The lesser Romantics and Romanticists were meanwhile working diligently in Paris. A group of successful piano-composers of this class reaches down to our own day. The chief names are Fauré, Widor, Vincent d’Indy, Chabrier, César Franck, Dubois, Cécile Chaminade, Paul Lacombe. The drawing-room romance, which in Chaminade unfortunately tends too often to shallowness, exhibits often a Mendelssohnian classicism, of which dainty specimens are given in Lacombe’s Toccatina, and in the Toccata of Chaminade herself. The literature for two pianos is well illustrated in Chabrier’s Romantic Waltzes, which are unusually spirited. César Franck’s symphonic variations, serious and academic, and St Saens’ Concertos, more interesting in their effective technique than in content, stand out from the mass of orchestral piano-work. [Illustration: From painting by Fritz Erler.] An equally important group is that of the Russians, headed by the emotional and highly-strung Tschaïkowski, whom Bülow, not without justice, honoured with his special admiration. Tschaïkowski’s variations are one of the soundest and most genuine of modern piano works; and the B flat minor concerto has a swing and rush that carries us away. His Sonata, not only by its application of national themes, but specially by the national colouring of the episodic parts, down to the light and shade of the figurations, is unique among piano pieces. He was simpler and more popular in his numerous drawing-room pieces, which constantly reward study by a spirited phrase or unusual harmony. The school of older and younger Russians has worked on the same popular lines. To this school belong Borodin, Cui, Liadoff, Rimsky-Korsakoff, Mussorgsky, Glazounow, Naprawnik. A third group is that of the Scandinavians, who gained importance in Europe about the middle of the century, not merely in fiction and painting, but in music also. But they were rather inspired than inspirers. Their leader is Grieg, whose well-known concerto Op. 16, in spite of certain eccentricities, has a very flowing course suggesting the united influence of many predecessors. His themes are good specimens of a music which is not the product of experience, but of invention. Scores of variations and dainty isolated pieces keep the same happy and attractive medium between the shallow and the interesting. They are in any case more important than Gade’s Mendelssohniana. For a long time less known, but far deeper and more genuine than Grieg, is Halfdan Kjerulf, whose works have been republished by Arno Kleffel (Simon). Humorous little pieces in the post-romantic style, but of concentrative ability, deserve the highest praise a Romantic can receive; they are like Schubert in spirit. Among the later Scandinavians, Schytte and Sinding have tried no new paths; Stenhammer, also of importance as a virtuoso, has given us works of pith and character, which may rank among the first. [Illustration]