March 16, 1922
MUSICAL COURIER
14
LEO ORNSTEIN SCORNS AT “METHOD;״
BELIEVES IN RESULTS AND NOT THEORIES
Distinguished Pianist-Composer Says He Never Bothers to Analyze or Dissect His Own Works, But Simply Writes—Discusses His New Sonata—How He Works—Ornstein and Casellaand Korngold—His Remarkable Facility and His Memory
tunity for a confab. Casella, says Ornstein, kept asking him what he thought of this or that theory, until, finally, Ornstein wanted to know “what difference it made ?” How could such things matter to a composer? The business of a composer is to compose, not to theorize, and Ornstein confessed himself unable to understand how a composer could think so much about his own methods and still retain the necessary spontaneity for inspirational production.
Ornstein’s words suggest to the mind that perhaps these all too theoretical composers are turning their works out by
Apeda Photo
LEO ORNSTEIN,
Pianist and Composer.
rule of thumb rather than by wooing the muse (although it will be recalled that Casella specifically denies this in his article).
Naturally, other composers came under review, among them Korngold and his latest American production, “Die Tote Stadt.” Ornstein was not impressed, and was amazed that I could be. The orchestration, yes, he would willingly acknowledge that it was masterly. But did not all this splendid workmanship become tiresome with its lack of “substance”?
“Substance 1” That is a word which, with Ornstein, evidently covers the whole subject of idea and invention—the “realness” of any musical composition. All else, surely, must die if that essential, life-giving quality is missing. One must have, above all things, something to say. The setting of the diamond may, indeed, be of importance, but not nearly (Continued on page 58.)
piano, in two keys at once—two keys half a tone apart. It seemed to me that the upper of these two keys was harmonized by the accompanying arpeggios, and that the other simply caused a confusion of the tonality. The assumption might naturally be that the second key might be omitted, but Ornstein played it that way, and, lo! there was evidently something wrong—a sort of void or emptiness resulted, which left me greatly puzzled.
Ornstein was not puzzled. To him it seemed quite natural. He said that was the way he heard it before he wrote it down, and, of course, leaving out some of the essential notes, would destroy the effect of the original inspiration. But, he adds, that is not really a passage in two keys at once. The additional notes are merely passing chords, and their only object color.
The essence of this new music, so strange sounding to most of us, is not theory but practice. It is nothing more or less than an effort on the part of the composer to do just what all musicians have done since the beginning—to find a means of self-expression, and this means is not sought out of any preconceived method of chords and scales, but out of the composer’s own inner consciousness. In other words, it is purely inspirational.
One may then well ask why the music of Ornstein differs so greatly from other music, and that was the question I put to him. The answer was, simply, that when he wrote in traditional modes, with traditional harmonies, he found that the music did not satisfy him. Indeed, he tells me that in his sonata for two pianos he felt that, for the first time, he had succeeded in attaining to a semblance of that which he has in mind. As to what this or other of his pieces means he tells me that, even when they have names, the names were chosen after the music was conceived or written. In no case is it program music in the true sense of the word. And this is true, too, in such apparent tone paintings as “Chinatown” or the “Wild Man’s Dance.” He says that “Chinatown” was almost completed before the suggestion־ of the possible meaning of it came to him.
He works at two or three pieces at one time, but he finds that he cannot lay them down and resume work on them long afterwards. He must complete them when the inspiration is fresh. Thus the new sonata for two pianos was written in a few weeks. Most of it was written away from the piano, and as rapidly as the notes could be put on paper.
This so evidently differs from the methods of Casella, whose article on his own music has just appeared in the Musical Courier and was fresh in mind, that I asked Ornstein his opinion on the subject. It proved to be a pertinent question, for Ornstein and Casella had recently met somewhere on their concert tours and had taken a rail trip together, which had furnished them with time and oppor-
In the ordinary meaning of the word, it would be a difficult thing to interview Leo Ornstein. Not that, he has any objection to talking about the things that interest him—but in the matter of his own composition he is much more interested in results than in theories. He has little faith in those who figure out a method based upon fact or fancy, and compose accordingly. His own work springs direct out of his invention, and he finds, with the best will in the world, little to say about it.
Yet there are some points that have come up in intimate conversations that I have had with him that are well worth recording, if for no other reason than that they throw an illuminating sidelight upon this interesting and original charac-acter, and because, too, they may well exercise a healthy influence upon younger composers—not younger in years, perhaps, but younger musically, for Ornstein, in spite of the fact that his opus number is already up near the eighties, is only twenty-six years old.
One of the interesting things about him is that he is not at all original in his methods, whatever he may be in results. He thinks of composition, his whole attitude is towards composition, and the way he actually composes is exactly that which has been followed by the best composers from time immemorial. His one idea is to write good music. He has no theories of modernism nor futurism nor anything of that sort, and he never bothers himself to analyze or dissect his own works. He simply writes, just as Bach and Mozart and Beethoven, Wagner, Brahms and the rest of them simply wrote.
That the results are rather amazing does not bother him any, and he, for one, does not find them so. He sees nothing shocking in his dissonances, and one very surprising thing about those same dissonances is that Ornstein very quickly convinces you, sometimes against your will, that they are not only perfectly natural but entirely indispensable in his music.
We had a long discussion, for instance, about his new sonata for two pianos, played the other evening at Aeolian Hall by Ornstein and Leginska, and still in manuscript. He was interested in my reaction towards it, since I am a confirmed modernist and have my likes and dislikes in modernistic music. Among my most sincere likes is some of Ornstein. Some other of Ornstein is quite beyond me, and among these this new sonata for two pianos. The question which we tried frankly to answer was: Why do some of these dissonances appeal to me and why do others seem “wrong” to me? assuming always that mine is just an ordinary taste and that others are likely to feel the same way about it.
Right in the opening of the first movement I picked out a passage where the motive or melody is played by the first piano, to a simple enough accompaniment on the second
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