Music: An Art and a Language

ative artist that he was, as first and foremost a unique per-
sonality. Had he not written a note of music we should have
sufficient historical evidence to assure ourselves of the vigor of
his intellect and the elevation of his ideals. Whereas Haydn and
Mozart are to be judged purely as musicians, in Beethoven it is
always something underlying the musical symbols which claims
our allegiance. Furthermore he had the inestimable advantage of
finding the mechanical structure of instrumental music carefully
formulated by his predecessors. The stone had been quarried,
the rough cutting done and the blocks lay ready for a genius to
use in the erection of his own poetically conceived edifice. And
these forms were still fresh and vigorous; they had not yet hard-
ened into formalism. In Beethoven’s works we rarely find form
employed for its own sake, as a mere “tour de force” of skilful
workmanship, rather is it made to adapt itself to the individ-
ual needs of the composer. Finally Beethoven’s career coincided
with momentous changes and upheavals in the social, political
and artistic world. He is the embodiment of that spirit of in-
dividualism, of human freedom and self-respect which found its
expression in the French Revolution, in our American War of
Independence and in the entire alteration of social standards.
Beethoven at all costs resolved to be himself. With him music
ceases to be a mere “concourse of sweet sounds”; it must always
bring some message to the brooding human soul, and be some-
thing more than a skilful example of abstract ingenuity. These
personal tendencies of Beethoven were fostered by the spirit of
the times, and his music became in turn a vital expression of
revolt against existing conditions and of passionate aspiration
towards something better. He was the first musician to free him-
self from the enervating influence of having to write exclusively
for aristocratic patronage. Such was the social emancipation
of the period that he could address himself at first hand to a
musical public eagerly receptive and constantly growing. His
representative works could never have been composed in the
time of Haydn and Mozart; for though in formal structure the
logical development of preceding methods—Beethoven being no
reckless iconoclast—in individual content they reveal a freedom
of utterance which took its rise in tendencies hitherto unknown.
Beethoven’s mighty personality and far-reaching influence can
not be stated in a few formulae. An extensive library covering
his life and times is accessible to the interested layman, and a
thorough appreciation of his masterpieces is a spiritual posses-