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These few measures are typical of the essence of the keyboard, rather the pianoforte, style of Chopin, a style showing a grace and flexibility highly characteristic of his music in general. One finds such art only very rarely in the works of other composers since the time of Bach and Couperin, as, for example, in the second Intermezzo in the second number of the Kreisleriana and at the end of Brahms’ Caprice in F-sharp minor, opus 76, No. 1. It is the sort of music which sounds best on the pianoforte, which cannot give the same effect on any other instrument nor by any combination of instruments. There are the constant movement which is necessary to keep the piano vibrating, and the richness of harmony which belongs to no other single instrument except the organ. The homogeneous nature of the scale gives to the runs a continuity of line and of color that is almost uniquely proper to the piano. The single notes of the runs drop with the bell-like quality which likewise belongs only to this instrument. At last it must be noted how the sound of it all floats and changes. This is strikingly a sonority of after-sounds.

In the case of the above selection from the Scherzo this is obtained by the arrangement of chords with the broad melody of the left hand. Of the six chords that are struck four are left to vibrate during two measures; that is to say, that five-sixths of their value is given only in after-sounds. Against this tonal background are arranged the rapidly moving notes of the right hand, which a careful study will show accentuates in varying fashion the floating harmonies of the left. So that the whole passage has not only a vague shimmer but a sparkling radiance as well.

In the following selection from the same piece it will be noticed that this sonority is built up by the movement of the accompanying figures which at the same time sprinkle their own mist with sparks. It is like the passage of a faint comet through the sky, leaving a trail of apparently substantial light. And here this drifting light of sound resolves itself into definite harmonies, in the third, fifth, seventh, ninth, fourteenth and fifteenth measures. The substantial harmonies of the passage are very obviously established by the chords in the left hand part; but it is the movement of the right hand that makes them glow and darken as it were. In those measures not mentioned above, this movement seems to weave a mist about these harmonies, which, in the measures we have numbered, clears for an instant and lets the light through. And that the notes in this movement which have such an harmonic clarity may be not so much emphasized as retained is one of the fine points in the playing of Chopin which the unskilled player is likely wholly to miss, and with it the elusive subtlety of Chopin.

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The ordinary pianoforte style of running figuration generally is made up of simple arpeggios or scales. Liszt does not often show himself master of more than such. It is only Chopin who envelopes his harmonies in such an exquisitely spun thread of melody. The last measures of the Barcarolle show such a thread of pure gold, woven and twisted as no other composer for the piano has been able to spin.

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In such passages as these three we find a movement which entered the pianoforte style as a necessity (to keep harmonies in vibration) metamorphosed into a line of melody which still retains the power to suggest harmonies. It demands the virtuoso but is in no sense virtuoso music. For virtuoso music is a music in listening to which one hardly knows whether it is sound itself or the rapid movement of sound that thrills. Figures have little musical significance in it. Notice how in the music of the two greatest virtuoso composers for the piano, D. Scarlatti and Liszt, a few figures are repeated endlessly with no variation. The necessity of movement has become a luxury, oftenest not truly beautiful, nor of any but a gymnastic worth.