Over a hundred and fifty years ago, in the year 1747, John Sebastian Bach went to Potsdam to visit Frederick the Great, and while there he was asked to try over some of the new fortepianos that had recently been made for the King by Silbermann. He did so, and disliked the noise extremely. His ears, too long accustomed to the gentle tinkle of his beloved clavichord, could not accept this harsh, modern instrument, and he returned home thankful that Providence had not brought him up on such an abominable invention.

But his son, Carl Philip Emanuel, in the service of the King, and having therefore the opportunity to study the Fortepiano at his leisure, became so much interested in it that he wrote a book on the art of playing it—the first book that exists on piano technique. His father's instructions for the clavichord advised players to keep the hand as quiet as possible, "to wipe a note off the keys with the end-joint of the finger only, as if taking up a coin from a table"—"not to be too lavish in the employment of the thumb." Carl Philip Emanuel transferred what he could of this to his own book, putting in a plea for certain necessary innovations—he thought they might look on the thumb with a little more favour: on rare occasions a note might be struck, it was inadvisable now to pass the fingers over each other backwards if they could do without. They must, above all things, maintain an elegant tranquillity, a quiet deportment, being careful to sit precisely before the middle of the keyboard, using their fingers softly, caressing

In Bach's time, and long afterwards, people never played vigorously. They could not. If they had attempted to do so the piano would have collapsed at once. They were very delicate instruments, unfitted for any but the most tender treatment—which, indeed, is all they ever had.

Playing must have been anxious work in those days. There was no pedal to swell the sound, or cover up defective technique. The note died away immediately after it was struck, making—what distressed Mozart so much—"cantabile playing" an impossibility. The touch of the keyboard was something like that of a harpsichord, the keys jumping up and down with a little jerk; and when the instrument went out of tune it was a serious matter.

By the beginning of the nineteenth century all this had changed. The mechanism was so much improved that it had developed into a responsive medium worth the trouble of studying. Clementi was the first who composed specially for the piano; for Mozart and Haydn, concerning themselves little with its mechanical resources (what they wrote serving equally well for the clavichord or harpsichord), treated it merely as a vehicle for the expression of their ideas, well suited to the inspiration of the moment. Clementi—whose inspirations were few and far between—regarded it from an entirely different standpoint. He was interested in the instrument itself; he experimented with it, tried what effects could be got out of it, and composed to introduce these effects rather than for any other reason. He considered the pianist more than the musician, and, in so doing, became the founder of a school of playing that regarded mechanical skill as a study in itself.

By degrees the piano and its players, developing side by side, diverged into two distinct styles—the English and the Viennese. The English school grew up, so to speak, of the masculine sex, the Viennese of the feminine—their respective instruments being in a large measure responsible for the heavy, vigorous qualities of the one, and the delicacy and lightness of the other. As long as Mozart lived, the Viennese held to their old-time gentleness and quaint dignity, but after his death they became more and more brilliant; so that, in his "Music in Germany," Dr. Burney could write of them as the "most remarkable people for fire and invention" (by which he probably meant improvisation) that he had ever heard. In spite of this reputation, the manner of performance in those days, tried by present standards, would have seemed very dry indeed. Correct, accurate, redolent of propriety and good manners, the goal of perfection exemplified by such men as Herz, Hunten, and Steibelt, cannot have been very interesting. Clementi himself, though no doubt angular and stiff, did try to some extent to shake off prim custom. At any rate, his was a wider mind, genuinely interested in striving to infuse some warmth and colour into his art. He pioneered his cause to the utmost, talking about it, writing studies for it, and setting every one else doing the same. His ideas were worked out still further by his pupils Field and Cramer, who, having a faint inkling of the mysteries of "tone-effects," tried to "make the piano sing"—as Field's compositions show.

As yet no one had in the least realised what the instrument could be made to do. Quantity of notes, not quality, was the chief concern; fluency, not beauty of tone, the aim of a good player. The perpendicular finger of the Bach era—a relic of the clavichord touch—was still fashionable; indeed, up to this time, there was no reason why it should not be so, for the music of the day called for nothing more forcible. But there were signs that this dull code of dry formulÆ was soon to become too narrow, and the complaisant pedagogue to be driven from his throne. There was need of a change, and the man destined to effect it was at hand.

Wiping out their stiffness, poking fun at their propriety, it was Beethoven who broke through their foolish little rules and gave them something deeper and more vital to think of. Full of dramatic power, of orchestral effects, of changing moods, his music outstretched their limits entirely. It created a new element and offered them a new problem: the study of tone. He demanded of the piano what had never been demanded of it before; both the instrument and its players were forced to change. Henceforward the art of pianism stood on an entirely different level. A new school was growing up.

Weber, who was an immense admirer of Beethoven, and a great influence in the musical world, went into the question with enthusiasm—indeed, some of his own Sonatas showed a faint dramatic tendency, new figures, and a more complicated technique.

Kalkbrenner, a follower of Clementi and famous teacher, was at work in Paris. Dussek, and Berger (Mendelssohn's master) helped elsewhere. Schubert in his compositions afforded food for experiment too.

On the other side Czerny, Woelffl, Herz, Steibelt, and even Hummel—who was considered a good enough pianist to be put forward as Beethoven's rival—upheld the prim style of their youth. Thus began the usual struggle between old and new, ending in the invariable victory for the new. Moscheles and Mendelssohn, though educated in the old traditions, sympathised with modern views, so welding a link between the past and "the wonderful things reported of a Pole—Chopin by name," of whom Schumann told the world in his journal.

In about eighty years both players and instruments had developed beyond recognition, virtuosity became an art in itself, and the piano so increased in importance that instead of being regarded as little worse than an accompaniment, it had become popular as a solo instrument, and long recitals, without the relief of song or strings, were given for it alone.

Partly to avoid the monotony of this one-man entertainment, and partly to induce the public to stop to the end, great pianists, such as Thalberg, Liszt, and Dreyschock began to do strange and wonderful gymnastic tricks. They passed one hand over the other with extraordinary rapidity; divided the melody between two hands and made it sound as if they had not; played octaves glissando; jumped with marvellous agility from one end of the piano to the other; wrote horrible and difficult fantasias of interminable length; played without the music; in short, they did everything they could think of to make a sensation and astonish the public. Vienna and Paris, where the audiences came from gay and sprightly circles and much preferred being amused to being instructed, were delighted. Sober-minded Germany was less so, for—although Liszt created a furore there as well as elsewhere—she had Mendelssohn to keep her in the way she should go. Europe was divided into two distinct camps—the one brilliant, the other scholarly. To the former belonged Leschetizky.

In 1830, the year of his birth, Rubinstein was but a baby; Von Bulow a few months old; Clara Schumann had just given her first concert at the age of ten—(her programme is interesting as showing the kind of music popular at the time: "Rondo Brilliant," by Kalkbrenner, "Variations Brilliantes," by Herz, "Variations" on a thema of her own); Saint-SaËns was born five—Tausig eleven—years later. Dreyschock was already twelve; Henselt sixteen; Thalberg eighteen; Liszt nineteen.

All these artists and many more visited Vienna, and Leschetizky heard them often. They were the source from which he drew inspiration as a young teacher, and whose playing served him as material from which, later on, to build up a system of his own. It is from them, from Schulhoff his friend, and from Czerny his master, that he has worked out the principles known as "The Leschetizky Method."

The explanation of the technical part of this method without practical illustration—that is, without a piano at hand—is impossible; for the description would have to cover not only the account of the manual exercises themselves, but of their application to the instrument. The art of playing the piano cannot be taught by correspondence; although the development of the hand may be. The instrument must be there to give value to the statement. To describe a pianoforte method by the pen does as much good to the pianist as the "Absent Treatment" of a Christian Scientist does to his patient. Indeed, the treatment might, by a rare chance, cure a patient furnished with a fertile imagination; whereas no amount of imagination will make anybody play the piano, even if he read all the treatises written, from the naÏve simplicity of Philip Emanuel Bach's "True Art of Piano Playing," to the wonderful complexity of Tobias Mathay, on "The Act of Touch."

With regard to methods in general, Leschetizky is very broad-minded. If a method can teach the pupil to accomplish what is necessary, the process by which it has been done is quite immaterial. Any suggestion that makes for progress would be welcome to him, and though he seems to have drawn all that is serviceable and important into his own system, he says: "I have thought over these things all my life, but if you can find better ways than mine I will adopt them—yes, and I will take two lessons of you and give you a thousand gulden a lesson."

Nearly every one can do something well if they are told exactly what to do. Leschetizky does not expect to make a silver goblet out of a pewter-pot, but he takes the trouble to make the pewter-pot as perfect in its way as possible. He does not think the world is made for genius. He sees that it is made for the ordinary man. Not in the least imbued with "that appreciation of mediocrity that the Creator of all things must evidently possess,"—as Ehlert puts it—he knows that those who can "reach the heaven" and "come back and tell the world" are very few, and it is the cry of the weaker talent that has to be answered, and for whom (unfortunately) methods must be worked out. Genius has called forth no system. It will express itself well, no matter what means it may elect to use.

Broadly speaking, Leschetizky's plan is to cultivate the pupil's special gifts, whatever they may be; to leave those things that lie beyond his capacity almost entirely alone. He prefers the narrower and more perfect field, to unfinished work on a large scale. To spend time wrestling with details in which glory can never be attained is a waste of energy. The struggle merely serves to emphasise incapacity in one direction to the detriment of natural talents in others, and generally ends in making the player so nervous that the very thought of being asked to play overwhelms him with terror.

People are very ingenious in finding excuses when they do not want to play, or when they have played badly. "A bad instrument" is one of them. "Artists say too much about the materials they have to use," says Leschetizky. "It is hard to find the tools unresponsive or uncertain, but do not accustom yourselves to a first-rate piano. If you do, it will lead you to think you are responsible for the beautiful sounds that come out of it; whereas very likely it is but its natural tone—independent of your skill. At home you think: 'What a lovely touch I have.' Then you come to me. You play abominably, and say it is the fault of my piano. It is not my piano at all. It is you. Your hand is not under control, you have not learnt the principles of things. If you really know how to produce a certain effect—and produce it as the result of your knowledge—not of your piano—you can face almost any instrument with a clear conscience. If you leave anything to chance, you will be the first to feel it—your audience will be the second. A good pianist should be able to make any passable instrument sound well, for his knowledge will be so accurate that he can calculate to a very fine point how much he must allow for the difference and quality of touch."

In Leschetizky's young days even more depended on the player's scientific knowledge of how things should be done than now, for people were asked to play upon very strange instruments. The mere remembrance of them makes him indignant. "When one was invited somewhere to dinner," he expostulated one evening when reminiscences brought up the subject, "the plates given you to eat upon were not cracked, the wine-glasses to drink out of were not dirty, the hostess was not in rags, but decked out in her finest, and she gave you the best she had to give. That was at dinner. But after dinner! Mein Gott, she wanted music. She had a piano, but—one or two notes stuck a little—could you manage? The pedal squeaked—well, you need not use it much, need you? The things on the top of the piano jingled rather—but then they were such a bother to move. The tuner came yesterday, but he said it is not as good as it used to be—which is so strange, for it has scarcely been played upon these twenty years—but do play us something! They say times have changed in this respect,—perhaps so—but my pupils don't seem to go with the times, for they tell me they meet with these things still."