When she plays Chopin, she interprets his
sureness and neatness. She is the master of Chopin's technique, but
she never walks where Chopin walks on the heights. Somehow, she
stops short of the fulness of music.
I did like her method with Brahms, and she was not unwilling, at my
suggestion, to go over and over the Three Rhapsodies. On the Third
Intermezzo she was at her best, and a good best it was.
"You were talking of Debussy," she remarked. "I've got some of his
stuff here. But I don't get into it. I don't understand it, and
there is no use in trying. It doesn't seem altogether like real
music to me. It fails to get hold of me, just as I fail to get hold
of it."
"Yet you like MacDowell," I challenged.
"Y. . . es," she admitted grudgingly. "His New England Idylls and
Fireside Tales. And I like that Finnish man's stuff, Sibelius, too,
although it seems to me too soft, too richly soft, too beautiful, if
you know what I mean. It seems to cloy."
What a pity, I thought, that with that noble masculine touch of hers
she is unaware of the deeps of music.
Pages:
181
182
183
184
185
186
187
188
189
190
191
192
193
194
195
196
197
198
199
200
201
202
203
204
205