ABSTRACT
Bettina’s introspections, compared with my own, suggest that part of our likings and dislikings are due to something besides musical preference, and even such sensitiveness (or lack thereof) to the mere (“Cecilian”) “Powers of Sound.” It would seem as if “Listeners” and “Hearers” are apt to respond, like a vibrating string, to some particular affective character to which they are individually attuned, indeed tuned. Besides Bettina’s responsiveness to every musical suggestion of passionate enthusiasm and self-surrender, and my own sensitiveness to that particular Mozartian pathos, we have come across several other instances of the same sort. There is “C. A. T.” singling out, even in her most abstract illustrations, two alternating expressions; the exultation of achievement (Wellington after Waterloo) and the tenderness of protective strength (the mother with the “little baby”). There is M. Ernest harping on the (sombre) resignation of Beethoven. And among our “Hearers” there is Spiridion’s constant interpretation of musical emotion in terms of a vague poetical mysticism which seem to tally with his confession that he sometimes imagines himself to have written, under musical inspiration, masterpieces which proved not to be such when re-read in less exalted moments.
