PADEREWSKI ON MUSIC.

Evening Post, Volume LX, Issue 114, 10 November 1900, Page 3 (Supplement)

PADEREWSKI ON MUSIC.

Paderewski has been giving bis views on music publicity lately, through tha medium of a London interviewer. "If I were asked," he says, "to name tha chief qualification for a great pianist, I should answer in a word — genius. That is the spark which fires every heart; that is the voice which all men stop to hear! Lacking genius, your pianist is simply a player- I—an1 — an artist, pei'haps — whose work is politely listened to or admired in moderation as a musical 'tour de force.' He leaves his hearers cold ; nor is the appeal which he makes through the medium of his art a universal one. And here let me say, referring to the celebrated 'paradox' of Diderot, that lam firmly of the belief that the pianist, in order to produce the finest and most delicate effects, must feel what he is playing, identify himself absolutely with his work, be in sympathy with the composition in its entirety, as well as with its every shade of expression. Only so shall he speak to that immense audience which ever depends on perfect art. Yet — and here is a paradox indeed — he must put his own personality resolutely, triumphantly into his interpretation of the composer's ideas, in the same manner as, for example, ■ a great actor like Sir Henry Irving gives us, in that wonderful portrait of Louis the Eleventh, the senile monarch, cowardly, despicable, and— himself." Paderewksi regards Beethoven as the most soul-satisfying of composers for the piano. "He was the master-harmonist, and we must all reverence his memory — no, not his memory, for how can it be said of such a towering genius that he is dead. Upon his brow there rests the fadeless garland of immortal fame. He speaks to us in music, he lives in sounds that ravish us to hear." As to the piano, " assuredly it is the greatest of musical instruments. Its powers — who has yet been .able to test them to the full? Its limitations— who shall define them? No sooner does one fancy that nothing further can be done to enhance its possibilities, than inventive ability steps forward and gives to, it a greater volume, a more velvety smoothness of tone.' Looking forward, Paderewski anticipates no radical change in the manner of expressing musical ideas. V Sensuousness is a marked characteristic of the music of our time, and undoubtedly makes a potent appeal to a large section of the public. However, pure intellectu- I ality in pianoforte and other music still finds its eagerly appreciative if limited audience. As to a general comparison of the old composers with the moderns, what can one say but this : A man is not necessarily a master because he happened to compose two, or three centuries ago. Much that was written I then was worthless, and long since has gone down to ' dusty death ;' other things were truly fine, and have survived. Let us beware of the worship of mere- antiquity: " After all, time tests the works of men as it tries their hearts. In music as in every other art, what is pure gold comes out of the furnace-heat'; the dross is burned away."