The century illustrated monthly magazine . d no charms for him;French morality repelled him. He dislikedParis as thoroughly as Mendelssohn did halfa century later. Both were too serious andtoo earnest in their art, too delicate and poeticin their genius to please the light-heartedParisians. If the tone of the great world wasdistasteful to him, he liked the musicians nobetter. His good nature is imposed upon, heis deceived with false promises, refuses theposition of organist at Versailles as too obscure,gives a few lessons, hopes, and is he is not idle. His eager mind quicklydi
The century illustrated monthly magazine . d no charms for him;French morality repelled him. He dislikedParis as thoroughly as Mendelssohn did halfa century later. Both were too serious andtoo earnest in their art, too delicate and poeticin their genius to please the light-heartedParisians. If the tone of the great world wasdistasteful to him, he liked the musicians nobetter. His good nature is imposed upon, heis deceived with false promises, refuses theposition of organist at Versailles as too obscure,gives a few lessons, hopes, and is he is not idle. His eager mind quicklydivined the value of the new methods, as wellas the superiority of the French drama. Hestudied with care the works of Gretry and ofGluck, omitting no opportunity to make him-self familiar with French masterpieces. To someone who asked him if the study of the Italianswould not be more profitable, he replied, In allthat regards melody, yes, but for truth of dictionand dramatic expression, no. Mozart was be- 2IO MOZART—AFTER A HUNDRED MOZART S SPINET, IN THE MOZART MUSEUM. fore all things a musician, and believed that poetry in the opera ought to be absolutely theobedient daughter of music. He never ac-cepted the theory of Gluck that the true functionof music was to add to poetry what vivacity ofcolor, the happy accord of light and shade, addto a correct and well-composed design. Butwith his dramatic genius, his fine artistic sense,and his perfect mastery of the art of musicalexpression, he reaches simply and naturally apoint which Gluck had touched from an oppo-site direction — a point where the poem seemsnot less made for the music than the music forthe poem. In the midst of this life, so unsatisfac-tory in its immediate results but so fruitful forhis genius, the plans of Mozart were suddenlychanged by the death of his mother. Alone ina foreign city, without experience and withoutconsolation, he meets his first great sorrow. Oneis struck with the delicacy, the tender c
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Keywords: ., bookcentury1800, bookdecade1880, booksubjectamerica, bookyear1882
