Frederick Chopin as a Man and Musician

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The pianoforte assumed under his fingers a marvellous and
never harsh sonorousness, for he did not seek forced effects.
His playing, smooth, sustained, harmonious, and of a perfect
evenness, charmed even more than it astonished; moreover, a
faultless neatness in the most difficult passages, and a left
hand of unparalleled bravura, made Kalkbrenner an
extraordinary virtuoso. Let us add that the perfect
independence of the fingers, the absence of the in our day so
frequent movements of the arms, the tranquillity of the hands
and body, a perfect bearing--all these qualities combined,
and many others which we forget, left the auditor free to
enjoy the pleasure of listening without having his attention
diverted by fatiguing gymnastics. Kalkbrenner's manner of
phrasing was somewhat lacking in expression and communicative
warmth, but the style was always noble, true, and of the
grand school.

We now know what Chopin meant when he described Kalkbrenner as
"perfect and possessed of something that raised him above all
other virtuosos"; we now know also that Chopin's admiration was
characteristic and not misplaced. Nevertheless, nobody will think
for a moment of disagreeing with those who advised Chopin not to
become a pupil of this master, who always exacted absolute
submission to his precepts; for it was to be feared that he would
pay too dear for the gain of inferior accomplishments with the
loss of his invaluable originality. But, as we have seen, the
affair came to nothing, Chopin ceasing to attend the classes
after a few visits. What no doubt influenced his final decision
more than the advice of his friends was the success which his
playing and compositions met with at the concert of which I have
now to tell the history. Chopin's desertion as a pupil did not
terminate the friendly relation that existed between the two
artists. When Chopin published his E minor Concerto he dedicated
it to Kalkbrenner, and the latter soon after composed "Variations
brillantes (Op. 120) pour le piano sur une Mazourka de Chopin,"
and often improvised on his young brother-artist's mazurkas.
Chopin's friendship with Camille Pleyel helped no doubt to keep
up his intercourse with Kalkbrenner, who was a partner of the
firm of Pleyel & Co.

The arrangements for his concert gave Chopin much trouble, and
had they not been taken in hand by Paer, Kalkbrenner, and
especially Norblin, he would not have been able to do anything in
Paris, where one required at least two months to get up a
concert. This is what Chopin tells Elsner in the letter dated
December 14, 1831. Notwithstanding such powerful assistance he
did not succeed in giving his concert on the 25th of December, as
he at first intended. The difficulty was to find a lady vocalist.
Rossini, the director of the Italian Opera, was willing to help
him, but Robert, the second director, refused to give permission
to any of the singers in his company to perform at the concert,
fearing that, if he did so once, there would be no end of
applications. As Veron, the director of the Academie Royale
likewise refused Chopin's request, the concert had to be put off
till the 15th of January, 1832, when, however, on account of
Kalkbrenner's illness or for some other reason, it had again to
be postponed. At last it came off on February 26, 1832. Chopin
writes on December 16, 1831, about the arrangements for the
concert:--

Baillot, the rival of Paganini, and Brod, the celebrated oboe-
player, will assist me with their talent. I intend to play my
F minor Concerto and the Variations in B flat...I shall play
not only the concerto and the variations, but also with
Kalkbrenner his duet "Marche suivie d'une Polonaise" for two
pianos, with the accompaniment of four others. Is this not an
altogether mad idea? One of the grand pianos is very large,
and is for Kalkbrenner; the other is small (a so-called mono-
chord), and is for me. On the other large ones, which are as
loud as an orchestra, Hiller, Osborne, Stamati, and Sowinski
are to play. Besides these performers, Norblin, Vidal, and
the celebrated viola-player Urban will take part in the
concert.

The singers of the evening were Mdlles. Isambert and Tomeoni, and
M. Boulanger. I have not been able to discover the programme of
the concert. Hiller says that Chopin played his E minor Concerto
and some of his mazurkas and nocturnes. Fetis, in the Revue
musicale (March 3, 1832), mentions only in a general way that
there were performed a concerto by Chopin, a composition for six
pianos by Kalkbrenner, some vocal pieces, an oboe solo, and "a
quintet for violin [sic], executed with that energy of feeling
and that variety of inspiration which distinguish the talent of
M. Baillot." The concert, which took place in Pleyel's rooms, was
financially a failure; the receipts did not cover the expenses.
The audience consisted chiefly of Poles, and most of the French
present had free tickets. Hiller says that all the musical
celebrities of Paris were there, and that Chopin's performances
took everybody by storm. "After this," he adds, "nothing more was
heard of want of technique, and Mendelssohn applauded
triumphantly." Fetis describes this soiree musicale as one of the
most pleasant that had been given that year. His criticism
contains such interesting and, on the whole, such excellent
remarks that I cannot resist the temptation to quote the more
remarkable passages:--

Here is a young man who, abandoning himself to his natural
impressions and without taking a model, has found, if not a
complete renewal of pianoforte music, at least a part of what
has been sought in vain for a long time--namely, an abundance
of original ideas of which the type is to be found nowhere.
We do not mean by this that M. Chopin is endowed with a
powerful organisation like that of Beethoven, nor that there
are in his music such powerful conceptions as one remarks in
that of this great man. Beethoven has composed pianoforte
music, but I speak here of pianists' music, and it is by
comparison with the latter that I find in M. Chopin's
inspirations the indication of a renewal of forms which may
exercise in time much influence over this department of the
art.

Of Chopin's concerto Fetis remarks that it:--

equally astonished and surprised his audience, as much by the
novelty of the melodic ideas as by the figures, modulations,
and general disposition of the movements. There is soul in
these melodies, fancy in these figures, and originality in
everything. Too much luxuriance in the modulations, disorder
in the linking of the phrases, so that one seems sometimes to
hear an improvisation rather than written music, these are
the defects which are mixed with the qualities I have just
now pointed out. But these defects belong to the age of the
artist; they will disappear when experience comes. If the
subsequent works of M. Chopin correspond to his debut, there
can be no doubt but that he will acquire a brilliant and
merited reputation.

As an executant also the young artist deserves praise. His
playing is elegant, easy, graceful, and possesses brilliance
and neatness. He brings little tone out of the instrument,
and resembles in this respect the majority of German
pianists. But the study which he is making of this part of
his art, under the direction of M. Kalkbrenner, cannot fail
to give him an important quality on which the nerf of
execution depends, and without which the accents of the
instrument cannot be modified.

Of course dissentient voices made themselves heard who objected
to this and that; but an overwhelming majority, to which belonged
the young artists, pronounced in favour of Chopin. Liszt says
that he remembers his friend's debut:--

The most vigorous applause seemed not to suffice to our
enthusiasm in the presence of this talented musician, who
revealed a new phase of poetic sentiment combined with such
happy innovations in the form of his art.

The concluding remark of the above-quoted criticism furnishes an
additional proof that Chopin went for some time to Kalkbrenner's
class. As Fetis and Chopin were acquainted with each other, we
may suppose that the former was well informed on this point. In
passing, we may take note of Chopin's account of the famous
historian and theorist's early struggles:--

Fetis [Chopin writes on December 14, 1831], whom I know, and
from whom one can learn much, lives outside the town, and
comes to Paris only to give his lessons. They say he is
obliged to do this because his debts are greater than the
profits from his "Revue musicale." He is sometimes in danger
of making intimate acquaintance with the debtors' prison. You
must know that according to the law of the country a debtor
can only be arrested in his dwelling. Fetis has, therefore,
left the town and lives in the neighbourhood of Paris, nobody
knows where.

On May 20, 1832, less than three months after his first concert,
Chopin made his second public appearance in Paris, at a concert
given by the Prince de la Moskowa for the benefit of the poor.
Among the works performed was a mass composed by the Prince.
Chopin played the first movement of:--

the concerto, which had already been heard at Pleyel's rooms,
and had there obtained a brilliant success. On this occasion
it was not so well received, a fact which, no doubt, must be
attributed to the instrumentation, which is lacking in
lightness, and to the small volume of tone which M. Chopin
draws from the piano. However, it appears to us that the
music of this artist will gain in the public opinion when it
becomes better known. [FOOTNOTE: From the "Revue musicale."]

The great attraction of the evening was not Chopin, but Brod, who
"enraptured" the audience. Indeed, there were few virtuosos who
were as great favourites as this oboe-player; his name was absent
from the programme of hardly any concert of note.

In passing we will note some other musical events of interest
which occurred about the same time that Chopin made his debut. On
March 18 Mendelssohn played Beethoven's G major Concerto with
great success at one of the Conservatoire concerts, [FOOTNOTE: It
was the first performance of this work in Paris.] the younger
master's overture to the "Midsummer Night's Dream" had been heard
and well received at the same institution in the preceding month,
and somewhat later his "Reformation Symphony" was rehearsed, but
laid aside. In the middle of March Paganini, who had lately
arrived, gave the first of a series of concerts, with what
success it is unnecessary to say. Of Chopin's intercourse with
Zimmermann, the distinguished pianoforte-professor at the
Conservatoire, and his family we learn from M. Marmontel, who was
introduced to Chopin and Liszt, and heard them play in 1832 at
one of his master's brilliant musical fetes, and gives a charming
description of the more social and intimate parties at which
Chopin seems to have been occasionally present.

Madame Zimmermann and her daughters did the honours to a
great number of artists. Charades were acted; the forfeits
that were given, and the rebuses that were not guessed, had
to be redeemed by penances varying according to the nature of
the guilty ones. Gautier, Dumas, and Musset were condemned to
recite their last poem. Liszt or Chopin had to improvise on a
given theme, Mesdames Viardot, Falcon, and Euggnie Garcia had
also to discharge their melodic debts, and I myself remember
having paid many a forfeit.

The preceding chapter and the foregoing part of this chapter set
forth the most important facts of Chopin's social and artistic
life in his early Paris days. The following extract from a letter
of his to Titus Woyciechowski, dated December 25, 1831, reveals
to us something of his inward life, the gloom of which contrasts
violently with the outward brightness:--

Ah, how I should like to have you beside me!...You cannot
imagine how sad it is to have nobody to whom I can open my
troubled heart. You know how easily I make acquaintances, how
I love human society--such acquaintances I make in great
numbers--but with no one, no one can I sigh. My heart beats
as it were always "in syncopes," therefore I torment myself
and seek for a rest--for solitude, so that the whole day
nobody may look at me and speak to me. It is too annoying to
me when there is a pull at the bell, and a tedious visit is
announced while I am writing to you. At the moment when I was
going to describe to you the ball, at which a divine being
with a rose in her black hair enchanted me, arrives your
letter. All the romances of my brain disappear? my thoughts
carry me to you, I take your hand and weep...When shall we
see each other again?...Perhaps never, because, seriously, my
health is very bad. I appear indeed merry, especially when I
am among my fellow-countrymen; but inwardly something
torments me--a gloomy presentiment, unrest, bad dreams,
sleeplessness, yearning, indifference to everything, to the
desire to live and the desire to die. It seems to me often as
if my mind were benumbed, I feel a heavenly repose in my
heart, in my thoughts I see images from which I cannot tear
myself away, and this tortures me beyond all measure. In
short, it is a combination of feelings that are difficult to
describe...Pardon me, dear Titus, for telling you of all
this; but now I have said enough...I will dress now and go,
or rather drive, to the dinner which our countrymen give to-
day to Ramorino and Langermann...Your letter contained much
that was news to me; you have written me four pages and
thirty-seven lines--in all my life you have never been so
liberal to me, and I stood in need of something of the kind,
I stood indeed very much in need of it.

What you write about my artistic career is very true, and I
myself am convinced of it.

I drive in my own equipage, only the coachman is hired.

I shall close, because otherwise I should be too late for the
post, for I am everything in one person, master and servant.
Take pity on me and write as often as possible!--Yours unto
death,

FREDERICK.

In the postscript of this letter Chopin's light fancy gets the
better of his heavy heart; in it all is fun and gaiety. First he
tells his friend of a pretty neighbour whose husband is out all
day and who often invites him to visit and comfort her. But the
blandishments of the fair one were of no avail; he had no taste
for adventures, and, moreover, was afraid to be caught and beaten
by the said husband. A second love-story is told at greater
length. The dramatis personae are Chopin, John Peter Pixis, and
Francilla Pixis, a beautiful girl of sixteen, a German orphan
whom the pianist-composer, then a man of about forty-three, had
adopted, and who afterwards became known as a much-admired
singer. Chopin made their acquaintance in Stuttgart, and remarks
that Pixis said that he intended to marry her. On his return to
Paris Pixis invited Chopin to visit him; the latter, who had by
this time forgotten pretty Francilla, was in no hurry to call.
What follows must be given in Chopin's own words:--

Eight days after the second invitation I went to his house,
and accidentally met his pet on the stairs. She invited me to
come in, assuring me it did not matter that Mr. Pixis was not
at home; meanwhile I was to sit down, he would return soon,
and so on. A strange embarrassment seized both of us. I made
my excuses--for I knew the old man was very jealous--and said
I would rather return another time. While we were talking
familiarly and innocently on the staircase, Pixis came up,
looking over his spectacles in order to see who was speaking
above to his bella. He may not have recognised us at once,
quickened his steps, stopped before us, and said to her
harshly: "Qu'est-ce que vous faites ici?" and gave her a
severe lecture for receiving young men in his absence, and so
on. I addressed Pixis smilingly, and said to her that it was
somewhat imprudent to leave the room in so thin a silk dress.
At last the old man became calm--he took me by the arm and
led me into the drawing-room. He was in such a state of
excitement that he did not know what seat to offer me; for he
was afraid that, if he had offended me, I would make better
use of his absence another time. When I left he accompanied
me down stairs, and seeing me smile (for I could not help
doing so when I found I was thought capable of such a thing),
he went to the concierge and asked how long it was since I
had come. The concierge must have calmed his fears, for since
that time Pixis does not know how to praise my talent
sufficiently to all his acquaintances. What do you think of
this? I, a dangerous seducteur!

The letters which Chopin wrote to his parents from Paris passed,
after his mother's death, into the hands of his sister, who
preserved them till September 19, 1863. On that day the house in
which she lived in Warsaw--a shot having been fired and some
bombs thrown from an upper story of it when General Berg and his
escort were passing--was sacked by Russian soldiers, who burned
or otherwise destroyed all they could lay hands on, among the
rest Chopin's letters, his portrait by Ary Scheffer, the
Buchholtz piano on which he had made his first studies, and other
relics. We have now also exhausted, at least very nearly
exhausted, Chopin's extant correspondence with his most intimate
Polish friends, Matuszynski and Woyciechowski, only two
unimportant letters written in 1849 and addressed to the latter
remaining yet to be mentioned. That the confidential
correspondence begins to fail us at this period (the last letter
is of December 25, 1831) is particularly inopportune; a series of
letters like those he wrote from Vienna would have furnished us
with the materials for a thoroughly trustworthy history of his
settlement in Paris, over which now hangs a mythical haze.
Karasowski, who saw the lost letters, says they were tinged with
melancholy.

Besides the thought of his unhappy country, a thought constantly
kept alive by the Polish refugees with whom Paris was swarming,
Chopin had another more prosaic but not less potent cause of
disquietude and sadness. His pecuniary circumstances were by no
means brilliant. Economy cannot fill a slender purse, still less
can a badly-attended concert do so, and Chopin was loath to be a
burden on his parents who, although in easy circumstances, were
not wealthy, and whose income must have been considerably
lessened by some of the consequences of the insurrection, such as
the closing of schools, general scarcity of money, and so forth.
Nor was Paris in 1831, when people were so busy with politics, El
Dorado for musicians. Of the latter, Mendelssohn wrote at the
time that they did not, like other people, wrangle about
politics, but lamented over them. "One has lost his place,
another his title, and a third his money, and they say this all
proceeds from the 'juste milieu.'" As Chopin saw no prospect of
success in Paris he began to think, like others of his
countrymen, of going to America. His parents, however, were
against this project, and advised him either to stay where he was
and wait for better things, or to return to Warsaw. Although he
might fear annoyances from the Russian government on account of
his not renewing his passport before the expiration of the time
for which it was granted, he chose the latter alternative.
Destiny, however, had decided the matter otherwise.[FOOTNOTE:
Karasowski says that Liszt, Hiller, and Sowinski dissuaded him
from leaving Paris. Liszt and Hiller both told me, and so did
also Franchomme, that they knew nothing of Chopin having had any
such intention; and Sowinski does not mention the circumstance in
his Musiciens polonais.]
One day, or, as some will have it, on the very day when he was
preparing for his departure, Chopin met in the street Prince
Valentine Radziwill, and, in the course of the conversation which
the latter opened, informed him of his intention of leaving
Paris. The Prince, thinking, no doubt, of the responsibility he
would incur by doing so, did not attempt to dissuade him, but
engaged the artist to go with him in the evening to Rothschild's.
Chopin, who of course was asked by the hostess to play something,
charmed by his wonderful performance, and no doubt also by his
refined manners, the brilliant company assembled there to such a
degree that he carried off not only a plentiful harvest of praise
and compliments, but also some offers of pupils. Supposing the
story to be true, we could easily believe that this soiree was
the turning-point in Chopin's career, but nevertheless might
hesitate to assert that it changed his position "as if by
enchantment." I said "supposing the story to be true," because,
although it has been reported that Chopin was fond of alluding to
this incident, his best friends seem to know nothing of it: Liszt
does not mention it, Hiller and Franchomme told me they never
heard of it, and notwithstanding Karasowski's contrary statement
there is nothing to be found about it in Sowinski's Musiciens
polonais. Still, the story may have a substratum of truth, to
arrive at which it has only to be shorn of its poetical
accessories and exaggerations, of which, however, there is little
in my version.

But to whatever extent, or whether to any extent at all, this or
any similar soiree may have served Chopin as a favourable
introduction to a wider circle of admirers and patrons, and as a
stepping-stone to success, his indebtedness to his countrymen,
who from the very first befriended and encouraged him, ought not
to be forgotten or passed over in silence for the sake of giving
point to a pretty anecdote. The great majority of the Polish
refugees then living in Paris would of course rather require than
be able to afford help and furtherance, but there was also a not
inconsiderable minority of persons of noble birth and great
wealth whose patronage and influence could not but be of immense
advantage to a struggling artist. According to Liszt, Chopin was
on intimate terms with the inmates of the Hotel Lambert, where
old Prince Adam Czartoryski and his wife and daughter gathered
around them "les debris de la Pologne que la derniere guerre
avait jetes au loin." Of the family of Count Plater and other
compatriots with whom the composer had friendly intercourse we
shall speak farther on. Chopin's friends were not remiss in
exerting themselves to procure him pupils and good fees at the
same time. They told all inquirers that he gave no lesson for
less than twenty francs, although he had expressed his
willingness to be at first satisfied with more modest terms.
Chopin had neither to wait in vain nor to wait long, for in about
a year's time he could boast of a goodly number of pupils.

The reader must have noticed with surprise the absence of any
mention of the "Ideal" from Chopin's letters to his friend Titus
Woyciechowski, to whom the love-sick artist was wont to write so
voluminously on this theme. How is this strange silence to be
accounted for? Surely this passionate lover could not have
forgotten her beneath whose feet he wished his ashes to be spread
after his death? But perhaps in the end of 1831 he had already
learnt what was going to happen in the following year. The sad
fact has to be told: inconstant Constantia Gladkowska married a
merchant of the name of Joseph Grabowski, at Warsaw, in 1832;
this at least is the information given in Sowinski's biographical
dictionary Les musiciens polonais et slaves.[FOOTNOTE: According
to Count Wodzinski she married a country gentleman, and
subsequently became blind.] As the circumstances of the case and
the motives of the parties are unknown to me, and as a biographer
ought not to take the same liberties as a novelist, I shall
neither expatiate on the fickleness and mercenariness of woman,
nor attempt to describe the feelings of our unfortunate hero
robbed of his ideal, but leave the reader to make his own
reflections and draw his own moral.

On August 2, 1832, Chopin wrote a letter to Hiller, who had gone
in the spring of the year to Germany. What the young Pole thought
of this German brother-artist may be gathered from some remarks
of his in the letter to Titus Woyciechowski dated December 16,
1831:--

The concert of the good Hiller, who is a pupil of Hummel and
a youth of great talent, came off very successfully the day
before yesterday. A symphony of his was received with much
applause. He has taken Beethoven for his model, and his work
is full of poesy and inspiration.

Since then the two had become more intimate, seeing each other
almost every day, Chopin, as Osborne relates, being always in
good spirits when Hiller was with him. The bearer of the said
letter was Mr. Johns, to whom the five Mazurkas, Op. 7, are
dedicated, and whom Chopin introduced to Hiller as "a
distinguished amateur of New Orleans." After warmly recommending
this gentleman, he excuses himself for not having acknowledged
the receipt of his friend's letter, which procured him the
pleasure of Paul Mendelssohn's acquaintance, and then proceeds:--