Letters of Franz Liszt Volume I Part 41

Yours in all friends.h.i.+p,

F. Liszt

Bronsart is going shortly to Paris, where he will stay some time.

Cornelius is working at a comic opera [This would be the Barber of Baghdad.--Translator's note.] in the Bernhard's-Hutle. Raff is to finish his "Samson" for Darmstadt. Tausig is giving concerts in Warsaw. Pruckner will spend the winter in Vienna and appear at several concerts. Damrosch composed lately an Overture and Entre- acte music to the "Maid of Orleans." Stor plunges himself into the duties of a general music director. Thus much have I learned of our Neu-Weymar-Verein.

169. To Professor L. A. Zellner in Vienna

[General Secretary of the Gesellschaft der Musikfreunde ("Society of Lovers of Music") in Vienna; composer and writer on music.]

To my letter of yesterday I have still to add a postscript, my dear friend, concerning the information in your new Abonnement,[The Blatter fur Musik, Theater, and Kunst ("Pages of Music, theater, and Art"), edited by Z.] in which I was struck with the name of Bertini among the cla.s.sics, which does not seem to me suitable. As far as I know, Bertini is still living, [He did not die till 1876.] and according to the common idea, to which one must stick fast, only those who are dead can rank as cla.s.sic and be proclaimed as cla.s.sic. Thus Schumann, the romanticist, and Beethoven, the glorious, holy, crazy one, have become cla.s.sics. Should Bertini have already died, I take back my remark, although the popularity of his Studies is not, to me, a satisfactory reason for making his name a cla.s.sic.--Moscheles'

and Czerny's Studies and "Methods" would have a much more just claim to such a thing, and your paper has especially to set itself the task of counteracting, with principle and consistency, the confusion of ideas from which confusion and ruin of matters arise. Hold fast then to this principle, both in great and small things, for the easier understanding with the public, that the recognition of posterity alone impresses the stamp of "cla.s.sical"

upon works, in the same way as facts and history are established; for thus much is certain, that all great cla.s.sics have been reviled in their own day as innovators and even romanticists, if not bunglers and crazy fellows, and you yourself have commented on, and inquired into, this matter many times..--.

In your number of today I read an extract from my letter to Erkel, [A well-known Hungarian composer ("Hunyadi Laszlo")] in which, however, the points are missing. Erkel shall show you the letter on the first opportunity, for he has not left it lying idle in his desk. Of course no public use is to be made of it.

Yours ever, F. L.

January 2nd, 1857

170. To Herr von Turanyi, Musical Conductor of the Town of Aix- la-Chapelle

[Published in the Allgemeine Musikzeitung, July 11th, 1890]

Weymar, January 3rd, 1857

Dear Herr Capellmeister,

Although I am still kept to my bed by a long-continued indisposition, yet I will not delay giving you my warmest thanks for the active pains you have so kindly taken to place my endeavors in the cause of Art in a better light than I could otherwise have expected in your neighborhood.

The result of the choice of myself as conductor of the Musical Festival at Aix-la-Chapelle this year--a result which was notified to me yesterday by the letter of the Committee of the Lower-Rhine Musical Festival--is a welcome sign to me of the gradual recognition which an open and honestly expressed, consistent, and thoroughly disinterested conviction may meet with in different places. Whilst feeling myself especially indebted to you for having brought about this result, I would express to you at the same time the fact of my readiness to answer your very flattering wishes to the best of my powers, and to put aside any hindrances that may be in the way, in order to fulfill the task entrusted to me, if the following remarks are brought to the attention of the Committee, as I consider them essential to the success and also to the importance of the Musical Festival.

My conducting in Aix-la-Chapelle can only have such significance as attaches to the less-known and newer works, and those which are more nearly allied to the Art-interests of today; its justification would be strengthened by an excellent performance of such works. I was on this account completely in accordance with the programme you so kindly sent me (with the addition of one or two numbers), as I am unable to be with the other programme, received in the letter of the Committee yesterday. The latter is as follows:--

First day: Messiah by Handel.--Second day: Ma.s.s (in D major) by Beethoven.

The former as follows:--

First day: Ma.s.s by Beethoven (preceded by one of the shorter works of Handel--or possibly by a Cantata by Bach [?]).

Second day: Schubert's Symphony (in C); one of the larger choral works of Schumann (say, perhaps, "The Rose's Pilgrimage"--or one of the Ballades), and, as I should propose, one of the longer scenes from Berlioz' "Faust," and one or other of my Symphonic Poems.

You will not expect of me, dear Herr Capellmeister, that I should go off into a great panegyric about Handel and, if you caught me doing it, you might stop me immediately with the words of the ancient Greek who did not want any more praises of Homer--"You praise him, but who is thinking of blaming him?" The fullness and glory of this musical majesty is as uncontested as the pleasant, emulating, easily attainable performance of the "Messiah," a chef-d'oeuvre, which has been for years the "daily bread," so to speak, of great and small vocal societies both in England and Germany. With the exception of Haydn's "Creation" there is scarcely a work of that kind existing which could show such countless performances. I, for my part, chose the "Messiah" for performance again in Weymar (in August 1850)--partly because Herder had interested himself in the preparation of the German text--and in the previous August they celebrated the Middle-Rhine Musical Festival at Darmstadt with it. This latter circ.u.mstance enhances my general consideration as to the artistic judiciousness of a repeated performance of the Messiah, up to a special point in regard to the Aix-la-Chapelle Festival, and therefore I should like the question put to the Committee "whether they consider that, in the interests of the 'fresher life of the Musical Festival there,' it can be advantageous for the Lower-Rhine to repeat it after the Middle-Rhine."

The sentence in the letter of the Committee, in which the hope is cherished and expressed that "the celebrated Frau Lind- Goldschmidt may be engaged," leads me to an almost more serious consideration.--

Do not be alarmed, dear sir, and do not be in the least afraid that I am going to struggle, in the usual style of our unchivalrous Don Quixote of musical criticism, with the windmill of virtuosity. You could not fairly expect this of me either, for I have never concealed that, since the grapes of virtuosity could not be made sour for me, I should take no pleasure whatever in finding them sour in somebody else's mouth.

Frau Land-Goldschmidt stands as incomparable in her glittering renown as a singer as Handel in his as a composer, with the difference--which is in Frau Lind's favor to boot--that Handel's works weary many people and do not always succeed in filling the coffers, whereas the mere appearance of Frau Lind secures the utmost rapture of the public, as well as that of the cas.h.i.+er. If, therefore, we place the affairs of the Musical Festival simply on the satisfying and commercial debit and credit basis, certainly no artist, and still less any work of Art, could venture to compete with, and to offer an equal attraction to, the high and highly celebrated name of Frau Lind. Without raising the slightest objection to this, I must express my common-sense opinion that with this magnet all others would be quite superfluous, which, however, cannot be quite so indifferent to me; for, as Louis XIV. represented the State, so Frau Lind would const.i.tute the Musical Festival proper. This avowal (for which I deserve, at the very least, stoning with the usual ingredients of operations of that kind in our civilized age, if I did not happen to implore grace of the divine Diva herself)--this avowal I already made last year, on occasion of the Dusseldorf Musical Festival, to my esteemed friend of many years, Ferdinand Hiller.

What is the use of orchestra and singers, rehearsals and preparations, pieces and programmes, when the public only want to hear the Lind, and then hear her again--or, more correctly speaking, when they must be able to say they leave heard her, in order to be able to wallow at ease in their enthusiasm for Art?

What I foresaw then was also confirmed to a hair, for it proved, as everybody knows, that all the sympathy of the public went in favor of whatever Frau Lind did, so that the so-called Artist- concert on the third day was the most fully attended, because in it there were an aria from "Beatrice di Tenda" and Swedish songs as special attraction--for which marvels the very simplest pianoforte accompaniment was no doubt sufficient.--Should the Committee of Aix-la-Chapelle be minded to take to heart the motto of Hiller's Symphony, "Es muss doch Fruhling werden," ["The spring will surely come."] in all its artistic endeavour, and, as you write, to steer clear towards the goal of a "fresher rekindling of the Musical Festival," we shall be obliged, alas!

to do without the Swedish Nightingale and Europe's Queen of Song.

In short, the point of the matter of this year's Musical Festival at Aix-la-Chapelle is, as concerns myself, as follows:-

If they decide on having the "Messiah," I must beg to be pardoned for having to excuse myself from coming. [Liszt finally dropped his objection to the "Messiah." He had it performed at the Musical Festival, conducted by him.]

If the Committee accepts the programme I have drawn (Schubert Symphony, etc., including the last numbers) for the second day, then it will be a pleasing duty to me to accept the honor of the invitation, always supposing that the means for a brilliant performance of the Beethoven Ma.s.s and the other works are forthcoming, as one cannot doubt will be the case in Aix-la- Chapelle--if my share in the Festival does not in any way give offence to the neighboring towns, in which case I should of course gladly and quietly retire, in order not to occasion any disturbance, or unsatisfactorily prepared discord in the customs of the musical Rhine-lands. I think there is no need for me to accentuate the fact that a musical conductor cannot blindly subscribe to just every programme that is put before him, and I hope that the honorable Committee will not consider that there is any a.s.sumption in my proposition to place the Aix-la-Chapelle programme more in accord with my own collective endeavors.

I am writing a few lines of thanks by the next post to President Herr Van Houten for the distinction shown to me about the consideration contained in this letter, which I beg that you will communicate to him verbally.

Awaiting further communications from the Committee, I remain, dear Herr Capellmeister, with warm acknowledgements and high esteem,

Yours very truly,

F. Liszt

171. To J. W. von Wasielewski in Dresden

Dear Friend,

Your letter reached me, after some delay, in Zurich, where I had to keep my bed for several weeks--and today I write to you still from my bed, and sulking because the geographical change which I have made has not brought about any improvement in my pathological condition (which, by the way, is quite without danger).

How are you, dear Wasielewski? Have you settled yourself pleasantly in Dresden? Are you working at music industriously and methodically?--How far have you got in your biography of R.

Schumann? With regard to this work, the publication of which I am awaiting with great interest, I am sorry to be unable to follow the wish you so kindly express. Many letters addressed to me by Schumann in earlier years are lost, and since my residence in Weymar (from the year 1848) we certainly wrote to one another from time to time, but only when theater or concert performances of his works gave a sort of business occasion for it. Weymar does not deserve the reproach of having kept itself too much in the background in this respect. At the Goethe Festival in 1849 I had the great closing scene to the second part of "Faust" given, which was, later on, repeated; at the beginning of 1852 the music to Byron's "Manfred," with a stage performance of the drama such as he desired, was given several times, and, as far as I know, up to now no other theater has made this attempt. [Liszt was actually the first.] The Weymar theater is likewise the only one which contains in its repertoire Schumann's "Genoveva" (which was indeed given here for the first time in April 1855). It goes without saying that, during the years of my work here, most of his chamber music--Quartets, Trios, Sonatas--as well as his Symphonies, Overtures, and Songs, have been cherished with particular preference and love, and have been frequently heard in various concerts, with the exception of one of the most important; but the very slight amount of public activity of our Vocal Union has prevented, as yet, any performance of the "Peri,"

which, however, has already been partly studied, and will ere long be given at last.

As a contribution to your biographical studies, dear Wasielewski, I should like to tell you truly with what sincere, heartfelt, and complete reverence I have followed Schumann's genius during twenty years and faithfully adhered to it. Although I am sure that you, and all who know me more intimately, have no doubt about this, yet at this moment the feeling comes over me--a feeling which I cannot resist--to tell you more fully about my relations with R. Schumann, which date from the year 1836, and to give them you here plainly in extenso. Have a little patience, therefore, in reading this letter, which I have not time to make shorter.

After the buzz and hubbub called forth by my article in the Paris Gazette Musicale on Thalberg (the meaning of which, be it said in pa.s.sing, has been quite distorted), which was re-echoed in German papers and salons, Maurice Schlesinger, the then proprietor of the Gazette Musicale, took the opportunity of asking me to insert in his paper a very eulogistic article on anything new that came out in the world of Art. For months Schlesinger sent me with this object all sorts of novelties, among which, however, I could not find anything that seemed to me deserving of praise, until at last, when I was at the Lake of Como, Schumann's "Impromptu" in C major (properly variations), the "Etudes symphoniques," and the "Concert sans orchestre" [Concerto without orchestra] (published later, in the second edition, under the more suitable t.i.tle Sonata in F minor) came into my hands. In playing these pieces through, I felt at once what musical mettle was in them; and, without having previously heard anything of Schumann, without knowing how or where he lived (for I had not at that time been to Germany, and he had no name in France and Italy), I wrote the critique which was published in the Gazette Musicale towards the end of 1837, and which became known to Schumann.

Soon afterwards, when I was giving my first concerts in Vienna (April to May 1838), he wrote to me and sent me a ma.n.u.script ent.i.tled "Gruss an Franz Liszt in Deutschland" ["Greeting to Franz Liszt in Germany"]. I forget at this moment under what t.i.tle it was afterwards published; the opening bars are as follows:--

[Here, Liszt hand-writes the score for the opening bars. It is the beginning of the second Novelette Op. 21, but not quite correctly quoted by Liszt]

At about the same time followed the publis.h.i.+ng of the great "Fantasia" (C major) in three movements, which he dedicated to me; my dedication to him in return for this glorious and n.o.ble work was only made three years ago in my "Sonata" in B minor.

At the beginning of the winter of 1840 I traveled from Vienna back to Paris by way of Prague, Dresden, and Leipzig. Schumann paid me the friendly attention of welcoming me immediately on my arrival in Dresden, and we then travelled together to Leipzig.

Wieck, afterwards Schumann's father-in-law, had at that time a lawsuit against him to prevent his marriage with Clara. I had known Wieck and his daughter from Vienna days, and was friendly with both. None the less I refused to see Wieck again in Dresden, as he had made himself so unfriendly to Schumann; and, breaking off all further intercourse with him, I took Schumann's side entirely, as seemed to me only right and natural. Wieck without delay richly requited me for this after my first appearance in Leipzig, where he aired his bitter feelings against me in several papers. One of my earlier pupils, by name Hermann Cohen--a native of Hamburg, who in later years aroused much attention in France, and who, as a monk, had taken the name of Frere Augustin (Carme dechausse [Barefooted Carmelite])--was the scapegoat in Leipzig for Wieck's publicly inflamed scandal, so that Cohen was obliged to bring an action for damage by libel against Wieck, which action Hermann won with the a.s.sistance of Dr. Friederici, barrister-at-law.

In Leipzig Schumann and I were together every day and all day long--and my comprehension of his works became thereby more familiar and intimate. Since my first acquaintance with his compositions, I have played many of them in private circles in Milan, Vienna, etc., but without being able to win over my hearers to them. They lay, happily, much too far removed from the insipid taste, which at that time absolutely dominated, for it to be possible for any one to thrust them into the commonplace circle of approbation. The public did not care for them, and the majority of pianists did not understand them. In Leipzig even, where I played the "Carneval" at my second concert in the Gewandhaus, I did not succeed in obtaining my usual applause. The musicians, together with those who were supposed to understand music, had (with few exceptions) their ears still too tightly stopped up to be able to comprehend this charming, tasteful "Carneval," the various numbers of which are harmoniously combined in such artistic fancy. I do not doubt that, later on, this work will maintain its natural place in universal recognition by the side of the "Thirty-three Variations on a Waltz of Diabelli" by Beethoven (to which, in my opinion, it is superior even in melodic invention and importance). The frequent ill-success of my performances of Schumann's compositions, both in private circles and in public, discouraged me from including and keeping them in the programmes of my concerts which followed so rapidly on one another--programmes which, partly from want of time and partly from carelessness and satiety of the "Glanz- Periode" ["Splendor period"] of my pianoforte-playing, I seldom, except in the rarest cases, planned myself, but gave them now into this one's hands, and now that one, to choose what they liked. That was a mistake, as I discovered later and deeply regretted, when I had learned to understand that for the artist who wishes to be worthy of the name of artist the danger of not pleasing the public is a far less one than that of allowing oneself to be decided by its humors