The French composer, Saint-Saëns, considers a piano a useless item in
the art of composition, at all events in his case, for he rarely, if
ever, makes use of one when composing, even to play over completed
works.
Some MS. paper and a pencil are the only materials he works with, and
he has composed whole operas without a musical instrument in the house.
This manner of composing M. Saint-Saëns finds a great saving of
valuable time (and if composers' time is not important, whose is?), and
he does not consider that ideas come any the more readily when seated
before a piano; in fact, rather the reverse.
The portion of MS. will be familiar to those who have studied his works.
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