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French Revolution, the first work showing the author to be a genuine and original man of genius. It shows him deliberately rejecting all that was traditionally connected with the idea of a work in
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affording to the soloist none of the conventional opportunities for display, demanding from him the mastery of an enormously difficult technique, full of double-note passages, full of heavy and exhausting reduplications; demanding also exceptional tact, intelligence, and presence of mind such as are only to be found in a few players of the very first rank. The music of the first movement is of profoundly sinister and tragic import, portraying the rage, grief, and unrest in some struggle of the heroic soul. It has nothing entertaining and nothing to propitiate superficial taste. No wonder it was a failure at Leipsic in 1859, when that centre of enlightenment was given up to the Mendelssohn cult! After the composer himself, the first pianist to take up the Concerto was Hans von Bülow, who with a performance at a Philharmonic Concert in Berlin won early recognition of its surpassing merit. Other performers who contributed towards the success of the work with the world in general were Madame Schumann and Mr. D'Albert. At the present time it may be doubted whether there is any better exponent of it than Mr. Busoni. What a German writer has called the
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first motive was delivered in a manner that showed perfect grasp of its poetic import, and the tragic eloquence of the ensuing development was never marred either by any sort of technical fault or by inappropriate expression. The
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Benedictus forming the slow movement is fraught with that profound religious feeling the musical expression of which has been accomplished only by Bach, Beethoven, and Brahms. It was no less perfectly rendered than the opening movement, and the concluding Rondo was played with appropriate breadth, energy, and mastery of heavy and intricate passages. Afterwards another work for the same instrumental combination was played, namely, Liszt's
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Spanish Rhapsody, which Mr. Busoni has treated very much as Liszt himself treated the
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Wanderer Fantasie of Schubert, making an arrangement on the concerto principle, with a part for pianoforte and orchestral accompaniments. The Rhapsody is put together on the same principle as the Hungarian Rhapsodies, having majestic motives in the first part, and afterwards dance themes with variations and ornamentations in the transcendental manner peculiar to Liszt. Mr. Busoni's orchestration is all very clever and telling, and in playing the solo part, which is brilliant beyond all description, he, as it were, came down from the pedestal of seriousness and showed that he also can, on occasion, be simply entertaining. As an extra piece without orchestra, Mr. Busoni played Liszt's
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Campanella