And the pianoforte has one possession wholly peculiar to itself, an inimitable device, a photograph of the sky, a ray of moonlight—the Pedal.
The effects of the pedal are unexhausted, because they have remained even to this day the drudges of a narrow-souled and senseless harmonic theory; the treatment accorded them is like trying to mould air or water into geometric forms. Beethoven, who incontestably achieved the greatest progress on and for the pianoforte, divined the mysteries of the pedal, and to him we owe the first liberties.
The pedal is in ill-repute. For this, absurd irregularities must bear the blame. Let us experiment with sensible irregularities.
L'ENVOI
I felt … that the book I shall write will be neither in English nor in Latin; and this for the one reason … namely, that the language in which it may be given me not only to write, but also to think, will not be Latin, or English, or Italian, or Spanish, but a language not even one of whose words I know, a language in which dumb things speak to me, and in which, it may be, I shall at last have to respond in my grave to an Unknown Judge.”
(Von Hofmannsthal: A letter.)
[A] None the less, in these arts, taste and individuality can and will unceasingly find refreshment and rejuvenation.
[B] Tradition is a plaster mask taken from life, which, in the course of many years, and after passing through the hands of innumerable artisans, leaves its resemblance to the original largely a matter of imagination.
[C] “Die Ur-Musik,” is the author's happy phrase. But as this music never has been, our English terms like “primitive,” “original,” etc., would involve a non sequitur which is avoided, at least, by “infinite.” [Translator's Note.]