THE ETUDE MAY 1920 Page 295 How the Great Masters Practiced By ARTHUR ELSON ONCE upon a time the church fathers at the little German town of Arnstadt became somewhat worried over the ways of the young organist they had hired. The trouble consisted in part of his irregularity; fo r he had disappeared fo r some time, running off to Liibeck to hear another organist perform. They also wished to know by what right he brought a "strange maiden" into the church, and even let her touch the sacred keyboard, during his own supposed periods of practice. This is a pleasant way of practicing—visiting distant places when the desire arises, and teaching one's "best girl" during working hours. But the organist's name was John Sebastian Bach, and the girl was his cousin, Maria Barbara, whom he afterwards married. W e know now that this young man's methods did not pre-vent him from becoming a most wonderful organist, as well as the greatest composer who ever lived. BachVSurprising Variations The church elders of Arnstadt now seem rather lacking in discernment; fo r they complained of Bach's "surprising variations" on the chorales, and the "many strange sounds" with which he "bewildered the congre-gation. Later on, Weimar and Leipsic marveled at Bach's genius as an organist, and were astounded by his wonderful improvisations; and Reinken, whom Bach had once taken as a model, came to congratulate Bach on keeping alive the great glories of counter-point, which were then being supplanted by the har-monic style. But there is no accounting for tastes— and Arnstadt sought fo r a new organist. A t Anhalt-Cothen Bach had no organ within easy reach, so he devoted some of his time to mastering other keyboard instruments. His success in these ef -forts is reflected in the greatness of his Well-Tem-pered Clavichord, and exemplified further by his pro-posed harpsichord contest with Marchand, from which the latter ran away to avoid certain defeat. That Bach worked hard at his art is witnessed by many incidents. In early youth, for instance, he strained his eyes while copying compositions secretly by moon-light. In later years, the domestic performances given by his large family of children testified further to his love of the tonal art, which he always held in the utmost reverence. Carlyle's definition of genius is "a capacity fo r tak-ing pains." This is only half the truth; fo r brains, as well as pains, are needed. But as far as it goes, the statement is incontestable. All the great composers worked hard at the performing side of their art; or if they slighted this side, they usually came to regret their loss afterwards. Handel's Hard Practice Handel, Bach's great contemporary, was another ex-ample of the benefit gained from hard work. In his childhood his musical desires were blocked by his father; but a well-known anecdote tells us that he hid a musical instrument in the family garret and prac-ticed in secret. The unwary often claim that this in-strument was a spinet, but a child of six could no more carry such a weight around than he could juggle a couple of barrels of flour. The spinet also has too twangy a tone to remain secret for more than a few seconds. What the boy did (probably with the help of his indulgent Aunt Anna) was to conceal in the friendly garret a clavichord, whose light tones would not pene-trate far. In the next year, when his father was to visit the Duke of Saxe-Weissenfels, the childish Handel clam-ored fo r permission to go along also, but was refused. His desire, however, was so impelling that he decided to go anyway. Pursuing his father's chaise (and prob-ably hooking on behind, in true small-boy fashion), he let himself be discovered when it was too late for the old folks to send him back. This was a fortunate trip, for the Duke persuaded Handel's father to withdraw his opposition to his son's musical career. Handel then became a pupil of Zachau; and he said afterwards, "Zachau made me work like the devil!" Haydn, too, came to know the blessings that resulted fro m hard work. Under Reuter he was kept in the straight and narrow path by many floggings; while under Porpora, in later years, he performed so many menial services that he was nicknamed "Porpora's bootblack." Fat and Scarlatti D'omenico Scarlatti, a rival of Handel in harpsichord playing, was the inventor of cross-hand work, which appears in his earlier sonatas. But as he grew old and fat, he found this sort of exercise too arduous, and his later compositions are wholly devoid of cross-hand passages. Mozart was undoubtedly the greatest child prodigy in all musical history. Without undue forcing from his father (the violinist, Leopold Mozart), the six-year-old boy was able to take his place beside his gifted sister, Maria Anna, and make concert tours of unin-terrupted success. But it was not until five years later that he was put through the Gradus ad Pamassum. A concert given by Mozart at Mantua, while still in his 'teens, is interesting as an example of the many ways in which his genius was expected to display itself. The program consisted o f a symphony by the youthful artist himself; a piano concerto which he was to read at sight; a sonata to which he was to add variations, with repeats in new keys ; a poem, to which he would improvise both melody and accompaniment; themes to be given by the audience, upon which he would ex-temporize a sonata and a fugue ; a trio of which he was to improvise the violin part and another of his symphonies. With all this genius, however, Mozart could obtain no justice fro m his early patron and mas-ter, the selfish Archbishop of Salzburg. That crabbed dignitary actually opposed Mozart's making any concert tours at all, and said: "I don't like such beggary from town to town." In later years Mozart appeared in one of the customary harpsichord duels, with Clementi as his opponent, after which the latter set to work earn-estly to acquire Mozart's "singing touch." Beethoven was forced to practice early and late by a severe and irresponsible father, whose later decease was spoken of as "a great loss to the tax on liquors." That father would sometimes bring home a boon com -panion at a late hour, and rout out the boy to perform fo r the visitor. Under such severity it is a wonder that the young Beethoven was not driven to hate music altogether. But his love for the art triumphed, and we find-him taking his youthful lessons from Haydn, who found the rising genius so independent that he called his new pupil "The Great Mogul." Bee-thoven's earnest work at the piano gave him such a command of the instrument that Steibelt, after hear-ing him, ran away from a competition in which the two were to take part. Beethoven's work as a viola player in the Bonn orchestra gave him a thorough understand-ing of orchestral instruments also. His piano perform-ances were leonine in style, and his improvisations most wonderful. Schubert's Example Schubert was one of the "horrible examples" who prove the value of hard work by not always doing it. Gifted with a natural genius, he astonished his early teachers so much that they did not give him the drill he needed. Thus he never learned counterpoint, and though his vocal works are the perfect expression of lyric genius, yet his symphonies would have been bene-fited by a greater contrapuntal knowledge. He planned to take up the study with Sechter, but he met an un-timely death before carrying out his plans. In piano practice also he was somewhat deficient. A well-known anecdote tells of his breaking down in an endeavor to play his own Fantaisie, and his remarking, "Th e devil himself couldn't play such stuff." Weber, like Beethoven, suffered from the Mozart tra-dition, and had a father who tried to make him a child prodigy. Weber's father did not hesitate at falsifying his son's age to create a greater impression. But in spite of these plans, the family's theatrical wanderings prevented the youngster from becoming too precocious; and his later successes were in composition rather than in performance. Weber's sonatas, which were once held to equal Beethoven's, are very little played at present. Schumann, like many other musical geniuses, was in-tended for the law. But he soon found the lure of music too potent to be resisted, and became a pupil of the celebrated Friedrich Wieck. A t Wieck's home he reveled in the artistic atmosphere, and indulged in little romances with Ernestine von Fricken and other attract-ive students of the gentle sex before he finally married Wieck's elder daughter Clara. Schumann never became a pianist; for after inventing a contrivance to strengthen the weak fourth finger, he found that he had injured his hands permanently by its use. This was a gain for the world, since it forced him into composition, and gave the public the long series of richly expressive works fo r voice, piano, or orchestra that 'have made his name one of the foremost in all music. Mendelssohn Not Pampered Mendelssohn was somewhat of a child prodigy, mak-ing his first concert appearance at the age of nine. Mendelssohn and his sister Fanny had what their mother called "Bach-fugue fingers," which were ex-cellently adapted to pianoforte work. But it was in com-position rather than in playing that Mendelssohn won youthful fame, for his great Midsummer Night's Dream overture, composed in his eighteenth year, is by far the greatest work ever produced by anyone at that age. His grandfather was the famous philosopher, Moses Mendelssohn; and his father, Abraham, used to say, "Formerly I was known as the son of my father; now I am famous as the father of my son." Mendelssohn had his full share of hard work, however, and in youth he was always glad when Sunday arrived, since on that day he did not have to get up at five A . M. and start his studies. Chopin made the piano the chief object of his devo-tion, even his concertos being practically solos with orchestral obbligato. In his infancy piano music made him cry; but this was probably due to extreme sensi-tiveness rather than to any dislike of the instrument. He studied hard with Zywny and Eisner, and said after-wards that "even the greatest ass must learn something from such teachers." In preparing for a concert, Chopin would "shut himself up for a fortnight and play Bach." Liszt's Quickness of Fingers Franz Liszt was undoubtedly the greatest of all pian-ists^ and his fame in that direction obscured fo r a time the merit of his great orchestral pieces. At the age of nine, his concerts at Oldenburg and Pressburg were so remarkable that the local nobility raised a subscrip-tion to pay for his future musical training. Later on Cherubini refused to admit him to the Paris Conserva-toire, though the refusal was based on the ground that the applicant was a foreigner. But Liszt already had a great reputation; and he brought to his study an enthu-siasm that carried him triumphantly through the mechanical drudgery of acquiring technic. Liszt's style of execution has been aptly called "the orchestration of the pianoforte." It is best illustrated by some of his transcriptions, in which broad sweeps of melody were united with great antiphonal effects of accompaniment. His original works show this tremen-dous strength of effect also. In playing, Liszt was no t absolutely infallible. Once, at one of his Weimar even-ings, he struck an obviously false note; but he atoned for it by continuing with the most astonishing brilliancy.
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