etitzky, of Vienna. His method is that of common sense, based on
keen analytical faculties, and he never trains the hand apart from the
musical sense. His most renowned pupil is Ignace Jan Paderewski, the
magnetic Pole, whose exquisite touch and tone long made him the idol of
the concert room, and who, with time, has gained in robustness, but also
in recklessness of style. Another gifted pupil of the Viennese master is
Fannie Bloomfield Zeisler, of Chicago, an artiste of rare temperament,
musical feeling and nervous power, of whom Dr. Hanslick said that her
virtuosity was stupendous, her delicacy in the finest florid work as
marvelous as her fascinating energy in the forte passages.

The great tidal wave set in motion by the piano has swept over the
civilized world, carrying with it hosts of accomplished pianists. Of
some of those who are familiar figures in our musical centres it has
been said that Teresa Carreno learned from Rubinstein the art of piano
necromancy; that Rosenthal is an amazing technician whose
interpretations lack tenderness; that De Pachmann is on terms of
intimacy with Chopin, and that Rafael Joseffy, the disciple of Tausig,
combines all that is best in the others with striking methods of his
own.

Great is the piano, splendid its literature, many its earnest students,
numerous its worthy exponents. That it is so often made a means of empty
show is not the fault of the piano, it is due to a tendency of the day
that calls for superficial glamor. Herbert Spencer was not so wrong as
some of the critics seem to think when, in his last volume, he said that
teachers of music and music performers were often corrupters of music.
Those certainly are corrupters of music who use the piano solely for
meaningless technical feats.

VII

The Poetry and Leadership of Chopin

"The piano bard, the piano rhapsodist, the piano mind, the piano soul is
Chopin," said Rubinstein. "Tragic, romantic, lyric, heroic, dramatic,
fantastic, soulful, sweet, dreamy, brilliant, grand, simple, all
possible expressions are found in his compositions and all are sung by
him on his instrument."

In these few, bold strokes one who knew him by virtue of close art and
race kinship, presents an incomparable outline sketch of the Polish
tone-poet who explored the harmonic vastness of the pianoforte and made
his own all its mystic secrets.

Born and bred on Poland's soil, son of a French father and a Polish
mother, Frederic Cho