Chopin knew this and cultivated
his ego. He saw too that the love of beauty for beauty's sake was
fascinating but led to the way called madness. So he rooted his
art, gave it the earth of Poland and its deliquescence is put off
to the day when a new system of musical aestheticism will have
routed the old, when the Ugly shall be king and Melody the
handmaiden of science. But until that most grievous and undesired
time he will catch the music of our souls and give it cry and
flesh.
III
Chopin is the open door in music. Besides having been a poet and
giving vibratory expression to the concrete, he was something
else--he was a pioneer. Pioneer because in youth he had bowed to
the tyranny of the diatonic scale and savored the illicit joys of
the chromatic. It is briefly curious that Chopin is regarded
purely as a poet among musicians and not as a practical musician.
They will swear him a phenomenal virtuoso, but your musician,
orchestral and theoretical, raises the eyebrow of the
supercilious if Chopin is called creative. A cunning finger-
smith, a moulder of decorative patterns, a master at making new
figures, all this is granted, but speak of Chopin as path-breaker
in the harmonic forest--that true "forest of numbers"--as the
forger of a melodic metal, the sweetest, purest in temper, and
lo! you are regarded as one mentally askew.
Pages:
124
125
126
127
128
129
130
131
132
133
134
135
136
137
138
139
140
141
142
143
144
145
146
147
148