click image to view full size in a new window
Busoni Arouses Berlin Enthusiasm
Ferruccio Busoni's reappearances at Berlin, according to those best able to judge, are among the most prominent musical events of the season. He started with a recital at Beethoven-Saal, which was entirely sold out and at which he received an ovation of so warm a nature that Busoni, accustomed as he is to the worship of his Berlin audiences, seemed to be overwhelmed.
His second appearance was made at the same hall, when he conducted the first of two orchestral concerts given by the Philharmonic Orchestra, which, on this occasion, was assisted by the soloist Egon Petri, Busoni's favorite and most eminent pupil; Josef Szigeti, the violinist, and the Choral Society of the Chalottenburg Teachers, who are directed by Emil Thilo. The program began with Bach's piano concerto in D minor, arranged by Busoni; then followed Busoni's violin concerto, op. 35; it closed with Busoni's so called choral concerto, op. 39, for orchestra, piano and male chorus.
It is difficult to give a clear picture of the impression which this concerto had made. The Berlin press writes in a strain which is not easily conveyed in translations.
His piano recital was also commented upon in a most enthusiastic manner. A few notices, culled from the most important and most severe papers, appear below. The Vossische-Zeitung of February 20, 1914, speaks as follows:
Ferruccio Busoni gave his first piano evening. After D'Albert, the feeling one, now comes he, the knowing one. But Busoni is not only sagacious and penetrating - no, he is much more, he is a sage. Considering his fabulous musical culture, one is compelled to consider a hundred times before one dares to differ from him; and even if one is inclined to be of a different opinion, in the end, he conquers and converts one. Liszt in his "Figaro Fantasy," for the purpose of showing off his wealth of virtuosity, undertook to rearrange the works of no less a master than Mozart. He of whom one spoke as a tremendous pianist dared to commit this act of bad taste. And now Busoni dares to repeat this. But in reality he does not transcribe - he lifts the work into an atmosphere of art where anything doubtful falls away. It is the same to him whether his theme is beautiful or ugly - he ennobles it. Busoni's creations are wonderfully alive and glorious; they appeal to the senses; they are full of feeling; and, speaking of the technical side - how many possibilities of touch, of clarity, of choice mixtures of tone colors he produces. His work forms an uninterrupted chain of glorious victories over materialism, and from a musical point of view what elasticity, what style, what greatness of formation, what rhythm, what purity of expression is to be perceived. The parting of technic and art in his works is only artificial. In reality Busoni keeps both elements intimately linked; their relations are constantly observed playing backward and forward, and go to make a whole which must take hold of the hearer and enthuse him.
The reproduction of the great B flat major sonata for hammerklavier is a compendium of artistic wisdom. Busoni's playing it is not merely actuated by impulse. There is no darkness, no uncertainty, no one-sidedness - everything is subject to a comprehensive, artistic thoughtfulness - everything has to make its way through the grinding mill of deep thought, and comes out shining brilliantly and clear like a jewel.
These are the reasons why this artist appears to us so extraordinarily in touch with his time in the very best sense of the word. The modern spirit finds its personification in him.
In speaking of Busoni the B. Z. am Mirrag (Berlin Midday Paper) says:
Now and then it is pleasant to realize that we live in a musical period which must be recognized by the greatness of its productive art. If personalities like Liszt, Bulow and Joachim, who were not only musically but also spiritually of most eminent standing, do not live with us, the fruit of their work is now fully developed. Within a few days we have had a Brahms evening by the Klinger Quartet, the Bohemians and D'Albert, Hubermann and Heifetz appeared on the concert platform, and if we look upon the wonderful background given to all their appearances by the conducting of Richard Strauss, Arthur Nikisch and Siegfried Ochs, one certainly gets an impression of overwhelming wealth, which does not allow individually to project itself so suspiciously brilliantly, but allows us to become accustomed to beauty without making us blase - for all these appeared before thousands of greatly excited hearers, whose tingling nerves and devotion to personality and cause were clearly perceptible.
What must be offered to overshadow all this brilliancy and make us ungrateful for all the beautiful gifts that have been showered upon us? It is the hardly explicable offering of genius, which, with all its lonely power of effect, and with all its victory, is touching. The name in this case is Ferruccio Busoni. If the puzzle of that other genius D'Albert is explained because he touches the general feeling with unequalled power, Busoni overshadows everythings, because he possesses all the mind, all the spirituality, which leads him along a path of his own, regardless of whether he is being followed or not. He does not make us familiar with the art work which he reproduces. If he makes the concession of sitting down to the piano before an audience, he has his revenge by removing the work a number of spiritual miles away to some stadium, where he will be totally alone with it, and only from that distance does he speak with that ever strong and at other times almost brutal tenderness of his exceptionally big heart.
There is no German living, in whom we could clearly perceive his emotion, as we see it in this Southerner, who does not need a greater force of power for the most collosal fortissimo than he does for the most tenderly pianissimo; but all the same he has had to fight for truth and success, and one can almost believe that he would like to play as others do, but he cannot. His very technical equipment does not permit it. He has to enter the matter with every fibre of his being, and the five fingers which he has on each hand must be occupied. Moreover, these fingers are full of fantasy. As with all great technic, his is the product at the same time of creative spirit and of one who is reproducing. He finds it plainly difficult to play anything as it is written. Bach wooed God, Beethoven wooed Athos, Mozart wooed Love itself, but Busoni woos Bach, Beethoven and MOzart. He must transpose, but even when he gives the original in exact text, it sounds transposed, removed, Busonified; it sounds like the creation of no one else. What wonderful tone-colored expressions, produced by the greatest techniz which ever was expressed by the hand of a pianist - expressions the light of which is generally dimmed by the mysticism of the haze of the uncertain.
I think of Arnold Schonberg's second string quartet, which was recently given for the first time in Berlin. For the purpose of making this uncertainty complete, he lets a soprano voice sing a few verses by Stefan George, but it does not help. If Schonberg but knew how uncomplicated he is, he would stop composing. How shocking this poverty of not being able to say something with words which convey a different meaning. Let him hear Busoni and marvel how Bach and Mozart clasp hands with the spirit of our time; how Beethoven has given breath to this spirit; how Kontrapunt has been converted into metaphysic.
In speaking of other pianists one talks of the independence of the fingers; in speaking of Busoni one talks of the revolving spheres, which in their individual life remain unrecognizable, until the great harmony calls them, reconciles them and transfigures them.
Until our music machine industry is able to deliver to posterity a phenomenon like Busoni, the industry is not worth a penny. I wish it could be achieved. The sun will rise again, but there are dawns of extinction which will be unendurable, while they are irretrievable in their combination of the accidental and necessary. After Busoni it is difficult to speak of others. (Advertisement.)
