Walker-My_Musical_Ex.. - Walter Cosand

HENSELT 237
A quotation from tlie brochure, entitled ' Observa-
tions, resulting from long years of experience, on
Pianoforte-playing, and intended as a guide for
teachers and pupils in the Imperial Institutes over
which I am placed, and to be observed by all such
as are therein engaged,' signed Adolf Henselt, will
enable us to form some idea of the nature and extent
of this authority. Henselt begins his observations by
saying that what many people, especially teachers,
are pleased to cavil at and call ' Henselt' s method,'
and to describe as so special and peculiar as to be
neither possible nor desirable for all, is only a simple
and thorough carrying out of those fundamental and
absolutely incontrovertible principles of true art which
all musicians and all teachers are bound to know and
follow, and which are contained in every sound piano-
forte school. He then goes on to define what good
teaching should be ; and in many interesting examples,
taken from pieces with which we all are more or less
familiar, he exposes the superficiality and inaccuracy
which characterize the opposite. The brochure closes
with the authoritative mandate that all teachers of
the pianoforte in these Imperial Institutes shall pro-
vide themselves with a copy of these ' Observations,'
and to the very utmost of their ability teach according
to the principles laid down therein. But not only
were the pianoforte-teachers (whether men or women)
theoretically supposed to teach thia system thoroughly
and conscientiously, observing in all points the dictum