Frederick Chopin as a Man and Musician

F >> Frederick Niecks >> Frederick Chopin as a Man and Musician

Pages:
1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 | 19 | 20 | 21 | 22 | 23 | 24 | 25 | 26 | 27 | 28 | 29 | 30 | 31 | 32 | 33 | 34 | 35 | 36 | 37 | 38 | 39 | 40 | 41 | 42 | 43 | 44 | 45 | 46 | 47 | 48 | 49 | 50 | 51 | 52 | 53 | 54 | 55 | 56 | 57 | 58 | 59 | 60 | 61 | 62 | 63 | 64

What one reads and hears of Chopin's playing agrees with the
account of his pupil Mikuli, who remarks that, with all the
warmth which Chopin possessed in so high a degree, his rendering
was nevertheless temperate [massvoll], chaste, nay, aristocratic,
and sometimes even severely reserved. When, on returning home
from the above-mentioned visit to the Russian ladies, Lenz
expressed his sincere opinion of Chopin's playing of Beethoven's
variations, the master replied testily: "I indicate (j'indique);
the hearer must complete (parachever) the picture." And when
afterwards, while Chopin was changing his clothes in an adjoining
room, Lenz committed the impertinence of playing Beethoven's
theme as he understood it, the master came in in his shirt-
sleeves, sat down beside him, and at the end of the theme laid
his hand on Lenz's shoulder and said: "I shall tell Liszt of it;
this has never happened to me before; but it is beautiful--well,
BUT MUST ONE THEN ALWAYS SPEAK SO PASSIONATELY (si
declamatoirement)?" The italics in the text, not those in
parentheses, are mine. I marked some of Chopin's words thus that
they might get the attention they deserve. "Tell me with whom you
associate, and I will tell you who you are." Parodying this
aphorism one might say, not without a good deal of truth: Tell me
what piano you use, and I will tell you what sort of a pianist
you are. Liszt gives us all the desirable information as to
Chopin's predilection in this respect. But Lenz too has, as we
have seen, touched on this point. Liszt writes:--

While Chopin was strong and healthy, as during the first years
of his residence in Paris, he used to play on an Erard piano;
but after his friend Camille Pleyel had made him a present of
one of his splendid instruments, remarkable for their metallic
ring and very light touch, he would play on no other maker's.

If he was engaged for a soiree at the house of one of his
Polish or French friends, he would often send his own
instrument, if there did not happen to be a Pleyel in the
house.

Chopin was very partial to [affectionnait] Pleyel's pianos,
particularly on account of their silvery and somewhat veiled
sonority, and of the easy touch which permitted him to draw
from them sounds which one might have believed to belong to
those harmonicas of which romantic Germany has kept the
monopoly, and which her ancient masters constructed so
ingeniously, marrying crystal to water.

Chopin himself said:--

When I am indisposed, I play on one of Erard's pianos and
there I easily find a ready-made tone. But when I feel in the
right mood and strong enough to find my own tone for myself, I
must have one of Pleyel's pianos.

From the fact that Chopin played during his visit to Great
Britain in 1848 at public concerts as well as at private parties
on instruments of Broadwood's, we may conclude that he also
appreciated the pianos of this firm. In a letter dated London,
48, Dover Street, May 6, 1848, he writes to Gutmann: "Erard a ete
charmant, il m'a fait poser un piano. J'ai un de Broadwood et un
de Pleyel, ce qui fait 3, et je ne trouve pas encore le temps
pour les jouer." And in a letter dated Edinburgh, August 6, and
Calder House, August 11, he writes to Franchomme: "I have a
Broadwood piano in my room, and the Pleyel of Miss Stirling in
the salon."

Here, I think, will be the fittest place to record what I have
learnt regarding Chopin's musical taste and opinions on music and
musicians, and what will perhaps illustrate better than any other
part of this book the character of the man and artist. His
opinions of composers and musical works show that he had in a
high degree les vices de ses qualites. The delicacy of his
constitution and the super-refinement of his breeding, which put
within his reach the inimitable beauties of subtlest tenderness
and grace that distinguish his compositions and distinguished his
playing, were disqualifications as well as qualifications. "Every
kind of uncouth roughness [toutes les rudesses sauvages] inspired
him with aversion," says Liszt. "In music as in literature and in
every-day life everything which bordered on melodrama was torture
to him." In short, Chopin was an aristocrat with all the
exclusiveness of an aristocrat.

The inability of men of genius to appreciate the merit of one or
the other of their great predecessors and more especially of
their contemporaries has often been commented on and wondered at,
but I doubt very much whether a musician could be instanced whose
sympathies were narrower than those of Chopin. Besides being
biographically important, the record of the master's likings and
dislikings will teach a useful lesson to the critic and furnish
some curious material for the psychological student.

Highest among all the composers, living and dead, Chopin esteemed
Mozart. Him he regarded as "the ideal type, the poet par
excellence." It is related of Chopin--with what truth I do not
know--that he never travelled without having either the score of
"Don Giovanni" or that of the "Requiem" in his portmanteau.
Significant, although not founded on fact, is the story according
to which he expressed the wish that the "Requiem" should be
performed at his funeral service. Nothing, however, shows his
love for the great German master more unmistakably and more
touchingly than the words which on his death-bed he addressed to
his dear friends the Princess Czartoryska and M. Franchomme: "You
will play Mozart together, and I shall hear you." And why did
Chopin regard Mozart as the ideal type, the poet par excellence?
Liszt answers: "Because Mozart condescended more rarely than any
other composer to cross the steps which separate refinement from
vulgarity." But what no doubt more especially stirred
sympathetic chords in the heart of Chopin, and inspired him with
that loving admiration for the earlier master, was the sweetness,
the grace, and the harmoniousness which in Mozart's works reign
supreme and undisturbed--the unsurpassed and unsurpassable
perfect loveliness and lovely perfection which result from a
complete absence of everything that is harsh, hard, awkward,
unhealthy, and eccentric. And yet, says Liszt of Chopin:--

His sybaritism of purity, his apprehension of what was
commonplace, were such that even in "Don Giovanni," even in
this immortal chef-d'oeuvre, he discovered passages the
presence of which we have heard him regret. His worship of
Mozart was not thereby diminished, but as it were saddened.

The composer who next to Mozart stood highest in Chopin's esteem
was Bach. "It was difficult to say," remarks Mikuli, "which of
the two he loved most." Chopin not only, as has already been
mentioned, had works of Bach on his writing-table at Valdemosa,
corrected the Parisian edition for his own use, and prepared
himself for his concerts by playing Bach, but also set his pupils
to study the immortal cantor's suites, partitas, and preludes and
fugues. Madame Dubois told me that at her last meeting with him
(in 1848) he recommended her "de toujours travailler Bach,"
adding that that was the best means of making progress.

Hummel, Field, and Moscheles were the pianoforte composers who
seem to have given Chopin most satisfaction. Mozart and Bach were
his gods, but these were his friends. Gutmann informed me that
Chopin was particularly fond of Hummel; Liszt writes that Hummel
was one of the composers Chopin played again and again with the
greatest pleasure; and from Mikuli we learn that of Hummel's
compositions his master liked best the Fantasia, the Septet, and
the Concertos. Liszt's statement that the Nocturnes of Field were
regarded by Chopin as "insuffisants" seems to me disproved by
unexceptionable evidence. Chopin schooled his pupils most
assiduously and carefully in the Nocturnes as well as in the
Concertos of Field, who was, to use Madame Dubois's words, "an
author very sympathetic to him." Mikuli relates that Chopin had a
predilection for Field's A flat Concerto and the Nocturnes, and
that, when playing the latter, he used to improvise the most
charming embellishments. To take liberties with another artist's
works and complain when another artist takes liberties with your
own works is very inconsistent, is it not? But it is also
thoroughly human, and Chopin was not exempt from the common
failing. One day when Liszt did with some composition of Chopin's
what the latter was in the habit of doing with Field's Nocturnes,
the enraged composer is said to have told his friend to play his
compositions as they were written or to let them alone. M.
Marmontel writes:--

Either from a profound love of the art or from an excess of
conscience personelle, Chopin could not bear any one to touch
the text of his works. The slightest modification seemed to
him a grave fault which he did not even forgive his intimate
friends, his fervent admirers, Liszt not excepted. I have many
a time, as well as my master, Zimmermann, caused Chopin's
sonatas, concertos, ballades, and allegros to be played as
examination pieces; but restricted as I was to a fragment of
the work, I was pained by the thought of hurting the composer,
who considered these alterations a veritable sacrilege.

This, however, is a digression. Little need be added to what has
already been said in another chapter of the third composer of the
group we were speaking of. Chopin, the reader will remember, told
Moscheles that he loved his music, and Moscheles admitted that he
who thus complimented him was intimately acquainted with it. From
Mikuli we learn that Moscheles' studies were very sympathetic to
his master. As to Moscheles' duets, they were played by Chopin
probably more frequently than the works of any other composer,
excepting of course his own works. We hear of his playing them
not only with his pupils, but with Osborne, with Moscheles
himself, and with Liszt, who told me that Chopin was fond of
playing with him the duets of Moscheles and Hummel.

Speaking of playing duets reminds me of Schubert, who, Gutmann
informed me, was a favourite of Chopin's. The Viennese master's
"Divertissement hongrois" he admired without reserve. Also the
marches and polonaises a quatre mains he played with his pupils.
But his teaching repertoire seems to have contained, with the
exception of the waltzes, none of the works a deux mains, neither
the sonatas, nor the impromptus, nor the "Moments musicals." This
shows that if Schubert was a favourite of Chopin's, he was so
only to a certain extent. Indeed, Chopin even found fault with
the master where he is universally regarded as facile princeps.
Liszt remarks:--

In spite of the charm which he recognised in some of
Schubert's melodies, he did not care to hear those whose
contours were too sharp for his ear, where feeling is as it
were denuded, where one feels, so to speak, the flesh
palpitate and the bones crack under the grasp of anguish. A
propos of Schubert, Chopin is reported to have said: "The
sublime is dimmed when it is followed by the common or the
trivial."

I shall now mention some of those composers with whom Chopin was
less in sympathy. In the case of Weber his approval, however,
seems to have outweighed his censure. At least Mikuli relates
that the E minor and A flat major Sonatas and the "Concertstuck"
were among those works for which his master had a predilection,
and Madame Dubois says that he made his pupils play the Sonatas
in C and in A flat major with extreme care. Now let us hear Lenz:-
-

He could not appreciate Weber; he spoke of "opera,"
"unsuitable for the piano" [unklaviermassig]! On the whole,
Chopin was little in sympathy with the GERMAN spirit in music,
although I heard him say: "There is only ONE SCHOOL, the
German!"

Gutmann informed me that he brought the A flat major Sonata with
him from Germany in 1836 or 1837, and that Chopin did not know it
then. It is hard enough to believe that Liszt asked Lenz in 1828
if the composer of the "Freischutz" had also written for the
piano, but Chopin's ignorance in 1836 is much more startling. Did
fame and publications travel so slowly in the earlier part of the
century? Had genius to wait so long for recognition? If the
statement, for the correctness of which Gutmann alone is
responsible, rests on fact and not on some delusion of memory,
this most characteristic work of Weber and one of the most
important items of the pianoforte literature did not reach
Chopin, one of the foremost European pianists, till twenty years
after its publication, which took place in December, 1816.

That Chopin had a high opinion of Beethoven may be gathered from
a story which Lenz relates in an article written for the
"Berliner Musikzeitung" (Vol. XXVI). Little Filtsch--the talented
young Hungarian who made Liszt say: "I shall shut my shop when he
begins to travel"--having played to a select company invited by
his master the latter's Concerto in E minor, Chopin was so
pleased with his pupil's performance that he went with him to
Schlesinger's music-shop, asked for the score of "Fidelio," and
presented it to him with the words:--"I am in your debt, you have
given me great pleasure to-day, I wrote the concerto in a happy
time, accept, my dear young friend, the great master work! read
in it as long as you live and remember me also sometimes." But
Chopin's high opinion of Beethoven was neither unlimited nor
unqualified. His attitude as regards this master, which
Franchomme briefly indicated by saying that his friend loved
Beethoven, but had his dislikes in connection with him, is more
fully explained by Liszt.

However great his admiration for the works of Beethoven might
be, certain parts of them seemed to him too rudely fashioned.
Their structure was too athletic to please him; their wraths
seemed to him too violent [leurs courroux lui semblaient trop
rugissants]. He held that in them passion too closely
approaches cataclysm; the lion's marrow which is found in
every member of his phrases was in his opinion a too
substantial matter, and the seraphic accents, the Raphaelesque
profiles, which appear in the midst of the powerful creations
of this genius, became at times almost painful to him in so
violent a contrast.

I am able to illustrate this most excellent general description
by some examples. Chopin said that Beethoven raised him one
moment up to the heavens and the next moment precipitated him to
the earth, nay, into the very mire. Such a fall Chopin
experienced always at the commencement of the last movement of
the C minor Symphony. Gutmann, who informed me of this, added
that pieces such as the first movement of the Moonlight Sonata (C
sharp minor) were most highly appreciated by his master. One day
when Mr. Halle played to Chopin one of the three Sonatas, Op. 31
(I am not sure which it was), the latter remarked that he had
formerly thought the last movement VULGAR. From this Mr. Halle
naturally concluded that Chopin could not have studied the works
of Beethoven thoroughly. This conjecture is confirmed by what we
learn from Lenz, who in 1842 saw a good deal of Chopin, and
thanks to his Boswellian inquisitiveness, persistence, and
forwardness, made himself acquainted with a number of interesting
facts. Lenz and Chopin spoke a great deal about Beethoven after
that visit to the Russian ladies mentioned in a foregoing part of
this chapter. They had never spoken of the great master before.
Lenz says of Chopin:--

He did not take a very serious interest in Beethoven; he knew
only his principal compositions, the last works not at all.
This was in the Paris air! People knew the symphonies, the
quartets of the middle period but little, the last ones not at
all.

Chopin, on being told by Lenz that Beethoven had in the F minor
Quartet anticipated Mendelssohn, Schumann, and him; and that the
scherzo prepared the way for his mazurka-fantasias, said: "Bring
me this quartet, I do not know it." According to Mikuli Chopin
was a regular frequenter of the concerts of the Societe des
Concerts du Conservatoire and of the Alard, Franchomme, &c.,
quartet party. But one of the most distinguished musicians living
in Paris, who knew Chopin's opinion of Beethoven, suspects that
the music was for him not the greatest attraction of the
Conservatoire concerts, that in fact, like most of those who went
there, he considered them a fashionable resort. True or not, the
suspicion is undeniably significant. "But Mendelssohn," the
reader will say, "surely Chopin must have admired and felt in
sympathy with this sweet-voiced, well-mannered musician?"
Nothing, however, could be farther from the truth. Chopin hated
Mendelssohn's D minor Trio, and told Halle that that composer had
never written anything better than the first Song without Words.
Franchomme, stating the case mildly, says that Chopin did not
care much for Mendelssohn's music; Gutmann, however, declared
stoutly that his master positively disliked it and thought it
COMMON. This word and the mention of the Trio remind me of a
passage in Hiller's "Mendelssohn: Letters and Recollections," in
which the author relates how, when his friend played to him the D
minor Trio after its completion, he was favourably impressed by
the fire, spirit, and flow, in one word, the masterly character
of the work, but had some misgivings about certain pianoforte
passages, especially those based on broken chords, which,
accustomed as he was by his constant intercourse with Liszt and
Chopin during his stay of several years in Paris to the rich
passage work of the new school, appeared to him old-fashioned.
Mendelssohn, who in his letters repeatedly alludes to his
sterility in the matter of new pianoforte passages, allowed
himself to be persuaded by Hiller to rewrite the pianoforte part,
and was pleased with the result. It is clear from the above that
if Mendelssohn failed to give Chopin his due, Chopin did more
than apply the jus talionis.

Schumann, however, found still less favour in the eyes of Chopin
than Mendelssohn; for whilst among the works which, for instance,
Madame Dubois, who was Chopin's pupil for five years, studied
under her master, Mendelssohn was represented at least by the
Songs without Words and the G minor Concerto, Schumann was
conspicuous by his total absence. And let it be remarked that
this was in the last years of Chopin's life, when Schumann had
composed and published almost all his important works for
pianoforte alone and many of his finest works for pianoforte with
other instruments. M. Mathias, Chopin's pupil during the years
1839-1844, wrote to me: "I think I recollect that he had no great
opinion of Schumann. I remember seeing the "Carnaval," Op. 9, on
his table; he did not speak very highly of it." In 1838, when
Stephen Heller was about to leave Augsburg for Paris, Schumann
sent him a copy of his "Carnaval" (published in September, 1837),
to be presented to Chopin. This copy had a title-page printed in
various colours and was most tastefully bound; for Schumann knew
Chopin's love of elegance, and wished to please him. Soon after
his arrival in Paris, Heller called on the Polish musician and
found him sitting for his portrait. On receiving the copy of the
"Carnaval" Chopin said: "How beautifully they get up these things
in Germany!" but uttered not a word about the music. However, we
shall see presently what his opinion of it was. Some time,
perhaps some years, after this first meeting with Chopin, Heller
was asked by Schlesinger whether he would advise him to publish
Schumann's "Carnaval." Heller answered that it would be a good
speculation, for although the work would probably not sell well
at first, it was sure to pay in the long run. Thereupon
Schlesinger confided to Heller what Chopin had told him--namely,
that the "Carnaval" was not music at all. The contemplation of
this indifference and more than indifference of a great artist to
the creations of one of his most distinguished contemporaries is
saddening, especially if we remember how devoted Schumann was to
Chopin, how he admired him, loved him, upheld him, and idolised
him. Had it not been for Schumann's enthusiastic praise and
valiant defence Chopin's fame would have risen and spread, more
slowly in Germany.

"Of virtuoso music of any kind I never saw anything on his desk,
nor do I think anybody else ever did," says Mikuli.. This,
although true in the main, is somewhat too strongly stated.
Kalkbrenner, whose "noisy virtuosities [virtuosites tapageuses]
and decorative expressivities [expressivites decoratives]" Chopin
regarded with antipathy, and Thalberg, whose shallow elegancies
and brilliancies he despised, were no doubt altogether banished
from his desk; this, however, seems not to have been the case
with Liszt, who occasionally made his appearance there. Thus
Madame Dubois studied under Chopin Liszt's transcription of
Rossini's "Tarantella" and of the Septet from Donizetti's "Lucia
di Lammermoor." But the compositions of Liszt that had Chopin's
approval were very limited in number. Chopin, who viewed making
concessions to bad taste at the cost of true art and for the sake
of success with the greatest indignation, found his former friend
often guilty of this sin. In 1840 Liszt's transcription of
Beethoven's "Adelaide" was published in a supplement to the
Gazette musicale. M. Mathias happened to come to Chopin on the
day when the latter had received the number of the journal which
contained the piece in question, and found his master furious,
outre, on account of certain cadenzas which he considered out of
place and out of keeping.

We have seen in one of the earlier chapters how little Chopin
approved of Berlioz's matter and manner; some of the ultra-
romanticist's antipodes did not fare much better. As for Halevy,
Chopin had no great opinion of him; Meyerbeer's music he heartily
disliked; and, although not insensible to Auber's French esprit
and liveliness, he did not prize this master's works very highly.
Indeed, at the Italian opera-house he found more that was to his
taste than at the French opera-houses. Bellini's music had a
particular charm for Chopin, and he was also an admirer of
Rossini.

The above notes exemplify and show the truth of Liszt's remark:--

In the great models and the master-works of art Chopin sought
only what corresponded with his nature. What resembled it
pleased him; what differed from it hardly received justice
from him.

CHAPTER XXVI.

1843-1847.

CHOPIN'S PECUNIARY CIRCUMSTANCES, AND BUSINESS EXPERIENCES WITH
PUBLISHERS.--LETTERS TO FRANCHOMME.--PUBLICATIONS FROM 1842-7.--
SOJOURNS AT NOHANT.--LISZT, MATTHEW ARNOLD, GEORGE SAND, CHARLES
ROLLINAT, AND EUGENE DELACROIX ON NOHANT AND LIFE AT NOHANT.--
CHOPIN'S MODE OF COMPOSITION.--CHOPIN AND GEORGE SAND TAKE UP
THEIR PARIS QUARTERS IN THE CITE D'ORLEANS.--THEIR WAY OF LIFE
THERE, PARTICULARLY CHOPIN'S, AS DESCRIBED BY HIS PUPILS LINDSAY
SLOPER, MATHIAS, AND MADAME DUBOIS, AND MORE ESPECIALLY BY LENZ,
MADAME SAND HERSELF, AND PROFESSOR ALEXANDER CHODZKO (DOMESTIC
RELATIONS, APARTMENTS, MANNERS, SYMPATHIES, HIS TALENT FOR
MIMICRY, GEORGE SAND'S FRIENDS, AND HER ESTIMATE OF CHOPIN'S
CHARACTER).

Chopin's life from 1843 to 1847 was too little eventful to lend
itself to a chronologically progressive narrative. I shall,
therefore, begin this chapter with a number of letters written by
the composer during this period to his friend Franchomme, and
then endeavour to describe Chopin's mode of life, friends,
character, &c.

The following fascicle of letters, although containing less about
the writer's thoughts, feelings, and doings than we could wish,
affords nevertheless matter of interest. At any rate, much
additional light is thrown on Chopin's pecuniary circumstances
and his dealings with his publishers.

Impecuniosity seems to have been a chronic state with the artist
and sometimes to have pressed hard upon him. On one occasion it
even made him write to the father of one of his pupils, and ask
for the payment of the fees for five lessons (100 francs). M.
Mathias tells me that the letter is still in his possession. One
would hardly have expected such a proceeding from a grand
seigneur like Chopin, and many will, no doubt, ask, how it was
that a teacher so much sought after, who got 20 francs a lesson,
and besides had an income from his compositions, was reduced to
such straits. The riddle is easily solved. Chopin was open-handed
and not much of an economist: he spent a good deal on pretty
trifles, assisted liberally his needy countrymen, made handsome
presents to his friends, and is said to have had occasionally to
pay bills of his likewise often impecunious lady-love. Moreover,
his total income was not so large as may be supposed, for
although he could have as many pupils as he wished, he never
taught more than five hours a day, and lived every year for
several months in the country. And then there is one other point
to be taken into consideration: he often gave his lessons gratis.
From Madame Rubio I learned that on one occasion when she had
placed the money for a series of lessons on the mantel-piece, the
master declined to take any of it, with the exception of a 20-
franc piece, for which sum he put her name down on a subscription
list for poor Poles. Lindsay Sloper, too, told me that Chopin
declined payment for the lessons he gave him.