find Nevin's "Valse Caprice," Op. 6, No. 1, thoroughly delightful. It
is the first of a set of several pieces comprised in his sixth work,
this fact being expressed by the designation Opus 6, No. 1. The piece
is full of pretty sentiment and I always like to imagine that it
describes an episode during a dance. It has charming melodies.
Ornamental figurations in the accompaniment, now above, now below,
give the effect of whispered questions and answers during the dance.
The questions--put by the man--are pressing and ardent, the
answers--from the girl--playful and parrying. Sometimes they even
ripple with chaff. Yet, toward the end of the dainty little
composition, they become tinged with sentiment, as if she were afraid
she might have gone a little too far and might "spoil things" and
thought it just as well to let him know in time that, after all, she
was not turning a wholly deaf ear to his pleading.
This piece I would follow with Nevin's "Intermezzo," Op. 7, No. 3.
Although it belongs to an entirely different work I enjoy playing it
immediately after the waltz and imagining that it relates to the same
young couple--that he has led her out into the conservatory or on to a
terrace overlooking a moonlight garden and under these romantic
circumstances, is urging his suit more persistently than before. She,
however, is a little too fond of flirting to let her real sentiments
be known at once. But when, as if giving up the riddle in her dancing
eyes and seemingly mocking smile, he appears about to lead her back
into the ballroom, there is, at least so I like to read the music, a
pretty little laugh, as much as to say, "Can't you read my real
feelings under my mask of banter," a tender glance indicated by a
retard on a charmingly expressive little turn of the melody--and she
is in his arms.
Now I would repeat the waltz, to indicate that, carried away by their
happiness, they have gone back into the ballroom and thrown themselves
heart and soul into the dance. And there you have a little Nevin suite
telling a pretty story.
To me one of this composer's most fanciful tone paintings is, "In my
Neighbor's Garden," Op. 21, No. 2. This is one of a series of pieces
the complete title of which is "May in Tuscany," and which he composed
during a sojourn in Florence. You can hear a bird sing all through
this piece, and that the composer so intended it, became clear to me
when I found that its original title was "Rusignuolo," Italian for
nightingale.
Make haste to mount, thou wistful moon,
Make haste to wake the nightingale:
Let silence set the world in tune
To harken to that wordless tale
Which warbles from the nightingale.
Those lines from Christina Rosetti's "Bird Raptures," seem to me
perfectly reflected in Nevin's composition, and equally so are these
lines from the same poet's "Twilight Calm":--
Hark! that's the nightingale,
Telling the self-same tale
Her song told when this ancient earth was young:
So echoes answered when her song was sung
In the first wooded vale.
Or this from Byron's "Parisina":--
It is the hour when from the boughs
The nightingale's high note is heard;
It is the hour when lovers' vows
Seem sweet in every whisper'd word.
Nevin's "Barcarolle" is another beautiful composition, which conveys
the listener to Venice with its picturesque canals and ancient
palaces. It is a night scene, and reminds me of Wagner's description
of the singing of the gondoliers at night in one of his letters from
Venice: "Ah, music on the canal. A gondola with gaily colored lights,
singers and players. More and more gondolas join it. The flotilla,
barely moving, gently gliding, floats the whole width of the canal. At
last, almost imperceptibly, it makes the turn of the bend and
vanishes. For a long while I hear the tones beautified by the night.
Finally the last sound, dying away, seems to dissolve itself into the
moonlight, which beams softly on, like a visible realm of music."
There is an entire Venetian suite by Nevin which he composed during a
stay in the Italian city. One day he gave his gondolier a day off,
and the boatman took his sweetheart, who lived on the mainland and
never had been in Venice, through the waterways. It was this which
suggested to Nevin the composition of the suite, which he entitled "A
Day in Venice." The best known number from it is the "Venetian Love
Song."
Moskowszki is another good composer of light music, and like Nevin,
what he writes is thoroughly original. His "Serenata" Op. 15, No. 1,
is one of the prettiest of modern pieces, and a perfect example of
what a serenade should be--a graceful melody over an accompaniment of
guitarlike chords. There is an intervening part with much
ornamentation, which has the effect of improvising, a delicious little
run leading back to the first melody which now should be played very
softly and with slight retardations, as if the serenader were
departing and the music dying away. "From Foreign Parts,"
Moskowszki's Op. 23, is one of the best known modern compositions. It
consists of several numbers each representing a country and composed
in true national style and with as much success as if, were such a
thing possible, the composer were a native of each of these countries
and were thoroughly imbued with its spirit. Of these separate numbers
I am inclined especially to recommend to the pianolist "Germany," with
its beautiful, broad, sustained melody, thoroughly German in contour
and expression, and among the most beautiful melodies composed in
modern times; and "Spain," one of the most brilliant little rolls for
the piano-player--gay, spirited and full of snap and go, the movement
never flagging from beginning to end. Moskowszki has shown himself
most happy in catching the spirit of Spanish music. He has a book of
Spanish dances and two Spanish albums full of music of most varying
mood, yet every mood characteristic of Spain and its people, now gay,
now languorous, now dashing, now subdued, now softly whispering, now
full of verve and passion, like the "Bolero," the fifth of the
"Spanish Dances," Op. 12, with its sharply accentuated rhythm and
dashing melody, which toward the end fairly swirls with excitement.
A "Moment Musical," Op. 7, No. 2, was the composition which gave
Moskowszki his first taste of international fame, but in spite of much
that is genuinely beautiful, especially in its opening melody, I think
the work suffers from undue length. By all means, however, the
pianolist should not neglect this composition. Were I asked, however,
to select the work which seems to me to bring out in the most
favorable relief Moskowszki's traits as a composer it would be his
"Waltz," Op. 34, No. 1. It has an introduction beginning with a
phrase in the bass like a man asking the honor of a dance with an
attractive girl, followed by a little upward run, the gleam of the
smile with which she gives assent. Then there are short, crisp, bright
phrases, as though she enjoyed the knowledge that every one is looking
at her as he leads her out and whispers compliments.
The introduction with all these interesting preliminaries over, the
waltz itself opens with a melody full of sentiment and almost personal
in its persistent suggestion of wooing. At the same time it has a
graceful swing that carries it along like an undercurrent, with rising
and falling inflections, and, like the Nevin waltz, with much dainty
ornamentation, as if the couple were conversing in low tones while
dancing. Then there is a brilliant episode when individuals seem lost
sight of in the general vividness of the scene with its gaily colored
costumes and flash of jewels. There are alternating sentimental
passages until, toward the end, the first melody bursts into a
fortissimo--a great rising inflection, insistent and impassioned--then
a final pitch of excitement as all seem to throw themselves into the
whirl and the waltz reaches a brilliant end. While Nevin in the waltz
which I selected from among his works, appears to tell the story of
two people, Moskowszki here places before our eyes a vivid ballroom
scene with one particularly handsome couple as the center of
attraction, without, however, letting us wholly into their secret. The
waltz, though long, is of never-flagging interest.
This composer's opus 34 is an orchestral suite ("Première Suite d'
Orchestre") of which the second number is an "Allegretto giojoso," a
playful, sportive, chic and graceful movement, with a tender melody in
the middle part, at first heard alone, then with a sparkling
accompaniment. This piece having originally been scored for orchestra,
it is quite possible to detect orchestral instruments like flutes and
clarionets in some of the brilliant runs. The pianola roll is a
reproduction of an arrangement for four hands, that is, for two
players at one piano, yet only one player is required to produce the
full effect of a pianoforte duet arranged from an orchestral
composition.
Moskowszki is a prolific composer, and it is well worth the
pianolist's while to thoroughly explore the catalogue of his works.
Much modern music merely echoes what has gone before and may be summed
up as watered Chopin. Therefore, even if Moskowszki's compositions are
in the lighter forms, their originality and melodiousness make them
worthy of ranking high among modern salon pieces.
One of the prettiest and deservedly popular little works in the modern
repertory is the Paderewski "Minuet," Op. 14, No. 1. Modern minuets
are echoes of the classical period. Compositions of this kind are to
be found in the sonatas and symphonies of Haydn, Mozart and Beethoven
and even further back in the suites of Bach. Accordingly the
Paderewski "Minuet," in keeping with the form, is simple and clear-cut
and gracefully melodious. At the same time, however, it is modern in
the brilliant ornamentation introduced in the middle part of the
composition which in a minuet is called the trio.
The minuet was a stately dance. The word is derived from the French
menu meaning small and referring to the short steps taken in the
dance. Originally the music to it was brief, but as a complement, a
second minuet was added which, in time, became the trio, so-called,
because it was written in three part harmony. This was followed by a
repetition of the first minuet. While the designation trio has been
retained to this day, the three part harmony no longer is considered
obligatory. The minuet is one of the very few of the older dance forms
which have not become obsolete.
It was a square dance, the steps consisting of a coupée (a salute to
one's partner, while resting on one foot and swinging the other
backward and forward) a high step and a balance. In the Paderewski
minuet the stately, ceremonious character of this dance is preserved
together with its old fashioned, naïve grace and charm. It is quite
possible while playing it to see the dancers at a French court ball or
in the ballroom of some chateau, the women, beauties of their day, in
high pompadour with puffs and curls powdered white, with petites
mouches, little moon and star-shaped beauty spots, on their faces;
square cut bodices, lace stomachers, paniers over brocaded skirts with
lace panels; feet encased in high heel satin slippers with jewelled
buckles; and gracefully managing their ostrich feather fans as they
curtsy to their partners; the latter wearing wigs also powdered white,
long coats of brocade, elaborately embroidered waistcoats with lace
jabots, satin knee breeches, silk stockings and a garter with jewelled
buckle on the right leg, and helping themselves to snuff out of gold
or silver boxes during brief pauses in the dance. Such is the picture
that can be conjured up in imagination while playing the Paderewski
minuet.
Quite different yet equally effective in its way is his "Cracovienne
Fantastic," Op. 14, No. 6. The cracovienne is a Polish dance for a
large and brilliant company and just as Paderewski recalled in his
minuet the stately assemblage of days long past, so in his
cracovienne he gives us a brilliant picture of a ballroom scene in his
native Poland when that country was still in its glory and not
partitioned among three nations of Europe. The reiteration of its
characteristic rhythm gives it peculiar fascination. It is clearly and
distinctly melodious, with bright, flashing runs giving it brilliancy.
Again different in style from any of the preceding are the works of
Cécile Chaminade. Not only is this composer a woman, she is a French
woman and, like a French woman, essentially clever and chic. She may
be a trifle more superficial than the composers I have mentioned, but
her music is clean-cut, clear as a crystal, and, like everything about
a refined woman, the quintessence of neatness. It is quite as if Mme.
Chaminade's maid laid out her musical thoughts as well as her dresses,
being sure to have every frill and furbelow in its place, whether it
be the robe d' interieur which she is to wear at breakfast, her robe
de ville for calling, or her robe de soirée. True it is that serious
musicians are apt to wear a somewhat supercilious expression at
mention of her music and to pronounce it clever rather than deep, yet
it is equally true that it takes its place among the best salon pieces
of the day and gains value if only from the fact that this bright
French woman has skillfully refrained from attempting flights for
which her graceful wings are not strong enough. Most of her music is
characterized by a fascinating archness and coquetry and requires
quick and sudden changes in time for its proper interpretation. While
rarely attempting the larger musical forms, she has been an
industrious student of the best music, so that all her compositions
are what is called "well made," correct according to the rules of
musical science, yet in melodic and harmonic inspiration characterized
by originality and musical inventiveness. She writes with judgment,
refinement and taste, avoiding on the one hand the pitfall of
pretentiousness, and, on the other, the monotony of platitude found in
the works of those who compose in the larger forms but lack the
originality to fill them with new and interesting matter. It is a
great thing to know your limitations, yet to be able to do vivid and
original work within them.
Brief as is Chaminade's "Serenade," Op. 29, its melody is charming, it
is ably harmonized and it appeals to the heart. There is not a
commonplace bar in it. It is one of those delicate bits of inspiration
which survive other and seemingly grander works, the grandeur of
which, however, is in course of time, discovered to be mere hollow
pretentiousness. It is a capital example of the manner in which this
composer writes in the small genre--delicate, refined and sensitive.
She has been highly successful in compositions in dance form, managing
these without a suggestion of the trivial. Thus her "Air de Ballet,"
Op. 30, No. 1, is full of brilliancy and nervous energy without ever
degenerating into vulgar noisiness. Another "Air de Ballet" by her
from the ballet "Callirhoe," to which her widely known "Scarf Dance"
also belongs, is crisp, bright and dainty. "Callirhoe" is a
ballet-symphonique for stage performance and its production showed her
to be so well grounded in her art that it does not suffer even under
the pressure of rapid composition, or of being obliged to work "on
time." The commission for this ballet was offered to Godard, a
well-known French composer. He was, however, occupied with an opera
and declined the work, at the same time recommending that the
commission be offered to Chaminade. It was accepted by her and within
six weeks from the day when she began work upon it, it was completed
even to the scoring for orchestra.
While the pianolist hardly can go amiss in choosing from among the
list of Chaminade's compositions I may mention as especially
characteristic her "Arabesque," "Humoresque," La Lisonjera (Flatterer)
"Pierrette," "Scaramouche" (Mountebank) and "Spinning Wheel."
Chaminade's compositions are so popular in this country yet so little
is known about her personally, that I have secured a few personal data
concerning her from my friend, Mr. Percy Mitchell, who is attached to
the staff of an American paper in Paris. Mme. Carbonel-Chaminade has a
shock of dark, curly, short-cropped hair which gives her a boyish
aspect, a touch of masculinity further emphasized by a tailor-made
costume with stiff, white, turned-down collar and loosely tied scarf.
Beyond this aspect, however, there is nothing mannish about her. She
cares neither for sport nor exercise in general; her principal
occupation is musical composition, her chief relaxation practicing the
pianoforte two hours a day; and she reads an immense amount of poetry
from which she carefully selects the words for her songs. Society she
abhors, but she attends scrupulously to her large correspondence. Very
many of these letters come from America, and in a practical spirit
truly American seek information regarding the interpretation of her
works. "How should your 'Serenade' be phrased?--I am learning the
'Scarf Dance.' By this same mail I am sending you a copy of it. Would
you kindly mark the phrasing in it and return it to me?" In
connection with questions of this kind it is interesting to note that
practically all of Chaminade's compositions have been metrostyled for
the pianola by the composer herself. The pianolist at least will not
find it necessary to trouble her with questions like the above.
Probably no composer has had one set method of work. It is apt to vary
according to surroundings. So with Chaminade. She may write while
seated at her pianoforte, testing her thoughts on the keyboard and
even working them out in detail before putting them on paper. Or she
may sit at her table, a vast velvet-covered affair taking up nearly
half of her studio. Sometimes an idea that has haunted her for weeks
may take definite shape while she is speeding on a train to fulfill a
concert engagement and she will jot it down in spite of the roar and
vibration of railway travel. As the train rushes on the composition
may be completely worked out in the composer's mind before the
journey's end, and so retentive is Chaminade's memory that, when she
returns to her villa in Vésinet, near the forest of St. Germain not
far from Paris, she can seat herself at her table and copy the work
from that mental vision of it which she had on the train.
Some years ago during a semi-professional tour which she made through
Roumania, Servia and Greece, she was invited to play for the students
of the Athens conservatory. When she stepped on the stage she saw row
after row of young people armed with the printed music of what she was
about to play and prepared in a cold-blooded, business-like way to
open the music of the first number on the program and to follow the
concert note for note from the printed scores from beginning to end.
Imagine the effect upon her nerves produced by the rustling of one
hundred pages all being turned at the same instant at intervals during
the concert; and even now she laughingly confesses that she was nearly
overcome with stage fright and prays she may never have to endure
again such an ordeal as the music students of Athens unwittingly
prepared for her.
With the exception of Nevin, the composers whose works I have
mentioned are living and actively engaged in composition. The piece to
which I now desire to call the pianolist's attention belongs to the
dawn of the romantic period in music. It was composed by Weber who
died in 1826, is entitled "Invitation to the Dance," was written a few
months after his happy marriage with the opera singer Caroline Brandt,
and is dedicated to "My Caroline." Because Weber was one of the first
composers who rank as great to give distinctly descriptive titles to
compositions, and because of certain other characteristics in his
works, he is regarded as the founder of the romantic school of
music--music which is not simply sufficient unto itself but has a
secondary meaning that adds immeasurably to its interests; music which
seeks to suggest a definite mood and even to throw a realistic picture
of some scene in nature or some human experience upon a background of
harmony and instrumental coloring; and which cares less for the
artifices of form than for the expression of the true and the
beautiful from the standpoint of modern art.
The "Invitation to the Dance" derives further interest from the fact
that it was the first composition to lift the waltz, which up to that
time had been employed simply as an accompaniment for dancing, to the
level of other legitimate and recognized artistic musical forms. The
composition opens with an introduction in slow time, the first phrase
unmistakably being the voice of the man conveying to the lady an
invitation to dance. You hear her playful objection--undoubtedly she
wants to be asked a second time--the repetition of his invitation, her
assent, the short dialogue as the two step out on the floor; brief,
but resonant preluding chords; then the free, elastic rhythm of the
waltz followed by its gay, dashing melody. There is an exuberance of
runs and ornamentations until the first feeling of elation lapses into
a second dreamy, languorous waltz melody, as if the dancers were
floating on the scented atmosphere of the ballroom. In portions of
this there is a sentimental colloquy between the couple whom we met in
the introduction, the two voices being clearly differentiated. The
little duet between them adds to the beauty and interest of this
portion of the work, the melody of which simply is exquisite. Then
everything whirls and sparkles again and, when the dance has ceased,
there is a briefer recapitulation of the introduction, the lady is led
back to her seat, and the episode comes to an end.
The pianolist may now place Liszt's "Campanella" (Bell rondo) on the
instrument. Originally this was composed by the famous violinist
Paganini, Liszt transcribed it for the pianoforte and so successfully
that now it is better known in his version than in its original form.
It is a piece which can be described only by one word--delicious. Its
title is immediately understood by the unmistakable silvery tinkle of
a bell in the high treble, constantly recurring, but always with added
instead of diminishing, beauty. On the pianoforte it demands
virtuosity of the highest rank, yet for the pianolist it is as easy
to play as is the simplest pianoforte piece intended for a beginner.
And so, having begun this chapter with Nevin, one of the lighter
composers of pronounced merit, the pianolist already finds himself
playing a work by Weber and another by Liszt, two of the most famous
figures in musical history. Even if, as I trust will be the case, he
becomes so interested in the works I have cited in this chapter, as to
try much other music by the same composers, he will, in an almost
incredibly short space of time, be ready for the thrill of the great
masters--which shows that, after all, the sequence I am following in
this book is not as haphazard as some may think.
IV. THE THRILL OF THE GREAT MASTERS
In his choice of music the pianolist need not pause to consider the
slow evolution of the art from the simple to the more complex, since
for him nothing is complex. Thus he is free to disregard all
traditions, even such an absurd one, for example, as that which
insists that a sonata or symphony should be played as a whole, that,
if a work in this form consists of three or four movements, none of
these should be "lifted" out of the whole and played as a separate
composition.