The other original was an old lady whom I accompanied on the piano. She was a passionate admirer of Beethoven, against which I had nothing to say, but she had the whim, moreover, never to play any other music than that of her favorite. She had all Beethoven’s pianoforte-compositions, as also his orchestral works arranged for the piano. Her apartment was also hung with every portrait of him that she had been able to procure. As many of these differed greatly in resemblance to each other, she urged me to inform her which most resembled him of the whole. She possessed also some relics of him which had been brought to her from Vienna by English travellers, among others a button of his dressing-gown and a piece of music paper with some note marks and ink-blots from his hand. When I apprized her that I had lived for some time on terms of great intimacy with him, I rose greatly in her estimation, and she had then so much to ask that on some days we never played at all. She spoke French with tolerably fluency, and could even bring out a few words of German. Her pianoforte play was not at all bad, so that I was rather pleased to play the sonatas for piano and violin. But when she subsequently produced the trios also, and played with me without violoncello, and then even the piano concertos, in which, with the exception of first orchestral-violin, which I played, all else was wanting, it became very clear to me that her enthusiasm for Beethoven was nothing but affectation, and that she had not the least perception of the excellence of his compositions.
I became acquainted with a third singular character in the following manner. One morning a servant in livery brought a letter to me, which my old Johanning translated in the following manner: “Mr. Spohr is requested to call at the house of the undersigned, at 4 o’clock precisely.” As I did not know the name appended to the note, nor could ascertain from the servant the purpose for which my attendance was requested, I replied thereto in an equally laconic manner: “At the hour indicated I am engaged and cannot come.” The next morning the servant reappeared with a second much more polite note: “Mr. Spohr is requested to honour the undersigned with a visit, and to appoint the time himself.” At the same time the servant had been ordered to offer his master’s carriage, and as I had been meanwhile informed that the writer was a celebrated physician, who frequently attended concerts, and interested himself especially in violin music, I no longer hesitated to go, but indicated the appointed hour to the servant and was duly fetched in the doctor’s carriage. An amiable old gentlemen with snow white hair received me at the foot of the stairs, but we now discovered to our mutual regret that we could not make ourselves intelligible to each other, for he spoke neither German nor French. We stood opposite to each other in great embarassment, until he took me by the arm and led me into a spacious room on the walls of which a number of violins were hung. Others had been taken from their cases and placed upon tables. The doctor handed a bow to me and pointed to the instruments. I now comprehended that I was to give my opinion of the respective merits of the violins, and immediately began to try them and to arrange them in order according to their worth. This was no easy work to do; for there were a great number of them, and the old gentleman brought them all in succession, without omitting one. When at length, after the lapse of about an hour, I had found the best six of them, and still played on these alternately to discover the very best of them, I observed that the doctor eyed one of them with looks of particular fondness, and his face lit up with pleasure every time I struck the strings. I therefore readily gave the kind old gentleman the satisfaction of indicating that instrument as the matador of the whole collection. Quite delighted with this announcement, he now brought a viola d’amour, and began to play a fantasia on this long-unused instrument. I listened to him with pleasure, as I had not heard the instrument before and the doctor played by no means ill. Thus terminated the interview to the satisfaction of both, and I had taken up my hat, to take my leave of him when the old gentleman, with a kindly expression of countenance and several low bows, handed to me a five-pound note. Astonished at this, I looked at the note and the donor, and at first knew not what he meant; when it struck me that he intended it as a remuneration for my testing his violins, and shaking my head with a smile, I laid the note on the table, pressed the doctor’s hand with warmth, and hastened down stairs. He followed me out into the street, assisted me into the carriage and then spoke some words with evident emotion to his coachman. This had made so much impression on the coachman, that he immediately told it to old Johanning, who had come with the carriage, to open the door. He had said to him: “You are driving there a German who is a perfect gentleman; and I expect you will take him home to his house with the greatest care.”—A few months afterwards, when I gave my benefit concert, the doctor sent for a ticket and forwarded to me at the same time a ten-pound note.
Meanwhile my wife had by unflagging industry acquired great proficiency on the new harp, but in doing so—on account of the greater stretch of arm it required and the stronger tension of the strings—she had exerted herself over much and now suffered greatly from the exhaustion it had induced. From former experience I had learned that nothing so quickly imparted fresh strength to her nerves as the frequent enjoyment of fresh air. I therefore availed myself of every moment of sunshine in the first days of spring to take gentle walks into Regent’s Park, which was very near to our dwelling in Charlotte Street. On Sundays, when all music ceases in London, and when even without fear of giving offence we could not play in our own apartments, we used to make more distant excursions to Hampstead, and to the other parks. Our companion and guide was alternately the younger Ries and an old amiable man of the name of Stumpf, an instrument maker. I soon had the gratification of seeing my wife regain fresh strength and spirits from the mild influence of the English spring, but I adhered strictly to my previous resolution that she should appear once only at my own concert, and declined with firmness several offers that were made to her. But as for myself, I played at all concerts where they were willing to pay the price I asked, and as this according to English notions was not excessively high, I was in frequent requisition, and saw my name announced on almost all the concert-programmes of the season. But I never could make up my mind to play for remuneration at private parties, for the manner in which musicians were then treated there, was to me most unbecoming and degrading. They were not admitted to join the company, but were shewn into an adjoining room, where they had to wait until the moment arrived when they were summoned to the apartments where the company was assembled before whom they were to play; their performance over, they had to leave the room again immediately. My wife and I were ourselves once eyewitnesses of this contemptuous treatment of the first and most eminent artists in London. We had received letters of introduction to the king’s brothers the Dukes of Sussex and Clarence, and as the latter was married to a German, a Princess of Meiningen, I paid them a visit accompanied by my wife. The Ducal couple received us in a very kind manner and invited us to a musical party they were to give in a few days and at which we were also asked to assist. I then thought in what way I could best extricate myself from this disgusting exclusion from the company, and resolved if I could not succeed to return home immediately. When therefore we entered the palace, and a lacquey was on the point of opening the door of the room where the other musicians were assembled, I told Johanning to deliver my violin case to him, and with my wife on my arm, immediately ascended the staircase before the lacquey had time to recover from his astonishment. Arrived at the door of the apartments where the company were assembled, I announced my name to the footman in waiting, and as he hesitated to open the door I evinced an intention of opening it myself. Upon this the lacquey instantly threw open the door and called out the names of the new-comers. The Duchess, alive to German usages, rose immediately from her seat, advanced a few steps to meet my wife, and led her into the circle of ladies. The Duke welcomed me also with a few friendly words and introduced me to the gentlemen around him. I now thought I had successfully achieved all; but I soon observed that the servants notwithstanding not did consider me as properly belonging to the company, for they always passed me by with the tea-tray and other refreshments, without offering me any. At length the Duke may also have remarked this; for I saw him whisper a few words in the ear of the steward of the household. After this the refreshments were also presented to me. When the concert was to commence the steward of the household sent a servant to summon the invited artists in the order in which their names appeared on the programme. They hereupon entered the apartment with their sheet of music or instrument in hand, saluted the company with a profound bow, and began their performances. They were the élite of the most distinguished singers and musicians in London, and the execution of their respective pieces was almost without exception charmingly beautiful. This, however, did not appear to be felt by the noble and fashionable auditory; for they did not cease their conversation one moment. Once only when a very favorite female singer entered the room they became somewhat more silent, and a few subdued bravas were heard, for which she immediately returned thanks with profound curtsies. I was exceedingly annoyed by this derogation of art and still more so with the artists who submitted to be so treated, and I had a great mind not to play at all. When the turn came to me, therefore, I purposely hesitated so long till the Duke, probably at a sign made to him by his wife, invited me himself to play. I then requested one of the servants to bring up my violin case, and I then began to play the piece I had proposed to myself without making the customary bows to the company. All these circumstances excited no doubt the attention of the company, for during the whole time of my performance the greatest stillness pervaded the apartment. When I had concluded the ducal pair and their guests applauded. Now also I first expressed my thanks by making a bow. Shortly afterwards the concert terminated, and the musicians retired. If our having constituted ourselves part of the company had furnished matter of surprise, this was still more increased when they saw that we stopped there also to supper, and during the supper were treated with great attention by the ducal hosts. The circumstance to which we doubtless owed this distinction—one so unheard-of and repugnant to all English notions of that day—was the fact that the Duchess had known us while yet living in her paternal house, and had there witnessed the friendly reception which, at the time when we lived at Gotha, we had frequently met with at the court of Meiningen. The Duke of Sussex, to whom I had brought a letter of recommendation from the Duke of Cambridge, then regent of Hanover, received me also with great distinction and conversed with me a good deal. During a conversation we had upon the subject of English national songs, the Duke even sent for his guitar and sang to me some English and Irish national songs, which afterwards suggested to me the idea of working up some of the most popular of these as a pot-pourri for my instrument, and of introducing the same at my concert.[26] When the company broke up, which was not till long after midnight, we returned home greatly pleased with the result of our daring and with the victory we had gained over the prejudices of London society.
Among those who solicited me to play solo at their concerts was Sir George Smart, one of the directors of the Philharmonic Society. During the season he gave a succession of subscription concerts which he called “sacred concerts,” in which nevertheless a great deal of the music was “worldly” also. I played at two of them, in return for which Sir George undertook the arrangements for my benefit-concert—a by no means light task even for a native well versed in the matter, and which if I had undertaken in person would perhaps have occupied six weeks of my time, which I could employ in a much more advantageous manner. My concert took place on the 18th. June, and was one of the most brillant and well attended of the whole season. Almost every person to whom we had brought letters of recommendation—and among them also the Dukes of Sussex and Clarence—had taken either boxes or reserved seats, and several of those wealthy personages had forwarded considerable sums for them.
A great number of the subscribers to the Philharmonic Society also retained their seats, and as the lowest price for a ticket was half a guinea, and the room held nearly a thousand people, the receipts were very considerable. I derived a great additional advantage from the circumstance, that the expenses which otherwise in London are enormously high, were greatly reduced on this occasion by the refusal of several of the members of the orchestra to receive any gratuity, from a friendly feeling towards me, and from the agreement previously entered into by me with the Philharmonic Society, that the use of the rooms should cost me nothing. On the other hand, however, I had to pay all the singers, and I yet well remember that I was obliged to pay Mrs. Salmon, the then most popular female vocalist in London, and without whose presence my concert would have been considered not sufficiently attractive, the sum of thirty pounds sterling for a single song; and she made it a further condition of agreement, that she should not sing until towards the end of the concert, as she had first to sing at a concert in the city, six miles off. I must here mention also a singular custom which prevailed at all concerts in London at that time, which now, however, like many other strange practices of that period, has been discontinued. Namely, it was required that the party giving the concert should provide the auditory with refreshments during the pause between the first and second parts of the concert. These were accordingly supplied at a buffet in an adjoining room, and one was obliged to agree beforehand with the confectioner upon the sum for their purveyance, which at my concert was undertaken for ten pounds sterling. If the company consisted for the most part of persons of rank and fashion, with whom it was not usual to take any refreshments, the confectioner used to make a good thing of it, but if it was a very numerous and mixed company, and the heat very great, he might frequently be a loser. But he never did a better stroke of business than at my concert.
This took place on the very day that Queen Charlotte of England made her entry into London on her return from Italy, to make her defence before Parliament against the charge of infidelity brought against her by her husband. All London was divided into two parties, the larger of which, composed of the middle and lower classes, was on the side of the Queen. The town was in the greatest commotion, and it was a very fortunate thing for me that I had already disposed of the whole of the tickets for my concert, as otherwise by this unfavourable circumstance I might have incurred a very great loss. The bills announcing my concert, posted at the corners of the streets, were quickly pasted over and covered with large placards in which in the name of the people a general illumination of the town was called for to celebrate the day; and Johanning brought me word that the populace threatened to smash the windows in every house, where this call was not complied with. As at that time the police force as well as the few military were not sufficiently numerous to protect the royal palaces from the threatened excesses of the populace, the partisans of the king, who were wholly unable to repress the tumult, were compelled to abide the worst, and contented themselves with making the best use of the short notice given by having their windows nailed up with boards, in order to save their costly mirrors and furniture. In this manner during the whole of the day the sound of the carpenter’s hammer was everywhere heard, particularly in Portland Place, close adjoining where many of the nobility resided, and these preparations of defence were subjects of great derision and amusement to the young vagabonds of the street. While we were rehearsing at home the pieces to be performed in the evening, the people poured in crowds through the streets to meet the Queen upon her entry. As this took place in the direction of the city, it became perfectly quiet towards evening at the West-end. We found therefore, as we drove at half-past eight o’clock to the concert-rooms, the streets almost less thronged than usual, and met with no obstacle on our way. But we remarked everywhere active preparations for the illumination, in order that the sovereign will of the people might be immediately complied with. My wife, who was somewhat nervous respecting her first public appearance with the new harp, was in great trepidation as to what might occur from this excitement of the populace, and I was greatly afraid that the agitation in which I saw her would be prejudicial both to her play and to her health. I therefore endeavoured to soothe her by argument and persuasion, in which I happily succeeded. The concert-room filled by degrees with a numerous auditory and the concert began. I am able to give here the entire programme, as Sir G. Smart upon my last visit to London (in the year 1852) made me a present of a copy of that which was handed at the time to the audience upon their entry into the rooms. It runs as follows:
NEW ARGYLL ROOMS.
MR. SPOHR’S CONCERT.
Thursday, June 18th. 1820.