Saint-Saens never deceives himself. His memory
serves him as he pleases, but he is never troubled by it.
As far as one can judge, M. Saint-Saens' musical ideas are infused with
the spirit of the great classics belonging to the end of the eighteenth
century--far more, whatever people may say, with the spirit of
Beethoven, Haydn, and Mozart, than with the spirit of Bach. Schumann's
seductiveness also left its mark upon him, and he has felt the influence
of Gounod, Bizet, and Wagner. But a stronger influence was that of
Berlioz, his friend and master,[130] and, above all, that of Liszt. We
must stop at this last name.
[Footnote 130: "Thanks to Berlioz, all my generation has been shaped,
and well shaped" _(Portraits et Souvenirs_).]
M. Saint-Saens has good reason for liking Liszt, for Liszt was also a
lover of freedom, and had shaken off traditions and pedantry, and
scorned German routine; and he liked him, too, because his music was a
reaction from the stiff school of Brahms.[131] He was enthusiastic about
Liszt's work, and was one of the earliest and most ardent champions of
that new music of which Liszt was the leading spirit--of that
"programme" music which Wagner's triumph seemed to have nipped in the
bud, but which has suddenly and gloriously burst into life again in the
works of Richard Strauss.
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