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THE MUSIC TRADE REVIEW
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The Fourth of a Series of Talks on Chopin and His Music, Wherein the
History of the G Minor Nocturne Is Given, Together With Some Sugges-
tions for Playing This Number in a Proper Fashion on the Player-Piano
Most people have heard of the music-lovers
whom George Ade has described as insisting
that the musician of the party play "Showpan's
Noctern." There are probably some hundreds
of thousands to whom the word Nocturne
means the little work in E flat, op. 9 No. 2,
that very sugary, not to say treacly, thing as
it is, when the young lady from the conserva-
tory plays it before the admiring circle of her
friends at the church social. But if the pieces,
by the composition of which Chopin is best
known to the great lay world, were all of this
sort, we should give little time to them. Hap-
pily they are not; in the words of Mr. Weller,
"not by no means, sir!"
The Meaning of Nocturne
The word Nocturne derives from the Latin
nox, night, and has the same meaning as our
word nocturnal. "Night music" is a rough ap-
proximation; but it should be understood spirit-
ually and not materially. Originally the type
of composition was thought out by John Field,
that eccentric Irish genius who, born in Dub-
lin in 1782, died fifty-five years later in Mos-
cow, where he had lived for some years, his
early death being brought on by disease con-
tracted while on an European concert tour.
Field was pianist as well as composer and en-
joyed in his day a popularity that now seems
the more strange for his present obscurity.
The Nocturnes of John Field are his sole sur-
viving works in popular estimation. No one
to-day plays his concertos or sonatas. The lit-
tle Nocturnes are charming idylls, "poesies in-
times," as Liszt called them. But while Field
settled the form he did not exhaust the spirit.
His works are colorless besides the warm glow-
ing passion or repressed fire of melancholy
wherewith Chopin filled the simple outlines.
When we come to Chopin, we come to genius;
and although the Polish master is indebted to
his Irish predecessor for the idea, he alone is
to be credited with the wonderful development
that has made the Nocturne an enduring form,
and his own Nocturnes immortal.
Dannreuther says: "The form of Chopin's
weird nocturnes, the kind of emotion embodied
therein, the type of melody and its graceful em-
bellishments, the peculiar waving accompani-
ment in widespread chords, with their vaguely
prolonged sound resting on the pedal; all this
and more we owe to Field." True, no doubt,
as to the skeleton, but not at all as to the
spirit. For Chopin is Chopin, and only he can
speak that tongue in its perfection.
As the Chopin Nocturnes now stand before
us in all their beauty and passion, we may say
of them that they embody, amongst them,
"every phase of human emotion or experience
(to quote Baxter Perry) or any aspect of in-
animate nature which can rationally be con-
ceived as appropriately emanating from or en-
vironed by nocturnal conditions."
The form itself is extremely simple, being
simply of two parts, with return of the first
strain; no more complex than the simplest songs.
A first melody is stated and worked out in free
fancy with all the wealth of accompanimental
mastery in which Chopin excelled all competi-
tors. Long spread-out arpeggios, reaching often
into what would otherwise be remote discords,
form the basis of the accompaniments, while
above them sings the melody, tender, as the one
in G major op. 37, passionate as in C minor op.
48, deeply foreboding as in D flat op. 27, filled
with beauty and shimmering as a jewel in velvet
and brocade from a mass of dainty delicate lace-
like ornament in which strange appogiaturas and
graceful arabesque extensions of the melody
combine to form a glittering coruscating band
of magic sound; yet all so quiet, even in moment
of passion or gleam of proud anger. Never
noisy, never obtrusive, always beautiful.
This lovely first strain is succeeded, when its
possibilities have been worked out, by a second
division of the melody, usually planned in some
markedly contrasting spirit, grave where the
first was gay, tender where the first was stormy.
Yet the rule is not invariable, for in the won-
derful piece of tone-painting which is the G
minor Nocturne in op. 37, the sad sighing' of the
sea ceases only to be replaced by the solemn
intonation of a monkish hymn. But in general
the second strain shows a new mood; not neces- -
sarily in violent contrast but always new.
To this once more succeeds the first melody
through some one of the many lovely transi-
tions which Chopin so magically could write;
and then comes the close, in which sometimes
the most fascinating and delightful changes are
rung; as in the sudden transformation to the
major key in the last three bars of the G minor
Nocturne mentioned above.
In order to get a better understanding of the
sort of thing which Chopin succeeded in doing
through the composition of his book of Noc-
turnes, let us consider the case of the wonder-
ful little piece in G minor, op. 37, already men-
tioned.
A Balearic Picture
Whatever may be the exact truth of the mat-
ter, the tradition, which cannot in the conditions
of the case be wholly wrong, runs that this
Nocturne, along with at least two if not more
of the Preludes, was written during the winter
which Chopin spent on the island of Majorca
in the Mediterranean Sea, in company with
George Sand and a small party of friends.
Chopin's health had been failing for some years,
and there is no doubt that he was already much
tormented by fear of disease and death. This
fear some of his friends attempted to relieve
during the winter of 1838, by proposing a visit
to Majorca. George Sand, whose influence over
Chopin was dominant, though her material af-
fection for him has been most brutally distorted,
agreed to make the arrangements; and in due
time the party arrived on the island.
Scarce known even now, Majorca seemed
indeed a desert to the travelers from Paris.
The superstitious inhabitants for some reason
took a dislike to Chopin and trouble with the
landlord of the ill-built house where they lodged
was intensified by the suspicion of the country
folks, who were angry at Chopin's failure to
attend Mass on the first Sunday after his ar-
rival. When it was rumored that ill-health was
the cause of the mysterious absence, hostility
became terror, and it was cried out that the
stranger and alien was the victim of a dire pesti-
lence and had been driven from his own coun-
try in consequence. In short, the whole party,
without a moment's warning, were turned out
of doors and forced to retreat for shelter from
the winds and rains that suddenly began to
rage steadily day and night in the cells and re-
fectory of a half-ruined monastery.
Here a most miserable winter was passed,
which indeed would have been wholly unsup-
portable but for the courage, good humor and
resourcefulness of George Sand, who was
mother, landlady, housekeeper, nurse and gen-
eral manager of the party, all in one. In Feb-
ruary, however, the strain became too much and
Chopin, finding himself able to travel, persuaded
his friends to turn back home.
It has been denied that any musical work was
completed during this winter's stay, but the Noc-
turne in G minor has always been attributed, on
the authority of George Sand, to this period;
and we follow the indications she has given in
framing the following story of its meaning and
of the circumstances in which it came to be
written.
One day when the weather had cleared up
somewhat, a member of the Chopin party sug-
gested a sail in one of the many fishing boats
at hand. The suggestion was taken up with
alacrity by all but Chopin, who preferred to stay
behind. He was accordingly made comfortable
and his friends set out.
How the Inspiration Came
The room in which he sat, made comfortable
by the loving labor of George Sand, contained
his piano, some other furniture, books and a
few luxuries dear to the invalid's heart. But
these did not half fill its great area. Two sets
of windows looked out from it, one directed to-
wards the sea arid the other into the ruined
courtyard or cloister of the monastery immedi-
ately opposite the refectory. The room had in-
deed been the community room of the brother-
hood. Its vast spaces were gloomy and filled
with shadows in every corner. To the sick
man, sitting in an arm chair looking out over
the sea, with his piano near at hand, it seemed
as if the distant corners were alive with moving
shadowy forms, former denizens come back to
visit their old homes. The atmosphere was
chilly, the scene of tumbling waters had no
fascination for him. He gazed into the far
spaces of his great apartment and seemed as
one fascinated; not afraid, but full of a great
wonder.
The afternoon wore on, the sun was hid be-
hind banks of gathering cloud. A wind sprang
up, the room darkened. His friends had not
returned and a storm was nigh. As he gazed
it seemed to him that the shadows in the far
corners took shape, that there were hundreds of
them, monks of old time in their sombre habits.
He rose to see them more clearly and passed
down the room looking through the side win-
dows as he did so.
Beneath in the courtyard more shapes, more
shadows, more whisperings and flutterings. As
the sea moaned and the wind sighed, and the
clouds lowered, Chopin's disordered fancy saw
the whole gloomy courtyard of a sudden people
with shapes. The monastery was assembling
at the door of the refectory, two by two, to
make procession into the chapel across the
cloister. A strain of slow solemn organ music
stole out from the chapel and with its first
sounds the line began slowly to move across
the paved space, taking up as they walked the
measured tones of a plain-chant, of which the
Latin words floated dimly back to the hearer,
who stood at his window amazed.
First the thurifer with his censer of incense.
Then the great Cross borne by a tall brother
supported by two acolytes. Then two by two
the novices, followed by the brothers lay, the
brothers regular and the fathers, with the ven-
erable prior in mitre and cope bringing up the
rear.
The solemn procession disappeared through
the chapel door, the sad moaning of the sea
again sounded in Chopin's ears; and as he turned,
half in terror, half in amazement, to the other
(Continued on page 10)