possessed by
players who can lay no particular claim to personal beauty. Some players
seem fairly to hypnotize their audiences--yes, hypnotize them. This is
not done by practicing any species of black art, or by consciously
following any psychological formula, but by the sheer intensity of
feeling of the artist at the moment of performance.

"The great performer in such moments of passion forgets himself
entirely. He is in a sort of artistic trance. Technical mastery of the
composition being presupposed, the artist need not and does not give
thought to the matter of playing the notes correctly, but, re-creating
in himself what he feels to have been the mood of the composer,
re-creates the composition itself. It is this kind of playing which
establishes an invisible cord, connecting the player's and the hearers'
hearts, and, swayed himself by the feelings of the moment, he sways his
audience. He makes the music he draws from the instrument supreme in
every soul in the audience; his feeling and passion are contagious and
carry the audience away. These are the moments, not only of the greatest
triumph, but of the greatest exultation for the artist. He who cannot
thus sway audiences will never rise above mediocrity.

DO NOT ATTEMPT THE IMPOSSIBLE

"To those who are still in the preparatory stage of development I am
glad to give one word of advice. _Do not play pieces that are away
beyond your grasp._ This is the greatest fault in our American musical
educational systems of to-day. Pupils are permitted to play works that
are technically impossible for them to hope to execute without years of
preparation. What a huge blunder this is!

"The pupil comes to the teacher, let us say, with the _Second Hungarian
Rhapsody_ of Liszt. It takes some fortitude for the conscientious
teacher to tell the pupil that she should work with the _C Major Sonata_
of Haydn instead. The pupil, with a kind of confidence that is, to say
the least, dangerous, imagines that the teacher is trying to keep her
back, and often goes to another teacher who will gratify her whim.

"American girls think that they can do everything. Nothing is beyond
them. This is a country of great accomplishment, and they do not realize
that in music 'Art is long.' The virtuoso comes to a great metropolis
and plays a Moszkowski concerto of great difficulty. The next day the
music stores exhaust their stocks of this work, and a dozen misses, who
might with difficulty pla