Bechstein Grand Piano de luxe, “Rheingold.” 1896.
When the grand piano is used as an object for decoration, the result is usually unsatisfactory. The contradiction between its plain form and gaudy ornamentation becomes very marked. Earlier ages saw clearly that the walls of the piano and its lid are best left plain, and adorned with paintings. But to-day the cases are more frequent in which specially magnificent pianos are so carefully fitted up with plastic ornamentation in all styles with pillars, reliefs, and other descriptions of carving, that one can only smile at the waste of labour. In the over-rich rococo adornment, which was presented by a piano built by Bechstein some time ago for the Empress Frederick for a particular apartment, a trained eye can to-day find no pleasure. More tolerable are the splendid grands, richly adorned with paintings, in which, in Germany, Max Koch is chiefly concerned. The Wagner piano for the Prince of Anhalt-Dessau, or the Rheingold piano, both by Bechstein, are also worth noticing. The latter has the daughters of the Rhine for legs, a waving ornamentation on the walls, and carved bulrushes on the lid; it is one of the most interesting monster-pianos built in our time. In England Alma Tadema is the piano-painter most in request. For Henry Marquand of New York he prepared an instrument, adorned with precious stones and with painting, which was priced at £15,000. His own piano is also extraordinary. The ornamentation chosen is in the style of mediæval mosaics, with expensive surface ornamentations. Under the lid are framed and adorned parchment strips, on which Liszt, Tschaïkowski, Gounod, and others, inscribed their names. This was appraised at £2500. A piano built in London for Carmen Sylva had ivory legs. Perhaps a varied ebony and ivory ornamentation, which springs from the appearance of the keys, taking advantage of the splendid surface provided by these materials, would be more promising than any kind of rococo or Gothic design. Ivory is still in strong demand for pianos. Ninety thousand instruments are yearly issued from the hundred and seventy London houses; and these take ten thousand tusks.
Ever since composers began to write easier pieces the demand for pianos has been greater. The market has of course been well supplied. In 1896 appeared over 2500 “books”[134] of piano solos, 2000 songs with piano accompaniment, more than 250 books of duets, and 300 pieces for piano and violin. Among these figure many new editions of old works, which to-day form a literature by themselves. The arrangement of historical material, as it gives its character to the calling of the modern pianist, is also reflected in it. We have excellent editions, like the Berlin “Original Texts” (Urtexte), “Bischoff’s Bach,” published by Steingräber, “Klindworth’s Chopin,” published by Bote and Bock, “Bischoff and Neitzel’s Schumann,” “Bülow’s Beethoven’s Sonatas.” Breitkopf and Härtel have extended their Popular Library over the widest area. They have arranged their piano-publications into a uniform piano-library, which soon will embrace 10,000 numbers. Nay, the “Moonlight Sonata” is already to be purchased for a penny. And yet we must confess that really beautiful editions of bibliographical value are not to be found. An edition in artistic binding, on thick paper, in elegant engraving, following the best original copy, with none of those instructive but unornamental marks of fingering or phrasing, and at the same time well adapted for opening out without injury, and calculated for perfect typographical pictures on every page—why is there no such edition of Beethoven, when people can be found who will pay ten or twelve thousand pounds for a piano?
Where the historic tendency is so well marked, creativeness has degenerated. Since the middle of the century plenty of good sound stuff has been written for the piano; but it must be confessed that piano-music has shown no tendency to strike out a new path. No commanding or revolutionary personality, like Schumann, Chopin, or Liszt, has arisen. Almost all modern production is but the popularisation of Liszt, or a respectable mean between Chopin and Schumann.
Ferdinand Hiller began the endless succession of these eclectic musicians. But the last of the solid old style was Alkan, a solitary, eccentric, misanthropic, but withal interesting old man. He was born in Paris in 1813, and remained there. He was one of the many pupils of Zimmermann, that modest but most influential teacher. Alkan’s pieces were highly esteemed by Bülow, who gave him a place in his list of Étude-masters. In his works, which are chiefly Études and Preludes, there speaks a Berlioz, with an elemental and realistic power. He stands in his kind half-way between Chopin and Liszt. Some pieces, like the highly original Op. 39, 1, do not easily fade out of the memory. The seventh of the twelve Études, dedicated to Fétis, is a remarkably significant Chopin-like Ballade in Berlioz’ style, with kettle-drum rolls, and other most peculiar harmonic and orchestral effects. In the “Allegro Barbaro” of the fifth Étude he gives full play to his propensity to exotic phrases of foreign colouring. He works with uncanny, lengthy unisons, or with cutting climbing ninths. An out-and-out romantic, he delights not merely to rush into the middle of his pieces with explanatory words—“Mors” is one of these—but he has hit upon the most original titles that ever an association of ideas led a composer to adopt: “Pseudo-naïveté,” “Fais Dodo,” “Heraclitus and Democritus,” “Railroad,” “Odi profanum vulgus,” “Morituri te salutant.” To play his pieces is as difficult as to construe the Talmud.