This little episode shows that Beethoven was not fully appreciated, and it also shows that quartet playing was regarded at that time in an entirely different light from that in which we are accustomed to think of it to-day. We do not consider the first violinist a soloist and the rest merely his accompaniment, but each member of the quartet is practically of equal importance.
Lambert Joseph Massart, the eminent teacher of Paris, is said to have been an excellent quartet player, and often, with his wife, an admirable pianist, he gave delightful chamber concerts.
Few violinists have been more closely associated with quartet playing than Ferdinand David, in his way one of the most celebrated violinists. Little is known of his early youth except that he was born at Hamburg in 1810, and was there at the time of the French occupation. It has been said that he played in a concert at ten years of age and at thirteen became a pupil of Spohr at Cassel. He made a concert tour with his sister, Madame Dulcken, and in 1827 entered the orchestra of the Königstadt Theatre at Berlin. Here he became acquainted with Mendelssohn, with whom he was from that time on terms of the greatest intimacy. While in Berlin he was heard by a wealthy musical amateur named Liphart, who lived at Dorpat, and who maintained a private quartet. He engaged David, who eventually married his daughter, to lead this quartet, and for several years the young violinist remained in Dorpat, though he found opportunity to make some concert tours through the north of Europe.
When Mendelssohn was appointed conductor of the Gewandhaus concerts at Leipzig, he sent for David and made him concert master, which post he occupied from 1836. Seven years later the conservatory was founded by Mendelssohn, and David became professor of violin, in which position his influence became great and beneficial.
In Leipzig David established a quartet, which was one of the best, if not the very best, in its day, though it may have been surpassed later by the Florentine Quartet and those of Joachim, in London and Berlin, and possibly by Brodsky's later Leipzig quartet.
David died in 1873, beloved and respected, and will be remembered as one of the most refined musicians and admirable teachers of the century.
Josef Hellmesberger, one of the most brilliant violinists and noted teachers of Vienna, founded, in 1849, a quartet which achieved an immense reputation. His associates were Heissler, Durst, and Schlesinger. Hellmesberger made a point of finding works of merit which had sunk into oblivion, but which were worthy of a hearing. Hellmesberger spent the whole of his life in Vienna, with the exception of a tour in 1847, and he held the highest musical office in the Austrian Empire, that of director of the Imperial Band.
A story which is told of him bears testimony to his remarkable musical instinct. Teresa Milanollo, in 1840, took a new manuscript by De Bériot to Vienna. She wished to keep it for her own use, and did not show it to anybody. Hellmesberger heard it played at two rehearsals, and then went home and wrote out the whole work from memory.
No small portion of the immense influence which Joachim has wielded in the musical world has been directed toward quartet playing, and he has established a quartet in London and another one at Berlin, which both bear an enviable reputation. His chamber music classes, too, at the Berlin High School, tend to develop admirable quartet players; thus we find Marie Soldat organising a ladies' quartet which had a good career, and Gabrielle Wietrowitz taking the place of first violin in the excellent ladies' quartet formed in England by Miss Emily Shinner.[1] Miss Shinner, whose efforts in the artistic world have been of great value, and whose quartet has an immense reputation in England, was also a pupil of Joachim.
[1] The Shinner Quartet consisted of Miss Emily Shinner (Mrs. F. Liddell), first violin, Miss Lucy H. Stone, second violin, Miss Cecilia Gates, viola, and Miss Florence Hemmings, violoncello.