THE ALLEGED DECLINE OF THE PIANO
[To the Editor of the SPECTATOR.] SIR,—If it is correct that the popularity of the piano is declining it will be the greatest stimulus to the production and appreciation of pure music since the seventeenth century. Almost all the vulgarity and over-cleverness of modern musical expression .can be traced to the universal cult of the piano ; this mechanical pattering which usurps the name of Art. Just as Cezanne, in painting, reverts to the simple and elemental forms of expression, replacing the subject picture of last century, so must the more personal musical instruments take us back to the purity of expression of three hundred years ago.
What would the musicians of long ago think of our modern musical fireworks, whether of the piano or orchestra ? Would they not see in them a hopeless jumble of misdirected energy ? They would be as contemptuous as, say, Rembrandt before the subject pictures of Frith or Maclise. The great men of this early period never attempted the ridiculous task of telling stories in music, or depicting landscapes, sunsets and ruined castles in terms of sound. There is nothing more laughable than to read a modern explanatory concert programme, which tries to depict the story in a composer's mind, real or imaginary. It is this love of the story in art which gives us the opera— that conglomeration of subject, scenery, sex and costume, designed for the benefit of those who can only tolerate music when presented with all this extraneous matter. The opera is in close relation to the subject picture painted for those who have no appreciation of art. This debasement in musical taste is mainly due to the popularity of the piano in preference to those stringed instruments which stand for personal expres- sion in music,—I am, Sir, &c., HUGH BLAKER. Old Isleworth.
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