It has been shown that Paganini's performances caused a revolution in the style of composition and execution in pianoforte music, as exemplified in the works of Liszt. But did violin playing benefit? As Paganini belonged to no school, so he founded no school. He had his imitators, but he had few pupils, and no absolute successor. Camillo Sivori is generally put forth as his only pupil. I have heard that great artist, but--I say it with diffidence--I could never consider him the equal of what I imagined Paganini to have been. According to William Gardiner, Paganini was accompanied by Antonio Oury when he first went to London. It was Oury who introduced Gardiner to Paganini, and the former stated that Oury was Paganini's favourite pupil.[50] Then the Chevalier Robbio, who appeared at Jullien's concerts at Drury Lane Theatre in 1854, claimed to have been a pupil of Paganini. Acknowledged pupils were Teresa Ottavio, who was playing in Vienna, in 1835, and Mlle. Neumann, who gave concerts in Venice and elsewhere, in 1838. But all these were of small account. The question remains. Did Paganini influence the art of violin playing, and in what direction? Let a very recent writer contribute an answer. "We would not miss this greatest of fiddlers in the annals of violin playing--no, not for a Spohr or any other great modern violin master; but his influence can hardly be called beneficial. It forced violin playing into a Procrustean bed unsuited to its true nature and mission. Paganini had temporarily transformed the angel into a devil, and the angel did not escape unscathed--Lucifer burned his wings. Violin-playing will never be quite what it was before Paganini. He helped to hurry the growing old process--brought out the lines, the spots, and the wrinkles on the once fair face. He, before all others, established the iron rule of technique, with its train of other evils, in the place of the gentler reign of charming naiveté of the elder master."[51] There is truth here, and cause for sadness; but can the hand of time be turned back, and music regain the artless joy of the seventeenth century, when technique was unknown? Paganini, after all, was only one of the forces that effected the revolution that produced the music of the last half of the nineteenth century. It is not too much to say that the technique of the modern orchestra, in regard to the string section, is due to Paganini. Compare the scores of the classical composers with those of the most modern writers, and see what an enormous difference there is in the work for the strings--from the violins to the double-basses. The orchestral player of to-day is a virtuoso. For good or evil, music has entered upon a phase that has raised executive skill to a pinnacle never attained before: and this it owes to Paganini: may it be the prelude to higher achievements in the spiritual domain of art! FOOTNOTES: [44] Karl Michael Esser, born about 1736, date of death unknown.