DR. HANS RICHTER.
[To THU EDITOR OF TER "srscv.roa."]
SIR,—The excellent article in the Spectator of November 29th upon Dr. Richter appears to do rather less than justice to the great conductor in one particular. Your contributor speaks of his "sober and common-sense conception" of the works of Beethoven and other masters of the orchestra. Might I be allowed to point out, what I think no one who has played under him with dispute, that, apart from his mere objective and practical gifts, his pre-eminence as a conductor lies in the nobility of his conception of the great works in question ? Dr. Richter is not only the greatest judge of musical style in Europe, but his performances of the Beethoven Symphonies are perhaps the only contemporaneous performances of these works possessing the breadth and grandeur which unequivo- cally denote the grand style.—I am, Sir, &c., S. W.
[We readily endorse our correspondent's view. "Common- sense" was perhaps not a very well-chosen word. But sanity is not incompatible with nobility, and the writer of the article more than once alluded to Dr. Richter as an Olympian.— En. Spectator.1
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