Old Fogy | Page 3

for the purposes
of my argument to mention the names of Liszt, Berlioz, Tchaikovsky
and Richard Strauss. Some day when the weather is wretched, when
icicles hang by the wall, and "ways be foul" and "foul is fair and fair is
foul"--pardon this jumble of Shakespeare!--I shall tell you what I think
of the blond madman who sets to music crazy philosophies, bloody
legends, sublime tommy-rot, and his friend's poems and pictures. At
this writing I have neither humor nor space.
As I understand the rank and jargon of modern criticism, Berlioz is
called the father of modern instrumentation. That is, he says nothing in
his music, but says it magnificently. His orchestration covers a
multitude of weaknesses with a flamboyant cloak of charity. [Now,
here I go again; I could have just as easily written "flaming"; but I, too,
must copy Berlioz!] He pins haughty, poetic, high-sounding labels to
his works, and, like Charles Lamb, we sit open-mouthed at concerts
trying to fill in his big sonorous frame with a picture. Your picture is
not mine, and I'll swear that the young man who sits next to me with a
silly chin, goggle-eyes and cocoanut-shaped head sees as in a fluttering

mirror the idealized image of a strong-chinned, ox-eyed,
classic-browed youth, a mixture of Napoleon at Saint Helena and Lord
Byron invoking the Alps to fall upon him. Now, I loathe such music. It
makes its chief appeal to the egotism of mankind, all the time slily
insinuating that it addresses the imagination. What fudge! Yes, the
imagination of your own splendid ego in a white vest [we called them
waistcoats when I was young], driving an automobile down Walnut
Street, at noon on a bright Spring Sunday. How lofty!
Let us pass to the Hungarian piano-virtuoso who posed as a composer.
That he lent money and thematic ideas to his precious son-in-law,
Richard Wagner, I do not doubt. But, then, beggars must not be
choosers, and Liszt gave to Wagner mighty poor stuff, musically
speaking. And I fancy that Wagner liked far better the solid cash than
the notes of hand! Liszt, I think, would have had nothing to say if
Berlioz had not preceded him. The idea struck him, for he was a master
of musical snippets, that Berlioz was too long-winded, that his
symphonies were neither fish nor form. What ho! cried Master Franz,
I'll give them a dose homeopathic. He did, and named his prescription a
Symphonic Poem or, rather, Poéme Symphonique, which is not quite the
same thing. Nothing tickles the vanity of the groundlings like this sort
of verbal fireworks. "It leaves so much to the imagination," says the
stout man with the twenty-two collar and the number six hat. It does.
And the kind of imagination--Oh, Lord! Liszt, nothing daunted because
he couldn't shake out an honest throw of a tune from his technical
dice-box, built his music on so-called themes, claiming that in this
matter he derived from Bach. Not so. Bach's themes were subjects for
fugal treatment; Liszt's, for symphonic. The parallel is not fair. Besides,
Daddy Liszt had no melodic invention. Bach had. Witness his chorals,
his masses, his oratorios! But the Berlioz ball had to be kept a-rolling;
the formula was too easy; so Liszt named his poems, named his notes,
put dog-collars on his harmonies--and yet no one whistled after them.
Is it any wonder?
Tchaikovsky studied Liszt with one eye; the other he kept on Bellini
and the Italians. What might have happened if he had been one-eyed I
cannot pretend to say. In love with lush, sensuous melody, attracted by

the gorgeous pyrotechnical effects in Berlioz and Liszt and the
pomposities of Meyerbeer, this Russian, who began study too late and
being too lazy to work hard, manufactured a number of symphonic
poems. To them he gave strained, fantastic names--names meaningless
and pretty--and, as he was short-winded contrapuntally, he wrote his
so-called instrumental poems shorter than Liszt's. He had no symphonic
talent, he substituted Italian tunes for dignified themes, and when the
development section came he plastered on more sentimental melodies.
His sentiment is hectic, is unhealthy, is morbid. Tchaikovsky either
raves or whines like the people in a Russian novel. I think the fellow
was a bit touched in the upper story; that is, I did until I heard the
compositions of R. Strauss, of Munich. What misfit music for such a
joyous name, a name evocative of all that is gay, refined, witty,
sparkling, and spontaneous in music! After Mozart give me
Strauss--Johann, however, not Richard!
No longer the wheezings, gaspings, and short-breathed phrases of Liszt;
no longer the evil sensuality, loose construction, formlessness, and
drunken peasant dances of Tchaikovsky; but a blending of Wagner,
Brahms, Liszt--and the classics. Oh, Strauss, Richard, knows his
business!