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[Illustration: Frederick Chopin.]
STUDIES
IN MODERN MUSIC
_SECOND SERIES_
_FREDERICK CHOPIN ANTONIN DVOŘÁK
JOHANNES BRAHMS_
BY
W. H. HADOW, M.A.
_Fellow of Worcester College, Oxford_
FIFTH EDITION
LONDON
SEELEY AND CO. LIMITED
38 Great Russell Street
1904
Dedicated to
C. F.
_CONTENTS_
OUTLINES OF MUSICAL FORM
CHAP. PAGE
I.--FACULTIES OF APPRECIATION, 3
II.--STYLE AND STRUCTURE, 26
III.--FUNCTION, 57
FREDERICK CHOPIN
I.--WARSAW, 79
II.--PARIS--AND AN EPISODE, 111
III.--A LYRIC POET, 147
ANTONIN DVOŘÁK
I.--DAYS OF PREPARATION, 173
II.--DURCH KAMPF ZU LICHT, 190
III.--NATIONAL AND PERSONAL CHARACTERISTICS, 210
JOHANNES BRAHMS
I.--GROWTH, 229
II.--MATURITY, 250
III.--THE DIRECTION OF THE NEW PATHS, 274
INDEX,
_LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS_
PAGE
FREDERICK CHOPIN, _from a drawing by_ WINTERHALTER, _Frontispiece_
FREDERICK CHOPIN, _from a drawing made after death, by_ GRAEFLE, 144
ANTONIN DVOŘÁK, _from a photograph by_ DURAS, 190
JOHANNES BRAHMS, _from a photograph_, 250
_NOTE_
The following works have been consulted for the present volume:--
Dr Parry--'The Art of Music.'
Sir George Grove--'Dictionary of Music and Musicians,'
particularly Mr Fuller-Maitland's article
on Dvořák.
'Life of Chopin,' by Liszt.
'Life and Letters of Chopin,' by Moritz Karasowski.
'Life of Chopin,' by Professor Niecks.
'Chopin,' by Charles Willeby.
'Chopin and other Essays,' by Henry T. Finck.
'Les trois Romans de Chopin,' by Count Wodzinski.
'Musical Studies,' by Dr Hueffer.
George Sand--'Histoire de ma vie.'
George Sand--'Correspondance.'
George Sand--'Un Hiver à Majorque.'
George Sand--'Lucrezia Floriani.'
George Sand--'Elle et Lui.'
P. de Musset--'Lui et Elle.'
'George Sand,' by E. Caro.
'George Sand,' by Bertha Thomas.
'George Sand,' by Matthew Arnold.[1]
Sainte Beuve--'Portraits Contemporains.'
Delacroix--'Lettres.'
Heine--'Lutetia.'
Henry James--'French Poets and Novelists.'
E. Zola--'Documents Litteraires.'
'Journal des Goncourt.'
'Une Contemporaine,' by M. Brault.
'Antonin Dvořák,' by Dr Zubaty.
'Antonin Dvořák,' by H. E. Krehbiel. (Century, Sept. 1892.)
'Antonin Dvořák,' by J. J. Kral. (Music; Chicago; Oct. 1893.)
'Antonin Dvořák,' by Dr Stecker. (New Bohemian Encyclopædia.)
E. Chvala--'Ein Vierteljahrhundert Böhmischer Musik.'
'Johannes Brahms,' by Dr Deiters.
'Johannes Brahms,' by Bernhard Vogel.
'Johannes Brahms in seinen Werken,' by E. Krause.
J. A. Fuller-Maitland--'Masters of German Music.'
Dr Spitta--'Zur Musik.'
Dr Ehrlich--'Dreissig Jahre Künstlerleben.'
The writer wishes to express his most cordial thanks to Mr E. W.
Hennell, for permission to use the two portraits of Chopin; to Herr E.
Mandyczewski, Librarian of the Gesellschaft der Musikfreunde at Vienna,
for assistance in the study of newspaper records and other documents; to
Messrs Mourek Naprstek, and Zubaty, for aid and advice in the Libraries
at Prague; and to M. Subert, Director of the Czech National Theatre, for
permission to consult, in its Library, the scores of Dvořák's
Operas.
FOOTNOTE:
[1] Originally published in the _Fortnightly Review_ for June 1877,
Reprinted in 'Mixed Essays.'
OUTLINES OF MUSICAL FORM
Non leve quiddam interest inter humanæ mentis idola et divinæ mentis
ideas; hoc est, inter placita quædam inania et veras signaturas atque
impressiones factas in creaturis, prout inveniuntur.--BACON.
I
FACULTIES OF APPRECIATION
It is only natural that a systematic induction should present itself
somewhat late in the history of Science. At first, when the world is
new, the process of exploration must necessarily be hazardous and
tentative: the discoverer must walk with uncertain steps, and must find
his way by the sole aid of his own personal qualities. Hence his method
is a part of himself, and can no more be communicated than keenness of
sight, or delicacy of touch, or rapidity of instinct; he reaches his
conclusions with only a half-consciousness of the road by which they
have been attained, and imparts his results more as separate individual
dogmas than as interdependent parts of an ordered and coherent scheme.
His followers, dazzled by the brilliance of his intellect, and
unprovided with any test for distinguishing between facts and fancies,
accept everything that he has said, and carry on the work, not by any
presumptuous attempt to map out the ground that he has already covered,
but by deducing further application of his laws and further development
of his principles. It may be that the route which he suggested was
purely conjectural; they follow it loyally in the full confidence that
it will bring them to the goal. It may be that some assertion was a mere
hypothesis--a rough and ready explanation which its propounder never
lived to correct; none the less, they take it as axiomatic, and force
the facts into compliance by some subtle and ingenious interpretation of
its terms. The master's word is paramount, and if he and Nature
disagree, it is so much the worse for Nature.
For a time, no doubt, there is a real value in this attitude of
subservience--this unquestioning acknowledgment of the prescriptive
rights of genius. In science, as in political history, it is good that
the earlier steps should be autocratic, and that men should not claim a
share in the constitution until they have in some measure qualified
themselves for its exercise. When the state is small, a posture of
constant criticism is dangerous; when the populace is ignorant, it will
pass no very reasonable judgments upon the code. But as the area widens,
and the mental activity increases, it becomes more and more impossible
to accept as law the untested utterances of an absolute monarch:
subjects begin to feel their power and to arrogate their due position;
they wish to understand the system which they obey, and, it may be, to
revise such of its injunctions as have grown outworn or obsolete, until
at last they find their champion, and some _Novum Organum_ appears as
the constituted representative of the popular voice. And so the story
passes into its third and final stage; the judge himself is tried before
a jury of the people at large, his enactments are criticised point by
point, and his administration remodelled upon a charter of liberty to
which all succeeding kings are amenable.
It is hardly necessary to say that such criticism, if it is to be of any
avail, must be moderate in tone and reverent in spirit. The inductive
method does not 'equalise all intellects'; there will still be contrasts
of hill and valley in the levels of the human mind; there will still be
peaks of genius standing, remote and solitary, above the snow line. But
it is equally certain that criticism is idle unless it be entirely
honest and fearless. When it is uncertain, it should confess its
uncertainty without reserve; when it is opposed by some consensus of
great names, it should be prepared to acknowledge itself in the wrong,
and should keep an open mind for conviction; but in no case should it
insult with an unthinking assent any scientific law of which it
understands neither the principles nor the application. Of course, not
all men have time or inclination or capacity for all topics; some things
must necessarily be left on one side in the press and hurry of life; but
if we are interested in a subject, we are bound to take some measure of
the responsibility which that interest entails. It is a poor occupation
to look upon the conflicts of thought with an aimless _dilettante_
wonder, and bear no hand, even in our own field, to maintain the cause
with which we profess ourselves in sympathy.
There have been some attempts to bar this rule with an exception.
Science, we are told, is concrete, systematic, rational; a proper field
for the exercise of analytic judgment and critical examination; but in
art, as in Religion, there is a mystery into which it is impious to
penetrate. The great doctrines of the Church should be exempt from
criticism, because it is not given to man to comprehend them; the
principles of art should be accepted in silence by a public which knows
nothing of the inspiration from which they come. This dogma is probably
the most dangerous half-truth that has ever helped to retard the
progress of mankind. It is, of course, beyond all question that behind
art, as behind Religion, there lies the unfathomable mystery of life:
that, in estimating both, there is a point at which reason ends and
faith begins; but it is equally sure that, before that point is reached,
there is a wide and fruitful field for critical activity. Science itself
has its mystery--its limit of explanation; yet no one regards Darwin
as a traitor to biology, or Newton as a profane violator of the
mathematics. It was no unchristian authority who bade us 'give a reason
for the faith that is in us'; it is no inartistic teacher who tells us
that the springs of true appreciation must flow from ourselves. And
more: it is because Religion has been regarded as only a mystery that it
has so often withered into a dead superstition: it is because art has
been so regarded that generation after generation has stultified itself
by false judgment. Grant that the production of a work of art demands
certain qualities which are beyond the reach of analysis, it still
remains true that the work itself can be fairly criticised if only we
will find our standpoint. Prometheus may have stolen his fire from
Heaven, yet, before we accept it at his hands, we should know something
of its attributes, and form some measure of its value. Above all, we
should have some means of distinguishing the true spark kindled at a
divine flame, from the wandering marshlights that gleam and flicker with
the phosphorescence of corruption.
It is not from the great artists that one hears this plea for the
mystery of their calling. Homer, Dante, Shakespear wrote to be
understood, they did not wrap up their meaning in recondite phrase and
elaborate symbolism. Raphael sent his drawings to Dürer, not to exhibit
their intricacy of conception, but 'to shew their handiwork.' Beethoven,
on his deathbed, can trust the popular verdict, and know that his new
quartett 'will please some day.' And it is idle to say that these men
undervalued the religion in which they held the priesthood. Only they
knew that its Theology was on broad, simple lines, that its gospel
consisted of truths which could find a ready echo in the heart of the
world; that its temple was one in which the humblest worshipper could
find his appointed place. It is the sciolist, the _dilettante_, the
half-educated amateur, who professes this Gnosticism of art, and
replaces the teaching of the Church by some mystic subtleties of Æons
and Pleroma.
We of the general public are in a great measure responsible for the
existence of this heresy. The seed has no doubt been sown by the
arrogance of the minor artist, but it has found a fostering soil in our
own cowardice and our own indolence. We may set on one side those men
who are altogether outside the influence of any given art, men who have
no feeling at all for music or for painting or for literature: they, at
any rate, maintain the honest doubt in which lives more faith than in
half the creeds, and, whatever their position, they lie wholly outside
the limit of our present purpose. It is the rest of us that are really
to blame, we who profess to care for painting or music, and yet lack the
courage to express our own likes and dislikes, who wait timidly for some
authoritative opinion, that we may gain the credit of agreeing with it,
if it is right, and, if it is wrong, may divert from ourselves the
responsibility of the error. No doubt this attitude has found some
degree of excuse. Artists, like other enthusiasts, are apt to
Rush on a benighted man,
And give him two black eyes for being blind;
nor does anyone like to be called blockhead, even by the representative
of an opposing party. But we may reflect that free judgment is our best
remedy against the intolerance of partisan spirit, and that, whatever be
the issue, we are bound in common fairness and honesty to think for
ourselves. Of all diseases to which the appreciation of art is liable,
hypocrisy is the most fatal and the most insidious.
More particularly is this true of music, the whole criterion of which
is, in a sense, subjective. That is to say, in music we have no external
standard of comparison, such as exists in the representative arts; we
must draw all our rules of guidance partly from the constitution of our
own mind, and partly from the established practice of the great masters.
If the two conflict, we must weigh the evidence before summing up on
the one side or on the other. It may be that a work is great, but not
great for us, that it makes its appeal to some psychological feature or
faculty in which we are deficient. In that case, we must rest content to
be out of sympathy with it, unless, indeed, we can train ourselves to a
wider and more catholic admiration. And this we are most likely to
attain if we analyse the cause and material of our enjoyment, if we find
out, first, what are the elements in our nature to which music attaches
itself, and, second, what are the factors in musical composition to
which our nature, as a whole, most readily responds. Here, then, are two
questions for the inductive method to consider: the first a matter of
pure psychology, the second a matter of pure æsthetics. Of course, the
two questions are complementary: indeed, they may almost be regarded as
two aspects of the same problem: but it will be convenient to take them
separately, and to illustrate each by the other. The reader may be
warned at the outset that there is not going to be any attempt at
exhaustive analysis. Æsthetics, even more than ethics, are 'too complex
to admit of accuracy'; and, in dealing with the conditions of beauty, we
must be content to leave much to individual judgment and individual
perception.
First, then, for the psychological side. We may well begin by accepting
the ordinary tripartite division of human nature which has passed
current ever since the time of Aristotle. Apart from the broad fact of
life which is common to the whole organic world, the faculties of man
may be classified under the three heads of sensation, which he
undoubtedly shares with the other animals, emotion, which he shares with
them in a higher and more developed degree, and reason, which, so far
as our present knowledge attests, he possesses as a sole and special
prerogative. There is no need to enter here into any vexed questions of
limit and demarcation. A philosophy of evolution may some day show that
all human faculties spring from a common source: it has not yet done so;
and whether it succeed or fail, the fact remains that in our present
condition the three classes are different both in property and in
function. Emotion may be partly dependent on the nervous system, but it
cannot be summed up in terms of nervous energy: still less can the work
of the mind be resolved into formulæ of chemical change and molecular
movement. The spiritual principle in man is no more to be confounded
with the brain which it employs as its instrument, than the sculptor
with his mallet and chisel, or the violinist with his Stradivarius.
Further, the rational principle may itself be regarded as twofold. On
the lower side there is a discursive intellect, which weighs evidence
and compares the reports of the senses, which is logical, inferential,
ratiocinative: on the higher side there is faculty of pure intuition,
whence come our axioms, our great Religious truths, our first principles
of art and science. Here again we must wait to determine whether this
distinction be one of aspect or faculty, until we are certain that we
know the meaning of the two terms: at present it is only necessary to
note that the distinction is recognised as real by psychologists, no
less diverse in aim than Aristotle and Hegel. Faith to the Theologian is
the exercise of the intuitive reason on divine things. Thought to the
metaphysician is the faculty behind inference with which Being itself
is correlative. But there is no need to call further testimony. It is
enough to say in plain words, that if we know conclusions which we can
prove, we must have some faculty of knowledge which deals with proof: if
we know axiomatic laws which we cannot prove, we must have some faculty
of knowledge which is independent of proof. We know that two straight
lines cannot enclose a space: we know that the angles at the base of an
isosceles triangle are equal to one another. In these two facts of
knowledge the two aspects of reason are exhibited in their simplest
exercise.
Now, with this spiritual principle of intuition we have, for the
present, nothing further to do. As it is the highest faculty in us, so
it is the least capable of analysis; we cannot define it or describe it,
or say more than that we are conscious of its existence. 'Everyone,'
said Gautier, 'has his measure of inspiration,' and the words, apart
from the tone of mockery in which they were uttered, are literally true.
Everybody is, at some time or another, affected beyond the reach of
words by some great display of beauty or majesty or heroism; and at such
moments we feel a true inspiration which is none the less real for being
inarticulate. So in Music, the one function of this intuitive principle
is the immediate apprehension of vitality in the best work. To one it
may be the first hearing of a Beethoven symphony, to another it may be
the _Messiah_, to another some complete and perfect Volkslied; but
whatever the object, we cease to reason or criticise, and simply
acknowledge it as divine, in virtue of a divine principle in ourselves.
The work is a momentary scintillation from the great glowing fire of
genius, and we can love it, because the best faculty that we possess is
a spark kindled by the same light. Not that in admiring we claim
equality. We are dumb poets, 'wanting the accomplishment of verse,'
lacking the gift of articulation, which implies a clearer vision and a
closer communion with the ideal. But to admire at all, in this true
sense of enthusiasm and self-abandonment, is only possible when the
highest chord of our nature is struck. Man is never lifted nearer to
Heaven than when he bows himself to worship.
Such moments of inspired admiration are of rare occurrence. But it is
impossible to mistake them; impossible to confuse them with the
careless, unthinking enjoyment of the senses, in which so much of our
musical appreciation is supposed to consist. Between the spontaneous
reverence for a masterpiece, and the unintelligent pleasure in mere
sound, there is as wide a difference as between the two loves of Plato's
fable and Titian's picture: the one is a daughter of Urania, the other
of mortal parentage and of mortal passion. In our impulse towards
beauty, as in all other affections of our nature, the two extreme
points lie outside the limits of the discursive reason, and it is
with the intervening space that rational analysis can be most
profitably occupied. In other words, there is a whole realm of artistic
appreciation in which we can resolve our pleasure into its constituent
factors, and discover not only what it is that we enjoy, but how our
capacity for enjoyment is originated and developed. And as almost all
errors of musical judgment spring from carelessness of observation, such
analysis will not only possess a scientific interest, it will also
supply us with some criterion for estimating the value of separate
styles and distinguishing the false and ephemeral from the true and
abiding. In a previous essay some attempt was made to sketch roughly and
imperfectly the four great corner-stones on which this method should
rest: the law of vitality, the law of labour, the law of proportion, and
the law of fitness to the matter in hand. It now remains to build upon
this foundation, to trace out in some degree the application of these
laws, and to discover, if discovery is possible, the _axiomata media_
which these wider generalisations include.
The mode, then, in which we are ordinarily influenced by Music may be
roughly classified under three main types of affection. First, there is
the purely physical, the effect of bodily pleasure or pain, which is
produced on the nervous system by a concurrence or succession of air
vibrations, and is analogous to those impressions of the palate, which
are translated into taste, or those movements of the optic nerve, which
are translated into colour. Secondly, there is the semi-physical, in
which, for the mere corporeal excitation of the senses, we have that
subtler and more sublimated form of influence which it is usual to
comprise under the name of emotion. Here we may find analogy with the
vague, half-conscious feeling of melancholy which we experience in
reading Shelley's _Stanzas written in Dejection_, or the throb of
courage and hopefulness which, without any thought of the artistic value
of the poem, stirs in our heart as an answer to Browning's _Prospice_.
Not, of course, that our appreciation of these two works is merely
emotional; to say this would be to deny their position as products of
art; but it has its emotional side, of which we are all conscious in a
greater or less degree. It is a commonplace of criticism that verse
which is religious or patriotic is often estimated entirely out of
relation to its artistic worth; and that a poor poem may strike a
responsive chord in our nature which leads us to give it an altogether
factitious importance. And this error of judgment is due not to the
spiritual part of our nature, for that takes artistic form for granted,
and rises above it, but to an emotional sympathy with the tenour of the
poem which blinds us for the moment to its literary imperfection. So in
Music, it does not follow that because we feel ourselves stirred by a
certain combination of notes, we are therefore in the presence of a real
masterpiece. The passage in question may strike us because it is great,
but it may equally do so because we are unintelligent; and though in
either case our attitude has its noble aspect, for all genuine
admiration is good up to its limits, yet it is a matter of some moment
whether we are burning our incense before a true or a false shrine.
There is no small difference between being stimulated by some prophetic
utterance, and finding our consolation in the sound 'of that blessed
word Mesopotamia.'
Third, and most vital of the three, is the rational or logical side,
through which we appraise an artistic work, not by any test of sensuous
pleasure or emotional stimulus, but by some definite and intelligible
scheme of æsthetic laws. To this belongs our appreciation of style, our
appreciation of structure, all that we really imply in the word
'criticism.' By this we estimate everything in art, of which the
estimation can be reduced to laws, everything that is not confined to a
bare statement of personal likes and dislikes. In the two previous forms
of affection we are merely passive, the recipients of some mechanical
or semi-mechanical impact from outside; in this alone we aid the
composer by our own judgment, and respond to his call with a sane and
intelligent answer. Grant that the application of logic to art has
special and serious dangers, that to its misuse we owe all the pedantry
and all the intolerance by which the history of criticism has so often
been defaced; it still remains true that the method, if rightly
exercised, is the one condition of any sound and scientific analysis.
Grant that the highest art and the highest appreciation are both, in a
sense, spontaneous, it will be found that they have not disregarded
reason, but absorbed it. To touch the most purely spiritual part of
man's nature is, _ipso facto_, to have removed furthest from the purely
animal; and it is no very extreme paradox to hold that, if a limit be
transcended, it must first have been traversed. So the greatest
masterpieces in Music will be found to contain sensuous, emotional and
rational factors, and something beside, some divine element of life by
which they are animated and inspired. The fourth of these we shall never
be able to analyse, but we may, at least, devote a little attention to
the organic chemistry of the others.
The sensation of sound is, on its material side, an affection of the
auric nerve, under stimulus of regular and periodic air vibrations. The
physical pleasure which results from it is entirely dependent on
the degree of stimulation, and is therefore conditioned by two
variables--the manner of vibration in the air waves, and the particular
receptivity of the nerve. It will be convenient, for the sake of
clearness, to take these two separately.
The simplest air vibrations may differ from each other in three ways.
By their rapidity is determined the pitch of the sound, that is, its
distinction of high and low; by their size, the volume of the sound,
that is, its distinction of loud and soft; and by their shape, the
_timbre_ of the sound, that is, the peculiar quality which distinguishes
the 'voices' of the different musical instruments. It does not appear
that the pleasurableness of the result is seriously affected by the
first two of these, provided that they fall within the limits of clear
sensation. No doubt there are at the extreme ends of the gamut notes
which we cannot detect without some difficulty, but between them the
differences of pitch are recognised by everyone as plain facts, which
have little or nothing to do with the agreeableness of the tone. Again,
when we are standing near the organ, on which some follower of Master
Hugues is 'blaring out the Mode Palestrina,' our ear may be overcharged
with sound, but in that case we can no more be said to hear the music
than the eye can be said to see when it is dazzled with a sudden
splendour of light. Differences of _timbre_, on the contrary, do seem to
imply distinctions of pleasurableness or the reverse. Almost all people
of imperfect musical cultivation have their favourite instruments; one
enjoys the violin, but cares nothing for the piano; another remains in
frozen indifference until he is melted by the human voice; another finds
all music comprised in the invigorating skirl of the bagpipes. It must
be remembered that such influences are wholly physical. They have
nothing to do with artistic appreciation in the proper sense of the
term; they are as purely sensuous as our delight in the colour of a
flower or the taste of a dish.
Now, the immediate effect of music upon the nervous system is
incontestable. It has often been noticed in animals other than man; it
is a matter of common observation in children; it has been made the
basis of a proposal to use the art as a medicinal agency.[2] And as no
two sets of nerves are exactly alike, it follows that in no two
organisms will the same effect be produced. If the temperament be highly
strung, and if there be no intellectual enjoyment of the art to divert
attention, the nerve may be over-stimulated, and the result will be a
feeling of pain. As the nerve strengthens, it will grow more tolerant;
as education advances, the mind will be occupied with new interests.
Questions of form and style will assert their pre-eminence over
questions of tone. In a word, body will
Get its sop and hold its noise,
And leave soul free a little.
Théophile Gautier honestly defined music as 'le plus désagréable de tous
les sons.' Charles Lamb rushed from the opera-house to solace his
sufferings amid the rattle of the cab wheels. And equally the child
Chopin cried with pain at the first sound of the pianoforte, and the
child Mozart fainted under the intolerable blare of the trumpet. In all
these cases the explanation is the same--a nerve too delicate to endure
the stimulus, and an absence of any counteracting influence that could
inhibit the sensation.
It is thus wholly erroneous to suppose that there is a gulf fixed
between the man who 'has no ear' and the trained musician: on the
contrary, the two extremes shade into each other by a thousand
varieties of gradation. And this is particularly true of these complex
impressions which result from several notes combined in harmony. The
stimulus which we receive from a chord is, for obvious reasons, more
vehement and acute than that which we receive from any of its
constituent notes taken separately; and hence it is in our appreciation
of harmonies, more than in any other form of musical effect, that the
sensuous side of the art becomes apparent. Now, there is not a single
chord in common use at the present day which has not been at some time
condemned as a dissonance. The major third was once held to be a
discord; so, later, was the dominant seventh; so, within living memory,
was the so-called dominant thirteenth. Fifty years ago Chopin's harmony
was 'unendurable;' thirty years ago the world accepted Chopin, but
shrank in terror from Wagner and Brahms; now, we accept all three, but
shake our heads over Goldmark. And the inference to which all this
points is, that the terms 'concord' and 'discord' are wholly relative to
the ear of the listener. The distinction between them is not to be
explained on any mathematical basis, or by any _a priori_ law of
acoustics; it is altogether a question of psychology.
At the same time, it may be held, fairly enough, that a composer is
bound to write in a manner intelligible to his generation. Volapuk may
be the language of the future, but a poet who, at the present day,
should publish his epic in that tongue, has only himself to thank if he
find no readers. True, but the composer, like the poet, is himself a
part of his generation, and, if he write simply and naturally, may be
trusted not to pass out of touch with contemporary thought. He is a
leader, but it is no part of a leader's business to lose sight of his
army. And in Music, it is not the sensuous question which matters, but
the intellectual; not the fact of concord or discord, but the way in
which they are employed. We still find Monteverde harsh and the Prince
of Venosa crude, not because they use sharp dissonances and extreme
modulations, but because they fail to justify them on any artistic
grounds. They are in this matter children playing with edged tools. So,
at the present day, a composer who should end a piece on a minor second
would be deliberately violating the established language of the time;
and would be reprehensible, not because a minor second is ugly--for it
will be a concord some day--but because, in the existing state of Music,
it could not be naturally placed at the close of a cadence. Imagine
Handel's face on being shown a song which finished on a dominant seventh
out of the key. And, having imagined it, turn to Schumann's _Im
wunderschönen Monat Mai_.
Again, supposing that a generation has mainly agreed to find the climax
of sensuous pleasure in certain chords--the augmented sixth, the
diminished seventh and the like--it by no means follows that a
composition is delightful because it contains those particular effects.
Everything depends on their relation to their context, or the standpoint
from which they are introduced, on the general style of the passage in
which they appear. Any amateur purveyor of hymn tunes and waltzes can
learn to write them; the difficulty is to present them fitly and
properly, and to place them, as points of colour, where they will
harmonise with the complete scheme of the work. Even more recondite
effects, like the wonderful 'voca me cum benedictis' in Dvořák's
_Requiem_, are _quâ_ sensuous of secondary value. Their true importance
lies in their intellectual side, in their function of exhibiting new key
relationships or new methods of resolution. And if a chord does not
fulfil some such duty, if it does not justify itself by bearing some
definite organic part in the total plan, then it is not art but
confectionery. Hearers, whose only delight in music arises from the
perception of 'sweet' harmonies, are on a par with the schoolboy in
Leech's picture, who suggests that the claret would be improved by a
little sugar.
From this two conclusions would seem to follow. First, that Music can
never be adequately criticised on sensuous grounds, partly because the
receptivity of the nerve differs in different temperaments, partly
because even where there is an agreement the sensuous side is wholly
subordinate to the intellectual. Secondly, as a corollary from this, any
musician who deliberately aims at sensuous effects alone, _ipso facto_,
commits artistic suicide. He can be beaten on his own ground by the
great masters, and he leaves untouched the whole of that field to the
occupation of which they owe their greatness. Finally, it may be added,
that sense notoriously grows tired, while mental activity endures. We
very soon weary of the average drawing-room ballad, even if it gave us
some animal pleasure at the first hearing: but we return again and again
to the fugue of Bach or the sonata of Beethoven, because there we find
the permanent expression of mind and intelligence. And thus the musical
critic may virtually disregard the element of sensation, or at most may
allude to it only so far as to show that it is, in Aristotle's phrase,
'obedient to reason.'
Music affects our emotional nature in two ways: partly through the
nervous system, partly through the ordinary law of association. It is a
commonplace of psychology that our emotions are largely conditioned by
physical states in the body,[3] and to this rule music assuredly offers
no exception. Under certain circumstances, a current of energy, after
passing from the ear to the brain, is transmuted into the nervous
movements which constitute the material cause of the simple feelings,
and thus we are roused or exhilarated or depressed by means as
mechanical as those of any agency in external nature. Here, again, as in
sensation itself, much depends upon the receptivity of the nerve. One
hearer may be thrown into agitation by an impulse which leaves another
comparatively cold, a strong temperament may be vehemently excited by
conditions under which a weaker organism is stunned or paralysed. But
all who are in any degree susceptible of the influence of music, have
experienced some measure of this emotional stimulus, poured into the
brain through sensation, and then sublimated in a physical alembic.
Among the most conspicuous existing causes may be noted the rapid
tremolo of the strings, as in the death song at the end of _Tristan_,
the beat of a recurring figure, as in the 'Ride to the Abyss' of
Berlioz' _Faust_, the reiteration of high notes on the violin, as in
much of Dvořák's chamber music, and the restlessness of frequent
modulation or uncertain tonality. Any reader who is at the pains to
analyse the effect produced upon him by these means of musical
expression, will probably agree that they rouse first a particular kind
of stimulus in the sense, and then, without any conscious intervention
on his own part, a corresponding state of emotional feeling.
Far more important is the influence of association. There is no reason
_in rerum naturâ_ why the minor mode should be sad, but our first
ancestors noticed that a cry sank in tone as the power of its utterance
failed, and hence established a connection between depression of note
and waning strength. So began an association of ideas to which, by
transmission and inheritance, the pathos of our minor keys is mainly
due. Again, the bass naturally suggests gravity and earnestness, because
that is the case with the speaking voice. 'No man of real dignity,' says
Aristotle, 'could ever be shrill of speech;' and similarly, when we look
for serious or dignified music, we expect to find some prominence given
to its lower register. Much, too, of this association is due to the
motions of our ordinary life: the force that strikes like a blow in the
first phrase of Beethoven's Fifth Symphony, the agitation so often
expressed by rapid and irregular movement; the broken voices at the end
of the Funeral March in the _Eroica_; and others of similar kind. Of
course music cannot define any specific emotional state: it is far too
vague and indeterminate to be regarded as an articulate language; but it
undoubtedly can suggest and adumbrate general types of emotion, either
by producing their sensuous conditions, or by presenting some form of
phrase which we can connect by association with our own experience.
But it is not in this emotional influence that the truest laws of
musical criticism are to be sought. Its criterion is nobler than that
of sense, partly because it deals with an aspect of our nature which is
less animal, partly because it implies a greater degree of skill in the
artist; but it is too personal and intimate to afford a satisfactory
basis for discussion, and taken by itself, it offers little or no
opportunity for the exercise of the higher faculties. In the _Journal
des Goncourt_, there is a well-known passage describing the effect of
music on a roomful of highly-strung and unintelligent listeners. The
picture is not a little degrading to our humanity: nervous emotion
trembling on the verge of hysteria, sentiment that has passed out of
rational control, an intoxication of feeling morbid in itself and
dangerous in its inevitable reaction. The case may be extreme, the
account may be rhetorically exaggerated, but it contains a salutary
truth. If we look on music merely as a stimulus to our emotional nature,
we are really disregarding all that makes it of permanent value as an
art. We are lowering it to the level of sentimental romance or
bloodthirsty melodrama. Grant that this form of indulgence is less gross
than the direct gratification of the senses, it is not a whit more
critical. While we are under its spell, we are as incapable of sane
judgment as Rinaldo in Armida's garden; we have abrogated our manhood,
we have drugged our reason, we are lying passive and inert at the mercy
of an external will.
It is hardly necessary to point out that this state of mere recipience
is altogether different from artistic appreciation. Art is not more a
riot of the passions than it is a debauch of the senses: it contains, no
doubt, sensuous and emotional elements, the importance of which there is
no need to undervalue, but it is only artistic if it subordinate them
to the paramount claims of reason. Even the purest and noblest emotions
do not constitute a sufficient response. We are only in a position to
criticise when we have passed through the emotional stage and emerged
into the intellectual region beyond. To judge a composition simply from
the manner in which it works upon our feelings, is no better than
judging a picture or a poem merely from our sympathy with its subject.
To this conclusion two possible objections may be urged: first, that it
takes an 'ascetic' view of art; second, that it places the criterion in
a mere subservience to abstract and mechanical laws. Both of these rest
on a misunderstanding of the position. True art is neither ascetic nor
intemperate: it implies a full command of the sensuous and emotional
factors in beauty, but it knows how to employ them. Its object is to
make the whole work beautiful, not to elaborate this or that aspect at
the expense of the rest; and such an object can only be achieved in
virtue of certain intellectual principles. Beethoven's harmony is not
less exquisite, or his passion less true and vital because he regards
the requirements of style and structure as paramount. On the contrary,
the sensuous and emotional beauties of his work are themselves enhanced
by the unerring skill with which he places his effects and contrasts his
colours. Again, whatever their intellectual laws may be they are not
mechanical. They afford no excuse for _kapellmeistermusik_, no
justification for cold accuracy and dull correctness: so far from
precluding genius, they presuppose it. They are not grammatical
conventions which can be learned from text-books, they are the direct
and spontaneous outcome of the human reason. Thus, in order to
ascertain them, we must begin by discovering what is the broadest
principle of formal beauty which can be deduced from the laws of mind,
and use it as a provisional hypothesis with which to approach our
problem. We shall then see how far this principle finds actual
embodiment in the works of the great composers, and if there are
exceptions or divergences, how far they can be explained. If our
original hypothesis is confirmed by experience, we may reasonably
conclude that it is true; if not, we must recognise that we are on the
wrong line, and we must retrace our steps. In musical criticism, as in
every other form of scientific investigation, it is not the function of
man to anticipate facts, but to interpret them.
FOOTNOTES:
[2] See an interesting essay in Dr Frank's _Satyræ Medicæ_. See also
Burton's _Anatomy of Melancholy_, II. ii. 6, 3.
[3] On this point, see Professor James' _Principles of Psychology_,
chap. xxv.
II
STYLE AND STRUCTURE
'It may be shown,' says Mr Herbert Spencer,[4] 'that Music is but an
idealisation of the natural language of emotion, and that, consequently,
Music must be good or bad according as it conforms to the laws of this
natural language. The various inflections of voice which accompany
feelings of different kinds and intensities, are the germs out of which
Music is developed. It is demonstrable that these inflections and
cadences are not accidental or arbitrary: but that they are determined
by certain general principles of vital action; and that their
expressiveness depends on this. Whence it follows that musical phrases,
and the melodies built on them, can be effective only when they are in
harmony with these general principles. It is difficult here properly to
illustrate this position. But perhaps it will suffice to instance the
swarms of worthless ballads that infest drawing-rooms, as compositions
which science would forbid. They sin against science by setting to music
ideas that are not emotional enough to prompt musical expression: and
they also sin against science by using musical phrases that have no
relation to the ideas expressed, even when these are emotional. They are
bad because they are untrue. And to say they are untrue is to say they
are unscientific.'
In these words we may find a starting-point for sound criticism. If a
musical composition is to make any bid for the rank of classic it must,
as a primary essential, be genuine in feeling: by which we mean, that it
must not only be original, though originality is implied and included,
but that, in Wordsworth's fine phrase, it must be inevitable. To
recognise a melody as perfect is to feel, when we come to know it, that
it could not possibly have been written in any other way: that its
phraseology, whether simple or complex, whether obvious or recondite, is
the necessary outgrowth of the thought which it embodies. Of course this
law does not preclude the element of surprise, which is one legitimate
factor of musical effect. The hearer, like the composer, may sometimes
be 'stung with the splendour of a sudden thought' and roused into a
moment of exquisite consciousness by an unexpected cadence or a new
modulation. But if the surprise be more than temporary, it is
inartistic. Before we reach the conclusion of the work, we must be
convinced that the effect in question bears some vital and organic part
in the total structure: that it is, in short, a prediction which is
justified by a future fulfilment. And, in that case, we end by
acknowledging that it was not an isolated and deliberate attempt to stir
our wonder, but part of an established plan which only astonished us at
the moment because we were unable to foresee its issue.
It is obvious that in the drama or the novel we are but little impressed
by devices which we can detect as artificial. A writer who lets us see
that he 'wants to make our flesh creep,' has forearmed us already
against all his terrors: a playwright who tells us at the outset that he
is going to persecute his heroine, simply fills us with an idle
curiosity as to the precise form which the persecution will take. There
can be no illusion where there is no appearance of spontaneity: no art
when there is no concealment of artifice. Victor Hugo can move us
intensely; Scribe cannot move us at all: for the former, with all his
vehemence and exaggeration, is speaking out of the abundance of the
heart, and the latter is merely using the stage as a chess-board for the
elaboration of ingenious problems. So it is in Music. Meyerbeer is one
of the 'cleverest' of musicians: brilliant, ready, resourceful,
courageous enough to rob the grave of its horror and the Church of its
majesty, if only he may rouse his audience to a higher strain of
attention. Yet we are no more stirred by Meyerbeer than we are by Monk
Lewis. The music is drowned by the soliloquies of the composer, who
looks on from his box and wonders whether this scene is sufficiently
terrible, whether that situation contains the requisite amount of
pathos; and whether the effects, which have been so carefully calculated
and so precisely measured, have after all proved to be a profitable
investment.
But there are lower depths than this. It is not long since an eminent
composer of sentimental ballads was obliging enough to communicate to
the magazines a complete recipe of his method. It is hardly worth while
to give the details, but attention may be called to the singularly naïve
confession with which the disclosure ended:--that for a song to be truly
successful 'its melody must always remind the audience of something that
they have heard before.' Surely there has never been so complete an
instance of artistic falsehood gibbeted by its own perpetrator. Poe, no
doubt may be quoted as a parallel, but not with justice. The famous
essay on the Raven is clearly an afterthought: a critical puzzle
designed to mystify a credulous public. One might as well believe that
Burger's _Lenore_ was written by rule and measure, or that Berlioz
planned his _Marche au Supplice_ with a diagram of the procession at his
side.
Such examples of artistic failure are not always ignoble. It is quite
possible that a man may be preoccupied with some scientific aspect of
his art, that he may write not from the overmastering desire to express
some beautiful thought, but from a deliberate wish to solve some
difficult problem or transcend some technical limit. In such a case he
will produce work which, though not valuable as an artistic achievement,
is yet interesting as a study. He may show us some new method of
resolving a discord, some new cadence for the conclusion of a phrase,
some new shape which the melodic curve can legitimately assume: and
thus, though he devote himself to a side issue, though his work will be
purely formal and academic, he may yet claim an honourable place, not
indeed among the poets of Music, but among its verse-writers. Of this
type we have a conspicuous instance in Sir George Macfarren. He is
essentially a musical grammarian, engaged all his life long in settling
the doctrine of the enclitic de, wide of knowledge, sincere of purpose,
and almost entirely devoid of spontaneity. Consequently there is not, in
all his composition, a single page which is without interest to the
student of harmony, and there is hardly one which can put forward any
claim to rank as a living product of art. And this is not because he
has regarded the intellectual aspect of Music as paramount,--for to do
this is a necessary condition of good work,--but because he has
emphasised the wrong intellectual aspect, because he has confused
grammar with style. The great masters--Bach, Beethoven, Brahms--are
every whit as correct as Macfarren, and every whit as ingenious, but to
them correctness and ingenuity are subordinate, almost incidental: to
him they appear to be the main object and aim of composition.