Music-Study in Germany Part 17

HAMBURG, _February 1, 1875_.

Hamburg is a lovely city, though I _am_ having such a dreadfully dreary and stupid time here--partly because my boarding-place is so intensely disagreeable, and partly because I made up my mind when I came to make no acquaintances and to do nothing but study. I have stuck to my resolution, though I'm not sure it is not a mistake, for there is a most elegant and luxurious society in this ancestral town of ours.[J]

Life is solid and material here, however, and music is at a low ebb. The Philharmonic concerts are wretched, and n.o.body goes to even the few piano concerts there are. That little Laura Kahrer, now Frau Rappoldi, that I heard in Weimar at Liszt's, has been wanting to come here with her husband, who is an eminent violinist, but she has not dared to do it, because all the musicians tell her she would not make her expenses.

She played at the Philharmonic, too, but since then they won't have any more piano playing at the Philharmonic. n.o.body cares for it, unless Bulow or Rubinstein or Clara Schumann are the performers. I thought Frau Rappoldi played magnificently, but I was the only person who _did_ think so. She made a dead failure here. Everybody was down on her. As to the criticism, it was about like this: "Frau Rappoldi played quite prettily and in a lady-like manner, but she had no tone, etc." Poor thing! The next day when Schubert went to see her she wept bitterly, and well she might. Schubert is one of the directors of the Philharmonic, and it was through him she got the chance of playing. He, too, felt awfully cut up at her want of success. "That is what one gets," said he to me, "by recommending people. If they don't succeed, _you_ get all the blame for it." He felt he had burnt his fingers! I think the whole secret of Frau Rappoldi's want of success was that she did not _look_ pretty. She was so dowdily dressed, and her hair looked like a Feejee Islander's. People laughed at her before she began. Too true!--that "dress makes the woman."[K]

Deppe's darling Fannie Warburg gave a concert here last month, and she, also, got a pretty poor criticism, and for the same reason, viz.: people haven't the musical sense to appreciate her--at least in my opinion. The action of her hands on the piano is grace itself, and the elasticity of her wrist is wonderful. Her touch completely realizes Deppe's ideal of "letting the notes fall from the finger-tips like drops of water," and she executes better with the left hand, if that be possible, than with the right! At any rate, there is _no_ difference. It is the most heavenly enjoyment to hear her, and you feel as if you would like to have her go on forever. And yet, I don't believe she will make a great career. She has not fire enough to make the public appreciate the immensity of her performance. No rush--no _abandon_! She has no _presence_ either, but is a timid, meek, childlike little maiden--docility itself, but a _made_ player, as it were, not a spontaneous one. Such is life! To me, her playing is the purest music--"_die reine Musik_"--and the bigger the hall the more that _tone_ of hers rolls out and fills it!

HAMBURG, _March 1, 1875_.

I wish I could write up Deppe's system for publication, but it is a very difficult thing to give any adequate idea of. Fraulein Timm tells me it is only comparatively recently that he has perfected it himself to its present point (though he has long had the conception of it), and that accounts for its not being known. He was completely buried in Hamburg, where there is no scope for art. I believe his ambition is to found a School of this exquisitely pure and perfect and almost idealized piano-playing, which may serve as a counterpoise to the warmer and more sensuous prevailing one--_sculpture_ as contrasted with _painting_!

I have been chiefly studying _Kammer-Musik_ (Chamber Music) this winter--that is, trios, quartettes, etc. Fraulein Timm is giving me such a training as I never had before. She has the most astonis.h.i.+ng talent for teaching, and has reduced it to a science. I don't play anything up to tempo under her--always slow, slow, _slow_. She really dissects every tone, and shows me when and why it doesn't sound well. My whole attention is now bent upon _tone_. Ah, M., _that's_ the thing in playing!--To bring out the _soul_ there is in the key simply by touching it, as the great masters do.--It is the pianist's highest art, though amid the dazzle of piano pyrotechnics the public often forget it.

I am just finis.h.i.+ng Beethoven's third Trio, Op. 1. The last movement is the loveliest thing! It makes me think of a wood in spring filled with birds. One minute you hear a lot of gossiping little sparrows twittering and chippering, and then comes some rare wild bird with a sort of cadence, and then come others and whistle and call. It is bewitching, and the most perfect imitation of nature imaginable; gay--_so_ gay! as only Beethoven can be when he begins to play. Everything is on the wing.

It is, of course, exceedingly difficult, because, like all this pure, cla.s.sic music, to make any effect it has to be executed with the utmost perfection. I am so infatuated with it that when I get through practicing it, I feel as if I were tipsy!

These Beethoven trios are a perfect mine in themselves. Each one seems to be entirely different from all the rest. There are twelve in all, and Deppe wants me to learn them all. Think what a piece of work! This enormous amount of literature that you must have to form a repertoire--the trios, quartettes, quintettes, concertos, etc., it is that makes it so long before one is a finished artist. And then you must consider the hours and hours that go to waste on _studies_, just to get your hand into a condition to play these masterpieces. Oh, the arduousness of it is incalculable! I often ask myself, "What demon has tempted me here?" as I sit and drudge at the piano. I play all day, take a walk with L. in the afternoon, and at night tumble into bed and sleep like a log--that is, when my hardest of beds and s.h.i.+vering room will _let_ me sleep. That is my life, day after day. I only see the people of the house at meals.

I am the only lady in this family. All the other boarders are very young men, almost boys, who are here to learn German or commerce. There are three South Americans, one Portugese, one Brazilian, one Russian and one Frenchman. I hear Spanish and French all the while, but no English, and with the German it is very confusing.--I feel very sorry for all these young fellows, their lives are so bare and disagreeable, and so wholly devoid of any influence that can make them better or happier. As for our landlady, it would take a Balzac to do justice to such a combination.

She is a good housekeeper. The cooking is excellent, and my room (when warm) is pleasant. Indeed, the Hamburg standard of housekeeping is much higher than in Berlin. Things are _much_ daintier. But her power of making you physically and mentally uncomfortable in other ways is unsurpa.s.sed. Were it not that my stay is indefinite, and that I have already moved once, I would not remain here. As it is, I prefer putting up with it to the trouble and expense of changing; beside which, I have found that when once you have left your own home-circle, you have to bear, as a rule, with at least one intensely disagreeable person in every house.

My opinion of human nature has not risen since I came abroad, and I think that this winter has quite cured me of my natural tendency to skepticism.--I now realize too well what people's characters, both men and women, may become without religion either in themselves or in those about them. I suppose there _is_ religion in Germany, but _I_ have seen very little of it, either in Protestants or Catholics, and the results I consider simply dreadful! You see, there is _no_ adequate motive to check the indulgence of _any_ impulse--I have come to the conclusion that jealousy is the national vice of the Germans. Everybody is jealous of everybody else, no matter how absurdly or causelessly. Old women are jealous of young ones, and even sisters in the same family are jealous of each other to a degree that I couldn't have believed, had I not seen it.

HAMBURG, _Easter Sunday, 1875_.

With regard to playing in concert, I find myself doubting whether on general principles it is best to get one's whole musical training under one master only, as Fannie Warburg, for instance, has done; for my experience teaches me that though nearly all masters can give you something, none can give you everything. If, with my present light, I could begin my study over again, I should first stay three years with Deppe, in order to endow the spirit of music that I hope is within me, with the outward form and perfection of an artist. Next, I should study a year with Kullak, to give my playing a brilliant _concert dress_, and finally, I would spend two seasons with Liszt, in order to add the last ineffable graces--(for never, _never_ should an artist complete a musical course without going to LISZT, while he is on this earth!)--The trouble is, however, that one master always feels hurt if you leave him for another! No one can bear the imputation that he _can't_ "give you everything."

But in truth I am getting very impatient to be at home where I can study by myself, and take as much time as I think necessary to work up my pieces. Deppe and Fraulein Timm are like Kullak in one thing. They never will give me time enough, but hurry me on so from one thing to another, that it is impossible for me to prepare a programme. So I have given up my plan of a concert in Berlin this spring. They have one set of ideas and I another, and I see I shall never be able to play in public until I abandon masters and start out on my own course. Two people never think exactly alike. Masters can put you on the road, but they can't make you go. You must do that for yourself. As Dr. V. says, "If you want to do a thing you have got to _keep_ doing it. You mustn't stop--certainly not!"

Concert-playing, like everything else, is _routine_, and has got to be learned by little and little, and perhaps, with many half-failures. But if the "great public" will only tolerate one as a pupil long enough, eventually, one must succeed. At any rate, IT is probably the best and the only "master" for me now!

On Wednesday I return for a while to Berlin, to the American boarding-house, No. 15 Tauben Stra.s.se, whither you can all direct as formerly. This winter has been rather a contrast to last. Then I lived entirely among North Americans, whereas here I am almost exclusively with South Americans. There are any number of these latter in Hamburg, and you have no idea how fascinating many of them are--so handsome and so bright. They all have a talent for music and dancing. Their music is entirely of a light character, but they have _rhythm_ and grace in a remarkable degree. When I hear them play I always think of George Sands's description in her novel "_Malgre-tout_" of the artist Abel--the hero of the book, and a great violinist. She says, "_Il racla un air sur son violon avec entrain_."--That is just what these South Americans do--"_racler!_" They all play the piano just as with us the negro plays the fiddle, without instruction, apparently, and simply because "it is their nature to." I saw at once where Gottschalk got his "Banjo" and "Bananier," and the peculiar style of his compositions generally, and since I've met so many South Americans I can readily imagine why he spent so much of his time in South America. I long to go there myself. I think it must be a fascinating place for an artist.

One of the South Americans here at the house is a boy of fifteen, named Juan di Livramento, or, I should say, Juan Moreiro Aranjo di Livramento!

(They all have about a dozen names in the grandiloquent style of the Spaniards.) This boy is a curious youngster. He is tall and lithe, with the most magnificent dark eyes I ever saw or conceived, thick silky black hair, all in a tumble about his head, a delicate and very expressive face, and a clear olive complexion--a perfect type of a Spaniard. He seems born to dance the Bolero, like Belinda, in Mrs.

Edwards's novel. It is the prettiest thing to see him do it--and in fact he does it on all occasions without any reference to propriety, being an utterly lawless individual. He frequently gets up from the dinner-table, throws his napkin over his shoulders, snaps his thumbs, and begins a dance in the corner of the room, between the courses. It has got to be such an every-day thing that n.o.body looks surprised or pays any attention to him. We dine late, and as there are a good many boarders, it takes some time always to change the plates. Juan, who is like so much mercury, never can sit still during these intervals. When asked to ring the bell for the servant, he will spring up like a shot, give it a violent pull, and then take advantage of being up to dance in the corner, or at least to cut a few antics, fling his leg over the back of his chair, and come down astride of it. This is his usual mode of resuming his seat.

On the days when he doesn't dance, he keeps up a continual talking. He will rattle on in Spanish till Herr S. gets desperate, and tries to reduce him to order. It is a rule that German must be spoken at table, but Juan thinks it sufficient if he applies the rule only so far as not to speak Spanish, his native language. He goes to school where, of course, he learns English and French, and he is always trying to get off some remarks in these languages. He speaks all wrong, but that does not cause him the least embarra.s.sment.--On Sundays especially is Juan perfectly irrepressible, for then Frau S. goes to dine and spend the evening with her parents, and Herr S. is left to maintain order. He is an indulgent old man, and very fond of Juan, so that the latter has not the least fear of him, and I nearly die trying to keep my face straight when they have one of their scenes.

"You shall NOT speak Spanish at the table," said poor old S. the other day, in a rage. Spanish is jargon to him, and Juan had been talking it for some time at the top of his voice across Herr S., to his friend Candido, who sat opposite. Juan knew very well that that meant he must speak German, but instead of that he began in foreign languages, and said to Herr S., in English, "Do you spoke Russish (Do you speak Russian)?"

Herr S., to whom English is as unintelligible as Spanish, naturally making no reply to this brilliant remark, Juan continued--"'Spring is Coming,' Poem by James K. Blake," and then he began to recite with much gesticulation--

"Spring is coming, spring is coming, Birds are singing, insects humming; Flowers are peeping from their sleeping, Streams escape from winter's keeping, etc."

I won't pretend to say what the rest of it was, as his p.r.o.nunciation was utterly unintelligible. Herr S. rolled up his eyes and made no further protest, for he found he only got "out of the frying-pan into the fire," Juan having a historical anecdote called "The Dead Watch," which he occasionally subst.i.tutes for the poem.

After dinner he generally has an affectionate turn, and goes round the table shaking hands with those still seated, or putting his arm around their necks, and then he seems like some gentle wild animal which comes and rubs its head up against you, and it is impossible to help loving him. As soon, however, as T. or anybody thrums a waltz on the piano, he instantly throws himself into the att.i.tude to dance. He is so very light on his feet that you don't hear him, and often I am surprised on looking up, without thinking, to see Juan poised on one toe like a ballet dancer, and his great eyes s.h.i.+ning soft on me like two suns. It is most peculiar. There are _no_ eyes like the Spanish eyes. Not only have they so much _fire_, but when their owners are in a sentimental mood, they can throw a languor and a sort of droop into them that is irresistible.

This is the way Juan does, and though he is too young to be sentimental, he _looks_ as if he were. One minute he is all ablaze, and the next perfectly melting.--The other day Frau S. took him to task for his extreme animation.--"_Junge_," (German for "Boy"), "you mustn't scream so all over the house. You really are a nuisance." Juan was offended at this, and began to defend himself. "Why do you scold me," he said. "I'm always in good humour. I never sulk or find fault with anything. _Ja, immer vergnugt_ (Yes, always in a good humour), and ready to amuse everybody, and I never get angry." Frau S. admitted that was true, but at the same time suggested it would be well for him to remember we were not all deaf. Juan withdrew in dudgeon.--Well, I suppose you are tired of hearing about him, but these South Americans are a type by themselves, and I felt as if I must touch off one of them for the benefit of the family.

BERLIN, _April 18, 1875_.

Since my return I have been enjoying extremely what I suppose I must consider my last lessons with Deppe. After studying with Fraulein Timm I know much better what he is driving at. The technique seems to be unfolding to me like a ribbon. So all her _maulings_ were to some purpose! Yesterday I played him a sonata of Beethoven's and he said, "G.o.d grant that you may still be left to me some time longer! Now you are really beginning to be my scholar."--And indeed, having studied his technique so long with Frauleins Timm and Steiniger, it does seem hard that I have to leave him! How I wish I could stay on indefinitely and give myself up to his purely _musical_ side and get the benefit of all his deep and beautiful ideas. There never _was_ such a teacher! If I could only come up to his standard I should be perfectly happy. Lucky girl--that Steiniger! Think of it! She has _nine_ concertos that she could get up for concert any minute. That's the crus.h.i.+ng kind of repertoire he gives his pupils--so exhaustive and complete in every department. He knows the whole piano literature, and is continually fis.h.i.+ng up some new or old pearl or other to surprise one with.

I find Deppe is getting to be much more recognized in Berlin this year than he was before. He has just been directing a new opera here which has created quite a sensation, and he is continually engaged in some great work. Fortunate that I found him out when I did! for he takes fewer pupils than ever. He says he can't teach people who are not sympathetic to him. The other day he presented a beautiful overture of his own composition to the Duke of Mecklenburg, who accepted it in person and sent Deppe an exquisite pin in token of recognition. When simple little Deppe gets _that_ stuck in his scarf, he will be a terrific swell!

Now for a piece of news! I was paying my French teacher, Mademoiselle D., a call one evening last week, and I played for her and for a friend of hers who is very musical, and who gives lessons herself. She at once said very decidedly that I "ought to be heard in concert." Her brother is the director of the Philharmonic Society in a place called Frankfurt-an-der-Oder--a little city not far from here. What should she do but write to her brother about me, and what should _he_ do but immediately write up for me to come down and play in a Philharmonic concert there the first week in May. As I have been so anxious to play in a concert before leaving Germany, and yet have seen no way to do it, I am going, of course, and am most grateful to his sister for thinking of it. But it is always the Unexpected that helps you out!

BERLIN, _May 13, 1875_.

Well, dear, my little debut was a decided success, and I had one encore, beside being heartily applauded after every piece. I went on to Frankfurt on Monday morning, and when I got there Herr Oertling, the Philharmonic Director, was at the station to meet me with a droschkie.

We drove to the Deutches Haus, an excellent hotel, where I was shown into a large and comfortable room. Here I rested until dinner time, and after dinner, about five o'clock, Herr Oertling came back. He took me to the house of a musical friend of his who was to lend me his grand piano, and there we tried our sonata. As soon as Oertling touched his violin I saw that he was a superior artist, and that immediately inspired me. His playing carried me right along, and I think I played well. At all events, he seemed entirely satisfied, and said, "We could have played that sonata without rehearsing it." After we finished the sonata, I played for about an hour, all sorts of things. There were quite a number of people present to judge of my powers. Herr W., the owner of the piano, was a remarkable judge of music, and made some excellent criticisms and suggestions. We stayed there to supper, but I went back to the hotel early and went to bed about half-past nine, where I slept like a log till eight the next morning.

After breakfast Oertling came to take me to try the pianos of a celebrated manufacturer of uprights. I played there three or four hours.

The maker's name was Gruss, and his pianos were the best uprights I had ever seen; nearly as powerful as a grand, and with a superb tone and action. On the wall was a testimonial from Henselt, framed. It seems Henselt goes to Frankfurt every year to visit a Russian lady there, who is the grandee of the place and a great patroness of artists. In the afternoon, Oertling came for me to go and rehea.r.s.e in the hall.

Everything went beautifully, and I returned to the hotel in good spirits. By the time I was dressed for the concert, which was to begin at seven, Oertling appeared again, in evening costume, and presented me with a bouquet. We drove to the hall through a pouring rain. It was crowded, notwithstanding, for he had had the a.s.surance to print that the concert was "to be brilliant through the performance of an American Virtuosin, named Miss Amy Fay. This young lady has studied with the greatest masters, and has had the most perfect success everywhere in her concert tours!" Did you ever!--You can imagine how I felt on reading it and seeing that I was expected to perform as if I had been on the stage all my life! Oertling had arranged the programme judiciously. Our sonata came _first_, so that I plunged right in and didn't have to wait and tremble! Then came two pieces by the orchestra; next, my three solos in a row, and a symphony of Haydn closed the programme. The sonata went off very smoothly. In my first solo I occasionally missed a note, but my second was without slip, and my third--Chopin's Study in Sixths--was encored, though I took the tempo too fast. However, the Frau Excellency von X. said she had frequently heard it from Henselt, but that I played it "just as well as he did." That's absurd, of course, though not bad considered as a _compliment_! They all said, "What a pity Henselt wasn't here!" I said to myself, "What a blessing Henselt wasn't!"--though I would give much to see him, as he is the greatest piano virtuoso in the world after Liszt.

After the concert Oertling and some of the musicians accompanied me to the hotel, where I was obliged to sit at table and have my health drunk in champagne till two o'clock in the morning! for you know when the Germans once begin that sort of thing there's no end to it. They drank to my health, and then they drank to my future performance in the first Philharmonic next season, and then they drank to our frequent reunion, etc., etc. When they had finished I had to respond. So I toasted the Herr Director and I toasted the piano-maker, and I toasted the orchestra, and what not. At last I was released and could go to my room.

The next morning I left for Berlin, which I reached in time for dinner, and as soon as I appeared at table the boarders saluted me with a burst of applause!--I found it a very pleasant _finale_.

I translate for you the criticism from the _Frankfurter Zeitung und Allgemeiner Anzeiger_ for May 11. Herr Oertling sent it to me yesterday:

"The Philharmonic concert which took place last Friday evening, must be considered as an excellent recommendation of the active members of that a.s.sociation to the public. For not only did the playing of the pianist, Fraulein Amy Fay, give great pleasure to all those who love and understand music, but there was also no fault to be found with the interpretations of the orchestra. * * * With regard to the performance of Fraulein Fay, we were equally charmed by her clear and certain touch and by her conception of the various solo pieces she played. The concert opened with the Sonata in E flat major for violin and piano by Beethoven. The whole effect of the work was a very sympathetic and satisfactory one, and showed a thoughtful interpretation on the part of the artist. The beauty of her conception was especially evident in the Raff "Capriccio," and in Hiller's "Zur Guitarre," given as an encore upon her recall by the audience, and we can but congratulate the teacher of the young lady, Herr Ludwig Deppe, of Berlin, upon such a scholar."

[Two weeks after the concert, the relative to whom most of the foregoing letters were written, joined the writer at Berlin, and the correspondence came to an end. In the following September, after an absence of six years, my sister returned home.--My sister hopes that no American girl who reads this book will be influenced by it rashly to attempt what she herself undertook, viz.: to be trained in Europe from an amateur into an artist. Its pages have afforded glimpses, only, of the trials and difficulties with which a girl may meet when studying art alone in a foreign land, but they should not therefore be underrated.

Piano teaching has developed immensely in America since the date of the first of the foregoing letters, and not only such celebrities as Dr.

William Mason, Mr. Wm. H. Sherwood, and Mrs. Rive King, but various other brilliant or exquisite pianists in this country are as able to train pupils for the technical demands of the concert-room as any masters that are to be found abroad. American teachers best understand the American temperament, and therefore are by far the best for American pupils until they have got beyond the pupil stage.--Not manual skill, but musical insight and conception, wider and deeper musical comprehension, and "concert style" are what the young artist should now go to seek in that marvellous and only real home of music--GERMANY.]--ED.

FOOTNOTES:

[A] This was written before the full development of the Thomas Orchestra. The writer had heard it only in its infancy.

[B] Christ is risen out of bonds and death. He promises joy and blessing to all the world, which for this glorifies Him.

[C] In Mr. Longfellow's Poems of Places is a translation of Gerok's poem on the subject:--