Books › An Encyclopedia of the Violin, 1925 › scan 192
Scan 192
An Encyclopedia of the Violin, 1925
15 lines. Read by computer on 28 September 2026. Printed page 164. See the scan on archive.org.
1The work should not be made heavy and clumsy under the pretext of interpreting it. Beethoven is perfectly clear and concise in his indication of his wishes; it might be said of his works that not a note in them need be changed, and whoever transgresses the supreme logic of this immortal composer takes far too much upon himself.
3Kubelik sometimes makes inoffensive "readjustments" in his playing of Paganini; but he does so in very dangerous places, where it is almost impossible to make certain of success, as in the wizard violinist's "Witches' Dance."
5Paganini – Original Var. III
6As played by Kubelik
8And now we come to one of the most delicate questions to be considered in this chapter, that of the progress made in the teaching of modern violin technique.
10There has come into being a whole legion of specialists in violin technique, who are ready to turn out "Paganinis" in double quick time. All these destroyers of art in its purity should be shunned, for they are manufacturers of mechanical musicians, the most skilful among whom earn but little glory, and are the cause of disquiet to genuine artists. The pupils of such teachers may reach a certain point of development but in nearly every case they remain standing on the threshold of the temple of art, which they are musically unfit to enter.
12One should wage unrelenting war against these mere technicians of the violin. Paganini was the possessor of a phenomenal mechanism, but he was a great artist as well; Mendelssohn declared that the famous Genoese sang the simplest things on his violin with the most affecting sentiment. My aversion for the mechanician violinist has always been intense, and has been measurably increased during the last few years. The number of violinistic acrobats has developed at a prodigious rate, and the public, easily impressed, reacting to all that is brilliant and, especially, all that "sounds," is frequently unduly pleased over what is nothing but unmusical "fireworks."
14The public is sometimes sadly lacking in good judgment in selecting its musical idols, for few laymen are competent to judge the real musicianship of a performer. Clever advertising and the way in which the artist is presented establish his success rather than ability. I remember—it was when a certain technically skilful but musically deficient virtuoso played for the first time in the Théâtre du Vaudeville in Paris—the remark of a gentleman sitting beside me. The performer was playing Vieuxtemps' First Concerto, and after the
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