Rubinstein Matinee Recital: 4th

Includes program for all seven recitals.

“Mr. Rubinstein gave at Steinway Hall yesterday, the fourth of the piano recitals already written of in these columns, The programme consisted wholly of compositions by Schumann, and Mr. Rubinstein, who has a decided penchant for that master, interpreted it capitally.” 

“The great ‘romanticist’ of the piano, as Robert Schumann has been happily called, supplied the component elements of yesterday’s programme at Steinway Hall. The audience was larger than ever, and the pianist in his best mood. No greater compliment could be paid to the Russian pianist than to say he is in full sympathetic accord with Schumann where the works of that master demand his attention. The following was the programme [see above]. Not that Rubinstein played them in the order mentioned, for he has a strange fancy of sitting down to the piano and commencing with whatever work that first comes to his mind. But he excelled himself in his marvelous interpretation of the works which are an unfathomable mystery to most pianists. Players there are here, finished, brilliant, classical and poetical, to whom Beethoven, Chopin and Liszt are as familiar as the scales, but Rubinstein is the first who has lifted the veil from Schumann’s works and revealed to wondering ears the treasures that were so long concealed. The ‘Carnival,’ ‘Scènes Mignonnes sur quatre notes pour piano,’ with its typical masquerade of emotions; the ‘Kreisleriana,’ to which his love for Clara Wieck gave birth, a poetically rich, soul-absorbing and refined picture of a heart’s feelings, the ‘Symphonic Studies;’ which are almost orchestral in their wealth of harmonic combination, in which the fingers serve as the dramatis personae of a tone poem; the ‘Fantasias,’ those ‘songs without words’ in which strength and tenderness form an agreeable contrast—all place Schumann’s piano works in the highest niche of the temple of Fame. It is a pity that we hear so little of them; perhaps on account of the lack of talent necessary to interpret them. Many pianists dabble in them, but scarcely ruffle the surface. It remained for a Titan like Rubinstein to introduce us to a new world of beauty, in which the thoughts and passions speak and act as on the mimic stage.” 

“The programme of Mr. Rubinstein’s fourth recital on Saturday afternoon was devoted to Schumann, and embraced [see above]. In nearly all of these pieces there is call for the softest graces of touch and most poetic refinements of interpretation, and we need hardly say that Mr. Rubinstein fulfilled the requirements of the composer more perfectly than any other artist who has ever undertaken to play Schumann in this country. It was hard to believe that the fingers which caressed the keys in some of these beautiful selections, and taught them to sing such tender strains were the same which electrified us on Friday with Weber and Schubert, and on Wednesday with the great C minor Sonata of Beethoven. In the ‘Etudes Symphoniques’ there was of course more freedom and majesty, in the ‘Traumeswirren’ more brilliancy. The fragmentary scenes of the ‘Carnival’ were delightfully depicted—all of them distinct, elegant, and animated with the inimitable spirit and dash, and the difficulties of the closing ‘March of the Davidites’ were conquered with an ease and magnificent élan that at once stirred the enthusiasm of the house.

The public interest in these extraordinary concerts steadily increased all through the week, and on Friday and Saturday the large hall was almost entirely full.”

Includes program.