"Are you musical?"
"No; I neither play nor sing."
Your answer shows a complete misunderstanding of the case. Because you
neither play nor sing, it by no means follows that you are unmusical.
If you love music and appreciate it, you may be more musical than many
pianists or singers; and certainly you may become so.
This book is planned for the lover of music, for those who throng the
concert and recital halls and the opera--those who have not followed
music as a profession, and yet love it as an art; who may not play or
sing, and yet are musical. Among these is an ever-growing number that
"wants to know," that no longer is satisfied simply with allowing
music to play upon the senses and the emotions, but wants to
understand why it does so.
To satisfy this natural desire which, with many, amounts to a craving
or even a passion, and to do so in wholly untechnical language and in
a manner that shall be intelligible to the average reader, is the
purpose of this book. In carrying it out I have not neglected the
personal side of music, but have endeavored to keep clearly before the
eyes of the reader, and in their proper sequence, the great names in
musical history.
I am somewhat of a radical in my musical opinions, one of those
persons of advanced views who does not lift his eyes reverentially
heavenward every time the words "symphony" and "sonata" are mentioned.
In fact, I am most in sympathy with the liberating tendencies of
modern music, which lays more stress upon the expression of life and
truth than upon the exact form in which these are sought to be
expressed. Nevertheless, I am quite aware that only through the
gradual development and expansion of forms that now may be growing
obsolete has music achieved its emancipation from the tyranny of form.
Therefore, while I would rather listen to a Wagner music-drama than to
a Mozart opera, or might go to more trouble to hear a Richard Strauss
tone poem than a Beethoven symphony, I am not such an unconscionable
heretic as to be unaware of the great, the very great part played by
the Mozart opera and the Beethoven symphony in the evolution of music,
or their importance in the orderly and systematic study of the art.
Indeed, I was brought up on "Don Giovanni," the Fifth Symphony and the
Sonatas before I brought myself up on Chopin, Liszt (for whom I have
far greater admiration than most critics), and Wagner. Therefore, an
ample portion of this book will be found devoted to the classical
epoch and its great masters, especially its greatest master,
Beethoven, and to the forms in which they worked. Nor do I think that
these pages will be found written unsympathetically. But something is
due the great body of music-lovers who, being told that they _must_
admire this, that and the other classical composer, _because he is
classical_, find themselves at a loss and think themselves to blame
because modern music makes a more vivid and deeper impression upon
them. If they only knew it--they are in the right! But they have
needed some one to tell them so.
"Advanced," this book is. But plenty will be found in it regarding the
sonata and the symphony, and, through the latter, the development of
the orchestra; and orchestral instruments, their tone quality, scope
and purpose are described and explained.
More, perhaps, than in any work with the same purpose, the great part
played by the pianoforte in the evolution of music is here recognized,
and I have availed myself of the opportunity to tell much of the story
of that evolution in connection with this, the most popular of musical
instruments, and its great masters. Why the greater freedom of
technique and expression made possible by the modern instrument has
caused the classical sonata to be superseded by the more romantic
works of Chopin and others whose compositions are typically pianistic,
and how these works differ in form and substance from those of the
classicists, are among the many points made clear in these chapters.
The same care has been bestowed upon that portion of the book relating
to vocal music--to songs, opera, music-drama and oratorio. In fact,
the aim has been to equip the lover of music--that is, of good music
of all kinds--with the knowledge which will enable him to enjoy far
more than before either an orchestral concert, a piano or song
recital, an opera or a music-drama--anything, in fact, in music from
Bach to Richard Strauss; to place everything before him from the
standpoint of a writer who is himself a lover of music and who,
although thoroughly in sympathy with the more advanced schools of the
art, also appreciates the great masters of the past and is behind none
in acknowledging what they contributed to make music what it is.
"Are you musical?"
"No; I neither play nor sing."
But, if you can read and listen, there is no reason why you should not
be more musical--a more genuine lover of music--than many of those
whose musicianship lies merely in their fingers or vocal cords. Try!