The Violin: Some Account of That Leading Instrument and Its Most Eminent Professors, from Its Earliest Date to the Present Time; with Hints to Amateurs, Anecdotes, etc.Dubourg, George
History
The Violin: Some Account of That Leading Instrument and Its Most Eminent Professors, from Its Earliest Date to the Present Time; with Hints to Amateurs, Anecdotes, etc.
Dubourg, George
Violin; Violinists -- Biography
To advert more minutely to Mori’s powers as a Violinist—since he was not
great in _all_ the requisites, it follows that he can scarcely be
regarded as an artist of the very highest order. That mechanical command
over the executive difficulties of the instrument, for which he was so
remarkable, and which enabled him, when yet a boy, to delight the lovers
of the surprising—was his chief merit—“the pith and marrow of his
attribute.” The tuition he received from Viotti, that most vigorous of
Violinists, was of great importance in directing and maturing his great
manual capacity; but, though he derived from him, and from his own
assiduous study, a full, free tone, a dashing execution, and the most
accurate neatness,—his temperament, somewhat hard and ungenial, seems to
have been too little in accordance with Viotti’s, to admit of his fully
acquiring _all_ the advantages which that great preceptor was fitted to
impart. He caught most felicitously the art of triumphing over difficult
passages—the perfection of mere fiddling—but he had not the soul
“To snatch a grace _beyond_ the reach of _art_—”
to awaken, through the magic of expression, those deeper sensibilities
in which music finds the truest source of its empire. Mori’s playing,
with its powers and its deficiencies, was admirably suited to the
apprehension and desires of a fashionable audience. It was showy, but
not profound; striking, but not moving; full of artificial neatness,
with little of natural grace. His hand wrought to more purpose than his
mind. He was (before the malady that finally subdued him) a man of rigid
nerve, and had all the advantages that confidence could bestow,—and
these, especially in solo playing, are far from inconsiderable—but then,
for want of the sensitiveness pertaining to a more delicate
organization, he lost the finest part of what _might_ have been
accomplished. He has occupied a very marked place amongst English
instrumentalists; but, for the reasons here alleged, the impression he
produced seems not likely to prove of a very durable character, so as to
secure to him any considerable future importance in musical annals. As a
composer for his instrument, he possessed very slender pretensions. His
performance itself, admirable as it was in some points, sufficiently
shewed why he could not hope to distinguish himself in composition. The
few manifestations he made in that way have given no cause for
regretting his general habit of trusting to the works of others, for the
musical ideas which he had to convey[59].
Mr. LODER, of Bath, long prominent among provincials, and not unknown in
the metropolis, was justly esteemed for his knowledge of the orchestra,
and his utility as an able leader.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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