Amy Fay

“ Joachim, on the contrary, is the quiet gentleman-artist. He advances in the most unpretentious way, but as he adjusts his violin he looks his audience over with the calm air of a musical monarch, as much as to say, "I repose wholly on my art, and I've no need of any 'ways or manners.'" In reality I admire Joachim's principle the most, but there is something indescribably fascinating and subduing about Liszt's willfulness. You feel at once that he is a great genius, and that you are nothing but his puppet, and somehow you take a base delight in the humiliation! ”

“ His playing was a complete revelation to me, and has given me an entirely new insight into music. You cannot conceive, without hearing him, how poetic he is, or the thousand nuances that he can throw into the simplest thing, and he is equally great on all sides. From the zephyr to the tempest, the whole scale is equally at his command.
But Liszt is not at all like a master, and cannot be treated like one. He is a monarch, and when he extends his royal sceptre you can sit down and play to him. You never can ask him to play anything for you, no matter how much you're dying to hear it. ”

“ Fräulein Timm is giving me such a training as I never had before. She has the most astonishing talent for teaching, and has reduced it to a science. I don't play anything up to tempo under her—always slow, slow, slow. She really dissects every tone, and shows me when and why it doesn't sound well. My whole attention is now bent upon tone. Ah, M., that's the thing in playing!—To bring out the soul there is in the key simply by touching it, as the great masters do.—It is the pianist's highest art, though amid the dazzle of piano pyrotechnics the public often forget it. ”

“ The moonlight, the river flowing along and spanned with beautiful bridges, the thousands of lamps reflected in it and trembling across the water and under the arches, the infinity of little steamers and wherries sailing to and fro and brilliantly lighted up, the music, and the throngs of people passing slowly by, put one into a delicious and bewildered sort of state, and one feels as if this world were heaven! ”

“ I am always astonished, amazed and delighted afresh, and even as I listen I can hardly believe that the man can play so! But Liszt, in addition to his marvellous playing, has this unique and imposing personality, whereas at first Joachim is not specially striking. Liszt's face is all a play of feature, a glow of fancy, a blaze of imagination, whereas Joachim is absorbed in his violin, and his face has only an expression of fine discrimination and of intense solicitude to produce his artistic effects. Liszt never looks at his instrument; Joachim never looks at anything else. ”

“ The applause grew more and more enthusiastic, until it finally found vent in a shower of wreaths and bouquets. Wagner bowed and bowed, and it seemed as if the people would never settle down again. At the end of the concert followed another shower of flowers, and his Kaiser March was encored. Such an effect! After the tempest of sound of the introduction the drums came in with a sharp tat-tat-tat-tat-tat! Then the brass began with the air and came to a crescendo, at last blaring out in such a way as shivered you to the very marrow of your bones. ”

“ The city lies to the left, below you, and the towers rise so prettily—precisely as in a picture. This air of the culture of centuries lies over everything, and the soft and lazy atmosphere lulls the soul to rest. We used to walk until we came to the Belvidere, which is a large restaurant with a gallery up-stairs running all round it. There was a band of music, and here we sat and took our tea, and spent two or three hours, always. ”

“ When I think what a little savage Tausig often was, and how cuttingly sarcastic Kullak could be at times, I am astonished that Liszt so rarely loses his temper. He has the power of turning the best side of every one outward, and also the most marvellous and instant appreciation of what that side is. If there is anything in you, you may be sure that Liszt will know it. Whether he chooses to let you think he does, may, however, be another matter. ”

“ As soon, however, as T. or anybody thrums a waltz on the piano, he instantly throws himself into the attitude to dance. He is so very light on his feet that you don't hear him, and often I am surprised on looking up, without thinking, to see Juan poised on one toe like a ballet dancer, and his great eyes shining soft on me like two suns. It is most peculiar. There are no eyes like the Spanish eyes. Not only have they so much fire, but when their owners are in a sentimental mood, they can throw a languor and a sort of droop into them that is irresistible. ”

“ I am having the most heavenly time in Weimar, studying with Liszt, and sometimes I can scarcely realize that I am at that summit of my ambition, to be his pupil! It was the Baroness von S.'s letter that secured it for me, I am sure. He is so overrun with people, that I think it is a wonder he is civil to anybody, but he is the most amiable man I ever knew, though he can be dreadful, too, when he chooses, and he understands how to put people outside his door in as short a space of time as it can be done. ”

“ And what a revelation is an orchestra the first time one hears it, even if it be but a poor one!—Music come bodily down from Heaven! And here in their musical darkness, the Americans in the provinces are having an orchestra of the very highest excellence burst upon them in full splendour. What could be more American? They always have the best or none!
At nine o'clock in the evening the concert was over, and we all returned to the hotel for supper. We were all desperately hungry after so much music and enthusiasm. ”

“ Even Joachim, whom I think divine, never moved me. When Liszt plays anything pathetic, it sounds as if he had been through everything, and opens all one's wounds afresh. All that one has ever suffered comes before one again. Who was it that I heard say once, that years ago he saw Clara Schumann sitting in tears near the platform, during one of Liszt's performances?—Liszt knows well the influence he has on people, for he always fixes his eyes on some one of us when he plays, and I believe he tries to wring our hearts. ”

“ We always took tea in the open air, and listened to a band of music playing. The Germans just live in the open air in summer, and it is perfectly fascinating. They have these gardens everywhere, filled with trees, under which are little tables and chairs and footstools; and there you can sit and have dinner or tea served up to you. At night they are all lighted up with gas.
It seemed like fairy land, as we sat there in Dresden. The evenings were soft and balmy, the very perfection of summer weather. The terrace is quite high above the river, and you look up and down it for a long distance. ”

“ They are fearfully difficult things to play, and far more difficult, I think, than solos are, because the effort is so sustained. They are to me the most interesting things to listen to of all, and I can't imagine how you can think that piano and orchestra are "not made to go together." However, I never myself appreciated concertos until I came to Germany. Kullak is the most awfully discouraging teacher that can be imagined. When you play to him, it is like looking at your skin through a magnifying glass. All your faults seem to start out and glare at you. ”

“ Liszt is the most interesting and striking looking man imaginable. Tall and slight, with deep-set eyes, shaggy eyebrows, and long iron-gray hair, which he wears parted in the middle. His mouth turns up at the corners, which gives him a most crafty and Mephistophelean expression when he smiles, and his whole appearance and manner have a sort of Jesuitical elegance and ease. His hands are very narrow, with long and slender fingers that look as if they had twice as many joints as other people's. They are so flexible and supple that it makes you nervous to look at them. ”

“ With regard to playing in concert, I find myself doubting whether on general principles it is best to get one's whole musical training under one master only, as Fannie Warburg, for instance, has done; for my experience teaches me that though nearly all masters can give you something, none can give you everything. If, with my present light, I could begin my study over again, I should first stay three years with Deppe, in order to endow the spirit of music that I hope is within me, with the outward form and perfection of an artist. ”

“ I have heard both Rubinstein and Tausig in concert since I last wrote. They are both wonderful, but in quite a different way. Rubinstein has the greatest power and abandon in playing that you can imagine, and is extremely exciting. I never saw a man to whom it seemed so easy to play. It is as if he were just sporting with the piano, and could do what he pleased with it. Tausig, on the contrary, is extremely restrained, and has not quite enthusiasm enough, but he is absolutely perfect, and plays with the greatest expression. ”

“ So, without meaning any disparagement to the splendid masters to whom I owe all my previous musical culture, I cannot help feeling that I have at last got into the hands not of a mere piano virtuoso, however great, but, rather, of a profound musical savant—a man who has been a violinist, as well as a director, and who, without being a player himself, has made such a study of the piano, that probably all pianists except Liszt might learn something from him. ”

“ So he feels as if things were against him, though his heart and soul are so bound up in sacred music, that he told me it had become to him "the only thing worth living for." He really seems to care almost nothing for his piano-playing or for his piano compositions.
And yet, what beauty is there in those compositions! In Berlin I had always been taught that Liszt was a would-be composer, that he could not write a melody, that he had no originality, and that his compositions were merely glitter to dazzle the eyes of the public. ”

“ If, as they say, Liszt's trill is "like the warble of a bird," his is as much so. It is not surprising that he is so celebrated, and I long to hear him in concert, where he will do full justice to his powers. He thrills you to the very marrow of your bones. He is divorced from his wife, and I think it not improbable that she could not live with him, for he looks as haughty and despotic as Lucifer, though he has a very winning way with him when he likes. His playing is spoken of as sans pareil. ”

“ Now, if I could only play like Liszt!—I don't wonder Liszt spends so much of his time in Weimar. I am getting perfectly crazy to hear him, by the way, for everybody says there is nobody in the world like him, and that he is the only artist who combines everything. He does not play in public any more, but Weitzmann says that he is amiability itself, and that it would probably not be difficult for me to get an opportunity to hear him in private.
In the palace I also saw the little boudoir of the Duchess. ”

“ Bülow had just returned from his grand concert tour, and had been in London for the first time. In a few months he had given one hundred and twenty concerts! He is a fascinating creature, too, like all these master artists, but entirely different from Liszt, being small, quick, and airy in his movements, and having one of the boldest and proudest foreheads I ever saw. He looks like strength of will personified. Liszt gazed at "his Hans," as he calls him, with the fondest pride, and seemed perfectly happy over his arrival. ”

“ Don't you remember my telling you that Liszt has an inconceivable lightness, swiftness and smoothness of execution? When Deppe was explaining this to me, I suddenly remembered that when he was playing scales or passages, his fingers seemed to lie across the keys in a slanting sort of way, and to execute these rapid passages almost without any perceptible motion. Well, dear, there it was again! As Liszt is a great experimentalist, he probably does all these things by instinct, and without reasoning it out, but that is why nobodys else's playing sounds like his. ”

“ Next, I should study a year with Kullak, to give my playing a brilliant concert dress, and finally, I would spend two seasons with Liszt, in order to add the last ineffable graces— (for never, never should an artist complete a musical course without going to LISZT, while he is on this earth!) —The trouble is, however, that one master always feels hurt if you leave him for another! No one can bear the imputation that he can't "give you everything." ”

“ This is the more remarkable because it is thoroughly readable and amusing, which books on music too rarely are. The freshness and truth of the letters is not to be denied. We may laugh at the writer's enthusiasm, at the readiness with which she changes her methods and gives up all that she has already learnt at the call of each fresh teacher, at the certainty with which every new artist is announced as quite the best she ever heard, and at the glowing and confident predictions—not, alas, apparently always realised. ”

“ No doubt dwelling with such a genius has developed her. They say that Joachim has had such a happy life that he wants to live forever! He certainly does overtop everything. On this occasion he played Beethoven's great Kreutzer Sonata for violin and piano, with Clara Schumann, and I thought it the most magnificent performance I ever heard! I perfectly adore Joachim, and consider him the wonder of the age. It is simple ecstasy to listen to him. ”

“ For we learn to appreciate sooner or later that enthusiasm is the propelling force and the refreshing source of inspiration. Finally, born of all these elements there appear on the pages of Miss Fay's letters such fascinating pen-portraits as that of her revered master, Franz Liszt, the incomparable. Turning the pages of the volume to refresh my memory and impression of it, I confess that I skipped quite a few because their interest seemed so remote and personal, but I found myself absorbing every word Miss Fay had to say in her chapters about Liszt and his Weimar circle. ”

“ But you need not fear that I am "giving up American standards" because I reverence Liszt so boundlessly. Everything is topsy-turvy in Europe according to our moral ideas, and they don't have what we call "men" over here. But they do have artists that we cannot approach! It is as a Master in Art that I look at and write of Liszt, and his mere presence is to his pupils such stimulus and joy, that when I leave him I shall feel I have left the best part of my life behind! ”