Scan 359
Grove's dictionary of music and musicians ed. by J. A. Fuller Maitland, 1910
8 lines. Read by computer on 3 September 2026. Printed page 325. See the scan on archive.org.
1though often commonplace, does not go against its nature, while Vieuxtemps not unfrequently seems to do violence to it, and in some of his tours de force oversteps the boundaries of the beautiful. Both these great artists travelled much, and gained by the great excellence of their performances universal success in almost every European country. Vieuxtemps was also the first violinist, of the highest rank, who visited America. De Bériot, as leader at the Brussels Conservatoire, formed a great number of excellent violinists, the best known of whom are the Spaniard MONASTERIO (born 1836), SAURET (born 1852), SCHRADIECK (born 1846), and HEERMAN (born 1844). JEAN BECKER (born 1833) and LAUTERBACH (born 1832) also studied for some time under him.
3Among Baillot's pupils F. A. HABENECK (1781–1849) attained a great reputation as conductor and as teacher. He counts among his pupils SAINTON (born 1813), PRUME (1816–1849), ALARD (1815–88), and LÉONARD (born 1819). The two last, with MASSART (born 1811), a pupil of Kreutzer, headed the Franco-Belgian school as teachers at the Paris Conservatoire. Alard's most eminent pupil was SARASATE (1844–1908). MARSICK and M. DENGREMONT (born 1866) studied under Léonard.
5WIENIAWSKI, LOTTO, and TERESINA TUA are pupils of Massart. Wieniawski (1835–80) was indeed a wonderful player. He possessed a beautiful tone, an astonishing technique of the left hand and of the bow, and threw into his performances an amount of life and warmth which, if it now and then led to some exaggeration, was irresistible. The marvellous perfection of Sarasate's playing, and the gracefulness of his style, are too well known to require further comment. The character of his répertoire deserves, however, special attention. It was a very extended one, and illustrated a remarkable general change in the répertoires, if not in the style, of the younger generation of French violinists. Formerly the French violinist, no less than the German one, as a matter of course, wrote his own Concertos — or if that was beyond his power, his own Fantasias or the like. Unfortunately, French violinists, with few exceptions, have not been highly trained musicians. We know that Rode and De Bériot had even to seek assistance in the scoring of their Concertos. The descent from the compositions of Rode and Kreutzer to those of De Bériot, Alard, and Léonard is only too apparent. The operatic Fantasias of the last two mark, we may say, the lowest point to which composition for the violin had hitherto descended. Of late years the taste for serious instrumental music has grown more and more universal in France, and a reaction has set in. Not that the public has left off its delight in brilliant technical display. The fabulous successes of some modern virtuosi prove the contrary. But these triumphs have been won as much by their performance of the best Concertos by the best composers as of brilliant show-pieces.
7In Germany we find the schools of Cassel, Leipzig, and Vienna taking the lead. Spohr at Cassel had a great number of pupils, but his manner and style were too exclusively individual to form a school. His most eminent pupil was FERDINAND DAVID (1810–73), who as founder of the Leipzig school exercised great influence on violin-playing in Germany. It can hardly be said that he perpetuated in his pupils Spohr's method and style. Entirely differing from his great master in musical temperament, enjoying from his early youth close intercourse with Mendelssohn, and strongly imbued with the spirit of modern music as manifested in Beethoven, he represents a more modern phase in German violin-playing and an eclecticism which has avoided one-sidedness not less in matters of technique than in musical taste and judgment generally. He was the first who played Bach's Violin Solos, and all the last Quartets of Beethoven (not even excepting the Fugue) in public. Schubert's Quartets and Quintet were on the programmes of his chamber-concerts at the time when they had not yet been heard in public, except perhaps at Vienna. As a teacher his chief aim was to give to his pupils a thorough command of the technique of the violin, and to arouse and develop their musical intelligence. There as elsewhere the classical works of violin literature naturally formed the main stock of teaching material. At the same time David laid great stress on the study of the modern French masters, maintaining that, irrespective of musical value, their works, being as a rule written with the aim of bringing out the capabilities of the violin, contain a large amount of useful material for technical training, which in the end must benefit and improve the execution of music of any style. The correctness of this theory is strikingly proved by JOACHIM, who, as Boehm's pupil at Vienna, was made thoroughly familiar with the technique of the modern French school, while he studied most of his classical répertoire at Leipzig under David's guidance, and in what we may term Mendelssohn's musical atmosphere. Joachim's unlimited command over technical difficulties in music of any style, which enabled him to do equal justice to Paganini and Bach, was undoubtedly largely owing to the fact that his early training was free from one-sidedness, and that he gained through the study of brilliant modern music the highest finish as well as the completest mastery. David trained a large number of good violinists: — Japha (Cologne), Röntgen (Leipzig), Jacobsohn (Bremen), Schradieck (who succeeded him at Leipzig), F. Hegar (Zürich), and many more. By far the most eminent of his pupils was WILHELMJ (1845–1908), a virtuoso of the very first rank, who
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