Violinist

“ The violinist is capable of a perfect rendering only if,—in addition to a firm, easy technique of the left hand, adroitness in bowing and susceptibility to the modifications of tone, and a technique equal to all demands made upon it,—he has under his control a higher spiritual musical development, fine taste, and a warm individual feeling. Only through the combination of all these qualities can one reinvest the dead signs of the composer with spirit and life, and cause his work to pass before the hearer’s soul as an ideal, living picture. ”

“ What is my idea of the violin as a medium of expression? It seems to me that it is that of any other valid artistic medium. It is not so much a question of the violin as of the violinist. A great interpreter reveals his inner-most soul through his instrument, whatever it may be. Most people think the violin is more expressive than any other instrument, but this is open to question. ”

“ A distinguished musical amateur—an intimate friend, to whom I had told the story of my imprisoned violinist, and who thought it a romance highly colored by imagination—sent me a note to say that I was to be treated to a violin concert, by way of curing my enthusiasm. ”

“ The ball is in full swing. The music is furnished by an orchestra of three pieces. The musicians resemble closely their respective instruments; the violinist, a violin—lean neck, small head, a shock of hair brushed to one side, back somewhat bent, a handkerchief correctly adjusted on his shoulder under the violin; the flute-player, a flute—very, tall, with a thin, elongated face, and stiff, thin legs, the bass-violinist, a double-bass—stumpy, round-shouldered, lower part of his body very stout, wide trousers. The uncommon effort with which the musicians play is painfully evident. ”

“ The skilled violinist has also great control over the tone, and can determine the harmonics, or overtones, which shall accompany the fundamental by altering the point on the string at which the bow is applied, and lightly touching it at some other point.
The great art in the construction of the violin rests in the manufacture of the wooden body. ”

“ With the violin thought commences with the means. The hand is trained; we say set the fingers so, and the thumb so. Now practice; when the action is perfect the tone will be right. Briefly in singing we strive for the tone and the action follows, in the violin we strive for the action and the tone follows. Thus it is clear that a knowledge of the structure of the hand is of distinct value to a violinist—in particular, a teacher—while, on the other hand, the knowledge of the anatomy of the throat can be little more than interesting to the vocalist. ”

“ Famous composers, such as Tartini, Corelli, Spohr and Viotti have been great violinists, and by their compositions, as much as by their talents as virtuosi, have largely developed the capacity of the violin as a vehicle of profound musical expression. To the listener the violin speaks with an intensity, a sympathy, and evokes a thrill of the senses such as no other instrument can produce. For the player it seems to respond to every pulse of his emotions. ”

“ THE PHILOSOPHY OF VIOLIN TEACHING
"Class study is for the advanced student, not the beginner. In the beginning only the closest personal contact between the individual pupil and the teacher is desirable. To borrow an analogy from nature, the student may be compared to the young bird whose untrained wings will not allow him to take any trial flights unaided by his natural guardian. For the beginning violinist the principal thing to do is to learn the 'voice placing' of the violin. ”

“ Ah! so different from the modern school! Why, the violinist of to–day serves his instrument as though it were a slave, and must be driven to duty with the lash. The player should treat his violin as a tender child—fondle and caress it, not beat it. The beauty of a performance lies in exacting from the instrument tones corresponding with the deep love a true artist feels for his art.”
[342]
The letter referred to by Ole Bull was the one translated by Dr. ”

“ His title to recollection in the history of music will not be so much that of a great general composer, but that of the greatest of composers for the violin, and the one who taught violinists that height of excellence as an excutant should go hand in hand with good taste and self-restraint, to produce its most permanent effects and exert its most vital influence. ”

“ Ah, that little violin!—a cherished relic now. Perhaps it plays soft, plaintive airs all by itself, in the place where it is kept, missing the touch of the baby fingers which used to waken it into life! ”

“ The violinists proceed to tighten or slacken the hair of their bows, to throw back the coat collar, or stuff a white handkerchief under it, in order to adjust the violin to the peculiar crook of each neck, with as much apparent anxiety as if they had not been doing the same thing for the last thirty years, and some of their heads had not become bald over the sound-post. ”

“ From the beginning of the nineteenth century to the present time the lists of excellent violinists have rapidly increased and heights of technical skill have been reached by many that would have dazzled early violin masters. The special tendencies of gifted leaders have divided players into defined schools. ”

“ Yet Americans have the brains as well as the spiritual endowment necessary to understand and appreciate beauty in a high degree. They can already point with pride to violinists who emphatically deserve to be called artists, and another quarter-century of artistic striving may well bring them into the front rank of violinistic achievement! ”

“ The violin is the poet laureate of music; violin of the virtuoso and master, fiddle of the untutored in the ideal art. It is the aristocrat of the palace and the hall; it is the democrat of the unpretentious home and humble cabin. As violin, it weaves its garlands of roses and camelias; as fiddle it scatters its modest violets. It is admired by the cultured for its magnificent powers and wonderful creations; it is loved by the millions for its simple melodies. ”

“ Slow and tender melodies are never better rendered than by a mass of violins. Nothing can equal the touching sweetness of a score of first strings made to sing by twenty well-skilled bows. The violin is, in fact, the true female voice of the Orchestra,—a voice at once passionate and chaste, heart-rending yet soft, which can weep, sigh and lament, chant, pray and muse, or burst forth into joyous accents as none other can do. ”

“ You cannot reach my soul through touch or gaze;
Be our full lips with infinite meanings rife:
The longed-for words, which of us ever says?
THE VIOLIN.
Touch gently, friend, and slow, the violin, So sweet and low,
That my dreaming senses may be beckoned so
Into a rest as deep as the long past "years ago!"
So softly, then, begin;
And ever gently touch the violin,
Until an impulse grows of a sudden, like wind
On the brow of the earth,
And the voice of your violin shows its wide-swung girth
With a crash of the strings and a medley of rage and mirth ”

“ But these are "bright particular stars," men of genius. The instrument is so difficult of mastery, that few violin-students may hope to equal such marvellous players as those mentioned; although long-continued and severe application may make them good orchestral performers or fair soloists.
The violin is said to be the "king of instruments;" but, by this, reference is made to those powers and extensive resources of expression that are made manifest when the instrument is subject to the brain and hand of the very skilful performer. ”

“ Indeed, this noble instrument, under the deft fingering and skilful bowing of a master-player, becomes almost sentient, and is shown to possess the superior and exclusive power of expressing nearly all the human voice can produce except the articulation of words. A music-teacher once wrote that "the art of playing on the violin requires the nicest perception and the most sense of any art in the known world;" ”

“ They are the heart of the whole orchestra, the most essential part of music, next to the human voice. It is a graceful, manly, healthy exercise, to play the violin. If it be very difficult to play it like an artist, so much the worthier of a manly aspiration. If it is often only vulgar fiddling, it is, on the other hand, with those truly schooled, the most gentlemanly of instruments. ”

“ My native cheerfulness, my piano, my violin, my violoncello, my canvas children, and my pipes, all nourish me like meat and wine. I played upon my violin a little impromptu good-bye to my landscape—a melodious farewell to a sweet creation. The time seemed long before my landlady returned, and when I put back my violin in its case, I heard a sound of crying on the stairs. I opened the door and looked out, and there was a little English angel, whom I had never before seen, sitting upon the topmost step, close to my attic door, crying as if her heart had broken. ”

“ An artist is at this moment engaged at the instrument, but you hear no sound. I place this violin upon the end of the rod; the violin becomes instantly musical—not, however, with the vibrations of its own strings, but with those of the piano. I remove the violin: the sound ceases. I put in its place a guitar, and the music revives. For the violin and guitar I substitute this plain wooden tray: it is also rendered musical. Here, finally, is a harp, against the sound-board of which I cause the end of the deal rod to press: every note of the piano is reproduced before you. ”

“ With the sorrow in mine heart, I have studied and worked until I have made mineself one great artist. If you do not believe, I can show you the papers, where much has been written of me and mine violin. Women have cried when I have played, and have thrown their red roses to me. I had the technique, and when the hurt broke open mine heart, I was immediately one artist. ”

“ The final beauty of the violin tone, the pure legato, remains in the beginning as in the end a matter of holding the violin and bow. Together they 'place' the tone just as the physical media in the throat 'place' the tone of the voice.
"Piano teachers have made greater advances in the tone developing technic of their instrument than the violin teachers. One reason is, that as a class they are more intellectual. And then, too, violin teaching is regarded too often as a mystic art, an occult science, and one into which only those specially gifted may hope to be initiated. ”

“ The violin told a story of human life: Two lovers strayed among the elms and oaks and down by the river side where daffodils and pansies bend and smile to rippling waves, and there, under the bloom of incense-breathing bowers, the old, old story—so old and yet so new, conceived in heaven, first told in Eden, then handed down through all the ages,—was told over and over again. ”

“ At last I thought I would offer my violin to the devil, in order to discover what kind of a musician he was, when, to my great astonishment, I heard him play a solo, so singularly beautiful and with such superior taste and precision, that it surpassed all the music I had ever heard or conceived in the whole course of my life. ”

“ The execution of a rare melody demands as a prime condition an instrument of wide compass and delicate construction, and one of even more rich and varied capabilities is needed to render those grand harmonies which are woven in the modulation of sonorous chords. A skilful hand may draw a scale from wooden blocks set upon ropes of straw, but the great musician must hold the violin, or must feel the keys of the organ under his fingers and the responsive pedals at his feet, before he can expect to interpret fittingly the immortal thought of the composer. ”

“ When it says his finger-tips were perfected by delicate rectitude of use, I think it means doing everything as it is done in heaven, and that anybody who wants to make a perfect violin must keep his eye open to all the beautiful things God has made, and his ear open to all the music he has put into the world, and then never let his hands touch a piece of work that is crooked or straggling or false, till, after years and years of rightness, they are fit to make a violin like the squire’s, a violin that can say everything, a violin that an angel wouldn’t be ashamed to play on. ”

“ Those old painters were right who put violins into the hands of their musical angels. Give a violin time enough, and the music of it will gradually eat up the whole body, or etherealize it, till some day the musician, touching carefully his precious film of a Cremona, will find it melt in his hands, and disappear in a harmonious sigh. ”

“ Then he took his violin once again for the last time, and played just as if he had gathered all the dust of life into a single pinch and would scatter it to the winds by the vibrations of his instrument. ”

“ The violin is, perhaps, only useful to one person. But how much more intimate it is! Tucked under the chin it becomes almost a part of the player—as the sculls used to be to the Autocrat when he went rowing. The tones of the violin are yours and have to be evoked through your own patient effort; the pianoforte stands glistening and repellent, almost impervious to your personality. I would have children taught to play the violin, or violoncello in preference to the pianoforte, and I look forward to the time when we shall train our young people to play other orchestral instruments as well. ”

“ The sound of the violin stands like a slender girl above it and is clear and alone. The voices cease and the violin continues alone. In the night it is so thin it sounds frozen; one must stand close up; it would be much better in a room;—out here it makes a man grow sad. ”

“ At the end comes another long cadenza, that for soft, whispering tones, sweetness, grace, and vanishing lightness, is almost unequaled. Her face becomes serious. Her eyes have a far away expression, dreamy and tender, that soon affects the music. The magic violin sighs and breathes in melting tenderness. The melody floats upward, melting and fading away, exhaled into palpable silence. Not quite, for just as it seems ready to languish into nothing, a soft, sweet chord from the band completes the cadence and brings it to a natural end. ”