatic thirds and octaves. Powerful, repellant, this prelude is +almost infernal in its pride and scorn. But in it I discern no vestige +of uncontrolled hysteria. It is well-nigh as strong, rank and human as +Beethoven. The various editorial phraseology is not of much moment. +Riemann uses thirty-second notes for the cadenzas, Kullak eighths and +Klindworth sixteenths. +</P> + +<P> +Niecks writes of the Prelude in C sharp minor, op. 45, that it +"deserves its name better than almost any one of the twenty-four; still +I would rather call it improvisata. It seems unpremeditated, a heedless +outpouring, when sitting at the piano in a lonely, dreary hour, perhaps +in the twilight. The quaver figure rises aspiringly, and the sustained +parts swell out proudly. The piquant cadenza forestalls in the +progression of diminished chords favorite effects of some of our more +modern composers. The modulation from C sharp minor to D major and back +again—after the cadenza—is very striking and equally beautiful." +</P> + +<P> +Elsewhere I have called attention to the Brahmsian coloring of this +prelude. Its mood is fugitive and hard to hold after capture. Recondite +it is and not music for the multitude. +</P> + +<P> +Niecks does not think Chopin created a new type in the Preludes. "They +are too unlike each other in form and character." Yet notwithstanding +the fleeting, evanescent moods of the Preludes, there is designedly a +certain unity of feeling and contrasted tonalities, all being grouped +in approved Bach-ian manner. This may be demonstrated by playing them +through at a sitting, which Arthur Friedheim, the Russian virtuoso, did +in a concert with excellent effect. As if wishing to exhibit his genius +in perspective, Chopin carved these cameos with exceeding fineness, +exceeding care. In a few of them the idea overbalances the form, but +the greater number are exquisite examples of a just proportion of +manner and matter, a true blending of voice and vision. Even in the +more microscopic ones the tracery, echoing like the spirals in strange +seashells, is marvellously measured. Much in miniature are these +sculptured Preludes of the Polish poet. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap08"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +VIII. IMPROMPTUS AND VALSES +</H3> + +<P> +To write of the four Impromptus in their own key of unrestrained +feeling and pondered intention would not be as easy as recapturing the +first "careless rapture" of the lark. With all the freedom of an +improvisation the Chopin impromptu has a well defined form. There is +structural impulse, although the patterns are free and original. The +mood-color is not much varied in three, the first, third and fourth, +but in the second there is a ballade-like quality that hints of the +tragic. The A flat Impromptu, op. 29, is, if one is pinned down to the +title, the happiest named of the set. Its seething, prankish, nimble, +bubbling quality is indicated from the start; the D natural in the +treble against the C and E flat—the dominant—in the bass is a most +original effect, and the flowing triplets of the first part of this +piece give a ductile, gracious, high-bred character to it. The +chromatic involutions are many and interesting. When the F minor part +is reached the ear experiences the relief of a strongly contrasted +rhythm. The simple duple measure, so naturally ornamented, is nobly, +broadly melodious. After the return of the first dimpling theme there +is a short coda, a chiaroscura, and then with a few chords the +composition goes to rest. A bird flew that way! Rubato should be +employed, for, as Kleczynski says, "Here everything totters from +foundation to summit, and everything is, nevertheless, so beautiful and +so clear." But only an artist with velvety fingers should play this +sounding arabesque. +</P> + +<P> +There is more limpidezza, more pure grace of line in the first +Impromptu than in the second in F sharp, op. 36. Here symmetry is +abandoned, as Kullak remarks, but the compensation of intenser +emotional issues is offered. There is something sphinx-like in the pose +of this work. Its nocturnal beginning with the carillon-like bass—a +bass that ever recalls to me the faint, buried tones of Hauptmann's +"Sunken Bell," the sweetly grave close of the section, the faint +hoof-beats of an approaching cavalcade, with the swelling thunders of +its passage, surely suggests a narrative, a programme. After the D +major episode there are two bars of anonymous modulation—these bars +creak on their hinges—and the first subject reappears in F, then +climbs to F sharp, thence merges into a glittering melodic organ-point, +exciting, brilliant, the whole subsiding into an echo of earlier +harmonies. The final octaves are marked fortissimo which always seems +brutal. Yet its logic lies in the scheme of the composer. Perhaps he +wished to arouse us harshly from his dreamland, as was his habit while +improvising for friends—a glissando would send them home shivering +after an evening of delicious reverie. +</P> + +<P> +Niecks finds this Impromptu lacking the pith of the first. To me it is +of more moment than the other three. It is irregular and wavering in +outline, the moods are wandering and capricious, yet who dares deny its +power, its beauty? In its use of accessory figures it does not reveal +so much ingenuity, but just because the "figure in the carpet" is not +so varied in pattern, its passion is all the deeper. It is another +Ballade, sadder, more meditative of the tender grace of vanished days. +</P> + +<P> +The third Impromptu in G flat, op. 51, is not often played. It may be +too difficult for the vandal with an average technique, but it is +neither so fresh in feeling nor so spontaneous in utterance as its +companions. There is a touch of the faded, blase, and it is hardly +healthy in sentiment. Here are some ophidian curves in triplets, as in +the first Impromptu, but with interludes of double notes, in coloring +tropical and rich to morbidity. The E flat minor trio is a fine bit of +melodic writing. The absence of simplicity is counterbalanced by +greater freedom of modulation and complexity of pattern. The impromptu +flavor is not missing, and there is allied to delicacy of design a +strangeness of sentiment—that strangeness which Edgar Poe declared +should be a constituent element of all great art. +</P> + +<P> +The Fantaisie-Impromptu in C sharp minor, op. 66, was published by +Fontana in 1855, and is one of the few posthumous works of Chopin +worthy of consideration. It was composed about 1834. A true Impromptu, +but the title of Fantaisie given by Fontana is superfluous. The piece +presents difficulties, chiefly rhythmical. Its involuted first phrases +suggest the Bellini-an fioriture so dear to Chopin, but the D flat part +is without nobility. Here is the same kind of saccharine melody that +makes mawkish the trio in the "Marche Funebre." There seems no danger +that this Fantaisie-Impromptu will suffer from neglect, for it is the +joy of the piano student, who turns its presto into a slow, blurred +mess of badly related rhythms, and its slower movement into a long +drawn sentimental agony; but in the hands of a master the C sharp minor +Impromptu is charming, though not of great depth. +</P> + +<P> +The first Impromptu, dedicated to Mlle. la Comtesse de Lobau, was +published December, 1837; the second, May, 1840; the third, dedicated +to Madame la Comtesse Esterhazy, February, 1843. Not one of these four +Impromptus is as naive as Schubert's; they are more sophisticated and +do not smell of nature and her simplicities. +</P> + +<P> +Of the Chopin Valses it has been said that they are dances of the soul +and not of the body. Their animated rhythms, insouciant airs and +brilliant, coquettish atmosphere, the true atmosphere of the ballroom, +seem to smile at Ehlert's poetic exaggeration. The valses are the most +objective of the Chopin works, and in few of them is there more than a +hint of the sullen, Sargasson seas of the nocturnes and scherzi. +Nietzsche's la Gaya Scienza—the Gay Science—is beautifully set forth +in the fifteen Chopin valses. They are less intimate, in the psychic +sense, but exquisite exemplars of social intimacy and aristocratic +abandon. As Schumann declared, the dancers of these valses should be at +least countesses. There is a high-bred reserve despite their +intoxication, and never a hint of the brawling peasants of Beethoven, +Grieg, Brahms, Tschaikowsky, and the rest. But little of Vienna is in +Chopin. Around the measures of this most popular of dances he has +thrown mystery, allurement, and in them secret whisperings and the +unconscious sigh. It is going too far not to dance to some of this +music, for it is putting Chopin away from the world he at times loved. +Certain of the valses may be danced: the first, second, fifth, sixth, +and a few others. The dancing would be of necessity more picturesque +and less conventional than required by the average valse, and there +must be fluctuations of tempo, sudden surprises and abrupt languors. +The mazurkas and polonaises are danced to-day in Poland, why not the +valses? Chopin's genius reveals itself in these dance forms, and their +presentation should be not solely a psychic one. Kullak, stern old +pedagogue, divides these dances into two groups, the first dedicated to +"Terpsichore," the second a frame for moods. Chopin admitted that he +was unable to play valses in the Viennese fashion, yet he has contrived +to rival Strauss in his own genre. Some of these valses are trivial, +artificial, most of them are bred of candlelight and the swish of +silken attire, and a few are poetically morbid and stray across the +border into the rhythms of the mazurka. All of them have been edited to +death, reduced to the commonplace by vulgar methods of performance, but +are altogether sprightly, delightful specimens of the composer's +careless, vagrant and happy moods. +</P> + +<P> +Kullak utters words of warning to the "unquiet" sex regarding the +habitual neglect of the bass. It should mean something in valse tempo, +but it usually does not. Nor need it be brutally banged; the +fundamental tone must be cared for, the subsidiary harmonies lightly +indicated. The rubato in the valses need not obtrude itself as in the +mazurkas. +</P> + +<P> +Opus 18, in E flat, was published in June, 1834, and dedicated to Mile. +Laura Harsford. It is a true ballroom picture, spirited and infectious +in rhythms. Schumann wrote rhapsodically of it. The D flat section has +a tang of the later Chopin. There is bustle, even chatter, in this +valse, which in form and content is inferior to op. 34, No. I, A flat. +The three valses of this set were published December, 1838. There are +many editorial differences in the A flat Valse, owing to the careless +way it was copied and pirated. Klindworth and Kullak are the safest for +dynamic markings. This valse may be danced as far as its dithyrhambic +coda. Notice in this coda as in many other places the debt Schumann +owes Chopin for a certain passage in the Preambule of his "Carneval." +</P> + +<P> +The next Valse in A minor has a tinge of Sarmatian melancholy, indeed, +it is one of Chopin's most desponding moods. The episode in C rings of +the mazurka, and the A major section is of exceeding loveliness; Its +coda is characteristic. This valse is a favorite, and who need wonder? +The F major Valse, the last of this series, is a whirling, wild dance +of atoms. It has the perpetuum mobile quality, and older masters would +have prolonged its giddy arabesques into pages of senseless spinning. +It is quite long enough as it is. The second theme is better, but the +appoggiatures are flippant. It buzzes to the finish. Of it is related +that Chopin's cat sprang upon his keyboard and in its feline flight +gave him the idea of the first measures. I suppose as there is a dog +valse, there had to be one for the cat. +</P> + +<P> +But as Rossini would have said, "Ca sent de Scarlatti!" +</P> + +<P> +The A minor Valse was, of the three, Chopin's favorite. When Stephen +Heller told him this too was his beloved valse, Chopin was greatly +pleased, inviting the Hungarian composer, Niecks relates, to luncheon +at the Cafe Riche. +</P> + +<P> +Not improvised in the ballroom as the preceding, yet a marvellous +epitome is the A flat Valse, op. 42, published July, 1840. It is the +best rounded specimen of Chopin's experimenting with the form. The +prolonged trill on E flat, summoning us to the ballroom, the suggestive +intermingling of rhythms, duple and triple, the coquetry, hesitation, +passionate avowal and the superb coda, with its echoes of evening—have +not these episodes a charm beyond compare? Only Schumann in certain +pages of his "Carneval" seizes the secret of young life and love, but +his is not so finished, so glowing a tableau. +</P> + +<P> +Regarding certain phrasing of this valse Moriz Rosenthal wrote to the +London "Musical Standard": +</P> + +<P CLASS="block"> + In Music there is Liberty and Fraternity, but seldom Equality, + and in music Social Democracy has no voice. Notes have a right + to the Aftertone (Nachton), and this right depends upon their + role in the key. The Vorhalt (accented passing note) will + always have an accent. On this point Riemann must without + question be considered right. Likewise the feeling player will + mark those notes that introduce the transition to another key. + We will consider now our example and set down my accents: +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +[Musical score excerpt] +</P> + +<P CLASS="block"> + In the first bar we have the tonic chord of its major key as + bass, and are thus not forced to any accent. In the second bar + we have the dominant harmony in the bass, and in the treble, + C, which falls upon the down beat as Vorhalt to the next tone + (B flat), so it must be accented. Also in the fourth bar the B + flat is Vorhalt to the B flat, and likewise requires an + accent. In bars 6, 7 and 8 the notes, A flat, B flat and C, + are without doubt the characteristic ones of the passage, and + the E flat has in each case only a secondary significance. +</P> + +<P CLASS="block"> + That a genius like Chopin did not indicate everything + accurately is quite explainable. He flew where we merely limp + after. Moreover, these accents must be felt rather than + executed, with softest touch, and as tenderly as possible. +</P> + +<P> +The D flat Valse—"le valse du petit chien"—is of George Sand's own +prompting. One evening at her home in the Square d'Orleans, she was +amused by her little pet dog, chasing its tail. She begged Chopin, her +little pet pianist, to set the tail to music. He did so, and behold the +world is richer for this piece. I do not dispute the story. It seems +well grounded, but then it is so ineffably silly! The three valses of +this op. 64 were published September, 1847, and are respectively +dedicated to the Comtesse Delphine Potocka, the Baronne Nathaniel de +Rothschild and the Baronne Bronicka. +</P> + +<P> +I shall not presume to speak of the execution of the D flat Valse; like +the rich, it is always with us. It is usually taken at a meaningless, +rapid gait. I have heard it played by a genuine Chopin pupil, M. +Georges Mathias, and he did not take it prestissimo. He ran up the D +flat scale, ending with a sforzato at the top, and gave a variety of +nuance to the composition. The cantabile is nearly always delivered +with sloppiness of sentiment. This valse has been served up in a highly +indigestible condition for concert purposes by Tausig, Joseffy—whose +arrangement was the first to be heard here—Theodore Ritter, Rosenthal +and Isidor Philipp. +</P> + +<P> +The C sharp minor Valse is the most poetic of all. The first theme has +never been excelled by Chopin for a species of veiled melancholy. It is +a fascinating, lyrical sorrow, and what Kullak calls the psychologic +motivation of the first theme in the curving figure of the second does +not relax the spell. A space of clearer skies, warmer, more consoling +winds are in the D flat interlude, but the spirit of unrest, ennui +returns. The elegiac imprint is unmistakable in this soul dance. The A +flat Valse which follows is charming. It is for superior souls who +dance with intellectual joy, with the joy that comes of making +exquisite patterns and curves. Out of the salon and from its +brilliantly lighted spaces the dancers do not wander, do not dance into +the darkness and churchyard, as Ehlert imagines of certain other valses. +</P> + +<P> +The two valses in op. 69, three valses, op. 70, and the two remaining +valses in E minor and E major, need not detain us. They are posthumous. +The first of op. 69 in F minor was composed in 1836; the B minor in +1829; G flat, op. 70, in 1835; F minor in 1843, and D flat major, 1830. +The E major and E minor were composed in 1829. Fontana gave these +compositions to the world. The F minor Valse, op. 69, No. 1, has a +charm of its own. Kullak prints the Fontana and Klindworth variants. +This valse is suavely melancholy, but not so melancholy as the B minor +of the same opus. It recalls in color the B minor mazurka. Very gay and +sprightly is the G flat Valse, op. 70, No. I. The next in F minor has +no special physiognomy, while the third in D flat contains, as Niecks +points out, germs of the op. 42 and the op. 34 Valses. It recalls to me +the D flat study in the supplementary series. The E minor Valse, +without opus, is beloved. It is very graceful and not without +sentiment. The major part is the early Chopin. The E major Valse is +published in the Mikuli edition. It is commonplace, hinting of its +composer only in places. Thus ends the collection of valses, not +Chopin's most signal success in art, but a success that has dignified +and given beauty to this conventional dance form. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap09"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +IX. NIGHT AND ITS MELANCHOLY MYSTERIES:—THE NOCTURNES +</H3> + +<P> +Here is the chronology of the nocturnes: Op. 9, three nocturnes, +January, 1833; op. 15, three nocturnes, January, 1834; op. 27, two +nocturnes, May, 1836; op. 32, two nocturnes, December, 1837; op. 37, +two nocturnes, May, 1840; op. 48, two nocturnes, November, 1841; op. +55, two nocturnes, August, 1844; op. 62, two nocturnes, September, +1846. In addition there is a nocturne written in 1828 and published by +Fontana, with the opus number 72, No. 2, and the lately discovered one +in C sharp minor, written when Chopin was young and published in 1895. +This completes the nocturne list, but following Niecks' system of +formal grouping I include the Berceuse and Barcarolle as full fledged +specimens of nocturnes. +</P> + +<P> +John Field has been described as the forerunner of Chopin. The limpid +style of this pupil and friend of Clementi, his beautiful touch and +finished execution, were certainly admired and imitated by the Pole. +Field's nocturnes are now neglected—so curious are Time's +caprices—and without warrant, for not only is Field the creator of the +form, but in both his concertos and nocturnes he has written charming, +sweet and sane music. He rather patronized Chopin, for whose melancholy +pose he had no patience. "He has a talent of the hospital," growled +Field in the intervals between his wine drinking, pipe smoking and the +washing of his linen—the latter economical habit he contracted from +Clementi. There is some truth in his stricture. Chopin, seldom +exuberantly cheerful, is morbidly sad and complaining in many of the +nocturnes. The most admired of his compositions, with the exception of +the valses, they are in several instances his weakest. Yet he ennobled +the form originated by Field, giving it dramatic breadth, passion and +even grandeur. Set against Field's naive and idyllic specimens, +Chopin's efforts are often too bejewelled for true simplicity, too +lugubrious, too tropical—Asiatic is a better word—and they have the +exotic savor of the heated conservatory, and not the fresh scent of the +flowers reared in the open by the less poetic Irishman. And, then, +Chopin is so desperately sentimental in some of these compositions. +They are not altogether to the taste of this generation; they seem to +be suffering from anaemia. However, there are a few noble nocturnes; +and methods of performance may have much to answer for the +sentimentalizing of some others. More vigor, a quickening of the +time-pulse, and a less languishing touch will rescue them from lush +sentiment. Chopin loved the night and its soft mysteries as much as did +Robert Louis Stevenson, and his nocturnes are true night pieces, some +with agitated, remorseful countenance, others seen in profile only, +while many are whisperings at dusk. Most of them are called feminine, a +term psychologically false. The poetic side of men of genius is +feminine, and in Chopin the feminine note was over emphasized—at times +it was almost hysterical—particularly in these nocturnes. +</P> + +<P> +The Scotch have a proverb: "She wove her shroud, and wore it in her +lifetime." In the nocturnes the shroud is not far away. Chopin wove his +to the day of his death, and he wore it sometimes but not always, as +many think. +</P> + +<P> +One of the most elegiac of his nocturnes is the first in B flat minor. +It is one of three, op. 9, dedicated to Mme. Camille Pleyel. Of far +more significance than its two companions, it is, for some reason, +neglected. While I am far from agreeing with those who hold that in the +early Chopin all his genius was completely revealed, yet this nocturne +is as striking as the last, for it is at once sensuous and dramatic, +melancholy and lovely. Emphatically a mood, it is best heard on a gray +day of the soul, when the times are out of joint; its silken tones will +bring a triste content as they pour out upon one's hearing. The second +section in octaves is of exceeding charm. As a melody it has all the +lurking voluptuousness and mystic crooning of its composer. There is +flux and reflux throughout, passion peeping out in the coda. +</P> + +<P> +The E flat nocturne is graceful, shallow of content, but if it is +played with purity of touch and freedom from sentimentality it is not +nearly so banal as it usually seems. It is Field-like, therefore play +it as did Rubinstein, in a Field-like fashion. +</P> + +<P> +Hadow calls attention to the "remote and recondite modulations" in the +twelfth bar, the chromatic double notes. For him they only are one real +modulation, "the rest of the passage is an iridescent play of color, an +effect of superficies, not an effect of substance." It was the E flat +nocturne that unloosed Rellstab's critical wrath in the "Iris." Of it +he wrote: "Where Field smiles, Chopin makes a grinning grimace; where +Field sighs, Chopin groans; where Field shrugs his shoulders, Chopin +twists his whole body; where Field puts some seasoning into the food, +Chopin empties a handful of cayenne pepper. In short, if one holds +Field's charming romances before a distorting, concave mirror, so that +every delicate impression becomes a coarse one, one gets Chopin's work. +We implore Mr. Chopin to return to nature." +</P> + +<P> +Rellstab might have added that while Field was often commonplace, +Chopin never was. Rather is to be preferred the sound judgment of J. W. +Davison, the English critic and husband of the pianist, Arabella +Goddard. Of the early works he wrote: +</P> + +<P CLASS="block"> + Commonplace is instinctively avoided in all the works of + Chopin—a stale cadence or a trite progression—a hum-drum + subject or a worn-out passage—a vulgar twist of the melody or + a hackneyed sequence—a meagre harmony or an unskilful + counterpoint—may in vain be looked for throughout the entire + range of his compositions, the prevailing characteristics of + which are a feeling as uncommon as beautiful; a treatment as + original as felicitous; a melody and a harmony as new, fresh, + vigorous and striking as they are utterly unexpected and out + of the original track. In taking up one of the works of Chopin + you are entering, as it were, a fairyland untrodden by human + footsteps—a path hitherto unfrequented but by the great + composer himself. +</P> + +<P> +Gracious, even coquettish, is the first part of the B major Nocturne of +this opus. Well knit, the passionate intermezzo has the true dramatic +Chopin ring. It should be taken alla breve. The ending is quite +effective. +</P> + +<P> +I do not care much for the F major Nocturne, op. 15, No. I. The opus is +dedicated to Ferdinand Hiller. Ehlert speaks of "the ornament in +triplets with which he brushes the theme as with the gentle wings of a +butterfly," and then discusses the artistic value of the ornament which +may be so profitably studied in the Chopin music. "From its nature, the +ornament can only beautify the beautiful." Music like Chopin's, "with +its predominating elegance, could not forego ornament. But he surely +did not purchase it of a jeweller; he designed it himself, with a +delicate hand. He was the first to surround a note with diamond facets +and to weave the rushing floods of his emotions with the silver beams +of the moonlight. In his nocturnes there is a glimmering as of distant +stars. From these dreamy, heavenly gems he has borrowed many a line. +The Chopin nocturne is a dramatized ornament. And why may not Art speak +for once in such symbols? In the much admired F sharp major Nocturne +the principal theme makes its appearance so richly decorated that one +cannot avoid imagining that his fancy confined itself to the Arabesque +form for the expression of its poetical sentiments. Even the middle +part borders upon what I should call the tragic style of ornament. The +ground thought is hidden behind a dense veil, but a veil, too, can be +an ornament." +</P> + +<P> +In another place Ehlert thinks that the F sharp major Nocturne seems +inseparable from champagne and truffles. It is certainly more elegant +and dramatic than the one in F major, which precedes it. That, with the +exception of the middle part in F minor, is weak, although rather +pretty and confiding. The F sharp Nocturne is popular. The "doppio +movemento" is extremely striking and the entire piece is saturated with +young life, love and feelings of good will to men. Read Kleczynski. The +third nocturne of the three is in G minor, and contains some fine, +picturesque writing. Kullak does not find in it aught of the fantastic. +The languid, earth-weary voice of the opening and the churchly refrain +of the chorale, is not this fantastic contrast! This nocturne contains +in solution all that Chopin developed later in a nocturne of the same +key. But I think the first stronger—its lines are simpler, more +primitive, its coloring less complicated, yet quite as rich and gloomy. +Of it Chopin said: "After Hamlet," but changed his mind. "Let them +guess for themselves," was his sensible conclusion. Kullak's programme +has a conventional ring. It is the lament for the beloved one, the lost +Lenore, with the consolation of religion thrown in. The "bell-tones" of +the plain chant bring to my mind little that consoles, although the +piece ends in the major mode. It is like Poe's "Ulalume." A complete +and tiny tone poem, Rubinstein made much of it. In the fourth bar and +for three bars there is a held note F, and I heard the Russian +virtuoso, by some miraculous means, keep this tone prolonged. The tempo +is abnormally slow, and the tone is not in a position where the +sustaining pedal can sensibly help it. Yet under Rubinstein's fingers +it swelled and diminished, and went singing into D, as if the +instrument were an organ. I suspected the inaudible changing of fingers +on the note or a sustaining pedal. It was wonderfully done. +</P> + +<P> +The next nocturne, op. 27, No. I, brings us before a masterpiece. With +the possible exception of the C minor Nocturne, this one in the sombre +key of C sharp minor is the great essay in the form. Kleczynski finds +it "a description of a calm night at Venice, where, after a scene of +murder, the sea closes over a corpse and continues to serve as a mirror +to the moonlight." This is melodramatic. Willeby analyzes it at length +with the scholarly fervor of an English organist. He finds the +accompaniment to be "mostly on a double pedal," and remarks that +"higher art than this one could not have if simplicity of means be a +factor of high art." The wide-meshed figure of the left hand supports a +morbid, persistent melody that grates on the nerves. From the piu mosso +the agitation increases, and here let me call to your notice the +Beethoven-ish quality of these bars, which continue until the change of +signature. There is a surprising climax followed by sunshine and favor +in the D flat part, then after mounting dissonances a bold succession +of octaves returns to the feverish plaint of the opening. Kullak speaks +of a resemblance to Meyerbeer's song, Le Moine. The composition reaches +exalted states. Its psychological tension is so great at times as to +border on a pathological condition. There is unhealthy power in this +nocturne, which is seldom interpreted with sinister subtlety. Henry T. +Finck rightfully thinks it "embodies a greater variety of emotion and +more genuine dramatic spirit on four pages than many operas on four +hundred." +</P> + +<P> +The companion picture in D flat, op. 27, No. 2, has, as Karasowski +writes, "a profusion of delicate fioriture." It really contains but one +subject, and is a song of the sweet summer of two souls, for there is +obvious meaning in the duality of voices. Often heard in the concert +room, this nocturne gives us a surfeit of sixths and thirds of +elaborate ornamentation and monotone of mood. Yet it is a lovely, +imploring melody, and harmonically most interesting. A curious marking, +and usually overlooked by pianists, is the crescendo and con forza of +the cadenza. This is obviously erroneous. The theme, which occurs three +times, should first be piano, then pianissimo, and lastly forte. This +opus is dedicated to the Comtesse d'Appony. +</P> + +<P> +The best part of the next nocturne,—B major, op. 32, No. I, dedicated +to Madame de Billing—is the coda. It is in the minor and is like the +drum-beat of tragedy. The entire ending, a stormy recitative, is in +stern contrast to the dreamy beginning. Kullak in the first bar of the +last line uses a G; Fontana, F sharp, and Klindworth the same as +Kullak. The nocturne that follows in A flat is a reversion to the Field +type, the opening recalling that master's B flat Nocturne. The F minor +section of Chopin's broadens out to dramatic reaches, but as an +entirety this opus is a little tiresome. Nor do I admire inordinately +the Nocturne in G minor, op. 37, No. 1. It has a complaining tone, and +the choral is not noteworthy. This particular part, so Chopin's pupil +Gutmann declared, is taken too slowly, the composer having forgotten to +mark the increased tempo. But the Nocturne in G, op. 37, No. 2, is +charming. Painted with Chopin's most ethereal brush, without the +cloying splendors of the one in D flat, the double sixths, fourths and +thirds are magically euphonious. The second subject, I agree with +Karasowski, is the most beautiful melody Chopin ever wrote. It is in +true barcarolle vein; and most subtle are the shifting harmonic hues. +Pianists usually take the first part too fast, the second too slowly, +transforming this poetic composition into an etude. As Schumann wrote +of this opus: +</P> + +<P> +"The two nocturnes differ from his earlier ones chiefly through greater +simplicity of decoration and more quiet grace. We know Chopin's +fondness in general for spangles, gold trinkets and pearls. He has +already changed and grown older; decoration he still loves, but it is +of a more judicious kind, behind which the nobility of the poetry +shimmers through with all the more loveliness: indeed, taste, the +finest, must be granted him." +</P> + +<P> +Both numbers of this opus are without dedication. They are the +offspring of the trip to Majorca. +</P> + +<P> +Niecks, writing of the G major Nocturne, adjures us "not to tarry too +long in the treacherous atmosphere of this Capua—it bewitches and +unmans." Kleczynski calls the one in G minor "homesickness," while the +celebrated Nocturne in C minor "is the tale of a still greater grief +told in an agitated recitando; celestial harps"—ah! I hear the squeak +of the old romantic machinery—"come to bring one ray of hope, which is +powerless in its endeavor to calm the wounded soul, which...sends forth +to heaven a cry of deepest anguish." It doubtless has its despairing +movement, this same Nocturne in C minor, op. 48, No. I, but Karasowski +is nearer right when he calls it "broad and most imposing with its +powerful intermediate movement, a thorough departure from the nocturne +style." Willeby finds it "sickly and labored," and even Niecks does not +think it should occupy a foremost place among its companions. The +ineluctable fact remains that this is the noblest nocturne of them all. +Biggest in conception it seems a miniature music drama. It requires the +grand manner to read it adequately, and the doppio movemento is +exciting to a dramatic degree. I fully agree with Kullak that too +strict adherence to the marking of this section produces the effect of +an "inartistic precipitation" which robs the movement of clarity. +Kleczynski calls the work The Contrition of a Sinner and devotes +several pages to its elucidation. De Lenz chats most entertainingly +with Tausig about it. Indeed, an imposing march of splendor is the +second subject in C. A fitting pendant is this work to the C sharp +minor Nocturne. Both have the heroic quality, both are free from +mawkishness and are of the greater Chopin, the Chopin of the mode +masculine. +</P> + +<P> +Niecks makes a valuable suggestion: "In playing these nocturnes—op. +48—there occurred to me a remark of Schumann's, when he reviewed some +nocturnes by Count Wielhorski. He said that the quick middle movements +which Chopin frequently introduced into his nocturnes are often weaker +than his first conceptions; meaning the first portions of his +nocturnes. Now, although the middle part in the present instances are, +on the contrary, slower movements, yet the judgment holds good; at +least with respect to the first nocturne, the middle part of which has +nothing to recommend it but a full, sonorous instrumentation, if I may +use this word in speaking of one instrument. The middle part of the +second—D flat, molto piu lento—however, is much finer; in it we meet +again, as we did in some other nocturnes, with soothing, simple chord +progressions. When Gutmann studied the C sharp minor Nocturne with +Chopin, the master told him that the middle section—the molto piu +lento in D flat major—should be played as a recitative. 'A tyrant +commands'—the first two chords—he said, 'and the other asks for +mercy.'" +</P> + +<P> +Of course Niecks means the F sharp minor, not the C sharp minor +Nocturne, op. 48, No. 2, dedicated, with the C minor, to Mlle. L. +Duperre. +</P> + +<P> +Opus 55, two nocturnes in F minor and E flat major, need not detain us +long. The first is familiar. Kleczynski devotes a page or more to its +execution. He seeks to vary the return of the chief subject with +nuances—as would an artistic singer the couplets of a classic song. +There are "cries of despair" in it, but at last a "feeling of hope." +Kullak writes of the last measures: "Thank God—the goal is reached!" +It is the relief of a major key after prolonged wanderings in the +minor. It is a nice nocturne, neat in its sorrow, yet not epoch-making. +The one following has "the impression of an improvisation." It has also +the merit of being seldom heard. These two nocturnes are dedicated to +Mlle. J. W. Stirling. +</P> + +<P> +Opus 62 brings us to a pair in B major and E major inscribed to Madame +de Konneritz. The first, the Tuberose Nocturne, is faint with a sick, +rich odor. The climbing trellis of notes, that so unexpectedly leads to +the tonic, is charming and the chief tune has charm, a fruity charm. It +is highly ornate, its harmonies dense, the entire surface overrun with +wild ornamentation and a profusion of trills. The piece—the third of +its sort in the key of B—is not easy. Mertke gives the following +explication of the famous chain trills: +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +[Musical score excerpt] +</P> + +<P> +Although this nocturne is luxuriant in style, it deserves warmer praise +than is accorded it. Irregular as its outline is, its troubled lyrism +is appealing, is melting, and the A flat portion, with its hesitating, +timid accents, has great power of attraction. The E major Nocturne has +a bardic ring. Its song is almost declamatory and not at all +sentimental—unless so distorted—as Niecks would have us imagine. The +intermediate portion is wavering and passionate, like the middle of the +F sharp major Nocturne. It shows no decrease in creative vigor or +lyrical fancy. The Klindworth version differs from the original, as an +examination of the following examples will show, the upper being +Chopin's: +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +[Musical score excerpt] +</P> + +<P> +The posthumous nocturne in E minor, composed in 1827, is weak and +uninteresting. Moreover, it contains some very un-Chopin-like +modulations. The recently discovered nocturne in C sharp minor is +hardly a treasure trove. It is vague and reminiscent The following note +was issued by its London publishers, Ascherberg & Co.: +</P> + +<P CLASS="block"> + The first question, suggested by the announcement of a new + posthumous composition of Chopin's, will be "What proof is + there of its authenticity?" To musicians and amateurs who + cannot recognize the beautiful Nocturne in C sharp minor as + indeed the work of Chopin, it may in the first place be + pointed out that the original manuscript (of which a facsimile + is given on the title-page) is in Chopin's well-known + handwriting, and, secondly, that the composition, which is + strikingly characteristic, was at once accepted as the work of + Chopin by the distinguished composer and pianist Balakireff, + who played it for the first time in public at the Chopin + Commemoration Concert, held in the autumn of 1894 at Zelazowa + Wola, and afterward at Warsaw. This nocturne was addressed by + Chopin to his sister Louise, at Warsaw, in a letter from + Paris, and was written soon after the production of the two + lovely piano concertos, when Chopin was still a very young + man. It contains a quotation from his most admired Concerto in + F minor, and a brief reference to the charming song known as + the Maiden's Wish, two of his sister's favorite melodies. The + manuscript of the nocturne was supposed to have been destroyed + in the sacking of the Zamojski Palace, at Warsaw, toward the + end of the insurrection of 1863, but it was discovered quite + recently among papers of various kinds in the possession of a + Polish gentleman, a great collector, whose son offered Mr. + Polinski the privilege of selecting from such papers. His + choice was three manuscripts of Chopin's, one of them being + this nocturne. A letter from Mr. Polinski on the subject of + this nocturne is in the possession of Miss Janotha. +</P> + +<P> +Is this the nocturne of which Tausig spoke to his pupil Joseffy as +belonging to the Master's "best period," or did he refer to the one in +E minor? +</P> + +<P> +The Berceuse, op. 57, published June, 1845, and dedicated to Mlle. +Elise Gavard, is the very sophistication of the art of musical +ornamentation. It is built on a tonic and dominant bass—the triad of +the tonic and the chord of the dominant seventh. A rocking theme is set +over this basso ostinato and the most enchanting effects are produced. +The rhythm never alters in the bass, and against this background, the +monotone of a dark, gray sky, the composer arranges an astonishing +variety of fireworks, some florid, some subdued, but all delicate in +tracery and design. Modulations from pigeon egg blue to Nile green, +most misty and subtle modulations, dissolve before one's eyes, and for +a moment the sky is peppered with tiny stars in doubles, each +independently tinted. Within a small segment of the chromatic bow +Chopin has imprisoned new, strangely dissonant colors. It is a miracle; +and after the drawn-out chord of the dominant seventh and the rain of +silvery fire ceases one realizes that the whole piece is a delicious +illusion, but an ululation in the key of D flat, the apotheosis of +pyrotechnical colorature. +</P> + +<P> +Niecks quotes Alexandre Dumas fils, who calls the Berceuse "muted +music," but introduces a Turkish bath comparison, which crushes the +sentiment. Mertke shows the original and Klindworth's reading of a +certain part of the Berceuse, adding a footnote to the examples: +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +[Two musical score excerpts from Op. 57, one from the original version, +one from Klindworth's edition] +</P> + +<P> +[Footnote: Das tr (flat) der Originale (Scholtz tr natural-flat) +zeigt, dass Ch. den Triller mit Ganzton und nach Mikuli den +Trilleranfang mit Hauptton wollte.] The Barcarolle, op. 60, published +September, 1846, is another highly elaborated work. Niecks must be +quoted here: "One day Tausig, the great piano virtuoso, promised W. de +Lenz to play him Chopin's Barcarolle, adding, 'That is a performance +which must not be undertaken before more than two persons. I shall play +you my own self. I love the piece, but take it rarely.' Lenz got the +music, but it did not please him—it seemed to him a long movement in +the nocturne style, a Babel of figuration on a lightly laid foundation. +But he found that he had made a mistake, and, after hearing it played +by Tausig, confessed that the virtuoso had infused into the 'nine pages +of enervating music, of one and the same long-breathed rhythm, so much +interest, so much motion, so much action,' that he regretted the long +piece was not longer." +</P> + +<P> +Tausig's conception of the barcarolle was this: "There are two persons +concerned in the affair; it is a love scene in a discrete gondola; let +us say this mise-en-scene is the symbol of a lover's meeting generally." +</P> + +<P> +"This is expressed in thirds and sixths; the dualism of two +notes—persons—is maintained throughout; all is two-voiced, +two-souled. In this modulation in C sharp major—superscribed dolce +sfogato—there are kiss and embrace! This is evident! When, after three +bars of introduction, the theme, 'lightly rocking in the bass solo,' +enters in the fourth, this theme is nevertheless made use of throughout +the whole fabric only as an accompaniment, and ON this the cantilena in +two parts is laid; we have thus a continuous, tender dialogue." +</P> + +<P> +The Barcarolle is a nocturne painted on a large canvas, with larger +brushes. It has Italian color in spots—Schumann said that, +melodically, Chopin sometimes "leans over Germany into Italy"—and is a +masterly one in sentiment, pulsating with amorousness. To me it sounds +like a lament for the splendors, now vanished, of Venice the Queen. In +bars 8, 9, and 10, counting backward, Louis Ehlert finds obscurities in +the middle voices. It is dedicated to the Baronne de Stockhausen. +</P> + +<P> +The nocturnes—including the Berceuse and Barcarolle—should seldom be +played in public and not the public of a large hall. Something of +Chopin's delicate, tender warmth and spiritual voice is lost in larger +spaces. In a small auditorium, and from the fingers of a sympathetic +pianist, the nocturnes should be heard, that their intimate, night side +may be revealed. Many are like the music en sourdine of Paul Verlaine +in his "Chanson D'Automne" or "Le Piano que Baise une Main Frele." They +are essentially for the twilight, for solitary enclosures, where their +still, mysterious tones—"silent thunder in the leaves" as Yeats +sings—become eloquent and disclose the poetry and pain of their +creator. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap10"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +X. THE BALLADES:—FAERY DRAMAS +</H3> + +<P> +W. H. Hadow has said some pertinent things about Chopin in "Studies in +Modern Music." Yet we cannot accept unconditionally his statement that +"in structure Chopin is a child playing with a few simple types, and +almost helpless as soon as he advances beyond them; in phraseology he +is a master whose felicitous perfection of style is one of the abiding +treasures of the art." +</P> + +<P> +Chopin then, according to Hadow, is no "builder of the lofty rhyme," +but the poet of the single line, the maker of the phrase exquisite. +This is hardly comprehensive. With the more complex, classical types of +the musical organism Chopin had little sympathy, but he contrived +nevertheless to write two movements of a piano sonata that are +excellent—the first half of the B flat minor Sonata. The idealized +dance forms he preferred; the Polonaise, Mazurka and Valse were already +there for him to handle, but the Ballade was not. Here he is not +imitator, but creator. Not loosely-jointed, but compact structures +glowing with genius and presenting definite unity of form and +expression, are the ballades—commonly written in six-eight and +six-four time. "None of Chopin's compositions surpasses in masterliness +of form and beauty and poetry of contents his ballades. In them he +attains the acme of his power as an artist," remarks Niecks. +</P> + +<P> +I am ever reminded of Andrew Lang's lines, "the thunder and surge of +the Odyssey," when listening to the G minor Ballade, op. 23. It is the +Odyssey of Chopin's soul. That 'cello-like largo with its noiseless +suspension stays us for a moment in the courtyard of Chopin's House +Beautiful. Then, told in his most dreamy tones, the legend begins. As +in some fabulous tales of the Genii this Ballade discloses surprising +and delicious things. There is the tall lily in the fountain that nods +to the sun. It drips in cadenced monotone and its song is repeated on +the lips of the slender-hipped girl with the eyes of midnight—and so +might I weave for you a story of what I see in the Ballade and you +would be aghast or puzzled. With such a composition any programme could +be sworn to, even the silly story of the Englishman who haunted Chopin, +beseeching him to teach him this Ballade. That Chopin had a programme, +a definite one, there can be no doubt; but he has, wise artist, left us +no clue beyond Mickiewicz's, the Polish bard Lithuanian poems. In +Leipzig, Karasowski relates, that when Schumann met Chopin, the pianist +confessed having "been incited to the creation of the ballades by the +poetry" of his fellow countryman. The true narrative tone is in this +symmetrically constructed Ballade, the most spirited, most daring work +of Chopin, according to Schumann. Louis Ehlert says of the four +Ballades: "Each one differs entirely from the others, and they have but +one thing in common—their romantic working out and the nobility of +their motives. Chopin relates in them, not like one who communicates +something really experienced; it is as though he told what never took +place, but what has sprung up in his inmost soul, the anticipation of +something longed for. They may contain a strong element of national +woe, much outwardly expressed and inwardly burning rage over the +sufferings of his native land; yet they do not carry with a positive +reality like that which in a Beethoven Sonata will often call words to +our lips." Which means that Chopin was not such a realist as Beethoven? +Ehlert is one of the few sympathetic German Chopin commentators, yet he +did not always indicate the salient outlines of his art. Only the Slav +may hope to understand Chopin thoroughly. But these Ballades are more +truly touched by the universal than any other of his works. They belong +as much to the world as to Poland. +</P> + +<P> +The G minor Ballade after "Konrad Wallenrod," is a logical, well knit +and largely planned composition. The closest parallelism may be +detected in its composition of themes. Its second theme in E flat is +lovely in line, color and sentiment. The return of the first theme in A +minor and the quick answer in E of the second are evidences of Chopin's +feeling for organic unity. Development, as in strict cyclic forms, +there is not a little. After the cadenza, built on a figure of wavering +tonality, a valse-like theme emerges and enjoys a capricious, butterfly +existence. It is fascinating. Passage work of an etherealized character +leads to the second subject, now augmented and treated with a broad +brush. The first questioning theme is heard again, and with a +perpendicular roar the presto comes upon us. For two pages the dynamic +energy displayed by the composer is almost appalling. A whirlwind I +have called it elsewhere. It is a storm of the emotions, muscular in +its virility. I remember de Pachmann—a close interpreter of certain +sides of Chopin—playing this coda piano, pianissimo and prestissimo. +The effect was strangely irritating to the nerves, and reminded me of a +tornado seen from the wrong end of an opera glass. According to his own +lights the Russian virtuoso was right: his strength was not equal to +the task, and so, imitating Chopin, he topsy-turvied the shading. It +recalled Moscheles' description of Chopin's playing: "His piano is so +softly breathed forth that he does not require any strong forte to +produce the wished for contrast." +</P> + +<P> +This G minor Ballade was published in June, 1836, and is dedicated to +Baron Stockhausen. The last bar of the introduction has caused some +controversy. Gutmann, Mikuli and other pupils declare for the E flat; +Klindworth and Kullak use it. Xaver Scharwenka has seen fit to edit +Klindworth, and gives a D natural in the Augener edition. That he is +wrong internal testimony abundantly proves. Even Willeby, who +personally prefers the D natural, thinks Chopin intended the E flat, +and quotes a similar effect twenty-eight bars later. He might have +added that the entire composition contains examples—look at the first +bar of the valse episode in the bass. As Niecks thinks, "This dissonant +E flat may be said to be the emotional keynote of the whole poem. It is +a questioning thought that, like a sudden pain, shoots through mind and +body." +</P> + +<P> +There is other and more confirmatory evidence. Ferdinand Von Inten, a +New York pianist, saw the original Chopin manuscript at Stuttgart. It +was the property of Professor Lebert (Levy), since deceased, and in it, +without any question, stands the much discussed E flat. This testimony +is final. The D natural robs the bar of all meaning. It is insipid, +colorless. +</P> + +<P> +Kullak gives 60 to the half note at the moderato. On the third page, +third bar, he uses F natural in the treble. So does Klindworth, +although F sharp may be found in some editions. On the last page, +second bar, first line, Kullak writes the passage beginning with E flat +in eighth notes, Klindworth in sixteenths. The close is very striking, +full of the splendors of glancing scales and shrill octave +progressions. "It would inspire a poet to write words to it," said +Robert Schumann. +</P> + +<P> +"Perhaps the most touching of all that Chopin has written is the tale +of the F major Ballade. I have witnessed children lay aside their games +to listen thereto. It appears like some fairy tale that has become +music. The four-voiced part has such a clearness withal, it seems as if +warm spring breezes were waving the lithe leaves of the palm tree. How +soft and sweet a breath steals over the senses and the heart!" +</P> + +<P> +And how difficult it seems to be to write of Chopin except in terms of +impassioned prose! Louis Ehlert, a romantic in feeling and a classicist +in theory, is the writer of the foregoing. The second Ballade, although +dedicated to Robert Schumann, did not excite his warmest praise. "A +less artistic work than the first," he wrote, "but equally fantastic +and intellectual. Its impassioned episodes seem to have been afterward +inserted. I recollect very well that when Chopin played this Ballade +for me it finished in F major; it now closes in A minor." Willeby gives +its key as F minor. It is really in the keys of F major—A minor. +Chopin's psychology was seldom at fault. A major ending would have +crushed this extraordinary tone-poem, written, Chopin admits, under the +direct inspiration of Adam Mickiewicz's "Le Lac de Willis." Willeby +accepts Schumann's dictum of the inferiority of this Ballade to its +predecessor. Niecks does not. Niecks is quite justified in asking how +"two such wholly dissimilar things can be compared and weighed in this +fashion." +</P> + +<P> +In truth they cannot. "The second Ballade possesses beauties in no way +inferior to those of the first," he continues. "What can be finer than +the simple strains of the opening section! They sound as if they had +been drawn from the people's store-house of song. The entrance of the +presto surprises, and seems out of keeping with what precedes; but what +we hear after the return of tempo primo—the development of those +simple strains, or rather the cogitations on them—justifies the +presence of the presto. The second appearance of the latter leads to an +urging, restless coda in A minor, which closes in the same key and +pianissimo with a few bars of the simple, serene, now veiled first +strain." +</P> + +<P> +Rubinstein bore great love for this second Ballade. This is what it +meant for him: "Is it possible that the interpreter does not feel the +necessity of representing to his audience—a field flower caught by a +gust of wind, a caressing of the flower by the wind; the resistance of +the flower, the stormy struggle of the wind; the entreaty of the +flower, which at last lies there broken; and paraphrased—the field +flower a rustic maiden, the wind a knight." +</P> + +<P> +I can find "no lack of affinity" between the andantino and presto. The +surprise is a dramatic one, withal rudely vigorous. Chopin's robust +treatment of the first theme results in a strong piece of craftmanship. +The episodical nature of this Ballade is the fruit of the esoteric +moods of its composer. It follows a hidden story, and has the +quality—as the second Impromptu in F sharp—of great, unpremeditated +art. It shocks one by its abrupt but by no means fantastic transitions. +The key color is changeful, and the fluctuating themes are well +contrasted. It was written at Majorca while the composer was only too +noticeably disturbed in body and soul. +</P> + +<P> +Presto con fuoco Chopin marks the second section. Kullak gives 84 to +the quarter, and for the opening 66 to the quarter. He also wisely +marks crescendos in the bass at the first thematic development. He +prefers the E—as does Klindworth—nine bars before the return of the +presto. At the eighth bar, after this return, Kullak adheres to the E +instead of F at the beginning of the bar, treble clef. Klindworth +indicates both. Nor does Kullak follow Mikuli in using a D in the coda. +He prefers a D sharp, instead of a natural. I wish the second Ballade +were played oftener in public. It is quite neglected for the third in A +flat, which, as Ehlert says, has the voice of the people. +</P> + +<P> +This Ballade, the "Undine" of Mickiewicz, published November, 1841, and +dedicated to Mlle. P. de Noailles, is too well known to analyze. It is +the schoolgirls' delight, who familiarly toy with its demon, seeing +only favor and prettiness in its elegant measures. In it "the refined, +gifted Pole, who is accustomed to move in the most distinguished +circles of the French capital, is pre-eminently to be recognized." Thus +Schumann. Forsooth, it is aristocratic, gay, graceful, piquant, and +also something more. Even in its playful moments there is delicate +irony, a spiritual sporting with graver and more passionate emotions. +Those broken octaves which usher in each time the second theme, with +its fascinating, infectious, rhythmical lilt, what an ironically joyous +fillip they give the imagination! +</P> + +<P> +"A coquettish grace—if we accept by this expression that half +unconscious toying with the power that charms and fires, that follows +up confession with reluctance—seems the very essence of Chopin's +being." +</P> + +<P> +"It becomes a difficult task to transcribe the easy transitions, full +of an irresistible charm, with which he portrays Love's game. Who will +not recall the memorable passage in the A flat Ballade, where the right +hand alone takes up the dotted eighths after the sustained chord of the +sixth of A flat? Could a lover's confusion be more deliciously enhanced +by silence and hesitation?" Ehlert above evidently sees a ballroom +picture of brilliancy, with the regulation tender avowal. The episodes +of this Ballade are so attenuated of any grosser elements that none but +psychical meanings should be read into them. +</P> + +<P> +The disputed passage is on the fifth page of the Kullak edition, after +the trills. A measure is missing in Kullak, who, like Klindworth, gives +it in a footnote. To my mind this repetition adds emphasis, although it +is a formal blur. And what an irresistible moment it is, this +delightful territory, before the darker mood of the C sharp minor part +is reached! Niecks becomes enthusiastic over the insinuation and +persuasion of this composition: "the composer showing himself in a +fundamentally caressing mood." The ease with which the entire work is +floated proves that Chopin in mental health was not daunted by larger +forms. There is moonlight in this music, and some sunlight, too. The +prevailing moods are coquetry and sweet contentment. +</P> + +<P> +Contrapuntal skill is shown in the working out section. Chopin always +wears his learning lightly; it does not oppress us. The inverted +dominant pedal in the C sharp minor episode reveals, with the massive +coda, a great master. Kullak suggests some variants. He uses the +transient shake in the third bar, instead of the appoggiatura which +Klindworth prefers. Klindworth attacks the trill on the second page +with the upper tone—A flat. Kullak and Mertke, in the Steingraber +edition, play the passage in this manner: +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +[Musical score excerpt from the original version of the Op. 47. Ballade] +</P> + +<P> +Here is Klindworth: +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +[Musical score excerpt of the same passage in Klindworth's edition] +</P> + +<P> +Of the fourth and glorious Ballade in F minor dedicated to Baronne C. +de Rothschild I could write a volume. It is Chopin in his most +reflective, yet lyric mood. Lyrism is the keynote of the work, a +passionate lyrism, with a note of self-absorption, suppressed +feeling—truly Slavic, this shyness!—and a concentration that is +remarkable even for Chopin. The narrative tone is missing after the +first page, a rather moody and melancholic pondering usurping its +place. It is the mood of a man who examines with morbid, curious +insistence the malady that is devouring his soul. This Ballade is the +companion of the Fantaisie-Polonaise, but as a Ballade "fully worthy of +its sisters," to quote Niecks. It was published December, 1843. The +theme in F minor has the elusive charm of a slow, mournful valse, that +returns twice, bejewelled, yet never overladen. Here is the very +apotheosis of the ornament; the figuration sets off the idea in +dazzling relief. There are episodes, transitional passage work, +distinguished by novelty and the finest art. At no place is there +display for display's sake. The cadenza in A is a pause for breath, +rather a sigh, before the rigorously logical imitations which presage +the re-entrance of the theme. How wonderfully the introduction comes in +for its share of thoughtful treatment. What a harmonist! And consider +the D flat scale runs in the left hand; how suave, how satisfying is +this page. I select for especial admiration this modulatory passage: +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +[Musical score excerpt] +</P> + +<P> +And what could be more evocative of dramatic suspense than the sixteen +bars before the mad, terrifying coda! How the solemn splendors of the +half notes weave an atmosphere of mystic tragedy! This soul-suspension +recalls Maeterlinck. Here is the episode: +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +[Musical score excerpt] +</P> + +<P> +A story of de Lenz that lends itself to quotation is about this piece: +</P> + +<P CLASS="block"> + Tausig impressed me deeply in his interpretation of Chopin's + Ballade in F minor. It has three requirements: The + comprehension of the programme as a whole,—for Chopin writes + according to a programme, to the situations in life best known + to, and understood by himself; and in an adequate manner; the + conquest of the stupendous difficulties in complicated + figures, winding harmonies and formidable passages. +</P> + +<P CLASS="block"> + Tausig fulfilled these requirements, presenting an embodiment + of the signification and the feeling of the work. The Ballade— + andante con moto, six-eighths—begins in the major key of the + dominant; the seventh measure comes to a stand before a + fermata on C major. The easy handling of these seven measures + Tausig interpreted thus: 'The piece has not yet begun;' in his + firmer, nobly expressive exposition of the principal theme, + free from sentimentality—to which one might easily yield—the + grand style found due scope. An essential requirement in an + instrumental virtuoso is that he should understand how to + breathe, and how to allow his hearers to take breath—giving + them opportunity to arrive at a better understanding. By this + I mean a well chosen incision—the cesura, and a lingering— + "letting in air," Tausig cleverly called it—which in no way + impairs rhythm and time, but rather brings them into stronger + relief; a LINGERING which our signs of notation cannot + adequately express, because it is made up of atomic time + values. Rub the bloom from a peach or from a butterfly—what + remains will belong to the kitchen, to natural history! It is + not otherwise with Chopin; the bloom consisted in Tausig's + treatment of the Ballade. +</P> + +<P CLASS="block"> + He came to the first passage—the motive among blossoms and + leaves—a figurated recurrence to the principal theme is in + the inner parts—its polyphonic variant. A little thread + connects this with the chorale-like introduction of the second + theme. The theme is strongly and abruptly modulated, perhaps a + little too much so. Tausig tied the little thread to a doppio + movimento in two-four time, but thereby resulted sextolets, + which threw the chorale into still bolder relief. Then + followed a passage a tempo, in which the principal theme + played hide and seek. How clear it all became as Tausig played + it! Of technical difficulties he knew literally nothing; the + intricate and evasive parts were as easy as the easiest—I + might say easier! +</P> + +<P CLASS="block"> + I admired the short trills in the left hand, which were + trilled out quite independently, as if by a second player; the + gliding ease of the cadence marked dolcissimo. It swung itself + into the higher register, where it came to a stop before A + major, just as the introduction stopped before C major. Then, + after the theme has once more presented itself in a modified + form—variant—it comes under the pestle of an extremely + figurate coda, which demands the study of an artist, the + strength of a robust man—the most vigorous pianistic health, + in a word! Tausig overcame this threatening group of terrific + difficulties, whose appearance in the piece is well explained + by the programme, without the slightest effect. The coda, in + modulated harp tones, came to a stop before a fermata which + corresponded to those before mentioned, in order to cast + anchor in the haven of the dominant, finishing with a witches' + dance of triplets, doubled in thirds. This piece winds up with + extreme bravura. +</P> + +<P> +The "lingering" mentioned by de Lenz is tempo rubato, so fatally +misunderstood by most Chopin players. De Lenz in a note quotes +Meyerbeer as saying—Meyerbeer, who quarrelled with Chopin about the +rhythm of a mazurka—"Can one reduce women to notation? They would +breed mischief, were they emancipated from the measure." +</P> + +<P> +There is passion, refined and swelling, in the curves of this most +eloquent composition. It is Chopin at the supreme summit of his art, an +art alembicated, personal and intoxicating. I know of nothing in music +like the F minor Ballade. Bach in the Chromatic Fantasia—be not +deceived by its classical contours, it is music hot from the +soul—Beethoven in the first movement of the C sharp minor Sonata, the +arioso of the Sonata op. 110, and possibly Schumann in the opening of +his C major Fantaisie, are as intimate, as personal as the F minor +Ballade, which is as subtly distinctive as the hands and smile of Lisa +Gioconda. Its inaccessible position preserves it from rude and +irreverent treatment. Its witchery is irresistible. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap11"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +XI. CLASSICAL CURRENTS +</H3> + +<P> +Guy de Maupassant put before us a widely diverse number of novels in a +famous essay attached to the definitive edition of his masterpiece, +"Pierre et Jean," and puzzlingly demanded the real form of the novel. +If "Don Quixote" is one, how can "Madame Bovary" be another? If "Les +Miserables" is included in the list, what are we to say to Huysmans' +"La Bas"? +</P> + +<P> +Just such a question I should like to propound, substituting sonata for +novel. If Scarlatti wrote sonatas, what is the Appassionata? If the A +flat Weber is one, can the F minor Brahms be called a sonata? Is the +Haydn form orthodox and the Schumann heterodox? These be enigmas to +make weary the formalists. Come, let us confess, and in the open air: +there is a great amount of hypocrisy and cant in this matter. We can, +as can any conservatory student, give the recipe for turning out a smug +specimen of the form, but when we study the great examples, it is just +the subtle eluding of hard and fast rules that distinguishes the +efforts of the masters from the machine work of apprentices and +academic monsters. Because it is no servile copy of the Mozart Sonata, +the F sharp minor of Brahms is a piece of original art. Beethoven at +first trod in the well blazed path of Haydn, but study his second +period, and it sounds the big Beethoven note. There is no final court +of appeal in the matter of musical form, and there is none in the +matter of literary style. The history of the sonata is the history of +musical evolution. Every great composer, Schubert included, added to +the form, filed here, chipped away there, introduced lawlessness where +reigned prim order—witness the Schumann F sharp minor Sonata—and then +came Chopin. +</P> + +<P> +The Chopin sonata has caused almost as much warfare as the Wagner music +drama. It is all the more ludicrous, for Chopin never wrote but one +piano sonata that has a classical complexion: in C minor, op. 4, and it +was composed as early as 1828. Not published until July, 1851, it +demonstrates without a possibility of doubt that the composer had no +sympathy with the form. He tried so hard and failed so dismally that it +is a relief when the second and third sonatas are reached, for in them +there are only traces of formal beauty and organic unity. But then +there is much Chopin, while little of his precious essence is to be +tasted in the first sonata. +</P> + +<P> +Chopin wrote of the C minor Sonata: "As a pupil I dedicated it to +Elsner," and—oh, the irony of criticism!—it was praised by the +critics because not so revolutionary as the Variations, op. 2. This, +too, despite the larghetto in five-four time. The first movement is +wheezing and all but lifeless. One asks in astonishment what Chopin is +doing in this gallery. And it is technically difficult. The menuetto is +excellent, its trio being a faint approach to Beethoven in color. The +unaccustomed rhythm of the slow movement is irritating. Our young +Chopin does not move about as freely as Benjamin Godard in the scherzo +of his violin and piano sonata in the same bizarre rhythm. Niecks sees +naught but barren waste in the finale. I disagree with him. There is +the breath of a stirring spirit, an imitative attempt that is more +diverting than the other movements. Above all there is movement, and +the close is vigorous, though banal. The sonata is the dullest music +penned by Chopin, but as a whole it hangs together as a sonata better +than its two successors. So much for an attempt at strict devotion to +scholastic form. +</P> + +<P> +From this schoolroom we are transported in op. 35 to the theatre of +larger life and passion. The B flat minor Sonata was published May, +1840. Two movements are masterpieces; the funeral march that forms the +third movement is one of the Pole's most popular compositions, while +the finale has no parallel in piano music. Schumann says that Chopin +here "bound together four of his maddest children," and he is not +astray. He thinks the march does not belong to the work. It certainly +was written before its companion movements. As much as Hadow admires +the first two movements, he groans at the last pair, though they are +admirable when considered separately. +</P> + +<P> +These four movements have no common life. Chopin says he intended the +strange finale as a gossiping commentary on the march. "The left hand +unisono with the right hand are gossiping after the march." Perhaps the +last two movements do hold together, but what have they in common with +the first two? Tonality proves nothing. Notwithstanding the grandeur +and beauty of the grave, the power and passion of the scherzo, this +Sonata in B flat minor is not more a sonata than it is a sequence of +ballades and scherzi. And again we are at the de Maupassant crux. The +work never could be spared; it is Chopin mounted for action and in the +thick of the fight. The doppio movimento is pulse-stirring—a strong, +curt and characteristic theme for treatment. Here is power, and in the +expanding prologue flashes more than a hint of the tragic. The D flat +Melody is soothing, charged with magnetism, and urged to a splendid +fever of climax. The working out section is too short and dissonantal, +but there is development, perhaps more technical than logical—I mean +by this more pianistic than intellectually musical—and we mount with +the composer until the B flat version of the second subject is reached, +for the first subject, strange to say, does not return. From that on to +the firm chords of the close there is no misstep, no faltering or +obscurity. Noble pages have been read, and the scherzo is approached +with eagerness. Again there is no disappointment. On numerous occasions +I have testified my regard for this movement in warm and uncritical +terms. It is simply unapproachable, and has no equal for lucidity, +brevity and polish among the works of Chopin, except the Scherzo in C +sharp minor; but there is less irony, more muscularity, and more native +sweetness in this E flat minor Scherzo. I like the way Kullak marks the +first B flat octave. It is a pregnant beginning. The second bar I have +never heard from any pianist save Rubinstein given with the proper +crescendo. No one else seems to get it explosive enough within the +walls of one bar. It is a true Rossin-ian crescendo. And in what a wild +country we are landed when the F sharp minor is crashed out! Stormy +chromatic double notes, chords of the sixth, rush on with incredible +fury, and the scherzo ends on the very apex of passion. A Trio in G +flat is the song of songs, its swaying rhythms and phrase-echoings +investing a melody at once sensuous and chaste. The second part and the +return to the scherzo are proofs of the composer's sense of balance and +knowledge of the mysteries of anticipation. The closest parallelisms +are noticeable, the technique so admirable that the scherzo floats in +mid-air—Flaubert's ideal of a miraculous style. +</P> + +<P> +And then follows that deadly Marche Funebre! Ernest Newman, in his +remarkable "Study of Wagner," speaks of the fundamental difference +between the two orders of imagination, as exemplified by Beethoven and +Chopin on the one side, Wagner on the other. This regarding the funeral +marches of the three. Newman finds Wagner's the more concrete +imagination; the "inward picture" of Beethoven, and Chopin "much vaguer +and more diffused." Yet Chopin is seldom so realistic; here are the +bell-like basses, the morbid coloring. Schumann found "it contained +much that is repulsive," and Liszt raves rhapsodically over it; for +Karasowski it was the "pain and grief of an entire nation," while +Ehlert thinks "it owes its renown to the wonderful effect of two +triads, which in their combination possess a highly tragical element. +The middle movement is not at all characteristic. Why could it not at +least have worn second mourning? After so much black crepe drapery one +should not at least at once display white lingerie!" This is cruel. +</P> + +<P> +The D flat Trio is a logical relief after the booming and glooming of +the opening. That it is "a rapturous gaze into the beatific regions of +a beyond," as Niecks writes, I am not prepared to say. We do know, +however, that the march, when isolated, has a much more profound effect +than in its normal sequence. The presto is too wonderful for words. +Rubinstein, or was it originally Tausig who named it "Night winds +sweeping over the churchyard graves"? Its agitated, whirring, +unharmonized triplets are strangely disquieting, and can never be +mistaken for mere etude passage work. The movement is too sombre, its +curves too full of half-suppressed meanings, its rush and sub-human +growling too expressive of something that defies definition. Schumann +compares it to a "sphinx with a mocking smile." To Henri Barbadette +"C'est Lazare grattant de ses ongles la pierre de son tombeau," or, +like Mendelssohn, one may abhor it, yet it cannot be ignored. It has +Asiatic coloring, and to me seems like the wavering outlines of +light-tipped hills seen sharply en silhouette, behind which rises and +falls a faint, infernal glow. This art paints as many differing +pictures as there are imaginations for its sonorous background; not +alone the universal solvent, as Henry James thinks, it bridges the +vast, silent gulfs between human souls with its humming eloquence. This +sonata is not dedicated. +</P> + +<P> +The third Sonata in B minor, op. 58, has more of that undefinable +"organic unity," yet, withal, it is not so powerful, so pathos-breeding +or so compact of thematic interest as its forerunner. The first page, +to the chromatic chords of the sixth, promises much. There is a clear +statement, a sound theme for developing purposes, the crisp march of +chord progressions, and then—the edifice goes up in smoke. After +wreathings and curlings of passage work, and on the rim of despair, we +witness the exquisite budding of the melody in D. It is an aubade, a +nocturne of the morn—if the contradictory phrase be allowed. There is +morning freshness in its hue and scent, and, when it bursts, a parterre +of roses. The close of the section is inimitable. All the more sorrow +at what follows: wild disorder and the luxuriance called tropical. When +B major is compassed we sigh, for it augurs us a return of delight. The +ending is not that of a sonata, but a love lyric. For Chopin is not the +cool breadth and marmoreal majesty of blank verse. He sonnets to +perfection, but the epical air does not fill his nostrils. +</P> + +<P> +Vivacious, charming, light as a harebell in the soft breeze is the +Scherzo in E flat. It has a clear ring of the scherzo and harks back to +Weber in its impersonal, amiable hurry. The largo is tranquilly +beautiful, rich in its reverie, lovely in its tune. The trio is +reserved and hypnotic. The last movement, with its brilliancy and +force, is a favorite, but it lacks weight, and the entire sonata is, as +Niecks writes, "affiliated, but not cognate." It was published June, +1845, and is dedicated to Comtesse E. de Perthuis. +</P> + +<P> +So these sonatas of Chopin are not sonatas at all, but, throwing titles +to the dogs, would we forego the sensations that two of them evoke? +There is still another, the Sonata in G minor, op. 65, for piano and +'cello. It is dedicated to Chopin's friend, August Franchomme, the +violoncellist. Now, while I by no means share Finck's exalted +impression of this work, yet I fancy the critics have dealt too harshly +with it. Robbed of its title of sonata—though sedulously aping this +form—it contains much pretty music. And it is grateful for the 'cello. +There is not an abundant literature for this kingly instrument, in +conjunction with the piano, so why flaunt Chopin's contribution? I will +admit that he walks stiffly, encased in his borrowed garb, but there is +the andante, short as it is, an effective scherzo and a carefully made +allegro and finale. Tonal monotony is the worst charge to be brought +against this work. +</P> + +<P> +The trio, also in G minor, op. 8, is more alluring. It was published +March, 1833, and dedicated to Prince Anton Radziwill. Chopin later, in +speaking of it to a pupil, admitted that he saw things he would like to +change. He regretted not making it for viola, instead of violin, 'cello +and piano. +</P> + +<P> +It was worked over a long time, the first movement being ready in 1833. +When it appeared it won philistine praise, for its form more nearly +approximates the sonata than any of his efforts in the cyclical order, +excepting op. 4. In it the piano receives better treatment than the +other instruments; there are many virtuoso passages, but again key +changes are not frequent or disparate enough to avoid a monotone. +Chopin's imagination refuses to become excited when working in the open +spaces of the sonata form. Like creatures that remain drab of hue in +unsympathetic or dangerous environment, his music is transformed to a +bewildering bouquet of color when he breathes native air. Compare the +wildly modulating Chopin of the ballades to the tame-pacing Chopin of +the sonatas, trio and concertos! The trio opens with fire, the scherzo +is fanciful, and the adagio charming, while the finale is cheerful to +loveliness. It might figure occasionally on the programmes of our +chamber music concerts, despite its youthful puerility. +</P> + +<P> +There remain the two concertos, which I do not intend discussing fully. +Not Chopin at his very best, the E minor and F minor concertos are +frequently heard because of the chances afforded the solo player. I +have written elsewhere at length of the Klindworth, Tausig and +Burmeister versions of the two concertos. As time passes I see no +reason for amending my views on this troublous subject. Edgar S. Kelly +holds a potent brief for the original orchestration, contending that it +suits the character of the piano part. Rosenthal puts this belief into +practice by playing the older version of the E minor with the first +long tutti curtailed. But he is not consistent, for he uses the Tausig +octaves at the close of the rondo. While I admire the Tausig +orchestration, these particlar octaves are hideously cacaphonic. The +original triplet unisons are so much more graceful and musical. +</P> + +<P> +The chronology of the concertos has given rise to controversy. The +trouble arose from the F minor Concerto, it being numbered op. 21, +although composed before the one in E minor. The former was published +April, 1836; the latter September, 1833. The slow movement of the F +minor Concerto was composed by Chopin during his passion for Constantia +Gladowska. She was "the ideal" he mentions in his letters, the adagio +of this concerto. This larghetto in A flat is a trifle too ornamental +for my taste, mellifluous and serene as it is. The recitative is finely +outlined. I think I like best the romanze of the E minor Concerto. It +is less flowery. The C sharp minor part is imperious in its beauty, +while the murmuring mystery of the close mounts to the imagination. The +rondo is frolicksome, tricky, genial and genuine piano music. It is +true the first movement is too long, too much in one set of keys, and +the working-out section too much in the nature of a technical study. +The first movement of the F minor far transcends it in breadth, passion +and musical feeling, but it is short and there is no coda. Richard +Burmeister has supplied the latter deficiency in a capitally made +cadenza, which Paderewski plays. It is a complete summing up of the +movement. The mazurka-like finale is very graceful and full of pure, +sweet melody. This concerto is altogether more human than the E minor. +</P> + +<P> +Both derive from Hummel and Field. The passage work is superior in +design to that of the earlier masters, the general character +episodical,—but episodes of rare worth and originality. As Ehlert +says, "Noblesse oblige—and thus Chopin felt himself compelled to +satisfy all demands exacted of a pianist, and wrote the unavoidable +piano concerto. It was not consistent with his nature to express +himself in broad terms. His lungs were too weak for the pace in seven +league boots, so often required in a score. The trio and 'cello sonata +were also tasks for whose accomplishment Nature did not design him. He +must touch the keys by himself without being called upon to heed the +players sitting next him. He is at his best when without formal +restraint, he can create out of his inmost soul." +</P> + +<P> +"He must touch the keys by himself!" There you have summed up in a +phrase the reason Chopin never succeeded in impressing his +individuality upon the sonata form and his playing upon the masses. His +was the lonely soul. George Sand knew this when she wrote, "He made an +instrument speak the language of the infinite. Often in ten lines that +a child might play he has introduced poems of unequalled elevation, +dramas unrivalled in force and energy. He did not need the great +material methods to find expression for his genius. Neither saxophone +nor ophicleide was necessary for him to fill the soul with awe. Without +church organ or human voice he inspired faith and enthusiasm." +</P> + +<P> +It might be remarked here that Beethoven, too, aroused a wondering and +worshipping world without the aid of saxophone or ophicleide. But it is +needless cruelty to pick at Madame Sand's criticisms. She had no +technical education, and so little appreciation of Chopin's peculiar +genius for the piano that she could write, "The day will come when his +music will be arranged for orchestra without change of the piano +score;" which is disaster-breeding nonsense. We have sounded Chopin's +weakness when writing for any instrument but his own, when writing in +any form but his own. +</P> + +<P> +The E minor Concerto is dedicated to Frederick Kalkbrenner, the F minor +to the Comtesse Deiphine Potocka. The latter dedication demonstrates +that he could forget his only "ideal" in the presence of the charming +Potocka! Ah! these vibratile and versatile Poles! +</P> + +<P> +Robert Schumann, it is related, shook his head wearily when his early +work was mentioned. "Dreary stuff," said the composer, whose critical +sense did not fail him even in so personal a question. What Chopin +thought of his youthful music may be discovered in his scanty +correspondence. To suppose that the young Chopin sprang into the arena +a fully equipped warrior is one of those nonsensical notions which +gains currency among persons unfamiliar with the law of musical +evolution. Chopin's musical ancestry is easily traced; as Poe had his +Holley Chivers, Chopin had his Field. The germs of his second period +are all there; from op. 1 to opus 22 virtuosity for virtuosity's sake +is very evident. Liszt has said that in every young artist there is the +virtuoso fever, and Chopin being a pianist did not escape the fever of +the footlights. He was composing, too, at a time when piano music was +well nigh strangled by excess of ornament, when acrobats were kings, +when the Bach Fugue and Beethoven Sonata lurked neglected and dusty in +the memories of the few. Little wonder, then, we find this individual, +youthful Pole, not timidly treading in the path of popular composition, +but bravely carrying his banner, spangled, glittering and fanciful, and +outstripping at their own game all the virtuosi of Europe. His +originality in this bejewelled work caused Hummel to admire and +Kalkbrenner to wonder. The supple fingers of the young man from Warsaw +made quick work of existing technical difficulties. He needs must +invent some of his own, and when Schumann saw the pages of op. 2 he +uttered his historical cry. Today we wonder somewhat at his enthusiasm. +It is the old story—a generation seeks to know, a generation +comprehends and enjoys, and a generation discards. +</P> + +<P> +Opus 1, a Rondo in C minor, dedicated to Madame de Linde, saw the light +in 1825, but it was preceded by two polonaises, a set of variations, +and two mazurkas in G and B flat major. Schumann declared that Chopin's +first published work was his tenth, and that between op. 1 and 2 there +lay two years and twenty works. Be this as it may, one cannot help +liking the C minor Rondo. In the A flat section we detect traces of his +F minor Concerto. There is lightness, joy in creation, which contrast +with the heavy, dour quality of the C minor Sonata, op. 4. Loosely +constructed, in a formal sense, and too exuberant for his strict +confines, this op. 1 is remarkable, much more remarkable, than +Schumann's Abegg variations. +</P> + +<P> +The Rondo a la Mazur, in F, is a further advance. It is dedicated to +Comtesse Moriolles, and was published in 1827 (?). Schumann reviewed it +in 1836. It is sprightly, Polish in feeling and rhythmic life, and a +glance at any of its pages gives us the familiar Chopin +impression—florid passage work, chords in extensions and chromatic +progressions. The Concert Rondo, op. 14, in F, called Krakowiak, is +built on a national dance in two-four time, which originated in +Cracovia. It is, to quote Niecks, a modified polonaise, danced by the +peasants with lusty abandon. Its accentual life is usually manifested +on an unaccented part of the bar, especially at the end of a section or +phrase. Chopin's very Slavic version is spirited, but the virtuoso +predominates. There is lushness in ornamentation, and a bold, merry +spirit informs every page. The orchestral accompaniment is thin. +Dedicated to the Princesse Czartoryska, it was published June, 1834. +The Rondo, op. 16, with an Introduction, is in great favor at the +conservatories, and is neat rather than poetical, although the +introduction has dramatic touches. It is to this brilliant piece, with +its Weber-ish affinities, that Richard Burmeister has supplied an +orchestral accompaniment. +</P> + +<P> +The remaining Rondo, posthumously published as op. 73, and composed in +1828, was originally intended, so Chopin writes in 1828, for one piano. +It is full of fire, but the ornamentation runs mad, and no traces of +the poetical Chopin are present. He is preoccupied with the brilliant +surfaces of the life about him. His youthful expansiveness finds a fair +field in these variations, rondos and fantasias. +</P> + +<P> +Schumann's enthusiasm over the variations on "La ci darem la mano" +seems to us a little overdone. Chopin had not much gift for variation +in the sense that we now understand variation. Beethoven, Schumann and +Brahms—one must include Mendelssohn's Serious Variations—are masters +of a form that is by no means structurally simple or a reversion to +mere spielerei, as Finck fancies. Chopin plays with his themes +prettily, but it is all surface display, all heat lightning. He never +smites, as does Brahms with his Thor hammer, the subject full in the +middle, cleaving it to its core. Chopin is slightly effeminate in his +variations, and they are true specimens of spielerei, despite the +cleverness of design in the arabesques, their brilliancy and euphony. +Op. 2 has its dazzling moments, but its musical worth is inferior. It +is written to split the ears of the groundlings, or rather to astonish +and confuse them, for the Chopin dynamics in the early music are never +very rude. The indisputable superiority to Herz and the rest of the +shallow-pated variationists caused Schumann's passionate admiration. It +has, however, given us an interesting page of music criticism. +Rellstab, grumpy old fellow, was near right when he wrote of these +variations that "the composer runs down the theme with roulades, and +throttles and hangs it with chains of shakes." The skip makes its +appearance in the fourth variation, and there is no gainsaying the +brilliancy and piquant spirit of the Alla Polacca. Op. 2 is +orchestrally accompanied, an accompaniment that may be gladly dispensed +with, and dedicated by Chopin to the friend of his youth, Titus +Woyciechowski. +</P> + +<P> +Je Vends des Scapulaires is a tune in Herold and Halevy's "Ludovic." +Chopin varied it in his op. 12. This rondo in B flat is the weakest of +Chopin's muse. It is Chopin and water, and Gallic eau sucree at that. +The piece is written tastefully, is not difficult, but woefully +artificial. Published in 1833, it was dedicated to Miss Emma Horsford. +In May, 1851, appeared the Variations in E, without an opus number. +They are not worth the trouble. Evidently composed before Chopin's op. +1 and before 1830, they are musically light waisted, although written +by one who already knew the keyboard. The last, a valse, is the +brightest of the set. The theme is German. +</P> + +<P> +The Fantaisie, op 13, in A, on Polish airs, preceded by an introduction +in F sharp minor, is dedicated to the pianist J. P. Pixis. It was +published in April, 1834. It is Chopin brilliant. Its orchestral +background does not count for much, but the energy, the color and +Polish character of the piece endeared it to the composer. He played it +often, and as Kleczynski asks, "Are these brilliant passages, these +cascades of pearly notes, these bold leaps the sadness and the despair +of which we hear? Is it not rather youth exuberant with intensity and +life? Is it not happiness, gayety, love for the world and men? The +melancholy notes are there to bring out, to enforce the principal +ideas. For instance, in the Fantaisie, op. 13, the theme of Kurpinski +moves and saddens us; but the composer does not give time for this +impression to become durable; he suspends it by means of a long trill, +and then suddenly by a few chords and with a brilliant prelude leads us +to a popular dance, which makes us mingle with the peasant couples of +Mazovia. Does the finale indicate by its minor key the gayety of a man +devoid of hope—as the Germans say?" Kleczynski then tells us that a +Polish proverb, "A fig for misery," is the keynote of a nation that +dances furiously to music in the minor key. "Elevated beauty, not +sepulchral gayety," is the character of Polish, of Chopin's music. This +is a valuable hint. There are variations in the Fantaisie which end +with a merry and vivacious Kujawiak. +</P> + +<P> +The F minor Fantaisie will be considered later. Neither by its +magnificent content, construction nor opus number (49) does it fall +into this chapter. +</P> + +<P> +The Allegro de Concert in A, op. 46, was published in November, 1841, +and dedicated to Mlle. Friederike Muller, a pupil of Chopin. It has all +the characteristics of a concerto, and is indeed a truncated one—much +more so than Schumann's F minor Sonata, called Concert Sans Orchestre. +There are tutti in the Chopin work, the solo part not really beginning +until the eighty-seventh bar. But it must not be supposed that these +long introductory passages are ineffective for the player. The Allegro +is one of Chopin's most difficult works. It abounds in risky skips, +ambuscades of dangerous double notes, and the principal themes are bold +and expressive. The color note is strikingly adapted for public +performance, and perhaps Schumann was correct in believing that Chopin +had originally sketched this for piano and orchestra. Niecks asks if +this is not the fragment of a concerto for two pianos, which Chopin, in +a letter written at Vienna, December 21, 1830, said he would play in +public with his friend Nidecki, if he succeeded in writing it to his +satisfaction. And is there any significance in the fact that Chopin, +when sending this manuscript to Fontana, probably in the summer of +1841, calls it a concerto? +</P> + +<P> +While it adds little to Chopin's reputation, it has the potentialities +of a powerful and more manly composition than either of the two +concertos. Jean Louis Nicode has given it an orchestral garb, besides +arranging it for two pianos. He has added a developing section of +seventy bars. This version was first played in New York a decade ago by +Marie Geselschap, a Dutch pianist, under the direction of the late +Anton Seidl. The original, it must be acknowledged, is preferable. +</P> + +<P> +The Bolero, op. 19, has a Polonaise flavor. There is but little Spanish +in its ingredients. It is merely a memorandum of Chopin's early essays +in dance forms. It was published in 1834, four years before Chopin's +visit to Spain. Niecks thinks it an early work. That it can be made +effective was proven by Emil Sauer. It is for fleet-fingered pianists, +and the principal theme has the rhythmical ring of the Polonaise, +although the most Iberian in character. It is dedicated to Comtesse E. +de Flahault. In the key of A minor, its coda ends in A major. Willeby +says it is in C major! +</P> + +<P> +The Tarantella is in A flat, and is numbered op. 43. It was published +in 1841 (?), and bears no dedication. Composed at Nohant, it is as +little Italian as the Bolero is Spanish. Chopin's visit to Italy was of +too short a duration to affect him, at least in the style of dance. It +is without the necessary ophidian tang, and far inferior to Heller and +Liszt's efforts in the constricted form. One finds little of the frenzy +ascribed to it by Schumann in his review. It breathes of the North, not +the South, and ranks far below the A flat Impromptu in geniality and +grace. +</P> + +<P> +The C minor Funeral March, composed, according to Fontana, in 1829, +sounds like Mendelssohn. The trio has the processional quality of a +Parisian funeral cortege. It is modest and in no wise remarkable. The +three Ecossaises, published as op. 73, No. 3, are little dances, +schottisches, nothing more. No. 2 in G is highly popular in girls' +boarding schools. +</P> + +<P> +The Grand Duo Concertant for 'cello and piano is jointly composed by +Chopin and Franchomme on themes from "Robert le Diable." It begins in E +and ends in A major, and is without opus number. Schumann thinks +"Chopin sketched the whole of it, and that Franchomme said 'Yes' to +everything." It is for the salon of 1833, when it was published. It is +empty, tiresome and only slightly superior to compositions of the same +sort by De Beriot and Osborne. Full of rapid elegancies and shallow +passage work, this duo is certainly a piece d'occasion—the occasion +probably being the need of ready money. +</P> + +<P> +The seventeen Polish songs were composed between 1824 and 1844. In the +psychology of the Lied Chopin was not happy. Karasowski writes that +many of the songs were lost and some of them are still sung in Poland, +their origin being hazy. The Third of May is cited as one of these. +Chopin had a habit of playing songs for his friends, but neglected +putting some of them on paper. The collected songs are under the opus +head 74. The words are by his friends, Stephen Witwicki, Adam +Mickiewicz, Bogdan Zaleski and Sigismond Krasinski. The first in the +key of A, the familiar Maiden's Wish, has been brilliantly paraphrased +by Liszt. This pretty mazurka is charmingly sung and played by Marcella +Sembrich in the singing lesson of "The Barber of Seville." There are +several mazurkas in the list. Most of these songs are mediocre. +Poland's Dirge is an exception, and so is Horsemen Before the Battle. +"Was ein junges Madchen liebt" has a short introduction, in which the +reminiscence hunter may find a true bit of "Meistersinger" color. +Simple in structure and sentiment, the Chopin lieder seem almost +rudimentary compared to essays in this form by Schubert, Schumann, +Franz, Brahms and Tschaikowsky. +</P> + +<P> +A word of recommendation may not be amiss here regarding the technical +study of Chopin. Kleczynski, in his two books, gives many valuable +hints, and Isidor Philipp has published a set of Exercises Quotidiens, +made up of specimens in double notes, octaves and passages taken from +the works. Here skeletonized are the special technical problems. In +these Daily Studies, and his edition of the Etudes, are numerous +examples dealt with practically. For a study of Chopin's ornaments, +Mertke has discussed at length the various editorial procedure in the +matter of attacking the trill in single and double notes, also the +easiest method of executing the flying scud and vapors of the +fioriture. This may be found in No. 179 of the Edition Steingraber. +Philipp's collection is published in Paris by J. Hamelle, and is +prefixed by some interesting remarks of Georges Mathias. Chopin's +portrait in 1833, after Vigneron, is included. +</P> + +<P> +One composition more is to be considered. In 1837 Chopin contributed +the sixth variation of the march from "I Puritani." These variations +were published under the title: "Hexameron: Morceau de Concert. Grandes +Variations de bravoure sur la marche des Puritans de Bellini, composees +pour le concert de Madame la Princesse Belgiojoso au benefice des +pauvres, par MM. Liszt, Thalberg, Pixis, H. Herz, Czerny et Chopin." +Liszt wrote an orchestral accompaniment, never published. His pupil, +Moriz Rosenthal, is the only modern virtuoso who plays the Hexameron in +his concerts, and play it he does with overwhelming splendor. Chopin's +contribution in E major is in his sentimental, salon mood. Musically, +it is the most impressive of this extraordinary mastodonic survival of +the "pianistic" past. +</P> + +<P> +The newly published Fugue—or fugato—in A minor, in two voices, is +from a manuscript in the possession of Natalie Janotha, who probably +got it from the late Princess Czartoryska, a pupil of the composer. The +composition is ineffective, and in spots ugly—particularly in the +stretta—and is no doubt an exercise during the working years with +Elsner. The fact that in the coda the very suspicious octave +pedal-point and trills may be omitted—so the editorial note +urns—leads one to suspect that out of a fragment Janotha has evolved, +Cuvier-like, an entire composition. Chopin as fugue-maker does not +appear in a brilliant light. Is the Polish composer to become a musical +Hugh Conway? Why all these disjecta membra of a sketch-book? +</P> + +<P> +In these youthful works may be found the beginnings of the greater +Chopin, but not his vast subjugation of the purely technical to the +poetic and spiritual. That came later. To the devout Chopinist the +first compositions are so many proofs of the joyful, victorious spirit +of the man whose spleen and pessimism have been wrongfully compared to +Leopardi's and Baudelaire's. Chopin was gay, fairly healthy and +bubbling over with a pretty malice. His first period shows this; it +also shows how thorough and painful the processes by which he evolved +his final style. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap12"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +XII. THE POLONAISES:—HEROIC HYMNS OF BATTLE. +</H3> + +<P> +How is one to reconcile "the want of manliness, moral and +intellectual," which Hadow asserts is "the one great limitation of +Chopin's province," with the power, splendor and courage of the +Polonaises? Here are the cannon buried in flowers of Robert Schumann, +here overwhelming evidences of versatility, virility and passion. +Chopin blinded his critics and admirers alike; a delicate, puny fellow, +he could play the piano on occasion like a devil incarnate. He, too, +had his demon as well as Liszt, and only, as Ehlert puts it, +"theoretical fear" of this spirit driving him over the cliffs of reason +made him curb its antics. After all the couleur de rose portraits and +lollipop miniatures made of him by pensive, poetic persons it is not +possible to conceive Chopin as being irascible and almost brutal. Yet +he was at times even this. "Beethoven was scarce more vehement and +irritable," writes Ehlert. And we remember the stories of friends and +pupils who have seen this slender, refined Pole wrestling with his +wrath as one under the obsession of a fiend. It is no desire to +exaggerate this side of his nature that impels this plain writing. +Chopin left compositions that bear witness to his masculine side. +Diminutive in person, bad-temper became him ill; besides, his whole +education and tastes were opposed to scenes of violence. So this +energy, spleen and raging at fortune found escape in some of his music, +became psychical in its manifestations. +</P> + +<P> +But, you may say, this is feminine hysteria, the impotent cries of an +unmanly, weak nature. Read the E flat minor, the C minor, the A major, +the F sharp minor and the two A flat major Polonaises! Ballades, +Scherzi, Studies, Preludes and the great F minor Fantaisie are +purposely omitted from this awing scheme. Chopin was weak in physique, +but he had the soul of a lion. Allied to the most exquisite poetic +sensibilities—one is reminded here of Balzac's "Ce beau genie est +moins un musicien qu'une dine qui se rend sensible"—there was another +nature, fiery, implacable. He loved Poland, he hated her oppressors. +There is no doubt he idealized his country and her wrongs until the +theme grew out of all proportion. Politically the Poles and Celts rub +shoulders. Niecks points out that if Chopin was "a flattering idealist +as a national poet, as a personal poet he was an uncompromising +realist." So in the polonaises we find two distinct groups: in one the +objective, martial side predominates, in the other is Chopin the moody, +mournful and morose. But in all the Polish element pervades. Barring +the mazurkas, these dances are the most Polish of his works. +Appreciation of Chopin's wide diversity of temperament would have +sparedthe world the false, silly, distorted portraits of him. He had +the warrior in him, even if his mailed fist was seldom used. There are +moments when he discards gloves and soft phrases and deals blows that +reverberate with formidable clangor. +</P> + +<P> +By all means read Liszt's gorgeous description of the Polonaise. +Originating during the last half of the sixteenth century, it was at +first a measured procession of nobles and their womankind to the sound +of music. In the court of Henry of Anjou, in 1574, after his election +to the Polish throne, the Polonaise was born, and throve in the hardy, +warlike atmosphere. It became a dance political, and had words set to +it. Thus came the Kosciuszko, the Oginski, the Moniuszko, the +Kurpinski, and a long list written by composers with names ending in +"ski." It is really a march, a processional dance, grave, moderate, +flowing, and by no means stereotyped. Liszt tells of the capricious +life infused into its courtly measures by the Polish aristocracy. It is +at once the symbol of war and love, a vivid pageant of martial +splendor, a weaving, cadenced, voluptuous dance, the pursuit of shy, +coquettish woman by the fierce warrior. +</P> + +<P> +The Polonaise is in three-four time, with the accent on the second beat +of the bar. In simple binary form—ternary if a trio is added—this +dance has feminine endings to all the principal cadences. The +rhythmical cast of the bass is seldom changed. Despite its essentially +masculine mould, it is given a feminine title; formerly it was called +Polonais. Liszt wrote of it: +</P> + +<P> +"In this form the noblest traditional feelings of ancient Poland are +represented. The Polonaise is the true and purest type of Polish +national character, as in the course of centuries it was developed, +partly through the political position of the kingdom toward east and +west, partly through an undefinable, peculiar, inborn disposition of +the entire race. In the development of the Polonaise everything +co-operated which specifically distinguished the nation from others. In +the Poles of departed times manly resolution was united with glowing +devotion to the object of their love. Their knightly heroism was +sanctioned by high-soaring dignity, and even the laws of gallantry and +the national costume exerted an influence over the turns of this dance. +The Polonaises are the keystone in the development of this form. They +belong to the most beautiful of Chopin inspirations. With their +energetic rhythm they electrify, to the point of excited demonstration, +even the sleepiest indifferentism. Chopin was born too late, and left +his native hearth too early, to be initiated into the original +character of the Polonaise as danced through his own observation. But +what others imparted to him in regard to it was supplemented by his +fancy and his nationality." +</P> + +<P> +Chopin wrote fifteen Polonaises, the authenticity of one in G flat +major being doubted by Niecks. This list includes the Polonaise for +violoncello and piano, op. 3, and the Polonaise, op. 22, for piano and +orchestra. This latter Polonaise is preceded by an andante spianato in +G in six-eight time, and unaccompanied. It is a charming, liquid-toned, +nocturne-like composition, Chopin in his most suave, his most placid +mood: a barcarolle, scarcely a ripple of emotion, disturbs the mirrored +calm of this lake. After sixteen bars of a crudely harmonized tutti +comes the Polonaise in the widely remote key of E flat; it is +brilliant, every note telling, the figuration rich and novel, the +movement spirited and flowing. Perhaps it is too long and lacks relief. +The theme on each re-entrance is varied ornamentally. The second theme, +in C minor, has a Polish and poetic ring, while the coda is effective. +This opus is vivacious, but not characterized by great depth. +Crystalline, gracious, and refined, the piece is stamped "Paris," the +elegant Paris of 1830. Composed in that year and published in July, +1836, it is dedicated to the Baronne D'Est. Chopin introduced it at a +Conservatoire concert for the benefit of Habeneck, April 26, 1835. +This, according to Niecks, was the only time he played the Polonaise +with orchestral accompaniment. It was practically a novelty to New York +when Rafael Joseffy played it here, superlatively well, in 1879. +</P> + +<P> +The orchestral part seems wholly superfluous, for the scoring is not +particularly effective, and there is a rumor that Chopin cannot be held +responsible for it. Xaver Scharwenka made a new instrumentation that is +discreet and extremely well sounding. With excellent tact he has +managed the added accompaniment to the introduction, giving some +thematic work of the slightest texture to the strings, and in the +pretty coda to the wood-wind. A delicately managed allusion is made by +the horns to the second theme of the nocturne in G. There are even five +faint taps of the triangle, and the idyllic atmosphere is never +disturbed. Scharwenka first played this arrangement at a Seidl memorial +concert, in Chickering Hall, New York, April, 1898. Yet I cannot +truthfully say the Polonaise sounds so characteristic as when played +solo. +</P> + +<P> +The C sharp minor Polonaise, op. 26, has had the misfortune of being +sentimentalized to death. What can be more "appassionata" than the +opening with its "grand rhythmical swing"? It is usually played by +timid persons in a sugar-sweet fashion, although fff stares them in the +face. The first three lines are hugely heroic, but the indignation soon +melts away, leaving an apathetic humor; after the theme returns and is +repeated we get a genuine love motif tender enough in all faith +wherewith to woo a princess. On this the Polonaise closes, an odd +ending for such a fiery opening. +</P> + +<P> +In no such mood does No. 2 begin. In E flat minor it is variously known +as the Siberian, the Revolt Polonaise. It breathes defiance and rancor +from the start. What suppressed and threatening rumblings are there! +Volcanic mutterings these: +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +[Musical score excerpt] +</P> + +<P> +It is a sinister page, and all the more so because of the injunction to +open with pianissimo. One wishes that the shrill, high G flat had been +written in full chords as the theme suffers from a want of massiveness. +Then follows a subsidiary, but the principal subject returns +relentlessly. The episode in B major gives pause for breathing. It has +a hint of Meyerbeer. But again with smothered explosions the Polonaise +proper appears, and all ends in gloom and the impotent clanking of +chains. It is an awe-provoking work, this terrible Polonaise in E flat +minor, op. 26; it was published July, 1836, and is dedicated to M. J. +Dessauer. +</P> + +<P> +Not so the celebrated A major Polonaise, op. 40, Le Militaire. To +Rubinstein this seemed a picture of Poland's greatness, as its +companion in C minor is of Poland's downfall. Although Karasowski and +Kleczynski give to the A flat major Polonaise the honor of suggesting a +well-known story, it is really the A major that provoked it—so the +Polish portrait painter Kwiatowski informed Niecks. The story runs, +that after composing it, Chopin in the dreary watches of the night was +surprised—terrified is a better word—by the opening of his door and +the entrance of a long train of Polish nobles and ladies, richly robed, +who moved slowly by him. Troubled by the ghosts of the past he had +raised, the composer, hollow eyed, fled the apartment. All this must +have been at Majorca, for op. 40 was composed or finished there. +Ailing, weak and unhappy as he was, Chopin had grit enough to file and +polish this brilliant and striking composition into its present shape. +It is the best known and, though the most muscular of his compositions, +it is the most played. It is dedicated to J. Fontana, and was published +November, 1840. This Polonaise has the festive glitter of Weber. +</P> + +<P> +The C minor Polonaise of the same set is a noble, troubled composition, +large in accents and deeply felt. Can anything be more impressive than +this opening? +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +[Musical score excerpt] +</P> + +<P> +It is indeed Poland's downfall. The Trio in A flat, with its +kaleidoscopic modulations, produces an impression of vague unrest and +suppressed sorrow. There is loftiness of spirit and daring in it. +</P> + +<P> +What can one say new of the tremendous F sharp minor Polonaise? Willeby +calls it noisy! And Stanislaw Przybyszewski—whom Vance Thompson +christened a prestidigious noctambulist-has literally stormed over it. +It is barbaric, it is perhaps pathologic, and of it Liszt has said most +eloquent things. It is for him a dream poem, the "lurid hour that +precedes a hurricane" with a "convulsive shudder at the close." The +opening is very impressive, the nerve-pulp being harassed by the +gradually swelling prelude. There is defiant power in the first theme, +and the constant reference to it betrays the composer's exasperated +mental condition. This tendency to return upon himself, a tormenting +introspection, certainly signifies a grave state. But consider the +musical weight of the work, the recklessly bold outpourings of a mind +almost distraught! There is no greater test for the poet-pianist than +the F sharp minor Polonaise. It is profoundly ironical—what else means +the introduction of that lovely mazurka, "a flower between two +abysses"? This strange dance is ushered in by two of the most enigmatic +pages of Chopin. The A major intermezzo, with its booming cannons and +reverberating overtones, is not easily defensible on the score of form, +yet it unmistakably fits in the picture. The mazurka is full of +interrogation and emotional nuanciren. The return of the tempest is not +long delayed. It bursts, wanes, and with the coda comes sad yearning, +then the savage drama passes tremblingly into the night after fluid and +wavering affirmations; a roar in F sharp and finally a silence that +marks the cessation of an agitating nightmare. No "sabre dance" this, +but a confession from the dark depths of a self-tortured soul. Op. 44 +was published November, 1841, and is dedicated to Princesse de Beauvau. +There are few editorial differences. In the eighteenth bar from the +beginning, Kullak, in the second beat, fills out an octave. Not so in +Klindworth nor in the original. At the twentieth bar Klindworth differs +from the original as follows. The Chopin text is the upper one: +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +[Musical score excerpts] +</P> + +<P> +The A flat Polonaise, op. 53, was published December, 1843, and is said +by Karasowski to have been composed in 1840, after Chopin's return from +Majorca. It is dedicated to A. Leo. This is the one Karasowski calls +the story of Chopin's vision of the antique dead in an isolated tower +of Madame Sand's chateau at Nohant. We have seen this legend disproved +by one who knows. This Polonaise is not as feverish and as exalted as +the previous one. It is, as Kleczynski writes, "the type of a war +song." Named the Heroique, one hears in it Ehlert's "ring of damascene +blade and silver spur." There is imaginative splendor in this thrilling +work, with its thunder of horses' hoofs and fierce challengings. What +fire, what sword thrusts and smoke and clash of mortal conflict! Here +is no psychical presentation, but an objective picture of battle, of +concrete contours, and with a cleaving brilliancy that excites the +blood to boiling pitch. That Chopin ever played it as intended is +incredible; none but the heroes of the keyboard may grasp its dense +chordal masses, its fiery projectiles of tone. But there is something +disturbing, even ghostly, in the strange intermezzo that separates the +trio from the polonaise. Both mist and starlight are in it. Yet the +work is played too fast, and has been nicknamed the "Drum" Polonaise, +losing in majesty and force because of the vanity of virtuosi. The +octaves in E major are spun out as if speed were the sole idea of this +episode. Follow Kleczynski's advice and do not sacrifice the Polonaise +to the octaves. Karl Tausig, so Joseffy and de Lenz assert, played this +Polonaise in an unapproachable manner. Powerful battle tableau as it +is, it may still be presented so as not to shock one's sense of the +euphonious, of the limitations of the instrument. This work becomes +vapid and unheroic when transferred to the orchestra. +</P> + +<P> +The Polonaise-Fantaisie in A flat, op. 61, given to the world +September, 1846, is dedicated to Madame A. Veyret. One of three great +Polonaises, it is just beginning to be understood, having been derided +as amorphous, febrile, of little musical moment, even Liszt declaring +that "such pictures possess but little real value to art. ... +Deplorable visions which the artist should admit with extreme +circumspection within the graceful circle of his charmed realm." This +was written in the old-fashioned days, when art was aristocratic and +excluded the "baser" and more painful emotions. For a generation +accustomed to the realism of Richard Strauss, the Fantaisie-Polonaise +seems vaporous and idealistic, withal new. It recalls one of those +enchanted flasks of the magii from which on opening smoke exhales that +gradually shapes itself into fantastic and fearsome figures. This +Polonaise at no time exhibits the solidity of its two predecessors; its +plasticity defies the imprint of the conventional Polonaise, though we +ever feel its rhythms. It may be full of monologues, interspersed +cadenzas, improvised preludes and short phrases, as Kullak suggests, +yet there is unity in the composition, the units of structure and +style. It was music of the future when Chopin composed; it is now music +of the present, as much as Richard Wagner's. But the realism is a +trifle clouded. Here is the duality of Chopin the suffering man and +Chopin the prophet of Poland. Undimmed is his poetic vision—Poland +will be free!—undaunted his soul, though oppressed by a suffering +body. There are in the work throes of agony blended with the trumpet +notes of triumph. And what puzzled our fathers—the shifting lights and +shadows, the restless tonalities—are welcome, for at the beginning of +this new century the chromatic is king. The ending of this Polonaise is +triumphant, recalling in key and climaxing the A flat Ballade. Chopin +is still the captain of his soul—and Poland will be free! Are Celt and +Slav doomed to follow ever the phosphorescent lights of patriotism? +Liszt acknowledges the beauty and grandeur of this last Polonaise, +which unites the characteristics of superb and original manipulation of +the form, the martial and the melancholic. +</P> + +<P> +Opus 71, three posthumous Polonaises, given to the world by Julius +Fontana, are in D minor, published in 1827, B flat major, 1828, and F +minor, 1829. They are interesting to Chopinists. The influence of +Weber, a past master in this form, is felt. Of the three the last in F +minor is the strongest, although if Chopin's age is taken into +consideration, the first, in D minor, is a feat for a lad of eighteen. +I agree with Niecks that the posthumous Polonaise, without opus number, +in G sharp minor, was composed later than 1822—the date given in the +Breitkopf & Hartel edition. It is an artistic conception, and in "light +winged figuration" far more mature than the Chopin of op. 71. Really a +graceful and effective little composition of the florid order, but like +his early music without poetic depth. The Warsaw "Echo Musicale," to +commemorate the fiftieth anniversary of Chopin's death, published a +special number in October, 1899, with the picture of a farmer named +Krysiak, born in 1810, the year after the composer. Thereat Finck +remarked that it is not a case of survival of the fittest! A fac-simile +reproduction of a hitherto unpublished Polonaise in A flat, written at +the age of eleven, is also included in this unique number. This tiny +dance shows, it is said, the "characteristic physiognomy" of the +composer. In reality this polacca is thin, a tentative groping after a +form that later was mastered so magnificently by the composer. Here is +the way it begins—the autograph is Chopin's: +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +[Musical score excerpt] +</P> + +<P> +The Alla Polacca for piano and 'cello, op. 3, was composed in 1829, +while Chopin was on a visit to Prince Radziwill. It is preceded by an +introduction, and is dedicated to Joseph Merk, the 'cellist. Chopin +himself pronounced it a brilliant salon piece. It is now not even that, +for it sounds antiquated and threadbare. The passage work at times +smacks of Chopin and Weber—a hint of the Mouvement Perpetuel—and the +'cello has the better of the bargain. Evidently written for my lady's +chamber. +</P> + +<P> +Two Polonaises remain. One, in B flat minor, was composed in 1826, on +the occasion of the composer's departure for Reinerz. A footnote to the +edition of this rather elegiac piece tells this. Adieu to Guillaume +Kolberg, is the title, and the Trio in D flat is accredited to an air +of "Gazza Ladra," with a sentimental Au Revoir inscribed. Kleczynski +has revised the Gebethner & Wolff edition. The little cadenza in +chromatic double notes on the last page is of a certainty Chopin. But +the Polonaise in G flat major, published by Schott, is doubtful. It has +a shallow ring, a brilliant superficiality that warrants Niecks in +stamping it as a possible compilation. There are traces of the master +throughout, particularly in the E flat minor Trio, but there are some +vile progressions and an air of vulgarity surely not Chopin's. This +dance form, since the death of the great composer, has been chiefly +developed on the virtuoso side. Beethoven, Schubert, Weber, and even +Bach—in his B minor suite for strings and flute—also indulged in this +form. Wagner, as a student, wrote a Polonaise for four hands, in D, and +in Schumann's Papillons there is a charming specimen. Rubinstein +composed a most brilliant and dramatic example in E flat in Le Bal. The +Liszt Polonaises, all said and done, are the most remarkable in design +and execution since Chopin. But they are more Hungarian than Polish. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap13"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +XIII. MAZURKAS:—DANCES OF THE SOUL +</H3> + +<BR> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +I +</H4> + +<P> +"Coquetries, vanities, fantasies, inclinations, elegies, vague +emotions, passions, conquests, struggles upon which the safety or +favors of others depend, all, all meet in this dance." +</P> + +<P> +Thus Liszt. De Lenz further quotes him: "Of the Mazurkas, one must +harness a new pianist of the first rank to each of them." Yet Liszt +told Niecks he did not care much for Chopin's Mazurkas. "One often +meets in them with bars which might just as well be in another place. +But as Chopin puts them perhaps nobody could have put them." Liszt, +despite the rhapsodical praise of his friend, is not always to be +relied upon. Capricious as Chopin, he had days when he disliked not +only the Mazurkas, but all music. He confessed to Niecks that when he +played a half hour for amusement it was Chopin he took up. +</P> + +<P> +There is no more brilliant chapter than this Hungarian's on the dancing +of the Mazurka by the Poles. It is a companion to his equally +sensational description of the Polonaise. He gives a wild, whirling, +highly-colored narrative of the Mazurka, with a coda of extravagant +praise of the beauty and fascination of Polish women. "Angel through +love, demon through fantasy," as Balzac called her. In none of the +piano rhapsodies are there such striking passages to be met as in +Liszt's overwrought, cadenced prose, prose modelled after +Chateaubriand. Niema iak Polki—"nothing equals the Polish women" and +their "divine coquetries;" the Mazurka is their dance—it is the +feminine complement to the heroic and masculine Polonaise. +</P> + +<P> +An English writer describes the dancing of the Mazurka in contemporary +Russia: +</P> + +<P CLASS="block"> + In the salons of St. Petersburg, for instance, the guests + actually dance; they do not merely shamble to and fro in a + crowd, crumpling their clothes and ruffling their tempers, and + call it a set of quadrilles. They have ample space for the + sweeping movements and complicated figures of all the orthodox + ball dances, and are generally gifted with sufficient plastic + grace to carry them out in style. They carefully cultivate + dances calling for a kind of grace which is almost beyond the + reach of art. The mazurka is one of the finest of these, and + it is quite a favorite at balls on the banks of the Neva. It + needs a good deal of room, one or more spurred officers, and + grace, grace and grace. The dash with which the partners rush + forward, the clinking and clattering of spurs as heel clashes + with heel in mid air, punctuating the staccato of the music, + the loud thud of boots striking the ground, followed by their + sibilant slide along the polished floor, then the swift + springs and sudden bounds, the whirling gyrations and dizzy + evolutions, the graceful genuflections and quick embraces, and + all the other intricate and maddening movements to the + accompaniment of one of Glinka's or Tschaikowsky's + masterpieces, awaken and mobilize all the antique heroism, + mediaeval chivalry and wild romance that lie dormant in the + depths of men's being. There is more genuine pleasure in being + the spectator of a soul thrilling dance like that than in + taking an active part in the lifeless make-believes performed + at society balls in many of the more Western countries of + Europe. +</P> + +<P> +Absolutely Slavonic, though a local dance of the province of Mazovia, +the Mazurek or Mazurka, is written in three-four time, with the usual +displaced accent in music of Eastern origin. Brodzinski is quoted as +saying that in its primitive form the Mazurek is only a kind of +Krakowiak, "less lively, less sautillant." At its best it is a dancing +anecdote, a story told in a charming variety of steps and gestures. It +is intoxicating, rude, humorous, poetic, above all melancholy. When he +is happiest he sings his saddest, does the Pole. Hence his predilection +for minor modes. The Mazurka is in three-four or three-eight time. +Sometimes the accent is dotted, but this is by no means absolute. Here +is the rhythm most frequently encountered, although Chopin employs +variants and modifications. The first part of the bar has usually the +quicker notes. +</P> + +<P> +The scale is a mixture of major and minor—melodies are encountered +that grew out of a scale shorn of a degree. Occasionally the augmented +second, the Hungarian, is encountered, and skips of a third are of +frequent occurrence. This, with progressions of augmented fourths and +major sevenths, gives to the Mazurkas of Chopin an exotic character +apart from their novel and original content. As was the case with the +Polonaise, Chopin took the framework of the national dance, developed +it, enlarged it and hung upon it his choicest melodies, his most +piquant harmonies. He breaks and varies the conventionalized rhythm in +a half hundred ways, lifting to the plane of a poem the heavy hoofed +peasant dance. But in this idealization he never robs it altogether of +the flavor of the soil. It is, in all its wayward disguises, the Polish +Mazurka, and is with the Polonaise, according to Rubinstein, the only +Polish-reflective music he has made, although "in all of his +compositions we hear him relate rejoicingly of Poland's vanished +greatness, singing, mourning, weeping over Poland's downfall and all +that, in the most beautiful, the most musical, way." Besides the "hard, +inartistic modulations, the startling progressions and abrupt changes +of mood" that jarred on the old-fashioned Moscheles, and dipped in +vitriol the pen of Rellstab, there is in the Mazurkas the greatest +stumbling block of all, the much exploited rubato. Berlioz swore that +Chopin could not play in time—which was not true—and later we shall +see that Meyerbeer thought the same. What to the sensitive critic is a +charming wavering and swaying in the measure—"Chopin leans about +freely within his bars," wrote an English critic—for the classicists +was a rank departure from the time beat. According to Liszt's +description of the rubato "a wind plays in the leaves, Life unfolds and +develops beneath them, but the tree remains the same—that is the +Chopin rubato." Elsewhere, "a tempo agitated, broken, interrupted, a +movement flexible, yet at the same time abrupt and languishing, and +vacillating as the fluctuating breath by which it is agitated." Chopin +was more commonplace in his definition: "Supposing," he explained, +"that a piece lasts a given number of minutes; it may take just so long +to perform the whole, but in detail deviations may differ." +</P> + +<P> +The tempo rubato is probably as old as music itself. It is in Bach, it +was practised by the old Italian singers. Mikuli says that no matter +how free Chopin was in his treatment of the right hand in melody or +arabesque, the left kept strict time. Mozart and not Chopin it was who +first said: "Let your left hand be your conductor and always keep +time." Halle, the pianist, once asserted that he proved Chopin to be +playing four-four instead of three-four measure in a mazurka. Chopin +laughingly admitted that it was a national trait. Halle was bewildered +when he first heard Chopin play, for he did not believe such music +could be represented by musical signs. Still he holds that this style +has been woefully exaggerated by pupils and imitators. If a Beethoven +symphony or a Bach fugue be played with metronomical rigidity it loses +its quintessential flavor. Is it not time the ridiculous falsehoods +about the Chopin rubato be exposed? Naturally abhorring anything that +would do violence to the structural part of his compositions, Chopin +was a very martinet with his pupils if too much license of tempo was +taken. His music needs the greatest lucidity in presentation, and +naturally a certain elasticity of phrasing. Rhythms need not be +distorted, nor need there be absurd and vulgar haltings, silly and +explosive dynamics. Chopin sentimentalized is Chopin butchered. He +loathed false sentiment, and a man whose taste was formed by Bach and +Mozart, who was nurtured by the music of these two giants, could never +have indulged in exaggerated, jerky tempi, in meaningless expression. +Come, let us be done with this fetish of stolen time, of the wonderful +and so seldom comprehended rubato. If you wish to play Chopin, play him +in curves; let there be no angularities of surface, of measure, but in +the name of the Beautiful do not deliver his exquisitely balanced +phrases with the jolting, balky eloquence of a cafe chantant singer. +The very balance and symmetry of the Chopin phraseology are internal; +it must be delivered in a flowing, waving manner, never square or hard, +yet with every accent showing like the supple muscles of an athlete +beneath his skin. Without the skeleton a musical composition is +flaccid, shapeless, weak and without character. Chopin's music needs a +rhythmic sense that to us, fed upon the few simple forms of the West, +seems almost abnormal. The Chopin rubato is rhythm liberated from its +scholastic bonds, but it does not mean anarchy, disorder. What makes +this popular misconception all the more singular is the freedom with +which the classics are now being interpreted. A Beethoven, and even a +Mozart symphony, no longer means a rigorous execution, in which the +measure is ruthlessly hammered out by the conductor, but the melodic +and emotional curve is followed and the tempo fluctuates. Why then is +Chopin singled out as the evil and solitary representative of a vicious +time-beat? Play him as you play Mendelssohn and your Chopin has +evaporated. Again play him lawlessly, with his accentual life +topsy-turvied, and he is no longer Chopin—his caricature only. +Pianists of Slavic descent alone understand the secret of the tempo +rubato. +</P> + +<P CLASS="block"> + I have read in a recently started German periodical that to + make the performance of Chopin's works pleasing it is + sufficient to play them with less precision of rhythm than the + music of other composers. I, on the contrary, do not know a + single phrase of Chopin's works—including even the freest + among them—in which the balloon of inspiration, as it moves + through the air, is not checked by an anchor of rhythm and + symmetry. Such passages as occur in the F minor Ballade, the B + flat minor Scherzo—the middle part—the F minor Prelude, and + even the A flat Impromptu, are not devoid of rhythm. The most + crooked recitative of the F minor Concerto, as can be easily + proved, has a fundamental rhythm not at all fantastic, and + which cannot be dispensed with when playing with orchestra. + ... Chopin never overdoes fantasy, and is always restrained by + a pronounced aesthetical instinct. ... Everywhere the + simplicity of his poetical inspiration and his sobriety saves + us from extravagance and false pathos. +</P> + +<P> +Kleczynski has this in his second volume, for he enjoyed the invaluable +prompting of Chopin's pupil, the late Princess Marceline Czartoryska. +</P> + +<P> +Niecks quotes Mme. Friederike Stretcher, nee Muller, a pupil, who wrote +of her master: "He required adherence to the strictest rhythm, hated +all lingering and lagging, misplaced rubatos, as well as exaggerated +ritardandos. 'Je vous prie de vous asseoir,' he said, on such an +occasion, with gentle mockery. And it is just in this respect that +people make such terrible mistakes in the execution of his works." +</P> + +<P> +And now to the Mazurkas, which de Lenz said were Heinrich Heine's songs +on the piano. "Chopin was a phoenix of intimacy with the piano. In his +nocturnes and mazurkas he is unrivalled, downright fabulous." +</P> + +<P> +No compositions are so Chopin-ish as the Mazurkas. Ironical, sad, +sweet, joyous, morbid, sour, sane and dreamy, they illustrate what was +said of their composer—"his heart is sad, his mind is gay." That +subtle quality, for an Occidental, enigmatic, which the Poles call Zal, +is in some of them; in others the fun is almost rough and roaring. Zal, +a poisonous word, is a baleful compound of pain, sadness, secret +rancor, revolt. It is a Polish quality and is in the Celtic peoples. +Oppressed nations with a tendency to mad lyrism develop this mental +secretion of the spleen. Liszt writes that "the Zal colors with a +reflection now argent, now ardent the whole of Chopin's works." This +sorrow is the very soil of Chopin's nature. He so confessed when +questioned by Comtesse d'Agoult. Liszt further explains that the +strange word includes in its meanings—for it seems packed with +them—"all the tenderness, all the humility of a regret borne with +resignation and without a murmur;" it also signifies "excitement, +agitation, rancor, revolt full of reproach, premeditated vengeance, +menace never ceasing to threaten if retaliation should ever become +possible, feeding itself meanwhile with a bitter if sterile hatred." +</P> + +<P> +Sterile indeed must be such a consuming passion. Even where his +patriotism became a lyric cry, this Zal tainted the source of Chopin's +joy. It made him irascible, and with his powers of repression, this +smouldering, smothered rage must have well nigh suffocated him, and in +the end proved harmful alike to his person and to his art. As in +certain phases of disease it heightened the beauty of his later work, +unhealthy, feverish, yet beauty without doubt. The pearl is said to be +a morbid secretion, so the spiritual ferment called Zal gave to +Chopin's music its morbid beauty. It is in the B minor Scherzo but not +in the A flat Ballade. The F minor Ballade overflows with it, and so +does the F sharp minor Polonaise, but not the first Impromptu. Its dark +introspection colors many of the preludes and mazurkas, and in the C +sharp minor Scherzo it is in acrid flowering—truly fleurs du mal. +Heine and Baudelaire, two poets far removed from the Slavic, show +traces of the terrible drowsy Zal in their poetry. It is the collective +sorrow and tribal wrath of a down-trodden nation, and the mazurkas for +that reason have ethnic value. As concise, even as curt as the +Preludes, they are for the most part highly polished. They are dancing +preludes, and often tiny single poems of great poetic intensity and +passionate plaint. +</P> + +<P> +Chopin published during his lifetime forty-one Mazurkas in eleven +cahiers of three, four and five numbers. Op. 6, four Mazurkas, and op. +7, five Mazurkas, were published December, 1832. Op. 6 is dedicated to +Comtesse Pauline Plater; op. 7 to Mr. Johns. Op. 17, four Mazurkas, May +4, dedicated to Madame Lina Freppa; op. 24, four Mazurkas, November, +1835, dedicated to Comte de Perthuis; op. 30, four Mazurkas, December, +1837, dedicated to Princesse Czartoryska; op. 33, four Mazurkas, +October, 1838, dedicated to Comtesse Mostowska; op. 41, four Mazurkas, +December, 1840, dedicated to E. Witwicki; op. 50, three Mazurkas, +November, 1841, dedicated to Leon Szmitkowski; op. 56, three Mazurkas, +August, 1844, dedicated to Mile. C. Maberly; op. 59, three Mazurkas, +April, 1846, no dedication, and op. 63, three Mazurkas, September, +1847, dedicated to Comtesse Czosnowska. +</P> + +<P> +Besides there are op. 67 and 68 published by Fontana after Chopin's +death, consisting of eight Mazurkas, and there are a miscellaneous +number, two in A minor, both in the Kullak, Klindworth and Mikuli +editions, one in F sharp major, said to be written by Charles Mayer—in +Klindworth's—and four others, in G, B flat, D and C major. This makes +in all fifty-six to be grouped and analyzed. Niecks thinks there is a +well-defined difference between the Mazurkas as far as op. 41 and those +that follow. In the latter he misses "savage beauties" and spontaneity. +As Chopin gripped the form, as he felt more, suffered more and knew +more, his Mazurkas grew broader, revealed more Weltschmerz, became +elaborate and at times impersonal, but seldom lost the racial "snap" +and hue. They are sonnets in their well-rounded mecanisme, and, as +Schumann says, something new is to be found in each. Toward the last, a +few are blithe and jocund, but they are the exceptions. In the larger +ones the universal quality is felt, but to the detriment of the +intimate, Polish characteristics. These Mazurkas are just what they are +called, only some dance with the heart, others with the heels. +Comprising a large and original portion of Chopin's compositions, they +are the least known. Perhaps when they wander from the map of Poland +they lose some of their native fragrance. Like hardy, simple wild +flowers, they are mostly for the open air, the only out-of-doors music +Chopin ever made. But even in the open, under the moon, the note of +self-torture, of sophisticated sadness is not absent. Do not accuse +Chopin, for this is the sign-manual of his race. The Pole suffers in +song the joy of his sorrow. +</P> + +<BR> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +II +</H4> + +<P> +The F sharp minor Mazurka of op. 6 begins with the characteristic +triplet that plays such a role in the dance. Here we find a Chopin +fuller fledged than in the nocturnes and variations, and probably +because of the form. This Mazurka, first in publication, is melodious, +slightly mournful but of a delightful freshness. The third section with +the appoggiaturas realizes a vivid vision of country couples dancing +determinedly. Who plays No. 2 of this set? It, too, has the "native +wood note wild," with its dominant pedal bass, its slight twang and its +sweet-sad melody in C sharp minor. There is hearty delight in the +major, and how natural it seems. No. 3 in E is still on the village +green, and the boys and girls are romping in the dance. We hear a drone +bass—a favorite device of Chopin—and the chatter of the gossips, the +bustle of a rural festival. The harmonization is rich, the rhythmic +life vital. But in the following one in E flat minor a different note +is sounded. Its harmonies are closer and there is sorrow abroad. The +incessant circling around one idea, as if obsessed by fixed grief, is +used here for the first, but not for the last time, by the composer. +</P> + +<P> +Opus 7 drew attention to Chopin. It was the set that brought down the +thunders of Rellstab, who wrote: "If Mr. Chopin had shown this +composition to a master the latter would, it is to be hoped, have torn +it and thrown it at his feet, which we hereby do symbolically." +Criticism had its amenities in 1833. In a later number of "The Iris," +in which a caustic notice appeared of the studies, op. 10, Rellstab +printed a letter, signed Chopin, the authenticity of which is extremely +doubtful. In it Chopin is made to call the critic "really a very bad +man." Niecks demonstrates that the Polish pianist was not the writer. +It reads like the effusion of some indignant, well meaning female +friend. +</P> + +<P> +The B flat major Mazurka which opens op. 7 is the best known of these +dances. There is an expansive swing, a laissez-aller to this piece, +with its air of elegance, that are very alluring. The rubato +flourishes, and at the close we hear the footing of the peasant. A +jolly, reckless composition that makes one happy to be alive and +dancing. The next, which begins in A minor, is as if one danced upon +one's grave; a change to major does not deceive, it is too +heavy-hearted. No. 3, in F minor, with its rhythmic pronouncement at +the start, brings us back to earth. The triplet that sets off the +phrase has great significance. Guitar-like is the bass in its snapping +resolution. The section that begins on the dominant of D flat is full +of vigor and imagination; the left hand is given a solo. This Mazurka +has the true ring. +</P> + +<P> +The following one, in A flat, is a sequence of moods. Its assertiveness +soon melts into tenderer hues, and in an episode in A we find much to +ponder. No. 5, in C, consists of three lines. It is a sort of coda to +the opus and full of the echoes of lusty happiness. A silhouette with a +marked profile. +</P> + +<P> +Opus 17, No. 1, in B flat, is bold, chivalric, and I fancy I hear the +swish of the warrior's sabre. The peasant has vanished or else gapes +through the open window while his master goes through the paces of a +courtlier dance. We encounter sequential chords of the seventh, and +their use, rhythmically framed as they are, gives a line of sternness +to the dance. Niecks thinks that the second Mazurka might be called The +Request, so pathetic, playful and persuasive is it. It is in E minor +and has a plaintive, appealing quality. The G major part is very +pretty. In the last lines the passion mounts, but is never shrill. +Kullak notes that in the fifth and sixth bars there is no slur in +certain editions. Klindworth employs it, but marks the B sforzando. A +slur on two notes of the same pitch with Chopin does not always mean a +tie. The A flat Mazurka, No. 3, is pessimistic, threatening and +irritable. Though in the key of E major the trio displays a relentless +sort of humor. The return does not mend matters. A dark page! In A +minor the fourth is called by Szulc the Little Jew. Szulc, who wrote +anecdotes of Chopin and collected them with the title of "Fryderyk +Szopen," told the story to Kleczynski. It is this: +</P> + +<P CLASS="block"> + Chopin did not care for programme music, though more than one + of his compositions, full of expression and character, may be + included under that name. Who does not know the A minor + Mazurka of op. 17, dedicated to Lena Freppa? Itwas already + known in our country as the "Little Jew" before the departure + of our artist abroad. It is one of the works of Chopin which + are characterized by distinct humor. A Jew in slippers and a + long robe comes out of his inn, and seeing an unfortunate + peasant, his customer, intoxicated, tumbling about the road + and uttering complaints, exclaims from his threshold, "What is + this?" Then, as if by way of contrast to this scene, the gay + wedding party of a rich burgess comes along on its way from + church, with shouts of various kinds, accompanied in a lively + manner by violins and bagpipes. The train passes by, the tipsy + peasant renews his complaints—the complaints of a man who had + tried to drown his misery in the glass. The Jew returns + indoors, shaking his head and again asking, "What was this?" +</P> + +<P> +The story strikes one as being both childish and commonplace. The +Mazurka is rather doleful and there is a little triplet of +interrogation standing sentinel at the fourth bar. It is also the last +phrase. But what of that? I, too, can build you a programme as lofty or +lowly as you please, but it will not be Chopin's. Niecks, for example, +finds this very dance bleak and joyless, of intimate emotional +experience, and with "jarring tones that strike in and pitilessly wake +the dreamer." So there is no predicating the content of music except in +a general way; the mood key may be struck, but in Chopin's case this is +by no means infallible. If I write with confidence it is that begot of +desperation, for I know full well that my version of the story will not +be yours. The A minor Mazurka for me is full of hectic despair, +whatever that may mean, and its serpentining chromatics and apparently +suspended close—on the chord of the sixth—gives an impression of +morbid irresolution modulating into a sort of desperate gayety. Its +tonality accounts for the moods evoked, being indeterminate and +restless. +</P> + +<P> +Opus 24 begins with the G minor Mazurka, a favorite because of its +comparative freedom from technical difficulties. Although in the minor +mode there is mental strength in the piece, with its exotic scale of +the augmented second, and its trio is hearty. In the next, in C, we +find, besides the curious content, a mixture of tonalities—Lydian and +mediaeval church modes. Here the trio is occidental. The entire piece +leaves a vague impression of discontent, and the refrain recalls the +Russian bargemen's songs utilized at various times by Tschaikowsky. +Klindworth uses variants. There is also some editorial differences in +the metronomic markings, Mikuli being, according to Kullak, too slow. +Mention has not been made, as in the studies and preludes, of the tempi +of the Mazurkas. These compositions are so capricious, so varied, that +Chopin, I am sure, did not play any one of them twice alike. They are +creatures of moods, melodic air plants, swinging to the rhythms of any +vagrant breeze. The metronome is for the student, but metronome and +rubato are, as de Lenz would have said, mutually exclusive. +</P> + +<P> +The third Mazurka of op. 24 is in A flat. It is pleasing, not deep, a +real dance with an ornamental coda. But the next! Ah! here is a gem, a +beautiful and exquisitely colored poem. In B flat minor, it sends out +prehensile filaments that entwine and draw us into the centre of a +wondrous melody, laden with rich odors, odors that almost intoxicate. +The figuration is tropical, and when the major is reached and those +glancing thirty-seconds so coyly assail us we realize the seductive +charm of Chopin. The reprise is still more festooned, and it is almost +a relief when the little, tender unison begins with its positive chord +assertions closing the period. Then follows a fascinating, cadenced +step, with lights and shades, sweet melancholy driving before it joy +and being routed itself, until the annunciation of the first theme and +the dying away of the dance, dancers and the solid globe itself, as if +earth had committed suicide for loss of the sun. The last two bars +could have been written only by Chopin. They are ineffable sighs. +</P> + +<P> +And now the chorus of praise begins to mount in burning octaves. The C +minor Mazurka, op. 30, is another of those wonderful, heartfelt +melodies of the master. What can I say of the deepening feeling at the +con anima! It stabs with its pathos. Here is the poet Chopin, the poet +who, with Burns, interprets the simple strains of the folk, who blinds +us with color and rich romanticism like Keats and lifts us Shelley-wise +to transcendental azure. And his only apparatus a keyboard. As Schumann +wrote: "Chopin did not make his appearance by an orchestral army, as a +great genius is accustomed to do; he only possesses a small cohort, but +every soul belongs to him to the last hero." +</P> + +<P> +Eight lines is this dance, yet its meanings are almost endless. No. 2, +in B minor, is called The Cuckoo by Kleczynski. It is sprightly and +with the lilt, notwithstanding its subtle progressions, of Mazovia. No. +3 in D flat is all animation, brightness and a determination to stay +out the dance. The alternate major-minor of the theme is truly Polish. +The graceful trio and canorous brilliancy of this dance make it a +favored number. The ending is epigrammatic. It comes so suddenly upon +us, our cortical cells pealing with the minor, that its very abruptness +is witty. One can see Chopin making a mocking moue as he wrote it. +Tschaikowsky borrowed the effect for the conclusion of the Chinoise in +a miniature orchestral suite. The fourth of this opus is in C sharp +minor. Again I feel like letting loose the dogs of enthusiasm. The +sharp rhythms and solid build of this ample work give it a massive +character. It is one of the big Mazurkas, and the ending, raw as it +is—consecutive, bare-faced fifths and sevenths—compasses its intended +meaning. +</P> + +<P> +Opus 33 is a popular set. It begins with one in G sharp minor, which is +curt and rather depressing. The relief in B major is less real than it +seems—on paper. Moody, withal a tender-hearted Mazurka. No. 2, in D, +is bustling, graceful and full of unrestrained vitality. Bright and not +particularly profound, it was successfully arranged for voice by +Viardot-Garcia. The third of the opus, in C, is the one described by de +Lenz as almost precipitating a violent row between Chopin and +Meyerbeer. He had christened it the Epitaph of the Idea. +</P> + +<P> +"Two-four," said Meyerbeer, after de Lenz played it. "Three-four," +answered Chopin, flushing angrily. "Let me have it for a ballet in my +new opera and I'll show you," retorted Meyerbeer. "It's three-four," +scolded Chopin, and played it himself. De Lenz says they parted coolly, +each holding to his opinion. Later, in St. Petersburg, Meyerbeer met +this gossip and told him that he loved Chopin. "I know no pianist, no +composer for the piano like him." Meyerbeer was wrong in his idea of +the tempo. Though Chopin slurs the last beat, it is there, +nevertheless. This Mazurka is only four lines long and is charming, as +charming as the brief specimen in the Preludes. The next Mazurka is +another famous warhorse. In B minor, it is full of veiled coquetries, +hazardous mood transitions, growling recitatives and smothered plaints. +The continual return to the theme gives rise to all manner of fanciful +programmes. One of the most characteristic is by the Polish poet +Zelenski, who, so Kleczynski relates, wrote a humorous poem on this +mazurka. For him it is a domestic comedy in which a drunken peasant and +his much abused wife enact a little scene. Returning home the worse for +wear he sings "Oj ta dana"—"Oh dear me"—and rumbles in the bass in a +figure that answers the treble. His wife reproaching him, he strikes +her. Here we are in B flat. She laments her fate in B major. Then her +husband shouts: "Be quiet, old vixen." This is given in the octaves, a +genuine dialogue, the wife tartly answering: "Shan't be quiet." The +gruff grumbling in the bass is heard, an imitation of the above, when +suddenly the man cries out, the last eight bars of the composition: +"Kitty, Kitty come—do come here, I forgive you," which is decidedly +masculine in its magnanimity. +</P> + +<P> +If one does not care for the rather coarse realism of this reading +Kleczynski offers the poem of Ujejeski, called The Dragoon. A soldier +flatters a girl at the inn. She flies from him, and her lover, +believing she has deceived him, despairingly drowns himself. The +ending, with its "Ring, ring, ring the bell there! Horses carry me to +the depths," has more poetic contour than the other. Without grafting +any libretto on it, this Mazurka is a beautiful tone-piece in itself. +Its theme is delicately mournful and the subject, in B major, simply +entrancing in its broad, flowing melody. +</P> + +<P> +In C sharp minor, op. 41, is a Mazurka that is beloved of me. Its scale +is exotic, its rhythm convincing, its tune a little saddened by life, +but courage never fails. This theme sounds persistently, in the middle +voices, in the bass, and at the close in full harmonies, unisons, +giving it a startling effect. Octaves take it up in profile until it +vanishes. Here is the very apotheosis of rhythm. No. 2, in E minor, is +not very resolute of heart. It was composed, so Niecks avers, at Palma, +when Chopin's health fully accounts for the depressed character of the +piece, for it is sad to the point of tears. Of op. 41 he wrote to +Fontana from Nohant in 1839, "You know I have four new Mazurkas, one +from Palma, in E minor; three from here, in B major, A flat major and C +sharp minor. They seem to me pretty, as the youngest children usually +do when the parents grow old." No. 3 is a vigorous, sonorous dance. No. +4, over which the editors deviate on the serious matter of text, in A +flat, is for the concert room, and is allied to several of his gracious +Valses. Playful and decorative, but not profound in feeling. +</P> + +<P> +Opus 50, the first in G major, is healthy and vivacious. Good humor +predominates. Kullak notes that in some editions it closes pianissimo, +which seems a little out of drawing. No. 2 is charming. In A flat, it +is a perfect specimen of the aristocratic Mazurka. The D flat Trio, the +answering episode in B flat minor, and the grace of the return make +this one to be studied and treasured. De Lenz finds Bach-ian influences +in the following, in C sharp minor: "It begins as though written for +the organ, and ends in an exclusive salon; it does him credit and is +worked out more fully than the others. Chopin was much pleased when I +told him that in the construction of this Mazurka the passage from E +major to F major was the same as that in the Agatha aria in +'Freischutz.'" De Lenz refers to the opening Bach-like mutations. The +texture of this dance is closer and finer spun than any we have +encountered. Perhaps spontaneity is impaired, mais que voulez vous? +Chopin was bound to develop, and his Mazurkas, fragile and constricted +as is the form, were sure to show a like record of spiritual and +intellectual growth. +</P> + +<P> +Opus 56, in B major, is elaborate, even in its beginning. There is +decoration in the ritornelle in E flat and one feels the absence of a +compensating emotion, despite the display of contrapuntal skill. Very +virtuoso-like, but not so intimate as some of the others. Karasowski +selects No. 2 in C as an illustration. "It is as though the composer +had sought for the moment to divert himself with narcotic intoxication +only to fall back the more deeply into his original gloom." There is +the peasant in the first bars in C, but the A minor and what follows +soon disturb the air of bonhomie. Theoretical ease is in the imitative +passages; Chopin is now master of his tools. The third Mazurka of op. +56 is in C minor. It is quite long and does not give the impression of +a whole. With the exception of a short break in B major, it is composed +with the head, not the heart, nor yet the heels. +</P> + +<P> +Not unlike, in its sturdy affirmation, the one in C sharp minor, op. +41, is the next Mazurka, in A minor, op. 59. That Chopin did not repeat +himself is an artistic miracle. A subtle turn takes us off the familiar +road to some strange glade, wherein the flowers are rare in scent and +odor. This Mazurka, like the one that follows, has a dim resemblance to +others, yet there is always a novel point of departure, a fresh +harmony, a sudden melody or an unexpected ending. Hadow, for example, +thinks the A flat of this opus the most beautiful of them all. In it he +finds legitimately used the repetition in various shapes of a single +phrase. To me this Mazurka seems but an amplification, an elaboration +of the lovely one in the same key, op. 50, No. 2. The double sixths and +more complicated phraseology do not render the later superior to the +early Mazurka, yet there is no gainsaying the fact that this is a noble +composition. But the next, in F sharp minor, despite its rather +saturnine gaze, is stronger in interest, if not in workmanship. While +it lacks Niecks' beautes sauvages, is it not far loftier in conception +and execution than op. 6, in F sharp minor? The inevitable triplet +appears in the third bar, and is a hero throughout. Oh, here is charm +for you! Read the close of the section in F sharp major. In the major +it ends, the triplet fading away at last, a mere shadow, a turn on D +sharp, but victor to the last. Chopin is at the summit of his +invention. Time and tune, that wait for no man, are now his bond +slaves. Pathos, delicacy, boldness, a measured melancholy and the art +of euphonious presentiment of all these, and many factors more, stamp +this Mazurka a masterpiece. +</P> + +<P> +Niecks believes there is a return of the early freshness and poetry in +the last three Mazurkas, op. 63. "They are, indeed, teeming with +interesting matter," he writes. "Looked at from the musician's point of +view, how much do we not see novel and strange, beautiful and +fascinating withal? Sharp dissonances, chromatic passing notes, +suspensions and anticipations, displacement of accent, progressions of +perfect fifths—the horror of schoolmen—sudden turns and unexpected +digressions that are so unaccountable, so out of the line of logical +sequence, that one's following the composer is beset with difficulties. +But all this is a means to an end, the expression of an individuality +with its intimate experiences. The emotional content of many of these +trifles—trifles if considered only by their size—is really +stupendous." Spoken like a brave man and not a pedant! +</P> + +<P> +Full of vitality is the first number of op. 63. In B major, it is +sufficiently various in figuration and rhythmical life to single it +from its fellows. The next, in F minor, has a more elegiac ring. Brief +and not difficult of matter or manner is this dance. The third, of +winning beauty, is in C sharp minor—surely a pendant to the C sharp +minor Valse. I defy anyone to withstand the pleading, eloquent voice of +this Mazurka. Slender in technical configuration, yet it impressed +Louis Ehlert so much that he was impelled to write: "A more perfect +canon in the octave could not have been written by one who had grown +gray in the learned arts." +</P> + +<P> +The four Mazurkas, published posthumously in 1855, that comprise op. 67 +were composed by Chopin at various dates. To the first, in G, +Klindworth affixes 1849 as the year of composition. Niecks gives a much +earlier date, 1835. I fancy the latter is correct, as the piece sounds +like one of Chopin's more youthful efforts. It is jolly and rather +superficial. The next, in G minor, is familiar. It is very pretty, and +its date is set down by Niecks as 1849, while Klindworth gives 1835. +Here again Niecks is correct, although I suspect that Klindworth +transposed his figures accidentally. No. 3, in C, was composed in 1835. +On this both biographer and editor agree. It is certainly an early +effusion of no great value, although a good dancing tune. No. 4 A +minor, of this opus, composed in 1846, is more mature, but in no wise +remarkable. +</P> + +<P> +Opus 68, the second of the Fontana set, was composed in 1830. The +first, in C, is commonplace; the one in A minor, composed in 1827, is +much better, being lighter and well made; the third, in F major, 1830, +weak and trivial, and the fourth, in F minor, 1849, interesting because +it is said by Julius Fontana to be Chopin's last composition. He put it +on paper a short time before his death, but was too ill to try it at +the piano. It is certainly morbid in its sick insistence in phrase +repetition, close harmonies and wild departure—in A—from the first +figure. But it completes the gloomy and sardonic loop, and we wish, +after playing this veritable song of the tomb, that we had parted from +Chopin in health, not disease. This page is full of the premonitions of +decay. Too weak and faltering to be febrile, Chopin is here a debile, +prematurely exhausted young man. There are a few accents of a forced +gayety, but they are swallowed up in the mists of dissolution—the +dissolution of one of the most sensitive brains ever wrought by nature. +Here we may echo, without any savor of Liszt's condescension or de +Lenz's irony: "Pauvre Frederic!" +</P> + +<P> +Klindworth and Kullak have different ideas concerning the end of this +Mazurka. Both are correct. Kullak, Klindworth and Mikuli include in +their editions two Mazurkas in A minor. Neither is impressive. One, the +date of composition unknown, is dedicated "a son ami Emile Gaillard;" +the other first appeared in a musical publication of Schotts' about +1842 or 1843—according to Niecks. Of this set I prefer the former; it +abounds in octaves and ends with a long trill There is in the +Klindworth edition a Mazurka, the last in the set, in the key of F +sharp. It is so un-Chopinish and artificial that the doubts of the +pianist Ernst Pauer were aroused as to its authenticity. On +inquiry—Niecks quotes from the London monthly "Musical Record," July +1, 1882—Pauer discovered that the piece was identical with a Mazurka +by Charles Mayer. Gotthard being the publisher of the alleged Chopin +Mazurka, declared he bought the manuscript from a Polish +countess—possibly one of the fifty in whose arms Chopin died—and that +the lady parted with Chopin's autograph because of her dire poverty. It +is, of course, a clear case of forgery. +</P> + +<P> +Of the four early Mazurkas, in G major and B flat major—dating from +1825—D major—composed in 1829-30, but remodelled in 1832—and C +major—of 1833—the latter is the most characteristic. The G major is +of slight worth. As Niecks remarks, it contains a harmonic error. The +one in B flat starts out with a phrase that recalls the A minor +Mazurka, numbered 45 in the Breitkopf & Hartel edition. This B flat +Mazurka, early as it was composed, is, nevertheless, pretty. There are +breadth and decision in the C major Mazurka. The recasting improves the +D major Mazurka. Its trio is lifted an octave and the doubling of notes +throughout gives more weight and richness. +</P> + +<P> +"In the minor key laughs and cries, dances and mourns the Slav," says +Dr. J. Schucht in his monograph on Chopin. Chopin here reveals not only +his nationality, but his own fascinating and enigmatic individuality. +Within the tremulous spaces of this immature dance is enacted the play +of a human soul, a soul that voices the sorrow and revolt of a dying +race, of a dying poet. They are epigrammatic, fluctuating, crazy, and +tender, these Mazurkas, and some of them have a soft, melancholy light, +as if shining through alabaster—true corpse light leading to a morass +of doubt and terror. But a fantastic, dishevelled, debonair spirit is +the guide, and to him we abandon ourselves in these precise and +vertiginous dances. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap14"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +XIV. CHOPIN THE CONQUEROR +</H3> + +<P> +The Scherzi of Chopin are of his own creation; the type as illustrated +by Beethoven and Mendelssohn had no meaning for him. Whether in earnest +or serious jest, Chopin pitched on a title that is widely misleading +when the content is considered. The Beethoven Scherzo is full of a +robust sort of humor. In it he is seldom poetical, frequently given to +gossip, and at times he hints at the mystery of life. The demoniacal +element, the fierce jollity that mocks itself, the almost titanic anger +of Chopin would not have been regarded by the composer of the Eroica +Symphony as adapted to the form. The Pole practically built up a new +musical structure, boldly called it a Scherzo, and, as in the case of +the Ballades, poured into its elastic mould most disturbing and +incomparable music. +</P> + +<P> +Chopin seldom compasses sublimity. His arrows are tipped with fire, yet +they do not fly far. But in some of his music he skirts the regions +where abide the gods. In at least one Scherzo, in one Ballade, in the F +minor Fantaisie, in the first two movements of the B flat minor Sonata, +in several of the Eludes, and in one of the Preludes, he compasses +grandeur. Individuality of utterance, beauty of utterance, and the +eloquence we call divine are his; criticism then bows its questioning +brows before this anointed one. In the Scherzi Chopin is often prophet +as well as poet. He fumes and frets, but upon his countenance is the +precious fury of the sibyls. We see the soul that suffers from secret +convulsions, but forgive the writhing for the music made. These four +Scherzi are psychical records, confessions committed to paper of +outpourings that never could have passed the lips. From these alone we +may almost reconstruct the real Chopin, the inner Chopin, whose +conventional exterior so ill prepared the world for the tragic issues +of his music. +</P> + +<P> +The first Scherzo is a fair model. There are a few bars of +introduction—the porch, as Niecks would call it—a principal subject, +a trio, a short working-out section, a skilful return to the opening +theme, and an elaborate coda. This edifice, not architecturally +flawless, is better adapted to the florid beauties of Byzantine +treatment than to the severe Hellenic line. Yet Chopin gave it dignity, +largeness and a classic massiveness. The interior is romantic, is +modern, personal, but the facade shows gleaming minarets, the strangely +builded shapes of the Orient. This B minor Scherzo has the acid note of +sorrow and revolt, yet the complex figuration never wavers. The walls +stand firm despite the hurricane blowing through and around them. +Ehlert finds this Scherzo tornadic. It is gusty, and the hurry and +over-emphasis do not endear it to the pianist. The first pages are +filled with wrathful sounds, there is much tossing of hands and cries +to heaven, calling down its fire and brimstone. A climax mounts to a +fine frenzy until the lyric intermezzo in B is reached. Here love +chants with honeyed tongues. The widely dispersed figure of the melody +has an entrancing tenderness. But peace does not long prevail against +the powers of Eblis, and infernal is the Wilde Jagd of the finale. +After shrillest of dissonances, a chromatic uproar pilots the doomed +one across this desperate Styx. +</P> + +<P> +What Chopin's programme was we can but guess. He may have outlined the +composition in a moment of great ebullition, a time of soul laceration +arising from a cat scratch or a quarrel with Maurice Sand in the garden +over the possession of the goat cart. +</P> + +<P> +The Klindworth edition is preferable. Kullak follows his example in +using the double note stems in the B major part. He gives the A sharp +in the bass six bars before the return of the first motif. Klindworth, +and other editions, prescribe A natural, which is not so effective. +This Scherzo might profit by being played without the repeats. The +chromatic interlocked octaves at the close are very striking. +</P> + +<P> +I find at times—as my mood changes—something almost repellant in the +B minor Scherzo. It does not present the frank physiognomy of the +second Scherzo, op. 31, in B flat minor. Ehlert cries that it was +composed in a blessed hour, although de Lenz quotes Chopin as saying of +the opening, "It must be a charnel house." The defiant challenge of the +beginning has no savor of the scorn and drastic mockery of its +fore-runner. We are conscious that tragedy impends, that after the +prologue may follow fast catastrophe. Yet it is not feared with all the +portentous thunder of its index. Nor are we deceived. A melody of +winning distinction unrolls before us. It has a noble tone, is of a +noble type. Without relaxing pace it passes and drops like a +thunderbolt into the bowels of the earth. Again the story is told, and +tarrying not at all we are led to a most delectable spot in the key of +A major. This trio is marked by genius. Can anything be more bewitching +than the episode in C sharp minor merging into E major, with the +overflow at the close? The fantasy is notable for variety of tonality, +freedom in rhythmical incidents and genuine power. The coda is dizzy +and overwhelming. For Schumann this Scherzo is Byronic in tenderness +and boldness. Karasowski speaks of its Shakespearian humor, and indeed +it is a very human and lovable piece of art. It holds richer, warmer, +redder blood than the other three and like the A flat Ballade, is +beloved of the public. But then it is easier to understand. +</P> + +<P> +Opus 39, the third Scherzo in C sharp minor, was composed or finished +at Majorca and is the most dramatic of the set. I confess to see no +littleness in the polished phrases, though irony lurks in its bars and +there is fever in its glance—a glance full of enigmatic and luring +scorn. I heartily agree with Hadow, who finds the work clear cut and of +exact balance. And noting that Chopin founded whole paragraphs "either +on a single phrase repeated in similar shapes or on two phrases in +alternation"—a primitive practice in Polish folksongs—he asserts that +"Beethoven does not attain the lucidity of his style by such +parallelism of phraseology," but admits that Chopin's methods made for +"clearness and precision...may be regarded as characteristic of the +national manner." A thoroughly personal characteristic too. +</P> + +<P> +There is virile clangor in the firmly struck octaves of the opening +pages. No hesitating, morbid view of life, but rank, harsh +assertiveness, not untinged with splenetic anger. The chorale of the +trio is admirably devised and carried out. Its piety is a bit of +liturgical make-believe. The contrasts here are most artistic—sonorous +harmonies set off by broken chords that deliciously tinkle. There is a +coda of frenetic movement and the end is in major, a surprising +conclusion when considering all that has gone before. Never to become +the property of the profane, the C sharp minor Scherzo, notwithstanding +its marked asperities and agitated moments, is a great work of art. +Without the inner freedom of its predecessor, it is more sober and +self-contained than the B minor Scherzo. +</P> + +<P> +The fourth Scherzo, op. 54, is in the key of E. Built up by a series of +cunning touches and climaxes and without the mood depth or variety of +its brethren, it is more truly a Scherzo than any of them. It has +tripping lightness and there is sunshine imprisoned behind its open +bars. Of it Schumann could not ask, "How is gravity to clothe itself if +jest goes about in dark veils?" Here, then, is intellectual refinement +and jesting of a superior sort. Niecks thinks it fragmentary. I find +the fairy-like measures delightful after the doleful mutterings of some +of the other Scherzi. There is the same "spirit of opposition," but of +arrogance none. The C sharp minor theme is of lyric beauty, the coda +with its scales, brilliant. It seems to be banned by classicists and +Chopin worshippers alike. The agnostic attitude is not yet dead in the +piano playing world. +</P> + +<P> +Rubinstein most admired the first two Scherzi. The B minor has been +criticised for being too much in the etude vein. But with all their +shortcomings these compositions are without peer in the literature of +the piano. +</P> + +<P> +They were published and dedicated as follows: Op. 20, February, 1835, +to M. T. Albrecht; op. 31, December, 1837, Comtesse de Furstenstein; +op. 39, October, 1840, Adolph Gutmann, and op. 54, December, 1843, +Mile, de Caraman. De Lenz relates that Chopin dedicated the C sharp +minor Scherzo to his pupil Gutmann, because this giant, with a prize +fighter's fist, could "knock a hole in the table" with a certain chord +for the left hand—sixth measure from the beginning—and adds quite +naively: "Nothing more was ever heard of this Gutmann—he was a +discovery of Chopin's." Chopin died in this same Gutmann's arms, and, +despite de Lenz, Gutmann was in evidence until his death as a "favorite +pupil." +</P> + +<P> +And now we have reached the grandest—oh, banal and abused word—of +Chopin's compositions, the Fantaisie in F minor, op. 49. Robert +Schumann, after remarking that the cosmopolitan must "sacrifice the +small interests of the soil on which he was born," notices that +Chopin's later works "begin to lose something of their especial +Sarmatian physiognomy, to approach partly more nearly the universal +ideal cultivated by the divine Greeks which we find again in Mozart." +The F minor Fantaisie has hardly the Mozartian serenity, but parades a +formal beauty—not disfigured by an excess of violence, either personal +or patriotic, and its melodies, if restless by melancholy, are of +surprising nobility and dramatic grandeur. Without including the +Beethoven Sonatas, not strictly born of the instrument, I do not fear +to maintain that this Fantaisie is one of the greatest of piano pieces. +Never properly appreciated by pianists, critics, or public, it is, +after more than a half century of neglect, being understood at last. It +was published November, 1843, and probably composed at Nohant, as a +letter of the composer indicates. The dedication is to Princesse C. de +Souzzo—these interminable countesses and princesses of Chopin! For +Niecks, who could not at first discern its worth, it suggests a Titan +in commotion. It is Titanic; the torso of some Faust-like dream, it is +Chopin's Faust. A macabre march, containing some dangerous dissonances, +gravely ushers us to ascending staircases of triplets, only to +precipitate us to the very abysses of the piano. That first subject, is +it not almost as ethically puissant and passionate as Beethoven in his +F minor Sonata? Chopin's lack of tenaciousness is visible here. +Beethoven would have built a cathedral on such a foundational scheme, +but Chopin, ever prodigal in his melody making, dashes impetuously to +the A flat episode, that heroic love chant, erroneously marked dolce +and played with the effeminacies of a salon. Three times does it +resound in this strange Hall of Glancing Mirrors, yet not once should +it be caressed. The bronze fingers of a Tausig are needed. Now are +arching the triplets to the great, thrilling song, beginning in C +minor, and then the octaves, in contrary motion, split wide asunder the +very earth. After terrific chordal reverberations there is the rapid +retreat of vague armies, and once again is begun the ascent of the +rolling triplets to inaccessible heights, and the first theme sounds in +C minor. The modulation lifts to G flat, only to drop to abysmal +depths. What mighty, desperate cause is being espoused? When peace is +presaged in the key of B, is this the prize for which strive these +agonized hosts? Is some forlorn princess locked behind these solemn, +inaccessible bars? For a few moments there is contentment beyond all +price. Then the warring tribe of triplets recommence, after clamorous G +flat octaves reeling from the stars to the sea of the first theme. +Another rush into D flat ensues, the song of C minor reappears in F +minor, and the miracle is repeated. Oracular octaves quake the +cellarage of the palace, the warriors hurry by, their measured tramp is +audible after they vanish, and the triplets obscure their retreat with +chromatic vapors. Then an adagio in this fantastic old world tale—the +curtain prepares to descend—a faint, sweet voice sings a short, +appealing cadenza, and after billowing A flat arpeggios, soft, great +hummocks of tone, two giant chords are sounded, and the Ballade of Love +and War is over. Who conquers? Is the Lady with the Green Eyes and Moon +White Face rescued? Or is all this a De Quincey's Dream Fugue +translated into tone—a sonorous, awesome vision? Like De Quincey, it +suggests the apparition of the empire of fear, the fear that is +secretly felt with dreams, wherein the spirit expands to the drummings +of infinite space. +</P> + +<P> +Alas! for the validity of subjective criticism. Franz Liszt told +Vladimir de Pachmann the programme of the Fantaisie, as related to him +by Chopin. At the close of one desperate, immemorial day, the pianist +was crooning at the piano, his spirits vastly depressed. Suddenly came +a knocking at his door, a Poe-like, sinister tapping, which he at once +rhythmically echoed upon the keyboard, his phono-motor centre being +unusually sensitive. The first two bars of the Fantaisie describe these +rappings, just as the third and fourth stand for Chopin's musical +invitation, entrez, entrez! This is all repeated until the doors wide +open swinging admit Liszt, George Sand, Madame Camille Pleyel nee Mock, +and others. To the solemn measures of the march they enter, and range +themselves about Chopin, who after the agitated triplets begins his +complaint in the mysterious song in F minor. But Sand, with whom he has +quarrelled, falls before him on her knees and pleads for pardon. +Straightway the chant merges into the appealing A flat section—this +sends skyward my theory of its interpretation—and from C minor the +current becomes more tempestuous until the climax is reached and to the +second march the intruders rapidly vanish. The remainder of the work, +with the exception of the Lento Sostenuto in B—where it is to be hoped +Chopin's perturbed soul finds momentary peace—is largely repetition +and development. This far from ideal reading is an authoritative one, +coming as it does from Chopin by way of Liszt. I console myself for its +rather commonplace character with the notion that perhaps in the +re-telling the story has caught some personal cadenzas of the two +historians. In any case I shall cling to my own version. +</P> + +<P> +The F minor Fantaisie will mean many things to many people. Chopin has +never before maintained so artistically, so free from delirium, such a +level of strong passion, mental power and exalted euphony. It is his +largest canvas, and though there are no long-breathed periods such as +in the B flat minor Scherzo, the phraseology is amply broad, without +padding of paragraphs. The rapt interest is not relaxed until the final +bar. This transcendental work more nearly approaches Beethoven in its +unity, its formal rectitude and its brave economy of thematic material. +</P> + +<P> +While few men have dared to unlock their hearts thus, Chopin is not so +intimate here as in the mazurkas. But the pulse beats ardently in the +tissues of this composition. As art for art, it is less perfect; the +gain is on the human side. Nearing his end Chopin discerned, with ever +widening, ever brighter vision, the great heart throb of the universe. +Master of his material, if not of his mortal tenement, he passionately +strove to shape his dreams into abiding sounds. He did not always +succeed, but his victories are the precious prizes of mankind. One is +loath to believe that the echo of Chopin's magic music can ever fall +upon unheeding ears. He may become old-fashioned, but, like Mozart, he +will remain eternally beautiful. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="biblio"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +BIBLIOGRAPHY +</H3> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> + Frederic Chopin as a Man and Musician, by Frederick Niecks. + London, Novello, Ewer & Co. +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> + Frederic Chopin, by Franz Liszt. London, W. Reeves. +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> + Life and Letters of Frederic Chopin, by Moritz Karasowski, + translated from the Russian by Emily Hill. London, W. Reeves. +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> + Chopin and Other Musical Essays, by Henry T. Finck. New York, + Charles Scribner's Sons. +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> + The Works of Frederic Chopin and their Proper Interpretation, + by Jean Kleczynski, translated by A. Whittingham. London, W. + Reeves. +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> + Chopin's Greater Works, by Jean Kleczynski, translated with + additions by Natalie Janotha. New York, Charles Scribner's + Sons. +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> + Frederic Francois Chopin, by Charles Willeby. London, Sampson + Low, Marston & Co. +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> + Frederic Chopin, by Joseph Bennett. Novello, Ewer & Co. +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> + F. Chopin, la Tradicion de su Musica, por Eduardo Gariel. City + of Mexico, 1894. +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> + Frederic Chopin, sa Vie et ses OEuvres, par Madame A. Audley. + Paris, E. Plon et Cie. +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> + F. Chopin, Essai de Critique musicale, par H. Barbedette. + Friedrich Chopin und seine Werke, von Dr. J. Schucht. Leipzig, + C. F. Kahnt. +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> + Friedrich Chopin's Leben und Werke, von A. Niggli. Leipzig, + Breitkopf & Hartel. +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> + Chopin, by Francis Hueffer, in Musical Studies. Edinburgh, A. + & C. Black. +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> + Frederic Chopin, by W. H. Hadow, in Studies in Modern Music. + New York, Macmillan Co. +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> + Frederic Chopin, by Louis Ehlert, in From the Tone World, + translated by Helen D. Tretbar. New York. +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> + Chopin, by W. de Lenz, from The Great Piano Virtuosos of our + Time, translated by Madeleine R. Baker. New York, G. Schirmer. +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> + Chopin, in Robert Schumann's Music and Musicians, translated + by Fanny Raymond Ritter. New York, Schuberth & Co. +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> + Chopin, in Anton Rubinstein's Conversation on Music, + translated by Mrs. John P. Morgan. Steinway Hall: Charles F. + Tretbar, publisher. +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> + Les Musiciens Polonais, par Albert Sowinski. Paris, Le Clerc. +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> + Les Trois Romans de Frederic Chopin, par le Comte Wodinski. + Paris, Calman Levy. +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> + Une Contemporaine, par M. Brault. +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> + Histoire de ma Vie et Correspondance, par George Sand. Paris, + Calman Levy. +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> + George Sand, by Henry James in French Poets and Novelists. New + York, Macmillan Co. +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> + G. Sand, par Stefane-Pol, from Trois Grandes Figures, preface + by D'Armand Silvestre. Paris, Ernest Flammarian. +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> + George Sand, sa Vie et ses OEuvres, par Wladimir Kardnine. + Paris, Ollendorf. +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> + Deux Eleves de Chopin, par Adolphe Brisson. +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> + The Beautiful in Music, by Dr. Eduard Hanslick. Translated by + Gustave Cohen. Novello, Ewer & Co., London and New York. +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> + How Music Developed, by W. J. Henderson. New York, Frederick + A. Stokes Co. +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> + Wagner and His Works, by Henry T. Finck. New York, Charles + Scribner's Sons. +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> + By the Way, by William F. Apthorp. Boston, Copeland & Day. +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> + A Study of Wagner, by Ernest Newman. New York, G. P. Putnam's + Sons. +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> + Folk-Music Studies, by H. E. Krehbiel. New York Tribune, + August, 1899. +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> + Analytical Notes to Schlesinger Edition, by Theodor Kullak. +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> + The New Spirit, by Havelock Ellis. London, Walter Scott, Ltd. +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> + Flaubert, par Emile Faguet. Paris, Hachette et Cie. +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> + Reisebilder, by Heinrich Heine. +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> + Affirmations, by Havelock Ellis. London, Walter Scott. +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> + The Psychology of the Emotions, by Th. Ribot. New York, + Charles Scribner's Sons. +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> + The Man of Genius, by Cesare Lombroso. New York, Charles + Scribner's Sons. +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> + The Musical Courier, New York. Files from 1889 to 1900. +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> + Chopin's Works, by Rutland Boughton, in London Musical + Standard. +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> + Chopin, by Stanislas Count Tarnowski. Translated from the + Polish by Natalie Janotha. 1899. +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> + The School of Giorgione, An Essay by Walter Pater. +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> + Chopin and the Sick Men, by John F. Runciman, in London + Saturday Review, September 9, 1899. +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> + Frederick Chopin, by Edward Dannreuther from Famous Composers + and their Works. Boston, J. B. Millet Company. +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> + Primitive Music, by Wallaschek. +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> + Zur Psychologie des Individuums, Chopin und Nietzsche, by + Stanislaw Przybyszewski. Berlin, W. Fontaine & Co., 1892. +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> + Musical Interpretation, by Adolph Carpe. Leipzig, London and + Paris, Bosworth & Co., Boston, B. F. Wood Music Co. +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> + Pianistes Celebres, par Francois Marmontel. +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> + Frederyka Chopina, in Echo Musicale, Warsaw, Poland, October + 15, 1899. +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> + OEuvres Poetiques Completes de Adam Mickiewicz, Traduction du + Polonais par Christien Ostrowski. Paris, Firmin Didot Freres, + Fils et Cie, 1859. +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> + The World as Will and Idea, by Arthur Schopenhauer. +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> + The Case of Richard Wagner, by Friedrich Nietzsche. New York, + Macmillan Co. +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> + With the Immortals, by Marion Crawford. References to Chopin. +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> + Preface to Isidor Philipp's Exercises Quotidiens tires des + OEuvres de Chopin, by Georges Mathias. Paris, J. Hamelle. +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> + Pianoforte Study, by Alexander McArthur. +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> + Chopin Ein Gedenkblatt, by August Spanuth, New York Staats-Zeitung, + October 15, 1899. +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> + The Pianoforte Sonata, by J. B. Shedlock, London, Methuen & + Co. +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> + A History of Pianoforte Playing and Pianoforte Literature, by + C. F. Weitzmann, translated by Dr. Th. Baker. New York, G. + Schirmer. +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> + Der Letze Virtuoso, by C. F. Weitzmann. Leipzig, Kahnt. +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> + Chopin—and Some Others, in London Musical News, October 14, + 1899. +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> + Chopin, in A History of the Pianoforte and Pianoforte Players, + by Oscar Bie. New York, E. P. Dutton & Co. +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> + Chopin, in Rubinstein's Die Meister des Klaviers. New York, + Schuberth. +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> + Chopin, in Berliner Tageblatt, by Dr. Leopold Schmidt. +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> + Chopin Juzgada por Schumann, in Gaceta Musical, City of + Mexico. +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> + The Chopin Rubato and so-called Chopin Fingering, by John + Kautz, in The Musical Record, Boston, 1898. +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> + Franz Liszt, by Lina Ramann. Breitkopf & Hartel. +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> + Preface to Mikuli Edition by Carl Mikuli. +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> + The AEsthetics of Pianoforte Playing, by Adolf Kullak. New + York, G. Schirmer. +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> + Chopin und die Frauen, by Eugen Isolani. Berliner Courier, + October 17, 1899. +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> + Chopin, by W. J. Henderson in The New York Times, October 29, + 1899. +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> + A Note on Chopin, by L. A. Corbeille, and Chopin, An + Irresponsibility, by "Israfel," in The Dome, October, 1899, + London, Unicorn Press. +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> + Chopin and the Romantics, by John F. Runciman in The Saturday + Review (London), February 10,1900. +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> + Chopiniana: in the February, 1900, issue of the London Monthly + Musical Record, including some new letters of Chopin's. +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> + La maladie de Chopin (d'apres des documents inedits), par + Cabanes. Chronique medicale, Paris, 1899, vi., No. 21, 673-685. +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> + Also recollections in letters and diaries of Moscheles, + Hiller, Mendelssohn, Berlioz, Henselt, Schumann, Rubinstein, + Mathias, Legouve, Tarnowski, Grenier and others. +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> + The author begs to acknowledge the kind suggestions and + assistance of Rafael Joseffy, Vladimir de Pachmann, Moriz + Rosenthal, Jaraslow de Zielinski, Edwin W. Morse, Edward E. + Ziegler and Ignace Jan Paderewski. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="books"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +BOOKS BY JAMES HUNEKER +</H3> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +What Maeterlinck wrote: +</P> + +<P CLASS="block"> + Maurice Maeterlinck wrote thus of James Huneker: "Do you know + that 'Iconoclasts' is the only book of high and universal + critical worth that we have had for years—to be precise, + since Georg Brandes. It is at once strong and fine, supple and + firm, indulgent and sure." +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +The Evening Post of June 10, 1915, wrote of Mr. Huneker's "The New +Cosmopolis": +</P> + +<P CLASS="block"> + "The region of Bohemia, Mr. James Huneker found long ago, is + within us. At twenty, he says, he discovered that there is no + such enchanted spot as the Latin Quarter, but that every + generation sets back the mythical land into the golden age of + the Commune, or of 1848, or the days of 'Hernani.' It is the + same with New York's East Side, 'the fabulous East Side,' as + Mr. Huneker calls it in his collection of international urban + studies, 'The New Cosmopolis.' If one judged externals by + grime, by poverty, by sanded back-rooms, with long-haired + visionaries assailing the social order, then the East Side of + the early eighties has gone down before the mad rush of + settlement workers, impertinent reformers, sociological + cranks, self-advertising politicians, billionaire socialists, + and the reporters. To-day the sentimental traveller 'feels a + heart-pang to see the order, the cleanliness, the wide + streets, the playgrounds, the big boulevards, the absence of + indigence that have spoiled the most interesting part of New + York City.' But apparently this is only a first impression; + for Mr. Huneker had no trouble in discovering in one cafe a + patriarchal figure quite of the type beloved of the local-color + hunters of twenty years ago, a prophet, though speaking + a modern language and concerned with things of the day. So + that we owe to Mr. Huneker the discovery of a notable truth, + namely, that Bohemia is not only a creation of the sentimental + memory, but, being psychological, may be located in clean and + prosperous quarters. The tendency has always been to place it + in a golden age, but a tattered and unswept age. Bohemia is + now shown to exist amidst model tenements and sanitary + drinking-cups." +</P> + +<BR> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +IVORY APES AND PEACOCKS With frontispiece portrait of Dostoievsky 12mo. +$1.50 net +</P> + +<BR> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +NEW COSMOPOLIS 12mo. $1.50 net +</P> + +<BR> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +THE PATHOS of DISTANCE A Book of a Thousand and One Moments 12mo. $2.00 +net +</P> + +<BR> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +PROMENADES of an IMPRESSIONIST 12mo. $1.50 net +</P> + +<P CLASS="block"> + "We like best such sober essays as those which analyze for us + the technical contributions of Cezanne and Rodin. Here Mr. + Huneker is a real interpreter, and here his long experience of + men and ways in art counts for much. Charming, in the lighter + vein, are such appreciations as the Monticelli, and Chardin." +</P> + +<P CLASS="block"> + —FRANK JEWETT MATHER, JR., in New York Nation and Evening + Post. +</P> + +<BR> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +EGOISTS A Book of Supermen STENDHAL, BAUDELAIRE, FLAUBERT, ANATOLE +FRANCE, HUYSMANS, BARRES, HELLO, BLAKE, NIETZSCHE, IBSEN, AND MAX +STIRNER With Portrait and Facsimile Reproductions 12mo. $1.50 net +</P> + +<BR> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +ICONOCLASTS: A Book of Dramatists 12mo. $1.50 net +</P> + +<P CLASS="block"> + CONTENTS: Henrik Ibsen—August Strindberg—Henry Becque— + Gerhart Hauptmann—Paul Hervieu—The Quintessence of Shaw— + Maxim Gorky's Nachtasyl—Hermann Sudermann—Princess + Mathilde's Play—Duse and D'Annunzio—Villiers de l'Isle + Adam—Maurice Maeterlinck. +</P> + +<P CLASS="block"> + "His style is a little jerky, but it is one of those rare + styles in which we are led to expect some significance, if not + wit, in every sentence." +</P> + +<P CLASS="block"> + —G. K. CHESTERTON, in London Daily News. +</P> + +<BR> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +OVERTONES: A Book of Temperaments WITH FRONTISPIECE PORTRAIT Of RICHARD +STRAUSS 12mo. $1.50 net +</P> + +<P CLASS="block"> + "In some respects Mr. Huneker must be reckoned the most + brilliant of all living writers on matters musical." +</P> + +<P CLASS="block"> + —Academy, London. +</P> + +<BR> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +MEZZOTINTS IN MODERN MUSIC BRAHMS, TSCHAIKOWSKY, CHOPIN. RICHARD +STRAUSS, LISZT, AND WAGNER 12mo. $1.50 net +</P> + +<P CLASS="block"> + "Mr. Huneker is, in the best sense, a critic; he listens to + the music and gives you his impressions as rapidly and in as + few words as possible; or he sketches the composers in fine, + broad, sweeping strokes with a magnificent disregard for + unimportant details. ... A distinctly original and very + valuable contribution to the world's tiny musical literature." +</P> + +<P CLASS="block"> + —J. F. RUNCIMAN, in London Saturday Review. +</P> + +<BR> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +FRANZ LISZT WITH NUMEROUS ILLUSTRATIONS 12mo. $2.00 net +</P> + +<BR> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +CHOPIN: The Man and His Music WITH ETCHED PORTRAIT 12mo. $2.00 net +</P> + +<BR> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +VISIONARIES 12 mo. $1.50 net +</P> + +<P CLASS="block"> + CONTENTS: A Master of Cobwebs—The Eighth Deadly Sin—The + Puree of Aholibah—Rebels of the Moon—The Spiral Road—A Mock + Sun—Antichrist—The Eternal Duel—The Enchanted Yodler—The + Third Kingdom—The Haunted Harpsichord—The Tragic Wall—A + Sentimental Rebellion—Hall of the Missing Footsteps—The + Cursory Light—An Iron Fan—The Woman Who Loved Chopin—The + Tune of Time—Nada—Pan. +</P> + +<P CLASS="block"> + "In 'The Spiral Road' and in some of the other stories both + fantasy and narrative may be compared with Hawthorne in his + most unearthly moods. The younger man has read his Nietzsche + and has cast off his heritage of simple morals. 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You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Chopin: The Man and His Music + +Author: James Huneker + +Posting Date: June 14, 2010 [EBook #4939] +Release Date: January, 2004 +First Posted: April 1, 2002 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK CHOPIN: THE MAN AND HIS MUSIC *** + + + + +Produced by John Mamoun <mamounjo@umdnj.edu> with help +from Charles Franks and the Online Distributed Proofreaders +website. + + + + + + + + + + +CHOPIN: THE MAN AND HIS MUSIC + +by + +James Huneker + + + + +TABLE OF CONTENTS + + + PART I.--THE MAN. + + I. POLAND:--YOUTHFUL IDEALS + II. PARIS:--IN THE MAELSTROM + III. ENGLAND, SCOTLAND AND FERE LA CHAISE + IV. THE ARTIST + V. POET AND PSYCHOLOGIST + + PART II.--HIS MUSIC. + + VI. THE STUDIES:--TITANIC EXPERIMENTS + VII. MOODS IN MINIATURE: THE PRELUDES + VIII. IMPROMPTUS AND VALSES + IX. NIGHT AND ITS MELANCHOLY MYSTERIES: THE NOCTURNES + X. THE BALLADES: FAERY DRAMAS + XI. CLASSICAL CURRENTS + XII. THE POLONAISES: HEROIC HYMNS OF BATTLE + XIII. MAZURKAS: DANCES OF THE SOUL + XIV. CHOPIN THE CONQUEROR + + BIBLIOGRAPHY + BOOKS BY JAMES HUNEKER + + + + +PART I.--THE MAN + + + + +I. POLAND:--YOUTHFUL IDEALS + + +Gustave Flaubert, pessimist and master of cadenced lyric prose, urged +young writers to lead ascetic lives that in their art they might be +violent. Chopin's violence was psychic, a travailing and groaning of +the spirit; the bright roughness of adventure was missing from his +quotidian existence. The tragedy was within. One recalls Maurice +Maeterlinck: "Whereas most of our life is passed far from blood, cries +and swords, and the tears of men have become silent, invisible and +almost spiritual." Chopin went from Poland to France--from Warsaw to +Paris--where, finally, he was borne to his grave in Pere la Chaise. He +lived, loved and died; and not for him were the perils, prizes and +fascinations of a hero's career. He fought his battles within the walls +of his soul--we may note and enjoy them in his music. His outward state +was not niggardly of incident though his inner life was richer, +nourished as it was in the silence and the profound unrest of a being +that irritably resented every intrusion. There were events that left +ineradicable impressions upon his nature, upon his work: his early +love, his sorrow at parting from parents and home, the shock of the +Warsaw revolt, his passion for George Sand, the death of his father and +of his friend Matuszynski, and the rupture with Madame Sand--these were +crises of his history. All else was but an indeterminate factor in the +scheme of his earthly sojourn. Chopin though not an anchorite resembled +Flaubert, being both proud and timid; he led a detached life, hence his +art was bold and violent. Unlike Liszt he seldom sought the glamor of +the theatre, and was never in such public view as his maternal admirer, +Sand. He was Frederic Francois Chopin, composer, teacher of piano and a +lyric genius of the highest range. + +Recently the date of his birth has been again discussed by Natalie +Janotha, the Polish pianist. Chopin was born in Zelazowa-Wola, six +miles from Warsaw, March 1, 1809. This place is sometimes spelled +Jeliasovaya-Volia. The medallion made for the tomb by Clesinger--the +son-in-law of George Sand--and the watch given by the singer Catalan! +in 1820 with the inscription "Donne par Madame Catalan! a Frederic +Chopin, age de dix ans," have incited a conflict of authorities. +Karasowski was informed by Chopin's sister that the correct year of his +birth was 1809, and Szulc, Sowinski and Niecks agree with him. Szulc +asserts that the memorial in the Holy Cross Church, Warsaw--where +Chopin's heart is preserved--bears the date March 2, 1809. Chopin, so +Henry T. Finck declares, was twenty-two years of age when he wrote to +his teacher Elsner in 1831. Liszt told Niecks in 1878 that Karasowski +had published the correct date in his biography. Now let us consider +Janotha's arguments. According to her evidence the composer's natal day +was February 22, 1810 and his christening occurred April 28 of the same +year. The following baptismal certificate, originally in Latin and +translated by Finck, is adduced. It is said to be from the church in +which Chopin was christened: "I, the above, have performed the ceremony +of baptizing in water a boy with the double name Frederic Francois, on +the 22d day of February, son of the musicians Nicolai Choppen, a +Frenchman, and Justina de Krzyzanowska his legal spouse. God-parents: +the musicians Franciscus Grembeki and Donna Anna Skarbekowa, Countess +of Zelazowa-Wola." The wrong date was chiselled upon the monument +unveiled October 14, 1894, at Chopin's birthplace--erected practically +through the efforts of Milia Balakireff the Russian composer. Janotha, +whose father founded the Warsaw Conservatory, informed Finck that the +later date has also been put on other monuments in Poland. + +Now Chopin's father was not a musician, neither was his mother. I +cannot trace Grembeki, but we know that the Countess Skarbek, mother of +Chopin's namesake, was not a musician; however, the title "musician" in +the baptismal certificate may have signified something eulogistic at +that time. Besides, the Polish clergy was not a particularly accurate +class. But Janotha has more testimony: in her controversy with me in +1896 she quoted Father Bielawski, the present cure of Brochow parish +church of Zelazowa-Wola; this reverend person consulted records and +gave as his opinion that 1810 is authentic. Nevertheless, the biography +of Wojcicki and the statement of the Chopin family contradict him. And +so the case stands. Janotha continues firm in her belief although +authorities do not justify her position. + +All this petty pother arose since Niecks' comprehensive biography +appeared. So sure was he of his facts that he disposed of the +pseudo-date in one footnote. Perhaps the composer was to blame; +artists, male as well as female, have been known to make themselves +younger in years by conveniently forgetting their birthdate, or by +attributing the error to carelessness in the registry of dates. Surely +the Chopin family could not have been mistaken in such an important +matter! Regarding Chopin's ancestry there is still a moiety of doubt. +His father was born August 17, 1770--the same year as Beethoven--at +Nancy, Lorraine. Some claim that he had Polish blood in his veins. +Szulc claims that he was the natural son of a Polish nobleman, who +followed King Stanislas Leszcinski to Lorraine, dropping the Szopen, or +Szop, for the more Gallic Chopin. When Frederic went to Paris, he in +turn changed the name from Szopen to Chopin, which is common in France. + +Chopin's father emigrated to Warsaw in 1787--enticed by the offer of a +compatriot there in the tobacco business--and was the traditional +Frenchman of his time, well-bred, agreeable and more than usually +cultivated. + +He joined the national guard during the Kosciuszko revolution in 1794. +When business stagnated he was forced to teach in the family of the +Leszynskis; Mary of that name, one of his pupils, being beloved by +Napoleon I. became the mother of Count Walewski, a minister of the +second French empire. Drifting to Zelazowa-Wola, Nicholas Chopin lived +in the house of the Countess Skarbek, acting as tutor to her son, +Frederic. There he made the acquaintance of Justina Krzyzanowska, born +of "poor but noble parents." He married her in 1806 and she bore him +four children: three girls, and the boy Frederic Francois. + +With a refined, scholarly French father, Polish in political +sentiments, and an admirable Polish mother, patriotic to the extreme, +Frederic grew to be an intelligent, vivacious, home-loving lad. Never a +hearty boy but never very delicate, he seemed to escape most of the +disagreeable ills of childhood. The moonstruck, pale, sentimental calf +of many biographers, he never was. Strong evidence exists that he was +merry, pleasure-loving and fond of practical jokes. While his father +was never rich, the family after the removal to Warsaw lived at ease. +The country was prosperous and Chopin the elder became a professor in +the Warsaw Lyceum. His children were brought up in an atmosphere of +charming simplicity, love and refinement. The mother was an ideal +mother, and, as George Sand declared, Chopin's "only love." But, as we +shall discover later, Lelia was ever jealous--jealous even of Chopin's +past. His sisters were gifted, gentle and disposed to pet him. Niecks +has killed all the pretty fairy tales of his poverty and suffering. + +Strong common sense ruled the actions of Chopin's parents, and when his +love for music revealed itself at an early age they engaged a teacher +named Adalbert Zwyny, a Bohemian who played the violin and taught +piano. Julius Fontana, one of the first friends of the boy--he +committed suicide in Paris, December 31, 1869,--says that at the age of +twelve Chopin knew so much that he was left to himself with the usual +good and ill results. He first played on February 24, 1818, a concerto +by Gyrowetz and was so pleased with his new collar that he naively told +his mother, "Everybody was looking at my collar." His musical +precocity, not as marked as Mozart's, but phenomenal withal, brought +him into intimacy with the Polish aristocracy and there his taste for +fashionable society developed. The Czartoryskis, Radziwills, Skarbeks, +Potockis, Lubeckis and the Grand Duke Constantine with his Princess +Lowicka made life pleasant for the talented boy. Then came his lessons +with Joseph Elsner in composition, lessons of great value. Elsner saw +the material he had to mould, and so deftly did he teach that his +pupil's individuality was never checked, never warped. For Elsner +Chopin entertained love and reverence; to him he wrote from Paris +asking his advice in the matter of studying with Kalkbrenner, and this +advice he took seriously. "From Zwyny and Elsner even the greatest ass +must learn something," he is quoted as having said. + +Then there are the usual anecdotes--one is tempted to call them the +stock stories of the boyhood of any great composer. In infancy Chopin +could not hear music without crying. Mozart was morbidly sensitive to +the tones of a trumpet. Later the Polish lad sported familiarly with +his talents, for he is related to have sent to sleep and awakened a +party of unruly boys at his father's school. Another story is his +fooling of a Jew merchant. He had high spirits, perhaps too high, for +his slender physique. He was a facile mimic, and Liszt, Balzac, Bocage, +Sand and others believed that he would have made an actor of ability. +With his sister Emilia he wrote a little comedy. Altogether he was a +clever, if not a brilliant lad. His letters show that he was not the +latter, for while they are lively they do not reveal much literary +ability. But their writer saw with open eyes, eyes that were disposed +to caricature the peculiarities of others. This trait, much clarified +and spiritualized in later life, became a distinct, ironic note in his +character. Possibly it attracted Heine, although his irony was on a +more intellectual plane. + +His piano playing at this time was neat and finished, and he had +already begun those experimentings in technique and tone that afterward +revolutionized the world of music and the keyboard. He being sickly and +his sister's health poor, the pair was sent in 1826 to Reinerz, a +watering place in Prussian Silesia. This with a visit to his godmother, +a titled lady named Wiesiolowska and a sister of Count Frederic +Skarbek,--the name does not tally with the one given heretofore, as +noted by Janotha,--consumed this year. In 1827 he left his regular +studies at the Lyceum and devoted his time to music. He was much in the +country, listening to the fiddling and singing of the peasants, thus +laying the corner stone of his art as a national composer. In the fall +of 1828 he went to Berlin, and this trip gave him a foretaste of the +outer world. + +Stephen Heller, who saw Chopin in 1830, described him as pale, of +delicate health, and not destined, so they said in Warsaw, for a long +life. This must have been during one of his depressed periods, for his +stay in Berlin gives a record of unclouded spirits. However, his sister +Emilia died young of pulmonary trouble and doubtless Frederic was +predisposed to lung complaint. He was constantly admonished by his +relatives to keep his coat closed. Perhaps, as in Wagner's case, the +uncontrollable gayety and hectic humors were but so many signs of a +fatal disintegrating process. Wagner outlived them until the Scriptural +age, but Chopin succumbed when grief, disappointment and intense +feeling had undermined him. For the dissipations of the "average +sensual man" he had an abiding contempt. He never smoked, in fact +disliked it. His friend Sand differed greatly in this respect, and one +of the saddest anecdotes related by De Lenz accuses her of calling for +a match to light her cigar: "Frederic, un fidibus," she commanded, and +Frederic obeyed. Mr. Philip Hale mentions a letter from Balzac to his +Countess Hanska, dated March 15, 1841, which concludes: "George Sand +did not leave Paris last year. She lives at Rue Pigalle, No. +16...Chopin is always there. Elle ne fume que des cigarettes, et pas +autre chose" Mr. Hale states that the italics are in the letter. So +much for De Lenz and his fidibus! + +I am impelled here to quote from Mr. Earnest Newman's "Study of Wagner" +because Chopin's exaltation of spirits, alternating with irritability +and intense depression, were duplicated in Wagner. Mr. Newman writes of +Wagner: "There have been few men in whom the torch of life has burned +so fiercely. In his early days he seems to have had that gayety of +temperament and that apparently boundless energy which men in his case, +as in that of Heine, Nietzsche, Amiel and others, have wrongly assumed +to be the outcome of harmonious physical and mental health. There is a +pathetic exception in the outward lives of so many men of genius, the +bloom being, to the instructed eye, only the indication of some subtle +nervous derangement, only the forerunner of decay." The overmastering +cerebral agitation that obsessed Wagner's life, was as with Chopin a +symptom, not a sickness; but in the latter it had not yet assumed a +sinister turn. + +Chopin's fourteen days in Berlin,--he went there under the protection +of his father's friend, Professor Jarocki, to attend the great +scientific congress--were full of joy unrestrained. The pair left +Warsaw September 9, 1828, and after five days travel in a diligence +arrived at Berlin. This was a period of leisure travelling and living. +Frederic saw Spontini, Mendelssohn and Zelter at a distance and heard +"Freischutz." He attended the congress and made sport of the +scientists, Alexander von Humboldt included. On the way home they +stopped at a place called Zullichau, and Chopin improvised on Polish +airs so charmingly that the stage was delayed, "all hands turning in" +to listen. This is another of the anecdotes of honorable antiquity. +Count Tarnowski relates that "Chopin left Warsaw with a light heart, +with a mind full of ideas, perhaps full of dreams of fame and +happiness. 'I have only twenty kreuzers in my pockets,' he writes in +his note-book, 'and it seems to me that I am richer than Arthur +Potocki, whom I met only a moment ago;' besides this, witty +conceptions, fun, showing a quiet and cheerful spirit; for example, +'May it be permitted to me to sign myself as belonging to the circle of +your friends,--F. Chopin.' Or, 'A welcome moment in which I can express +to you my friendship.--F. Chopin, office clerk.' Or again, 'Ah, my most +lordly sir, I do not myself yet understand the joy which I feel on +entering the circle of your real friends.--F. Chopin, penniless'!" + +These letters have a Micawber ring, but they indicate Chopin's love of +jest. Sikorski tells a story of the lad's improvising in church so that +the priest, choir and congregation were forgotten by him. + +The travellers arrived at Warsaw October 6 after staying a few days in +Posen where the Prince Radziwill lived; here Chopin played in private. +This prince-composer, despite what Liszt wrote, did not contribute a +penny to the youth's musical education, though he always treated him in +a sympathetic manner. + +Hummel and Paganini visited Warsaw in 1829. The former he met and +admired, the latter he worshipped. This year may have seen the +composition, if not the publication of the "Souvenir de Paganini," said +to be in the key of A major and first published in the supplement of +the "Warsaw Echo Muzyczne." Niecks writes that he never saw a copy of +this rare composition. Paderewski tells me he has the piece and that it +is weak, having historic interest only. I cannot find much about the +Polish poet, Julius Slowacki, who died the same year, 1849, as Edgar +Allan Poe. Tarnowski declares him to have been Chopin's warmest friend +and in his poetry a starting point of inspiration for the composer. + +In July 1829, accompanied by two friends, Chopin started for Vienna. +Travelling in a delightful, old-fashioned manner, the party saw much of +the country--Galicia, Upper Silesia and Moravia--the Polish +Switzerland. On July 31 they arrived in the Austrian capital. Then +Chopin first began to enjoy an artistic atmosphere, to live less +parochially. His home life, sweet and tranquil as it was, could not +fail to hurt him as artist; he was flattered and coddled and doubtless +the touch of effeminacy in his person was fostered. In Vienna the life +was gayer, freer and infinitely more artistic than in Warsaw. He met +every one worth knowing in the artistic world and his letters at that +period are positively brimming over with gossip and pen pictures of the +people he knew. The little drop of malice he injects into his +descriptions of the personages he encounters is harmless enough and +proves that the young man had considerable wit. Count Gallenberg, the +lessee of the famous Karnthnerthor Theatre, was kind to him, and the +publisher Haslinger treated him politely. He had brought with him his +variations on "La ci darem la mano"; altogether the times seemed +propitious and much more so when he was urged to give a concert. +Persuaded to overcome a natural timidity, he made his Vienna debut at +this theatre August 11, 1829, playing on a Stein piano his Variations, +opus 2. His Krakowiak Rondo had been announced, but the parts were not +legible, so instead he improvised. He had success, being recalled, and +his improvisation on the Polish tune called "Chmiel" and a theme from +"La Dame Blanche" stirred up much enthusiasm in which a grumbling +orchestra joined. The press was favorable, though Chopin's playing was +considered rather light in weight. His style was admired and voted +original--here the critics could see through the millstone--while a +lady remarked "It's a pity his appearance is so insignificant." This +reached the composer's ear and caused him an evil quarter of an hour +for he was morbidly sensitive; but being, like most Poles, secretive, +managed to hide it. + +August 18, encouraged by his triumph, Chopin gave a second concert on +the same stage. This time he played the Krakowiak and his talent for +composition was discussed by the newspapers. "He plays very quietly, +without the daring elan which distinguishes the artist from the +amateur," said one; "his defect is the non-observance of the indication +of accent at the beginning of musical phrases." What was then admired +in Vienna was explosive accentuations and piano drumming. The article +continues: "As in his playing he was like a beautiful young tree that +stands free and full of fragrant blossoms and ripening fruits, so he +manifested as much estimable individuality in his compositions where +new figures and passages, new forms unfolded themselves." This rather +acute critique, translated by Dr. Niecks, is from the Wiener +"Theaterzeitung" of August 20, 1829. The writer of it cannot be accused +of misoneism, that hardening of the faculties of curiousness and +prophecy--that semi-paralysis of the organs of hearing which afflicts +critics of music so early in life and evokes rancor and dislike to +novelties. Chopin derived no money from either of his concerts. + +By this time he was accustomed to being reminded of the lightness and +exquisite delicacy of his touch and the originality of his style. It +elated him to be no longer mistaken for a pupil and he writes home that +"my manner of playing pleases the ladies so very much." This manner +never lost its hold over female hearts, and the airs, caprices and +little struttings of Frederic are to blame for the widely circulated +legend of his effeminate ways. The legend soon absorbed his music, and +so it has come to pass that this fiction, begotten of half fact and +half mental indolence, has taken root, like the noxious weed it is. +When Rubinstein, Tausig and Liszt played Chopin in passional phrases, +the public and critics were aghast. This was a transformed Chopin +indeed, a Chopin transposed to the key of manliness. Yet it is the true +Chopin. The young man's manners were a trifle feminine but his brain +was masculine, electric, and his soul courageous. His Polonaises, +Ballades, Scherzi and Etudes need a mighty grip, a grip mental and +physical. + +Chopin met Czerny. "He is a good man, but nothing more," he said of +him. Czerny admired the young pianist with the elastic hand and on his +second visit to Vienna, characteristically inquired, "Are you still +industrious?" Czerny's brain was a tireless incubator of piano +exercises, while Chopin so fused the technical problem with the poetic +idea, that such a nature as the old pedagogue's must have been +unattractive to him. He knew Franz, Lachner and other celebrities and +seems to have enjoyed a mild flirtation with Leopoldine Blahetka, a +popular young pianist, for he wrote of his sorrow at parting from her. +On August 19 he left with friends for Bohemia, arriving at Prague two +days later. There he saw everything and met Klengel, of canon fame, a +still greater canon-eer than the redoubtable Jadassohn of Leipzig. +Chopin and Klengel liked each other. Three days later the party +proceeded to Teplitz and Chopin played in aristocratic company. He +reached Dresden August 26, heard Spohr's "Faust" and met capellmeister +Morlacchi--that same Morlacchi whom Wagner succeeded as a conductor +January 10, 1843--vide Finck's "Wagner." By September 12, after a brief +sojourn in Breslau, Chopin was again safe at home in Warsaw. + +About this time he fell in love with Constantia Gladowska, a singer and +pupil of the Warsaw Conservatory. Niecks dwells gingerly upon his +fervor in love and friendship--"a passion with him" and thinks that it +gives the key to his life. Of his romantic friendship for Titus +Woyciechowski and John Matuszynski--his "Johnnie"--there are abundant +evidences in the letters. They are like the letters of a love-sick +maiden. But Chopin's purity of character was marked; he shrank from +coarseness of all sorts, and the Fates only know what he must have +suffered at times from George Sand and her gallant band of retainers. +To this impressionable man, Parisian badinage--not to call it anything +stronger--was positively antipathetical. Of him we might indeed say in +Lafcadio Hearn's words, "Every mortal man has been many million times a +woman." And was it the Goncourts who dared to assert that, "there are +no women of genius: women of genius are men"? Chopin needed an outlet +for his sentimentalism. His piano was but a sieve for some, and we are +rather amused than otherwise on reading the romantic nonsense of his +boyish letters. + +After the Vienna trip his spirits and his health flagged. He was +overwrought and Warsaw became hateful to him, for he loved but had not +the courage to tell it to the beloved one. He put it on paper, he +played it, but speak it he could not. Here is a point that reveals +Chopin's native indecision, his inability to make up his mind. He +recalls to me the Frederic Moreau of Flaubert's "L'Education +Sentimentale." There is an atrophy of the will, for Chopin can neither +propose nor fly from Warsaw. He writes letters that are full of +self-reproaches, letters that must have both bored and irritated his +friends. Like many other men of genius he suffered all his life from +folie de doute, indeed his was what specialists call "a beautiful +case." This halting and irresolution was a stumbling block in his +career and is faithfully mirrored in his art. + +Chopin went to Posen in October, 1829, and at the Radziwills was +attracted by the beauty and talent of the Princess Elisa, who died +young. George Sand has noted Chopin's emotional versatility in the +matter of falling in and out of love. He could accomplish both of an +evening and a crumpled roseleaf was sufficient cause to induce frowns +and capricious flights--decidedly a young man tres difficile. He played +at the "Ressource" in November, 1829, the Variations, opus 2. On March +17, 1830, he gave his first concert in Warsaw, and selected the adagio +and rondo of his first concerto, the one in F minor, and the Potpourri +on Polish airs. His playing was criticised for being too delicate--an +old complaint--but the musicians, Elsner, Kurpinski and the rest were +pleased. Edouard Wolff said they had no idea in Warsaw of "the real +greatness of Chopin." He was Polish, this the public appreciated, but +of Chopin the individual they missed entirely the flavor. A week later, +spurred by adverse and favorable criticism, he gave a second concert, +playing the same excerpts from this concerto--the slow movement is +Constance Gladowska musically idealized--the Krakowiak and an +improvisation. The affair was a success. From these concerts he cleared +six hundred dollars, not a small sum in those days for an unknown +virtuoso. A sonnet was printed in his honor, champagne was offered him +by an enthusiastic Paris bred, but not born, pianist named Dunst, who +for this act will live in all chronicles of piano playing. Worse still, +Orlowski served up the themes of his concerto into mazurkas and had the +impudence to publish them. + +Then came the last blow: he was asked by a music seller for his +portrait, which he refused, having no desire, he said with a shiver, to +see his face on cheese and butter wrappers. Some of the criticisms were +glowing, others absurd as criticisms occasionally are. Chopin wrote to +Titus the same rhapsodical protestations and finally declared in +meticulous peevishness, "I will no longer read what people write about +me." This has the familiar ring of the true artist who cares nothing +for the newspapers but reads them religiously after his own and his +rivals' concerts. + +Chopin heard Henrietta Sontag with great joy; he was ever a lover and a +connoisseur of singing. He advised young pianists to listen carefully +and often to great singers. Mdlle. de Belleville the pianist and +Lipinski the violinist were admired, and he could write a sound +criticism when he chose. But the Gladowska is worrying him. "Unbearable +longing" is driving him to exile. He attends her debut as Agnese in +Paer's opera of that title and writes a complete description of the +important function to Titus, who is at his country seat where Chopin +visits him betimes. Agitated, he thinks of going to Berlin or Vienna, +but after much philandering remains in Warsaw. On October 11, 1830, +following many preparations and much emotional shilly-shallying, Chopin +gave his third and last Warsaw concert. He played the E minor concerto +for the first time in public but not in sequence. The first and last +two movements were separated by an aria, such being the custom of those +days. Later he gave the Fantasia on Polish airs. Best of all for him, +Miss Gladowska sang a Rossini air, "wore a white dress and roses in her +hair, and was charmingly beautiful." Thus Chopin; and the details have +all the relevancy of a male besieged by Dan Cupid. Chopin must have +played well. He said so himself, and he was always a cautious +self-critic despite his pride. His vanity and girlishness peep out in +his recital by the response to a quartet of recalls: "I believe I did +it yesterday with a certain grace, for Brandt had taught me how to do +it properly." He is not speaking of his poetic performance, but of his +bow to the public. As he formerly spoke to his mother of his pretty +collar, so as young man he makes much of his deportment. But it is all +quite in the role; scratch an artist and you surprise a child. + +Of course, Constantia sang wonderfully. "Her low B came out so +magnificently that Zielinski declared it alone was worth a thousand +ducats." Ah, these enamored ones! Chopin left Warsaw November 1, 1830, +for Vienna and without declaring his love. Or was he a rejected suitor? +History is dumb. He never saw his Gladowska again, for he did not +return to Warsaw. The lady was married in 1832--preferring a solid +certainty to nebulous genius--to Joseph Grabowski, a merchant at +Warsaw. Her husband, so saith a romantic biographer, Count Wodzinski, +became blind; perhaps even a blind country gentleman was preferable to +a lachrymose pianist. Chopin must have heard of the attachment in 1831. +Her name almost disappears from his correspondence. Time as well as +other nails drove from his memory her image. If she was fickle, he was +inconstant, and so let us waste no pity on this episode, over which +lakes of tears have been shed and rivers of ink have been spilt. + +Chopin was accompanied by Elsner and a party of friends as far as Wola, +a short distance from Warsaw. There the pupils of the Conservatory sang +a cantata by Elsner, and after a banquet he was given a silver goblet +filled with Polish earth, being adjured, so Karasowski relates, never +to forget his country or his friends wherever he might wander. Chopin, +his heart full of sorrow, left home, parents, friends, and "ideal," +severed with his youth, and went forth in the world with the keyboard +and a brain full of beautiful music as his only weapons. + +At Kaliz he was joined by the faithful Titus, and the two went to +Breslau, where they spent four days, going to the theatre and listening +to music. Chopin played quite impromptu two movements of his E minor +concerto, supplanting a tremulous amateur. In Dresden where they +arrived November 10, they enjoyed themselves with music. Chopin went to +a soiree at Dr. Kreyssig's and was overwhelmed at the sight of a circle +of dames armed with knitting needles which they used during the +intervals of music-making in the most formidable manner. He heard Auber +and Rossini operas and Rolla, the Italian violinist, and listened with +delight to Dotzauer and Kummer the violoncellists--the cello being an +instrument for which he had a consuming affection. Rubini, the brother +of the great tenor, he met, and was promised important letters of +introduction if he desired to visit Italy. He saw Klengel again, who +told the young Pole, thereby pleasing him very much, that his playing +was like John Field's. Prague was also visited, and he arrived at +Vienna in November. There he confidently expected a repetition of his +former successes, but was disappointed. Haslinger received him coldly +and refused to print his variations or concerto unless he got them for +nothing. Chopin's first brush with the hated tribe of publishers begins +here, and he adopts as his motto the pleasing device, "Pay, thou +animal," a motto he strictly adhered to; in money matters Chopin was +very particular. The bulk of his extant correspondence is devoted to +the exposure of the ways and wiles of music publishers. "Animal" is the +mildest term he applies to them, "Jew" the most frequent objurgation. +After all Chopin was very Polish. + +He missed his friends the Blahetkas, who had gone to Stuttgart, and +altogether did not find things so promising as formerly. No profitable +engagements could be secured, and, to cap his misery, Titus, his other +self, left him to join the revolutionists in Poland November 30. His +letters reflect his mental agitation and terror over his parents' +safety. A thousand times he thought of renouncing his artistic +ambitions and rushing to Poland to fight for his country. He never did, +and his indecision--it was not cowardice--is our gain. Chopin put his +patriotism, his wrath and his heroism into his Polonaises. That is why +we have them now, instead of Chopin having been the target of some +black-browed Russian. Chopin was psychically brave; let us not cavil at +the almost miraculous delicacy of his organization. He wrote letters to +his parents and to Matuszyriski, but they are not despairing--at least +not to the former. He pretended gayety and had great hopes for the +future, for he was living entirely on means supplied him by his father. +News of Constantia gladdened him, and he decided to go to Italy, but +the revolution early in 1831 decided him for France. Dr. Malfatti was +good to him and cheered him, and he managed to accomplish much social +visiting. The letters of this period are most interesting. He heard +Sarah Heinefetter sing, and listened to Thaiberg's playing of a +movement of his own concerto. Thalberg was three years younger than +Chopin and already famous. Chopin did not admire him: "Thalberg plays +famously, but he is not my man...He plays forte and piano with the +pedals but not with the hand; takes tenths as easily as I do octaves, +and wears studs with diamonds." + +Thalberg was not only too much of a technician for Chopin, but he was +also a Jew and a successful one. In consequence, both poet and Pole +revolted. + +Hummel called on Frederic, but we hear nothing of his opinion of the +elder man and his music; this is all the more strange, considering how +much Chopin built on Hummel's style. Perhaps that is the cause of the +silence, just as Wagner's dislike for Meyerbeer was the result of his +obligations to the composer of "Les Huguenots." He heard Aloys Schmitt +play, and uttered the very Heinesque witticism that "he is already over +forty years old, and composes eighty years old music." This in a letter +to Elsner. Our Chopin could be amazingly sarcastic on occasion. He knew +Slavik the violin virtuoso, Merk the 'cellist, and all the music +publishers. At a concert given by Madame Garzia-Vestris, in April, +1831, he appeared, and in June gave a concert of his own, at which he +must have played the E minor concerto, because of a passing mention in +a musical paper. He studied much, and it was July 20, 1831, before he +left Vienna after a second, last, and thoroughly discouraging visit. + +Chopin got a passport vised for London, "passant par Paris &. Londres," +and had permission from the Russian Ambassador to go as far as Munich. +Then the cholera gave him some bother, as he had to secure a clean bill +of health, but he finally got away. The romantic story of "I am only +passing through Paris," which he is reported to have said in after +years, has been ruthlessly shorn of its sentiment. At Munich he played +his second concerto and pleased greatly. But he did not remain in the +Bavarian capital, hastening to Stuttgart, where he heard of the capture +of Warsaw by the Russians, September 8, 1831. This news, it is said, +was the genesis of the great C minor etude in opus 10, sometimes called +the "Revolutionary." Chopin exclaimed in a letter dated December 16, +1831, "All this caused me much pain--who could have foreseen it!" and +in another letter he wrote, "How glad my mamma will be that I did not +go back." Count Tarnowski in his recollections prints some extracts +from a diary said to have been kept by Chopin. According to this his +agitation must have been terrible. Here are several examples: + +"My poor father! My dearest ones! Perhaps they hunger? Maybe he has not +anything to buy bread for mother? Perhaps my sisters have fallen +victims to the fury of the Muscovite soldiers? Oh, father, is this the +consolation of your old age? Mother, poor suffering mother, is it for +this you outlived your daughter?" + +"And I here unoccupied! And I am here with empty hands! Sometimes I +groan, suffer and despair at the piano! O God, move the earth, that it +may swallow the humanity of this century! May the most cruel fortune +fall upon the French, that they did not come to our aid." All this +sounds a trifle melodramatic and quite unlike Chopin. + +He did not go to Warsaw, but started for France at the end of +September, arriving early in October, 1831. Poland's downfall had +aroused him from his apathy, even if it sent him further from her. This +journey, as Liszt declares, "settled his fate." Chopin was twenty-two +years old when he reached Paris. + + + + +II. PARIS:--IN THE MAELSTROM + + +Here, according to Niecks, is the itinerary of Chopin's life for the +next eighteen years: In Paris, 27 Boulevard Poisonniere, to 5 and 38 +Chaussee d'Antin, to Aix-la-Chapelle, Carlsbad, Leipzig, Heidelberg, +Marienbad, and London, to Majorca, to 5 Rue Tronchet, 16 Rue Pigalle, +and 9 Square d'Orleans, to England and Scotland, to 9 Square d'Orleans +once more, Rue Chaillot and 12 Place Vendeme, and then--Pere la Chaise, +the last resting-place. It may be seen that Chopin was a restless, +though not roving nature. In later years his inability to remain +settled in one place bore a pathological impress,--consumptives are +often so. + +The Paris of 1831, the Paris of arts and letters, was one of the most +delightful cities in the world for the culture-loving. The molten tide +of passion and decorative extravagance that swept over intellectual +Europe three score years and ten ago, bore on its foaming crest Victor +Hugo, prince of romanticists. Near by was Henri Heine,--he left +Heinrich across the Rhine,--Heine, who dipped his pen in honey and +gall, who sneered and wept in the same couplet. The star of classicism +had seemingly set. In the rich conflict of genius were Gautier, +Schumann, and the rest. All was romance, fantasy, and passion, and the +young men heard the moon sing silvery--you remember De Musset!--and the +leaves rustle rhythms to the heart-beats of lovers. "Away with the +gray-beards," cried he of the scarlet waistcoat, and all France +applauded "Ernani." Pity it was that the romantic infant had to die of +intellectual anaemia, leaving as a legacy the memories and work of one +of the most marvellous groupings of genius since the Athens of +Pericles. The revolution of 1848 called from the mud the sewermen. +Flaubert, his face to the past, gazed sorrowfully at Carthage and wrote +an epic of the French bourgeois. Zola and his crowd delved into a moral +morass, and the world grew weary of them. And then the faint, fading +flowers of romanticism were put into albums where their purple +harmonies and subtle sayings are pressed into sweet twilight +forgetfulness. Berlioz, mad Hector of the flaming locks, whose +orchestral ozone vivified the scores of Wagnerand Liszt, began to sound +garishly empty, brilliantly superficial; "the colossal nightingale" is +difficult to classify even to-day. A romantic by temperament he +unquestionably was. But then his music, all color, nuance, and +brilliancy, was not genuinely romantic in its themes. Compare him with +Schumann, and the genuine romanticist tops the virtuoso. Berlioz, I +suspect, was a magnified virtuoso. His orchestral technique is supreme, +but his music fails to force its way into my soul. It pricks the +nerves, it pleases the sense of the gigantic, the strange, the +formless, but there is something uncanny about it all, like some huge, +prehistoric bird, an awful Pterodactyl with goggle eyes, horrid snout +and scream. Berlioz, like Baudelaire, has the power of evoking the +shudder. But as John Addington Symonds wrote: "The shams of the +classicists, the spasms of the romanticists have alike to be abandoned. +Neither on a mock Parnassus nor on a paste-board Blocksberg can the +poet of the age now worship. The artist walks the world at large +beneath the light of natural day." All this was before the Polish +charmer distilled his sugared wormwood, his sweet, exasperated poison, +for thirsty souls in morbid Paris. + +Think of the men and women with whom the new comer associated--for his +genius was quickly divined: Hugo, Lamartine, Pere Lamenais,--ah! what +balm for those troubled days was in his "Paroles d'un +Croyant,"--Chateaubriand, Saint-Simon, Merimee, Gautier, Liszt, Victor +Cousin, Baudelaire, Ary Scheffer, Berlioz, Heine,--who asked the Pole +news of his muse the "laughing nymph,"--"If she still continued to +drape her silvery veil around the flowing locks of her green hair, with +a coquetry so enticing; if the old sea god with the long white beard +still pursued this mischievous maid with his ridiculous love?"--De +Musset, De Vigny, Rossini, Meyerbeer, Auber, Sainte-Beuve, Adolphe +Nourrit, Ferdinand Hiller, Balzac, Dumas, Heller, Delacroix,--the Hugo +of painters,--Michelet, Guizot, Thiers, Niemcevicz and Mickiewicz the +Polish bards, and George Sand: the quintessence of the Paris of art and +literature. + +The most eloquent page in Liszt's "Chopin" is the narrative of an +evening in the Chaussee d'Antin, for it demonstrates the Hungarian's +literary gifts and feeling for the right phrase. This description of +Chopin's apartment "invaded by surprise" has a hypnotizing effect on +me. The very furnishings of the chamber seem vocal under Liszt's +fanciful pen. In more doubtful taste is his statement that "the glace +which covers the grace of the elite, as it does the fruit of their +desserts,...could not have been satisfactory to Chopin"! Liszt, despite +his tendency to idealize Chopin after his death, is our most +trustworthy witness at this period. Chopin was an ideal to Liszt though +he has not left us a record of his defects. The Pole was ombrageux and +easily offended; he disliked democracies, in fact mankind in the bulk +stunned him. This is one reason, combined with a frail physique, of his +inability to conquer the larger public. Thalberg could do it; his +aristocratic tournure, imperturbability, beautiful touch and polished +mechanism won the suffrage of his audiences. Liszt never stooped to +cajole. He came, he played, he overwhelmed. Chopin knew all this, knew +his weaknesses, and fought to overcome them but failed. Another +crumpled roseleaf for this man of excessive sensibility. + +Since told of Liszt and first related by him, is the anecdote of Chopin +refusing to play, on being incautiously pressed, after dinner, giving +as a reason "Ah, sir, I have eaten so little!" Even though his host was +gauche it cannot be denied that the retort was rude. + +Chopin met Osborne, Mendelssohn--who rather patronized him with his +"Chopinetto,"--Baillot the violinist and Franchomme the 'cellist. With +the latter he contracted a lasting friendship, often playing duos with +him and dedicating to him his G minor 'cello Sonata. He called on +Kalkbrenner, then the first pianist of his day, who was puzzled by the +prodigious novelty of the young Pole's playing. Having heard Herz and +Hiller, Chopin did not fear to perform his E minor concerto for him. He +tells all about the interview in a letter to Titus: "Are you a pupil of +Field's?" was asked by Kalkbrenner, who remarked that Chopin had the +style of Cramer and the touch of Field. Not having a standard by which +to gauge the new phenomenon, Kalkbrenner was forced to fall back on the +playing of men he knew. He then begged Chopin to study three years with +him--only three!--but Elsner in an earnest letter dissuaded his pupil +from making any experiments that might hurt his originality of style. +Chopin actually attended the class of Kalkbrenner but soon quit, for he +had nothing to learn of the pompous, penurious pianist. The Hiller +story of how Mendelssohn, Chopin, Liszt and Heller teased this grouty +old gentleman on the Boulevard des Italiens is capital reading, if not +absolutely true. Yet Chopin admired Kalkbrenner's finished technique +despite his platitudinous manner. Heine said--or rather quoted +Koreff--that Kalkbrenner looked like a bonbon that had been in the mud. +Niecks thinks Chopin might have learned of Kalkbrenner on the +mechanical side. Chopin, in public, was modest about his attainments, +looking upon himself as self-taught. "I cannot create a new school, +because I do not even know the old," he said. It is this very absence +of scholasticism that is both the power and weakness of his music. In +reality his true technical ancestor was Hummel. + +He played the E minor concerto first in Paris, February 26, 1832, and +some smaller pieces. Although Kalkbrenner, Baillot and others +participated, Chopin was the hero of the evening. The affair was a +financial failure, the audience consisting mostly of distinguished and +aristocratic Poles. Mendelssohn, who disliked Kalkbrenner and was +angered at his arrogance in asking Chopin to study with him, "applauded +furiously." "After this," Hiller writes, "nothing more was heard of +Chopin's lack of technique." The criticisms were favorable. On May 20, +1832, Chopin appeared at a charity concert organized by Prince de la +Moskowa. He was lionized in society and he wrote to Titus that his +heart beat in syncopation, so exciting was all this adulation, social +excitement and rapid gait of living. But he still sentimentalizes to +Titus and wishes him in Paris. + +A flirtation of no moment, with Francilla Pixis, the adopted daughter +of Pixis the hunchback pianist--cruelly mimicked by Chopin--aroused the +jealousy of the elder artist. Chopin was delighted, for he was +malicious in a dainty way. "What do you think of this?" he writes. +"_I_, a dangerous seducteur!" The Paris letters to his parents were +unluckily destroyed, as Karasowski relates, by Russian soldiers in +Warsaw, September 19, 1863, and with them were burned his portrait by +Ary Scheffer and his first piano. The loss of the letters is +irremediable. Karasowski who saw some of them says they were tinged +with melancholy. Despite his artistic success Chopin needed money and +began to consider again his projected trip to America. Luckily he met +Prince Valentine Radziwill on the street, so it is said, and was +persuaded to play at a Rothschild soiree. From that moment his +prospects brightened, for he secured paying pupils. Niecks, the +iconoclast, has run this story to earth and finds it built on airy, +romantic foundations. Liszt, Hiller, Franchomme and Sowinski never +heard of it although it was a stock anecdote of Chopin. + +Chopin must have broadened mentally as well as musically in this +congenial, artistic environment. He went about, hobnobbed with +princesses, and of the effect of this upon his compositions there can +be no doubt. If he became more cosmopolitan he also became more +artificial and for a time the salon with its perfumed, elegant +atmosphere threatened to drug his talent into forgetfulness of loftier +aims. Luckily the master-sculptor Life intervened and real troubles +chiselled his character on tragic, broader and more passionate lines. +He played frequently in public during 1832-1833 with Hiller, Liszt, +Herz and Osborne, and much in private. There was some rivalry in this +parterre of pianists. Liszt, Chopin and Hiller indulged in friendly +contests and Chopin always came off winner when Polish music was +essayed. He delighted in imitating his colleagues, Thalberg especially. +Adolphe Brisson tells of a meeting of Sand, Chopin and Thalberg, where, +as Mathias says, the lady "chattered like a magpie" and Thalberg, after +being congratulated by Chopin on his magnificent virtuosity, reeled off +polite phrases in return; doubtless he valued the Pole's compliments +for what they were worth. The moment his back was presented, Chopin at +the keyboard was mocking him. It was then Chopin told Sand of his +pupil, Georges Mathias, "c'est une bonne caboche." Thalberg took his +revenge whenever he could. After a concert by Chopin he astonished +Hiller by shouting on the way home. In reply to questions he slily +answered that he needed a forte as he had heard nothing but pianissimo +the entire evening! + +Chopin was never a hearty partisan of the Romantic movement. Its +extravagance, misplaced enthusiasm, turbulence, attacks on church, +state and tradition disturbed the finical Pole while noise, reclame and +boisterousness chilled and repulsed him. He wished to be the Uhland of +Poland, but he objected to smashing idols and refused to wade in +gutters to reach his ideal. He was not a fighter, yet as one reviews +the past half century it is his still small voice that has emerged from +the din, the golden voice of a poet and not the roar of the artistic +demagogues of his day. Liszt's influence was stimulating, but what did +not Chopin do for Liszt? Read Schumann. He managed in 1834 to go to +Aix-la-Chapelle to attend the Lower Rhenish Music Festival. There he +met Hiller and Mendelssohn at the painter Schadow's and improvised +marvellously, so Hiller writes. He visited Coblenz with Hiller before +returning home. + +Professor Niecks has a deep spring of personal humor which he taps at +rare intervals. He remarks that "the coming to Paris and settlement +there of his friend Matuszynski must have been very gratifying to +Chopin, who felt so much the want of one with whom to sigh." This +slanting allusion is matched by his treatment of George Sand. After +literally ratting her in a separate chapter, he winds up his work with +the solemn assurance that he abstains "from pronouncing judgment +because the complete evidence did not seem to me to warrant my doing +so." This is positively delicious. When I met this biographer at +Bayreuth in 1896, I told him how much I had enjoyed his work, adding +that I found it indispensable in the re-construction of Chopin. +Professor Niecks gazed at me blandly--he is most amiable and +scholarly-looking--and remarked, "You are not the only one." He was +probably thinking of the many who have had recourse to his human +documents of Chopin. But Niecks, in 1888, built on Karasowski, Liszt, +Schumann, Sand and others, so the process is bound to continue. Since +1888 much has been written of Chopin, much surmised. + +With Matuszysnki the composer was happier. He devoutly loved his +country and despite his sarcasm was fond of his countrymen. Never an +extravagant man, he invariably assisted the Poles. After 1834-5, +Chopin's activity as a public pianist began to wane. He was not always +understood and was not so warmly welcomed as he deserved to be; on one +occasion when he played the Larghetto of his F minor concerto in a +Conservatoire concert, its frigid reception annoyed him very much. +Nevertheless he appeared at a benefit concert at Habeneck's, April 26, +1835. The papers praised, but his irritability increased with every +public performance. About this time he became acquainted with Bellini, +for whose sensuous melodies he had a peculiar predilection. + +In July, 1835, Chopin met his father at Carlsbad. Then he went to +Dresden and later to Leipzig, playing privately for Schumann, Clara +Wieck, Wenzel and Mendelssohn. Schumann gushes over Chopin, but this +friendliness was never reciprocated. On his return to Paris Chopin +visited Heidelberg, where he saw the father of his pupil, Adolphe +Gutmann, and reached the capital of the civilized world the middle of +October. + +Meanwhile a love affair had occupied his attention in Dresden. In +September, 1835, Chopin met his old school friends, the Wodzinskis, +former pupils at his father's school. He fell in love with their sister +Marie and they became engaged. He spoke to his father about the matter, +and for the time Paris and his ambitions were forgotten. He enjoyed a +brief dream of marrying and of settling near Warsaw, teaching and +composing--the occasional dream that tempts most active artists, +soothing them with the notion that there is really a haven of rest from +the world's buffets. Again the gods intervened in the interest of +music. The father of the girl objected on the score of Chopin's means +and his social position--artists were not Paderewskis in those +days--although the mother favored the romance. The Wodzinskis were +noble and wealthy. In the summer of 1836, at Marienbad, Chopin met +Marie again. In 1837, the engagement was broken and the following year +the inconstant beauty married the son of Chopin's godfather, Count +Frederic Skarbek. As the marriage did not prove a success--perhaps the +lady played too much Chopin--a divorce ensued and later she married a +gentleman by the name of Orpiszewski. Count Wodzinski wrote "Les Trois +Romans de Frederic Chopin," in which he asserts that his sister +rejected Chopin at Marienbad in 1836. But Chopin survived the shock. He +went back to Paris, and in July 1837, accompanied by Camille Pleyel and +Stanislas Kozmian, visited England for the first time. His stay was +short, only eleven days, and his chest trouble dates from this time. He +played at the house of James Broadwood, the piano manufacturer, being +introduced by Pleyel as M. Fritz; but his performance betrayed his +identity. His music was already admired by amateurs but the critics +with a few exceptions were unfavorable to him. + +Now sounds for the first time the sinister motif of the George Sand +affair. In deference to Mr. Hadow I shall not call it a liaison. It was +not, in the vulgar sense. Chopin might have been petty--a common +failing of artistic men--but he was never vulgar in word or deed. He +disliked "the woman with the sombre eye" before he had met her. Her +reputation was not good, no matter if George Eliot, Matthew Arnold, +Elizabeth Barrett Browning and others believed her an injured saint. +Mr. Hadow indignantly repudiates anything that savors of irregularity +in the relations of Chopin and Aurore Dudevant. If he honestly believes +that their contemporaries flagrantly lied and that the woman's words +are to be credited, why by all means let us leave the critic in his +Utopia. Mary, Queen of Scots, has her Meline; why should not Sand boast +of at least one apologist for her life--besides herself? I do not say +this with cynical intent. Nor do I propose to discuss the details of +the affair which has been dwelt upon ad nauseam by every twanger of the +romantic string. The idealists will always see a union of souls, the +realists--and there were plenty of them in Paris taking notes from 1837 +to 1847--view the alliance as a matter for gossip. The truth lies +midway. + +Chopin, a neurotic being, met the polyandrous Sand, a trampler on all +the social and ethical conventions, albeit a woman of great gifts; +repelled at first he gave way before the ardent passion she manifested +toward him. She was his elder, so could veil the situation with the +maternal mask, and she was the stronger intellect, more +celebrated--Chopin was but a pianist in the eyes of the many--and so +won by her magnetism the man she desired. Paris, artistic Paris, was +full of such situations. Liszt protected the Countess d'Agoult, who +bore him children, Cosima Von Bulow-Wagner among the rest. +Balzac--Balzac, that magnificent combination of Bonaparte and Byron, +pirate and poet--was apparently leading the life of a saint, but his +most careful student, Viscount Spelboerch de Lovenjoul--whose name is +veritably Balzac-ian--tells us some different stories; even Gustave +Flaubert, the ascetic giant of Rouen, had a romance with Madame Louise +Colet, a mediocre writer and imitator of Sand,--as was Countess +d'Agoult, the Frankfort Jewess better known as "Daniel Stern,"--that +lasted from 1846 to 1854, according to Emile Faguet. Here then was a +medium which was the other side of good and evil, a new transvaluation +of morals, as Nietzsche would say. Frederic deplored the union for he +was theoretically a Catholic. Did he not once resent the visit of Liszt +and a companion to his apartments when he was absent? Indeed he may be +fairly called a moralist. Carefully reared in the Roman Catholic +religion he died confessing that faith. With the exception of the Sand +episode, his life was not an irregular one, He abhorred the vulgar and +tried to conceal this infatuation from his parents. + +This intimacy, however, did the pair no harm artistically, +notwithstanding the inevitable sorrow and heart burnings at the close. +Chopin had some one to look after him--he needed it--and in the society +of this brilliant Frenchwoman he throve amazingly: his best work may be +traced to Nohant and Majorca. She on her side profited also. After the +bitterness of her separation from Alfred de Musset about 1833 she had +been lonely, for the Pagello intermezzo was of short duration. The De +Musset-Sand story was not known in its entirety until 1896. Again M. +Spelboerch de Lovenjoul must be consulted, as he possessed a bundle of +letters that were written by George Sand and M. Buloz, the editor of +"La Revue des Deux Mondes," in 1858. + +De Musset went to Venice with Sand in the fall of 1833. They had the +maternal sanction and means supplied by Madame de Musset. The story +gives forth the true Gallic resonance on being critically tapped. De +Musset returned alone, sick in body and soul, and thenceforth absinthe +was his constant solace. There had been references, vague and +disquieting, of a Dr. Pagello for whom Sand had suddenly manifested one +of her extraordinary fancies. This she denied, but De Musset's brother +plainly intimated that the aggravating cause of his brother's illness +had been the unexpected vision of Sand coquetting with the young +medical man called in to prescribe for Alfred. Dr. Pagello in 1896 was +interviewed by Dr. Cabanes of the Paris "Figaro" and here is his story +of what had happened in 1833. This story will explain the later +behavior of "la merle blanche" toward Chopin. + +"One night George Sand, after writing three pages of prose full of +poetry and inspiration, took an unaddressed envelope, placed therein +the poetic declaration, and handed it to Dr. Pagello. He, seeing no +address, did not, or feigned not, to understand for whom the letter was +intended, and asked George Sand what he should do with it. Snatching +the letter from his hands, she wrote upon the envelope: 'To the Stupid +Pagello.' Some days afterward George Sand frankly told De Musset that +henceforth she could be to him only a friend." + +De Musset died in 1857 and after his death Sand startled Paris with +"Elle et Lui," an obvious answer to "Confessions of a Child of the +Age," De Musset's version--an uncomplimentary one to himself--of their +separation. The poet's brother Paul rallied to his memory with "Lui et +Elle," and even Louisa Colet ventured into the fracas with a trashy +novel called "Lui." During all this mud-throwing the cause of the +trouble calmly lived in the little Italian town of Belluno. It was Dr. +Giuseppe Pagello who will go down in literary history as the one man +that played Joseph to George Sand. + +Now do you ask why I believe that Sand left Chopin when she was bored +with him? The words "some days afterwards" are significant. I print the +Pagello story not only because it is new, but as a reminder that George +Sand in her love affairs was always the man. She treated Chopin as a +child, a toy, used him for literary copy--pace Mr. Hadow!--and threw +him over after she had wrung out all the emotional possibilities of the +problem. She was true to herself even when she attempted to palliate +her want of heart. Beware of the woman who punctuates the pages of her +life with "heart" and "maternal feelings." "If I do not believe any +more in tears it is because I saw thee crying!" exclaimed Chopin. Sand +was the product of abnormal forces, she herself was abnormal, and her +mental activity, while it created no permanent types in literary +fiction, was also abnormal. She dominated Chopin, as she had dominated +Jules Sandeau, Calmatta the mezzotinter, De Musset, Franz Liszt, +Delacroix, Michel de Bourges--I have not the exact chronological +order--and later Flaubert. The most lovable event in the life of this +much loved woman was her old age affair--purely platonic--with Gustave +Flaubert. The correspondence shows her to have been "maternal" to the +last. + +In the recently published "Lettres a l'etrangere" of Honore de Balzac, +this about Sand is very apropos. A visit paid to George Sand at Nohant, +in March 1838, brought the following to Madame Hanska: + + It was rather well that I saw her, for we exchanged + confidences regarding Sandeau. I, who blamed her to the last + for deserting him, now feel only a deep compassion for her, as + you will have for me, when you learn with whom we have had + relations, she of love, I of friendship. + + But she has been even more unhappy with Musset. So here she + is, in retreat, denouncing both marriage and love, because in + both she has found nothing but delusion. + + I will tell you of her immense and secret devotion to these + two men, and you will agree that there is nothing in common + between angels and devils. All the follies she has committed + are claims to glory in the eyes of great and beautiful souls. + She has been the dupe of la Dorval, Bocage, Lamenais, etc.; + through the same sentiment she is the dupe of Liszt and Madame + d'Agoult. + +So let us accept without too much questioning as did Balzac, a reader +of souls, the Sand-Chopin partnership and follow its sinuous course +until 1847. + +Chopin met Sand at a musical matinee in 1837. Niecks throttles every +romantic yarn about the pair that has been spoken or printed. He got +his facts viva voce from Franchomme. Sand was antipathetic to Chopin +but her technique for overcoming masculine coyness was as remarkable in +its particular fashion as Chopin's proficiency at the keyboard. They +were soon seen together, and everywhere. She was not musical, not a +trained musician, but her appreciation for all art forms was highly +sympathetic. Not a beautiful woman, being swarthy and rather heavy-set +in figure, this is what she was, as seen by Edouard Grenier:-- + + She was short and stout, but her face attracted all my + attention, the eyes especially. They were wonderful eyes, a + little too close together, it may be, large, with full + eyelids, and black, very black, but by no means lustrous; they + reminded me of unpolished marble, or rather of velvet, and + this gave a strange, dull, even cold expression to her + countenance. Her fine eyebrows and these great placid eyes + gave her an air of strength and dignity which was not borne + out by the lower part of her face. Her nose was rather thick + and not over shapely. Her mouth was also rather coarse and her + chin small. She spoke with great simplicity, and her manners + were very quiet. + +But she attracted with imperious power all that she met. Liszt felt +this attraction at one time--and it is whispered that Chopin was +jealous of him. Pouf! the woman who could conquer Franz Liszt in his +youth must have been a sorceress. He, too, was versatile. + +In 1838, Sand's boy Maurice being ill, she proposed a visit to Majorca. +Chopin went with the party in November and full accounts of the +Mediterranean trip, Chopin's illness, the bad weather, discomforts and +all the rest may be found in the "Histoire de Ma Vie" by Sand. It was a +time of torment. "Chopin is a detestable invalid," said Sand, and so +they returned to Nohant in June 1839. They saw Genoa for a few days in +May, but that is as far as Chopin ever penetrated into the promised +land--Italy, at one time a passion with him. Sand enjoyed the subtle +and truly feminine pleasure of again entering the city which six years +before she had visited in company with another man, the former lover of +Rachel. + +Chopin's health in 1839 was a source of alarm to himself and his +friends. He had been dangerously ill at Majorca and Marseilles. Fever +and severe coughing proved to be the dread forerunners of the disease +that killed him ten years later. He was forced to be very careful in +his habits, resting more, giving fewer lessons, playing but little in +private or public, and becoming frugal of his emotions. Now Sand began +to cool, though her lively imagination never ceased making graceful, +touching pictures of herself in the roles of sister of mercy, mother, +and discreet friend, all merged into one sentimental composite. Her +invalid was her one thought, and for an active mind and body like hers, +it must have been irksome to submit to the caprices of a moody, ailing +man. He composed at Nohant, and she has told us all about it; how he +groaned, wrote and re-wrote and tore to pieces draft after draft of his +work. This brings to memory another martyr to style, Gustave Flaubert, +who for forty years in a room at Croisset, near Rouen, wrestled with +the devils of syntax and epithet. Chopin was of an impatient, nervous +disposition. All the more remarkable then his capacity for taking +infinite pains. Like Balzac he was never pleased with the final +"revise" of his work, he must needs aim at finishing touches. His +letters at this period are interesting for the Chopinist but for the +most part they consist of requests made to his pupils, Fontana, Gutmann +and others, to jog the publishers, to get him new apartments, to buy +him many things. Wagner was not more importunate or minatory than this +Pole, who depended on others for the material comforts and necessities +of his existence. Nor is his abuse of friends and patrons, the Leos and +others, indicative of an altogether frank, sincere nature. He did not +hesitate to lump them all as "pigs" and "Jews" if anything happened to +jar his nerves. Money, money, is the leading theme of the Paris and +Mallorean letters. Sand was a spendthrift and Chopin had often to put +his hands in his pocket for her. He charged twenty francs a lesson, but +was not a machine and for at least four months of the year he earned +nothing. Hence his anxiety to get all he could for his compositions. +Heaven-born geniuses are sometimes very keen in financial transactions, +and indeed why should they not be? + +In 1839 Chopin met Moscheles. They appeared together at St. Cloud, +playing for the royal family. Chopin received a gold cup, Moscheles a +travelling case. "The King gave him this," said the amiable Frederic, +"to get the sooner rid of him." There were two public concerts in 1841 +and 1842, the first on April 26 at Pleyel's rooms, the second on +February 20 at the same hall. Niecks devotes an engrossing chapter to +the public accounts and the general style of Chopin's playing; of this +more hereafter. From 1843 to 1847 Chopin taught, and spent the +vacations at Nohant, to which charming retreat Liszt, Matthew Arnold, +Delacroix, Charles Rollinat and many others came. His life was +apparently happy. He composed and amused himself with Maurice and +Solange, the "terrible children" of this Bohemian household. There, +according to reports, Chopin and Liszt were in friendly rivalry--are +two pianists ever friendly?--Liszt imitating Chopin's style, and once +in the dark they exchanged places and fooled their listeners. Liszt +denied this. Another story is of one or the other working the pedal +rods--the pedals being broken. This too has been laughed to scorn by +Liszt. Nor could he recall having played while Viardot-Garcia sang out +on the terrace of the chateau. Garcia's memory is also short about this +event. Rollinat, Delacroix and Sand have written abundant souvenirs of +Nohant and its distinguished gatherings, so let us not attempt to +impugn the details of the Chopin legend, that legend which coughs +deprecatingly as it points to its aureoled alabaster brow. De Lenz +should be consulted for an account of this period; he will add the +finishing touches of unreality that may be missing. + +Chopin knew every one of note in Paris. The best salons were open to +him. Some of his confreres have not hesitated to describe him as a bit +snobbish, for during the last ten years of his life he was generally +inaccessible. But consider his retiring nature, his suspicious Slavic +temperament, above all his delicate health! Where one accuses him of +indifference and selfishness there are ten who praise his unfaltering +kindness, generosity and forbearance. He was as a rule a kind and +patient teacher, and where talent was displayed his interest trebled. +Can you fancy this Ariel of the piano giving lessons to hum-drum +pupils! Playing in a charmed and bewitching circle of countesses, +surrounded by the luxury and the praise that kills, Chopin is a much +more natural figure, yet he gave lessons regularly and appeared to +relish them. He had not much taste for literature. He liked Voltaire +though he read but little that was not Polish--did he really enjoy +Sand's novels?--and when asked why he did not compose symphonies or +operas, answered that his metier was the piano, and to it he would +stick. He spoke French though with a Polish accent, and also German, +but did not care much for German music except Bach and Mozart. +Beethoven--save in the C sharp minor and several other sonatas--was not +sympathetic. Schubert he found rough, Weber, in his piano music, too +operatic and Schumann he dismissed without a word. He told Heller that +the "Carneval" was really not music at all. This remark is one of the +curiosities of musical anecdotage. + +But he had his gay moments when he would gossip, chatter, imitate every +one, cut up all manner of tricks and, like Wagner, stand on his head. +Perhaps it was feverish, agitated gayety, yet somehow it seemed more +human than that eternal Thaddeus of Warsaw melancholy and regret for +the vanished greatness and happiness of Poland--a greatness and +happiness that never had existed. Chopin disliked letter writing and +would go miles to answer one in person. He did not hate any one in +particular, being rather indifferent to every one and to political +events--except where Poland was concerned. Theoretically he hated Jews +and Russians, yet associated with both. He was, like his music, a +bundle of unreconciled affirmations and evasions and never could have +been contented anywhere or with any one. Of himself he said that "he +was in this world like the E string of a violin on a contrabass." This +"divine dissatisfaction" led him to extremes: to the flouting of +friends for fancied affronts, to the snubbing of artists who sometimes +visited him. He grew suspicious of Liszt and for ten years was not on +terms of intimacy with him although they never openly quarrelled. + +The breach which had been very perceptibly widening became hopeless in +1847, when Sand and Chopin parted forever. A literature has grown up on +the subject. Chopin never had much to say but Sand did; so did Chopin's +pupils, who were quite virulent in their assertions that she killed +their master. The break had to come. It was the inevitable end of such +a friendship. The dynamics of free-love have yet to be formulated. This +much we know: two such natures could never entirely cohere. When the +novelty wore off the stronger of the two--the one least in love--took +the initial step. It was George Sand who took it with Chopin. He would +never have had the courage nor the will. + +The final causes are not very interesting. Niecks has sifted all the +evidence before the court and jury of scandal-mongers. The main quarrel +was about the marriage of Solange Sand with Clesinger the sculptor. Her +mother did not oppose the match, but later she resented Clesinger's +actions. He was coarse and violent, she said, with the true +mother-in-law spirit--and when Chopin received the young woman and her +husband after a terrible scene at Nohant, she broke with him. It was a +good excuse. He had ennuied her for several years, and as he had +completed his artistic work on this planet and there was nothing more +to be studied,--the psychological portrait was supposedly +painted--Madame George got rid of him. The dark stories of maternal +jealousy, of Chopin's preference for Solange, the visit to Chopin of +the concierge's wife to complain of her mistress' behavior with her +husband, all these rakings I leave to others. It was a triste affair +and I do not doubt in the least that it undermined Chopin's feeble +health. Why not! Animals die of broken hearts, and this emotional +product of Poland, deprived of affection, home and careful attention, +may well, as De Lenz swears, have died of heart-break. Recent gossip +declares that Sand was jealous of Chopin's friendships--this is silly. + +Mr. A. B. Walkley, the English dramatic critic, after declaring that he +would rather have lived during the Balzac epoch in Paris, continues in +this entertaining vein: + + And then one might have had a chance of seeing George Sand in + the thick of her amorisms. For my part I would certainly + rather have met her than Pontius Pilate. The people who saw + her in her old age--Flaubert, Gautier, the Goncourts--have + left us copious records of her odd appearance, her perpetual + cigarette smoking, and her whimsical life at Nohant. But then + she was only an "extinct volcano;" she must have been much + more interesting in full eruption. Of her earlier career--the + period of Musset and Pagello--she herself told us something in + "Elle et Lui," and correspondence published a year or so ago + in the "Revue de Paris" told us more. But, to my mind, the + most fascinating chapter in this part of her history is the + Chopin chapter, covering the next decade, or, roughly + speaking, the 'forties. She has revealed something of this + time--naturally from her own point of view--in "Lucrezia + Floriana" (1847). For it is, of course, one of the most + notorious characteristics of George Sand that she invariably + turned her loves into "copy." The mixture of passion and + printer's ink in this lady's composition is surely one of the + most curious blends ever offered to the palate of the epicure. + + But it was a blend which gave the lady an unfair advantage for + posterity. We hear too much of her side of the matter. This + one feels especially as regards her affair with Chopin. With + Musset she had to reckon a writer like herself; and against + her "Elle et Lui" we can set his "Confession d'un enfant du + siecle." But poor Chopin, being a musician, was not good at + "copy." The emotions she gave him he had to pour out in music, + which, delightful as sound, is unfortunately vague as a + literary "document." How one longs to have his full, true, and + particular account of the six months he spent with George Sand + in Majorca! M. Pierre Mille, who has just published in the + "Revue Bleue" some letters of Chopin (first printed, it seems, + in a Warsaw newspaper), would have us believe that the lady + was really the masculine partner. We are to understand that it + was Chopin who did the weeping, and pouting, and "scene"-making + while George Sand did the consoling, the pooh-poohing, + and the protecting. Liszt had already given us a + characteristic anecdote of this Majorca period. We see George + Sand, in sheer exuberance of health and animal spirits, + wandering out into the storm, while Chopin stays at home, to + have an attack of "nerves," to give vent to his anxiety (oh, + "artistic temperament"!) by composing a prelude, and to fall + fainting at the lady's feet when she returns safe and sound. + There is no doubt that the lady had enough of the masculine + temper in her to be the first to get tired. And as poor Chopin + was coughing and swooning most of the time, this is scarcely + surprising. But she did not leave him forthwith. She kept up + the pretence of loving him, in a maternal, protecting sort of + way, out of pity, as it were, for a sick child. + + So much the published letters clearly show. Many of them are + dated from Nohant. But in themselves the letters are dull + enough. Chopin composed with the keyboard of a piano; with ink + and paper he could do little. Probably his love letters were + wooden productions, and George Sand, we know, was a fastidious + critic in that matter. She had received and written so many! + But any rate, Chopin did not write whining recriminations like + Mussel. His real view of her we shall never know--and, if you + like, you may say it is no business of ours. She once uttered + a truth about that (though not apropos of Chopin), "There are + so many things between two lovers of which they alone can be + the judges." + +Chopin gave his last concert in Paris, February 16, 1848, at Pleyel's. +He was ill but played beautifully. Oscar Commettant said he fainted in +the artist's room. Sand and Chopin met but once again. She took his +hand, which was "trembling and cold," but he escaped without saying a +word. He permitted himself in a letter to Grzymala from London dated +November 17-18, 1848, to speak of Sand. "I have never cursed any one, +but now I am so weary of life that I am near cursing Lucrezia. But she +suffers too, and suffers more because she grows older in wickedness. +What a pity about Soli! Alas! everything goes wrong with the world!" I +wonder what Mr. Hadow thinks of this reference to Sand! + +"Soli" is Solange Sand, who was forced to leave her husband because of +ill-treatment. As her mother once boxed Clesinger's ears at Nohant, she +followed the example. In trying to settle the affair Sand quarrelled +hopelessly with her daughter. That energetic descendant of "emancipated +woman" formed a partnership, literary of course, with the Marquis +Alfieri, the nephew of the Italian poet. Her salon was as much in vogue +as her mother's, but her tastes were inclined to politics, +revolutionary politics preferred. She had for associates Gambetta, +Jules Ferry, Floquet, Taine, Herve, Weiss, the critic of the "Debats," +Henri Fouquier and many others. She had the "curved Hebraic nose of her +mother and hair coal-black." She died in her chateau at Montgivray and +was buried March 20, 1899, at Nohant where, as my informant says, "her +mother died of over-much cigarette smoking." She was a clever woman and +wrote a book "Masks and Buffoons." Maurice Sand died in 1883. He was +the son of his mother, who was gathered to her heterogeneous ancestors +June 8, 1876. + +In literature George Sand is a feminine pendant to Jean Jacques +Rousseau, full of ill-digested, troubled, fermenting, social, +political, philosophical and religious speculations and theories. She +wrote picturesque French, smooth, flowing and full of color. The +sketches of nature, of country life, have positive value, but where has +vanished her gallery of Byronic passion-pursued women? Where are the +Lelias, the Indianas, the Rudolstadts? She had not, as Mr. Henry James +points out, a faculty for characterization. As Flaubert wrote her: "In +spite of your great Sphinx eyes you have always seen the world as +through a golden mist." She dealt in vague, vast figures, and so her +Prince Karol in "Lucrezia Floriana," unquestionably intended for +Chopin, is a burlesque--little wonder he was angered when the precious +children asked him "Cher M. Chopin, have you read 'Lucrezia'? Mamma has +put you in it." Of all persons Sand was pre-elected to give to the +world a true, a sympathetic picture of her friend. She understood him, +but she had not the power of putting him between the coversof a book. +If Flaubert, or better still, Pierre Loti, could have known Chopin so +intimately we should possess a memoir in which every vibration of +emotion would be recorded, every shade noted, and all pinned with the +precise adjective, the phrase exquisite. + + + + +III. ENGLAND, SCOTLAND AND PERE LA CHAISE. + + +The remaining years of Chopin's life were lonely. His father died in +1844 of chest and heart complaint, his sister Emilia died of +consumption--ill-omens these!--and shortly after, John Matuszynski +died. Titus Woyciechowski was in far-off Poland on his estates and +Chopin had but Grzymala and Fontana to confide in; they being Polish he +preferred them, although he was diplomatic enough not to let others see +this. Both Franchomme and Gutmann whispered to Niecks at different +times that each was the particular soul, the alter ego, of Chopin. He +appeared to give himself to his friends but it was usually surface +affection. He had coaxing, coquettish ways, playful ways that cost him +nothing when in good spirits. So he was "more loved than loving." This +is another trait of the man, which, allied with his fastidiousness and +spiritual brusquerie, made him difficult to decipher. The loss of Sand +completed his misery and we find him in poor health when he arrived in +London, for the second and last time, April 21, 1848. + +Mr. A. J. Hipkins is the chief authority on the details of Chopin's +visit to England. To this amiable gentleman and learned writer on +pianos, Franz Hueffer, Joseph Bennett and Niecks are indebted for the +most of their facts. From them the curious may learn all there is to +learn. The story is not especially noteworthy, being in the main a +record of ill-health, complainings, lamentations and not one signal +artistic success. + +War was declared upon Chopin by a part of the musical world. The +criticism was compounded of pure malice and stupidity. Chopin was +angered but little for he was too sick to care now. He went to an +evening party but missed the Macready dinner where he was to have met +Thackeray, Berlioz, Mrs. Procter and Sir Julius Benedict. With Benedict +he played a Mozart duet at the Duchess of Sutherland's. Whether he +played at court the Queen can tell; Niecks cannot. He met Jenny +Lind-Goldschmidt and liked her exceedingly--as did all who had the +honor of knowing her. She sided with him, woman-like, in the Sand +affair--echoes of which had floated across the channel--and visited him +in Paris in 1849. Chopin gave two matinees at the houses of Adelaide +Kemble and Lord Falmouth--June 23 and July 7. They were very recherche, +so it appears. Viardot-Garcia sang. The composer's face and frame were +wasted by illness and Mr. Solomon spoke of his "long attenuated +fingers." He made money and that was useful to him, for doctors' bills +and living had taken up his savings. There was talk of his settling in +London, but the climate, not to speak of the unmusical atmosphere, +would have been fatal to him. Wagner succumbed to both, sturdy fighter +that he was. + +Chopin left for Scotland in August and stopped at the house of his +pupil, Miss Stirling. Her name is familiar to Chopin students, for the +two nocturnes, opus 55, are dedicated to her. He was nearly killed with +kindness but continually bemoaned his existence. At the house of Dr. +Lyschinski, a Pole, he lodged in Edinburgh and was so weak that he had +to be carried up and down stairs. To the doctor's good wife he replied +in answer to the question "George Sand is your particular friend?" "Not +even George Sand." And is he to be blamed for evading tiresome +reminders of the past? He confessed that his excessive thinness had +caused Sand to address him as "My Dear Corpse." Charming, is it not? +Miss Stirling was doubtless in love with him and Princess Czartoryska +followed him to Scotland to see if his health was better. So he was not +altogether deserted by the women--indeed he could not live without +their little flatteries and agreeable attentions. It is safe to say +that a woman was always within call of Chopin. + +He played at Manchester on the 28th of August, but his friend Mr. +Osborne, who was present, says "his playing was too delicate to create +enthusiasm and I felt truly sorry for him." On his return to Scotland +he stayed with Mr. and Mrs. Salis Schwabe. + +Mr. J. Cuthbert Hadden wrote several years ago in the Glasgow "Herald" +of Chopin's visit to Scotland in 1848. The tone-poet was in the poorest +health, but with characteristic tenacity played at concerts and paid +visits to his admirers. Mr. Hadden found the following notice in the +back files of the Glasgow "Courier": + + Monsieur Chopin has the honour to announce that his matinee + musicale will take place on Wednesday, the 27th September, in + the Merchant Hall, Glasgow. To commence at half-past two + o'clock. Tickets, limited in number, half-a-guinea each, and + full particulars to be had from Mr. Muir Wood, 42, Buchanan + street. + +He continues: + + The net profits of this concert are said to have been exactly + L60--a ridiculously low sum when we compare it with the + earnings of later day virtuosi; nay, still more ridiculously + low when we recall the circumstance that for two concerts in + Glasgow sixteen years before this Paganini had L 1,400. Muir + Wood, who has since died, said: "I was then a comparative + stranger in Glasgow, but I was told that so many private + carriages had never been seen at any concert in the town. In + fact, it was the county people who turned out, with a few of + the elite of Glasgow society. Being a morning concert, the + citizens were busy otherwise, and half a guinea was considered + too high a sum for their wives and daughters." + + The late Dr. James Hedderwick, of Glasgow, tells in his + reminiscences that on entering the hall he found it about one-third + full. It was obvious that a number of the audience were + personal friends of Chopin. Dr. Hedderwick recognized the + composer at once as "a little, fragile-looking man, in pale + gray suit, including frock coat of identical tint and texture, + moving about among the company, conversing with different + groups, and occasionally consulting his watch," which seemed + to be "no bigger than an agate stone on the forefinger of an + alderman." Whiskerless, beardless, fair of hair, and pale and + thin of face, his appearance was "interesting and + conspicuous," and when, "after a final glance at his miniature + horologe, he ascended the platform and placed himself at the + instrument, he at once commanded attention." Dr. Hedderwick + says it was a drawing-room entertainment, more piano than + forte, though not without occasional episodes of both strength + and grandeur. It was perfectly clear to him that Chopin was + marked for an early grave. + + So far as can be ascertained, there are now living only two + members of that Glasgow audience of 1848. One of the two is + Julius Seligmann, the veteran president of the Glasgow Society + of Musicians, who, in response to some inquiries on the + subject, writes as follows: + + "Several weeks before the concert Chopin lived with different + friends or pupils on their invitations, in the surrounding + counties. I think his pupil Miss Jane Stirling had something + to do with all the general arrangements. Muir Wood managed the + special arrangements of the concert, and I distinctly remember + him telling me that he never had so much difficulty in + arranging a concert as on this occasion. Chopin constantly + changed his mind. Wood had to visit him several times at the + house of Admiral Napier, at Milliken Park, near Johnstone, but + scarcely had he returned to Glasgow when he was summoned back + to alter something. The concert was given in the Merchant + Hall, Hutcheson street, now the County Buildings. The hall was + about three-quarters filled. Between Chopin's playing Madame + Adelasio de Margueritte, daughter of a well-known London + physician, sang, and Mr. Muir accompanied her. Chopin was + evidently very ill. His touch was very feeble, and while the + finish, grace, elegance and delicacy of his performances were + greatly admired by the audience, the want of power made his + playing somewhat monotonous. I do not remember the whole + programme, but he was encored for his well-known mazurka in B + flat (op. 7, No. 1), which he repeated with quite different + nuances from those of the first time. The audience was very + aristocratic, consisting mostly of ladies, among whom were the + then Duchess of Argyll and her sister, Lady Blantyre." + + The other survivor is George Russell Alexander, son of the + proprietor of the Theatre Royal, Dunlop street, who in a + letter to the writer remarks especially upon Chopin's pale, + cadaverous appearance. "My emotion," he says, "was so great + that two or three times I was compelled to retire from the + room to recover myself. I have heard all the best and most + celebrated stars of the musical firmament, but never one has + left such an impress on my mind." + +Chopin played October 4 in Edinburgh, and returned to London in +November after various visits. We read of a Polish ball and concert at +which he played, but the affair was not a success. He left England in +January 1849 and heartily glad he was to go. "Do you see the cattle in +this meadow?" he asked, en route for Paris: "Ca a plus d'intelligence +que des Anglais," which was not nice of him. Perhaps M. Niedzwiecki, to +whom he made the remark took as earnest a pure bit of nonsense, and +perhaps--! He certainly disliked England and the English. + +Now the curtain prepares to fall on the last dreary finale of Chopin's +life, a life not for a moment heroic, yet lived according to his lights +and free from the sordid and the soil of vulgarity. Jules Janin said: +"He lived ten miraculous years with a breath ready to fly away," and we +know that his servant Daniel had always to carry him to bed. For ten +years he had suffered from so much illness that a relapse was not +noticed by the world. His very death was at first received with +incredulity, for, as Stephen Heller said, he had been reported dead so +often that the real news was doubted. In 1847 his legs began to bother +him by swelling, and M. Mathias described him as "a painful spectacle, +the picture of exhaustion, the back bent, head bowed--but always +amiable and full of distinction." His purse was empty, and his lodgings +in the Rue Chaillot were represented to the proud man as being just +half their cost,--the balance being paid by the Countess Obreskoff, a +Russian lady. Like a romance is the sending, by Miss Stirling, of +twenty-five thousand francs, but it is nevertheless true. The +noble-hearted Scotchwoman heard of Chopin's needs through Madame Rubio, +a pupil, and the money was raised. That packet containing it was +mislaid or lost by the portress of Chopin's house, but found after the +woman had been taxed with keeping it. + +Chopin, his future assured, moved to Place Vendome, No. 12. There he +died. His sister Louise was sent for, and came from Poland to Paris. In +the early days of October he could no longer sit upright without +support. Gutmann and the Countess Delphine Potocka, his sister, and M. +Gavard, were constantly with him. It was Turgenev who spoke of the half +hundred countesses in Europe who claimed to have held the dying Chopin +in their arms. In reality he died in Gutmann's, raising that pupil's +hand to his mouth and murmuring "cher ami" as he expired. Solange Sand +was there, but not her mother, who called and was not admitted--so they +say. Gutmann denies having refused her admittance. On the other hand, +if she had called, Chopin's friends would have kept her away from him, +from the man who told Franchomme two days before his death, "She said +to me that I would die in no arms but hers." Surely--unless she was +monstrous in her egotism, and she was not--George Sand did not hear +this sad speech without tears and boundless regrets. Alas! all things +come too late for those who wait. + +Tarnowski relates that Chopin gave his last orders in perfect +consciousness. He begged his sister to burn all his inferior +compositions. "I owe it to the public," he said, "and to myself to +publish only good things. I kept to this resolution all my life; I wish +to keep to it now." This wish has not been respected. The posthumous +publications are for the most part feeble stuff. + +Chopin died, October 17, 1849, between three and four in the morning, +after having been shrived by the Abbe Jelowicki. His last word, +according to Gavard, was "Plus," on being asked if he suffered. +Regarding the touching and slightly melodramatic death bed scene on the +day previous, when Delphine Potocka sang Stradella and Mozart--or was +it Marcello?--Liszt, Karasowski, and Gutmann disagree. + +The following authentic account of the last hours of Chopin appears +here for the first time in English, translated by Mr. Hugh Craig. In +Liszt's well-known work on Chopin, second edition, 1879, mention is +made of a conversation that he had held with the Abbe Jelowicki +respecting Chopin's death; and in Niecks' biography of Chopin some +sentences from letters by the Abbe are quoted. These letters, written +in French, have been translated and published in the "Allgemeine Musik +Zeitung," to which they were given by the Princess Marie Hohenlohe, the +daughter of Princess Caroline Sayn Wittgenstein, Liszt's universal +legatee and executor, who died in 1887. + + For many years [so runs the document] the life of Chopin was + but a breath. His frail, weak body was visibly unfitted for + the strength and force of his genius. It was a wonder how in + such a weak state, he could live at all, and occasionally act + with the greatest energy. His body was almost diaphanous; his + eyes were almost shadowed by a cloud from which, from time to + time, the lightnings of his glance flashed. Gentle, kind, + bubbling with humor, and every way charming, he seemed no + longer to belong to earth, while, unfortunately, he had not + yet thought of heaven. He had good friends, but many bad + friends. These bad friends were his flatterers, that is, his + enemies, men and women without principles, or rather with bad + principles. Even his unrivalled success, so much more subtle + and thus so much more stimulating than that of all other + artists, carried the war into his soul and checked the + expression of faith and of prayer. The teachings of the + fondest, most pious mother became to him a recollection of his + childhood's love. In the place of faith, doubt had stepped in, + and only that decency innate in every generous heart hindered + him from indulging in sarcasm and mockery over holy things and + the consolations of religion. + + While he was in this spiritual condition he was attacked by + the pulmonary disease that was soon to carry him away from us. + The knowledge of this cruel sickness reached me on my return + from Rome. With beating heart I hurried to him, to see once + more the friend of my youth, whose soul was infinitely dearer + to me than all his talent. I found him, not thinner, for that + was impossible, but weaker. His strength sank, his life faded + visibly. He embraced me with affection and with tears in his + eyes, thinking not of his own pain but of mine; he spoke of my + poor friend Eduard Worte, whom I had just lost, you know how. + (He was shot, a martyr of liberty, at Vienna, November 10, + 1848.) + + I availed myself of his softened mood to speak to him about + his soul. I recalled his thoughts to the piety of his + childhood and of his beloved mother. "Yes," he said, "in order + not to offend my mother I would not die without the + sacraments, but for my part I do not regard them in the sense + that you desire. I understand the blessing of confession in so + far as it is the unburdening of a heavy heart into a friendly + hand, but not as a sacrament. I am ready to confess to you if + you wish it, because I love you, not because I hold it + necessary." Enough: a crowd of anti-religious speeches filled + me with terror and care for this elect soul, and I feared + nothing more than to be called to be his confessor. + + Several months passed with similar conversations, so painful + to me, the priest and the sincere friend. Yet I clung to the + conviction that the grace of God would obtain the victory over + this rebellious soul, even if I knew not how. After all my + exertions, prayer remained my only refuge. + + On the evening of October 12 I had with my brethren retired to + pray for a change in Chopin's mind, when I was summoned by + orders of the physician, in fear that he would not live + through the night. I hastened to him. He pressed my hand, but + bade me at once to depart, while he assured me he loved me + much, but did not wish to speak to me. + + Imagine, if you can, what a night I passed! Next day was the + 13th, the day of St. Edward, the patron of my poor brother. I + said mass for the repose of his soul and prayed for Chopin's + soul. "My God," I cried, "if the soul of my brother Edward is + pleasing to thee, give me, this day, the soul of Frederic." + + In double distress I then went to the melancholy abode of our + poor sick man. + + I found him at breakfast, which was served as carefully as + ever, and after he had asked me to partake I said: "My friend, + today is the name day of my poor brother." "Oh, do not let us + speak of it!" he cried. "Dearest friend," I continued, "you + must give me something for my brother's name day." "What shall + I give you?" "Your soul." "Ah! I understand. Here it is; take + it!" + + At these words unspeakable joy and anguish seized me. What + should I say to him? What should I do to restore his faith, + how not to lose instead of saving this beloved soul? How + should I begin to bring it back to God? I flung myself on my + knees, and after a moment of collecting my thoughts I cried in + the depths of my heart, "Draw it to Thee, Thyself, my God!" + + Without saying a word I held out to our dear invalid the + crucifix. Rays of divine light, flames of divine fire, + streamed, I might say, visibly from the figure of the + crucified Saviour, and at once illumined the soul and kindled + the heart of Chopin. Burning tears streamed from his eyes. His + faith was once more revived, and with unspeakable fervor he + made his confession and received the Holy Supper. After the + blessed Viaticum, penetrated by the heavenly consecration + which the sacraments pour forth on pious souls, he asked for + Extreme Unction. He wished to pay lavishly the sacristan who + accompanied me, and when I remarked that the sum presented by + him was twenty times too much he replied, "Oh, no, for what I + have received is beyond price." + + From this hour he was a saint. The death struggle began and + lasted four days. Patience, trust in God, even joyful + confidence, never left him, in spite of all his sufferings, + till the last breath. He was really happy, and called himself + happy. In the midst of the sharpest sufferings he expressed + only ecstatic joy, touching love of God, thankfulness that I + had led him back to God, contempt of the world and its good, + and a wish for a speedy death. + + He blessed his friends, and when, after an apparently last + crisis, he saw himself surrounded by the crowd that day and + night filled his chamber, he asked me, "Why do they not pray?" + At these words all fell on their knees, and even the + Protestants joined in the litanies and prayers for the dying. + + Day and night he held my hand, and would not let me leave him. + "No, you will not leave me at the last moment," he said, and + leaned on my breast as a little child in a moment of danger + hides itself in its mother's breast. + + Soon he called upon Jesus and Mary, with a fervor that reached + to heaven; soon he kissed the crucifix in an excess of faith, + hope and love. He made the most touching utterances. "I love + God and man," he said. "I am happy so to die; do not weep, my + sister. My friends, do not weep. I am happy. I feel that I am + dying. Farewell, pray for me!" + + Exhausted by deathly convulsions he said to the physicians, + "Let me die. Do not keep me longer in this world of exile. Let + me die; why do you prolong my life when I have renounced all + things and God has enlightened my soul? God calls me; why do + you keep me back?" + + Another time he said, "O lovely science, that only lets one + suffer longer! Could it give me back my strength, qualify me + to do any good, to make any sacrifice--but a life of fainting, + of grief, of pain to all who love me, to prolong such a life-- + O lovely science!" + + Then he said again: "You let me suffer cruelly. Perhaps you + have erred about my sickness. But God errs not. He punishes + me, and I bless him therefor. Oh, how good is God to punish me + here below! Oh, how good God is!" + + His usual language was always elegant, with well chosen words, + but at last to express all his thankfulness and, at the same + time, all the misery of those who die unreconciled to God, he + cried, "Without you I should have croaked (krepiren) like a + pig." + + While dying he still called on the names of Jesus, Mary, + Joseph, kissed the crucifix and pressed it to his heart with + the cry "Now I am at the source of Blessedness!" + + Thus died Chopin, and in truth, his death was the most + beautiful concerto of all his life. + +The worthy abbe must have had a phenomenal memory. I hope that it was +an exact one. His story is given in its entirety because of its +novelty. The only thing that makes me feel in the least sceptical is +that La Mara,--the pen name of a writer on musical +subjects,--translated these letters into German. But every one agrees +that Chopin's end was serene; indeed it is one of the musical +death-beds of history, another was Mozart's. His face was beautiful and +young in the flower-covered coffin, says Liszt. He was buried from the +Madeleine, October 30, with the ceremony befitting a man of genius. The +B flat minor Funeral march, orchestrated by Henri Reber, was given, and +during the ceremony Lefebure-Wely played on the organ the E and B minor +Preludes. The pall-bearers were distinguished men, Meyerbeer, +Delacroix, Pleyel and Franchomme--at least Theophile Gautier so +reported it for his journal. Even at his grave in Pere la Chaise no two +persons could agree about Chopin. This controversy is quite +characteristic of Chopin who was always the calm centre of argument. + +He was buried in evening clothes, his concert dress, but not at his own +request. Kwiatowski the portrait painter told this to Niecks. It is a +Polish custom for the dying to select their grave clothes, yet Lombroso +writes that Chopin "in his will directed that he should be buried in a +white tie, small shoes and short breeches," adducing this as an +evidence of his insanity. He further adds "he abandoned the woman whom +he tenderly loved because she offered a chair to some one else before +giving the same invitation to himself." Here we have a Sand story +raised to the dignity of a diagnosed symptom. It is like the other +nonsense. + + + + +IV. THE ARTIST + + +Chopin's personality was a pleasant, persuasive one without being so +striking or so dramatic as Liszt's. As a youth his nose was too large, +his lips thin, the lower one protruding. Later, Moscheles said that he +looked like his music. Delicacy and a certain aristrocratic bearing, a +harmonious ensemble, produced a most agreeable sensation. "He was of +slim frame, middle height; fragile but wonderfully flexible limbs, +delicately formed hands, very small feet, an oval, softly outlined +head, a pale transparent complexion, long silken hair of a light +chestnut color, parted on one side, tender brown eyes, intelligent +rather than dreamy, a finely-curved aquiline nose, a sweet subtle +smile, graceful and varied gestures." This precise description is by +Niecks. Liszt said he had blue eyes, but he has been overruled. Chopin +was fond of elegant, costly attire, and was very correct in the matter +of studs, walking sticks and cravats. Not the ideal musician we read +of, but a gentleman. Berlioz told Legouve to see Chopin, "for he is +something which you have never seen--and some one you will never +forget." An orchidaceous individuality this. + +With such personal refinement he was a man punctual and precise in his +habits. Associating constantly with fashionable folk his naturally +dignified behavior was increased. He was an aristocrat--there is no +other word--and he did not care to be hail-fellow-well-met with the +musicians. A certain primness and asperity did not make him popular. +While teaching, his manner warmed, the earnest artist came to life, all +halting of speech and polite insincerities were abandoned. His pupils +adored him. Here at least the sentiment was one of solidarity. De Lenz +is his most censorious critic and did not really love Chopin. The +dislike was returned, for the Pole suspected that his pupil was sent by +Liszt to spy on his methods. This I heard in Paris. + +Chopin was a remarkable teacher. He never taught but one genius, little +Filtsch, the Hungarian lad of whom Liszt said, "When he starts playing +I will shut up shop." The boy died in 1845, aged fifteen; Paul +Gunsberg, who died the same year, was also very talented. Once after +delivering in a lovely way the master's E minor concerto Filtsch was +taken by Chopin to a music store and presented with the score of +Beethoven's "Fidelio." He was much affected by the talents of this +youthful pupil. Lindsay Sloper and Brinley Richards studied with +Chopin. Caroline Hartmann, Gutmann, Lysberg, Georges Mathias, Mlle. +O'Meara, many Polish ladies of rank, Delphine Potocka among the rest, +Madame Streicher, Carl Mikuli, Madame Rubio, Madame Peruzzi, Thomas +Tellefsen, Casimir Wernik, Gustav Schumann, Werner Steinbrecher, and +many others became excellent pianists. Was the American pianist, Louis +Moreau Gottschalk, ever his pupil? His friends say so, but Niecks does +not mention him. Ernst Pauer questions it. We know that Gottschalk +studied in Paris with Camille Stamaty, and made his first appearance +there in 1847. This was shortly before Chopin's death when his interest +in music had abated greatly. No doubt Gottschalk played for Chopin for +he was the first to introduce the Pole's music in America. + +Chopin was very particular about the formation of the touch, giving +Clementi's Preludes at first. "Is that a dog barking?" was his sudden +exclamation at a rough attack. He taught the scales staccato and legato +beginning with E major. Ductility, ease, gracefulness were his aim; +stiffness, harshness annoyed him. He gave Clementi, Moscheles and Bach. +Before playing in concert he shut himself up and played, not Chopin but +Bach, always Bach. Absolute finger independence and touch +discrimination and color are to be gained by playing the preludes and +fugues of Bach. Chopin started a method but it was never finished and +his sister gave it to the Princess Czartoryska after his death. It is a +mere fragment. Janotha has translated it. One point is worth quoting. +He wrote: + + No one notices inequality in the power of the notes of a scale + when it is played very fast and equally, as regards time. In a + good mechanism the aim is not to play everything with an equal + sound, but to acquire a beautiful quality of touch and a + perfect shading. For a long time players have acted against + nature in seeking to give equal power to each finger. On the + contrary, each finger should have an appropriate part assigned + it. The thumb has the greatest power, being the thickest + finger and the freest. Then comes the little finger, at the + other extremity of the hand. The middle finger is the main + support of the hand, and is assisted by the first. Finally + comes the third, the weakest one. As to this Siamese twin of + the middle finger, some players try to force it with all their + might to become independent. A thing impossible, and most + likely unnecessary. There are, then, many different qualities + of sound, just as there are several fingers. The point is to + utilize the differences; and this, in other words, is the art + of fingering. + +Here, it seems to me, is one of the most practical truths ever uttered +by a teacher. Pianists spend thousands of hours trying to subjugate +impossible muscles. Chopin, who found out most things for himself, saw +the waste of time and force. I recommend his advice. He was ever +particular about fingering, but his innovations horrified the purists. +"Play as you feel," was his motto, a rather dangerous precept for +beginners. He gave to his pupils the concertos and sonatas--all +carefully graded--of Mozart, Scarlatti, Field, Dussek, Hummel, +Beethoven, Mendelssohn, Weber and Hiller and, of Schubert, the +four-hand pieces and dances. Liszt he did not favor, which is natural, +Liszt having written nothing but brilliant paraphrases in those days. +The music of the later Liszt is quite another thing. Chopin's genius +for the pedal, his utilization of its capacity for the vibration of +related strings, the overtones, I refer to later. Rubinstein said: + + The piano bard, the piano rhapsodist, the piano mind, the + piano soul is Chopin. ... Tragic, romantic, lyric, heroic, + dramatic, fantastic, soulful, sweet, dreamy, brilliant, grand, + simple; all possible expressions are found in his compositions + and all are sung by him upon his instrument. + +Chopin is dead only fifty years, but his fame has traversed the half +century with ease, and bids fair to build securely in the loves of our +great-grandchildren. The six letters that comprise his name pursue +every piano that is made. Chopin and modern piano playing are +inseparable, and it is a strain upon homely prophecy to predict a time +when the two shall be put asunder. Chopin was the greatest interpreter +of Chopin, and following him came those giants of other days, Liszt, +Tausig, and Rubinstein. + +While he never had the pupils to mould as had Liszt, Chopin made some +excellent piano artists. They all had, or have--the old guard dies +bravely--his tradition, but exactly what the Chopin tradition is no man +may dare to say. Anton Rubinstein, when I last heard him, played Chopin +inimitably. Never shall I forget the Ballades, the two Polonaises in F +sharp minor and A flat major, the B flat minor Prelude, the A minor +"Winter Wind" the two C minor studies, and the F minor Fantasie. Yet +the Chopin pupils, assembled in judgment at Paris when he gave his +Historical Recitals, refused to accept him as an interpreter. His touch +was too rich and full, his tone too big. Chopin did not care for +Liszt's reading of his music, though he trembled when he heard him +thunder in the Eroica Polonaise. I doubt if even Karl Tausig, +impeccable artist, unapproachable Chopin player, would have pleased the +composer. Chopin played as his moods prompted, and his playing was the +despair and delight of his hearers. Rubinstein did all sorts of +wonderful things with the coda of the Barcarolle--such a page!--but Sir +Charles Halle said that it was "clever but not Chopinesque." Yet Halle +heard Chopin at his last Paris concert, February, 1848, play the two +forte passages in the Barcarolle "pianissimo and with all sorts of +dynamic finesse." This is precisely what Rubinstein did, and his +pianissimo was a whisper. Von Bulow was too much of a martinet to +reveal the poetic quality, though he appreciated Chopin on the +intellectual side; his touch was not beautiful enough. The Slavic and +Magyar races are your only true Chopin interpreters. Witness Liszt the +magnificent, Rubinstein a passionate genius, Tausig who united in his +person all the elements of greatness, Essipowa fascinating and +feminine, the poetic Paderewski, de Pachmann the fantastic, subtle +Joseffy, and Rosenthal a phenomenon. + +A world-great pianist was this Frederic Francois Chopin. He played as +he composed: uniquely. All testimony is emphatic as to this. Scales +that were pearls, a touch rich, sweet, supple and singing and a +technique that knew no difficulties, these were part of Chopin's +equipment as a pianist. He spiritualized the timbre of his instrument +until it became transformed into something strange, something remote +from its original nature. His pianissimo was an enchanting whisper, his +forte seemed powerful by contrast so numberless were the gradations, so +widely varied his dynamics. The fairylike quality of his play, his +diaphanous harmonies, his liquid tone, his pedalling--all were the work +of a genius and a lifetime; and the appealing humanity he infused into +his touch, gave his listeners a delight that bordered on the +supernatural. So the accounts, critical, professional and personal +read. There must have been a hypnotic quality in his performances that +transported his audience wherever the poet willed. Indeed the stories +told wear an air of enthusiasm that borders on the exaggerated, on the +fantastic. Crystalline pearls falling on red hot velvet-or did Scudo +write this of Liszt?--infinite nuance and the mingling of silvery +bells,--these are a few of the least exuberant notices. Was it not +Heine who called "Thalberg a king, Liszt a prophet, Chopin a poet, Herz +an advocate, Kalkbrenner a minstrel, Madame Pleyel a sibyl, and +Doehler--a pianist"? The limpidity, the smoothness and ease of Chopin's +playing were, after all, on the physical plane. It was the poetic +melancholy, the grandeur, above all the imaginative lift, that were +more in evidence than mere sensuous sweetness. Chopin had, we know, his +salon side when he played with elegance, brilliancy and coquetry. But +he had dark moments when the keyboard was too small, his ideas too big +for utterance. Then he astounded, thrilled his auditors. They were rare +moments. His mood-versatility was reproduced in his endless colorings +and capricious rhythms. The instrument vibrated with these new, +nameless effects like the violin in Paganini's hands. It was ravishing. +He was called the Ariel, the Undine of the piano. There was something +imponderable, fluid, vaporous, evanescent in his music that eluded +analysis and eluded all but hard-headed critics. This novelty was the +reason why he has been classed as a "gifted amateur" and even to-day is +he regarded by many musicians as a skilful inventor of piano passages +and patterned figures instead of what he really is--one of the most +daring harmonists since Bach. + +Chopin's elastic hand, small, thin, with lightly articulated fingers, +was capable of stretching tenths with ease. Examine his first study for +confirmation of this. His wrist was very supple. Stephen Heller said +that "it was a wonderful sight to see Chopin's small hands expand and +cover a third of the keyboard. It was like the opening of the mouth of +a serpent about to swallow a rabbit whole." He played the octaves in +the A flat Polonaise with infinite ease but pianissimo. Now where is +the "tradition" when confronted by the mighty crashing of Rosenthal in +this particular part of the Polonaise? Of Karl Tausig, Weitzmann said +that "he relieved the romantically sentimental Chopin of his +Weltschmerz and showed him in his pristine creative vigor and wealth of +imagination." In Chopin's music there are many pianists, many styles +and all are correct if they are poetically musical, logical and +individually sincere. Of his rubato I treat in the chapter devoted to +the Mazurkas, making also an attempt to define the "zal" of his playing +and music. + +When Chopin was strong he used a Pleyel piano, when he was ill an +Erard--a nice fable of Liszt's! He said that he liked the Erard but he +really preferred the Pleyel with its veiled sonority. What could not he +have accomplished with the modern grand piano? In the artist's room of +the Maison Pleyel there stands the piano at which Chopin composed the +Preludes, the G minor nocturne, the Funeral March, the three +supplementary etudes, the A minor Mazurka, the Tarantelle, the F minor +Fantasie and the B minor Scherzo. A brass tablet on the inside lid +notes this. The piano is still in good condition as regards tone and +action. + +Mikuli asserted that Chopin brought out an "immense" tone in +cantabiles. He had not a small tone, but it was not the orchestral tone +of our day. Indeed how could it be, with the light action and tone of +the French pianos built in the first half of the century? After all it +was quality, not quantity that Chopin sought. Each one of his ten +fingers was a delicately differentiated voice, and these ten voices +could sing at times like the morning stars. + +Rubinstein declared that all the pedal marks are wrong in Chopin. I +doubt if any edition can ever give them as they should be, for here +again the individual equation comes into play. Apart from certain +fundamental rules for managing the pedals, no pedagogic regulations +should ever be made for the more refined nuances. + +The portraits of Chopin differ widely. There is the Ary Scheffer, the +Vigneron--praised by Mathias--the Bovy medallion, the Duval drawing, +and the head by Kwiatowski. Delacroix tried his powerful hand at +transfixing in oil the fleeting expressions of Chopin. Felix Barrias, +Franz Winterhalter, and Albert Graefle are others who tried with more +or less success. Anthony Kolberg painted Chopin in 1848-49. Kleczynski +reproduces it; it is mature in expression. The Clesinger head I have +seen at Pere la Chaise. It is mediocre and lifeless. Kwiatowski has +caught some of the Chopin spirit in the etching that may be found in +volume one of Niecks' biography. The Winterhalter portrait in Mr. +Hadow's volume is too Hebraic, and the Graefle is a trifle ghastly. It +is the dead Chopin, but the nose is that of a predaceous bird, +painfully aquiline. The "Echo Muzyczne" Warsaw, of October 1899--in +Polish "17 Pazdziernika"--printed a picture of the composer at the age +of seventeen. It is that of a thoughtful, poetic, but not handsome lad, +his hair waving over a fine forehead, a feminine mouth, large, aquiline +nose, the nostrils delicately cut, and about his slender neck a Byronic +collar. Altogether a novel likeness. Like the Chopin interpretation, a +satisfactory Chopin portrait is extremely rare. + +As some difficulty was experienced in discovering the identity of +Countess Delphine Potocka, I applied in 1899 to Mr. Jaraslow de +Zielinski, a pianist of Buffalo, New York, for assistance; he is an +authority on Polish and Russian music and musicians. Here are the facts +he kindly transmitted: "In 1830 three beautiful Polish women came to +Nice to pass the winter. They were the daughters of Count Komar, the +business manager of the wealthy Count Potocki. They were singularly +accomplished; they spoke half the languages of Europe, drew well, and +sang to perfection. All they needed was money to make them queens of +society; this they soon obtained, and with it high rank. Their graceful +manners and loveliness won the hearts of three of the greatest of +noblemen. Marie married the Prince de Beauvau-Craon; Delphine became +Countess Potocka, and Nathalie, Marchioness Medici Spada. The last +named died young, a victim to the zeal in favor of the cholera-stricken +of Rome. The other two sisters went to live in Paris, and became famous +for their brilliant elegance. Their sumptuous 'hotels' or palaces were +thrown open to the most prominent men of genius of their time, and +hither came Chopin, to meet not only with the homage due to his genius, +but with a tender and sisterly friendship, which proved one of the +greatest consolations of his life. To the amiable Princess de Beauvau +he dedicated his famous Polonaise in F sharp minor, op. 44, written in +the brilliant bravura style for pianists of the first force. To +Delphine, Countess Potocka, he dedicated the loveliest of his valses, +op. 64, No. 1, so well transcribed by Joseffy into a study in thirds." + +Therefore the picture of the Grafin Potocka in the Berlin gallery is +not that of Chopin's devoted friend. + +Here is another Count Tarnowski story. It touches on a Potocka episode. +"Chopin liked and knew how to express individual characteristics on the +piano. Just as there formerly was a rather widely-known fashion of +describing dispositions and characters in so-called 'portraits,' which +gave to ready wits a scope for parading their knowledge of people and +their sharpness of observation; so he often amused himself by playing +such musical portraits. Without saying whom he had in his thoughts, he +illustrated the characters of a few or of several people present in the +room, and illustrated them so clearly and so delicately that the +listeners could always guess correctly who was intended, and admired +the resemblance of the portrait. One little anecdote is related in +connection with this which throws some light on his wit, and a little +pinch of sarcasm in it. + +"During the time of Chopin's greatest brilliancy and popularity, in the +year 1835, he once played his musical portraits in a certain Polish +salon, where the three daughters of the house were the stars of the +evening. After a few portraits had been extemporized, one of these +ladies wished to have hers--Mme. Delphine Potocka. Chopin, in reply, +drew her shawl from her shoulders, threw it on the keyboard and began +to play, implying in this two things; first, that he knew the character +of the brilliant and famous queen of fashion so well, that by heart and +in the dark he was able to depict it; secondly, that this character and +this soul is hidden under habits, ornamentations and decorations of an +elegant worldly life, through the symbol of elegance and fashion of +that day, as the tones of the piano through the shawl." + +Because Chopin did not label his works with any but general titles, +Ballades, Scherzi, Studies, Preludes and the like, his music sounds all +the better: the listener is not pinned down to any precise mood, the +music being allowed to work its particular charm without the aid of +literary crutches for unimaginative minds. Dr. Niecks gives specimens +of what the ingenious publisher, without a sense of humor, did with +some of Chopin's compositions: Adieu a Varsovie, so was named the +Rondo, op. 1; Hommage a Mozart, the Variations, op. 2; La Gaite, +Introduction and Polonaise, op. 3 for piano and 'cello; La +Posiana--what a name!--the Rondo a la Mazur, op. 5; Murmures de la +Seine, Nocturnes op. 9; Les Zephirs, Nocturnes, op. 15; Invitation a la +Valse, Valse, op. 18; Souvenir d'Andalousie, Bolero, op. 19--a bolero +which sounds Polish!--Le Banquet Infernal, the First Scherzo, op. +20--what a misnomer!--Ballade ohne Worte, the G minor Ballade--there is +a polyglot mess for you!--Les Plaintives, Nocturnes, op. 27; La +Meditation, Second Scherzo, B flat minor-meditation it is not!--II +Lamento e la Consolazione, Nocturnes, op. 32; Les Soupirs, Nocturnes, +op. 37, and Les Favorites, Polonaises, op. 40. The C minor Polonaise of +this opus was never, is not now, a favorite. The mazurkas generally +received the title of Souvenir de la Pologne. + +In commemoration of the fiftieth anniversary of the death of Chopin, +October 17, 1899, a medal was struck at Warsaw, bearing on one side an +artistically executed profile of the Polish composer. On the reverse, +the design represents a lyre, surrounded by a laurel branch, and having +engraved upon it the opening bars of the Mazurka in A flat major. The +name of the great composer with the dates of his birth and death, are +given in the margin. Paderewski is heading a movement to remove from +Paris to Warsaw the ashes of the pianist, but it is doubtful if it can +be managed. Paris will certainly object to losing the bones of such a +genius. + +Chopin's acoustic parallelisms are not so concrete, so vivid as +Wagner's. Nor are they so theatrical, so obvious. It does not, however, +require much fancy to conjure up "the drums and tramplings of three +conquests" in the Eroica Polonaise or the F sharp major Impromptu. The +rhythms of the Cradle Song and the Barcarolle are suggestive enough and +if you please there are dew-drops in his cadenzas and there is the +whistling of the wind in the last A minor Study. Of the A flat Study +Chopin said: "Imagine a little shepherd who takes refuge in a peaceful +grotto from an approaching storm. In the distance rushes the wind and +the rain, while the shepherd gently plays a melody on his flute." This +is quoted by Kleczynski. There are word-whisperings in the next study +in F minor, whilst the symbolism of the dance--the Valse, Mazurka, +Polonaise, Menuetto, Bolero, Schottische, Krakowiak and Tarantella--is +admirably indicated in all of them. The bells of the Funeral March, the +will o' wisp character of the last movement of the B flat minor Sonata, +the dainty Butterfly Study in G flat, opus 25, the aeolian murmurs of +the E flat Study, in opus 10, the tiny prancing silvery hoofs in the F +major Study, opus 25, the flickering flame-like C major Study No. 7, +opus 10, the spinning in the D flat Valse and the cyclonic rush of +chromatic double notes in the E flat minor Scherzo--these are not +studied imitations but spontaneous transpositions to the ideal plane of +primary, natural phenomena. + +Chopin's system--if it be a system--of cadenzas, fioriture +embellishment and ornamentation is perhaps traceable to the East. In +his "Folk Music Studies," Mr. H. E. Krehbiel quotes the description of +"a rhapsodical embellishment, called 'alap,' which after going through +a variety of ad libitum passages, rejoins the melody with as much grace +as if it had never been disunited, the musical accompaniment all the +while keeping time. These passages are not reckoned essential to the +melody, but are considered only as grace notes introduced according to +the fancy of the singer, when the only limitations by which the +performer is bound are the notes peculiar to that particular melody and +a strict regard to time." + +Chopin founded no school, although the possibilities of the piano were +canalized by him. In playing, as in composition, only the broad trend +of his discoveries may be followed, for his was a manner not a method. +He has had for followers Liszt, Rubinstein, Mikuli, Zarembski, +Nowakowski, Xaver Scharwenka, Saint-Saens, Scholtz, Heller, Nicode, +Moriz Moszkowski, Paderewski, Stojowski, Arenski, Leschetizki, the two +Wieniawskis, and a whole group of the younger Russians Liadoff, +Scriabine and the rest. Even Brahms--in his F sharp major Sonata and E +flat minor Scherzo--shows Chopin's influence. Indeed but for Chopin +much modern music would not exist. + +But a genuine school exists not. Henselt was only a German who fell +asleep and dreamed of Chopin. To a Thalberg-ian euphony he has added a +technical figuration not unlike Chopin's, and a spirit quite Teutonic +in its sentimentality. Rubinstein calls Chopin the exhalation of the +third epoch in art. He certainly closed one. With a less strong +rhythmic impulse and formal sense Chopin's music would have degenerated +into mere overperfumed impressionism. The French piano school of his +day, indeed of today, is entirely drowned by its devotion to cold +decoration, to unemotional ornamentation. Mannerisms he had--what great +artist has not?--but the Greek in him, as in Heine, kept him from +formlessness. He is seldom a landscapist, but he can handle his brush +deftly before nature if he must. He paints atmosphere, the open air at +eventide, with consummate skill, and for playing fantastic tricks on +your nerves in the depiction of the superhuman he has a peculiar +faculty. Remember that in Chopin's early days the Byronic pose, the +grandiose and the horrible prevailed--witness the pictures of Ingres +and Delacroix--and Richter wrote with his heart-strings saturated in +moonshine and tears. Chopin did not altogether escape the artistic +vices of his generation. As a man he was a bit of poseur--the little +whisker grown on one side of his face, the side which he turned to his +audience, is a note of foppery--but was ever a detester of the +sham-artistic. He was sincere, and his survival, when nearly all of +Mendelssohn, much of Schumann and half of Berlioz have suffered an +eclipse, is proof positive of his vitality. The fruit of his +experimentings in tonality we see in the whole latter-day school of +piano, dramatic and orchestral composers. That Chopin may lead to the +development and adoption of the new enharmonic scales, the "Homotonic +scales," I do not know. For these M. A. de Bertha claimed the future of +music. He wrote: + +"Now vaporously illumined by the crepuscular light of a magical sky on +the boundaries of the major and minor modes, now seeming to spring from +the bowels of the earth with sepulchral inflexions, melody moves with +ease on the serried degrees of the enharmonic scales. Lively or slow +she always assumed in them the accents of a fatalist impossibility, for +the laws of arithmetic have preceded her, and there still remains, as +it were, an atmosphere of proud rigidity. Melancholy or passionate she +preserves the reflected lines of a primitive rusticity, which clings to +the homotones in despite of their artificial origin." But all this will +be in the days to come when the flat keyboard will be superseded by a +Janko many-banked clavier contrivance, when Mr. Krehbiel's oriental +srootis are in use and Mr. Apthorp's nullitonic order, no key at all, +is invented. Then too a new Chopin may be born, but I doubt it. + +Despite his idiomatic treatment of the piano it must be remembered that +Chopin under Sontag's and Paganini's influence imitated both voice and +violin on the keyboard. His lyricism is most human, while the +portamento, the slides, trills and indescribably subtle turns--are they +not of the violin? Wagner said to Mr. Dannreuther--see Finck's "Wagner +and his Works"--that "Mozart's music and Mozart's orchestra are a +perfect match; an equally perfect balance exists between Palestrina's +choir and Palestrina's counterpoint, and I find a similar +correspondence between Chopin's piano and some of his Etudes and +Preludes--I do not care for the Ladies' Chopin; there is too much of +the Parisian salon in that, but he has given us many things which are +above the salon." Which latter statement is slightly condescending. +Recollect, however, Chopin's calm depreciation of Schumann. Mr. John F. +Runciman, the English critic, asserts that "Chopin thought in terms of +the piano, and only the piano. So when we see Chopin's orchestral music +or Wagner's music for the piano we realize that neither is talking his +native tongue--the tongue which nature fitted him to speak." Speaking +of "Chopin and the Sick Men" Mr. Runciman is most pertinent: + +"These inheritors of rickets and exhausted physical frames made some of +the most wonderful music of the century for us. Schubert was the most +wonderful of them all, but Chopin runs him very close. ... He wrote +less, far less than Schubert wrote; but, for the quantity he did write, +its finish is miraculous. It may be feverish, merely mournful, cadavre, +or tranquil, and entirely beautiful; but there is not a phrase that is +not polished as far as a phrase will bear polishing. It is marvellous +music; but, all the same, it is sick, unhealthy music." + +"Liszt's estimate of the technical importance of Chopin's works," +writes Mr. W.J. Henderson, "is not too large. It was Chopin who +systematized the art of pedalling and showed us how to use both pedals +in combination to produce those wonderful effects of color which are so +necessary in the performance of his music. ... The harmonic schemes of +the simplest of Chopin's works are marvels of originality and musical +loveliness, and I make bold to say that his treatment of the passing +note did much toward showing later writers how to produce the restless +and endless complexity of the harmony in contemporaneous orchestral +music." + +Heinrich Pudor in his strictures on German music is hardly +complimentary to Chopin: "Wagner is a thorough-going decadent, an +off-shoot, an epigonus, not a progonus. His cheeks are hollow and +pale--but the Germans have the full red cheeks. Equally decadent is +Liszt. Liszt is a Hungarian and the Hungarians are confessedly a +completely disorganized, self-outlived, dying people. No less decadent +is Chopin, whose figure comes before one as flesh without bones, this +morbid, womanly, womanish, slip-slop, powerless, sickly, bleached, +sweet-caramel Pole!" This has a ring of Nietzsche--Nietzsche who +boasted of his Polish origin. + +Now listen to the fatidical Pole Przybyszewski: "In the beginning there +was sex, out of sex there was nothing and in it everything was. And sex +made itself brain whence was the birth of the soul." And then, as Mr. +Vance Thompson, who first Englished this "Mass of the Dead"--wrote: "He +pictures largely in great cosmic symbols, decorated with passionate and +mystic fervors, the singular combat between the growing soul and the +sex from which it fain would be free." Arno Holz thus parodies +Przybyszewski: "In our soul there is surging and singing a song of the +victorious bacteria. Our blood lacks the white corpuscles. On the +sounding board of our consciousness there echoes along the frightful +symphony of the flesh. It becomes objective in Chopin; he alone, the +modern primeval man, puts our brains on the green meadows, he alone +thinks in hyper-European dimensions. He alone rebuilds the shattered +Jerusalem of our souls." All of which shows to what comically +delirious lengths this sort of deleterious soul-probing may go. + +It would be well to consider this word "decadent" and its morbid +implications. There is a fashion just now in criticism to +over-accentuate the physical and moral weaknesses of the artist. +Lombroso started the fashion, Nordau carried it to its logical +absurdity, yet it is nothing new. In Hazlitt's day he complains, that +genius is called mad by foolish folk. Mr. Newman writes in his Wagner, +that "art in general, and music in particular, ought not to be +condemned merely in terms of the physical degeneration or abnormality +of the artist. Some of the finest work in art and literature, indeed, +has been produced by men who could not, from any standpoint, be +pronounced normal. In the case of Flaubert, of De Maupassant, of +Dostoievsky, of Poe, and a score of others, though the organic system +was more or less flawed, the work remains touched with that universal +quality that gives artistic permanence even to perceptions born of the +abnormal." Mr. Newman might have added other names to his list, those +of Michael Angelo and Beethoven and Swinburne. Really, is any great +genius quite sane according to philistine standards? The answer must be +negative. The old enemy has merely changed his mode of attack: instead +of charging genius with madness, the abnormal used in an abnormal sense +is lugged in and though these imputations of degeneracy, moral and +physical, have in some cases proven true, the genius of the accused one +can in no wise be denied. But then as Mr. Philip Hale asks: Why this +timidity at being called decadent? What's in the name? + +Havelock Ellis in his masterly study of Joris Karl Huysmans, considers +the much misunderstood phenomenon in art called decadence. "Technically +a decadent style is only such in relation to a classic style. It is +simply a further development of a classic style, a further +specialization, the homogeneous in Spencerian phraseology having become +heterogeneous. The first is beautiful because the parts are +subordinated to the whole; the second is beautiful because the whole is +subordinated to the parts." Then he proceeds to show in literature that +Sir Thomas Browne, Emerson, Pater, Carlyle, Poe, Hawthorne and Whitman +are decadents--not in any invidious sense--but simply in "the breaking +up of the whole for the benefit of its parts." Nietzsche is quoted to +the effect that "in the period of corruption in the evolution of +societies we are apt to overlook the fact that the energy which in more +primitive times marked the operations of a community as a whole has now +simply been transferred to the individuals themselves, and this +aggrandizement of the individual really produces an even greater amount +of energy." And further, Ellis: "All art is the rising and falling of +the slopes of a rhythmic curve between these two classic and decadent +extremes. Decadence suggests to us going down, falling, decay. If we +walk down a real hill we do not feel that we commit a more wicked act +than when we walked up it....Roman architecture is classic to become in +its Byzantine developments completely decadent, and St. Mark's is the +perfected type of decadence in art. ... We have to recognize that +decadence is an aesthetic and not a moral conception. The power of +words is great but they need not befool us. ... We are not called upon +to air our moral indignation over the bass end of the musical clef." I +recommend the entire chapter to such men as Lombroso Levi, Max Nordau +and Heinrich Pudor, who have yet to learn that "all confusion of +intellectual substances is foolish." + +Oscar Bie states the Chopin case most excellently:-- + + Chopin is a poet. It has become a very bad habit to place this + poet in the hands of our youth. The concertos and polonaises + being put aside, no one lends himself worse to youthful + instruction than Chopin. Because his delicate touches + inevitably seem perverse to the youthful mind, he has gained + the name of a morbid genius. The grown man who understands how + to play Chopin, whose music begins where that of another + leaves off, whose tones show the supremest mastery in the + tongue of music--such a man will discover nothing morbid in + him. Chopin, a Pole, strikes sorrowful chords, which do not + occur frequently to healthy normal persons. But why is a Pole + to receive less justice than a German? We know that the + extreme of culture is closely allied to decay; for perfect + ripeness is but the foreboding of corruption. Children, of + course, do not know this. And Chopin himself would have been + much too noble ever to lay bare his mental sickness to the + world. And his greatness lies precisely in this: that he + preserves the mean between immaturity and decay. His greatness + is his aristocracy. He stands among musicians in his faultless + vesture, a noble from head to foot. The sublimest emotions + toward whose refinement whole generations had tended, the last + things in our soul, whose foreboding is interwoven with the + mystery of Judgment Day, have in his music found their form. + +Further on I shall attempt--I write the word with a patibulary +gesture--in a sort of a Chopin variorum, to analyze the salient +aspects, technical and aesthetic, of his music. To translate into +prose, into any language no matter how poetical, the images aroused by +his music, is impossible. I am forced to employ the technical +terminology of other arts, but against my judgment. Read Mr. W. F. +Apthorp's disheartening dictum in "By the Way." "The entrancing +phantasmagoria of picture and incident which we think we see rising +from the billowing sea of music is in reality nothing more than an +enchanting fata morgana, visible at no other angle than that of our own +eye. The true gist of music it never can be; it can never truly +translate what is most essential and characteristic in its expression. +It is but something that we have half unconsciously imputed to music; +nothing that really exists in music." + +The shadowy miming of Chopin's soul has nevertheless a significance for +this generation. It is now the reign of the brutal, the realistic, the +impossible in music. Formal excellence is neglected and programme-music +has reduced art to the level of an anecdote. Chopin neither preaches +nor paints, yet his art is decorative and dramatic--though in the +climate of the ideal. He touches earth and its emotional issues in +Poland only; otherwise his music is a pure aesthetic delight, an +artistic enchantment, freighted with no ethical or theatric messages. +It is poetry made audible, the "soul written in sound." All that I can +faintly indicate is the way it affects me, this music with the petals +of a glowing rose and the heart of gray ashes. Its analogies to Poe, +Verlaine, Shelley, Keats, Heine and Mickiewicz are but critical +sign-posts, for Chopin is incomparable, Chopin is unique. "Our +interval," writes Walter Pater, "is brief." Few pass it recollectedly +and with full understanding of its larger rhythms and more urgent +colors. Many endure it in frivol and violence, the majority in bored, +sullen submission. Chopin, the New Chopin, is a foe to ennui and the +spirit that denies; in his exquisite soul-sorrow, sweet world-pain, we +may find rich impersonal relief. + + + + +V. POET AND PSYCHOLOGIST + + +Music is an order of mystic, sensuous mathematics. A sounding mirror, +an aural mode of motion, it addresses itself on the formal side to the +intellect, in its content of expression it appeals to the emotions. +Ribot, admirable psychologist, does not hesitate to proclaim music as +the most emotional of the arts. "It acts like a burn, like heat, cold +or a caressing contact, and is the most dependent on physiological +conditions." + +Music then, the most vague of the arts in the matter of representing +the concrete, is the swiftest, surest agent for attacking the +sensibilities. The CRY made manifest, as Wagner asserts, it is a cry +that takes on fanciful shapes, each soul interpreting it in an +individual fashion. Music and beauty are synonymous, just as their form +and substance are indivisible. + +Havelock Ellis is not the only aesthetician who sees the marriage of +music and sex. "No other art tells us such old forgotten secrets about +ourselves...It is in the mightiest of all instincts, the primitive sex +traditions of the race before man was, that music is rooted...Beauty is +the child of love." Dante Gabriel Rossetti has imprisoned in a sonnet +the almost intangible feeling aroused by music, the feeling of having +pursued in the immemorial past the "route of evanescence." + + Is it this sky's vast vault or ocean's sound, + That is Life's self and draws my life from me, + And by instinct ineffable decree + Holds my breath + Quailing on the bitter bound? + Nay, is it Life or Death, thus thunder-crown'd, + That 'mid the tide of all emergency + Now notes my separate wave, and to what sea + Its difficult eddies labor in the ground? + Oh! what is this that knows the road I came, + The flame turned cloud, the cloud returned to flame, + The lifted, shifted steeps and all the way? + That draws around me at last this wind-warm space, + And in regenerate rapture turns my face + Upon the devious coverts of dismay? + +During the last half of the nineteenth century two men became rulers of +musical emotion, Richard Wagner and Frederic Francois Chopin. The music +of the latter is the most ravishing gesture that art has yet made. +Wagner and Chopin, the macrocosm and the microcosm! "Wagner has made +the largest impersonal synthesis attainable of the personal influences +that thrill our lives," cries Havelock Ellis. Chopin, a young man +slight of frame, furiously playing out upon the keyboard his soul, the +soul of his nation, the soul of his time, is the most individual +composer that has ever set humming the looms of our dreams. Wagner and +Chopin have a motor element in their music that is fiercer, intenser +and more fugacious than that of all other composers. For them is not +the Buddhistic void, in which shapes slowly form and fade; their +psychical tempo is devouring. They voiced their age, they moulded their +age and we listen eagerly to them, to these vibrile prophetic voices, +so sweetly corrosive, bardic and appealing. Chopin being nearer the +soil in the selection of forms, his style and structure are more naive, +more original than Wagner's, while his medium, less artificial, is +easier filled than the vast empty frame of the theatre. Through their +intensity of conception and of life, both men touch issues, though +widely dissimilar in all else. Chopin had greater melodic and as great +harmonic genius as Wagner; he made more themes, he was, as Rubinstein +wrote, the last of the original composers, but his scope was not +scenic, he preferred the stage of his soul to the windy spaces of the +music-drama. His is the interior play, the eternal conflict between +body and soul. He viewed music through his temperament and it often +becomes so imponderable, so bodiless as to suggest a fourth dimension +in the art. Space is obliterated. With Chopin one does not get, as from +Beethoven, the sense of spiritual vastness, of the overarching sublime. +There is the pathos of spiritual distance, but it is pathos, not +sublimity. "His soul was a star and dwelt apart," though not in the +Miltonic or Wordsworthian sense. A Shelley-like tenuity at times wings +his thought, and he is the creator of a new thrill within the thrill. +The charm of the dying fall, the unspeakable cadence of regret for the +love that is dead, is in his music; like John Keats he sometimes sees:-- + + Charm'd magic casements, opening on the foam + Of perilous seas, in faery lands forlorn. + +Chopin, "subtle-souled psychologist," is more kin to Keats than +Shelley, he is a greater artist than a thinker. His philosophy is of +the beautiful, as was Keats', and while he lingers by the river's edge +to catch the song of the reeds, his gaze is oftener fixed on the +quiring planets. He is nature's most exquisite sounding-board and +vibrates to her with intensity, color and vivacity that have no +parallel. Stained with melancholy, his joy is never that of the strong +man rejoicing in his muscles. Yet his very tenderness is tonic and his +cry is ever restrained by an Attic sense of proportion. Like Alfred De +Vigny, he dwelt in a "tour d'ivoire" that faced the west and for him +the sunrise was not, but O! the miraculous moons he discovered, the +sunsets and cloud-shine! His notes cast great rich shadows, these +chains of blown-roses drenched in the dew of beauty. Pompeian colors +are too restricted and flat; he divulges a world of half-tones, some +"enfolding sunny spots of greenery," or singing in silvery shade the +song of chromatic ecstasy, others "huge fragments vaulted like +rebounding hail" and black upon black. Chopin is the color genius of +the piano, his eye was attuned to hues the most fragile and attenuated; +he can weave harmonies that are as ghostly as a lunar rainbow. And +lunar-like in their libration are some of his melodies--glimpses, +mysterious and vast, as of a strange world. + +His utterances are always dynamic, and he emerges betimes, as if from +Goya's tomb, and etches with sardonic finger Nada in dust. But this +spirit of denial is not an abiding mood; Chopin throws a net of tone +over souls wearied with rancors and revolts, bridges "salty, estranged +seas" of misery and presently we are viewing a mirrored, a fabulous +universe wherein Death is dead, and Love reigns Lord of all. + + +II + +Heine said that "every epoch is a sphinx which plunges into the abyss +as soon as its problem is solved." Born in the very upheaval of the +Romantic revolution--a revolution evoked by the intensity of its +emotion, rather than by the power of its ideas--Chopin was not +altogether one of the insurgents of art. Just when his individual soul +germinated, who may tell? In his early music are discovered the roots +and fibres of Hummel and Field. His growth, involuntary, inevitable, +put forth strange sprouts, and he saw in the piano, an instrument of +two dimensions, a third, and so his music deepened and took on stranger +colors. The keyboard had never sung so before; he forged its formula. A +new apocalyptic seal of melody and harmony was let fall upon it. +Sounding scrolls, delicious arabesques gorgeous in tint, martial, +lyric, "a resonance of emerald," a sobbing of fountains--as that Chopin +of the Gutter, Paul Verlaine, has it--the tear crystallized midway, an +arrested pearl, were overheard in his music, and Europe felt a new +shudder of sheer delight. + +The literary quality is absent and so is the ethical--Chopin may +prophesy but he never flames into the divers tongues of the upper +heaven. Compared with his passionate abandonment to the dance, Brahms +is the Lao-tsze of music, the great infant born with gray hair and with +the slow smile of childhood. Chopin seldom smiles, and while some of +his music is young, he does not raise in the mind pictures of the +fatuous romance of youth. His passion is mature, self-sustained and +never at a loss for the mot propre. And with what marvellous vibration +he gamuts the passions, festooning them with carnations and great white +tube roses, but the dark dramatic motive is never lost in the +decorative wiles of this magician. As the man grew he laid aside his +pretty garlands and his line became sterner, its traceries more gothic; +he made Bach his chief god and within the woven walls of his strange +harmonies he sings the history of a soul, a soul convulsed by antique +madness, by the memory of awful things, a soul lured by Beauty to +secret glades wherein sacrificial rites are performed to the solemn +sounds of unearthly music. Like Maurice de Guerin, Chopin perpetually +strove to decipher Beauty's enigma and passionately demanded of the +sphinx that defies: + +"Upon the shores of what oceans have they rolled the stone that hides +them, O Macareus?" + +His name was as the stroke of a bell to the Romancists; he remained +aloof from them though in a sympathetic attitude. The classic is but +the Romantic dead, said an acute critic. Chopin was a classic without +knowing it; he compassed for the dances of his land what Bach did for +the older forms. With Heine he led the spirit of revolt, but enclosed +his note of agitation in a frame beautiful. The color, the "lithe +perpetual escape" from the formal deceived his critics, Schumann among +the rest. Chopin, like Flaubert, was the last of the idealists, the +first of the realists. The newness of his form, his linear +counterpoint, misled the critics, who accused him of the lack of it. +Schumann's formal deficiency detracts from much of his music, and +because of their formal genius Wagner and Chopin will live. + +To Chopin might be addressed Sar Merodack Peladan's words: + +"When your hand writes a perfect line the Cherubim descend to find +pleasure therein as in a mirror." Chopin wrote many perfect lines; he +is, above all, the faultless lyrist, the Swinburne, the master of +fiery, many rhythms, the chanter of songs before sunrise, of the burden +of the flesh, the sting of desire and large-moulded lays of passionate +freedom. His music is, to quote Thoreau, "a proud sweet satire on the +meanness of our life." He had no feeling for the epic, his genius was +too concentrated, and though he could be furiously dramatic the +sustained majesty of blank verse was denied him. With musical ideas he +was ever gravid but their intensity is parent to their brevity. And it +must not be forgotten that with Chopin the form was conditioned by the +idea. He took up the dancing patterns of Poland because they suited his +vivid inner life; he transformed them, idealized them, attaining to +more prolonged phraseology and denser architecture in his Ballades and +Scherzi--but these periods are passionate, never philosophical. + +All artists are androgynous; in Chopin the feminine often prevails, but +it must be noted that this quality is a distinguishing sign of +masculine lyric genius, for when he unbends, coquets and makes graceful +confessions or whimpers in lyric loveliness at fate, then his mother's +sex peeps out, a picture of the capricious, beautiful tyrannical Polish +woman. When he stiffens his soul, when Russia gets into his nostrils, +then the smoke and flame of his Polonaises, the tantalizing despair of +his Mazurkas are testimony to the strong man-soul in rebellion. But it +is often a psychical masquerade. The sag of melancholy is soon felt, +and the old Chopin, the subjective Chopin, wails afresh in melodic +moodiness. + +That he could attempt far flights one may see in his B flat minor +Sonata, in his Scherzi, in several of the Ballades, above all in the F +minor Fantasie. In this great work the technical invention keeps pace +with the inspiration. It coheres, there is not a flaw in the +reverberating marble, not a rift in the idea. If Chopin, diseased to +death's door, could erect such a Palace of Dreams, what might not he +have dared had he been healthy? But forth from his misery came +sweetness and strength, like honey from the lion. He grew amazingly the +last ten years of his existence, grew with a promise that recalls +Keats, Shelley, Mozart, Schubert and the rest of the early slaughtered +angelic crew. His flame-like spirit waxed and waned in the gusty +surprises of a disappointed life. To the earth for consolation he bent +his ear and caught echoes of the cosmic comedy, the far-off laughter of +the hills, the lament of the sea and the mutterings of its depths. +These things with tales of sombre clouds and shining skies and +whisperings of strange creatures dancing timidly in pavonine twilights, +he traced upon the ivory keys of his instrument and the world was +richer for a poet. Chopin is not only the poet of the piano, he is also +the poet of music, the most poetic of composers. Compared with him Bach +seems a maker of solid polyphonic prose, Beethoven a scooper of stars, +a master of growling storms, Mozart a weaver of gay tapestries, +Schumann a divine stammerer. Schubert, alone of all the composers, +resembles him in his lyric prodigality. Both were masters of melody, +but Chopin was the master-workman of the two and polished, after +bending and beating, his theme fresh from the fire of his forge. He +knew that to complete his "wailing Iliads" the strong hand of the +reviser was necessary, and he also realized that nothing is more +difficult for the genius than to retain his gift. Of all natures the +most prone to pessimism, procrastination and vanity, the artist is most +apt to become ennuied. It is not easy to flame always at the focus, to +burn fiercely with the central fire. Chopin knew this and cultivated +his ego. He saw too that the love of beauty for beauty's sake was +fascinating but led to the way called madness. So he rooted his art, +gave it the earth of Poland and its deliquescence is put off to the day +when a new system of musical aestheticism will have routed the old, +when the Ugly shall be king and Melody the handmaiden of science. But +until that most grievous and undesired time he will catch the music of +our souls and give it cry and flesh. + + +III + +Chopin is the open door in music. Besides having been a poet and giving +vibratory expression to the concrete, he was something else--he was a +pioneer. Pioneer because in youth he had bowed to the tyranny of the +diatonic scale and savored the illicit joys of the chromatic. It is +briefly curious that Chopin is regarded purely as a poet among +musicians and not as a practical musician. They will swear him a +phenomenal virtuoso, but your musician, orchestral and theoretical, +raises the eyebrow of the supercilious if Chopin is called creative. A +cunning finger-smith, a moulder of decorative patterns, a master at +making new figures, all this is granted, but speak of Chopin as +path-breaker in the harmonic forest--that true "forest of numbers"--as +the forger of a melodic metal, the sweetest, purest in temper, and lo! +you are regarded as one mentally askew. Chopin invented many new +harmonic devices, he untied the chord that was restrained within the +octave, leading it into the dangerous but delectable land of extended +harmonies. And how he chromaticized the prudish, rigid garden of German +harmony, how he moistened it with flashing changeful waters until it +grew bold and brilliant with promise! A French theorist, Albert +Lavignac, calls Chopin a product of the German Romantic school. This is +hitching the star to the wagon. Chopin influenced Schumann; it can be +proven a hundred times. And Schumann understood Chopin else he could +not have written the "Chopin" of the Carneval, which quite out-Chopins +Chopin. + +Chopin is the musical soul of Poland; he incarnates its political +passion. First a Slav, by adoption a Parisian, he is the open door +because he admitted into the West, Eastern musical ideas, Eastern +tonalities, rhythms, in fine the Slavic, all that is objectionable, +decadent and dangerous. He inducted Europe into the mysteries and +seductions of the Orient. His music lies wavering between the East and +the West. A neurotic man, his tissues trembling, his sensibilities +aflame, the offspring of a nation doomed to pain and partition, it was +quite natural for him to go to France--Poland had ever been her +historical client--the France that overheated all Europe. Chopin, born +after two revolutions, the true child of insurrection, chose Paris for +his second home. Revolt sat easily upon his inherited aristocratic +instincts--no proletarian is quite so thorough a revolutionist as the +born aristocrat, witness Nietzsche--and Chopin, in the bloodless battle +of the Romantics, in the silent warring of Slav against Teuton, Gaul +and Anglo-Saxon, will ever stand as the protagonist of the artistic +drama. + +All that followed, the breaking up of the old hard-and-fast boundaries +on the musical map is due to Chopin. A pioneer, he has been rewarded as +such by a polite ignorement or bland condescension. He smashed the +portals of the convention that forbade a man baring his soul to the +multitude. The psychology of music is the gainer thereby. Chopin, like +Velasquez, could paint single figures perfectly, but to great massed +effects he was a stranger. Wagner did not fail to profit by his +marvellously drawn soul-portraits. Chopin taught his century the pathos +of patriotism, and showed Grieg the value of national ore. He +practically re-created the harmonic charts, he gave voice to the +individual, himself a product of a nation dissolved by overwrought +individualism. As Schumann assures us, his is "the proudest and most +poetic spirit of his time." Chopin, subdued by his familiar demon, was +a true specimen of Nietzsche's Ubermensch,--which is but Emerson's +Oversoul shorn of her wings. Chopin's transcendental scheme of technics +is the image of a supernormal lift in composition. He sometimes robs +music of its corporeal vesture and his transcendentalism lies not alone +in his striving after strange tonalities and rhythms, but in seeking +the emotionally recondite. Self-tormented, ever "a dweller on the +threshold" he saw visions that outshone the glories of Hasheesh and his +nerve-swept soul ground in its mills exceeding fine music. His vision +is of beauty; he persistently groped at the hem of her robe, but never +sought to transpose or to tone the commonplace of life. For this he +reproved Schubert. Such intensity cannot be purchased but at the cost +of breadth, of sanity, and his picture of life is not so high, wide, +sublime, or awful as Beethoven's. Yet is it just as inevitable, sincere +and as tragically poignant. + +Stanislaw Przybyszewski in his "Zur Psychologie des Individuums" +approaches the morbid Chopin--the Chopin who threw open to the world +the East, who waved his chromatic wand to Liszt, Tschaikowsky, +Saint-Saens, Goldmark, Rubinstein, Richard Strauss, Dvorak and all +Russia with its consonantal composers. This Polish psychologist--a +fulgurant expounder of Nietzsche--finds in Chopin faith and mania, the +true stigma of the mad individualist, the individual "who in the first +instance is naught but an oxidation apparatus." Nietzsche and Chopin +are the most outspoken individualities of the age--he forgets +Wagner--Chopin himself the finest flowering of a morbid and rare +culture. His music is a series of psychoses--he has the sehnsucht of a +marvellously constituted nature--and the shrill dissonance of his +nerves, as seen in the physiological outbursts of the B minor Scherzo, +is the agony of a tortured soul. The piece is Chopin's Iliad; in it are +the ghosts that lurk near the hidden alleys of the soul, but here come +out to leer and exult. + +Horla! the Horla of Guy de Maupassant, the sinister Doppelganger of +mankind, which races with him to the goal of eternity, perhaps to +outstrip and master him in the next evolutionary cycle, master as does +man, the brute creation. This Horla, according to Przybyszewski, +conquered Chopin and became vocal in his music--this Horla has mastered +Nietzsche, who, quite mad, gave the world that Bible of the Ubermensch, +that dancing lyric prose-poem, "Also Sprach Zarathustra." + +Nietzsche's disciple is half right. Chopin's moods are often morbid, +his music often pathological; Beethoven too is morbid, but in his +kingdom, so vast, so varied, the mood is lost or lightly felt, while in +Chopin's province, it looms a maleficent upas-tree, with flowers of +evil and its leaves glistering with sensuousness. But so keen for +symmetry, for all the term formal beauty implies, is Chopin, that +seldom does his morbidity madden, his voluptuousness poison. His music +has its morass, but also its upland where the gale blows strong and +true. Perhaps all art is, as the incorrigible Nordau declares, a slight +deviation from the normal, though Ribot scoffs at the existence of any +standard of normality. The butcher and the candle-stick-maker have +their Horla, their secret soul convulsions, which they set down to +taxation, the vapors, or weather. + +Chopin has surprised the musical malady of the century. He is its chief +spokesman. After the vague, mad, noble dreams of Byron, Shelley and +Napoleon, the awakening found those disillusioned souls, Wagner, +Nietzsche and Chopin. Wagner sought in the epical rehabilitation of a +vanished Valhalla a surcease from the world-pain. He consciously +selected his anodyne and in "Die Meistersinger" touched a consoling +earth. Chopin and Nietzsche, temperamentally finer and more sensitive +than Wagner--the one musically, the other intellectually--sang +themselves in music and philosophy, because they were so constituted. +Their nerves rode them to their death. Neither found the serenity and +repose of Wagner, for neither was as sane and both suffered mortally +from hyperaesthesia, the penalty of all sick genius. + +Chopin's music is the aesthetic symbol of a personality nurtured on +patriotism, pride and love; that it is better expressed by the piano is +because of that instrument's idiosyncrasies of evanescent tone, +sensitive touch and wide range in dynamics. It was Chopin's lyre, the +"orchestra of his heart," from it he extorted music the most intimate +since Sappho. Among lyric moderns Heine closely resembles the Pole. +Both sang because they suffered, sang ineffable and ironic melodies; +both will endure because of their brave sincerity, their surpassing +art. The musical, the psychical history of the nineteenth century would +be incomplete without the name of Frederic Francois Chopin. Wagner +externalized its dramatic soul; in Chopin the mad lyricism of the +Time-spirit is made eloquent. Into his music modulated the poesy of his +age; he is one of its heroes, a hero of whom Swinburne might have sung: + + O strong-winged soul with prophetic + Lips hot with the blood-beats of song; + With tremor of heart-strings magnetic, + With thoughts as thunder in throng; + With consonant ardor of chords + That pierce men's souls as with swords + And hale them hearing along. + + + + +PART II:--HIS MUSIC + + + + +VI. THE STUDIES:--TITANIC EXPERIMENTS + + +October 20, 1829, Frederic Chopin, aged twenty, wrote to his friend +Titus Woyciechowski, from Warsaw: "I have composed a study in my own +manner;" and November 14, the same year: "I have written some studies; +in your presence I would play them well." + +Thus, quite simply and without booming of cannon or brazen proclamation +by bell, did the great Polish composer announce an event of supreme +interest and importance to the piano-playing world. Niecks thinks these +studies were published in the summer of 1833, July or August, and were +numbered op. 10. Another set of studies, op. 25, did not find a +publisher until 1837, although some of them were composed at the same +time as the previous work; a Polish musician who visited the French +capital in 1834 heard Chopin play the studies contained in op. 25. The +C minor study, op. 10, No. 12, commonly known as the Revolutionary, was +born at Stuttgart, September, 1831, "while under the excitement caused +by the news of the taking of Warsaw by the Russians, on September 8, +1831." These dates are given so as to rout effectually any dilatory +suspicion that Liszt influenced Chopin in the production of his +masterpieces. Lina Ramann, in her exhaustive biography of Franz Liszt, +openly declares that Nos. 9 and 12 of op. 10 and Nos. 11 and 12 of op. +25 reveal the influence of the Hungarian virtuoso. Figures prove the +fallacy of her assertion. The influence was the other way, as Liszt's +three concert studies show--not to mention other compositions. When +Chopin arrived in Paris his style had been formed, he was the creator +of a new piano technique. + +The three studies known as Trois Nouvelles Etudes, which appeared in +1840 in Moscheles and Fetis Method of Methods were published separately +afterward. Their date of composition we do not know. + +Many are the editions of Chopin's studies, but after going over the +ground, one finds only about a dozen worthy of study and consultation. +Karasowski gives the date of the first complete edition of the Chopin +works as 1846, with Gebethner & Wolff, Warsaw, as publishers. Then, +according to Niecks, followed Tellefsen, Klindworth--Bote & +Bock--Scholtz--Peters--Breitkopf & Hartel, Mikuli, Schuberth, Kahnt, +Steingraber--better known as Mertke's--and Schlesinger, edited by the +great pedagogue Theodor Kullak. Xaver Scharwenka has edited Klindworth +for the London edition of Augener & Co. Mikuli criticised the Tellefsen +edition, yet both men had been Chopin pupils. This is a significant +fact and shows that little reliance can be placed on the brave talk +about tradition. Yet Mikuli had the assistance of a half dozen of +Chopin's "favorite" pupils, and, in addition, Ferdinand Hiller. Herman +Scholtz, who edited the works for Peters, based his results on careful +inspection of original French, German and English editions, besides +consulting M. Georges Mathias, a pupil of Chopin. If Fontana, Wolff, +Gutmann, Mikuli and Tellefsen, who copied from the original Chopin +manuscripts under the supervision of the composer, cannot agree, then +upon what foundation are reared the structures of the modern critical +editions? The early French, German and Polish editions are faulty, +indeed useless, because of misprints and errata of all kinds. Every +succeeding edition has cleared away some of these errors, but only in +Karl Klindworth has Chopin found a worthy, though not faultless, +editor. His edition is a work of genius and was called by Von Bulow +"the only model edition." In a few sections others, such as Kullak, Dr. +Hugo Riemann and Hans von Bulow, may have outstripped him, but as a +whole his editing is amazing for its exactitude, scholarship, fertility +in novel fingerings and sympathetic insight in phrasing. This edition +appeared at Moscow from 1873 to 1876. + +The twenty-seven studies of Chopin have been separately edited by +Riemann and Von Bulow. + +Let us narrow our investigations and critical comparisons to +Klindworth, Von Bulow, Kullak and Riemann. Carl Reinecke's edition of +the studies in Breitkopf & Hartel's collection offers nothing new, +neither do Mertke, Scholtz and Mikuli. The latter one should keep at +hand because of the possible freedom from impurities in his text, but +of phrasing or fingering he contributes little. It must be remembered +that with the studies, while they completely exhibit the entire range +of Chopin's genius, the play's the thing after all. The poetry, the +passion of the Ballades and Scherzi wind throughout these technical +problems like a flaming skein. With the modern avidity for exterior as +well as interior analysis, Mikuli, Reinecke, Mertke and Scholtz +evidence little sympathy. It is then from the masterly editing of +Kullak, Von Bulow, Riemann and Klindworth that I shall draw copiously. +They have, in their various ways, given us a clue to their musical +individuality, as well as their precise scholarship. Klindworth is the +most genially intellectual, Von Bulow the most pedagogic, and Kullak is +poetic, while Riemann is scholarly; the latter gives more attention to +phrasing than to fingering. The Chopin studies are poems fit for +Parnassus, yet they also serve a very useful purpose in pedagogy. Both +aspects, the material and the spiritual, should be studied, and with +four such guides the student need not go astray. + +In the first study of the first book, op. 10, dedicated to Liszt, +Chopin at a leap reached new land. Extended chords had been sparingly +used by Hummel and Clementi, but to take a dispersed harmony and +transform it into an epical study, to raise the chord of the tenth to +heroic stature--that could have been accomplished by Chopin only. And +this first study in C is heroic. Theodore Kullak writes of it: "Above a +ground bass proudly and boldly striding along, flow mighty waves of +sound. The etude--whose technical end is the rapid execution of widely +extended chord figurations exceeding the span of an octave--is to be +played on the basis of forte throughout. With sharply dissonant +harmonies the forte is to be increased to fortissimo, diminishing again +with consonant ones. Pithy accents! Their effect is enhanced when +combined with an elastic recoil of the hand." + +The irregular, black, ascending and descending staircases of notes +strike the neophyte with terror. Like Piranesi's marvellous aerial +architectural dreams, these dizzy acclivities and descents of Chopin +exercise a charm, hypnotic, if you will, for eye as well as ear. Here +is the new technique in all its nakedness, new in the sense of figure, +design, pattern, web, new in a harmonic way. The old order was +horrified at the modulatory harshness, the young sprigs of the new, +fascinated and a little frightened. A man who could explode a mine that +assailed the stars must be reckoned with. The nub of modern piano music +is in the study, the most formally reckless Chopin ever penned. Kullak +gives Chopin's favorite metronome sign, 176 to the quarter, but this +editor rightly believes that "the majestic grandeur is impaired," and +suggests 152 instead. The gain is at once apparent. Indeed Kullak, a +man of moderate pulse, is quite right in his strictures on the Chopin +tempi, tempi that sprang from the expressively light mechanism of the +prevailing pianos of Chopin's day. Von Bulow declares that "the +requisite suppleness of the hand in gradual extension and rapid +contraction will be most quickly attained if the player does not +disdain first of all to impress on the individual fingers the chord +which is the foundation of each arpeggio;" a sound pedagogic point. He +also inveighs against the disposition to play the octave basses +arpeggio. In fact, those basses are the argument of the play; they must +be granitic, ponderable and powerful. The same authority calls +attention to a misprint C, which he makes B flat, the last note treble +in the twenty-ninth bar. Von Bulow gives the Chopin metronomic marking. + +It remained for Riemann to make some radical changes. This learned and +worthy doctor astonished the musical world a few years by his new marks +of phrasing in the Beethoven symphonies. They topsy-turvied the old +bowing. With Chopin, new dynamic and agogic accents are rather +dangerous, at least to the peace of mind of worshippers of the Chopin +fetish. Riemann breaks two bars into one. It is a finished period for +him, and by detaching several of the sixteenths in the first group, the +first and fourth, he makes the accent clearer,--at least to the eye. He +indicates alla breve with 88 to the half. In later studies examples +will be given of this phrasing, a phrasing that becomes a mannerism +with the editor. He offers no startling finger changes. The value of +his criticism throughout the volume seems to be in the phrasing, and +this by no means conforms to accepted notions of how Chopin should be +interpreted. I intend quoting more freely from Riemann than from the +others, but not for the reason that I consider him as a cloud by day +and a pillar of fire by night in the desirable land of the Chopin +fitudes, rather because his piercing analysis lays bare the very roots +of these shining examples of piano literature. Klindworth contents +himself with a straightforward version of the C major study, his +fingering being the clearest and most admirable. The Mikuli edition +makes one addition: it is a line which binds the last note of the first +group to the first of the second. The device is useful, and occurs only +on the upward flights of the arpeggio. + +This study suggests that its composer wished to begin the exposition of +his wonderful technical system with a skeletonized statement. It is the +tree stripped of its bark, the flower of its leaves, yet, austere as is +the result, there is compensating power, dignity and unswerving logic. +This study is the key with which Chopin unlocked--not his heart, but +the kingdom of technique. It should be played, for variety, unisono, +with both hands, omitting, of course, the octave bass. + +Von Bulow writes cannily enough, that the second study in A minor being +chromatically related to Moscheles' etude, op. 70, No. 3, that piece +should prepare the way for Chopin's more musical composition. In +different degrees of tempo, strength and rhythmic accent it should be +practised, omitting the thumb and first finger. Mikuli's metronome is +144 to the quarter, Von Bulow's, 114; Klindworth's, the same as Mikuli, +and Riemann is 72 to the half, with an alla breve. The fingering in +three of these authorities is almost identical. Riemann has ideas of +his own, both in the phrasing and figuration. Look at these first two +bars: + +[Musical score excerpt without caption: ] + +Von Bulow orders "the middle harmonies to be played throughout +distinctly, and yet transiently"--in German, "fluchtig." In fact, the +entire composition, with its murmuring, meandering, chromatic +character, is a forerunner to the whispering, weaving, moonlit effects +in some of his later studies. The technical purpose is clear, but not +obtrusive. It is intended for the fourth and fifth finger of the right +hand, but given in unison with both hands it becomes a veritable but +laudable torture for the thumb of the left. With the repeat of the +first at bar 36 Von Bulow gives a variation in fingering. Kullak's +method of fingering is this: "Everywhere that two white keys occur in +succession the fifth finger is to be used for C and F in the right +hand, and for F and E in the left." He has also something to say about +holding "the hand sideways, so that the back of the hand and arm form +an angle." This question of hand position, particularly in Chopin, is +largely a matter of individual formation. No two hands are alike, no +two pianists use the same muscular movements. Play along the easiest +line of resistance. + +We now have reached a study, the third, in which the more intimately +known Chopin reveals himself. This one in E is among the finest +flowering of the composer's choice garden. It is simpler, less morbid, +sultry and languorous, therefore saner, than the much bepraised study +in C sharp minor, No. 7, op. 25. Niecks writes that this study "may be +counted among Chopin's loveliest compositions." It combines "classical +chasteness of contour with the fragrance of romanticism." Chopin told +his faithful Gutmann that "he had never in his life written another +such melody," and once when hearing it raised his arms aloft and cried +out: "Oh, ma patrie!" + +I cannot vouch for the sincerity of Chopin's utterance for as Runciman +writes: "They were a very Byronic set, these young men; and they took +themselves with ludicrous seriousness." + +Von Bulow calls it a study in expression--which is obvious--and thinks +it should be studied in company with No. 6, in E flat minor. This +reason is not patent. Emotions should not be hunted in couples and the +very object of the collection, variety in mood as well as mechanism, is +thus defeated. But Von Bulow was ever an ardent classifier. Perhaps he +had his soul compartmentized. He also attempts to regulate the +rubato--this is the first of the studies wherein the rubato's rights +must be acknowledged. The bars are even mentioned 32, 33, 36 and 37, +where tempo license may be indulged. But here is a case which innate +taste and feeling must guide. You can no more teach a real Chopin +rubato--not the mawkish imitation,--than you can make a donkey +comprehend Kant. The metronome is the same in all editions, 100 to the +eighth. + +Kullak rightly calls this lovely study "ein wunderschones, poetisches +Tonstuck," more in the nocturne than study style. He gives in the +bravura-like cadenza, an alternate for small hands, but small hands +should not touch this piece unless they can grapple the double sixths +with ease. Klindworth fingers the study with great care. The figuration +in three of the editions is the same, Mikuli separating the voices +distinctly. Riemann exercises all his ingenuity to make the beginning +clear to the eye. + +[Musical score excerpt] + +What a joy is the next study, No. 4! How well Chopin knew the value of +contrast in tonality and sentiment! A veritable classic is this piece, +which, despite its dark key color, C sharp minor as a foil to the +preceding one in E, bubbles with life and spurts flame. It reminds one +of the story of the Polish peasants, who are happiest when they sing in +the minor mode. Kullak calls this "a bravura study for velocity and +lightness in both hands. Accentuation fiery!" while Von Bulow believes +that "the irresistible interest inspired by the spirited content of +this truly classical and model piece of music may become a stumbling +block in attempting to conquer the technical difficulties." Hardly. The +technics of this composition do not lie beneath the surface. They are +very much in the way of clumsy fingers and heavy wrists. Presto 88 to +the half is the metronome indication in all five editions. Klindworth +does not comment, but I like his fingering and phrasing best of all. +Riemann repeats his trick of breaking a group, detaching a note for +emphasis; although he is careful to retain the legato bow. One wonders +why this study does not figure more frequently on programmes of piano +recitals. It is a fine, healthy technical test, it is brilliant, and +the coda is very dramatic. Ten bars before the return of the theme +there is a stiff digital hedge for the student. A veritable lance of +tone is this study, if justly poised. + +Riemann has his own ideas of the phrasing of the following one, the +fifth and familiar "Black Key" etude. Examine the first bar: + +[Musical Illustration without caption] + +Von Bulow would have grown jealous if he had seen this rather fantastic +phrasing. It is a trifle too finical, though it must be confessed looks +pretty. I like longer breathed phrasing. The student may profit by this +analysis. The piece is indeed, as Kullak says, "full of Polish +elegance." Von Bulow speaks rather disdainfully of it as a Damen-Salon +Etude. It is certainly graceful, delicately witty, a trifle naughty, +arch and roguish, and it is delightfully invented. Technically, it +requires smooth, velvet-tipped fingers and a supple wrist. In the +fourth bar, third group, third note of group, Klindworth and Riemann +print E flat instead of D flat. Mikuli, Kullak and Von Bulow use the D +flat. Now, which is right? The D flat is preferable. There are already +two E flats in the bar. The change is an agreeable one. Joseffy has +made a concert variation for this study. The metronome of the original +is given at 116 to the quarter. + +A dark, doleful nocturne is No. 6, in E flat minor. Niecks praises it +in company with the preceding one in E. It is beautiful, if music so +sad may be called beautiful, and the melody is full of stifled sorrow. +The study figure is ingenious, but subordinated to the theme. In the E +major section the piece broadens to dramatic vigor. Chopin was not yet +the slave of his mood. There must be a psychical programme to this +study, some record of a youthful disillusion, but the expression of it +is kept well within chaste lines. The Sarmatian composer had not yet +unlearned the value of reserve. The Klindworth reading of this troubled +poem is the best though Kullak used Chopin's autographic copy. There is +no metronomic sign in this autograph. Tellefsen gives 69 to the +quarter; Klindworth, 60; Riemann, 69; Mikuli, the same; Von Bulow and +Kullak, 60. Kullak also gives several variante from the text, adding an +A flat to the last group in bar II. Riemann and the others make the +same addition. The note must have been accidentally omitted from the +Chopin autograph. Two bars will illustrate what Riemann can accomplish +when he makes up his mind to be explicit, leaving little to the +imagination: + +[Illustration without caption] + +A luscious touch, and a sympathetic soul is needed for this nocturne +study. + +We emerge into a clearer, more bracing atmosphere in the C major study, +No. 7. It is a genuine toccata, with moments of tender twilight, +serving a distinct technical purpose--the study of double notes and +changing on one key--and is as healthy as the toccata by Robert +Schumann. Here is a brave, an undaunted Chopin, a gay cavalier, with +the sunshine shimmering about him. There are times when this study +seems like light dripping through the trees of a mysterious forest; +with the delicato there are Puck-like rustlings, and all the while the +pianist without imagination is exercising wrist and ringers in a +technical exercise! Were ever Beauty and Duty so mated in double +harness? Pegasus pulling a cloud charged with rain over an arid +country! For study, playing the entire composition with a wrist stroke +is advisable. It will secure clear articulation, staccato and +finger-memory. Von Bulow phrases the study in groups of two, Kullak in +sixes, Klindworth and Mikuli the same, while Riemann in alternate twos, +fours and sixes. One sees his logic rather than hears it. Von Bulow +plastically reproduces the flitting, elusive character of the study far +better than the others. + +It is quite like him to suggest to the panting and ambitious pupil that +the performance in F sharp major, with the same fingering as the next +study in F, No. 8, would be beneficial. It certainly would. By the same +token, the playing of the F minor Sonata, the Appassionata of +Beethoven, in the key of F sharp minor, might produce good results. +This was another crotchet of Wagner's friend and probably was born of +the story that Beethoven transposed the Bach fugues in all keys. The +same is said of Saint-Saens. + +In his notes to the F major study Theodor Kullak expatiates at length +upon his favorite idea that Chopin must not be played according to his +metronomic markings. The original autograph gives 96 to the half, the +Tellefsen edition 88, Klindworth 80, Von Bulow 89, Mikuli 88, and +Riemann the same. Kullak takes the slower tempo of Klindworth, +believing that the old Herz and Czerny ideals of velocity are vanished, +that the shallow dip of the keys in Chopin's day had much to do with +the swiftness and lightness of his playing. The noble, more sonorous +tone of a modern piano requires greater breadth of style and less +speedy passage work. There can be no doubt as to the wisdom of a +broader treatment of this charming display piece. How it makes the +piano sound--what a rich, brilliant sweep it secures! It elbows the +treble to its last euphonious point, glitters and crests itself, only +to fall away as if the sea were melodic and could shatter and tumble +into tuneful foam! The emotional content is not marked. The piece is +for the fashionable salon or the concert hall. One catches at its close +the overtones of bustling plaudits and the clapping of gloved palms. +Ductility, an aristocratic ease, a delicate touch and fluent technique +will carry off this study with good effect. Technically it is useful; +one must speak of the usefulness of Chopin, even in these imprisoned, +iridescent soap bubbles of his. On the fourth line and in the first bar +of the Kullak version, there is a chord of the dominant seventh in +dispersed position that does not occur in any other edition. Yet it +must be Chopin or one of his disciples, for this autograph is in the +Royal Library at Berlin. Kullak thinks it ought to be omitted, moreover +he slights an E flat, that occurs in all the other editions situated in +the fourth group of the twentieth bar from the end. + +The F minor study, No. 9, is the first one of those tone studies of +Chopin in which the mood is more petulant than tempestuous. The melody +is morbid, almost irritating, and yet not without certain accents of +grandeur. There is a persistency in repetition that foreshadows the +Chopin of the later, sadder years. The figure in the left hand is the +first in which a prominent part is given to that member. Not as noble +and sonorous a figure as the one in the C minor study, it is a distinct +forerunner of the bass of the D minor Prelude. In this F minor study +the stretch is the technical object. It is rather awkward for +close-knit fingers. The best fingering is Von Bulow's. It is 5, 3, 1, +4, 1, 3 for the first figure. All the other editions, except Riemann's, +recommend the fifth finger on F, the fourth on C. Von Billow believes +that small hands beginning with his system will achieve quicker results +than by the Chopin fingering. This is true. Riemann phrases the study +with a multiplicity of legato bows and dynamic accents. Kullak prefers +the Tellefsen metronome 80, rather than the traditional 96. Most of the +others use 88 to the quarter, except Riemann, who espouses the more +rapid gait of 96. Klindworth, with his 88, strikes a fair medium. + +The verdict of Von Bulow on the following study in A flat, No. 10, has +no uncertainty of tone in its proclamation: + + He who can play this study in a really finished manner may + congratulate himself on having climbed to the highest point of + the pianist's Parnassus, as it is perhaps the most difficult + piece of the entire set. The whole repertory of piano music + does not contain a study of perpetuum mobile so full of genius + and fancy as this particular one is universally acknowledged + to be, except perhaps Liszt's Feux Follets. The most important + point would appear to lie not so much in the interchange of + the groups of legato and staccato as in the exercise of + rhythmic contrasts--the alternation of two and three part + metre (that is, of four and six) in the same bar. To overcome + this fundamental difficulty in the art of musical reproduction + is the most important thing here, and with true zeal it may + even be accomplished easily. + +Kullak writes: "Harmonic anticipations; a rich rhythmic life +originating in the changing articulation of the twelve-eights in groups +of three and two each. ... This etude is an exceedingly piquant +composition, possessing for the hearer a wondrous, fantastic charm, if +played with the proper insight." The metronomic marking is practically +the same in all editions, 152 to the quarter notes. The study is one of +the most charming of the composer. There is more depth in it than in +the G flat and F major studies, and its effectiveness in the virtuoso +sense is unquestionable. A savor of the salon hovers over its perfumed +measures, but there is grace, spontaneity and happiness. Chopin must +have been as happy as his sensitive nature would allow when he +conceived this vivacious caprice. + +In all the editions, Riemann's excepted, there is no doubt left as to +the alternations of metres. Here are the first few bars of Von +Billow's, which is normal phrasing: + +[Musical score excerpt] + +Read Riemann's version of these bars: + +[Musical score excerpt] + +Riemann is conducive to clear-sighted phrasing, and will set the +student thinking, but the general effect of accentuation is certainly +different. All the editors quoted agree with Von Bulow, Klindworth and +Kullak. But if this is a marked specimen of Riemann, examine his +reading of the phrase wherein Chopin's triple rhythm is supplanted by +duple. Thus Von Bulow--and who will dare cavil? + +[Musical score excerpt] + +Riemann: + +[Musical score excerpt] + +The difference is more imaginary than real, for the stems of the +accented notes give us the binary metre. But the illustration serves to +show how Dr. Riemann is disposed to refine upon the gold of Chopin. + +Kullak dilates upon a peculiarity of Chopin: the dispersed position of +his underlying harmonies. This in a footnote to the eleventh study of +op. 10. Here one must let go the critical valve, else strangle in +pedagogics. So much has been written, so much that is false, perverted +sentimentalism and unmitigated cant about the nocturnes, that the +wonder is the real Chopin lover has not rebelled. There are pearls and +diamonds in the jewelled collection of nocturnes, many are dolorous, +few dramatic, and others are sweetly insane and songful. I yield to +none in my admiration for the first one of the two in G minor, for the +psychical despair in the C sharp minor nocturne, for that noble drama +called the C minor nocturne, for the B major, the Tuberose nocturne; +and for the E, D flat and G major nocturnes, it remains unabated. But +in the list there is no such picture painted, a Corot if ever there was +one, as this E flat study. + +Its novel design, delicate arabesques--as if the guitar had been +dowered with a soul--and the richness and originality of its harmonic +scheme, gives us pause to ask if Chopin's invention is not almost +boundless. The melody itself is plaintive; a plaintive grace informs +the entire piece. The harmonization is far more wonderful, but to us +the chord of the tenth and more remote intervals, seem no longer +daring; modern composition has devilled the musical alphabet into the +very caverns of the grotesque, yet there are harmonies in the last page +of this study that still excite wonder. The fifteenth bar from the end +is one that Richard Wagner might have made. From that bar to the close, +every group is a masterpiece. + +Remember, this study is a nocturne, and even the accepted metronomic +markings in most editions, 76 to the quarter, are not too slow; they +might even be slower. Allegretto and not a shade speedier! The color +scheme is celestial and the ending a sigh, not unmixed with happiness. +Chopin, sensitive poet, had his moments of peace, of divine +content--lebensruhe. The dizzy appoggiatura leaps in the last two bars +set the seal of perfection upon this unique composition. + +Touching upon the execution, one may say that it is not for small +hands, nor yet for big fists. The former must not believe that any +"arrangements" or simplified versions will ever produce the aerial +effect, the swaying of the tendrils of tone, intended by Chopin. Very +large hands are tempted by their reach to crush the life out of the +study in not arpeggiating it. This I have heard, and the impression was +indescribably brutal. As for fingering, Mikuli, Von Bulow, Kullak, +Riemann and Klindworth all differ, and from them must most pianists +differ. Your own grasp, individual sense of fingering and tact will +dictate the management of technics. Von Bulow gives a very sensible +pattern to work from, and Kullak is still more explicit. He analyzes +the melody and, planning the arpeggiating with scrupulous fidelity, he +shows why the arpeggiating "must be affected with the utmost rapidity, +bordering upon simultaneousness of harmony in the case of many chords." +Kullak has something to say about the grace notes and this bids me call +your attention to Von Bulow's change in the appoggiatura at the last +return of the subject. A bad misprint is in the Von Bulow edition: it +is in the seventeenth bar from the end, the lowest note in the first +bass group and should read E natural, instead of the E flat that stands. + +Von Bulow does not use the arpeggio sign after the first chord. He +rightly believes it makes unclear for the student the subtleties of +harmonic changes and fingering. He also suggests--quite like the +fertile Hans Guido--that "players who have sufficient patience and +enthusiasm for the task would find it worth their while to practise the +arpeggi the reverse way, from top to bottom; or in contrary motion, +beginning with the top note in one hand and the bottom note in the +other. A variety of devices like this would certainly help to give +greater finish to the task." + +Doubtless, but consider: man's years are but threescore and ten! + +The phrasing of the various editions examined do not vary much. Riemann +is excepted, who has his say in this fashion, at the beginning: + +[Musical score excerpt] + +More remarkable still is the diversity of opinion regarding the first +three bass chord groups in the fifteenth bar from the close: the bottom +notes in the Von Bulow and Klindworth editions are B flat and two A +naturals, and in the Riemann, Kullak and Mikuli editions the notes are +two B flats and one A natural. The former sounds more varied, but we +may suppose the latter to be correct because of Mikuli. Here is the +particular bar, as given by Riemann: + +[Musical score excerpt] + +Yet this exquisite flight into the blue, this nocturne which should be +played before sundown, excited the astonishment of Mendelssohn, the +perplexed wrath of Moscheles and the contempt of Rellstab, editor of +the "Iris," who wrote in that journal in 1834 of the studies in op. +10:-- + +"Those who have distorted fingers may put them right by practising +these studies; but those who have not, should not play them, at least +not without having a surgeon at hand." What incredible surgery would +have been needed to get within the skull of this narrow critic any +savor of the beauty of these compositions! In the years to come the +Chopin studies will be played for their music, without any thought of +their technical problems. + +Now the young eagle begins to face the sun, begins to mount on +wind-weaving pinions. We have reached the last study of op. 10, the +magnificent one in C minor. Four pages suffice for a background upon +which the composer has flung with overwhelming fury the darkest, the +most demoniac expressions of his nature. Here is no veiled surmise, no +smothered rage, but all sweeps along in tornadic passion. Karasowski's +story may be true regarding the genesis of this work, but true or not, +it is one of the greatest dramatic outbursts in piano literature. Great +in outline, pride, force and velocity, it never relaxes its grim grip +from the first shrill dissonance to the overwhelming chordal close. +This end rings out like the crack of creation. It is elemental. Kullak +calls it a "bravura study of the very highest order for the left hand. +It was composed in 1831 in Stuttgart, shortly after Chopin had received +tidings of the taking of Warsaw by the Russians, September 8, 1831." +Karasowski wrote: "Grief, anxiety and despair over the fate of his +relatives and his dearly-beloved father filled the measure of his +sufferings. Under the influence of this mood he wrote the C minor +Etude, called by many the Revolutionary Etude. Out of the mad and +tempestuous storm of passages for the left hand the melody rises aloft, +now passionate and anon proudly majestic, until thrills of awe stream +over the listener, and the image is evoked of Zeus hurling thunderbolts +at the world." + +Niecks thinks it "superbly grand," and furthermore writes: "The +composer seems fuming with rage; the left hand rushes impetuously along +and the right hand strikes in with passionate ejaculations." Von Bulow +said: "This C minor study must be considered a finished work of art in +an even higher degree than the study in C sharp minor." All of which is +pretty, but not enough to the point. + +Von Bulow fingers the first passage for the left hand in a very +rational manner; Klindworth differs by beginning with the third instead +of the second finger, while Riemann--dear innovator--takes the group: +second, first, third, and then, the fifth finger on D, if you please! +Kullak is more normal, beginning with the third. Here is Riemann's +phrasing and grouping for the first few bars. Notice the half note with +peculiar changes of fingering at the end. It gives surety and variety. +Von Bulow makes the changes ring on the second and fifth, instead of +third and fifth, fingers. Thus Riemann: + +[Musical score excerpt] + +In the above the accustomed phrasing is altered, for in all other +editions the accent falls upon the first note of each group. In Riemann +the accentuation seems perverse, but there is no question as to its +pedagogic value. It may be ugly, but it is useful though I should not +care to hear it in the concert room. Another striking peculiarity of +the Riemann phrasing is his heavy accent on the top E flat in the +principal passage for the left hand. He also fingers what Von Bulow +calls the "chromatic meanderings," in an unusual manner, both on the +first page and the last. His idea of the enunciation of the first theme +is peculiar: + +[Musical score excerpt] + +Mikuli places a legato bow over the first three octaves--so does +Kullak--Von Bulow only over the last two, which gives a slightly +different effect, while Klindworth does the same as Kullak. The heavy +dynamic accents employed by Riemann are unmistakable. They signify the +vital importance of the phrase at its initial entrance. He does not use +it at the repetition, but throughout both dynamic and agogic accents +are unsparingly used, and the study seems to resound with the sullen +booming of a park of artillery. The working-out section, with its +anticipations of "Tristan and Isolde," is phrased by all the editors as +it is never played. Here the technical figure takes precedence over the +law of the phrase, and so most virtuosi place the accent on the fifth +finger, regardless of the pattern. This is as it should be. In +Klindworth there is a misprint at the beginning of the fifteenth bar +from the end in the bass. It should read B natural, not B flat. The +metronome is the same in all editions, 160 to the quarter, but speed +should give way to breadth at all hazards. Von Bulow is the only +editor, to my knowledge, who makes an enharmonic key change in this +working-out section. It looks neater, sounds the same, but is it +Chopin? He also gives a variant for public performance by transforming +the last run in unisono into a veritable hurricane by interlocked +octaves. The effect is brazen. Chopin needs no such clangorous padding +in this etude, which gains by legitimate strokes the most startling +contrasts. + +The study is full of tremendous pathos; it compasses the sublime, and +in its most torrential moments the composer never quite loses his +mental equipoise. He, too, can evoke tragic spirits, and at will send +them scurrying back to their dim profound. It has but one rival in the +Chopin studies--No. 12, op. 25, in the same key. + + +II + + +Opus 25, twelve studies by Frederic Chopin, are dedicated to Madame la +Comtesse d'Agoult. The set opens with the familiar study in A flat, so +familiar that I shall not make further ado about it except to say that +it is delicious, but played often and badly. All that modern editing +can do since Miluki is to hunt out fresh accentuation. Von Bullow is +the worst sinner in this respect, for he discovers quaint nooks and +dells for his dynamics undreamed of by the composer. His edition should +be respectfully studied and, when mastered, discarded for a more poetic +interpretation. Above all, poetry, poetry and pedals. Without pedalling +of the most varied sort this study will remain as dry as a dog-gnawed +bone. Von Bulow says the "figure must be treated as a double +triplet--twice three and not three times two--as indicated in the first +two bars." Klindworth makes the group a sextolet. Von Bulow has set +forth numerous directions in fingering and phrasing, giving the exact +number of notes in the bass trill at the end. Kullak uses the most +ingenious fingering. Look at the last group of the last bar, second +line, third page. It is the last word in fingering. Better to end with +Robert Schumann's beautiful description of this study, as quoted by +Kullak: + + In treating of the present book of Etudes, Robert Schumann, + after comparing Chopin to a strange star seen at midnight, + wrote as follows: "Whither his path lies and leads, or how + long, how brilliant its course is yet to be, who can say? As + often, however, as it shows itself, there is ever seen the + same deep dark glow, the same starry light and the same + austerity, so that even a child could not fail to recognize + it. But besides this, I have had the advantage of hearing most + of these Etudes played by Chopin himself, and quite a la + Chopin did he play them!" + + Of the first one especially he writes: "Imagine that an + aeolian harp possessed all the musical scales, and that the + hand of an artist were to cause them all to intermingle in all + sorts of fantastic embellishments, yet in such a way as to + leave everywhere audible a deep fundamental tone and a soft + continuously-singing upper voice, and you will get the right + idea of his playing. But it would be an error to think that + Chopin permitted every one of the small notes to be distinctly + heard. It was rather an undulation of the A flat major chord, + here and there thrown aloft anew by the pedal. Throughout all + the harmonies one always heard in great tones a wondrous + melody, while once only, in the middle of the piece, besides + that chief song, a tenor voice became prominent in the midst + of chords. After the Etude a feeling came over one as of + having seen in a dream a beatific picture which when half + awake one would gladly recall." + + After these words there can be no doubt as to the mode of + delivery. No commentary is required to show that the melodic + and other important tones indicated by means of large notes + must emerge from within the sweetly whispering waves, and that + the upper tones must be combined so as to form a real melody + with the finest and most thoughtful shadings. + +The twenty-fourth bar of this study in A major is so Lisztian that +Liszt must have benefited by its harmonies. + +"And then he played the second in the book, in F minor, one in which +his individuality displays itself in a manner never to be forgotten. +How charming, how dreamy it was! Soft as the song of a sleeping child." +Schumann wrote this about the wonderful study in F minor, which +whispers, not of baleful deeds in a dream, as does the last movement of +the B flat minor sonata, but is--"the song of a sleeping child." No +comparison could be prettier, for there is a sweet, delicate drone that +sometimes issues from childish lips, having a charm for ears not +attuned to grosser things. + +This must have been the study that Chopin played for Henrietta Voigt at +Leipsic, September 12, 1836. In her diary she wrote: "The over +excitement of his fantastic manner is imparted to the keen eared. It +made me hold my breath. Wonderful is the ease with which his velvet +fingers glide, I might almost say fly, over the keys. He has enraptured +me--in a way which hitherto had been unknown to me. What delighted me +was the childlike, natural manner which he showed in his demeanor and +in his playing." Von Bulow believes the interpretation of this magical +music should be without sentimentality, almost without +shading--clearly, delicately and dreamily executed. "An ideal +pianissimo, an accentless quality, and completely without passion or +rubato." There is little doubt this was the way Chopin played it. Liszt +is an authority on the subject, and M. Mathias corroborates him. +Regarding the rhythmical problem to be overcome, the combination of two +opposing rhythms, Von Bulow indicates an excellent method, and Kullak +devotes part of a page to examples of how the right, then the left, and +finally both hands, are to be treated. Kullak furthermore writes: "Or, +if one will, he may also betake himself in fancy to a still, green, +dusky forest, and listen in profound solitude to the mysterious +rustling and whispering of the foliage. What, indeed, despite the +algebraic character of the tone-language, may not a lively fancy +conjure out of, or, rather, into, this etude! But one thing is to be +held fast: it is to be played in that Chopin-like whisper of which, +among others, Mendelssohn also affirmed that for him nothing more +enchanting existed." But enough of subjective fancies. This study +contains much beauty, and every bar rules over a little harmonic +kingdom of its own. It is so lovely that not even the Brahms' +distortion in double notes or the version in octaves can dull its +magnetic crooning. At times so delicate is its design that it recalls +the faint fantastic tracery made by frost on glass. In all instances +save one it is written as four unbroken quarter triplets in the +bar--right hand. Not so Riemann. He has views of his own, both as to +fingering and phrasing: + +[Musical score excerpt] + +Jean Kleczynski's interesting brochure, "The Works of Frederic Chopin +and Their Proper Interpretation," is made up of three lectures +delivered at Warsaw. While the subject is of necessity foreshortened, +he says some practical things about the use of the pedals in Chopin's +music. He speaks of this very study in F minor and the enchanting way +Rubinstein and Essipowa ended it--the echo-like effects on the four +C's, the pedal floating the tone. The pedals are half the battle in +Chopin playing. ONE CAN NEVER PLAY CHOPIN BEAUTIFULLY ENOUGH. Realistic +treatment dissipates his dream palaces, shatters his aerial +architecture. He may be played broadly, fervently, dramatically but +coarsely, never. I deprecate the rose-leaf sentimentalism in which he +is swathed by nearly all pianists. "Chopin is a sigh, with something +pleasing in it," wrote some one, and it is precisely this notion which +has created such havoc among his interpreters. But if excess in feeling +is objectionable, so too is the "healthy" reading accorded his works by +pianists with more brawn than brain. The real Chopin player is born and +can never be a product of the schools. + +Schumann thinks the third study in F less novel in character, although +"here the master showed his admirable bravura powers." "But," he +continues, "they are all models of bold, indwelling, creative force, +truly poetic creations, though not without small blots in their +details, but on the whole striking and powerful. Yet, if I give my +complete opinion, I must confess that his earlier collection seems more +valuable to me. Not that I mean to imply any deterioration, for these +recently published studies were nearly all written at the same time as +the earlier ones, and only a few were composed a little while ago--the +first in A flat and the last magnificent one in C minor, both of which +display great mastership." + +One may be permitted to disagree with Schumann, for op. 25 contains at +least two of Chopin's greater studies--A minor and C minor. The most +valuable point of the passage quoted is the clenching of the fact that +the studies were composed in a bunch. That settles many important +psychological details. Chopin had suffered much before going to Paris, +had undergone the purification and renunciation of an unsuccessful love +affair, and arrived in Paris with his style fully formed--in his case +the style was most emphatically the man. + +Kullak calls the study in F "a spirited little caprice, whose kernel +lies in the simultaneous application of four different little rhythms +to form a single figure in sound, which figure is then repeated +continuously to the end. In these repetitions, however, changes of +accentuation, fresh modulations, and piquant antitheses, serve to make +the composition extremely vivacious and effective." He pulls apart the +brightly colored petals of the thematic flower and reveals the inner +chemistry of this delicate growth. Four different voices are +distinguished in the kernel. + +"The third voice is the chief one, and after it the first, because they +determine the melodic and harmonic contents": + +[Musical score excerpt of 'four different voices'] + +Kullak and Mikuli dot the C of the first bar. Klindworth and Von Bulow +do not. As to phrasing and fingering I pin my faith to Riemann. His +version is the most satisfactory. Here are the first bars. The idea is +clearly expressed: + +[Musical score excerpt] + +Best of all is the careful accentuation, and at a place indicated in no +other edition that I have examined. With the arrival of the +thirty-second notes, Riemann punctuates the theme this way: + +[Musical score excerpt] + +The melody, of course in profile, is in the eighth notes. This gives +meaning to the decorative pattern of the passage. And what charm, +buoyancy, and sweetness there is in this caprice! It has the +tantalizing, elusive charm of a humming bird in full flight. The human +element is almost eliminated. We are in the open, the sun blazes in the +blue, and all is gay, atmospheric, and illuding. Even where the tone +deepens, where the shadows grow cooler and darker in the B major +section, there is little hint of preoccupation with sadness. Subtle are +the harmonic shifts, admirable the ever changing devices of the +figuration. Riemann accents the B, the E, A, B flat, C and F, at the +close--perilous leaps for the left hand, but they bring into fine +relief the exquisite harmonic web. An easy way of avoiding the tricky +position in the left hand at this spot--thirteen bars from the +close--is to take the upper C in bass with the right hand thumb and in +the next bar the upper B in bass the same way. This minimizes the risk +of the skip, and it is perfectly legitimate to do this--in public at +least. The ending, to be "breathed" away, according to Kullak, is +variously fingered. He also prescribes a most trying fingering for the +first group, fourth finger on both hands. This is useful for study, but +for performance the third finger is surer. Von Bulow advises the player +to keep the "upper part of the body as still as possible, as any haste +of movement would destroy the object in view, which is the acquisition +of a loose wrist." He also suggests certain phrasing in bar seventeen, +and forbids a sharp, cutting manner in playing the sforzati at the last +return of the subject. Kullak is copious in his directions, and thinks +the touch should be light and the hand gliding, and in the B major part +"fiery, wilful accentuation of the inferior beats." Capricious, +fantastic, and graceful, this study is Chopin in rare spirits. Schumann +has the phrase--the study should be executed with "amiable bravura." +There is a misprint in the Kullak edition: at the beginning of the +thirty-second notes an A instead of an F upsets the tonality, besides +being absurd. + +Of the fourth study in A minor there is little to add to Theodor +Kullak, who writes: + + "In the broadest sense of the word, every piece of music is an + etude. In a narrower sense, however, we demand of an etude + that it shall have a special end in view, promote facility in + something, and lead to the conquest of some particular + difficulty, whether of technics, of rhythm, expression or + delivery." (Robert Schumann, Collected Writings, i., 201.) The + present study is less interesting from a technical than a + rhythmical point of view. While the chief beats of the measure + (1st, 3d, 5th and 7th eighths) are represented only by single + tones (in the bass part), which are to a certain extent "free + and unconcerned, and void of all encumbrance," the inferior + parts of the measure (2d, 4th, 6th and 8th eighths) are + burdened with chords, the most of which, moreover, are + provided with accents in opposition to the regular beats of + the measure. Further, there is associated with these chords, + or there may be said to grow out of them, a cantilene in the + upper voice, which appears in syncopated form opposite to the + strong beats of the bass. This cantilene begins on a weak + beat, and produces numerous suspensions, which, in view of the + time of their entrance, appear as so many retardations and + delayals of melodic tones. + + All these things combine to give the composition a wholly + peculiar coloring, to render its flow somewhat restless and to + stamp the etude as a little characteristic piece, a capriccio, + which might well be named "Inquietude." + + As regards technics, two things are to be studied: the + staccato of the chords and the execution of the cantilena. The + chords must be formed more by pressure than by striking. The + fingers must support themselves very lightly upon the chord + keys and then rise again with the back of the hand in the most + elastic manner. The upward movement of the hand must be very + slight. Everything must be done with the greatest precision, + and not merely in a superficial manner. Where the cantilena + appears, every melodic tone must stand apart from the tones of + the accompaniment as if in "relief." Hence the fingers for the + melodic tones must press down the keys allotted to them with + special force, in doing which the back of the hand may be + permitted to turn lightly to the right (sideward stroke), + especially when there is a rest in the accompaniment. Compare + with this etude the introduction to the Capriccio in B minor, + with orchestra, by Felix Mendelssohn, first page. Aside from a + few rallentando places, the etude is to be played strictly in + time. + +I prefer the Klindworth editing of this rather sombre, nervous +composition, which may be merely an etude, but it also indicates a +slightly pathologic condition. With its breath-catching syncopations +and narrow emotional range, the A minor study has nevertheless moments +of power and interest. Riemann's phrasing, while careful, is not more +enlightening than Klindworth's. Von Bulow says: "The bass must be +strongly marked throughout--even when piano--and brought out in +imitation of the upper part." Singularly enough, his is the only +edition in which the left hand arpeggios at the close, though in the +final bar "both hands may do so." This is editorial quibbling. Stephen +Heller remarked that this study reminded him of the first bar of the +Kyrie--rather the Requiem Aeternam of Mozart's Requiem. + +It is safe to say that the fifth study in E minor is less often heard +in the concert room than any one of its companions. I cannot recall +having heard it since Annette Essipowa gave that famous recital during +which she played the entire twenty-seven studies. Yet it is a sonorous +piano piece, rich in embroideries and general decorative effect in the +middle section. Perhaps the rather perverse, capricious and not +altogether amiable character of the beginning has caused pianists to be +wary of introducing it at a recital. It is hugely effective and also +difficult, especially if played with the same fingering throughout, as +Von Bulow suggests. Niecks quotes Stephen Heller's partiality for this +very study. In the "Gazette Musicale," February 24, 1839, Heller wrote +of Chopin's op. 25: + + What more do we require to pass one or several evenings in as + perfect a happiness as possible? As for me, I seek in this + collection of poesy--this is the only name appropriate to the + works of Chopin--some favorite pieces which I might fix in my + memory, rather than others. Who could retain everything? For + this reason I have in my notebook quite particularly marked + the numbers four, five and seven of the present poems. Of + these twelve much loved studies--every one of which has a + charm of its own--the three numbers are those I prefer to all + the rest. + +The middle part of this E minor study recalls Thalberg. Von Bulow +cautions the student against "the accenting of the first note with the +thumb--right hand--as it does not form part of the melody, but only +comes in as an unimportant passing note." This refers to the melody in +E. He also writes that the addition of the third in the left hand, +Klindworth edition, needs no special justification. I discovered one +marked difference in the Klindworth edition. The leap in the left +hand--first variant of the theme, tenth bar from beginning--is preceded +by an appoggiatura, E natural. The jump is to F sharp, instead of G, as +in the Mikuli, Kullak and Riemann editions. Von Bulow uses the F sharp, +but without the ninth below. Riemann phrases the piece so as to get the +top melody, B, E and G, and his stems are below instead of above, as in +Mikuli and Von Bulow. Kullak dots the eighth note. Riemann uses a +sixteenth, thus: + +[Musical score excerpt] + +Kullak writes that the figure 184 is not found on the older metronomes. +This is not too fast for the capriccio, with its pretty and ingenious +rhythmical transformations. As regards the execution of the 130th bar, +Von Bulow says: "The acciaccature--prefixes--are to be struck +simultaneously with the other parts, as also the shake in bar 134 and +following bars; this must begin with the upper auxiliary note." These +details are important. Kullak concludes his notes thus: + + Despite all the little transformations of the motive member + which forms the kernel, its recognizability remains + essentially unimpaired. Meanwhile out of these little + metamorphoses there is developed a rich rhythmic life, which + the performer must bring out with great precision. If in + addition, he possesses a fine feeling for what is graceful, + coquettish, or agreeably capricious, he will understand how to + heighten still further the charm of the chief part, which, as + far as its character is concerned, reminds one of Etude, op. + 25, No. 3. + + The secondary part, in major, begins. Its kernel is formed of + a beautiful broad melody, which, if soulfully conceived and + delivered, will sing its way deep into the heart of the + listener. For the accompaniment in the right hand we find + chord arpeggiations in triplets, afterward in sixteenths, + calmly ascending and descending, and surrounding the melody as + with a veil. They are to be played almost without + accentuation. + +It was Louis Ehlert who wrote of the celebrated study in G sharp minor +op. 25, No. 6: "Chopin not only versifies an exercise in thirds; he +transforms it into such a work of art that in studying it one could +sooner fancy himself on Parnassus than at a lesson. He deprives every +passage of all mechanical appearance by promoting it to become the +embodiment of a beautiful thought, which in turn finds graceful +expression in its motion." + +And indeed in the piano literature no more remarkable merging of matter +and manner exists. The means justifies the end, and the means employed +by the composer are beautiful, there is no other word to describe the +style and architectonics of this noble study. It is seldom played in +public because of its difficulty. With the Schumann Toccata, the G +sharp minor study stands at the portals of the delectable land of +Double Notes. Both compositions have a common ancestry in the Czerny +Toccata, and both are the parents of such a sensational offspring as +Balakirew's "Islamey." In reading through the double note studies for +the instrument it is in the nature of a miracle to come upon Chopin's +transfiguration of such a barren subject. This study is first music, +then a technical problem. Where two or three pianists are gathered +together in the name of Chopin, the conversation is bound to formulate +itself thus: "How do you finger the double chromatic thirds in the G +sharp minor study?" That question answered, your digital politics are +known. You are classified, ranged. If you are heterodox you are eagerly +questioned; if you follow Von Bulow and stand by the Czerny fingering, +you are regarded as a curiosity. As the interpretation of the study is +not taxing, let us examine the various fingerings. First, a fingering +given by Leopold Godowsky. It is for double chromatic thirds: + +[Musical score excerpt] + +You will now be presented with a battalion of authorities, so that you +may see at a glance the various efforts to climb those slippery +chromatic heights. Here is Mikuli: + +[Musical score excerpt] + +Kullak's is exactly the same as above. It is the so-called Chopin +fingering, as contrasted with the so-called Czerny fingering--though in +reality Clementi's, as Mr. John Kautz contends. "In the latter the +third and fifth fingers fall upon C sharp and E and F sharp and A in +the right hand, and upon C and E flat and G and B flat in the left." +Klindworth also employs the Chopin fingering. Von Bulow makes this +statement: "As the peculiar fingering adopted by Chopin for chromatic +scales in thirds appears to us to render their performance in +legatissimo utterly unattainable on our modern instruments, we have +exchanged it, where necessary, for the older method of Hummel. Two of +the greatest executive artists of modern times, Alexander Dreyschock +and Carl Tausig, were, theoretically and practically, of the same +opinion. It is to be conjectured that Chopin was influenced in his +method of fingering by the piano of his favorite makers, Pleyel and +Wolff, of Paris--who, before they adopted the double echappement, +certainly produced instruments with the most pliant touch possible--and +therefore regarded the use of the thumb in the ascending scale on two +white keys in succession--the semitones EF and BC--as practicable. On +the grand piano of the present day we regard it as irreconcilable with +conditions of crescendo legato." This Chopin fingering in reality +derives directly from Hummel. See his "Piano School." + +So he gives this fingering: + +[Musical score excerpt] + +He also suggests the following phrasing for the left hand. This is +excellent: + +[Musical score excerpt] + +Riemann not only adopts new fingering for the double note scale, but +also begins the study with the trill on first and third, second and +fourth, instead of the usual first and fourth, second and fifth +fingers, adopted by the rest. This is his notion of the run in +chromatic thirds: + +[Musical score excerpt] + +For the rest the study must be played like the wind, or, as Kullak +says: "Apart from a few places and some accents, the Etude is to be +played almost throughout in that Chopin whisper. The right hand must +play its thirds, especially the diatonic and chromatic scales, with +such equality that no angularity of motion shall be noticeable where +the fingers pass under or over each other. The left hand, too, must +receive careful attention and special study. The chord passages and all +similar ones must be executed discreetly and legatissimo. Notes with +double stems must be distinguished from notes with single stems by +means of stronger shadings, for they are mutually interconnected." + +Von Bulow calls the seventh study, the one in C sharp minor, a +nocturne--a duo for 'cello and flute. He ingeniously smooths out the +unequal rhythmic differences of the two hands, and justly says the +piece does not work out any special technical matter. This study is the +most lauded of all. Yet I cannot help agreeing with Niecks, who writes +of it--he oddly enough places it in the key of E: "A duet between a He +and a She, of whom the former shows himself more talkative and emphatic +than the latter, is, indeed, very sweet, but, perhaps, also somewhat +tiresomely monotonous, as such tete-a-tetes naturally are to third +parties." + +For Chopin's contemporaries this was one of his greatest efforts. +Heller wrote: "It engenders the sweetest sadness, the most enviable +torments, and if in playing it one feels oneself insensibly drawn +toward mournful and melancholy ideas, it is a disposition of the soul +which I prefer to all others. Alas! how I love these sombre and +mysterious dreams, and Chopin is the god who creates them." In this +etude Kleczynski thinks there are traces of weariness of life, and +quotes Orlowski, Chopin's friend, "He is only afflicted with +homesickness." Willeby calls this study the most beautiful of them all. +For me it is both morbid and elegiac. There is nostalgia in it, the +nostalgia of a sick, lacerated soul. It contains in solution all the +most objectionable and most endearing qualities of the master. Perhaps +we have heard its sweet, highly perfumed measures too often. Its +interpretation is a matter of taste. Kullak has written the most +ambitious programme for it. Here is a quotation from Albert R. Parsons' +translation in Schirmer's edition of Kullak. + + Throughout the entire piece an elegiac mood prevails. The + composer paints with psychologic truthfulness a fragment out + of the life of a deeply clouded soul. He lets a broken heart, + filled with grief, proclaim its sorrow in a language of pain + which is incapable of being misunderstood. The heart has + lost--not something, but everything. The tones, however, do not + always bear the impress of a quiet, melancholy resignation. + More passionate impulses awaken, and the still plaint becomes + a complaint against cruel fate. It seeks the conflict, and + tries through force of will to burst the fetters of pain, or + at least to alleviate it through absorption in a happy past. + But in vain! The heart has not lost something--it has lost + everything. The musical poem divides into three, or if one + views the little episode in B major as a special part, into + four parts (strophes), of which the last is an elaborated + repetition of the first with a brief closing part appended. + The whole piece is a song, or, better still, an aria, in which + two principal voices are to be brought out; the upper one is + in imitation of a human voice, while the lower one must bear + the character throughout of an obligato violoncello. It is + well known that Chopin was very fond of the violoncello and + that in his piano compositions he imitated the style of + passages peculiar to that instrument. The two voices + correspond closely, supplementing and imitating each other + reciprocally. Between the two a third element exists: an + accompaniment of eighths in uniform succession without any + significance beyond that of filling out the harmony. This + third element is to be kept wholly subordinate. The little, + one-voiced introduction in recitative style which precedes the + aria reminds one vividly of the beginning of the Ballade in G + minor, op. 23. + +The D flat study, No. 8, is called by Von Bulow "the most useful +exercise in the whole range of etude literature. It might truly be +called 'l'indispensable du pianiste,' if the term, through misuse, had +not fallen into disrepute. As a remedy for stiff fingers and +preparatory to performing in public, playing it six times through is +recommended, even to the most expert pianist." Only six times! The +separate study of the left hand is recommended. Kullak finds this study +"surprisingly euphonious, but devoid of depth of content." It is an +admirable study for the cultivation of double sixths. It contains a +remarkable passage of consecutive fifths that set the theorists by the +ears. Riemann manages to get some new editorial comment upon it. + +The nimble study, No. 9, which bears the title of "The Butterfly," is +in G flat Von Bulow transposes it enharmonically to F sharp, avoiding +numerous double flats. The change is not laudable. He holds anything +but an elevated opinion of the piece, classing it with a composition of +the Charles Mayer order. This is unjust; the study if not deep is +graceful and certainly very effective. It has lately become the +stamping ground for the display of piano athletics. Nearly all modern +virtuosi pull to pieces the wings of this gay little butterfly. They +smash it, they bang it, and, adding insult to cruelty, they finish it +with three chords, mounting an octave each time, thus giving a +conventional character to the close--the very thing the composer +avoids. Much distorted phrasing is also indulged in. The Tellefsen's +edition and Klindworth's give these differences: + +[Musical score excerpt] + +Mikuli, Von Bulow and Kullak place the legato bow over the first three +notes of the group. Riemann, of course, is different: + +[Musical score excerpt] + +The metronomic markings are about the same in all editions. + +Asiatic wildness, according to Von Bulow, pervades the B minor study, +op. 25, No. 10, although Willeby claims it to be only a study in +octaves "for the left hand"! Von Bulow furthermore compares it, because +of its monophonic character, to the Chorus of Dervishes in Beethoven's +"Ruins of Athens." Niecks says it is "a real pandemonium; for a while +holier sounds intervene, but finally hell prevails." The study is for +Kullak "somewhat far fetched and forced in invention, and leaves one +cold, although it plunges on wildly to the end." Von Bulow has made the +most complete edition. Klindworth strengthens the first and the seventh +eighth notes of the fifth bar before the last by filling in the +harmonics of the left hand. This etude is an important one, +technically; because many pianists make little of it that does not +abate its musical significance, and I am almost inclined to group it +with the last two studies of this opus. The opening is portentous and +soon becomes a driving whirlwind of tone. Chopin has never penned a +lovelier melody than the one in B--the middle section of this etude--it +is only to be compared to the one in the same key in the B minor +Scherzo, while the return to the first subject is managed as +consummately as in the E flat minor Scherzo, from op. 35. I confess to +being stirred by this B minor study, with its tempo at a forced draught +and with its precipitous close. There is a lushness about the octave +melody; the tune may be a little overripe, but it is sweet, sensuous +music, and about it hovers the hush of a rich evening in early autumn. + +And now the "Winter Wind"--the study in A minor, op. 25, No. 11. Here +even Von Bulow becomes enthusiastic: + +"It must be mentioned as a particular merit of this, the longest and, +in every respect, the grandest of Chopin's studies, that, while +producing the greatest fulness of sound imaginable, it keeps itself so +entirely and utterly unorchestral, and represents piano music in the +most accurate sense of the word. To Chopin is due the honor and credit +of having set fast the boundary between piano and orchestral music, +which through other composers of the romantic school, especially Robert +Schumann, has been defaced and blotted out, to the prejudice and damage +of both species." + +Kullak is equally as warm in his praise of it: + + One of the grandest and most ingenious of Chopin's etudes, and + a companion piece to op. 10, No. 12, which perhaps it even + surpasses. It is a bravura study of the highest order; and is + captivating through the boldness and originality of its + passages, whose rising and falling waves, full of agitation, + overflow the entire keyboard; captivating through its harmonic + and modulatory shadings; and captivating, finally, through a + wonderfully invented little theme which is drawn like a "red + thread" through all the flashing and glittering waves of tone, + and which, as it were, prevents them from scattering to all + quarters of the heavens. This little theme, strictly speaking + only a phrase of two measures, is, in a certain sense, the + motto which serves as a superscription for the etude, + appearing first one voiced, and immediately afterward four + voiced. The slow time (Lento) shows the great importance which + is to be attached to it. They who have followed thus far and + agree with what has been said cannot be in doubt concerning + the proper artistic delivery. To execute the passages quite in + the rapid time prescribed one must possess a finished + technique. Great facility, lightness of touch, equality, + strength and endurance in the forte passages, together with + the clearest distinctness in the piano and pianissimo--all of + this must have been already achieved, for the interpreter must + devote his whole attention to the poetic contents of the + composition, especially to the delivery of the march-like + rhythms, which possess a life of their own, appearing now calm + and circumspect, and anon bold and challenging. The march-like + element naturally requires strict playing in time. + +This study is magnificent, and moreover it is music. + +In bar fifteen Von Bulow makes B natural the second note of the last +group, although all other editions, except Klindworth, use a B flat. +Von Bulow has common sense on his side. The B flat is a misprint. The +same authority recommends slow staccato practice, with the lid of the +piano closed. Then the hurly-burly of tone will not intoxicate the +player and submerge his critical faculty. + +Each editor has his notion of the phrasing of the initial sixteenths. +Thus Mikuli's--which is normal: + +[Musical score excerpt] + +Klindworth fingers this passage more ingeniously, but phrases it about +the same, omitting the sextolet mark. Kullak retains it. Von Bulow +makes his phrase run in this fashion: + +[Musical score excerpt] + +As regards grouping, Riemann follows Von Bulow, but places his accents +differently. + +The canvas is Chopin's largest--for the idea and its treatment are on a +vastly grander scale than any contained in the two concertos. The +latter are after all miniatures, precious ones if you will, joined and +built with cunning artifice; in neither work is there the resistless +overflow of this etude, which has been compared to the screaming of the +winter blasts. Ah, how Chopin puts to flight those modern men who +scheme out a big decorative pattern and then have nothing wherewith to +fill it! He never relaxes his theme, and its fluctuating surprises are +many. The end is notable for the fact that scales appear. Chopin very +seldom uses scale figures in his studies. From Hummel to Thalberg and +Herz the keyboard had glittered with spangled scales. Chopin must have +been sick of them, as sick of them as of the left-hand melody with +arpeggiated accompaniment in the right, a la Thalberg. Scales had been +used too much, hence Chopin's sparing employment of them. In the first +C sharp minor study, op. 10, there is a run for the left hand in the +coda. In the seventh study, same key, op. 25, there are more. The +second study of op. 10, in A minor, is a chromatic scale study; but +there are no other specimens of the form until the mighty run at the +conclusion of this A minor study. + +It takes prodigious power and endurance to play this work, prodigious +power, passion and no little poetry. It is open air music, storm music, +and at times moves in processional splendor. Small souled men, no +matter how agile their fingers, should avoid it. + +The prime technical difficulty is the management of the thumb. Kullak +has made a variant at the end for concert performance. It is effective. +The average metronomic marking is sixty-nine to the half. + +Kullak thinks the twelfth and last study of op. 25 in C minor "a grand, +magnificent composition for practice in broken chord passages for both +hands, which requires no comment." I differ from this worthy teacher. +Rather is Niecks more to my taste: "No. 12, C minor, in which the +emotions rise not less high than the waves of arpeggios which symbolize +them." + +Von Bulow is didactic: + + The requisite strength for this grandiose bravura study can + only be attained by the utmost clearness, and thus only by a + gradually increasing speed. It is therefore most desirable to + practise it piano also by way of variety, for otherwise the + strength of tone might easily degenerate into hardness, and in + the poetic striving after a realistic portrayal of a storm on + the piano the instrument, as well as the piece, would come to + grief. + + The pedal is needful to give the requisite effect, and must + change with every new harmony; but it should only be used in + the latter stages of study, when the difficulties are nearly + mastered. + +We have our preferences. Mine in op. 25 is the C minor study, which, +like the prelude in D minor, is "full of the sound of great guns." +Willeby thinks otherwise. On page 81 in his life of Chopin he has the +courage to write: "Had Professor Niecks applied the term monotonous to +No. 12 we should have been more ready to indorse his opinion, as, +although great power is manifested, the very 'sameness' of the form of +the arpeggio figure causes a certain amount of monotony to be felt." +The C minor study is, in a degree, a return to the first study in C. +While the idea in the former is infinitely nobler, more dramatic and +tangible, there is in the latter naked, primeval simplicity, the larger +eloquence, the elemental puissance. Monotonous? A thousand times no! +Monotonous as is the thunder and spray of the sea when it tumbles and +roars on some sullen, savage shore. Beethov-ian, in its ruggedness, the +Chopin of this C minor study is as far removed from the musical +dandyisms of the Parisian drawing rooms as is Beethoven himself. It is +orchestral in intention and a true epic of the piano. + +Riemann places half notes at the beginning of each measure, as a +reminder of the necessary clinging of the thumbs. I like Von Bulow's +version the best of all. His directions are most minute. He gives the +Liszt method of working up the climax in octave triplets. How Liszt +must have thundered through this tumultuous work! Before it all +criticism should be silenced that fails to allow Chopin a place among +the greatest creative musicians. We are here in the presence of Chopin +the musician, not Chopin the composer for piano. + + +III + + +In 1840, Trois Nouvelles Etudes, by Frederic Chopin, appeared in the +"Methode des Methodes pour le piano," by F. J. Fetis and I. Moscheles. +It was odd company for the Polish composer. "Internal evidence seems to +show," writes Niecks, "that these weakest of the master's +studies--which, however, are by no means uninteresting and certainly +very characteristic--may be regarded more than op. 25 as the outcome of +a gleaning." + +The last decade has added much to the artistic stature of these three +supplementary studies. They have something of the concision of the +Preludes. The first is a masterpiece. In F minor the theme in triplet +quarters, broad, sonorous and passionate, is unequally pitted against +four-eight notes in the bass. The technical difficulty to be overcome +is purely rhythmic, and Kullak takes pains to show how it may be +overcome. It is the musical, the emotional content of the study that +fascinates. The worthy editor calls it a companion piece to the F minor +study in op. 25. The comparison is not an apt one. Far deeper is this +new study, and although the doors never swing quite open, we divine the +tragic issues concealed. + +Beautiful in a different way is the A flat study which follows. Again +the problem is a rhythmical one, and again the composer demonstrates +his exhaustless invention and his power of evoking a single mood, +viewing all its lovely contours and letting it melt away like dream +magic. Full of gentle sprightliness and lingering sweetness is this +study. Chopin has the hypnotic quality more than any composer of the +century, Richard Wagner excepted. After you have enjoyed playing this +study read Kullak and his "triplicity in biplicity." It may do you +good, and it will not harm the music. + +In all the editions save one that I have seen the third study in D flat +begins on A flat, like the famous Valse in D flat. The exception is +Klindworth, who starts with B flat, the note above. The study is full +of sunny, good humor, spiritualized humor, and leaves the most cheering +impression after its performance. Its technical object is a +simultaneous legato and staccato. The result is an idealized Valse in +allegretto tempo, the very incarnation of joy, tempered by aristocratic +reserve. Chopin never romps, but he jests wittily, and always in +supremely good taste. This study fitly closes his extraordinary labors +in this form, and it is as if he had signed it "F. Chopin, et ego in +Arcady." + +Among the various editions let me recommend Klindworth for daily usage, +while frequent reference to Von Bulow, Riemann and Kullak cannot fail +to prove valuable, curious and interesting. + +Of the making of Chopin editions there is seemingly no end. In 1894 I +saw in manuscript some remarkable versions of the Chopin Studies by +Leopold Godowsky. The study in G sharp minor was the first one +published and played in public by this young pianist Unlike the Brahms +derangements, they are musical but immensely difficult. Topsy-turvied +as are the figures, a Chopin, even if lop-sided, hovers about, +sometimes with eye-brows uplifted, sometimes with angry, knitted +forehead and not seldom amused to the point of smiling. You see his +narrow shoulders, shrugged in the Polish fashion as he examines the +study in double-thirds transposed to the left hand! Curiously enough +this transcription, difficult as it is, does not tax the fingers as +much as a bedevilment of the A minor, op. 25, No. 4, which is extremely +difficult, demanding color discrimination and individuality of finger. + +More breath-catching, and a piece at which one must cry out: "Hats off, +gentlemen! A tornado!" is the caprice called "Badinage." But if it is +meant to badinage, it is no sport for the pianist of everyday technical +attainments. This is formed of two studies. In the right hand is the G +flat study, op. 25, No. 9, and in the left the black key study, op. 10, +No. 5. The two go laughing through the world like old friends; brother +and sister they are tonally, trailing behind them a cloud of iridescent +glory. Godowsky has cleverly combined the two, following their melodic +curves as nearly as is possible. In some places he has thickened the +harmonies and shifted the "black key" figures to the right hand. It is +the work of a remarkable pianist. This is the way it looks on paper at +the beginning: + +[Musical llustration] + +The same study G flat, op. 10, No. 5, is also treated separately, the +melody being transferred to the treble. The Butterfly octaves, in +another study, are made to hop nimbly along in the left hand, and the C +major study, op. 10, No. 7, Chopin's Toccata, is arranged for the left +hand, and seems very practical and valuable. Here the adapter has +displayed great taste and skill, especially on the third page. The +pretty musical idea is not destroyed, but viewed from other points of +vantage. Op. 10, No. 2, is treated like a left hand study, as it should +be. Chopin did not always give enough work to the left hand, and the +first study of this opus in C is planned on brilliant lines for both +hands. Ingenious is the manipulation of the seldom played op. 25, No. +5, in E minor. As a study in rhythms and double notes it is very +welcome. The F minor study, op. 25, No. 2, as considered by the +ambidextrous Godowsky, is put in the bass, where it whirrs along to the +melodic encouragement of a theme of the paraphraser's own, in the +right. This study has suffered the most of all, for Brahms, in his +heavy, Teutonic way, set it grinding double sixths, while Isidor +Philipp, in his "Studies for the Left Hand," has harnessed it to sullen +octaves. This Frenchman, by the way, has also arranged for left hand +alone the G sharp minor, the D flat double sixths, the A minor--"Winter +Wind"--studies, the B flat minor prelude, and, terrible to relate, the +last movement of the Chopin B flat minor Sonata. + +Are the Godowsky transcriptions available? Certainly. In ten years--so +rapid is the technical standard advancing--they will be used in the +curriculum of students. Whether he has treated Chopin with reverence I +leave my betters to determine. What has reverence to do with the case, +anyhow? Plato is parsed in the schoolroom, and Beethoven taught in +conservatories! Therefore why worry over the question of Godowsky's +attitude! Besides, he is writing for the next generation--presumably a +generation of Rosenthals. + +And now, having passed over the salt and stubbly domain of pedagogics, +what is the dominant impression gleaned from the twenty-seven Chopin +studies? Is it not one of admiration, tinged with wonder at such a +prodigal display of thematic and technical invention? Their variety is +great, the aesthetic side is nowhere neglected for the purely +mechanical, and in the most poetic of them stuff may be found for +delicate fingers. Astounding, canorous, enchanting, alembicated and +dramatic, the Chopin studies are exemplary essays in emotion and +manner. In them is mirrored all of Chopin, the planetary as well as the +secular Chopin. When most of his piano music has gone the way of all +things fashioned by mortal hands, these studies will endure, will stand +for the nineteenth century as Beethoven crystallized the eighteenth, +Bach the seventeenth centuries in piano music. Chopin is a classic. + + + + +VII. MOODS IN MINIATURE:--THE PRELUDES. + + +The Preludes bear the opus number 28 and are dedicated to J. C. +Kessler, a composer of well-known piano studies. It is only the German +edition that bears his name, the French and English being inscribed by +Chopin "a son ami Pleyel." As Pleyel advanced the pianist 2,000 francs +for the Preludes he had a right to say: "These are my Preludes." Niecks +is authority for Chopin's remark: "I sold the Preludes to Pleyel +because he liked them." This was in 1838, when Chopin's health demanded +a change of climate. He wished to go to Majorca with Madame Sand and +her children, and had applied for money to the piano maker and +publisher, Camille Pleyel. He received but five hundred francs in +advance, the balance being paid on delivery of the manuscript. + +The Preludes were published in 1839, yet there is internal evidence +which proves that most of them had been composed before the trip to the +Balearic Islands. This will upset the very pretty legend of music +making at the monastery of Valdemosa. Have we not all read with sweet +credulity the eloquent pages in George Sand in which the storm is +described that overtook the novelist and her son Maurice? After +terrible trials, dangers and delays, they reached their home and found +Chopin at the piano. Uttering a cry, he arose and stared at the pair. +"Ah! I knew well that you were dead." It was the sixth prelude, the one +in B minor, that he played, and dreaming, as Sand writes, that "he saw +himself drowned in a lake; heavy, ice cold drops of water fell at +regular intervals upon his breast; and when I called his attention to +those drops of water which were actually falling upon the roof, he +denied having heard them. He was even vexed at what I translated by the +term, imitative harmony. He protested with all his might, and he was +right, against the puerility of these imitations for the ear. His +genius was full of mysterious harmonies of nature." + +Yet this prelude was composed previous to the Majorcan episode. "The +Preludes," says Niecks, "consist--to a great extent, at least--of +pickings from the composer's portfolios, of pieces, sketches and +memoranda written at various times and kept to be utilized when +occasion might offer." + +Gutmann, Chopin's pupil, who nursed him to the last, declared the +Preludes to have been composed before he went away with Madame Sand, +and to Niecks personally he maintained that he had copied all of them. +Niecks does not credit him altogether, for there are letters in which +several of the Preludes are mentioned as being sent to Paris, so he +reaches the conclusion that "Chopin's labors at Majorca on the Preludes +were confined to selecting, filing and polishing." This seems to be a +sensible solution. + +Robert Schumann wrote of these Preludes: "I must signalize them as most +remarkable. I will confess I expected something quite different, +carried out in the grand style of his studies. It is almost the +contrary here; these are sketches, the beginning of studies, or, if you +will, ruins, eagles' feathers, all strangely intermingled. But in every +piece we find in his own hand, 'Frederic Chopin wrote it.' One +recognizes him in his pauses, in his impetuous respiration. He is the +boldest, the proudest poet soul of his time. To be sure the book also +contains some morbid, feverish, repellant traits; but let everyone look +in it for something that will enchant him. Philistines, however, must +keep away." + +It was in these Preludes that Ignaz Moscheles first comprehended Chopin +and his methods of execution. The German pianist had found his music +harsh and dilettantish in modulation, but Chopin's originality of +performance--"he glides lightly over the keys in a fairy-like way with +his delicate fingers"--quite reconciled the elder man to this strange +music. + +To Liszt the Preludes seem modestly named, but "are not the less types +of perfection in a mode created by himself, and stamped like all his +other works with the high impress of his poetic genius. Written in the +commencement of his career, they are characterized by a youthful vigor +not to be found in some of his subsequent works, even when more +elaborate, finished and richer in combinations; a vigor which is +entirely lost in his latest productions, marked by an overexcited +sensibility, a morbid irritability, and giving painful intimations of +his own state of suffering and exhaustion." + +Liszt, as usual, erred on the sentimental side. Chopin, being +essentially a man of moods, like many great men, and not necessarily +feminine in this respect, cannot always be pinned down to any +particular period. Several of the Preludes are very morbid--I purposely +use this word--as is some of his early music, while he seems quite gay +just before his death. + +"The Preludes follow out no technical idea, are free creations on a +small basis, and exhibit the musician in all his versatility," says +Louis Ehlert. "No work of Chopin's portrays his inner organization so +faithfully and completely. Much is embryonic. It is as though he turned +the leaves of his fancy without completely reading any page. Still, one +finds in them the thundering power of the Scherzi, the half satirical, +half coquettish elegance of the Mazurkas, and the southern, luxuriously +fragrant breath of the Nocturnes. Often it is as though they were small +falling stars dissolved into tones as they fall." + +Jean Kleczynski, who is credited with understanding Chopin, himself a +Pole and a pianist, thinks that "people have gone too far in seeking in +the Preludes for traces of that misanthropy, of that weariness of life +to which he was prey during his stay in the Island of Majorca...Very +few of the Preludes present this character of ennui, and that which is +the most marked, the second one, must have been written, according to +Count Tarnowski, a long time before he went to Majorca. ... What is +there to say concerning the other Preludes, full of good humor and +gaiety--No. 18, in E flat; No. 21, in B flat; No. 23, in F, or the +last, in D minor? Is it not strong and energetic, concluding, as it +does, with three cannon shots?" + +Willeby in his "Frederic Francois Chopin" considers at length the +Preludes. He agrees in the main with Niecks, that certain of these +compositions were written at Valdemosa--Nos. 4, 6, 9, 13, 20 and +21--and that "Chopin, having sketches of others with him, completed the +whole there, and published them under one opus number. ... The +atmosphere of those I have named is morbid and azotic; to them there +clings a faint flavor of disease, a something which is overripe in its +lusciousness and febrile in its passion. This in itself inclines me to +believe they were written at the time named." + +This is all very well, but Chopin was faint and febrile in his music +before he went to Majorca, and the plain facts adduced by Gutmann and +Niecks cannot be passed over. Henry James, an old admirer of Madame +Sand, admits her utter unreliability, and so we may look upon her +evidence as romantic but by no means infallible. The case now stands: +Chopin may have written a few of the Preludes at Majorca, filed them, +finished them, but the majority of them were in his portfolio in 1837 +and 1838. Op. 45, a separate Prelude in C sharp minor, was published in +December, 1841. It was composed at Nohant in August of that year. It is +dedicated to Mme. la Princesse Elizabeth Czernicheff, whose name, as +Chopin confesses in a letter, he knows not how to spell. + + +II + + +Theodore Kullak is curt and pedagogic in his preface to the Preludes. +He writes: + + Chopin's genius nowhere reveals itself more charmingly than + within narrowly bounded musical forms. The Preludes are, in + their aphoristic brevity, masterpieces of the first rank. Some + of them appear like briefly sketched mood pictures related to + the nocturne style, and offer no technical hindrance even to + the less advanced player. I mean Nos. 4, 6, 7, 9, 15 and 20. + More difficult are Nos. 17, 25 and 11, without, however, + demanding eminent virtuosity. The other Preludes belong to a + species of character-etude. Despite their brevity of outline + they are on a par with the great collections op. 10 and op. + 25. In so far as it is practicable--special cases of + individual endowments not being taken into consideration--I + would propose the following order of succession: Begin with + Nos. 1, 14, 10, 22, 23, 3 and 18. Very great bravura is + demanded by Nos. 12, 8, 16 and 24. The difficulty of the other + Preludes, Nos. 2, 5, 13, 19 and 21, lies in the delicate piano + and legato technique, which, on account of the extended + positions, leaps and double notes, presupposes a high degree + of development. + +This is eminently a common sense grouping. The first prelude, which, +like the first etude, begins in C, has all the characteristics of an +impromptu. We know the wonderful Bach Preludes, which grew out of a +free improvisation to the collection of dance forms called a suite, and +the preludes which precede his fugues. In the latter Bach sometimes +exhibits all the objectivity of the study or toccata, and often wears +his heart in full view. Chopin's Preludes--the only preludes to be +compared to Bach's--are largely personal, subjective, and intimate. +This first one is not Bach-ian, yet it could have been written by no +one but a devout Bach student. The pulsating, passionate, agitated, +feverish, hasty qualities of the piece are modern; so is the changeful +modulation. It is a beautiful composition, rising to no dramatic +heights, but questioning and full of life. Klindworth writes in triplet +groups, Kullak in quintolets. Breitkopf & Hartel do not. Dr. Hugo +Riemann, who has edited a few of the Preludes, phrases the first bars +thus: + +Desperate and exasperating to the nerves is the second prelude in A +minor. It is an asymmetric tune. Chopin seldom wrote ugly music, but is +this not ugly, forlorn, despairing, almost grotesque, and discordant? +It indicates the deepest depression in its sluggish, snake-like +progression. Willeby finds a resemblance to the theme of the first +nocturne. And such a theme! The tonality is vague, beginning in E +minor. Chopin's method of thematic parallelism is here very clear. A +small figure is repeated in descending keys until hopeless gloom and +depraved melancholy are reached in the closing chords. Chopin now is +morbid, here are all his most antipathetic qualities. There is aversion +to life--in this music he is a true lycanthrope. A self-induced +hypnosis, a mental, an emotional atrophy are all present. + +Kullak divides the accompaniment, difficult for small hands, between +the two. Riemann detaches the eighth notes of the bass figures, as is +his wont, for greater clearness. Like Klindworth, he accents heavily +the final chords. He marks his metronome 50 to the half note. All the +editions are lento with alla breve. + +That the Preludes are a sheaf of moods, loosely held together by the +rather vague title, is demonstrated by the third, in the key of G. The +rippling, rain-like figure for the left hand is in the nature of a +study. The melody is delicate in sentiment, Gallic in its esprit. A +true salon piece, this prelude has no hint of artificiality. It is a +precise antithesis to the mood of the previous one. Graceful and gay, +the G major prelude is a fair reflex of Chopin's sensitive and +naturally buoyant nature. It requires a light hand and nimble fingers. +The melodic idea requires no special comment. Kullak phrases it +differently from Riemann and Klindworth. The latter is the preferable. +Klindworth gives 72 to the half note as his metronomic marking, Riemann +only 60--which is too slow--while Klindworth contents himself by +marking a simple Vivace. Regarding the fingering one may say that all +tastes are pleased in these three editions. Klindworth's is the +easiest. Riemann breaks up the phrase in the bass figure, but I cannot +see the gain on the musical side. + +Niecks truthfully calls the fourth prelude in E minor "a little poem, +the exquisitely sweet, languid pensiveness of which defies description. +The composer seems to be absorbed in the narrow sphere of his ego, from +which the wide, noisy world is for the time shut out." Willeby finds +this prelude to be "one of the most beautiful of these spontaneous +sketches; for they are no more than sketches. The melody seems +literally to wail, and reaches its greatest pitch of intensity at the +stretto." For Karasowski it is a "real gem, and alone would immortalize +the name of Chopin as a poet." It must have been this number that +impelled Rubinstein to assert that the Preludes were the pearls of his +works. In the Klindworth edition, fifth bar from the last, the editor +has filled in the harmonies to the first six notes of the left hand, +added thirds, which is not reprehensible, although uncalled for. Kullak +makes some new dynamic markings and several enharmonic changes. He also +gives as metronome 69 to the quarter. This tiny prelude contains +wonderful music. The grave reiteration of the theme may have suggested +to Peter Cornelius his song "Ein Ton." Chopin expands a melodic unit, +and one singularly pathetic. The whole is like some canvas by +Rembrandt, Rembrandt who first dramatized the shadow in which a single +motif is powerfully handled; some sombre effect of echoing light in the +profound of a Dutch interior. For background Chopin has substituted his +soul; no one in art, except Bach or Rembrandt, could paint as Chopin +did in this composition. Its despair has the antique flavor, and there +is a breadth, nobility and proud submission quite free from the +tortured, whimpering complaint of the second prelude. The picture is +small, but the subject looms large in meanings. + +The fifth prelude in D is Chopin at his happiest. Its arabesque pattern +conveys a most charming content; and there is a dewy freshness, a joy +in life, that puts to flight much of the morbid tittle-tattle about +Chopin's sickly soul. The few bars of this prelude, so seldom heard in +public, reveal musicianship of the highest order. The harmonic scheme +is intricate; Klindworth phrases the first four bars so as to bring out +the alternate B and B flat. It is Chopin spinning his finest, his most +iridescent web. + +The next prelude, the sixth, in B minor, is doleful, pessimistic. As +George Sand says: "It precipitates the soul into frightful depression." +It is the most frequently played--and oh! how meaninglessly--prelude of +the set; this and the one in D flat. Classical is its repression of +feeling, its pure contour. The echo effect is skilfully managed, +monotony being artfully avoided. Klindworth rightfully slurs the duple +group of eighths; Kullak tries for the same effect by different means. +The duality of the voices should be clearly expressed. The tempo, +marked in both editions, lento assai, is fast. To be precise, +Klindworth gives 66 to the quarter. + +The plaintive little mazurka of two lines, the seventh prelude, is a +mere silhouette of the national dance. Yet in its measures is +compressed all Mazovia. Klindworth makes a variant in the fourth bar +from the last, a G sharp instead of an F sharp. It is a more piquant +climax, perhaps not admissible to the Chopin purist. In the F sharp +minor prelude No. 7, Chopin gives us a taste of his grand manner. For +Niecks the piece is jerky and agitated, and doubtless suggests a mental +condition bordering on anxiety; but if frenzy there is, it is kept well +in check by the exemplary taste of the composer. The sadness is rather +elegiac, remote, and less poignant than in the E minor prelude. +Harmonic heights are reached on the second page--surely Wagner knew +these bars when he wrote "Tristan and Isolde"--while the ingenuity of +the figure and avoidance of a rhythmical monotone are evidences of +Chopin's feeling for the decorative. It is a masterly prelude. +Klindworth accents the first of the bass triplets, and makes an +unnecessary enharmonic change at the sixth and seventh lines. + +There is a measure of grave content in the ninth prelude in E. It is +rather gnomic, and contains hints of both Brahms and Beethoven. It has +an ethical quality, but that may be because of its churchly rhythm and +color. + +The C sharp minor prelude, No. 10, must be the "eagle wings" of +Schumann's critique. There is a flash of steel gray, deepening into +black, and then the vision vanishes as though some huge bird aloft had +plunged down through blazing sunlight, leaving a color-echo in the void +as it passed to its quarry. Or, to be less figurative, this prelude is +a study in arpeggio, with double notes interspersed, and is too short +to make more than a vivid impression. + +No. II in B is all too brief. It is vivacious, dolce indeed, and most +cleverly constructed. Klindworth gives a more binding character to the +first double notes. Another gleam of the Chopin sunshine. + +Storm clouds gather in the G sharp minor, the twelfth prelude, so +unwittingly imitated by Grieg in his Menuetto of the same key, and in +its driving presto we feel the passionate clench of Chopin's hand. It +is convulsed with woe, but the intellectual grip, the self-command are +never lost in these two pages of perfect writing. The figure is +suggestive, and there is a well defined technical problem, as well as a +psychical character. Disputed territory is here: the editors do not +agree about the twelfth and eleventh bars from the last. According to +Breitkopf & Hartel the bass octaves are E both times. Mikuli gives G +sharp the first time instead of E; Klindworth, G sharp the second time; +Riemann, E, and also Kullak. The G sharp seems more various. + +In the thirteenth prelude, F sharp major, here is lovely atmosphere, +pure and peaceful. The composer has found mental rest. Exquisitely +poised are his pinions for flight, and in the piu lento he wheels +significantly and majestically about in the blue. The return to earth +is the signal for some strange modulatory tactics. It is an impressive +close. Then, almost without pause, the blood begins to boil in this +fragile man's veins. His pulse beat increases, and with stifled rage he +rushes into the battle. It is the fourteenth prelude in the sinister +key of E flat minor, and its heavy, sullen-arched triplets recalls for +Niecks the last movement of the B flat minor Sonata; but there is less +interrogation in the prelude, less sophistication, and the heat of +conflict over it all. There is not a break in the clouds until the +beginning of the fifteenth, the familiar prelude in D flat. + +This must be George Sand's: "Some of them create such vivid impressions +that the shades of dead monks seem to rise and pass before the hearer +in solemn and gloomy funereal pomp." The work needs no programme. Its +serene beginning, lugubrious interlude, with the dominant pedal never +ceasing, a basso ostinato, gives color to Kleczynski's contention that +the prelude in B minor is a mere sketch of the idea fully elaborated in +No. 15. "The foundation of the picture is the drops of rain falling at +regular intervals"--the echo principle again--"which by their continual +patter bring the mind to a state of sadness; a melody full of tears is +heard through the rush of the rain; then passing to the key of C sharp +minor, it rises from the depths of the bass to a prodigious crescendo, +indicative of the terror which nature in its deathly aspect excites in +the heart of man. Here again the form does not allow the ideas to +become too sombre; notwithstanding the melancholy which seizes you, a +feeling of tranquil grandeur revives you." To Niecks, the C sharp minor +portion affects one as in an oppressive dream: "The re-entrance of the +opening D flat, which dispels the dreadful nightmare, comes upon one +with the smiling freshness of dear, familiar nature." + +The prelude has a nocturnal character. It has become slightly banal +from frequent repetition, likewise the C sharp minor study in opus 25. +But of its beauty, balance and exceeding chastity there can be no +doubt. The architecture is at once Greek and Gothic. + +The sixteenth prelude in the relative key of B flat minor is the +boldest of the set. Its scale figures, seldom employed by Chopin, boil +and glitter, the thematic thread of the idea never being quite +submerged. Fascinating, full of perilous acclivities and sudden +treacherous descents, this most brilliant of preludes is Chopin in +riotous spirits. He plays with the keyboard: it is an avalanche, anon a +cascade, then a swift stream, which finally, after mounting to the +skies, descends to an abyss. Full of imaginative lift, caprice and +stormy dynamics, this prelude is the darling of the virtuoso. Its +pregnant introduction is like a madly jutting rock from which the eagle +spirit of the composer precipitates itself. + +In the twenty-third bar there is curious editorial discrepancy. +Klindworth uses an A natural in the first of the four groups of +sixteenths, Kullak a B natural; Riemann follows Kullak. Nor is this +all. Kullak in the second group, right hand, has an E flat, Klindworth +a D natural. Which is correct? Klindworth's texture is more closely +chromatic and it sounds better, the chromatic parallelism being more +carefully preserved. Yet I fancy that Kullak has tradition on his side. + +The seventeenth prelude Niecks finds Mendelssohn-ian. I do not. It is +suave, sweet, well developed, yet Chopin to the core, and its harmonic +life surprisingly rich and novel. The mood is one of tranquillity. The +soul loses itself in early autumnal revery while there is yet splendor +on earth and in the skies. Full of tonal contrasts, this highly +finished composition is grateful to the touch. The eleven booming A +flats on the last page are historical. Klindworth uses a B flat instead +of a G at the beginning of the melody. It is logical, but is it Chopin? + +The fiery recitatives of No. 18 in F minor are a glimpse of Chopin, +muscular and not hectic. In these editions you will find three +different groupings of the cadenzas. It is Riemann's opportunity for +pedagogic editing, and he does not miss it. In the first long breathed +group of twenty-two sixteenth notes he phrases as shown on the +following page. + +It may be noticed that Riemann even changes the arrangement of the +bars. This prelude is dramatic almost to an operatic degree. Sonorous, +rather grandiloquent, it is a study in declamation, the declamation of +the slow movement in the F minor concerto. Schumann may have had the +first phrase in his mind when he wrote his Aufschwung. This page of +Chopin's, the torso of a larger idea, is nobly rhetorical. + +[Musical score excerpt] + +What piano music is the nineteenth prelude in E flat! Its widely +dispersed harmonies, its murmuring grace and June-like beauty, are they +not Chopin, the Chopin we best love? He is ever the necromancer, ever +invoking phantoms, but with its whirring melody and furtive caprice +this particular shape is an alluring one. And difficult it is to +interpret with all its plangent lyric freedom. + +No. 20 in C minor contains in its thirteen bars the sorrows of a +nation. It is without doubt a sketch for a funeral march, and of it +George Sand must have been thinking when she wrote that one prelude of +Chopin contained more music than all the trumpetings of Meyerbeer. + +Of exceeding loveliness is the B flat major prelude, No. 21. It is +superior in content and execution to most of the nocturnes. In feeling +it belongs to that form. The melody is enchanting. The accompaniment +figure shows inventive genius. Klindworth employs a short appoggiatura, +Kullak the long, in the second bar. Judge of what is true editorial +sciolism when I tell you that Riemann--who evidently believes in a +rigid melodic structure--has inserted an E flat at the end of bar four, +thus maiming the tender, elusive quality of Chopin's theme. This is +cruelly pedantic. The prelude arrests one in ecstasy; the fixed period +of contemplation of the saint or the hypnotized sets in, and the +awakening is almost painful. Chopin, adopting the relative minor key as +a pendant to the picture in B flat, thrills the nerves by a bold +dissonance in the next prelude, No. 22. Again, concise paragraphs +filled with the smoke of revolt and conflict The impetuosity of this +largely moulded piece in G minor, its daring harmonics,--read the +seventeenth and eighteenth bars,--and dramatic note make it an +admirable companion to the Prelude in F minor. Technically it serves as +an octave study for the left hand. + +In the concluding bar, but one, Chopin has in the F major Prelude +attempted a most audacious feat in harmony. An E flat in the bass of +the third group of sixteenths leaves the whole composition floating +enigmatically in thin air. It deliciously colors the close, leaving a +sense of suspense, of anticipation which is not tonally realized, for +the succeeding number is in a widely divorced key. But it must have +pressed hard the philistines. And this prelude, the twenty-third, is +fashioned out of the most volatile stuff. Aerial, imponderable, and +like a sun-shot spider web oscillating in the breeze of summer, its +hues change at every puff. It is in extended harmonics and must be +delivered with spirituality. The horny hand of the toilsome pianist +would shatter the delicate, swinging fantasy of the poet. Kullak points +out a variant in the fourteenth bar, G instead of B natural being used +by Riemann. Klindworth prefers the latter. + +We have reached the last prelude of op. 28. In D minor, it is +sonorously tragic, troubled by fevers and visions, and capricious, +irregular and massive in design. It may be placed among Chopin's +greater works: the two Etudes in C minor, the A minor, and the F sharp +minor Prelude. The bass requires an unusual span, and the suggestion by +Kullak, that the thumb of the right hand may eke out the weakness of +the left is only for the timid and the small of fist. But I do not +counsel following his two variants in the fifth and twenty-third bars. +Chopin's text is more telling. Like the vast reverberation of monstrous +waves on the implacable coast of a remote world is this prelude. +Despite its fatalistic ring, its note of despair is not dispiriting. +Its issues are larger, more impersonal, more elemental than the other +preludes. It is a veritable Appassionata, but its theatre is cosmic and +no longer behind the closed doors of the cabinet of Chopin's soul. The +Seelenschrei of Stanislaw Przybyszewski is here, explosions of wrath +and revolt; not Chopin suffers, but his countrymen. Kleczynski speaks +of the three tones at the close. They are the final clangor of +oppressed, almost overthrown, reason. After the subject reappears in C +minor there is a shift to D flat, and for a moment a point of repose is +gained, but this elusive rest is brief. The theme reappears in the +tonic and in octaves, and the tension becomes too great; the +accumulated passion discharges and dissolves in a fierce gust of double +chromatic thirds and octaves. Powerful, repellant, this prelude is +almost infernal in its pride and scorn. But in it I discern no vestige +of uncontrolled hysteria. It is well-nigh as strong, rank and human as +Beethoven. The various editorial phraseology is not of much moment. +Riemann uses thirty-second notes for the cadenzas, Kullak eighths and +Klindworth sixteenths. + +Niecks writes of the Prelude in C sharp minor, op. 45, that it +"deserves its name better than almost any one of the twenty-four; still +I would rather call it improvisata. It seems unpremeditated, a heedless +outpouring, when sitting at the piano in a lonely, dreary hour, perhaps +in the twilight. The quaver figure rises aspiringly, and the sustained +parts swell out proudly. The piquant cadenza forestalls in the +progression of diminished chords favorite effects of some of our more +modern composers. The modulation from C sharp minor to D major and back +again--after the cadenza--is very striking and equally beautiful." + +Elsewhere I have called attention to the Brahmsian coloring of this +prelude. Its mood is fugitive and hard to hold after capture. Recondite +it is and not music for the multitude. + +Niecks does not think Chopin created a new type in the Preludes. "They +are too unlike each other in form and character." Yet notwithstanding +the fleeting, evanescent moods of the Preludes, there is designedly a +certain unity of feeling and contrasted tonalities, all being grouped +in approved Bach-ian manner. This may be demonstrated by playing them +through at a sitting, which Arthur Friedheim, the Russian virtuoso, did +in a concert with excellent effect. As if wishing to exhibit his genius +in perspective, Chopin carved these cameos with exceeding fineness, +exceeding care. In a few of them the idea overbalances the form, but +the greater number are exquisite examples of a just proportion of +manner and matter, a true blending of voice and vision. Even in the +more microscopic ones the tracery, echoing like the spirals in strange +seashells, is marvellously measured. Much in miniature are these +sculptured Preludes of the Polish poet. + + + + +VIII. IMPROMPTUS AND VALSES + + +To write of the four Impromptus in their own key of unrestrained +feeling and pondered intention would not be as easy as recapturing the +first "careless rapture" of the lark. With all the freedom of an +improvisation the Chopin impromptu has a well defined form. There is +structural impulse, although the patterns are free and original. The +mood-color is not much varied in three, the first, third and fourth, +but in the second there is a ballade-like quality that hints of the +tragic. The A flat Impromptu, op. 29, is, if one is pinned down to the +title, the happiest named of the set. Its seething, prankish, nimble, +bubbling quality is indicated from the start; the D natural in the +treble against the C and E flat--the dominant--in the bass is a most +original effect, and the flowing triplets of the first part of this +piece give a ductile, gracious, high-bred character to it. The +chromatic involutions are many and interesting. When the F minor part +is reached the ear experiences the relief of a strongly contrasted +rhythm. The simple duple measure, so naturally ornamented, is nobly, +broadly melodious. After the return of the first dimpling theme there +is a short coda, a chiaroscura, and then with a few chords the +composition goes to rest. A bird flew that way! Rubato should be +employed, for, as Kleczynski says, "Here everything totters from +foundation to summit, and everything is, nevertheless, so beautiful and +so clear." But only an artist with velvety fingers should play this +sounding arabesque. + +There is more limpidezza, more pure grace of line in the first +Impromptu than in the second in F sharp, op. 36. Here symmetry is +abandoned, as Kullak remarks, but the compensation of intenser +emotional issues is offered. There is something sphinx-like in the pose +of this work. Its nocturnal beginning with the carillon-like bass--a +bass that ever recalls to me the faint, buried tones of Hauptmann's +"Sunken Bell," the sweetly grave close of the section, the faint +hoof-beats of an approaching cavalcade, with the swelling thunders of +its passage, surely suggests a narrative, a programme. After the D +major episode there are two bars of anonymous modulation--these bars +creak on their hinges--and the first subject reappears in F, then +climbs to F sharp, thence merges into a glittering melodic organ-point, +exciting, brilliant, the whole subsiding into an echo of earlier +harmonies. The final octaves are marked fortissimo which always seems +brutal. Yet its logic lies in the scheme of the composer. Perhaps he +wished to arouse us harshly from his dreamland, as was his habit while +improvising for friends--a glissando would send them home shivering +after an evening of delicious reverie. + +Niecks finds this Impromptu lacking the pith of the first. To me it is +of more moment than the other three. It is irregular and wavering in +outline, the moods are wandering and capricious, yet who dares deny its +power, its beauty? In its use of accessory figures it does not reveal +so much ingenuity, but just because the "figure in the carpet" is not +so varied in pattern, its passion is all the deeper. It is another +Ballade, sadder, more meditative of the tender grace of vanished days. + +The third Impromptu in G flat, op. 51, is not often played. It may be +too difficult for the vandal with an average technique, but it is +neither so fresh in feeling nor so spontaneous in utterance as its +companions. There is a touch of the faded, blase, and it is hardly +healthy in sentiment. Here are some ophidian curves in triplets, as in +the first Impromptu, but with interludes of double notes, in coloring +tropical and rich to morbidity. The E flat minor trio is a fine bit of +melodic writing. The absence of simplicity is counterbalanced by +greater freedom of modulation and complexity of pattern. The impromptu +flavor is not missing, and there is allied to delicacy of design a +strangeness of sentiment--that strangeness which Edgar Poe declared +should be a constituent element of all great art. + +The Fantaisie-Impromptu in C sharp minor, op. 66, was published by +Fontana in 1855, and is one of the few posthumous works of Chopin +worthy of consideration. It was composed about 1834. A true Impromptu, +but the title of Fantaisie given by Fontana is superfluous. The piece +presents difficulties, chiefly rhythmical. Its involuted first phrases +suggest the Bellini-an fioriture so dear to Chopin, but the D flat part +is without nobility. Here is the same kind of saccharine melody that +makes mawkish the trio in the "Marche Funebre." There seems no danger +that this Fantaisie-Impromptu will suffer from neglect, for it is the +joy of the piano student, who turns its presto into a slow, blurred +mess of badly related rhythms, and its slower movement into a long +drawn sentimental agony; but in the hands of a master the C sharp minor +Impromptu is charming, though not of great depth. + +The first Impromptu, dedicated to Mlle. la Comtesse de Lobau, was +published December, 1837; the second, May, 1840; the third, dedicated +to Madame la Comtesse Esterhazy, February, 1843. Not one of these four +Impromptus is as naive as Schubert's; they are more sophisticated and +do not smell of nature and her simplicities. + +Of the Chopin Valses it has been said that they are dances of the soul +and not of the body. Their animated rhythms, insouciant airs and +brilliant, coquettish atmosphere, the true atmosphere of the ballroom, +seem to smile at Ehlert's poetic exaggeration. The valses are the most +objective of the Chopin works, and in few of them is there more than a +hint of the sullen, Sargasson seas of the nocturnes and scherzi. +Nietzsche's la Gaya Scienza--the Gay Science--is beautifully set forth +in the fifteen Chopin valses. They are less intimate, in the psychic +sense, but exquisite exemplars of social intimacy and aristocratic +abandon. As Schumann declared, the dancers of these valses should be at +least countesses. There is a high-bred reserve despite their +intoxication, and never a hint of the brawling peasants of Beethoven, +Grieg, Brahms, Tschaikowsky, and the rest. But little of Vienna is in +Chopin. Around the measures of this most popular of dances he has +thrown mystery, allurement, and in them secret whisperings and the +unconscious sigh. It is going too far not to dance to some of this +music, for it is putting Chopin away from the world he at times loved. +Certain of the valses may be danced: the first, second, fifth, sixth, +and a few others. The dancing would be of necessity more picturesque +and less conventional than required by the average valse, and there +must be fluctuations of tempo, sudden surprises and abrupt languors. +The mazurkas and polonaises are danced to-day in Poland, why not the +valses? Chopin's genius reveals itself in these dance forms, and their +presentation should be not solely a psychic one. Kullak, stern old +pedagogue, divides these dances into two groups, the first dedicated to +"Terpsichore," the second a frame for moods. Chopin admitted that he +was unable to play valses in the Viennese fashion, yet he has contrived +to rival Strauss in his own genre. Some of these valses are trivial, +artificial, most of them are bred of candlelight and the swish of +silken attire, and a few are poetically morbid and stray across the +border into the rhythms of the mazurka. All of them have been edited to +death, reduced to the commonplace by vulgar methods of performance, but +are altogether sprightly, delightful specimens of the composer's +careless, vagrant and happy moods. + +Kullak utters words of warning to the "unquiet" sex regarding the +habitual neglect of the bass. It should mean something in valse tempo, +but it usually does not. Nor need it be brutally banged; the +fundamental tone must be cared for, the subsidiary harmonies lightly +indicated. The rubato in the valses need not obtrude itself as in the +mazurkas. + +Opus 18, in E flat, was published in June, 1834, and dedicated to Mile. +Laura Harsford. It is a true ballroom picture, spirited and infectious +in rhythms. Schumann wrote rhapsodically of it. The D flat section has +a tang of the later Chopin. There is bustle, even chatter, in this +valse, which in form and content is inferior to op. 34, No. I, A flat. +The three valses of this set were published December, 1838. There are +many editorial differences in the A flat Valse, owing to the careless +way it was copied and pirated. Klindworth and Kullak are the safest for +dynamic markings. This valse may be danced as far as its dithyrhambic +coda. Notice in this coda as in many other places the debt Schumann +owes Chopin for a certain passage in the Preambule of his "Carneval." + +The next Valse in A minor has a tinge of Sarmatian melancholy, indeed, +it is one of Chopin's most desponding moods. The episode in C rings of +the mazurka, and the A major section is of exceeding loveliness; Its +coda is characteristic. This valse is a favorite, and who need wonder? +The F major Valse, the last of this series, is a whirling, wild dance +of atoms. It has the perpetuum mobile quality, and older masters would +have prolonged its giddy arabesques into pages of senseless spinning. +It is quite long enough as it is. The second theme is better, but the +appoggiatures are flippant. It buzzes to the finish. Of it is related +that Chopin's cat sprang upon his keyboard and in its feline flight +gave him the idea of the first measures. I suppose as there is a dog +valse, there had to be one for the cat. + +But as Rossini would have said, "Ca sent de Scarlatti!" + +The A minor Valse was, of the three, Chopin's favorite. When Stephen +Heller told him this too was his beloved valse, Chopin was greatly +pleased, inviting the Hungarian composer, Niecks relates, to luncheon +at the Cafe Riche. + +Not improvised in the ballroom as the preceding, yet a marvellous +epitome is the A flat Valse, op. 42, published July, 1840. It is the +best rounded specimen of Chopin's experimenting with the form. The +prolonged trill on E flat, summoning us to the ballroom, the suggestive +intermingling of rhythms, duple and triple, the coquetry, hesitation, +passionate avowal and the superb coda, with its echoes of evening--have +not these episodes a charm beyond compare? Only Schumann in certain +pages of his "Carneval" seizes the secret of young life and love, but +his is not so finished, so glowing a tableau. + +Regarding certain phrasing of this valse Moriz Rosenthal wrote to the +London "Musical Standard": + + In Music there is Liberty and Fraternity, but seldom Equality, + and in music Social Democracy has no voice. Notes have a right + to the Aftertone (Nachton), and this right depends upon their + role in the key. The Vorhalt (accented passing note) will + always have an accent. On this point Riemann must without + question be considered right. Likewise the feeling player will + mark those notes that introduce the transition to another key. + We will consider now our example and set down my accents: + + [Musical score excerpt] + + In the first bar we have the tonic chord of its major key as + bass, and are thus not forced to any accent. In the second bar + we have the dominant harmony in the bass, and in the treble, + C, which falls upon the down beat as Vorhalt to the next tone + (B flat), so it must be accented. Also in the fourth bar the B + flat is Vorhalt to the B flat, and likewise requires an + accent. In bars 6, 7 and 8 the notes, A flat, B flat and C, + are without doubt the characteristic ones of the passage, and + the E flat has in each case only a secondary significance. + + That a genius like Chopin did not indicate everything + accurately is quite explainable. He flew where we merely limp + after. Moreover, these accents must be felt rather than + executed, with softest touch, and as tenderly as possible. + +The D flat Valse--"le valse du petit chien"--is of George Sand's own +prompting. One evening at her home in the Square d'Orleans, she was +amused by her little pet dog, chasing its tail. She begged Chopin, her +little pet pianist, to set the tail to music. He did so, and behold the +world is richer for this piece. I do not dispute the story. It seems +well grounded, but then it is so ineffably silly! The three valses of +this op. 64 were published September, 1847, and are respectively +dedicated to the Comtesse Delphine Potocka, the Baronne Nathaniel de +Rothschild and the Baronne Bronicka. + +I shall not presume to speak of the execution of the D flat Valse; like +the rich, it is always with us. It is usually taken at a meaningless, +rapid gait. I have heard it played by a genuine Chopin pupil, M. +Georges Mathias, and he did not take it prestissimo. He ran up the D +flat scale, ending with a sforzato at the top, and gave a variety of +nuance to the composition. The cantabile is nearly always delivered +with sloppiness of sentiment. This valse has been served up in a highly +indigestible condition for concert purposes by Tausig, Joseffy--whose +arrangement was the first to be heard here--Theodore Ritter, Rosenthal +and Isidor Philipp. + +The C sharp minor Valse is the most poetic of all. The first theme has +never been excelled by Chopin for a species of veiled melancholy. It is +a fascinating, lyrical sorrow, and what Kullak calls the psychologic +motivation of the first theme in the curving figure of the second does +not relax the spell. A space of clearer skies, warmer, more consoling +winds are in the D flat interlude, but the spirit of unrest, ennui +returns. The elegiac imprint is unmistakable in this soul dance. The A +flat Valse which follows is charming. It is for superior souls who +dance with intellectual joy, with the joy that comes of making +exquisite patterns and curves. Out of the salon and from its +brilliantly lighted spaces the dancers do not wander, do not dance into +the darkness and churchyard, as Ehlert imagines of certain other valses. + +The two valses in op. 69, three valses, op. 70, and the two remaining +valses in E minor and E major, need not detain us. They are posthumous. +The first of op. 69 in F minor was composed in 1836; the B minor in +1829; G flat, op. 70, in 1835; F minor in 1843, and D flat major, 1830. +The E major and E minor were composed in 1829. Fontana gave these +compositions to the world. The F minor Valse, op. 69, No. 1, has a +charm of its own. Kullak prints the Fontana and Klindworth variants. +This valse is suavely melancholy, but not so melancholy as the B minor +of the same opus. It recalls in color the B minor mazurka. Very gay and +sprightly is the G flat Valse, op. 70, No. I. The next in F minor has +no special physiognomy, while the third in D flat contains, as Niecks +points out, germs of the op. 42 and the op. 34 Valses. It recalls to me +the D flat study in the supplementary series. The E minor Valse, +without opus, is beloved. It is very graceful and not without +sentiment. The major part is the early Chopin. The E major Valse is +published in the Mikuli edition. It is commonplace, hinting of its +composer only in places. Thus ends the collection of valses, not +Chopin's most signal success in art, but a success that has dignified +and given beauty to this conventional dance form. + + + + +IX. NIGHT AND ITS MELANCHOLY MYSTERIES:--THE NOCTURNES + + +Here is the chronology of the nocturnes: Op. 9, three nocturnes, +January, 1833; op. 15, three nocturnes, January, 1834; op. 27, two +nocturnes, May, 1836; op. 32, two nocturnes, December, 1837; op. 37, +two nocturnes, May, 1840; op. 48, two nocturnes, November, 1841; op. +55, two nocturnes, August, 1844; op. 62, two nocturnes, September, +1846. In addition there is a nocturne written in 1828 and published by +Fontana, with the opus number 72, No. 2, and the lately discovered one +in C sharp minor, written when Chopin was young and published in 1895. +This completes the nocturne list, but following Niecks' system of +formal grouping I include the Berceuse and Barcarolle as full fledged +specimens of nocturnes. + +John Field has been described as the forerunner of Chopin. The limpid +style of this pupil and friend of Clementi, his beautiful touch and +finished execution, were certainly admired and imitated by the Pole. +Field's nocturnes are now neglected--so curious are Time's +caprices--and without warrant, for not only is Field the creator of the +form, but in both his concertos and nocturnes he has written charming, +sweet and sane music. He rather patronized Chopin, for whose melancholy +pose he had no patience. "He has a talent of the hospital," growled +Field in the intervals between his wine drinking, pipe smoking and the +washing of his linen--the latter economical habit he contracted from +Clementi. There is some truth in his stricture. Chopin, seldom +exuberantly cheerful, is morbidly sad and complaining in many of the +nocturnes. The most admired of his compositions, with the exception of +the valses, they are in several instances his weakest. Yet he ennobled +the form originated by Field, giving it dramatic breadth, passion and +even grandeur. Set against Field's naive and idyllic specimens, +Chopin's efforts are often too bejewelled for true simplicity, too +lugubrious, too tropical--Asiatic is a better word--and they have the +exotic savor of the heated conservatory, and not the fresh scent of the +flowers reared in the open by the less poetic Irishman. And, then, +Chopin is so desperately sentimental in some of these compositions. +They are not altogether to the taste of this generation; they seem to +be suffering from anaemia. However, there are a few noble nocturnes; +and methods of performance may have much to answer for the +sentimentalizing of some others. More vigor, a quickening of the +time-pulse, and a less languishing touch will rescue them from lush +sentiment. Chopin loved the night and its soft mysteries as much as did +Robert Louis Stevenson, and his nocturnes are true night pieces, some +with agitated, remorseful countenance, others seen in profile only, +while many are whisperings at dusk. Most of them are called feminine, a +term psychologically false. The poetic side of men of genius is +feminine, and in Chopin the feminine note was over emphasized--at times +it was almost hysterical--particularly in these nocturnes. + +The Scotch have a proverb: "She wove her shroud, and wore it in her +lifetime." In the nocturnes the shroud is not far away. Chopin wove his +to the day of his death, and he wore it sometimes but not always, as +many think. + +One of the most elegiac of his nocturnes is the first in B flat minor. +It is one of three, op. 9, dedicated to Mme. Camille Pleyel. Of far +more significance than its two companions, it is, for some reason, +neglected. While I am far from agreeing with those who hold that in the +early Chopin all his genius was completely revealed, yet this nocturne +is as striking as the last, for it is at once sensuous and dramatic, +melancholy and lovely. Emphatically a mood, it is best heard on a gray +day of the soul, when the times are out of joint; its silken tones will +bring a triste content as they pour out upon one's hearing. The second +section in octaves is of exceeding charm. As a melody it has all the +lurking voluptuousness and mystic crooning of its composer. There is +flux and reflux throughout, passion peeping out in the coda. + +The E flat nocturne is graceful, shallow of content, but if it is +played with purity of touch and freedom from sentimentality it is not +nearly so banal as it usually seems. It is Field-like, therefore play +it as did Rubinstein, in a Field-like fashion. + +Hadow calls attention to the "remote and recondite modulations" in the +twelfth bar, the chromatic double notes. For him they only are one real +modulation, "the rest of the passage is an iridescent play of color, an +effect of superficies, not an effect of substance." It was the E flat +nocturne that unloosed Rellstab's critical wrath in the "Iris." Of it +he wrote: "Where Field smiles, Chopin makes a grinning grimace; where +Field sighs, Chopin groans; where Field shrugs his shoulders, Chopin +twists his whole body; where Field puts some seasoning into the food, +Chopin empties a handful of cayenne pepper. In short, if one holds +Field's charming romances before a distorting, concave mirror, so that +every delicate impression becomes a coarse one, one gets Chopin's work. +We implore Mr. Chopin to return to nature." + +Rellstab might have added that while Field was often commonplace, +Chopin never was. Rather is to be preferred the sound judgment of J. W. +Davison, the English critic and husband of the pianist, Arabella +Goddard. Of the early works he wrote: + + Commonplace is instinctively avoided in all the works of + Chopin--a stale cadence or a trite progression--a hum-drum + subject or a worn-out passage--a vulgar twist of the melody or + a hackneyed sequence--a meagre harmony or an unskilful + counterpoint--may in vain be looked for throughout the entire + range of his compositions, the prevailing characteristics of + which are a feeling as uncommon as beautiful; a treatment as + original as felicitous; a melody and a harmony as new, fresh, + vigorous and striking as they are utterly unexpected and out + of the original track. In taking up one of the works of Chopin + you are entering, as it were, a fairyland untrodden by human + footsteps--a path hitherto unfrequented but by the great + composer himself. + +Gracious, even coquettish, is the first part of the B major Nocturne of +this opus. Well knit, the passionate intermezzo has the true dramatic +Chopin ring. It should be taken alla breve. The ending is quite +effective. + +I do not care much for the F major Nocturne, op. 15, No. I. The opus is +dedicated to Ferdinand Hiller. Ehlert speaks of "the ornament in +triplets with which he brushes the theme as with the gentle wings of a +butterfly," and then discusses the artistic value of the ornament which +may be so profitably studied in the Chopin music. "From its nature, the +ornament can only beautify the beautiful." Music like Chopin's, "with +its predominating elegance, could not forego ornament. But he surely +did not purchase it of a jeweller; he designed it himself, with a +delicate hand. He was the first to surround a note with diamond facets +and to weave the rushing floods of his emotions with the silver beams +of the moonlight. In his nocturnes there is a glimmering as of distant +stars. From these dreamy, heavenly gems he has borrowed many a line. +The Chopin nocturne is a dramatized ornament. And why may not Art speak +for once in such symbols? In the much admired F sharp major Nocturne +the principal theme makes its appearance so richly decorated that one +cannot avoid imagining that his fancy confined itself to the Arabesque +form for the expression of its poetical sentiments. Even the middle +part borders upon what I should call the tragic style of ornament. The +ground thought is hidden behind a dense veil, but a veil, too, can be +an ornament." + +In another place Ehlert thinks that the F sharp major Nocturne seems +inseparable from champagne and truffles. It is certainly more elegant +and dramatic than the one in F major, which precedes it. That, with the +exception of the middle part in F minor, is weak, although rather +pretty and confiding. The F sharp Nocturne is popular. The "doppio +movemento" is extremely striking and the entire piece is saturated with +young life, love and feelings of good will to men. Read Kleczynski. The +third nocturne of the three is in G minor, and contains some fine, +picturesque writing. Kullak does not find in it aught of the fantastic. +The languid, earth-weary voice of the opening and the churchly refrain +of the chorale, is not this fantastic contrast! This nocturne contains +in solution all that Chopin developed later in a nocturne of the same +key. But I think the first stronger--its lines are simpler, more +primitive, its coloring less complicated, yet quite as rich and gloomy. +Of it Chopin said: "After Hamlet," but changed his mind. "Let them +guess for themselves," was his sensible conclusion. Kullak's programme +has a conventional ring. It is the lament for the beloved one, the lost +Lenore, with the consolation of religion thrown in. The "bell-tones" of +the plain chant bring to my mind little that consoles, although the +piece ends in the major mode. It is like Poe's "Ulalume." A complete +and tiny tone poem, Rubinstein made much of it. In the fourth bar and +for three bars there is a held note F, and I heard the Russian +virtuoso, by some miraculous means, keep this tone prolonged. The tempo +is abnormally slow, and the tone is not in a position where the +sustaining pedal can sensibly help it. Yet under Rubinstein's fingers +it swelled and diminished, and went singing into D, as if the +instrument were an organ. I suspected the inaudible changing of fingers +on the note or a sustaining pedal. It was wonderfully done. + +The next nocturne, op. 27, No. I, brings us before a masterpiece. With +the possible exception of the C minor Nocturne, this one in the sombre +key of C sharp minor is the great essay in the form. Kleczynski finds +it "a description of a calm night at Venice, where, after a scene of +murder, the sea closes over a corpse and continues to serve as a mirror +to the moonlight." This is melodramatic. Willeby analyzes it at length +with the scholarly fervor of an English organist. He finds the +accompaniment to be "mostly on a double pedal," and remarks that +"higher art than this one could not have if simplicity of means be a +factor of high art." The wide-meshed figure of the left hand supports a +morbid, persistent melody that grates on the nerves. From the piu mosso +the agitation increases, and here let me call to your notice the +Beethoven-ish quality of these bars, which continue until the change of +signature. There is a surprising climax followed by sunshine and favor +in the D flat part, then after mounting dissonances a bold succession +of octaves returns to the feverish plaint of the opening. Kullak speaks +of a resemblance to Meyerbeer's song, Le Moine. The composition reaches +exalted states. Its psychological tension is so great at times as to +border on a pathological condition. There is unhealthy power in this +nocturne, which is seldom interpreted with sinister subtlety. Henry T. +Finck rightfully thinks it "embodies a greater variety of emotion and +more genuine dramatic spirit on four pages than many operas on four +hundred." + +The companion picture in D flat, op. 27, No. 2, has, as Karasowski +writes, "a profusion of delicate fioriture." It really contains but one +subject, and is a song of the sweet summer of two souls, for there is +obvious meaning in the duality of voices. Often heard in the concert +room, this nocturne gives us a surfeit of sixths and thirds of +elaborate ornamentation and monotone of mood. Yet it is a lovely, +imploring melody, and harmonically most interesting. A curious marking, +and usually overlooked by pianists, is the crescendo and con forza of +the cadenza. This is obviously erroneous. The theme, which occurs three +times, should first be piano, then pianissimo, and lastly forte. This +opus is dedicated to the Comtesse d'Appony. + +The best part of the next nocturne,--B major, op. 32, No. I, dedicated +to Madame de Billing--is the coda. It is in the minor and is like the +drum-beat of tragedy. The entire ending, a stormy recitative, is in +stern contrast to the dreamy beginning. Kullak in the first bar of the +last line uses a G; Fontana, F sharp, and Klindworth the same as +Kullak. The nocturne that follows in A flat is a reversion to the Field +type, the opening recalling that master's B flat Nocturne. The F minor +section of Chopin's broadens out to dramatic reaches, but as an +entirety this opus is a little tiresome. Nor do I admire inordinately +the Nocturne in G minor, op. 37, No. 1. It has a complaining tone, and +the choral is not noteworthy. This particular part, so Chopin's pupil +Gutmann declared, is taken too slowly, the composer having forgotten to +mark the increased tempo. But the Nocturne in G, op. 37, No. 2, is +charming. Painted with Chopin's most ethereal brush, without the +cloying splendors of the one in D flat, the double sixths, fourths and +thirds are magically euphonious. The second subject, I agree with +Karasowski, is the most beautiful melody Chopin ever wrote. It is in +true barcarolle vein; and most subtle are the shifting harmonic hues. +Pianists usually take the first part too fast, the second too slowly, +transforming this poetic composition into an etude. As Schumann wrote +of this opus: + +"The two nocturnes differ from his earlier ones chiefly through greater +simplicity of decoration and more quiet grace. We know Chopin's +fondness in general for spangles, gold trinkets and pearls. He has +already changed and grown older; decoration he still loves, but it is +of a more judicious kind, behind which the nobility of the poetry +shimmers through with all the more loveliness: indeed, taste, the +finest, must be granted him." + +Both numbers of this opus are without dedication. They are the +offspring of the trip to Majorca. + +Niecks, writing of the G major Nocturne, adjures us "not to tarry too +long in the treacherous atmosphere of this Capua--it bewitches and +unmans." Kleczynski calls the one in G minor "homesickness," while the +celebrated Nocturne in C minor "is the tale of a still greater grief +told in an agitated recitando; celestial harps"--ah! I hear the squeak +of the old romantic machinery--"come to bring one ray of hope, which is +powerless in its endeavor to calm the wounded soul, which...sends forth +to heaven a cry of deepest anguish." It doubtless has its despairing +movement, this same Nocturne in C minor, op. 48, No. I, but Karasowski +is nearer right when he calls it "broad and most imposing with its +powerful intermediate movement, a thorough departure from the nocturne +style." Willeby finds it "sickly and labored," and even Niecks does not +think it should occupy a foremost place among its companions. The +ineluctable fact remains that this is the noblest nocturne of them all. +Biggest in conception it seems a miniature music drama. It requires the +grand manner to read it adequately, and the doppio movemento is +exciting to a dramatic degree. I fully agree with Kullak that too +strict adherence to the marking of this section produces the effect of +an "inartistic precipitation" which robs the movement of clarity. +Kleczynski calls the work The Contrition of a Sinner and devotes +several pages to its elucidation. De Lenz chats most entertainingly +with Tausig about it. Indeed, an imposing march of splendor is the +second subject in C. A fitting pendant is this work to the C sharp +minor Nocturne. Both have the heroic quality, both are free from +mawkishness and are of the greater Chopin, the Chopin of the mode +masculine. + +Niecks makes a valuable suggestion: "In playing these nocturnes--op. +48--there occurred to me a remark of Schumann's, when he reviewed some +nocturnes by Count Wielhorski. He said that the quick middle movements +which Chopin frequently introduced into his nocturnes are often weaker +than his first conceptions; meaning the first portions of his +nocturnes. Now, although the middle part in the present instances are, +on the contrary, slower movements, yet the judgment holds good; at +least with respect to the first nocturne, the middle part of which has +nothing to recommend it but a full, sonorous instrumentation, if I may +use this word in speaking of one instrument. The middle part of the +second--D flat, molto piu lento--however, is much finer; in it we meet +again, as we did in some other nocturnes, with soothing, simple chord +progressions. When Gutmann studied the C sharp minor Nocturne with +Chopin, the master told him that the middle section--the molto piu +lento in D flat major--should be played as a recitative. 'A tyrant +commands'--the first two chords--he said, 'and the other asks for +mercy.'" + +Of course Niecks means the F sharp minor, not the C sharp minor +Nocturne, op. 48, No. 2, dedicated, with the C minor, to Mlle. L. +Duperre. + +Opus 55, two nocturnes in F minor and E flat major, need not detain us +long. The first is familiar. Kleczynski devotes a page or more to its +execution. He seeks to vary the return of the chief subject with +nuances--as would an artistic singer the couplets of a classic song. +There are "cries of despair" in it, but at last a "feeling of hope." +Kullak writes of the last measures: "Thank God--the goal is reached!" +It is the relief of a major key after prolonged wanderings in the +minor. It is a nice nocturne, neat in its sorrow, yet not epoch-making. +The one following has "the impression of an improvisation." It has also +the merit of being seldom heard. These two nocturnes are dedicated to +Mlle. J. W. Stirling. + +Opus 62 brings us to a pair in B major and E major inscribed to Madame +de Konneritz. The first, the Tuberose Nocturne, is faint with a sick, +rich odor. The climbing trellis of notes, that so unexpectedly leads to +the tonic, is charming and the chief tune has charm, a fruity charm. It +is highly ornate, its harmonies dense, the entire surface overrun with +wild ornamentation and a profusion of trills. The piece--the third of +its sort in the key of B--is not easy. Mertke gives the following +explication of the famous chain trills: + +[Musical score excerpt] + +Although this nocturne is luxuriant in style, it deserves warmer praise +than is accorded it. Irregular as its outline is, its troubled lyrism +is appealing, is melting, and the A flat portion, with its hesitating, +timid accents, has great power of attraction. The E major Nocturne has +a bardic ring. Its song is almost declamatory and not at all +sentimental--unless so distorted--as Niecks would have us imagine. The +intermediate portion is wavering and passionate, like the middle of the +F sharp major Nocturne. It shows no decrease in creative vigor or +lyrical fancy. The Klindworth version differs from the original, as an +examination of the following examples will show, the upper being +Chopin's: + +[Musical score excerpt] + +The posthumous nocturne in E minor, composed in 1827, is weak and +uninteresting. Moreover, it contains some very un-Chopin-like +modulations. The recently discovered nocturne in C sharp minor is +hardly a treasure trove. It is vague and reminiscent The following note +was issued by its London publishers, Ascherberg & Co.: + + The first question, suggested by the announcement of a new + posthumous composition of Chopin's, will be "What proof is + there of its authenticity?" To musicians and amateurs who + cannot recognize the beautiful Nocturne in C sharp minor as + indeed the work of Chopin, it may in the first place be + pointed out that the original manuscript (of which a facsimile + is given on the title-page) is in Chopin's well-known + handwriting, and, secondly, that the composition, which is + strikingly characteristic, was at once accepted as the work of + Chopin by the distinguished composer and pianist Balakireff, + who played it for the first time in public at the Chopin + Commemoration Concert, held in the autumn of 1894 at Zelazowa + Wola, and afterward at Warsaw. This nocturne was addressed by + Chopin to his sister Louise, at Warsaw, in a letter from + Paris, and was written soon after the production of the two + lovely piano concertos, when Chopin was still a very young + man. It contains a quotation from his most admired Concerto in + F minor, and a brief reference to the charming song known as + the Maiden's Wish, two of his sister's favorite melodies. The + manuscript of the nocturne was supposed to have been destroyed + in the sacking of the Zamojski Palace, at Warsaw, toward the + end of the insurrection of 1863, but it was discovered quite + recently among papers of various kinds in the possession of a + Polish gentleman, a great collector, whose son offered Mr. + Polinski the privilege of selecting from such papers. His + choice was three manuscripts of Chopin's, one of them being + this nocturne. A letter from Mr. Polinski on the subject of + this nocturne is in the possession of Miss Janotha. + +Is this the nocturne of which Tausig spoke to his pupil Joseffy as +belonging to the Master's "best period," or did he refer to the one in +E minor? + +The Berceuse, op. 57, published June, 1845, and dedicated to Mlle. +Elise Gavard, is the very sophistication of the art of musical +ornamentation. It is built on a tonic and dominant bass--the triad of +the tonic and the chord of the dominant seventh. A rocking theme is set +over this basso ostinato and the most enchanting effects are produced. +The rhythm never alters in the bass, and against this background, the +monotone of a dark, gray sky, the composer arranges an astonishing +variety of fireworks, some florid, some subdued, but all delicate in +tracery and design. Modulations from pigeon egg blue to Nile green, +most misty and subtle modulations, dissolve before one's eyes, and for +a moment the sky is peppered with tiny stars in doubles, each +independently tinted. Within a small segment of the chromatic bow +Chopin has imprisoned new, strangely dissonant colors. It is a miracle; +and after the drawn-out chord of the dominant seventh and the rain of +silvery fire ceases one realizes that the whole piece is a delicious +illusion, but an ululation in the key of D flat, the apotheosis of +pyrotechnical colorature. + +Niecks quotes Alexandre Dumas fils, who calls the Berceuse "muted +music," but introduces a Turkish bath comparison, which crushes the +sentiment. Mertke shows the original and Klindworth's reading of a +certain part of the Berceuse, adding a footnote to the examples: + +[Two musical score excerpts from Op. 57, one from the original version, +one from Klindworth's edition] + +[Footnote: Das tr (flat) der Originale (Scholtz tr natural-flat) +zeigt, dass Ch. den Triller mit Ganzton und nach Mikuli den +Trilleranfang mit Hauptton wollte.] The Barcarolle, op. 60, published +September, 1846, is another highly elaborated work. Niecks must be +quoted here: "One day Tausig, the great piano virtuoso, promised W. de +Lenz to play him Chopin's Barcarolle, adding, 'That is a performance +which must not be undertaken before more than two persons. I shall play +you my own self. I love the piece, but take it rarely.' Lenz got the +music, but it did not please him--it seemed to him a long movement in +the nocturne style, a Babel of figuration on a lightly laid foundation. +But he found that he had made a mistake, and, after hearing it played +by Tausig, confessed that the virtuoso had infused into the 'nine pages +of enervating music, of one and the same long-breathed rhythm, so much +interest, so much motion, so much action,' that he regretted the long +piece was not longer." + +Tausig's conception of the barcarolle was this: "There are two persons +concerned in the affair; it is a love scene in a discrete gondola; let +us say this mise-en-scene is the symbol of a lover's meeting generally." + +"This is expressed in thirds and sixths; the dualism of two +notes--persons--is maintained throughout; all is two-voiced, +two-souled. In this modulation in C sharp major--superscribed dolce +sfogato--there are kiss and embrace! This is evident! When, after three +bars of introduction, the theme, 'lightly rocking in the bass solo,' +enters in the fourth, this theme is nevertheless made use of throughout +the whole fabric only as an accompaniment, and ON this the cantilena in +two parts is laid; we have thus a continuous, tender dialogue." + +The Barcarolle is a nocturne painted on a large canvas, with larger +brushes. It has Italian color in spots--Schumann said that, +melodically, Chopin sometimes "leans over Germany into Italy"--and is a +masterly one in sentiment, pulsating with amorousness. To me it sounds +like a lament for the splendors, now vanished, of Venice the Queen. In +bars 8, 9, and 10, counting backward, Louis Ehlert finds obscurities in +the middle voices. It is dedicated to the Baronne de Stockhausen. + +The nocturnes--including the Berceuse and Barcarolle--should seldom be +played in public and not the public of a large hall. Something of +Chopin's delicate, tender warmth and spiritual voice is lost in larger +spaces. In a small auditorium, and from the fingers of a sympathetic +pianist, the nocturnes should be heard, that their intimate, night side +may be revealed. Many are like the music en sourdine of Paul Verlaine +in his "Chanson D'Automne" or "Le Piano que Baise une Main Frele." They +are essentially for the twilight, for solitary enclosures, where their +still, mysterious tones--"silent thunder in the leaves" as Yeats +sings--become eloquent and disclose the poetry and pain of their +creator. + + + + +X. THE BALLADES:--FAERY DRAMAS + + +W. H. Hadow has said some pertinent things about Chopin in "Studies in +Modern Music." Yet we cannot accept unconditionally his statement that +"in structure Chopin is a child playing with a few simple types, and +almost helpless as soon as he advances beyond them; in phraseology he +is a master whose felicitous perfection of style is one of the abiding +treasures of the art." + +Chopin then, according to Hadow, is no "builder of the lofty rhyme," +but the poet of the single line, the maker of the phrase exquisite. +This is hardly comprehensive. With the more complex, classical types of +the musical organism Chopin had little sympathy, but he contrived +nevertheless to write two movements of a piano sonata that are +excellent--the first half of the B flat minor Sonata. The idealized +dance forms he preferred; the Polonaise, Mazurka and Valse were already +there for him to handle, but the Ballade was not. Here he is not +imitator, but creator. Not loosely-jointed, but compact structures +glowing with genius and presenting definite unity of form and +expression, are the ballades--commonly written in six-eight and +six-four time. "None of Chopin's compositions surpasses in masterliness +of form and beauty and poetry of contents his ballades. In them he +attains the acme of his power as an artist," remarks Niecks. + +I am ever reminded of Andrew Lang's lines, "the thunder and surge of +the Odyssey," when listening to the G minor Ballade, op. 23. It is the +Odyssey of Chopin's soul. That 'cello-like largo with its noiseless +suspension stays us for a moment in the courtyard of Chopin's House +Beautiful. Then, told in his most dreamy tones, the legend begins. As +in some fabulous tales of the Genii this Ballade discloses surprising +and delicious things. There is the tall lily in the fountain that nods +to the sun. It drips in cadenced monotone and its song is repeated on +the lips of the slender-hipped girl with the eyes of midnight--and so +might I weave for you a story of what I see in the Ballade and you +would be aghast or puzzled. With such a composition any programme could +be sworn to, even the silly story of the Englishman who haunted Chopin, +beseeching him to teach him this Ballade. That Chopin had a programme, +a definite one, there can be no doubt; but he has, wise artist, left us +no clue beyond Mickiewicz's, the Polish bard Lithuanian poems. In +Leipzig, Karasowski relates, that when Schumann met Chopin, the pianist +confessed having "been incited to the creation of the ballades by the +poetry" of his fellow countryman. The true narrative tone is in this +symmetrically constructed Ballade, the most spirited, most daring work +of Chopin, according to Schumann. Louis Ehlert says of the four +Ballades: "Each one differs entirely from the others, and they have but +one thing in common--their romantic working out and the nobility of +their motives. Chopin relates in them, not like one who communicates +something really experienced; it is as though he told what never took +place, but what has sprung up in his inmost soul, the anticipation of +something longed for. They may contain a strong element of national +woe, much outwardly expressed and inwardly burning rage over the +sufferings of his native land; yet they do not carry with a positive +reality like that which in a Beethoven Sonata will often call words to +our lips." Which means that Chopin was not such a realist as Beethoven? +Ehlert is one of the few sympathetic German Chopin commentators, yet he +did not always indicate the salient outlines of his art. Only the Slav +may hope to understand Chopin thoroughly. But these Ballades are more +truly touched by the universal than any other of his works. They belong +as much to the world as to Poland. + +The G minor Ballade after "Konrad Wallenrod," is a logical, well knit +and largely planned composition. The closest parallelism may be +detected in its composition of themes. Its second theme in E flat is +lovely in line, color and sentiment. The return of the first theme in A +minor and the quick answer in E of the second are evidences of Chopin's +feeling for organic unity. Development, as in strict cyclic forms, +there is not a little. After the cadenza, built on a figure of wavering +tonality, a valse-like theme emerges and enjoys a capricious, butterfly +existence. It is fascinating. Passage work of an etherealized character +leads to the second subject, now augmented and treated with a broad +brush. The first questioning theme is heard again, and with a +perpendicular roar the presto comes upon us. For two pages the dynamic +energy displayed by the composer is almost appalling. A whirlwind I +have called it elsewhere. It is a storm of the emotions, muscular in +its virility. I remember de Pachmann--a close interpreter of certain +sides of Chopin--playing this coda piano, pianissimo and prestissimo. +The effect was strangely irritating to the nerves, and reminded me of a +tornado seen from the wrong end of an opera glass. According to his own +lights the Russian virtuoso was right: his strength was not equal to +the task, and so, imitating Chopin, he topsy-turvied the shading. It +recalled Moscheles' description of Chopin's playing: "His piano is so +softly breathed forth that he does not require any strong forte to +produce the wished for contrast." + +This G minor Ballade was published in June, 1836, and is dedicated to +Baron Stockhausen. The last bar of the introduction has caused some +controversy. Gutmann, Mikuli and other pupils declare for the E flat; +Klindworth and Kullak use it. Xaver Scharwenka has seen fit to edit +Klindworth, and gives a D natural in the Augener edition. That he is +wrong internal testimony abundantly proves. Even Willeby, who +personally prefers the D natural, thinks Chopin intended the E flat, +and quotes a similar effect twenty-eight bars later. He might have +added that the entire composition contains examples--look at the first +bar of the valse episode in the bass. As Niecks thinks, "This dissonant +E flat may be said to be the emotional keynote of the whole poem. It is +a questioning thought that, like a sudden pain, shoots through mind and +body." + +There is other and more confirmatory evidence. Ferdinand Von Inten, a +New York pianist, saw the original Chopin manuscript at Stuttgart. It +was the property of Professor Lebert (Levy), since deceased, and in it, +without any question, stands the much discussed E flat. This testimony +is final. The D natural robs the bar of all meaning. It is insipid, +colorless. + +Kullak gives 60 to the half note at the moderato. On the third page, +third bar, he uses F natural in the treble. So does Klindworth, +although F sharp may be found in some editions. On the last page, +second bar, first line, Kullak writes the passage beginning with E flat +in eighth notes, Klindworth in sixteenths. The close is very striking, +full of the splendors of glancing scales and shrill octave +progressions. "It would inspire a poet to write words to it," said +Robert Schumann. + +"Perhaps the most touching of all that Chopin has written is the tale +of the F major Ballade. I have witnessed children lay aside their games +to listen thereto. It appears like some fairy tale that has become +music. The four-voiced part has such a clearness withal, it seems as if +warm spring breezes were waving the lithe leaves of the palm tree. How +soft and sweet a breath steals over the senses and the heart!" + +And how difficult it seems to be to write of Chopin except in terms of +impassioned prose! Louis Ehlert, a romantic in feeling and a classicist +in theory, is the writer of the foregoing. The second Ballade, although +dedicated to Robert Schumann, did not excite his warmest praise. "A +less artistic work than the first," he wrote, "but equally fantastic +and intellectual. Its impassioned episodes seem to have been afterward +inserted. I recollect very well that when Chopin played this Ballade +for me it finished in F major; it now closes in A minor." Willeby gives +its key as F minor. It is really in the keys of F major--A minor. +Chopin's psychology was seldom at fault. A major ending would have +crushed this extraordinary tone-poem, written, Chopin admits, under the +direct inspiration of Adam Mickiewicz's "Le Lac de Willis." Willeby +accepts Schumann's dictum of the inferiority of this Ballade to its +predecessor. Niecks does not. Niecks is quite justified in asking how +"two such wholly dissimilar things can be compared and weighed in this +fashion." + +In truth they cannot. "The second Ballade possesses beauties in no way +inferior to those of the first," he continues. "What can be finer than +the simple strains of the opening section! They sound as if they had +been drawn from the people's store-house of song. The entrance of the +presto surprises, and seems out of keeping with what precedes; but what +we hear after the return of tempo primo--the development of those +simple strains, or rather the cogitations on them--justifies the +presence of the presto. The second appearance of the latter leads to an +urging, restless coda in A minor, which closes in the same key and +pianissimo with a few bars of the simple, serene, now veiled first +strain." + +Rubinstein bore great love for this second Ballade. This is what it +meant for him: "Is it possible that the interpreter does not feel the +necessity of representing to his audience--a field flower caught by a +gust of wind, a caressing of the flower by the wind; the resistance of +the flower, the stormy struggle of the wind; the entreaty of the +flower, which at last lies there broken; and paraphrased--the field +flower a rustic maiden, the wind a knight." + +I can find "no lack of affinity" between the andantino and presto. The +surprise is a dramatic one, withal rudely vigorous. Chopin's robust +treatment of the first theme results in a strong piece of craftmanship. +The episodical nature of this Ballade is the fruit of the esoteric +moods of its composer. It follows a hidden story, and has the +quality--as the second Impromptu in F sharp--of great, unpremeditated +art. It shocks one by its abrupt but by no means fantastic transitions. +The key color is changeful, and the fluctuating themes are well +contrasted. It was written at Majorca while the composer was only too +noticeably disturbed in body and soul. + +Presto con fuoco Chopin marks the second section. Kullak gives 84 to +the quarter, and for the opening 66 to the quarter. He also wisely +marks crescendos in the bass at the first thematic development. He +prefers the E--as does Klindworth--nine bars before the return of the +presto. At the eighth bar, after this return, Kullak adheres to the E +instead of F at the beginning of the bar, treble clef. Klindworth +indicates both. Nor does Kullak follow Mikuli in using a D in the coda. +He prefers a D sharp, instead of a natural. I wish the second Ballade +were played oftener in public. It is quite neglected for the third in A +flat, which, as Ehlert says, has the voice of the people. + +This Ballade, the "Undine" of Mickiewicz, published November, 1841, and +dedicated to Mlle. P. de Noailles, is too well known to analyze. It is +the schoolgirls' delight, who familiarly toy with its demon, seeing +only favor and prettiness in its elegant measures. In it "the refined, +gifted Pole, who is accustomed to move in the most distinguished +circles of the French capital, is pre-eminently to be recognized." Thus +Schumann. Forsooth, it is aristocratic, gay, graceful, piquant, and +also something more. Even in its playful moments there is delicate +irony, a spiritual sporting with graver and more passionate emotions. +Those broken octaves which usher in each time the second theme, with +its fascinating, infectious, rhythmical lilt, what an ironically joyous +fillip they give the imagination! + +"A coquettish grace--if we accept by this expression that half +unconscious toying with the power that charms and fires, that follows +up confession with reluctance--seems the very essence of Chopin's +being." + +"It becomes a difficult task to transcribe the easy transitions, full +of an irresistible charm, with which he portrays Love's game. Who will +not recall the memorable passage in the A flat Ballade, where the right +hand alone takes up the dotted eighths after the sustained chord of the +sixth of A flat? Could a lover's confusion be more deliciously enhanced +by silence and hesitation?" Ehlert above evidently sees a ballroom +picture of brilliancy, with the regulation tender avowal. The episodes +of this Ballade are so attenuated of any grosser elements that none but +psychical meanings should be read into them. + +The disputed passage is on the fifth page of the Kullak edition, after +the trills. A measure is missing in Kullak, who, like Klindworth, gives +it in a footnote. To my mind this repetition adds emphasis, although it +is a formal blur. And what an irresistible moment it is, this +delightful territory, before the darker mood of the C sharp minor part +is reached! Niecks becomes enthusiastic over the insinuation and +persuasion of this composition: "the composer showing himself in a +fundamentally caressing mood." The ease with which the entire work is +floated proves that Chopin in mental health was not daunted by larger +forms. There is moonlight in this music, and some sunlight, too. The +prevailing moods are coquetry and sweet contentment. + +Contrapuntal skill is shown in the working out section. Chopin always +wears his learning lightly; it does not oppress us. The inverted +dominant pedal in the C sharp minor episode reveals, with the massive +coda, a great master. Kullak suggests some variants. He uses the +transient shake in the third bar, instead of the appoggiatura which +Klindworth prefers. Klindworth attacks the trill on the second page +with the upper tone--A flat. Kullak and Mertke, in the Steingraber +edition, play the passage in this manner: + +[Musical score excerpt from the original version of the Op. 47. Ballade] + +Here is Klindworth: + +[Musical score excerpt of the same passage in Klindworth's edition] + +Of the fourth and glorious Ballade in F minor dedicated to Baronne C. +de Rothschild I could write a volume. It is Chopin in his most +reflective, yet lyric mood. Lyrism is the keynote of the work, a +passionate lyrism, with a note of self-absorption, suppressed +feeling--truly Slavic, this shyness!--and a concentration that is +remarkable even for Chopin. The narrative tone is missing after the +first page, a rather moody and melancholic pondering usurping its +place. It is the mood of a man who examines with morbid, curious +insistence the malady that is devouring his soul. This Ballade is the +companion of the Fantaisie-Polonaise, but as a Ballade "fully worthy of +its sisters," to quote Niecks. It was published December, 1843. The +theme in F minor has the elusive charm of a slow, mournful valse, that +returns twice, bejewelled, yet never overladen. Here is the very +apotheosis of the ornament; the figuration sets off the idea in +dazzling relief. There are episodes, transitional passage work, +distinguished by novelty and the finest art. At no place is there +display for display's sake. The cadenza in A is a pause for breath, +rather a sigh, before the rigorously logical imitations which presage +the re-entrance of the theme. How wonderfully the introduction comes in +for its share of thoughtful treatment. What a harmonist! And consider +the D flat scale runs in the left hand; how suave, how satisfying is +this page. I select for especial admiration this modulatory passage: + +[Musical score excerpt] + +And what could be more evocative of dramatic suspense than the sixteen +bars before the mad, terrifying coda! How the solemn splendors of the +half notes weave an atmosphere of mystic tragedy! This soul-suspension +recalls Maeterlinck. Here is the episode: + +[Musical score excerpt] + +A story of de Lenz that lends itself to quotation is about this piece: + + Tausig impressed me deeply in his interpretation of Chopin's + Ballade in F minor. It has three requirements: The + comprehension of the programme as a whole,--for Chopin writes + according to a programme, to the situations in life best known + to, and understood by himself; and in an adequate manner; the + conquest of the stupendous difficulties in complicated + figures, winding harmonies and formidable passages. + + Tausig fulfilled these requirements, presenting an embodiment + of the signification and the feeling of the work. The Ballade-- + andante con moto, six-eighths--begins in the major key of the + dominant; the seventh measure comes to a stand before a + fermata on C major. The easy handling of these seven measures + Tausig interpreted thus: 'The piece has not yet begun;' in his + firmer, nobly expressive exposition of the principal theme, + free from sentimentality--to which one might easily yield--the + grand style found due scope. An essential requirement in an + instrumental virtuoso is that he should understand how to + breathe, and how to allow his hearers to take breath--giving + them opportunity to arrive at a better understanding. By this + I mean a well chosen incision--the cesura, and a lingering-- + "letting in air," Tausig cleverly called it--which in no way + impairs rhythm and time, but rather brings them into stronger + relief; a LINGERING which our signs of notation cannot + adequately express, because it is made up of atomic time + values. Rub the bloom from a peach or from a butterfly--what + remains will belong to the kitchen, to natural history! It is + not otherwise with Chopin; the bloom consisted in Tausig's + treatment of the Ballade. + + He came to the first passage--the motive among blossoms and + leaves--a figurated recurrence to the principal theme is in + the inner parts--its polyphonic variant. A little thread + connects this with the chorale-like introduction of the second + theme. The theme is strongly and abruptly modulated, perhaps a + little too much so. Tausig tied the little thread to a doppio + movimento in two-four time, but thereby resulted sextolets, + which threw the chorale into still bolder relief. Then + followed a passage a tempo, in which the principal theme + played hide and seek. How clear it all became as Tausig played + it! Of technical difficulties he knew literally nothing; the + intricate and evasive parts were as easy as the easiest--I + might say easier! + + I admired the short trills in the left hand, which were + trilled out quite independently, as if by a second player; the + gliding ease of the cadence marked dolcissimo. It swung itself + into the higher register, where it came to a stop before A + major, just as the introduction stopped before C major. Then, + after the theme has once more presented itself in a modified + form--variant--it comes under the pestle of an extremely + figurate coda, which demands the study of an artist, the + strength of a robust man--the most vigorous pianistic health, + in a word! Tausig overcame this threatening group of terrific + difficulties, whose appearance in the piece is well explained + by the programme, without the slightest effect. The coda, in + modulated harp tones, came to a stop before a fermata which + corresponded to those before mentioned, in order to cast + anchor in the haven of the dominant, finishing with a witches' + dance of triplets, doubled in thirds. This piece winds up with + extreme bravura. + +The "lingering" mentioned by de Lenz is tempo rubato, so fatally +misunderstood by most Chopin players. De Lenz in a note quotes +Meyerbeer as saying--Meyerbeer, who quarrelled with Chopin about the +rhythm of a mazurka--"Can one reduce women to notation? They would +breed mischief, were they emancipated from the measure." + +There is passion, refined and swelling, in the curves of this most +eloquent composition. It is Chopin at the supreme summit of his art, an +art alembicated, personal and intoxicating. I know of nothing in music +like the F minor Ballade. Bach in the Chromatic Fantasia--be not +deceived by its classical contours, it is music hot from the +soul--Beethoven in the first movement of the C sharp minor Sonata, the +arioso of the Sonata op. 110, and possibly Schumann in the opening of +his C major Fantaisie, are as intimate, as personal as the F minor +Ballade, which is as subtly distinctive as the hands and smile of Lisa +Gioconda. Its inaccessible position preserves it from rude and +irreverent treatment. Its witchery is irresistible. + + + + +XI. CLASSICAL CURRENTS + + +Guy de Maupassant put before us a widely diverse number of novels in a +famous essay attached to the definitive edition of his masterpiece, +"Pierre et Jean," and puzzlingly demanded the real form of the novel. +If "Don Quixote" is one, how can "Madame Bovary" be another? If "Les +Miserables" is included in the list, what are we to say to Huysmans' +"La Bas"? + +Just such a question I should like to propound, substituting sonata for +novel. If Scarlatti wrote sonatas, what is the Appassionata? If the A +flat Weber is one, can the F minor Brahms be called a sonata? Is the +Haydn form orthodox and the Schumann heterodox? These be enigmas to +make weary the formalists. Come, let us confess, and in the open air: +there is a great amount of hypocrisy and cant in this matter. We can, +as can any conservatory student, give the recipe for turning out a smug +specimen of the form, but when we study the great examples, it is just +the subtle eluding of hard and fast rules that distinguishes the +efforts of the masters from the machine work of apprentices and +academic monsters. Because it is no servile copy of the Mozart Sonata, +the F sharp minor of Brahms is a piece of original art. Beethoven at +first trod in the well blazed path of Haydn, but study his second +period, and it sounds the big Beethoven note. There is no final court +of appeal in the matter of musical form, and there is none in the +matter of literary style. The history of the sonata is the history of +musical evolution. Every great composer, Schubert included, added to +the form, filed here, chipped away there, introduced lawlessness where +reigned prim order--witness the Schumann F sharp minor Sonata--and then +came Chopin. + +The Chopin sonata has caused almost as much warfare as the Wagner music +drama. It is all the more ludicrous, for Chopin never wrote but one +piano sonata that has a classical complexion: in C minor, op. 4, and it +was composed as early as 1828. Not published until July, 1851, it +demonstrates without a possibility of doubt that the composer had no +sympathy with the form. He tried so hard and failed so dismally that it +is a relief when the second and third sonatas are reached, for in them +there are only traces of formal beauty and organic unity. But then +there is much Chopin, while little of his precious essence is to be +tasted in the first sonata. + +Chopin wrote of the C minor Sonata: "As a pupil I dedicated it to +Elsner," and--oh, the irony of criticism!--it was praised by the +critics because not so revolutionary as the Variations, op. 2. This, +too, despite the larghetto in five-four time. The first movement is +wheezing and all but lifeless. One asks in astonishment what Chopin is +doing in this gallery. And it is technically difficult. The menuetto is +excellent, its trio being a faint approach to Beethoven in color. The +unaccustomed rhythm of the slow movement is irritating. Our young +Chopin does not move about as freely as Benjamin Godard in the scherzo +of his violin and piano sonata in the same bizarre rhythm. Niecks sees +naught but barren waste in the finale. I disagree with him. There is +the breath of a stirring spirit, an imitative attempt that is more +diverting than the other movements. Above all there is movement, and +the close is vigorous, though banal. The sonata is the dullest music +penned by Chopin, but as a whole it hangs together as a sonata better +than its two successors. So much for an attempt at strict devotion to +scholastic form. + +From this schoolroom we are transported in op. 35 to the theatre of +larger life and passion. The B flat minor Sonata was published May, +1840. Two movements are masterpieces; the funeral march that forms the +third movement is one of the Pole's most popular compositions, while +the finale has no parallel in piano music. Schumann says that Chopin +here "bound together four of his maddest children," and he is not +astray. He thinks the march does not belong to the work. It certainly +was written before its companion movements. As much as Hadow admires +the first two movements, he groans at the last pair, though they are +admirable when considered separately. + +These four movements have no common life. Chopin says he intended the +strange finale as a gossiping commentary on the march. "The left hand +unisono with the right hand are gossiping after the march." Perhaps the +last two movements do hold together, but what have they in common with +the first two? Tonality proves nothing. Notwithstanding the grandeur +and beauty of the grave, the power and passion of the scherzo, this +Sonata in B flat minor is not more a sonata than it is a sequence of +ballades and scherzi. And again we are at the de Maupassant crux. The +work never could be spared; it is Chopin mounted for action and in the +thick of the fight. The doppio movimento is pulse-stirring--a strong, +curt and characteristic theme for treatment. Here is power, and in the +expanding prologue flashes more than a hint of the tragic. The D flat +Melody is soothing, charged with magnetism, and urged to a splendid +fever of climax. The working out section is too short and dissonantal, +but there is development, perhaps more technical than logical--I mean +by this more pianistic than intellectually musical--and we mount with +the composer until the B flat version of the second subject is reached, +for the first subject, strange to say, does not return. From that on to +the firm chords of the close there is no misstep, no faltering or +obscurity. Noble pages have been read, and the scherzo is approached +with eagerness. Again there is no disappointment. On numerous occasions +I have testified my regard for this movement in warm and uncritical +terms. It is simply unapproachable, and has no equal for lucidity, +brevity and polish among the works of Chopin, except the Scherzo in C +sharp minor; but there is less irony, more muscularity, and more native +sweetness in this E flat minor Scherzo. I like the way Kullak marks the +first B flat octave. It is a pregnant beginning. The second bar I have +never heard from any pianist save Rubinstein given with the proper +crescendo. No one else seems to get it explosive enough within the +walls of one bar. It is a true Rossin-ian crescendo. And in what a wild +country we are landed when the F sharp minor is crashed out! Stormy +chromatic double notes, chords of the sixth, rush on with incredible +fury, and the scherzo ends on the very apex of passion. A Trio in G +flat is the song of songs, its swaying rhythms and phrase-echoings +investing a melody at once sensuous and chaste. The second part and the +return to the scherzo are proofs of the composer's sense of balance and +knowledge of the mysteries of anticipation. The closest parallelisms +are noticeable, the technique so admirable that the scherzo floats in +mid-air--Flaubert's ideal of a miraculous style. + +And then follows that deadly Marche Funebre! Ernest Newman, in his +remarkable "Study of Wagner," speaks of the fundamental difference +between the two orders of imagination, as exemplified by Beethoven and +Chopin on the one side, Wagner on the other. This regarding the funeral +marches of the three. Newman finds Wagner's the more concrete +imagination; the "inward picture" of Beethoven, and Chopin "much vaguer +and more diffused." Yet Chopin is seldom so realistic; here are the +bell-like basses, the morbid coloring. Schumann found "it contained +much that is repulsive," and Liszt raves rhapsodically over it; for +Karasowski it was the "pain and grief of an entire nation," while +Ehlert thinks "it owes its renown to the wonderful effect of two +triads, which in their combination possess a highly tragical element. +The middle movement is not at all characteristic. Why could it not at +least have worn second mourning? After so much black crepe drapery one +should not at least at once display white lingerie!" This is cruel. + +The D flat Trio is a logical relief after the booming and glooming of +the opening. That it is "a rapturous gaze into the beatific regions of +a beyond," as Niecks writes, I am not prepared to say. We do know, +however, that the march, when isolated, has a much more profound effect +than in its normal sequence. The presto is too wonderful for words. +Rubinstein, or was it originally Tausig who named it "Night winds +sweeping over the churchyard graves"? Its agitated, whirring, +unharmonized triplets are strangely disquieting, and can never be +mistaken for mere etude passage work. The movement is too sombre, its +curves too full of half-suppressed meanings, its rush and sub-human +growling too expressive of something that defies definition. Schumann +compares it to a "sphinx with a mocking smile." To Henri Barbadette +"C'est Lazare grattant de ses ongles la pierre de son tombeau," or, +like Mendelssohn, one may abhor it, yet it cannot be ignored. It has +Asiatic coloring, and to me seems like the wavering outlines of +light-tipped hills seen sharply en silhouette, behind which rises and +falls a faint, infernal glow. This art paints as many differing +pictures as there are imaginations for its sonorous background; not +alone the universal solvent, as Henry James thinks, it bridges the +vast, silent gulfs between human souls with its humming eloquence. This +sonata is not dedicated. + +The third Sonata in B minor, op. 58, has more of that undefinable +"organic unity," yet, withal, it is not so powerful, so pathos-breeding +or so compact of thematic interest as its forerunner. The first page, +to the chromatic chords of the sixth, promises much. There is a clear +statement, a sound theme for developing purposes, the crisp march of +chord progressions, and then--the edifice goes up in smoke. After +wreathings and curlings of passage work, and on the rim of despair, we +witness the exquisite budding of the melody in D. It is an aubade, a +nocturne of the morn--if the contradictory phrase be allowed. There is +morning freshness in its hue and scent, and, when it bursts, a parterre +of roses. The close of the section is inimitable. All the more sorrow +at what follows: wild disorder and the luxuriance called tropical. When +B major is compassed we sigh, for it augurs us a return of delight. The +ending is not that of a sonata, but a love lyric. For Chopin is not the +cool breadth and marmoreal majesty of blank verse. He sonnets to +perfection, but the epical air does not fill his nostrils. + +Vivacious, charming, light as a harebell in the soft breeze is the +Scherzo in E flat. It has a clear ring of the scherzo and harks back to +Weber in its impersonal, amiable hurry. The largo is tranquilly +beautiful, rich in its reverie, lovely in its tune. The trio is +reserved and hypnotic. The last movement, with its brilliancy and +force, is a favorite, but it lacks weight, and the entire sonata is, as +Niecks writes, "affiliated, but not cognate." It was published June, +1845, and is dedicated to Comtesse E. de Perthuis. + +So these sonatas of Chopin are not sonatas at all, but, throwing titles +to the dogs, would we forego the sensations that two of them evoke? +There is still another, the Sonata in G minor, op. 65, for piano and +'cello. It is dedicated to Chopin's friend, August Franchomme, the +violoncellist. Now, while I by no means share Finck's exalted +impression of this work, yet I fancy the critics have dealt too harshly +with it. Robbed of its title of sonata--though sedulously aping this +form--it contains much pretty music. And it is grateful for the 'cello. +There is not an abundant literature for this kingly instrument, in +conjunction with the piano, so why flaunt Chopin's contribution? I will +admit that he walks stiffly, encased in his borrowed garb, but there is +the andante, short as it is, an effective scherzo and a carefully made +allegro and finale. Tonal monotony is the worst charge to be brought +against this work. + +The trio, also in G minor, op. 8, is more alluring. It was published +March, 1833, and dedicated to Prince Anton Radziwill. Chopin later, in +speaking of it to a pupil, admitted that he saw things he would like to +change. He regretted not making it for viola, instead of violin, 'cello +and piano. + +It was worked over a long time, the first movement being ready in 1833. +When it appeared it won philistine praise, for its form more nearly +approximates the sonata than any of his efforts in the cyclical order, +excepting op. 4. In it the piano receives better treatment than the +other instruments; there are many virtuoso passages, but again key +changes are not frequent or disparate enough to avoid a monotone. +Chopin's imagination refuses to become excited when working in the open +spaces of the sonata form. Like creatures that remain drab of hue in +unsympathetic or dangerous environment, his music is transformed to a +bewildering bouquet of color when he breathes native air. Compare the +wildly modulating Chopin of the ballades to the tame-pacing Chopin of +the sonatas, trio and concertos! The trio opens with fire, the scherzo +is fanciful, and the adagio charming, while the finale is cheerful to +loveliness. It might figure occasionally on the programmes of our +chamber music concerts, despite its youthful puerility. + +There remain the two concertos, which I do not intend discussing fully. +Not Chopin at his very best, the E minor and F minor concertos are +frequently heard because of the chances afforded the solo player. I +have written elsewhere at length of the Klindworth, Tausig and +Burmeister versions of the two concertos. As time passes I see no +reason for amending my views on this troublous subject. Edgar S. Kelly +holds a potent brief for the original orchestration, contending that it +suits the character of the piano part. Rosenthal puts this belief into +practice by playing the older version of the E minor with the first +long tutti curtailed. But he is not consistent, for he uses the Tausig +octaves at the close of the rondo. While I admire the Tausig +orchestration, these particlar octaves are hideously cacaphonic. The +original triplet unisons are so much more graceful and musical. + +The chronology of the concertos has given rise to controversy. The +trouble arose from the F minor Concerto, it being numbered op. 21, +although composed before the one in E minor. The former was published +April, 1836; the latter September, 1833. The slow movement of the F +minor Concerto was composed by Chopin during his passion for Constantia +Gladowska. She was "the ideal" he mentions in his letters, the adagio +of this concerto. This larghetto in A flat is a trifle too ornamental +for my taste, mellifluous and serene as it is. The recitative is finely +outlined. I think I like best the romanze of the E minor Concerto. It +is less flowery. The C sharp minor part is imperious in its beauty, +while the murmuring mystery of the close mounts to the imagination. The +rondo is frolicksome, tricky, genial and genuine piano music. It is +true the first movement is too long, too much in one set of keys, and +the working-out section too much in the nature of a technical study. +The first movement of the F minor far transcends it in breadth, passion +and musical feeling, but it is short and there is no coda. Richard +Burmeister has supplied the latter deficiency in a capitally made +cadenza, which Paderewski plays. It is a complete summing up of the +movement. The mazurka-like finale is very graceful and full of pure, +sweet melody. This concerto is altogether more human than the E minor. + +Both derive from Hummel and Field. The passage work is superior in +design to that of the earlier masters, the general character +episodical,--but episodes of rare worth and originality. As Ehlert +says, "Noblesse oblige--and thus Chopin felt himself compelled to +satisfy all demands exacted of a pianist, and wrote the unavoidable +piano concerto. It was not consistent with his nature to express +himself in broad terms. His lungs were too weak for the pace in seven +league boots, so often required in a score. The trio and 'cello sonata +were also tasks for whose accomplishment Nature did not design him. He +must touch the keys by himself without being called upon to heed the +players sitting next him. He is at his best when without formal +restraint, he can create out of his inmost soul." + +"He must touch the keys by himself!" There you have summed up in a +phrase the reason Chopin never succeeded in impressing his +individuality upon the sonata form and his playing upon the masses. His +was the lonely soul. George Sand knew this when she wrote, "He made an +instrument speak the language of the infinite. Often in ten lines that +a child might play he has introduced poems of unequalled elevation, +dramas unrivalled in force and energy. He did not need the great +material methods to find expression for his genius. Neither saxophone +nor ophicleide was necessary for him to fill the soul with awe. Without +church organ or human voice he inspired faith and enthusiasm." + +It might be remarked here that Beethoven, too, aroused a wondering and +worshipping world without the aid of saxophone or ophicleide. But it is +needless cruelty to pick at Madame Sand's criticisms. She had no +technical education, and so little appreciation of Chopin's peculiar +genius for the piano that she could write, "The day will come when his +music will be arranged for orchestra without change of the piano +score;" which is disaster-breeding nonsense. We have sounded Chopin's +weakness when writing for any instrument but his own, when writing in +any form but his own. + +The E minor Concerto is dedicated to Frederick Kalkbrenner, the F minor +to the Comtesse Deiphine Potocka. The latter dedication demonstrates +that he could forget his only "ideal" in the presence of the charming +Potocka! Ah! these vibratile and versatile Poles! + +Robert Schumann, it is related, shook his head wearily when his early +work was mentioned. "Dreary stuff," said the composer, whose critical +sense did not fail him even in so personal a question. What Chopin +thought of his youthful music may be discovered in his scanty +correspondence. To suppose that the young Chopin sprang into the arena +a fully equipped warrior is one of those nonsensical notions which +gains currency among persons unfamiliar with the law of musical +evolution. Chopin's musical ancestry is easily traced; as Poe had his +Holley Chivers, Chopin had his Field. The germs of his second period +are all there; from op. 1 to opus 22 virtuosity for virtuosity's sake +is very evident. Liszt has said that in every young artist there is the +virtuoso fever, and Chopin being a pianist did not escape the fever of +the footlights. He was composing, too, at a time when piano music was +well nigh strangled by excess of ornament, when acrobats were kings, +when the Bach Fugue and Beethoven Sonata lurked neglected and dusty in +the memories of the few. Little wonder, then, we find this individual, +youthful Pole, not timidly treading in the path of popular composition, +but bravely carrying his banner, spangled, glittering and fanciful, and +outstripping at their own game all the virtuosi of Europe. His +originality in this bejewelled work caused Hummel to admire and +Kalkbrenner to wonder. The supple fingers of the young man from Warsaw +made quick work of existing technical difficulties. He needs must +invent some of his own, and when Schumann saw the pages of op. 2 he +uttered his historical cry. Today we wonder somewhat at his enthusiasm. +It is the old story--a generation seeks to know, a generation +comprehends and enjoys, and a generation discards. + +Opus 1, a Rondo in C minor, dedicated to Madame de Linde, saw the light +in 1825, but it was preceded by two polonaises, a set of variations, +and two mazurkas in G and B flat major. Schumann declared that Chopin's +first published work was his tenth, and that between op. 1 and 2 there +lay two years and twenty works. Be this as it may, one cannot help +liking the C minor Rondo. In the A flat section we detect traces of his +F minor Concerto. There is lightness, joy in creation, which contrast +with the heavy, dour quality of the C minor Sonata, op. 4. Loosely +constructed, in a formal sense, and too exuberant for his strict +confines, this op. 1 is remarkable, much more remarkable, than +Schumann's Abegg variations. + +The Rondo a la Mazur, in F, is a further advance. It is dedicated to +Comtesse Moriolles, and was published in 1827 (?). Schumann reviewed it +in 1836. It is sprightly, Polish in feeling and rhythmic life, and a +glance at any of its pages gives us the familiar Chopin +impression--florid passage work, chords in extensions and chromatic +progressions. The Concert Rondo, op. 14, in F, called Krakowiak, is +built on a national dance in two-four time, which originated in +Cracovia. It is, to quote Niecks, a modified polonaise, danced by the +peasants with lusty abandon. Its accentual life is usually manifested +on an unaccented part of the bar, especially at the end of a section or +phrase. Chopin's very Slavic version is spirited, but the virtuoso +predominates. There is lushness in ornamentation, and a bold, merry +spirit informs every page. The orchestral accompaniment is thin. +Dedicated to the Princesse Czartoryska, it was published June, 1834. +The Rondo, op. 16, with an Introduction, is in great favor at the +conservatories, and is neat rather than poetical, although the +introduction has dramatic touches. It is to this brilliant piece, with +its Weber-ish affinities, that Richard Burmeister has supplied an +orchestral accompaniment. + +The remaining Rondo, posthumously published as op. 73, and composed in +1828, was originally intended, so Chopin writes in 1828, for one piano. +It is full of fire, but the ornamentation runs mad, and no traces of +the poetical Chopin are present. He is preoccupied with the brilliant +surfaces of the life about him. His youthful expansiveness finds a fair +field in these variations, rondos and fantasias. + +Schumann's enthusiasm over the variations on "La ci darem la mano" +seems to us a little overdone. Chopin had not much gift for variation +in the sense that we now understand variation. Beethoven, Schumann and +Brahms--one must include Mendelssohn's Serious Variations--are masters +of a form that is by no means structurally simple or a reversion to +mere spielerei, as Finck fancies. Chopin plays with his themes +prettily, but it is all surface display, all heat lightning. He never +smites, as does Brahms with his Thor hammer, the subject full in the +middle, cleaving it to its core. Chopin is slightly effeminate in his +variations, and they are true specimens of spielerei, despite the +cleverness of design in the arabesques, their brilliancy and euphony. +Op. 2 has its dazzling moments, but its musical worth is inferior. It +is written to split the ears of the groundlings, or rather to astonish +and confuse them, for the Chopin dynamics in the early music are never +very rude. The indisputable superiority to Herz and the rest of the +shallow-pated variationists caused Schumann's passionate admiration. It +has, however, given us an interesting page of music criticism. +Rellstab, grumpy old fellow, was near right when he wrote of these +variations that "the composer runs down the theme with roulades, and +throttles and hangs it with chains of shakes." The skip makes its +appearance in the fourth variation, and there is no gainsaying the +brilliancy and piquant spirit of the Alla Polacca. Op. 2 is +orchestrally accompanied, an accompaniment that may be gladly dispensed +with, and dedicated by Chopin to the friend of his youth, Titus +Woyciechowski. + +Je Vends des Scapulaires is a tune in Herold and Halevy's "Ludovic." +Chopin varied it in his op. 12. This rondo in B flat is the weakest of +Chopin's muse. It is Chopin and water, and Gallic eau sucree at that. +The piece is written tastefully, is not difficult, but woefully +artificial. Published in 1833, it was dedicated to Miss Emma Horsford. +In May, 1851, appeared the Variations in E, without an opus number. +They are not worth the trouble. Evidently composed before Chopin's op. +1 and before 1830, they are musically light waisted, although written +by one who already knew the keyboard. The last, a valse, is the +brightest of the set. The theme is German. + +The Fantaisie, op 13, in A, on Polish airs, preceded by an introduction +in F sharp minor, is dedicated to the pianist J. P. Pixis. It was +published in April, 1834. It is Chopin brilliant. Its orchestral +background does not count for much, but the energy, the color and +Polish character of the piece endeared it to the composer. He played it +often, and as Kleczynski asks, "Are these brilliant passages, these +cascades of pearly notes, these bold leaps the sadness and the despair +of which we hear? Is it not rather youth exuberant with intensity and +life? Is it not happiness, gayety, love for the world and men? The +melancholy notes are there to bring out, to enforce the principal +ideas. For instance, in the Fantaisie, op. 13, the theme of Kurpinski +moves and saddens us; but the composer does not give time for this +impression to become durable; he suspends it by means of a long trill, +and then suddenly by a few chords and with a brilliant prelude leads us +to a popular dance, which makes us mingle with the peasant couples of +Mazovia. Does the finale indicate by its minor key the gayety of a man +devoid of hope--as the Germans say?" Kleczynski then tells us that a +Polish proverb, "A fig for misery," is the keynote of a nation that +dances furiously to music in the minor key. "Elevated beauty, not +sepulchral gayety," is the character of Polish, of Chopin's music. This +is a valuable hint. There are variations in the Fantaisie which end +with a merry and vivacious Kujawiak. + +The F minor Fantaisie will be considered later. Neither by its +magnificent content, construction nor opus number (49) does it fall +into this chapter. + +The Allegro de Concert in A, op. 46, was published in November, 1841, +and dedicated to Mlle. Friederike Muller, a pupil of Chopin. It has all +the characteristics of a concerto, and is indeed a truncated one--much +more so than Schumann's F minor Sonata, called Concert Sans Orchestre. +There are tutti in the Chopin work, the solo part not really beginning +until the eighty-seventh bar. But it must not be supposed that these +long introductory passages are ineffective for the player. The Allegro +is one of Chopin's most difficult works. It abounds in risky skips, +ambuscades of dangerous double notes, and the principal themes are bold +and expressive. The color note is strikingly adapted for public +performance, and perhaps Schumann was correct in believing that Chopin +had originally sketched this for piano and orchestra. Niecks asks if +this is not the fragment of a concerto for two pianos, which Chopin, in +a letter written at Vienna, December 21, 1830, said he would play in +public with his friend Nidecki, if he succeeded in writing it to his +satisfaction. And is there any significance in the fact that Chopin, +when sending this manuscript to Fontana, probably in the summer of +1841, calls it a concerto? + +While it adds little to Chopin's reputation, it has the potentialities +of a powerful and more manly composition than either of the two +concertos. Jean Louis Nicode has given it an orchestral garb, besides +arranging it for two pianos. He has added a developing section of +seventy bars. This version was first played in New York a decade ago by +Marie Geselschap, a Dutch pianist, under the direction of the late +Anton Seidl. The original, it must be acknowledged, is preferable. + +The Bolero, op. 19, has a Polonaise flavor. There is but little Spanish +in its ingredients. It is merely a memorandum of Chopin's early essays +in dance forms. It was published in 1834, four years before Chopin's +visit to Spain. Niecks thinks it an early work. That it can be made +effective was proven by Emil Sauer. It is for fleet-fingered pianists, +and the principal theme has the rhythmical ring of the Polonaise, +although the most Iberian in character. It is dedicated to Comtesse E. +de Flahault. In the key of A minor, its coda ends in A major. Willeby +says it is in C major! + +The Tarantella is in A flat, and is numbered op. 43. It was published +in 1841 (?), and bears no dedication. Composed at Nohant, it is as +little Italian as the Bolero is Spanish. Chopin's visit to Italy was of +too short a duration to affect him, at least in the style of dance. It +is without the necessary ophidian tang, and far inferior to Heller and +Liszt's efforts in the constricted form. One finds little of the frenzy +ascribed to it by Schumann in his review. It breathes of the North, not +the South, and ranks far below the A flat Impromptu in geniality and +grace. + +The C minor Funeral March, composed, according to Fontana, in 1829, +sounds like Mendelssohn. The trio has the processional quality of a +Parisian funeral cortege. It is modest and in no wise remarkable. The +three Ecossaises, published as op. 73, No. 3, are little dances, +schottisches, nothing more. No. 2 in G is highly popular in girls' +boarding schools. + +The Grand Duo Concertant for 'cello and piano is jointly composed by +Chopin and Franchomme on themes from "Robert le Diable." It begins in E +and ends in A major, and is without opus number. Schumann thinks +"Chopin sketched the whole of it, and that Franchomme said 'Yes' to +everything." It is for the salon of 1833, when it was published. It is +empty, tiresome and only slightly superior to compositions of the same +sort by De Beriot and Osborne. Full of rapid elegancies and shallow +passage work, this duo is certainly a piece d'occasion--the occasion +probably being the need of ready money. + +The seventeen Polish songs were composed between 1824 and 1844. In the +psychology of the Lied Chopin was not happy. Karasowski writes that +many of the songs were lost and some of them are still sung in Poland, +their origin being hazy. The Third of May is cited as one of these. +Chopin had a habit of playing songs for his friends, but neglected +putting some of them on paper. The collected songs are under the opus +head 74. The words are by his friends, Stephen Witwicki, Adam +Mickiewicz, Bogdan Zaleski and Sigismond Krasinski. The first in the +key of A, the familiar Maiden's Wish, has been brilliantly paraphrased +by Liszt. This pretty mazurka is charmingly sung and played by Marcella +Sembrich in the singing lesson of "The Barber of Seville." There are +several mazurkas in the list. Most of these songs are mediocre. +Poland's Dirge is an exception, and so is Horsemen Before the Battle. +"Was ein junges Madchen liebt" has a short introduction, in which the +reminiscence hunter may find a true bit of "Meistersinger" color. +Simple in structure and sentiment, the Chopin lieder seem almost +rudimentary compared to essays in this form by Schubert, Schumann, +Franz, Brahms and Tschaikowsky. + +A word of recommendation may not be amiss here regarding the technical +study of Chopin. Kleczynski, in his two books, gives many valuable +hints, and Isidor Philipp has published a set of Exercises Quotidiens, +made up of specimens in double notes, octaves and passages taken from +the works. Here skeletonized are the special technical problems. In +these Daily Studies, and his edition of the Etudes, are numerous +examples dealt with practically. For a study of Chopin's ornaments, +Mertke has discussed at length the various editorial procedure in the +matter of attacking the trill in single and double notes, also the +easiest method of executing the flying scud and vapors of the +fioriture. This may be found in No. 179 of the Edition Steingraber. +Philipp's collection is published in Paris by J. Hamelle, and is +prefixed by some interesting remarks of Georges Mathias. Chopin's +portrait in 1833, after Vigneron, is included. + +One composition more is to be considered. In 1837 Chopin contributed +the sixth variation of the march from "I Puritani." These variations +were published under the title: "Hexameron: Morceau de Concert. Grandes +Variations de bravoure sur la marche des Puritans de Bellini, composees +pour le concert de Madame la Princesse Belgiojoso au benefice des +pauvres, par MM. Liszt, Thalberg, Pixis, H. Herz, Czerny et Chopin." +Liszt wrote an orchestral accompaniment, never published. His pupil, +Moriz Rosenthal, is the only modern virtuoso who plays the Hexameron in +his concerts, and play it he does with overwhelming splendor. Chopin's +contribution in E major is in his sentimental, salon mood. Musically, +it is the most impressive of this extraordinary mastodonic survival of +the "pianistic" past. + +The newly published Fugue--or fugato--in A minor, in two voices, is +from a manuscript in the possession of Natalie Janotha, who probably +got it from the late Princess Czartoryska, a pupil of the composer. The +composition is ineffective, and in spots ugly--particularly in the +stretta--and is no doubt an exercise during the working years with +Elsner. The fact that in the coda the very suspicious octave +pedal-point and trills may be omitted--so the editorial note +urns--leads one to suspect that out of a fragment Janotha has evolved, +Cuvier-like, an entire composition. Chopin as fugue-maker does not +appear in a brilliant light. Is the Polish composer to become a musical +Hugh Conway? Why all these disjecta membra of a sketch-book? + +In these youthful works may be found the beginnings of the greater +Chopin, but not his vast subjugation of the purely technical to the +poetic and spiritual. That came later. To the devout Chopinist the +first compositions are so many proofs of the joyful, victorious spirit +of the man whose spleen and pessimism have been wrongfully compared to +Leopardi's and Baudelaire's. Chopin was gay, fairly healthy and +bubbling over with a pretty malice. His first period shows this; it +also shows how thorough and painful the processes by which he evolved +his final style. + + + + +XII. THE POLONAISES:--HEROIC HYMNS OF BATTLE. + + +How is one to reconcile "the want of manliness, moral and +intellectual," which Hadow asserts is "the one great limitation of +Chopin's province," with the power, splendor and courage of the +Polonaises? Here are the cannon buried in flowers of Robert Schumann, +here overwhelming evidences of versatility, virility and passion. +Chopin blinded his critics and admirers alike; a delicate, puny fellow, +he could play the piano on occasion like a devil incarnate. He, too, +had his demon as well as Liszt, and only, as Ehlert puts it, +"theoretical fear" of this spirit driving him over the cliffs of reason +made him curb its antics. After all the couleur de rose portraits and +lollipop miniatures made of him by pensive, poetic persons it is not +possible to conceive Chopin as being irascible and almost brutal. Yet +he was at times even this. "Beethoven was scarce more vehement and +irritable," writes Ehlert. And we remember the stories of friends and +pupils who have seen this slender, refined Pole wrestling with his +wrath as one under the obsession of a fiend. It is no desire to +exaggerate this side of his nature that impels this plain writing. +Chopin left compositions that bear witness to his masculine side. +Diminutive in person, bad-temper became him ill; besides, his whole +education and tastes were opposed to scenes of violence. So this +energy, spleen and raging at fortune found escape in some of his music, +became psychical in its manifestations. + +But, you may say, this is feminine hysteria, the impotent cries of an +unmanly, weak nature. Read the E flat minor, the C minor, the A major, +the F sharp minor and the two A flat major Polonaises! Ballades, +Scherzi, Studies, Preludes and the great F minor Fantaisie are +purposely omitted from this awing scheme. Chopin was weak in physique, +but he had the soul of a lion. Allied to the most exquisite poetic +sensibilities--one is reminded here of Balzac's "Ce beau genie est +moins un musicien qu'une dine qui se rend sensible"--there was another +nature, fiery, implacable. He loved Poland, he hated her oppressors. +There is no doubt he idealized his country and her wrongs until the +theme grew out of all proportion. Politically the Poles and Celts rub +shoulders. Niecks points out that if Chopin was "a flattering idealist +as a national poet, as a personal poet he was an uncompromising +realist." So in the polonaises we find two distinct groups: in one the +objective, martial side predominates, in the other is Chopin the moody, +mournful and morose. But in all the Polish element pervades. Barring +the mazurkas, these dances are the most Polish of his works. +Appreciation of Chopin's wide diversity of temperament would have +sparedthe world the false, silly, distorted portraits of him. He had +the warrior in him, even if his mailed fist was seldom used. There are +moments when he discards gloves and soft phrases and deals blows that +reverberate with formidable clangor. + +By all means read Liszt's gorgeous description of the Polonaise. +Originating during the last half of the sixteenth century, it was at +first a measured procession of nobles and their womankind to the sound +of music. In the court of Henry of Anjou, in 1574, after his election +to the Polish throne, the Polonaise was born, and throve in the hardy, +warlike atmosphere. It became a dance political, and had words set to +it. Thus came the Kosciuszko, the Oginski, the Moniuszko, the +Kurpinski, and a long list written by composers with names ending in +"ski." It is really a march, a processional dance, grave, moderate, +flowing, and by no means stereotyped. Liszt tells of the capricious +life infused into its courtly measures by the Polish aristocracy. It is +at once the symbol of war and love, a vivid pageant of martial +splendor, a weaving, cadenced, voluptuous dance, the pursuit of shy, +coquettish woman by the fierce warrior. + +The Polonaise is in three-four time, with the accent on the second beat +of the bar. In simple binary form--ternary if a trio is added--this +dance has feminine endings to all the principal cadences. The +rhythmical cast of the bass is seldom changed. Despite its essentially +masculine mould, it is given a feminine title; formerly it was called +Polonais. Liszt wrote of it: + +"In this form the noblest traditional feelings of ancient Poland are +represented. The Polonaise is the true and purest type of Polish +national character, as in the course of centuries it was developed, +partly through the political position of the kingdom toward east and +west, partly through an undefinable, peculiar, inborn disposition of +the entire race. In the development of the Polonaise everything +co-operated which specifically distinguished the nation from others. In +the Poles of departed times manly resolution was united with glowing +devotion to the object of their love. Their knightly heroism was +sanctioned by high-soaring dignity, and even the laws of gallantry and +the national costume exerted an influence over the turns of this dance. +The Polonaises are the keystone in the development of this form. They +belong to the most beautiful of Chopin inspirations. With their +energetic rhythm they electrify, to the point of excited demonstration, +even the sleepiest indifferentism. Chopin was born too late, and left +his native hearth too early, to be initiated into the original +character of the Polonaise as danced through his own observation. But +what others imparted to him in regard to it was supplemented by his +fancy and his nationality." + +Chopin wrote fifteen Polonaises, the authenticity of one in G flat +major being doubted by Niecks. This list includes the Polonaise for +violoncello and piano, op. 3, and the Polonaise, op. 22, for piano and +orchestra. This latter Polonaise is preceded by an andante spianato in +G in six-eight time, and unaccompanied. It is a charming, liquid-toned, +nocturne-like composition, Chopin in his most suave, his most placid +mood: a barcarolle, scarcely a ripple of emotion, disturbs the mirrored +calm of this lake. After sixteen bars of a crudely harmonized tutti +comes the Polonaise in the widely remote key of E flat; it is +brilliant, every note telling, the figuration rich and novel, the +movement spirited and flowing. Perhaps it is too long and lacks relief. +The theme on each re-entrance is varied ornamentally. The second theme, +in C minor, has a Polish and poetic ring, while the coda is effective. +This opus is vivacious, but not characterized by great depth. +Crystalline, gracious, and refined, the piece is stamped "Paris," the +elegant Paris of 1830. Composed in that year and published in July, +1836, it is dedicated to the Baronne D'Est. Chopin introduced it at a +Conservatoire concert for the benefit of Habeneck, April 26, 1835. +This, according to Niecks, was the only time he played the Polonaise +with orchestral accompaniment. It was practically a novelty to New York +when Rafael Joseffy played it here, superlatively well, in 1879. + +The orchestral part seems wholly superfluous, for the scoring is not +particularly effective, and there is a rumor that Chopin cannot be held +responsible for it. Xaver Scharwenka made a new instrumentation that is +discreet and extremely well sounding. With excellent tact he has +managed the added accompaniment to the introduction, giving some +thematic work of the slightest texture to the strings, and in the +pretty coda to the wood-wind. A delicately managed allusion is made by +the horns to the second theme of the nocturne in G. There are even five +faint taps of the triangle, and the idyllic atmosphere is never +disturbed. Scharwenka first played this arrangement at a Seidl memorial +concert, in Chickering Hall, New York, April, 1898. Yet I cannot +truthfully say the Polonaise sounds so characteristic as when played +solo. + +The C sharp minor Polonaise, op. 26, has had the misfortune of being +sentimentalized to death. What can be more "appassionata" than the +opening with its "grand rhythmical swing"? It is usually played by +timid persons in a sugar-sweet fashion, although fff stares them in the +face. The first three lines are hugely heroic, but the indignation soon +melts away, leaving an apathetic humor; after the theme returns and is +repeated we get a genuine love motif tender enough in all faith +wherewith to woo a princess. On this the Polonaise closes, an odd +ending for such a fiery opening. + +In no such mood does No. 2 begin. In E flat minor it is variously known +as the Siberian, the Revolt Polonaise. It breathes defiance and rancor +from the start. What suppressed and threatening rumblings are there! +Volcanic mutterings these: + +[Musical score excerpt] + +It is a sinister page, and all the more so because of the injunction to +open with pianissimo. One wishes that the shrill, high G flat had been +written in full chords as the theme suffers from a want of massiveness. +Then follows a subsidiary, but the principal subject returns +relentlessly. The episode in B major gives pause for breathing. It has +a hint of Meyerbeer. But again with smothered explosions the Polonaise +proper appears, and all ends in gloom and the impotent clanking of +chains. It is an awe-provoking work, this terrible Polonaise in E flat +minor, op. 26; it was published July, 1836, and is dedicated to M. J. +Dessauer. + +Not so the celebrated A major Polonaise, op. 40, Le Militaire. To +Rubinstein this seemed a picture of Poland's greatness, as its +companion in C minor is of Poland's downfall. Although Karasowski and +Kleczynski give to the A flat major Polonaise the honor of suggesting a +well-known story, it is really the A major that provoked it--so the +Polish portrait painter Kwiatowski informed Niecks. The story runs, +that after composing it, Chopin in the dreary watches of the night was +surprised--terrified is a better word--by the opening of his door and +the entrance of a long train of Polish nobles and ladies, richly robed, +who moved slowly by him. Troubled by the ghosts of the past he had +raised, the composer, hollow eyed, fled the apartment. All this must +have been at Majorca, for op. 40 was composed or finished there. +Ailing, weak and unhappy as he was, Chopin had grit enough to file and +polish this brilliant and striking composition into its present shape. +It is the best known and, though the most muscular of his compositions, +it is the most played. It is dedicated to J. Fontana, and was published +November, 1840. This Polonaise has the festive glitter of Weber. + +The C minor Polonaise of the same set is a noble, troubled composition, +large in accents and deeply felt. Can anything be more impressive than +this opening? + +[Musical score excerpt] + +It is indeed Poland's downfall. The Trio in A flat, with its +kaleidoscopic modulations, produces an impression of vague unrest and +suppressed sorrow. There is loftiness of spirit and daring in it. + +What can one say new of the tremendous F sharp minor Polonaise? Willeby +calls it noisy! And Stanislaw Przybyszewski--whom Vance Thompson +christened a prestidigious noctambulist-has literally stormed over it. +It is barbaric, it is perhaps pathologic, and of it Liszt has said most +eloquent things. It is for him a dream poem, the "lurid hour that +precedes a hurricane" with a "convulsive shudder at the close." The +opening is very impressive, the nerve-pulp being harassed by the +gradually swelling prelude. There is defiant power in the first theme, +and the constant reference to it betrays the composer's exasperated +mental condition. This tendency to return upon himself, a tormenting +introspection, certainly signifies a grave state. But consider the +musical weight of the work, the recklessly bold outpourings of a mind +almost distraught! There is no greater test for the poet-pianist than +the F sharp minor Polonaise. It is profoundly ironical--what else means +the introduction of that lovely mazurka, "a flower between two +abysses"? This strange dance is ushered in by two of the most enigmatic +pages of Chopin. The A major intermezzo, with its booming cannons and +reverberating overtones, is not easily defensible on the score of form, +yet it unmistakably fits in the picture. The mazurka is full of +interrogation and emotional nuanciren. The return of the tempest is not +long delayed. It bursts, wanes, and with the coda comes sad yearning, +then the savage drama passes tremblingly into the night after fluid and +wavering affirmations; a roar in F sharp and finally a silence that +marks the cessation of an agitating nightmare. No "sabre dance" this, +but a confession from the dark depths of a self-tortured soul. Op. 44 +was published November, 1841, and is dedicated to Princesse de Beauvau. +There are few editorial differences. In the eighteenth bar from the +beginning, Kullak, in the second beat, fills out an octave. Not so in +Klindworth nor in the original. At the twentieth bar Klindworth differs +from the original as follows. The Chopin text is the upper one: + +[Musical score excerpts] + +The A flat Polonaise, op. 53, was published December, 1843, and is said +by Karasowski to have been composed in 1840, after Chopin's return from +Majorca. It is dedicated to A. Leo. This is the one Karasowski calls +the story of Chopin's vision of the antique dead in an isolated tower +of Madame Sand's chateau at Nohant. We have seen this legend disproved +by one who knows. This Polonaise is not as feverish and as exalted as +the previous one. It is, as Kleczynski writes, "the type of a war +song." Named the Heroique, one hears in it Ehlert's "ring of damascene +blade and silver spur." There is imaginative splendor in this thrilling +work, with its thunder of horses' hoofs and fierce challengings. What +fire, what sword thrusts and smoke and clash of mortal conflict! Here +is no psychical presentation, but an objective picture of battle, of +concrete contours, and with a cleaving brilliancy that excites the +blood to boiling pitch. That Chopin ever played it as intended is +incredible; none but the heroes of the keyboard may grasp its dense +chordal masses, its fiery projectiles of tone. But there is something +disturbing, even ghostly, in the strange intermezzo that separates the +trio from the polonaise. Both mist and starlight are in it. Yet the +work is played too fast, and has been nicknamed the "Drum" Polonaise, +losing in majesty and force because of the vanity of virtuosi. The +octaves in E major are spun out as if speed were the sole idea of this +episode. Follow Kleczynski's advice and do not sacrifice the Polonaise +to the octaves. Karl Tausig, so Joseffy and de Lenz assert, played this +Polonaise in an unapproachable manner. Powerful battle tableau as it +is, it may still be presented so as not to shock one's sense of the +euphonious, of the limitations of the instrument. This work becomes +vapid and unheroic when transferred to the orchestra. + +The Polonaise-Fantaisie in A flat, op. 61, given to the world +September, 1846, is dedicated to Madame A. Veyret. One of three great +Polonaises, it is just beginning to be understood, having been derided +as amorphous, febrile, of little musical moment, even Liszt declaring +that "such pictures possess but little real value to art. ... +Deplorable visions which the artist should admit with extreme +circumspection within the graceful circle of his charmed realm." This +was written in the old-fashioned days, when art was aristocratic and +excluded the "baser" and more painful emotions. For a generation +accustomed to the realism of Richard Strauss, the Fantaisie-Polonaise +seems vaporous and idealistic, withal new. It recalls one of those +enchanted flasks of the magii from which on opening smoke exhales that +gradually shapes itself into fantastic and fearsome figures. This +Polonaise at no time exhibits the solidity of its two predecessors; its +plasticity defies the imprint of the conventional Polonaise, though we +ever feel its rhythms. It may be full of monologues, interspersed +cadenzas, improvised preludes and short phrases, as Kullak suggests, +yet there is unity in the composition, the units of structure and +style. It was music of the future when Chopin composed; it is now music +of the present, as much as Richard Wagner's. But the realism is a +trifle clouded. Here is the duality of Chopin the suffering man and +Chopin the prophet of Poland. Undimmed is his poetic vision--Poland +will be free!--undaunted his soul, though oppressed by a suffering +body. There are in the work throes of agony blended with the trumpet +notes of triumph. And what puzzled our fathers--the shifting lights and +shadows, the restless tonalities--are welcome, for at the beginning of +this new century the chromatic is king. The ending of this Polonaise is +triumphant, recalling in key and climaxing the A flat Ballade. Chopin +is still the captain of his soul--and Poland will be free! Are Celt and +Slav doomed to follow ever the phosphorescent lights of patriotism? +Liszt acknowledges the beauty and grandeur of this last Polonaise, +which unites the characteristics of superb and original manipulation of +the form, the martial and the melancholic. + +Opus 71, three posthumous Polonaises, given to the world by Julius +Fontana, are in D minor, published in 1827, B flat major, 1828, and F +minor, 1829. They are interesting to Chopinists. The influence of +Weber, a past master in this form, is felt. Of the three the last in F +minor is the strongest, although if Chopin's age is taken into +consideration, the first, in D minor, is a feat for a lad of eighteen. +I agree with Niecks that the posthumous Polonaise, without opus number, +in G sharp minor, was composed later than 1822--the date given in the +Breitkopf & Hartel edition. It is an artistic conception, and in "light +winged figuration" far more mature than the Chopin of op. 71. Really a +graceful and effective little composition of the florid order, but like +his early music without poetic depth. The Warsaw "Echo Musicale," to +commemorate the fiftieth anniversary of Chopin's death, published a +special number in October, 1899, with the picture of a farmer named +Krysiak, born in 1810, the year after the composer. Thereat Finck +remarked that it is not a case of survival of the fittest! A fac-simile +reproduction of a hitherto unpublished Polonaise in A flat, written at +the age of eleven, is also included in this unique number. This tiny +dance shows, it is said, the "characteristic physiognomy" of the +composer. In reality this polacca is thin, a tentative groping after a +form that later was mastered so magnificently by the composer. Here is +the way it begins--the autograph is Chopin's: + +[Musical score excerpt] + +The Alla Polacca for piano and 'cello, op. 3, was composed in 1829, +while Chopin was on a visit to Prince Radziwill. It is preceded by an +introduction, and is dedicated to Joseph Merk, the 'cellist. Chopin +himself pronounced it a brilliant salon piece. It is now not even that, +for it sounds antiquated and threadbare. The passage work at times +smacks of Chopin and Weber--a hint of the Mouvement Perpetuel--and the +'cello has the better of the bargain. Evidently written for my lady's +chamber. + +Two Polonaises remain. One, in B flat minor, was composed in 1826, on +the occasion of the composer's departure for Reinerz. A footnote to the +edition of this rather elegiac piece tells this. Adieu to Guillaume +Kolberg, is the title, and the Trio in D flat is accredited to an air +of "Gazza Ladra," with a sentimental Au Revoir inscribed. Kleczynski +has revised the Gebethner & Wolff edition. The little cadenza in +chromatic double notes on the last page is of a certainty Chopin. But +the Polonaise in G flat major, published by Schott, is doubtful. It has +a shallow ring, a brilliant superficiality that warrants Niecks in +stamping it as a possible compilation. There are traces of the master +throughout, particularly in the E flat minor Trio, but there are some +vile progressions and an air of vulgarity surely not Chopin's. This +dance form, since the death of the great composer, has been chiefly +developed on the virtuoso side. Beethoven, Schubert, Weber, and even +Bach--in his B minor suite for strings and flute--also indulged in this +form. Wagner, as a student, wrote a Polonaise for four hands, in D, and +in Schumann's Papillons there is a charming specimen. Rubinstein +composed a most brilliant and dramatic example in E flat in Le Bal. The +Liszt Polonaises, all said and done, are the most remarkable in design +and execution since Chopin. But they are more Hungarian than Polish. + + + + +XIII. MAZURKAS:--DANCES OF THE SOUL + + +I + +"Coquetries, vanities, fantasies, inclinations, elegies, vague +emotions, passions, conquests, struggles upon which the safety or +favors of others depend, all, all meet in this dance." + +Thus Liszt. De Lenz further quotes him: "Of the Mazurkas, one must +harness a new pianist of the first rank to each of them." Yet Liszt +told Niecks he did not care much for Chopin's Mazurkas. "One often +meets in them with bars which might just as well be in another place. +But as Chopin puts them perhaps nobody could have put them." Liszt, +despite the rhapsodical praise of his friend, is not always to be +relied upon. Capricious as Chopin, he had days when he disliked not +only the Mazurkas, but all music. He confessed to Niecks that when he +played a half hour for amusement it was Chopin he took up. + +There is no more brilliant chapter than this Hungarian's on the dancing +of the Mazurka by the Poles. It is a companion to his equally +sensational description of the Polonaise. He gives a wild, whirling, +highly-colored narrative of the Mazurka, with a coda of extravagant +praise of the beauty and fascination of Polish women. "Angel through +love, demon through fantasy," as Balzac called her. In none of the +piano rhapsodies are there such striking passages to be met as in +Liszt's overwrought, cadenced prose, prose modelled after +Chateaubriand. Niema iak Polki--"nothing equals the Polish women" and +their "divine coquetries;" the Mazurka is their dance--it is the +feminine complement to the heroic and masculine Polonaise. + +An English writer describes the dancing of the Mazurka in contemporary +Russia: + + In the salons of St. Petersburg, for instance, the guests + actually dance; they do not merely shamble to and fro in a + crowd, crumpling their clothes and ruffling their tempers, and + call it a set of quadrilles. They have ample space for the + sweeping movements and complicated figures of all the orthodox + ball dances, and are generally gifted with sufficient plastic + grace to carry them out in style. They carefully cultivate + dances calling for a kind of grace which is almost beyond the + reach of art. The mazurka is one of the finest of these, and + it is quite a favorite at balls on the banks of the Neva. It + needs a good deal of room, one or more spurred officers, and + grace, grace and grace. The dash with which the partners rush + forward, the clinking and clattering of spurs as heel clashes + with heel in mid air, punctuating the staccato of the music, + the loud thud of boots striking the ground, followed by their + sibilant slide along the polished floor, then the swift + springs and sudden bounds, the whirling gyrations and dizzy + evolutions, the graceful genuflections and quick embraces, and + all the other intricate and maddening movements to the + accompaniment of one of Glinka's or Tschaikowsky's + masterpieces, awaken and mobilize all the antique heroism, + mediaeval chivalry and wild romance that lie dormant in the + depths of men's being. There is more genuine pleasure in being + the spectator of a soul thrilling dance like that than in + taking an active part in the lifeless make-believes performed + at society balls in many of the more Western countries of + Europe. + +Absolutely Slavonic, though a local dance of the province of Mazovia, +the Mazurek or Mazurka, is written in three-four time, with the usual +displaced accent in music of Eastern origin. Brodzinski is quoted as +saying that in its primitive form the Mazurek is only a kind of +Krakowiak, "less lively, less sautillant." At its best it is a dancing +anecdote, a story told in a charming variety of steps and gestures. It +is intoxicating, rude, humorous, poetic, above all melancholy. When he +is happiest he sings his saddest, does the Pole. Hence his predilection +for minor modes. The Mazurka is in three-four or three-eight time. +Sometimes the accent is dotted, but this is by no means absolute. Here +is the rhythm most frequently encountered, although Chopin employs +variants and modifications. The first part of the bar has usually the +quicker notes. + +The scale is a mixture of major and minor--melodies are encountered +that grew out of a scale shorn of a degree. Occasionally the augmented +second, the Hungarian, is encountered, and skips of a third are of +frequent occurrence. This, with progressions of augmented fourths and +major sevenths, gives to the Mazurkas of Chopin an exotic character +apart from their novel and original content. As was the case with the +Polonaise, Chopin took the framework of the national dance, developed +it, enlarged it and hung upon it his choicest melodies, his most +piquant harmonies. He breaks and varies the conventionalized rhythm in +a half hundred ways, lifting to the plane of a poem the heavy hoofed +peasant dance. But in this idealization he never robs it altogether of +the flavor of the soil. It is, in all its wayward disguises, the Polish +Mazurka, and is with the Polonaise, according to Rubinstein, the only +Polish-reflective music he has made, although "in all of his +compositions we hear him relate rejoicingly of Poland's vanished +greatness, singing, mourning, weeping over Poland's downfall and all +that, in the most beautiful, the most musical, way." Besides the "hard, +inartistic modulations, the startling progressions and abrupt changes +of mood" that jarred on the old-fashioned Moscheles, and dipped in +vitriol the pen of Rellstab, there is in the Mazurkas the greatest +stumbling block of all, the much exploited rubato. Berlioz swore that +Chopin could not play in time--which was not true--and later we shall +see that Meyerbeer thought the same. What to the sensitive critic is a +charming wavering and swaying in the measure--"Chopin leans about +freely within his bars," wrote an English critic--for the classicists +was a rank departure from the time beat. According to Liszt's +description of the rubato "a wind plays in the leaves, Life unfolds and +develops beneath them, but the tree remains the same--that is the +Chopin rubato." Elsewhere, "a tempo agitated, broken, interrupted, a +movement flexible, yet at the same time abrupt and languishing, and +vacillating as the fluctuating breath by which it is agitated." Chopin +was more commonplace in his definition: "Supposing," he explained, +"that a piece lasts a given number of minutes; it may take just so long +to perform the whole, but in detail deviations may differ." + +The tempo rubato is probably as old as music itself. It is in Bach, it +was practised by the old Italian singers. Mikuli says that no matter +how free Chopin was in his treatment of the right hand in melody or +arabesque, the left kept strict time. Mozart and not Chopin it was who +first said: "Let your left hand be your conductor and always keep +time." Halle, the pianist, once asserted that he proved Chopin to be +playing four-four instead of three-four measure in a mazurka. Chopin +laughingly admitted that it was a national trait. Halle was bewildered +when he first heard Chopin play, for he did not believe such music +could be represented by musical signs. Still he holds that this style +has been woefully exaggerated by pupils and imitators. If a Beethoven +symphony or a Bach fugue be played with metronomical rigidity it loses +its quintessential flavor. Is it not time the ridiculous falsehoods +about the Chopin rubato be exposed? Naturally abhorring anything that +would do violence to the structural part of his compositions, Chopin +was a very martinet with his pupils if too much license of tempo was +taken. His music needs the greatest lucidity in presentation, and +naturally a certain elasticity of phrasing. Rhythms need not be +distorted, nor need there be absurd and vulgar haltings, silly and +explosive dynamics. Chopin sentimentalized is Chopin butchered. He +loathed false sentiment, and a man whose taste was formed by Bach and +Mozart, who was nurtured by the music of these two giants, could never +have indulged in exaggerated, jerky tempi, in meaningless expression. +Come, let us be done with this fetish of stolen time, of the wonderful +and so seldom comprehended rubato. If you wish to play Chopin, play him +in curves; let there be no angularities of surface, of measure, but in +the name of the Beautiful do not deliver his exquisitely balanced +phrases with the jolting, balky eloquence of a cafe chantant singer. +The very balance and symmetry of the Chopin phraseology are internal; +it must be delivered in a flowing, waving manner, never square or hard, +yet with every accent showing like the supple muscles of an athlete +beneath his skin. Without the skeleton a musical composition is +flaccid, shapeless, weak and without character. Chopin's music needs a +rhythmic sense that to us, fed upon the few simple forms of the West, +seems almost abnormal. The Chopin rubato is rhythm liberated from its +scholastic bonds, but it does not mean anarchy, disorder. What makes +this popular misconception all the more singular is the freedom with +which the classics are now being interpreted. A Beethoven, and even a +Mozart symphony, no longer means a rigorous execution, in which the +measure is ruthlessly hammered out by the conductor, but the melodic +and emotional curve is followed and the tempo fluctuates. Why then is +Chopin singled out as the evil and solitary representative of a vicious +time-beat? Play him as you play Mendelssohn and your Chopin has +evaporated. Again play him lawlessly, with his accentual life +topsy-turvied, and he is no longer Chopin--his caricature only. +Pianists of Slavic descent alone understand the secret of the tempo +rubato. + + I have read in a recently started German periodical that to + make the performance of Chopin's works pleasing it is + sufficient to play them with less precision of rhythm than the + music of other composers. I, on the contrary, do not know a + single phrase of Chopin's works--including even the freest + among them--in which the balloon of inspiration, as it moves + through the air, is not checked by an anchor of rhythm and + symmetry. Such passages as occur in the F minor Ballade, the B + flat minor Scherzo--the middle part--the F minor Prelude, and + even the A flat Impromptu, are not devoid of rhythm. The most + crooked recitative of the F minor Concerto, as can be easily + proved, has a fundamental rhythm not at all fantastic, and + which cannot be dispensed with when playing with orchestra. + ... Chopin never overdoes fantasy, and is always restrained by + a pronounced aesthetical instinct. ... Everywhere the + simplicity of his poetical inspiration and his sobriety saves + us from extravagance and false pathos. + +Kleczynski has this in his second volume, for he enjoyed the invaluable +prompting of Chopin's pupil, the late Princess Marceline Czartoryska. + +Niecks quotes Mme. Friederike Stretcher, nee Muller, a pupil, who wrote +of her master: "He required adherence to the strictest rhythm, hated +all lingering and lagging, misplaced rubatos, as well as exaggerated +ritardandos. 'Je vous prie de vous asseoir,' he said, on such an +occasion, with gentle mockery. And it is just in this respect that +people make such terrible mistakes in the execution of his works." + +And now to the Mazurkas, which de Lenz said were Heinrich Heine's songs +on the piano. "Chopin was a phoenix of intimacy with the piano. In his +nocturnes and mazurkas he is unrivalled, downright fabulous." + +No compositions are so Chopin-ish as the Mazurkas. Ironical, sad, +sweet, joyous, morbid, sour, sane and dreamy, they illustrate what was +said of their composer--"his heart is sad, his mind is gay." That +subtle quality, for an Occidental, enigmatic, which the Poles call Zal, +is in some of them; in others the fun is almost rough and roaring. Zal, +a poisonous word, is a baleful compound of pain, sadness, secret +rancor, revolt. It is a Polish quality and is in the Celtic peoples. +Oppressed nations with a tendency to mad lyrism develop this mental +secretion of the spleen. Liszt writes that "the Zal colors with a +reflection now argent, now ardent the whole of Chopin's works." This +sorrow is the very soil of Chopin's nature. He so confessed when +questioned by Comtesse d'Agoult. Liszt further explains that the +strange word includes in its meanings--for it seems packed with +them--"all the tenderness, all the humility of a regret borne with +resignation and without a murmur;" it also signifies "excitement, +agitation, rancor, revolt full of reproach, premeditated vengeance, +menace never ceasing to threaten if retaliation should ever become +possible, feeding itself meanwhile with a bitter if sterile hatred." + +Sterile indeed must be such a consuming passion. Even where his +patriotism became a lyric cry, this Zal tainted the source of Chopin's +joy. It made him irascible, and with his powers of repression, this +smouldering, smothered rage must have well nigh suffocated him, and in +the end proved harmful alike to his person and to his art. As in +certain phases of disease it heightened the beauty of his later work, +unhealthy, feverish, yet beauty without doubt. The pearl is said to be +a morbid secretion, so the spiritual ferment called Zal gave to +Chopin's music its morbid beauty. It is in the B minor Scherzo but not +in the A flat Ballade. The F minor Ballade overflows with it, and so +does the F sharp minor Polonaise, but not the first Impromptu. Its dark +introspection colors many of the preludes and mazurkas, and in the C +sharp minor Scherzo it is in acrid flowering--truly fleurs du mal. +Heine and Baudelaire, two poets far removed from the Slavic, show +traces of the terrible drowsy Zal in their poetry. It is the collective +sorrow and tribal wrath of a down-trodden nation, and the mazurkas for +that reason have ethnic value. As concise, even as curt as the +Preludes, they are for the most part highly polished. They are dancing +preludes, and often tiny single poems of great poetic intensity and +passionate plaint. + +Chopin published during his lifetime forty-one Mazurkas in eleven +cahiers of three, four and five numbers. Op. 6, four Mazurkas, and op. +7, five Mazurkas, were published December, 1832. Op. 6 is dedicated to +Comtesse Pauline Plater; op. 7 to Mr. Johns. Op. 17, four Mazurkas, May +4, dedicated to Madame Lina Freppa; op. 24, four Mazurkas, November, +1835, dedicated to Comte de Perthuis; op. 30, four Mazurkas, December, +1837, dedicated to Princesse Czartoryska; op. 33, four Mazurkas, +October, 1838, dedicated to Comtesse Mostowska; op. 41, four Mazurkas, +December, 1840, dedicated to E. Witwicki; op. 50, three Mazurkas, +November, 1841, dedicated to Leon Szmitkowski; op. 56, three Mazurkas, +August, 1844, dedicated to Mile. C. Maberly; op. 59, three Mazurkas, +April, 1846, no dedication, and op. 63, three Mazurkas, September, +1847, dedicated to Comtesse Czosnowska. + +Besides there are op. 67 and 68 published by Fontana after Chopin's +death, consisting of eight Mazurkas, and there are a miscellaneous +number, two in A minor, both in the Kullak, Klindworth and Mikuli +editions, one in F sharp major, said to be written by Charles Mayer--in +Klindworth's--and four others, in G, B flat, D and C major. This makes +in all fifty-six to be grouped and analyzed. Niecks thinks there is a +well-defined difference between the Mazurkas as far as op. 41 and those +that follow. In the latter he misses "savage beauties" and spontaneity. +As Chopin gripped the form, as he felt more, suffered more and knew +more, his Mazurkas grew broader, revealed more Weltschmerz, became +elaborate and at times impersonal, but seldom lost the racial "snap" +and hue. They are sonnets in their well-rounded mecanisme, and, as +Schumann says, something new is to be found in each. Toward the last, a +few are blithe and jocund, but they are the exceptions. In the larger +ones the universal quality is felt, but to the detriment of the +intimate, Polish characteristics. These Mazurkas are just what they are +called, only some dance with the heart, others with the heels. +Comprising a large and original portion of Chopin's compositions, they +are the least known. Perhaps when they wander from the map of Poland +they lose some of their native fragrance. Like hardy, simple wild +flowers, they are mostly for the open air, the only out-of-doors music +Chopin ever made. But even in the open, under the moon, the note of +self-torture, of sophisticated sadness is not absent. Do not accuse +Chopin, for this is the sign-manual of his race. The Pole suffers in +song the joy of his sorrow. + + +II + +The F sharp minor Mazurka of op. 6 begins with the characteristic +triplet that plays such a role in the dance. Here we find a Chopin +fuller fledged than in the nocturnes and variations, and probably +because of the form. This Mazurka, first in publication, is melodious, +slightly mournful but of a delightful freshness. The third section with +the appoggiaturas realizes a vivid vision of country couples dancing +determinedly. Who plays No. 2 of this set? It, too, has the "native +wood note wild," with its dominant pedal bass, its slight twang and its +sweet-sad melody in C sharp minor. There is hearty delight in the +major, and how natural it seems. No. 3 in E is still on the village +green, and the boys and girls are romping in the dance. We hear a drone +bass--a favorite device of Chopin--and the chatter of the gossips, the +bustle of a rural festival. The harmonization is rich, the rhythmic +life vital. But in the following one in E flat minor a different note +is sounded. Its harmonies are closer and there is sorrow abroad. The +incessant circling around one idea, as if obsessed by fixed grief, is +used here for the first, but not for the last time, by the composer. + +Opus 7 drew attention to Chopin. It was the set that brought down the +thunders of Rellstab, who wrote: "If Mr. Chopin had shown this +composition to a master the latter would, it is to be hoped, have torn +it and thrown it at his feet, which we hereby do symbolically." +Criticism had its amenities in 1833. In a later number of "The Iris," +in which a caustic notice appeared of the studies, op. 10, Rellstab +printed a letter, signed Chopin, the authenticity of which is extremely +doubtful. In it Chopin is made to call the critic "really a very bad +man." Niecks demonstrates that the Polish pianist was not the writer. +It reads like the effusion of some indignant, well meaning female +friend. + +The B flat major Mazurka which opens op. 7 is the best known of these +dances. There is an expansive swing, a laissez-aller to this piece, +with its air of elegance, that are very alluring. The rubato +flourishes, and at the close we hear the footing of the peasant. A +jolly, reckless composition that makes one happy to be alive and +dancing. The next, which begins in A minor, is as if one danced upon +one's grave; a change to major does not deceive, it is too +heavy-hearted. No. 3, in F minor, with its rhythmic pronouncement at +the start, brings us back to earth. The triplet that sets off the +phrase has great significance. Guitar-like is the bass in its snapping +resolution. The section that begins on the dominant of D flat is full +of vigor and imagination; the left hand is given a solo. This Mazurka +has the true ring. + +The following one, in A flat, is a sequence of moods. Its assertiveness +soon melts into tenderer hues, and in an episode in A we find much to +ponder. No. 5, in C, consists of three lines. It is a sort of coda to +the opus and full of the echoes of lusty happiness. A silhouette with a +marked profile. + +Opus 17, No. 1, in B flat, is bold, chivalric, and I fancy I hear the +swish of the warrior's sabre. The peasant has vanished or else gapes +through the open window while his master goes through the paces of a +courtlier dance. We encounter sequential chords of the seventh, and +their use, rhythmically framed as they are, gives a line of sternness +to the dance. Niecks thinks that the second Mazurka might be called The +Request, so pathetic, playful and persuasive is it. It is in E minor +and has a plaintive, appealing quality. The G major part is very +pretty. In the last lines the passion mounts, but is never shrill. +Kullak notes that in the fifth and sixth bars there is no slur in +certain editions. Klindworth employs it, but marks the B sforzando. A +slur on two notes of the same pitch with Chopin does not always mean a +tie. The A flat Mazurka, No. 3, is pessimistic, threatening and +irritable. Though in the key of E major the trio displays a relentless +sort of humor. The return does not mend matters. A dark page! In A +minor the fourth is called by Szulc the Little Jew. Szulc, who wrote +anecdotes of Chopin and collected them with the title of "Fryderyk +Szopen," told the story to Kleczynski. It is this: + + Chopin did not care for programme music, though more than one + of his compositions, full of expression and character, may be + included under that name. Who does not know the A minor + Mazurka of op. 17, dedicated to Lena Freppa? Itwas already + known in our country as the "Little Jew" before the departure + of our artist abroad. It is one of the works of Chopin which + are characterized by distinct humor. A Jew in slippers and a + long robe comes out of his inn, and seeing an unfortunate + peasant, his customer, intoxicated, tumbling about the road + and uttering complaints, exclaims from his threshold, "What is + this?" Then, as if by way of contrast to this scene, the gay + wedding party of a rich burgess comes along on its way from + church, with shouts of various kinds, accompanied in a lively + manner by violins and bagpipes. The train passes by, the tipsy + peasant renews his complaints--the complaints of a man who had + tried to drown his misery in the glass. The Jew returns + indoors, shaking his head and again asking, "What was this?" + +The story strikes one as being both childish and commonplace. The +Mazurka is rather doleful and there is a little triplet of +interrogation standing sentinel at the fourth bar. It is also the last +phrase. But what of that? I, too, can build you a programme as lofty or +lowly as you please, but it will not be Chopin's. Niecks, for example, +finds this very dance bleak and joyless, of intimate emotional +experience, and with "jarring tones that strike in and pitilessly wake +the dreamer." So there is no predicating the content of music except in +a general way; the mood key may be struck, but in Chopin's case this is +by no means infallible. If I write with confidence it is that begot of +desperation, for I know full well that my version of the story will not +be yours. The A minor Mazurka for me is full of hectic despair, +whatever that may mean, and its serpentining chromatics and apparently +suspended close--on the chord of the sixth--gives an impression of +morbid irresolution modulating into a sort of desperate gayety. Its +tonality accounts for the moods evoked, being indeterminate and +restless. + +Opus 24 begins with the G minor Mazurka, a favorite because of its +comparative freedom from technical difficulties. Although in the minor +mode there is mental strength in the piece, with its exotic scale of +the augmented second, and its trio is hearty. In the next, in C, we +find, besides the curious content, a mixture of tonalities--Lydian and +mediaeval church modes. Here the trio is occidental. The entire piece +leaves a vague impression of discontent, and the refrain recalls the +Russian bargemen's songs utilized at various times by Tschaikowsky. +Klindworth uses variants. There is also some editorial differences in +the metronomic markings, Mikuli being, according to Kullak, too slow. +Mention has not been made, as in the studies and preludes, of the tempi +of the Mazurkas. These compositions are so capricious, so varied, that +Chopin, I am sure, did not play any one of them twice alike. They are +creatures of moods, melodic air plants, swinging to the rhythms of any +vagrant breeze. The metronome is for the student, but metronome and +rubato are, as de Lenz would have said, mutually exclusive. + +The third Mazurka of op. 24 is in A flat. It is pleasing, not deep, a +real dance with an ornamental coda. But the next! Ah! here is a gem, a +beautiful and exquisitely colored poem. In B flat minor, it sends out +prehensile filaments that entwine and draw us into the centre of a +wondrous melody, laden with rich odors, odors that almost intoxicate. +The figuration is tropical, and when the major is reached and those +glancing thirty-seconds so coyly assail us we realize the seductive +charm of Chopin. The reprise is still more festooned, and it is almost +a relief when the little, tender unison begins with its positive chord +assertions closing the period. Then follows a fascinating, cadenced +step, with lights and shades, sweet melancholy driving before it joy +and being routed itself, until the annunciation of the first theme and +the dying away of the dance, dancers and the solid globe itself, as if +earth had committed suicide for loss of the sun. The last two bars +could have been written only by Chopin. They are ineffable sighs. + +And now the chorus of praise begins to mount in burning octaves. The C +minor Mazurka, op. 30, is another of those wonderful, heartfelt +melodies of the master. What can I say of the deepening feeling at the +con anima! It stabs with its pathos. Here is the poet Chopin, the poet +who, with Burns, interprets the simple strains of the folk, who blinds +us with color and rich romanticism like Keats and lifts us Shelley-wise +to transcendental azure. And his only apparatus a keyboard. As Schumann +wrote: "Chopin did not make his appearance by an orchestral army, as a +great genius is accustomed to do; he only possesses a small cohort, but +every soul belongs to him to the last hero." + +Eight lines is this dance, yet its meanings are almost endless. No. 2, +in B minor, is called The Cuckoo by Kleczynski. It is sprightly and +with the lilt, notwithstanding its subtle progressions, of Mazovia. No. +3 in D flat is all animation, brightness and a determination to stay +out the dance. The alternate major-minor of the theme is truly Polish. +The graceful trio and canorous brilliancy of this dance make it a +favored number. The ending is epigrammatic. It comes so suddenly upon +us, our cortical cells pealing with the minor, that its very abruptness +is witty. One can see Chopin making a mocking moue as he wrote it. +Tschaikowsky borrowed the effect for the conclusion of the Chinoise in +a miniature orchestral suite. The fourth of this opus is in C sharp +minor. Again I feel like letting loose the dogs of enthusiasm. The +sharp rhythms and solid build of this ample work give it a massive +character. It is one of the big Mazurkas, and the ending, raw as it +is--consecutive, bare-faced fifths and sevenths--compasses its intended +meaning. + +Opus 33 is a popular set. It begins with one in G sharp minor, which is +curt and rather depressing. The relief in B major is less real than it +seems--on paper. Moody, withal a tender-hearted Mazurka. No. 2, in D, +is bustling, graceful and full of unrestrained vitality. Bright and not +particularly profound, it was successfully arranged for voice by +Viardot-Garcia. The third of the opus, in C, is the one described by de +Lenz as almost precipitating a violent row between Chopin and +Meyerbeer. He had christened it the Epitaph of the Idea. + +"Two-four," said Meyerbeer, after de Lenz played it. "Three-four," +answered Chopin, flushing angrily. "Let me have it for a ballet in my +new opera and I'll show you," retorted Meyerbeer. "It's three-four," +scolded Chopin, and played it himself. De Lenz says they parted coolly, +each holding to his opinion. Later, in St. Petersburg, Meyerbeer met +this gossip and told him that he loved Chopin. "I know no pianist, no +composer for the piano like him." Meyerbeer was wrong in his idea of +the tempo. Though Chopin slurs the last beat, it is there, +nevertheless. This Mazurka is only four lines long and is charming, as +charming as the brief specimen in the Preludes. The next Mazurka is +another famous warhorse. In B minor, it is full of veiled coquetries, +hazardous mood transitions, growling recitatives and smothered plaints. +The continual return to the theme gives rise to all manner of fanciful +programmes. One of the most characteristic is by the Polish poet +Zelenski, who, so Kleczynski relates, wrote a humorous poem on this +mazurka. For him it is a domestic comedy in which a drunken peasant and +his much abused wife enact a little scene. Returning home the worse for +wear he sings "Oj ta dana"--"Oh dear me"--and rumbles in the bass in a +figure that answers the treble. His wife reproaching him, he strikes +her. Here we are in B flat. She laments her fate in B major. Then her +husband shouts: "Be quiet, old vixen." This is given in the octaves, a +genuine dialogue, the wife tartly answering: "Shan't be quiet." The +gruff grumbling in the bass is heard, an imitation of the above, when +suddenly the man cries out, the last eight bars of the composition: +"Kitty, Kitty come--do come here, I forgive you," which is decidedly +masculine in its magnanimity. + +If one does not care for the rather coarse realism of this reading +Kleczynski offers the poem of Ujejeski, called The Dragoon. A soldier +flatters a girl at the inn. She flies from him, and her lover, +believing she has deceived him, despairingly drowns himself. The +ending, with its "Ring, ring, ring the bell there! Horses carry me to +the depths," has more poetic contour than the other. Without grafting +any libretto on it, this Mazurka is a beautiful tone-piece in itself. +Its theme is delicately mournful and the subject, in B major, simply +entrancing in its broad, flowing melody. + +In C sharp minor, op. 41, is a Mazurka that is beloved of me. Its scale +is exotic, its rhythm convincing, its tune a little saddened by life, +but courage never fails. This theme sounds persistently, in the middle +voices, in the bass, and at the close in full harmonies, unisons, +giving it a startling effect. Octaves take it up in profile until it +vanishes. Here is the very apotheosis of rhythm. No. 2, in E minor, is +not very resolute of heart. It was composed, so Niecks avers, at Palma, +when Chopin's health fully accounts for the depressed character of the +piece, for it is sad to the point of tears. Of op. 41 he wrote to +Fontana from Nohant in 1839, "You know I have four new Mazurkas, one +from Palma, in E minor; three from here, in B major, A flat major and C +sharp minor. They seem to me pretty, as the youngest children usually +do when the parents grow old." No. 3 is a vigorous, sonorous dance. No. +4, over which the editors deviate on the serious matter of text, in A +flat, is for the concert room, and is allied to several of his gracious +Valses. Playful and decorative, but not profound in feeling. + +Opus 50, the first in G major, is healthy and vivacious. Good humor +predominates. Kullak notes that in some editions it closes pianissimo, +which seems a little out of drawing. No. 2 is charming. In A flat, it +is a perfect specimen of the aristocratic Mazurka. The D flat Trio, the +answering episode in B flat minor, and the grace of the return make +this one to be studied and treasured. De Lenz finds Bach-ian influences +in the following, in C sharp minor: "It begins as though written for +the organ, and ends in an exclusive salon; it does him credit and is +worked out more fully than the others. Chopin was much pleased when I +told him that in the construction of this Mazurka the passage from E +major to F major was the same as that in the Agatha aria in +'Freischutz.'" De Lenz refers to the opening Bach-like mutations. The +texture of this dance is closer and finer spun than any we have +encountered. Perhaps spontaneity is impaired, mais que voulez vous? +Chopin was bound to develop, and his Mazurkas, fragile and constricted +as is the form, were sure to show a like record of spiritual and +intellectual growth. + +Opus 56, in B major, is elaborate, even in its beginning. There is +decoration in the ritornelle in E flat and one feels the absence of a +compensating emotion, despite the display of contrapuntal skill. Very +virtuoso-like, but not so intimate as some of the others. Karasowski +selects No. 2 in C as an illustration. "It is as though the composer +had sought for the moment to divert himself with narcotic intoxication +only to fall back the more deeply into his original gloom." There is +the peasant in the first bars in C, but the A minor and what follows +soon disturb the air of bonhomie. Theoretical ease is in the imitative +passages; Chopin is now master of his tools. The third Mazurka of op. +56 is in C minor. It is quite long and does not give the impression of +a whole. With the exception of a short break in B major, it is composed +with the head, not the heart, nor yet the heels. + +Not unlike, in its sturdy affirmation, the one in C sharp minor, op. +41, is the next Mazurka, in A minor, op. 59. That Chopin did not repeat +himself is an artistic miracle. A subtle turn takes us off the familiar +road to some strange glade, wherein the flowers are rare in scent and +odor. This Mazurka, like the one that follows, has a dim resemblance to +others, yet there is always a novel point of departure, a fresh +harmony, a sudden melody or an unexpected ending. Hadow, for example, +thinks the A flat of this opus the most beautiful of them all. In it he +finds legitimately used the repetition in various shapes of a single +phrase. To me this Mazurka seems but an amplification, an elaboration +of the lovely one in the same key, op. 50, No. 2. The double sixths and +more complicated phraseology do not render the later superior to the +early Mazurka, yet there is no gainsaying the fact that this is a noble +composition. But the next, in F sharp minor, despite its rather +saturnine gaze, is stronger in interest, if not in workmanship. While +it lacks Niecks' beautes sauvages, is it not far loftier in conception +and execution than op. 6, in F sharp minor? The inevitable triplet +appears in the third bar, and is a hero throughout. Oh, here is charm +for you! Read the close of the section in F sharp major. In the major +it ends, the triplet fading away at last, a mere shadow, a turn on D +sharp, but victor to the last. Chopin is at the summit of his +invention. Time and tune, that wait for no man, are now his bond +slaves. Pathos, delicacy, boldness, a measured melancholy and the art +of euphonious presentiment of all these, and many factors more, stamp +this Mazurka a masterpiece. + +Niecks believes there is a return of the early freshness and poetry in +the last three Mazurkas, op. 63. "They are, indeed, teeming with +interesting matter," he writes. "Looked at from the musician's point of +view, how much do we not see novel and strange, beautiful and +fascinating withal? Sharp dissonances, chromatic passing notes, +suspensions and anticipations, displacement of accent, progressions of +perfect fifths--the horror of schoolmen--sudden turns and unexpected +digressions that are so unaccountable, so out of the line of logical +sequence, that one's following the composer is beset with difficulties. +But all this is a means to an end, the expression of an individuality +with its intimate experiences. The emotional content of many of these +trifles--trifles if considered only by their size--is really +stupendous." Spoken like a brave man and not a pedant! + +Full of vitality is the first number of op. 63. In B major, it is +sufficiently various in figuration and rhythmical life to single it +from its fellows. The next, in F minor, has a more elegiac ring. Brief +and not difficult of matter or manner is this dance. The third, of +winning beauty, is in C sharp minor--surely a pendant to the C sharp +minor Valse. I defy anyone to withstand the pleading, eloquent voice of +this Mazurka. Slender in technical configuration, yet it impressed +Louis Ehlert so much that he was impelled to write: "A more perfect +canon in the octave could not have been written by one who had grown +gray in the learned arts." + +The four Mazurkas, published posthumously in 1855, that comprise op. 67 +were composed by Chopin at various dates. To the first, in G, +Klindworth affixes 1849 as the year of composition. Niecks gives a much +earlier date, 1835. I fancy the latter is correct, as the piece sounds +like one of Chopin's more youthful efforts. It is jolly and rather +superficial. The next, in G minor, is familiar. It is very pretty, and +its date is set down by Niecks as 1849, while Klindworth gives 1835. +Here again Niecks is correct, although I suspect that Klindworth +transposed his figures accidentally. No. 3, in C, was composed in 1835. +On this both biographer and editor agree. It is certainly an early +effusion of no great value, although a good dancing tune. No. 4 A +minor, of this opus, composed in 1846, is more mature, but in no wise +remarkable. + +Opus 68, the second of the Fontana set, was composed in 1830. The +first, in C, is commonplace; the one in A minor, composed in 1827, is +much better, being lighter and well made; the third, in F major, 1830, +weak and trivial, and the fourth, in F minor, 1849, interesting because +it is said by Julius Fontana to be Chopin's last composition. He put it +on paper a short time before his death, but was too ill to try it at +the piano. It is certainly morbid in its sick insistence in phrase +repetition, close harmonies and wild departure--in A--from the first +figure. But it completes the gloomy and sardonic loop, and we wish, +after playing this veritable song of the tomb, that we had parted from +Chopin in health, not disease. This page is full of the premonitions of +decay. Too weak and faltering to be febrile, Chopin is here a debile, +prematurely exhausted young man. There are a few accents of a forced +gayety, but they are swallowed up in the mists of dissolution--the +dissolution of one of the most sensitive brains ever wrought by nature. +Here we may echo, without any savor of Liszt's condescension or de +Lenz's irony: "Pauvre Frederic!" + +Klindworth and Kullak have different ideas concerning the end of this +Mazurka. Both are correct. Kullak, Klindworth and Mikuli include in +their editions two Mazurkas in A minor. Neither is impressive. One, the +date of composition unknown, is dedicated "a son ami Emile Gaillard;" +the other first appeared in a musical publication of Schotts' about +1842 or 1843--according to Niecks. Of this set I prefer the former; it +abounds in octaves and ends with a long trill There is in the +Klindworth edition a Mazurka, the last in the set, in the key of F +sharp. It is so un-Chopinish and artificial that the doubts of the +pianist Ernst Pauer were aroused as to its authenticity. On +inquiry--Niecks quotes from the London monthly "Musical Record," July +1, 1882--Pauer discovered that the piece was identical with a Mazurka +by Charles Mayer. Gotthard being the publisher of the alleged Chopin +Mazurka, declared he bought the manuscript from a Polish +countess--possibly one of the fifty in whose arms Chopin died--and that +the lady parted with Chopin's autograph because of her dire poverty. It +is, of course, a clear case of forgery. + +Of the four early Mazurkas, in G major and B flat major--dating from +1825--D major--composed in 1829-30, but remodelled in 1832--and C +major--of 1833--the latter is the most characteristic. The G major is +of slight worth. As Niecks remarks, it contains a harmonic error. The +one in B flat starts out with a phrase that recalls the A minor +Mazurka, numbered 45 in the Breitkopf & Hartel edition. This B flat +Mazurka, early as it was composed, is, nevertheless, pretty. There are +breadth and decision in the C major Mazurka. The recasting improves the +D major Mazurka. Its trio is lifted an octave and the doubling of notes +throughout gives more weight and richness. + +"In the minor key laughs and cries, dances and mourns the Slav," says +Dr. J. Schucht in his monograph on Chopin. Chopin here reveals not only +his nationality, but his own fascinating and enigmatic individuality. +Within the tremulous spaces of this immature dance is enacted the play +of a human soul, a soul that voices the sorrow and revolt of a dying +race, of a dying poet. They are epigrammatic, fluctuating, crazy, and +tender, these Mazurkas, and some of them have a soft, melancholy light, +as if shining through alabaster--true corpse light leading to a morass +of doubt and terror. But a fantastic, dishevelled, debonair spirit is +the guide, and to him we abandon ourselves in these precise and +vertiginous dances. + + + + +XIV. CHOPIN THE CONQUEROR + + +The Scherzi of Chopin are of his own creation; the type as illustrated +by Beethoven and Mendelssohn had no meaning for him. Whether in earnest +or serious jest, Chopin pitched on a title that is widely misleading +when the content is considered. The Beethoven Scherzo is full of a +robust sort of humor. In it he is seldom poetical, frequently given to +gossip, and at times he hints at the mystery of life. The demoniacal +element, the fierce jollity that mocks itself, the almost titanic anger +of Chopin would not have been regarded by the composer of the Eroica +Symphony as adapted to the form. The Pole practically built up a new +musical structure, boldly called it a Scherzo, and, as in the case of +the Ballades, poured into its elastic mould most disturbing and +incomparable music. + +Chopin seldom compasses sublimity. His arrows are tipped with fire, yet +they do not fly far. But in some of his music he skirts the regions +where abide the gods. In at least one Scherzo, in one Ballade, in the F +minor Fantaisie, in the first two movements of the B flat minor Sonata, +in several of the Eludes, and in one of the Preludes, he compasses +grandeur. Individuality of utterance, beauty of utterance, and the +eloquence we call divine are his; criticism then bows its questioning +brows before this anointed one. In the Scherzi Chopin is often prophet +as well as poet. He fumes and frets, but upon his countenance is the +precious fury of the sibyls. We see the soul that suffers from secret +convulsions, but forgive the writhing for the music made. These four +Scherzi are psychical records, confessions committed to paper of +outpourings that never could have passed the lips. From these alone we +may almost reconstruct the real Chopin, the inner Chopin, whose +conventional exterior so ill prepared the world for the tragic issues +of his music. + +The first Scherzo is a fair model. There are a few bars of +introduction--the porch, as Niecks would call it--a principal subject, +a trio, a short working-out section, a skilful return to the opening +theme, and an elaborate coda. This edifice, not architecturally +flawless, is better adapted to the florid beauties of Byzantine +treatment than to the severe Hellenic line. Yet Chopin gave it dignity, +largeness and a classic massiveness. The interior is romantic, is +modern, personal, but the facade shows gleaming minarets, the strangely +builded shapes of the Orient. This B minor Scherzo has the acid note of +sorrow and revolt, yet the complex figuration never wavers. The walls +stand firm despite the hurricane blowing through and around them. +Ehlert finds this Scherzo tornadic. It is gusty, and the hurry and +over-emphasis do not endear it to the pianist. The first pages are +filled with wrathful sounds, there is much tossing of hands and cries +to heaven, calling down its fire and brimstone. A climax mounts to a +fine frenzy until the lyric intermezzo in B is reached. Here love +chants with honeyed tongues. The widely dispersed figure of the melody +has an entrancing tenderness. But peace does not long prevail against +the powers of Eblis, and infernal is the Wilde Jagd of the finale. +After shrillest of dissonances, a chromatic uproar pilots the doomed +one across this desperate Styx. + +What Chopin's programme was we can but guess. He may have outlined the +composition in a moment of great ebullition, a time of soul laceration +arising from a cat scratch or a quarrel with Maurice Sand in the garden +over the possession of the goat cart. + +The Klindworth edition is preferable. Kullak follows his example in +using the double note stems in the B major part. He gives the A sharp +in the bass six bars before the return of the first motif. Klindworth, +and other editions, prescribe A natural, which is not so effective. +This Scherzo might profit by being played without the repeats. The +chromatic interlocked octaves at the close are very striking. + +I find at times--as my mood changes--something almost repellant in the +B minor Scherzo. It does not present the frank physiognomy of the +second Scherzo, op. 31, in B flat minor. Ehlert cries that it was +composed in a blessed hour, although de Lenz quotes Chopin as saying of +the opening, "It must be a charnel house." The defiant challenge of the +beginning has no savor of the scorn and drastic mockery of its +fore-runner. We are conscious that tragedy impends, that after the +prologue may follow fast catastrophe. Yet it is not feared with all the +portentous thunder of its index. Nor are we deceived. A melody of +winning distinction unrolls before us. It has a noble tone, is of a +noble type. Without relaxing pace it passes and drops like a +thunderbolt into the bowels of the earth. Again the story is told, and +tarrying not at all we are led to a most delectable spot in the key of +A major. This trio is marked by genius. Can anything be more bewitching +than the episode in C sharp minor merging into E major, with the +overflow at the close? The fantasy is notable for variety of tonality, +freedom in rhythmical incidents and genuine power. The coda is dizzy +and overwhelming. For Schumann this Scherzo is Byronic in tenderness +and boldness. Karasowski speaks of its Shakespearian humor, and indeed +it is a very human and lovable piece of art. It holds richer, warmer, +redder blood than the other three and like the A flat Ballade, is +beloved of the public. But then it is easier to understand. + +Opus 39, the third Scherzo in C sharp minor, was composed or finished +at Majorca and is the most dramatic of the set. I confess to see no +littleness in the polished phrases, though irony lurks in its bars and +there is fever in its glance--a glance full of enigmatic and luring +scorn. I heartily agree with Hadow, who finds the work clear cut and of +exact balance. And noting that Chopin founded whole paragraphs "either +on a single phrase repeated in similar shapes or on two phrases in +alternation"--a primitive practice in Polish folksongs--he asserts that +"Beethoven does not attain the lucidity of his style by such +parallelism of phraseology," but admits that Chopin's methods made for +"clearness and precision...may be regarded as characteristic of the +national manner." A thoroughly personal characteristic too. + +There is virile clangor in the firmly struck octaves of the opening +pages. No hesitating, morbid view of life, but rank, harsh +assertiveness, not untinged with splenetic anger. The chorale of the +trio is admirably devised and carried out. Its piety is a bit of +liturgical make-believe. The contrasts here are most artistic--sonorous +harmonies set off by broken chords that deliciously tinkle. There is a +coda of frenetic movement and the end is in major, a surprising +conclusion when considering all that has gone before. Never to become +the property of the profane, the C sharp minor Scherzo, notwithstanding +its marked asperities and agitated moments, is a great work of art. +Without the inner freedom of its predecessor, it is more sober and +self-contained than the B minor Scherzo. + +The fourth Scherzo, op. 54, is in the key of E. Built up by a series of +cunning touches and climaxes and without the mood depth or variety of +its brethren, it is more truly a Scherzo than any of them. It has +tripping lightness and there is sunshine imprisoned behind its open +bars. Of it Schumann could not ask, "How is gravity to clothe itself if +jest goes about in dark veils?" Here, then, is intellectual refinement +and jesting of a superior sort. Niecks thinks it fragmentary. I find +the fairy-like measures delightful after the doleful mutterings of some +of the other Scherzi. There is the same "spirit of opposition," but of +arrogance none. The C sharp minor theme is of lyric beauty, the coda +with its scales, brilliant. It seems to be banned by classicists and +Chopin worshippers alike. The agnostic attitude is not yet dead in the +piano playing world. + +Rubinstein most admired the first two Scherzi. The B minor has been +criticised for being too much in the etude vein. But with all their +shortcomings these compositions are without peer in the literature of +the piano. + +They were published and dedicated as follows: Op. 20, February, 1835, +to M. T. Albrecht; op. 31, December, 1837, Comtesse de Furstenstein; +op. 39, October, 1840, Adolph Gutmann, and op. 54, December, 1843, +Mile, de Caraman. De Lenz relates that Chopin dedicated the C sharp +minor Scherzo to his pupil Gutmann, because this giant, with a prize +fighter's fist, could "knock a hole in the table" with a certain chord +for the left hand--sixth measure from the beginning--and adds quite +naively: "Nothing more was ever heard of this Gutmann--he was a +discovery of Chopin's." Chopin died in this same Gutmann's arms, and, +despite de Lenz, Gutmann was in evidence until his death as a "favorite +pupil." + +And now we have reached the grandest--oh, banal and abused word--of +Chopin's compositions, the Fantaisie in F minor, op. 49. Robert +Schumann, after remarking that the cosmopolitan must "sacrifice the +small interests of the soil on which he was born," notices that +Chopin's later works "begin to lose something of their especial +Sarmatian physiognomy, to approach partly more nearly the universal +ideal cultivated by the divine Greeks which we find again in Mozart." +The F minor Fantaisie has hardly the Mozartian serenity, but parades a +formal beauty--not disfigured by an excess of violence, either personal +or patriotic, and its melodies, if restless by melancholy, are of +surprising nobility and dramatic grandeur. Without including the +Beethoven Sonatas, not strictly born of the instrument, I do not fear +to maintain that this Fantaisie is one of the greatest of piano pieces. +Never properly appreciated by pianists, critics, or public, it is, +after more than a half century of neglect, being understood at last. It +was published November, 1843, and probably composed at Nohant, as a +letter of the composer indicates. The dedication is to Princesse C. de +Souzzo--these interminable countesses and princesses of Chopin! For +Niecks, who could not at first discern its worth, it suggests a Titan +in commotion. It is Titanic; the torso of some Faust-like dream, it is +Chopin's Faust. A macabre march, containing some dangerous dissonances, +gravely ushers us to ascending staircases of triplets, only to +precipitate us to the very abysses of the piano. That first subject, is +it not almost as ethically puissant and passionate as Beethoven in his +F minor Sonata? Chopin's lack of tenaciousness is visible here. +Beethoven would have built a cathedral on such a foundational scheme, +but Chopin, ever prodigal in his melody making, dashes impetuously to +the A flat episode, that heroic love chant, erroneously marked dolce +and played with the effeminacies of a salon. Three times does it +resound in this strange Hall of Glancing Mirrors, yet not once should +it be caressed. The bronze fingers of a Tausig are needed. Now are +arching the triplets to the great, thrilling song, beginning in C +minor, and then the octaves, in contrary motion, split wide asunder the +very earth. After terrific chordal reverberations there is the rapid +retreat of vague armies, and once again is begun the ascent of the +rolling triplets to inaccessible heights, and the first theme sounds in +C minor. The modulation lifts to G flat, only to drop to abysmal +depths. What mighty, desperate cause is being espoused? When peace is +presaged in the key of B, is this the prize for which strive these +agonized hosts? Is some forlorn princess locked behind these solemn, +inaccessible bars? For a few moments there is contentment beyond all +price. Then the warring tribe of triplets recommence, after clamorous G +flat octaves reeling from the stars to the sea of the first theme. +Another rush into D flat ensues, the song of C minor reappears in F +minor, and the miracle is repeated. Oracular octaves quake the +cellarage of the palace, the warriors hurry by, their measured tramp is +audible after they vanish, and the triplets obscure their retreat with +chromatic vapors. Then an adagio in this fantastic old world tale--the +curtain prepares to descend--a faint, sweet voice sings a short, +appealing cadenza, and after billowing A flat arpeggios, soft, great +hummocks of tone, two giant chords are sounded, and the Ballade of Love +and War is over. Who conquers? Is the Lady with the Green Eyes and Moon +White Face rescued? Or is all this a De Quincey's Dream Fugue +translated into tone--a sonorous, awesome vision? Like De Quincey, it +suggests the apparition of the empire of fear, the fear that is +secretly felt with dreams, wherein the spirit expands to the drummings +of infinite space. + +Alas! for the validity of subjective criticism. Franz Liszt told +Vladimir de Pachmann the programme of the Fantaisie, as related to him +by Chopin. At the close of one desperate, immemorial day, the pianist +was crooning at the piano, his spirits vastly depressed. Suddenly came +a knocking at his door, a Poe-like, sinister tapping, which he at once +rhythmically echoed upon the keyboard, his phono-motor centre being +unusually sensitive. The first two bars of the Fantaisie describe these +rappings, just as the third and fourth stand for Chopin's musical +invitation, entrez, entrez! This is all repeated until the doors wide +open swinging admit Liszt, George Sand, Madame Camille Pleyel nee Mock, +and others. To the solemn measures of the march they enter, and range +themselves about Chopin, who after the agitated triplets begins his +complaint in the mysterious song in F minor. But Sand, with whom he has +quarrelled, falls before him on her knees and pleads for pardon. +Straightway the chant merges into the appealing A flat section--this +sends skyward my theory of its interpretation--and from C minor the +current becomes more tempestuous until the climax is reached and to the +second march the intruders rapidly vanish. The remainder of the work, +with the exception of the Lento Sostenuto in B--where it is to be hoped +Chopin's perturbed soul finds momentary peace--is largely repetition +and development. This far from ideal reading is an authoritative one, +coming as it does from Chopin by way of Liszt. I console myself for its +rather commonplace character with the notion that perhaps in the +re-telling the story has caught some personal cadenzas of the two +historians. In any case I shall cling to my own version. + +The F minor Fantaisie will mean many things to many people. Chopin has +never before maintained so artistically, so free from delirium, such a +level of strong passion, mental power and exalted euphony. It is his +largest canvas, and though there are no long-breathed periods such as +in the B flat minor Scherzo, the phraseology is amply broad, without +padding of paragraphs. The rapt interest is not relaxed until the final +bar. This transcendental work more nearly approaches Beethoven in its +unity, its formal rectitude and its brave economy of thematic material. + +While few men have dared to unlock their hearts thus, Chopin is not so +intimate here as in the mazurkas. But the pulse beats ardently in the +tissues of this composition. As art for art, it is less perfect; the +gain is on the human side. Nearing his end Chopin discerned, with ever +widening, ever brighter vision, the great heart throb of the universe. +Master of his material, if not of his mortal tenement, he passionately +strove to shape his dreams into abiding sounds. He did not always +succeed, but his victories are the precious prizes of mankind. One is +loath to believe that the echo of Chopin's magic music can ever fall +upon unheeding ears. He may become old-fashioned, but, like Mozart, he +will remain eternally beautiful. + + + + +BIBLIOGRAPHY + + + Frederic Chopin as a Man and Musician, by Frederick Niecks. + London, Novello, Ewer & Co. + + Frederic Chopin, by Franz Liszt. London, W. Reeves. + + Life and Letters of Frederic Chopin, by Moritz Karasowski, + translated from the Russian by Emily Hill. London, W. Reeves. + + Chopin and Other Musical Essays, by Henry T. Finck. New York, + Charles Scribner's Sons. + + The Works of Frederic Chopin and their Proper Interpretation, + by Jean Kleczynski, translated by A. Whittingham. London, W. + Reeves. + + Chopin's Greater Works, by Jean Kleczynski, translated with + additions by Natalie Janotha. New York, Charles Scribner's + Sons. + + Frederic Francois Chopin, by Charles Willeby. London, Sampson + Low, Marston & Co. + + Frederic Chopin, by Joseph Bennett. Novello, Ewer & Co. + + F. Chopin, la Tradicion de su Musica, por Eduardo Gariel. City + of Mexico, 1894. + + Frederic Chopin, sa Vie et ses OEuvres, par Madame A. Audley. + Paris, E. Plon et Cie. + + F. Chopin, Essai de Critique musicale, par H. Barbedette. + Friedrich Chopin und seine Werke, von Dr. J. Schucht. Leipzig, + C. F. Kahnt. + + Friedrich Chopin's Leben und Werke, von A. Niggli. Leipzig, + Breitkopf & Hartel. + + Chopin, by Francis Hueffer, in Musical Studies. Edinburgh, A. + & C. Black. + + Frederic Chopin, by W. H. Hadow, in Studies in Modern Music. + New York, Macmillan Co. + + Frederic Chopin, by Louis Ehlert, in From the Tone World, + translated by Helen D. Tretbar. New York. + + Chopin, by W. de Lenz, from The Great Piano Virtuosos of our + Time, translated by Madeleine R. Baker. New York, G. Schirmer. + + Chopin, in Robert Schumann's Music and Musicians, translated + by Fanny Raymond Ritter. New York, Schuberth & Co. + + Chopin, in Anton Rubinstein's Conversation on Music, + translated by Mrs. John P. Morgan. Steinway Hall: Charles F. + Tretbar, publisher. + + Les Musiciens Polonais, par Albert Sowinski. Paris, Le Clerc. + + Les Trois Romans de Frederic Chopin, par le Comte Wodinski. + Paris, Calman Levy. + + Une Contemporaine, par M. Brault. + + Histoire de ma Vie et Correspondance, par George Sand. Paris, + Calman Levy. + + George Sand, by Henry James in French Poets and Novelists. New + York, Macmillan Co. + + G. Sand, par Stefane-Pol, from Trois Grandes Figures, preface + by D'Armand Silvestre. Paris, Ernest Flammarian. + + George Sand, sa Vie et ses OEuvres, par Wladimir Kardnine. + Paris, Ollendorf. + + Deux Eleves de Chopin, par Adolphe Brisson. + + The Beautiful in Music, by Dr. Eduard Hanslick. Translated by + Gustave Cohen. Novello, Ewer & Co., London and New York. + + How Music Developed, by W. J. Henderson. New York, Frederick + A. Stokes Co. + + Wagner and His Works, by Henry T. Finck. New York, Charles + Scribner's Sons. + + By the Way, by William F. Apthorp. Boston, Copeland & Day. + + A Study of Wagner, by Ernest Newman. New York, G. P. Putnam's + Sons. + + Folk-Music Studies, by H. E. Krehbiel. New York Tribune, + August, 1899. + + Analytical Notes to Schlesinger Edition, by Theodor Kullak. + + The New Spirit, by Havelock Ellis. London, Walter Scott, Ltd. + + Flaubert, par Emile Faguet. Paris, Hachette et Cie. + + Reisebilder, by Heinrich Heine. + + Affirmations, by Havelock Ellis. London, Walter Scott. + + The Psychology of the Emotions, by Th. Ribot. New York, + Charles Scribner's Sons. + + The Man of Genius, by Cesare Lombroso. New York, Charles + Scribner's Sons. + + The Musical Courier, New York. Files from 1889 to 1900. + + Chopin's Works, by Rutland Boughton, in London Musical + Standard. + + Chopin, by Stanislas Count Tarnowski. Translated from the + Polish by Natalie Janotha. 1899. + + The School of Giorgione, An Essay by Walter Pater. + + Chopin and the Sick Men, by John F. Runciman, in London + Saturday Review, September 9, 1899. + + Frederick Chopin, by Edward Dannreuther from Famous Composers + and their Works. Boston, J. B. Millet Company. + + Primitive Music, by Wallaschek. + + Zur Psychologie des Individuums, Chopin und Nietzsche, by + Stanislaw Przybyszewski. Berlin, W. Fontaine & Co., 1892. + + Musical Interpretation, by Adolph Carpe. Leipzig, London and + Paris, Bosworth & Co., Boston, B. F. Wood Music Co. + + Pianistes Celebres, par Francois Marmontel. + + Frederyka Chopina, in Echo Musicale, Warsaw, Poland, October + 15, 1899. + + OEuvres Poetiques Completes de Adam Mickiewicz, Traduction du + Polonais par Christien Ostrowski. Paris, Firmin Didot Freres, + Fils et Cie, 1859. + + The World as Will and Idea, by Arthur Schopenhauer. + + The Case of Richard Wagner, by Friedrich Nietzsche. New York, + Macmillan Co. + + With the Immortals, by Marion Crawford. References to Chopin. + + Preface to Isidor Philipp's Exercises Quotidiens tires des + OEuvres de Chopin, by Georges Mathias. Paris, J. Hamelle. + + Pianoforte Study, by Alexander McArthur. + + Chopin Ein Gedenkblatt, by August Spanuth, New York Staats-Zeitung, + October 15, 1899. + + The Pianoforte Sonata, by J. B. Shedlock, London, Methuen & + Co. + + A History of Pianoforte Playing and Pianoforte Literature, by + C. F. Weitzmann, translated by Dr. Th. Baker. New York, G. + Schirmer. + + Der Letze Virtuoso, by C. F. Weitzmann. Leipzig, Kahnt. + + Chopin--and Some Others, in London Musical News, October 14, + 1899. + + Chopin, in A History of the Pianoforte and Pianoforte Players, + by Oscar Bie. New York, E. P. Dutton & Co. + + Chopin, in Rubinstein's Die Meister des Klaviers. New York, + Schuberth. + + Chopin, in Berliner Tageblatt, by Dr. Leopold Schmidt. + + Chopin Juzgada por Schumann, in Gaceta Musical, City of + Mexico. + + The Chopin Rubato and so-called Chopin Fingering, by John + Kautz, in The Musical Record, Boston, 1898. + + Franz Liszt, by Lina Ramann. Breitkopf & Hartel. + + Preface to Mikuli Edition by Carl Mikuli. + + The AEsthetics of Pianoforte Playing, by Adolf Kullak. New + York, G. Schirmer. + + Chopin und die Frauen, by Eugen Isolani. Berliner Courier, + October 17, 1899. + + Chopin, by W. J. Henderson in The New York Times, October 29, + 1899. + + A Note on Chopin, by L. A. Corbeille, and Chopin, An + Irresponsibility, by "Israfel," in The Dome, October, 1899, + London, Unicorn Press. + + Chopin and the Romantics, by John F. Runciman in The Saturday + Review (London), February 10,1900. + + Chopiniana: in the February, 1900, issue of the London Monthly + Musical Record, including some new letters of Chopin's. + + La maladie de Chopin (d'apres des documents inedits), par + Cabanes. Chronique medicale, Paris, 1899, vi., No. 21, 673-685. + + Also recollections in letters and diaries of Moscheles, + Hiller, Mendelssohn, Berlioz, Henselt, Schumann, Rubinstein, + Mathias, Legouve, Tarnowski, Grenier and others. + + The author begs to acknowledge the kind suggestions and + assistance of Rafael Joseffy, Vladimir de Pachmann, Moriz + Rosenthal, Jaraslow de Zielinski, Edwin W. Morse, Edward E. + Ziegler and Ignace Jan Paderewski. + + + + +BOOKS BY JAMES HUNEKER + + +What Maeterlinck wrote: + + Maurice Maeterlinck wrote thus of James Huneker: "Do you know + that 'Iconoclasts' is the only book of high and universal + critical worth that we have had for years--to be precise, + since Georg Brandes. It is at once strong and fine, supple and + firm, indulgent and sure." + +The Evening Post of June 10, 1915, wrote of Mr. Huneker's "The New +Cosmopolis": + + "The region of Bohemia, Mr. James Huneker found long ago, is + within us. At twenty, he says, he discovered that there is no + such enchanted spot as the Latin Quarter, but that every + generation sets back the mythical land into the golden age of + the Commune, or of 1848, or the days of 'Hernani.' It is the + same with New York's East Side, 'the fabulous East Side,' as + Mr. Huneker calls it in his collection of international urban + studies, 'The New Cosmopolis.' If one judged externals by + grime, by poverty, by sanded back-rooms, with long-haired + visionaries assailing the social order, then the East Side of + the early eighties has gone down before the mad rush of + settlement workers, impertinent reformers, sociological + cranks, self-advertising politicians, billionaire socialists, + and the reporters. To-day the sentimental traveller 'feels a + heart-pang to see the order, the cleanliness, the wide + streets, the playgrounds, the big boulevards, the absence of + indigence that have spoiled the most interesting part of New + York City.' But apparently this is only a first impression; + for Mr. Huneker had no trouble in discovering in one cafe a + patriarchal figure quite of the type beloved of the local-color + hunters of twenty years ago, a prophet, though speaking + a modern language and concerned with things of the day. So + that we owe to Mr. Huneker the discovery of a notable truth, + namely, that Bohemia is not only a creation of the sentimental + memory, but, being psychological, may be located in clean and + prosperous quarters. The tendency has always been to place it + in a golden age, but a tattered and unswept age. Bohemia is + now shown to exist amidst model tenements and sanitary + drinking-cups." + + +IVORY APES AND PEACOCKS With frontispiece portrait of Dostoievsky 12mo. +$1.50 net + + +NEW COSMOPOLIS 12mo. $1.50 net + + +THE PATHOS of DISTANCE A Book of a Thousand and One Moments 12mo. $2.00 +net + + +PROMENADES of an IMPRESSIONIST 12mo. $1.50 net + + "We like best such sober essays as those which analyze for us + the technical contributions of Cezanne and Rodin. Here Mr. + Huneker is a real interpreter, and here his long experience of + men and ways in art counts for much. Charming, in the lighter + vein, are such appreciations as the Monticelli, and Chardin." + + --FRANK JEWETT MATHER, JR., in New York Nation and Evening + Post. + + +EGOISTS A Book of Supermen STENDHAL, BAUDELAIRE, FLAUBERT, ANATOLE +FRANCE, HUYSMANS, BARRES, HELLO, BLAKE, NIETZSCHE, IBSEN, AND MAX +STIRNER With Portrait and Facsimile Reproductions 12mo. $1.50 net + + +ICONOCLASTS: A Book of Dramatists 12mo. $1.50 net + + CONTENTS: Henrik Ibsen--August Strindberg--Henry Becque-- + Gerhart Hauptmann--Paul Hervieu--The Quintessence of Shaw-- + Maxim Gorky's Nachtasyl--Hermann Sudermann--Princess + Mathilde's Play--Duse and D'Annunzio--Villiers de l'Isle + Adam--Maurice Maeterlinck. + + "His style is a little jerky, but it is one of those rare + styles in which we are led to expect some significance, if not + wit, in every sentence." + + --G. K. CHESTERTON, in London Daily News. + + +OVERTONES: A Book of Temperaments WITH FRONTISPIECE PORTRAIT Of RICHARD +STRAUSS 12mo. $1.50 net + + "In some respects Mr. Huneker must be reckoned the most + brilliant of all living writers on matters musical." + + --Academy, London. + + +MEZZOTINTS IN MODERN MUSIC BRAHMS, TSCHAIKOWSKY, CHOPIN. RICHARD +STRAUSS, LISZT, AND WAGNER 12mo. $1.50 net + + "Mr. Huneker is, in the best sense, a critic; he listens to + the music and gives you his impressions as rapidly and in as + few words as possible; or he sketches the composers in fine, + broad, sweeping strokes with a magnificent disregard for + unimportant details. ... A distinctly original and very + valuable contribution to the world's tiny musical literature." + + --J. F. RUNCIMAN, in London Saturday Review. + + +FRANZ LISZT WITH NUMEROUS ILLUSTRATIONS 12mo. $2.00 net + + +CHOPIN: The Man and His Music WITH ETCHED PORTRAIT 12mo. $2.00 net + + +VISIONARIES 12 mo. $1.50 net + + CONTENTS: A Master of Cobwebs--The Eighth Deadly Sin--The + Puree of Aholibah--Rebels of the Moon--The Spiral Road--A Mock + Sun--Antichrist--The Eternal Duel--The Enchanted Yodler--The + Third Kingdom--The Haunted Harpsichord--The Tragic Wall--A + Sentimental Rebellion--Hall of the Missing Footsteps--The + Cursory Light--An Iron Fan--The Woman Who Loved Chopin--The + Tune of Time--Nada--Pan. + + "In 'The Spiral Road' and in some of the other stories both + fantasy and narrative may be compared with Hawthorne in his + most unearthly moods. The younger man has read his Nietzsche + and has cast off his heritage of simple morals. Hawthorne's + Puritanism finds no echo in these modern souls, all sceptical, + wavering and unblessed. But Hawthorne's splendor of vision and + his power of sympathy with a tormented mind do live again in + the best of Mr. Huneker's stories." + + --London Academy (Feb. 3, 1906). + + +MELOMANIACS 12mo. $1.50 net + + "It would be difficult to sum up 'Melomaniacs' in a phrase. + Never did a book, in my opinion at any rate, exhibit greater + contrasts, not, perhaps, of strength and weakness, but of + clearness and obscurity." + + --HAROLD E. 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You can also find out about how to make a +donation to Project Gutenberg, and how to get involved. + + +**Welcome To The World of Free Plain Vanilla Electronic Texts** + +**eBooks Readable By Both Humans and By Computers, Since 1971** + +*****These eBooks Were Prepared By Thousands of Volunteers!***** + + +Title: Chopin: The Man and His Music + +Author: James Huneker + +Release Date: Jan, 2004 [EBook #4939] +[Yes, we are more than one year ahead of schedule] +[This file was first posted on April 1, 2002] + +Edition: 10 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK CHOPIN: THE MAN AND HIS MUSIC *** + + + + + +This ebook was produced by John Mamoun <mamounjo@umdnj.edu> with +help from Charles Franks and the Online Distributed Proofreaders +website. + + + + + +CHOPIN: THE MAN AND HIS MUSIC + + + +TABLE OF CONTENTS + + + + PART I.--THE MAN. + + I. POLAND:--YOUTHFUL IDEALS + II. PARIS:--IN THE MAELSTROM + III. ENGLAND, SCOTLAND AND FERE LA CHAISE + IV. THE ARTIST + V. POET AND PSYCHOLOGIST + + PART II.--HIS MUSIC. + + VI. THE STUDIES:--TITANIC EXPERIMENTS + VII. MOODS IN MINIATURE: THE PRELUDES + VIII. IMPROMPTUS AND VALSES + IX. NIGHT AND ITS MELANCHOLY MYSTERIES: THE NOCTURNES + X. THE BALLADES: FAERY DRAMAS + XI. CLASSICAL CURRENTS + XII. THE POLONAISES: HEROIC HYMNS OF BATTLE + XIII. MAZURKAS: DANCES OF THE SOUL + XIV. CHOPIN THE CONQUEROR + + BIBLIOGRAPHY + BOOKS BY JAMES HUNEKER + + + +PART I.--THE MAN + + + +I. POLAND:--YOUTHFUL IDEALS + + + +Gustave Flaubert, pessimist and master of cadenced lyric prose, +urged young writers to lead ascetic lives that in their art they +might be violent. Chopin's violence was psychic, a travailing and +groaning of the spirit; the bright roughness of adventure was +missing from his quotidian existence. The tragedy was within. One +recalls Maurice Maeterlinck: "Whereas most of our life is passed +far from blood, cries and swords, and the tears of men have +become silent, invisible and almost spiritual." Chopin went from +Poland to France--from Warsaw to Paris--where, finally, he was +borne to his grave in Pere la Chaise. He lived, loved and died; +and not for him were the perils, prizes and fascinations of a +hero's career. He fought his battles within the walls of his soul- +-we may note and enjoy them in his music. His outward state was +not niggardly of incident though his inner life was richer, +nourished as it was in the silence and the profound unrest of a +being that irritably resented every intrusion. There were events +that left ineradicable impressions upon his nature, upon his +work: his early love, his sorrow at parting from parents and +home, the shock of the Warsaw revolt, his passion for George +Sand, the death of his father and of his friend Matuszynski, and +the rupture with Madame Sand--these were crises of his history. +All else was but an indeterminate factor in the scheme of his +earthly sojourn. Chopin though not an anchorite resembled +Flaubert, being both proud and timid; he led a detached life, +hence his art was bold and violent. Unlike Liszt he seldom sought +the glamor of the theatre, and was never in such public view as +his maternal admirer, Sand. He was Frederic Francois Chopin, +composer, teacher of piano and a lyric genius of the highest +range. + +Recently the date of his birth has been again discussed by +Natalie Janotha, the Polish pianist. Chopin was born in Zelazowa- +Wola, six miles from Warsaw, March 1, 1809. This place is +sometimes spelled Jeliasovaya-Volia. The medallion made for the +tomb by Clesinger--the son-in-law of George Sand--and the watch +given by the singer Catalan! in 1820 with the inscription "Donne +par Madame Catalan! a Frederic Chopin, age de dix ans," have +incited a conflict of authorities. Karasowski was informed by +Chopin's sister that the correct year of his birth was 1809, and +Szulc, Sowinski and Niecks agree with him. Szulc asserts that the +memorial in the Holy Cross Church, Warsaw--where Chopin's heart +is preserved--bears the date March 2, 1809. Chopin, so Henry T. +Finck declares, was twenty-two years of age when he wrote to his +teacher Elsner in 1831. Liszt told Niecks in 1878 that Karasowski +had published the correct date in his biography. Now let us +consider Janotha's arguments. According to her evidence the +composer's natal day was February 22, 1810 and his christening +occurred April 28 of the same year. The following baptismal +certificate, originally in Latin and translated by Finck, is +adduced. It is said to be from the church in which Chopin was +christened: "I, the above, have performed the ceremony of +baptizing in water a boy with the double name Frederic Francois, +on the 22d day of February, son of the musicians Nicolai Choppen, +a Frenchman, and Justina de Krzyzanowska his legal spouse. God- +parents: the musicians Franciscus Grembeki and Donna Anna +Skarbekowa, Countess of Zelazowa-Wola." The wrong date was +chiselled upon the monument unveiled October 14, 1894, at +Chopin's birthplace--erected practically through the efforts of +Milia Balakireff the Russian composer. Janotha, whose father +founded the Warsaw Conservatory, informed Finck that the later +date has also been put on other monuments in Poland. + +Now Chopin's father was not a musician, neither was his mother. I +cannot trace Grembeki, but we know that the Countess Skarbek, +mother of Chopin's namesake, was not a musician; however, the +title "musician" in the baptismal certificate may have signified +something eulogistic at that time. Besides, the Polish clergy was +not a particularly accurate class. But Janotha has more +testimony: in her controversy with me in 1896 she quoted Father +Bielawski, the present cure of Brochow parish church of Zelazowa- +Wola; this reverend person consulted records and gave as his +opinion that 1810 is authentic. Nevertheless, the biography of +Wojcicki and the statement of the Chopin family contradict him. +And so the case stands. Janotha continues firm in her belief +although authorities do not justify her position. + +All this petty pother arose since Niecks' comprehensive biography +appeared. So sure was he of his facts that he disposed of the +pseudo-date in one footnote. Perhaps the composer was to blame; +artists, male as well as female, have been known to make +themselves younger in years by conveniently forgetting their +birthdate, or by attributing the error to carelessness in the +registry of dates. Surely the Chopin family could not have been +mistaken in such an important matter! Regarding Chopin's ancestry +there is still a moiety of doubt. His father was born August 17, +1770--the same year as Beethoven--at Nancy, Lorraine. Some claim +that he had Polish blood in his veins. Szulc claims that he was +the natural son of a Polish nobleman, who followed King Stanislas +Leszcinski to Lorraine, dropping the Szopen, or Szop, for the +more Gallic Chopin. When Frederic went to Paris, he in turn +changed the name from Szopen to Chopin, which is common in +France. + +Chopin's father emigrated to Warsaw in 1787--enticed by the offer +of a compatriot there in the tobacco business--and was the +traditional Frenchman of his time, well-bred, agreeable and more +than usually cultivated. + +He joined the national guard during the Kosciuszko revolution in +1794. When business stagnated he was forced to teach in the +family of the Leszynskis; Mary of that name, one of his pupils, +being beloved by Napoleon I. became the mother of Count Walewski, +a minister of the second French empire. Drifting to Zelazowa- +Wola, Nicholas Chopin lived in the house of the Countess Skarbek, +acting as tutor to her son, Frederic. There he made the +acquaintance of Justina Krzyzanowska, born of "poor but noble +parents." He married her in 1806 and she bore him four children: +three girls, and the boy Frederic Francois. + +With a refined, scholarly French father, Polish in political +sentiments, and an admirable Polish mother, patriotic to the +extreme, Frederic grew to be an intelligent, vivacious, home- +loving lad. Never a hearty boy but never very delicate, he seemed +to escape most of the disagreeable ills of childhood. The +moonstruck, pale, sentimental calf of many biographers, he never +was. Strong evidence exists that he was merry, pleasure-loving +and fond of practical jokes. While his father was never rich, the +family after the removal to Warsaw lived at ease. The country was +prosperous and Chopin the elder became a professor in the Warsaw +Lyceum. His children were brought up in an atmosphere of charming +simplicity, love and refinement. The mother was an ideal mother, +and, as George Sand declared, Chopin's "only love." But, as we +shall discover later, Lelia was ever jealous--jealous even of +Chopin's past. His sisters were gifted, gentle and disposed to +pet him. Niecks has killed all the pretty fairy tales of his +poverty and suffering. + +Strong common sense ruled the actions of Chopin's parents, and +when his love for music revealed itself at an early age they +engaged a teacher named Adalbert Zwyny, a Bohemian who played the +violin and taught piano. Julius Fontana, one of the first friends +of the boy--he committed suicide in Paris, December 31, 1869,-- +says that at the age of twelve Chopin knew so much that he was +left to himself with the usual good and ill results. He first +played on February 24, 1818, a concerto by Gyrowetz and was so +pleased with his new collar that he naively told his mother, +"Everybody was looking at my collar." His musical precocity, not +as marked as Mozart's, but phenomenal withal, brought him into +intimacy with the Polish aristocracy and there his taste for +fashionable society developed. The Czartoryskis, Radziwills, +Skarbeks, Potockis, Lubeckis and the Grand Duke Constantine with +his Princess Lowicka made life pleasant for the talented boy. +Then came his lessons with Joseph Elsner in composition, lessons +of great value. Elsner saw the material he had to mould, and so +deftly did he teach that his pupil's individuality was never +checked, never warped. For Elsner Chopin entertained love and +reverence; to him he wrote from Paris asking his advice in the +matter of studying with Kalkbrenner, and this advice he took +seriously. "From Zwyny and Elsner even the greatest ass must +learn something," he is quoted as having said. + +Then there are the usual anecdotes--one is tempted to call them +the stock stories of the boyhood of any great composer. In +infancy Chopin could not hear music without crying. Mozart was +morbidly sensitive to the tones of a trumpet. Later the Polish +lad sported familiarly with his talents, for he is related to +have sent to sleep and awakened a party of unruly boys at his +father's school. Another story is his fooling of a Jew merchant. +He had high spirits, perhaps too high, for his slender physique. +He was a facile mimic, and Liszt, Balzac, Bocage, Sand and others +believed that he would have made an actor of ability. With his +sister Emilia he wrote a little comedy. Altogether he was a +clever, if not a brilliant lad. His letters show that he was not +the latter, for while they are lively they do not reveal much +literary ability. But their writer saw with open eyes, eyes that +were disposed to caricature the peculiarities of others. This +trait, much clarified and spiritualized in later life, became a +distinct, ironic note in his character. Possibly it attracted +Heine, although his irony was on a more intellectual plane. + +His piano playing at this time was neat and finished, and he had +already begun those experimentings in technique and tone that +afterward revolutionized the world of music and the keyboard. He +being sickly and his sister's health poor, the pair was sent in +1826 to Reinerz, a watering place in Prussian Silesia. This with +a visit to his godmother, a titled lady named Wiesiolowska and a +sister of Count Frederic Skarbek,--the name does not tally with +the one given heretofore, as noted by Janotha,--consumed this +year. In 1827 he left his regular studies at the Lyceum and +devoted his time to music. He was much in the country, listening +to the fiddling and singing of the peasants, thus laying the +corner stone of his art as a national composer. In the fall of +1828 he went to Berlin, and this trip gave him a foretaste of the +outer world. + +Stephen Heller, who saw Chopin in 1830, described him as pale, of +delicate health, and not destined, so they said in Warsaw, for a +long life. This must have been during one of his depressed +periods, for his stay in Berlin gives a record of unclouded +spirits. However, his sister Emilia died young of pulmonary +trouble and doubtless Frederic was predisposed to lung complaint. +He was constantly admonished by his relatives to keep his coat +closed. Perhaps, as in Wagner's case, the uncontrollable gayety +and hectic humors were but so many signs of a fatal +disintegrating process. Wagner outlived them until the Scriptural +age, but Chopin succumbed when grief, disappointment and intense +feeling had undermined him. For the dissipations of the "average +sensual man" he had an abiding contempt. He never smoked, in fact +disliked it. His friend Sand differed greatly in this respect, +and one of the saddest anecdotes related by De Lenz accuses her +of calling for a match to light her cigar: "Frederic, un +fidibus," she commanded, and Frederic obeyed. Mr. Philip Hale +mentions a letter from Balzac to his Countess Hanska, dated March +15, 1841, which concludes: "George Sand did not leave Paris last +year. She lives at Rue Pigalle, No. 16...Chopin is always there. +Elle ne fume que des cigarettes, et pas autre chose" Mr. Hale +states that the italics are in the letter. So much for De Lenz +and his fidibus! + +I am impelled here to quote from Mr. Earnest Newman's "Study of +Wagner" because Chopin's exaltation of spirits, alternating with +irritability and intense depression, were duplicated in Wagner. +Mr. Newman writes of Wagner: "There have been few men in whom the +torch of life has burned so fiercely. In his early days he seems +to have had that gayety of temperament and that apparently +boundless energy which men in his case, as in that of Heine, +Nietzsche, Amiel and others, have wrongly assumed to be the +outcome of harmonious physical and mental health. There is a +pathetic exception in the outward lives of so many men of genius, +the bloom being, to the instructed eye, only the indication of +some subtle nervous derangement, only the forerunner of decay." +The overmastering cerebral agitation that obsessed Wagner's life, +was as with Chopin a symptom, not a sickness; but in the latter +it had not yet assumed a sinister turn. + +Chopin's fourteen days in Berlin,--he went there under the +protection of his father's friend, Professor Jarocki, to attend +the great scientific congress--were full of joy unrestrained. The +pair left Warsaw September 9, 1828, and after five days travel in +a diligence arrived at Berlin. This was a period of leisure +travelling and living. Frederic saw Spontini, Mendelssohn and +Zelter at a distance and heard "Freischutz." He attended the +congress and made sport of the scientists, Alexander von Humboldt +included. On the way home they stopped at a place called +Zullichau, and Chopin improvised on Polish airs so charmingly +that the stage was delayed, "all hands turning in" to listen. +This is another of the anecdotes of honorable antiquity. Count +Tarnowski relates that "Chopin left Warsaw with a light heart, +with a mind full of ideas, perhaps full of dreams of fame and +happiness. 'I have only twenty kreuzers in my pockets,' he writes +in his note-book, 'and it seems to me that I am richer than +Arthur Potocki, whom I met only a moment ago;' besides this, +witty conceptions, fun, showing a quiet and cheerful spirit; for +example, 'May it be permitted to me to sign myself as belonging +to the circle of your friends,--F. Chopin.' Or, 'A welcome moment +in which I can express to you my friendship.--F. Chopin, office +clerk.' Or again, 'Ah, my most lordly sir, I do not myself yet +understand the joy which I feel on entering the circle of your +real friends.--F. Chopin, penniless'!" + +These letters have a Micawber ring, but they indicate Chopin's +love of jest. Sikorski tells a story of the lad's improvising in +church so that the priest, choir and congregation were forgotten +by him. + +The travellers arrived at Warsaw October 6 after staying a few +days in Posen where the Prince Radziwill lived; here Chopin +played in private. This prince-composer, despite what Liszt +wrote, did not contribute a penny to the youth's musical +education, though he always treated him in a sympathetic manner. + +Hummel and Paganini visited Warsaw in 1829. The former he met and +admired, the latter he worshipped. This year may have seen the +composition, if not the publication of the "Souvenir de +Paganini," said to be in the key of A major and first published +in the supplement of the "Warsaw Echo Muzyczne." Niecks writes +that he never saw a copy of this rare composition. Paderewski +tells me he has the piece and that it is weak, having historic +interest only. I cannot find much about the Polish poet, Julius +Slowacki, who died the same year, 1849, as Edgar Allan Poe. +Tarnowski declares him to have been Chopin's warmest friend and +in his poetry a starting point of inspiration for the composer. + +In July 1829, accompanied by two friends, Chopin started for +Vienna. Travelling in a delightful, old-fashioned manner, the +party saw much of the country--Galicia, Upper Silesia and Moravia- +-the Polish Switzerland. On July 31 they arrived in the Austrian +capital. Then Chopin first began to enjoy an artistic atmosphere, +to live less parochially. His home life, sweet and tranquil as it +was, could not fail to hurt him as artist; he was flattered and +coddled and doubtless the touch of effeminacy in his person was +fostered. In Vienna the life was gayer, freer and infinitely more +artistic than in Warsaw. He met every one worth knowing in the +artistic world and his letters at that period are positively +brimming over with gossip and pen pictures of the people he knew. +The little drop of malice he injects into his descriptions of the +personages he encounters is harmless enough and proves that the +young man had considerable wit. Count Gallenberg, the lessee of +the famous Karnthnerthor Theatre, was kind to him, and the +publisher Haslinger treated him politely. He had brought with him +his variations on "La ci darem la mano"; altogether the times +seemed propitious and much more so when he was urged to give a +concert. Persuaded to overcome a natural timidity, he made his +Vienna debut at this theatre August 11, 1829, playing on a Stein +piano his Variations, opus 2. His Krakowiak Rondo had been +announced, but the parts were not legible, so instead he +improvised. He had success, being recalled, and his improvisation +on the Polish tune called "Chmiel" and a theme from "La Dame +Blanche" stirred up much enthusiasm in which a grumbling +orchestra joined. The press was favorable, though Chopin's +playing was considered rather light in weight. His style was +admired and voted original--here the critics could see through +the millstone--while a lady remarked "It's a pity his appearance +is so insignificant." This reached the composer's ear and caused +him an evil quarter of an hour for he was morbidly sensitive; but +being, like most Poles, secretive, managed to hide it. + +August 18, encouraged by his triumph, Chopin gave a second +concert on the same stage. This time he played the Krakowiak and +his talent for composition was discussed by the newspapers. "He +plays very quietly, without the daring elan which distinguishes +the artist from the amateur," said one; "his defect is the non- +observance of the indication of accent at the beginning of +musical phrases." What was then admired in Vienna was explosive +accentuations and piano drumming. The article continues: "As in +his playing he was like a beautiful young tree that stands free +and full of fragrant blossoms and ripening fruits, so he +manifested as much estimable individuality in his compositions +where new figures and passages, new forms unfolded themselves." +This rather acute critique, translated by Dr. Niecks, is from the +Wiener "Theaterzeitung" of August 20, 1829. The writer of it +cannot be accused of misoneism, that hardening of the faculties +of curiousness and prophecy--that semi-paralysis of the organs of +hearing which afflicts critics of music so early in life and +evokes rancor and dislike to novelties. Chopin derived no money +from either of his concerts. + +By this time he was accustomed to being reminded of the lightness +and exquisite delicacy of his touch and the originality of his +style. It elated him to be no longer mistaken for a pupil and he +writes home that "my manner of playing pleases the ladies so very +much." Thismanner never lost its hold over female hearts, and the +airs, caprices and little struttings of Frederic are to blame for +the widely circulated legend of his effeminate ways. The legend +soon absorbed his music, and so it has come to pass that this +fiction, begotten of half fact and half mental indolence, has +taken root, like the noxious weed it is. When Rubinstein, Tausig +and Liszt played Chopin in passional phrases, the public and +critics were aghast. This was a transformed Chopin indeed, a +Chopin transposed to the key of manliness. Yet it is the true +Chopin. The young man's manners were a trifle feminine but his +brain was masculine, electric, and his soul courageous. His +Polonaises, Ballades, Scherzi and Etudes need a mighty grip, a +grip mental and physical. + +Chopin met Czerny. "He is a good man, but nothing more," he said +of him. Czerny admired the young pianist with the elastic hand +and on his second visit to Vienna, characteristically inquired, +"Are you still industrious?" Czerny's brain was a tireless +incubator of piano exercises, while Chopin so fused the technical +problem with the poetic idea, that such a nature as the old +pedagogue's must have been unattractive to him. He knew Franz, +Lachner and other celebrities and seems to have enjoyed a mild +flirtation with Leopoldine Blahetka, a popular young pianist, for +he wrote of his sorrow at parting from her. On August 19 he left +with friends for Bohemia, arriving at Prague two days later. +There he saw everything and met Klengel, of canon fame, a still +greater canon-eer than the redoubtable Jadassohn of Leipzig. +Chopin and Klengel liked each other. Three days later the party +proceeded to Teplitz and Chopin played in aristocratic company. +He reached Dresden August 26, heard Spohr's "Faust" and met +capellmeister Morlacchi--that same Morlacchi whom Wagner +succeeded as a conductor January 10, 1843--vide Finck's "Wagner." +By September 12, after a brief sojourn in Breslau, Chopin was +again safe at home in Warsaw. + +About this time he fell in love with Constantia Gladowska, a +singer and pupil of the Warsaw Conservatory. Niecks dwells +gingerly upon his fervor in love and friendship--"a passion with +him" and thinks that it gives the key to his life. Of his +romantic friendship for Titus Woyciechowski and John Matuszynski- +-his "Johnnie"--there are abundant evidences in the letters. They +are like the letters of a love-sick maiden. But Chopin's purity +of character was marked; he shrank from coarseness of all sorts, +and the Fates only know what he must have suffered at times from +George Sand and her gallant band of retainers. To this +impressionable man, Parisian badinage--not to call it anything +stronger--was positively antipathetical. Of him we might indeed +say in Lafcadio Hearn's words, "Every mortal man has been many +million times a woman." And was it the Goncourts who dared to +assert that, "there are no women of genius: women of genius are +men"? Chopin needed an outlet for his sentimentalism. His piano +was but a sieve for some, and we are rather amused than otherwise +on reading the romantic nonsense of his boyish letters. + +After the Vienna trip his spirits and his health flagged. He was +overwrought and Warsaw became hateful to him, for he loved but +had not the courage to tell it to the beloved one. He put it on +paper, he played it, but speak it he could not. Here is a point +that reveals Chopin's native indecision, his inability to make up +his mind. He recalls to me the Frederic Moreau of Flaubert's +"L'Education Sentimentale." There is an atrophy of the will, for +Chopin can neither propose nor fly from Warsaw. He writes letters +that are full of self-reproaches, letters that must have both +bored and irritated his friends. Like many other men of genius he +suffered all his life from folie de doute, indeed his was what +specialists call "a beautiful case." This halting and +irresolution was a stumbling block in his career and is +faithfully mirrored in his art. + +Chopin went to Posen in October, 1829, and at the Radziwills was +attracted by the beauty and talent of the Princess Elisa, who +died young. George Sand has noted Chopin's emotional versatility +in the matter of falling in and out of love. He could accomplish +both of an evening and a crumpled roseleaf was sufficient cause +to induce frowns and capricious flights--decidedly a young man +tres difficile. He played at the "Ressource" in November, 1829, +the Variations, opus 2. On March 17, 1830, he gave his first +concert in Warsaw, and selected the adagio and rondo of his first +concerto, the one in F minor, and the Potpourri on Polish airs. +His playing was criticised for being too delicate--an old +complaint--but the musicians, Elsner, Kurpinski and the rest were +pleased. Edouard Wolff said they had no idea in Warsaw of "the +real greatness of Chopin." He was Polish, this the public +appreciated, but of Chopin the individual they missed entirely +the flavor. A week later, spurred by adverse and favorable +criticism, he gave a second concert, playing the same excerpts +from this concerto--the slow movement is Constance Gladowska +musically idealized--the Krakowiak and an improvisation. The +affair was a success. From these concerts he cleared six hundred +dollars, not a small sum in those days for an unknown virtuoso. A +sonnet was printed in his honor, champagne was offered him by an +enthusiastic Paris bred, but not born, pianist named Dunst, who +for this act will live in all chronicles of piano playing. Worse +still, Orlowski served up the themes of his concerto into +mazurkas and had the impudence to publish them. + +Then came the last blow: he was asked by a music seller for his +portrait, which he refused, having no desire, he said with a +shiver, to see his face on cheese and butter wrappers. Some of +the criticisms were glowing, others absurd as criticisms +occasionally are. Chopin wrote to Titus the same rhapsodical +protestations and finally declared in meticulous peevishness, "I +will no longer read what people write about me." This has the +familiar ring of the true artist who cares nothing for the +newspapers but reads them religiously after his own and his +rivals' concerts. + +Chopin heard Henrietta Sontag with great joy; he was ever a lover +and a connoisseur of singing. He advised young pianists to listen +carefully and often to great singers. Mdlle. de Belleville the +pianist and Lipinski the violinist were admired, and he could +write a sound criticism when he chose. But the Gladowska is +worrying him. "Unbearable longing" is driving him to exile. He +attends her debut as Agnese in Paer's opera of that title and +writes a complete description of the important function to Titus, +who is at his country seat where Chopin visits him betimes. +Agitated, he thinks of going to Berlin or Vienna, but after much +philandering remains in Warsaw. On October 11, 1830, following +many preparations and much emotional shilly-shallying, Chopin +gave his third and last Warsaw concert. He played the E minor +concerto for the first time in public but not in sequence. The +first and last two movements were separated by an aria, such +being the custom of those days. Later he gave the Fantasia on +Polish airs. Best of all for him, Miss Gladowska sang a Rossini +air, "wore a white dress and roses in her hair, and was +charmingly beautiful." Thus Chopin; and the details have all the +relevancy of a male besieged by Dan Cupid. Chopin must have +played well. He said so himself, and he was always a cautious +self-critic despite his pride. His vanity and girlishness peep +out in his recital by the response to a quartet of recalls: "I +believe I did it yesterday with a certain grace, for Brandt had +taught me how to do it properly." He is not speaking of his +poetic performance, but of his bow to the public. As he formerly +spoke to his mother of his pretty collar, so as young man he +makes much of his deportment. But it is all quite in the role; +scratch an artist and you surprise a child. + +Of course, Constantia sang wonderfully. "Her low B came out so +magnificently that Zielinski declared it alone was worth a +thousand ducats." Ah, these enamored ones! Chopin left Warsaw +November 1, 1830, for Vienna and without declaring his love. Or +was he a rejected suitor? History is dumb. He never saw his +Gladowska again, for he did not return to Warsaw. The lady was +married in 1832--preferring a solid certainty to nebulous genius- +-to Joseph Grabowski, a merchant at Warsaw. Her husband, so saith +a romantic biographer, Count Wodzinski, became blind; perhaps +even a blind country gentleman was preferable to a lachrymose +pianist. Chopin must have heard of the attachment in 1831. Her +name almost disappears from his correspondence. Time as well as +other nails drove from his memory her image. If she was fickle, +he was inconstant, and so let us waste no pity on this episode, +over which lakes of tears have been shed and rivers of ink have +been spilt. + +Chopin was accompanied by Elsner and a party of friends as far as +Wola, a short distance from Warsaw. There the pupils of the +Conservatory sang a cantata by Elsner, and after a banquet he was +given a silver goblet filled with Polish earth, being adjured, so +Karasowski relates, never to forget his country or his friends +wherever he might wander. Chopin, his heart full of sorrow, left +home, parents, friends, and "ideal," severed with his youth, and +went forth in the world with the keyboard and a brain full of +beautiful music as his only weapons. + +At Kaliz he was joined by the faithful Titus, and the two went to +Breslau, where they spent four days, going to the theatre and +listening to music. Chopin played quite impromptu two movements +of his E minor concerto, supplanting a tremulous amateur. In +Dresden where they arrived November 10, they enjoyed themselves +with music. Chopin went to a soiree at Dr. Kreyssig's and was +overwhelmed at the sight of a circle of dames armed with knitting +needles which they used during the intervals of music-making in +the most formidable manner. He heard Auber and Rossini operas and +Rolla, the Italian violinist, and listened with delight to +Dotzauer and Kummer the violoncellists--the cello being an +instrument for which he had a consuming affection. Rubini, the +brother of the great tenor, he met, and was promised important +letters of introduction if he desired to visit Italy. He saw +Klengel again, who told the young Pole, thereby pleasing him very +much, that his playing was like John Field's. Prague was also +visited, and he arrived at Vienna in November. There he +confidently expected a repetition of his former successes, but +was disappointed. Haslinger received him coldly and refused to +print his variations or concerto unless he got them for nothing. +Chopin's first brush with the hated tribe of publishers begins +here, and he adopts as his motto the pleasing device, "Pay, thou +animal," a motto he strictly adhered to; in money matters Chopin +was very particular. The bulk of his extant correspondence is +devoted to the exposure of the ways and wiles of music +publishers. "Animal" is the mildest term he applies to them, +"Jew" the most frequent objurgation. After all Chopin was very +Polish. + +He missed his friends the Blahetkas, who had gone to Stuttgart, +and altogether did not find things so promising as formerly. No +profitable engagements could be secured, and, to cap his misery, +Titus, his other self, left him to join the revolutionists in +Poland November 30. His letters reflect his mental agitation and +terror over his parents' safety. A thousand times he thought of +renouncing his artistic ambitions and rushing to Poland to fight +for his country. He never did, and his indecision--it was not +cowardice--is our gain. Chopin put his patriotism, his wrath and +his heroism into his Polonaises. That is why we have them now, +instead of Chopin having been the target of some black-browed +Russian. Chopin was psychically brave; let us not cavil at the +almost miraculous delicacy of his organization. He wrote letters +to his parents and to Matuszyriski, but they are not despairing-- +at least not to the former. He pretended gayety and had great +hopes for the future, for he was living entirely on means +supplied him by his father. News of Constantia gladdened him, and +he decided to go to Italy, but the revolution early in 1831 +decided him for France. Dr. Malfatti was good to him and cheered +him, and he managed to accomplish much social visiting. The +letters of this period are most interesting. He heard Sarah +Heinefetter sing, and listened to Thaiberg's playing of a +movement of his own concerto. Thalberg was three years younger +than Chopin and already famous. Chopin did not admire him: +"Thalberg plays famously, but he is not my man...He plays forte +and piano with the pedals but not with the hand; takes tenths as +easily as I do octaves, and wears studs with diamonds." + +Thalberg was not only too much of a technician for Chopin, but he +was also a Jew and a successful one. In consequence, both poet +and Pole revolted. + +Hummel called on Frederic, but we hear nothing of his opinion of +the elder man and his music; this is all the more strange, +considering how much Chopin built on Hummel's style. Perhaps that +is the cause of the silence, just as Wagner's dislike for +Meyerbeer was the result of his obligations to the composer of +"Les Huguenots." He heard Aloys Schmitt play, and uttered the +very Heinesque witticism that "he is already over forty years +old, and composes eighty years old music." This in a letter to +Elsner. Our Chopin could be amazingly sarcastic on occasion. He +knew Slavik the violin virtuoso, Merk the 'cellist, and all the +music publishers. At a concert given by Madame Garzia-Vestris, in +April, 1831, he appeared, and in June gave a concert of his own, +at which he must have played the E minor concerto, because of a +passing mention in a musical paper. He studied much, and it was +July 20, 1831, before he left Vienna after a second, last, and +thoroughly discouraging visit. + +Chopin got a passport vised for London, "passant par Paris &. +Londres," and had permission from the Russian Ambassador to go as +far as Munich. Then the cholera gave him some bother, as he had +to secure a clean bill of health, but he finally got away. The +romantic story of "I am only passing through Paris," which he is +reported to have said in after years, has been ruthlessly shorn +of its sentiment. At Munich he played his second concerto and +pleased greatly. But he did not remain in the Bavarian capital, +hastening to Stuttgart, where he heard of the capture of Warsaw +by the Russians, September 8, 1831. This news, it is said, was +the genesis of the great C minor etude in opus 10, sometimes +called the "Revolutionary." Chopin exclaimed in a letter dated +December 16, 1831, "All this caused me much pain--who could have +foreseen it!" and in another letter he wrote, "How glad my mamma +will be that I did not go back." Count Tarnowski in his +recollections prints some extracts from a diary said to have been +kept by Chopin. According to this his agitation must have been +terrible. Here are several examples: + +"My poor father! My dearest ones! Perhaps they hunger? Maybe he +has not anything to buy bread for mother? Perhaps my sisters have +fallen victims to the fury of the Muscovite soldiers? Oh, father, +is this the consolation of your old age? Mother, poor suffering +mother, is it for this you outlived your daughter?" + +"And I here unoccupied! And I am here with empty hands! Sometimes +I groan, suffer and despair at the piano! O God, move the earth, +that it may swallow the humanity of this century! May the most +cruel fortune fall upon the French, that they did not come to our +aid." All this sounds a trifle melodramatic and quite unlike +Chopin. + +He did not go to Warsaw, but started for France at the end of +September, arriving early in October, 1831. Poland's downfall had +aroused him from his apathy, even if it sent him further from +her. This journey, as Liszt declares, "settled his fate." Chopin +was twenty-two years old when he reached Paris. + + + +II. PARIS:--IN THE MAELSTROM + + + +Here, according to Niecks, is the itinerary of Chopin's life for +the next eighteen years: In Paris, 27 Boulevard Poisonniere, to 5 +and 38 Chaussee d'Antin, to Aix-la-Chapelle, Carlsbad, Leipzig, +Heidelberg, Marienbad, and London, to Majorca, to 5 Rue Tronchet, +16 Rue Pigalle, and 9 Square d'Orleans, to England and Scotland, +to 9 Square d'Orleans once more, Rue Chaillot and 12 Place +Vendeme, and then--Pere la Chaise, the last resting-place. It may +be seen that Chopin was a restless, though not roving nature. In +later years his inability to remain settled in one place bore a +pathological impress,--consumptives are often so. + +The Paris of 1831, the Paris of arts and letters, was one of the +most delightful cities in the world for the culture-loving. The +molten tide of passion and decorative extravagance that swept +over intellectual Europe three score years and ten ago, bore on +its foaming crest Victor Hugo, prince of romanticists. Near by +was Henri Heine,--he left Heinrich across the Rhine,--Heine, who +dipped his pen in honey and gall, who sneered and wept in the +same couplet. The star of classicism had seemingly set. In the +rich conflict of genius were Gautier, Schumann, and the rest. All +was romance, fantasy, and passion, and the young men heard the +moon sing silvery--you remember De Musset!--and the leaves rustle +rhythms to the heart-beats of lovers. "Away with the gray- +beards," cried he of the scarlet waistcoat, and all France +applauded "Ernani." Pity it was that the romantic infant had to +die of intellectual anaemia, leaving as a legacy the memories and +work of one of the most marvellous groupings of genius since the +Athens of Pericles. The revolution of 1848 called from the mud +the sewermen. Flaubert, his face to the past, gazed sorrowfully +at Carthage and wrote an epic of the French bourgeois. Zola and +his crowd delved into a moral morass, and the world grew weary of +them. And then the faint, fading flowers of romanticism were put +into albums where their purple harmonies and subtle sayings are +pressed into sweet twilight forgetfulness. Berlioz, mad Hector of +the flaming locks, whose orchestral ozone vivified the scores of +Wagnerand Liszt, began to sound garishly empty, brilliantly +superficial; "the colossal nightingale" is difficult to classify +even to-day. A romantic by temperament he unquestionably was. But +then his music, all color, nuance, and brilliancy, was not +genuinely romantic in its themes. Compare him with Schumann, and +the genuine romanticist tops the virtuoso. Berlioz, I suspect, +was a magnified virtuoso. His orchestral technique is supreme, +but his music fails to force its way into my soul. It pricks the +nerves, it pleases the sense of the gigantic, the strange, the +formless, but there is something uncanny about it all, like some +huge, prehistoric bird, an awful Pterodactyl with goggle eyes, +horrid snout and scream. Berlioz, like Baudelaire, has the power +of evoking the shudder. But as John Addington Symonds wrote: "The +shams of the classicists, the spasms of the romanticists have +alike to be abandoned. Neither on a mock Parnassus nor on a paste- +board Blocksberg can the poet of the age now worship. The artist +walks the world at large beneath the light of natural day." All +this was before the Polish charmer distilled his sugared +wormwood, his sweet, exasperated poison, for thirsty souls +inmorbid Paris. + +Think of the men and women with whom the new comer associated-- +for his genius was quickly divined: Hugo, Lamartine, Pere +Lamenais,--ah! what balm for those troubled days was in his +"Paroles d'un Croyant,"--Chateaubriand, Saint-Simon, Merimee, +Gautier, Liszt, Victor Cousin, Baudelaire, Ary Scheffer, Berlioz, +Heine,--who asked the Pole news of his muse the "laughing nymph,"- +-"If she still continued to drape her silvery veil around the +flowing locks of her green hair, with a coquetry so enticing; if +the old sea god with the long white beard still pursued this +mischievous maid with his ridiculous love?"--De Musset, De Vigny, +Rossini, Meyerbeer, Auber, Sainte-Beuve, Adolphe Nourrit, +Ferdinand Hiller, Balzac, Dumas, Heller, Delacroix,--the Hugo of +painters,--Michelet, Guizot, Thiers, Niemcevicz and Mickiewicz +the Polish bards, and George Sand: the quintessence of the Paris +of art and literature. + +The most eloquent page in Liszt's "Chopin" is the narrative of an +evening in the Chaussee d'Antin, for it demonstrates the +Hungarian's literary gifts and feeling for the right phrase. This +description of Chopin's apartment "invaded by surprise" has a +hypnotizing effect on me. The very furnishings of the chamber +seem vocal under Liszt's fanciful pen. In more doubtful taste is +his statement that "the glace which covers the grace of the elite, +as it does the fruit of their desserts,...could not have been +satisfactory to Chopin"! Liszt, despite his tendency to idealize +Chopin after his death, is our most trustworthy witness at this +period. Chopin was an ideal to Liszt though he has not left us a +record of his defects. The Pole was ombrageux and easily +offended; he disliked democracies, in fact mankind in the bulk +stunned him. This is one reason, combined with a frail physique, +of his inability to conquer the larger public. Thalberg could do +it; his aristocratic tournure, imperturbability, beautiful touch +and polished mechanism won the suffrage of his audiences. Liszt +never stooped to cajole. He came, he played, he overwhelmed. +Chopin knew all this, knew his weaknesses, and fought to overcome +them but failed. Another crumpled roseleaf for this man of +excessive sensibility. + +Since told of Liszt and first related by him, is the anecdote of +Chopin refusing to play, on being incautiously pressed, after +dinner, giving as a reason "Ah, sir, I have eaten so little!" +Even though his host was gauche it cannot be denied that the +retort was rude. + +Chopin met Osborne, Mendelssohn--who rather patronized him with +his "Chopinetto,"--Baillot the violinist and Franchomme the +'cellist. With the latter he contracted a lasting friendship, +often playing duos with him and dedicating to him his G minor +'cello Sonata. He called on Kalkbrenner, then the first pianist +of his day, who was puzzled by the prodigious novelty of the +young Pole's playing. Having heard Herz and Hiller, Chopin did +not fear to perform his E minor concerto for him. He tells all +about the interview in a letter to Titus: "Are you a pupil of +Field's?" was asked by Kalkbrenner, who remarked that Chopin had +the style of Cramer and the touch of Field. Not having a standard +by which to gauge the new phenomenon, Kalkbrenner was forced to +fall back on the playing of men he knew. He then begged Chopin to +study three years with him--only three!--but Elsner in an earnest +letter dissuaded his pupil from making any experiments that might +hurt his originality of style. Chopin actually attended the class +of Kalkbrenner but soon quit, for he had nothing to learn of the +pompous, penurious pianist. The Hiller story of how Mendelssohn, +Chopin, Liszt and Heller teased this grouty old gentleman on the +Boulevard des Italiens is capital reading, if not absolutely +true. Yet Chopin admired Kalkbrenner's finished technique despite +his platitudinous manner. Heine said--or rather quoted Koreff-- +that Kalkbrenner looked like a bonbon that had been in the mud. +Niecks thinks Chopin might have learned of Kalkbrenner on the +mechanical side. Chopin, in public, was modest about his +attainments, looking upon himself as self-taught. "I cannot +create a new school, because I do not even know the old," he +said. It is this very absence of scholasticism that is both the +power and weakness of his music. In reality his true technical +ancestor was Hummel. + +He played the E minor concerto first in Paris, February 26, 1832, +and some smaller pieces. Although Kalkbrenner, Baillot and others +participated, Chopin was the hero of the evening. The affair was +a financial failure, the audience consisting mostly of +distinguished and aristocratic Poles. Mendelssohn, who disliked +Kalkbrenner and was angered at his arrogance in asking Chopin to +study with him, "applauded furiously." "After this," Hiller +writes, "nothing more was heard of Chopin's lack of technique." +The criticisms were favorable. On May 20, 1832, Chopin appeared +at a charity concert organized by Prince de la Moskowa. He was +lionized in society and he wrote to Titus that his heart beat in +syncopation, so exciting was all this adulation, social +excitement and rapid gait of living. But he still sentimentalizes +to Titus and wishes him in Paris. + +A flirtation of no moment, with Francilla Pixis, the adopted +daughter of Pixis the hunchback pianist--cruelly mimicked by +Chopin--aroused the jealousy of the elder artist. Chopin was +delighted, for he was malicious in a dainty way. "What do you +think of this?" he writes. "_I_, a dangerous seducteur!" The +Paris letters to his parents were unluckily destroyed, as +Karasowski relates, by Russian soldiers in Warsaw, September 19, +1863, and with them were burned his portrait by Ary Scheffer and +his first piano. The loss of the letters is irremediable. +Karasowski who saw some of them says they were tinged with +melancholy. Despite his artistic success Chopin needed money and +began to consider again his projected trip to America. Luckily he +met Prince Valentine Radziwill on the street, so it is said, and +was persuaded to play at a Rothschild soiree. From that moment +his prospects brightened, for he secured paying pupils. Niecks, +the iconoclast, has run this story to earth and finds it built on +airy, romantic foundations. Liszt, Hiller, Franchomme and +Sowinski never heard of it although it was a stock anecdote of +Chopin. + +Chopin must have broadened mentally as well as musically in this +congenial, artistic environment. He went about, hobnobbed with +princesses, and of the effect of this upon his compositions there +can be no doubt. If he became more cosmopolitan he also became +more artificial and for a time the salon with its perfumed, +elegant atmosphere threatened to drug his talent into +forgetfulness of loftier aims. Luckily the master-sculptor Life +intervened and real troubles chiselled his character on tragic, +broader and more passionate lines. He played frequently in public +during 1832-1833 with Hiller, Liszt, Herz and Osborne, and much +in private. There was some rivalry in this parterre of pianists. +Liszt, Chopin and Hiller indulged in friendly contests and Chopin +always came off winner when Polish music was essayed. He +delighted in imitating his colleagues, Thalberg especially. +Adolphe Brisson tells of a meeting of Sand, Chopin and Thalberg, +where, as Mathias says, the lady "chattered like a magpie" and +Thalberg, after being congratulated by Chopin on his magnificent +virtuosity, reeled off polite phrases in return; doubtless he +valued the Pole's compliments for what they were worth. The +moment his back was presented, Chopin at the keyboard was mocking +him. It was then Chopin told Sand of his pupil, Georges Mathias, +"c'est une bonne caboche." Thalberg took his revenge whenever he +could. After a concert by Chopin he astonished Hiller by shouting +on the way home. In reply to questions he slily answered that he +needed a forte as he had heard nothing but pianissimo the entire +evening! + +Chopin was never a hearty partisan of the Romantic movement. Its +extravagance, misplaced enthusiasm, turbulence, attacks on +church, state and tradition disturbed the finical Pole while +noise, reclame and boisterousness chilled and repulsed him. He +wished to be the Uhland of Poland, but he objected to smashing +idols and refused to wade in gutters to reach his ideal. He was +not a fighter, yet as one reviews the past half century it is his +still small voice that has emerged from the din, the golden voice +of a poet and not the roar of the artistic demagogues of his day. +Liszt's influence was stimulating, but what did not Chopin do for +Liszt? Read Schumann. He managed in 1834 to go to Aix-la-Chapelle +to attend the Lower Rhenish Music Festival. There he met Hiller +and Mendelssohn at the painter Schadow's and improvised +marvellously, so Hiller writes. He visited Coblenz with Hiller +before returning home. + +Professor Niecks has a deep spring of personal humor which he +taps at rare intervals. He remarks that "the coming to Paris and +settlement there of his friend Matuszynski must have been very +gratifying to Chopin, who felt so much the want of one with whom +to sigh." This slanting allusion is matched by his treatment of +George Sand. After literally ratting her in a separate chapter, +he winds up his work with the solemn assurance that he abstains +"from pronouncing judgment because the complete evidence did not +seem to me to warrant my doing so." This is positively delicious. +When I met this biographer at Bayreuth in 1896, I told him how +much I had enjoyed his work, adding that I found it indispensable +in the re-construction of Chopin. Professor Niecks gazed at me +blandly--he is most amiable and scholarly-looking--and remarked, +"You are not the only one." He was probably thinking of the many +who have had recourse to his human documents of Chopin. But +Niecks, in 1888, built on Karasowski, Liszt, Schumann, Sand and +others, so the process is bound to continue. Since 1888 much has +been written of Chopin, much surmised. + +With Matuszysnki the composer was happier. He devoutly loved his +country and despite his sarcasm was fond of his countrymen. Never +an extravagant man, he invariably assisted the Poles. After 1834- +5, Chopin's activity as a public pianist began to wane. He was +not always understood and was not so warmly welcomed as he +deserved to be; on one occasion when he played the Larghetto of +his F minor concerto in a Conservatoire concert, its frigid +reception annoyed him very much. Nevertheless he appeared at a +benefit concert at Habeneck's, April 26, 1835. The papers +praised, but his irritability increased with every public +performance. About this time he became acquainted with Bellini, +for whose sensuous melodies he had a peculiar predilection. + +In July, 1835, Chopin met his father at Carlsbad. Then he went to +Dresden and later to Leipzig, playing privately for Schumann, +Clara Wieck, Wenzel and Mendelssohn. Schumann gushes over Chopin, +but this friendliness was never reciprocated. On his return to +Paris Chopin visited Heidelberg, where he saw the father of his +pupil, Adolphe Gutmann, and reached the capital of the civilized +world the middle of October. + +Meanwhile a love affair had occupied his attention in Dresden. In +September, 1835, Chopin met his old school friends, the +Wodzinskis, former pupils at his father's school. He fell in love +with their sister Marie and they became engaged. He spoke to his +father about the matter, and for the time Paris and his ambitions +were forgotten. He enjoyed a brief dream of marrying and of +settling near Warsaw, teaching and composing--the occasional +dream that tempts most active artists, soothing them with the +notion that there is really a haven of rest from the world's +buffets. Again the gods intervened in the interest of music. The +father of the girl objected on the score of Chopin's means and +his social position--artists were not Paderewskis in those days-- +although the mother favored the romance. The Wodzinskis were +noble and wealthy. In the summer of 1836, at Marienbad, Chopin +met Marie again. In 1837, the engagement was broken and the +following year the inconstant beauty married the son of Chopin's +godfather, Count Frederic Skarbek. As the marriage did not prove +a success--perhaps the lady played too much Chopin--a divorce +ensued and later she married a gentleman by the name of +Orpiszewski. Count Wodzinski wrote "Les Trois Romans de Frederic +Chopin," in which he asserts that his sister rejected Chopin at +Marienbad in 1836. But Chopin survived the shock. He went back to +Paris, and in July 1837, accompanied by Camille Pleyel and +Stanislas Kozmian, visited England for the first time. His stay +was short, only eleven days, and his chest trouble dates from +this time. He played at the house of James Broadwood, the piano +manufacturer, being introduced by Pleyel as M. Fritz; but his +performance betrayed his identity. His music was already admired +by amateurs but the critics with a few exceptions were +unfavorable to him. + +Now sounds for the first time the sinister motif of the George +Sand affair. In deference to Mr. Hadow I shall not call it a +liaison. It was not, in the vulgar sense. Chopin might have been +petty--a common failing of artistic men--but he was never vulgar +in word or deed. He disliked "the woman with the sombre eye" +before he had met her. Her reputation was not good, no matter if +George Eliot, Matthew Arnold, Elizabeth Barrett Browning and +others believed her an injured saint. Mr. Hadow indignantly +repudiates anything that savors of irregularity in the relations +of Chopin and Aurore Dudevant. If he honestly believes that their +contemporaries flagrantly lied and that the woman's words are to +be credited, why by all means let us leave the critic in his +Utopia. Mary, Queen of Scots, has her Meline; why should not Sand +boast of at least one apologist for her life--besides herself? I +do not say this with cynical intent. Nor do I propose to discuss +the details of the affair which has been dwelt upon ad nauseam by +every twanger of the romantic string. The idealists will always +see a union of souls, the realists--and there were plenty of them +in Paris taking notes from 1837 to 1847--view the alliance as a +matter for gossip. The truth lies midway. + +Chopin, a neurotic being, met the polyandrous Sand, a trampler on +all the social and ethical conventions, albeit a woman of great +gifts; repelled at first he gave way before the ardent passion +she manifested toward him. She was his elder, so could veil the +situation with the maternal mask, and she was the stronger +intellect, more celebrated--Chopin was but a pianist in the eyes +of the many--and so won by her magnetism the man she desired. +Paris, artistic Paris, was full of such situations. Liszt +protected the Countess d'Agoult, who bore him children, Cosima +Von Bulow-Wagner among the rest. Balzac--Balzac, that magnificent +combination of Bonaparte and Byron, pirate and poet--was +apparently leading the life of a saint, but his most careful +student, Viscount Spelboerch de Lovenjoul--whose name is +veritably Balzac-ian--tells us some different stories; even +Gustave Flaubert, the ascetic giant of Rouen, had a romance with +Madame Louise Colet, a mediocre writer and imitator of Sand,--as +was Countess d'Agoult, the Frankfort Jewess better known as +"Daniel Stern,"--that lasted from 1846 to 1854, according to +Emile Faguet. Here then was a medium which was the other side of +good and evil, a new transvaluation of morals, as Nietzsche would +say. Frederic deplored the union for he was theoretically a +Catholic. Did he not once resent the visit of Liszt and a +companion to his apartments when he was absent? Indeed he may be +fairly called a moralist. Carefully reared in the Roman Catholic +religion he died confessing that faith. With the exception of the +Sand episode, his life was not an irregular one, He abhorred the +vulgar and tried to conceal this infatuation from his parents. + +This intimacy, however, did the pair no harm artistically, +notwithstanding the inevitable sorrow and heart burnings at the +close. Chopin had some one to look after him--he needed it--and +in the society of this brilliant Frenchwoman he throve amazingly: +his best work may be traced to Nohant and Majorca. She on her +side profited also. After the bitterness of her separation from +Alfred de Musset about 1833 she had been lonely, for the Pagello +intermezzo was of short duration. The De Musset-Sand story was +not known in its entirety until 1896. Again M. Spelboerch de +Lovenjoul must be consulted, as he possessed a bundle of letters +that were written by George Sand and M. Buloz, the editor of "La +Revue des Deux Mondes," in 1858. + +De Musset went to Venice with Sand in the fall of 1833. They had +the maternal sanction and means supplied by Madame de Musset. The +story gives forth the true Gallic resonance on being critically +tapped. De Musset returned alone, sick in body and soul, and +thenceforth absinthe was his constant solace. There had been +references, vague and disquieting, of a Dr. Pagello for whom Sand +had suddenly manifested one of her extraordinary fancies. This +she denied, but De Musset's brother plainly intimated that the +aggravating cause of his brother's illness had been the +unexpected vision of Sand coquetting with the young medical man +called in to prescribe for Alfred. Dr. Pagello in 1896 was +interviewed by Dr. Cabanes of the Paris "Figaro" and here is his +story of what had happened in 1833. This story will explain the +later behavior of "la merle blanche" toward Chopin. + +"One night George Sand, after writing three pages of prose full +of poetry and inspiration, took an unaddressed envelope, placed +therein the poetic declaration, and handed it to Dr. Pagello. He, +seeing no address, did not, or feigned not, to understand for +whom the letter was intended, and asked George Sand what he +should do with it. Snatching the letter from his hands, she wrote +upon the envelope: 'To the Stupid Pagello.' Some days afterward +George Sand frankly told De Musset that henceforth she could be +to him only a friend." + +De Musset died in 1857 and after his death Sand startled Paris +with "Elle et Lui," an obvious answer to "Confessions of a Child +of the Age, "De Musset's version--an uncomplimentary one to +himself--of their separation. The poet's brother Paul rallied to +his memory with "Lui et Elle," and even Louisa Colet ventured +into the fracas with a trashy novel called "Lui." During all this +mud-throwing the cause of the trouble calmly lived in the little +Italian town of Belluno. It was Dr. Giuseppe Pagello who will go +down in literary history as the one man that played Joseph to +George Sand. + +Now do you ask why I believe that Sand left Chopin when she was +bored with him? The words "some days afterwards" are significant. +I print the Pagello story not only because it is new, but as a +reminder that George Sand in her love affairs was always the man. +She treated Chopin as a child, a toy, used him for literary copy- +-pace Mr. Hadow!--and threw him over after she had wrung out all +the emotional possibilities of the problem. She was true to +herself even when she attempted to palliate her want of heart. +Beware of the woman who punctuates the pages of her life with +"heart" and "maternal feelings." "If I do not believe any more in +tears it is because I saw thee crying!" exclaimed Chopin. Sand +was the product of abnormal forces, she herself was abnormal, and +her mental activity, while it created no permanent types in +literary fiction, was also abnormal. She dominated Chopin, as she +had dominated Jules Sandeau, Calmatta the mezzotinter, De Musset, +Franz Liszt, Delacroix, Michel de Bourges--I have not the exact +chronological order--and later Flaubert. The most lovable event +in the life of this much loved woman was her old age affair-- +purely platonic--with Gustave Flaubert. The correspondence shows +her to have been "maternal" to the last. + +In the recently published "Lettres a l'etrangere" of Honore de +Balzac, this about Sand is very apropos. A visit paid to George +Sand at Nohant, in March 1838, brought the following to Madame +Hanska: + + It was rather well that I saw her, for we exchanged + confidences regarding Sandeau. I, who blamed her to the last + for deserting him, now feel only a deep compassion for her, as + you will have for me, when you learn with whom we have had + relations, she of love, I of friendship. + + But she has been even more unhappy with Musset. So here she + is, in retreat, denouncing both marriage and love, because in + both she has found nothing but delusion. + + I will tell you of her immense and secret devotion to these + two men, and you will agree that there is nothing in common + between angels and devils. All the follies she has committed + are claims to glory in the eyes of great and beautiful souls. + She has been the dupe of la Dorval, Bocage, Lamenais, etc.; + through the same sentiment she is the dupe of Liszt and Madame + d'Agoult. + +So let us accept without too much questioning as did Balzac, a +reader of souls, the Sand-Chopin partnership and follow its +sinuous course until 1847. + +Chopin met Sand at a musical matinee in 1837. Niecks throttles +every romantic yarn about the pair that has been spoken or +printed. He got his facts viva voce from Franchomme. Sand was +antipathetic to Chopin but her technique for overcoming masculine +coyness was as remarkable in its particular fashion as Chopin's +proficiency at the keyboard. They were soon seen together, and +everywhere. She was not musical, not a trained musician, but her +appreciation for all art forms was highly sympathetic. Not a +beautiful woman, being swarthy and rather heavy-set in figure, +this is what she was, as seen by Edouard Grenier:-- + + She was short and stout, but her face attracted all my + attention, the eyes especially. They were wonderful eyes, a + little too close together, it may be, large, with full + eyelids, and black, very black, but by no means lustrous; they + reminded me of unpolished marble, or rather of velvet, and + this gave a strange, dull, even cold expression to her + countenance. Her fine eyebrows and these great placid eyes + gave her an air of strength and dignity which was not borne + out by the lower part of her face. Her nose was rather thick + and not over shapely. Her mouth was also rather coarse and her + chin small. She spoke with great simplicity, and her manners + were very quiet. + +But she attracted with imperious power all that she met. Liszt +felt this attraction at one time--and it is whispered that Chopin +was jealous of him. Pouf! the woman who could conquer Franz Liszt +in his youth must have been a sorceress. He, too, was versatile. + +In 1838, Sand's boy Maurice being ill, she proposed a visit to +Majorca. Chopin went with the party in November and full accounts +of the Mediterranean trip, Chopin's illness, the bad weather, +discomforts and all the rest may be found in the "Histoire de Ma +Vie" by Sand. It was a time of torment. "Chopin is a detestable +invalid," said Sand, and so they returned to Nohant in June 1839. +They saw Genoa for a few days in May, but that is as far as +Chopin ever penetrated into the promised land--Italy, at one time +a passion with him. Sand enjoyed the subtle and truly feminine +pleasure of again entering the city which six years before she +had visited in company with another man, the former lover of +Rachel. + +Chopin's health in 1839 was a source of alarm to himself and his +friends. He had been dangerously ill at Majorca and Marseilles. +Fever and severe coughing proved to be the dread forerunners of +the disease that killed him ten years later. He was forced to be +very careful in his habits, resting more, giving fewer lessons, +playing but little in private or public, and becoming frugal of +his emotions. Now Sand began to cool, though her lively +imagination never ceased making graceful, touching pictures of +herself in the roles of sister of mercy, mother, and discreet +friend, all merged into one sentimental composite. Her invalid +was her one thought, and for an active mind and body like hers, +it must have been irksome to submit to the caprices of a moody, +ailing man. He composed at Nohant, and she has told us all about +it; how he groaned, wrote and re-wrote and tore to pieces draft +after draft of his work. This brings to memory another martyr to +style, Gustave Flaubert, who for forty years in a room at +Croisset, near Rouen, wrestled with the devils of syntax and +epithet. Chopin was of an impatient, nervous disposition. All the +more remarkable then his capacity for taking infinite pains. Like +Balzac he was never pleased with the final "revise" of his work, +he must needs aim at finishing touches. His letters at this +period are interesting for the Chopinist but for the most part +they consist of requests made to his pupils, Fontana, Gutmann and +others, to jog the publishers, to get him new apartments, to buy +him many things. Wagner was not more importunate or minatory than +this Pole, who depended on others for the material comforts and +necessities of his existence. Nor is his abuse of friends and +patrons, the Leos and others, indicative of an altogether frank, +sincere nature. He did not hesitate to lump them all as "pigs" +and "Jews" if anything happened to jar his nerves. Money, money, +is the leading theme of the Paris and Mallorean letters. Sand was +a spendthrift and Chopin had often to put his hands in his pocket +for her. He charged twenty francs a lesson, but was not a machine +and for at least four months of the year he earned nothing. Hence +his anxiety to get all he could for his compositions. Heaven-born +geniuses are sometimes very keen in financial transactions, and +indeed why should they not be? + +In 1839 Chopin met Moscheles. They appeared together at St. +Cloud, playing for the royal family. Chopin received a gold cup, +Moscheles a travelling case. "The King gave him this," said the +amiable Frederic, "to get the sooner rid of him." There were two +public concerts in 1841 and 1842, the first on April 26 at +Pleyel's rooms, the second on February 20 at the same hall. +Niecks devotes an engrossing chapter to the public accounts and +the general style of Chopin's playing; of this more hereafter. +From 1843 to 1847 Chopin taught, and spent the vacations at +Nohant, to which charming retreat Liszt, Matthew Arnold, +Delacroix, Charles Rollinat and many others came. His life was +apparently happy. He composed and amused himself with Maurice and +Solange, the "terrible children" of this Bohemian household. +There, according to reports, Chopin and Liszt were in friendly +rivalry--are two pianists ever friendly?--Liszt imitating +Chopin's style, and once in the dark they exchanged places and +fooled their listeners. Liszt denied this. Another story is of +one or the other working the pedal rods--the pedals being broken. +This too has been laughed to scorn by Liszt. Nor could he recall +having played while Viardot-Garcia sang out on the terrace of the +chateau. Garcia's memory is also short about this event. +Rollinat, Delacroix and Sand have written abundant souvenirs of +Nohant and its distinguished gatherings, so let us not attempt to +impugn the details of the Chopin legend, that legend which coughs +deprecatingly as it points to its aureoled alabaster brow. De +Lenz should be consulted for an account of this period; he will +add the finishing touches of unreality that may be missing. + +Chopin knew every one of note in Paris. The best salons were open +to him. Some of his confreres have not hesitated to describe him +as a bit snobbish, for during the last ten years of his life he +was generally inaccessible. But consider his retiring nature, his +suspicious Slavic temperament, above all his delicate health! +Where one accuses him of indifference and selfishness there are +ten who praise his unfaltering kindness, generosity and +forbearance. He was as a rule a kind and patient teacher, and +where talent was displayed his interest trebled. Can you fancy +this Ariel of the piano giving lessons to hum-drum pupils! +Playing in a charmed and bewitching circle of countesses, +surrounded by the luxury and the praise that kills, Chopin is a +much more natural figure, yet he gave lessons regularly and +appeared to relish them. He had not much taste for literature. He +liked Voltaire though he read but little that was not Polish--did +he really enjoy Sand's novels?--and when asked why he did not +compose symphonies or operas, answered that his metier was the +piano, and to it he would stick. He spoke French though with a +Polish accent, and also German, but did not care much for German +music except Bach and Mozart. Beethoven--save in the C sharp +minor and several other sonatas--was not sympathetic. Schubert he +found rough, Weber, in his piano music, too operatic and Schumann +he dismissed without a word. He told Heller that the "Carneval" +was really not music at all. This remark is one of the +curiosities of musical anecdotage. + +But he had his gay moments when he would gossip, chatter, imitate +every one, cut up all manner of tricks and, like Wagner, stand on +his head. Perhaps it was feverish, agitated gayety, yet somehow +it seemed more human than that eternal Thaddeus of Warsaw +melancholy and regret for the vanished greatness and happiness of +Poland--a greatness and happiness that never had existed. Chopin +disliked letter writing and would go miles to answer one in +person. He did not hate any one in particular, being rather +indifferent to every one and to political events--except where +Poland was concerned. Theoretically he hated Jews and Russians, +yet associated with both. He was, like his music, a bundle of +unreconciled affirmations and evasions and never could have been +contented anywhere or with any one. Of himself he said that "he +was in this world like the E string of a violin on a contrabass." +This "divine dissatisfaction" led him to extremes: to the +flouting of friends for fancied affronts, to the snubbing of +artists who sometimes visited him. He grew suspicious of Liszt +and for ten years was not on terms of intimacy with him although +they never openly quarrelled. + +The breach which had been very perceptibly widening became +hopeless in 1847, when Sand and Chopin parted forever. A +literature has grown up on the subject. Chopin never had much to +say but Sand did; so did Chopin's pupils, who were quite virulent +in their assertions that she killed their master. The break had +to come. It was the inevitable end of such a friendship. The +dynamics of free-love have yet to be formulated. This much we +know: two such natures could never entirely cohere. When the +novelty wore off the stronger of the two--the one least in love-- +took the initial step. It was George Sand who took it with +Chopin. He would never have had the courage nor the will. + +The final causes are not very interesting. Niecks has sifted all +the evidence before the court and jury of scandal-mongers. The +main quarrel was about the marriage of Solange Sand with +Clesinger the sculptor. Her mother did not oppose the match, but +later she resented Clesinger's actions. He was coarse and +violent, she said, with the true mother-in-law spirit--and when +Chopin received the young woman and her husband after a terrible +scene at Nohant, she broke with him. It was a good excuse. He had +ennuied her for several years, and as he had completed his +artistic work on this planet and there was nothing more to be +studied,--the psychological portrait was supposedly painted-- +Madame George got rid of him. The dark stories of maternal +jealousy, of Chopin's preference for Solange, the visit to Chopin +of the concierge's wife to complain of her mistress' behavior +with her husband, all these rakings I leave to others. It was a +triste affair and I do not doubt in the least that it undermined +Chopin's feeble health. Why not! Animals die of broken hearts, +and this emotional product of Poland, deprived of affection, home +and careful attention, may well, as De Lenz swears, have died of +heart-break. Recent gossip declares that Sand was jealous of +Chopin's friendships--this is silly. + +Mr. A. B. Walkley, the English dramatic critic, after declaring +that he would rather have lived during the Balzac epoch in Paris, +continues in this entertaining vein: + + And then one might have had a chance of seeing George Sand in + the thick of her amorisms. For my part I would certainly + rather have met her than Pontius Pilate. The people who saw + her in her old age--Flaubert, Gautier, the Goncourts--have + left us copious records of her odd appearance, her perpetual + cigarette smoking, and her whimsical life at Nohant. But then + she was only an "extinct volcano;" she must have been much + more interesting in full eruption. Of her earlier career--the + period of Musset and Pagello--she herself told us something in + "Elle et Lui," and correspondence published a year or so ago + in the "Revue de Paris" told us more. But, to my mind, the + most fascinating chapter in this part of her history is the + Chopin chapter, covering the next decade, or, roughly + speaking, the 'forties. She has revealed something of this + time--naturally from her own point of view--in "Lucrezia + Floriana" (1847). For it is, of course, one of the most + notorious characteristics of George Sand that she invariably + turned her loves into "copy." The mixture of passion and + printer's ink in this lady's composition is surely one of the + most curious blends ever offered to the palate of the epicure. + + But it was a blend which gave the lady an unfair advantage for + posterity. We hear too much of her side of the matter. This + one feels especially as regards her affair with Chopin. With + Musset she had to reckon a writer like herself; and against + her "Elle et Lui" we can set his "Confession d'un enfant du + siecle." But poor Chopin, being a musician, was not good at + "copy." The emotions she gave him he had to pour out in music, + which, delightful as sound, is unfortunately vague as a + literary "document." How one longs to have his full, true, and + particular account of the six months he spent with George Sand + in Majorca! M. Pierre Mille, who has just published in the + "Revue Bleue" some letters of Chopin (first printed, it seems, + in a Warsaw newspaper), would have us believe that the lady + was really the masculine partner. We are to understand that it + was Chopin who did the weeping, and pouting, and "scene"- + making while George Sand did the consoling, the pooh-poohing, + and the protecting. Liszt had already given us a + characteristic anecdote of this Majorca period. We see George + Sand, in sheer exuberance of health and animal spirits, + wandering out into the storm, while Chopin stays at home, to + have an attack of "nerves," to give vent to his anxiety (oh, + "artistic temperament"!) by composing a prelude, and to fall + fainting at the lady's feet when she returns safe and sound. + There is no doubt that the lady had enough of the masculine + temper in her to be the first to get tired. And as poor Chopin + was coughing and swooning most of the time, this is scarcely + surprising. But she did not leave him forthwith. She kept up + the pretence of loving him, in a maternal, protecting sort of + way, out of pity, as it were, for a sick child. + + So much the published letters clearly show. Many of them are + dated from Nohant. But in themselves the letters are dull + enough. Chopin composed with the keyboard of a piano; with ink + and paper he could do little. Probably his love letters were + wooden productions, and George Sand, we know, was a fastidious + critic in that matter. She had received and written so many! + But any rate, Chopin did not write whining recriminations like + Mussel. His real view of her we shall never know--and, if you + like, you may say it is no business of ours. She once uttered + a truth about that (though not apropos of Chopin), "There are + so many things between two lovers of which they alone can be + the judges." + +Chopin gave his last concert in Paris, February 16, 1848, at +Pleyel's. He was ill but played beautifully. Oscar Commettant +said he fainted in the artist's room. Sand and Chopin met but +once again. She took his hand, which was "trembling and cold," +but he escaped without saying a word. He permitted himself in a +letter to Grzymala from London dated November 17-18, 1848, to +speak of Sand. "I have never cursed any one, but now I am so +weary of life that I am near cursing Lucrezia. But she suffers +too, and suffers more because she grows older in wickedness. What +a pity about Soli! Alas! everything goes wrong with the world!" I +wonder what Mr. Hadow thinks of this reference to Sand! + +"Soli" is Solange Sand, who was forced to leave her husband +because of ill-treatment. As her mother once boxed Clesinger's +ears at Nohant, she followed the example. In trying to settle the +affair Sand quarrelled hopelessly with her daughter. That +energetic descendant of "emancipated woman" formed a partnership, +literary of course, with the Marquis Alfieri, the nephew of the +Italian poet. Her salon was as much in vogue as her mother's, but +her tastes were inclined to politics, revolutionary politics +preferred. She had for associates Gambetta, Jules Ferry, Floquet, +Taine, Herve, Weiss, the critic of the "Debats," Henri Fouquier +and many others. She had the "curved Hebraic nose of her mother +and hair coal-black." She died in her chateau at Montgivray and +was buried March 20, 1899, at Nohant where, as my informant says, +"her mother died of over-much cigarette smoking." She was a +clever woman and wrote a book "Masks and Buffoons." Maurice Sand +died in 1883. He was the son of his mother, who was gathered to +her heterogeneous ancestors June 8, 1876. + +In literature George Sand is a feminine pendant to Jean Jacques +Rousseau, full of ill-digested, troubled, fermenting, social, +political, philosophical and religious speculations and theories. +She wrote picturesque French, smooth, flowing and full of color. +The sketches of nature, of country life, have positive value, but +where has vanished her gallery of Byronic passion-pursued women? +Where are the Lelias, the Indianas, the Rudolstadts? She had not, +as Mr. Henry James points out, a faculty for characterization. As +Flaubert wrote her: "In spite of your great Sphinx eyes you have +always seen the world as through a golden mist." She dealt in +vague, vast figures, and so her Prince Karol in "Lucrezia +Floriana," unquestionably intended for Chopin, is a burlesque-- +little wonder he was angered when the precious children asked him +"Cher M. Chopin, have you read 'Lucrezia'? Mamma has put you in +it." Of all persons Sand was pre-elected to give to the world a +true, a sympathetic picture of her friend. She understood him, +but she had not the power of putting him between the coversof a +book. If Flaubert, or better still, Pierre Loti, could have known +Chopin so intimately we should possess a memoir in which every +vibration of emotion would be recorded, every shade noted, and +all pinned with the precise adjective, the phrase exquisite. + + + +III. ENGLAND, SCOTLAND AND PERE LA CHAISE. + + + +The remaining years of Chopin's life were lonely. His father died +in 1844 of chest and heart complaint, his sister Emilia died of +consumption--ill-omens these!--and shortly after, John +Matuszynski died. Titus Woyciechowski was in far-off Poland on +his estates and Chopin had but Grzymala and Fontana to confide +in; they being Polish he preferred them, although he was +diplomatic enough not to let others see this. Both Franchomme and +Gutmann whispered to Niecks at different times that each was the +particular soul, the alter ego, of Chopin. He appeared to give +himself to his friends but it was usually surface affection. He +had coaxing, coquettish ways, playful ways that cost him nothing +when in good spirits. So he was "more loved than loving." This is +another trait of the man, which, allied with his fastidiousness +and spiritual brusquerie, made him difficult to decipher. The +loss of Sand completed his misery and we find him in poor health +when he arrived in London, for the second and last time, April +21, 1848. + +Mr. A. J. Hipkins is the chief authority on the details of +Chopin's visit to England. To this amiable gentleman and learned +writer on pianos, Franz Hueffer, Joseph Bennett and Niecks are +indebted for the most of their facts. From them the curious may +learn all there is to learn. The story is not especially +noteworthy, being in the main a record of ill-health, +complainings, lamentations and not one signal artistic success. + +War was declared upon Chopin by a part of the musical world. The +criticism was compounded of pure malice and stupidity. Chopin was +angered but little for he was too sick to care now. He went to an +evening party but missed the Macready dinner where he was to have +met Thackeray, Berlioz, Mrs. Procter and Sir Julius Benedict. +With Benedict he played a Mozart duet at the Duchess of +Sutherland's. Whether he played at court the Queen can tell; +Niecks cannot. He met Jenny Lind-Goldschmidt and liked her +exceedingly--as did all who had the honor of knowing her. She +sided with him, woman-like, in the Sand affair--echoes of which +had floated across the channel--and visited him in Paris in 1849. +Chopin gave two matinees at the houses of Adelaide Kemble and +Lord Falmouth--June 23 and July 7. They were very recherche, so +it appears. Viardot-Garcia sang. The composer's face and frame +were wasted by illness and Mr. Solomon spoke of his "long +attenuated fingers." He made money and that was useful to him, +for doctors' bills and living had taken up his savings. There was +talk of his settling in London, but the climate, not to speak of +the unmusical atmosphere, would have been fatal to him. Wagner +succumbed to both, sturdy fighter that he was. + +Chopin left for Scotland in August and stopped at the house of +his pupil, Miss Stirling. Her name is familiar to Chopin +students, for the two nocturnes, opus 55, are dedicated to her. +He was nearly killed with kindness but continually bemoaned his +existence. At the house of Dr. Lyschinski, a Pole, he lodged in +Edinburgh and was so weak that he had to be carried up and down +stairs. To the doctor's good wife he replied in answer to the +question "George Sand is your particular friend?" "Not even +George Sand." And is he to be blamed for evading tiresome +reminders of the past? He confessed that his excessive thinness +had caused Sand to address him as "My Dear Corpse." Charming, is +it not? Miss Stirling was doubtless in love with him and Princess +Czartoryska followed him to Scotland to see if his health was +better. So he was not altogether deserted by the women--indeed he +could not live without their little flatteries and agreeable +attentions. It is safe to say that a woman was always within call +of Chopin. + +He played at Manchester on the 28th of August, but his friend Mr. +Osborne, who was present, says "his playing was too delicate to +create enthusiasm and I felt truly sorry for him." On his return +to Scotland he stayed with Mr. and Mrs. Salis Schwabe. + +Mr. J. Cuthbert Hadden wrote several years ago in the Glasgow +"Herald" of Chopin's visit to Scotland in 1848. The tone-poet was +in the poorest health, but with characteristic tenacity played at +concerts and paid visits to his admirers. Mr. Hadden found the +following notice in the back files of the Glasgow "Courier": + + Monsieur Chopin has the honour to announce that his matinee + musicale will take place on Wednesday, the 27th September, in + the Merchant Hall, Glasgow. To commence at half-past two + o'clock. Tickets, limited in number, half-a-guinea each, and + full particulars to be had from Mr. Muir Wood, 42, Buchanan + street. + +He continues: + + The net profits of this concert are said to have been exactly + L60--a ridiculously low sum when we compare it with the + earnings of later day virtuosi; nay, still more ridiculously + low when we recall the circumstance that for two concerts in + Glasgow sixteen years before this Paganini had L 1,400. Muir + Wood, who has since died, said: "I was then a comparative + stranger in Glasgow, but I was told that so many private + carriages had never been seen at any concert in the town. In + fact, it was the county people who turned out, with a few of + the elite of Glasgow society. Being a morning concert, the + citizens were busy otherwise, and half a guinea was considered + too high a sum for their wives and daughters." + + The late Dr. James Hedderwick, of Glasgow, tells in his + reminiscences that on entering the hall he found it about one- + third full. It was obvious that a number of the audience were + personal friends of Chopin. Dr. Hedderwick recognized the + composer at once as "a little, fragile-looking man, in pale + gray suit, including frock coat of identical tint and texture, + moving about among the company, conversing with different + groups, and occasionally consulting his watch," which seemed + to be" no bigger than an agate stone on the forefinger of an + alderman." Whiskerless, beardless, fair of hair, and pale and + thin of face, his appearance was "interesting and + conspicuous," and when, "after a final glance at his miniature + horologe, he ascended the platform and placed himself at the + instrument, he at once commanded attention." Dr. Hedderwick + says it was a drawing-room entertainment, more piano than + forte, though not without occasional episodes of both strength + and grandeur. It was perfectly clear to him that Chopin was + marked for an early grave. + + So far as can be ascertained, there are now living only two + members of that Glasgow audience of 1848. One of the two is + Julius Seligmann, the veteran president of the Glasgow Society + of Musicians, who, in response to some inquiries on the + subject, writes as follows: + + "Several weeks before the concert Chopin lived with different + friends or pupils on their invitations, in the surrounding + counties. I think his pupil Miss Jane Stirling had something + to do with all the general arrangements. Muir Wood managed the + special arrangements of the concert, and I distinctly remember + him telling me that he never had so much difficulty in + arranging a concert as on this occasion. Chopin constantly + changed his mind. Wood had to visit him several times at the + house of Admiral Napier, at Milliken Park, near Johnstone. but + scarcely had he returned to Glasgow when he was summoned back + to alter something. The concert was given in the Merchant + Hall, Hutcheson street, now the County Buildings. The hall was + about three-quarters filled. Between Chopin's playing Madame + Adelasio de Margueritte, daughter of a well-known London + physician, sang, and Mr. Muir accompanied her. Chopin was + evidently very ill. His touch was very feeble, and while the + finish, grace, elegance and delicacy of his performances were + greatly admired by the audience, the want of power made his + playing somewhat monotonous. I do not remember the whole + programme, but he was encored for his well-known mazurka in B + flat (op. 7, No. 1), which he repeated with quite different + nuances from those of the first time. The audience was very + aristocratic, consisting mostly of ladies, among whom were the + then Duchess of Argyll and her sister, Lady Blantyre." + + The other survivor is George Russell Alexander, son of the + proprietor of the Theatre Royal, Dunlop street, who in a + letter to the writer remarks especially upon Chopin's pale, + cadaverous appearance. "My emotion," he says, "was so great + that two or three times I was compelled to retire from the + room to recover myself. I have heard all the best and most + celebrated stars of the musical firmament, but never one has + left such an impress on my mind." + +Chopin played October 4 in Edinburgh, and returned to London in +November after various visits. We read of a Polish ball and +concert at which he played, but the affair was not a success. He +left England in January 1849 and heartily glad he was to go. "Do +you see the cattle in this meadow?" he asked, en route for Paris: +"Ca a plus d'intelligence que des Anglais," which was not nice of +him. Perhaps M. Niedzwiecki, to whom he made the remark took as +earnest a pure bit of nonsense, and perhaps--! He certainly +disliked England and the English. + +Now the curtain prepares to fall on the last dreary finale of +Chopin's life, a life not for a moment heroic, yet lived +according to his lights and free from the sordid and the soil of +vulgarity. Jules Janin said: "He lived ten miraculous years with +a breath ready to fly away," and we know that his servant Daniel +had always to carry him to bed. For ten years he had suffered +from so much illness that a relapse was not noticed by the world. +His very death was at first received with incredulity, for, as +Stephen Heller said, he had been reported dead so often that the +real news was doubted. In 1847 his legs began to bother him by +swelling, and M. Mathias described him as "a painful spectacle, +the picture of exhaustion, the back bent, head bowed--but always +amiable and full of distinction." His purse was empty, and his +lodgings in the Rue Chaillot were represented to the proud man as +being just half their cost,--the balance being paid by the +Countess Obreskoff, a Russian lady. Like a romance is the +sending, by Miss Stirling, of twenty-five thousand francs, but it +is nevertheless true. The noble-hearted Scotchwoman heard of +Chopin's needs through Madame Rubio, a pupil, and the money was +raised. That packet containing it was mislaid or lost by the +portress of Chopin's house, but found after the woman had been +taxed with keeping it. + +Chopin, his future assured, moved to Place Vendome, No. 12. There +he died. His sister Louise was sent for, and came from Poland to +Paris. In the early days of October he could no longer sit +upright without support. Gutmann and the Countess Delphine +Potocka, his sister, and M. Gavard, were constantly with him. It +was Turgenev who spoke of the half hundred countesses in Europe +who claimed to have held the dying Chopin in their arms. In +reality he died in Gutmann's, raising that pupil's hand to his +mouth and murmuring "cher ami" as he expired. Solange Sand was +there, but not her mother, who called and was not admitted--so +they say. Gutmann denies having refused her admittance. On the +other hand, if she had called, Chopin's friends would have kept +her away from him, from the man who told Franchomme two days +before his death, "She said to me that I would die in no arms but +hers." Surely--unless she was monstrous in her egotism, and she +was not--George Sand did not hear this sad speech without tears +and boundless regrets. Alas! all things come too late for those +who wait. + +Tarnowski relates that Chopin gave his last orders in perfect +consciousness. He begged his sister to burn all his inferior +compositions. "I owe it to the public," he said, "and to myself +to publish only good things. I kept to this resolution all my +life; I wish to keep to it now." This wish has not been +respected. The posthumous publications are for the most part +feeble stuff. + +Chopin died, October 17, 1849, between three and four in the +morning, after having been shrived by the Abbe Jelowicki. His +last word, according to Gavard, was "Plus," on being asked if he +suffered. Regarding the touching and slightly melodramatic death +bed scene on the day previous, when Delphine Potocka sang +Stradella and Mozart--or was it Marcello?--Liszt, Karasowski, and +Gutmann disagree. + +The following authentic account of the last hours of Chopin +appears here for the first time in English, translated by Mr. +Hugh Craig. In Liszt's well-known work on Chopin, second edition, +1879, mention is made of a conversation that he had held with the +Abbe Jelowicki respecting Chopin's death; and in Niecks' +biography of Chopin some sentences from letters by the Abbe are +quoted. These letters, written in French, have been translated +and published in the "Allgemeine Musik Zeitung," to which they +were given by the Princess Marie Hohenlohe, the daughter of +Princess Caroline Sayn Wittgenstein, Liszt's universal legatee +and executor, who died in 1887. + + For many years [so runs the document] the life of Chopin was + but a breath. His frail, weak body was visibly unfitted for + the strength and force of his genius. It was a wonder how in + such a weak state, he could live at all, and occasionally act + with the greatest energy. His body was almost diaphanous; his + eyes were almost shadowed by a cloud from which, from time to + time, the lightnings of his glance flashed. Gentle, kind, + bubbling with humor, and every way charming, he seemed no + longer to belong to earth, while, unfortunately, he had not + yet thought of heaven. He had good friends, but many bad + friends. These bad friends were his flatterers, that is, his + enemies, men and women without principles, or rather with bad + principles. Even his unrivalled success, so much more subtle + and thus so much more stimulating than that of all other + artists, carried the war into his soul and checked the + expression of faith and of prayer. The teachings of the + fondest, most pious mother became to him a recollection of his + childhood's love. In the place of faith, doubt had stepped in, + and only that decency innate in every generous heart hindered + him from indulging in sarcasm and mockery over holy things and + the consolations of religion. + + While he was in this spiritual condition he was attacked by + the pulmonary disease that was soon to carry him away from us. + The knowledge of this cruel sickness reached me on my return + from Rome. With beating heart I hurried to him, to see once + more the friend of my youth, whose soul was infinitely dearer + to me than all his talent. I found him, not thinner, for that + was impossible, but weaker. His strength sank, his life faded + visibly. He embraced me with affection and with tears in his + eyes, thinking not of his own pain but of mine; he spoke of my + poor friend Eduard Worte, whom I had just lost, you know how. + (He was shot, a martyr of liberty, at Vienna, November 10, + 1848.) + + I availed myself of his softened mood to speak to him about + his soul. I recalled his thoughts to the piety of his + childhood and of his beloved mother. "Yes," he said, "in order + not to offend my mother I would not die without the + sacraments, but for my part I do not regard them in the sense + that you desire. I understand the blessing of confession in so + far as it is the unburdening of a heavy heart into a friendly + hand, but not as a sacrament. I am ready to confess to you if + you wish it, because I love you, not because I hold it + necessary." Enough: a crowd of anti-religious speeches filled + me with terror and care for this elect soul, and I feared + nothing more than to be called to be his confessor. + + Several months passed with similar conversations, so painful + to me, the priest and the sincere friend. Yet I clung to the + conviction that the grace of God would obtain the victory over + this rebellious soul, even if I knew not how. After all my + exertions, prayer remained my only refuge. + + On the evening of October 12 I had with my brethren retired to + pray for a change in Chopin's mind, when I was summoned by + orders of the physician, in fear that he would not live + through the night. I hastened to him. He pressed my hand, but + bade me at once to depart, while he assured me he loved me + much, but did not wish to speak to me. + + Imagine, if you can, what a night I passed! Next day was the + 13th, the day of St. Edward, the patron of my poor brother. I + said mass for the repose of his soul and prayed for Chopin's + soul. "My God," I cried, "if the soul of my brother Edward is + pleasing to thee, give me, this day, the soul of Frederic." + + In double distress I then went to the melancholy abode of our + poor sick man. + + I found him at breakfast, which was served as carefully as + ever, and after he had asked me to partake I said: "My friend, + today is the name day of my poor brother." "Oh, do not let us + speak of it!" he cried. "Dearest friend," I continued, "you + must give me something for my brother's name day." "What shall + I give you?" "Your soul." "Ah! I understand. Here it is; take + it!" + + At these words unspeakable joy and anguish seized me. What + should I say to him? What should I do to restore his faith, + how not to lose instead of saving this beloved soul? How + should I begin to bring it back to God? I flung myself on my + knees, and after a moment of collecting my thoughts I cried in + the depths of my heart, "Draw it to Thee, Thyself, my God!" + + Without saying a word I held out to our dear invalid the + crucifix. Rays of divine light, flames of divine fire, + streamed, I might say, visibly from the figure of the + crucified Saviour, and at once illumined the soul and kindled + the heart of Chopin. Burning tears streamed from his eyes. His + faith was once more revived, and with unspeakable fervor he + made his confession and received the Holy Supper. After the + blessed Viaticum, penetrated by the heavenly consecration + which the sacraments pour forth on pious souls, he asked for + Extreme Unction. He wished to pay lavishly the sacristan who + accompanied me, and when I remarked that the sum presented by + him was twenty times too much he replied, "Oh, no, for what I + have received is beyond price." + + From this hour he was a saint. The death struggle began and + lasted four days. Patience, trust in God, even joyful + confidence, never left him, in spite of all his sufferings, + till the last breath. He was really happy, and called himself + happy. In the midst of the sharpest sufferings he expressed + only ecstatic joy, touching love of God, thankfulness that I + had led him back to God, contempt of the world and its good, + and a wish for a speedy death. + + He blessed his friends, and when, after an apparently last + crisis, he saw himself surrounded by the crowd that day and + night filled his chamber, he asked me, "Why do they not pray?" + At these words all fell on their knees, and even the + Protestants joined in the litanies and prayers for the dying. + + Day and night he held my hand, and would not let me leave him. + "No, you will not leave me at the last moment," he said, and + leaned on my breast as a little child in a moment of danger + hides itself in its mother's breast. + + Soon he called upon Jesus and Mary, with a fervor that reached + to heaven; soon he kissed the crucifix in an excess of faith, + hope and love. He made the most touching utterances. "I love + God and man," he said. "I am happy so to die; do not weep, my + sister. My friends, do not weep. I am happy. I feel that I am + dying. Farewell, pray for me!" + + Exhausted by deathly convulsions he said to the physicians, + "Let me die. Do not keep me longer in this world of exile. Let + me die; why do you prolong my life when I have renounced all + things and God has enlightened my soul? God calls me; why do + you keep me back?" + + Another time he said, "O lovely science, that only lets one + suffer longer! Could it give me back my strength, qualify me + to do any good, to make any sacrifice--but a life of fainting, + of grief, of pain to all who love me, to prolong such a life-- + O lovely science!" + + Then he said again: "You let me suffer cruelly. Perhaps you + have erred about my sickness. But God errs not. He punishes + me, and I bless him therefor. Oh, how good is God to punish me + here below! Oh, how good God is!" + + His usual language was always elegant, with well chosen words, + but at last to express all his thankfulness and, at the same + time, all the misery of those who die unreconciled to God, he + cried, "Without you I should have croaked (krepiren) like a + pig." + + While dying he still called on the names of Jesus, Mary, + Joseph, kissed the crucifix and pressed it to his heart with + the cry "Now I am at the source of Blessedness!" + + Thus died Chopin, and in truth, his death was the most + beautiful concerto of all his life. + +The worthy abbe must have had a phenomenal memory. I hope that it +was an exact one. His story is given in its entirety because of +its novelty. The only thing that makes me feel in the least +sceptical is that La Mara,--the pen name of a writer on musical +subjects,--translated these letters into German. But every one +agrees that Chopin's end was serene; indeed it is one of the +musical death-beds of history, another was Mozart's. His face was +beautiful and young in the flower-covered coffin, says Liszt. He +was buried from the Madeleine, October 30, with the ceremony +befitting a man of genius. The B flat minor Funeral march, +orchestrated by Henri Reber, was given, and during the ceremony +Lefebure-Wely played on the organ the E and B minor Preludes. The +pall-bearers were distinguished men, Meyerbeer, Delacroix, Pleyel +and Franchomme--at least Theophile Gautier so reported it for his +journal. Even at his grave in Pere la Chaise no two persons could +agree about Chopin. This controversy is quite characteristic of +Chopin who was always the calm centre of argument. + +He was buried in evening clothes, his concert dress, but not at +his own request. Kwiatowski the portrait painter told this to +Niecks. It is a Polish custom for the dying to select their grave +clothes, yet Lombroso writes that Chopin "in his will directed +that he should be buried in a white tie, small shoes and short +breeches," adducing this as an evidence of his insanity. He +further adds "he abandoned the woman whom he tenderly loved +because she offered a chair to some one else before giving the +same invitation to himself." Here we have a Sand story raised to +the dignity of a diagnosed symptom. It is like the other +nonsense. + + + +IV. THE ARTIST + + + +Chopin's personality was a pleasant, persuasive one without being +so striking or so dramatic as Liszt's. As a youth his nose was +too large, his lips thin, the lower one protruding. Later, +Moscheles said that he looked like his music. Delicacy and a +certain aristrocratic bearing, a harmonious ensemble, produced a +most agreeable sensation. "He was of slim frame, middle height; +fragile but wonderfully flexible limbs, delicately formed hands, +very small feet, an oval, softly outlined head, a pale +transparent complexion, long silken hair of a light chestnut +color, parted on one side, tender brown eyes, intelligent rather +than dreamy, a finely-curved aquiline nose, a sweet subtle smile, +graceful and varied gestures." This precise description is by +Niecks. Liszt said he had blue eyes, but he has been overruled. +Chopin was fond of elegant, costly attire, and was very correct +in the matter of studs, walking sticks and cravats. Not the ideal +musician we read of, but a gentleman. Berlioz told Legouve to see +Chopin, "for he is something which you have never seen--and some +one you will never forget." An orchidaceous individuality this. + +With such personal refinement he was a man punctual and precise +in his habits. Associating constantly with fashionable folk his +naturally dignified behavior was increased. He was an aristocrat- +-there is no other word--and he did not care to be hail-fellow- +well-met with the musicians. A certain primness and asperity did +not make him popular. While teaching, his manner warmed, the +earnest artist came to life, all halting of speech and polite +insincerities were abandoned. His pupils adored him. Here at +least the sentiment was one of solidarity. De Lenz is his most +censorious critic and did not really love Chopin. The dislike was +returned, for the Pole suspected that his pupil was sent by Liszt +to spy on his methods. This I heard in Paris. + +Chopin was a remarkable teacher. He never taught but one genius, +little Filtsch, the Hungarian lad of whom Liszt said, "When he +starts playing I will shut up shop." The boy died in 1845, aged +fifteen; Paul Gunsberg, who died the same year, was also very +talented. Once after delivering in a lovely way the master's E +minor concerto Filtsch was taken by Chopin to a music store and +presented with the score of Beethoven's "Fidelio." He was much +affected by the talents of this youthful pupil. Lindsay Sloper +and Brinley Richards studied with Chopin. Caroline Hartmann, +Gutmann, Lysberg, Georges Mathias, Mlle. O'Meara, many Polish +ladies of rank, Delphine Potocka among the rest, Madame +Streicher, Carl Mikuli, Madame Rubio, Madame Peruzzi, Thomas +Tellefsen, Casimir Wernik, Gustav Schumann, Werner Steinbrecher, +and many others became excellent pianists. Was the American +pianist, Louis Moreau Gottschalk, ever his pupil? His friends say +so, but Niecks does not mention him. Ernst Pauer questions it. We +know that Gottschalk studied in Paris with Camille Stamaty, and +made his first appearance there in 1847. This was shortly before +Chopin's death when his interest in music had abated greatly. No +doubt Gottschalk played for Chopin for he was the first to +introduce the Pole's music in America. + +Chopin was very particular about the formation of the touch, +giving dementi's Preludes at first. "Is that a dog barking?" was +his sudden exclamation at a rough attack. He taught the scales +staccato and legato beginning with E major. Ductility, ease, +gracefulness were his aim; stiffness, harshness annoyed him. He +gave Clementi, Moscheles and Bach. Before playing in concert he +shut himself up and played, not Chopin but Bach, always Bach. +Absolute finger independence and touch discrimination and color +are to be gained by playing the preludes and fugues of Bach. +Chopin started a method but it was never finished and his sister +gave it to the Princess Czartoryska after his death. It is a mere +fragment. Janotha has translated it. One point is worth quoting. +He wrote: + + No one notices inequality in the power of the notes of a scale + when it is played very fast and equally, as regards time. In a + good mechanism the aim is not to play everything with an equal + sound, but to acquire a beautiful quality of touch and a + perfect shading. For a long time players have acted against + nature in seeking to give equal power to each finger. On the + contrary, each finger should have an appropriate part assigned + it. The thumb has the greatest power, being the thickest + finger and the freest. Then comes the little finger, at the + other extremity of the hand. The middle finger is the main + support of the hand, and is assisted by the first. Finally + comes the third, the weakest one. As to this Siamese twin of + the middle finger, some players try to force it with all their + might to become independent. A thing impossible, and most + likely unnecessary. There are, then, many different qualities + of sound, just as there are several fingers. The point is to + utilize the differences; and this, in other words, is the art + of fingering. + +Here, it seems to me, is one of the most practical truths ever +uttered by a teacher. Pianists spend thousands of hours trying to +subjugate impossible muscles. Chopin, who found out most things +for himself, saw the waste of time and force. I recommend his +advice. He was ever particular about fingering, but his +innovations horrified the purists. "Play as you feel," was his +motto, a rather dangerous precept for beginners. He gave to his +pupils the concertos and sonatas--all carefully graded--of +Mozart, Scarlatti, Field, Dussek, Hummel, Beethoven, Mendelssohn, +Weber and Hiller and, of Schubert, the four-hand pieces and +dances. Liszt he did not favor, which is natural, Liszt having +written nothing but brilliant paraphrases in those days. The +music of the later Liszt is quite another thing. Chopin's genius +for the pedal, his utilization of its capacity for the vibration +of related strings, the overtones, I refer to later. Rubinstein +said: + + The piano bard, the piano rhapsodist, the piano mind, the + piano soul is Chopin. ... Tragic, romantic, lyric, heroic, + dramatic, fantastic, soulful, sweet, dreamy, brilliant, grand, + simple; all possible expressions are found in his compositions + and all are sung by him upon his instrument. + +Chopin is dead only fifty years, but his fame has traversed the +half century with ease, and bids fair to build securely in the +loves of our great-grandchildren. The six letters that comprise +his name pursue every piano that is made. Chopin and modern piano +playing are inseparable, and it is a strain upon homely prophecy +to predict a time when the two shall be put asunder. Chopin was +the greatest interpreter of Chopin, and following him came those +giants of other days, Liszt, Tausig, and Rubinstein. + +While he never had the pupils to mould as had Liszt, Chopin made +some excellent piano artists. They all had, or have--the old +guard dies bravely--his tradition, but exactly what the Chopin +tradition is no man may dare to say. Anton Rubinstein, when I +last heard him, played Chopin inimitably. Never shall I forget +the Ballades, the two Polonaises in F sharp minor and A flat +major, the B flat minor Prelude, the A minor "Winter Wind" the +two C minor studies, and the F minor Fantasie. Yet the Chopin +pupils, assembled in judgment at Paris when he gave his +Historical Recitals, refused to accept him as an interpreter. His +touch was too rich and full, his tone too big. Chopin did not +care for Liszt's reading of his music, though he trembled when he +heard him thunder in the Eroica Polonaise. I doubt if even Karl +Tausig, impeccable artist, unapproachable Chopin player, would +have pleased the composer. Chopin played as his moods prompted, +and his playing was the despair and delight of his hearers. +Rubinstein did all sorts of wonderful things with the coda of the +Barcarolle--such a page!--but Sir Charles Halle said that it was +"clever but not Chopinesque." Yet Halle heard Chopin at his last +Paris concert, February, 1848, play the two forte passages in the +Barcarolle "pianissimo and with all sorts of dynamic finesse." +This is precisely what Rubinstein did, and his pianissimo was a +whisper. Von Bulow was too much of a martinet to reveal the +poetic quality, though he appreciated Chopin on the intellectual +side; his touch was not beautiful enough. The Slavic and Magyar +races are your only true Chopin interpreters. Witness Liszt the +magnificent, Rubinstein a passionate genius, Tausig who united in +his person all the elements of greatness, Essipowa fascinating +and feminine, the poetic Paderewski, de Pachmann the fantastic, +subtle Joseffy, and Rosenthal a phenomenon. + +A world-great pianist was this Frderic Francois Chopin. He played +as he composed: uniquely. All testimony is emphatic as to this. +Scales that were pearls, a touch rich, sweet, supple and singing +and a technique that knew no difficulties, these were part of +Chopin's equipment as a pianist. He spiritualized the timbre of +his instrument until it became transformed into something +strange, something remote from its original nature. His +pianissimo was an enchanting whisper, his forte seemed powerful +by contrast so numberless were the gradations, so widely varied +his dynamics. The fairylike quality of his play, his diaphanous +harmonies, his liquid tone, his pedalling--all were the work of a +genius and a lifetime; and the appealing humanity he infused into +his touch, gave his listeners a delight that bordered on the +supernatural. So the accounts, critical, professional and +personal read. There must have been a hypnotic quality in his +performances that transported his audience wherever the poet +willed. Indeed the stories told wear an air of enthusiasm that +borders on the exaggerated, on the fantastic. Crystalline pearls +falling on red hot velvet-or did Scudo write this of Liszt?-- +infinite nuance and the mingling of silvery bells,--these are a +few of the least exuberant notices. Was it not Heine who called +"Thalberg a king, Liszt a prophet, Chopin a poet, Herz an +advocate, Kalkbrenner a minstrel, Madame Pleyel a sibyl, and +Doehler--a pianist"? The limpidity, the smoothness and ease of +Chopin's playing were, after all, on the physical plane. It was +the poetic melancholy, the grandeur, above all the imaginative +lift, that were more in evidence than mere sensuous sweetness. +Chopin had, we know, his salon side when he played with elegance, +brilliancy and coquetry. But he had dark moments when the +keyboard was too small, his ideas too big for utterance. Then he +astounded, thrilled his auditors. They were rare moments. His +mood-versatility was reproduced in his endless colorings and +capricious rhythms. The instrument vibrated with these new, +nameless effects like the violin in Paganini's hands. It was +ravishing. He was called the Ariel, the Undine of the piano. +There was something imponderable, fluid, vaporous, evanescent in +his music that eluded analysis and illuded all but hard-headed +critics. This novelty was the reason why he has been classed as a +"gifted amateur" and even to-day is he regarded by many musicians +as a skilful inventor of piano passages and patterned figures +instead of what he really is--one of the most daring harmonists +since Bach. + +Chopin's elastic hand, small, thin, with lightly articulated +fingers, was capable of stretching tenths with ease. Examine his +first study for confirmation of this. His wrist was very supple. +Stephen Heller said that "it was a wonderful sight to see +Chopin's small hands expand and cover a third of the keyboard. It +was like the opening of the mouth of a serpent about to swallow a +rabbit whole." He played the octaves in the A flat Polonaise with +infinite ease but pianissimo. Now where is the "tradition" when +confronted by the mighty crashing of Rosenthal in this particular +part of the Polonaise? Of Karl Tausig, Weitzmann said that "he +relieved the romantically sentimental Chopin of his Weltschmerz +and showed him in his pristine creative vigor and wealth of +imagination." In Chopin's music there are many pianists, many +styles and all are correct if they are poetically musical, +logical and individually sincere. Of his rubato I treat in the +chapter devoted to the Mazurkas, making also an attempt to define +the "zal" of his playing and music. + +When Chopin was strong he used a Pleyel piano, when he was ill an +Erard--a nice fable of Liszt's! He said that he liked the Erard +but he really preferred the Pleyel with its veiled sonority. What +could not he have accomplished with the modern grand piano? +In the artist's room of the Maison Pleyel there stands the piano +at which Chopin composed the Preludes, the G minor nocturne, the +Funeral March, the three supplementary fitudes, the A minor +Mazurka, the Tarantelle, the F minor Fantasie and the B minor +Scherzo. A brass tablet on the inside lid notes this. The piano +is still in good condition as regards tone and action. + +Mikuli asserted that Chopin brought out an "immense" tone in +cantabiles. He had not a small tone, but it was not the +orchestral tone of our day. Indeed how could it be, with the +light action and tone of the French pianos built in the first +half of the century? After all it was quality, not quantity that +Chopin sought. Each one of his ten fingers was a delicately +differentiated voice, and these ten voices could sing at times +like the morning stars. + +Rubinstein declared that all the pedal marks are wrong in Chopin. +I doubt if any edition can ever give them as they should be, for +here again the individual equation comes into play. Apart from +certain fundamental rules for managing the pedals, no pedagogic +regulations should ever be made for the more refined nuanciren. + +The portraits of Chopin differ widely. There is the Ary Scheffer, +the Vigneron--praised by Mathias--the Bovy medallion, the Duval +drawing, and the head by Kwiatowski. Delacroix tried his powerful +hand at transfixing in oil the fleeting expressions of Chopin. +Felix Barrias, Franz Winterhalter, and Albert Graefle are others +who tried with more or less success. Anthony Kolberg painted +Chopin in 1848-49. Kleczynski reproduces it; it is mature in +expression. The Clesinger head I have seen at Pere la Chaise. It +is mediocre and lifeless. Kwiatowski has caught some of the +Chopin spirit in the etching that may be found in volume one of +Niecks' biography. The Winterhalter portrait in Mr. Hadow's +volume is too Hebraic, and the Graefle is a trifle ghastly. It is +the dead Chopin, but the nose is that of a predaceous bird, +painfully aquiline. The "Echo Muzyczne" Warsaw, of October 1899-- +in Polish "17 Pazdziernika"--printed a picture of the composer at +the age of seventeen. It is that of a thoughtful, poetic, but not +handsome lad, his hair waving over a fine forehead, a feminine +mouth, large, aquiline nose, the nostrils delicately cut, and +about his slender neck a Byronic collar. Altogether a novel +likeness. Like the Chopin interpretation, a satisfactory Chopin +portrait is extremely rare. + +As some difficulty was experienced in discovering the identity of +Countess Delphine Potocka, I applied in 1899 to Mr. Jaraslow de +Zielinski, a pianist of Buffalo, New York, for assistance; he is +an authority on Polish and Russian music and musicians. Here are +the facts he kindly transmitted: "In 1830 three beautiful Polish +women came to Nice to pass the winter. They were the daughters of +Count Komar, the business manager of the wealthy Count Potocki. +They were singularly accomplished; they spoke half the languages +of Europe, drew well, and sang to perfection. All they needed was +money to make them queens of society; this they soon obtained, +and with it high rank. Their graceful manners and loveliness won +the hearts of three of the greatest of noblemen. Marie married +the Prince de Beauvau-Craon; Delphine became Countess Potocka, +and Nathalie, Marchioness Medici Spada. The last named died +young, a victim to the zeal in favor of the cholera-stricken of +Rome. The other two sisters went to live in Paris, and became +famous for their brilliant elegance. Their sumptuous 'hotels' or +palaces were thrown open to the most prominent men of genius of +their time, and hither came Chopin, to meet not only with the +homage due to his genius, but with a tender and sisterly +friendship, which proved one of the greatest consolations of his +life. To the amiable Princess de Beauvau he dedicated his famous +Polonaise in F sharp minor, op. 44, written in the brilliant +bravura style for pianists of the first force. To Delphine, +Countess Potocka, he dedicated the loveliest of his valses, op. +64, No. 1, so well transcribed by Joseffy into a study in +thirds." + +Therefore the picture of the Grafin Potocka in the Berlin gallery +is not that of Chopin's devoted friend. + +Here is another Count Tarnowski story. It touches on a Potocka +episode. "Chopin liked and knew how to express individual +characteristics on the piano. Just as there formerly was a rather +widely-known fashion of describing dispositions and characters in +so-called 'portraits,' which gave to ready wits a scope for +parading their knowledge of people and their sharpness of +observation; so he often amused himself by playing such musical +portraits. Without saying whom he had in his thoughts, he +illustrated the characters of a few or of several people present +in the room, and illustrated them so clearly and so delicately +that the listeners could always guess correctly who was intended, +and admired the resemblance of the portrait. One little anecdote +is related in connection with this which throws some light on his +wit, and a little pinch of sarcasm in it. + +"During the time of Chopin's greatest brilliancy and popularity, +in the year 1835, he once played his musical portraits in a +certain Polish salon, where the three daughters of the house were +the stars of the evening. After a few portraits had been +extemporized, one of these ladies wished to have hers--Mme. +Delphine Potocka. Chopin, in reply, drew her shawl from her +shoulders, threw it on the keyboard and began to play, implying +in this two things; first, that he knew the character of the +brilliant and famous queen of fashion so well, that by heart and +in the dark he was able to depict it; secondly, that this +character and this soul is hidden under habits, ornamentations +and decorations of an elegant worldly life, through the symbol of +elegance and fashion of that day, as the tones of the piano +through the shawl." + +Because Chopin did not label his works with any but general +titles, Ballades, Scherzi, Studies, Preludes and the like, his +music sounds all the better: the listener is not pinned down to +any precise mood, the music being allowed to work its particular +charm without the aid of literary crutches for unimaginative +minds. Dr. Niecks gives specimens of what the ingenious +publisher, without a sense of humor, did with some of Chopin's +compositions: Adieu a Varsovie, so was named the Rondo, op. 1; +Hommage a Mozart, the Variations, op. 2; La Gaite, Introduction +and Polonaise, op. 3 for piano and 'cello; La Posiana--what a +name!--the Rondo a la Mazur, op. 5; Murmures de la Seine, +Nocturnes op. 9; Les Zephirs, Nocturnes, op. 15; Invitation a la +Valse, Valse, op. 18; Souvenir d'Andalousie, Bolero, op. 19--a +bolero which sounds Polish!--Le Banquet Infernal, the First +Scherzo, op. 20--what a misnomer!--Ballade ohne Worte, the G +minor Ballade--there is a polyglot mess for you!--Les Plaintives, +Nocturnes, op. 27; La Meditation, Second Scherzo, B flat minor- +meditation it is not!--II Lamento e la Consolazione, Nocturnes, +op. 32; Les Soupirs, Nocturnes, op. 37, and Les Favorites, +Polonaises, op. 40. The C minor Polonaise of this opus was never, +is not now, a favorite. The mazurkas generally received the title +of Souvenir de la Pologne. + +In commemoration of the fiftieth anniversary of the death of +Chopin, October 17, 1899, a medal was struck at Warsaw, bearing +on one side an artistically executed profile of the Polish +composer. On the reverse, the design represents a lyre, +surrounded by a laurel branch, and having engraved upon it the +opening bars of the Mazurka in A flat major. The name of the +great composer with the dates of his birth and death, are given +in the margin. Paderewski is heading a movement to remove from +Paris to Warsaw the ashes of the pianist, but it is doubtful if +it can be managed. Paris will certainly object to losing the +bones of such a genius. + +Chopin's acoustic parallelisms are not so concrete, so vivid as +Wagner's. Nor are they so theatrical, so obvious. It does not, +however, require much fancy to conjure up "the drums and +tramplings of three conquests" in the Eroica Polonaise or the F +sharp major Impromptu. The rhythms of the Cradle Song and the +Barcarolle are suggestive enough and if you please there are dew- +drops in his cadenzas and there is the whistling of the wind in +the last A minor Study. Of the A flat Study Chopin said: "Imagine +a little shepherd who takes refuge in a peaceful grotto from an +approaching storm. In the distance rushes the wind and the rain, +while the shepherd gently plays a melody on his flute." This is +quoted by Kleczynski. There are word-whisperings in the next +study in F minor, whilst the symbolism of the dance--the Valse, +Mazurka, Polonaise, Menuetto, Bolero, Schottische, Krakowiak and +Tarantella--is admirably indicated in all of them. The bells of +the Funeral March, the will o' wisp character of the last +movement of the B flat minor Sonata, the dainty Butterfly Study +in G flat, opus 25, the aeolian murmurs of the E flat Study, in +opus 10, the tiny prancing silvery hoofs in the F major Study, +opus 25, the flickering flame-like C major Study No. 7, opus 10, +the spinning in the D flat Valse and the cyclonic rush of +chromatic double notes in the E flat minor Scherzo--these are not +studied imitations but spontaneous transpositions to the ideal +plane of primary, natural phenomena. + +Chopin's system--if it be a system--of cadenzas, fioriture +embellishment and ornamentation is perhaps traceable to the East. +In his "Folk Music Studies," Mr. H. E. Krehbiel quotes the +description of "a rhapsodical embellishment, called 'alap,' which +after going through a variety of ad libitum passages, rejoins the +melody with as much grace as if it had never been disunited, the +musical accompaniment all the while keeping time. These passages +are not reckoned essential to the melody, but are considered only +as grace notes introduced according to the fancy of the singer, +when the only limitations by which the performer is bound are the +notes peculiar to that particular melody and a strict regard to +time." + +Chopin founded no school, although the possibilities of the piano +were canalized by him. In playing, as in composition, only the +broad trend of his discoveries may be followed, for his was a +manner not a method. He has had for followers Liszt, Rubinstein, +Mikuli, Zarembski, Nowakowski, Xaver Scharwenka, Saint-Saens, +Scholtz, Heller, Nicode, Moriz Moszkowski, Paderewski, Stojowski, +Arenski, Leschetizki, the two Wieniawskis, and a whole group of +the younger Russians Liadoff, Scriabine and the rest. Even Brahms- +-in his F sharp major Sonata and E flat minor Scherzo--shows +Chopin's influence. Indeed but for Chopin much modern music would +not exist. + +But a genuine school exists not. Henselt was only a German who +fell asleep and dreamed of Chopin. To a Thalberg-ian euphony he +has added a technical figuration not unlike Chopin's, and a +spirit quite Teutonic in its sentimentality. Rubinstein calls +Chopin the exhalation of the third epoch in art. He certainly +closed one. With a less strong rhythmic impulse and formal sense +Chopin's music would have degenerated into mere overperfumed +impressionism. The French piano school of his day, indeed of +today, is entirely drowned by its devotion to cold decoration, to +unemotional ornamentation. Mannerisms he had--what great artist +has not?--but the Greek in him, as in Heine, kept him from +formlessness. He is seldom a landscapist, but he can handle his +brush deftly before nature if he must. He paints atmosphere, the +open air at eventide, with consummate skill, and for playing +fantastic tricks on your nerves in the depiction of the +superhuman he has a peculiar faculty. Remember that in Chopin's +early days the Byronic pose, the grandiose and the horrible +prevailed--witness the pictures of Ingres and Delacroix--and +Richter wrote with his heart-strings saturated in moonshine and +tears. Chopin did not altogether escape the artistic vices of his +generation. As a man he was a bit of poseur--the little whisker +grown on one side of his face, the side which he turned to his +audience, is a note of foppery--but was ever a detester of the +sham-artistic. He was sincere, and his survival, when nearly all +of Mendelssohn, much of Schumann and half of Berlioz have +suffered an eclipse, is proof positive of his vitality. The fruit +of his experimentings in tonality we see in the whole latter-day +school of piano, dramatic and orchestral composers. That Chopin +may lead to the development and adoption of the new enharmonic +scales, the "Homotonic scales," I do not know. For these M. A. de +Bertha claimed the future of music. He wrote: + +"Now vaporously illumined by the crepuscular light of a magical +sky on the boundaries of the major and minor modes, now seeming +to spring from the bowels of the earth with sepulchral +inflexions, melody moves with ease on the serried degrees of the +enharmonic scales. Lively or slow she always assumed in them the +accents of a fatalist impossibility, for the laws of arithmetic +have preceded her, and there still remains, as it were, an +atmosphere of proud rigidity. Melancholy or passionate she +preserves the reflected lines of a primitive rusticity, which +clings to the homotones in despite of their artificial origin." +But all this will be in the days to come when the flat keyboard +will be superseded by a Janko many-banked clavier contrivance, +when Mr. Krehbiel's oriental srootis are in use and Mr. Apthorp's +nullitonic order, no key at all, is invented. Then too a new +Chopin may be born, but I doubt it. + +Despite his idiomatic treatment of the piano it must be +remembered that Chopin under Sontag's and Paganini's influence +imitated both voice and violin on the keyboard. His lyricism is +most human, while the portamento, the slides, trills and +indescribably subtle turns--are they not of the violin? Wagner +said to Mr. Dannreuther--see Finck's "Wagner and his Works"--that +"Mozart's music and Mozart's orchestra are a perfect match; an +equally perfect balance exists between Palestrina's choir and +Palestrina's counterpoint, and I find a similar correspondence +between Chopin's piano and some of his Etudes and Preludes--I do +not care for the Ladies' Chopin; there is too much of the +Parisian salon in that, but he has given us many things which are +above the salon." Which latter statement is slightly +condescending. Recollect, however, Chopin's calm depreciation of +Schumann. Mr. John F. Runciman, the English critic, asserts that +"Chopin thought in terms of the piano, and only the piano. So +when we see Chopin's orchestral music or Wagner's music for the +piano we realize that neither is talking his native tongue--the +tongue which nature fitted him to speak." Speaking of "Chopin and +the Sick Men" Mr. Runciman is most pertinent: + +"These inheritors of rickets and exhausted physical frames made +some of the most wonderful music of the century for us. Schubert +was the most wonderful of them all, but Chopin runs him very +close. ... He wrote less, far less than Schubert wrote; but, for +the quantity he did write, its finish is miraculous. It may be +feverish, merely mournful, cadavre, or tranquil, and entirely +beautiful; but there is not a phrase that is not polished as far +as a phrase will bear polishing. It is marvellous music; but, all +the same, it is sick, unhealthy music." + +"Liszt's estimate of the technical importance of Chopin's works," +writes Mr. W.J. Henderson, "is not too large. It was Chopin who +systematized the art of pedalling and showed us how to use both +pedals in combination to produce those wonderful effects of color +which are so necessary in the performance of his music. ... The +harmonic schemes of the simplest of Chopin's works are marvels of +originality and musical loveliness, and I make bold to say that +his treatment of the passing note did much toward showing later +writers how to produce the restless and endless complexity of the +harmony in contemporaneous orchestral music." + +Heinrich Pudor in his strictures on German music is hardly +complimentary to Chopin: "Wagner is a thorough-going decadent, an +off-shoot, an epigonus, not a progonus. His cheeks are hollow and +pale--but the Germans have the full red cheeks. Equally decadent +is Liszt. Liszt is a Hungarian and the Hungarians are confessedly +a completely disorganized, self-outlived, dying people. No less +decadent is Chopin, whose figure comes before one as flesh +without bones, this morbid, womanly, womanish, slip-slop, +powerless, sickly, bleached, sweet-caramel Pole!" This has a ring +of Nietzsche--Nietzsche who boasted of his Polish origin. + +Now listen to the fatidical Pole Przybyszewski: "In the beginning +there was sex, out of sex there was nothing and in it everything +was. And sex made itself brain whence was the birth of the soul." +And then, as Mr. Vance Thompson, who first Englished this "Mass +of the Dead"--wrote: "He pictures largely in great cosmic +symbols, decorated with passionate and mystic fervors, the +singular combat between the growing soul and the sex from which +it fain would be free." Arno Holz thus parodies Przybyszewski: +"In our soul there is surging and singing a song of the +victorious bacteria. Our blood lacks the white corpuscles. On the +sounding board of our consciousness there echoes along the +frightful symphony of the flesh. It becomes objective in Chopin; +he alone, the modern primeval man, puts our brains on the green +meadows, he alone thinks in hyper-European dimensions. He alone +rebuilds the shattered Jerusalem of our souls."All of which shows +to what comically delirious lengths this sort of deleterious soul- +probing may go. + +It would be well to consider this word "decadent" and its morbid +implications. There is a fashion just now in criticism to over- +accentuate the physical and moral weaknesses of the artist. +Lombroso started the fashion, Nordau carried it to its logical +absurdity, yet it is nothing new. In Hazlitt's day he complains, +that genius is called mad by foolish folk. Mr. Newman writes in +his Wagner, that "art in general, and music in particular, ought +not to be condemned merely in terms of the physical degeneration +or abnormality of the artist. Some of the finest work in art and +literature, indeed, has been produced by men who could not, from +any standpoint, be pronounced normal. In the case of Flaubert, of +De Maupassant, of Dostoievsky, of Poe, and a score of others, +though the organic system was more or less flawed, the work +remains touched with that universal quality that gives artistic +permanence even to perceptions born of the abnormal." Mr. Newman +might have added other names to his list, those of Michael Angelo +and Beethoven and Swinburne. Really, is any great genius quite +sane according to philistine standards? The answer must be +negative. The old enemy has merely changed his mode of attack: +instead of charging genius with madness, the abnormal used in an +abnormal sense is lugged in and though these imputations of +degeneracy, moral and physical, have in some cases proven true, +the genius of the accused one can in no wise be denied. But then +as Mr. Philip Hale asks: Why this timidity at being called +decadent? What's in the name? + +Havelock Ellis in his masterly study of Joris Karl Huysmans, +considers the much misunderstood phenomenon in art called +decadence. "Technically a decadent style is only such in relation +to a classic style. It is simply a further development of a +classic style, a further specialization, the homogeneous in +Spencerian phraseology having become heterogeneous. The first is +beautiful because the parts are subordinated to the whole; the +second is beautiful because the whole is subordinated to the +parts." Then he proceeds to show in literature that Sir Thomas +Browne, Emerson, Pater, Carlyle, Poe, Hawthorne and Whitman are +decadents--not in any invidious sense--but simply in "the +breaking up of the whole for the benefit of its parts." Nietzsche +is quoted to the effect that "in the period of corruption in the +evolution of societies we are apt to overlook the fact that the +energy which in more primitive times marked the operations of a +community as a whole has now simply been transferred to the +individuals themselves, and this aggrandizement of the individual +really produces an even greater amount of energy." And further, +Ellis: "All art is the rising and falling of the slopes of a +rhythmic curve between these two classic and decadent extremes. +Decadence suggests to us going down, falling, decay. If we walk +down a real hill we do not feel that we commit a more wicked act +than when we walked up it....Roman architecture is classic to +become in its Byzantine developments completely decadent, and St. +Mark's is the perfected type of decadence in art. ... We have to +recognize that decadence is an aesthetic and not a moral +conception. The power of words is great but they need not befool +us. ... We are not called upon to air our moral indignation over +the bass end of the musical clef." I recommend the entire chapter +to such men as Lombroso Levi, Max Nordau and Heinrich Pudor, who +have yet to learn that "all confusion of intellectual substances +is foolish." + +Oscar Bie states the Chopin case most excellently:-- + + Chopin is a poet. It has become a very bad habit to place this + poet in the hands of our youth. The concertos and polonaises + being put aside, no one lends himself worse to youthful + instruction than Chopin. Because his delicate touches + inevitably seem perverse to the youthful mind, he has gained + the name of a morbid genius. The grown man who understands how + to play Chopin, whose music begins where that of another + leaves off, whose tones show the supremest mastery in the + tongue of music--such a man will discover nothing morbid in + him. Chopin, a Pole, strikes sorrowful chords, which do not + occur frequently to healthy normal persons. But why is a Pole + to receive less justice than a German? We know that the + extreme of culture is closely allied to decay; for perfect + ripeness is but the foreboding of corruption. Children, of + course, do not know this. And Chopin himself would have been + much too noble ever to lay bare his mental sickness to the + world. And his greatness lies precisely in this: that he + preserves the mean between immaturity and decay. His greatness + is his aristocracy. He stands among musicians in his faultless + vesture, a noble from head to foot. The sublimest emotions + toward whose refinement whole genrations had tended, the last + things in our soul, whose foreboding is interwoven with the + mystery of Judgment Day, have in his music found their form. + +Further on I shall attempt--I write the word with a patibulary +gesture--in a sort of a Chopin variorum, to analyze the salient +aspects, technical and aesthetic, of his music. To translate into +prose, into any language no matter how poetical, the images +aroused by his music, is impossible. I am forced to employ the +technical terminology of other arts, but against my judgment. +Read Mr. W. F. Apthorp's disheartening dictum in "By the Way." +"The entrancing phantasmagoria of picture and incident which we +think we see rising from the billowing sea of music is in reality +nothing more than an enchanting fata morgana, visible at no other +angle than that of our own eye. The true gist of music it never +can be; it can never truly translate what is most essential and +characteristic in its expression. It is but something that we +have half unconsciously imputed to music; nothing that really +exists in music." + +The shadowy miming of Chopin's soul has nevertheless a +significance for this generation. It is now the reign of the +brutal, the realistic, the impossible in music. Formal excellence +is neglected and programme-music has reduced art to the level of +an anecdote. Chopin neither preaches nor paints, yet his art is +decorative and dramatic--though in the climate of the ideal. He +touches earth and its emotional issues in Poland only; otherwise +his music is a pure aesthetic delight, an artistic enchantment, +freighted with no ethical or theatric messages. It is poetry made +audible, the "soul written in sound." All that I can faintly +indicate is the way it affects me, this music with the petals of +a glowing rose and the heart of gray ashes. Its analogies to Poe, +Verlaine, Shelley, Keats, Heine and Mickiewicz are but critical +sign-posts, for Chopin is incomparable, Chopin is unique. "Our +interval," writes Walter Pater, "is brief." Few pass it +recollectedly and with full understanding of its larger rhythms +and more urgent colors. Many endure it in frivol and violence, +the majority in bored, sullen submission. Chopin, the New Chopin, +is a foe to ennui and the spirit that denies; in his exquisite +soul-sorrow, sweet world-pain, we may find rich impersonal +relief. + + + +V. POET AND PSYCHOLOGIST + + + +Music is an order of mystic, sensuous mathematics. A sounding +mirror, an aural mode of motion, it addresses itself on the +formal side to the intellect, in its content of expression it +appeals to the emotions. Ribot, admirable psychologist, does not +hesitate to proclaim music as the most emotional of the arts. "It +acts like a burn, like heat, cold or a caressing contact, and is +the most dependent on physiological conditions." + +Music then, the most vague of the arts in the matter of +representing the concrete, is the swiftest, surest agent for +attacking the sensibilities. The CRY made manifest, as Wagner +asserts, it is a cry that takes on fanciful shapes, each soul +interpreting it in an individual fashion. Music and beauty are +synonymous, just as their form and substance are indivisible. + +Havelock Ellis is not the only aesthetician who sees the marriage +of music and sex. "No other art tells us such old forgotten +secrets about ourselves...It is in the mightiest of all +instincts, the primitive sex traditions of the race before man +was, that music is rooted...Beauty is the child of love." Dante +Gabriel Rossetti has imprisoned in a sonnet the almost intangible +feeling aroused by music, the feeling of having pursued in the +immemorial past the "route of evanescence." + + Is it this sky's vast + vault or ocean's + sound, + That is Life's self + and draws my life from me, + And by instinct ineffable decree + Holds my breath + Quailing on the bitter bound? + Nay, is it Life or Death, thus thunder-crown'd, + That 'mid the tide of all emergency + Now notes my separate wave, and to what sea + Its difficult eddies labor in the ground? + Oh! what is this that knows the road I came, + The flame turned cloud, the cloud returned to flame, + The lifted, shifted steeps and all the way? + That draws around me at last this wind-warm space, + And in regenerate rapture turns my face + Upon the devious coverts of dismay? + +During the last half of the nineteenth century two men became +rulers of musical emotion, Richard Wagner and Frederic Francois +Chopin. The music of the latter is the most ravishing gesture +that art has yet made. Wagner and Chopin, the macrocosm and the +microcosm! "Wagner has made the largest impersonal synthesis +attainable of the personal influences that thrill our lives," +cries Havelock Ellis. Chopin, a young man slight of frame, +furiously playing out upon the keyboard his soul, the soul of his +nation, the soul of his time, is the most individual composer +that has ever set humming the looms of our dreams. Wagner and +Chopin have a motor element in their music that is fiercer, +intenser and more fugacious than that of all other composers. For +them is not the Buddhistic void, in which shapes slowly form and +fade; their psychical tempo is devouring. They voiced their age, +they moulded their age and we listen eagerly to them, to these +vibrile prophetic voices, so sweetly corrosive, bardic and +appealing. Chopin being nearer the soil in the selection of +forms, his style and structure are more naive, more original than +Wagner's, while his medium, less artificial, is easier filled +than the vast empty frame of the theatre. Through their intensity +of conception and of life, both men touch issues, though widely +dissimilar in all else. Chopin had greater melodic and as great +harmonic genius as Wagner; he made more themes, he was, as +Rubinstein wrote, the last of the original composers, but his +scope was not scenic, he preferred the stage of his soul to the +windy spaces of the music-drama. His is the interior play, the +eternal conflict between body and soul. He viewed music through +his temperament and it often becomes so imponderable, so bodiless +as to suggest a fourth dimension in the art. Space is +obliterated. With Chopin one does not get, as from Beethoven, the +sense of spiritual vastness, of the overarching sublime. There is +the pathos of spiritual distance, but it is pathos, not +sublimity. "His soul was a star and dwelt apart," though not in +the Miltonic or Wordsworthian sense. A Shelley-like tenuity at +times wings his thought, and he is the creator of a new thrill +within the thrill. The charm of the dying fall, the unspeakable +cadence of regret for the love that is dead, is in his music; +like John Keats he sometimes sees:-- + + Charm'd magic casements, opening on the foam + Of perilous seas, in faery lands forlorn. + +Chopin, "subtle-souled psychologist," is more kin to Keats than +Shelley, he is a greater artist than a thinker. His philosophy is +of the beautiful, as was Keats', and while he lingers by the +river's edge to catch the song of the reeds, his gaze is oftener +fixed on the quiring planets. He is nature's most exquisite +sounding-board and vibrates to her with intensity, color and +vivacity that have no parallel. Stained with melancholy, his joy +is never that of the strong man rejoicing in his muscles. Yet his +very tenderness is tonic and his cry is ever restrained by an +Attic sense of proportion. Like Alfred De Vigny, he dwelt in a +"tour d'ivoire" that faced the west and for him the sunrise was +not, but O! the miraculous moons he discovered, the sunsets and +cloud-shine! His notes cast great rich shadows, these chains of +blown-roses drenched in the dew of beauty. Pompeian colors are +too restricted and flat; he divulges a world of half-tones, some +"enfolding sunny spots of greenery," or singing in silvery shade +the song of chromatic ecstasy, others "huge fragments vaulted +like rebounding hail" and black upon black. Chopin is the color +genius of the piano, his eye was attuned to hues the most fragile +and attenuated; he can weave harmonies that are as ghostly as a +lunar rainbow. And lunar-like in their libration are some of his +melodies--glimpses, mysterious and vast, as of a strange world. + +His utterances are always dynamic, and he emerges betimes, as if +from Goya's tomb, and etches with sardonic finger Nada in dust. +But this spirit of denial is not an abiding mood; Chopin throws a +net of tone over souls wearied with rancors and revolts, bridges +"salty, estranged seas" of misery and presently we are viewing a +mirrored, a fabulous universe wherein Death is dead, and Love +reigns Lord of all. + + +II + + +Heine said that "every epoch is a sphinx which plunges into the +abyss as soon as its problem is solved." Born in the very +upheaval of the Romantic revolution--a revolution evoked by the +intensity of its emotion, rather than by the power of its ideas-- +Chopin was not altogether one of the insurgents of art. Just when +his individual soul germinated, who may tell? In his early music +are discovered the roots and fibres of Hummel and Field. His +growth, involuntary, inevitable, put forth strange sprouts, and +he saw in the piano, an instrument of two dimensions, a third, +and so his music deepened and took on stranger colors. The +keyboard had never sung so before; he forged its formula. A new +apocalyptic seal of melody and harmony was let fall upon it. +Sounding scrolls, delicious arabesques gorgeous in tint, martial, +lyric, "a resonance of emerald," a sobbing of fountains--as that +Chopin of the Gutter, Paul Verlaine, has it--the tear +crystallized midway, an arrested pearl, were overheard in his +music, and Europe felt a new shudder of sheer delight. + +The literary quality is absent and so is the ethical--Chopin may +prophesy but he never flames into the divers tongues of the upper +heaven. Compared with his passionate abandonment to the dance, +Brahms is the Lao-tsze of music, the great infant born with gray +hair and with the slow smile of childhood. Chopin seldom smiles, +and while some of his music is young, he does not raise in the +mind pictures of the fatuous romance of youth. His passion is +mature, self-sustained and never at a loss for the mot propre. +And with what marvellous vibration he gamuts the passions, +festooning them with carnations and great white tube roses, but +the dark dramatic motive is never lost in the decorative wiles of +this magician. As the man grew he laid aside his pretty garlands +and his line became sterner, its traceries more gothic; he made +Bach his chief god and within the woven walls of his strange +harmonies he sings the history of a soul, a soul convulsed by +antique madness, by the memory of awful things, a soul lured by +Beauty to secret glades wherein sacrificial rites are performed +to the solemn sounds of unearthly music. Like Maurice de Guerin, +Chopin perpetually strove to decipher Beauty's enigma and +passionately demanded of the sphinx that defies: + +"Upon the shores of what oceans have they rolled the stone that +hides them, O Macareus?" + +His name was as the stroke of a bell to the Romancists; he +remained aloof from them though in a sympathetic attitude. The +classic is but the Romantic dead, said an acute critic. Chopin +was a classic without knowing it; he compassed for the dances of +his land what Bach did for the older forms. With Heine he led the +spirit of revolt, but enclosed his note of agitation in a frame +beautiful. The color, the "lithe perpetual escape" from the +formal deceived his critics, Schumann among the rest. Chopin, +like Flaubert, was the last of the idealists, the first of the +realists. The newness of his form, his linear counterpoint, +misled the critics, who accused him of the lack of it. Schumann's +formal deficiency detracts from much of his music, and because of +their formal genius Wagner and Chopin will live. + +To Chopin might be addressed Sar Merodack Peladan's words: + +"When your hand writes a perfect line the Cherubim descend to +find pleasure therein as in a mirror." Chopin wrote many perfect +lines; he is, above all, the faultless lyrist, the Swinburne, the +master of fiery, many rhythms, the chanter of songs before +sunrise, of the burden of the flesh, the sting of desire and +large-moulded lays of passionate freedom. His music is, to quote +Thoreau, "a proud sweet satire on the meanness of our life." He +had no feeling for the epic, his genius was too concentrated, and +though he could be furiously dramatic the sustained majesty of +blank verse was denied him. With musical ideas he was ever gravid +but their intensity is parent to their brevity. And it must not +be forgotten that with Chopin the form was conditioned by the +idea. He took up the dancing patterns of Poland because they +suited his vivid inner life; he transformed them, idealized them, +attaining to more prolonged phraseology and denser architecture +in his Ballades and Scherzi--but these periods are passionate, +never philosophical. + +All artists are androgynous; in Chopin the feminine often +prevails, but it must be noted that this quality is a +distinguishing sign of masculine lyric genius, for when he +unbends, coquets and makes graceful confessions or whimpers in +lyric loveliness at fate, then his mother's sex peeps out, a +picture of the capricious, beautiful tyrannical Polish woman. +When he stiffens his soul, when Russia gets into his nostrils, +then the smoke and flame of his Polonaises, the tantalizing +despair of his Mazurkas are testimony to the strong man-soul in +rebellion. But it is often a psychical masquerade. The sag of +melancholy is soon felt, and the old Chopin, the subjective +Chopin, wails afresh in melodic moodiness. + +That he could attempt far flights one may see in his B flat minor +Sonata, in his Scherzi, in several of the Ballades, above all in +the F minor Fantasie. In this great work the technical invention +keeps pace with the inspiration. It coheres, there is not a flaw +in the reverberating marble, not a rift in the idea. If Chopin, +diseased to death's door, could erect such a Palace of Dreams, +what might not he have dared had he been healthy? But forth from +his misery came sweetness and strength, like honey from the lion. +He grew amazingly the last ten years of his existence, grew with +a promise that recalls Keats, Shelley, Mozart, Schubert and the +rest of the early slaughtered angelic crew. His flame-like spirit +waxed and waned in the gusty surprises of a disappointed life. To +the earth for consolation he bent his ear and caught echoes of +the cosmic comedy, the far-off laughter of the hills, the lament +of the sea and the mutterings of its depths. These things with +tales of sombre clouds and shining skies and whisperings of +strange creatures dancing timidly in pavonine twilights, he +traced upon the ivory keys of his instrument and the world was +richer for a poet. Chopin is not only the poet of the piano, he +is also the poet of music, the most poetic of composers. Compared +with him Bach seems a maker of solid polyphonic prose, Beethoven +a scooper of stars, a master of growling storms, Mozart a weaver +of gay tapestries, Schumann a divine stammerer. Schubert, alone +of all the composers, resembles him in his lyric prodigality. +Both were masters of melody, but Chopin was the master-workman of +the two and polished, after bending and beating, his theme fresh +from the fire of his forge. He knew that to complete his "wailing +Iliads" the strong hand of the reviser was necessary, and he also +realized that nothing is more difficult for the genius than to +retain his gift. Of all natures the most prone to pessimism, +procrastination and vanity, the artist is most apt to become +ennuied. It is not easy to flame always at the focus, to burn +fiercely with the central fire. Chopin knew this and cultivated +his ego. He saw too that the love of beauty for beauty's sake was +fascinating but led to the way called madness. So he rooted his +art, gave it the earth of Poland and its deliquescence is put off +to the day when a new system of musical aestheticism will have +routed the old, when the Ugly shall be king and Melody the +handmaiden of science. But until that most grievous and undesired +time he will catch the music of our souls and give it cry and +flesh. + + +III + + +Chopin is the open door in music. Besides having been a poet and +giving vibratory expression to the concrete, he was something +else--he was a pioneer. Pioneer because in youth he had bowed to +the tyranny of the diatonic scale and savored the illicit joys of +the chromatic. It is briefly curious that Chopin is regarded +purely as a poet among musicians and not as a practical musician. +They will swear him a phenomenal virtuoso, but your musician, +orchestral and theoretical, raises the eyebrow of the +supercilious if Chopin is called creative. A cunning finger- +smith, a moulder of decorative patterns, a master at making new +figures, all this is granted, but speak of Chopin as path-breaker +in the harmonic forest--that true "forest of numbers"--as the +forger of a melodic metal, the sweetest, purest in temper, and +lo! you are regarded as one mentally askew. Chopin invented many +new harmonic devices, he untied the chord that was restrained +within the octave, leading it into the dangerous but delectable +land of extended harmonies. And how he chromaticized the prudish, +rigid garden of German harmony, how he moistened it with flashing +changeful waters until it grew bold and brilliant with promise! A +French theorist, Albert Lavignac, calls Chopin a product of the +German Romantic school. This is hitching the star to the wagon. +Chopin influenced Schumann; it can be proven a hundred times. And +Schumann under stood Chopin else he could not have written the +"Chopin" of the Carneval, which quite out-Chopins Chopin. + +Chopin is the musical soul of Poland; he incarnates its political +passion. First a Slav, by adoption a Parisian, he is the open +door because he admitted into the West, Eastern musical ideas, +Eastern tonalities, rhythms, in fine the Slavic, all that is +objectionable, decadent and dangerous. He inducted Europe into +the mysteries and seductions of the Orient. His music lies +wavering between the East and the West. A neurotic man, his +tissues trembling, his sensibilities aflame, the offspring of a +nation doomed to pain and partition, it was quite natural for him +to go to France--Poland had ever been her historical client--the +France that overheated all Europe. Chopin, born after two +revolutions, the true child of insurrection, chose Paris for his +second home. Revolt sat easily upon his inherited aristocratic +instincts--no proletarian is quite so thorough a revolutionist as +the born aristocrat, witness Nietzsche--and Chopin, in the +bloodless battle of the Romantics, in the silent warring of Slav +against Teuton, Gaul and Anglo-Saxon, will ever stand as the +protagonist of the artistic drama. + +All that followed, the breaking up of the old hard-and-fast +boundaries on the musical map is due to Chopin. A pioneer, he has +been rewarded as such by a polite ignorement or bland +condescension. He smashed the portals of the convention that +forbade a man baring his soul to the multitude. The psychology of +music is the gainer thereby. Chopin, like Velasquez, could paint +single figures perfectly, but to great massed effects he was a +stranger. Wagner did not fail to profit by his marvellously drawn +soul-portraits. Chopin taught his century the pathos of +patriotism, and showed Grieg the value of national ore. He +practically re-created the harmonic charts, he gave voice to the +individual, himself a product of a nation dissolved by +overwrought individualism. As Schumann assures us, his is "the +proudest and most poetic spirit of his time." Chopin, subdued by +his familiar demon, was a true specimen of Nietzsche's +Ubermensch,--which is but Emerson's Oversoul shorn of her wings. +Chopin's transcendental scheme of technics is the image of a +supernormal lift in composition. He sometimes robs music of its +corporeal vesture and his transcendentalism lies not alone in his +striving after strange tonalities and rhythms, but in seeking the +emotionally recondite. Self-tormented, ever "a dweller on the +threshold" he saw visions that outshone the glories of Hasheesh +and his nerve-swept soul ground in its mills exceeding fine +music. His vision is of beauty; he persistently groped at the hem +of her robe, but never sought to transpose or to tone the +commonplace of life. For this he reproved Schubert. Such +intensity cannot be purchased but at the cost of breadth, of +sanity, and his picture of life is not so high, wide, sublime, or +awful as Beethoven's. Yet is it just as inevitable, sincere and +as tragically poignant. + +Stanislaw Przybyszewski in his "Zur Psychologie des Individuums" +approaches the morbid Chopin--the Chopin who threw open to the +world the East, who waved his chromatic wand to Liszt, +Tschaikowsky, Saint-Saens, Goldmark, Rubinstein, Richard Strauss, +Dvorak and all Russia with its consonantal composers. This Polish +psychologist--a fulgurant expounder of Nietzsche--finds in Chopin +faith and mania, the true stigma of the mad individualist, the +individual "who in the first instance is naught but an oxidation +apparatus." Nietzsche and Chopin are the most outspoken +individualities of the age--he forgets Wagner--Chopin himself the +finest flowering of a morbid and rare culture. His music is a +series of psychoses--he has the sehnsucht of a marvellously +constituted nature--and the shrill dissonance of his nerves, as +seen in the physiological outbursts of the B minor Scherzo, is +the agony of a tortured soul. The piece is Chopin's Iliad; in it +are the ghosts that lurk near the hidden alleys of the soul, but +here come out to leer and exult. + +Horla! the Horla of Guy de Maupassant, the sinister Doppelganger +of mankind, which races with him to the goal of eternity, perhaps +to outstrip and master him in the next evolutionary cycle, master +as does man, the brute creation. This Horla, according to +Przybyszewski, conquered Chopin and became vocal in his music-- +this Horla has mastered Nietzsche, who, quite mad, gave the world +that Bible of the Ubermensch, that dancing lyric prose-poem, +"Also Sprach Zarathustra." + +Nietzsche's disciple is half right. Chopin's moods are often +morbid, his music often pathological; Beethoven too is morbid, +but in his kingdom, so vast, so varied, the mood is lost or +lightly felt, while in Chopin's province, it looms a maleficent +upas-tree, with flowers of evil and its leaves glistering with +sensuousness. But so keen for symmetry, for all the term formal +beauty implies, is Chopin, that seldom does his morbidity madden, +his voluptuousness poison. His music has its morass, but also its +upland where the gale blows strong and true. Perhaps all art is, +as the incorrigible Nordau declares, a slight deviation from the +normal, though Ribot scoffs at the existence of any standard of +normality. The butcher and the candle-stick-maker have their +Horla, their secret soul convulsions, which they set down to +taxation, the vapors, or weather. + +Chopin has surprised the musical malady of the century. He is its +chief spokesman. After the vague, mad, noble dreams of Byron, +Shelley and Napoleon, the awakening found those disillusioned +souls, Wagner, Nietzsche and Chopin. Wagner sought in the epical +rehabilitation of a vanished Valhalla a surcease from the world- +pain. He consciously selected his anodyne and in "Die +Meistersinger" touched a consoling earth. Chopin and Nietzsche, +temperamentally finer and more sensitive than Wagner--the one +musically, the other intellectually--sang themselves in music and +philosophy, because they were so constituted. Their nerves rode +them to their death. Neither found the serenity and repose of +Wagner, for neither was as sane and both suffered mortally from +hyperaesthesia, the penalty of all sick genius. + +Chopin's music is the aesthetic symbol of a personality nurtured +on patriotism, pride and love; that it is better expressed by the +piano is because of that instrument's idiosyncrasies of +evanescent tone, sensitive touch and wide range in dynamics. It +was Chopin's lyre, the "orchestra of his heart," from it he +extorted music the most intimate since Sappho. Among lyric +moderns Heine closely resembles the Pole. Both sang because they +suffered, sang ineffable and ironic melodies; both will endure +because of their brave sincerity, their surpassing art. The +musical, the psychical history of the nineteenth century would be +incomplete without the name of Frederic Francois Chopin. Wagner +externalized its dramatic soul; in Chopin the mad lyricism of the +Time-spirit is made eloquent. Into his music modulated the poesy +of his age; he is one of its heroes, a hero of whom Swinburne +might have sung: + + O strong-winged soul with prophetic + Lips hot with the blood-beats of song; + With tremor of heart-strings magnetic, + With thoughts as thunder in throng; + With consonant ardor of chords + That pierce men's souls as with swords + And hale them hearing along. + + + +PART II:--HIS MUSIC + + + +VI. THE STUDIES:--TITANIC EXPERIMENTS + + + +October 20, 1829, Frederic Chopin, aged twenty, wrote to his +friend Titus Woyciechowski, from Warsaw: "I have composed a study +in my own manner;" and November 14, the same year: "I have +written some studies; in your presence I would play them well." + +Thus, quite simply and without booming of cannon or brazen +proclamation by bell, did the great Polish composer announce an +event of supreme interest and importance to the piano-playing +world. Niecks thinks these studies were published in the summer +of 1833, July or August, and were numbered op. 10. Another set of +studies, op. 25, did not find a publisher until 1837, although +some of them were composed at the same time as the previous work; +a Polish musician who visited the French capital in 1834 heard +Chopin play the studies contained in op. 25. The C minor study, +op. 10, No. 12, commonly known as the Revolutionary, was born at +Stuttgart, September, 1831, "while under the excitement caused by +the news of the taking of Warsaw by the Russians, on September 8, +1831." These dates are given so as to rout effectually any +dilatory suspicion that Liszt influenced Chopin in the production +of his masterpieces. Lina Ramann, in her exhaustive biography of +Franz Liszt, openly declares that Nos. 9 and 12 of op. 10 and +Nos. 11 and 12 of op. 25 reveal the influence of the Hungarian +virtuoso. Figures prove the fallacy of her assertion. The +influence was the other way, as Liszt's three concert studies +show--not to mention other compositions. When Chopin arrived in +Paris his style had been formed, he was the creator of a new +piano technique. + +The three studies known as Trois Nouvelles Etudes, which appeared +in 1840 in Moscheles and Fetis Method of Methods were published +separately afterward. Their date of composition we do not know. + +Many are the editions of Chopin's studies, but after going over +the ground, one finds only about a dozen worthy of study and +consultation. Karasowski gives the date of the first complete +edition of the Chopin works as 1846, with Gebethner & Wolff, +Warsaw, as publishers. Then, according to Niecks, followed +Tellefsen, Klindworth--Bote & Bock--Scholtz--Peters--Breitkopf & +Hartel, Mikuli, Schuberth, Kahnt, Steingraber--better known as +Mertke's--and Schlesinger, edited by the great pedagogue Theodor +Kullak. Xaver Scharwenka has edited Klindworth for the London +edition of Augener & Co. Mikuli criticised the Tellefsen edition, +yet both men had been Chopin pupils. This is a significant fact +and shows that little reliance can be placed on the brave talk +about tradition. Yet Mikuli had the assistance of a half dozen of +Chopin's "favorite" pupils, and, in addition, Ferdinand Hiller. +Herman Scholtz, who edited the works for Peters, based his +results on careful inspection of original French, German and +English editions, besides consulting M. Georges Mathias, a pupil +of Chopin. If Fontana, Wolff, Gutmann, Mikuli and Tellefsen, who +copied from the original Chopin manuscripts under the supervision +of the composer, cannot agree, then upon what foundation are +reared the structures of the modern critical editions? The early +French, German and Polish editions are faulty, indeed useless, +because of misprints and errata of all kinds. Every succeeding +edition has cleared away some of these errors, but only in Karl +Klindworth has Chopin found a worthy, though not faultless, +editor. His edition is a work of genius and was called by Von +Bulow "the only model edition." In a few sections others, such as +Kullak, Dr. Hugo Riemann and Hans von Bulow, may have outstripped +him, but as a whole his editing is amazing for its exactitude, +scholarship, fertility in novel fingerings and sympathetic +insight in phrasing. This edition appeared at Moscow from 1873 to +1876. + +The twenty-seven studies of Chopin have been separately edited by +Riemann and Von Bulow. + +Let us narrow our investigations and critical comparisons to +Klindworth, Von Bulow, Kullak and Riemann. Carl Reinecke's +edition of the studies in Breitkopf & Hartel's collection offers +nothing new, neither do Mertke, Scholtz and Mikuli. The latter +one should keep at hand because of the possible freedom from +impurities in his text, but of phrasing or fingering he +contributes little. It must be remembered that with the studies, +while they completely exhibit the entire range of Chopin's +genius, the play's the thing after all. The poetry, the passion +of the Ballades and Scherzi wind throughout these technical +problems like a flaming skein. With the modern avidity for +exterior as well as interior analysis, Mikuli, Reinecke, Mertke +and Scholtz evidence little sympathy. It is then from the +masterly editing of Kullak, Von Bulow, Riemann and Klindworth +that I shall draw copiously. They have, in their various ways, +given us a clue to their musical individuality, as well as their +precise scholarship. Klindworth is the most genially +intellectual, Von Bulow the most pedagogic, and Kullak is poetic, +while Riemann is scholarly; the latter gives more attention to +phrasing than to fingering. The Chopin studies are poems fit for +Parnassus, yet they also serve a very useful purpose in pedagogy. +Both aspects, the material and the spiritual, should be studied, +and with four such guides the student need not go astray. + +In the first study of the first book, op. 10, dedicated to Liszt, +Chopin at a leap reached new land. Extended chords had been +sparingly used by Hummel and Clementi, but to take a dispersed +harmony and transform it into an epical study, to raise the chord +of the tenth to heroic stature--that could have been accomplished +by Chopin only. And this first study in C is heroic. Theodore +Kullak writes of it: "Above a ground bass proudly and boldly +striding along, flow mighty waves of sound. The etude--whose +technical end is the rapid execution of widely extended chord +figurations exceeding the span of an octave--is to be played on +the basis of forte throughout. With sharply dissonant harmonies +the forte is to be increased to fortissimo, diminishing again +with consonant ones. Pithy accents! Their effect is enhanced when +combined with an elastic recoil of the hand." + +The irregular, black, ascending and descending staircases of +notes strike the neophyte with terror. Like Piranesi's marvellous +aerial architectural dreams, these dizzy acclivities and descents +of Chopin exercise a charm, hypnotic, if you will, for eye as +well as ear. Here is the new technique in all its nakedness, new +in the sense of figure, design, pattern, web, new in a harmonic +way. The old order was horrified at the modulatory harshness, the +young sprigs of the new, fascinated and a little frightened. A +man who could explode a mine that assailed the stars must be +reckoned with. The nub of modern piano music is in the study, the +most formally reckless Chopin ever penned. Kullak gives Chopin's +favorite metronome sign, 176 to the quarter, but this editor +rightly believes that "the majestic grandeur is impaired," and +suggests 152 instead. The gain is at once apparent. Indeed +Kullak, a man of moderate pulse, is quite right in his strictures +on the Chopin tempi, tempi that sprang from the expressively +light mechanism of the prevailing pianos of Chopin's day. Von +Bulow declares that "the requisite suppleness of the hand in +gradual extension and rapid contraction will be most quickly +attained if the player does not disdain first of all to impress +on the individual fingers the chord which is the foundation of +each arpeggio;" a sound pedagogic point. He also inveighs against +the disposition to play the octave basses arpeggio. In fact, +those basses are the argument of the play; they must be granitic, +ponderable and powerful. The same authority calls attention to a +misprint C, which he makes B flat, the last note treble in the +twenty-ninth bar. Von Bulow gives the Chopin metronomic marking. + +It remained for Riemann to make some radical changes. This +learned and worthy doctor astonished the musical world a few +years by his new marks of phrasing in the Beethoven symphonies. +They topsy-turvied the old bowing. With Chopin, new dynamic and +agogic accents are rather dangerous, at least to the peace of +mind of worshippers of the Chopin fetish. Riemann breaks two bars +into one. It is a finished period for him, and by detaching +several of the sixteenths in the first group, the first and +fourth, he makes the accent clearer,--at least to the eye. He +indicates alla breve with 88 to the half. In later studies +examples will be given of this phrasing, a phrasing that becomes +a mannerism with the editor. He offers no startling finger +changes. The value of his criticism throughout the volume seems +to be in the phrasing, and this by no means conforms to accepted +notions of how Chopin should be interpreted. I intend quoting +more freely from Riemann than from the others, but not for the +reason that I consider him as a cloud by day and a pillar of fire +by night in the desirable land of the Chopin fitudes, rather +because his piercing analysis lays bare the very roots of these +shining examples of piano literature. Klindworth contents himself +with a straightforward version of the C major study, his +fingering being the clearest and most admirable. The Mikuli +edition makes one addition: it is a line which binds the last +note of the first group to the first of the second. The device is +useful, and occurs only on the upward flights of the arpeggio. + +This study suggests that its composer wished to begin the +exposition of his wonderful technical system with a skeletonized +statement. It is the tree stripped of its bark, the flower of its +leaves, yet, austere as is the result, there is compensating +power, dignity and unswerving logic. This study is the key with +which Chopin unlocked--not his heart, but the kingdom of +technique. It should be played, for variety, unisono, with both +hands, omitting, of course, the octave bass. + +Von Bulow writes cannily enough, that the second study in A minor +being chromatically related to Moscheles' etude, op. 70, No. 3, +that piece should prepare the way for Chopin's more musical +composition. In different degrees of tempo, strength and rhythmic +accent it should be practised, omitting the thumb and first +finger. Mikuli's metronome is 144 to the quarter, Von Bulow's, +114; Klindworth's, the same as Mikuli, and Riemann is 72 to the +half, with an alla breve. The fingering in three of these +authorities is almost identical. Riemann has ideas of his own, +both in the phrasing and figuration. Look at these first two +bars: [Musical score excerpt without caption: ] + +Von Bulow orders "the middle harmonies to be played throughout +distinctly, and yet transiently"--in German, "fluchtig." In fact, +the entire composition, with its murmuring, meandering, chromatic +character, is a forerunner to the whispering, weaving, moonlit +effects in some of his later studies. The technical purpose is +clear, but not obtrusive. It is intended for the fourth and fifth +finger of the right hand, but given in unison with both hands it +becomes a veritable but laudable torture for the thumb of the +left. With the repeat of the first at bar 36 Von Bulow gives a +variation in fingering. Kullak's method of fingering is this: +"Everywhere that two white keys occur in succession the fifth +finger is to be used for C and F in the right hand, and for F and +E in the left." He has also something to say about holding "the +hand sideways, so that the back of the hand and arm form an +angle. "This question of hand position, particularly in Chopin, +is largely a matter of individual formation. No two hands are +alike, no two pianists use the same muscular movements. Play +along the easiest line of resistance. + +We now have reached a study, the third, in which the more +intimately known Chopin reveals himself. This one in E is among +the finest flowering of the composer's choice garden. It is +simpler, less morbid, sultry and languorous, therefore saner, +than the much bepraised study in C sharp minor, No. 7, op. 25. +Niecks writes that this study "may be counted among Chopin's +loveliest compositions." It combines "classical chasteness of +contour with the fragrance of romanticism." Chopin told his +faithful Gutmann that "he had never in his life written another +such melody," and once when hearing it raised his arms aloft and +cried out: "Oh, ma patrie!" + +I cannot vouch for the sincerity of Chopin's utterance for as +Runciman writes: "They were a very Byronic set, these young men; +and they took themselves with ludicrous seriousness." + +Von Bulow calls it a study in expression--which is obvious--and +thinks it should be studied in company with No. 6, in E flat +minor. This reason is not patent. Emotions should not be hunted +in couples and the very object of the collection, variety in mood +as well as mechanism, is thus defeated. But Von Bulow was ever an +ardent classifier. Perhaps he had his soul compartmentized. He +also attempts to regulate the rubato--this is the first of the +studies wherein the rubato's rights must be acknowledged. The +bars are even mentioned 32, 33, 36 and 37, where tempo license +may be indulged. But here is a case which innate taste and +feeling must guide. You can no more teach a real Chopin rubato-- +not the mawkish imitation,--than you can make a donkey comprehend +Kant. The metronome is the same in all editions, 100 to the +eighth. + +Kullak rightly calls this lovely study "ein wunderschones, +poetisches Tonstuck," more in the nocturne than study style. He +gives in the bravura-like cadenza, an alternate for small hands, +but small hands should not touch this piece unless they can +grapple the double sixths with ease. Klindworth fingers the study +with great care. The figuration in three of the editions is the +same, Mikuli separating the voices distinctly. Riemann exercises +all his ingenuity to make the beginning clear to the eye. + +[Musical score excerpt] + +What a joy is the next study, No. 4! How well Chopin knew the +value of contrast in tonality and sentiment! A veritable classic +is this piece, which, despite its dark key color, C sharp minor +as a foil to the preceding one in E, bubbles with life and spurts +flame. It reminds one of the story of the Polish peasants, who +are happiest when they sing in the minor mode. Kullak calls this +"a bravura study for velocity and lightness in both hands. +Accentuation fiery!" while Von Bulow believes that "the +irresistible interest inspired by the spirited content of this +truly classical and model piece of music may become a stumbling +block in attempting to conquer the technical difficulties." +Hardly. The technics of this composition do not lie beneath the +surface. They are very much in the way of clumsy fingers and +heavy wrists. Presto 88 to the half is the metronome indication +in all five editions. Klindworth does not comment, but I like his +fingering and phrasing best of all. Riemann repeats his trick of +breaking a group, detaching a note for emphasis; although he is +careful to retain the legato bow. One wonders why this study does +not figure more frequently on programmes of piano recitals. It is +a fine, healthy technical test, it is brilliant, and the coda is +very dramatic. Ten bars before the return of the theme there is a +stiff digital hedge for the student. A veritable lance of tone is +this study, if justly poised. + +Riemann has his own ideas of the phrasing of the following one, +the fifth and familiar "Black Key" etude. Examine the first bar: + +[Musical Illustration without caption] + +Von Bulow would have grown jealous if he had seen this rather +fantastic phrasing. It is a trifle too finical, though it must be +confessed looks pretty. I like longer breathed phrasing. The +student may profit by this analysis. The piece is indeed, as +Kullak says, "full of Polish elegance." Von Bulow speaks rather +disdainfully of it as a Damen-Salon Etude. It is certainly +graceful, delicately witty, a trifle naughty, arch and roguish, +and it is delightfully invented. Technically, it requires smooth, +velvet-tipped fingers and a supple wrist. In the fourth bar, +third group, third note of group, Klindworth and Riemann print E +flat instead of D flat. Mikuli, Kullak and Von Bulow use the D +flat. Now, which is right? The D flat is preferable. There are +already two E flats in the bar. The change is an agreeable one. +Joseffy has made a concert variation for this study. The +metronome of the original is given at 116 to the quarter. + +A dark, doleful nocturne is No. 6, in E flat minor. Niecks +praises it in company with the preceding one in E. It is +beautiful, if music so sad may be called beautiful, and the +melody is full of stifled sorrow. The study figure is ingenious, +but subordinated to the theme. In the E major section the piece +broadens to dramatic vigor. Chopin was not yet the slave of his +mood. There must be a psychical programme to this study, some +record of a youthful disillusion, but the expression of it is +kept well within chaste lines. The Sarmatian composer had not yet +unlearned the value of reserve. The Klindworth reading of this +troubled poem is the best though Kullak used Chopin's autographic +copy. There is no metronomic sign in this autograph. Tellefsen +gives 69 to the quarter; Klindworth, 60; Riemann, 69; Mikuli, the +same; Von Bulow and Kullak, 60. Kullak also gives several +variante from the text, adding an A flat to the last group in bar +II. Riemann and the others make the same addition. The note must +have been accidentally omitted from the Chopin autograph. Two +bars will illustrate what Riemann can accomplish when he makes up +his mind to be explicit, leaving little to the imagination: + +[Illustration without caption] + +A luscious touch, and a sympathetic soul is needed for this +nocturne study. + +We emerge into a clearer, more bracing atmosphere in the C major +study, No. 7. It is a genuine toccata, with moments of tender +twilight, serving a distinct technical purpose--the study of +double notes and changing on one key--and is as healthy as the +toccata by Robert Schumann. Here is a brave, an undaunted Chopin, +a gay cavalier, with the sunshine shimmering about him. There are +times when this study seems like light dripping through the trees +of a mysterious forest; with the delicato there are Puck-like +rustlings, and all the while the pianist without imagination is +exercising wrist and ringers in a technical exercise! Were ever +Beauty and Duty so mated in double harness? Pegasus pulling a +cloud charged with rain over an arid country! For study, playing +the entire composition with a wrist stroke is advisable. It will +secure clear articulation, staccato and finger-memory. Von Bulow +phrases the study in groups of two, Kullak in sixes, Klindworth +and Mikuli the same, while Riemann in alternate twos, fours and +sixes. One sees his logic rather than hears it. Von Bulow +plastically reproduces the flitting, elusive character of the +study far better than the others. + +It is quite like him to suggest to the panting and ambitious +pupil that the performance in F sharp major, with the same +fingering as the next study in F, No. 8, would be beneficial. It +certainly would. By the same token, the playing of the F minor +Sonata, the Appassionata of Beethoven, in the key of F sharp +minor, might produce good results. This was another crotchet of +Wagner's friend and probably was born of the story that Beethoven +transposed the Bach fugues in all keys. The same is said of Saint- +Saens. + +In his notes to the F major study Theodor Kullak expatiates at +length upon his favorite idea that Chopin must not be played +according to his metronomic markings. The original autograph +gives 96 to the half, the Tellefsen edition 88, Klindworth 80, +Von Bulow 89, Mikuli 88, and Riemann the same. Kullak takes the +slower tempo of Klindworth, believing that the old Herz and +Czerny ideals of velocity are vanished, that the shallow dip of +the keys in Chopin's day had much to do with the swiftness and +lightness of his playing. The noble, more sonorous tone of a +modern piano requires greater breadth of style and less speedy +passage work. There can be no doubt as to the wisdom of a broader +treatment of this charming display piece. How it makes the piano +sound--what a rich, brilliant sweep it secures! It elbows the +treble to its last euphonious point, glitters and crests itself, +only to fall away as if the sea were melodic and could shatter +and tumble into tuneful foam! The emotional content is not +marked. The piece is for the fashionable salon or the concert +hall. One catches at its close the overtones of bustling plaudits +and the clapping of gloved palms. Ductility, an aristocratic +ease, a delicate touch and fluent technique will carry off this +study with good effect. Technically it is useful; one must speak +of the usefulness of Chopin, even in these imprisoned, iridescent +soap bubbles of his. On the fourth line and in the first bar of +the Kullak version, there is a chord of the dominant seventh in +dispersed position that does not occur in any other edition. Yet +it must be Chopin or one of his disciples, for this autograph is +in the Royal Library at Berlin. Kullak thinks it ought to be +omitted, moreover he slights an E flat, that occurs in all the +other editions situated in the fourth group of the twentieth bar +from the end. + +The F minor study, No. 9, is the first one of those tone studies +of Chopin in which the mood is more petulant than tempestuous. +The melody is morbid, almost irritating, and yet not without +certain accents of grandeur. There is a persistency in repetition +that foreshadows the Chopin of the later, sadder years. The +figure in the left hand is the first in which a prominent part is +given to that member. Not as noble and sonorous a figure as the +one in the C minor study, it is a distinct forerunner of the bass +of the D minor Prelude. In this F minor study the stretch is the +technical object. It is rather awkward for close-knit fingers. +The best fingering is Von Bulow's. It is 5, 3, 1, 4, 1, 3 for the +first figure. All the other editions, except Riemann's, recommend +the fifth finger on F, the fourth on C. Von Billow believes that +small hands beginning with his system will achieve quicker +results than by the Chopin fingering. This is true. Riemann +phrases the study with a multiplicity of legato bows and dynamic +accents. Kullak prefers the Tellefsen metronome 80, rather than +the traditional 96. Most of the others use 88 to the quarter, +except Riemann, who espouses the more rapid gait of 96. +Klindworth, with his 88, strikes a fair medium. + +The verdict of Von Bulow on the following study in A flat, No. +10, has no uncertainty of tone in its proclamation: + + He who can play this study in a really finished manner may + congratulate himself on having climbed to the highest point of + the pianist's Parnassus, as it is perhaps the most difficult + piece of the entire set. The whole repertory of piano music + does not contain a study of perpetuum mobile so full of genius + and fancy as this particular one is universally acknowledged + to be, except perhaps Liszt's Feux Follets. The most important + point would appear to lie not so much in the interchange of + the groups of legato and staccato as in the exercise of + rhythmic contrasts--the alternation of two and three part + metre (that is, of four and six) in the same bar. To overcome + this fundamental difficulty in the art of musical reproduction + is the most important thing here, and with true zeal it may + even be accomplished easily. + +Kullak writes: "Harmonic anticipations; a rich rhythmic life +originating in the changing articulation of the twelve-eights in +groups of three and two each. ... This etude is an exceedingly +piquant composition, possessing for the hearer a wondrous, +fantastic charm, if played with the proper insight." The +metronomic marking is practically the same in all editions, 152 +to the quarter notes. The study is one of the most charming of +the composer. There is more depth in it than in the G flat and F +major studies, and its effectiveness in the virtuoso sense is +unquestionable. A savor of the salon hovers over its perfumed +measures, but there is grace, spontaneity and happiness. Chopin +must have been as happy as his sensitive nature would allow when +he conceived this vivacious caprice. + +In all the editions, Riemann's excepted, there is no doubt left +as to the alternations of metres. Here are the first few bars of +Von Billow's, which is normal phrasing: + +[Musical score excerpt] + +Read Riemann's version of these bars: + +[Musical score excerpt] + +Riemann is conducive to clear-sighted phrasing, and will set the +student thinking, but the general effect of accentuation is +certainly different. All the editors quoted agree with Von Bulow, +Klindworth and Kullak. But if this is a marked specimen of +Riemann, examine his reading of the phrase wherein Chopin's +triple rhythm is supplanted by duple. Thus Von Bulow--and who +will dare cavil? + +[Musical score excerpt] + +Riemann: + +[Musical score excerpt] + +The difference is more imaginary than real, for the stems of the +accented notes give us the binary metre. But the illustration +serves to show how Dr. Riemann is disposed to refine upon the +gold of Chopin. + +Kullak dilates upon a peculiarity of Chopin: the dispersed +position of his underlying harmonies. This in a footnote to the +eleventh study of op. 10. Here one must let go the critical +valve, else strangle in pedagogics. So much has been written, so +much that is false, perverted sentimentalism and unmitigated cant +about the nocturnes, that the wonder is the real Chopin lover has +not rebelled. There are pearls and diamonds in the jewelled +collection of nocturnes, many are dolorous, few dramatic, and +others are sweetly insane and songful. I yield to none in my +admiration for the first one of the two in G minor, for the +psychical despair in the C sharp minor nocturne, for that noble +drama called the C minor nocturne, for the B major, the Tuberose +nocturne; and for the E, D flat and G major nocturnes, it remains +unabated. But in the list there is no such picture painted, a +Corot if ever there was one, as this E flat study. + +Its novel design, delicate arabesques--as if the guitar had been +dowered with a soul--and the richness and originality of its +harmonic scheme, gives us pause to ask if Chopin's invention is +not almost boundless. The melody itself is plaintive; a plaintive +grace informs the entire piece. The harmonization is far more +wonderful, but to us the chord of the tenth and more remote +intervals, seem no longer daring; modern composition has devilled +the musical alphabet into the very caverns of the grotesque, yet +there are harmonies in the last page of this study that still +excite wonder. The fifteenth bar from the end is one that Richard +Wagner might have made. From that bar to the close, every group +is a masterpiece. + +Remember, this study is a nocturne, and even the accepted +metronomic markings in most editions, 76 to the quarter, are not +too slow; they might even be slower. Allegretto and not a shade +speedier! The color scheme is celestial and the ending a sigh, +not unmixed with happiness. Chopin, sensitive poet, had his +moments of peace, of divine content--lebensruhe. The dizzy +appoggiatura leaps in the last two bars set the seal of +perfection upon this unique composition. + +Touching upon the execution, one may say that it is not for small +hands, nor yet for big fists. The former must not believe that +any "arrangements" or simplified versions will ever produce the +aerial effect, the swaying of the tendrils of tone, intended by +Chopin. Very large hands are tempted by their reach to crush the +life out of the study in not arpeggiating it. This I have heard, +and the impression was indescribably brutal. As for fingering, +Mikuli, Von Bulow, Kullak, Riemann and Klindworth all differ, and +from them must most pianists differ. Your own grasp, individual +sense of fingering and tact will dictate the management of +technics. Von Bulow gives a very sensible pattern to work from, +and Kullak is still more explicit. He analyzes the melody and, +planning the arpeggiating with scrupulous fidelity, he shows why +the arpeggiating "must be affected with the utmost rapidity, +bordering upon simultaneousness of harmony in the case of many +chords." Kullak has something to say about the grace notes and +this bids me call your attention to Von Bulow's change in the +appoggiatura at the last return of the subject. A bad misprint is +in the Von Bulow edition: it is in the seventeenth bar from the +end, the lowest note in the first bass group and should read E +natural, instead of the E flat that stands. + +Von Bulow does not use the arpeggio sign after the first chord. +He rightly believes it makes unclear for the student the +subtleties of harmonic changes and fingering. He also suggests-- +quite like the fertile Hans Guido--that "players who have +sufficient patience and enthusiasm for the task would find it +worth their while to practise the arpeggi the reverse way, from +top to bottom; or in contrary motion, beginning with the top note +in one hand and the bottom note in the other. A variety of +devices like this would certainly help to give greater finish to +the task." + +Doubtless, but consider: man's years are but threescore and ten! + +The phrasing of the various editions examined do not vary much. +Riemann is excepted, who has his say in this fashion, at the +beginning: + +[Musical score excerpt] + +More remarkable still is the diversity of opinion regarding the +first three bass chord groups in the fifteenth bar from the +close: the bottom notes in the Von Bulow and Klindworth editions +are B flat and two A naturals, and in the Riemann, Kullak and +Mikuli editions the notes are two B flats and one A natural. The +former sounds more varied, but we may suppose the latter to be +correct because of Mikuli. Here is the particular bar, as given +by Riemann: + +[Musical score excerpt] + +Yet this exquisite flight into the blue, this nocturne which +should be played before sundown, excited the astonishment of +Mendelssohn, the perplexed wrath of Moscheles and the contempt of +Rellstab, editor of the "Iris," who wrote in that journal in 1834 +of the studies in op. 10:-- + +"Those who have distorted fingers may put them right by +practising these studies; but those who have not, should not play +them, at least not without having a surgeon at hand." What +incredible surgery would have been needed to get within the skull +of this narrow critic any savor of the beauty of these +compositions! In the years to come the Chopin studies will be +played for their music, without any thought of their technical +problems. + +Now the young eagle begins to face the sun, begins to mount on +wind-weaving pinions. We have reached the last study of op. 10, +the magnificent one in C minor. Four pages suffice for a +background upon which the composer has flung with overwhelming +fury the darkest, the most demoniac expressions of his nature. +Here is no veiled surmise, no smothered rage, but all sweeps +along in tornadic passion. Karasowski's story may be true +regarding the genesis of this work, but true or not, it is one of +the greatest dramatic outbursts in piano literature. Great in +outline, pride, force and velocity, it never relaxes its grim +grip from the first shrill dissonance to the overwhelming chordal +close. This end rings out like the crack of creation. It is +elemental. Kullak calls it a "bravura study of the very highest +order for the left hand. It was composed in 1831 in Stuttgart, +shortly after Chopin had received tidings of the taking of Warsaw +by the Russians, September 8, 1831." Karasowski wrote: "Grief, +anxiety and despair over the fate of his relatives and his dearly- +beloved father filled the measure of his sufferings. Under the +influence of this mood he wrote the C minor Etude, called by many +the Revolutionary Etude. Out of the mad and tempestuous storm of +passages for the left hand the melody rises aloft, now passionate +and anon proudly majestic, until thrills of awe stream over the +listener, and the image is evoked of Zeus hurling thunderbolts at +the world." + +Niecks thinks it "superbly grand," and furthermore writes: "The +composer seems fuming with rage; the left hand rushes impetuously +along and the right hand strikes in with passionate +ejaculations." Von Bulow said: "This C minor study must be +considered a finished work of art in an even higher degree than +the study in C sharp minor." All of which is pretty, but not +enough to the point. + +Von Bulow fingers the first passage for the left hand in a very +rational manner; Klindworth differs by beginning with the third +instead of the second finger, while Riemann--dear innovator-- +takes the group: second, first, third, and then, the fifth finger +on D, if you please! Kullak is more normal, beginning with the +third. Here is Riemann's phrasing and grouping for the first few +bars. Notice the half note with peculiar changes of fingering at +the end. It gives surety and variety. Von Bulow makes the changes +ring on the second and fifth, instead of third and fifth, +fingers. Thus Riemann: [Musical score excerpt] + +In the above the accustomed phrasing is altered, for in all other +editions the accent falls upon the first note of each group. In +Riemann the accentuation seems perverse, but there is no question +as to its pedagogic value. It may be ugly, but it is useful +though I should not care to hear it in the concert room. Another +striking peculiarity of the Riemann phrasing is his heavy accent +on the top E flat in the principal passage for the left hand. He +also fingers what Von Bulow calls the "chromatic meanderings," in +an unusual manner, both on the first page and the last. His idea +of the enunciation of the first theme is peculiar: + +[Musical score excerpt] + +Mikuli places a legato bow over the first three octaves--so does +Kullak--Von Bulow only over the last two, which gives a slightly +different effect, while Klindworth does the same as Kullak. The +heavy dynamic accents employed by Riemann are unmistakable. They +signify the vital importance of the phrase at its initial +entrance. He does not use it at the repetition, but throughout +both dynamic and agogic accents are unsparingly used, and the +study seems to resound with the sullen booming of a park of +artillery. The working-out section, with its anticipations of +"Tristan and Isolde," is phrased by all the editors as it is +never played. Here the technical figure takes precedence over the +law of the phrase, and so most virtuosi place the accent on the +fifth finger, regardless of the pattern. This is as it should be. +In Klindworth there is a misprint at the beginning of the +fifteenth bar from the end in the bass. It should read B natural, +not B flat. The metronome is the same in all editions, 160 to the +quarter, but speed should give way to breadth at all hazards. Von +Bulow is the only editor, to my knowledge, who makes an +enharmonic key change in this working-out section. It looks +neater, sounds the same, but is it Chopin? He also gives a +variant for public performance by transforming the last run in +unisono into a veritable hurricane by interlocked octaves. The +effect is brazen. Chopin needs no such clangorous padding in this +etude, which gains by legitimate strokes the most startling +contrasts. + +The study is full of tremendous pathos; it compasses the sublime, +and in its most torrential moments the composer never quite loses +his mental equipoise. He, too, can evoke tragic spirits, and at +will send them scurrying back to their dim profound. It has but +one rival in the Chopin studies--No. 12, op. 25, in the same key. + + +II + + +Opus 25, twelve studies by Frederic Chopin, are dedicated to +Madame la Comtesse d'Agoult. The set opens with the familiar +study in A flat, so familiar that I shall not make further ado +about it except to say that it is delicious, but played often and +badly. All that modern editing can do since Miluki is to hunt out +fresh accentuation. Von Bullow is the worst sinner in this +respect, for he discovers quaint nooks and dells for his dynamics +undreamed of by the composer. His edition should be respectfully +studied and, when mastered, discarded for a more poetic +interpretation. Above all, poetry, poetry and pedals. Without +pedalling of the most varied sort this study will remain as dry +as a dog-gnawed bone. Von Bulow says the "figure must be treated +as a double triplet--twice three and not three times two--as +indicated in the first two bars." Klindworth makes the group a +sextolet. Von Bulow has set forth numerous directions in +fingering and phrasing, giving the exact number of notes in the +bass trill at the end. Kullak uses the most ingenious fingering. +Look at the last group of the last bar, second line, third page. +It is the last word in fingering. Better to end with Robert +Schumann's beautiful description of this study, as quoted by +Kullak: + + In treating of the present book of Etudes, Robert Schumann, + after comparing Chopin to a strange star seen at midnight, + wrote as follows: "Whither his path lies and leads, or how + long, how brilliant its course is yet to be, who can say? As + often, however, as it shows itself, there is ever seen the + same deep dark glow, the same starry light and the same + austerity, so that even a child could not fail to recognize + it. But besides this, I have had the advantage of hearing most + of these Etudes played by Chopin himself, and quite a la + Chopin did he play them!" + + Of the first one especially he writes: "Imagine that an + aeolian harp possessed all the musical scales, and that the + hand of an artist were to cause them all to intermingle in all + sorts of fantastic embellishments, yet in such a way as to + leave everywhere audible a deep fundamental tone and a soft + continuously-singing upper voice, and you will get the right + idea of his playing. But it would be an error to think that + Chopin permitted every one of the small notes to be distinctly + heard. It was rather an undulation of the A flat major chord, + here and there thrown aloft anew by the pedal. Throughout all + the harmonies one always heard in great tones a wondrous + melody, while once only, in the middle of the piece, besides + that chief song, a tenor voice became prominent in the midst + of chords. After the Etude a feeling came over one as of + having seen in a dream a beatific picture which when half + awake one would gladly recall." + + After these words there can be no doubt as to the mode of + delivery. No commentary is required to show that the melodic + and other important tones indicated by means of large notes + must emerge from within the sweetly whispering waves, and that + the upper tones must be combined so as to form a real melody + with the finest and most thoughtful shadings. + +The twenty-fourth bar of this study in A major is so Lisztian +that Liszt must have benefited by its harmonies. + +"And then he played the second in the book, in F minor, one in +which his individuality displays itself in a manner never to be +forgotten. How charming, how dreamy it was! Soft as the song of a +sleeping child." Schumann wrote this about the wonderful study in +F minor, which whispers, not of baleful deeds in a dream, as does +the last movement of the B flat minor sonata, but is--"the song +of a sleeping child." No comparison could be prettier, for there +is a sweet, delicate drone that sometimes issues from childish +lips, having a charm for ears not attuned to grosser things. + +This must have been the study that Chopin played for Henrietta +Voigt at Leipsic, September 12, 1836. In her diary she wrote: +"The over excitement of his fantastic manner is imparted to the +keen eared. It made me hold my breath. Wonderful is the ease with +which his velvet fingers glide, I might almost say fly, over the +keys. He has enraptured me--in a way which hitherto had been +unknown to me. What delighted me was the childlike, natural +manner which he showed in his demeanor and in his playing." Von +Bulow believes the interpretation of this magical music should be +without sentimentality, almost without shading--clearly, +delicately and dreamily executed. "An ideal pianissimo, an +accentless quality, and completely without passion or rubato." +There is little doubt this was the way Chopin played it. Liszt is +an authority on the subject, and M. Mathias corroborates him. +Regarding the rhythmical problem to be overcome, the combination +of two opposing rhythms, Von Bulow indicates an excellent method, +and Kullak devotes part of a page to examples of how the right, +then the left, and finally both hands, are to be treated. Kullak +furthermore writes: "Or, if one will, he may also betake himself +in fancy to a still, green, dusky forest, and listen in profound +solitude to the mysterious rustling and whispering of the +foliage. What, indeed, despite the algebraic character of the +tone-language, may not a lively fancy conjure out of, or, rather, +into, this etude! But one thing is to be held fast: it is to be +played in that Chopin-like whisper of which, among others, +Mendelssohn also affirmed that for him nothing more enchanting +existed." But enough of subjective fancies. This study contains +much beauty, and every bar rules over a little harmonic kingdom +of its own. It is so lovely that not even the Brahms' distortion +in double notes or the version in octaves can dull its magnetic +crooning. At times so delicate is its design that it recalls the +faint fantastic tracery made by frost on glass. In all instances +save one it is written as four unbroken quarter triplets in the +bar--right hand. Not so Riemann. He has views of his own, both as +to fingering and phrasing: + +[Musical score excerpt] + +Jean Kleczynski's interesting brochure, "The Works of Frederic +Chopin and Their Proper Interpretation," is made up of three +lectures delivered at Warsaw. While the subject is of necessity +foreshortened, he says some practical things about the use of the +pedals in Chopin's music. He speaks of this very study in F minor +and the enchanting way Rubinstein and Essipowa ended it--the echo- +like effects on the four C's, the pedal floating the tone. The +pedals are half the battle in Chopin playing. ONE CAN NEVER PLAY +CHOPIN BEAUTIFULLY ENOUGH. Realistic treatment dissipates his +dream palaces, shatters his aerial architecture. He may be played +broadly, fervently, dramatically but coarsely, never. I deprecate +the rose-leaf sentimentalism in which he is swathed by nearly all +pianists. "Chopin is a sigh, with something pleasing in it," +wrote some one, and it is precisely this notion which has created +such havoc among his interpreters. But if excess in feeling is +objectionable, so too is the "healthy" reading accorded his works +by pianists with more brawn than brain. The real Chopin player is +born and can never be a product of the schools. + +Schumann thinks the third study in F less novel in character, +although "here the master showed his admirable bravura powers." +"But," he continues," they are all models of bold, indwelling, +creative force, truly poetic creations, though not without small +blots in their details, but on the whole striking and powerful. +Yet, if I give my complete opinion, I must confess that his +earlier collection seems more valuable to me. Not that I mean to +imply any deterioration, for these recently published studies +were nearly all written at the same time as the earlier ones, and +only a few were composed a little while ago--the first in A flat +and the last magnificent one in C minor, both of which display +great mastership." + +One may be permitted to disagree with Schumann, for op. 25 +contains at least two of Chopin's greater studies--A minor and C +minor. The most valuable point of the passage quoted is the +clenching of the fact that the studies were composed in a bunch. +That settles many important psychological details. Chopin had +suffered much before going to Paris, had undergone the +purification and renunciation of an unsuccessful love affair, and +arrived in Paris with his style fully formed--in his case the +style was most emphatically the man. + +Kullak calls the study in F "a spirited little caprice, whose +kernel lies in the simultaneous application of four different +little rhythms to form a single figure in sound, which figure is +then repeated continuously to the end. In these repetitions, +however, changes of accentuation, fresh modulations, and piquant +antitheses, serve to make the composition extremely vivacious and +effective." He pulls apart the brightly colored petals of the +thematic flower and reveals the inner chemistry of this delicate +growth. Four different voices are distinguished in the kernel. + +"The third voice is the chief one, and after it the first, +because they determine the melodic and harmonic contents": + +[Musical score excerpt of 'four different voices'] + +Kullak and Mikuli dot the C of the first bar. Klindworth and Von +Bulow do not. As to phrasing and fingering I pin my faith to +Riemann. His version is the most satisfactory. Here are the first +bars. The idea is clearly expressed: + +[Musical score excerpt] + +Best of all is the careful accentuation, and at a place indicated +in no other edition that I have examined. With the arrival of the +thirty-second notes, Riemann punctuates the theme this way: + +[Musical score excerpt] + +The melody, of course in profile, is in the ghth [sic: eighth] +notes. This gives meaning to the decorative pattern of the +passage. And what charm, buoyancy, and sweetness there is in this +caprice! It has the tantalizing, elusive charm of a humming bird +in full flight. The human element is almost eliminated. We are in +the open, the sun blazes in the blue, and all is gay, +atmospheric, and illuding. Even where the tone deepens, where the +shadows grow cooler and darker in the B major section, there is +little hint of preoccupation with sadness. Subtle are the +harmonic shifts, admirable the ever changing devices of the +figuration. Riemann accents the B, the E, A, B flat, C and F, at +the close--perilous leaps for the left hand, but they bring into +fine relief the exquisite harmonic web. An easy way of avoiding +the tricky position in the left hand at this spot--thirteen bars +from the close--is to take the upper C in bass with the right +hand thumb and in the next bar the upper B in bass the same way. +This minimizes the risk of the skip, and it is perfectly +legitimate to do this--in public at least. The ending, to be +"breathed" away, according to Kullak, is variously fingered. He +also prescribes a most trying fingering for the first group, +fourth finger on both hands. This is useful for study, but for +performance the third finger is surer. Von Bulow advises the +player to keep the "upper part of the body as still as possible, +as any haste of movement would destroy the object in view, which +is the acquisition of a loose wrist." He also suggests certain +phrasing in bar seventeen, and forbids a sharp, cutting manner in +playing the sforzati at the last return of the subject. Kullak is +copious in his directions, and thinks the touch should be light +and the hand gliding, and in the B major part "fiery, wilful +accentuation of the inferior beats." Capricious, fantastic, and +graceful, this study is Chopin in rare spirits. Schumann has the +phrase--the study should be executed with "amiable bravura." +There is a misprint in the Kullak edition: at the beginning of +the thirty-second notes an A instead of an F upsets the tonality, +besides being absurd. + +Of the fourth study in A minor there is little to add to Theodor +Kullak, who writes: + + "In the broadest sense of the word, every piece of music is an + etude. In a narrower sense, however, we demand of an etude + that it shall have a special end in view, promote facility in + something, and lead to the conquest of some particular + difficulty, whether of technics, of rhythm, expression or + delivery." (Robert Schumann, Collected Writings, i., 201.) The + present study is less interesting from a technical than a + rhythmical point of view. While the chief beats of the measure + (1st, 3d, 5th and 7th eighths) are represented only by single + tones (in the bass part), which are to a certain extent "free + and unconcerned, and void of all encumbrance," the inferior + parts of the measure (2d, 4th, 6th and 8th eighths) are + burdened with chords, the most of which, moreover, are + provided with accents in opposition to the regular beats of + the measure. Further, there is associated with these chords, + or there may be said to grow out of them, a cantilene in the + upper voice, which appears in syncopated form opposite to the + strong beats of the bass. This cantilene begins on a weak + beat, and produces numerous suspensions, which, in view of the + time of their entrance, appear as so many retardations and + delayals of melodic tones. + + All these things combine to give the composition a wholly + peculiar coloring, to render its flow somewhat restless and to + stamp the etude as a little characteristic piece, a capriccio, + which might well be named "Inquietude." + + As regards technics, two things are to be studied: the + staccato of the chords and the execution of the cantilena. The + chords must be formed more by pressure than by striking. The + fingers must support themselves very lightly upon the chord + keys and then rise again with the back of the hand in the most + elastic manner. The upward movement of the hand must be very + slight. Everything must be done with the greatest precision, + and not merely in a superficial manner. Where the cantilena + appears, every melodic tone must stand apart from the tones of + the accompaniment as if in "relief." Hence the fingers for the + melodic tones must press down the keys allotted to them with + special force, in doing which the back of the hand may be + permitted to turn lightly to the right (sideward stroke), + especially when there is a rest in the accompaniment. Compare + with this etude the introduction to the Capriccio in B minor, + with orchestra, by Felix Mendelssohn, first page. Aside from a + few rallentando places, the etude is to be played strictly in + time. + +I prefer the Klindworth editing of this rather sombre, nervous +composition, which may be merely an etude, but it also indicates +a slightly pathologic condition. With its breath-catching +syncopations and narrow emotional range, the A minor study has +nevertheless moments of power and interest. Riemann's phrasing, +while careful, is not more enlightening than Klindworth's. Von +Bulow says: "The bass must be strongly marked throughout--even +when piano--and brought out in imitation of the upper part." +Singularly enough, his is the only edition in which the left hand +arpeggios at the close, though in the final bar "both hands may +do so." This is editorial quibbling. Stephen Heller remarked that +this study reminded him of the first bar of the Kyrie--rather the +Requiem Aeternam of Mozart's Requiem. + +It is safe to say that the fifth study in E minor is less often +heard in the concert room than any one of its companions. I +cannot recall having heard it since Annette Essipowa gave that +famous recital during which she played the entire twenty-seven +studies. Yet it is a sonorous piano piece, rich in embroideries +and general decorative effect in the middle section. Perhaps the +rather perverse, capricious and not altogether amiable character +of the beginning has caused pianists to be wary of introducing it +at a recital. It is hugely effective and also difficult, +especially if played with the same fingering throughout, as Von +Bulow suggests. Niecks quotes Stephen Heller's partiality for +this very study. In the "Gazette Musicale," February 24, 1839, +Heller wrote of Chopin's op. 25: + + What more do we require to pass one or several evenings in as + perfect a happiness as possible? As for me, I seek in this + collection of poesy--this is the only name appropriate to the + works of Chopin--some favorite pieces which I might fix in my + memory, rather than others. Who could retain everything? For + this reason I have in my notebook quite particularly marked + the numbers four, five and seven of the present poems. Of + these twelve much loved studies--every one of which has a + charm of its own--the three numbers are those I prefer to all + the rest. + +The middle part of this E minor study recalls Thalberg. Von Bulow +cautions the student against "the accenting of the first note +with the thumb--right hand--as it does not form part of the +melody, but only comes in as an unimportant passing note." This +refers to the melody in E. He also writes that the addition of +the third in the left hand, Klindworth edition, needs no special +justification. I discovered one marked difference in the +Klindworth edition. The leap in the left hand--first variant of +the theme, tenth bar from beginning--is preceded by an +appoggiatura, E natural. The jump is to F sharp, instead of G, as +in the Mikuli, Kullak and Riemann editions. Von Bulow uses the F +sharp, but without the ninth below. Riemann phrases the piece so +as to get the top melody, B, E and G, and his stems are below +instead of above, as in Mikuli and Von Bulow. Kullak dots the +eighth note. Riemann uses a sixteenth, thus: + +[Musical score excerpt] + +Kullak writes that the figure 184 is not found on the older +metronomes. This is not too fast for the capriccio, with its +pretty and ingenious rhythmical transformations. As regards the +execution of the 13Oth bar, Von Bulow says: "The acciaccature-- +prefixes--are to be struck simultaneously with the other parts, +as also the shake in bar 134 and following bars; this must begin +with the upper auxiliary note." These details are important. +Kullak concludes his notes thus: + + Despite all the little transformations of the motive member + which forms the kernel, its recognizability remains + essentially unimpaired. Meanwhile out of these little + metamorphoses there is developed a rich rhythmic life, which + the performer must bring out with great precision. If in + addition, he possesses a fine feeling for what is graceful, + coquettish, or agreeably capricious, he will understand how to + heighten still further the charm of the chief part, which, as + far as its character is concerned, reminds one of Etude, op. + 25, No. 3. + + The secondary part, in major, begins. Its kernel is formed of + a beautiful broad melody, which, if soulfully conceived and + delivered, will sing its way deep into the heart of the + listener. For the accompaniment in the right hand we find + chord arpeggiations in triplets, afterward in sixteenths, + calmly ascending and descending, and surrounding the melody as + with a veil. They are to be played almost without + accentuation. + +It was Louis Ehlert who wrote of the celebrated study in G sharp +minor op. 25, No. 6: "Chopin not only versifies an exercise in +thirds; he transforms it into such a work of art that in studying +it one could sooner fancy himself on Parnassus than at a lesson. +He deprives every passage of all mechanical appearance by +promoting it to become the embodiment of a beautiful thought, +which in turn finds graceful expression in its motion." + +And indeed in the piano literature no more remarkable merging of +matter and manner exists. The means justifies the end, and the +means employed by the composer are beautiful, there is no other +word to describe the style and architectonics of this noble +study. It is seldom played in public because of its difficulty. +With the Schumann Toccata, the G sharp minor study stands at the +portals of the delectable land of Double Notes. Both compositions +have a common ancestry in the Czerny Toccata, and both are the +parents of such a sensational offspring as Balakirew's "Islamey." +In reading through the double note studies for the instrument it +is in the nature of a miracle to come upon Chopin's +transfiguration of such a barren subject. This study is first +music, then a technical problem. Where two or three pianists are +gathered together in the name of Chopin, the conversation is +bound to formulate itself thus: "How do you finger the double +chromatic thirds in the G sharp minor study?" That question +answered, your digital politics are known. You are classified, +ranged. If you are heterodox you are eagerly questioned; if you +follow Von Bulow and stand by the Czerny fingering, you are +regarded as a curiosity. As the interpretation of the study is +not taxing, let us examine the various fingerings. First, a +fingering given by Leopold Godowsky. It is for double chromatic +thirds: + +[Musical score excerpt] + +You will now be presented with a battalion of authorities, so +that you may see at a glance the various efforts to climb those +slippery chromatic heights. Here is Mikuli: + +[Musical score excerpt] + +Kullak's is exactly the same as above. It is the so-called Chopin +fingering, as contrasted with the so-called Czerny fingering-- +though in reality Clementi's, as Mr. John Kautz contends. "In the +latter the third and fifth fingers fall upon C sharp and E and F +sharp and A in the right hand, and upon C and E flat and G and B +flat in the left." Klindworth also employs the Chopin fingering. +Von Bulow makes this statement: "As the peculiar fingering +adopted by Chopin for chromatic scales in thirds appears to us to +render their performance in legatissimo utterly unattainable on +our modern instruments, we have exchanged it, where necessary, +for the older method of Hummel. Two of the greatest executive +artists of modern times, Alexander Dreyschock and Carl Tausig, +were, theoretically and practically, of the same opinion. It is +to be conjectured that Chopin was influenced in his method of +fingering by the piano of his favorite makers, Pleyel and Wolff, +of Paris--who, before they adopted the double echappement, +certainly produced instruments with the most pliant touch +possible--and therefore regarded the use of the thumb in the +ascending scale on two white keys in succession--the semitones EF +and BC--as practicable. On the grand piano of the present day we +regard it as irreconcilable with conditions of crescendo legato." +This Chopin fingering in reality derives directly from Hummel. +See his "Piano School." + +So he gives this fingering: + +[Musical score excerpt] He also suggests the following phrasing +for the left hand. This is excellent: + +[Musical score excerpt] + +Riemann not only adopts new fingering for the double note scale, +but also begins the study with the trill on first and third, +second and fourth, instead of the usual first and fourth, second +and fifth fingers, adopted by the rest. This is his notion of the +run in chromatic thirds: + +[Musical score excerpt] + +For the rest the study must be played like the wind, or, as +Kullak says: "Apart from a few places and some accents, the Etude +is to be played almost throughout in that Chopin whisper. The +right hand must play its thirds, especially the diatonic and +chromatic scales, with such equality that no angularity of motion +shall be noticeable where the fingers pass under or over each +other. The left hand, too, must receive careful attention and +special study. The chord passages and all similar ones must be +executed discreetly and legatissimo. Notes with double stems must +be distinguished from notes with single stems by means of +stronger shadings, for they are mutually interconnected." + +Von Bulow calls the seventh study, the one in C sharp minor, a +nocturne--a duo for 'cello and flute. He ingeniously smooths out +the unequal rhythmic differences of the two hands, and justly +says the piece does not work out any special technical matter. +This study is the most lauded of all. Yet I cannot help agreeing +with Niecks, who writes of it--he oddly enough places it in the +key of E: "A duet between a He and a She, of whom the former +shows himself more talkative and emphatic than the latter, is, +indeed, very sweet, but, perhaps, also somewhat tiresomely +monotonous, as such tete-a-tetes naturally are to third parties." + +For Chopin's contemporaries this was one of his greatest efforts. +Heller wrote: "It engenders the sweetest sadness, the most +enviable torments, and if in playing it one feels oneself +insensibly drawn toward mournful and melancholy ideas, it is a +disposition of the soul which I prefer to all others. Alas! how I +love these sombre and mysterious dreams, and Chopin is the god +who creates them." In this etude Kleczynski thinks there are +traces of weariness of life, and quotes Orlowski, Chopin's +friend," He is only afflicted with homesickness." Willeby calls +this study the most beautiful of them all. For me it is both +morbid and elegiac. There is nostalgia in it, the nostalgia of a +sick, lacerated soul. It contains in solution all the most +objectionable and most endearing qualities of the master. Perhaps +we have heard its sweet, highly perfumed measures too often. Its +interpretation is a matter of taste. Kullak has written the most +ambitious programme for it. Here is a quotation from Albert R. +Parsons' translation in Schirmer's edition of Kullak. + + Throughout the entire piece an elegiac mood prevails. The + composer paints with psychologic truthfulness a fragment out + of the life of a deeply clouded soul. He lets a broken heart, + filled with grief, proclaim its sorrow in a language of pain + which is incapable of being misunderstood. The heart has lost-- + not something, but everything. The tones, however, do not + always bear the impress of a quiet, melancholy resignation. + More passionate impulses awaken, and the still plaint becomes + a complaint against cruel fate. It seeks the conflict, and + tries through force of will to burst the fetters of pain, or + at least to alleviate it through absorption in a happy past. + But in vain! The heart has not lost something--it has lost + everything. The musical poem divides into three, or if one + views the little episode in B major as a special part, into + four parts (strophes), of which the last is an elaborated + repetition of the first with a brief closing part appended. + The whole piece is a song, or, better still, an aria, in which + two principal voices are to be brought out; the upper one is + in imitation of a human voice, while the lower one must bear + the character throughout of an obligato violoncello. It is + well known that Chopin was very fond of the violoncello and + that in his piano compositions he imitated the style of + passages peculiar to that instrument. The two voices + correspond closely, supplementing and imitating each other + reciprocally. Between the two a third element exists: an + accompaniment of eighths in uniform succession without any + significance beyond that of filling out the harmony. This + third element is to be kept wholly subordinate. The little, + one-voiced introduction in recitative style which precedes the + aria reminds one vividly of the beginning of the Ballade in G + minor, op. 23. + +The D flat study, No. 8, is called by Von Bulow "the most useful +exercise in the whole range of etude literature. It might truly +be called 'l'indispensable du pianiste,' if the term, through +misuse, had not fallen into disrepute. As a remedy for stiff +fingers and preparatory to performing in public, playing it six +times through is recommended, even to the most expert pianist." +Only six times! The separate study of the left hand is +recommended. Kullak finds this study "surprisingly euphonious, +but devoid of depth of content." It is an admirable study for the +cultivation of double sixths. It contains a remarkable passage of +consecutive fifths that set the theorists by the ears. Riemann +manages to get some new editorial comment upon it. + +The nimble study, No. 9, which bears the title of "The +Butterfly," is in G flat Von Bulow transposes it enharmonically +to F sharp, avoiding numerous double flats. The change is not +laudable. He holds anything but an elevated opinion of the piece, +classing it with a composition of the Charles Mayer order. This +is unjust; the study if not deep is graceful and certainly very +effective. It has lately become the stamping ground for the +display of piano athletics. Nearly all modern virtuosi pull to +pieces the wings of this gay little butterfly. They smash it, +they bang it, and, adding insult to cruelty, they finish it with +three chords, mounting an octave each time, thus giving a +conventional character to the close--the very thing the composer +avoids. Much distorted phrasing is also indulged in. The +Tellefsen's edition and Klindworth's give these differences: + +[Musical score excerpt] + +Mikuli, Von Bulow and Kullak place the legato bow over the first +three notes of the group. Riemann, of course, is different: + +[Musical score excerpt] + +The metronomic markings are about the same in all editions. + +Asiatic wildness, according to Von Bulow, pervades the B minor +study, op. 25, No. 10, although Willeby claims it to be only a +study in octaves "for the left hand"! Von Bulow furthermore +compares it, because of its monophonic character, to the Chorus +of Dervishes in Beethoven's "Ruins of Athens." Niecks says it is +"a real pandemonium; for a while holier sounds intervene, but +finally hell prevails." The study is for Kullak "somewhat far +fetched and forced in invention, and leaves one cold, although it +plunges on wildly to the end." Von Bulow has made the most +complete edition. Klindworth strengthens the first and the +seventh eighth notes of the fifth bar before the last by filling +in the harmonics of the left hand. This etude is an important +one, technically; because many pianists make little of it that +does not abate its musical significance, and I am almost inclined +to group it with the last two studies of this opus. The opening +is portentous and soon becomes a driving whirlwind of tone. +Chopin has never penned a lovelier melody than the one in B--the +middle section of this etude--it is only to be compared to the +one in the same key in the B minor Scherzo, while the return to +the first subject is managed as consummately as in the E flat +minor Scherzo, from op. 35. I confess to being stirred by this B +minor study, with its tempo at a forced draught and with its +precipitous close. There is a lushness about the octave melody; +the tune may be a little overripe, but it is sweet, sensuous +music, and about it hovers the hush of a rich evening in early +autumn. + +And now the "Winter Wind"--the study in A minor, op. 25, No. 11. +Here even Von Bulow becomes enthusiastic: + +"It must be mentioned as a particular merit of this, the longest +and, in every respect, the grandest of Chopin's studies, that, +while producing the greatest fulness of sound imaginable, it +keeps itself so entirely and utterly unorchestral, and represents +piano music in the most accurate sense of the word. To Chopin is +due the honor and credit of having set fast the boundary between +piano and orchestral music, which through other composers of the +romantic school, especially Robert Schumann, has been defaced and +blotted out, to the prejudice and damage of both species." + +Kullak is equally as warm in his praise of it: + + One of the grandest and most ingenious of Chopin's etudes, and + a companion piece to op. 10, No. 12, which perhaps it even + surpasses. It is a bravura study of the highest order; and is + captivating through the boldness and originality of its + passages, whose rising and falling waves, full of agitation, + overflow the entire keyboard; captivating through its harmonic + and modulatory shadings; and captivating, finally, through a + wonderfully invented little theme which is drawn like a "red + thread" through all the flashing and glittering waves of tone, + and which, as it were, prevents them from scattering to all + quarters of the heavens. This little theme, strictly speaking + only a phrase of two measures, is, in a certain sense, the + motto which serves as a superscription for the etude, + appearing first one voiced, and immediately afterward four + voiced. The slow time (Lento) shows the great importance which + is to be attached to it. They who have followed thus far and + agree with what has been said cannot be in doubt concerning + the proper artistic delivery. To execute the passages quite in + the rapid time prescribed one must possess a finished + technique. Great facility, lightness of touch, equality, + strength and endurance in the forte passages, together with + the clearest distinctness in the piano and pianissimo--all of + this must have been already achieved, for the interpreter must + devote his whole attention to the poetic contents of the + composition, especially to the delivery of the march-like + rhythms, which possess a life of their own, appearing now calm + and circumspect, and anon bold and challenging. The march-like + element naturally requires strict playing in time. + +This study is magnificent, and moreover it is music. + +In bar fifteen Von Bulow makes B natural the second note of the +last group, although all other editions, except Klindworth, use a +B flat. Von Bulow has common sense on his side. The B flat is a +misprint. The same authority recommends slow staccato practice, +with the lid of the piano closed. Then the hurly-burly of tone +will not intoxicate the player and submerge his critical faculty. + +Each editor has his notion of the phrasing of the initial +sixteenths. Thus Mikuli's--which is normal: + +[Musical score excerpt] + +Klindworth fingers this passage more ingeniously, but phrases it +about the same, omitting the sextolet mark. Kullak retains it. +Von Bulow makes his phrase run in this fashion: + +[Musical score excerpt] + +As regards grouping, Riemann follows Von Bulow, but places his +accents differently. + +The canvas is Chopin's largest--for the idea and its treatment +are on a vastly grander scale than any contained in the two +concertos. The latter are after all miniatures, precious ones if +you will, joined and built with cunning artifice; in neither work +is there the resistless overflow of this etude, which has been +compared to the screaming of the winter blasts. Ah, how Chopin +puts to flight those modern men who scheme out a big decorative +pattern and then have nothing wherewith to fill it! He never +relaxes his theme, and its fluctuating surprises are many. The +end is notable for the fact that scales appear. Chopin very +seldom uses scale figures in his studies. From Hummel to Thalberg +and Herz the keyboard had glittered with spangled scales. Chopin +must have been sick of them, as sick of them as of the left-hand +melody with arpeggiated accompaniment in the right, a la +Thalberg. Scales had been used too much, hence Chopin's sparing +employment of them. In the first C sharp minor study, op. 10, +there is a run for the left hand in the coda. In the seventh +study, same key, op. 25, there are more. The second study of op. +10, in A minor, is a chromatic scale study; but there are no +other specimens of the form until the mighty run at the +conclusion of this A minor study. + +It takes prodigious power and endurance to play this work, +prodigious power, passion and no little poetry. It is open air +music, storm music, and at times moves in processional splendor. +Small souled men, no matter how agile their fingers, should avoid +it. + +The prime technical difficulty is the management of the thumb. +Kullak has made a variant at the end for concert performance. It +is effective. The average metronomic marking is sixty-nine to the +half. + +Kullak thinks the twelfth and last study of op. 25 in C minor "a +grand, magnificent composition for practice in broken chord +passages for both hands, which requires no comment." I differ +from this worthy teacher. Rather is Niecks more to my taste: "No. +12, C minor, in which the emotions rise not less high than the +waves of arpeggios which symbolize them." + +Von Bulow is didactic: + + The requisite strength for this grandiose bravura study can + only be attained by the utmost clearness, and thus only by a + gradually increasing speed. It is therefore most desirable to + practise it piano also by way of variety, for otherwise the + strength of tone might easily degenerate into hardness, and in + the poetic striving after a realistic portrayal of a storm on + the piano the instrument, as well as the piece, would come to + grief. + + The pedal is needful to give the requisite effect, and must + change with every new harmony; but it should only be used in + the latter stages of study, when the difficulties are nearly + mastered. + +We have our preferences. Mine in op. 25 is the C minor study, +which, like the prelude in D minor, is "full of the sound of +great guns." Willeby thinks otherwise. On page 81 in his life of +Chopin he has the courage to write: "Had Professor Niecks applied +the term monotonous to No. 12 we should have been more ready to +indorse his opinion, as, although great power is manifested, the +very 'sameness' of the form of the arpeggio figure causes a +certain amount of monotony to be felt. "The C minor study is, in +a degree, a return to the first study in C. While the idea in the +former is infinitely nobler, more dramatic and tangible, there is +in the latter naked, primeval simplicity, the larger eloquence, +the elemental puissance. Monotonous? A thousand times no! +Monotonous as is the thunder and spray of the sea when it tumbles +and roars on some sullen, savage shore. Beethov-ian, in its +ruggedness, the Chopin of this C minor study is as far removed +from the musical dandyisms of the Parisian drawing rooms as is +Beethoven himself. It is orchestral in intention and a true epic +of the piano. + +Riemann places half notes at the beginning of each measure, as a +reminder of the necessary clinging of the thumbs. I like Von +Bulow's version the best of all. His directions are most minute. +He gives the Liszt method of working up the climax in octave +triplets. How Liszt must have thundered through this tumultuous +work! Before it all criticism should be silenced that fails to +allow Chopin a place among the greatest creative musicians. We +are here in the presence of Chopin the musician, not Chopin the +composer for piano. + + +III + + +In 1840, Trois Nouvelles Etudes, by Frederic Chopin, appeared in +the "Methode des Methodes pour le piano," by F. J. Fetis and I. +Moscheles. It was odd company for the Polish composer. "Internal +evidence seems to show," writes Niecks, "that these weakest of +the master's studies--which, however, are by no means +uninteresting and certainly very characteristic--may be regarded +more than op. 25 as the outcome of a gleaning." + +The last decade has added much to the artistic stature of these +three supplementary studies. They have something of the concision +of the Preludes. The first is a masterpiece. In F minor the theme +in triplet quarters, broad, sonorous and passionate, is unequally +pitted against four-eight notes in the bass. The technical +difficulty to be overcome is purely rhythmic, and Kullak takes +pains to show how it may be overcome. It is the musical, the +emotional content of the study that fascinates. The worthy editor +calls it a companion piece to the F minor study in op. 25. The +comparison is not an apt one. Far deeper is this new study, and +although the doors never swing quite open, we divine the tragic +issues concealed. + +Beautiful in a different way is the A flat study which follows. +Again the problem is a rhythmical one, and again the composer +demonstrates his exhaustless invention and his power of evoking a +single mood, viewing all its lovely contours and letting it melt +away like dream magic. Full of gentle sprightliness and lingering +sweetness is this study. Chopin has the hypnotic quality more +than any composer of the century, Richard Wagner excepted. After +you have enjoyed playing this study read Kullak and his +"triplicity in biplicity." It may do you good, and it will not +harm the music. + +In all the editions save one that I have seen the third study in +D flat begins on A flat, like the famous Valse in D flat. The +exception is Klindworth, who starts with B flat, the note above. +The study is full of sunny, good humor, spiritualized humor, and +leaves the most cheering impression after its performance. Its +technical object is a simultaneous legato and staccato. The +result is an idealized Valse in allegretto tempo, the very +incarnation of joy, tempered by aristocratic reserve. Chopin +never romps, but he jests wittily, and always in supremely good +taste. This study fitly closes his extraordinary labors in this +form, and it is as if he had signed it "F. Chopin, et ego in +Arcady." + +Among the various editions let me recommend Klindworth for daily +usage, while frequent reference to Von Bulow, Riemann and Kullak +cannot fail to prove valuable, curious and interesting. + +Of the making of Chopin editions there is seemingly no end. In +1894 I saw in manuscript some remarkable versions of the Chopin +Studies by Leopold Godowsky. The study in G sharp minor was the +first one published and played in public by this young pianist +Unlike the Brahms derangements, they are musical but immensely +difficult. Topsy-turvied as are the figures, a Chopin, even if +lop-sided, hovers about, sometimes with eye-brows uplifted, +sometimes with angry, knitted forehead and not seldom amused to +the point of smiling. You see his narrow shoulders, shrugged in +the Polish fashion as he examines the study in double-thirds +transposed to the left hand! Curiously enough this transcription, +difficult as it is, does not tax the fingers as much as a +bedevilment of the A minor, op. 25, No. 4, which is extremely +difficult, demanding color discrimination and individuality of +finger. + +More breath-catching, and a piece at which one must cry out: +"Hats off, gentlemen! A tornado!" is the caprice called +"Badinage." But if it is meant to badinage, it is no sport for +the pianist of everyday technical attainments. This is formed of +two studies. In the right hand is the G flat study, op. 25, No. +9, and in the left the black key study, op. 10, No. 5. The two go +laughing through the world like old friends; brother and sister +they are tonally, trailing behind them a cloud of iridescent +glory. Godowsky has cleverly combined the two, following their +melodic curves as nearly as is possible. In some places he has +thickened the harmonies and shifted the "black key" figures to +the right hand. It is the work of a remarkable pianist. This is +the way it looks on paper at the beginning: + +[Musical llustration] + +The same study G flat, op. 10, No. 5, is also treated separately, +the melody being transferred to the treble. The Butterfly +octaves, in another study, are made to hop nimbly along in the +left hand, and the C major study, op. 10, No. 7, Chopin's +Toccata, is arranged for the left hand, and seems very practical +and valuable. Here the adapter has displayed great taste and +skill, especially on the third page. The pretty musical idea is +not destroyed, but viewed from other points of vantage. Op. 10, +No. 2, is treated like a left hand study, as it should be. Chopin +did not always give enough work to the left hand, and the first +study of this opus in C is planned on brilliant lines for both +hands. Ingenious is the manipulation of the seldom played op. 25, +No. 5, in E minor. As a study in rhythms and double notes it is +very welcome. The F minor study, op. 25, No. 2, as considered by +the ambidextrous Godowsky, is put in the bass, where it whirrs +along to the melodic encouragement of a theme of the +paraphraser's own, in the right. This study has suffered the most +of all, for Brahms, in his heavy, Teutonic way, set it grinding +double sixths, while Isidor Philipp, in his "Studies for the Left +Hand," has harnessed it to sullen octaves. This Frenchman, by the +way, has also arranged for left hand alone the G sharp minor, the +D flat double sixths, the A minor--"Winter Wind"--studies, the B +flat minor prelude, and, terrible to relate, the last movement of +the Chopin B flat minor Sonata. + +Are the Godowsky transcriptions available? Certainly. In ten +years--so rapid is the technical standard advancing--they will be +used in the curriculum of students. Whether he has treated Chopin +with reverence I leave my betters to determine. What has +reverence to do with the case, anyhow? Plato is parsed in the +schoolroom, and Beethoven taught in conservatories! Therefore why +worry over the question of Godowsky's attitude! Besides, he is +writing for the next generation--presumably a generation of +Rosenthals. + +And now, having passed over the salt and stubbly domain of +pedagogics, what is the dominant impression gleaned from the +twenty-seven Chopin studies? Is it not one of admiration, tinged +with wonder at such a prodigal display of thematic and technical +invention? Their variety is great, the aesthetic side is nowhere +neglected for the purely mechanical, and in the most poetic of +them stuff may be found for delicate fingers. Astounding, +canorous, enchanting, alembicated and dramatic, the Chopin +studies are exemplary essays in emotion and manner. In them is +mirrored all of Chopin, the planetary as well as the secular +Chopin. When most of his piano music has gone the way of all +things fashioned by mortal hands, these studies will endure, will +stand for the nineteenth century as Beethoven crystallized the +eighteenth, Bach the seventeenth centuries in piano music. Chopin +is a classic. + + + +VII. MOODS IN MINIATURE:--THE PRELUDES. + + + +The Preludes bear the opus number 28 and are dedicated to J. C. +Kessler, a composer of well-known piano studies. It is only the +German edition that bears his name, the French and English being +inscribed by Chopin "a son ami Pleyel." As Pleyel advanced the +pianist 2,000 francs for the Preludes he had a right to say: +"These are my Preludes." Niecks is authority for Chopin's remark: +"I sold the Preludes to Pleyel because he liked them." This was +in 1838, when Chopin's health demanded a change of climate. He +wished to go to Majorca with Madame Sand and her children, and +had applied for money to the piano maker and publisher, Camille +Pleyel. He received but five hundred francs in advance, the +balance being paid on delivery of the manuscript. + +The Preludes were published in 1839, yet there is internal +evidence which proves that most of them had been composed before +the trip to the Balearic Islands. This will upset the very pretty +legend of music making at the monastery of Valdemosa. Have we not +all read with sweet credulity the eloquent pages in George Sand +in which the storm is described that overtook the novelist and +her son Maurice? After terrible trials, dangers and delays, they +reached their home and found Chopin at the piano. Uttering a cry, +he arose and stared at the pair. "Ah! I knew well that you were +dead." It was the sixth prelude, the one in B minor, that he +played, and dreaming, as Sand writes, that "he saw himself +drowned in a lake; heavy, ice cold drops of water fell at regular +intervals upon his breast; and when I called his attention to +those drops of water which were actually falling upon the roof, +he denied having heard them. He was even vexed at what I +translated by the term, imitative harmony. He protested with all +his might, and he was right, against the puerility of these +imitations for the ear. His genius was full of mysterious +harmonies of nature." + +Yet this prelude was composed previous to the Majorcan episode. +"The Preludes," says Niecks, "consist--to a great extent, at +least--of pickings from the composer's portfolios, of pieces, +sketches and memoranda written at various times and kept to be +utilized when occasion might offer." + +Gutmann, Chopin's pupil, who nursed him to the last, declared the +Preludes to have been composed before he went away with Madame +Sand, and to Niecks personally he maintained that he had copied +all of them. Niecks does not credit him altogether, for there are +letters in which several of the Preludes are mentioned as being +sent to Paris, so he reaches the conclusion that "Chopin's labors +at Majorca on the Preludes were confined to selecting, filing and +polishing." This seems to be a sensible solution. + +Robert Schumann wrote of these Preludes: "I must signalize them +as most remarkable. I will confess I expected something quite +different, carried out in the grand style of his studies. It is +almost the contrary here; these are sketches, the beginning of +studies, or, if you will, ruins, eagles' feathers, all strangely +intermingled. But in every piece we find in his own hand, +'Frederic Chopin wrote it.' One recognizes him in his pauses, in +his impetuous respiration. He is the boldest, the proudest poet +soul of his time. To be sure the book also contains some morbid, +feverish, repellant traits; but let everyone look in it for +something that will enchant him. Philistines, however, must keep +away." + +It was in these Preludes that Ignaz Moscheles first comprehended +Chopin and his methods of execution. The German pianist had found +his music harsh and dilettantish in modulation, but Chopin's +originality of performance--"he glides lightly over the keys in a +fairy-like way with his delicate fingers"--quite reconciled the +elder man to this strange music. + +To Liszt the Preludes seem modestly named, but "are not the less +types of perfection in a mode created by himself, and stamped +like all his other works with the high impress of his poetic +genius. Written in the commencement of his career, they are +characterized by a youthful vigor not to be found in some of his +subsequent works, even when more elaborate, finished and richer +in combinations; a vigor which is entirely lost in his latest +productions, marked by an overexcited sensibility, a morbid +irritability, and giving painful intimations of his own state of +suffering and exhaustion." + +Liszt, as usual, erred on the sentimental side. Chopin, being +essentially a man of moods, like many great men, and not +necessarily feminine in this respect, cannot always be pinned +down to any particular period. Several of the Preludes are very +morbid--I purposely use this word--as is some of his early music, +while he seems quite gay just before his death. + +"The Preludes follow out no technical idea, are free creations on +a small basis, and exhibit the musician in all his versatility," +says Louis Ehlert. "No work of Chopin's portrays his inner +organization so faithfully and completely. Much is embryonic. It +is as though he turned the leaves of his fancy without completely +reading any page. Still, one finds in them the thundering power +of the Scherzi, the half satirical, half coquettish elegance of +the Mazurkas, and the southern, luxuriously fragrant breath of +the Nocturnes. Often it is as though they were small falling +stars dissolved into tones as they fall." + +Jean Kleczynski, who is credited with understanding Chopin, +himself a Pole and a pianist, thinks that "people have gone too +far in seeking in the Preludes for traces of that misanthropy, of +that weariness of life to which he was prey during his stay in +the Island of Majorca...Very few of the Preludes present this +character of ennui, and that which is the most marked, the second +one, must have been written, according to Count Tarnowski, a long +time before he went to Majorca. ... What is there to say +concerning the other Preludes, full of good humor and gaiety--No. +18, in E flat; No. 21, in B flat; No. 23, in F, or the last, in D +minor? Is it not strong and energetic, concluding, as it does, +with three cannon shots?" + +Willeby in his "Frederic Francois Chopin" considers at length the +Preludes. He agrees in the main with Niecks, that certain of +these compositions were written at Valdemosa--Nos. 4, 6, 9, 13, +20 and 21--and that "Chopin, having sketches of others with him, +completed the whole there, and published them under one opus +number. ... The atmosphere of those I have named is morbid and +azotic; to them there clings a faint flavor of disease, a +something which is overripe in its lusciousness and febrile in +its passion. This in itself inclines me to believe they were +written at the time named." + +This is all very well, but Chopin was faint and febrile in his +music before he went to Majorca, and the plain facts adduced by +Gutmann and Niecks cannot be passed over. Henry James, an old +admirer of Madame Sand, admits her utter unreliability, and so we +may look upon her evidence as romantic but by no means +infallible. The case now stands: Chopin may have written a few of +the Preludes at Majorca, filed them, finished them, but the +majority of them were in his portfolio in 1837 and 1838. Op. 45, +a separate Prelude in C sharp minor, was published in December, +1841. It was composed at Nohant in August of that year. It is +dedicated to Mme. la Princesse Elizabeth Czernicheff, whose name, +as Chopin confesses in a letter, he knows not how to spell. + + +II + + +Theodore Kullak is curt and pedagogic in his preface to the +Preludes. He writes: + + Chopin's genius nowhere reveals itself more charmingly than + within narrowly bounded musical forms. The Preludes are, in + their aphoristic brevity, masterpieces of the first rank. Some + of them appear like briefly sketched mood pictures related to + the nocturne style, and offer no technical hindrance even to + the less advanced player. I mean Nos. 4, 6, 7, 9, 15 and 20. + More difficult are Nos. 17, 25 and 11, without, however, + demanding eminent virtuosity. The other Preludes belong to a + species of character-etude. Despite their brevity of outline + they are on a par with the great collections op. 10 and op. + 25. In so far as it is practicable--special cases of + individual endowments not being taken into consideration--I + would propose the following order of succession: Begin with + Nos. 1, 14, 10, 22, 23, 3 and 18. Very great bravura is + demanded by Nos. 12, 8, 16 and 24. The difficulty of the other + Preludes, Nos. 2, 5, 13, 19 and 21, lies in the delicate piano + and legato technique, which, on account of the extended + positions, leaps and double notes, presupposes a high degree + of development. + +This is eminently a common sense grouping. The first prelude, +which, like the first etude, begins in C, has all the +characteristics of an impromptu. We know the wonderful Bach +Preludes, which grew out of a free improvisation to the +collection of dance forms called a suite, and the preludes which +precede his fugues. In the latter Bach sometimes exhibits all the +objectivity of the study or toccata, and often wears his heart in +full view. Chopin's Preludes--the only preludes to be compared to +Bach's--are largely personal, subjective, and intimate. This +first one is not Bach-ian, yet it could have been written by no +one but a devout Bach student. The pulsating, passionate, +agitated, feverish, hasty qualities of the piece are modern; so +is the changeful modulation. It is a beautiful composition, +rising to no dramatic heights, but questioning and full of life. +Klindworth writes in triplet groups, Kullak in quintolets. +Breitkopf & Hartel do not. Dr. Hugo Riemann, who has edited a few +of the Preludes, phrases the first bars thus: + +Desperate and exasperating to the nerves is the second prelude in +A minor. It is an asymmetric tune. Chopin seldom wrote ugly +music, but is this not ugly, forlorn, despairing, almost +grotesque, and discordant? It indicates the deepest depression in +its sluggish, snake-like progression. Willeby finds a resemblance +to the theme of the first nocturne. And such a theme! The +tonality is vague, beginning in E minor. Chopin's method of +thematic parallelism is here very clear. A small figure is +repeated in descending keys until hopeless gloom and depraved +melancholy are reached in the closing chords. Chopin now is +morbid, here are all his most antipathetic qualities. There is +aversion to life--in this music he is a true lycanthrope. A self- +induced hypnosis, a mental, an emotional atrophy are all present. + +Kullak divides the accompaniment, difficult for small hands, +between the two. Riemann detaches the eighth notes of the bass +figures, as is his wont, for greater clearness. Like Klindworth, +he accents heavily the final chords. He marks his metronome 50 to +the half note. All the editions are lento with alla breve. + +That the Preludes are a sheaf of moods, loosely held together by +the rather vague title, is demonstrated by the third, in the key +of G. The rippling, rain-like figure for the left hand is in the +nature of a study. The melody is delicate in sentiment, Gallic in +its esprit. A true salon piece, this prelude has no hint of +artificiality. It is a precise antithesis to the mood of the +previous one. Graceful and gay, the G major prelude is a fair +reflex of Chopin's sensitive and naturally buoyant nature. It +requires a light hand and nimble fingers. The melodic idea +requires no special comment. Kullak phrases it differently from +Riemann and Klindworth. The latter is the preferable. Klindworth +gives 72 to the half note as his metronomic marking, Riemann only +60--which is too slow--while Klindworth contents himself by +marking a simple Vivace. Regarding the fingering one may say that +all tastes are pleased in these three editions. Klindworth's is +the easiest. Riemann breaks up the phrase in the bass figure, but +I cannot see the gain on the musical side. + +Niecks truthfully calls the fourth prelude in E minor "a little +poem, the exquisitely sweet, languid pensiveness of which defies +description. The composer seems to be absorbed in the narrow +sphere of his ego, from which the wide, noisy world is for the +time shut out." Willeby finds this prelude to be "one of the most +beautiful of these spontaneous sketches; for they are no more +than sketches. The melody seems literally to wail, and reaches +its greatest pitch of intensity at the stretto." For Karasowski +it is a "real gem, and alone would immortalize the name of Chopin +as a poet." It must have been this number that impelled +Rubinstein to assert that the Preludes were the pearls of his +works. In the Klindworth edition, fifth bar from the last, the +editor has filled in the harmonies to the first six notes of the +left hand, added thirds, which is not reprehensible, although +uncalled for. Kullak makes some new dynamic markings and several +enharmonic changes. He also gives as metronome 69 to the quarter. +This tiny prelude contains wonderful music. The grave reiteration +of the theme may have suggested to Peter Cornelius his song "Ein +Ton." Chopin expands a melodic unit, and one singularly pathetic. +The whole is like some canvas by Rembrandt, Rembrandt who first +dramatized the shadow in which a single motif is powerfully +handled; some sombre effect of echoing light in the profound of a +Dutch interior. For background Chopin has substituted his soul; +no one in art, except Bach or Rembrandt, could paint as Chopin +did in this composition. Its despair has the antique flavor, and +there is a breadth, nobility and proud submission quite free from +the tortured, whimpering complaint of the second prelude. The +picture is small, but the subject looms large in meanings. + +The fifth prelude in D is Chopin at his happiest. Its arabesque +pattern conveys a most charming content; and there is a dewy +freshness, a joy in life, that puts to flight much of the morbid +tittle-tattle about Chopin's sickly soul. The few bars of this +prelude, so seldom heard in public, reveal musicianship of the +highest order. The harmonic scheme is intricate; Klindworth +phrases the first four bars so as to bring out the alternate B +and B flat. It is Chopin spinning his finest, his most iridescent +web. + +The next prelude, the sixth, in B minor, is doleful, pessimistic. +As George Sand says: "It precipitates the soul into frightful +depression." It is the most frequently played--and oh! how +meaninglessly--prelude of the set; this and the one in D flat. +Classical is its repression of feeling, its pure contour. The +echo effect is skilfully managed, monotony being artfully +avoided. Klindworth rightfully slurs the duple group of eighths; +Kullak tries for the same effect by different means. The duality +of the voices should be clearly expressed. The tempo, marked in +both editions, lento assai, is fast. To be precise, Klindworth +gives 66 to the quarter. + +The plaintive little mazurka of two lines, the seventh prelude, +is a mere silhouette of the national dance. Yet in its measures +is compressed all Mazovia. Klindworth makes a variant in the +fourth bar from the last, a G sharp instead of an F sharp. It is +a more piquant climax, perhaps not admissible to the Chopin +purist. In the F sharp minor prelude No. 7, Chopin gives us a +taste of his grand manner. For Niecks the piece is jerky and +agitated, and doubtless suggests a mental condition bordering on +anxiety; but if frenzy there is, it is kept well in check by the +exemplary taste of the composer. The sadness is rather elegiac, +remote, and less poignant than in the E minor prelude. Harmonic +heights are reached on the second page--surely Wagner knew these +bars when he wrote "Tristan and Isolde"--while the ingenuity of +the figure and avoidance of a rhythmical monotone are evidences +of Chopin's feeling for the decorative. It is a masterly prelude. +Klindworth accents the first of the bass triplets, and makes an +unnecessary enharmonic change at the sixth and seventh lines. + +There is a measure of grave content in the ninth prelude in E. It +is rather gnomic, and contains hints of both Brahms and +Beethoven. It has an ethical quality, but that may be because of +its churchly rhythm and color. + +The C sharp minor prelude, No. 10, must be the "eagle wings" of +Schumann's critique. There is a flash of steel gray, deepening +into black, and then the vision vanishes as though some huge bird +aloft had plunged down through blazing sunlight, leaving a color- +echo in the void as it passed to its quarry. Or, to be less +figurative, this prelude is a study in arpeggio, with double +notes interspersed, and is too short to make more than a vivid +impression. + +No. II in B is all too brief. It is vivacious, dolce indeed, and +most cleverly constructed. Klindworth gives a more binding +character to the first double notes. Another gleam of the Chopin +sunshine. + +Storm clouds gather in the G sharp minor, the twelfth prelude, so +unwittingly imitated by Grieg in his Menuetto of the same key, +and in its driving presto we feel the passionate clench of +Chopin's hand. It is convulsed with woe, but the intellectual +grip, the self-command are never lost in these two pages of +perfect writing. The figure is suggestive, and there is a well +defined technical problem, as well as a psychical character. +Disputed territory is here: the editors do not agree about the +twelfth and eleventh bars from the last. According to Breitkopf & +Hartel the bass octaves are E both times. Mikuli gives G sharp +the first time instead of E; Klindworth, G sharp the second time; +Riemann, E, and also Kullak. The G sharp seems more various. + +In the thirteenth prelude, F sharp major, here is lovely +atmosphere, pure and peaceful. The composer has found mental +rest. Exquisitely poised are his pinions for flight, and in the +piu lento he wheels significantly and majestically about in the +blue. The return to earth is the signal for some strange +modulatory tactics. It is an impressive close. Then, almost +without pause, the blood begins to boil in this fragile man's +veins. His pulse beat increases, and with stifled rage he rushes +into the battle. It is the fourteenth prelude in the sinister key +of E flat minor, and its heavy, sullen-arched triplets recalls +for Niecks the last movement of the B flat minor Sonata; but +there is less interrogation in the prelude, less sophistication, +and the heat of conflict over it all. There is not a break in the +clouds until the beginning of the fifteenth, the familiar prelude +in D flat. + +This must be George Sand's: "Some of them create such vivid +impressions that the shades of dead monks seem to rise and pass +before the hearer in solemn and gloomy funereal pomp." The work +needs no programme. Its serene beginning, lugubrious interlude, +with the dominant pedal never ceasing, a basso ostinato, gives +color to Kleczynski's contention that the prelude in B minor is a +mere sketch of the idea fully elaborated in No. 15. "The +foundation of the picture is the drops of rain falling at regular +intervals"--the echo principle again--"which by their continual +patter bring the mind to a state of sadness; a melody full of +tears is heard through the rush of the rain; then passing to the +key of C sharp minor, it rises from the depths of the bass to a +prodigious crescendo, indicative of the terror which nature in +its deathly aspect excites in the heart of man. Here again the +form does not allow the ideas to become too sombre; +notwithstanding the melancholy which seizes you, a feeling of +tranquil grandeur revives you." To Niecks, the C sharp minor +portion affects one as in an oppressive dream: "The re-entrance +of the opening D flat, which dispels the dreadful nightmare, +comes upon one with the smiling freshness of dear, familiar +nature." + +The prelude has a nocturnal character. It has become slightly +banal from frequent repetition, likewise the C sharp minor study +in opus 25. But of its beauty, balance and exceeding chastity +there can be no doubt. The architecture is at once Greek and +Gothic. + +The sixteenth prelude in the relative key of B flat minor is the +boldest of the set. Its scale figures, seldom employed by Chopin, +boil and glitter, the thematic thread of the idea never being +quite submerged. Fascinating, full of perilous acclivities and +sudden treacherous descents, this most brilliant of preludes is +Chopin in riotous spirits. He plays with the keyboard: it is an +avalanche, anon a cascade, then a swift stream, which finally, +after mounting to the skies, descends to an abyss. Full of +imaginative lift, caprice and stormy dynamics, this prelude is +the darling of the virtuoso. Its pregnant introduction is like a +madly jutting rock from which the eagle spirit of the composer +precipitates itself. + +In the twenty-third bar there is curious editorial discrepancy. +Klindworth uses an A natural in the first of the four groups of +sixteenths, Kullak a B natural; Riemann follows Kullak. Nor is +this all. Kullak in the second group, right hand, has an E flat, +Klindworth a D natural. Which is correct? Klindworth's texture is +more closely chromatic and it sounds better, the chromatic +parallelism being more carefully preserved. Yet I fancy that +Kullak has tradition on his side. + +The seventeenth prelude Niecks finds Mendelssohn-ian. I do not. +It is suave, sweet, well developed, yet Chopin to the core, and +its harmonic life surprisingly rich and novel. The mood is one of +tranquillity. The soul loses itself in early autumnal revery +while there is yet splendor on earth and in the skies. Full of +tonal contrasts, this highly finished composition is grateful to +the touch. The eleven booming A flats on the last page are +historical. Klindworth uses a B flat instead of a G at the +beginning of the melody. It is logical, but is it Chopin? + +The fiery recitatives of No. 18 in F minor are a glimpse of +Chopin, muscular and not hectic. In these editions you will find +three different groupings of the cadenzas. It is Riemann's +opportunity for pedagogic editing, and he does not miss it. In +the first long breathed group of twenty-two sixteenth notes he +phrases as shown on the following page. + +It may be noticed that Riemann even changes the arrangement of +the bars. This prelude is dramatic almost to an operatic degree. +Sonorous, rather grandiloquent, it is a study in declamation, the +declamation of the slow movement in the F minor concerto. +Schumann may have had the first phrase in his mind when he wrote +his Aufschwung. This page of Chopin's, the torso of a larger +idea, is nobly rhetorical. + +[Musical score excerpt] + +What piano music is the nineteenth prelude in E flat! Its widely +dispersed harmonies, its murmuring grace and June-like beauty, +are they not Chopin, the Chopin we best love? He is ever the +necromancer, ever invoking phantoms, but with its whirring melody +and furtive caprice this particular shape is an alluring one. And +difficult it is to interpret with all its plangent lyric freedom. + +No. 2O in C minor contains in its thirteen bars the sorrows of a +nation. It is without doubt a sketch for a funeral march, and of +it George Sand must have been thinking when she wrote that one +prelude of Chopin contained more music than all the trumpetings +of Meyerbeer. + +Of exceeding loveliness is the B flat major prelude, No. 21. It +is superior in content and execution to most of the nocturnes. In +feeling it belongs to that form. The melody is enchanting. The +accompaniment figure shows inventive genius. Klindworth employs a +short appoggiatura, Kullak the long, in the second bar. Judge of +what is true editorial sciolism when I tell you that Riemann--who +evidently believes in a rigid melodic structure--has inserted an +E flat at the end of bar four, thus maiming the tender, elusive +quality of Chopin's theme. This is cruelly pedantic. The prelude +arrests one in ecstasy; the fixed period of contemplation of the +saint or the hypnotized sets in, and the awakening is almost +painful. Chopin, adopting the relative minor key as a pendant to +the picture in B flat, thrills the nerves by a bold dissonance in +the next prelude, No. 22. Again, concise paragraphs filled with +the smoke of revolt and conflict The impetuosity of this largely +moulded piece in G minor, its daring harmonics,--read the +seventeenth and eighteenth bars,--and dramatic note make it an +admirable companion to the Prelude in F minor. Technically it +serves as an octave study for the left hand. + +In the concluding bar, but one, Chopin has in the F major Prelude +attempted a most audacious feat in harmony. An E flat in the bass +of the third group of sixteenths leaves the whole composition +floating enigmatically in thin air. It deliciously colors the +close, leaving a sense of suspense, of anticipation which is not +tonally realized, for the succeeding number is in a widely +divorced key. But it must have pressed hard the philistines. And +this prelude, the twenty-third, is fashioned out of the most +volatile stuff. Aerial, imponderable, and like a sun-shot spider +web oscillating in the breeze of summer, its hues change at every +puff. It is in extended harmonics and must be delivered with +spirituality. The horny hand of the toilsome pianist would +shatter the delicate, swinging fantasy of the poet. Kullak points +out a variant in the fourteenth bar, G instead of B natural being +used by Riemann. Klindworth prefers the latter. + +We have reached the last prelude of op. 28. In D minor, it is +sonorously tragic, troubled by fevers and visions, and +capricious, irregular and massive in design. It may be placed +among Chopin's greater works: the two Etudes in C minor, the A +minor, and the F sharp minor Prelude. The bass requires an +unusual span, and the suggestion by Kullak, that the thumb of the +right hand may eke out the weakness of the left is only for the +timid and the small of fist. But I do not counsel following his +two variants in the fifth and twenty-third bars. Chopin's text is +more telling. Like the vast reverberation of monstrous waves on +the implacable coast of a remote world is this prelude. Despite +its fatalistic ring, its note of despair is not dispiriting. Its +issues are larger, more impersonal, more elemental than the other +preludes. It is a veritable Appassionata, but its theatre is +cosmic and no longer behind the closed doors of the cabinet of +Chopin's soul. The Seelenschrei of Stanislaw Przybyszewski is +here, explosions of wrath and revolt; not Chopin suffers, but his +countrymen. Kleczynski speaks of the three tones at the close. +They are the final clangor of oppressed, almost overthrown, +reason. After the subject reappears in C minor there is a shift +to D flat, and for a moment a point of repose is gained, but this +elusive rest is brief. The theme reappears in the tonic and in +octaves, and the tension becomes too great; the accumulated +passion discharges and dissolves in a fierce gust of double +chromatic thirds and octaves. Powerful, repellant, this prelude +is almost infernal in its pride and scorn. But in it I discern no +vestige of uncontrolled hysteria. It is well-nigh as strong, rank +and human as Beethoven. The various editorial phraseology is not +of much moment. Riemann uses thirty-second notes for the +cadenzas, Kullak eighths and Klindworth sixteenths. + +Niecks writes of the Prelude in C sharp minor, op. 45, that it +"deserves its name better than almost any one of the twenty-four; +still I would rather call it improvisata. It seems +unpremeditated, a heedless outpouring, when sitting at the piano +in a lonely, dreary hour, perhaps in the twilight. The quaver +figure rises aspiringly, and the sustained parts swell out +proudly. The piquant cadenza forestalls in the progression of +diminished chords favorite effects of some of our more modern +composers. The modulation from C sharp minor to D major and back +again--after the cadenza--is very striking and equally +beautiful." + +Elsewhere I have called attention to the Brahmsian coloring of +this prelude. Its mood is fugitive and hard to hold after +capture. Recondite it is and not music for the multitude. + +Niecks does not think Chopin created a new type in the Preludes. +"They are too unlike each other in form and character." Yet +notwithstanding the fleeting, evanescent moods of the Preludes, +there is designedly a certain unity of feeling and contrasted +tonalities, all being grouped in approved Bach-ian manner. This +may be demonstrated by playing them through at a sitting, which +Arthur Friedheim, the Russian virtuoso, did in a concert with +excellent effect. As if wishing to exhibit his genius in +perspective, Chopin carved these cameos with exceeding fineness, +exceeding care. In a few of them the idea overbalances the form, +but the greater number are exquisite examples of a just +proportion of manner and matter, a true blending of voice and +vision. Even in the more microscopic ones the tracery, echoing +like the spirals in strange seashells, is marvellously measured. +Much in miniature are these sculptured Preludes of the Polish +poet. + + + +VIII. IMPROMPTUS AND VALSES + + + +To write of the four Impromptus in their own key of unrestrained +feeling and pondered intention would not be as easy as +recapturing the first "careless rapture" of the lark. With all +the freedom of an improvisation the Chopin impromptu has a well +defined form. There is structural impulse, although the patterns +are free and original. The mood-color is not much varied in +three, the first, third and fourth, but in the second there is a +ballade-like quality that hints of the tragic. The A flat +Impromptu, op. 29, is, if one is pinned down to the title, the +happiest named of the set. Its seething, prankish, nimble, +bubbling quality is indicated from the start; the D natural in +the treble against the C and E flat--the dominant--in the bass is +a most original effect, and the flowing triplets of the first +part of this piece give a ductile, gracious, high-bred character +to it. The chromatic involutions are many and interesting. When +the F minor part is reached the ear experiences the relief of a +strongly contrasted rhythm. The simple duple measure, so +naturally ornamented, is nobly, broadly melodious. After the +return of the first dimpling theme there is a short coda, a +chiaroscura, and then with a few chords the composition goes to +rest. A bird flew that way! Rubato should be employed, for, as +Kleczynski says, "Here everything totters from foundation to +summit, and everything is, nevertheless, so beautiful and so +clear." But only an artist with velvety fingers should play this +sounding arabesque. + +There is more limpidezza, more pure grace of line in the first +Impromptu than in the second in F sharp, op. 36. Here symmetry is +abandoned, as Kullak remarks, but the compensation of intenser +emotional issues is offered. There is something sphinx-like in +the pose of this work. Its nocturnal beginning with the carillon- +like bass--a bass that ever recalls to me the faint, buried tones +of Hauptmann's "Sunken Bell," the sweetly grave close of the +section, the faint hoof-beats of an approaching cavalcade, with +the swelling thunders of its passage, surely suggests a +narrative, a programme. After the D major episode there are two +bars of anonymous modulation--these bars creak on their hinges-- +and the first subject reappears in F, then climbs to F sharp, +thence merges into a glittering melodic organ-point, exciting, +brilliant, the whole subsiding into an echo of earlier harmonies. +The final octaves are marked fortissimo which always seems +brutal. Yet its logic lies in the scheme of the composer. Perhaps +he wished to arouse us harshly from his dreamland, as was his +habit while improvising for friends--a glissando would send them +home shivering after an evening of delicious reverie. + +Niecks finds this Impromptu lacking the pith of the first. To me +it is of more moment than the other three. It is irregular and +wavering in outline, the moods are wandering and capricious, yet +who dares deny its power, its beauty? In its use of accessory +figures it does not reveal so much ingenuity, but just because +the "figure in the carpet" is not so varied in pattern, its +passion is all the deeper. It is another Ballade, sadder, more +meditative of the tender grace of vanished days. + +The third Impromptu in G flat, op. 51, is not often played. It +may be too difficult for the vandal with an average technique, +but it is neither so fresh in feeling nor so spontaneous in +utterance as its companions. There is a touch of the faded, +blase, and it is hardly healthy in sentiment. Here are some +ophidian curves in triplets, as in the first Impromptu, but with +interludes of double notes, in coloring tropical and rich to +morbidity. The E flat minor trio is a fine bit of melodic +writing. The absence of simplicity is counterbalanced by greater +freedom of modulation and complexity of pattern. The impromptu +flavor is not missing, and there is allied to delicacy of design +a strangeness of sentiment--that strangeness which Edgar Poe +declared should be a constituent element of all great art. + +The Fantaisie-Impromptu in C sharp minor, op. 66, was published +by Fontana in 1855, and is one of the few posthumous works of +Chopin worthy of consideration. It was composed about 1834. A +true Impromptu, but the title of Fantaisie given by Fontana is +superfluous. The piece presents difficulties, chiefly rhythmical. +Its involuted first phrases suggest the Bellini-an fioriture so +dear to Chopin, but the D flat part is without nobility. Here is +the same kind of saccharine melody that makes mawkish the trio in +the "Marche Funebre." There seems no danger that this Fantaisie- +Impromptu will suffer from neglect, for it is the joy of the +piano student, who turns its presto into a slow, blurred mess of +badly related rhythms, and its slower movement into a long drawn +sentimental agony; but in the hands of a master the C sharp minor +Impromptu is charming, though not of great depth. + +The first Impromptu, dedicated to Mlle. la Comtesse de Lobau, was +published December, 1837; the second, May, 1840; the third, +dedicated to Madame la Comtesse Esterhazy, February, 1843. Not +one of these four Impromptus is as naive as Schubert's; they are +more sophisticated and do not smell of nature and her +simplicities. + +Of the Chopin Valses it has been said that they are dances of the +soul and not of the body. Their animated rhythms, insouciant airs +and brilliant, coquettish atmosphere, the true atmosphere of the +ballroom, seem to smile at Ehlert's poetic exaggeration. The +valses are the most objective of the Chopin works, and in few of +them is there more than a hint of the sullen, Sargasson seas of +the nocturnes and scherzi. Nietzsche's la Gaya Scienza--the Gay +Science--is beautifully set forth in the fifteen Chopin valses. +They are less intimate, in the psychic sense, but exquisite +exemplars of social intimacy and aristocratic abandon. As +Schumann declared, the dancers of these valses should be at least +countesses. There is a high-bred reserve despite their +intoxication, and never a hint of the brawling peasants of +Beethoven, Grieg, Brahms, Tschaikowsky, and the rest. But little +of Vienna is in Chopin. Around the measures of this most popular +of dances he has thrown mystery, allurement, and in them secret +whisperings and the unconscious sigh. It is going too far not to +dance to some of this music, for it is putting Chopin away from +the world he at times loved. Certain of the valses may be danced: +the first, second, fifth, sixth, and a few others. The dancing +would be of necessity more picturesque and less conventional than +required by the average valse, and there must be fluctuations of +tempo, sudden surprises and abrupt languors. The mazurkas and +polonaises are danced to-day in Poland, why not the valses? +Chopin's genius reveals itself in these dance forms, and their +presentation should be not solely a psychic one. Kullak, stern +old pedagogue, divides these dances into two groups, the first +dedicated to "Terpsichore," the second a frame for moods. Chopin +admitted that he was unable to play valses in the Viennese +fashion, yet he has contrived to rival Strauss in his own genre. +Some of these valses are trivial, artificial, most of them are +bred of candlelight and the swish of silken attire, and a few are +poetically morbid and stray across the border into the rhythms of +the mazurka. All of them have been edited to death, reduced to +the commonplace by vulgar methods of performance, but are +altogether sprightly, delightful specimens of the composer's +careless, vagrant and happy moods. + +Kullak utters words of warning to the "unquiet" sex regarding the +habitual neglect of the bass. It should mean something in valse +tempo, but it usually does not. Nor need it be brutally banged; +the fundamental tone must be cared for, the subsidiary harmonies +lightly indicated. The rubato in the valses need not obtrude +itself as in the mazurkas. + +Opus 18, in E flat, was published in June, 1834, and dedicated to +Mile. Laura Harsford. It is a true ballroom picture, spirited and +infectious in rhythms. Schumann wrote rhapsodically of it. The D +flat section has a tang of the later Chopin. There is bustle, +even chatter, in this valse, which in form and content is +inferior to op. 34, No. I, A flat. The three valses of this set +were published December, 1838. There are many editorial +differences in the A flat Valse, owing to the careless way it was +copied and pirated. Klindworth and Kullak are the safest for +dynamic markings. This valse may be danced as far as its +dithyrhambic coda. Notice in this coda as in many other places +the debt Schumann owes Chopin for a certain passage in the +Preambule of his "Carneval." + +The next Valse in A minor has a tinge of Sarmatian melancholy, +indeed, it is one of Chopin's most desponding moods. The episode +in C rings of the mazurka, and the A major section is of +exceeding loveliness; Its coda is characteristic. This valse is a +favorite, and who need wonder? The F major Valse, the last of +this series, is a whirling, wild dance of atoms. It has the +perpetuum mobile quality, and older masters would have prolonged +its giddy arabesques into pages of senseless spinning. It is +quite long enough as it is. The second theme is better, but the +appoggiatures are flippant. It buzzes to the finish. Of it is +related that Chopin's cat sprang upon his keyboard and in its +feline flight gave him the idea of the first measures. I suppose +as there is a dog valse, there had to be one for the cat. + +But as Rossini would have said, "Ca sent de Scarlatti!" + +The A minor Valse was, of the three, Chopin's favorite. When +Stephen Heller told him this too was his beloved valse, Chopin +was greatly pleased, inviting the Hungarian composer, Niecks +relates, to luncheon at the Cafe Riche. + +Not improvised in the ballroom as the preceding, yet a marvellous +epitome is the A flat Valse, op. 42, published July, 1840. It is +the best rounded specimen of Chopin's experimenting with the +form. The prolonged trill on E flat, summoning us to the +ballroom, the suggestive intermingling of rhythms, duple and +triple, the coquetry, hesitation, passionate avowal and the +superb coda, with its echoes of evening--have not these episodes +a charm beyond compare? Only Schumann in certain pages of his +"Carneval" seizes the secret of young life and love, but his is +not so finished, so glowing a tableau. + +Regarding certain phrasing of this valse Moriz Rosenthal wrote to +the London "Musical Standard": + + In Music there is Liberty and Fraternity, but seldom Equality, + and in music Social Democracy has no voice. Notes have a right + to the Aftertone (Nachton), and this right depends upon their + role in the key. The Vorhalt (accented passing note) will + always have an accent. On this point Riemann must without + question be considered right. Likewise the feeling player will + mark those notes that introduce the transition to another key. + We will consider now our example and set down my accents: + + [Musical score excerpt] + + In the first bar we have the tonic chord of its major key as + bass, and are thus not forced to any accent. In the second bar + we have the dominant harmony in the bass, and in the treble, + C, which falls upon the down beat as Vorhalt to the next tone + (B flat), so it must be accented. Also in the fourth bar the B + flat is Vorhalt to the B flat, and likewise requires an + accent. In bars 6, 7 and 8 the notes, A flat, B flat and C, + are without doubt the characteristic ones of the passage, and + the E flat has in each case only a secondary significance. + + That a genius like Chopin did not indicate everything + accurately is quite explainable. He flew where we merely limp + after. Moreover, these accents must be felt rather than + executed, with softest touch, and as tenderly as possible. + +The D flat Valse--"le valse du petit chien"--is of George Sand's +own prompting. One evening at her home in the Square d'Orleans, +she was amused by her little pet dog, chasing its tail. She +begged Chopin, her little pet pianist, to set the tail to music. +He did so, and behold the world is richer for this piece. I do +not dispute the story. It seems well grounded, but then it is so +ineffably silly! The three valses of this op. 64 were published +September, 1847, and are respectively dedicated to the Comtesse +Delphine Potocka, the Baronne Nathaniel de Rothschild and the +Baronne Bronicka. + +I shall not presume to speak of the execution of the D flat +Valse; like the rich, it is always with us. It is usually taken +at a meaningless, rapid gait. I have heard it played by a genuine +Chopin pupil, M. Georges Mathias, and he did not take it +prestissimo. He ran up the D flat scale, ending with a sforzato +at the top, and gave a variety of nuance to the composition. The +cantabile is nearly always delivered with sloppiness of +sentiment. This valse has been served up in a highly indigestible +condition for concert purposes by Tausig, Joseffy--whose +arrangement was the first to be heard here--Theodore Ritter, +Rosenthal and Isidor Philipp. + +The C sharp minor Valse is the most poetic of all. The first +theme has never been excelled by Chopin for a species of veiled +melancholy. It is a fascinating, lyrical sorrow, and what Kullak +calls the psychologic motivation of the first theme in the +curving figure of the second does not relax the spell. A space of +clearer skies, warmer, more consoling winds are in the D flat +interlude, but the spirit of unrest, ennui returns. The elegiac +imprint is unmistakable in this soul dance. The A flat Valse +which follows is charming. It is for superior souls who dance +with intellectual joy, with the joy that comes of making +exquisite patterns and curves. Out of the salon and from its +brilliantly lighted spaces the dancers do not wander, do not +dance into the darkness and churchyard, as Ehlert imagines of +certain other valses. + +The two valses in op. 69, three valses, op. 70, and the two +remaining valses in E minor and E major, need not detain us. They +are posthumous. The first of op. 69 in F minor was composed in +1836; the B minor in 1829; G flat, op. 70, in 1835; F minor in +1843, and D flat major, 1830. The E major and E minor were +composed in 1829. Fontana gave these compositions to the world. +The F minor Valse, op. 69, No. 1, has a charm of its own. Kullak +prints the Fontana and Klindworth variants. This valse is suavely +melancholy, but not so melancholy as the B minor of the same +opus. It recalls in color the B minor mazurka. Very gay and +sprightly is the G flat Valse, op. 70, No. I. The next in F minor +has no special physiognomy, while the third in D flat contains, +as Niecks points out, germs of the op. 42 and the op. 34 Valses. +It recalls to me the D flat study in the supplementary series. +The E minor Valse, without opus, is beloved. It is very graceful +and not without sentiment. The major part is the early Chopin. +The E major Valse is published in the Mikuli edition. It is +commonplace, hinting of its composer only in places. Thus ends +the collection of valses, not Chopin's most signal success in +art, but a success that has dignified and given beauty to this +conventional dance form. + + + +IX. NIGHT AND ITS MELANCHOLY MYSTERIES:--THE NOCTURNES + + + +Here is the chronology of the nocturnes: Op. 9, three nocturnes, +January, 1833; op. 15, three nocturnes, January, 1834; op. 27, +two nocturnes, May, 1836; op. 32, two nocturnes, December, 1837; +op. 37, two nocturnes, May, 1840; op. 48, two nocturnes, +November, 1841; op. 55, two nocturnes, August, 1844; op. 62, two +nocturnes, September, 1846. In addition there is a nocturne +written in 1828 and published by Fontana, with the opus number +72, No. 2, and the lately discovered one in C sharp minor, +written when Chopin was young and published in 1895. This +completes the nocturne list, but following Niecks' system of +formal grouping I include the Berceuse and Barcarolle as full +fledged specimens of nocturnes. + +John Field has been described as the forerunner of Chopin. The +limpid style of this pupil and friend of Clementi, his beautiful +touch and finished execution, were certainly admired and imitated +by the Pole. Field's nocturnes are now neglected--so curious are +Time's caprices--and without warrant, for not only is Field the +creator of the form, but in both his concertos and nocturnes he +has written charming, sweet and sane music. He rather patronized +Chopin, for whose melancholy pose he had no patience. "He has a +talent of the hospital," growled Field in the intervals between +his wine drinking, pipe smoking and the washing of his linen--the +latter economical habit he contracted from Clementi. There is +some truth in his stricture. Chopin, seldom exuberantly cheerful, +is morbidly sad and complaining in many of the nocturnes. The +most admired of his compositions, with the exception of the +valses, they are in several instances his weakest. Yet he +ennobled the form originated by Field, giving it dramatic +breadth, passion and even grandeur. Set against Field's naive and +idyllic specimens, Chopin's efforts are often too bejewelled for +true simplicity, too lugubrious, too tropical--Asiatic is a +better word--and they have the exotic savor of the heated +conservatory, and not the fresh scent of the flowers reared in +the open by the less poetic Irishman. And, then, Chopin is so +desperately sentimental in some of these compositions. They are +not altogether to the taste of this generation; they seem to be +suffering from anaemia. However, there are a few noble nocturnes; +and methods of performance may have much to answer for the +sentimentalizing of some others. More vigor, a quickening of the +time-pulse, and a less languishing touch will rescue them from +lush sentiment. Chopin loved the night and its soft mysteries as +much as did Robert Louis Stevenson, and his nocturnes are true +night pieces, some with agitated, remorseful countenance, others +seen in profile only, while many are whisperings at dusk. Most of +them are called feminine, a term psychologically false. The +poetic side of men of genius is feminine, and in Chopin the +feminine note was over emphasized--at times it was almost +hysterical--particularly in these nocturnes. + +The Scotch have a proverb: "She wove her shroud, and wore it in +her lifetime." In the nocturnes the shroud is not far away. +Chopin wove his to the day of his death, and he wore it sometimes +but not always, as many think. + +One of the most elegiac of his nocturnes is the first in B flat +minor. It is one of three, op. 9, dedicated to Mme. Camille +Pleyel. Of far more significance than its two companions, it is, +for some reason, neglected. While I am far from agreeing with +those who hold that in the early Chopin all his genius was +completely revealed, yet this nocturne is as striking as the +last, for it is at once sensuous and dramatic, melancholy and +lovely. Emphatically a mood, it is best heard on a gray day of +the soul, when the times are out of joint; its silken tones will +bring a triste content as they pour out upon one's hearing. The +second section in octaves is of exceeding charm. As a melody it +has all the lurking voluptuousness and mystic crooning of its +composer. There is flux and reflux throughout, passion peeping +out in the coda. + +The E flat nocturne is graceful, shallow of content, but if it is +played with purity of touch and freedom from sentimentality it is +not nearly so banal as it usually seems. It is Field-like, +therefore play it as did Rubinstein, in a Field-like fashion. + +Hadow calls attention to the "remote and recondite modulations" +in the twelfth bar, the chromatic double notes. For him they only +are one real modulation, "the rest of the passage is an +iridescent play of color, an effect of superficies, not an effect +of substance." It was the E flat nocturne that unloosed +Rellstab's critical wrath in the "Iris." Of it he wrote: "Where +Field smiles, Chopin makes a grinning grimace; where Field sighs, +Chopin groans; where Field shrugs his shoulders, Chopin twists +his whole body; where Field puts some seasoning into the food, +Chopin empties a handful of cayenne pepper. In short, if one +holds Field's charming romances before a distorting, concave +mirror, so that every delicate impression becomes a coarse one, +one gets Chopin's work. We implore Mr. Chopin to return to +nature." + +Rellstab might have added that while Field was often commonplace, +Chopin never was. Rather is to be preferred the sound judgment of +J. W. Davison, the English critic and husband of the pianist, +Arabella Goddard. Of the early works he wrote: + + Commonplace is instinctively avoided in all the works of + Chopin--a stale cadence or a trite progression--a hum-drum + subject or a worn-out passage--a vulgar twist of the melody or + a hackneyed sequence--a meagre harmony or an unskilful + counterpoint--may in vain be looked for throughout the entire + range of his compositions, the prevailing characteristics of + which are a feeling as uncommon as beautiful; a treatment as + original as felicitous; a melody and a harmony as new, fresh, + vigorous and striking as they are utterly unexpected and out + of the original track. In taking up one of the works of Chopin + you are entering, as it were, a fairyland untrodden by human + footsteps--a path hitherto unfrequented but by the great + composer himself. + +Gracious, even coquettish, is the first part of the B major +Nocturne of this opus. Well knit, the passionate intermezzo has +the true dramatic Chopin ring. It should be taken alla breve. The +ending is quite effective. + +I do not care much for the F major Nocturne, op. 15, No. I. The +opus is dedicated to Ferdinand Hiller. Ehlert speaks of "the +ornament in triplets with which he brushes the theme as with the +gentle wings of a butterfly," and then discusses the artistic +value of the ornament which may be so profitably studied in the +Chopin music. "From its nature, the ornament can only beautify +the beautiful." Music like Chopin's, "with its predominating +elegance, could not forego ornament. But he surely did not +purchase it of a jeweller; he designed it himself, with a +delicate hand. He was the first to surround a note with diamond +facets and to weave the rushing floods of his emotions with the +silver beams of the moonlight. In his nocturnes there is a +glimmering as of distant stars. From these dreamy, heavenly gems +he has borrowed many a line. The Chopin nocturne is a dramatized +ornament. And why may not Art speak for once in such symbols? In +the much admired F sharp major Nocturne the principal theme makes +its appearance so richly decorated that one cannot avoid +imagining that his fancy confined itself to the Arabesque form +for the expression of its poetical sentiments. Even the middle +part borders upon what I should call the tragic style of +ornament. The ground thought is hidden behind a dense veil, but a +veil, too, can be an ornament." + +In another place Ehlert thinks that the F sharp major Nocturne +seems inseparable from champagne and truffles. It is certainly more +elegant and dramatic than the one in F major, which precedes it. +That, with the exception of the middle part in F minor, is weak, +although rather pretty and confiding. The F sharp Nocturne is +popular. The "doppio movemento" is extremely striking and the +entire piece is saturated with young life, love and feelings of +good will to men. Read Kleczynski. The third nocturne of the three +is in G minor, and contains some fine, picturesque writing. Kullak +does not find in it aught of the fantastic. The languid, +earth-weary voice of the opening and the churchly refrain of the +chorale, is not this fantastic contrast! This nocturne contains in +solution all that Chopin developed later in a nocturne of the same +key. But I think the first stronger--its lines are simpler, more +primitive, its coloring less complicated, yet quite as rich and +gloomy. Of it Chopin said: "After Hamlet," but changed his mind. +"Let them guess for themselves," was his sensible conclusion. +Kullak's programme has a conventional ring. It is the lament for +the beloved one, the lost Lenore, with the consolation of religion +thrown in. The "bell-tones" of the plain chant bring to my mind +little that consoles, although the piece ends in the major mode. It +is like Foe's "Ulalume." A complete and tiny tone poem, Rubinstein +made much of it. In the fourth bar and for three bars there is a +held note F, and I heard the Russian virtuoso, by some miraculous +means, keep this tone prolonged. The tempo is abnormally slow, and +the tone is not in a position where the sustaining pedal can +sensibly help it. Yet under Rubinstein's fingers it swelled and +diminished, and went singing into D, as if the instrument were an +organ. I suspected the inaudible changing of fingers on the note or +a sustaining pedal. It was wonderfully done. + +The next nocturne, op. 27, No. I, brings us before a masterpiece. +With the possible exception of the C minor Nocturne, this one in +the sombre key of C sharp minor is the great essay in the form. +Kleczynski finds it "a description of a calm night at Venice, +where, after a scene of murder, the sea closes over a corpse and +continues to serve as a mirror to the moonlight." This is +melodramatic. Willeby analyzes it at length with the scholarly +fervor of an English organist. He finds the accompaniment to be +"mostly on a double pedal," and remarks that "higher art than +this one could not have if simplicity of means be a factor of +high art." The wide-meshed figure of the left hand supports a +morbid, persistent melody that grates on the nerves. From the piu +mosso the agitation increases, and here let me call to your +notice the Beethoven-ish quality of these bars, which continue +until the change of signature. There is a surprising climax +followed by sunshine and favor in the D flat part, then after +mounting dissonances a bold succession of octaves returns to the +feverish plaint of the opening. Kullak speaks of a resemblance to +Meyerbeer's song, Le Moine. The composition reaches exalted +states. Its psychological tension is so great at times as to +border on a pathological condition. There is unhealthy power in +this nocturne, which is seldom interpreted with sinister +subtlety. Henry T. Finck rightfully thinks it "embodies a greater +variety of emotion and more genuine dramatic spirit on four pages +than many operas on four hundred." + +The companion picture in D flat, op. 27, No. 2, has, as +Karasowski writes, "a profusion of delicate fioriture." It really +contains but one subject, and is a song of the sweet summer of +two souls, for there is obvious meaning in the duality of voices. +Often heard in the concert room, this nocturne gives us a surfeit +of sixths and thirds of elaborate ornamentation and monotone of +mood. Yet it is a lovely, imploring melody, and harmonically most +interesting. A curious marking, and usually overlooked by +pianists, is the crescendo and con forza of the cadenza. This is +obviously erroneous. The theme, which occurs three times, should +first be piano, then pianissimo, and lastly forte. This opus is +dedicated to the Comtesse d'Appony. + +The best part of the next nocturne,--B major, op. 32, No. I, +dedicated to Madame de Billing--is the coda. It is in the minor +and is like the drum-beat of tragedy. The entire ending, a stormy +recitative, is in stern contrast to the dreamy beginning. Kullak +in the first bar of the last line uses a G; Fontana, F sharp, and +Klindworth the same as Kullak. The nocturne that follows in A +flat is a reversion to the Field type, the opening recalling that +master's B flat Nocturne. The F minor section of Chopin's +broadens out to dramatic reaches, but as an entirety this opus is +a little tiresome. Nor do I admire inordinately the Nocturne in G +minor, op. 37, No. 1. It has a complaining tone, and the choral +is not noteworthy. This particular part, so Chopin's pupil +Gutmann declared, is taken too slowly, the composer having +forgotten to mark the increased tempo. But the Nocturne in G, op. +37, No. 2, is charming. Painted with Chopin's most ethereal +brush, without the cloying splendors of the one in D flat, the +double sixths, fourths and thirds are magically euphonious. The +second subject, I agree with Karasowski, is the most beautiful +melody Chopin ever wrote. It is in true barcarolle vein; and most +subtle are the shifting harmonic hues. Pianists usually take the +first part too fast, the second too slowly, transforming this +poetic composition into an etude. As Schumann wrote of this opus: + +"The two nocturnes differ from his earlier ones chiefly through +greater simplicity of decoration and more quiet grace. We know +Chopin's fondness in general for spangles, gold trinkets and +pearls. He has already changed and grown older; decoration he +still loves, but it is of a more judicious kind, behind which the +nobility of the poetry shimmers through with all the more +loveliness: indeed, taste, the finest, must be granted him." + +Both numbers of this opus are without dedication. They are the +offspring of the trip to Majorca. + +Niecks, writing of the G major Nocturne, adjures us "not to tarry +too long in the treacherous atmosphere of this Capua--it +bewitches and unmans." Kleczynski calls the one in G minor +"homesickness," while the celebrated Nocturne in C minor "is the +tale of a still greater grief told in an agitated recitando; +celestial harps"--ah! I hear the squeak of the old romantic +machinery--"come to bring one ray of hope, which is powerless in +its endeavor to calm the wounded soul, which...sends forth to +heaven a cry of deepest anguish." It doubtless has its despairing +movement, this same Nocturne in C minor, op. 48, No. I, but +Karasowski is nearer right when he calls it "broad and most +imposing with its powerful intermediate movement, a thorough +departure from the nocturne style." Willeby finds it "sickly and +labored," and even Niecks does not think it should occupy a +foremost place among its companions. The ineluctable fact remains +that this is the noblest nocturne of them all. Biggest in +conception it seems a miniature music drama. It requires the +grand manner to read it adequately, and the doppio movemento is +exciting to a dramatic degree. I fully agree with Kullak that too +strict adherence to the marking of this section produces the +effect of an "inartistic precipitation" which robs the movement +of clarity. Kleczynski calls the work The Contrition of a Sinner +and devotes several pages to its elucidation. De Lenz chats most +entertainingly with Tausig about it. Indeed, an imposing march of +splendor is the second subject in C. A fitting pendant is this +work to the C sharp minor Nocturne. Both have the heroic quality, +both are free from mawkishness and are of the greater Chopin, the +Chopin of the mode masculine. + +Niecks makes a valuable suggestion: "In playing these nocturnes-- +op. 48--there occurred to me a remark of Schumann's, when he +reviewed some nocturnes by Count Wielhorski. He said that the +quick middle movements which Chopin frequently introduced into +his nocturnes are often weaker than his first conceptions; +meaning the first portions of his nocturnes. Now, although the +middle part in the present instances are, on the contrary, slower +movements, yet the judgment holds good; at least with respect to +the first nocturne, the middle part of which has nothing to +recommend it but a full, sonorous instrumentation, if I may use +this word in speaking of one instrument. The middle part of the +second--D flat, molto piu lento--however, is much finer; in it we +meet again, as we did in some other nocturnes, with soothing, +simple chord progressions. When Gutmann studied the C sharp minor +Nocturne with Chopin, the master told him that the middle section- +-the molto piu lento in D flat major--should be played as a +recitative. 'A tyrant commands'--the first two chords--he said, +'and the other asks for mercy.'" + +Of course Niecks means the F sharp minor, not the C sharp minor +Nocturne, op. 48, No. 2, dedicated, with the C minor, to Mlle. L. +Duperre. + +Opus 55, two nocturnes in F minor and E flat major, need not +detain us long. The first is familiar. Kleczynski devotes a page +or more to its execution. He seeks to vary the return of the +chief subject with nuances--as would an artistic singer the +couplets of a classic song. There are "cries of despair" in it, +but at last a "feeling of hope." Kullak writes of the last +measures: "Thank God--the goal is reached!" It is the relief of a +major key after prolonged wanderings in the minor. It is a nice +nocturne, neat in its sorrow, yet not epoch-making. The one +following has "the impression of an improvisation." It has also +the merit of being seldom heard. These two nocturnes are +dedicated to Mlle. J. W. Stirling. + +Opus 62 brings us to a pair in B major and E major inscribed to +Madame de Konneritz. The first, the Tuberose Nocturne, is faint +with a sick, rich odor. The climbing trellis of notes, that so +unexpectedly leads to the tonic, is charming and the chief tune +has charm, a fruity charm. It is highly ornate, its harmonies +dense, the entire surface overrun with wild ornamentation and a +profusion of trills. The piece--the third of its sort in the key +of B--is not easy. Mertke gives the following explication of the +famous chain trills: + +[Musical score excerpt] + +Although this nocturne is luxuriant in style, it deserves warmer +praise than is accorded it. Irregular as its outline is, its +troubled lyrism is appealing, is melting, and the A flat portion, +with its hesitating, timid accents, has great power of +attraction. The E major Nocturne has a bardic ring. Its song is +almost declamatory and not at all sentimental--unless so +distorted--as Niecks would have us imagine. The intermediate +portion is wavering and passionate, like the middle of the F +sharp major Nocturne. It shows no decrease in creative vigor or +lyrical fancy. The Klindworth version differs from the original, +as an examination of the following examples will show, the upper +being Chopin's: + +[Musical score excerpt] + +The posthumous nocturne in E minor, composed in 1827, is weak and +uninteresting. Moreover, it contains some very un-Chopin-like +modulations. The recently discovered nocturne in C sharp minor is +hardly a treasure trove. It is vague and reminiscent The +following note was issued by its London publishers, Ascherberg & +Co.: + + The first question, suggested by the announcement of a new + posthumous composition of Chopin's, will be "What proof is + there of its authenticity?" To musicians and amateurs who + cannot recognize the beautiful Nocturne in C sharp minor as + indeed the work of Chopin, it may in the first place be + pointed out that the original manuscript (of which a facsimile + is given on the title-page) is in Chopin's well-known + handwriting, and, secondly, that the composition, which is + strikingly characteristic, was at once accepted as the work of + Chopin by the distinguished composer and pianist Balakireff, + who played it for the first time in public at the Chopin + Commemoration Concert, held in the autumn of 1894 at Zelazowa + Wola, and afterward at Warsaw. This nocturne was addressed by + Chopin to his sister Louise, at Warsaw, in a letter from + Paris, and was written soon after the production of the two + lovely piano concertos, when Chopin was still a very young + man. It contains a quotation from his most admired Concerto in + F minor, and a brief reference to the charming song known as + the Maiden's Wish, two of his sister's favorite melodies. The + manuscript of the nocturne was supposed to have been destroyed + in the sacking of the Zamojski Palace, at Warsaw, toward the + end of the insurrection of 1863, but it was discovered quite + recently among papers of various kinds in the possession of a + Polish gentleman, a great collector, whose son offered Mr. + Polinski the privilege of selecting from such papers. His + choice was three manuscripts of Chopin's, one of them being + this nocturne. A letter from Mr. Polinski on the subject of + this nocturne is in the possession of Miss Janotha. + +Is this the nocturne of which Tausig spoke to his pupil Joseffy +as belonging to the Master's "best period," or did he refer to +the one in E minor? + +The Berceuse, op. 57, published June, 1845, and dedicated to +Mlle. Elise Gavard, is the very sophistication of the art of +musical ornamentation. It is built on a tonic and dominant bass-- +the triad of the tonic and the chord of the dominant seventh. A +rocking theme is set over this basso ostinato and the most +enchanting effects are produced. The rhythm never alters in the +bass, and against this background, the monotone of a dark, gray +sky, the composer arranges an astonishing variety of fireworks, +some florid, some subdued, but all delicate in tracery and +design. Modulations from pigeon egg blue to Nile green, most +misty and subtle modulations, dissolve before one's eyes, and for +a moment the sky is peppered with tiny stars in doubles, each +independently tinted. Within a small segment of the chromatic bow +Chopin has imprisoned new, strangely dissonant colors. It is a +miracle; and after the drawn-out chord of the dominant seventh +and the rain of silvery fire ceases one realizes that the whole +piece is a delicious illusion, but an ululation in the key of D +flat, the apotheosis of pyrotechnical colorature. + +Niecks quotes Alexandre Dumas fils, who calls the Berceuse "muted +music," but introduces a Turkish bath comparison, which crushes +the sentiment. Mertke shows the original and Klindworth's reading +of a certain part of the Berceuse, adding a footnote to the +examples: + +[Two musical score excerpts from Op. 57, one from the original +version, one from Klindworth's edition] + +[Footnote: Das tr (flat) der Originale (Scholtz tr natural-flat) +zeigt, dass Ch. den Triller mit Ganzton und nach Mikuli den +Trilleranfang mit Hauptton wollte.] The Barcarolle, op. 60, +published September, 1846, is another highly elaborated work. +Niecks must be quoted here: "One day Tausig, the great piano +virtuoso, promised W. de Lenz to play him Chopin's Barcarolle, +adding, 'That is a performance which must not be undertaken +before more than two persons. I shall play you my own self. I +love the piece, but take it rarely.' Lenz got the music, but it +did not please him--it seemed to him a long movement in the +nocturne style, a Babel of figuration on a lightly laid +foundation. But he found that he had made a mistake, and, after +hearing it played by Tausig, confessed that the virtuoso had +infused into the 'nine pages of enervating music, of one and the +same long-breathed rhythm, so much interest, so much motion, so +much action,' that he regretted the long piece was not longer." + +Tausig's conception of the barcarolle was this: "There are two +persons concerned in the affair; it is a love scene in a discrete +gondola; let us say this mise-en-scene is the symbol of a lover's +meeting generally." + +"This is expressed in thirds and sixths; the dualism of two +notes--persons--is maintained throughout; all is two-voiced, two- +souled. In this modulation in C sharp major--superscribed dolce +sfogato--there are kiss and embrace! This is evident! When, after +three bars of introduction, the theme, 'lightly rocking in the +bass solo,' enters in the fourth, this theme is nevertheless made +use of throughout the whole fabric only as an accompaniment, and +ON this the cantilena in two parts is laid; we have thus a +continuous, tender dialogue." + +The Barcarolle is a nocturne painted on a large canvas, with +larger brushes. It has Italian color in spots--Schumann said +that, melodically, Chopin sometimes "leans over Germany into +Italy"--and is a masterly one in sentiment, pulsating with +amorousness. To me it sounds like a lament for the splendors, now +vanished, of Venice the Queen. In bars 8, 9, and 10, counting +backward, Louis Ehlert finds obscurities in the middle voices. It +is dedicated to the Baronne de Stockhausen. + +The nocturnes--including the Berceuse and Barcarolle--should +seldom be played in public and not the public of a large hall. +Something of Chopin's delicate, tender warmth and spiritual voice +is lost in larger spaces. In a small auditorium, and from the +fingers of a sympathetic pianist, the nocturnes should be heard, +that their intimate, night side may be revealed. Many are like +the music en sourdine of Paul Verlaine in his "Chanson D'Automne" +or "Le Piano que Baise une Main Frele." They are essentially for +the twilight, for solitary enclosures, where their still, +mysterious tones--"silent thunder in the leaves" as Yeats sings-- +become eloquent and disclose the poetry and pain of their +creator. + + + +X. THE BALLADES:--FAERY DRAMAS + + + +W. H. Hadow has said some pertinent things about Chopin in +"Studies in Modern Music." Yet we cannot accept unconditionally +his statement that "in structure Chopin is a child playing with a +few simple types, and almost helpless as soon as he advances +beyond them; in phraseology he is a master whose felicitous +perfection of style is one of the abiding treasures of the art." + +Chopin then, according to Hadow, is no "builder of the lofty +rhyme," but the poet of the single line, the maker of the phrase +exquisite. This is hardly comprehensive. With the more complex, +classical types of the musical organism Chopin had little +sympathy, but he contrived nevertheless to write two movements of +a piano sonata that are excellent--the first half of the B flat +minor Sonata. The idealized dance forms he preferred; the +Polonaise, Mazurka and Valse were already there for him to +handle, but the Ballade was not. Here he is not imitator, but +creator. Not loosely-jointed, but compact structures glowing with +genius and presenting definite unity of form and expression, are +the ballades--commonly written in six-eight and six-four time. +"None of Chopin's compositions surpasses in masterliness of form +and beauty and poetry of contents his ballades. In them he +attains the acme of his power as an artist," remarks Niecks. + +I am ever reminded of Andrew Lang's lines, "the thunder and surge +of the Odyssey," when listening to the G minor Ballade, op. 23. +It is the Odyssey of Chopin's soul. That 'cello-like largo with +its noiseless suspension stays us for a moment in the courtyard +of Chopin's House Beautiful. Then, told in his most dreamy tones, +the legend begins. As in some fabulous tales of the Genii this +Ballade discloses surprising and delicious things. There is the +tall lily in the fountain that nods to the sun. It drips in +cadenced monotone and its song is repeated on the lips of the +slender-hipped girl with the eyes of midnight--and so might I +weave for you a story of what I see in the Ballade and you would +be aghast or puzzled. With such a composition any programme could +be sworn to, even the silly story of the Englishman who haunted +Chopin, beseeching him to teach him this Ballade. That Chopin had +a programme, a definite one, there can be no doubt; but he has, +wise artist, left us no clue beyond Mickiewicz's, the Polish bard +Lithuanian poems. In Leipzig, Karasowski relates, that when +Schumann met Chopin, the pianist confessed having "been incited +to the creation of the ballades by the poetry" of his fellow +countryman. The true narrative tone is in this symmetrically +constructed Ballade, the most spirited, most daring work of +Chopin, according to Schumann. Louis Ehlert says of the four +Ballades: "Each one differs entirely from the others, and they +have but one thing in common--their romantic working out and the +nobility of their motives. Chopin relates in them, not like one +who communicates something really experienced; it is as though he +told what never took place, but what has sprung up in his inmost +soul, the anticipation of something longed for. They may contain +a strong element of national woe, much outwardly expressed and +inwardly burning rage over the sufferings of his native land; yet +they do not carry with a positive reality like that which in a +Beethoven Sonata will often call words to our lips." Which means +that Chopin was not such a realist as Beethoven? Ehlert is one of +the few sympathetic German Chopin commentators, yet he did not +always indicate the salient outlines of his art. Only the Slav +may hope to understand Chopin thoroughly. But these Ballades are +more truly touched by the universal than any other of his works. +They belong as much to the world as to Poland. + +The G minor Ballade after "Konrad Wallenrod," is a logical, well +knit and largely planned composition. The closest parallelism may +be detected in its composition of themes. Its second theme in E +flat is lovely in line, color and sentiment. The return of the +first theme in A minor and the quick answer in E of the second +are evidences of Chopin's feeling for organic unity. Development, +as in strict cyclic forms, there is not a little. After the +cadenza, built on a figure of wavering tonality, a valse-like +theme emerges and enjoys a capricious, butterfly existence. It is +fascinating. Passage work of an etherealized character leads to +the second subject, now augmented and treated with a broad brush. +The first questioning theme is heard again, and with a +perpendicular roar the presto comes upon us. For two pages the +dynamic energy displayed by the composer is almost appalling. A +whirlwind I have called it elsewhere. It is a storm of the +emotions, muscular in its virility. I remember de Pachmann--a +close interpreter of certain sides of Chopin--playing this coda +piano, pianissimo and prestissimo. The effect was strangely +irritating to the nerves, and reminded me of a tornado seen from +the wrong end of an opera glass. According to his own lights the +Russian virtuoso was right: his strength was not equal to the +task, and so, imitating Chopin, he topsy-turvied the shading. It +recalled Moscheles' description of Chopin's playing: "His piano +is so softly breathed forth that he does not require any strong +forte to produce the wished for contrast." + +This G minor Ballade was published in June, 1836, and is +dedicated to Baron Stockhausen. The last bar of the introduction +has caused some controversy. Gutmann, Mikuli and other pupils +declare for the E flat; Klindworth and Kullak use it. Xaver +Scharwenka has seen fit to edit Klindworth, and gives a D natural +in the Augener edition. That he is wrong internal testimony +abundantly proves. Even Willeby, who personally prefers the D +natural, thinks Chopin intended the E flat, and quotes a similar +effect twenty-eight bars later. He might have added that the +entire composition contains examples--look at the first bar of +the valse episode in the bass. As Niecks thinks, "This dissonant +E flat may be said to be the emotional keynote of the whole poem. +It is a questioning thought that, like a sudden pain, shoots +through mind and body." + +There is other and more confirmatory evidence. Ferdinand Von +Inten, a New York pianist, saw the original Chopin manuscript at +Stuttgart. It was the property of Professor Lebert (Levy), since +deceased, and in it, without any question, stands the much +discussed E flat. This testimony is final. The D natural robs the +bar of all meaning. It is insipid, colorless. + +Kullak gives 60 to the half note at the moderato. On the third +page, third bar, he uses F natural in the treble. So does +Klindworth, although F sharp may be found in some editions. On +the last page, second bar, first line, Kullak writes the passage +beginning with E flat in eighth notes, Klindworth in sixteenths. +The close is very striking, full of the splendors of glancing +scales and shrill octave progressions. "It would inspire a poet +to write words to it," said Robert Schumann. + +"Perhaps the most touching of all that Chopin has written is the +tale of the F major Ballade. I have witnessed children lay aside +their games to listen thereto. It appears like some fairy tale +that has become music. The four-voiced part has such a clearness +withal, it seems as if warm spring breezes were waving the lithe +leaves of the palm tree. How soft and sweet a breath steals over +the senses and the heart!" + +And how difficult it seems to be to write of Chopin except in +terms of impassioned prose! Louis Ehlert, a romantic in feeling +and a classicist in theory, is the writer of the foregoing. The +second Ballade, although dedicated to Robert Schumann, did not +excite his warmest praise. "A less artistic work than the first," +he wrote, "but equally fantastic and intellectual. Its +impassioned episodes seem to have been afterward inserted. I +recollect very well that when Chopin played this Ballade for me +it finished in F major; it now closes in A minor." Willeby gives +its key as F minor. It is really in the keys of F major--A minor. +Chopin's psychology was seldom at fault. A major ending would +have crushed this extraordinary tone-poem, written, Chopin +admits, under the direct inspiration of Adam Mickiewicz's "Le Lac +de Willis." Willeby accepts Schumann's dictum of the inferiority +of this Ballade to its predecessor. Niecks does not. Niecks is +quite justified in asking how "two such wholly dissimilar things +can be compared and weighed in this fashion." + +In truth they cannot. "The second Ballade possesses beauties in +no way inferior to those of the first," he continues. "What can +be finer than the simple strains of the opening section! They +sound as if they had been drawn from the people's store-house of +song. The entrance of the presto surprises, and seems out of +keeping with what precedes; but what we hear after the return of +tempo primo--the development of those simple strains, or rather +the cogitations on them--justifies the presence of the presto. +The second appearance of the latter leads to an urging, restless +coda in A minor, which closes in the same key and pianissimo with +a few bars of the simple, serene, now veiled first strain." + +Rubinstein bore great love for this second Ballade. This is what +it meant for him: "Is it possible that the interpreter does not +feel the necessity of representing to his audience--a field +flower caught by a gust of wind, a caressing of the flower by the +wind; the resistance of the flower, the stormy struggle of the +wind; the entreaty of the flower, which at last lies there +broken; and paraphrased--the field flower a rustic maiden, the +wind a knight." + +I can find "no lack of affinity" between the andantino and +presto. The surprise is a dramatic one, withal rudely vigorous. +Chopin's robust treatment of the first theme results in a strong +piece of craftmanship. The episodical nature of this Ballade is +the fruit of the esoteric moods of its composer. It follows a +hidden story, and has the quality--as the second Impromptu in F +sharp--of great, unpremeditated art. It shocks one by its abrupt +but by no means fantastic transitions. The key color is +changeful, and the fluctuating themes are well contrasted. It was +written at Majorca while the composer was only too noticeably +disturbed in body and soul. + +Presto con fuoco Chopin marks the second section. Kullak gives 84 +to the quarter, and for the opening 66 to the quarter. He also +wisely marks crescendos in the bass at the first thematic +development. He prefers the E--as does Klindworth--nine bars +before the return of the presto. At the eighth bar, after this +return, Kullak adheres to the E instead of F at the beginning of +the bar, treble clef. Klindworth indicates both. Nor does Kullak +follow Mikuli in using a D in the coda. He prefers a D sharp, +instead of a natural. I wish the second Ballade were played +oftener in public. It is quite neglected for the third in A flat, +which, as Ehlert says, has the voice of the people. + +This Ballade, the "Undine" of Mickiewicz, published November, +1841, and dedicated to Mlle. P. de Noailles, is too well known to +analyze. It is the schoolgirls' delight, who familiarly toy with +its demon, seeing only favor and prettiness in its elegant +measures. In it "the refined, gifted Pole, who is accustomed to +move in the most distinguished circles of the French capital, is +pre-eminently to be recognized." Thus Schumann. Forsooth, it is +aristocratic, gay, graceful, piquant, and also something more. +Even in its playful moments there is delicate irony, a spiritual +sporting with graver and more passionate emotions. Those broken +octaves which usher in each time the second theme, with its +fascinating, infectious, rhythmical lilt, what an ironically +joyous fillip they give the imagination! + +"A coquettish grace--if we accept by this expression that half +unconscious toying with the power that charms and fires, that +follows up confession with reluctance--seems the very essence of +Chopin's being." + +"It becomes a difficult task to transcribe the easy transitions, +full of an irresistible charm, with which he portrays Love's +game. Who will not recall the memorable passage in the A flat +Ballade, where the right hand alone takes up the dotted eighths +after the sustained chord of the sixth of A flat? Could a lover's +confusion be more deliciously enhanced by silence and +hesitation?" Ehlert above evidently sees a ballroom picture of +brilliancy, with the regulation tender avowal. The episodes of +this Ballade are so attenuated of any grosser elements that none +but psychical meanings should be read into them. + +The disputed passage is on the fifth page of the Kullak edition, +after the trills. A measure is missing in Kullak, who, like +Klindworth, gives it in a footnote. To my mind this repetition +adds emphasis, although it is a formal blur. And what an +irresistible moment it is, this delightful territory, before the +darker mood of the C sharp minor part is reached! Niecks becomes +enthusiastic over the insinuation and persuasion of this +composition: "the composer showing himself in a fundamentally +caressing mood." The ease with which the entire work is floated +proves that Chopin in mental health was not daunted by larger +forms. There is moonlight in this music, and some sunlight, too. +The prevailing moods are coquetry and sweet contentment. + +Contrapuntal skill is shown in the working out section. Chopin +always wears his learning lightly; it does not oppress us. The +inverted dominant pedal in the C sharp minor episode reveals, +with the massive coda, a great master. Kullak suggests some +variants. He uses the transient shake in the third bar, instead +of the appoggiatura which Klindworth prefers. Klindworth attacks +the trill on the second page with the upper tone--A flat. Kullak +and Mertke, in the Steingraber edition, play the passage in this +manner: [Musical score excerpt from the original version of the +Op. 47. Ballade] + +Here is Klindworth: + +[Musical score excerpt of the same passage in Klindworth's +edition] + +Of the fourth and glorious Ballade in F minor dedicated to +Baronne C. de Rothschild I could write a volume. It is Chopin in +his most reflective, yet lyric mood. Lyrism is the keynote of the +work, a passionate lyrism, with a note of self-absorption, +suppressed feeling--truly Slavic, this shyness!--and a +concentration that is remarkable even for Chopin. The narrative +tone is missing after the first page, a rather moody and +melancholic pondering usurping its place. It is the mood of a man +who examines with morbid, curious insistence the malady that is +devouring his soul. This Ballade is the companion of the +Fantaisie-Polonaise, but as a Ballade "fully worthy of its +sisters," to quote Niecks. It was published December, 1843. The +theme in F minor has the elusive charm of a slow, mournful valse, +that returns twice, bejewelled, yet never overladen. Here is the +very apotheosis of the ornament; the figuration sets off the idea +in dazzling relief. There are episodes, transitional passage +work, distinguished by novelty and the finest art. At no place is +there display for display's sake. The cadenza in A is a pause for +breath, rather a sigh, before the rigorously logical imitations +which presage the re-entrance of the theme. How wonderfully the +introduction comes in for its share of thoughtful treatment. What +a harmonist! And consider the D flat scale runs in the left hand; +how suave, how satisfying is this page. I select for especial +admiration this modulatory passage: + +[Musical score excerpt] + +And what could be more evocative of dramatic suspense than the +sixteen bars before the mad, terrifying coda! How the solemn +splendors of the half notes weave an atmosphere of mystic +tragedy! This soul-suspension recalls Maeterlinck. Here is the +episode: + +[Musical score excerpt] + +A story of de Lenz that lends itself to quotation is about this +piece: + + Tausig impressed me deeply in his interpretation of Chopin's + Ballade in F minor. It has three requirements: The + comprehension of the programme as a whole,--for Chopin writes + according to a programme, to the situations in life best known + to, and understood by himself; and in an adequate manner; the + conquest of the stupendous difficulties in complicated + figures, winding harmonies and formidable passages. + + Tausig fulfilled these requirements, presenting an embodiment + of the signification and the feeling of the work. The Ballade-- + andante con moto, six-eighths--begins in the major key of the + dominant; the seventh measure comes to a stand before a + fermata on C major. The easy handling of these seven measures + Tausig interpreted thus: 'The piece has not yet begun;' in his + firmer, nobly expressive exposition of the principal theme, + free from sentimentality--to which one might easily yield--the + grand style found due scope. An essential requirement in an + instrumental virtuoso is that he should understand how to + breathe, and how to allow his hearers to take breath--giving + them opportunity to arrive at a better understanding. By this + I mean a well chosen incision--the cesura, and a lingering-- + "letting in air," Tausig cleverly called it--which in no way + impairs rhythm and time, but rather brings them into stronger + relief; a LINGERING which our signs of notation cannot + adequately express, because it is made up of atomic time + values. Rub the bloom from a peach or from a butterfly--what + remains will belong to the kitchen, to natural history! It is + not otherwise with Chopin; the bloom consisted in Tausig's + treatment of the Ballade. + + He came to the first passage--the motive among blossoms and + leaves--a figurated recurrence to the principal theme is in + the inner parts--its polyphonic variant. A little thread + connects this with the chorale-like introduction of the second + theme. The theme is strongly and abruptly modulated, perhaps a + little too much so. Tausig tied the little thread to a doppio + movimento in two-four time, but thereby resulted sextolets, + which threw the chorale into still bolder relief. Then + followed a passage a tempo, in which the principal theme + played hide and seek. How clear it all became as Tausig played + it! Of technical difficulties he knew literally nothing; the + intricate and evasive parts were as easy as the easiest--I + might say easier! + + I admired the short trills in the left hand, which were + trilled out quite independently, as if by a second player; the + gliding ease of the cadence marked dolcissimo. It swung itself + into the higher register, where it came to a stop before A + major, just as the introduction stopped before C major. Then, + after the theme has once more presented itself in a modified + form--variant--it comes under the pestle of an extremely + figurate coda, which demands the study of an artist, the + strength of a robust man--the most vigorous pianistic health, + in a word! Tausig overcame this threatening group of terrific + difficulties, whose appearance in the piece is well explained + by the programme, without the slightest effect. The coda, in + modulated harp tones, came to a stop before a fermata which + corresponded to those before mentioned, in order to cast + anchor in the haven of the dominant, finishing with a witches' + dance of triplets, doubled in thirds. This piece winds up with + extreme bravura. + +The "lingering" mentioned by de Lenz is tempo rubato, so fatally +misunderstood by most Chopin players. De Lenz in a note quotes +Meyerbeer as saying--Meyerbeer, who quarrelled with Chopin about +the rhythm of a mazurka--"Can one reduce women to notation? They +would breed mischief, were they emancipated from the measure." + +There is passion, refined and swelling, in the curves of this +most eloquent composition. It is Chopin at the supreme summit of +his art, an art alembicated, personal and intoxicating. I know of +nothing in music like the F minor Ballade. Bach in the Chromatic +Fantasia--be not deceived by its classical contours, it is music +hot from the soul--Beethoven in the first movement of the C sharp +minor Sonata, the arioso of the Sonata op. 110, and possibly +Schumann in the opening of his C major Fantaisie, are as +intimate, as personal as the F minor Ballade, which is as subtly +distinctive as the hands and smile of Lisa Gioconda. Its +inaccessible position preserves it from rude and irreverent +treatment. Its witchery is irresistible. + + + +XI. CLASSICAL CURRENTS + + + +Guy de Maupassant put before us a widely diverse number of novels +in a famous essay attached to the definitive edition of his +masterpiece, "Pierre et Jean," and puzzlingly demanded the real +form of the novel. If "Don Quixote" is one, how can "Madame +Bovary" be another? If "Les Miserables" is included in the list, +what are we to say to Huysmans' "La Bas"? + +Just such a question I should like to propound, substituting +sonata for novel. If Scarlatti wrote sonatas, what is the +Appassionata? If the A flat Weber is one, can the F minor Brahms +be called a sonata? Is the Haydn form orthodox and the Schumann +heterodox? These be enigmas to make weary the formalists. Come, +let us confess, and in the open air: there is a great amount of +hypocrisy and cant in this matter. We can, as can any +conservatory student, give the recipe for turning out a smug +specimen of the form, but when we study the great examples, it is +just the subtle eluding of hard and fast rules that distinguishes +the efforts of the masters from the machine work of apprentices +and academic monsters. Because it is no servile copy of the +Mozart Sonata, the F sharp minor of Brahms is a piece of original +art. Beethoven at first trod in the well blazed path of Haydn, +but study his second period, and it sounds the big Beethoven +note. There is no final court of appeal in the matter of musical +form, and there is none in the matter of literary style. The +history of the sonata is the history of musical evolution. Every +great composer, Schubert included, added to the form, filed here, +chipped away there, introduced lawlessness where reigned prim +order--witness the Schumann F sharp minor Sonata--and then came +Chopin. + +The Chopin sonata has caused almost as much warfare as the Wagner +music drama. It is all the more ludicrous, for Chopin never wrote +but one piano sonata that has a classical complexion: in C minor, +op. 4, and it was composed as early as 1828. Not published until +July, 1851, it demonstrates without a possibility of doubt that +the composer had no sympathy with the form. He tried so hard and +failed so dismally that it is a relief when the second and third +sonatas are reached, for in them there are only traces of formal +beauty and organic unity. But then there is much Chopin, while +little of his precious essence is to be tasted in the first +sonata. + +Chopin wrote of the C minor Sonata: "As a pupil I dedicated it to +Elsner," and--oh, the irony of criticism!--it was praised by the +critics because not so revolutionary as the Variations, op. 2. +This, too, despite the larghetto in five-four time. The first +movement is wheezing and all but lifeless. One asks in +astonishment what Chopin is doing in this gallery. And it is +technically difficult. The menuetto is excellent, its trio being +a faint approach to Beethoven in color. The unaccustomed rhythm +of the slow movement is irritating. Our young Chopin does not +move about as freely as Benjamin Godard in the scherzo of his +violin and piano sonata in the same bizarre rhythm. Niecks sees +naught but barren waste in the finale. I disagree with him. There +is the breath of a stirring spirit, an imitative attempt that is +more diverting than the other movements. Above all there is +movement, and the close is vigorous, though banal. The sonata is +the dullest music penned by Chopin, but as a whole it hangs +together as a sonata better than its two successors. So much for +an attempt at strict devotion to scholastic form. + +From this schoolroom we are transported in op. 35 to the theatre +of larger life and passion. The B flat minor Sonata was published +May, 1840. Two movements are masterpieces; the funeral march that +forms the third movement is one of the Pole's most popular +compositions, while the finale has no parallel in piano music. +Schumann says that Chopin here "bound together four of his +maddest children," and he is not astray. He thinks the march does +not belong to the work. It certainly was written before its +companion movements. As much as Hadow admires the first two +movements, he groans at the last pair, though they are admirable +when considered separately. + +These four movements have no common life. Chopin says he intended +the strange finale as a gossiping commentary on the march. "The +left hand unisono with the right hand are gossiping after the +march." Perhaps the last two movements do hold together, but what +have they in common with the first two? Tonality proves nothing. +Notwithstanding the grandeur and beauty of the grave, the power +and passion of the scherzo, this Sonata in B flat minor is not +more a sonata than it is a sequence of ballades and scherzi. And +again we are at the de Maupassant crux. The work never could be +spared; it is Chopin mounted for action and in the thick of the +fight. The doppio movimento is pulse-stirring--a strong, curt and +characteristic theme for treatment. Here is power, and in the +expanding prologue flashes more than a hint of the tragic. The D +flat Melody is soothing, charged with magnetism, and urged to a +splendid fever of climax. The working out section is too short +and dissonantal, but there is development, perhaps more technical +than logical--I mean by this more pianistic than intellectually +musical--and we mount with the composer until the B flat version +of the second subject is reached, for the first subject, strange +to say, does not return. From that on to the firm chords of the +close there is no misstep, no faltering or obscurity. Noble pages +have been read, and the scherzo is approached with eagerness. +Again there is no disappointment. On numerous occasions I have +testified my regard for this movement in warm and uncritical +terms. It is simply unapproachable, and has no equal for +lucidity, brevity and polish among the works of Chopin, except +the Scherzo in C sharp minor; but there is less irony, more +muscularity, and more native sweetness in this E flat minor +Scherzo. I like the way Kullak marks the first B flat octave. It +is a pregnant beginning. The second bar I have never heard from +any pianist save Rubinstein given with the proper crescendo. No +one else seems to get it explosive enough within the walls of one +bar. It is a true Rossin-ian crescendo. And in what a wild +country we are landed when the F sharp minor is crashed out! +Stormy chromatic double notes, chords of the sixth, rush on with +incredible fury, and the scherzo ends on the very apex of +passion. A Trio in G flat is the song of songs, its swaying +rhythms and phrase-echoings investing a melody at once sensuous +and chaste. The second part and the return to the scherzo are +proofs of the composer's sense of balance and knowledge of the +mysteries of anticipation. The closest parallelisms are +noticeable, the technique so admirable that the scherzo floats in +mid-air--Flaubert's ideal of a miraculous style. + +And then follows that deadly Marche Funebre! Ernest Newman, in +his remarkable "Study of Wagner," speaks of the fundamental +difference between the two orders of imagination, as exemplified +by Beethoven and Chopin on the one side, Wagner on the other. +This regarding the funeral marches of the three. Newman finds +Wagner's the more concrete imagination; the "inward picture" of +Beethoven, and Chopin "much vaguer and more diffused." Yet Chopin +is seldom so realistic; here are the bell-like basses, the morbid +coloring. Schumann found "it contained much that is repulsive," +and Liszt raves rhapsodically over it; for Karasowski it was the +"pain and grief of an entire nation," while Ehlert thinks "it +owes its renown to the wonderful effect of two triads, which in +their combination possess a highly tragical element. The middle +movement is not at all characteristic. Why could it not at least +have worn second mourning? After so much black crepe drapery one +should not at least at once display white lingerie!" This is +cruel. + +The D flat Trio is a logical relief after the booming and +glooming of the opening. That it is "a rapturous gaze into the +beatific regions of a beyond," as Niecks writes, I am not +prepared to say. We do know, however, that the march, when +isolated, has a much more profound effect than in its normal +sequence. The presto is too wonderful for words. Rubinstein, or +was it originally Tausig who named it "Night winds sweeping over +the churchyard graves"? Its agitated, whirring, unharmonized +triplets are strangely disquieting, and can never be mistaken for +mere etude passage work. The movement is too sombre, its curves +too full of half-suppressed meanings, its rush and sub-human +growling too expressive of something that defies definition. +Schumann compares it to a "sphinx with a mocking smile." To Henri +Barbadette "C'est Lazare grattant de ses ongles la pierre de son +tombeau," or, like Mendelssohn, one may abhor it, yet it cannot +be ignored. It has Asiatic coloring, and to me seems like the +wavering outlines of light-tipped hills seen sharply en +silhouette, behind which rises and falls a faint, infernal glow. +This art paints as many differing pictures as there are +imaginations for its sonorous background; not alone the universal +solvent, as Henry James thinks, it bridges the vast, silent gulfs +between human souls with its humming eloquence. This sonata is +not dedicated. + +The third Sonata in B minor, op. 58, has more of that undefinable +"organic unity," yet, withal, it is not so powerful, so pathos- +breeding or so compact of thematic interest as its forerunner. +The first page, to the chromatic chords of the sixth, promises +much. There is a clear statement, a sound theme for developing +purposes, the crisp march of chord progressions, and then--the +edifice goes up in smoke. After wreathings and curlings of +passage work, and on the rim of despair, we witness the exquisite +budding of the melody in D. It is an aubade, a nocturne of the +morn--if the contradictory phrase be allowed. There is morning +freshness in its hue and scent, and, when it bursts, a parterre +of roses. The close of the section is inimitable. All the more +sorrow at what follows: wild disorder and the luxuriance called +tropical. When B major is compassed we sigh, for it augurs us a +return of delight. The ending is not that of a sonata, but a love +lyric. For Chopin is not the cool breadth and marmoreal majesty +of blank verse. He sonnets to perfection, but the epical air does +not fill his nostrils. + +Vivacious, charming, light as a harebell in the soft breeze is +the Scherzo in E flat. It has a clear ring of the scherzo and +harks back to Weber in its impersonal, amiable hurry. The largo +is tranquilly beautiful, rich in its reverie, lovely in its tune. +The trio is reserved and hypnotic. The last movement, with its +brilliancy and force, is a favorite, but it lacks weight, and the +entire sonata is, as Niecks writes, "affiliated, but not +cognate." It was published June, 1845, and is dedicated to +Comtesse E. de Perthuis. + +So these sonatas of Chopin are not sonatas at all, but, throwing +titles to the dogs, would we forego the sensations that two of +them evoke? There is still another, the Sonata in G minor, op. +65, for piano and 'cello. It is dedicated to Chopin's friend, +August Franchomme, the violoncellist. Now, while I by no means +share Finck's exalted impression of this work, yet I fancy the +critics have dealt too harshly with it. Robbed of its title of +sonata--though sedulously aping this form--it contains much +pretty music. And it is grateful for the 'cello. There is not an +abundant literature for this kingly instrument, in conjunction +with the piano, so why flaunt Chopin's contribution? I will admit +that he walks stiffly, encased in his borrowed garb, but there is +the andante, short as it is, an effective scherzo and a carefully +made allegro and finale. Tonal monotony is the worst charge to be +brought against this work. + +The trio, also in G minor, op. 8, is more alluring. It was +published March, 1833, and dedicated to Prince Anton Radziwill. +Chopin later, in speaking of it to a pupil, admitted that he saw +things he would like to change. He regretted not making it for +viola, instead of violin, 'cello and piano. + +It was worked over a long time, the first movement being ready in +1833. When it appeared it won philistine praise, for its form +more nearly approximates the sonata than any of his efforts in +the cyclical order, excepting op. 4. In it the piano receives +better treatment than the other instruments; there are many +virtuoso passages, but again key changes are not frequent or +disparate enough to avoid a monotone. Chopin's imagination +refuses to become excited when working in the open spaces of the +sonata form. Like creatures that remain drab of hue in +unsympathetic or dangerous environment, his music is transformed +to a bewildering bouquet of color when he breathes native air. +Compare the wildly modulating Chopin of the ballades to the tame- +pacing Chopin of the sonatas, trio and concertos! The trio opens +with fire, the scherzo is fanciful, and the adagio charming, +while the finale is cheerful to loveliness. It might figure +occasionally on the programmes of our chamber music concerts, +despite its youthful puerility. + +There remain the two concertos, which I do not intend discussing +fully. Not Chopin at his very best, the E minor and F minor +concertos are frequently heard because of the chances afforded +the solo player. I have written elsewhere at length of the +Klindworth, Tausig and Burmeister versions of the two concertos. +As time passes I see no reason for amending my views on this +troublous subject. Edgar S. Kelly holds a potent brief for the +original orchestration, contending that it suits the character of +the piano part. Rosenthal puts this belief into practice by +playing the older version of the E minor with the first long +tutti curtailed. But he is not consistent, for he uses the Tausig +octaves at the close of the rondo. While I admire the Tausig +orchestration, these particlar octaves are hideously cacaphonic. +The original triplet unisons are so much more graceful and +musical. + +The chronology of the concertos has given rise to controversy. +The trouble arose from the F minor Concerto, it being numbered +op. 21, although composed before the one in E minor. The former +was published April, 1836; the latter September, 1833. The slow +movement of the F minor Concerto was composed by Chopin during +his passion for Constantia Gladowska. She was "the ideal" he +mentions in his letters, the adagio of this concerto. This +larghetto in A flat is a trifle too ornamental for my taste, +mellifluous and serene as it is. The recitative is finely +outlined. I think I like best the romanze of the E minor +Concerto. It is less flowery. The C sharp minor part is imperious +in its beauty, while the murmuring mystery of the close mounts to +the imagination. The rondo is frolicksome, tricky, genial and +genuine piano music. It is true the first movement is too long, +too much in one set of keys, and the working-out section too much +in the nature of a technical study. The first movement of the F +minor far transcends it in breadth, passion and musical feeling, +but it is short and there is no coda. Richard Burmeister has +supplied the latter deficiency in a capitally made cadenza, which +Paderewski plays. It is a complete summing up of the movement. +The mazurka-like finale is very graceful and full of pure, sweet +melody. This concerto is altogether more human than the E minor. + +Both derive from Hummel and Field. The passage work is superior +in design to that of the earlier masters, the general character +episodical,--but episodes of rare worth and originality. As +Ehlert says, "Noblesse oblige--and thus Chopin felt himself +compelled to satisfy all demands exacted of a pianist, and wrote +the unavoidable piano concerto. It was not consistent with his +nature to express himself in broad terms. His lungs were too weak +for the pace in seven league boots, so often required in a score. +The trio and 'cello sonata were also tasks for whose +accomplishment Nature did not design him. He must touch the keys +by himself without being called upon to heed the players sitting +next him. He is at his best when without formal restraint, he can +create out of his inmost soul." + +"He must touch the keys by himself!" There you have summed up in +a phrase the reason Chopin never succeeded in impressing his +individuality upon the sonata form and his playing upon the +masses. His was the lonely soul. George Sand knew this when she +wrote, "He made an instrument speak the language of the infinite. +Often in ten lines that a child might play he has introduced +poems of unequalled elevation, dramas unrivalled in force and +energy. He did not need the great material methods to find +expression for his genius. Neither saxophone nor ophicleide was +necessary for him to fill the soul with awe. Without church organ +or human voice he inspired faith and enthusiasm." + +It might be remarked here that Beethoven, too, aroused a +wondering and worshipping world without the aid of saxophone or +ophicleide. But it is needless cruelty to pick at Madame Sand's +criticisms. She had no technical education, and so little +appreciation of Chopin's peculiar genius for the piano that she +could write, "The day will come when his music will be arranged +for orchestra without change of the piano score;" which is +disaster-breeding nonsense. We have sounded Chopin's weakness +when writing for any instrument but his own, when writing in any +form but his own. + +The E minor Concerto is dedicated to Frederick Kalkbrenner, the F +minor to the Comtesse Deiphine Potocka. The latter dedication +demonstrates that he could forget his only "ideal" in the +presence of the charming Potocka! Ah! these vibratile and +versatile Poles! + +Robert Schumann, it is related, shook his head wearily when his +early work was mentioned. "Dreary stuff," said the composer, +whose critical sense did not fail him even in so personal a +question. What Chopin thought of his youthful music may be +discovered in his scanty correspondence. To suppose that the +young Chopin sprang into the arena a fully equipped warrior is +one of those nonsensical notions which gains currency among +persons unfamiliar with the law of musical evolution. Chopin's +musical ancestry is easily traced; as Poe had his Holley Chivers, +Chopin had his Field. The germs of his second period are all +there; from op. 1 to opus 22 virtuosity for virtuosity's sake is +very evident. Liszt has said that in every young artist there is +the virtuoso fever, and Chopin being a pianist did not escape the +fever of the footlights. He was composing, too, at a time when +piano music was well nigh strangled by excess of ornament, when +acrobats were kings, when the Bach Fugue and Beethoven Sonata +lurked neglected and dusty in the memories of the few. Little +wonder, then, we find this individual, youthful Pole, not timidly +treading in the path of popular composition, but bravely carrying +his banner, spangled, glittering and fanciful, and outstripping +at their own game all the virtuosi of Europe. His originality in +this bejewelled work caused Hummel to admire and Kalkbrenner to +wonder. The supple fingers of the young man from Warsaw made +quick work of existing technical difficulties. He needs must +invent some of his own, and when Schumann saw the pages of op. 2 +he uttered his historical cry. Today we wonder somewhat at his +enthusiasm. It is the old story--a generation seeks to know, a +generation comprehends and enjoys, and a generation discards. + +Opus 1, a Rondo in C minor, dedicated to Madame de Linde, saw the +light in 1825, but it was preceded by two polonaises, a set of +variations, and two mazurkas in G and B flat major. Schumann +declared that Chopin's first published work was his tenth, and +that between op. 1 and 2 there lay two years and twenty works. Be +this as it may, one cannot help liking the C minor Rondo. In the +A flat section we detect traces of his F minor Concerto. There is +lightness, joy in creation, which contrast with the heavy, dour +quality of the C minor Sonata, op. 4. Loosely constructed, in a +formal sense, and too exuberant for his strict confines, this op. +1 is remarkable, much more remarkable, than Schumann's Abegg +variations. + +The Rondo a la Mazur, in F, is a further advance. It is dedicated +to Comtesse Moriolles, and was published in 1827 (?). Schumann +reviewed it in 1836. It is sprightly, Polish in feeling and +rhythmic life, and a glance at any of its pages gives us the +familiar Chopin impression--florid passage work, chords in +extensions and chromatic progressions. The Concert Rondo, op. 14, +in F, called Krakowiak, is built on a national dance in two-four +time, which originated in Cracovia. It is, to quote Niecks, a +modified polonaise, danced by the peasants with lusty abandon. +Its accentual life is usually manifested on an unaccented part of +the bar, especially at the end of a section or phrase. Chopin's +very Slavic version is spirited, but the virtuoso predominates. +There is lushness in ornamentation, and a bold, merry spirit +informs every page. The orchestral accompaniment is thin. +Dedicated to the Princesse Czartoryska, it was published June, +1834. The Rondo, op. 16, with an Introduction, is in great favor +at the conservatories, and is neat rather than poetical, although +the introduction has dramatic touches. It is to this brilliant +piece, with its Weber-ish affinities, that Richard Burmeister has +supplied an orchestral accompaniment. + +The remaining Rondo, posthumously published as op. 73, and +composed in 1828, was originally intended, so Chopin writes in +1828, for one piano. It is full of fire, but the ornamentation +runs mad, and no traces of the poetical Chopin are present. He is +preoccupied with the brilliant surfaces of the life about him. +His youthful expansiveness finds a fair field in these +variations, rondos and fantasias. + +Schumann's enthusiasm over the variations on "La ci darem la +mano" seems to us a little overdone. Chopin had not much gift for +variation in the sense that we now understand variation. +Beethoven, Schumann and Brahms--one must include Mendelssohn's +Serious Variations--are masters of a form that is by no means +structurally simple or a reversion to mere spielerei, as Finck +fancies. Chopin plays with his themes prettily, but it is all +surface display, all heat lightning. He never smites, as does +Brahms with his Thor hammer, the subject full in the middle, +cleaving it to its core. Chopin is slightly effeminate in his +variations, and they are true specimens of spielerei, despite the +cleverness of design in the arabesques, their brilliancy and +euphony. Op. 2 has its dazzling moments, but its musical worth is +inferior. It is written to split the ears of the groundlings, or +rather to astonish and confuse them, for the Chopin dynamics in +the early music are never very rude. The indisputable superiority +to Herz and the rest of the shallow-pated variationists caused +Schumann's passionate admiration. It has, however, given us an +interesting page of music criticism. Rellstab, grumpy old fellow, +was near right when he wrote of these variations that "the +composer runs down the theme with roulades, and throttles and +hangs it with chains of shakes." The skip makes its appearance in +the fourth variation, and there is no gainsaying the brilliancy +and piquant spirit of the Alla Polacca. Op. 2 is orchestrally +accompanied, an accompaniment that may be gladly dispensed with, +and dedicated by Chopin to the friend of his youth, Titus +Woyciechowski. + +Je Vends des Scapulaires is a tune in Herold and Halevy's +"Ludovic." Chopin varied it in his op. 12. This rondo in B flat +is the weakest of Chopin's muse. It is Chopin and water, and +Gallic eau sucree at that. The piece is written tastefully, is +not difficult, but woefully artificial. Published in 1833, it was +dedicated to Miss Emma Horsford. In May, 1851, appeared the +Variations in E, without an opus number. They are not worth the +trouble. Evidently composed before Chopin's op. 1 and before +1830, they are musically light waisted, although written by one +who already knew the keyboard. The last, a valse, is the +brightest of the set. The theme is German. + +The Fantaisie, op 13, in A, on Polish airs, preceded by an +introduction in F sharp minor, is dedicated to the pianist J. P. +Pixis. It was published in April, 1834. It is Chopin brilliant. +Its orchestral background does not count for much, but the +energy, the color and Polish character of the piece endeared it +to the composer. He played it often, and as Kleczynski asks, "Are +these brilliant passages, these cascades of pearly notes, these +bold leaps the sadness and the despair of which we hear? Is it +not rather youth exuberant with intensity and life? Is it not +happiness, gayety, love for the world and men? The melancholy +notes are there to bring out, to enforce the principal ideas. For +instance, in the Fantaisie, op. 13, the theme of Kurpinski moves +and saddens us; but the composer does not give time for this +impression to become durable; he suspends it by means of a long +trill, and then suddenly by a few chords and with a brilliant +prelude leads us to a popular dance, which makes us mingle with +the peasant couples of Mazovia. Does the finale indicate by its +minor key the gayety of a man devoid of hope--as the Germans +say?" Kleczynski then tells us that a Polish proverb, "A fig for +misery," is the keynote of a nation that dances furiously to +music in the minor key. "Elevated beauty, not sepulchral gayety," +is the character of Polish, of Chopin's music. This is a valuable +hint. There are variations in the Fantaisie which end with a +merry and vivacious Kujawiak. + +The F minor Fantaisie will be considered later. Neither by its +magnificent content, construction nor opus number (49) does it +fall into this chapter. + +The Allegro de Concert in A, op. 46, was published in November, +1841, and dedicated to Mlle. Friederike Muller, a pupil of +Chopin. It has all the characteristics of a concerto, and is +indeed a truncated one--much more so than Schumann's F minor +Sonata, called Concert Sans Orchestre. There are tutti in the +Chopin work, the solo part not really beginning until the eighty- +seventh bar. But it must not be supposed that these long +introductory passages are ineffective for the player. The Allegro +is one of Chopin's most difficult works. It abounds in risky +skips, ambuscades of dangerous double notes, and the principal +themes are bold and expressive. The color note is strikingly +adapted for public performance, and perhaps Schumann was correct +in believing that Chopin had originally sketched this for piano +and orchestra. Niecks asks if this is not the fragment of a +concerto for two pianos, which Chopin, in a letter written at +Vienna, December 21, 1830, said he would play in public with his +friend Nidecki, if he succeeded in writing it to his +satisfaction. And is there any significance in the fact that +Chopin, when sending this manuscript to Fontana, probably in the +summer of 1841, calls it a concerto? + +While it adds little to Chopin's reputation, it has the +potentialities of a powerful and more manly composition than +either of the two concertos. Jean Louis Nicode has given it an +orchestral garb, besides arranging it for two pianos. He has +added a developing section of seventy bars. This version was +first played in New York a decade ago by Marie Geselschap, a +Dutch pianist, under the direction of the late Anton Seidl. The +original, it must be acknowledged, is preferable. + +The Bolero, op. 19, has a Polonaise flavor. There is but little +Spanish in its ingredients. It is merely a memorandum of Chopin's +early essays in dance forms. It was published in 1834, four years +before Chopin's visit to Spain. Niecks thinks it an early work. +That it can be made effective was proven by Emil Sauer. It is for +fleet-fingered pianists, and the principal theme has the +rhythmical ring of the Polonaise, although the most Iberian in +character. It is dedicated to Comtesse E. de Flahault. In the key +of A minor, its coda ends in A major. Willeby says it is in C +major! + +The Tarantella is in A flat, and is numbered op. 43. It was +published in 1841 (?), and bears no dedication. Composed at +Nohant, it is as little Italian as the Bolero is Spanish. +Chopin's visit to Italy was of too short a duration to affect +him, at least in the style of dance. It is without the necessary +ophidian tang, and far inferior to Heller and Liszt's efforts in +the constricted form. One finds little of the frenzy ascribed to +it by Schumann in his review. It breathes of the North, not the +South, and ranks far below the A flat Impromptu in geniality and +grace. + +The C minor Funeral March, composed, according to Fontana, in +1829, sounds like Mendelssohn. The trio has the processional +quality of a Parisian funeral cortege. It is modest and in no +wise remarkable. The three Ecossaises, published as op. 73, No. +3, are little dances, schottisches, nothing more. No. 2 in G is +highly popular in girls' boarding schools. + +The Grand Duo Concertant for 'cello and piano is jointly composed +by Chopin and Franchomme on themes from "Robert le Diable." It +begins in E and ends in A major, and is without opus number. +Schumann thinks "Chopin sketched the whole of it, and that +Franchomme said 'Yes' to everything." It is for the salon of +1833, when it was published. It is empty, tiresome and only +slightly superior to compositions of the same sort by De Beriot +and Osborne. Full of rapid elegancies and shallow passage work, +this duo is certainly a piece d'occasion--the occasion probably +being the need of ready money. + +The seventeen Polish songs were composed between 1824 and 1844. +In the psychology of the Lied Chopin was not happy. Karasowski +writes that many of the songs were lost and some of them are +still sung in Poland, their origin being hazy. The Third of May +is cited as one of these. Chopin had a habit of playing songs for +his friends, but neglected putting some of them on paper. The +collected songs are under the opus head 74. The words are by his +friends, Stephen Witwicki, Adam Mickiewicz, Bogdan Zaleski and +Sigismond Krasinski. The first in the key of A, the familiar +Maiden's Wish, has been brilliantly paraphrased by Liszt. This +pretty mazurka is charmingly sung and played by Marcella Sembrich +in the singing lesson of "The Barber of Seville." There are +several mazurkas in the list. Most of these songs are mediocre. +Poland's Dirge is an exception, and so is Horsemen Before the +Battle. "Was ein junges Madchen liebt" has a short introduction, +in which the reminiscence hunter may find a true bit of +"Meistersinger" color. Simple in structure and sentiment, the +Chopin lieder seem almost rudimentary compared to essays in this +form by Schubert, Schumann, Franz, Brahms and Tschaikowsky. + +A word of recommendation may not be amiss here regarding the +technical study of Chopin. Kleczynski, in his two books, gives +many valuable hints, and Isidor Philipp has published a set of +Exercises Quotidiens, made up of specimens in double notes, +octaves and passages taken from the works. Here skeletonized are +the special technical problems. In these Daily Studies, and his +edition of the Etudes, are numerous examples dealt with +practically. For a study of Chopin's ornaments, Mertke has +discussed at length the various editorial procedure in the matter +of attacking the trill in single and double notes, also the +easiest method of executing the flying scud and vapors of the +fioriture. This may be found in No. 179 of the Edition +Steingraber. Philipp's collection is published in Paris by J. +Hamelle, and is prefixed by some interesting remarks of Georges +Mathias. Chopin's portrait in 1833, after Vigneron, is included. + +One composition more is to be considered. In 1837 Chopin +contributed the sixth variation of the march from "I Puritani." +These variations were published under the title: "Hexameron: +Morceau de Concert. Grandes Variations de bravoure sur la marche +des Puritans de Bellini, composees pour le concert de Madame la +Princesse Belgiojoso au benefice des pauvres, par MM. Liszt, +Thalberg, Pixis, H. Herz, Czerny et Chopin." Liszt wrote an +orchestral accompaniment, never published. His pupil, Moriz +Rosenthal, is the only modern virtuoso who plays the Hexameron in +his concerts, and play it he does with overwhelming splendor. +Chopin's contribution in E major is in his sentimental, salon +mood. Musically, it is the most impressive of this extraordinary +mastodonic survival of the "pianistic" past. + +The newly published Fugue--or fugato--in A minor, in two voices, +is from a manuscript in the possession of Natalie Janotha, who +probably got it from the late Princess Czartoryska, a pupil of +the composer. The composition is ineffective, and in spots ugly-- +particularly in the stretta--and is no doubt an exercise during +the working years with Elsner. The fact that in the coda the very +suspicious octave pedal-point and trills may be omitted--so the +editorial note urns--leads one to suspect that out of a fragment +Janotha has evolved, Cuvier-like, an entire composition. Chopin +as fugue-maker does not appear in a brilliant light. Is the +Polish composer to become a musical Hugh Conway? Why all these +disjecta membra of a sketch-book? + +In these youthful works may be found the beginnings of the +greater Chopin, but not his vast subjugation of the purely +technical to the poetic and spiritual. That came later. To the +devout Chopinist the first compositions are so many proofs of the +joyful, victorious spirit of the man whose spleen and pessimism +have been wrongfully compared to Leopardi's and Baudelaire's. +Chopin was gay, fairly healthy and bubbling over with a pretty +malice. His first period shows this; it also shows how thorough +and painful the processes by which he evolved his final style. + + + +XII. THE POLONAISES:--HEROIC HYMNS OF BATTLE. + + + +How is one to reconcile "the want of manliness, moral and +intellectual," which Hadow asserts is "the one great limitation +of Chopin's province," with the power, splendor and courage of +the Polonaises? Here are the cannon buried in flowers of Robert +Schumann, here overwhelming evidences of versatility, virility +and passion. Chopin blinded his critics and admirers alike; a +delicate, puny fellow, he could play the piano on occasion like a +devil incarnate. He, too, had his demon as well as Liszt, and +only, as Ehlert puts it, "theoretical fear" of this spirit +driving him over the cliffs of reason made him curb its antics. +After all the couleur de rose portraits and lollipop miniatures +made of him by pensive, poetic persons it is not possible to +conceive Chopin as being irascible and almost brutal. Yet he was +at times even this. "Beethoven was scarce more vehement and +irritable," writes Ehlert. And we remember the stories of friends +and pupils who have seen this slender, refined Pole wrestling +with his wrath as one under the obsession of a fiend. It is no +desire to exaggerate this side of his nature that impels this +plain writing. Chopin left compositions that bear witness to his +masculine side. Diminutive in person, bad-temper became him ill; +besides, his whole education and tastes were opposed to scenes of +violence. So this energy, spleen and raging at fortune found +escape in some of his music, became psychical in its +manifestations. + +But, you may say, this is feminine hysteria, the impotent cries +of an unmanly, weak nature. Read the E flat minor, the C minor, +the A major, the F sharp minor and the two A flat major +Polonaises! Ballades, Scherzi, Studies, Preludes and the great F +minor Fantaisie are purposely omitted from this awing scheme. +Chopin was weak in physique, but he had the soul of a lion. +Allied to the most exquisite poetic sensibilities--one is +reminded here of Balzac's "Ce beau genie est moins un musicien +qu'une dine qui se rend sensible"--there was another nature, +fiery, implacable. He loved Poland, he hated her oppressors. +There is no doubt he idealized his country and her wrongs until +the theme grew out of all proportion. Politically the Poles and +Celts rub shoulders. Niecks points out that if Chopin was "a +flattering idealist as a national poet, as a personal poet he was +an uncompromising realist." So in the polonaises we find two +distinct groups: in one the objective, martial side predominates, +in the other is Chopin the moody, mournful and morose. But in all +the Polish element pervades. Barring the mazurkas, these dances +are the most Polish of his works. Appreciation of Chopin's wide +diversity of temperament would have sparedthe world the false, +silly, distorted portraits of him. He had the warrior in him, +even if his mailed fist was seldom used. There are moments when +he discards gloves and soft phrases and deals blows that +reverberate with formidable clangor. + +By all means read Liszt's gorgeous description of the Polonaise. +Originating during the last half of the sixteenth century, it was +at first a measured procession of nobles and their womankind to +the sound of music. In the court of Henry of Anjou, in 1574, +after his election to the Polish throne, the Polonaise was born, +and throve in the hardy, warlike atmosphere. It became a dance +political, and had words set to it. Thus came the Kosciuszko, the +Oginski, the Moniuszko, the Kurpinski, and a long list written by +composers with names ending in "ski." It is really a march, a +processional dance, grave, moderate, flowing, and by no means +stereotyped. Liszt tells of the capricious life infused into its +courtly measures by the Polish aristocracy. It is at once the +symbol of war and love, a vivid pageant of martial splendor, a +weaving, cadenced, voluptuous dance, the pursuit of shy, +coquettish woman by the fierce warrior. + +The Polonaise is in three-four time, with the accent on the +second beat of the bar. In simple binary form--ternary if a trio +is added--this dance has feminine endings to all the principal +cadences. The rhythmical cast of the bass is seldom changed. +Despite its essentially masculine mould, it is given a feminine +title; formerly it was called Polonais. Liszt wrote of it: + +"In this form the noblest traditional feelings of ancient Poland +are represented. The Polonaise is the true and purest type of +Polish national character, as in the course of centuries it was +developed, partly through the political position of the kingdom +toward east and west, partly through an undefinable, peculiar, +inborn disposition of the entire race. In the development of the +Polonaise everything co-operated which specifically distinguished +the nation from others. In the Poles of departed times manly +resolution was united with glowing devotion to the object of +their love. Their knightly heroism was sanctioned by high-soaring +dignity, and even the laws of gallantry and the national costume +exerted an influence over the turns of this dance. The Polonaises +are the keystone in the development of this form. They belong to +the most beautiful of Chopin inspirations. With their energetic +rhythm they electrify, to the point of excited demonstration, +even the sleepiest indifferentism. Chopin was born too late, and +left his native hearth too early, to be initiated into the +original character of the Polonaise as danced through his own +observation. But what others imparted to him in regard to it was +supplemented by his fancy and his nationality." + +Chopin wrote fifteen Polonaises, the authenticity of one in G +flat major being doubted by Niecks. This list includes the +Polonaise for violoncello and piano, op. 3, and the Polonaise, +op. 22, for piano and orchestra. This latter Polonaise is +preceded by an andante spianato in G in six-eight time, and +unaccompanied. It is a charming, liquid-toned, nocturne-like +composition, Chopin in his most suave, his most placid mood: a +barcarolle, scarcely a ripple of emotion, disturbs the mirrored +calm of this lake. After sixteen bars of a crudely harmonized +tutti comes the Polonaise in the widely remote key of E flat; it +is brilliant, every note telling, the figuration rich and novel, +the movement spirited and flowing. Perhaps it is too long and +lacks relief. The theme on each re-entrance is varied +ornamentally. The second theme, in C minor, has a Polish and +poetic ring, while the coda is effective. This opus is vivacious, +but not characterized by great depth. Crystalline, gracious, and +refined, the piece is stamped "Paris," the elegant Paris of 1830. +Composed in that year and published in July, 1836, it is +dedicated to the Baronne D'Est. Chopin introduced it at a +Conservatoire concert for the benefit of Habeneck, April 26, +1835. This, according to Niecks, was the only time he played the +Polonaise with orchestral accompaniment. It was practically a +novelty to New York when Rafael Joseffy played it here, +superlatively well, in 1879. + +The orchestral part seems wholly superfluous, for the scoring is +not particularly effective, and there is a rumor that Chopin +cannot be held responsible for it. Xaver Scharwenka made a new +instrumentation that is discreet and extremely well sounding. +With excellent tact he has managed the added accompaniment to the +introduction, giving some thematic work of the slightest texture +to the strings, and in the pretty coda to the wood-wind. A +delicately managed allusion is made by the horns to the second +theme of the nocturne in G. There are even five faint taps of the +triangle, and the idyllic atmosphere is never disturbed. +Scharwenka first played this arrangement at a Seidl memorial +concert, in Chickering Hall, New York, April, 1898. Yet I cannot +truthfully say the Polonaise sounds so characteristic as when +played solo. + +The C sharp minor Polonaise, op. 26, has had the misfortune of +being sentimentalized to death. What can be more "appassionata" +than the opening with its "grand rhythmical swing"? It is usually +played by timid persons in a sugar-sweet fashion, although fff +stares them in the face. The first three lines are hugely heroic, +but the indignation soon melts away, leaving an apathetic humor; +after the theme returns and is repeated we get a genuine love +motif tender enough in all faith wherewith to woo a princess. On +this the Polonaise closes, an odd ending for such a fiery +opening. + +In no such mood does No. 2 begin. In E flat minor it is variously +known as the Siberian, the Revolt Polonaise. It breathes defiance +and rancor from the start. What suppressed and threatening +rumblings are there! Volcanic mutterings these: + +[Musical score excerpt] + +It is a sinister page, and all the more so because of the +injunction to open with pianissimo. One wishes that the shrill, +high G flat had been written in full chords as the theme suffers +from a want of massiveness. Then follows a subsidiary, but the +principal subject returns relentlessly. The episode in B major +gives pause for breathing. It has a hint of Meyerbeer. But again +with smothered explosions the Polonaise proper appears, and all +ends in gloom and the impotent clanking of chains. It is an awe- +provoking work, this terrible Polonaise in E flat minor, op. 26; +it was published July, 1836, and is dedicated to M. J. Dessauer. + +Not so the celebrated A major Polonaise, op. 40, Le Militaire. To +Rubinstein this seemed a picture of Poland's greatness, as its +companion in C minor is of Poland's downfall. Although Karasowski +and Kleczynski give to the A flat major Polonaise the honor of +suggesting a well-known story, it is really the A major that +provoked it--so the Polish portrait painter Kwiatowski informed +Niecks. The story runs, that after composing it, Chopin in the +dreary watches of the night was surprised--terrified is a better +word--by the opening of his door and the entrance of a long train +of Polish nobles and ladies, richly robed, who moved slowly by +him. Troubled by the ghosts of the past he had raised, the +composer, hollow eyed, fled the apartment. All this must have +been at Majorca, for op. 40 was composed or finished there. +Ailing, weak and unhappy as he was, Chopin had grit enough to +file and polish this brilliant and striking composition into its +present shape. It is the best known and, though the most muscular +of his compositions, it is the most played. It is dedicated to J. +Fontana, and was published November, 1840. This Polonaise has the +festive glitter of Weber. + +The C minor Polonaise of the same set is a noble, troubled +composition, large in accents and deeply felt. Can anything be +more impressive than this opening? + +[Musical score excerpt] + +It is indeed Poland's downfall. The Trio in A flat, with its +kaleidoscopic modulations, produces an impression of vague unrest +and suppressed sorrow. There is loftiness of spirit and daring in +it. + +What can one say new of the tremendous F sharp minor Polonaise? +Willeby calls it noisy! And Stanislaw Przybyszewski--whom Vance +Thompson christened a prestidigious noctambulist-has literally +stormed over it. It is barbaric, it is perhaps pathologic, and of +it Liszt has said most eloquent things. It is for him a dream +poem, the "lurid hour that precedes a hurricane" with a +"convulsive shudder at the close." The opening is very +impressive, the nerve-pulp being harassed by the gradually +swelling prelude. There is defiant power in the first theme, and +the constant reference to it betrays the composer's exasperated +mental condition. This tendency to return upon himself, a +tormenting introspection, certainly signifies a grave state. But +consider the musical weight of the work, the recklessly bold +outpourings of a mind almost distraught! There is no greater test +for the poet-pianist than the F sharp minor Polonaise. It is +profoundly ironical--what else means the introduction of that +lovely mazurka, "a flower between two abysses"? This strange +dance is ushered in by two of the most enigmatic pages of Chopin. +The A major intermezzo, with its booming cannons and +reverberating overtones, is not easily defensible on the score of +form, yet it unmistakably fits in the picture. The mazurka is +full of interrogation and emotional nuanciren. The return of the +tempest is not long delayed. It bursts, wanes, and with the coda +comes sad yearning, then the savage drama passes tremblingly into +the night after fluid and wavering affirmations; a roar in F +sharp and finally a silence that marks the cessation of an +agitating nightmare. No "sabre dance" this, but a confession from +the dark depths of a self-tortured soul. Op. 44 was published +November, 1841, and is dedicated to Princesse de Beauvau. There +are few editorial differences. In the eighteenth bar from the +beginning, Kullak, in the second beat, fills out an octave. Not +so in Klindworth nor in the original. At the twentieth bar +Klindworth differs from the original as follows. The Chopin text +is the upper one: + +[Musical score excerpts] + +The A flat Polonaise, op. 53, was published December, 1843, and +is said by Karasowski to have been composed in 1840, after +Chopin's return from Majorca. It is dedicated to A. Leo. This is +the one Karasowski calls the story of Chopin's vision of the +antique dead in an isolated tower of Madame Sand's chateau at +Nohant. We have seen this legend disproved by one who knows. This +Polonaise is not as feverish and as exalted as the previous one. +It is, as Kleczynski writes, "the type of a war song." Named the +Heroique, one hears in it Ehlert's "ring of damascene blade and +silver spur." There is imaginative splendor in this thrilling +work, with its thunder of horses' hoofs and fierce challengings. +What fire, what sword thrusts and smoke and clash of mortal +conflict! Here is no psychical presentation, but an objective +picture of battle, of concrete contours, and with a cleaving +brilliancy that excites the blood to boiling pitch. That Chopin +ever played it as intended is incredible; none but the heroes of +the keyboard may grasp its dense chordal masses, its fiery +projectiles of tone. But there is something disturbing, even +ghostly, in the strange intermezzo that separates the trio from +the polonaise. Both mist and starlight are in it. Yet the work is +played too fast, and has been nicknamed the "Drum" Polonaise, +losing in majesty and force because of the vanity of virtuosi. +The octaves in E major are spun out as if speed were the sole +idea of this episode. Follow Kleczynski's advice and do not +sacrifice the Polonaise to the octaves. Karl Tausig, so Joseffy +and de Lenz assert, played this Polonaise in an unapproachable +manner. Powerful battle tableau as it is, it may still be +presented so as not to shock one's sense of the euphonious, of +the limitations of the instrument. This work becomes vapid and +unheroic when transferred to the orchestra. + +The Polonaise-Fantaisie in A flat, op. 61, given to the world +September, 1846, is dedicated to Madame A. Veyret. One of three +great Polonaises, it is just beginning to be understood, having +been derided as amorphous, febrile, of little musical moment, +even Liszt declaring that "such pictures possess but little real +value to art. ... Deplorable visions which the artist should +admit with extreme circumspection within the graceful circle of +his charmed realm." This was written in the old-fashioned days, +when art was aristocratic and excluded the "baser" and more +painful emotions. For a generation accustomed to the realism of +Richard Strauss, the Fantaisie-Polonaise seems vaporous and +idealistic, withal new. It recalls one of those enchanted flasks +of the magii from which on opening smoke exhales that gradually +shapes itself into fantastic and fearsome figures. This Polonaise +at no time exhibits the solidity of its two predecessors; its +plasticity defies the imprint of the conventional Polonaise, +though we ever feel its rhythms. It may be full of monologues, +interspersed cadenzas, improvised preludes and short phrases, as +Kullak suggests, yet there is unity in the composition, the units +of structure and style. It was music of the future when Chopin +composed; it is now music of the present, as much as Richard +Wagner's. But the realism is a trifle clouded. Here is the +duality of Chopin the suffering man and Chopin the prophet of +Poland. Undimmed is his poetic vision--Poland will be free!-- +undaunted his soul, though oppressed by a suffering body. There +are in the work throes of agony blended with the trumpet notes of +triumph. And what puzzled our fathers--the shifting lights and +shadows, the restless tonalities--are welcome, for at the +beginning of this new century the chromatic is king. The ending +of this Polonaise is triumphant, recalling in key and climaxing +the A flat Ballade. Chopin is still the captain of his soul--and +Poland will be free! Are Celt and Slav doomed to follow ever the +phosphorescent lights of patriotism? Liszt acknowledges the +beauty and grandeur of this last Polonaise, which unites the +characteristics of superb and original manipulation of the form, +the martial and the melancholic. + +Opus 71, three posthumous Polonaises, given to the world by +Julius Fontana, are in D minor, published in 1827, B flat major, +1828, and F minor, 1829. They are interesting to Chopinists. The +influence of Weber, a past master in this form, is felt. Of the +three the last in F minor is the strongest, although if Chopin's +age is taken into consideration, the first, in D minor, is a feat +for a lad of eighteen. I agree with Niecks that the posthumous +Polonaise, without opus number, in G sharp minor, was composed +later than 1822--the date given in the Breitkopf & Hartel +edition. It is an artistic conception, and in "light winged +figuration" far more mature than the Chopin of op. 71. Really a +graceful and effective little composition of the florid order, +but like his early music without poetic depth. The Warsaw "Echo +Musicale," to commemorate the fiftieth anniversary of Chopin's +death, published a special number in October, 1899, with the +picture of a farmer named Krysiak, born in 1810, the year after +the composer. Thereat Finck remarked that it is not a case of +survival of the fittest! A fac-simile reproduction of a hitherto +unpublished Polonaise in A flat, written at the age of eleven, is +also included in this unique number. This tiny dance shows, it is +said, the "characteristic physiognomy" of the composer. In +reality this polacca is thin, a tentative groping after a form +that later was mastered so magnificently by the composer. Here is +the way it begins--the autograph is Chopin's: + +[Musical score excerpt] + +The Alla Polacca for piano and 'cello, op. 3, was composed in +1829, while Chopin was on a visit to Prince Radziwill. It is +preceded by an introduction, and is dedicated to Joseph Merk, the +'cellist. Chopin himself pronounced it a brilliant salon piece. +It is now not even that, for it sounds antiquated and threadbare. +The passage work at times smacks of Chopin and Weber--a hint of +the Mouvement Perpetuel--and the 'cello has the better of the +bargain. Evidently written for my lady's chamber. + +Two Polonaises remain. One, in B flat minor, was composed in +1826, on the occasion of the composer's departure for Reinerz. A +footnote to the edition of this rather elegiac piece tells this. +Adieu to Guillaume Kolberg, is the title, and the Trio in D flat +is accredited to an air of "Gazza Ladra," with a sentimental Au +Revoir inscribed. Kleczynski has revised the Gebethner & Wolff +edition. The little cadenza in chromatic double notes on the last +page is of a certainty Chopin. But the Polonaise in G flat major, +published by Schott, is doubtful. It has a shallow ring, a +brilliant superficiality that warrants Niecks in stamping it as a +possible compilation. There are traces of the master throughout, +particularly in the E flat minor Trio, but there are some vile +progressions and an air of vulgarity surely not Chopin's. This +dance form, since the death of the great composer, has been +chiefly developed on the virtuoso side. Beethoven, Schubert, +Weber, and even Bach--in his B minor suite for strings and flute- +-also indulged in this form. Wagner, as a student, wrote a +Polonaise for four hands, in D, and in Schumann's Papillons there +is a charming specimen. Rubinstein composed a most brilliant and +dramatic example in E flat in Le Bal. The Liszt Polonaises, all +said and done, are the most remarkable in design and execution +since Chopin. But they are more Hungarian than Polish. + + + +XIII. MAZURKAS:--DANCES OF THE SOUL + + +I + + +"Coquetries, vanities, fantasies, inclinations, elegies, vague +emotions, passions, conquests, struggles upon which the safety or +favors of others depend, all, all meet in this dance." + +Thus Liszt. De Lenz further quotes him: "Of the Mazurkas, one +must harness a new pianist of the first rank to each of them." +Yet Liszt told Niecks he did not care much for Chopin's Mazurkas. +"One often meets in them with bars which might just as well be in +another place. But as Chopin puts them perhaps nobody could have +put them." Liszt, despite the rhapsodical praise of his friend, +is not always to be relied upon. Capricious as Chopin, he had +days when he disliked not only the Mazurkas, but all music. He +confessed to Niecks that when he played a half hour for amusement +it was Chopin he took up. + +There is no more brilliant chapter than this Hungarian's on the +dancing of the Mazurka by the Poles. It is a companion to his +equally sensational description of the Polonaise. He gives a +wild, whirling, highly-colored narrative of the Mazurka, with a +coda of extravagant praise of the beauty and fascination of +Polish women. "Angel through love, demon through fantasy," as +Balzac called her. In none of the piano rhapsodies are there such +striking passages to be met as in Liszt's overwrought, cadenced +prose, prose modelled after Chateaubriand. Niema iak Polki-- +"nothing equals the Polish women" and their "divine coquetries;" +the Mazurka is their dance--it is the feminine complement to the +heroicand masculine Polonaise. + +An English writer describes the dancing of the Mazurka in +contemporary Russia: + + In the salons of St. Petersburg, for instance, the guests + actually dance; they do not merely shamble to and fro in a + crowd, crumpling their clothes and ruffling their tempers, and + call it a set of quadrilles. They have ample space for the + sweeping movements and complicated figures of all the orthodox + ball dances, and are generally gifted with sufficient plastic + grace to carry them out in style. They carefully cultivate + dances calling for a kind of grace which is almost beyond the + reach of art. The mazurka is one of the finest of these, and + it is quite a favorite at balls on the banks of the Neva. It + needs a good deal of room, one or more spurred officers, and + grace, grace and grace. The dash with which the partners rush + forward, the clinking and clattering of spurs as heel clashes + with heel in mid air, punctuating the staccato of the music, + the loud thud of boots striking the ground, followed by their + sibilant slide along the polished floor, then the swift + springs and sudden bounds, the whirling gyrations and dizzy + evolutions, the graceful genuflections and quick embraces, and + all the other intricate and maddening movements to the + accompaniment of one of Glinka's or Tschaikowsky's + masterpieces, awaken and mobilize all the antique heroism, + mediaeval chivalry and wild romance that lie dormant in the + depths of men's being. There is more genuine pleasure in being + the spectator of a soul thrilling dance like that than in + taking an active part in the lifeless make-believes performed + at society balls in many of the more Western countries of + Europe. + +Absolutely Slavonic, though a local dance of the province of +Mazovia, the Mazurek or Mazurka, is written in three-four time, +with the usual displaced accent in music of Eastern origin. +Brodzinski is quoted as saying that in its primitive form the +Mazurek is only a kind of Krakowiak, "less lively, less +sautillant." At its best it is a dancing anecdote, a story told +in a charming variety of steps and gestures. It is intoxicating, +rude, humorous, poetic, above all melancholy. When he is happiest +he sings his saddest, does the Pole. Hence his predilection for +minor modes. The Mazurka is in three-four or three-eight time. +Sometimes the accent is dotted, but this is by no means absolute. +Here is the rhythm most frequently encountered, although Chopin +employs variants and modifications. The first part of the bar has +usually the quicker notes. + +The scale is a mixture of major and minor--melodies are +encountered that grew out of a scale shorn of a degree. +Occasionally the augmented second, the Hungarian, is encountered, +and skips of a third are of frequent occurrence. This, with +progressions of augmented fourths and major sevenths, gives to +the Mazurkas of Chopin an exotic character apart from their novel +and original content. As was the case with the Polonaise, Chopin +took the framework of the national dance, developed it, enlarged +it and hung upon it his choicest melodies, his most piquant +harmonies. He breaks and varies the conventionalized rhythm in a +half hundred ways, lifting to the plane of a poem the heavy +hoofed peasant dance. But in this idealization he never robs it +altogether of the flavor of the soil. It is, in all its wayward +disguises, the Polish Mazurka, and is with the Polonaise, +according to Rubinstein, the only Polish-reflective music he has +made, although "in all of his compositions we hear him relate +rejoicingly of Poland's vanished greatness, singing, mourning, +weeping over Poland's downfall and all that, in the most +beautiful, the most musical, way." Besides the "hard, inartistic +modulations, the startling progressions and abrupt changes of +mood" that jarred on the old-fashioned Moscheles, and dipped in +vitriol the pen of Rellstab, there is in the Mazurkas the +greatest stumbling block of all, the much exploited rubato. +Berlioz swore that Chopin could not play in time--which was not +true--and later we shall see that Meyerbeer thought the same. +What to the sensitive critic is a charming wavering and swaying +in the measure--"Chopin leans about freely within his bars," +wrote an English critic--for the classicists was a rank departure +from the time beat. According to Liszt's description of the +rubato "a wind plays in the leaves, Life unfolds and develops +beneath them, but the tree remains the same--that is the Chopin +rubato." Elsewhere, "a tempo agitated, broken, interrupted, a +movement flexible, yet at the same time abrupt and languishing, +and vacillating as the fluctuating breath by which it is +agitated." Chopin was more commonplace in his definition: +"Supposing," he explained, "that a piece lasts a given number of +minutes; it may take just so long to perform the whole, but in +detail deviations may differ." + +The tempo rubato is probably as old as music itself. It is in +Bach, it was practised by the old Italian singers. Mikuli says +that no matter how free Chopin was in his treatment of the right +hand in melody or arabesque, the left kept strict time. Mozart +and not Chopin it was who first said: "Let your left hand be your +conductor and always keep time." Halle, the pianist, once +asserted that he proved Chopin to be playing four-four instead of +three-four measure in a mazurka. Chopin laughingly admitted that +it was a national trait. Halle was bewildered when he first heard +Chopin play, for he did not believe such music could be +represented by musical signs. Still he holds that this style has +been woefully exaggerated by pupils and imitators. If a Beethoven +symphony or a Bach fugue be played with metronomical rigidity it +loses its quintessential flavor. Is it not time the ridiculous +falsehoods about the Chopin rubato be exposed? Naturally +abhorring anything that would do violence to the structural part +of his compositions, Chopin was a very martinet with his pupils +if too much license of tempo was taken. His music needs the +greatest lucidity in presentation, and naturally a certain +elasticity of phrasing. Rhythms need not be distorted, nor need +there be absurd and vulgar haltings, silly and explosive +dynamics. Chopin sentimentalized is Chopin butchered. He loathed +false sentiment, and a man whose taste was formed by Bach and +Mozart, who was nurtured by the music of these two giants, could +never have indulged in exaggerated, jerky tempi, in meaningless +expression. Come, let us be done with this fetish of stolen time, +of the wonderful and so seldom comprehended rubato. If you wish +to play Chopin, play him in curves; let there be no angularities +of surface, of measure, but in the name of the Beautiful do not +deliver his exquisitely balanced phrases with the jolting, balky +eloquence of a cafe chantant singer. The very balance and +symmetry of the Chopin phraseology are internal; it must be +delivered in a flowing, waving manner, never square or hard, yet +with every accent showing like the supple muscles of an athlete +beneath his skin. Without the skeleton a musical composition is +flaccid, shapeless, weak and without character. Chopin's music +needs a rhythmic sense that to us, fed upon the few simple forms +of the West, seems almost abnormal. The Chopin rubato is rhythm +liberated from its scholastic bonds, but it does not mean +anarchy, disorder. What makes this popular misconception all the +more singular is the freedom with which the classics are now +being interpreted. A Beethoven, and even a Mozart symphony, no +longer means a rigorous execution, in which the measure is +ruthlessly hammered out by the conductor, but the melodic and +emotional curve is followed and the tempo fluctuates. Why then is +Chopin singled out as the evil and solitary representative of a +vicious time-beat? Play him as you play Mendelssohn and your +Chopin has evaporated. Again play him lawlessly, with his +accentual life topsy-turvied, and he is no longer Chopin--his +caricature only. Pianists of Slavic descent alone understand the +secret of the tempo rubato. + + I have read in a recently started German periodical that to + make the performance of Chopin's works pleasing it is + sufficient to play them with less precision of rhythm than the + music of other composers. I, on the contrary, do not know a + single phrase of Chopin's works--including even the freest + among them--in which the balloon of inspiration, as it moves + through the air, is not checked by an anchor of rhythm and + symmetry. Such passages as occur in the F minor Ballade, the B + flat minor Scherzo--the middle part--the F minor Prelude, and + even the A flat Impromptu, are not devoid of rhythm. The most + crooked recitative of the F minor Concerto, as can be easily + proved, has a fundamental rhythm not at all fantastic, and + which cannot be dispensed with when playing with orchestra. + ... Chopin never overdoes fantasy, and is always restrained by + a pronounced aesthetical instinct. ... Everywhere the + simplicity of his poetical inspiration and his sobriety saves + us from extravagance and false pathos. + +Kleczynski has this in his second volume, for he enjoyed the +invaluable prompting of Chopin's pupil, the late Princess +Marceline Czartoryska. + +Niecks quotes Mme. Friederike Stretcher, nee Muller, a pupil, who +wrote of her master: "He required adherence to the strictest +rhythm, hated all lingering and lagging, misplaced rubatos, as +well as exaggerated ritardandos. 'Je vous prie de vous asseoir,' +he said, on such an occasion, with gentle mockery. And it is just +in this respect that people make such terrible mistakes in the +execution of his works." + +And now to the Mazurkas, which de Lenz said were Heinrich Heine's +songs on the piano. "Chopin was a phoenix of intimacy with the +piano. In his nocturnes and mazurkas he is unrivalled, downright +fabulous." + +No compositions are so Chopin-ish as the Mazurkas. Ironical, sad, +sweet, joyous, morbid, sour, sane and dreamy, they illustrate +what was said of their composer--"his heart is sad, his mind is +gay." That subtle quality, for an Occidental, enigmatic, which +the Poles call Zal, is in some of them; in others the fun is +almost rough and roaring. Zal, a poisonous word, is a baleful +compound of pain, sadness, secret rancor, revolt. It is a Polish +quality and is in the Celtic peoples. Oppressed nations with a +tendency to mad lyrism develop this mental secretion of the +spleen. Liszt writes that "the Zal colors with a reflection now +argent, now ardent the whole of Chopin's works. "This sorrow is +the very soil of Chopin's nature. He so confessed when questioned +by Comtesse d'Agoult. Liszt further explains that the strange +word includes in its meanings--for it seems packed with them-- +"all the tenderness, all the humility of a regret borne with +resignation and without a murmur;" it also signifies "excitement, +agitation, rancor, revolt full of reproach, premeditated +vengeance, menace never ceasing to threaten if retaliation should +ever become possible, feeding itself meanwhile with a bitter if +sterile hatred." + +Sterile indeed must be such a consuming passion. Even where his +patriotism became a lyric cry, this Zal tainted the source of +Chopin's joy. It made him irascible, and with his powers of +repression, this smouldering, smothered rage must have well nigh +suffocated him, and in the end proved harmful alike to his person +and to his art. As in certain phases of disease it heightened the +beauty of his later work, unhealthy, feverish, yet beauty without +doubt. The pearl is said to be a morbid secretion, so the +spiritual ferment called Zal gave to Chopin's music its morbid +beauty. It is in the B minor Scherzo but not in the A flat +Ballade. The F minor Ballade overflows with it, and so does the F +sharp minor Polonaise, but not the first Impromptu. Its dark +introspection colors many of the preludes and mazurkas, and in +the C sharp minor Scherzo it is in acrid flowering--truly fleurs +du mal. Heine and Baudelaire, two poets far removed from the +Slavic, show traces of the terrible drowsy Zal in their poetry. +It is the collective sorrow and tribal wrath of a down-trodden +nation, and the mazurkas for that reason have ethnic value. As +concise, even as curt as the Preludes, they are for the most part +highly polished. They are dancing preludes, and often tiny single +poems of great poetic intensity and passionate plaint. + +Chopin published during his lifetime forty-one Mazurkas in eleven +cahiers of three, four and five numbers. Op. 6, four Mazurkas, +and op. 7, five Mazurkas, were published December, 1832. Op. 6 is +dedicated to Comtesse Pauline Plater; op. 7 to Mr. Johns. Op. 17, +four Mazurkas, May 4, dedicated to Madame Lina Freppa; op. 24, +four Mazurkas, November, 1835, dedicated to Comte de Perthuis; +op. 30, four Mazurkas, December, 1837, dedicated to Princesse +Czartoryska; op. 33, four Mazurkas, October, 1838, dedicated to +Comtesse Mostowska; op. 41, four Mazurkas, December, 1840, +dedicated to E. Witwicki; op. 50, three Mazurkas, November, 1841, +dedicated to Leon Szmitkowski; op. 56, three Mazurkas, August, +1844, dedicated to Mile. C. Maberly; op. 59, three Mazurkas, +April, 1846, no dedication, and op. 63, three Mazurkas, +September, 1847, dedicated to Comtesse Czosnowska. + +Besides there are op. 67 and 68 published by Fontana after +Chopin's death, consisting of eight Mazurkas, and there are a +miscellaneous number, two in A minor, both in the Kullak, +Klindworth and Mikuli editions, one in F sharp major, said to be +written by Charles Mayer--in Klindworth's--and four others, in G, +B flat, D and C major. This makes in all fifty-six to be grouped +and analyzed. Niecks thinks there is a well-defined difference +between the Mazurkas as far as op. 41 and those that follow. In +the latter he misses "savage beauties" and spontaneity. As Chopin +gripped the form, as he felt more, suffered more and knew more, +his Mazurkas grew broader, revealed more Weltschmerz, became +elaborate and at times impersonal, but seldom lost the racial +"snap" and hue. They are sonnets in their well-rounded mecanisme, +and, as Schumann says, something new is to be found in each. +Toward the last, a few are blithe and jocund, but they are the +exceptions. In the larger ones the universal quality is felt, but +to the detriment of the intimate, Polish characteristics. These +Mazurkas are just what they are called, only some dance with the +heart, others with the heels. Comprising a large and original +portion of Chopin's compositions, they are the least known. +Perhaps when they wander from the map of Poland they lose some of +their native fragrance. Like hardy, simple wild flowers, they are +mostly for the open air, the only out-of-doors music Chopin ever +made. But even in the open, under the moon, the note of self- +torture, of sophisticated sadness is not absent. Do not accuse +Chopin, for this is the sign-manual of his race. The Pole suffers +in song the joy of his sorrow. + + +II + + +The F sharp minor Mazurka of op. 6 begins with the characteristic +triplet that plays such a role in the dance. Here we find a +Chopin fuller fledged than in the nocturnes and variations, and +probably because of the form. This Mazurka, first in publication, +is melodious, slightly mournful but of a delightful freshness. +The third section with the appoggiaturas realizes a vivid vision +of country couples dancing determinedly. Who plays No. 2 of this +set? It, too, has the "native wood note wild," with its dominant +pedal bass, its slight twang and its sweet-sad melody in C sharp +minor. There is hearty delight in the major, and how natural it +seems. No. 3 in E is still on the village green, and the boys and +girls are romping in the dance. We hear a drone bass--a favorite +device of Chopin--and the chatter of the gossips, the bustle of a +rural festival. The harmonization is rich, the rhythmic life +vital. But in the following one in E flat minor a different note +is sounded. Its harmonies are closer and there is sorrow abroad. +The incessant circling around one idea, as if obsessed by fixed +grief, is used here for the first, but not for the last time, by +the composer. + +Opus 7 drew attention to Chopin. It was the set that brought down +the thunders of Rellstab, who wrote: "If Mr. Chopin had shown +this composition to a master the latter would, it is to be hoped, +have torn it and thrown it at his feet, which we hereby do +symbolically." Criticism had its amenities in 1833. In a later +number of "The Iris," in which a caustic notice appeared of the +studies, op. 10, Rellstab printed a letter, signed Chopin, the +authenticity of which is extremely doubtful. In it Chopin is made +to call the critic "really a very bad man." Niecks demonstrates +that the Polish pianist was not the writer. It reads like the +effusion of some indignant, well meaning female friend. + +The B flat major Mazurka which opens op. 7 is the best known of +these dances. There is an expansive swing, a laissez-aller to +this piece, with its air of elegance, that are very alluring. The +rubato flourishes, and at the close we hear the footing of the +peasant. A jolly, reckless composition that makes one happy to be +alive and dancing. The next, which begins in A minor, is as if +one danced upon one's grave; a change to major does not deceive, +it is too heavy-hearted. No. 3, in F minor, with its rhythmic +pronouncement at the start, brings us back to earth. The triplet +that sets off the phrase has great significance. Guitar-like is +the bass in its snapping resolution. The section that begins on +the dominant of D flat is full of vigor and imagination; the left +hand is given a solo. This Mazurka has the true ring. + +The following one, in A flat, is a sequence of moods. Its +assertiveness soon melts into tenderer hues, and in an episode in +A we find much to ponder. No. 5, in C, consists of three lines. +It is a sort of coda to the opus and full of the echoes of lusty +happiness. A silhouette with a marked profile. + +Opus 17, No. 1, in B flat, is bold, chivalric, and I fancy I hear +the swish of the warrior's sabre. The peasant has vanished or +else gapes through the open window while his master goes through +the paces of a courtlier dance. We encounter sequential chords of +the seventh, and their use, rhythmically framed as they are, +gives a line of sternness to the dance. Niecks thinks that the +second Mazurka might be called The Request, so pathetic, playful +and persuasive is it. It is in E minor and has a plaintive, +appealing quality. The G major part is very pretty. In the last +lines the passion mounts, but is never shrill. Kullak notes that +in the fifth and sixth bars there is no slur in certain editions. +Klindworth employs it, but marks the B sforzando. A slur on two +notes of the same pitch with Chopin does not always mean a tie. +The A flat Mazurka, No. 3, is pessimistic, threatening and +irritable. Though in the key of E major the trio displays a +relentless sort of humor. The return does not mend matters. A +dark page! In A minor the fourth is called by Szulc the Little +Jew. Szulc, who wrote anecdotes of Chopin and collected them with +the title of "Fryderyk Szopen," told the story to Kleczynski. It +is this: + + Chopin did not care for programme music, though more than one + of his compositions, full of expression and character, may be + included under that name. Who does not know the A minor + Mazurka of op. 17, dedicated to Lena Freppa? Itwas already + known in our country as the "Little Jew" before the departure + of our artist abroad. It is one of the works of Chopin which + are characterized by distinct humor. A Jew in slippers and a + long robe comes out of his inn, and seeing an unfortunate + peasant, his customer, intoxicated, tumbling about the road + and uttering complaints, exclaims from his threshold, "What is + this?" Then, as if by way of contrast to this scene, the gay + wedding party of a rich burgess comes along on its way from + church, with shouts of various kinds, accompanied in a lively + manner by violins and bagpipes. The train passes by, the tipsy + peasant renews his complaints--the complaints of a man who had + tried to drown his misery in the glass. The Jew returns + indoors, shaking his head and again asking, "What was this?" + +The story strikes one as being both childish and commonplace. The +Mazurka is rather doleful and there is a little triplet of +interrogation standing sentinel at the fourth bar. It is also the +last phrase. But what of that? I, too, can build you a programme +as lofty or lowly as you please, but it will not be Chopin's. +Niecks, for example, finds this very dance bleak and joyless, of +intimate emotional experience, and with "jarring tones that +strike in and pitilessly wake the dreamer." So there is no +predicating the content of music except in a general way; the +mood key may be struck, but in Chopin's case this is by no means +infallible. If I write with confidence it is that begot of +desperation, for I know full well that my version of the story +will not be yours. The A minor Mazurka for me is full of hectic +despair, whatever that may mean, and its serpentining chromatics +and apparently suspended close--on the chord of the sixth--gives +an impression of morbid irresolution modulating into a sort of +desperate gayety. Its tonality accounts for the moods evoked, +being indeterminate and restless. + +Opus 24 begins with the G minor Mazurka, a favorite because of +its comparative freedom from technical difficulties. Although in +the minor mode there is mental strength in the piece, with its +exotic scale of the augmented second, and its trio is hearty. In +the next, in C, we find, besides the curious content, a mixture +of tonalities--Lydian and mediaeval church modes. Here the trio +is occidental. The entire piece leaves a vague impression of +discontent, and the refrain recalls the Russian bargemen's songs +utilized at various times by Tschaikowsky. Klindworth uses +variants. There is also some editorial differences in the +metronomic markings, Mikuli being, according to Kullak, too slow. +Mention has not been made, as in the studies and preludes, of the +tempi of the Mazurkas. These compositions are so capricious, so +varied, that Chopin, I am sure, did not play any one of them +twice alike. They are creatures of moods, melodic air plants, +swinging to the rhythms of any vagrant breeze. The metronome is +for the student, but metronome and rubato are, as de Lenz would +have said, mutually exclusive. + +The third Mazurka of op. 24 is in A flat. It is pleasing, not +deep, a real dance with an ornamental coda. But the next! Ah! +here is a gem, a beautiful and exquisitely colored poem. In B +flat minor, it sends out prehensile filaments that entwine and +draw us into the centre of a wondrous melody, laden with rich +odors, odors that almost intoxicate. The figuration is tropical, +and when the major is reached and those glancing thirty-seconds +so coyly assail us we realize the seductive charm of Chopin. The +reprise is still more festooned, and it is almost a relief when +the little, tender unison begins with its positive chord +assertions closing the period. Then follows a fascinating, +cadenced step, with lights and shades, sweet melancholy driving +before it joy and being routed itself, until the annunciation of +the first theme and the dying away of the dance, dancers and the +solid globe itself, as if earth had committed suicide for loss of +the sun. The last two bars could have been written only by +Chopin. They are ineffable sighs. + +And now the chorus of praise begins to mount in burning octaves. +The C minor Mazurka, op. 30, is another of those wonderful, +heartfelt melodies of the master. What can I say of the deepening +feeling at the con anima! It stabs with its pathos. Here is the +poet Chopin, the poet who, with Burns, interprets the simple +strains of the folk, who blinds us with color and rich +romanticism like Keats and lifts us Shelley-wise to +transcendental azure. And his only apparatus a keyboard. As +Schumann wrote: "Chopin did not make his appearance by an +orchestral army, as a great genius is accustomed to do; he only +possesses a small cohort, but every soul belongs to him to the +last hero." + +Eight lines is this dance, yet its meanings are almost endless. +No. 2, in B minor, is called The Cuckoo by Kleczynski. It is +sprightly and with the lilt, notwithstanding its subtle +progressions, of Mazovia. No. 3 in D flat is all animation, +brightness and a determination to stay out the dance. The +alternate major-minor of the theme is truly Polish. The graceful +trio and canorous brilliancy of this dance make it a favored +number. The ending is epigrammatic. It comes so suddenly upon us, +our cortical cells pealing with the minor, that its very +abruptness is witty. One can see Chopin making a mocking moue as +he wrote it. Tschaikowsky borrowed the effect for the conclusion +of the Chinoise in a miniature orchestral suite. The fourth of +this opus is in C sharp minor. Again I feel like letting loose +the dogs of enthusiasm. The sharp rhythms and solid build of this +ample work give it a massive character. It is one of the big +Mazurkas, and the ending, raw as it is--consecutive, bare-faced +fifths and sevenths--compasses its intended meaning. + +Opus 33 is a popular set. It begins with one in G sharp minor, +which is curt and rather depressing. The relief in B major is +less real than it seems--on paper. Moody, withal a tender-hearted +Mazurka. No. 2, in D, is bustling, graceful and full of +unrestrained vitality. Bright and not particularly profound, it +was successfully arranged for voice by Viardot-Garcia. The third +of the opus, in C, is the one described by de Lenz as almost +precipitating a violent row between Chopin and Meyerbeer. He had +christened it the Epitaph of the Idea. + +"Two-four," said Meyerbeer, after de Lenz played it. "Three- +four," answered Chopin, flushing angrily. "Let me have it for a +ballet in my new opera and I'll show you," retorted Meyerbeer. +"It's three-four," scolded Chopin, and played it himself. De Lenz +says they parted coolly, each holding to his opinion. Later, in +St. Petersburg, Meyerbeer met this gossip and told him that he +loved Chopin. "I know no pianist, no composer for the piano like +him." Meyerbeer was wrong in his idea of the tempo. Though Chopin +slurs the last beat, it is there, nevertheless. This Mazurka is +only four lines long and is charming, as charming as the brief +specimen in the Preludes. The next Mazurka is another famous +warhorse. In B minor, it is full of veiled coquetries, hazardous +mood transitions, growling recitatives and smothered plaints. The +continual return to the theme gives rise to all manner of +fanciful programmes. One of the most characteristic is by the +Polish poet Zelenski, who, so Kleczynski relates, wrote a +humorous poem on this mazurka. For him it is a domestic comedy in +which a drunken peasant and his much abused wife enact a little +scene. Returning home the worse for wear he sings "Oj ta dana"-- +"Oh dear me"--and rumbles in the bass in a figure that answers +the treble. His wife reproaching him, he strikes her. Here we are +in B flat. She laments her fate in B major. Then her husband +shouts: "Be quiet, old vixen." This is given in the octaves, a +genuine dialogue, the wife tartly answering: "Shan't be quiet." +The gruff grumbling in the bass is heard, an imitation of the +above, when suddenly the man cries out, the last eight bars of +the composition: "Kitty, Kitty come--do come here, I forgive +you," which is decidedly masculine in its magnanimity. + +If one does not care for the rather coarse realism of this +reading Kleczynski offers the poem of Ujejeski, called The +Dragoon. A soldier flatters a girl at the inn. She flies from +him, and her lover, believing she has deceived him, despairingly +drowns himself. The ending, with its "Ring, ring, ring the bell +there! Horses carry me to the depths," has more poetic contour +than the other. Without grafting any libretto on it, this Mazurka +is a beautiful tone-piece in itself. Its theme is delicately +mournful and the subject, in B major, simply entrancing in its +broad, flowing melody. + +In C sharp minor, op. 41, is a Mazurka that is beloved of me. Its +scale is exotic, its rhythm convincing, its tune a little +saddened by life, but courage never fails. This theme sounds +persistently, in the middle voices, in the bass, and at the close +in full harmonies, unisons, giving it a startling effect. Octaves +take it up in profile until it vanishes. Here is the very +apotheosis of rhythm. No. 2, in E minor, is not very resolute of +heart. It was composed, so Niecks avers, at Palma, when Chopin's +health fully accounts for the depressed character of the piece, +for it is sad to the point of tears. Of op. 41 he wrote to +Fontana from Nohant in 1839, "You know I have four new Mazurkas, +one from Palma, in E minor; three from here, in B major, A flat +major and C sharp minor. They seem to me pretty, as the youngest +children usually do when the parents grow old." No. 3 is a +vigorous, sonorous dance. No. 4, over which the editors deviate +on the serious matter of text, in A flat, is for the concert +room, and is allied to several of his gracious Valses. Playful +and decorative, but not profound in feeling. + +Opus 50, the first in G major, is healthy and vivacious. Good +humor predominates. Kullak notes that in some editions it closes +pianissimo, which seems a little out of drawing. No. 2 is +charming. In A flat, it is a perfect specimen of the aristocratic +Mazurka. The D flat Trio, the answering episode in B flat minor, +and the grace of the return make this one to be studied and +treasured. De Lenz finds Bach-ian influences in the following, in +C sharp minor: "It begins as though written for the organ, and +ends in an exclusive salon; it does him credit and is worked out +more fully than the others. Chopin was much pleased when I told +him that in the construction of this Mazurka the passage from E +major to F major was the same as that in the Agatha aria in +'Freischutz.'" De Lenz refers to the opening Bach-like mutations. +The texture of this dance is closer and finer spun than any we +have encountered. Perhaps spontaneity is impaired, mais que +voulez vous? Chopin was bound to develop, and his Mazurkas, +fragile and constricted as is the form, were sure to show a like +record of spiritual and intellectual growth. + +Opus 56, in B major, is elaborate, even in its beginning. There +is decoration in the ritornelle in E flat and one feels the +absence of a compensating emotion, despite the display of +contrapuntal skill. Very virtuoso-like, but not so intimate as +some of the others. Karasowski selects No. 2 in C as an +illustration. "It is as though the composer had sought for the +moment to divert himself with narcotic intoxication only to fall +back the more deeply into his original gloom." There is the +peasant in the first bars in C, but the A minor and what follows +soon disturb the air of bonhomie. Theoretical ease is in the +imitative passages; Chopin is now master of his tools. The third +Mazurka of op. 56 is in C minor. It is quite long and does not +give the impression of a whole. With the exception of a short +break in B major, it is composed with the head, not the heart, +nor yet the heels. + +Not unlike, in its sturdy affirmation, the one in C sharp minor, +op. 41, is the next Mazurka, in A minor, op. 59. That Chopin did +not repeat himself is an artistic miracle. A subtle turn takes us +off the familiar road to some strange glade, wherein the flowers +are rare in scent and odor. This Mazurka, like the one that +follows, has a dim resemblance to others, yet there is always a +novel point of departure, a fresh harmony, a sudden melody or an +unexpected ending. Hadow, for example, thinks the A flat of this +opus the most beautiful of them all. In it he finds legitimately +used the repetition in various shapes of a single phrase. To me +this Mazurka seems but an amplification, an elaboration of the +lovely one in the same key, op. 50, No. 2. The double sixths and +more complicated phraseology do not render the later superior to +the early Mazurka, yet there is no gainsaying the fact that this +is a noble composition. But the next, in F sharp minor, despite +its rather saturnine gaze, is stronger in interest, if not in +workmanship. While it lacks Niecks' beautes sauvages, is it not +far loftier in conception and execution than op. 6, in F sharp +minor? The inevitable triplet appears in the third bar, and is a +hero throughout. Oh, here is charm for you! Read the close of the +section in F sharp major. In the major it ends, the triplet +fading away at last, a mere shadow, a turn on D sharp, but victor +to the last. Chopin is at the summit of his invention. Time and +tune, that wait for no man, are now his bond slaves. Pathos, +delicacy, boldness, a measured melancholy and the art of +euphonious presentiment of all these, and many factors more, +stamp this Mazurka a masterpiece. + +Niecks believes there is a return of the early freshness and +poetry in the last three Mazurkas, op. 63. "They are, indeed, +teeming with interesting matter," he writes. "Looked at from the +musician's point of view, how much do we not see novel and +strange, beautiful and fascinating withal? Sharp dissonances, +chromatic passing notes, suspensions and anticipations, +displacement of accent, progressions of perfect fifths--the +horror of schoolmen--sudden turns and unexpected digressions that +are so unaccountable, so out of the line of logical sequence, +that one's following the composer is beset with difficulties. But +all this is a means to an end, the expression of an individuality +with its intimate experiences. The emotional content of many of +these trifles--trifles if considered only by their size--is +really stupendous." Spoken like a brave man and not a pedant! + +Full of vitality is the first number of op. 63. In B major, it is +sufficiently various in figuration and rhythmical life to single +it from its fellows. The next, in F minor, has a more elegiac +ring. Brief and not difficult of matter or manner is this dance. +The third, of winning beauty, is in C sharp minor--surely a +pendant to the C sharp minor Valse. I defy anyone to withstand +the pleading, eloquent voice of this Mazurka. Slender in +technical configuration, yet it impressed Louis Ehlert so much +that he was impelled to write: "A more perfect canon in the +octave could not have been written by one who had grown gray in +the learned arts." + +The four Mazurkas, published posthumously in 1855, that comprise +op. 67 were composed by Chopin at various dates. To the first, in +G, Klindworth affixes 1849 as the year of composition. Niecks +gives a much earlier date, 1835. I fancy the latter is correct, +as the piece sounds like one of Chopin's more youthful efforts. +It is jolly and rather superficial. The next, in G minor, is +familiar. It is very pretty, and its date is set down by Niecks +as 1849, while Klindworth gives 1835. Here again Niecks is +correct, although I suspect that Klindworth transposed his +figures accidentally. No. 3, in C, was composed in 1835. On this +both biographer and editor agree. It is certainly an early +effusion of no great value, although a good dancing tune. No. 4 A +minor, of this opus, composed in 1846, is more mature, but in no +wise remarkable. + +Opus 68, the second of the Fontana set, was composed in 1830. The +first, in C, is commonplace; the one in A minor, composed in +1827, is much better, being lighter and well made; the third, in +F major, 1830, weak and trivial, and the fourth, in F minor, +1849, interesting because it is said by Julius Fontana to be +Chopin's last composition. He put it on paper a short time before +his death, but was too ill to try it at the piano. It is +certainly morbid in its sick insistence in phrase repetition, +close harmonies and wild departure--in A--from the first figure. +But it completes the gloomy and sardonic loop, and we wish, after +playing this veritable song of the tomb, that we had parted from +Chopin in health, not disease. This page is full of the +premonitions of decay. Too weak and faltering to be febrile, +Chopin is here a debile, prematurely exhausted young man. There +are a few accents of a forced gayety, but they are swallowed up +in the mists of dissolution--the dissolution of one of the most +sensitive brains ever wrought by nature. Here we may echo, +without any savor of Liszt's condescension or de Lenz's irony: +"Pauvre Frederic!" + +Klindworth and Kullak have different ideas concerning the end of +this Mazurka. Both are correct. Kullak, Klindworth and Mikuli +include in their editions two Mazurkas in A minor. Neither is +impressive. One, the date of composition unknown, is dedicated "a +son ami Emile Gaillard;" the other first appeared in a musical +publication of Schotts' about 1842 or 1843--according to Niecks. +Of this set I prefer the former; it abounds in octaves and ends +with a long trill There is in the Klindworth edition a Mazurka, +the last in the set, in the key of F sharp. It is so un-Chopinish +and artificial that the doubts of the pianist Ernst Pauer were +aroused as to its authenticity. On inquiry--Niecks quotes from +the London monthly "Musical Record," July 1, 1882--Pauer +discovered that the piece was identical with a Mazurka by Charles +Mayer. Gotthard being the publisher of the alleged Chopin +Mazurka, declared he bought the manuscript from a Polish countess- +-possibly one of the fifty in whose arms Chopin died--and that +the lady parted with Chopin's autograph because of her dire +poverty. It is, of course, a clear case of forgery. + +Of the four early Mazurkas, in G major and B flat major--dating +from 1825--D major--composed in 1829-30, but remodelled in 1832-- +and C major--of 1833--the latter is the most characteristic. The +G major is of slight worth. As Niecks remarks, it contains a +harmonic error. The one in B flat starts out with a phrase that +recalls the A minor Mazurka, numbered 45 in the Breitkopf & +Hartel edition. This B flat Mazurka, early as it was composed, +is, nevertheless, pretty. There are breadth and decision in the C +major Mazurka. The recasting improves the D major Mazurka. Its +trio is lifted an octave and the doubling of notes throughout +gives more weight and richness. + +"In the minor key laughs and cries, dances and mourns the Slav," +says Dr. J. Schucht in his monograph on Chopin. Chopin here +reveals not only his nationality, but his own fascinating and +enigmatic individuality. Within the tremulous spaces of this +immature dance is enacted the play of a human soul, a soul that +voices the sorrow and revolt of a dying race, of a dying poet. +They are epigrammatic, fluctuating, crazy, and tender, these +Mazurkas, and some of them have a soft, melancholy light, as if +shining through alabaster--true corpse light leading to a morass +of doubt and terror. But a fantastic, dishevelled, debonair +spirit is the guide, and to him we abandon ourselves in these +precise and vertiginous dances. + + + +XIV. CHOPIN THE CONQUEROR + + + +The Scherzi of Chopin are of his own creation; the type as +illustrated by Beethoven and Mendelssohn had no meaning for him. +Whether in earnest or serious jest, Chopin pitched on a title +that is widely misleading when the content is considered. The +Beethoven Scherzo is full of a robust sort of humor. In it he is +seldom poetical, frequently given to gossip, and at times he +hints at the mystery of life. The demoniacal element, the fierce +jollity that mocks itself, the almost titanic anger of Chopin +would not have been regarded by the composer of the Eroica +Symphony as adapted to the form. The Pole practically built up a +new musical structure, boldly called it a Scherzo, and, as in the +case of the Ballades, poured into its elastic mould most +disturbing and incomparable music. + +Chopin seldom compasses sublimity. His arrows are tipped with +fire, yet they do not fly far. But in some of his music he skirts +the regions where abide the gods. In at least one Scherzo, in one +Ballade, in the F minor Fantaisie, in the first two movements of +the B flat minor Sonata, in several of the Eludes, and in one of +the Preludes, he compasses grandeur. Individuality of utterance, +beauty of utterance, and the eloquence we call divine are his; +criticism then bows its questioning brows before this anointed +one. In the Scherzi Chopin is often prophet as well as poet. He +fumes and frets, but upon his countenance is che precious fury of +the sibyls. We see the soul that suffers from secret convulsions, +but forgive the writhing for the music made. These four Scherzi +are psychical records, confessions committed to paper of +outpourings that never could have passed the lips. From these +alone we may almost reconstruct the real Chopin, the inner +Chopin, whose conventional exterior so ill prepared the world for +the tragic issues of his music. + +The first Scherzo is a fair model. There are a few bars of +introduction--the porch, as Niecks would call it--a principal +subject, a trio, a short working-out section, a skilful return to +the opening theme, and an elaborate coda. This edifice, not +architecturally flawless, is better adapted to the florid +beauties of Byzantine treatment than to the severe Hellenic line. +Yet Chopin gave it dignity, largeness and a classic massiveness. +The interior is romantic, is modern, personal, but the facade +shows gleaming minarets, the strangely builded shapes of the +Orient. This B minor Scherzo has the acid note of sorrow and +revolt, yet the complex figuration never wavers. The walls stand +firm despite the hurricane blowing through and around them. +Ehlert finds this Scherzo tornadic. It is gusty, and the hurry +and over-emphasis do not endear it to the pianist. The first +pages are filled with wrathful sounds, there is much tossing of +hands and cries to heaven, calling down its fire and brimstone. A +climax mounts to a fine frenzy until the lyric intermezzo in B is +reached. Here love chants with honeyed tongues. The widely +dispersed figure of the melody has an entrancing tenderness. But +peace does not long prevail against the powers of Eblis, and +infernal is the Wilde Jagd of the finale. After shrillest of +dissonances, a chromatic uproar pilots the doomed one across this +desperate Styx. + +What Chopin's programme was we can but guess. He may have +outlined the composition in a moment of great ebullition, a time +of soul laceration arising from a cat scratch or a quarrel with +Maurice Sand in the garden over the possession of the goat cart. + +The Klindworth edition is preferable. Kullak follows his example +in using the double note stems in the B major part. He gives the +A sharp in the bass six bars before the return of the first +motif. Klindworth, and other editions, prescribe A natural, which +is not so effective. This Scherzo might profit by being played +without the repeats. The chromatic interlocked octaves at the +close are very striking. + +I find at times--as my mood changes--something almost repellant +in the B minor Scherzo. It does not present the frank physiognomy +of the second Scherzo, op. 31, in B flat minor. Ehlert cries that +it was composed in a blessed hour, although de Lenz quotes Chopin +as saying of the opening, "It must be a charnel house." The +defiant challenge of the beginning has no savor of the scorn and +drastic mockery of its fore-runner. We are conscious that tragedy +impends, that after the prologue may follow fast catastrophe. Yet +it is not feared with all the portentous thunder of its index. +Nor are we deceived. A melody of winning distinction unrolls +before us. It has a noble tone, is of a noble type. Without +relaxing pace it passes and drops like a thunderbolt into the +bowels of the earth. Again the story is told, and tarrying not at +all we are led to a most delectable spot in the key of A major. +This trio is marked by genius. Can anything be more bewitching +than the episode in C sharp minor merging into E major, with the +overflow at the close? The fantasy is notable for variety of +tonality, freedom in rhythmical incidents and genuine power. The +coda is dizzy and overwhelming. For Schumann this Scherzo is +Byronic in tenderness and boldness. Karasowski speaks of its +Shakespearian humor, and indeed it is a very human and lovable +piece of art. It holds richer, warmer, redder blood than the +other three and like the A flat Ballade, is beloved of the +public. But then it is easier to understand. + +Opus 39, the third Scherzo in C sharp minor, was composed or +finished at Majorca and is the most dramatic of the set. I +confess to see no littleness in the polished phrases, though +irony lurks in its bars and there is fever in its glance--a +glance full of enigmatic and luring scorn. I heartily agree with +Hadow, who finds the work clear cut and of exact balance. And +noting that Chopin founded whole paragraphs "either on a single +phrase repeated in similar shapes or on two phrases in +alternation"--a primitive practice in Polish folksongs--he +asserts that "Beethoven does not attain the lucidity of his style +by such parallelism of phraseology," but admits that Chopin's +methods made for "clearness and precision...may be regarded as +characteristic of the national manner." A thoroughly personal +characteristic too. + +There is virile clangor in the firmly struck octaves of the +opening pages. No hesitating, morbid view of life, but rank, +harsh assertiveness, not untinged with splenetic anger. The +chorale of the trio is admirably devised and carried out. Its +piety is a bit of liturgical make-believe. The contrasts here are +most artistic--sonorous harmonies set off by broken chords that +deliciously tinkle. There is a coda of frenetic movement and the +end is in major, a surprising conclusion when considering all +that has gone before. Never to become the property of the +profane, the C sharp minor Scherzo, notwithstanding its marked +asperities and agitated moments, is a great work of art. Without +the inner freedom of its predecessor, it is more sober and self- +contained than the B minor Scherzo. + +The fourth Scherzo, op. 54, is in the key of E. Built up by a +series of cunning touches and climaxes and without the mood depth +or variety of its brethren, it is more truly a Scherzo than any +of them. It has tripping lightness and there is sunshine +imprisoned behind its open bars. Of it Schumann could not ask, +"How is gravity to clothe itself if jest goes about in dark +veils?" Here, then, is intellectual refinement and jesting of a +superior sort. Niecks thinks it fragmentary. I find the fairy- +like measures delightful after the doleful mutterings of some of +the other Scherzi. There is the same "spirit of opposition," but +of arrogance none. The C sharp minor theme is of lyric beauty, +the coda with its scales, brilliant. It seems to be banned by +classicists and Chopin worshippers alike. The agnostic attitude +is not yet dead in the piano playing world. + +Rubinstein most admired the first two Scherzi. The B minor has +been criticised for being too much in the etude vein. But with +all their shortcomings these compositions are without peer in the +literature of the piano. + +They were published and dedicated as follows: Op. 20, February, +1835, to M. T. Albrecht; op. 31, December, 1837, Comtesse de +Furstenstein; op. 39, October, 1840, Adolph Gutmann, and op. 54, +December, 1843, Mile, de Caraman. De Lenz relates that Chopin +dedicated the C sharp minor Scherzo to his pupil Gutmann, because +this giant, with a prize fighter's fist, could "knock a hole in +the table" with a certain chord for the left hand--sixth measure +from the beginning--and adds quite naively: "Nothing more was +ever heard of this Gutmann--he was a discovery of Chopin's." +Chopin died in this same Gutmann's arms, and, despite de Lenz, +Gutmann was in evidence until his death as a "favorite pupil." + +And now we have reached the grandest--oh, banal and abused word-- +of Chopin's compositions, the Fantaisie in F minor, op. 49. +Robert Schumann, after remarking that the cosmopolitan must +"sacrifice the small interests of the soil on which he was born," +notices that Chopin's later works "begin to lose something of +their especial Sarmatian physiognomy, to approach partly more +nearly the universal ideal cultivated by the divine Greeks which +we find again in Mozart." The F minor Fantaisie has hardly the +Mozartian serenity, but parades a formal beauty--not disfigured +by an excess of violence, either personal or patriotic, and its +melodies, if restless by melancholy, are of surprising nobility +and dramatic grandeur. Without including the Beethoven Sonatas, +not strictly born of the instrument, I do not fear to maintain +that this Fantaisie is one of the greatest of piano pieces. Never +properly appreciated by pianists, critics, or public, it is, +after more than a half century of neglect, being understood at +last. It was published November, 1843, and probably composed at +Nohant, as a letter of the composer indicates. The dedication is +to Princesse C. de Souzzo--these interminable countesses and +princesses of Chopin! For Niecks, who could not at first discern +its worth, it suggests a Titan in commotion. It is Titanic; the +torso of some Faust-like dream, it is Chopin's Faust. A macabre +march, containing some dangerous dissonances, gravely ushers us +to ascending staircases of triplets, only to precipitate us to +the very abysses of the piano. That first subject, is it not +almost as ethically puissant and passionate as Beethoven in his F +minor Sonata? Chopin's lack of tenaciousness is visible here. +Beethoven would have built a cathedral on such a foundational +scheme, but Chopin, ever prodigal in his melody making, dashes +impetuously to the A flat episode, that heroic love chant, +erroneously marked dolce and played with the effeminacies of a +salon. Three times does it resound in this strange Hall of +Glancing Mirrors, yet not once should it be caressed. The bronze +fingers of a Tausig are needed. Now are arching the triplets to +the great, thrilling song, beginning in C minor, and then the +octaves, in contrary motion, split wide asunder the very earth. +After terrific chordal reverberations there is the rapid retreat +of vague armies, and once again is begun the ascent of the +rolling triplets to inaccessible heights, and the first theme +sounds in C minor. The modulation lifts to G flat, only to drop +to abysmal depths. What mighty, desperate cause is being +espoused? When peace is presaged in the key of B, is this the +prize for which strive these agonized hosts? Is some forlorn +princess locked behind these solemn, inaccessible bars? For a few +moments there is contentment beyond all price. Then the warring +tribe of triplets recommence, after clamorous G flat octaves +reeling from the stars to the sea of the first theme. Another +rush into D flat ensues, the song of C minor reappears in F +minor, and the miracle is repeated. Oracular octaves quake the +cellarage of the palace, the warriors hurry by, their measured +tramp is audible after they vanish, and the triplets obscure +their retreat with chromatic vapors. Then an adagio in this +fantastic old world tale--the curtain prepares to descend--a +faint, sweet voice sings a short, appealing cadenza, and after +billowing A flat arpeggios, soft, great hummocks of tone, two +giant chords are sounded, and the Ballade of Love and War is +over. Who conquers? Is the Lady with the Green Eyes and Moon +White Face rescued? Or is all this a De Quincey's Dream Fugue +translated into tone--a sonorous, awesome vision? Like De +Quincey, it suggests the apparition of the empire of fear, the +fear that is secretly felt with dreams, wherein the spirit +expands to the drummings of infinite space. + +Alas! for the validity of subjective criticism. Franz Liszt told +Vladimir de Pachmann the programme of the Fantaisie, as related +to him by Chopin. At the close of one desperate, immemorial day, +the pianist was crooning at the piano, his spirits vastly +depressed. Suddenly came a knocking at his door, a Poe-like, +sinister tapping, which he at once rhythmically echoed upon the +keyboard, his phono-motor centre being unusually sensitive. The +first two bars of the Fantaisie describe these rappings, just as +the third and fourth stand for Chopin's musical invitation, +entrez, entrez! This is all repeated until the doors wide open +swinging admit Liszt, George Sand, Madame Camille Pleyel nee +Mock, and others. To the solemn measures of the march they enter, +and range themselves about Chopin, who after the agitated +triplets begins his complaint in the mysterious song in F minor. +But Sand, with whom he has quarrelled, falls before him on her +knees and pleads for pardon. Straightway the chant merges into +the appealing A flat section--this sends skyward my theory of its +interpretation--and from C minor the current becomes more +tempestuous until the climax is reached and to the second march +the intruders rapidly vanish. The remainder of the work, with the +exception of the Lento Sostenuto in B--where it is to be hoped +Chopin's perturbed soul finds momentary peace--is largely +repetition and development. This far from ideal reading is an +authoritative one, coming as it does from Chopin by way of Liszt. +I console myself for its rather commonplace character with the +notion that perhaps in the re-telling the story has caught some +personal cadenzas of the two historians. In any case I shall +cling to my own version. + +The F minor Fantaisie will mean many things to many people. +Chopin has never before maintained so artistically, so free from +delirium, such a level of strong passion, mental power and +exalted euphony. It is his largest canvas, and though there are +no long-breathed periods such as in the B flat minor Scherzo, the +phraseology is amply broad, without padding of paragraphs. The +rapt interest is not relaxed until the final bar. This +transcendental work more nearly approaches Beethoven in its +unity, its formal rectitude and its brave economy of thematic +material. + +While few men have dared to unlock their hearts thus, Chopin is +not so intimate here as in the mazurkas. But the pulse beats +ardently in the tissues of this composition. As art for art, it +is less perfect; the gain is on the human side. Nearing his end +Chopin discerned, with ever widening, ever brighter vision, the +great heart throb of the universe. Master of his material, if not +of his mortal tenement, he passionately strove to shape his +dreams into abiding sounds. He did not always succeed, but his +victories are the precious prizes of mankind. One is loath to +believe that the echo of Chopin's magic music can ever fall upon +unheeding ears. He may become old-fashioned, but, like Mozart, he +will remain eternally beautiful. + + + +BIBLIOGRAPHY + + + + Frederic Chopin as a Man and Musician, by Frederick Niecks. + London, Novello, Ewer & Co. + + Frederic Chopin, by Franz Liszt. London, W. Reeves. + + Life and Letters of Frederic Chopin, by Moritz Karasowski, + translated from the Russian by Emily Hill. London, W. Reeves. + + Chopin and Other Musical Essays, by Henry T. Finck. New York, + Charles Scribner's Sons. + + The Works of Frederic Chopin and their Proper Interpretation, + by Jean Kleczynski, translated by A. Whittingham. London, W. + Reeves. + + Chopin's Greater Works, by Jean Kleczynski, translated with + additions by Natalie Janotha. New York, Charles Scribner's + Sons. + + Frederic Francois Chopin, by Charles Willeby. London, Sampson + Low, Marston & Co. + + Frederic Chopin, by Joseph Bennett. Novello, Ewer & Co. + + F. Chopin, la Tradicion de su Musica, por Eduardo Gariel. City + of Mexico, 1894. + + Frederic Chopin, sa Vie et ses OEuvres, par Madame A. Audley. + Paris, E. Plon et Cie. + + F. Chopin, Essai de Critique musicale, par H. Barbedette. + Friedrich Chopin und seine Werke, von Dr. J. Schucht. Leipzig, + C. F. Kahnt. + + Friedrich Chopin's Leben und Werke, von A. Niggli. Leipzig, + Breitkopf & Hartel. + + Chopin, by Francis Hueffer, in Musical Studies. Edinburgh, A. + & C. Black. + + Frederic Chopin, by W. H. Hadow, in Studies in Modern Music. + New York, Macmillan Co. + + Frederic Chopin, by Louis Ehlert, in From the Tone World, + translated by Helen D. Tretbar. New York. + + Chopin, by W. de Lenz, from The Great Piano Virtuosos of our + Time, translated by Madeleine R. Baker. New York, G. Schirmer. + + Chopin, in Robert Schumann's Music and Musicians, translated + by Fanny Raymond Ritter. New York, Schuberth & Co. + + Chopin, in Anton Rubinstein's Conversation on Music, + translated by Mrs. John P. Morgan. Steinway Hall: Charles F. + Tretbar, publisher. + + Les Musiciens Polonais, par Albert Sowinski. Paris, Le Clerc. + + Les Trois Romans de Frederic Chopin, par le Comte Wodinski. + Paris, Calman Levy. + + Une Contemporaine, par M. Brault. + + Histoire de ma Vie et Correspondance, par George Sand. Paris, + Calman Levy. + + George Sand, by Henry James in French Poets and Novelists. New + York, Macmillan Co. + + G. Sand, par Stefane-Pol, from Trois Grandes Figures, preface + by D'Armand Silvestre. Paris, Ernest Flammarian. + + George Sand, sa Vie et ses OEuvres, par Wladimir Kardnine. + Paris, Ollendorf. + + Deux Eleves de Chopin, par Adolphe Brisson. + + The Beautiful in Music, by Dr. Eduard Hanslick. Translated by + Gustave Cohen. Novello, Ewer & Co., London and New York. + + How Music Developed, by W. J. Henderson. New York, Frederick + A. Stokes Co. + + Wagner and His Works, by Henry T. Finck. New York, Charles + Scribner's Sons. + + By the Way, by William F. Apthorp. Boston, Copeland & Day. + + A Study of Wagner, by Ernest Newman. New York, G. P. Putnam's + Sons. + + Folk-Music Studies, by H. E. Krehbiel. New York Tribune, + August, 1899. + + Analytical Notes to Schlesinger Edition, by Theodor Kullak. + + The New Spirit, by Havelock Ellis. London, Walter Scott, Ltd. + + Flaubert, par Emile Faguet. Paris, Hachette et Cie. + + Reisebilder, by Heinrich Heine. + + Affirmations, by Havelock Ellis. London, Walter Scott. + + The Psychology of the Emotions, by Th. Ribot. New York, + Charles Scribner's Sons. + + The Man of Genius, by Cesare Lombroso. New York, Charles + Scribner's Sons. + + The Musical Courier, New York. Files from 1889 to 1900. + + Chopin's Works, by Rutland Boughton, in London Musical + Standard. + + Chopin, by Stanislas Count Tarnowski. Translated from the + Polish by Natalie Janotha. 1899. + + The School of Giorgione, An Essay by Walter Pater. + + Chopin and the Sick Men, by John F. Runciman, in London + Saturday Review, September 9, 1899. + + Frederick Chopin, by Edward Dannreuther from Famous Composers + and their Works. Boston, J. B. Millet Company. + + Primitive Music, by Wallaschek. + + Zur Psychologie des Individuums, Chopin und Nietzsche, by + Stanislaw Przybyszewski. Berlin, W. Fontaine & Co., 1892. + + Musical Interpretation, by Adolph Carpe. Leipzig, London and + Paris, Bosworth & Co., Boston, B. F. Wood Music Co. + + Pianistes Celebres, par Francois Marmontel. + + Frederyka Chopina, in Echo Musicale, Warsaw, Poland, October + 15, 1899. + + OEuvres Poetiques Completes de Adam Mickiewicz, Traduction du + Polonais par Christien Ostrowski. Paris, Firmin Didot Freres, + Fils et Cie, 1859. + + The World as Will and Idea, by Arthur Schopenhauer. + + The Case of Richard Wagner, by Friedrich Nietzsche. New York, + Macmillan Co. + + With the Immortals, by Marion Crawford. References to Chopin. + + Preface to Isidor Philipp's Exercises Quotidiens tires des + OEuvres de Chopin, by Georges Mathias. Paris, J. Hamelle. + + Pianoforte Study, by Alexander McArthur. + + Chopin Ein Gedenkblatt, by August Spanuth, New York Staats- + Zeitung, October 15, 1899. + + The Pianoforte Sonata, by J. B. Shedlock, London, Methuen & + Co. + + A History of Pianoforte Playing and Pianoforte Literature, by + C. F. Weitzmann, translated by Dr. Th. Baker. New York, G. + Schirmer. + + Der Letze Virtuoso, by C. F. Weitzmann. Leipzig, Kahnt. + + Chopin--and Some Others, in London Musical News, October 14, + 1899. + + Chopin, in A History of the Pianoforte and Pianoforte Players, + by Oscar Bie. New York, E. P. Dutton & Co. + + Chopin, in Rubinstein's Die Meister des Klaviers. New York, + Schuberth. + + Chopin, in Berliner Tageblatt, by Dr. Leopold Schmidt. + + Chopin Juzgada por Schumann, in Gaceta Musical, City of + Mexico. + + The Chopin Rubato and so-called Chopin Fingering, by John + Kautz, in The Musical Record, Boston, 1898. + + Franz Liszt, by Lina Ramann. Breitkopf & Hartel. + + Preface to Mikuli Edition by Carl Mikuli. + + The AEsthetics of Pianoforte Playing, by Adolf Kullak. New + York, G. Schirmer. + + Chopin und die Frauen, by Eugen Isolani. Berliner Courier, + October 17, 1899. + + Chopin, by W. J. Henderson in The New York Times, October 29, + 1899. + + A Note on Chopin, by L. A. Corbeille, and Chopin, An + Irresponsibility, by "Israfel," in The Dome, October, 1899, + London, Unicorn Press. + + Chopin and the Romantics, by John F. Runciman in The Saturday + Review (London), February 10,1900. + + Chopiniana: in the February, 1900, issue of the London Monthly + Musical Record, including some new letters of Chopin's. + + La maladie de Chopin (d'apres des documents inedits), par + Cabanes. Chronique medicale, Paris, 1899, vi., No. 21, 673- + 685. + + Also recollections in letters and diaries of Moscheles, + Hiller, Mendelssohn, Berlioz, Henselt, Schumann, Rubinstein, + Mathias, Legouve, Tarnowski, Grenier and others. + + The author begs to acknowledge the kind suggestions and + assistance of Rafael Joseffy, Vladimir de Pachmann, Moriz + Rosenthal, Jaraslow de Zielinski, Edwin W. Morse, Edward E. + Ziegler and Ignace Jan Paderewski. + + + +BOOKS BY JAMES HUNEKER + + + +What Maeterlinck wrote: + + Maurice Maeterlinck wrote thus of James Huneker: "Do you know + that 'Iconoclasts' is the only book of high and universal + critical worth that we have had for years--to be precise, + since Georg Brandes. It is at once strong and fine, supple and + firm, indulgent and sure." + +The Evening Post of June 10, 1915, wrote of Mr. Huneker's "The +New Cosmopolis": + + "The region of Bohemia, Mr. James Huneker found long ago, is + within us. At twenty, he says, he discovered that there is no + such enchanted spot as the Latin Quarter, but that every + generation sets back the mythical land into the golden age of + the Commune, or of 1848, or the days of 'Hernani.' It is the + same with New York's East Side, 'the fabulous East Side,' as + Mr. Huneker calls it in his collection of international urban + studies, 'The New Cosmopolis.' If one judged externals by + grime, by poverty, by sanded back-rooms, with long-haired + visionaries assailing the social order, then the East Side of + the early eighties has gone down before the mad rush of + settlement workers, impertinent reformers, sociological + cranks, self-advertising politicians, billionaire socialists, + and the reporters. To-day the sentimental traveller 'feels a + heart-pang to see the order, the cleanliness, the wide + streets, the playgrounds, the big boulevards, the absence of + indigence that have spoiled the most interesting part of New + York City.' But apparently this is only a first impression; + for Mr. Huneker had no trouble in discovering in one cafe a + patriarchal figure quite of the type beloved of the local- + color hunters of twenty years ago, a prophet, though speaking + a modern language and concerned with things of the day. So + that we owe to Mr. Huneker the discovery of a notable truth, + namely, that Bohemia is not only a creation of the sentimental + memory, but, being psychological, may be located in clean and + prosperous quarters. The tendency has always been to place it + in a golden age, but a tattered and unswept age. Bohemia is + now shown to exist amidst model tenements and sanitary + drinking-cups." + + +IVORY APES AND PEACOCKS +With frontispiece portrait of Dostoievsky +12mo. $1.50 net + + +NEW COSMOPOLIS +12mo. $1.50 net + + +THE PATHOS of DISTANCE +A Book of a Thousand and One Moments +12mo. $2.00 net + + +PROMENADES of an IMPRESSIONIST +12mo. $1.50 net + + "We like best such sober essays as those which analyze for us + the technical contributions of Cezanne and Rodin. Here Mr. + Huneker is a real interpreter, and here his long experience of + men and ways in art counts for much. Charming, in the lighter + vein, are such appreciations as the Monticelli, and Chardin." + + --FRANK JEWETT MATHER, JR., in New York Nation and Evening + Post. + + +EGOISTS +A Book of Supermen +STENDHAL, BAUDELAIRE, FLAUBERT, ANATOLE FRANCE, HUYSMANS, BARRES, +HELLO, BLAKE, NIETZSCHE, IBSEN, AND MAX STIRNER +With Portrait and Facsimile Reproductions 12mo. $1.50 net + + +ICONOCLASTS: +A Book of Dramatists +12mo. $1.50 net + + CONTENTS: Henrik Ibsen--August Strindberg--Henry Becque-- + Gerhart Hauptmann--Paul Hervieu--The Quintessence of Shaw-- + Maxim Gorky's Nachtasyl--Hermann Sudermann--Princess + Mathilde's Play--Duse and D'Annunzio--Villiers de l'Isle Adam- + -Maurice Maeterlinck. + + "His style is a little jerky, but it is one of those rare + styles in which we are led to expect some significance, if not + wit, in every sentence." + + --G. K. CHESTERTON, in London Daily News. + + +OVERTONES: +A Book of Temperaments +WITH FRONTISPIECE PORTRAIT Of RICHARD STRAUSS +12mo. $1.50 net + + "In some respects Mr. Huneker must be reckoned the most + brilliant of all living writers on matters musical." + + --Academy, London. + + +MEZZOTINTS IN MODERN MUSIC +BRAHMS, TSCHAIKOWSKY, CHOPIN. RICHARD STRAUSS, LISZT, AND WAGNER +12mo. $1.50 net + + "Mr. Huneker is, in the best sense, a critic; he listens to + the music and gives you his impressions as rapidly and in as + few words as possible; or he sketches the composers in fine, + broad, sweeping strokes with a magnificent disregard for + unimportant details. ... A distinctly original and very + valuable contribution to the world's tiny musical literature." + + --J. F. RUNCIMAN, in London Saturday Review. + + +FRANZ LISZT +WITH NUMEROUS ILLUSTRATIONS +12mo. $2.00 net + + +CHOPIN: +The Man and His Music +WITH ETCHED PORTRAIT +12mo. $2.00 net + + +VISIONARIES +l2 mo. $1.50 net + + CONTENTS: A Master of Cobwebs--The Eighth Deadly Sin--The + Puree of Aholibah--Rebels of the Moon--The Spiral Road--A Mock + Sun--Antichrist--The Eternal Duel--The Enchanted Yodler--The + Third Kingdom--The Haunted Harpsichord--The Tragic Wall--A + Sentimental Rebellion--Hall of the Missing Footsteps--The + Cursory Light--An Iron Fan--The Woman Who Loved Chopin--The + Tune of Time--Nada--Pan. + + "In 'The Spiral Road' and in some of the other stories both + fantasy and narrative may be compared with Hawthorne in his + most unearthly moods. The younger man has read his Nietzsche + and has cast off his heritage of simple morals. Hawthorne's + Puritanism finds no echo in these modern souls, all sceptical, + wavering and unblessed. But Hawthorne's splendor of vision and + his power of sympathy with a tormented mind do live again in + the best of Mr. Huneker's stories." + + --London Academy (Feb. 3, 1906). + + +MELOMANIACS +12mo. $1.50 net + + "It would be difficult to sum up 'Melomaniacs' in a phrase. + Never did a book, in my opinion at any rate, exhibit greater + contrasts, not, perhaps, of strength and weakness, but of + clearness and obscurity." + + --HAROLD E. 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