Après une Lecture de Liszt: Virtuosity and ... - Free

19THCENTURYMUSICgenial creativity, he would find himself correctednot only by the words of Goethe but by the worksand words of the musical masters, namely by Mozarthimself—who reveals a remarkably clear consciousnessof his intentions and their execution in hisletters. But principally speaking, this consciousnesscan be nothing other than an artistic consciousness,one that sets out from contemplation [Anschauung]and leads to action [Tat]. 36Though he later idealized this progressioninto a “completely integral [einheitsvoll] processof contemplation and act,” 37 Marx, likeSchumann, regarded a lack of training as thefirst stumbling block for a ragged composersuch as Liszt. Not surprisingly, in 1854 Hanslickcodified the necessity of music training as partof a compositional model hostile to virtuosoimprovisation, thereby cementing a paradigmfor composition that would increasingly definethe dominant critical aesthetics of the nineteenthcentury. Schumann, too, seemed sympatheticto this trend in 1848 and advised astudent: “Above all things, persevere in composingmentally, not with the help of the instrument,and keep on twisting and turning theprincipal melodies about in your head untilyou can say to yourself: ‘Now they will do’.” 38In this view, the authority of historical consciousnessdefeats that of momentary ecstasyin an idealist hierarchy of mind over body: “Thecomposer works slowly and intermittently,”Hanslick insisted pace Liszt, “forming the musicalartwork . . . for posterity.” 39 Even Wagner,writing to Hanslick about Tannhäuser eightyears earlier, had voiced a similar, historicallyconscious view: “Do not underestimate thepower of reflection; the unconsciously createdwork of art belongs to periods remote from ourown: the work of art of the most advanced36Cited in, and adapted from, A. B. Marx, Musical Form inthe Age of Beethoven, trans. Scott Burnham (Cambridge:Cambridge University Press, 1997), p. 19.37Ibid., p. 31.38“Vor Allem beharren Sie dabei, innerlich—nicht mit Hülfedes Instruments—zu erfinden, die melodischen Hauptmotiveim Kopfe so lange zu drehen und zu wenden, bisSie sich sagen können: ‘nun ist es gut’” (Schumann toLudwig Meinardus, 16 September 1848, Dresden, in RobertSchumanns Briefe, ed. Gustav Jansen [2nd edn. Leipzig:Breitkopf and Härtel, 1904], p. 289).39Eduard Hanslick, On the Musically Beautiful, trans. anded. Geoffrey Payzant (Indianapolis: Hackett, 1986), p. 49.period of culture can be produced only by aprocess of conscious creation.” 40By following the “outmoded” beliefs ofShelley and Schopenhauer, however, Liszt inhis early improvisatory fragments and free fantasieswould appear—indirectly—to have takenGoethe at his word: Im Anfang war die Tat! 41In a defensive comment on his musical proceduresdating from 1856, Liszt explicitly celebratesa musical structure that is sinnlichrather than geistig. Writing to Louis Köhler,who had dedicated a treatise on piano playingand composition to him, Liszt eschews all formalistdogma:However others may judge of these things, [my works]are for me the necessary development of my innerexperiences, which have brought me to the convictionthat invention and feeling are not so entirelyevil in Art. Certainly you very rightly observe thatthe forms (which are too often changed by quiterespectable people into formulas) “First Subject,Middle Subject, Closing Subject, etc., may very muchgrow into a habit, because they must be so thoroughlynatural, primitive, and very easily intelligible.”Without making the slightest objection tothis opinion, I only beg for permission to be allowedto decide upon the forms by the contents, and evenshould this permission be withheld from me fromthe side of the most commendable criticism, I shallnonetheless go on in my own modest way quitecheerfully. After all, in the end it comes principallyto this—what the ideas are, and how they are carriedout and worked up—and that leads us always backto the feeling and invention, if we would not scramblein the rut of a mere trade. 42The fulcrum on which this comment pivots isthe outward, or let us say readily perceivable,structures of music. In 1856 Liszt was thinkingabout these matters in the context of the symphonicpoem: a project of serious composition.But even before this new conception of large-40Wagner to Eduard Hanslick, 1 January 1847, Dresden, inSelected Letters of Richard Wagner, ed. and trans. StewartSpencer and Barry Millington (New York: W. W. Norton,1988), p. 134.41Goethe’s Faust famously rejects the word, meaning, andmental power before stating: “Mir hilft der Geist! Aufeinmal seh’ ich Rat / Und schreibe getrost: Im Anfang wardie Tat” (J. W. von Goethe, Faust, part I).42Liszt to Louis Köhler, 9 July 1856, Weimar, in La Mara,Letters of Franz Liszt, I, 273–74.62