Individuality.
If the artist has studied and learned how to give expression to the individual feeling of the composer, his own individuality in the performance is also of great consequence. It consists in this: that the same piece in performance shall appear ever fresh and new. Individual feeling is subject to continuous change, through influences from within and without, consequently an artist who has acquired a full and active control over all his powers does not perform a piece the second time in precisely the same manner as the first time. Where however, this is the case, it may be regarded as a sign that the performer has not yet arrived at a complete artistic freedom.
Phrasing.
Upon this subject no exhaustive treatise will be given, but only some observations upon intelligent phrasing as applied technically to violin playing. As in singing, and in wind instruments the breath, so in the playing of stringed instruments the change of bowing, is the potent medium through which phrases are divided, distinguished from each other, and rendered clear. Stringed instruments present considerably greater difficulty in this respect than singing, on account of the manifold kinds of stroke in bowing,—often within the compass of a short phrase the most varied bowings occur; moreover, it cannot be laid down that with each phrase or period the stroke must be changed. These phrases may, however, in many cases coincide with the change of bowing, and the player must in general make it his aim to obtain correct phrasing by a suitable application and adjustment of the changes in the stroke.
The following examples from Mendelssohn’s violin concerto are often incorrectly phrased, through changing the bow in the wrong places:—
The above passage is thus rendered by many violinists:
