Liszt, Thalberg and the night Paris fought with eighty keys.
by Marialuisa Veneziano
************
🎧 MUSIC FOR LETTURE – (Box 1)
Sigismond Thalberg – Fantaisie sur des thèmes de Moïse, op. 33
This time we don't listen to a simple soundtrack. We go directly into the duel.
Start with Thalberg: search for that melody that seems to sing in the center of the keyboard while the other fingers build them on and under a whole sound world. It is the famous effect of "three hands".
Click on the black arrow to make the listening appear
Matthew received the weapon at 9 a.m.
It was 15 centimetres long, it had the freshly tempered tip and it was red.
— Don't miss it. — said Mr. Valmont.
Matteo turned her in the fingers.
— It's a pencil.
— I see.
— You said you'd have given me something important.
The printer manager lifted his eyes.
— With that, tonight, you're gonna kill a man.
Matthew almost dropped the pencil.
Valmont burst out laughing.
— A name, you idiot. You'll kill a name.
On the bench, between lead characters, dirty ink rags and still wet leaves, were spread two first pages.
The first announced:
The second one:
Matteo read the first.
Then the second.
Then he returned to the first.
— But the concert is tonight.
— Good memory.
— They haven't played yet.
— Another impeccable observation.
— And you already wrote who won?
— I wrote both possibilities.
Matteo scratched his forehead.
— What if nobody wins?
Valmont stopped smiling.
He looked at it with that particular compassion that adults reserve to children when they say something reasonable.
— You're 14, aren't you?
— Yes.
— He's heard.
He pointed out the two pages.
— Tonight you will go to the palace of Princess Belgiumjoso. You will listen to Liszt and Thalberg. When they're done, you'll take this pencil and make a cross on the loser's name.
— And then?
— Run here.
— How strong?
— If you want to keep the job, enough to get there before two.
Matthew infiltrated the pencil in his pocket.
— So I'll decide who won.
Valmont laugh.
— No, my boy. Paris has already decided.
— So what do I serve?
— To discover what to do He was right.
That phrase remained in Matthew's head all day long.
Not because he was particularly smart.
Because, walking through the city, he realized that it was true.
Paris had split.
Not with barricades.
Not yet.
With something much more comfortable: opinions.
Coffee was fighting.
In the living rooms he fought with lower voice.
He was fighting in the fights, interrupting the job.
In the newspapers he fought with the ink, which had the advantage of making the nonsense permanent.
— Liszt is a genius.
— Liszt is an acrobat.
— Thalberg sings the piano.
— Thalberg always does the same trick.
— Liszt is the future.
— Thalberg tastes.
— Liszt has fire.
— Thalberg doesn't need it.
Near Pont-Neuf, Matthew handed some drafts to a man who was arguing.
— Thalberg is not worth half of Liszt!
Matteo stopped.
— Did you hear that?
Man looked at him.
— Who?
— Thalberg.
— No.
— So how do you know Liszt is better?
Man slowly took off his glasses.
— Who are you for?
— I don't know.
Man trusted him with suspicion.
— Then why are you talking?
Matthew continued.
Ten minutes later he heard two ladies.
— Liszt will certainly be unbearable.
— Have you ever listened to him?
— Never.
— So?
The lady opened the fan.
— My dear, certain things are understood.
Matthew continued to walk.
Around noon began to have the impression that the evening concert served everything except to listen to music. The palace of Princess Cristina Trivulzio of Belgiumjoso was already in ferment.
The concert would have been beneficial. A part of the proceeds would be served to Italians in difficulty and exiles.
When Matthew heard it, he straightened out.
— I'm Italian and I'm in trouble.
The butler who was giving him a pile of programs rode him.
— I'll keep you in mind if they're advancing cans.
Matthew decided that, for a Frenchman, he was a witty man.
He spent the afternoon carrying chairs, bending sheets and trying not to break anything worth more than his mother, that is almost everything.
That's when he heard the first piano.
The door of a living room was open.
Matthew peed.
An elegant man sat on the keyboard.
He didn't move much.
He didn't need it.
From the piano came out a clear melody, perfectly recognizable, as if someone was singing in the center of the instrument.
But above that voice, they ran arabesques.
And the bottom was moving.
Matthew looked at his hands.
Two.
He listened.
Three.
He looked again.
Two.
He took a few steps.
He leaned next to the piano.
Music stopped.
— Is there something interesting below?
Matthew lifted his head.
Man observed it.
— I was looking for the third hand.
Quiet.
— What third hand?
— The one playing the melody.
Man was serious.
Then laugh.
— And you found it?
— No.
— Too bad. They've been looking for her for years.
Matthew rose up.
— You are Thalberg.
— Depends.
— From what?
— If you come collect money, no.
Matteo smiled.
Sigismond Thalberg warned him to approach.
— Look.
He slowly recovered the passage.
The melody was passing through the thumbs in the middle register. The other fingers built around a soundscape that gave the illusion of multiple overlapping planes.
Matthew opened his eyes.
— It's a trick.
Thalberg looked at him.
— You work in a typography?
— Yes.
— When you print the word seaIs the sheet wet?
— No.
— Then you do tricks, too.
— It's not the same.
— Of course. My cost a lot more.
Matteo laugh.
Then he remembered the pencil in his pocket.
— Will you win tonight?
Thalberg stopped playing.
— Against who?
— Liszt.
— Ah.
The name remained among them.
— Everyone says it's gonna be a duel.
— Human beings love the duels in which they are not likely to be affected.
— But you want to win?
Thalberg looked at him.
Matthew expected a magnificent phrase on the superiority of art.
Thalberg said:
— Very much.
Matthew was disappointed.
— I thought you'd say that only music counts.
Thalberg closes the keyboard slowly.
— It's one of the things musicians say when they've already won.
BOX MUSICOLOGICAL (Click on the black arrow to open the contents)
The other piano was two rooms over there.
Matthew heard the same sentence nine times.
At the tenth he became angry.
Franz Liszt sat alone.
He played four jokes.
He stopped.
She was repeating.
Again.
Again.
At the twelfth Matthew asked:
— Can't you?
Liszt turned.
— What?
— That piece.
— Why?
— Keep doing it again.
Liszt studied it.
— When you can't do something, how many times do you try?
— Mr. Valmont usually arrives at the third and calls me incapable.
Liszt laughed.
Matthew entered.
In bending to collect some programs, he dropped the two first pages.
Liszt picked them up.
Lesse:
LISZT THALBERG.
A smile.
I'll turn the sheet.
THALBERG DETRONIZZA LISZT.
The smile remained, but the eyes changed.
— Previously.
— I need to get one back tonight.
— Then you won't have any trouble.
— What?
Liszt pointed out the first.
Matteo laugh.
— Thalberg also wants to win.
— What a surprising man.
— I thought you might have said that only music counts.
Liszt returned to the piano.
— Did Thalberg tell you that?
— No.
— So, for once, we agree perfectly.
He took the four jokes.
Matthew observed it.
Two very different men.
They both wanted to win.
For reasons Matthew didn't know yet, he liked it.
It made them less statues.
More dangerous.
More human.
And it's just when it feels important that you commit the best stupidities.
Thalberg was in the hallway when Matthew came out.
— Did you meet Liszt?
— Yes.
— And?
Matthew could have said:
He's trying.
He could have said:
He wants to win.
He could have shut up.
Instead, he heard Valmont's voice in his head.
Nobody buys a newspaper if nothing happens.
— He said he'd make you forget tonight.
Thalberg stopped.
— Did he say that?
Matthew's heart had a little relief.
— Sort of.
It was fake.
Not completely false, he said.
Liszt wanted to win.
One sentence, in the end, was worth the other.
Thalberg looked at him for a moment.
Then he entered the rehearsal room and closed the door.
Soon after Matthew heard the piano.
Not as calm as before.
Faster.
Harder.
One sentence was repeated three times.
Matthew felt cold.
He did something.
He didn't know how big.
For the first time, I took out the red pencil.
He looked at her.
She didn't look so innocent anymore.
At eight o'clock the building stopped being a house.
It became a theatre.
Then, slowly, an arena.
Carrozze in front of the entrance.
Jewelry.
Uniform.
Perfume.
Silk.
Ventagli.
Voices.
Matthew recognized Liszt's supporters and Thalberg's supporters without anyone carrying a uniform.
Just listen to them.
— If Thalberg still does his central melody game, I'm leaving.
— Really?
— Of course.
— Did you ever hear that?
— No.
Further:
— Liszt sounds too loud.
— He hasn't started yet.
— It doesn't matter.
Matteo strinse the programs.
He spent the afternoon with the two men.
Neither of them looked like the version they gave them.
As he walked through the salon, someone slipped his sheets out of his pocket.
Matteo turned scared.
Princess Belgiumjoso was reading them.
One.
Then the other.
— Very practical.
— Height...
— Don't worry. I'm not gonna report your paper for excess imagination.
He returned the papers.
— What will you use?
— The one.
— What if they're both wrong?
Matthew hesitated.
— My director says it's impossible.
The princess observed it.
— He must be a very lucky man.
— Why?
— I spent most of my life seeing things that very safe men had just defined impossible.
Then he directed the hall.
— Listen well.
— That's what I have to do.
— No.
Cristina just smiled.
— You have to choose. It's different.
He left.
Matthew stayed there.
For the first time, those two things seemed really different.
When Thalberg approached the piano, the room fell into silence.
A silence far from innocent.
Hundreds of people were waiting.
Some music.
A lot of the verdict.
Thalberg put his hands on the keyboard.
Fantasia started on Moses by Rossini.
Matthew knew him enough to see what the public could not see.
At first Thalberg was tense.
He knew it from his back.
First breathing.
From that tiny gesture he'd arranged his cuff.
Maybe he was thinking about the phrase that Matthew had attributed to Liszt.
It'll make you forget.
Matthew felt the shame coming up.
Then Thalberg really started playing.
And he forgot everything.
The melody appeared in the middle of the keyboard.
She was singing.
He had no other verb.
She was singing.
Around it, the notes ran like water around a stone.
Up.
Under.
Three sound planes with two hands.
Matthew looked.
He no longer looked for the third.
Close your eyes.
And he saw his mother.
Not in the present.
Two years earlier.
On the way to Paris.
A room for one night.
Few coins.
The rain.
He asked if the next day they would eat.
His mother didn't answer.
Then, in the dark, an Italian song.
Sing slowly.
With a voice he wanted to sound safe and he wasn't.
Matteo, then, had understood.
But he pretended not.
Thalberg continued.
The melody stood still in the middle while everything changed.
Just like that voice.
His mother was scared.
And he sang the same.
Matthew opened his eyes.
For a few seconds he didn't see the princess's living room.
He saw home.
A house that no longer existed.
The last note is lost.
There was a very short silence.
Then the applause.
Huge.
Matthew infiltrated his hand in his pocket.
I'll take out the page:
THALBERG DETRONIZZA LISZT.
He took the red pencil.
He spotted the tip to the card.
One inch.
Half.
He stopped.
Liszt hadn't played yet.
He filled the sheet.
*******
🎧 – (Box 2)
Franz Liszt – Great fantaisie sur des motifs de Niobe, S.419
You listened to Thalberg while Matthew found something of his past.
Liszt's coming in now.
Do not look for the same kind of beauty: the duel really begins because the piano changes face.
Click on the black arrow to make the listening appear.
Thalberg passed near him.
— So?
Matthew suffered.
— What?
— The third hand.
The boy smiled.
— I didn't find it.
— Good.
— Good?
Thalberg lowered his voice.
— When you stop looking for makeup, sometimes you start listening to music.
And he left.
Matthew remained still.
The phrase hurt him even more.
Because he did exactly the opposite that afternoon.
He looked for makeup in two men.
And he invented one.
When Liszt entered, a part of the audience applauded before it even touched the keyboard.
Matthew realized he was bothering him.
Then he recalled that it also happened with Thalberg.
Adults, he thought, often managed to be unjust in a perfectly balanced way.
Liszt sat down.
He didn't look at Thalberg.
Or maybe he did.
Matteo couldn't tell.
He started.
The Niobe entered the hall completely differently.
Matthew sought at first what he had found in Thalberg.
The middle voice.
The continuity.
That song.
There was no.
He almost felt betrayed.
Then Liszt changed perspective.
An explosive passage.
Another retreated suddenly.
The piano seemed too tight for what the pianist claimed from him.
Sometimes orchestra.
You have one voice.
At times matter.
Sometimes dizziness.
Matteo stopped thinking about his mother.
He began to think of himself.
The typography.
To the shoes too big he brought because they were of his cousin.
To the room he shared with his mother.
To the letters of lead that he composed every day to tell the lives of others.
He always thought he'd have a typography one day.
Not because he wanted it.
Because it was the only future he knew.
Then Liszt played a phrase that seemed to open up something.
Matthew had a thought.
What if it wasn't decided?
That's it.
A tiny thought.
But some thoughts need very little space to suddenly make the room where you lived until that moment small.
What if it wasn't decided what he would do?
Where would he live?
Who would become?
Liszt finished.
The room exploded.
Matthew did not applaud immediately.
He needed his hands to hold something he couldn't appoint.
Thalberg had returned him a place from which he came.
Liszt made him suspect there could be one to go.
Matteo took the two pages.
He put them next to each other.
He looked at the red pencil.
And he realized he was in trouble.
The music ended.
The race began.
— Liszt!
— Thalberg!
— Thalberg!
— Liszt!
Names bounced into the hall.
Somebody laugh.
Someone whistled.
The princess raised a hand.
The noise fell.
Not entirely.
Never entirely.
— Apparently — he said, — Paris came here with a question.
— Who won! — shouted someone.
Laugh.
Matteo looked at the pianists.
Liszt looked like a man who pretended very well not to be interested.
Thalberg is a man who pretended even better.
The princess looked at them.
Then he looked at Matthew.
And he saw the two sheets.
— Come here.
Blood left the boy's face.
He pretended he didn't understand.
— You.
Nothing to do.
He crossed the hall.
Every step seemed noisy.
The princess pointed out the sheets.
— Your newspaper wants a name.
— Yes.
— Good. Give it to him.
Matteo swallowed.
Someone said:
— Let's judge the boy!
A laugh went through the salon.
— So? — asked a man. — Who was better?
Matthew looked at Thalberg.
Then Liszt.
The answer didn't come.
— I don't know.
Laugh.
— He doesn't know!
— What a judge!
— But you have to choose!
Matthew infiltrated his hand in his pocket.
It was the pencil.
He watched Thalberg.
— When he played...
The living room slowly blew.
— ...I forgot that monsieur Liszt existed.
Someone will be biting approval.
Matteo turned to Liszt.
— And when he played, I forgot that monsieur Thalberg existed.
The Mormon changed.
The man of coffee, what he had already decided in the morning, drank.
— What does that prove?
Matteo lowered his eyes on the two first pages.
The answer came from there.
— That to decide who was better I should have remembered the other while listening.
No one laughs.
— But then I would have heard worse.
Quiet.
Matthew continued, now too scared to stop.
— Monsieur Thalberg made me remember home.
He looked at Liszt.
— Monsieur Liszt asked me where I could go.
Then he looked at the hall.
— I don't know which one is better.
Break.
— And I don't want to lose one just so I can say I chose well.
That phrase didn't make applause.
Matteo was almost happy.
The applauses would have ruined everything.
He produced something more rare.
People who didn't know what to say immediately.
He could have stopped.
The princess would have found an elegant sentence.
The audience would have discussed.
Valmont would have screamed.
Life would continue.
But Matthew saw Thalberg.
And he saw that door closed again in the afternoon.
The most nervous music.
The invented phrase.
He raised his hand.
— There is another thing.
The princess sighed.
— Of course.
A few laughs.
Matthew looked at Thalberg.
— I lied to you.
Thalberg attacked the forehead.
— When?
— Today.
Liszt looked up.
— I told you that Monsieur Liszt promised to make you forget.
The hall was built.
Thalberg turned to Liszt.
Liszt simply said:
— I didn’t say that.
Matthew felt his face burn.
— I know.
— Why? — Thalberg asked.
He wasn't angry.
It would have been easier if it was.
Matthew looked at the leaves.
— Because that sounds like a better story.
Nobody moves.
— I thought if you guys hated yourself a little more, people would want to know even more who would win.
Thalberg kept looking at him.
— What now?
Matteo inspired.
— Now I think the music was more interesting than the story I invented.
Liszt lowered his eyes.
Thalberg did the same.
For a moment the two men did not seem rivals or virtuous.
They seemed like two people who had just discovered how easily others could tell them where they felt.
The princess observed Matthew.
— You learned quickly.
— What?
— The journalist's job.
The room rise.
Matthew became red.
Then Cristina added:
— Fortunately you are also learning the remedy.
The chronicler next to the piano raised his voice.
— All very nice, Your Highness. But in the morning readers will still ask who won.
The tension came back.
— The boy has two titles — He continued. — One of them will be true.
Matthew looked at the leaves.
LISZT THALBERG.
THALBERG DETRONIZZA LISZT.
The red tip waited.
That was the easiest thing.
A cross.
A loser.
A winner.
A clean story.
Matteo thought of Valmont.
At work.
To his mother.
To the coins he brought home.
Then he drew a line.
On the first title.
Mormon.
He moved the pencil.
He drew a line on the second.
— Boy! — cried the chronicler.
Matthew put the pencil back.
— They're wrong.
— Both of you?
— Yes.
— And what should we write?
Matthew lifted his back.
— What happened.
— That's what we were doing!
Matthew looked at the two deleted phrases.
— No.
Then, very slowly:
— You were writing what you wanted to happen.
Liszt laughed first.
A short laugh.
Thalberg looked at him.
Then he laughed.
Not a hug.
Not a fairytale reconciliation.
Neither of them had suddenly stopped wanting victory.
But for a moment they seemed to see from the outside the cage in which Paris had put them.
And that was enough.
When almost everyone came out, Matthew returned to the salon.
He had to recover the abandoned programs.
There were glasses on the tables, consumed candles, an overturned chair.
The piano was still open.
Liszt was about to leave.
Thalberg was near the door.
They met in the middle of the room.
Matthew hid instinctively behind a tent.
He didn't want to eavesdrop.
He just wanted to see if they were gonna kill each other.
Liszt looked at Thalberg.
— The boy lied wrong.
— Very.
— He could have invented something more offensive.
— I told you.
A silence.
Then Liszt directed the piano.
— That melody in the middle registry.
Thalberg looked at him.
— What?
— Let me see it.
Thalberg remained still for a second.
Then he returned to the keyboard.
He slowly waved the passage.
Liszt observed.
He tried.
Thalberg shook his head.
— No.
Liszt repeated.
— Like that?
— Worse.
Liszt looked at him.
— You know you have an unbearable character?
— The public finds me elegant.
— The audience doesn't know you.
For the first time Matthew understood something that titles could never tell.
Two rivals could study.
Rub an idea.
Admiring countervoke.
Desiring to overcome and, precisely for this reason, to force itself to become better.
Competition was not necessarily evil.
Evil began when someone claimed that, to exist one, the other should be erased.
Matthew came out of the tent.
Liszt saw him.
— You.
Matteo stopped.
— I'm still sorry.
Thalberg made a gesture with his hand.
— We know.
Liszt directed the piano.
— Can you play?
— No.
— Perfect. Come on.
Matthew approached.
Liszt pointed a button.
— Press.
Matthew did.
A note.
Thalberg bowed his head.
— Too heavy.
Liszt said:
— Don't listen to him. It's envious.
Thalberg presses the same button.
— Here.
Liszt made a damp.
— Too elegant.
Matthew looked at them.
— Who played it better?
The two Teachian pianists.
Liszt pointed the door.
— Out.
That time Matteo laughed before he obeyed.
When he arrived in typography, the two of them passed.
Valmont was standing.
He said nothing.
It was worse.
Matteo put his sheets.
The director saw the first title erased.
Then the second.
He looked slowly.
— Explain.
— They didn't work.
— They're titles. They don't have to work.
— They were wrong.
— Who won?
— I don't know.
— Matteo.
— Really.
— I sent you to find one thing.
— I know.
— And come back without knowing it.
Matthew lowered his head.
— Yes.
Valmont inspired.
— Do you even know why?
Matteo thought about it.
— Because when they played, I couldn't compare them.
— That's exactly the opposite of what you had to do.
— I think so.
— You failed.
Matthew looked at the red pencil.
Then he said,
— Maybe.
Valmont became paonazzo.
— Maybe?
— But I listened to everything.
Quiet.
The printers stopped working.
Valmont looked at the two sheets.
Then Matthew.
Finally he threw them on the counter.
— Disassemble.
A man began to remove the characters from the composer.
SHOW.
One letter at a time.
S.
C.
H.
I.
A.
C.
C.
I.
A.
The verb disappears.
Then:
DETRONZATION.
D.
E.
T.
R.
Or.
No.
I.
Z.
Z.
A.
Matthew observed.
In the morning those words seemed made to him.
Now they came back to be what they had always been:
lead pieces chosen by someone.
Valmont took an empty composite.
— Good.
He looked at Matthew.
— Since you destroyed two first pages, help me with the third.
— Me?
— Don't make me repeat it.
Matthew thought.
— "Liszt and Thalberg play beautifully."
Valmont looked at him with disgust.
— I want to sell newspapers, not sleeping pills.
Matteo still reflects.
He thought about the salon.
To the public.
To the pencil.
To the two hands of Thalberg that seemed three.
The four jokes Liszt had tried 12 times.
To his mother.
To the future.
Then he said,
— Write...
Valmont waited.
— And then?
Matteo smiled.
The MUSIC didn't choose one.
Valmont fixed it.
— It's long.
Matthew lowered his eyes.
The director took a lead character.
— But you can work.
It was the greatest compliment Matthew had ever received from him.
******
Paris woke up exactly how she slept.
Divisa.
Those who supported Liszt continued to support Liszt.
Those who loved Thalberg continued to prefer Thalberg.
Someone swore that Liszt had triumphed.
Someone else Thalberg gave him a lesson.
Matteo was almost happy with it.
History didn't change the world.
The best stories rarely do it in one night.
He was delivering the papers when he saw a copy of the Journal des Débats.
He opened it.
He was looking for the evening report.
He read Jules Janin's judgment.
The critic had not delivered the absolute winner in Paris.
The sense was simple:
Two winners. No wins.
Matthew stood still on the sidewalk.
Then laugh.
The coffee man of the previous day was there.
— What are you laughing at?
— Nothing.
— Who finally won?
Matthew looked at him.
— Who were you for?
— Liszt.
— Did you listen to Thalberg?
— Of course.
Matteo smiled.
— No.
Man attacked his forehead.
— What's "no"?
But Matteo had already gone.
He had a typography to reach.
Valmont would have deducted from his pay the cost of the pencil he had broken running.
Because that morning, without thinking, Matthew had put his hand in his pocket, he had found it and had broken it in two.
Then he repented.
A good pencil had no fault.
He collected both half.
And he kept them.
To remember one thing: it is not the tool that deletes names.
It is the hand that decides to use it to do so.
We were not born to become the best copy of someone else.
There is always someone faster, safer, more applauded. But constantly confronting us can make us forget a more important question:
Am I really becoming the person I want to be?
Liszt and Thalberg were different because they were looking for different roads. Neither of them needed to erase the other to value.
Even in life is like this: growing does not mean coming before others, but understanding what is its direction. Because the real failure is not to be seconds. It's time to run a race that doesn't belong to us.
Leave a comment