Low sinks, where he would madly rise,This most pretentious imp!See! while with Paganin’ he vies,Praunlookethlessthanshrimp!
Low sinks, where he would madly rise,This most pretentious imp!See! while with Paganin’ he vies,Praunlookethlessthanshrimp!
After returning from Warsaw, Paganini visited Frankfort. It is related that, while he was in this latter city, an actor from the Breslau Theatre, taking advantage of his marked peculiarities of look, manner and gesture, made successful public mimicry of him; and that he had the good sense, himself, to attend one of these performances, and join in the general laugh with the best grace imaginable. He remained for a year at Frankfort; and it seemed as if he had renounced the previously well-circulated notion of his visiting Paris and London, when he suddenly made his appearance at Strasbourg, and soon afterwards arrived upon the banks of the Seine, to delight and astonish those idolators of novelty, the inhabitants of the French metropolis.
Of the impression produced by Paganini among the Parisians, as well as of his personal and musical characteristics, I find so graphic and picturesque an account in a French journal (Le Globe), that I am induced to translate, for my purpose, the chief portion of it, under the conviction that the length of passages leading to what is so far thereverseof “nothing” will be easily pardoned. Whether the writer’s moral estimate of the spectacle-hunting branch of the Parisian public be not a little overcharged with severity, is a point which I have no pretensions to determine. That there is someeloquence in the thoughts of the French writer, whoever he might be (and, alas! for common sense, he is, or was, a St. Simonian), will be, I think, admitted, even by those who would not so far admire his composition as to “mark it for a rapture nobly writ.” Here follows his sketch, however; and Paganini himself (in pictorial effigy) shall attend, and give it a sort of personal confirmation.
“The Artistis about to make his appearance—silence begins to be restored—the overture is over, without having been listened to—somewhat less of coldness and unconcern is expressed on the faces around—and the hands of the white-gloved are all armed with the double opera-glass.Enter Paganini and his Violin!
“A universal clapping of hands attends his first advent on the scene. He advances, with sundry awkward and heavy steps; he makes obeisance, and the applause is renewed: he moves forward, with increased oddity of gait, and the noise of hands is prolonged on all sides.
He makes several further salutations
“He makes several further salutations—he endeavours to animate his countenance with a smile of acknowledgment, which is instantly succeeded by a look of icy coldness.... He makes a halt, and, with still greater eccentricity of manner, it may be, than in his reverences and his walk, he seizes his fiddle, hugs it betwixt chin and chest, and fixes on it a look at once of pride, penetration and gentleness. Thus resteth he several seconds, leaving the public at leisure to examine and make him out in his strange originality—to note with curiosity his gaunt body, his lengthy arms and fingers, his dark hair descending to his shoulders, the sickness and suffering denoted in his whole frame, his sunken mouth, his long eagle nose, his wan and hollow cheeks, his large, fine, manifest forehead, such as Gall would have delighted to contemplate,—and, beneath the shelter and shadow of that front, eyes that dilate, sparkle and flash at every instant!
“Such doth Paganini show himself, formed, at every point of his person, to catch the greatest possible quantum of applause from a public whom it is his office toamuse. Behold him, a compound of chill irony and electric enthusiasm,—of haughtiness, with seeming humility,—of sickly languor, and fitful, nervous, fatal exultings,—of wild oddity, chastened by some hidden and unconscious grace—of frank abandonment, of charming attractiveness, of a superiority of talent that might fix the most indifferent,—but, above all this, a veryman-fiddle—a being of extraordinary nature, created as if expressly for the gratification of a public delighting, before all things, in the extraordinary!
“‘Sufficient for the eyes!’ seems he now to say within himself, as he notes in their operation the incoherent reveries and speculations of his beholders.Promptly his looks descend from his violin to the orchestra—he gives the signal—he raises his right hand briskly into the air, and dashes his bow down upon the instrument!
You anticipate the rupture of all its strings!
“You anticipate the rupture of all its strings! On the contrary, the lightest, the finest, the most delicate of sounds comes forth to win your surprise. He continues for some moments to sport with your pre-conceptions, to look askance at you, to irritate you; and every whim that occurs to him, is employed to draw you out from your supposed indifference. He teases you, he pleases you: he springs, he runs, he wanders from tone to tone, from octave to octave; achieves, with incredible lightness and precision, the widest intervals; ascends and descends the chromatic and diatonic scales; touches harmonic accompaniments in his way; extracts unknownsounds; searches, with easy success, for difficulties and tricks of skill; exhausts, within the space of a few bars, the whole range of chords and sounds possible upon the instrument—discourses, sings, bewails, ejaculates, describes! ’Tis suddenly a murmur of waves, a whistling in the air, a warbling of birds; a something undefinably musical, in the most acute as well as the lowest tones—an unrestricted impulse of caprices, and contrasts, without guide or measure! ’Tis, in a word, a perfect union of incoherence and nameless clatter, beyond which, the world-worn and vitiated beings around, the worshippers of singularity, can see nothing, imagine nothing, desire nothing!
“The great Artist has, nevertheless, resources other than those of phantasy, by which to captivate the public—and presently there succeeds to this musical phantasmagoria a broad, stately, harmonious (albeit somewhat too bare) simplicity. The fatigue of the public and of the Artist now gives place to a species of joy, that visibly blooms on every countenance. Chords that are pure sweet, melodious, brilliant, stream from beneath the bow; and then come accents of nature that seem to flow from the heart itself, and affect you with a perspiring thrill of delight; and then (prodigy of harmony!) the vague moans and unfinished plainings of a melancholy abandonment! You sympathize, in gentle pain, with the touching and melodious artist; you dispose yourself to follow, at his direction, the course of (as it should seem) some mournful, fleeting, intangible vision—when instantly a fit of violent distress, a sort of shuddering fury, seizes him, and we are startled, chilled, tormented, by cries which pierce the inmost recesses of our frame, and make us tremble for the hapless being whom we behold and hear! We dare not breathe—we are halfsuffocated;—fearfully the head burns, and the heart aches.
fearfully the head burns, and the heart aches.
“And yet—and yet, despite this too positive pain which the unfortunate artist has forced both upon us and himself, he bethinketh him mindfully that ’tis his vocation to serve forsportto the public that does him thehonorto come and listen to him. He snatches away, therefore, your ladies with delicate nerves, and your men of effeminacy, from the suffocation and syncope that threaten them. Truce to the cries of agony! truce to despair! A fantastic chaunt, a wild laugh, springs up—and then succeeds a sort of buffoon dance, to complete the relief of these people, and restore them tolife.Encorehe sings, he laughs, he dances: each face is completely reassured, and its owner, to prove to the rest, and to his own satisfaction, that he has not so farforgotten himself as to quit the precincts ofbon tonand eternal frigidity, smiles listlessly upon his neighbour, strokes his cravat adjustingly, and throws a careless glance from side to side! Amidst this returning indifference, let there come a new passage of arduous brilliancy, some more or less astonishing sleight of hand—and a reiterated clapping of palms convinces the unhappy purveyor of diversion that he has but too well served the public according to their taste!
“And now, should the rondo come, in its light and laughing gaiety—should the hymn of love and delight succeed, ’twill be the same case as with the cry of grief or despair. Each burst of simple gaiety must be followed by an air in the coquettish style, an impulse from the head, to give it stimulus. Amid the passionate harmonies of love, you shall hear interspersed the accents of coldness, of disdain, of raillery. After a voluptuous transport, you shall have mincings and caprices:—
for there is no gaiety, whether for him, or for the listening public,
for there is no gaiety, whether forhim, or for the listening public, of a natural, fresh and youthful character; there is no frank and confiding attachment; there is no serene and grateful pleasure; there is no sadness that pours itself out for the sake of consolation; no joys but such as are like scentless flowers, that one picks to pieces in sport; no passion save what is akin to delirium, debauchery, or deadly poison! What the public must have, and the artist, are yourpizzicati, your contrasts, your satanic schooleries, your touches of the extravagant;—’tis a dose of madness or despair,—’tis an agony—the sensation of a man suspended over a bottomless abyss;—’tis a violin, which is at once a flute, a bass, a guitar, and a whole orchestra, intermixed, confounded, and getting into harmony only by fits;—’tis a professional visage, revealing a wounded and withered heart; ’tis a human skeleton—death, in grotesque attire; ’tis the “talented exhibition” of a rebellious angel, who gnashes his teeth, and howls, and jeers! And so the public, seeing their artist hold forth to them, under convenient forms, all possible monstrosities, seem to applaud themselves inwardly, and to exclaim instinctively, ‘Here is our interpreter, our plaything, and our own handywork!‘
“Of such a public, and such an artist, how saddening the sight!... The public, made up of idlers—of beings isolated, selfish, cold, corrupt—must beamused, forsooth! and the artist exhausts his taste and his sentiment, and well nigh perspires blood and water, to comply with their exactions—toamusethem!—and if he attain this end, the public clap their hands, the manager of the theatre counts out to him a heap of gold, and he goes away, with his ears deafened at the noise which has surrounded him, and which, for a moment, (it maybe), has made his heart beat high;—he goes away, with a loving grasp tightened over the coin he has so hardly won; and inwardly exclaims, with a smile of pity, ‘The blockheads—the barbarians! Who is there among them that can comprehend me—that canfeelmy intentions?’—and then the home-returning public, selfish to the very soul, indemnify themselves for their fingers’-end applause, by sottish contempt, by remarks that are empty, or worse—that are scornful, bitter, shocking, disgusting even—such as those which may have been buzzed into one’s ears in Italy or in Paris, but varied in a hundred ways, and aggravated at will, just ashevaries and enlarges, twists and turns, beneath his magic bow, a subject of apparently the most simple and insignificant kind. And now the voices most distinguishable among the ebbing crowd murmur out the words, ‘Gambler! Libertine!’ or worse.... And the privileged public resort again to the theatre, to admire the talent of him whom they comprehend not; and the artist returns in like manner, toamusethose who provoke his pity, and whom he beholds so far below him! Thus, we have contempt on one side, compassion on the other—applause from hands chilled with the touch of gold, on the one part,—on the other, sounds that borrow their animation from no social sympathy! Such are the relations between the public and the professor—such the bonds that connect them!”
So much for the pungently descriptive, as regards this singular being. It is less difficult, however, to exhibit effects and appearances, than to analyze the causes or means which produce them—and it is in this latter endeavour, accordingly, that there has been least successattained by those who have made Paganini their theme, in Paris, as elsewhere. That which was already obscure in relation to him, has been forced into denser obscurity by the attempted demonstrations of certain pompous literary showmen, who have succeeded only in illustrating the proverb of “ignotum per ignotius.” Mystification and generalization, the resources of ambitious ignorance, have been copiously employed in these endeavours. Of a less unsatisfactory character, however, are the pretensions of M. Guhr, the able violinist, of Frankfort, who has attempted an analysis of the means employed, and the effects produced, by Paganini. Like most professors of a secret, the arch Italian was always studious of maintaining the mystery so provocative of curiosity and admiration. He assumed the air cabalistic, and, with a severe front and sullen eye, would stimulate and foster the impression of his being “profited in strange concealments.” M. Guhr, though he had the seeming advantage of personal and friendly access to him, found he could make nothing of him by the interrogatory system, and therefore adopted the alternative of becoming a silent student of his peculiarities, till he made certain discoveries of more or less importance, which he shaped into five heads, to show that Paganini’s chief points of difference from other violinists were—
1. In his manner of tuning the instrument.
2. In a management of thebow, entirely peculiar to himself.
3. In his mode of using the left hand in thepassages chantans, or passages of a singing character.
4. In the frequent employment of harmonic sounds.
5. In the art of putting the violin into double employ, so as to make it combine with its own usual office the simultaneous effects of a mandolin, harp, or otherinstrument of the kind, whereby you seem to hear two different performers.
As to the first of these points, “his manner of tuning the instrument,” observed M. Guhr, “is wholly original, and to me appears incomprehensible in many respects. Sometimes he tunes the first three strings half a tonehigher, while that of G is a thirdlower, than ordinary. Sometimes he changes this with a single turn of the peg, and he invariably meets the due intonation, which remains sure and firm. Whoever is aware how much the higher strings stretch with the least relaxation of the G, and how much all the strings generally lose, by a sudden change in tuning, the faculty of remaining with certainty at one point, will join me in the lively desire that Paganini may decide on communicating his secret in this respect. It was surprising to find, especially on one occasion, when he played for nearly an hour and a half in the most opposite keys—without its being perceptible that he had changed his tuning—that none of the strings became disturbed. In an evening concert, between theAndanteand thePolacca, his G string snapped, and that which he substituted, though afterwards tuned to B, remained firm as a rock. His manner of tuning his instrument contains the secret of many of his effects, of his succession of chords, and striking vibrations, which ordinarily appear impossible to the violinist.”
According to this statement, “curious, if true,” Paganini improved his effects by playing on an instrumentout of tune, and, with something like a miracle of creative power, produced harmony out of discord. Paganini must of a surety have “pegged hard,” and with a screwing that was inscrutable, to have attained such a management of his pegs! Was M. Guhr a misty demonstrator, or wasPaganini inexplicable? As to the G, that can bear to be pulled about in this fashion without resenting it, we must suppose it to possess a passive virtue, a habit of accommodation, quite beyond the custom of the stringy tribe.38
In expatiating on thesecondpoint, M. Guhr seems content to describe effects, rather than to labour (in vain) for the indication of a cause—but his description is not infelicitous:—
“Paganini’s management of the bow is chiefly remarkableby thetrippingmovement which he imparts to it in certain passages. Hisstaccatois no way similar to that ordinarily produced. He dashes his bow on the strings, and runs over a succession of scales with incredible rapidity, while the tones proceed from beneath his fingers, round as pearls. Thevarietyof his strokes with the bow is wonderful. I had never before heard marked with so much precision, and without the slightest disturbance of the measure, the shortest unaccented notes, in the most hurried movements. And again, what force he imparts in prolonged sounds! With what depth, in the adagio, he exhales, as it were, the sighs of a lacerated heart!”
However he might sometimes err in his doctrine, M. Guhr was at least right in his faith. The supremacy, which he assigned to the great Genoese genius, was expressed in the language of a handsome enthusiasm:—
“Rode, Kreutzer, Baillot, Spohr—those giants among violinists—seemed to have exhausted all the resources of the instrument. They had extended its mechanism, introduced the greatest imaginable variety in the use of the bow, which was made subservient to all the shades of expression and execution: they had succeeded, by the magic of their sounds, which rivalled the human voice, in painting all passions and all the movements of sentiment. In short, advancing rapidly in the path marked out by Corelli, Tartini, and Viotti, they had raised the violin to that rank which ensures to it the dominion of the human soul. Intheirstyle, they are, and remain, great and unsurpassed. But, when we hear Paganini, and compare him with the other masters, it must be confessed that he has passed all the barriers which custom had hitherto raised, and that he has opened a way peculiar to himself, and which essentiallyseparates him from those great Artists; so much so, that whoever hears him for the first time, is astonished and transported at hearing what is so completely new and unexpected;—astonished by the fiend-like power with which he rules over his instrument;—transported that, with a mechanical facility which no difficulty resists, he at the same time opens to the fancy a boundless space, gives to the violin the divinest breathings of the human voice, and deeply moves the inmost feelings of the soul.”
But we have left Paganini himself at Paris, where we must now rejoin him and his fortunes. As for the latter, in the moneyed meaning, they grew with a ratio of increase that would have been more wonderful, had it not been afterwards outdone by that of his gains in London. As it was, they were sufficient to inspire one of the Parisian dilettanti, a nicer worker in figures, with a special access of passion for calculating the value of notes—that is to say, of Paganini’s musical “notes of hand.” The result, based upon a concert given at the Opera at Paris, producing 16,500 francs, and presenting 1365 bars ofthefiddling, indicated a quotient of 12 francs foreach bar, and was still more curiously distributed into proportions as follows:—for a semibreve, 12 francs; a minim, 6 francs; a crotchet, 3 francs; a quaver, 1 franc, 50 centimes; a semiquaver, 15 sous; a demisemiquaver, 7½ sous. This exemplary calculation did not overlook, moreover, the cash value of each of the occurring sorts ofrests; besides working out a “contingent remainder” of 420 francs—that residue happening to be, by the most curious coincidence, exactly the price of such a violin as the Conservatory usually awards by way of prize to its most successful pupils!39
The provoking impertinence of Rumour, with her thousand busy tongues darting conjecture and accusation, drew forth, at Paris, as at Vienna, some effort at self-defence on the part of the assailed Artist. His letter to the Editor of theRévue Musicalemay claim a place here (in translated form), as well for its pleasantry and ingenuity, as for the clue it affords to the origin of some of the slanderous liberties which had and have been taken with his character. Of this letter, it subsequently appears that the materials were furnished by Paganini, and the diction arranged by his friend, M. Fétis:—
Paris, 21 April, 1831.
“Sir,“So many marks of kindness have been lavished on me by the Parisian public,—so many plaudits have been awarded to me,—that I am bound to give credit to that celebrity which is said to have preceded my arrival. But, if any doubt on the subject could have remained, it must have been dissipated by the care I see taken by your artists to make representations of my likeness,—by the numerous portraits of Paganini, more or less like the original, with which the walls of your capital are covered. It is not, however, to simple portraits, Sir, that their speculations are confined. While walking yesterday along the Boulevard des Italiens, I saw, in a print-shop, a lithograph representingPaganini in prison. “Well!” said I to myself, “here have we some worthy citizen who, in imitation of Don Bazilio, has been turning to account the calumny which has pursued me for the last fifteen years.” While smilingly examining all the details of this mystificationwith which the fancy of the artist had furnished him, I perceived that a numerous circle had gathered around me, and that every one, as he compared my features with those of the young man represented in the lithograph, was taking pains to satisfy himself as to the degree in which I was altered since the period of my imprisonment! Thus I found that the thing was takenau sérieux, and that the speculation, at least, was no bad one. It occurred to me that, as every onemust live, I might as well, of myself, furnish a few anecdotes to those enterprising persons who take so much interest in me and my affairs; so that, if so disposed, they may have a few more subjects for prints, as good, and quite as true, as that in question. It is with this view that I beg you, Sir, to do me the favour of inserting this letter in your Musical Review.
“These gentlemen have represented mein prison, but they do not seem to know whattook me there; and, so far, they are about as wise as myself, or as those who have brought the story into circulation. It bears, in fact, a great many versions, and presents a corresponding variety for the designer. It has been said, for instance, that, having surprised a rival in the chamber of my mistress, I had bravely stabbed him from behind, when he was incapable of defending himself. By others, it has been pretended that it was against the person of my mistress herself, that my fury had been directed; but they are not agreed as to themodeI had adopted to accomplish her destruction,—some contending for the poniard, and others for poison; so that, as each has indulged his imagination in describing the affair, it would be hard to deny a similar license to the dealers in lithographs. I will relate what occurred to me at Padua some fifteen years ago.
“I had given a concert there, and had met with considerable success. On the following day, I was one of sixty at atable d’hôte, where I had entered the room without being recognized. One of the guests was pleased to express himself in very flattering terms on my public appearance the evening before. Another concurred in the praise thus bestowed, but added, by way of explanation, “There is nothing in the talent of Paganini which ought to excite surprise. He is indebted for it to the sojourn he has made for eight years of his life within the walls of a dungeon, with nothing but his violin to mitigate the rigors of his captivity. He was condemned to this long confinement for having basely assassinated a friend ofmine, who was his rival.”
“The whole company, as you may well believe, exclaimed against the enormity of the offence. Formypart, I got up, and, addressing the person who seemed so well acquainted with my previous history, begged him to tell me where, when and how, the adventure had taken place. Every eye was turned towards me as I spoke, and you may judge of the general astonishment, when one amongst themselves was thus recognized as the chief actor in the tragedy. The historian was sadly embarrassed. It was no longer one ofhis friendswho had fallen; “he had heard it said,”—“he had been credibly informed,”—“he had believed,—but it was possible that he might have been mistaken!”
“It is thus, Sir, that the reputation of an artist is trifled with, because others, of more indolent habits, are at a loss to understand how a man should apply himself as effectually to study, while at full liberty in his own house, as within the walls of a dungeon!
“At Vienna, a still more preposterous rumour put the credulity of the inhabitants to the test. I had beenplaying those variations known by the name ofLe Stregghe(the Witches). A young man, who was described to me as of a pale and melancholy aspect, with eyes of the most inspired cast, said that he saw nothing surprising in my performance, for, while I was executing my variations, he had distinctly perceived the devil at my elbow, guiding my fingers, and directing my bow; that the said devil was dressed in red; had horns and a tail; and that, moreover, the striking likeness of our countenances plainly established the relationship between us! It was impossible to refuse credence to so circumstantial and descriptive an account: and the curious became satisfied that this was the true secret of what are called mytours de force.
“For a long time, I was weak enough to allow my tranquillity to be disturbed by such idle rumours. I tasked myself to demonstrate their absurdity. I called attention to the fact, that, from the age of fourteen, I had been constantly under the public eye, and giving concerts; that I had been employed, for sixteen years, as chief of the orchestra and director of the music, to the Court; and that, if it were true that I had been eight years in prison for killing my mistress or my rival, it must have been before my first appearance in public; so that I must have had a mistress, and a rival, before I was seven years of age. I invoked even the testimony of my country’s ambassador at Vienna, who declared that he had known me, for nearly twenty years, in the situation which became an honest man; and I thus succeeded, for the moment, in silencing the calumny; but calumny is never totally extinguished, and it does not surprise me to find it revive in this city.
“Under such circumstances, Sir, what ought I to do? I see nothing for it but to submit with resignation, andgive free scope to the exercise of an ingenious malignity. Before concluding, however, I may as well communicate an anecdote, which has probably given rise to some of these injurious rumours about me. It is as follows:
“A performer on the violin, named D . . . ,40who was at Milan in 1798, had connected himself with two men of bad character, who persuaded him to go with them during the night to a neighbouring village, to assassinate the clergyman, who was reported to have been possessed of great wealth. Happily, the heart of one of the associates failed him at the decisive moment, and he resolved to denounce his confederates. The gendarmerie went to the spot, and arrested D...i, and his friend, at the moment of their arrival at the house of thecuré. They were condemned to twenty years’ confinement, and thrown into prison; but General Menou, then Governor of Milan, at the end of the second year, set the artist at liberty.
“Would you believe it, Sir? It was on this foundation, that all my history has been raised. A performer on the violin was in question, and his name ended ini—so that itmusthave beenPaganini. It wasIwho had been in prison, and the assassination became that of my mistress, or my rival. Thus, to explain the discovery of my new style of performance, they encumber me with fetters which would but add to the difficulty. Let me hope, Sir, that if I must yield to the propagators of a calumny so obstinately persevered in against all verisimilitude, they will at least consent to abandon their preyafter death,—and that those who so cruelly avenge themselves of my success, will leave my ashes to rest in peace. Accept, Sir, the assurance, &c.
“Paganini.”
Largely profited in honours and revenue, through his exertions in France, the great artist directed his course to the shores of England, where the reception which awaited him was destined to form a climax to his previous triumphs. Fame, that most eager, but inexact lady-usher, who had introduced him to the French with so many whispers of wild import, took similar liberties when she presented him to the marvelling Londoners. “The page will be a strange one in the history of Art, to be written some fifty years hence (says a writer in theAthenæum), which shall contain all the rumours that heralded Paganini’s first appearance in England, and were quoted in explanation of his outward eccentricities of person and manner. Our children will laugh at the credulity of their fathers, when they read of a magician who strung his instrument with the heart-strings of his mistress—a sort of demon Orpheus, who had been initiated into his power by the gentle ordeals of murder and solitary confinement;—and yet such reports were widely spread, and, strange to say, believed! The writer of this notice remembers having heard it gravely said in society, “that Paganini could play upon his violin when all its strings were taken off!” and, when another of the party, to expose the absurdity of the tale, declared that this wonder of the world had done more, having once actuallystrung a gridiron(his own violin not arriving in time), on which he performed a concerto with immense applause—this second and surpassing marvel (of course fabricated in the humour of the moment) was not only swallowed, but absolutely retailed, as an accredited fact!”
The capacious area of the King’s Theatre, scarcely adequate to the large expectations founded upon his fame, was selected as the scene of his London début. An awkward collision with public opinion marked, however, the interval immediately preceding his appearance. An endeavour to elevate the prices of admission above the usualconcert-pitch, raised a storm of opposition, that was only allayed by prompt and necessary concession. To attribute the attempt, thus properly frustrated, to an extortionate spirit on the part of Paganini, as was pretty generally done at the time, seems hardly fair. It is more reasonable to suppose that his ignorance of the English customs was taken advantage of, for the sordid purposes of others; and on this point it may be worth while here to say a few words. There is in London a class of needy and adventurous foreigners, who, with no available talent of their own, have just industry enough to make them beset those of their countrymen, whose genius or good fortune enables them to figure successfully in our metropolis. Whoever, at the period here referred to, has had occasion to direct his course through the Regent’s Quadrant, either in the twilight of a departing day, or during the brighter reign of gas and night, must have noted the loose, idle, swaggering gait, the tawdry andoutréhabiliments, and the dark and dirty looks, of certain figures who loitered about in obstructive knots, or sauntered on in pairs or threes, among the more regulated passengers. Their equipment was ordinarily completed by a reeking cigar, which added to their sense of importance, and was an auxiliary to their impertinencies of demeanour towards the females, of whatever grade, who chanced to pass within their track. But their “high andpalmystate” was in the gallery of the King’s Theatre, where their pertinacious “manual exercise,” and their laudatory vociferations, in favour of the dancers who successively occupied the stage during the ballet, were a serious annoyance to all around them. Under this character, which seems to have no English termthat will exactly fit it, they were (and still are) known as theclaqueurs. Externally, they are altogether the personification of impudent pretence—and, to enable them to support their equivocal character, they seek out the private quarters of the great singer, or the fortunate artist, in whatever line, and, by all the arts of the meanest flattery, contrive to extract from his purse such tribute as his vanity, or his complaisance, may be willing to afford. It is no unnatural conjecture to suppose that, on the occasion just named, Paganini acted under a mistake produced by influence of this kind.41
Perhaps no achievement in the musical art, performed by one person, has ever been attended with more enthusiasm than marked the exhibition made by Paganini at his first concert in London, given on the 3rd of June, 1831. Certain it is that nothing in the way of musical performance, that had ever preceded it in this country, had exceeded it innovelty. It was the prevalent theme of talking wonder; and all the ingenuities of written criticism were tasked to describe and estimate it. Allowing for the difficulty of appreciating, where the singularity was so great, there was a remarkable acuteness shewn in some of the accounts that appeared in the journals of the day. From these I propose to make a few extracts, selecting such as seem best to illustrate the peculiarities with which they had to deal. Let us commence with a statement given in the first person, by Mr. Gardner, of Leicester.
“At the hazard of my ribs, I placed myself at the Opera door, two hours and a half before the concert began; presently, the crowd of musicians and violinists filled the Colonnade to suffocation, all anxious to get the front seat, because they had to pay for their places, Paganini not giving a single ticket away. The Concert opened with Beethoven’s Second Symphony, admirably performed by the Philharmonic band; after which Lablache sangLargo al Factotum, with much applause, and was encored. A breathless silence then ensued, and every eye was watching the action of this extraordinary violinist: and, as he glided from the side scenes to the front of the stage, an involuntary cheering burst from every part of the house, many rising from their seats to view thespectreduring the thunder of this unprecedented cheering—his gaunt and extraordinary appearance being more like that of a devotee, about to suffer martyrdom, than one to delight you with his art. With the tip of his bow, he set off the orchestra, in a grand military movement, with a force and vivacity as surprising as it was new. At the termination of this introduction, he commenced with a soft streamy note of celestial quality: and, with three or four whips of his bow, elicited points of sound that mounted to the third heaven, and as bright as the stars. A scream of astonishment and delight burst from the audience at the novelty of this effect. Immediately, an execution followed, that was equally indescribable, in which were intermingled tones more than human, which seemed to be wrung from the deepest anguish of a broken heart. After this, the audience were enraptured by a lively strain, in which you heard, commingled with the tones of the instrument, those of the voice, with thepizzicatoof the guitar, forming a compound of exquisite beauty. If it werepossible to aim at a description of his manner, we should say that you would take the violin to be a wild animal which he is endeavouring to quiet in his bosom, and which he occasionally, fiend-like, lashes with his bow; this he dashes upon the strings as you would whip with a walking switch; tearing from the creature the most horrid as well as delightful tones. He has long legs and arms, and his hands, in his playing, often assume the attitude of prayer, with the fingers pointed upwards. The highest notes (contrary to every thing we have learnt) are produced as the hand recedes from the bridge; overturning all our previous notions of the art. During these effects, a book caught fire upon one of the desks, which burned for some time unobserved by the musicians, who could neither see nor hear (though repeatedly called to by the audience) any thing but the feats of this wonderful performer. Some few pieces were played by the orchestra, that gave repose to the admiring audience. He then entered upon his celebrated performance of the single string, introducing the air ofNel cor più(Hope told a flattering tale), to which he imparted a tone so ‘plaintive and desolate that the heart was torn by it;’ in the midst of this he was sooutré—so comic—as to occasion the loudest bursts of laughter! This feat was uproariously encored. He then retired to put on three other strings, and ended this miraculous performance with the richestarpeggiosand echoes, intermingled with new effects that no language can describe! Though he retired amidst a confusion of huzzas and bravos that completely drowned the full orchestra, yet he was called for to receive the homage of the audience. There was no trick in his playing; it was all fair, scientific execution, opening to us a new order of sounds, the highest of which ascended two octaves above C in alt.”
Our next demonstration is from the able pen that gave life and eloquence to the new “Tatler:”—
“Those of our readers who have heard the most eminent of violin performers, eminent for strength, sweetness, and purity of tone, will hear all these requisites to absolute perfection in Paganini. They who have heard difficulties in the way of execution overcome, which it seemed bordering on desperation to attempt, may tax their faculties to invent new enormities, and they will not only fall short in their imaginings, but he will perform all, and more, not merely without show of effort, but as if they were a fanciful prelude, or pastime, to some laborious undertaking. In the course of the concert given last evening at the Opera-house, he performed four pieces, in which, we conceive, he exhibited every feature that the instrument can display, and many more than it has hitherto been thought capable of. The first was a concerto of the most florid character, varied with movements of exquisite expression and tenderness. The second was a composition in the minor key, and which, for its own intrinsic merit, made the strongest appeal to our feelings. In it he satisfied at once any doubt we might have that he would prove unequal in acantabile.—His expression in this piece was the most genuine display of passionate feeling we ever remember to have heard on any instrument. It required no explanatory chorus, no voice of accompaniment—it was the perfection of musical sighing, and gentle sorrow. The third performance was a military rondo, the whole of which he played upon one string—the fourth. In it he introduced the subject of ‘Non più andrai’ fromFigaro, with variations of the most astonishing description. He introduced passages of imitation in octaves, with wonderful rapidity and neatness, and with a purity of tone that was delicious. Theprecision, too, with which he dashed from the lowest note of the string to the opposite extreme, and all with the utmost indifference of manner, was one of the commonest of his achievements. The last piece, which was a brilliant rondo, he played entirely without the orchestral accompaniment; and this was the triumph of the evening. It consisted of an air with variations, crowded with enharmonic passages. The subject, now legato, and now hurried, was at one time attended with a florid, and at another with apizzicatoaccompaniment; and, as he drew to a close, he accelerated his time to aprestissimo, the air and the pizzicato moving on together, and ending with arapid shake upon the latter! The violin-player will fully appreciate the difficulty of this achievement. It is scarcely necessary to state that the audience weresatisfied. The applause was showered upon him in torrents.”
Another commentator thus expresses himself:—
“Paganini’s playing is in a very high degree intellectual. It is mental, as well as physical and mechanical. The instant he seizes his violin, which he usually coquets with for a time before bringing it up to its proper place, a sudden animation passes over his countenance. He has the advantage, which all concerto players, by the way, ought to adopt, ofnever using a book. This mode, in itself, has as much the superiority as a speech delivered has over one that is read. When the first bow is drawn, Paganini is evidently lost to every other thought, and is revelling probably in a world of his own creation. All his passages seem free and unpremeditated, as if conceived on the instant. One has no impression of their having cost him either forethought or labour. The word difficulty has no place in his vocabulary, so completely is all brought under his subjection and mastery.
“Nothing can be more intense in feeling than his conception and delivery of an adagio passage. His tone is not, perhaps, so full and round as that of some other players—as Baillot, or De Beriot, for example: it is delicate, rather than strong; but that delicacy is inconceivable, unless one has heard it, and was probably never possessed equally by any other player. His touch is occasionally so fine, that the note seems to float in the air, and not to spring from any instrument. In point of expression, it is impossible to imagine any thing more perfect. The melancholy or tender (as should be the case in slow movements) mostly predominates; but there is no shade or form of expression which the genius of Paganini does not draw forth. His adagios are intermixed with passages of rapid execution, which go off with the rapidity of a rocket, or a falling star—a break of the subject, or an impertinence, in any hands but his own—but, if analyzed, all is in perfect keeping.
“The only thing that can be said to lessen the wonder of Paganini’s powers in the way of mere mechanism, is that he is indebted for them, in some measure, to his own peculiar conformation. His long arms, and slender frame, allow him to place the instrument in the most advantageous position that is possible; and his left arm is brought so completely under it, that his hand seems to cover the whole extent of the finger-board. Such is the flexibility, besides, of his joints, that he can throw his thumb nearly back upon his wrist, and extend his little finger, at the same time, in the opposite direction. By these means, when in the first position, as it is called, of the violin, he can reach, without shifting, to the second octave. His extreme high notes—for he contrives to play three octaves on each string—are given, consequently, with a precision and certainty never heardbefore. This flexibility, without doubt, is indispensable to the execution of many of the passages, though it is, probably, not wholly natural to him, but acquired, in part, by his long and severe practice. His solo on the fourth or G string (the other three being discarded for the occasion) we consider among the most charming, as well as the most wonderful, specimens. There are few players, we apprehend, who, in point of mere difficulty, could do on four strings what Paganini does on one; but that is nothing. The charm lies in the peculiar effect—in the soft and silvery tone of that string, which one almost imagines to be increased, though, perhaps, without reason, by taking the others away. No defect is felt, as regards compass, in this piece. There appear to be as many notes as in the violin in its ordinary state; and, in fact, by the aid of the harmonics, he does make nearly as many.”
Such were the wonders achieved, and such the impressions created, by this superlative master of the most versatile of instruments. After he had performed at this his first concert, Mori went about with the jesting enquiry, “Who’ll buy a fiddle and bow for eighteen-pence?” and John Cramer exclaimed, “Thank Heaven, I am not a violin-player!” It seemed, in short, to be commonly admitted, that, as nothing had been heard before, in violin performance, equal to this exhibition, so nothing could be expected ever to exceed it—that “the force of fiddling could no further go.” One of the numerous critics whom he kindled into rapture, observed that in the style of Paganini were united the majesty of Rode, the vigour of Baillot, the sentiment of Spohr, thesensibilitéof Kiesewetter, the suavity of Vaccari, the mastery of Maurer, thejustesseof Lafont, and the elegant expression of De Beriot!
The excitement produced by the first public display of these powers in our metropolis was fully sustained on the subsequent occasions. It would fill a volume of itself, were I to treat, “avec circonstance,” of the successive concerts at theatres and other places, in which the Genoese genius electrified attending mortals