In the autumn of 1831, Rubini again visited Paris, where he was received with renewed enthusiasm, and in which city he is still performing with undiminished popularity.
CHARACTERISTIC TRAITS AND ANECDOTES OF BEETHOVEN.
[IN our last number (page 6), we inserted an account, from the Leipzig Musical Gazette, of Beethoven’s Studien in Generalbasse, &c.—a work recently published in Vienna,—and have since received the volume, which comprises the studies, with numerous and most valuable remarks by Beethoven, and many of his fragments, or unconnected observations, on musical subjects, chiefly on recitative, in 352 octavo pages. These are followed by thirteen pages of biography,—in which nothing is added to what has already appeared in our work,—and the following anecdotes, together with other matter, of which we shall avail ourselves in the two or three succeeding numbers. In our next will appear his chapter on Canon, a species of composition which he seems to have estimated according to its real value, therefore has dwelt most on the canon in unison,—the only rational kind,—of which he gives short, simple, and very pleasing examples, the most interesting whereof we shall reprint.]
BEETHOVEN should by no means be offered as a model for directors of orchestras. The performers under him were obliged cautiously to avoid being led astray by their conductor, who thought only of his composition, and constantly laboured to depict the exact expression required, by the most varied gesticulations. Thus, when the passage was loud he often beat time downwards, when his hand should have been up. A diminuendo he was in the habit of marking by contracting his person, making himself smaller and smaller; and when a pianissimo occurred, he seemed to slink, if the word is allowable, beneath the conductor’s desk. As the sounds increased in loudness, so did he gradually rise up, as if out of an abyss; and when the full force of the united instruments broke upon the ear, raising himself on tiptoe, he looked of gigantic stature, and, with both his arms floating about in undulating motion, seemed as if he would soar to the clouds. He was all motion, no part of him remained inactive, and the entire man could only be compared to a perpetuum mobile.
When his deafness increased, it was productive of frequent mischief, for the Maestro’s hand went up when it ought to have descended. He contrived to set himself right again most easily in the piano passages, but of the most powerful fortes he could make nothing. In many cases, however, his eye afforded him assistance, for he watched the movements of the bows, and thus discovering what was going on, soon corrected himself.
Among his favourite dishes was a bread soup, made in the manner of pap, in which he indulged every Thursday. To compose this, ten eggs were set before him, which he tried before mixing them with the other ingredients, and if it unfortunately happened that any of them were musty, a grand scene ensued; the offending cook was summoned to the presence by a tremendous ejaculation. She, however, well knowing what might occur, took care cautiously to stand on the threshold of the door, prepared to make a precipitate retreat; but the moment she made her appearance the attack commenced, and the broken eggs, like bombs from well-directed batteries, flew about her ears, their yellow and white contents covering her with viscous streams.
He never walked in the streets without a note-book, in which he entered whatever occurred to him at the moment. If the conversation accidentally turned upon this habit, he parodied the words of Joan of Arc,—“Without my colours I must not come,” and with undeviating firmness observed the self-imposed law. But his regularity was confined to this; the most exquisite confusion reigned in his house:—Books and music were scattered in all directions; here the residue of a cold luncheon—there some full, some half-emptied, bottles. On the desk the hasty sketch of a new quartett; in another corner the remains of breakfast. On the piano-forte, the scribbled hints for a noble symphony, yet little more than in embryo—hard by, a proof-sheet, waiting to be returned. Letters from friends, and on business, spread all over the floor. Between the windows a goodly Stracchino cheese: on one side of it ample vestiges of a genuine Verona Salami; and, notwithstanding all this confusion, he constantly eulogised, with Ciceronian eloquence, his own neatness and love of order! When, however, for whole hours, days, and often weeks, something mislaid was looked for, and all search had proved fruitless, then he changed his tone, and bitterly complained that everything was done to annoy him. But the servants knew the natural goodness of their master; they suffered him to rave, and in a few minutes all was forgotten,—till a similar occasion renewed the scene.