mean at all "staccato," was the ordinary way of playing
the instrument, and that the veritable "legato" was played only where
the author specially indicated it. The clavecin or harpsichord, which
preceded the piano, when complete with two banks of keys, many registers
giving the octaves and different tone qualities, oftentimes like the
organ with a key for pedals, offered resources which the piano does not
possess. A Polish lady, Madame Landowska, has studied thoroughly these
resources, and has shown us how pieces written for this instrument thus
disclosed elements of variety which are totally missing when the same
are played upon the piano; but the clavecin tone lacked fulness, and
shadings or nuances were out of the question.

Sonority or tone was varied by changing the keys or register just as on
the organ. On the other hand, with the piano one can vary the sonority
by augmenting or diminishing the force of the attack, hence its original
name of "forte piano,"--a name too long, which was shortened at first by
suppressing the last syllables; so that one reads, not without
astonishment, in the accounts given of young Mozart, of the skill he
showed in playing "forte" at a time when he was playing on instruments
of a very feeble tone. Nowadays when athletic artists exert all their
force upon the modern instruments of terrific sonority, they are said to
play the "piano" (_toucher du piano_).

We must conclude that the indication "non-legato" finally degenerated
into meaning "staccato." In my youth I heard persons advanced in age
whose performance on the piano was extremely dry and jumpy. Then a
reaction took place. The tyrannical reign of the perpetual "legato"
succeeded. It was decided that in piano playing unless indicated to the
contrary, and even at times in spite of such indication, everything
everywhere should be tied together.[3] This was a great misfortune of
which Kalkbrenner gives a manifest proof in the arrangement he has made
of Beethoven's symphonies. Besides, this "legato" tyranny continues.
Notwithstanding the example of Liszt, the greatest pianist of the
nineteenth century, and notwithstanding his numerous pupils, the fatal
school of the "legato" has prevailed,--not that it is unfortunate in
itself, but because it has perverted the intentions of musical authors.
Our French professors have followed the example of Kalkbrenner.

The house of Breitkopf, which until lately had the best editions of the
German