Then in quicker pace it sounds again all about, big and little, and ends, after a touch of modern Gallic scale, in opposing runs, with a last light, saucy fling.

Mahler, we feel again, realizes all the craving that Bruckner breeds for a kernel of feeling in the shell of counterpoint.  Though we cannot deny a rude breach of ancient rule and mode, there is in Mahler a genuine, original, individual quality of polyphonic art that marks a new stage since the first in Bach and a second in Beethoven.  It is this bold revel in the neglected sanctuary of the art that is most inspiriting for the future.  And as in all true poetry, this overleaping audacity of design is a mere expression of simplest gaiety.

CHAPTER XVIII

RICHARD STRAUSS[A]

[Footnote A:  Born in 1864.]

Much may be wisely written on the right limits of music as a depicting art.  The distinction is well drawn between actual delineation, of figure or event, and the mere suggestion of a mood.  It is no doubt a fine line, and fortunately; for the critic must beware of mere negative philosophy, lest what he says cannot be done, be refuted in the very doing.  If Lessing had lived a little later, he might have extended the principles of his “Laocoeon” beyond poetry and sculpture into the field of music.  Difficult and ungrateful as is the task of the critical philosopher, it must be performed.  There is every reason here as elsewhere why men should see and think clearly.

It is perhaps well that audiences should cling to the simple verdict of beauty, that they should not be led astray by the vanity of finding an answer; else the composer is tempted to create mere riddles.  So we may decline to find precise pictures, and content ourselves with the music.  The search is really time wasted; it is like a man digging in vain for gold and missing the sunshine above.

Strauss may have his special meanings.  But the beauty of the work is for us all-important.  We may expect him to mark his scenes.  We may not care to crack that kind of a nut.[A] It is really not good eating.  Rather must we be satisfied with the pure beauty of the fruit, without a further hidden kernel.  There is no doubt, however, of the ingenuity of these realistic touches.  It is interesting, here, to contrast Strauss with Berlioz, who told his stories largely by extra-musical means, such as the funeral trip, the knell of bells, the shepherd’s reed.  Strauss at this point joins with the Liszt-Wagner group in the use of symbolic motives.  Some of his themes have an effect of tonal word-painting.  The roguish laugh of Eulenspiegel is unmistakable.

[Footnote A:  Strauss remarked that in Till Eulenspiegel he had given the critics a hard nut to crack.]

It is in the harmonic rather than the melodic field that the fancy of Strauss soars the freest.  It is here that his music bears an individual stamp of beauty.  Playing in and out among the edges of the main harmony with a multitude of ornamental phrases, he gains a new shimmer of brilliancy.  Aside from instrumental coloring, where he seems to outshine all others in dazzling richness and startling contrasts, he adds to the lustre by a deft playing in the overtones of his harmonies, casting the whole in warmest hue.