Leipzig, March 30th, 1840. The turmoil of the last few weeks was overpowering. Liszt was here for a fortnight, and caused quite a paroxysm of excitement among us, both in a good and evil sense. I consider him to be in reality an amiable warm-hearted man, and an admirable artist. That he plays with more execution than all the others, does not admit of a doubt; yet Thalberg, with his composure, and within his more restricted sphere, is more perfect, taken as a virtuoso; and this is the standard which must also be applied to Liszt, for his compositions are inferior On the other hand, Liszt possesses a degree of velocity and complete independence of finger, and a thoroughly musical feeling, which can scarcely be equalled. In a word, I have heard no performer whose musical perceptions, like those of Liszt, extended to the very tips of his fingers, emanating directly from them. With this power, and his enormous technicality and practice, he must have far surpassed all others, if a man’s own ideas were not after all the chief point, and these, hitherto at least, seem denied to him; so that in this phase of art, most of the great virtuosos equal, and indeed excel him. But that he, along with Thalberg, alone represents the highest class of pianists of the present day, is, I think, undeniable. Unhappily the manner in which Liszt has acted towards the public here has not pleased them. The whole misunderstanding is, in fact, as if you were listening to two persons disputing, who are both in the wrong, and whom you would fain interrupt at every word. As for the citizens in general, who are angry at the high prices, and do not wish to see a clever fellow prosper It occurred to me that this unpleasant state of feeling might be most effectually allayed, by people seeing and hearing him in private; so I suddenly determined to give him a soirÉe in the Gewandhaus, of three hundred and fifty persons, with orchestra, choir, mulled wine, cakes, my “Meeresstille,” a Psalm, a triple concerto by Bach (Liszt, Hiller, and I), choruses from “St. Paul,” fantasia on “Lucia di Lammermoor,” the “Erl King,” the “Devil and his Grandmother,” and goodness knows what else; and all the people were delighted, and played and sang with the utmost enthusiasm, and vowed they had never passed a more capital evening,—so my object was thus happily effected in a most agreeable manner. I have to-day formed a resolution, in which I heartily rejoice, and that is, never again to take any part as judge of the prizes at a musical competition. Several proposals of this kind were made to me, and I did not know why I should be so annoyed by these, till I clearly saw that it was in fact a display of arrogance on my part, to which I would not myself submit from others, and should therefore carefully avoid; thus setting oneself up |