responsibility as compared with thirty per cent. for the remaining voices.  In all the famous quartet organizations, Joachim, Hellmesberger, etc., the first violin has been the directing instrument and has set the pace.  As chairman it has been his duty to say when second violin, viola and ’cello were entitled to hold the floor.  Hellmesberger, in fact, considered himself the whole quartet.”  Mr. Kneisel smiled and showed me a little book of Hellmesberger’s Vienna programs.  Each program was headed: 

HELLMESBERGER QUARTET

with the assistance of

MESSRS.  MATH.  DURST, CARL HEISSLER,
CARL SCHLESINGER

“In other words, Hellmesberger was the quartet himself, the other three artists merely ‘assisted,’ which, after all, is going too far!

“Of course, quartets differ.  Just as we have operas in which the alto solo role is the most important, so we have quartets in which the ’cello or the viola has a more significant part.  Mozart dedicated quartets to a King of Prussia, who played ’cello, and he was careful to make the ’cello part the most important.  And in Smetana’s quartet Aus meinem Leben, the viola plays a most important role.  Even the second violin often plays themes introducing principal themes of the first violin, and it has its brief moments of prominence.  Yet, though the second violin or the ’cellist may be, comparatively speaking, a better player than the first violin, the latter is and must be the leader.  Practically every composer of chamber music recognizes the fact in his compositions.  He, the first violin, should not command three slaves, though; but guide three associates, and do it tactfully with regard to their individuality and that of their instruments.

“ENSEMBLE” REHEARSING

“You ask what are the essentials of ensemble practice on the part of the artists?  Real reverence, untiring zeal and punctuality at rehearsals.  And then, an absolute sense of rhythm.  I remember rehearsing a Volkmann quartet once with a new second violinist.” [Mr. Kneisel crossed over to his bookcase and brought me the score to illustrate the rhythmic point in question, one slight in itself yet as difficult, perhaps, for a player without an absolute sense of rhythm as “perfect intonation” would be for some others.] “He had a lovely tone, a big technic and was a prize pupil of the Vienna Conservatory.  We went over this two measure phrase some sixteen times, until I felt sure he had grasped the proper accentuation.  And he was most amiable and willing about it, too.  But when we broke up he pointed to the passage and said to me with a smile:  ’After all, whether you play it this way, or that way, what’s the difference?’ Then I realized that he had stressed his notes correctly a few times by chance, and that his own sense of rhythm did not tell him that there were no two ways about it.  The rhythmic and tonal nuances in a quartet cannot be marked too perfectly in order to secure a beautiful and finished performance.  And such a violinist as the one mentioned, in spite of his tone and technic, was never meant for an ensemble player.