Music and manners; personal reminiscences and sketches of character

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It was, however, when avowedly improvising, that Liszt " let himself go," giving full rein to his fancy or humour of the moment, and indulging, to the top of his bent, in the exaggeration of technical difficulty. At such times, stimulated by strong excitement, he would put forth to their utmost executive limits the exceptional physical forces with which nature had gifted him, and would achieve what, to any other pianist, had been impossible. Practice and will had so disciplined his fingers and accustomed them to fulfil infallibly the orders transmitted to them from his brain, that, in all probability, the word "difficulty" (in connection with technique) had ceased to possess any exact significance, as far as Liszt the executant was concerned. Nobody who has heard him improvise can doubt that, absolutely free from any kind of pre-occupation as to the ability of his hands to execute whatever he may call upon them to do, he gives play to the creative and constructive faculties of his intellect without troubling himself in the least about the mere mechanical instruments attached to his wrists.

excerpt from 'Music and manners; personal reminiscences and sketches of character' pp. 227 (181 words)

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