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The gigantic tone-pictures which were constantly forming themselves in his inner consciousness were of so much greater importance than the events of his external life, that the latter were dwarfed by comparison and lost their significance. He now made a greater surrender of the ties connecting him with every-day life than ever before.
Ole Bull's violin compositions, though dry and rigorous musicians object to them as lacking in depth of science, as shallow and sensational, are distinctly tone-pictures full of suggestiveness for the imagination. It was this peculiarity which early began to impress his audiences, and gave Ole Bull a separate place by himself in an age of eminent players.
Finland, with its stretches of pine forest and gray waterways, had made a powerful appeal to his peculiar imagination; and the "Songs of the North" form the first of his many tone-pictures of that country.
No one, unless he should be inspired by the same feelings which animated the breast of Ole Bull, could ever evolve from his musical tone-pictures of Scandinavian myth and folk-lore the weird fascination which his bow struck from the strings. Ole Bull, like Paganini, laid no claim to greatness in interpreting the violin classics.
The history of his own mental state is depicted here. If we consider his malady in its bearing on his life, we have the story of Tantalus told again. Here was a man whose thoughts translated themselves into splendid tone-pictures which the orchestra was to portray. With the mental equipment to create a new era in his art, the medium by which he could apprehend his works was being closed to him.
His impressions of nature, life and literature he imprisoned in tones. He was a profound student of Bach, to whom he traced "the power of combination, poetry and humor in the new music." Infusing his own vital emotions into polyphonic forms he gave the piano far grander tone-pictures than those of Couperin.
But the soul still feels the process of absorbing air in an absolutely psycho-spiritual way, as an image, which appears in the form of tone-pictures surging up and down; these give form to the embryo which is being incorporated within them. The soul everywhere feels itself in the midst of sound waves, and that it is fashioning the body in accordance with those tone forces.
His great works in this line are a "Faust Symphony," "Les Préludes," "Orpheus," "Prometheus," "Mazeppa" and "Hamlet." Symphonic in form, although less restricted than the symphony, these works are designed to give tone-pictures of the subjects designated, or at least of the moods they awaken.
It has eight tones only, and though it has existed for many hundreds of years, no one has yet dreamed of all the wonderful tone-pictures which are contained in it. It is out of it that all the great composers have written their works, and for centuries to come men will find in it beauties great, and pure, and lasting. As we sing in school, we are learning to put the major scale to some use.
The Kyrie of the Mass in D has always presented itself to my consciousness as a series of gigantic tone-pictures, in which the omnipotence of God, and the impotence of humanity is brought into juxtaposition. The Coriolanus overture is another instance among the many at hand illustrating this point.
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