The St. Gall paper has several articles on
the subject, which I am sending you.
By Christmas I will send you the new copies of my Mass (which I
think I have considerably improved in the last revision,
especially by the concluding Fugue of the Gloria and a
heavenward-soaring climax of the subject.
[Here, Liszt illustrates with a vocal score excerpt at the point
where the singer sings: "et u-nam sanctam catho-li-camet a-po -
sto - - - - li-cam"]
Probably the work will be ready to appear by Easter. If you write
by return of post, you can send the ministerial answer to my
letter to Bach to me here. The contents, of which you have told
me, please me much, and I reckon with confidence that the
publishing of the score will fix the sense and meaning of my work
in public opinion. The work is truly "of pure musical water (not
in the sense of the ordinary diluted Church style, but like
diamond water) and living Catholic wine."
. - . Farewell, dearest Eduard, and remain true to me in heart and
spirit, as is also to you your
F. Liszt
168. To Alexander Ritter, Music Director in Stettin
Munich, December 4th, 1856
Dear Friend,
I received your letter on a day when I again greatly missed your
presence. We were together with Wagner at St. Gall, and the
Musical Society there had distinguished itself by the production
of an orchestra of ten first, ten second violins, eight violas,
six celli and double basses. Wagner conducted the Eroica, and I
two of my Symphonic Poems - "Orpheus" and "Les Preludes." The
performance and reception of my works were quite to my
satisfaction, and the "Preludes" had to be repeated (as they were
in Pest). Whether such a production would be possible in Stettin
I much doubt, in spite of your friendly advances. The open,
straightforward sense of the public is everywhere kept so much in
check by the oft-repeated rubbish of the men of the "But" and
"Yet," who batten on criticism, and appear to set themselves the
task of crushing to death every living endeavour, in order
thereby to increase their own reputation and importance, that I
must regard the rapid spread of my works almost as an imprudence.
You desire "Orpheus," "Tasso," and "Festklange" from me, dear
friend! But have you considered that "Orpheus" has no proper
working out section, and hovers quite simply between bliss and
woe, breathing out reconciliation in Art? Pray do not forget that
"Tasso" celebrates no psychic triumph, which an ingenious critic
has already denounced (probably mindful of the "inner camel,"
which Heine designates as an indispensable necessity of German
aestheticism!), and the "Festklange" sounded too confusedly noisy
even to our friend Pohl! And then what has all this canaille to
do with instruments of percussion, cymbals, triangle, and drum in
the sacred domain of Symphony? It is, believe me, not only
confusion and derangement of ideas, but also a prostitution of
the species itself!
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