Chapter 6

"The pupil comes to the teacher, let us say, with the _Second Hungarian Rhapsody_ of Liszt. It takes some fortitude for the conscientious teacher to tell the pupil that she should work with the _C Major Sonata_ of Haydn instead. The pupil, with a kind of confidence that is, to say the least, dangerous, imagines that the teacher is trying to keep her back, and often goes to another teacher who will gratify her whim.

"American girls think that they can do everything. Nothing is beyond them. This is a country of great accomplishment, and they do not realize that in music 'Art is long.' The virtuoso comes to a great metropolis and plays a Moszkowski concerto of great difficulty. The next day the music stores exhaust their stocks of this work, and a dozen misses, who might with difficulty play a Mendelssohn _Song With Words_, are buried in the avalanche of technical impossibilities that the alluring concerto provides.

FOREIGN DÉBUTS

"Unfortunately, a foreign _début_ seems to be necessary for the artist who would court the favor of the American public. Foreign pianists get engagements long before their managers in America ever hear them. In the present state of affairs, if an American pianist were to have the ability of three Liszts and three Rubinsteins in one person, he could only hope for meager reward if he did not have a great European reputation behind him.

"The condition is absurd and regrettable, but nevertheless true. We have many splendid teachers in America--as fine as there are in the world.

"We have in our larger cities musical audiences whose judgment is as discriminating as that of the best European audiences. Many an artist with a great European reputation has come to this country, and, failing 'to make good' in the judgment of our critics and audiences, went back with his reputation seriously impaired. Nevertheless, as I have stated, the American artist without a European reputation, has no drawing power and therefore does not interest the managers and the piano manufacturers, who nowadays have largely supplanted the managers. This being so, I can only advise the American artist to do as others had to do. Go to Europe; give a few concerts in Berlin, London, Vienna or Paris. Let the concert director who arranges your concerts paper the house, but be sure you get a few critics in the audience. Have your criticisms translated, and get them republished in American papers. Then, if you have real merit, you may get a chance.

"The interest in music in the United States at the present time is phenomenal. European peoples have no conception of it. Nowhere in the world can such interest be found. Audiences in different parts of the country do not differ very greatly from the standpoint of intelligent appreciation. When we consider the great uncultured masses of peasants in Europe and the conditions of our own farmers, especially in the West, there is no basis of comparison. America is already a musical country, a very musical country. It is only in its failure to properly support native musicians that we are subject to criticism.

PRACTICAL SUGGESTIONS

"To the young man or woman who would learn 'The Secret of Public Appearance' I would say:

"1. Look deeply into your natural qualifications. Use every morsel of judgment you possess to endeavor to determine whether you are talented or simply 'clever' at music. Court the advice of unbiased professional musicians and meditate upon the difficulties leading to a successful career, and do not decide to add one more musician to the world until you are confident of your suitability for the work. Remember that this moment of decision is a very important time and that you may be upon the threshold of a dangerous mistake. Remember that there are thousands of successful and happy teachers for one successful virtuoso.

"2. After you have determined to undertake the career of the concert performer let nothing stand in the way of study, except the consideration of your health. Success with a broken-down body and a shattered mind is a worthless conquest. Remember that if you wish a permanent position you must be thoroughly trained in all branches of your art.

"3. Avoid charlatanism and the kind of advertisement that will bring you notoriety at the sacrifice of your self-respect and the respect of your best friends. Remember that real worth is, after all, the thing that brings enduring fame.

"4. Study the public. Seek to find out what pleases it, but never lower the standards of your art. Read the best literature. Study pictures. Travel. Broaden your mind. Acquire general culture.

"5. Be careful of your stage deportment. Endeavor to do nothing at the keyboard that will emphasize any personal eccentricity. Always be sincere and true to your own nature, but within these limits try to make a pleasing impression.

"6. Always be your own severest critic. Be not easily satisfied with yourself. Hitch your wagon to a star. Let your standard of perfection be the very highest. Always strive to reach that standard. Never play in public a piece that you have not thoroughly mastered. There is nothing more valuable than public confidence. Once secured, it is the greatest asset an artist can possess.

"I have repeatedly been asked to give ten rules for practice.

"It is not possible to formulate ten all-comprehensive rules that could be applied in every case, but the following suggestions will be found valuable to many students:

"1. Concentrate during every second of your practice. To concentrate means to bring all your thinking powers to bear upon one central point with the greatest possible intensity. Without such concentration nothing can be accomplished during the practice period. One hour of concentrated thinking is worth weeks of thoughtless practice. It is safe to say that years are being wasted by students in this country who fail to get the most out of their practice because they do not know how to concentrate. A famous thinker has said: 'The evidence of superior genius is the power of intellectual concentration.'

"2. Divide your practice time into periods of not more than two hours. You will find it impossible to concentrate properly if you attempt to practice more than two hours at a time. Do not have an arbitrary program of practice work, for this course is liable to make your work monotonous. For one who practices four hours (and that is enough for almost any student), one hour for purely technical work, one hour for Bach, and two hours for pieces is to be recommended.

"3. In commencing your practice, play over your piece once or twice before beginning to memorize. Then, after working through the entire composition, pick out the more difficult passages for special attention and reiteration.

"4. Always practice slowly at first. This is simply another way of telling the pupil to concentrate. Even after you have played your piece at the required speed and with reasonable confidence that it is correct, never fail to go back now and then and play it at the speed at which you learned it. This is a practice which many virtuosos follow. Pieces that they have played time and time again before enthusiastic audiences are re-studied by playing them very slowly. This is the only real way to undo mistakes that are bound to creep into one's performance when pieces are constantly played in a rapid tempo.

"5. Do not attempt to practice your whole piece at first. Take a small section or even a phrase. If you take a longer section than say sixteen bars, you will find it difficult to avoid mistakes. Of course, when the piece is mastered you should have all these sections so unified that you can play the entire composition smoothly and without a break.

"6. First memorize _mentally_ the section you have selected for study, and then practice it. If you do not know it well enough to practice it from memory, you have not grasped its musical content, but are playing mechanically.

"7. Occasionally memorize backwards, that is, take the last few measures and learn them thoroughly, then take the preceding measures and continue in this way until the whole is mastered. Even after you have played the piece many times, this process often compels a concentration that is beneficial.

"8. When studying, remember that practice is simply a means of cultivating habits. If you play correctly from the start you will form good habits; if you play carelessly and faultily your playing will grow continually worse. Consequently, play so slowly and correctly from the start that you may insure the right fingering, phrasing, tone, touch (staccato, legato, portamento, etc.), pedaling and dynamic effects. If you postpone the attainment of any of these qualities to a later date they are much more difficult to acquire.

"9. Always listen while you are playing. Music is intended to be heard. If you do not listen to your own playing it is very probable that other people will not care to listen to it either.

"10. Never attempt to play anything in public that you have just finished studying. When you are through working upon a piece, put it away to be musically digested, then after some time repeat the same process, and again the third time, when your piece will, have become a part of yourself."

QUESTIONS IN STYLE, INTERPRETATION, EXPRESSION AND TECHNIC OF PIANOFORTE PLAYING

SERIES IV

FANNY BLOOMFIELD-ZEISLER

1. How should the public appearances of talented children be controlled?

2. What is the best material for the development of a mental technic?

3. Should one pin one's faith to any one method?

4. What combines to make a program attractive?

5. What should be artist's main object in giving a concert?

6. What part does personality play in the performer's success?

7. What is one of the greatest faults in musical educational work in America?

8. How should practice time be divided?

9. May one memorize "backwards"?

10. Why should one listen while playing?

FERRUCCIO BENVENUTO BUSONI

Biographical

Ferruccio Benvenuto Busoni was born at Empoli, near Florence, Italy, April 1, 1866. His father was a clarinetist and his mother whose maiden name was Weiss, indicating her German ancestry was an excellent pianist. His first teachers were his parents. So pronounced was his talent that he made his début at the age of eight in Vienna, Austria. He then studied in the Austrian city of Graz with W. A. Remy, whose right name was Dr. Wilhelm Mayer. This able teacher aside from being a learned jurist was also devoted to music and had among his other pupils no less a person than Felix Weingartner.

In 1881 Busoni toured Italy and was made a member of the Reale Accademia Filharmonica at Bologna. In 1886 he went to reside at Leipsic. Two years later he became teacher of pianoforte at the Helsingfors Conservatory in the Finnish capital. In 1890 he captured the famous Rubinstein prizes for both pianoforte and composition. In the same year he became Professor of pianoforte playing at the Moscow Imperial Conservatory. The next year he accepted a similar position in the New England Conservatory at Boston,--returning to Europe for another tour in 1893. After many successful tours he accepted the position of director of the Meisterschule at the Imperial Conservatory in Vienna. His compositions include over one hundred published opus numbers, the most pretentious probably being his _Choral Concerto_. His editions of Bach are masterpieces of technical and artistic erudition.

(The following Conference was conducted in English.)

VII

IMPORTANT DETAILS IN PIANO STUDY

FERRUCCIO BENVENUTO BUSONI

THE SIGNIFICANCE OF THE DETAIL

"Some years ago I met a very famous artist whose celebrity rested upon the wonderful colored glass windows that he had produced. He was considered by most of his contemporaries the greatest of all makers of high-art windows. His fame had extended throughout the artistic circles of all Europe. A little remark he made to me illustrates the importance of detail better than anything of which I can think at present.

"He said, 'If a truly great work of art in the form of a stained glass window should be accidentally shattered to little bits, one should be able to estimate the greatness of the whole window by examining one of the fragments even though all the other pieces were missing.'

"In fine piano playing all of the details are important. I do not mean to say that if one were in another room that one could invariably tell the ability of an artist by hearing him strike one note, but if the note is heard in relation to the other notes in a composition, its proportionate value should be so delicately and artistically estimated by the highly trained performer, that it forms part of the artistic whole.

"For instance, it is quite easy to conceive of compositions demanding a very smooth running performance in which one jarring or harsh note indicating faulty artistic calculation upon the part of the player would ruin the entire interpretation. As examples of this one might cite the Bach _Choral Vorspiel_, _Nun Freut euch_, of which I have made an arrangement, and such a composition as the Chopin Prelude Opus 28, No. 3, with its running accompaniment in the left hand.

"It is often perfection in little things which distinguishes the performance of the great pianist from that of the novice. The novice usually manages to get the so-called main points, but he does not work for the little niceties of interpretation which are almost invariably the defining characteristic of the interpretations of the real artist--that is, the performer who has formed the habit of stopping at nothing short of his highest ideal of perfection.

LEARNING TO LISTEN

"There is a detail which few students observe which is of such vast importance that one is tempted to say that the main part of successful musical progress depends upon it. This is the detail of learning to listen. Every sound that is produced during the practice period should be heard. That is, it should be heard with ears open to give that sound the intelligent analysis which it deserves.

"Anyone who has observed closely and taught extensively must have noticed that hours and hours are wasted by students strumming away on keyboards and giving no more attention to the sounds they produce than would the inmates of a deaf and dumb asylum. These students all expect to become fine performers even though they may not aim to become virtuosos. To them the piano keyboard is a kind of gymnasium attached to a musical instrument. They may of course acquire strong fingers, but they will have to learn to listen before they can hope to become even passable performers.

"At my own recitals no one in the audience listens more attentively than I do. I strive to hear every note and while I am playing my attention is so concentrated upon the one purpose of delivering the work in the most artistic manner dictated by the composer's demands and my conception of the piece, that I am little conscious of anything else. I have also learned that I must continually have my mind alert to opportunities for improvement. I am always in quest of new beauties and even while playing in public it is possible to conceive of new details that come like revelations.

"The artist who has reached the period when he fails to be on the outlook for details of this kind and is convinced that in no possible way could his performances be improved, has reached a very dangerous stage of artistic stagnation which will result in the ruin of his career. There is always room for improvement, that is the development of new details, and it is this which gives zest and intellectual interest to the work of the artist. Without it his public efforts would become very tame and unattractive.

SELF DEVELOPMENT

"In my own development as an artist it has been made evident to me, time and time again, that success comes from the careful observance of details. All students should strive to estimate their own artistic ability very accurately. A wrong estimate always leads to a dangerous condition. If I had failed to attend to certain details many years ago, I would have stopped very far short of anything like success.

"I remember that when I concluded my term as professor of piano at the New England Conservatory of Music I was very conscious of certain deficiencies in my style. Notwithstanding the fact that I had been accepted as a virtuoso in Europe and in America and had toured with great orchestras such as the Boston Symphony Orchestra, I knew better than anyone else that there were certain details in my playing that I could not afford to neglect.

"For instance, I knew that my method of playing the trill could be greatly improved and I also knew that I lacked force and endurance in certain passages. Fortunately, although a comparatively young man, I was not deceived by the flattery of well-meaning, but incapable critics, who were quite willing to convince me that my playing was as perfect as it was possible to make it. Every seeker of artistic truth is more widely awake to his own deficiencies than any of his critics could possibly be.

"In order to rectify the details I have mentioned as well as some I have not mentioned, I have come to the conclusion that I must devise an entirely new technical system. Technical systems are best when they are individual. Speaking theoretically, every individual needs a different technical system. Every hand, every arm, every set of ten fingers, every body and, what is of greatest importance, every intellect is different from every other. I consequently endeavored to get down to the basic laws underlying the subject of technic and make a system of my own.

"After much study, I discovered what I believed to be the technical cause of my defects and then I returned to Europe and for two years I devoted myself almost exclusively to technical study along the individual lines I had devised. To my great delight details that had always defied me, the rebellious trills, the faltering bravura passages, the uneven runs, all came into beautiful submission and with them came a new delight in playing.

FINDING INDIVIDUAL FAULTS

"I trust that my experience will set some ambitious piano students to thinking and that they may be benefited by it. There is always a way of correcting deficiencies if the way can only be found. The first thing, however, is to recognize the detail itself and then to realize that instead of being a detail it is a matter of vast importance until it has been conquered and brought into submission. In playing, always note where your difficulties seem to lie. Then, when advisable, isolate those difficulties and practice them separately. This is the manner in which all good technical exercises are devised.

"Your own difficulty is the difficulty which you should practice most. Why waste time in practicing passages which you can play perfectly well? One player may have difficulty in playing trills, while to another player of equal general musical ability trills may be perfectly easy. In playing arpeggios, however, the difficulties which prove obstacles to the players may be entirely reversed. The one who could play the trill perfectly might not be able, under any circumstance, to play an arpeggio with the requisite smoothness and true legato demanded, while the student who found the trill impossible possesses the ability to run arpeggios and cadenzas with the fluency of a forest rivulet.

"All technical exercises must be given to the pupil with great discretion and judgment just as poisonous medicines must be administered to the patient with great care. The indiscriminate giving of technical exercises may impede progress rather than advance the pupil. Simply because an exercise happens to come in a certain position in a book of technical exercises is no reason why the particular pupil being taught needs that exercise at that particular time. Some exercises which are not feasible and others which are inexpedient at a certain time, may prove invaluable later in the pupil's progress.

"Take the famous Tausig exercises, for instance. Tausig was a master of technic who had few, if any, equals in his time. His exercises are for the most part very ingenious and useful to advanced players, but when some of them are transposed into other keys as their composer demands they become practically impossible to play with the proper touch, etc. Furthermore, one would be very unlikely to find a passage demanding such a technical feat in the compositions of any of the great masters of the piano. Consequently, such exercises are of no practical value and would only be demanded by a teacher with more respect for tradition than common sense.

DETAILS OF PHRASING AND ACCENTUATION

"Some students look upon phrasing as a detail that can be postponed until other supposedly more important things are accomplished. The very musical meaning of any composition depends upon the correct understanding and delivery of the phrases which make that composition. To neglect the phrases would be about as sensible as it would be for the great actor to neglect the proper thought division in the interpretation of his lines. The greatest masterpiece of dramatic literature whether it be _Romeo and Juliet_, _Antigone_, _La Malade Imaginaire_ or _The Doll's House_ becomes nonsense if the thought divisions indicated by the verbal phrases are not carefully determined and expressed.

"Great actors spend hours and hours seeking for the best method of expressing the author's meaning. No pianist of ability would think of giving less careful attention to phrasing. How stupid it would be for the actor to add a word that concluded one sentence to the beginning of the next sentence. How erroneous then is it for the pupil to add the last note of one phrase to the beginning of the next phrase. Phrasing is anything but a detail.

"Fine phrasing depends first upon a knowledge of music which enables one to define the limitations of the phrase and then upon a knowledge of pianoforte playing which enables one to execute it properly. Phrasing is closely allied to the subject of accentuation and both subjects are intimately connected with that of fingering. Without the proper fingers it is often impossible to execute certain phrases correctly. Generally, the accents are considered of importance because they are supposed to fall in certain set parts of given measures, thus indicating the meter.

"In instructing very young pupils it may be necessary to lead them to believe that the time must be marked in a definite manner by such accents, but as the pupil advances he must understand that the measure divisions are inserted principally for the purpose of enabling him to read easily. He should learn to look upon each piece of music as a beautiful tapestry in which the main consideration is the principal design of the work as a whole and not the invisible marking threads which the manufacturer is obliged to put in the loom in order to have a structure upon which the tapestry may be woven.

BACH, BACH, BACH

"In the study of the subject of accentuation and phrasing it would not be possible for anyone to recommend anything more instructive than the works of Johann Sebastian Bach. The immortal Thüringian composer was the master-weaver of all. His tapestries have never been equalled in refinement, color, breadth and general beauty. Why is Bach so valuable for the student? This is an easy question to answer. It is because his works are so constructed that they compel one to study these details. Even if the student has only mastered the intricacies of the _Two Voice Inventions_, it is safe to say that he has become a better player. More than this, Bach forces the student to think.