I had already heard from Klingemann what a true friend you had been to my Overture, and now your description puts it all so visibly before me. After reading your letter, I took up the score, and played it straight through from beginning to end, and felt that I liked it better than before.
By the way, you complain of the difficulty in getting the pianos observed; and as I was playing the piece over again, it struck me that that was really my fault. It is easily remedied, for the whole thing, I believe, is due to the marks of expression; if you have those altered in the parts, it will be set right at once. First, everything should be marked one degree weaker; that is, where there is a p in the wind instruments, it should be pp; instead of mf, piano; instead of f, mf. The pp alone might remain, as I particularly dislike ppp. The sf’s, however, should be everywhere struck out, as they really are quite wrong, no abrupt accent being meant, but a gradual swelling of the tone, which is sufficiently indicated by the
. The same again wherever the
etc. recurs; in all such passages the sf’s should be done away with; and in the strings as well: for instance, at the very opening, and where the trumpets first come in, it should be pp; the f’s should simply disappear. Klingemann would, I am sure, oblige me by making these alterations in the score, a copyist would transfer them to the parts, and then the whole thing would sound twice as mermaidish.
What you say of Berlioz’s Overture I thoroughly agree with. It is a chaotic, prosaic piece, and yet more humanly conceived than some of his others. I always felt inclined to say with Faust,—
“He ran around, he ran about,
His thirst in puddles laving;
He gnawed and scratched the house throughout,
But nothing cured his raving;
And driven at last, in open day,
He ran into the kitchen.”
For his orchestration is such a frightful muddle, such an incongruous mess, that one ought to wash one’s hands after handling one of his scores. Besides, it really is a shame to set nothing but murder, misery, and wailing to music; even if it were well done, it would simply give us a record of atrocities. At first he made me quite melancholy, because his judgments on others are so clever, so cool, and correct, he seems so thoroughly sensible, and yet he does not perceive that his own works are such rubbishy nonsense. I am very glad to hear what you say about the “Gipsy Variations;” but do tell me whether you are not treating me much too liberally, for I never in my life should have dreamed of such high terms as now fall to my share alone. The E flat for the horns and trumpets I put down trusting to luck, and hoping that Providence would show the players some way to do it; if they have new contrivances for it, so much the better.
You sent me word not to let Mori have anything more gratis, on account of his indiscretion; I am doubly sorry for this, as I have just presented him with a manuscript, to make up for having kept him waiting six months for the Rondo. I did not like the idea of his having to pardon any shortcoming of mine, so I thought it the best way out of the difficulty, and now, although regretting the circumstance, I must of course keep my word; but for the future I will act upon your hint. That piece for Fanny Stone I should of all things like to write, but how am I to compose something easy? Well, I will set about it, and do my best to avoid octaves and broken chords; then there will be no ornamental passages at all, for you know I never write any others. No, but really I will look out seriously for a piece that I can dedicate to her.