The Symphony Since Beethoven |
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artist attained beautiful Beethoven Berlioz and Liszt Brahms Brahms's Bruckner Bülow C-major C-minor called character composer composer's compositions conceptions creations Der Freischütz E-flat major effect endeavor example expression Faust feeling FELIX WEINGARTNER finally genius German Goethe's hear Hector Berlioz Hermann Goetz hero ideal imagination impression inspiration instrumental invention Lachner last movement leading motives listener Magic Flute masterpiece Mazeppa melody Mendelssohn ment modern school mood Mozart's musical drama musician nature never new-classical Ninth Symphony old form old masters opera orchestra Orpheus overture passion perfect phony pianoforte piece of music poetical posers produced programme music programme-books Queen Mab Robert Schumann Romeo and Juliet scene scherzo Schu Schubert Schumann score senseless significant similar sonatas songs sounds speak spirit stands Strauss success symphonic poems Symphonie Fantastique SYMPHONY SINCE BEETHOVEN theme thoven's tion to-day tone-poem true variations Wagner wish wonderful write
Popular passages
Page 73 - ... always be discussed and they furnish the illustrative material for both sides of the argument. " His collected works have exerted a weighty influence upon musical art. He stands as the real originator and founder of the modern school, which is the leading one to-day, and whose advocates are striving to attain new aims and the highest possible success. Berlioz will always represent a milestone in the development of music, however that school may grow. He did not approach, by any means, that ethical...
Page 97 - German nor yet cosmopolitan and shallow, but having a strong, purely human feeling, because music is a universal art. I picture him inspired with a glowing enthusiasm for what the great minds of all times and of all nations have produced, and having an invincible aversion to mediocrity, with which he comes in contact only through his own kindness. I think of him as free from envy because conscious of and trusting in his own worth, far above any mean ways of advertising his own works; profoundly sincere,...
Page 50 - Think of him thus going unswervingly along his way toward the goal he had set himself, in the most absolute certainty of not being noticed and of attaining nothing but failure — and then compare him with our fashionable composers borne on by daily success and advertisement, who puzzle out their trifles with the utmost raffinerie.
Page 41 - ... study of The Symphony since Beethoven. 'The slow movement,' he said (and his comment is more astonishing every time one reads it), 'can be satisfactorily comprehended only after frequent hearing. It is difficult for it to disclose itself to the musical mind, but it does so thoroughly in the end. If I may be allowed the comparison, I should like to suggest a Dutch landscape at sunset. The eye at first sees nothing but the sky over the wide, wide plain; heedlessly and wearily it lets the glance...
Page 76 - debased and shorn of the subtle peculiarities of its being if he [the composer] attempts to bind it bar by bar or episode by episode to a programme. Music can interpret moods, it can represent a mental state that some event has caused in us, but it cannot picture the event itself." On the opposite side, we find arrayed no less a champion than Ernest Newman, one of the two or three men in Great Britain who write pregnant criticism of musical art. He holds that Beethoven deceived even himself when...
Page 50 - Think of this schoolmaster and organist, risen from the poorest surroundings and totally lacking in education, but steadily composing symphonies of dimensions hitherto unheard of, crowded with difficulties and solecisms of all kinds, which were the horror of conductors, performers, listeners, and critics, because they interfered sadly with their comfort. "Think of him thus going unswervingly along his way toward...
Page 24 - Schumann had not discovered it in Vienna, not long after Schubert's death. How grand it stands before us in its four glorious movements ! — the first swelling with life and strength, the second a gipsy romance with the wonderful secret horn...
Page 96 - An interesting figure of our day, but far too little esteemed as a composer, is Gustav Mahler. His works are of colossal dimension, and require an unusually large number of executants, which makes more difficult their performance and reputation.