I am not at all fit for giving concerts, the crowd intimidates me, its breath suffocates me, I feel paralysed by its curious look, and the unknown faces make me dumb. But you are destined for it, for when you do not win your public, you have the power to overwhelm it.
Opposition and indifference, which stimulate more vigorous natures, affected Chopin as touch does the mimosa pudica, the sensitive plant—they made him shrink and wither. Liszt observes correctly that the concerts did not so much fatigue Chopin's physical constitution as provoke his irritability as a poet; that, in fact, his delicate constitution was less a reason than a pretext for abstention, he wishing to avoid being again and again made the subject of debate. But it is more difficult for one in similar circumstances not to feel as Chopin did than for a successful virtuoso like Liszt to say:—
If Chopin suffered on account of his not being able to take part in those public and solemn jousts where popular acclamation salutes the victor; if he felt depressed at seeing himself excluded from them, it was because he did not esteem highly enough what he had, to do gaily without what he had not.
To be sure, the admiration of the best men of his time ought to have consoled him for the indifference of the dull crowd. But do we not all rather yearn for what we have not than enjoy what we have? Nay, do we not even often bewail the unattainableness of vain bubbles when it would be more seasonable to rejoice in the solid possessions with which we are blessed? Chopin's discontent, however, was caused by the unattainableness not of a vain bubble, but of a precious crown. There are artists who pretend to despise the great public, but their abuse of it when it withholds its applause shows their real feeling. No artist can at heart be fully satisfied with the approval of a small minority; Chopin, at any rate, was not such a one. Nature, who had richly endowed him with the qualities that make a virtuoso, had denied him one, perhaps the meanest of all, certainly the least dispensable, the want of which balked him of the fulfilment of the promise with which the others had flattered him, of the most brilliant reward of his striving. In the lists where men much below his worth won laurels and gold in abundance he failed to obtain a fair share of the popular acclamation. This was one of the disappointments which, like malignant cancers, cruelly tortured and slowly consumed his life.
The first performance of Bellini's "I Puritani" at the Theatre- Italien (January 24, 1835), which as well as that of Halevy's "La Juive" at the Academic (February 23, 1835), and of Auber's "Le cheval de bronze" at the Opera-Comique (March 23, 1835), was one of the chief musico-dramatic events of the season 1834-1835, reminds me that I ought to say a few words about the relation which existed between the Italian and the Polish composer. Most readers will have heard of Chopin's touching request to be buried by the side of Bellini. Loath though I am to discredit so charming a story, duty compels me to state that it is wholly fictitious. Chopin's liking for Bellini and his music, how ever, was true and real enough. Hiller relates that he rarely saw him so deeply moved as at a performance of Norma, which they attended together, and that in the finale of the second act, in which Rubini seemed to sing tears, Chopin had tears in his eyes. A liking for the Italian operatic music of the time, a liking which was not confined to Bellini's works, but, as Franchomme, Wolff, and others informed me, included also those of Rossini, appears at first sight rather strange in a musician of Chopin's complexion; the prevalent musical taste at Warsaw, and a kindred trait in the national characters of the Poles and Italians, however, account for it. With regard to Bellini, Chopin's sympathy was strengthened by the congeniality of their individual temperaments. Many besides Leon Escudier may have found in the genius of Chopin points of resemblance with Bellini as well as with Raphael—two artists who, it is needless to say, were heaven-wide apart in the mastery of the craft of their arts, and in the width, height, and depth of their conceptions. The soft, rounded Italian contours and sweet sonorousness of some of Chopin's cantilene cannot escape the notice of the observer. Indeed, Chopin's Italicisms have often been pointed out. Let me remind the reader here only of some remarks of Schumann's, made apropos of the Sonata in B flat minor, Op. 35:—
It is known that Bellini and Chopin were friends, and that they, who often made each other acquainted with their compositions, may perhaps have had some artistic influence on each other. But, as has been said, there is [on the part of Chopin] only a slight leaning to the southern manner; as soon as the cantilena is at an end the Sarmatian flashes out again.
To understand Chopin's sympathy we have but to picture to ourselves Bellini's personality—the perfectly well-proportioned, slender figure, the head with its high forehead and scanty blonde hair, the well-formed nose, the honest, bright look, the expressive mouth; and within this pleasing exterior, the amiable, modest disposition, the heart that felt deeply, the mind that thought acutely. M. Charles Maurice relates a characteristic conversation in his "Histoire anecdotique du Theatre." Speaking to Bellini about "La Sonnambula," he had remarked that there was soul in his music. This expression pleased the composer immensely. "Oui, n'est-ce pas? De l'ame!" he exclaimed in his soft Italian manner of speaking, "C'est ce que je veux…De L'ame! Oh! je suis sensible! Merci!…C'est que l'ame, c'est toute la musique!" "And he pressed my hands," says Charles Maurice, "as if I had discovered a new merit in his rare talent." This specimen of Bellini's conversation is sufficient to show that his linguistic accomplishments were very limited. Indeed, as a good Sicilian he spoke Italian badly, and his French was according to Heine worse than bad, it was frightful, apt to make people's hair stand on end.
When one was in the same salon with him, his vicinity inspired one with a certain anxiety mingled with the fascination of terror which repelled and attracted at the same time. His puns were not always of an amusing kind. Hiller also mentions Bellini's bad grammar and pronunciation, but he adds that the contrast between what he said and the way he said it gave to his gibberish a charm which is often absent from the irreproachable language of trained orators. It is impossible to conjecture what Bellini might have become as a musician if, instead of dying before the completion of his thirty-third year (September 24, 1835), he had lived up to the age of fifty or sixty; thus much, however, is certain, that there was still in him a vast amount of undeveloped capability. Since his arrival in Paris he had watched attentively the new musical phenomena that came there within his ken, and the "Puritani" proves that he had not done so without profit. This sweet singer from sensuous Italy was not insensible even to the depth and grandeur of German music. After hearing Beethoven's Pastoral Symphony, for instance, he said to Hiller, his eyes glistening as if he had himself done a great deed: "E bel comme la nature!" [Footnote: I give the words literally as they are printed in Hiller's Kimmerleben. The mixture of Italian and French was no doubt intended, but hardly the spelling.] In short, Bellini was a true artist, and therefore a meet companion for a true artist like Chopin, of whose music it can be said with greater force than of that of most composers that "it is all soul." Chopin, who of course met Bellini here and there in the salons of the aristocracy, came also in closer contact with him amidst less fashionable but more congenial surroundings. I shall now let Hiller, the pleasant story-teller, speak, who, after remarking that Bellini took a great interest in piano-forte music, even though it was not played by a Chopin, proceeds thus:—
I can never forget some evenings which I spent with him [Bellini] and Chopin and a few other guests at Madame Freppa's. Madame Freppa, an accomplished and exceedingly musical woman, born at Naples, but of French extraction, had, in order to escape from painful family circumstances, settled in Paris, where she taught singing in the most distinguished circles. She had an exceedingly sonorous though not powerful voice, and an excellent method, and by her rendering of Italian folk-songs and other simple vocal compositions of the older masters charmed even the spoiled frequenters of the Italian Opera. We cordially esteemed her, and sometimes went together to visit her at the extreme end of the Faubourg St. Germain, where she lived with her mother on a troisieme au dessus de l'entresol, high above all the noise and tumult of the ever-bustling city. There music was discussed, sung, and played, and then again discussed, played, and sung. Chopin and Madame Freppa seated themselves by turns at the pianoforte; I, too, did my best; Bellini made remarks, and accompanied himself in one or other of his cantilene, rather in illustration of what he had been saying than for the purpose of giving a performance of them. He knew how to sing better than any German composer whom I have met, and had a voice less full of sound than of feeling. His pianoforte- playing sufficed for the reproduction of his orchestra, which, indeed, is not saying much. But he knew very well what he wanted, and was far from being a kind of natural poet, as some may imagine him to have been.
In the summer of 1835, towards the end of July, Chopin journeyed to Carlsbad, whither his father had been sent by the Warsaw physicians. The meeting of the parents and their now famous son after a separation of nearly five years was no doubt a very joyous one; but as no accounts have come down to us of Chopin's doings and feelings during his sojourn in the Bohemian watering- place, I shall make no attempt to fill up the gap by a gushing description of what may have been, evolved out of the omniscience of my inner consciousness, although this would be an insignificant feat compared with those of a recent biographer whose imaginativeness enabled her to describe the appearance of the sky and the state of the weather in the night when her hero became a free citizen of this planet, and to analyse minutely the characters of private individuals whose lives were passed in retirement, whom she had never seen, and who had left neither works nor letters by which they might be judged.