Part 8 (2/2)
Ries gives a curious instance of this utter disregard of all outward things, in the story of the great master's commencing one day, while giving him a lesson, to play with the left hand the first fugue from Graun's ”Tod Jesu.” Gradually the right hand was added, and regardless of his awkward position, the fugue developed in all conceivable manners for the s.p.a.ce of half an hour, when he suddenly awoke to discover that his pupil was still in his place before the pianoforte.
In 1800 a more formidable rival appeared at Vienna in the person of Steibelt. Having conceived a great idea of his own powers from the flattery of his Parisian admirers, Steibelt came to the capital sure of conquest, and did not even consider it necessary to visit the opponent so far beneath him. They met accidentally at the house of Count Fries, ”where,” says Ferdinand Ries, ”Beethoven played for the first time[15]
his Trio in B flat major for piano; clarionet, and 'cello, Op. 11, in which there is not much room for display. Steibelt heard it with a kind of condescension, paid Beethoven several compliments, and believed himself sure of victory. He played a quintet of his own composition, and then improvised, and produced a great sensation by his free use of _tremolo_, which was at that time something quite new. To ask Beethoven to play again was not to be thought of. Eight days after there was again a concert at Count Fries'. Steibelt played another quintet with great success; he had besides, as might be easily perceived, _studied_ a brilliant improvisation, and chosen for a subject the theme on which the finale of Beethoven's trio was built. This disgusted the admirers of Beethoven, and displeased the latter also. It was his turn to seat himself at the pianoforte and to improvises. He placed himself at the instrument with his ordinary air--I might say, rather ill-humouredly, and as if pushed there. In pa.s.sing, he seized the violoncello part of Steibelt's quintet, placed it upside down on the desk (was this designedly?), and drummed out with one finger the theme of the first few bars.
”Then, impelled by his insulted and excited feelings, he improvised in such a manner that Steibelt quitted the room before Beethoven had ceased. He would never meet him again, and, when invited anywhere, always stipulated that Beethoven should not be present.”
But enough of such anecdotes! Triumphs which would have been glory to others were nothing to him. Let us pa.s.s on and see the master in the great struggle which prefaced the real commencement of life's work, and was continued without intermission until the victory was won.
FOOTNOTES:
[Footnote 14: Marx, vol. i., p. 66.]
[Footnote 15: This is evidently an error. The Trio had been published in 1798.--Thayer, Vol. II., p. 101.]
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[Ill.u.s.tration]
CHAPTER VI.
CONFLICT.
Deafness and its Consequences--His Brothers' Influence--Letters to Wegeler--”Mount of Olives”--Beethoven's Will--Beethoven as an Instructor--a Conductor--Sinfonia Eroica--”Leonora”
(”Fidelio”)--”Adelade.”
Suffering and genius! apparently so far apart, in reality so near!
The bitter cry of Milton,--
”Dark, dark, dark, amidst the blaze of noon!”
has gone up from many a thousand hearts to the eternal throne; but who may presume to fathom the dispensations of a mysterious providence? or to question that wisdom which gives to every earthborn soul the necessary discipline for immortality? Let us rather wonder and adore, and--
”Know how sublime a thing it is To suffer and _be strong_.”
We left our young musician in the full flush of success, in apparently vigorous health, caressed and flattered by princes, without a rival as a virtuoso, and fast leaving all compet.i.tors behind him as a composer, when suddenly a cloud appears, the brightness is overcast, and darkness comes on apace. _Beethoven became deaf._
For three years he had had premonitory fears, which were too sadly realized in the year 1801.
The loss of hearing is deprivation enough in ordinary cases; but to a young man of excitable artist temperament, and a musician! it seemed for a while worse than the loss of life itself. Our Beethoven writes thus to Wegeler:--
”If I had not read somewhere that man must not of his own free will depart this life, I should long ere this have been no more, and that through my own act.”
From this despair he was mercifully rescued. The strong, secret voice within, impelling Beethoven onwards and upwards to that aim which he ”felt, but could not describe,” spoke now in more stirring accents and with more thrilling emphasis amid the profound silence and desolation of his nature.
He ”was not disobedient” to the heavenly call; the triumph of mind was achieved; and from the dark prison-house the n.o.blest strains the world has ever heard escaped to wake responsive echoes in the hearts of all who have felt and suffered.
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