Mr. Kreisler gives no lessons and hence referred this question in the
most amiable manner to his boyhood friend and fellow-student Felix
Winternitz, the well-known Boston violin teacher, one of the faculty of
the New England Conservatory of Music, who had come in while we were
talking. Mr. Winternitz did not refuse an answer: "The serious student,
in my opinion, should not practice less than four hours a day, nor need
he practice more than five. Other teachers may demand more. Sevčik, I
know, insists that his pupils practice eight and ten hours a day. To do
so one must have the constitution of an ox, and the results are often
not equal to those produced by four hours of concentrated work. As Mr.
Kreisler intimated with regard to technic, practice calls for brain
power. Concentration in itself is not enough. There is only one way to
work and if the pupil can find it he can cover the labor of weeks in an
hour."
And turning to me, Mr. Winternitz added: "You must not take Mr. Kreisler
too seriously when he lays no stress on his own practicing. During the
concert season he has his violin in hand for an hour or so nearly every
day. He does not call it practicing, and you and I would consider it
playing and great playing at that. But it is a genuine illustration of
what I meant when I said that one who knew how could cover the work of
weeks in an hour's time."