Part 14 (2/2)
”'Just fancy, this Nachtigall had the impudence to call here and invite my friend Liszt to play upon his miserable Ratibor stage. A Liszt, and my guest, to play in Ratibor, and with a Nachtigall--unheard of! You may imagine that I gave this Nachtigall a becoming answer.'
”The bit stuck in my mouth, and, trembling with indignation, I said sharply:
”'My prince, am I not your guest, too? And do not I play in Ratibor, and with a Nachtigall? If your friend Liszt had done nothing worse here than play the piano in Ratibor he would not have degraded himself in any way.'
”'Ah! the town gossip of Ratibor has your ear, too, I see!' Lichnowsky said, with a scornful smile. 'But of course we are not going to quarrel.'”
Caroline Bauer also relates in her Memoires the following anecdote about Liszt and the haughty Princess Metternich:
”Liszt had been introduced to the princess and paid her a visit in Vienna. He was received and ushered into the drawing-room, in which the princess was holding a lively conversation with another lady. A condescending nod of the head was responded to the bow of the world-renowned artist; a gracious movement of the head invited him to be seated. In vain the proud and spoiled man waited to be introduced to the visitor, and to have an opportunity of joining in the conversation. The princess quietly continued to converse with the lady as if Franz Liszt were not in existence at all, at least not in her salon. At last she asked him in a cool and off-hand manner:
”'Did you do a good stroke of business at the concert you gave in Italy?'
”'Princess,' he replied coldly, 'I am a musician, and not a man of business.'
”The artist bowed stiffly and instantly left.
”Soon after this Prince Metternich proved himself to be as perfect a gentleman as he was a diplomatist. At Liszt's first concert in Vienna he went to him and, entering the artist's room, cordially pressed his hands before everybody, and, with a gracious smile, said softly:
”'I trust you will pardon my wife for a slip of the tongue the other day; you know what women are!'”
f.a.n.n.y KEMBLE
Mrs. Kemble, in her chatty book, Records of Later Life, relates a pleasant incident in September, 1842:
”Our temporary fellows.h.i.+p with Liszt procured for us a delightful partic.i.p.ation in a tribute of admiration from the citizen workmen of Coblentz, that was what the French call saisissant. We were sitting all in our hotel drawing-room together, the maestro, as usual, smoking his long pipe, when a sudden burst of music made us throw open the window and go out on the balcony, when Liszt was greeted by a magnificent chorus of nearly two hundred men's voices. They sang to perfection, each with his small sheet of music and his sheltered light in his hand; and the performance, which was the only one of the sort I ever heard, gave a wonderful impression of the musical capacity of the only really musical nation in the world.”
Mrs. Kemble also gives her impression of Liszt at Munich in 1870:
”I had gone to the theatre at Munich, where I was staying, to hear Wagner's opera of the Rheingold, with my daughter and her husband. We had already taken our places, when S. exclaimed to me, 'There is Liszt.'
The increased age, the clerical dress had effected but little change in the striking general appearance, which my daughter (who had never seen him since 1842, when she was quite a child) recognised immediately. I went round to his box, and, recalling myself to his memory, begged him to come to ours, and let me present my daughter to him. He very good-naturedly did so, and the next day called upon us at our hotel and sat with us a long time. His conversation on matters of art (Wagner's music which he and we had listened to the evening before) and literature was curiously cautious and guarded, and every expression of opinion given with extreme reserve, instead of the uncompromising fearlessness of his earlier years; and the Abbe was indeed quite another from the Liszt of our summer on the Rhine of 1842.”
LOLA MONTEZ
The once notorious actress, who, after a series of adventures caused some uproar at Munich, met Liszt during his travels in Germany, and her biographer relates how they divided honours at Dresden in 1842.
”Through the management of influential friends an opening was made for her at the Royal Theatre at Dresden, where she met the celebrated pianist, Franz Liszt, who was then creating such a furore that when he dropped his pocket handkerchief it was seized by the ladies and torn into rags, which they divided among themselves--each being but too happy to get so much as a sc.r.a.p which had belonged to the great artist. The furore created by Lola Montez' appearance at the theatre in Dresden was quite as great among the gentlemen as was Liszt's among the ladies.”
Lola Montez, during the last few years of her life, devoted herself to lecturing in various European cities, and the following is extracted from a published one ent.i.tled, ”The Wits and Women of Paris”:
”There was a gifted and fas.h.i.+onable lady (the Countess of Agoult), herself an accomplished auth.o.r.ess, concerning whom and George Sand a curious tale is told. They were great friends, and the celebrated pianist Liszt was the admirer of both. Things went on smoothly for some time, all couleur de rose, when one fine day Liszt and George Sand disappeared suddenly from Paris, having taken it into their heads to make the tour of Switzerland for the summer together. Great was the indignation of the fair countess at this double desertion; and when they returned to Paris Madame d'Agoult went to George Sand and immediately challenged the great writer to a duel, the weapons to be finger-nails, etc. Poor Liszt ran out of the room and locked himself up in a dark closet till the deadly affray was ended, and then made his body over in charge to a friend, to be preserved, as he said, for the remaining a.s.sailant. Madame d'Agoult was married to a bookworm, who cared for naught else but his library; he did not know even the number of children he possessed, and so little the old philosopher cared about the matter that when a stranger came to the house he invariably, at the appearance of the family, said: 'Allow me to present to you my wife's children'; all this with the blandest smile and most contented air.”
Lola Montez also says in her lecture:
”I once asked George Sand which she thought the greatest pianist, Liszt or Thalberg. She replied, 'Liszt is the greatest, but there is only one Thalberg. If I were to attempt to give an idea of the difference between Liszt and Thalberg, I should say that Thalberg is like the clear, placid flow of a deep, grand river; while Liszt is the same tide foaming and bubbling and das.h.i.+ng on like a cataract.'”
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