MEZZOTINTS
IN MODERN MUSIC
BRAHMS, TSCHAÏKOWSKY, CHOPINRICHARD STRAUSS, LISZTAND WAGNER
BY
JAMES HUNEKER
FOURTH EDITION
NEW YORK
CHARLES SCRIBNER’S SONS
1912
Copyright 1899
By CHARLES SCRIBNER’S SONS
Affectionately Inscribed
TO
HENRY EDWARD KREHBIEL
| Page | ||
|---|---|---|
| I. | The Music of the Future | 1 |
| II. | A Modern Music Lord | 81 |
| III. | Richard Strauss and Nietzsche | 141 |
| IV. | The Greater Chopin | 160 |
| V. | A Liszt Étude | 224 |
| VI. | The Royal Road to Parnassus | 240 |
| VII. | A Note on Richard Wagner | 285 |
| INDEX | 299 | |
[Pg 1]
The death of Johannes Brahms in 1897 removed from the sparsely settledland of music the last of the immortals; the one whom Bülow justlyranked with Bach and Beethoven; the one upon whom Schumann lavishedboth praise and prophecy. Not by any wrench of the imagination can weconjure the name of Antonin Dvorák, despite his delightful gift ofsaying naïve and Slavic things; not by any excess of sentiment can wedower Italy’s grand old man Verdi with the title, nor yet France’sfavorite son, Saint-Saëns; not any one nor all of these three varyingtalents can be compared to the great, virile man who died in Vienna,the city of his preference but not of his birth.
When the printed list of Brahms’ achievements in song, sonata, symphonyand choral works of vast proportions is placed before you, amazementat the slow, patient, extraordinary fertility and versatility of theman seizes upon you. It is not alone that he wrote[Pg 2] four symphoniesof s