It was all strange and new. Instead of hills and the waters of the fjords, there were tall, dark houses, gloomy streets, and such a lot of hurrying people.
SCENE IN LEIPZIG
But he soon grew used to it all and was busy as could be with lessons in piano and harmony. Just as in the earlier days in school, so in Leipzig, Edvard wrote music as it sounded in his heart. In the harmony lessons he could not make himself write plain chords to the bass which was given him as an exercise. He wrote the light, airy, lovely, fanciful tunes and rhythms that were singing within him. And just like the schoolmaster at home, the harmony teacher shouted at him, saying:
"No, that is all wrong!"
His harmony teacher was E. F. Richter.
E. F. RICHTER
But you remember that Ole Bull understood the boy's music. While here in Leipzig there were many who understood it too.
Bit by bit Edvard made friends who loved to listen to his pieces. One of them was Niels Gade, a fine musician in Denmark, who was a friend of Schumann's, who one time, wrote a Northern Song on the letters on Gade's name. It begins like this: