Chord-Playing. Deppe no "Mere Pedagogue." Sherwood. Mozart's
Concertos. Practicing Slowly. The Opera Ball.
BERLIN, _January 2, 1874_.
When I had got the principle of the scale pretty well into my head, what
should Deppe rummage out but Czerny's "_Schule der Geläufigkeit_ (School
of Velocity)," which I hadn't looked at since the days of my childhood
and fondly flattered myself I had done with forever. (We none of us know
what stands before us!) After having studied Cramer, Gradus and Chopin,
you may imagine it was rather a come down to have to take to the School
of Velocity again! And to study it _very_ slowly and with one hand
only!! That was adding insult to injury. Deppe knows what he is about,
though. He began picking out passages here and there all through the
book, and making me play them, stretching from the thumb and turning on
the fingers as often as possible. After I have mastered the passages I
am to learn a whole study, first with each hand alone, and then with
both together!
Deppe next proceeded to teach me how to strike chords. I had to learn to
raise my hands high over the key-board, and let them fall without any
resistance on the chord, and _then sink with the wrist_, and take up the
hand exactly over the notes, keeping the hand extended. There is quite
a little knack in letting the hand fall so, but when you have once got
it, the chord sounds much richer and fuller.--And so on, _ad infinitum_.
Deppe had thought out the best way of doing _everything_ on the
piano--the scale, the chord, the trill, octaves, broken octaves, broken
thirds, broken sixths, arpeggios, chromatics, accent, rhythm--all! He
says that the principle of the scale and of the chord are directly
opposite. "In playing the scale you must gather your hand into a
nut-shell, as it were, and play on the finger tips. In taking the chord,
on the contrary, you must spread the hands as if you were going to ask a
blessing." This is particularly the case with a wide interval. He told
me if I ever heard Rubinstein play again to observe how he strikes his
chords. "Nothing cramped about _him_! He spreads his hands as if he were
going to take in the universe, and takes them up with the greatest
freedom and _abandon_!" Deppe has the greatest admiration for
Rubinstein's _tone_, which he says is unequaled, but he places Tausig
above him as an artist. He said Tausig used to come to his room and play
to him, and he took off Tausig's little half bow and way of seating
himself at the piano and beginning at once, without prelude or wasting
of words, very funnily! He would scarcely take time to say "_Guten
Abend_ (Good Evening)." Deppe thinks Tausig played some things
matchlessly, but that in others he was dry and soulless. Clara Schumann,
he says, is the most "musical" of all the great artists--and you
remember how immensely struck I was with Natalie Janotha, who is her
pupil, and plays just like her.
From my telling you so much about technicalities, you must not think
Deppe only a pedagogue. He is in reality the soul of music, and all
these things are only "means to an end." As he says himself, "I always
hear the music the people _don't_ play." No pianist ever entirely suited
him, and this it was that set him to examining the instrument in order
to see what was the matter with it. He made friends with the great
virtuosi, and studied their ways of playing, and the result of all his
observation is that "Piano playing is the only thing where there is
something to be done." He declares that there is so much musical talent
going to waste in the world that it is "lying all about the streets,"
and he has a most ingenious way of accounting for the fact that there
are so many great pianists in spite of their not knowing _his_
method:--"Gifted people," he says, "play by the grace of God; but
_everybody_ could master the technique on _my_ system!!"
To show you that it is not alone my judgment of Deppe--four of Kullak's
best pupils, including Sherwood! left him for Deppe, after I did. They
got so uneasy from what I told them, that they went to see Deppe, and as
soon as they heard Fräulein Steiniger play, they had to admit that she
had got hold of some secrets of which they knew nothing. Sherwood, you
know, is a positive genius, yet he is beginning all over again, too. In
short, we are all unanimous, while Deppe, on his side, is much gratified
at having some American pupils.--He flatters himself that we will
introduce all his cherished ideas into our "new and progressive
country."
Ah, if I had only studied with Deppe before I went to Weimar! When I was
there I didn't play half as often to Liszt as I might have done, kind
and encouraging as he always was to me, for I always felt I wasn't
_worthy_ to be _his_ pupil! But if I had known Deppe four years ago,
what might I not have been now? After I took my first lesson of Deppe
this thought made me perfectly wretched. I felt so dreadfully that I
cried and cried. When I woke up in the morning I began to cry again. I
was so afflicted that at last my landlady, who is very kind and
sympathetic, asked me what ailed me. I told her I felt so dreadfully to
think I had met the person I ought to have met four years ago, at the
last minute, so.--"On the contrary, you ought to rejoice that you have
met him _at all_," said she. "Many persons go through life without ever
meeting the person they wish to, or they don't know him when they
do."--Sensible woman, Frau von H.!--After that I stopped fretting, and
tried to believe that there _is_ "a divinity that shapes our ends,
rough-hew them how we may."
* * *
BERLIN, _February 12, 1874_.
I am now taking three lessons a week from Fräulein Steiniger and one
lesson of Deppe himself, and he says I am almost through the technical
preparation, though I still practice only with one hand, and _very_
slowly all the time. Fräulein Steiniger says that she also practiced
slowly all the time for six months, as I am now doing. In fact, she
completely forgot how to play _fast_, and one day when Deppe finally
said to her in the lesson, "Now play fast for once," she could not do
it, and had to learn it all over again. Of course she very soon got her
hand in again, and now she has the most beautiful execution, and can
play _anything_ perfectly.
Deppe wants me to play a Mozart concerto for two pianos with Fräulein
Steiniger, the first thing I play in public. Did you know that Mozart
wrote _twenty_ concertos for the piano, and that nine of them are
masterpieces? Yet nobody plays them. Why? Because they are too hard,
Deppe says, and Lebert, the head of the Stuttgardt conservatory, told me
the same thing at Weimar. I remember that the musical critic of the
_Atlantic Monthly_ remarked that "we should regard Mozart's passages and
cadenzas as child's play now-a-days." _Child's play_, indeed! That
critic, whoever it is, "had better go to school again," as C. always
says!
Deppe is remarkable in Mozart, and has studied him more than anybody
else, I fancy. Indeed, to turn over his concertos, and see how he has
_fingered_ them alone, is enough to make you dizzy. He is always saying,
"You must hear Fannie Warburg play a Mozart concerto. _She_ can do it!"
and, indeed, I am most anxious to hear her.
It is ludicrous to hear Deppe talk about the artists that everybody else
thinks so great. Having been a director of an orchestra for years, he
has constantly directed their concerts, and he weighs them in a
relentless balance! The other day he gave me Mendelssohn's Concerto in
G minor, and just at the end of the first movement is a fearful
break-neck passage for both hands. "There!" cried Deppe, "that's a good
healthy place. _Nehmen Sie_ DAS _für Ihr tägliches Gebet_ (Take _that_
for your daily prayer). When you can play it eight times in succession
without missing a note, I'll be satisfied. That is one of the places
that when the pianists come to, they get their foot hard on to the pedal
and hold on to it--_Herr Gott!_ how they hold on to it--and so _lie_
themselves through." He said he never heard anyone do it right except
those to whom he had taught it. Steiniger played it for me the other day
and it so astonished my ears that I felt like saying, "_Herr Gott!_"
too. It was as if some one had snatched up a handful of hail and dashed
it all over me. Br-r-r-zip! how it did go!--Like a bundle of rockets
touched off one after the other. And yet this concerto is one of those
things that everybody thrums, and is one of the regular pieces you must
have in your repertoire. Deppe was quite shocked to find I had never
learned it.
My lesson usually lasts three hours! Nothing Deppe hates like being
hurried over a lesson. He likes to have plenty of time to express all
his ideas and tell you a good many anecdotes in between! I usually take
my lessons from seven till ten in the evening. Then he puts on his coat
and saunters along with me on his way to his "Kneipe," or beer-garden,
for he is far too sociable to go to bed without having taken a friendly
glass of beer with some one. Every block or so he will stand stock still
and impress some musical point upon my mind, and will often harangue me
for five or ten minutes before moving on. It seems to be impossible to
him to walk and _talk_ at the same time! In this way you may imagine it
takes me a good while to get home.
On Tuesday there is to be a grand ball at the opera house which the
Emperor and the whole court grace with their presence, and lead off the
first Polonaise. There are two of these grand public balls every winter.
The tickets are sold, and it is the sole occasion where the public can
have the felicity of gazing upon royalty in close proximity. I have
never been, though all my German friends have been dinning it into my
ears for the last four years that I ought to go and see it, for the
decorations are magnificent. This year there is to be but one, as the
Emperor is not very well, and I expect it will be as much as one's life
is worth to get in and get out again, such is the rush!
The German officers waltz perfectly, and with great spirit and elegance.
Dancing is a part of their military training and they are obliged to
learn it. But they are not very comfortable partners, for one rubs one's
face against their epaulets unless they are just the right height, and
you've no rest for your left hand. They take only two turns round the
room and then stop a moment or two to fan you and rest--then they take
two more. The consequence is, one never gets fairly going before one has
to stop. At first I used to think the effect of so many people whirling
round in the same direction dizzying and monotonous. But when I became
accustomed to it, the continual reversing of the Americans who come to
Berlin struck me as angular, in contrast to the graceful German
circling. It is not "the thing" here for the girls to look flushed and
disordered--skirts torn, and hair out of crimp--as our belles do at the
end of an evening. They retire from the ball-room with their dresses in
faultless condition, so that going to parties in Germany must cost the
_pater familias_ considerably less than with us! The floor is never so
crowded with dancers at one time, and as they are going in the same
direction, they don't run into each other as our couples do. On the
other hand, they don't have such a "good time" out of it as do our
girls, with their long five and ten minute turns to those delicious
waltzes! Strange, that though Germany is the native home of the waltz,
and the Vienna waltzes surpass all others, the Schottisch or
Rhinelaender should be their favourite dance. They dance it very
gracefully and rythmically.
* * *
BERLIN, _March 1, 1874_.
I went the other evening to the Opera ball I wrote you of in my last.
The whole opera house, stage and all, was floored over, and
magnificently decorated with evergreens, mirrors, fountains, and
flowers. The tickets are sold for some charitable purpose. Only nice
people can get in, because the whole thing is systematically arranged,
and nobody can give their tickets to anybody else. I got mine through
Mr. Bancroft, and I went with two other ladies and a gentleman.
We went very early, so as to get a box to sit in, and _never_ shall I
forget the first effect of the ball-room! That immense polished floor
stretching out like one vast mirror or sheet of ice, the fountains
flashing at the sides, the walls wreathed with green, a big orchestra
sitting in the balcony at each end, and about a hundred pairs of
magnificently dressed ladies and gentlemen descending the stairs into
the rooms and promenading about. Light, diamonds, colour, everywhere.
Oh, it was perfectly fairy-like! The floor was built over the tops of
the chairs in the parquette, and the entrance was through the royal box,
which is just in the centre of the opera house, facing the stage. This
box is like a large recess, of course, and not like the ordinary boxes.
There was an entrance on each side, coming in from the corridor, and a
flight of broad steps, carpeted, had been improvised, which led from it
down to the floor. It looked perfectly dazzling to see the pairs come in
from both sides at once and descend the steps, and the ladies' dresses
were displayed to perfection. Such toilets I never saw. The women were
covered with lace, feathers, and diamonds. The simpler dresses were of
tarletane (mine included!) but as they were quite fresh they gave a very
dressy air. We had a splendid box, first rank, and the second from the
proscenium boxes on the left, in which sat the royal family. In the box
between us and the latter sat the wife of the French ambassador with the
Countess von Seidlewitz and her sister, and behind them was a formidable
array of magnificent-looking officers in full uniform, their breasts
flashing with stars and orders and silver chains.
The Countess von Seidlewitz is a famous court beauty and is lady of
honour to the Princess Carl (sister of the Empress). She sat just next
to me, as only the partition of the box was between us, and she was the
most beautiful woman I saw--perfectly imperial, in fact--white and
magnificent as a lily. Her features were perfectly regular, and she had
a proudly-cut mouth, and such dazzling little teeth! Then, her arms,
neck, and shape were exquisite. She wore the severest kind of dress, and
one that only such beauty could have borne. It was a white silk, with an
immense train, of course, and without overskirt--simply caught up in a
great puff behind. The waist was made with a small basque, but very low,
and with very short sleeves. Round the neck was a white bugle fringe,
and there were two or three rows of this fringe in front, graduating to
the waist, smaller and smaller, and going round the basque. All the
front breadth of the skirt was laid in folds of satin, in groups of
three, and on the edge of every third row was the fringe again,
graduating wider and wider toward the bottom. In her hair she wore a
wreath of white verbenas or (snow-balls) and green leaves. Her sole
ornament was a magnificent diamond locket and ear-rings of some curious
design, the locket depending from a very fine gold chain, which
challenged all observers to notice the faultlessness of her neck. One
sly bit of coquetry was visible in two natural flowers,
lilies-of-the-valley, with their leaves, which she had stuck in her
corsage so that they should rest against her neck and show that they
were not whiter than her skin.--You see there were no folds anywhere,
as there was no overskirt, but the whole dress hung in long lines and
showed the contour of the figure. Nothing but these fringes (which
gleamed and waved with every motion) relieved it--not even a bit of
black velvet anywhere, for the lace round the neck was drawn through
with a white silk thread. There was another lady in the same box whose
dress was very beautiful, too, though she herself was not. It was a
green silk with green tulle overdress puffed, and with ears of silver
wheat scattered over it. The tunic was of silver crape, the bottom cut
in scallops and trimmed with silver wheat. A wisp of wheat was knotted
round her neck for a necklace, and a perfect sheaf of it in her hair. It
was an exquisite dress.
At ten o'clock everybody had arrived--about two thousand people. The
orchestra struck up the Polonaise, and the court descended from the box
to make the tour of the floor (_i. e._, only the members of the royal
family with their ladies of honour). The Emperor was not very well, so
he remained in his box, but the Empress led off with the Duke of
Edinburgh, who happened to be here. She was dressed in lavender satin,
covered with the most superb white lace. Her hair was done in braids on
the top of her head, very high, and upon it was fastened a double
coronet of diamonds, stuck on in stars, etc., which flashed like so many
small suns. Round her neck depended from a black velvet band, strings of
diamonds of great size and magnificence. It really almost made you start
when your eye caught them unexpectedly! The Empress is a very
elegant-looking woman, and is every inch a queen. She moved with stately
step, bowing and bowing graciously from side to side to the crowd which
parted and bent before her, and was followed by the Crown Prince and
Princess, the Princess Carl, the Princess Friedrich Carl (a beauty) and
her daughters, and I don't know who all, with their ladies of honour.
When the Countess von Seidlewitz came along, with her fringes waving and
gleaming in front of her, she shone out from all the rest, and, in fact,
from the whole two thousand guests, like the planet Venus among the
other stars.--Stunning!
The orchestra banged away its loudest, and it was quite exciting. The
three balconies were crowded with people, and all the boxes. The box of
the diplomatic corps was just opposite us, and our gay little Mrs. F.
sat in it dressed in white satin. Some of my friends came and stood
under my box and tried to get me to come down, but I would not, for I
knew I should lose my place if I did, and, indeed, I would not want to
dance there unless my dress were something superlative. You see, all the
swells sat in their boxes and gazed right down on the dancers, who had a
circular place roped off for them. De Rilvas, the Spanish minister,
looked so fine, however, with his broad blue ribbon across his breast
and his gold cross depending from his neck, that I should have liked
very well to have made the tour of the room with him.