Walker-My_Musical_Ex.. - Walter Cosand

HENSELT i8i
Von Henselts, with whom she had Jived, with one or
two interruptions, over thirty years. She related to
me many anecdotes about his Excellency, for whom
she had the greatest affection. Indeed, I never should
have understood him so well had it not been for the
various traits of his character she gave me. She told
me on several occasions that she always thought of
him as a Nathaniel, without guile— ' ohne Falsch.'
Great was my joy when the Meister recovered ; and
when he sent for me to play to him, I brought him
his own arrangement of Chopin's E Minor Concerto,
at which I had worked so hard in the fortnight during
which I had not seen him, that I could play the whole
piece from memory without the slightest hesitation.
And here comes in an amusing instance of the way
in which the intentions of composers are often mis-
understood.
The room in which I practised adjoined that of an
extremely cultivated and refined old gentleman, who
professed to have heard Chopin play very often, in a
country house where they both used to visit for weeks
together. He had heard me play many of Chopin's
compositions ;
and assuming the privilege of age, and
(as he himself said) of superior knowledge and ex-
perience, he commented freely on my rendering of
Chopin, as being far too. strictly in time, and he often
told me that Chopin played his compositions with
much freedom, and many variations in the tempo.
Whilst I was practising the Concerto which I was