And he quoted the lines of old Gottfried Keller, the rude citizen of Zurich—one of the German writers who was most dear to him by reason of his vigorous loyalty and his keen savor of the soil:
“Wer über den Partein sich wähnt mit stolzen Mienen
Der steht zumeist vielmehr beträchtlich unter ihnen.”
(“He who proudly preens himself on being above parties is rather immeasurably beneath them.”)
“Have courage and be true,” he went on. “Have courage and be ugly. If you like bad music, then say so frankly. Show yourselves, see yourselves as you are. Rid your souls of the loathsome burden of all your compromise and equivocation. Wash it in pure water. How long is it since you have seen yourselves in a mirror? I will show you yourselves. Composers, virtuosi, conductors, singers, and you, dear public. You shall for once know yourselves. … Be what you like: but, for any sake, be true! Be true even though art and artists—and I myself—have to suffer for it! If art and truth cannot live together, then let art disappear. Truth is life. Lies are death.”
Naturally, this youthful, wild outburst, which was all of a piece, and in very bad taste, produced an outcry. And yet, as everybody was attacked and nobody in particular, its pertinency was not recognized. Everyone is, or believes himself to be, or says that he is the best friend of truth: there was therefore no danger of the conclusions of the article being attacked. Only people were shocked by its general tone: everybody agreed that it was hardly proper, especially from an artist in a semiofficial position. A few musicians began to be uneasy and protested bitterly: they saw that Christophe would not stop at that. Others thought themselves more clever and congratulated Christophe on his courage: they were no less uneasy about his next articles.
Both tactics produced the same result. Christophe had plunged: nothing could stop him: and as he had promised, everybody was passed in survey, composers and interpreters alike.
The first victims were the Kapellmeisters. Christophe did not confine himself to general remarks on the art of conducting an orchestra. He mentioned his colleagues of his own town and the neighboring towns by name: or if he did not name them his allusions were so transparent that nobody could be mistaken. Everybody recognized the apathetic conductor of the Court, Alois von Werner, a cautious old man, laden with honors, who was afraid of everything, dodged everything, was too timid to make a remark to his musicians and meekly followed whatever they chose to do—who never risked anything on his programme that had not been consecrated by twenty years of success, or, at least, guaranteed by the official stamp of some academic dignity. Christophe ironically applauded his boldness: he congratulated him on having discovered Gade, Dvorak, or Tchaikovsky: he waxed enthusiastic over his unfailing correctness, his metronomic equality, the always fein-nuanciert (finely shaded) playing of his orchestra: he proposed to orchestrate the École de la Vélocité of Czerny for his next concert, and implored him not to try himself so much, not to give rein to his passions, to look after his precious health.—Or he cried out indignantly upon the way in which he had conducted the Eroica of Beethoven:
“A cannon! A cannon! Mow me down these people! … But have you then no idea of the conflict, the fight between human stupidity and human ferocity—and the strength which tramples them underfoot with a glad shout of laughter?—How could you know it? It is you against whom it fights! You expend all the heroism that is in you in listening or in playing the Eroica of Beethoven without a yawn—(for it bores you. … Confess that it bores you to death!)—or in risking a draught as you stand with bare head and bowed back to let some Serene Highness pass.”
He could not be sarcastic enough about the pontiffs of the Conservatories who interpreted the great men of the past as “classics.”
“Classical! That word expresses everything. Free passion, arranged and expurgated for the use of schools! Life, that vast plain swept by the winds—enclosed within the four walls of a school playground! The fierce, proud beat of a heart in anguish, reduced to the tic-tacs of a four-tune pendulum, which goes its jolly way, hobbling and imperturbably leaning on the crutch of time! … To enjoy the Ocean you need to put it in a bowl with goldfish. You only understand life when you have killed it.”
If he was not kind to the “bird-stuffers” as he called them, he was even less kind to the ringmen of the orchestra, the illustrious Kapellmeisters who toured the country to show off their flourishes and their dainty hands, those who exercised their virtuosity at the expense of the masters, tried hard to make the most familiar works unrecognizable, and turned somersaults through the hoop of the Symphony in C Minor. He made them appear as old coquettes, prima donnas of the orchestra, gipsies, and ropedancers.
The virtuosi naturally provided him with splendid material. He declared himself incompetent when he had to criticise their
