César Franck
Quintet in F Minor.
December 12, 1903.
The Quintet, for pianoforte and strings in F minor and major, is a typical example of the composer's profound learning and immense technical mastery, of his lofty ideal as a musical artist, and of his quite marvellous originality. Judging by such a composition, one would hardly claim the gift of melodic charm for César Franck. He has little or no lyrism, and he seems to be chiefly interested in delivering music from the bondage of the tonic and dominant system, while calling upon each instrument for what is most characteristic in its technical resource. He is thus as far removed as possible from Grieg and the song-and-dance men of recent time. He is a great master of form, but he dramatises the chamber-music forms very much as Beethoven dramatised the symphony, reconciling the claims of structure and emotion with the touch of unmistakable genius. The great Quintet is written for performers whose technique is subject to no limitations. Each part is intensely alive, and at many points the listener's imagination is carried into regions never before opened up. The music proves that the composer understood his medium with extraordinary thoroughness. Some of his audacious progressions, his persistent reduplications, and his rushing unison passages one might, at first blush, call orchestral, yet more careful observation quickly convinces one that they are not orchestral, but that the special kind of eloquence in the music belongs essentially to the particular combination for which it was written. The key system is disconcerting at first. The composer seems to insist that two chords so unlike tonic and dominant as F major and D flat minor (if anyone thinks there is no such key he cannot have studied César Franck) will do just as well for the main props of an extended composition; and he has all the best of the argument. The technical interest of the work is of the keenest from beginning to end; but the poetic interest seems to develop slowly, the imaginative play being nowhere as definite as in the finale, which begins with strong passages of extreme nervous agitation and culminates in a tumultuous dénoûment with strong reiterated insistence on the two chords aforementioned, above which the strings rush towards their point of repose in a unison of unparalleled energy and breadth. The subtle and heavy emotion of the slow movement reminds one of Maeterlinck. César Franck (1822-90) was a Liégeois who migrated to Paris, where he became the founder of the young French school—that school of which Mr. Vincent d'Indy is now the principal ornament. Another follower, much less truly distinguished than d'Indy but better known in this country, is Gabriel Fauré. Franck is the only great composer that Belgium has produced in modern times. The task of interpreting the wonderful Quintet was one of the most formidable that Dr. Brodsky and his associates ever took in hand. But they were equal to the occasion. With such a past master as Mr. Busoni at the pianoforte there could be no uncertainty as to the interpretation, and the immensely difficult string parts were rendered with that repose and sureness of touch which alone can make a great and complex composition intelligible.
[CHAPTER X.]
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PIANO-PLAYING.
Reisenauer.
February 13, 1896.
The reception of Mr. Alfred Reisenauer by the large audience in the Gentleman's Hall yesterday afternoon was marked by considerable reserve. Not once during the recital was there any display of enthusiasm. Yet it cannot be said that the performance fell short of Mr. Reisenauer's great reputation. In his rendering of Schumann's "Carnaval" not a point was missed, and the "Paganini" intermezzo, occurring in the middle of the slow waltz, gave a foretaste of the quite extraordinary technical powers which were more fully displayed later on. The "Davidsbündler" finale was played with less noise and more subtlety than is usually bestowed upon this curious march, with the Grossvaterstanz creeping in unobserved, much as the "Marseillaise" creeps into the "Faschingschwank in Wien" by the same composer. In certain numbers the pianist showed a tendency to prefer pieces of a secondary and almost trivial character such as the "Rondo à Capriccio" to which Beethoven has given the whimsical sub-title "Rage over the lost penny stormed out in a Caprice." Not that this work is altogether frivolous. As in almost all Beethoven's music, the working-out sections contain much that is beautiful and interesting; but the opening theme is quite as bald as the motif of Haydn's "Surprise" symphony. In the first part of the programme—that is, down to the end of the Beethoven selections—there were comparatively few indications of the pianist's true calibre. But in Liszt's transcription of the "Forelle" Mr. Reisenauer began to reveal some of those marvels of which he and perhaps one other living pianist have the monopoly. That interminable trill, with the song motif freely and expressively played by the same hand first below the trill and then above it, was a thing to be remembered. There was not the least trace of those licences which even first-rate players commonly allow themselves in order to facilitate such manœuvres. To the ear the effect was absolutely that of three independent hands. The "Erlkönig" transcription, on the other hand, was much less impressive. It was performed with an exaggerated tempo rubato, and was altogether too noisy. Of the Chopin Nocturne in D flat as rendered yesterday afternoon it is difficult to speak in measured terms. Mr. Reisenauer seems to be pretty generally put down by amateurs as wanting in "soul." But if so, it must surely be admitted that he gets on extraordinarily well without one. Anyhow, soul or no soul, his rendering of the Nocturne was a revelation. In the midst of an almost nebulous pianissimo the parts were still differentiated with perfect mastery, and altogether a science of tone-gradations was displayed that is probably unique. Not a lurking beauty in the composition escapes his research or exceeds his powers of interpretation. For the concluding number Liszt's "Hungarian Fantasia" was chosen, and this piece again fell totally flat on the greater part of the audience, possibly owing to want of familiarity with the Hungarian style. For this Fantasia is based on Hungarian popular songs, and decorated with passages that are a sort of glorified imitation of an Hungarian improvisatore's performance on the "cembalo." The song-themes are some of the most beautiful and interesting to be found in all Liszt's Rhapsodies and Fantasias, especially the first, which, in Korbay's edition, is set to the words "They have laid down him dead upon the black-draped bier," and the wonderful "Crane" song, which colours all the latter part of the Fantasia. The difficulties of the piece are some of the most heart-breaking to be found anywhere in the literature of the instrument.