ABSTRACT
A close examination of the repertoire brings to light a smaller sample that preserves the connection to improvisation, and, because of that flexibility, to broader definitions of didacticism in which instruction is enhanced by variety and imagination. In binary form, Ferdinand David's Piece No. 6 – subtitled Capriccio – fits more the whimsical tone of caprice than any idea of structured improvisation. Though prelude and capriccio share didactic function, prelude has a stronger historical bond to the actual improvisation of introductory material. It is Pierre Baillot's student, Charles de Beriot, who builds further on the culminating independent prelude as the cap of a didactic series. The balance of didacticism with both bravura and vocal qualities in that older style was crucial to Beriot, who lamented in the preface to his methode the dominance of virtuosity with its 'fever of technique, which in recent years has seized the violin.
