Aux galops de l inconnu (French Edition)
This scorn for gain is appropriate only to the hero. When Gawain appears as a secondary character in the tournament in Erec , he captures many horses and prisoners; when he appears as the hero of the tournament in Le Conte du graal , he promptly gives away all the horses he has captured and refuses to take their owners captive.
We might also note that this scorn for gain is appropriate only to the tournament. In these more central episodes the motivation of the hero is seldom simple, and our judgment of him varies from approval to disapproval to a mixture of the two. The tournaments are set pieces that stand apart from the main narrative and have little effect on the progress of the tale.
The motivation of the hero is simple, and our judgment of him seldom varies, since the tournaments are designed to reveal but one aspect of his character -- his perfect knighthood. Purified of greed, bloodshed, and the general indecorousness of actuality, the tournament is an activity with a character and tone distinctly its own -- an essential activity of the hero and the clearest and purest proof of his knightly virtue. Yet, their authenticating realism rendered them plausible and allowed the audience to Page The process of authentication works the other way as well. His works show, then, that the tournament is not a simple sport but an ancient and honorable custom that contemporary knights share with the knights of the Round Table.
To participate in a tournament is to do exactly as Arthur's knights had done in chivalry's greatest age. A knight of Count Philip's retinue who rode forward to engage in the commencailles might indeed have known that what he was about to do was forbidden by the Church, ignored by the serious-minded chroniclers, and noticed by the really powerful rulers of the time only when they bothered to suppress it. For his first audience this respectability probably remained only a potentiality. One can see traces of this new attitude even in the chroniclers.
Roger of Wendover, as I have noted, regarded the Young King's tour of the continental tournaments as a glorious enterprise by which he earned great fame. The life that Jean was conunissioned to write was, of course, to be a flattering portrait. The hero of such a work exemplifies in the present the virtues of the great heroes of the chivalric past, and as proof of this, he is shown engaging in the same activities as the heroes of romance.
In some later examples of this genre, such as The Pageant of the Birth, Life, and Death of Richard Beauchamp, Earl of Warwick , that is about all we get, as if the entire life had been merely a series of romantic exploits. Nevertheless, Jean the Minstrel's purpose was to present William as an ideal knight, and to do so he drew on the themes and conventions of romance. The best proof of this is the fact that William's tournaments are mentioned at all.
In his youth and early manhood William not only participated in many tournaments but also took the cross and spent two years in Syria as a crusader. There, Jean tells us, William did greater deeds in two years than others had done in seven. This was the sort of fighting that Popes and moralists recommended to Christian knights in place of the sinful tournament, and had Jean been writing fifty years earlier, when the model of knighthood was still that of the chansons de geste , William's crusading rather than his tournaments would doubtless have been offered as the main proof of his knightly virtue.
But the chivalric ideal had now Page To establish the relation between William's tournaments and the chivalric ideal, Jean drew heavily on the language, themes, and conventions of romance tournaments. Jean drew on romance for the details that authenticated his biography, that lent plausibility to his claim that his hero was a true model of chivalry. This is most apparent in Jean's accounts of the tournaments at Pleurs and at Joigni, both of which William attended on his own rather than as a member of the Young King's retinue.
William attends the tournament at Pleurs as an unknown young knight. This tournament is, as is proper to the theme, one of William's earliest adventures. The tournament at Pleurs is announced not by a prosaic messenger but by "Renown" itself: The Marshal determines to go, Jean says, because he was always eager to earn honor and glory ll. He obtains leave from his lord, sets out with but one attendant, and soon arrives at Pleurs. There was not a knight in all France nor in Flanders nor in the country Page All William lacks for the perfect image of romance knighthood is a devotion to the ladies, and in the other markedly romantic episode in the Histoire , the tournament at Joigni, we see even this.
I have mentioned this account before, since it is the only evidence we have for the presence of ladies at any tournament in the twelfth century. I assume the ladies were actually there, though elsewhere in the Histoire ladies are noticeably absent, and the account of this tournament owes so much to Lancelot and its descendants that one could legitimately question whether in fact they were.
Again the tone is heavily romantic, and again Renown brings news of the tournament ll. William, of course, immediately sets out on his own. He comes to the place where the tournament is to be held, and it seems less a tourneying field than a plaisance, "delightful and beautiful" l. The field is adorned with ladies, for the countess has come to watch the tournament from the lices. She is as lovely, Jean writes, "as Nature knew how to fashion" ll. The ladies decide that while they wait for the tournament they will dance in a carol.
The Marshal accompames them with a song, and he sings beautifully with a "clear voice and a sweet sound" l. Then a newly created herald sings a song, with the refrain "Marshal, give me a good horse" ll. The commencailles having already begun, William leaps on his steed, gallops onto the field, captures a horse, and rushes back to give it to the herald, who now changes his refrain to "look at this horse! The Marshal gave it to me! None of William's other tournaments has so romantic a coloring as those at Pleurs and Joigni, and one wonders how credible these accounts are.
It seems almost too convenient that William's most romantic exploits should have taken place at tournaments he attended without his usual companions, bevond the view of eyewitnesses. However, Jean the Minstrel was obviously less concerned with the biographical accuracy of these episodes than with establishing William's credentials as an ideal knight and thus setting the tone for the other tournaments, most of them briefer accounts with the exception of the tournament at Lagui-sur Marne in which the language and conventions of romance are used in a less emphatic manner.
These tournaments in turn set the tone of William's character for the whole work. William unabashedly fought for gain; his business arrangement with Roger de Gaugi is narrated immediately before the account of the tournament at Joigni. And Jean the Minstrel obviously approves; he repeatedly characterizes a really fine tournament -- including the tournament at Pleurs -- as one in which "everyone either gained or lost a great deal.
If William's sons could thus see their father's tournaments in the light of romance, one wonders what they thought of the tournaments in which they took part. Barnes and Noble, ; for a brief discussion of his ideas, see my Malory's Morte Darthur Cambridge: Press, , pp. Edizioni di "Storia a letteratura," Erec et Enide , ed.
Alexandre Micha, 84 ; Le Chevalier de la charette Lancelot , ed. Mario Roques, 86 ; Le Conte du graal , ed. Paul Meyer, 3 Page Rowman and Littlefield, , p. British Museum, , no pagination. Stationery Office, , I, Press], , II, Hahn, , Book I, Chapter 18 Schultz provides a convenient and learned survey of the early history of the tournament. The earliest clear record of a tournament is of one held at Antioch in Quaritch, , p.
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Continue shopping Checkout Continue shopping. Thus, he knew how to turn the instrument into a maximally resonant vibrating body. Chaulieu wrote that while the bust of Dussek adorned every piano, young people had never been told why his likeness deserved to be there, presumably because until so recently, it had been obvious to everyone. Le Pianiste an 1, — For further discussion, see David Rowland, — He could also be referring to Vauxhall Gardens. Chaulieu wrote that 3, guineas a guinea is one pound, one shilling was equivalent to 75, F. Jan Ladislav Dussek, Tre Sonate per il pianoforte, op.
In advocating that the third movement not be played, Chaulieu was probably describing a performance convention of the time. But either way, this personal and poignant analysis reveals so much about what Chaulieu thought music could aspire to, and comprises some of the most intriguing and intimate writing in Le Pianiste. To complete his picture of Dussek, Chaulieu also added his own memory of performing for Dussek as a young man.
He wrote that around , We were fortunate enough to hear him play it many times [the Grande symphonie concertante for two pianos and orchestra, op. Dussek, who was as indulgent as he was talented, was kind enough to encourage our efforts and attest to the satisfaction he felt in hearing his symphony without having to play one of the parts. Jan Ladislav Dussek, Quatuor pour le pianoforte, violin, alto et violoncelle, , C. This also may have fed into the meaning and usage of the word perruque. The writing in Le Pianiste reflects this tension and its solution. In typical French philosophical fashion of the time, the authors take the juste milieu, or the middle path, and discuss the value of both groups.
Lemoine and Chaulieu were open to new music, but despite this 84 See note On the other hand, Lemoine and Chaulieu had met Hummel: But neither Lemoine nor Chaulieu had ever met Beethoven. See the note imbedded in the article Le Pianiste an 1, For Hummel, this included his op. Le Pianiste writes in one other place about playing posture, but no where else do its authors discuss free improvisations. This can make these issues seem rather disconnected from the rest of the journal. Johann Nepomuk Hummel, Twenty-five Etudes, op.
Instead, Lemoine and Chaulieu clearly felt strongly about these two performance issues from his concerts and had not had a public platform to discuss them, until late His body was so tranquil while playing that he made difficult passages look like easy tasks. She has also told me that she is able to learn pieces faster now than ever before, because of the technique. Her PhD thesis with results is forthcoming. It appears there was even a desired aesthetic that prized making difficult passages look easy. It might have been seen as skillful, masterly, or perhaps even coquettish.
By in Paris, however, at least some audience members, who may have been less educated and more bourgeois, were looking to the pianist to provide them with cues about how difficult the music was. To show that the pianist was working or even struggling to successfully play certain passages provided information to the audience about the skill required to achieve them.
By the fact that Le Pianiste had to explain that Hummel had played difficult passages, it appears that this physical communication had become a crutch to some audience members — lacking it, they did not understand that the music was hard to play. Because Le Pianiste does not discuss this issue in further detail, more conclusive answers cannot be drawn. However, it does seem to suggest a disappointment with less educated audiences, and explains another reason why Le Pianiste took up its avid mission to educate.
Please see chapter 4 for more on Liszt. To remedy this, Lemoine and Chaulieu explained the relationship between composition and improvisation and explained how Hummel had been steeped in a higher and more profound method of improvisation that apparently had become rare in Paris by It is commonly understood that free improvisation declined in the period from about to , and this particular episode and its confusion provides some idea about differences in regional practices.
First, Lemoine and Chaulieu distinguished between two styles of free improvisation. This did not mean, however, that the piece had been practiced or planned. One conceives that the man of genius can, in the silence of his room, classify with order his inspiration [musical ideas], and that, only delivering them to the public revised with care [in a published, edited form], he says to himself with conscience: One again conceives that in public, without preparation, these same inspirations come with clarity, to form a whole so perfect that the envious can say with some appearance of truth: As for us, we were not tricked there [emphasis original].
Romantic Pianism and Modern Performance Oxford: See Gazette musicale an 1, 2.
Aux galops de l'inconnu by Alain L'Heureux (eBook) - Lulu
Cambridge University Press, , — As for us, who like to give justice to even those with whom we have differences, we say that Liszt would seem to us the sole pianist called to realize for us the memories of Beethoven, if the heat of playing and the extraordinary facility that place this young player in a totally exceptional position, would suffice; endowed with imaginative abilities, he might have been then a man of genius for whom all the possible conceptions are feasible.
But Liszt is only a man of talent, an immense talent, sometimes admirable, sometimes capricious, and often exaggerated. Instead, their discussions of Clementi, Cramer, Steibelt, and Dussek were meant to prevent these figures from being permanently overshadowed by the rising reputation of Beethoven. Their writing on the music and lives of these musicians is incredibly detailed, personal, and vivid: As we know, Beethoven began to be mythologized during his lifetime in a way that was so powerful it has been hard to alter in any way, and Le Pianiste allows us to see that these ideas were common currency in France by The valorization of Beethoven and the attitude about perruques created an environment hostile at worst, or indifferent at best, to the French piano history that Lemoine and Chaulieu feared would not be able to survive them.
While virtuosity seems like a new and contentious topic in other s journals, it was tritely familiar for the authors of Le Pianiste, and they believed that its pernicious influence did not extend to the fourth generation, or young pianists like Chopin and Liszt. Musicologists tend to trace the first backlash against nineteenth-century pianistic virtuosity to the s.
Most of this opposition stems from German sources, and has been understood to be a product of German romantic movements. D dissertation University of Rochester, , 5—9 for more information. In an enlightening study, Dana Gooley shows how virtuosity in Germany in the s was negatively connected to what he sees as provincial fears of flamboyant, selfish city folk that live in Paris. But using the press as a tool in this case can skew results because music journalism was much more common in the s than it was in the s.
The preponderance of this evidence from the s may simply be due to a proliferation of sources instead of a change of ideas. As its authors explained it, virtuosity, or a style of playing that prized rapid passagework above all else, had been a problem since it had come to France in Gibbs and Dana Gooley Princeton and Oxford: Princeton University Press, , 75— Cambridge University Press, , n. Le Pianiste did not focus on denouncing certain genres — piano variations, for one — as the Gazette did. This issue was deeply personal for Lemoine and Chaulieu, who explained how this change in pianism had irreparably altered the meaning of music in the public imagination.
The story the journal tells is not comprehensive, as it is found buried within biographical articles about pianists and in reviews. Yale University Press, One admired his skill, one laughed, and then it was over. Moscheles left France some months after his concert and moved to London. This idea is repeated in an 2, The French version of cup-and-ball features a carved rod and a ball with a hole in it. The final part of this passages repeats an idea that Chaulieu expressed elsewhere that sonatas had been made so unpopular that no publisher would buy them, but here the blame is ascribed to the rise of virtuosity that is absent in other iterations.
University of Rochester Press, Yale University Press, , It is not clear to what publisher Le Pianiste was referring, but judging by the amount of Czerny works published by one publisher over others, the comment may refer to the publishing firm of Richault. See Bibliographie de la France. Czerny, and his dramatic intentions are almost nil. Czerny, et ses intentions dramatiques sont presque nulles. For instance, a review of his Norma variations op. Sometimes noisy, sometimes diffuse, it nearly always tires the listener, either by the mass of chords or by the excessive quantity of notes.
However, Le Pianiste believed that a musician could reform himself. Lemoine and Chaulieu implored Czerny to abandon this florid style and remake himself as Moscheles had done. Lemoine and Chaulieu thought that musicians had their own unique and personal voice, something they called talent or ability. While Pixis is now considered to be a piano virtuoso, Le Pianiste viewed him as a serious composer of elevated works and compared him to Beethoven and Hummel.
Pixis the weak sister of the bunch , and Carl Czerny A Social History New York: Dover, [] , Le Pianiste also mentioned some operas. La Fanchette, the piece modeled after Moscheles whose success was thought to cement or represent a tangible change in Parisian taste, was published in Le Pianiste wrote that his op. His best works according to Le Pianiste were a series of sonata concertantes op.
Identification was aided by John S. Whereas Pixis was a victim of changing tastes, Henri Bertini jeune was a crusader against them. Pianiste virtuose et compositeur de musique Grenoble: Like most composers of his time, Bertini did not hold an exclusive contract with Lemoine, but Lemoine published enough of his music that he could be considered a house composer.
Bertini a fait entendre quelques-uns de ces grands Caprices [ However, despite this commercial arrangement, these articles describe the fight against the style of the s that goes far beyond Bertini himself. In one case, the sacrifice that Bertini had made by writing serious works was mapped onto Lemoine, because he, it was suggested, had abandoned potential profits by choosing to eschew fashion: There is more courage than one thinks in the world of music lovers, to engage in this serious and noble style of compositions that yield more glory than money.
There, he waits with calm for the term of all his troubles. There is in this interrupted, monotone bass, all the memory of the past agonies, and in this chorale in the right hand, all the resignation of the true philosopher. Le Pianiste, an 1, For the authors of Le Pianiste, however, he was not only a great opera composer, but also a fellow pianist of the Louis Adam school and a recently departed friend, having died in early His opera Ludovic, in particular, received attention in Le Pianiste because it premiered in mid, and variations based on numbers from Ludovic were being commissioned.
After the Encyclopedie pittoresque folded, this article was reprinted in Le Pianiste, but without the lithographed letter. Le Pianiste an 2, There is no daredevilry, therefore, it is pale.
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This practice had led to the idea that his music was for beginners, and Le Pianiste saw this as a serious problem for two reasons. Lemoine invested himself in writing music for beginners to alleviate this problem. His fingering, often little correct, achieved a great similarity between him and Steibelt [emphasis mine].
We can cite some grand performers who seem born to be mathematicians or something else entirely. We have many little Herzs, little Kalkbrenners, and why?! Aussi avons-nous beaucoup de petits Herzs, petits Kalkbrenners; et pourquoi!
It is unclear what would have been a normal performance for the authors of Le Pianiste since they never describe it fully, but their denouncement of the emphasis on virtuosity, cleanliness, and speed indicate that these elements had not been the focus of their concert experiences. For Le Pianiste, too much neatness in a performance meant that the ideas were rehearsed and therefore not fresh. Elsewhere, Le Pianiste argued that eight hours of practice a day was too much because extemporaneous performance was better than extreme polish, which revealed a fatal lack of ideas.
Allusions, suggestions, and references that would have opened up a world of meaning for the authors and presumably their readers are lost on a modern audience. This is common in the historical press, of course, but it seems especially pronounced for Kalkbrenner in Le Pianiste, as 95 For more on the Dactylion, see Schnapper. There, Kalkbrenner is both venerated and vilified, and his relationship to the virtuosity of the s is hard to place. Kalkbrenner seems to be the embodiment of a typical Parisian virtuoso in many ways. But while Le Pianiste scolded Kalkbrenner for deficiencies in his early career, the journal does not explain exactly what these deficiencies were.
The journal seems to pass over these problems, to make oblique references to them, and to focus on how Kalkbrenner by was the founder of one of the best schools in pianism. Hamilton uses the word brilliant here to mean the particular type of virtuosity popular in the s. Kalkbrenner, the journal explained, was fortunate enough to have extended this typically brief transition period, and had been enjoying this part of his career for nearly 10 years, since he returned to France around The piece moves from a G-sharp dominant heard in relation to C-sharp to G dominant via a fully diminished seventh chord on A-flat see the final three measures in Example 3.
A pianist as famous as Kalkbrenner would have exerted influence on this debate, and he could have guided virtuosity toward dominance or extinction, depending on what was found in his music. Kalkbrenner was internationally admired in the late s and early s, though his reputation fell sharply thereafter. This discussion helps to illuminate the style of a pianist whose influential career remains misunderstood. It is possible he published the piece earlier in England. Bibliographie de la France , In Le Pianiste, there is a sharp decline in Kalkbrenner performances between the first and second years.
In the first season, he played at least four times, and in the second year, he did not even play once.
On 20 April , Kalkbrenner performed his 4th concerto in A-flat op. Le Pianiste also mentioned that Lemoine and Chaulieu had heard Kalkbrenner play in private in early ; Kalkbrenner performed his Variations on a Mazurka of Chopin op. Marie Pleyel possibly op. Kalkbrenner was also a model for the way in which he had worked to better himself throughout his career. In a few cases, Le Pianiste rebuked Kalkbrenner for composing in genres that it felt were unworthy of this attention. The waltz from op. For Le Pianiste, Kalkbrenner was not always perfect, but when he was at his best, he combined style, wit, execution, and emotional variation.
Virtuosity emphasized the overt instead of the subtle; it rewarded the casual listener and left nothing for the finely-tuned ear. Further, the virtuosity of the s created an appetite for imitation that was felt to be unprecedented. Kalkbrenner might be best known for being the teacher Chopin turned down: Chopin was offered lessons and eventually refused because Kalkbrenner required three years of study at minimum.
Dover Publications, , — But the worst part for Lemoine and Chaulieu was that the success of this virtuosic style had fundamentally changed music comprehension. Many musicians in the first and second eras — Mozart and Beethoven, most notably — are well-known today. Equally familiar are musicians from the fourth era: But everyone in the third era is obscure. Why is it that this entire generation seems to have faltered, whereas their teachers and their students did not?
Broadly speaking, little of their music seems to rise above its time and place.
Is it that virtuosity so overwhelmed pianism in the s that even those opposed to it could not escape being defined by it? That some may be called virtuosi now only seems to represent the fact that they were primarily active in the s. Instead of placing all the agency on individual people, Le Pianiste understood virtuosity to be a response to a particular climate. But they also looked to the future, and worked to mold and encourage young careers. The authors believed that the new generation, pianists such as Chopin and Ferdinand Hiller, held great promise.
It was these musicians, they hoped, who would right the course and lead music back to substance in new and exciting ways. While some opinions were influenced by the business of the press, the reviews do not reflect long-standing relationships nor do they summarize entire careers. They are simply contemporary opinions on new music.
But in this simplicity we find fledgling thoughts that would later take hold, and other ideas that were forgotten or abandoned. Lemoine and Chaulieu wrote many early reviews of twenty-somethings such as Chopin, Liszt, Schumann, and Mendelssohn near their debut. What do their reactions reveal about the project of Le Pianiste, and the aesthetics of the Louis Adam school?
New music that appeared to provide an alternative to the virtuosic style of the s was especially praised, along with serious and expressive works. However, not all new ideas were good, and Le Pianiste chided certain players for trying to be bizarre on purpose. In some ways it appears that they thought Chopin was the heir to their line of thinking: Lemoine and Chaulieu were fascinated by him, and they reviewed almost all of his published music and concert activity in the two years Le Pianiste was in print. These reviews are notable not only for their unusual detail but also for how they evince the authors hopes in way that is deeply connected to and reflective of their desires for the future: Like most of the people discussed in Le Pianiste, Lemoine and Chaulieu knew Chopin personally and had attended his performances numerous times.
However, Kalkbrenner aided Chopin by organizing his Parisian debut in Pendragon Press, , — Eigeldinger notes one concert on Christmas Day and three others in where Chopin played that are not reviewed in Le Pianiste. While Le Pianiste complained that Chopin did not play in public enough, after April , Chopin did not play in public for two years.
It was both familiar in this way, and new and unique, containing special detail that fascinated Le Pianiste. Clementi represented music of the past, Kalkbrenner, music of the present, and Chopin, music of the future. The significance of this pronouncement cannot be overstated: For that reason it does not figure into the present analysis.
The people who previously accused Beethoven of being bizarre did not have any more comprehension of him than those today who call Chopin enigmatic. Thus, he implies that Chopin, just twenty-three years old and having completed his tenth work, might be nearly as important as Beethoven, meriting serious study. The article continues with an analysis of the op. I have only seen the copy in Paris; the Bodleian copy is reported by Ellis.
It is likely that Lemoine and Chaulieu were attempting to write meaningful commentaries that might be constructive as well as instructive to their readers, as opposed to generic praise or mere descriptions of the music that can be sometimes found in other contemporary reviews. Chaulieu gave this disarmingly blunt summation about his vexation with the note: Vient ensuite un solo cantabile pour le piano, long de deux pages et demie [ Alerting the readers to these types of details also modeled long-term study that the authors wanted them to undertake.
I say that you have a very delicate ear. Of the opening melody in the first of the op. As it turns out, this is not a mistake, but the publisher Schlesinger was thoroughly rebuked for it. Similarly, in the op. Third, he mimics the motion of a previous tonicization of F-major where a G-minor chord pivots back to F-major through motion of ii-V-I. At the end of the piece, this G-minor chord moves to c-minor as predominant in G instead of dominant in F and then onto the dominant D and a clear cadential pattern leading to the end in G-major see Example 4.
Note the error in the penultimate chord. Chopin had been publishing all of his works with Schlesinger until he published the opp. It seems the publication was a joint venture between Prilipp and Pleyel: The Lemoine firm also bought op. Chopin First Editions Online. In the second letter, sent the next day, Chopin backtracked and explained that in his haste of the previous day, he forgot about Lemoine, and in fact he preferred that Lemoine publish op. Any disagreement or criticism was not based on fear, but rather on differing visions for the future.
Pieces attributed in Jeffrey Kallberg, Chopin at the Boundaries: Harvard University Press, , First, Le Pianiste was much more critical of Liszt than Chopin. However, Lemoine and Chaulieu found other aspects of his playing, such as the force with which he hit the keys, as well as his manners, worthy of disdain. Gooley argues that this lack of criticism in the contemporary press leaves us with an incomplete picture of Liszt and his reception.
Le Pianiste is one of these journals, but more importantly, because the journal reprinted different articles on Liszt from other unknown sources, it provides evidence of a much greater range of sources that are, as yet, unstudied. For instance, there is an article borrowed from a medical 53For instance Le Pianiste an 1, One borrowed article in particular deserves special mention because of how it captures journalistic politics of the era.
Liszt is depicted as an angel who graces the earth with his golden tresses and heavenly fingers. Cited in Walker, Franz Liszt: Bruise their foreheads on the walls of their prison. Dresses in its freshest finery to please them. Jealous, took to perfume his heaven. The chords completely filled with a vague sadness. Floods you with fresh air and fills your breast. That which often, alas! Your soul had dreamt: Lina Ramann, Franz Liszt: Artist and Man — , vol 2, translated by E. Seems only to graze the quivering keyboard.
Fall and remain in the silver of the pool. Soar in the air while flapping their wings Ah! Journal subscriptions were expensive and it is doubtful that the readers of Le Pianiste and other musical papers had read these articles. No other musician is discussed in Le Pianiste like this, treated to endless anecdotes and non-musical discussion. Many of these articles are related in that they show Liszt appearing to think himself better than he was or affecting a pompous persona. While Le Pianiste did reprint these articles, the journal was rather gentle in its own criticism of Liszt.
When Liszt was good, Le Pianiste said that nothing could surpass his performance. Liszt displayed a talent about which we have already explained, and which has never shone with a more intense brilliance. It is indeed impossible to use a finer execution, a boldness more unprecedented, more happy, than did Liszt in this piece. Liszt executed the grand piece of Weber with a sagacity with which we are not accustomed; his success was complete. At the least, they were consistent in this misspelling, and they mocked the Gazette for spelling it in many different incorrect ways.
I have noted the incorrect spelling in the original French, but changed it to the correct spelling in the translations, to avoid marring the text with sics. Among his other bad habits, Liszt made a show of his body while performing, and Le Pianiste thought this detracted from the music. For 68Le Pianiste an 1, Concert of 12 April However, the little information there is about him seems to place him in Leipzig from Charles — seems to have been in Paris from His existence, however, has been largely forgotten, and seems to have been conflated with Louis.
Charles seems more likely to have been the performer in the concert, because he seems to have been in Paris consistently, though it is possible the Louis came from Leipzig and performed in this concert. Mentioned in Gooley, The Virtuoso Liszt, Gooley suggests that the criticism caused Liszt to change his performance style. Liszt, nearly proved to be fatal, and that a crisis, furthered progressively by the fatigue of the concert, ended in [him having] a complete blackout.
Liszt also had poor manners when it came to the timeliness of his performances: Le Pianiste complained that Liszt was often extremely late to his own concerts, or that he failed to appear at all. For instance, Le Pianiste attended a concert on 21 February where Liszt was three hours late. The concert was organized by the pianist Albert Sowinsky, but he had developed a finger infection and was unable to play, so he asked Schunke, Liszt, and Chopin, to fill in for him. The concert hall was packed at least a half hour early with paying customers, waiting for the concert to start at 8pm.
Aux galops de l'inconnu
The audience waited over three hours until Liszt finally arrived at Chopin, according to the story, did not arrive until near midnight, but he was not charged with lateness elsewhere, whereas it was a continuing problem with Liszt. Pendragon Press, , , confirms 9 April concert of unpublished Fantaisie symphonique. Liszt obligingly promised to beautify a particular concert by one of these brilliant and warm improvisations with which he owes his fame, a swarm of music lovers appeared from all over, came rushing in the hopes of hearing him, and he did not come; that is understandable because here there is only a voluntary promise: He also made it more difficult for journalists to support him.
Lemoine and Chaulieu specifically mentioned that critics ie. Le 76 Le Pianiste an 1, 92— There, Le Pianiste found a similar self-important quality. The piece promised too much and delivered too little; worse, it insulted anyone who did not understand it.
The Lamartine preface does not end at this point. Hachette et Cie, , ii—iii. While, for Le Pianiste, Liszt was a grand artist with a great talent, he had not yet reached his full potential, and his own habits stood in his way. Of course, Liszt must have meant ennui as listlessness, but ennui more commonly means boredom in French. That, at least, is our opinion. Ferdinand Hiller The German pianist and composer Ferdinand Hiller — had moved to Paris in , and he brought with him a palpably foreign concert repertoire and personal style.
Like other pianists, Hiller was a pianist-composer, and wrote and performed his own works in concerts. The Virtuoso Liszt, 21 footnote. Bach, Mozart, and Beethoven. His only concert of the —34 season, for instance, included the following weighty program: Bach concerto on three pianos performed by Hiller, Liszt, and Chopin either BWV or ; a piano duet, composed by Hiller, performed by him and Liszt; as well as a violin solo and some songs. The Bach may have come to Hiller through his friendship with Mendelssohn; a biographical article on Moscheles reports that Moscheles played a Bach concerto on three keyboards with Mendelssohn and Clara Wieck in What one can desire in the works of this young composer are forms that are a little less scholastic and some sacrifices to the taste of the public [ Hiller showed respect for the musicians of the past: Le Pianiste praised these efforts for their didactic quality: Conscientious people cannot listen without profiting from the masterpieces of five grand masters; since the execution left nothing to be desired.
The previous year, Hiller had organized the performance of a Bach triple concerto on three pianos, played by Hiller, Liszt, and Chopin, and it was not well-received. These pieces where the piquant originality is nearly unknown today, and where the tradition is almost lost, strongly interested artists. Le Pianiste offered the gentle reminder that works for the piano did not have the same tolerance for repetition as an orchestra.
Bibliographie de la France, , Hiller also showed humility and a devotion to self-improvement that pleased Lemoine and Chaulieu. Just as they had praised Dussek for remaining humble in the face of great fame, and Kalkbrenner for challenging himself after success in the s, they lauded Hiller for making various changes to his concerts. A review of a 22 Feb matinee organized by Hiller admired his commitment to better himself and suggested this was a recipe for greatness: Hiller, a natural vocation for elevated music, profound studies, a great respect for masters, a beautiful imagination developed by science, and finally, the elements of a good future [emphasis original].
But Herz started his career as a composer at a young age, and much of his reputation was built in the s when he published a series of popular works in the style of Moscheles. In the s, Lemoine and Chaulieu saw him as person who needed guidance to grow beyond his juvenile works, and their style of criticism shares Hiller concert review 22 Feb Born in Vienna, Herz moved to Paris around with his large, musical family. After he won the premier prix in , his reputation only grew, and by the mids he was able to sell his compositions to publishers for four times the going rate.
The writing on Herz is sometimes contradictory and stilted: This praise was conditional, however, and the journal focused on how he had matured since his early days and encouraged him to fully abandon the style that had made him famous. Beginning in its first issue in January , the Gazette published a number of articles that appealed for the cessation of the publication of variations because, as it argued, the genre was meaningless.
However, while a plethora of variations were published each year, these articles only focused on ones that Herz had written. Since Mozart, we scarcely see it Le Pianiste an 2, Vainly, the envious fought against him; they failed in front of the general craze, and were forced to try to imitate him. These articles may represent divergent opinions between Lemoine and Chaulieu, but the similarity of the ideas point to a single author.
Herz, qui aient tenu ce que leur enfance promettait. See Laure Schnapper, Henri Herz, magnat du piano: Prior publishing contracts between Le Pianiste and Herz affected it too. But Le Pianiste broke with typical business practices in this case. To square the contradictions between the former relationship between Lemoine and Herz and the principles of Le Pianiste, the journal focused on how Herz had improved since his early days, and delicately described the significance of his early work.
By the time the Gazette appeared to have abandoned condemning Herz, Le Pianiste was less laudatory. When he failed, Le Pianiste expressed its disappointment. For instance, a Full titles are as follows: Herz to combat his enemies with better weapons, and we are angry to have to announce yet another work of the same genre that is too feeble for fighting. This action would show that the Gazette had misunderstood his talent. When Herz published his op.
Herz will not stop on such a good path. Herz is the first in those which he has adopted. But Le Pianiste hoped that Herz would change his style and improve himself, as he had done previously. Many of the reviews defer to an image the authors had in their minds: While Schubert had passed away in , France was only beginning to have access to his music around An April review of Variations on a French song for piano four hands, op.
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Amateurs is used in Le Pianiste to mean both dilettantes and lovers of music, and it is unclear which it means here. Quick pace, prominent ideas, graceful trios, everything is good. This work will figure strongly next to the marches of Beethoven and Moscheles. But, in these short compositions, Mendelssohn leaves Field far behind [ How can someone write a work with two people? They not only gave a detailed and careful analysis of it, but they also claimed they would be paying special attention to future Schumann works. The journal pointed out one instance where it was physically impossible to play what was written, asking one hand to play a two octave spread Example 4.
In another case, the melodic lines crossed in a confusing way: The latter example could have been avoided with improved engraving, though the voice crossing would have been less apparent. The former, the two octave spread, cannot be achieved as written, and the attacks must be staggered or rolled. Schumann revised this piece extensively, and published a second version in These oddities led Le Pianiste to muse that the piece was written for the mythical Patagonian people, who were giants with nearly three pairs of feet.
Not all parts were bad: Le Pianiste noted an excellent and new type of modulation in the eighth impromptu Example 4.