Occasionally he played for the select
aristocratic circles into which he had been introduced; but even here
he did not often meet with the genuine appreciation and sympathy which
the artist craves. "Whoever could read in his face," says Liszt,
"could see how often he felt convinced that among all these handsome,
well-dressed gentlemen, among all the perfumed, elegant ladies, not
one understood him."
As for the French critics they seem to have been as obtuse as their
German colleagues. To give only one instance: M. Fetis, author of the
well-known musical dictionary, states in his article on Chopin, that
this composer is overrated to-day, and his popularity largely due to
the fact that he is fashionable. And in his article on Heller, he
asserts, more pointedly still, that "the time will undoubtedly come
when the world will recognize that Heller, much more than Chopin, is
the modern poet of the pianoforte." In this opinion Fetis probably
stands alone; but many who have not studied Chopin's deepest works
carefully, are still convinced that the pianoforte compositions of
Mozart, Beethoven, and Schumann, are of greater importance than
Chopin's.
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