IN the preceding chapters I have shown how long and persistently Russian society groped its way towards an ideal expression of nationalism in music. Gifted foreigners, such as Cavos, had tried to catch some faint echo of the folk-song and reproduce it disguised in Italian accents; talented, but poorly equipped, Russian musicians had exploited the music of the people with a certain measure of success, but without sufficient conviction or genius to form the solid basis of a national school. Yet all these strivings and aspirations, these mistaken enthusiasms and immature presentiments, were not wasted. Possibly the sacrifice of many talents is needed before the manifestation of one genius can be fulfilled. When the yearning after a musical Messiah had acquired sufficient force, the right man appeared in the person of Michael Ivanovich Glinka. With his advent we reach the first great climax in the history of Russian music.
It is in accordance with the latent mysticism and the ardour smouldering under the semi-oriental indolence of the Russian temperament that so many of their great men—especially their musicians—seem to have arrived at the consciousness of their vocation through a kind of process of conversion. Moussorgsky, Tchaikovsky, and Rimsky-Korsakov, to mention but one or two examples, all awoke suddenly from a condition of mental sloth or frivolity to the conviction of their artistic mission; and some of them were prepared to sacrifice social position and an assured livelihood for the sake of a new, ideal career. Glinka was no exception. He, too, heard his divine call and followed it. Lounging in the theatres and concert rooms of Italy, listening to Italian singers and fancying himself “deeply moved” by Bellini’s operas, suddenly it flashed upon Glinka, a cultivated amateur, that this was not what he needed to stimulate his inspiration. This race, this art, were alien to him and could never take the place of his own people. This swift sense of remoteness, this sudden change of thought and ideal, constituted the psychological moment in the history of Russian music. Glinka’s first impulse was merely to write a better Russian opera than his predecessors; but this impulse held the germ of the whole evolution of the new Russian School as we know it to-day.
It is rather remarkable that outside the Russian language so little has been written about this germinal genius, who summed up the ardent desires of many generations and begat a great school of national music. The following details of his childhood and early youth are taken from his Autobiographical Notes and now appear for the first time in an English translation.
“I was born on June 2nd (May 20th, O.S.), 1804, in the glow of the summer dawn at the village of Novospasskoï, which belonged to my father, Ivan Nicolaevich Glinka, a retired army captain.... Shortly after my birth, my mother, Eugenia Andreievna (née Glinka), was obliged to leave my early bringing up to my grandmother who, having taken possession of me, had me transferred to her own room. Here in company with her, a foster mother, and my nurse, I spent the first three or four years of my life, rarely seeing anything of my parents. I was a child of delicate constitution and of nervous tendencies. My grandmother was in her declining years, and almost always ailing, consequently the temperature of her room in which I lived was never less than 20 Réaumur.... In spite of this, I was not allowed to take off my pelisse, and night and day I was given tea with cream and quantities of sugar in it, and also cracknels and fancy bread of all kinds. I seldom went into the fresh air, and then only in hot weather. There is no doubt that this early upbringing had a great influence on my physical development and explains my unconquerable affection for warm climates....
“My grandmother spoilt me to an incredible degree and never denied me anything I wanted. In spite of this I was a gentle and well-behaved child, and only indulged in passing fits of peevishness—as indeed I still do when disturbed at one of my favourite occupations. One of my chief amusements was to lie flat on the floor and draw churches and trees with a bit of chalk. I was piously inclined, and church ceremonies, especially at the great festivals, filled me heart and soul with the liveliest poetic enthusiasm. Having learnt to read at a remarkably early age, I often moved my grandmother and her elderly friends to tears by reading the Scriptures aloud to them. My musical proclivities showed themselves at that time in a perfect passion for the sound of bells; I drank in these harsh sounds, and soon learnt how to imitate them rather cleverly by means of two copper bowls. When I was ill they used to give me a little hand-bell to keep me amused.
“On the death of my grandmother, my way of living underwent some changes. My mother spoilt me rather less, and tried to accustom me to the fresh air; but her efforts in this direction were not very successful.... My musical sense still remained undeveloped and crude. In my eighth year (1812), when we were delivered from the French invasion, I listened with all my old delight to the ringing of the bells, distinguishing the peals of the different churches, and imitating them on my copper bowls.
“Being entirely surrounded by women, and having for playmates only my sister, who was a year younger than myself, and my nurse’s little daughter, I was never like other boys of my age; moreover the passion for study, especially of geography and drawing—and in the latter I had begun to make sensible progress—drew me away from childish pastimes, and I was, from the first, of a quiet and gentle disposition.
“At my father’s house we often received many relatives and guests; this was usually the case on his name-day, or when someone came to stay whom he wished to entertain with special honours. On these occasions he would send for the musicians belonging to my maternal uncle, who lived eight versts away. They often remained with us for several days, and when the dances were over and the guests departed, they used to play all sorts of pieces. I remember once (it was in 1814, or 1815, when I was about ten) they played a quartet by Cruselli; this music produced in me an inconceivably new and rapturous effect; after hearing it I remained all day long in a state of feverish excitement, lost in inexplicably sweet dreamy emotions, and the next day at my drawing lesson I was quite absent-minded. My distracted condition increased as the lesson proceeded, and my teacher, remarking that I was drawing very carelessly, scolded me repeatedly, until finally guessing what was the matter with me, said that I now thought of nothing but music. ‘What’s to be done?’ I answered: ‘music is the soul of me!’
“In truth at that time I loved music passionately. My uncle’s orchestra was the source of the liveliest delight to me. When they played dances, such as écossaises, quadrilles and valses, I used to snatch up a violin or piccolo and join in with them, simply alternating between tonic and dominant. My father was often annoyed with me because I did not dance, and deserted our guests; but at the first opportunity I slipped back again among the musicians. During supper they generally played Russian folk-songs arranged for two flutes, two clarinets, two horns, and two bassoons; this poignantly tender, but for me perfectly satisfactory, combination delighted me (I could hardly endure shrill sounds, even the lower notes of the horn when they were not played loud), and perhaps these songs, heard in my childhood, were the first cause of my preference in later years for Russian folk-melodies. About this time we had a governess from St. Petersburg called Barbara Klemmer. She was a girl about twenty, very tall, strict and exacting. She taught us Russian, French, German, geography and music.... Although our music lessons, which included reading from notes and the rudiments of the piano, were rather mechanical, yet I made rapid progress with her, and shortly after she came one of the first violins from my uncle’s band was employed to teach me the fiddle. Unfortunately he himself did not play quite in tune and held his bow very stiffly, a bad habit which he passed on to me.
“Although I loved music almost unconsciously, yet I remember that at that time I preferred those pieces which were most accessible to my immature musical intelligence. I enjoyed the orchestra most of all, and next to the Russian songs, my favourite items in their repertory were: the Overtures to ‘Ma Tante Aurore,’ by Boieldieu, to ‘Lodoïska,’ by Rodolph Kreutzer, and to ‘Les Deux Aveugles,’ by Méhul. The last two I liked playing on the piano, as well as some of Steibelt’s sonatas, especially ‘The Storm,’ which I played rather neatly.”