Music-Study in Germany, from the Home Correspondence of Amy Fay

—BERLIN, May 31, 1874.

This season with Deppe has been of such immense importance to me, that I don't know what sum of money I would take in exchange for it. By practicing in his method the tone has an entirely different sound, being round, soft and yet penetrating, while the execution of passages is infinitely facilitated and perfected. In fact, it seems to me that in time one could attain anything by it, but time it will have. One has to study for months very slowly and with very simple things, to get into the way of playing so, and to be able to think about each finger as you use it – to "feel the note and make it conscious." Deppe won't let me finish anything at present, so I can't tell how far along I am myself. His principle is, never to learn a piece completely the first time you attack it, but to master it three-quarters, and then let it lie as you would fruit that you have put on a shelf to ripen; – afterward, take it up again and finish it. The principle may be a good one, but it prevents my ever having anything to play for people, and consequently I have ceased playing in company entirely. In fact, I find it impossible, and I don't see how Sherwood manages it. He has a whole repertoire, and sits down and plays piece after piece deliciously. But then he is a perfect genius, and will make a sensation when he comes out. He has that natural repose and imperturbability that are everything to an artist, but which, unfortunately, so few of us possess. His compositions, too, are exquisite, and so poetical! Mrs. Wrisley,9 of Boston, and Fräulein Estleben, of Sweden, who left Kullak when I did, are also gifted creatures, whereas I think I am only a steady old poke-along, who won't give up! Sherwood, however, is head and shoulders above all of us.

[The following extract, taken from the report in the Musical Review of Mr. Sherwood's address before the Music Teachers' National Association in Buffalo, in June, 1880, would seem to show that whether this distinguished young virtuoso, now by far the leading American concert-pianist, gained his ideas on the study of touch and tone from Herr Deppe or not, he certainly endorses them in both his playing and his teaching: – "It makes a great deal of difference whether a piano be struck with a stick, with mechanical fingers, or with fingers that are full of life and magnetism. I have examined Rubinstein's hand and arm, and found that they are not only full of life and magnetism, but that they are extremely elastic, and the fingers are so soft that the bones are scarcely felt. Can practice produce these qualities? I believe so, and I make it a point both with my pupils and myself to practice slow motions. It is much easier to strike quickly than slowly, but practice in the slow movement will develop both muscular and nervous power. And the tone obtained by this motion is much better than that obtained by striking. The mechanical practice in vogue at Leipsic and other European conservatories often fails because the subject of æsthetics and tone beauties are neglected." See pp. 288, 302-3, 334.] – ED.

My lessons with Deppe are a genuine musical excitement to me, always. In every one is something so new and unexpected – something that I never dreamed of before – that I am lost in astonishment and admiration. The weeks fly by like days before I know it. Deppe gives me the most beautiful music, and never wastes time over things which will be of no use to me afterward. Every piece has an aim, and is lovely, also, to play to people. Now, in Tausig's and Kullak's conservatories I wasted quantities of time over things which are beautiful enough, and do to play to one's self, but which are not in the least effective to play to other people either in the parlour or in the concert-room – as Bach's Toccata in C, for example. Such things take a good while to learn, and are of no practical advantage afterward. But Deppe has an organized plan in everything he does.

In my study with Kullak when I had any special difficulties, he only said, "Practice always, Fräulein. Time will do it for you some day. Hold your hand any way that is easiest for you. You can do it in this way – or in this way" – showing me different positions of the hand in playing the troublesome passage – "or you can play it with the back of the hand if that will help you any!" But Deppe, instead of saying, "Oh, you'll get this after years of practice," shows me how to conquer the difficulty now. He takes a piece, and while he plays it with the most wonderful fineness of conception, he cold-bloodedly dissects the mechanical elements of it, separates them, and tells you how to use your hand so as to grasp them one after the other. In short, he makes the technique and the conception identical, as of course they ought to be, but I never had any other master who trained his pupils to attempt it.

Deppe also hears me play, I think, in the true way, and as Liszt used to do: that is, he never interrupts me in a piece, but lets me go through it from beginning to end, and then he picks out the places he has noted, and corrects or suggests. These suggestions are always something which are not simply for that piece alone, but which add to your whole artistic experience – a principle, so to speak. So, without meaning any disparagement to the splendid masters to whom I owe all my previous musical culture, I cannot help feeling that I have at last got into the hands not of a mere piano virtuoso, however great, but, rather, of a profound musical savant– a man who has been a violinist, as well as a director, and who, without being a player himself, has made such a study of the piano, that probably all pianists except Liszt might learn something from him. You may all think me "enthusiastic," or even wild, as much as you like; but whether or not I ever conquer my own block of a hand – which has every defect a hand can have! – when I come home and begin teaching you all on Deppe's method, you'll succumb to the genius and beauty of it just as completely as I have. You will then all admit I was RIGHT!

July 22. – I have finally made up my mind to go to Pyrmont when Deppe does, and spend several weeks, keeping right on with my lessons, and perhaps, giving a little concert there. I have always had a curiosity to visit one of the German watering places, as I'm told they are extremely pleasant.

—PYRMONT, August 1, 1874.

Here I am in Pyrmont, and there's no knowing where I shall turn up next! Fräulein Steiniger got here before me, but Deppe has not yet arrived from Brussels, whither he has gone to be present at the yearly exhibition of the Conservatoire there. He has been appointed one of the judges on piano-playing. Pyrmont is a lovely little place. It is in a valley surrounded by hills, heavily wooded, and has a beautiful park, as all German towns have, no matter how small. The avenues of trees surpass anything I ever saw. The soil has something peculiar about it, and is particularly adapted to trees. They grow to an immense height, and their stems look so strong, and their foliage is so tremendously luxuriant, that it seems as if they were ready to burst for very life!

Fräulein Steiniger went with me to look up some rooms. Every family in Pyrmont takes lodgers, so that it is not difficult to find good accommodations. The women are renowned for being good housekeepers and their rooms are charmingly fitted up, but the prices are very high, as they live the whole year on what they make in summer. People come here to drink the waters of the springs, and to take the baths, which are said to be very invigorating. My rooms are near the principal "Allée" or Avenue, leading from the Springs. About half way down is a platform where the orchestra sit and play three times a day – at seven in the morning (which is the hour before breakfast, when it is the thing to take a glass or two of the water, and promenade a little), at four in the afternoon, when everybody takes their coffee in the open air, and at seven in the evening. As I don't drink the waters I do not rise early, and am usually awakened by the strains of the orchestra. There is a little piazza outside my window where I take my breakfast and supper. For dinner I go to "table-d'hôte" at a hotel near. – It is a great relief to get out of Berlin and see something green once more. I find the weather very cool, however, and one needs warm clothing here.

There are the loveliest walks all about Pyrmont that you can imagine, and beautiful wood-paths are cut along the sides of the hills. My favourite one is round the cone of a small hill to the right of the town. The path completely girdles it, and you can start and walk round the hill, returning to the point you set out from. It is like a leafy gallery, and before and behind you is always this curving vista. Whenever I take the walk it reminds me of —

"Curved is the line of beauty,Straight is the line of duty;Follow the last and thou shalt seeThe other ever following thee."

It is the first time I ever succeeded in combining the carved and the straight line at the same time – because, of course, it is my duty to take exercise!

CHAPTER XXVII

The Brussels Conservatoire. Steiniger. Excursion to Kleinberg. Giving a Concert. Fräulein TimmPYRMONT, August 15, 1874.

Deppe has got back from Brussels, and, as you may imagine, he had much to tell about his flight into the world, particularly as he had also been to London. He had a delightful time with the professors of the Brussels Conservatoire, who were all extremely polite to him, and he heard some talented young pupils. There was one girl about seventeen, whom he said he would give a good deal to have as his pupil, so gifted is she, though her playing did not suit him in many respects. He said he could have made some severe criticisms, but he refrained – partly because he felt the uselessness of it, partly because he says "it is extraordinary how amiable one gets when young ladies are in question!" He was very enthusiastic over the violin classes. "What a bow the youngsters do draw!" he exclaimed. Dupont, the great piano teacher in Brussels, must be a man of considerable "esprit," judging from the two of his compositions that I am familiar with – the "Toccata" and the "Staccato." I used to hear a good deal about him from his pupil Gurickx, whom I met in Weimar. Certainly Gurickx played magnificently, and with a brio I have rarely heard equalled. He is like an electric battery. Quite another school, however, from Deppe's – the severe, the chaste and the classic! Extreme purity of style is Deppe's characteristic, and not the passionate or the emotional. For instance, he has scarcely given me any Chopin, but keeps me among the classics, as he says on that side my musical culture has been deficient. He says that Chopin has been "so played to death that he ought to be put aside for twenty years!" – But if Chopin were really sympathetic to him he could never say that! The truth is, the modern "problematische Natur" has no charms for a transparent and simple temperament like his.

Steiniger has been playing most beautifully lately. She has given two concerts of her own here, and has played at another. Then she rehearsed with orchestra Mozart's B flat major concerto – the most difficult concerto in the world, and oh, so exquisite! Though I had long wished to do so, I never had heard it before, and as I listened I felt as if I never could leave Deppe until I could play that! I wish you could have heard it. It is sown with difficulties – enough to make your hair stand on end! Steiniger played it with an ease and perfection truly astonishing. The notes seemed fairly to run out of her fingers for fun. The last movement was Mozart all over, just as merry as a cricket! – I doubt whether anybody can play this concerto adequately who has not studied with Deppe. The beauty of his method is that the greatest difficulties become play to you.

I love to see Deppe direct the orchestra when Steiniger plays a concerto of Mozart. His clear blue eyes dance in his head and look so sunny, and he stands so light on his feet that it seems as if he would dance off himself on the tips of his toes, with his bâton in his hand! He is the incarnation of Mozart, just as Liszt and Joachim are of Beethoven, and Tausig was of Chopin. He has a marvellously delicate musical organization, and an instinct how things ought to be played which amounts to second sight. Fräulein Steiniger said to him one day: "Herr Deppe, I don't know why it is, but I can't make the opening bars of this piece sound right. It doesn't produce the impression it ought." "I know why," said Deppe. "It is because you don't strike the chord of G minor before you begin," – and so it was. When she struck the chord of G minor, it was the right preparation, and brought you immediately into the mood for what followed. It fixed the key.

Aside from music, Deppe, like all artists, has the most childlike nature, and I think Mozart is so peculiarly sympathetic to him because he has such a simple and sunny temperament himself. We made a beautiful excursion the other day in carriages, through the hills, to a little village far distant, where we drank coffee in the open air. Deppe, who knows every foot of the ground about Pyrmont, which he has frequented from his youth up, kept calling our attention to all the points of the scenery over and over again with the greatest delight, quite forgetting that he repeated the same thing fifty times. "That little village over there is called Kleinberg. It has a school and a church, and the pastor's name is Koehler," he would say to me first. Then he would repeat it to every one in our carriage. Then he would stand up and call it over to the carriage behind us. Then when he had got out he said it to the assembled crowd, and as I walked on in advance with Fräulein Estleben, the last thing I heard floating over the hill-top was, "The pastor's name is Koehler," – so I knew he was still instructing some one in the fact. "I wonder how often Deppe has repeated that?" I said to Fräulein Estleben. "At least fifty times," said she, laughing. "I'm going back to him and ask him once more what the name of the pastor is." So I went back, and said, "By the way, Herr Deppe, what did you say the name of the pastor of that village is?" "Koehler," said dear old Deppe, with great distinctness and with such simple good faith that I felt reproached at having quizzed him, though the others could scarcely keep their countenances, as they knew what I was after.

I have been preparing for some time to give a concert of Chamber Music in the salon of the hotel here, and expect it to take place a week from to-day. My head feels quite lame from so much practicing, the consequence, I suppose, of so much listening. I am to play a Quintette, Op. 87, in E major, by Hummel, for piano and strings, and a Beethoven Sonata, Op. 12, in E flat, for violin and piano, and the other instruments will play a Quartette by Haydn in between. It is a beautiful little programme, I think – every piece perfect of its kind. If I succeed in this concert as I hope, I shall probably listen to Deppe's implorings and remain under his guidance another season. Deppe believes that one must go through successive steps of preparation before one is fitted to attack the great concert works. I've found out (what he took good care not to tell me in the beginning!) that his "course" is three years!! and you can't hurry either him or his method. Your fingers have got to grow into it. – I do not at all regret, with you, not having hitherto played in concert; on the contrary, I think it providential that I did not. You see, you and I started out with wholly impracticable and ridiculous ideas. We thought that things could be done quickly. Well, they can't be done quickly and be worth anything. One must keep an end in view for years and gradually work up to it. The length of time spent in preparation has to be the same, whether you begin as a child (which is the best, and indeed the only proper way), or whether you begin after you have grown up. It is a ten years' labour, take it how you will.

—PYRMONT, August 15, 1874.

My concert came off yesterday evening, and Deppe says it was a complete success. I did not play any solos, after all, though I had prepared some beautiful ones, for Deppe said the programme would be too long, and he was not quite sure of my courage. "You'd be frightened, if you were a Herr Gott!" said he; but, contrary to my usual habit, I wasn't frightened in the least, and I think I did as well as such a shaky, trembly concern as I, could have expected, particularly as my hands are two little fiends who won't play if they don't feel like it, do what I will to make them! – My programme was à la Joachim (!) – only three pieces of Chamber Music: —

Deppe arranged the whole thing most practically. We had a large salle in the Hotel Bremen which was admirably proportioned, and a new grand piano from Berlin. Deppe had only so many chairs placed as he had given out invitations, and the consequence was that every chair was filled, and there were no rows of empty seats. My "public" was very musical and critical, and there were so many good judges there that I wonder I wasn't nervous; but a sort of inspiration came to me at the moment.

The musicians who accompanied me were exceedingly good ones for such a place as Pyrmont, and my strictly classic selections were received with great favour by the audience! That quintette of Hummel's is a most charming composition – so flowing and elegant – and one can display a good deal of virtuosity in the last part of it. I played first and last, and the quartette in between was performed by the stringed instruments alone. After I had finished the quintette, Deppe, who was at the extreme end of the hall, sent me word that I was "doing famously, and that he was delighted," and this encouraged me so that my sonata went beautifully, too. When it was over, ever so many people came up and congratulated me, and Fräulein Timm, Deppe's head teacher in Hamburg, even complimented me on my "extraordinary facility of execution." I couldn't help laughing at that, with my stubborn hand which never will do anything, and which only the most intense study has schooled – but in truth I was quite surprised myself at the plausible way in which it went over all difficulties! Quite a number of Deppe's scholars were present, all of them critics and several of them beautiful pianists. Two nice American girls, sisters, from the West, came on from Berlin on purpose for my concert. They helped me dress, and presented me with an exquisite bouquet. One of them is taking lessons of Deppe, and the other has a great talent for drawing, and has been two years studying in Berlin. She says she has only made a "beginning" now, and that she wishes to study "indefinitely" yet. – So it is in Art! I think her heads are excellent already.

After the concert was over, Deppe gave me a little champagne supper, together with Fräuleins Timm, Steiniger, and these two young ladies. When he poured out the wine he said he was going to propose a toast to two ladies; one of them, of course, was myself, "and the other," said he, "is in America, namely, the friend of Fräulein Fay, whom I judge to be a woman of genius, so truly and rightly does she feel about art (I've translated H's letters to him), and so nobly has she sympathized with and stood by Fräulein Fay. – To Mrs. A., whose acquaintance I long to make!" – You may be sure I drank to that toast with enthusiasm. Ah, it was a pleasant evening, after so many years of fruitless toil! The fat and jolly old landlord came himself to put me into the carriage and to say that everybody in the audience had expressed their pleasure and gratification at my performance. I rather regret now that I did not play my solos, but perhaps it is just as well to leave them until another time. I have "sprung over one little mound" – to use Deppe's simile – and got an idea of the impetus that will be necessary to "carry me over the mountain."

—PYRMONT, September 4, 1874.

After the unwonted exaltation of the success of my little concert, I have been suffering a corresponding reaction, partly because Fräulein Timm, Deppe's Hamburg assistant, with whom I am now studying, began her instructions, as teachers always do, by chucking me into a deeper slough of despond than usual. Consequently, I haven't been very bright, though I am gradually coming up to the surface again, for I'm pretty hard to drown!

Fräulein Timm belongs to the single sisterhood, but is one of the fresh and placid kind, and as neat as wax. She's got a great big brain and a remarkable gift for teaching, for which she has a passion. I quite adore her when she gets on her spectacles, for then she looks the personification of Sagacity! She has been associated with Deppe for years in teaching, and "keeps all his sayings and ponders them in her heart." Indeed, she knows his ideas almost better than he does himself, and carries on the whole circle of pupils that he left in Hamburg when he came to Berlin. Every now and then he runs down to see how they are getting on, gives them all lessons, reviews what they have done, and brings Fräulein Timm all the new pieces he has discovered and fingered. She also comes occasionally to Berlin to see him, takes a lesson every day, fills herself with as many new ideas as possible, and then returns to her post. Together, they form a very strong pair, and I think it a capital illustration of your theory that men ought to associate women with them in their work, and that "men should create, and women perfect."

Deppe makes Fräulein Timm and Fräulein Steiniger his partners and associates in his ideas, and the consequence is they add all their ingenuity to impart them to others. This spares him much of the tedious technical work, and leaves him free for the higher spheres of art, as they take the beginners and prepare them for him. He has made them magnificent teachers, and they employ their gifts to further him. I don't doubt that through them his method will be perpetuated, and even if he should die it would not be lost to the world. On the other hand, he has given them something to live for. – Curious that the practicalness of this association with women doesn't strike the masculine mind oftener!

So I am going down to Hamburg to study for a time with this Fräulein Timm, as I think she will develop my hand quicker than Deppe, even. Deppe has always urged me to it, but I never would do it, as I did not know her personally, and did not wish to leave him. Now that I have tried her, however, I find he was right, as he always is! At present she is throwing her whole weight upon my wrist, which I hope will get limber under it! She has an obstinacy and a perseverance in sticking at you that drive you almost wild, but make you learn "lots" in the end. I think my grand trouble all these years has been a stiff wrist and a heavy arm. I have borne down too heavily on wrist and arm, whereas the whole weight and power must be just in the tips of the fingers, and the wrist and arm must be quite light and free, the hand turning upon the wrist as if it were a pivot.

Pyrmont is an exquisite little place, and I regret to leave it. At first I almost perished with loneliness, but now that I have a few acquaintances here I am enjoying it. It is a fashionable watering place, but chiefly visited by ladies. There are about a hundred women to one man! The first week I was here I lived at a Herr S.'s, but finding it too expensive I looked up another lodging and am now living with a jolly old maid. I like living with old maids. I think they are much neater than married women, and they make you more comfortable. As the season is now over, this one's house is quite empty, and it is exquisitely kept. I took two rooms in the third story, small but very cozy, and with a lovely view of the hills.

We have just had the loveliest illumination I ever saw. It was one Sunday evening – "Golden Sunday" they call it here, though why they should call it so, I know not. I accepted the information, however, without inquiry into first causes, and went out in the evening to promenade in the Allée with the rest. The Allée is not all on a level, but descends gradually from the springs to a fountain which is at the opposite end. Rows and rows of Japanese lanterns were festooned across the trees. As you walked down the path, you saw the festoons one below the other. The fountain was illuminated with gas jets behind the water. You could not see the water till you got close up, and at a distance only the rows of gas jets were apparent. As you neared it, however, the watery veil seemed flung over them, like the foamy tulle over a bride. It was very fascinating to look at, and I kept receding a few paces and then returning. As I receded, the watery veil would disappear, and as I approached it would again take form. It reminded me of some people's characters, of which you see the bright points from the first, and think you know them so well, but when you draw closer, even in the moments of greatest intimacy, you always feel a veil between you and them – a thin, impalpable something which you cannot annihilate, even though you may see through it.