He spent weeks experimenting with a sensitive manometer,
gauging all the scale of dynamics. No doubt these fumblings on the edge
of a new science temporarily hurt his play. With a dangerous joy he
pressed the keys of his instrument, endeavouring to achieve more
delicate shadings. He quarrelled with the piano manufacturers for their
obstinate adherence to the old-fashioned clumsy action; everything had
been improved but the keyboard--that alone was as coldly unresponsive
and inelastic as a half-century ago. He had fugitive dreams of wires
that would vibrate like a violin. The sounding-board of a pianoforte is
too far from the pianist, while the violinist presses his strings as one
kisses the beloved. Little wonder it is the musical monarch. A new
pianoforte, with passionately coloured overtones, that could sob like a
violoncello, sing like a violin, and resound with the brazen clangours
of the orchestra--Liszt had conceived this synthesis, had by the sheer
force of his audacious genius compelled from his instrument ravishing
tones that were never heard before or--alas!--since.
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