y be more concisely expressed
thus: Since all things of permanent value in music have proceeded from a
fervid artistic imagination, they should be interpreted with the
continual employment of the performer's imagination.

On the other hand, the subjective method, right as it is in principle,
can become, of course, according to the Italian saying, _Traduttore,
traditore_--that is, an absolute treachery to the composer's ideal, if
the performer's understanding and execution of the composition is not
based upon long and careful investigation of all the fundamental laws
and associated branches of musical study, which are designed to give him
a basis for forming his own opinions upon the best method of
interpreting the composition. Inadequate training in this respect is the
Chinese Wall which surrounds the composer's hidden meaning. This wall
must be torn down, brick by brick, stone by stone, in a manner which we
would call "analytical practice." It is the only way in which the
student may gain entrance to the sacred city of the elect, to whom the
ideal of the composer has been revealed.

THE INTERPRETER MUST COOPERATE WITH THE COMPOSER

In a certain sense the interpreter is a cooperator with the composer,
or, more definitely expressed, he is the "continuer" along the line of
the musical thought and its adequate expression. Music, of all arts, is
the unfinished art. When a great painting is completed, time, and time
only, will make the changes in its surface. When the great masterpieces
left the brushes of Raphael, Rubens, Holbein, Correggio or Van Dyck they
were finished works of art. When Bach, Beethoven, Chopin, and Brahms put
their thoughts down upon paper they left a record in ink and paper which
must be born again every time it is brought to the minds of men. This
rebirth is the very essence of all that is best in interpretative skill.
New life goes into the composition at the very moment it passes through
the soul of the master performer. It is here that he should realize the
great truth that in music, more than in any other art, "the letter kills
and the spirit vivifies." The interpreter must master the "letter" and
seek to give "rebirth" to the spirit. If he can do this he will attain
the greatest in interpretative ability.

From the literal or objective standpoint, then, an insight is gained
into the nature of the composer's masterpiece,--by close and careful
study of the work itself, by gaining a knowledge of