Scan 14
Musical Courier 1894-08-29: Vol 29 Iss 755, 1894
72 lines. Read by computer on 21 September 2026. Printed page 15. See the scan on archive.org.
A town on its own line is one of the directory's headings. That is where the town on a maker's page comes from.
1Some Critical Points in the Appreciation of Music.
2By Eustace J. Breakspeare.
4(The Concluded.)
6The three main orders of musical, as well as of poetical, expression are, viz., the lyric, epic and dramatic.
8The primitive and naïf expression of feeling in music is the lyrical. The epic or narrative style seems to be a distinct development in combination with words (poetry); while the dramatic, though it preserves its own specific principle, appears to comprise also the lyrical and epic forms. It must be well understood that we can only speak of the epic and dramatic principles, as exhibited in music, so long as the latter consorts with poetry. Many aesthetic writers have committed the mistake of categorizing the styles and forms of music, as they take them to be, indifferent to the fact that music in certain of these instances would fail to exhibit (away from the attached art) the supposed distinctions. Generally considered, this mistake lies at the bottom of many false appreciations of the art. We speak, for instance, of the "music of the ancients," or of this or that "period," and make our evaluations of the same without sufficiently noting the relative share of poetry or any other accompanying art in the total result. Studied grammatically, the music is the same in either case; but studied aesthetically, it makes all the difference in the world."
10THE IDEAL ELEMENT.
12Hand says that "Painting and music both start with the characteristic order of the beautiful. The former in religious pictures, charged with special meaning; the latter, in the people's songs. They both end, however, by passing over into the allegorical and ideal—here, into the allegorical picture; there, into the ideal tone painting." This word "ideal," in common with so many other aesthetic terms, is variously comprehended and defined by aesthetic writers. We have it at times to denote the perfection or formal and general artistic beauties in a work; but mostly it is taken to refer to the transcendental, allegorical or supermundane significations of the work, thus being closely related to the sublime. It is partly confused with, or superadded to the purely artistic element of the work, partly set in contra-distinction to the "formal" attributes of the same. With Hand, the ideal constitutes the third order of the beautiful, after the formal and the characteristic. The fluctuating sense in which the word is employed by Hand, and others of his school, may be remarked in the following extract from the little book of Mr. Ernst Pauer, "The Beautiful in Music" (Novello Primers), which is professedly a digest of Hand's treatise:
14"In ideal beauty each work of art reaches its climax, its highest point of perfection, and it is by means of ideal beauty that the composer is able to raise us above the sublunary sphere of actual life into the higher regions of the sublime."
16We are here made a little uncertain whether the work receives its ideal quality from its artistic perfection, or from its power of raising us, &c. It is certain that a work of art may attain the highest pitch of artistic excellence in its own class, and yet be devoid altogether of sublimity or symbolic meaning.
18Referring to Mozart's "Don Giovanni," Mr. Pauer says: "In real life he (i.e., the hero) would at best awaken in us a kind of amused curiosity not unmingled with contempt. 'Don Giovanni' is the typical portrayal under poetical conditions." In this sense we may take it that all art is more or less ideal. But this is hardly the same thing that we had been led to understand above by the "ideal"—as having relation to an allegorical or transcendental attribute, over and beyond the purely formal qualities of the work. The evasiveness of the term will at any rate be evident from this: "In Mozart's opera," Mr. Pauer continues, "he approaches us, and becomes not an example to be imitated or avoided, but simply the exponent of some very charming music. He is thus entirely an ideal creation." Surely, an illogical—or at any rate, inconsistent—conclusion!
20The precise evaluation of the share of the symbolical element in art work—upon which what we understand as the ideal so largely depends—is one of the most difficult matters that the critic has to deal with. It is manifestly wrong (even if it were wholly possible) to detach the symbolical part from the "artistry" proper of an art work; to limit our critical survey to the mere craft evidences of the composition. On the other hand, it is equally true that no attached symbolism (however poetically conceived or elaborate) will at one for shortcomings in the specific handling, composition or general workings of the art. In any case it will be a nice question, how to preserve here the critical balance. It is a phase of the main difficulty indeed, which meets all art—the difficulty springing out of that inevitable essential, dualistic principle—poetic essence or idea on the one hand, artistic presentment on the other.
22Mr. Ruskin is of opinion that "any theory of aesthetic observations must be incomplete which does not give prominence to those more subtle and exhausted intellectual activities that are involved in the imaginative side of aesthetic appreciation."—"On the Symbolic Aspect of the Beautiful.") In studying this question in respect to music it is only possible to view the art in its relation to poetry, words or ideas. What the symbolical element is in the pictorial arts is represented by the conventional ideal in word and tone combinations. Mr. Ruskin, in the above sentence, appears to our thinking too much of a Platonist; he does not sufficiently take into account the question of association of ideas. It is plain that a work may be ever so suggestive, and the artist's conception evidently fine and exalted, and yet—the positive artistic result poor. It is a valuable maxim in art that the artist can never claim credit or allowance on the score of his intentions alone; neither (do we add) can he enhance the aesthetic value of any elements of his work by simply associating the same with certain extra aesthetic ideas of whatever sort and importance.
24THE ETHICAL QUESTION.
26In the quaint terms of Luther: "Dame Music makes people more refined and apt; she is partly a disciplinarian and training mistress, rendering people more gentle and gracious, better livers and more rational."
28Whatever "emotions" may be excited in art, it is very certain that there should be no ulterior end in view. But when the morale of art is so much insisted upon, then this æsthetic principle is apt to become obscured. Yet we are not supposed to maintain that art is not moral in its action and aspects. A thing may be "cathartic" in its operations; but the question may be put: How far is this thing cultivated for the sake of these cathartic properties? The difference is great between one who feels the refining influence of music, but who does not allow this consideration to interfere with his critical enjoyment, and one whose chief if not sole object in cultivating music is avowedly for the benefiting and bettering of his "moral" nature.
30It is properly the same here with the cultivation of art as with that of nature. No one is so foolish, in view of the Falls of Niagara, as to be feeling his moral pulse, so to speak, all the time, while estimating the exact value of its cathartic influence. The latter—as exerted both by nature and art—is an underlying, hidden current, and the resultant effects are correspondingly subtle. They are not to be set down and catalogued, as some have attempted it; nor need we concern ourselves about them in any inquiry, such as the present, as to the elementary principles of the art.
32The Ruskin theory that high art always implies high morality in the worker is one whose glaring evident contradictions must appear to everyone. The question must turn upon the exact idea attached here to the word "morality," and thus a conciliation of the theory with historical facts, upon a certain construction of the term (though different to the ordinary) may possibly be arrived at. But that "varying quantity" between the genius of the worker in art and his moral ego seems to defy the application of any rule. For in what one genius finds its "food" another will find its "poison"—its spiritual deterioration and ruin. Artists so frequently present in their lives such psychological enigmas, as to make impossible all narrow the ories of art-morality. At times—unless the "automaton" theory be favored—it is extremely difficult to discover the spiritual link between the man and his work, so much they may outwardly contrast.
34In speaking of "art and morals," then, we are dealing with subjects not (for us) co-ordinate. Art is certainly impressed with man's moral nature, and impresses in turn; but qua art, it must be contemplated apart from the question of morals. But, as we hastened to explain above, those matters may very well be discussed in a more open field. The specific talent of the artist has a connection of a very mysterious sort with the entire ego of the artist; so that this question, we fear, unless checked, would broaden out into psychological as well as social and historical problems.
36LOGICAL CONTINUITY AND CONTRAST.
38With respect to the question of "logical continuity" and "architectural contrast" in the sonata and other classic forms—upon which there reigns generally still great uncertainty—there is considerable light to be obtained by carefully studying and comparing the methods of classical writers belonging to entirely distinct periods in the instrumental development of the art. We see, for example, how in Haydn's sonatas that antithetical contrast of the two "subjects" is as yet but in process of becoming known. In the work of certain present day writers, on the contrary, we are apt to get these subjects entirely unrelated—neither inner nor formal correspondence being exhibited at all; the apparent aim of the composer indeed having been to secure the exact opposite.
40Viewed solely as a piece of formal construction, nothing certainly might seem to urge against the most vivid contrast in this way. It depends, however, upon the settlement of the question, whether the music is to be admitted as the possible outcome—or representation—of a distinct and logical consecutive series of æsthetic modes of feeling. If this is to be, we see at once the inadmissibility of these artificially opposed "masses," as we have termed them. Here then enters the problem: How to secure the beauties of formal contrast, while suffering no contravention of musical logic. But, as Mr. Sully has pointed out, even violent transitions in music, which might seem to lack all explanation in the absence of words, yet require a certain rationale when we recall how unmotived (or apparently so) at times are the subtle changes in our own consciousness from one mood to another.
42The same writer to whom we are indebted for several valuable suggestions—Küster—may be referred to on this subject. He says:
44"According to psychological laws, an energetic feeling may properly resolve itself into a soft and melting one, as well as vice versa; only, in the latter case, the energetic feeling will always undergo that mitigation which is necessary to the harmonious balance of both."
46And further on he makes the following very important statement:
48"The more the sonata form is to be regarded as the production of art the more care must be taken toward securing that musical naturalness in the themes which speak directly to the heart. Next to their rhythmical articulation, this resides principally in the singableness of the same, and is referable to those melodic laws which have been dictated to art by the human race. On the other hand, we must also expect to find in the sonata a complete exhibition of instrumental play (Instrumentenspiels). But so long, now, the inner necessity and musico-logical consequence is wanting hitherto, the form—despite the existence of the song element and of all characteristic importance in the themes—is not perfectly enunciated. Finally, we have also to consider the mutual correspondence of the different themes. This may not be a mere external one—as when the one theme is simply inverted to fit the other contrapuntally (though this may have its appreciable value at times), or when there has only taken place a scientifically contrived transposition of the one into the other; but they must have a superior unity in common, by which at least their process of evolution can be explained. This spiritual bond usually exists only when the composer has been so lifted up, by the creative power, to a height of inspiration for this idea that the subject is presented to his mind simultaneously with its metamorphoses or antithesis, even though but dimly and in its elementary germs. This inspiration must likewise, to a certain degree, be conveyed to the listener, so that unity in the diverse, easily manifests itself in the warmth and vivacity of his resultant impression."
50There is a difference, too, between mere change of musical motive and æsthetic transition: the former does not necessarily imply the latter. We recognize, while saying this, the impossibility of dissociating form and spirit in music, absolutely; or of altering the one without affecting the other. But there may be some considerable degree of formal contrast, the general "feeling" of the piece remaining yet unique; just as, on the other hand, the subjects, formally considered, may remain on the whole the same, or very nearly, in general outward character, though a certain thematic development—and, along therewith, a certain psychical transmutation—may all the time be carried on.—London "Musical Opinion."
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53OF THE
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57For Terms, Dates and other Particulars address
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