Music Trade Review

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THE
MUSIC TRADE
REVIEW
THE PLAYER-PIANISTS' DEPARTMENT
[It is in every way eminently desirable that a publication
which undertakes to give so much space and so authoritative
a treatment to the great player industry, as does The Re-
view, should not neglect what is after all the real excuse
for the player's existence, namely, the music that is evoked
from it. Recognizing the extraordinary importance of do-
ing everything possible to spread more widely appreciation
and love for music among player-pianists, The Review's
Player Section for the present month contains below, and
will in future regularly contain, a department devoted to
the musical interests of player-pianists and of the player-
piano. Each month one musical article of general interest
will appear, together with useful hints, notes and comments.
This is in addition to the regular sub-section of the Player
Section which analyzes the monthly issues of music_ rolls.
Professional demonstrators, salesmen and player-pianists of
every degree will find each month on the "Player-Pianist's"
page of the Player Section much valuable information. And
the Editor of the Player Section will at all times be glad
to answer inquiries on any and all musical player matters.]
moves in slow procession, chanting its Sanctus.
Gaze into the depths of the Preludes and catch
the fire of passion that blazes from these tiny
gems. Ponder deeply on those wonderful narra-
tives in tone, the Ballades, and feel yoursalf trans-
ported into the land of kgend and lore, or faerie
queen and knight errant, of mysterious lake and
dim forest. Hear the riot of passion, death, de-
spair and everlasting grief that fairly cries out to
you from the Study in C minor (op. 10, No. 12),
composed by Chopin when the news of Warsaw's
fall, in 1830, reached him!
Yes, into each and every work that Chopin gave
to the world he breathed the living breath of a
CHOPIN AND HIS MUSIC.
great spirit. When he began to compose for the
Frederic Chopin lived a life of tremendous ar-
piano, that instrument was still comparatively weak
tistic and creative power. His work left an in-
and thin-toned. When he died in 1848 massive iron
delible impress upon the art of music. He revo-
construction and high-tension wire had made a
lutionized piano playing on its technical side and
tone-apparatus that Beethoven would hardly have
re-created the instrument as a distinctly musical
recognized, and which was in effect the piano of
voice. Beethoven was too much occupied in de-
to day. And so Chopin's music, conceived for a
veloping the empty form of symphony and sonata
piano of essentially modern type, appeals to us,
into structures instinct with life, majesty and deep not as consecrated by time and the greatness of
emotion to care for the further refinement of in-
its composer, but rather in its own intrinsic ap-
strumental means. So, too, Weber, Schubert and
propriateness to modern modes and contemporary
Schumann had so much to say in their music that
needs. Every possible shade of human emotion,
neither orchestra nor piano, on the technical side, from gayest humor to most passionate protest,
came in for high development at their hands. It
from lightest grace to deepest despair, is to be
was left to Chopin, working in the narrow en-
found in the glowing pages which Chopin left to
vironment afforded to his creative instinct by the
the world. And after all, their chief charm lies
piano, and confining his efforts almost exclusively
in the fact that the man who wrote them was, in
to it, to reveal a new world of loveliness, a new
them, the creator of new forms, new and direct
atmosphere of tone, a fresh conception of the approaches to the temples of art, fresh conceptions
piano, which transformed it into, and has since
of Music's possibilities.
retained it as, an instrument with a voice which
It is worth while to pay some attention to the
sounds in no uncertain tones, a music-means un-
forms in which Chopin cast his musical expres-
surpassed for brilliance, expressiveness and ma-
sion. These may be divided into twelve classes:
jesty.
Nocturnes, Preludes, Studies, Scherzi, Ballades,
It is well that we should understand with the
Fantasies, Impromptus, Sonatas, Polonaises, Ma-
utmost clearness just how much Chopin has meant
zurkas, Waltzes and Concerti. In addition, there
to the piano. Before his time this instrument, even
are some songs and one or two instrumental trios.
under the spell that the mighty Beethoven wove
The latter, however, ne:d hardly be considered.
about it, was less an established thing than a new
In attempting to form a just estimate of the
experiment in craftsmanship, which so great a
various forms above mentioned, as well as of the
musician as Beethoven had indeed taken up, but
general spirit which informs them all, we must
which was neither generally recognized nor com-
consider what manner of man he was. Though a
monly understood. It was Chopin who definitely
son of Poland, born near the capital city of that
and once for all placed the piano on its own ap-
distressed land, his father was of French extrac-
propriate pedestal, and forever established its place
tion, while his mother was actually a French-
as the definite possessor of an individually beauti-
woman born. At the age of twenty-one he came
ful voice, whose place in the art of music could
to Paris and lived there almost all the rest of his
neither be superseded nor neglected. This it is that
life, until his death in 1849. While an ardent
we owe to Chopin: that he made the piano some-
patriot, he lived his life away from his native land.
thing to be desired for its own sake, that he re-
Twice during his life the unhappy Poles attempted
vealed for the first time in all their fulness the to throw off the Russian yoke. In these patriotic
beauties of tone, the immense possibilities of ex-
endeavors Chopin was deeply interested. Yet he
pression that inhere in it alone.
took no part in them. He was a Pole, but -also
The mere statement of these facts is enough to he was a Frenchman.
dismiss forever the charge of effeminacy that has
From this fact alone (i. e., from the conditions
so often been brought against Chopin. Morbid
of his descent, birth and life) we may obtain some
much of his music undoubtedly is; but morbidity light on the peculiarities of Chopin's genius. The
does not mean effieminacy; at least, not always.
Polonaises and Mazurkas are indeed dance pieces
His Nocturnes do undoubtedly lend themselves to in their origin, and are based on native Polish
effeminate, even to school-girlish, treatment in
rhythms, but they are ever glosssd with a certain
some individual cases. But at the same time we Gallic refinement. The Waltzes are not intended
never get from Chopin's Nocturnes what Chopin
to be played for dancing. They are written' in
put into them until we treat them in a masculine Waltz tempo, but that is all. Still they suggest, at
spirit and force ourselves to look deeper and
one and the same time, the haunting melodies and
deeper into their spiritual meaning. Of course
rhythms of Poland and the refined pessimism of a
Chopin was not a burly athlete. At the same time, polite world. Every sort of mood is to be found
however, he was not a wretched valetudinarian.
in these charming Waltzes, and everywhere a
Delicate in physical strength, in body, he was virile
characteristic daring in harmonic and melodic in-
in mind.
vention. Their form is simple; two parts, in con-
What is true of the man is true of his work.
trasting mood, and a closing coda.
Consider the profound tragedy embodied in the
The six Scherzi which Chopin composed are very
op. 32, No. 1 Nocturne, akin, as it apparently is, to
far from being "jests," as their title literally
Browning's "In a Gondola." Consider the deep
means. The work in B minor, with its rushing
brooding of the minor Nocturne (op. 37, No. 1), waves of emotion, broken midway by the lively
with its sense of the immanence of death, and the melody of the alternating movement and rushing,
weird procession of monkish ghosts that rises
Childe-Harold-like into tke depths of Avernus at
from the gloomy shadows of the old convent and
the close, is a marvelous tragedy.
Chopin's twenty-four Preludes, forming together
his opus 28, are tiny things, sometimes mere trifles
of half a page. But in each is found the setting
of a jewel whence flashes the fire of passion, the
glitter of brilliancy and the softer light of true
love. Almost formless in the exact sense, each
requires its own individual treatment. The fif-
teenth Prelude is perhaps the best known, and its
peculiar rhythm, imitating exactly the dropping of
rain (or perhaps of tears), has made it a great
favorite among amateurs, especially among those
amateurs who cannot play it well.
But, after all, what shall we, broadly speaking,
find for ourselves in Chopin? We shall find in
him a new piano technic, new and daring tonal
combinations, new and equally daring flights in
harmonization. We shall find a continuous melodic
line of singular beauty, neither stiff nor evenly bal-
anced, but requiring a treatment akin in linger-
ing, sensuous, passionate intensity to the spirit of
Chopin himself. A stiff treatment of Chopin is
death to his music. When it is remembered that
freedom of phrasing and tempo appears to be the
most difficult of the ants that the player-pianist
must acquire, it is not at all surprising that Chopin
on the player-piano is occasionally, • let us say,
rather horrible. But this need not be so.
Let the player-pianist, by the aid of all the
knowledge he can garner, and by absorbing all the
information that can be given, attack his Chopin
with the resolve to get deeply into the man's soul.
Then Chopin will be to him a living, breathing
thing, a part of his art-experience, a key which
will open the gate into the lovely land of Melos.
"A HEART TO HEART TALK
What Is Music?
Readers, and among them some not injudicious,
may want to know what is the use of asking ques-
tions like the above. As if anybody needed or
cared to know what music is! "Is it not enough,"
we hear some one saying, "that we can enjoy
music? Why should we want to bother our heads
as to what it particularly is?" And so on to the
same effect at any given length. But it is, after
all, very much a matter of interest for all who use
their heads as well as their instincts in living. The
lower animals are content to live in mere simple
consciousness of the fact that they exist., But
man not only knows that he exists, but knows that
he is he, that he is different from other men, and
that the world in which he lives is a curious and
interesting place, the penetralia of which must be
opened as soon as may be to his scrutiny. Each
and every phenomenon in this world has a mean-
ing as well as an existence. It signifies as well as
happens. We cannot enjoy music rationally un-
less we have some reason for knowing why we
should or should not enjoy it. And when we set
about to find that reason we perceive that we must
know what music is. And that is why knowledge
of that kind is useful as well as interesting.
Definitions and Defining.
Nothing is harder than to make a definition that
defines. But nothing is easier than to make a
definition that does not define. Volumes have been
written on the meaning of Music. Volumes have
been learnedly put together in an attempt to make
us understand the rationale of the sensations which
the performance of music inspires in us. But the
probability is very remote that the subject will ever
be treated in a manner thoroughly just. Nor is it
to be expected that much can be done in the re-
marks that follow. Nevertheless we may attempt
something of the kind. Let us first clear the
ground a little bit. This process will help us to
get a better view of what we are pursuing.
Although music, as a definite form of human