Shortly after the opening of the Friday-morning sitting the Composer
requested that the whole slate be ruled with staves for writing music.
Throughout the preceding Wednesday and Thursday attempts at the writing
of music had been of constant occurrence; they had come on slates, on
writing-pads, and on the leaves of closed books. These bits of musical
notation had been very fragmentary and obscure; often they had consisted
of less than half a dozen notes placed upon staves consisting of but
three or four lines, instead of five. The most successful of these
earlier efforts had been produced on a double school-slate, with a
wooden, list-bound frame: two measures on a treble staff had been
sprinkled with vague indications of musical script. No attempts had yet
been made to bring even the best of these various writings to order and
intelligibility. We were soon to learn that a scrap of music set down
within three or four minutes was to require as many hours for revision,
emendation, elucidation--for editing, in brief. It is but fair, however,
to state that some of this time was taken up by the registering of
irrelevant messages from other quarters and by digressions toward the
Composer's own private concerns.
The staff drawn on the wooden-framed slate had been ruled crosswise. The
Composer now directed that the new staves to be drawn on the silicon
slate should run lengthwise and should cover every page of it. This was
done by the editor. Provision was asked for seven measures, to which an
eighth was added later.
During the three minutes or so required for writing on the six pages of
the slate, the position of the slate, in reference to the editor, was as
follows: After considerable moving about beneath the top of the table,
during which time it was principally in the hands of the psychic, it
approached the writer and remained with him. The under cover of the
slate (with a bit of slate-pencil tightly enclosed) rested on his knee;
the upper cover was pressed against the frame of the table. The editor's
thumb rested rather lightly on the middle of the nearer half of the
upper cover, and his fingers assisted in supporting the nearer half of
the under cover. The psychic herself had surrendered the control of the
slate to the editor, and could have had no contact with it beyond
touching the edge farthest from him. On the second day, Saturday, during
which the bass for the last four measures was produced, the slate was in
the exclusive control of the editor, the psychic not touching it at all.
The progress of the musical writing was both felt and heard; it was a
combination of light and rapid scratching, pecking, and twitching, with
an occasional slight waving motion up and down.
The score, as first revealed, consisted of open-headed notes with curved
stems. They gave no indications of varying values; it was impossible to
distinguish quarter-notes from eighth-notes, sixteenth-notes, or
grace-notes; and no rests were set down. The notes were placed but
approximately as regarded lines and spaces. No stems, save in one or two
instances, united the chords, the notes of which were written more or
less above one another, yet detached. A few unsatisfactory attempts were
made by the Composer to place the bars. These were mostly put in by the
editor--sometimes by the direction or with the acquiescence of the
Composer--and, when they were drawn in advance of the writing, their
presence was always properly observed.
As the revision became more close and careful, the Composer directed
that the work be continued down-stairs beside the piano. Here every bar
of the treble was played separately as soon as edited, to be pronounced
satisfactory by the Composer, or to be modified under his direction. The
treble, on its completion--eight measures--was then played over in its
entirety and pronounced by the Composer to be correct. (He made one or
two further emendations, however, on the following day.) The eight bars
of the bass were gone over in the same fashion. The attempt to play the
entire composition, treble and bass, was not satisfactory, partly owing
to mechanical difficulties occasioned by the distribution of the matter
on the slate and the multiplicity of corrections, and partly from lack
of skill in the performer. However, two or three very brief passages
were given by both hands and pronounced correct by the Composer, who
showed surprise that anything so "_simple_"--as he characterized
it--should give so much trouble. In one instance he noted that, while
the two parts, treble and bass, were correct separately, they were not
played in correct time together. The Composer, throughout, was most
patient, persevering, courteous, and encouraging, though toward the
end--in the closing measures of the bass--he showed some confusion and
uncertainty. "_Wait a moment_," he would say; and once the whisper
asked that, as an aid to sight, the editor's hand be spread over that
leaf of the slate on which work was in progress. The Composer had
thought, earlier--and so said--that a trained musician could easily
supply the bass from the melody. His amanuensis was obliged to
acknowledge frankly an inability to cope successfully with so
complicated and unusual a matter. The psychic herself, though expressing
a fondness for the opera, disclaimed any knowledge of musical notation,
and added that never before had she performed such a function as at
present.
As the work of correction progressed, the Composer several times asked
for opportunity to make the changes himself; whereupon the pencil-tip
would be enclosed in the slate and satisfactory emendations be
forthcoming. In cases where corrections were made by the writer, the
Composer often watched the progress of the slate-pencil (a longer one
than that which was used between the leaves) and gave directions: "_Not
there_"; "_Yes, here_," and the like; and he would often acknowledge a
correction with a "_Thank you_," or meet a suggestion with a "_Yes, if
you please_." On these occasions the slate was some four feet distant
from the psychic, and practically out of her sight.
Repeated attempts were made on both sides to get down the name of the
composition. Various related versions of the word appeared, none of them
quite satisfactory. The Composer seemed to acquiesce in our attempts to
relate his title to different Slavic and Italian words for "gypsy," but
no importance can be attached, of course, to such a piece of direct
suggestion.
The final version of this brief but laborious score has been preserved,
and all the stages in its progress have been abundantly annotated. To
follow it through in detail, however, would be but weariness. All the
salient points in its production fall under one of three heads. There
are, first, the passages that seem to have been produced in co-operation
with the sitters. There are, second, the passages that seem to have been
produced in independence of the sitters. And there are, third, the
passages that seem to have been produced in direct opposition to the
sitters. Examples of all three classes follow; perhaps only those of the
third and last class are really important.
1. The Composer in Co-operation. The piece, in three sharps, opened on
the tonic, yet the very first note in the bass was a G-sharp. The
following colloquy ensued: Editor: "Does the piece begin with the tonic
chord of A?" Composer: "_Yes._" Editor: "Is the G-sharp, then, to be
regarded as a suspension?" Composer: "_Of course. That makes it right.
How could it be correct otherwise?_"
Another example. In the second bar a note which the editor had taken for
an eighth-note was explained by the Composer as being a grace-note. The
editor pointed out that this left only five eighth-notes to fill a
six-eight measure. The Composer directed the insertion of an eighth-rest
at the beginning of the bar.
In the fourth bar there was a partial chord, E-B--a fifth. The
Composer's attention was drawn to this blemish. He requested the
insertion of a G-sharp between, thus completing his triad.
But the above examples, and others which might be related, are not
without resemblances to thought transference.
2. The Composer in Independence. Under this head may be placed his
various instructions relative to tempo, expression, and the like. The
signature, three sharps, was set down by the editor, as the result of an
answer to his inquiry. But the time--six-eight--was written in (on the
editor's request) by the Composer himself. It was a distinct and
separate effort, for which the pencil was put in the slate and the slate
placed beneath the table. The time was set down before the notes
themselves were secured. The six-eight sign was clearly and neatly
written on the proper staff, in correct relation to the G-clef and to
the signature; and the two figures were also in correct relation to each
other. The word "Moderato" was written in by the Composer's direction,
without any request from the editor. Later, the words "With feeling"
and the mark of expression "pp," were obtained in the same way. Ties,
grace-notes, and staccato-marks were insisted upon, here and there, with
great vigor and earnestness.
Two further examples of the Composer's independence will perhaps
suffice. In the sixth measure there was a run of three eighth-notes in
the treble, exactly above a corresponding run of three eighth-notes in
the bass. In making his revision the Composer directed that each of
these three pairs of notes should be joined by stems. This took the
treble notes down to the bass, and left the last half of the treble bar
empty--a fact unnoticed by the editor and beyond the purview of the
psychic. The Composer, however, observed the hiatus, and directed the
insertion of two rests.
One other instance: The bar at the end of the first measure, as
originally drawn by the Composer, cut off two notes on leger-lines and
gave them to the succeeding measure. Another little colloquy: Editor:
"Shall I draw the bar where it belongs?" Composer: "_Yes, if you
please._" Editor: "Here?" Composer: "_No._" Editor: "There?" Composer:
"_Yes. Thank you._"
3. The Composer in Opposition. Numerous interesting cases of
cross-purposes between the Composer and the circle developed during
these two days. A number of salient examples follow:
On the first opening of the slate, the seventh measure of the treble
contained but two notes, which the Composer presently declared to be
quarter-notes. This left the first third of the measure vacant; and the
Composer, interrogated, directed the insertion of a quarter-rest. The
editor objected that this gave the measure a three-quarter look, instead
of the proper six-eighth look. "_That is a liberty I take_," came the
answer, like a flash.
At one stage the Composer requested that a certain note should have a
"dot" added. The editor placed the dot to the right of the note, thus
lengthening its value by one-half. "_No, no_," objected the Composer;
"_put it on top, above the staff_." His intention had been, once more,
to make a note "staccato," and he had been misunderstood.
The editor, in setting down the signature of sharps on the second page
of the slate, intentionally placed the last sharp a third below its
proper position. He was at once brought to book by "Dr. Cooke," the
"control." "_We are being fair by you, and you must be fair by us._"
In the eighth and last measure, which did not appear to be
satisfactorily completed, the Composer called for the insertion of a
figure 2. This meant, as became clear enough through a subsequent
reference to his published scores, that he wished two quarter-notes to
receive the value of three eighth-notes, but was not understood at the
time by his helper. "_Never mind_," said the Composer, graciously, "_I
will write it differently_." He cancelled the figure 2, and completed
the measure with a rest.
A similar instance occurred in the fifth measure, where the Composer
called insistently for a double sharp (x). The editor ventured to
object, and the passage was tried on the piano, at the Composer's
request. The double sharp was felt by him to be unsatisfactory, and was
sacrificed. "_It won't make much difference, anyway_," was his whispered
comment.
A curious point, to finish with: On the first day the editor inquired
about doubtful notes by name, as, A, C-sharp, and the like, while the
Composer indicated their position by specifying lines and spaces--as,
third space, second line, and so on. The next day, when the editor made
his inquiries on the basis of lines and spaces, the Composer oftenest
named the notes by letter.
Toward the end of the last sitting, "Dr. Cooke" once again came to the
fore and hinted that the result of our endeavors might perhaps be not a
reproduction of one of the Composer's manuscripts, but of a mental
picture in the Composer's mind. The "picture," as secured by us, was
not, it must be admitted, without distortion. The Composer himself used
the word "scattered" in such a way as to imply that he had sketched out
his ideas in life on various detached bits of paper. He added that a
certain member of his family "would know." The hopes raised by this
declaration have not been realized.
"_No more music to-day_," whispered "Dr. Cooke"; and the sitting--the
sittings--ended.