In piano-playing also,
I require no cutting of the interdigital fold, no mechanical
hand-support, no accelerator for the fingers or stretching machine; and
not even the "finger-rack" invented and used, without my knowledge, by a
famous pupil[A] of mine, for the proper raising of the third and fourth
fingers.
My dear young lady, if the Creator has made the throat badly for
singing, he alone is responsible. I cannot come to his assistance by
destroying the throat with lunar caustic, and then reconstructing it. If
the throat is really worn out, may it not perhaps be owing to the
teacher, and to his mistaken management?
Nature does many things well, and before the introduction of this modern
fashion of singing produced many beautiful voices: has she all at once
become incapable of doing any thing right?
We will, then, simply return to the _three trifles_ above-mentioned;
and in these we will live and work "with all our heart, with all our
soul, and with all our mind."
[A] Reference is here made to Robert Schumann, who, in order to
facilitate the use of the weaker fingers, employed a machine for raising
the fingers artificially, which resulted in loss of power over them, and
necessitated the abandonment of piano-playing.
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