"
Thalberg was not only too much of a technician for Chopin, but he
was also a Jew and a successful one. In consequence, both poet
and Pole revolted.
Hummel called on Frederic, but we hear nothing of his opinion of
the elder man and his music; this is all the more strange,
considering how much Chopin built on Hummel's style. Perhaps that
is the cause of the silence, just as Wagner's dislike for
Meyerbeer was the result of his obligations to the composer of
"Les Huguenots." He heard Aloys Schmitt play, and uttered the
very Heinesque witticism that "he is already over forty years
old, and composes eighty years old music." This in a letter to
Elsner. Our Chopin could be amazingly sarcastic on occasion. He
knew Slavik the violin virtuoso, Merk the 'cellist, and all the
music publishers. At a concert given by Madame Garzia-Vestris, in
April, 1831, he appeared, and in June gave a concert of his own,
at which he must have played the E minor concerto, because of a
passing mention in a musical paper. He studied much, and it was
July 20, 1831, before he left Vienna after a second, last, and
thoroughly discouraging visit.
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