CHAPTER VI.
HARMONIES POETIQUES.
Liszt’s Tribute to Wagner—A New Form of Instrumental Music—Liszt’s new Departure—The Symphonic Poem—Its Essence and Characteristics—The Union of Poetry and Music—Programme Music—How Liszt Developed his new Forms—Analysis of Individual Works—Liszt’s Tribute to Beethoven—His notice of “Egmont”—Beethoven as a Pioneer—Fulfillment of Haydn’s Prophecy.
AFTER the orchestral composition of Beethoven how many thought they would be obliged to acknowledge that his great “Ninth” was also to be the last symphony!
“There rose a towering genius, a sparkling, flaming spirit, summoned to wear a double crown of fire and gold. He boldly dreamed, as poets dream, to fix his aim so high that if it could ever be attained by art, it would certainly happen at a time when the public was no longer made up of that vacillating, heterogeneous, unprogressive, ignorant and conceited crowd, which in our time sits in judgment and dictates decrees, which the boldest scarcely venture to question.” Thus Liszt once said of Wagner, and to whom does it apply with more force than to himself?
Let us listen to an account of the new Siegfried-achievement which has been famous for almost a quarter of a century. It is the flower of the grand journalistic labor of a distinguished, theoretical musician of the future, now dead, and only retouched and amplified in some places to suit our more accurate estimate of things. It is in the “Neue Zeitschrift fuer Musik,” of the year 1858, and thus reads: “Goethe has already compared the progress of the physical sciences, as it appeared to him, to a wanderer, who approaches the rising luminary, and when it suddenly bursts upon him with blinding effulgence, is forced to turn away, because he can not endure it. The achievements in the musical world surpass this, for music pictures the grandest phenomena of modern culture.
“Just as every one must see the grand future which Richard Wagner has assured to the musical drama, so Liszt, by the freshness of his individuality has animated instrumental music, in that he has utilized its form for his purposes. The perception of the programme, the union of the known and unknown, these are what instrumental music have acquired for our time and for the future. Originally, music alone was sufficient, now we have the totality of culture.
“In marked contrast with the earlier style is the Symphonic Poem, which is extraordinarily striking in character. Such a title is the egg of Columbus, and it expresses the thoroughly accurate knowledge of the author. The poetical method was the only one left for progress, or the combination of the instrumental work with a general texture of poetical ideas, and thus complete mastery of the programme was achieved. We see in Beethoven how one with perfect knowledge seizes upon the fresh material of the intellectual life about him. It is (as Liszt’s favorite scholar, Hans Von Buelow expresses it,) the lamentation of the eagle whose flight is checked by the ardor of the sunbeams, the mournful roar of the lion whom the impenetrable darkness has overtaken. A newer, grander horizon looms up—a spiritual world full of poetry.
“Liszt grasped this manifold material with the strength of his imagination, and introduced it in the world of music. Having gradually arrived at complete maturity he gave his attention to a great variety of themes and taking them from the outer world he adapted them to the inner. With Germans that feeling is uppermost and it arouses the activity of the fancy. Reversing the process, the fancy seizes the object and arouses activity of feeling. There are spirit-tones, corresponding to the emotions of the soul, which form the substance of the early music. One has the feeling that here humanity approaches the highest questions, reflectively, not merely feeling them intuitively. It is consequently a new form above the bounds of music and musical knowledge, a spiritual form, yet coupled with a corresponding artistic natural skill, a form of higher intelligence and grander structure as time advanced and the relations of life were increased, for the most of the earlier musicians only foreshadowed it. We recognize, at a glance, the individuality of Liszt, and the requirements demanded by our times as well as the absence of that continual obtruding exclusiveness, that obstinate conservatism of the earlier times of music. At the very foundation of this lies a strong and solid individuality. Only the branches and twigs come in contact with the outer world, thus leaving space for development and drawing nourishment from it, while the trunk defies every storm. A brilliant, sentient basis, a grand and powerful array of passion, a depth of expression and spiritual value, a great, broad horizon, are the results.
“In the single works we do not find the variety of tone, the exuberance of emotion, nor the multitude of situations to be found in the works of the earlier masters, but when we consider them as a whole, their immense richness is disclosed. A great multitude of new ideas appear as revealed in the music, taking the place of what had been already settled and what was lost and gone. There was a joyous astonishment when this new world arose and when one realized its richness and diversity. There are the ‘Preludes,’ with their naivete and simple but strong texture. With what sad and tender, yet grand emotions the poet appears in ‘Tasso!’ A poetical glory illuminates ‘Orpheus.’ Antique austerity, boldness and ruggedness are the predominating peculiarities of ‘Prometheus.’ An enticing fascination carries us to the height of the ideal in the ‘Berg Symphony.’ Brilliancy, festal revelry, chivalrous elegance and knightliness are the traits which characterize the ‘Festklaenge.’ German tenderness and intensity, German dignity and intellectual power confront us in ‘Faust.’ The Adagio, called ‘Gretchen,’ fills our very souls with the sad ecstatic words of Faust: ‘Can it be that woman is so fair?’ A mystical meaning lies hidden in ‘Dante,’ fantastic weirdness in the ‘Hungaria,’ the sublimity of sorrow in the ‘Héroide funébre.’ Every work is a unit in itself, and as different works represent different moods, they can be worked out with greater sharpness and precision.”
Thus originated that richness of inward variety, that full scale of human possibilities manifested in the complete development and mastery of situations, which we call Liszt’s “Symphonic Poems.”
In closing, we may say, to quote from “The Meistersaenger”: “The witnesses, I think, were well selected. Is your Hans Sachs on that account disturbed?” The best literary test of the matter is contained in Richard Wagner’s “Letters on Franz Liszt’s Symphonic Poems,” which appeared in 1857. Liszt himself demonstrated his clear understanding of the far-reaching progress he had made for his art in his analysis of Beethoven’s “Egmont” music, in 1854.
“In ‘Egmont’ we recognize one of the first illustrations of the modern period. A great musician derives his inspiration directly from the works of a great poet,” says he. “At this time Beethoven appears to us as bold and rich in meaning as he was uncertain and wavering in his first attempts. When he composed these fragments he began to open up a new path for art. With mighty hand he felled the first tree in this hitherto unknown forest. Even while he cleared away the first obstacles and laid his hand to his work he entered upon the path himself. The world regarded this first step without particular attention, but the time came when art advanced upon this path and found it illuminated and laid out by him.”
Liszt describes himself when he thus characterizes the present epoch of music: “Going back to antiquity and searching for material scarcely anywhere do we fail to find a period of poetical life. Imagery and color characterize the tone-work of the people of the Orient as well as of the Occident. A full flooded magnetic stream unites poetry and music, those two forms of human thought and feeling.” He above all others has in reality done for music what was prophesied by Joseph Haydn, the father of the symphony, who was the first to invest it with a distinctively poetical character. At the close of his days he declared that what was yet to happen in music would be far greater than what had happened in it.