Thalberg did not immediately begin to perform in public, but, on returning to Vienna in 1827, played continually at private soirees, where he had the advantage of being heard and criticised by the foremost amateurs and musicians of the Austrian capital.  It had some time since become obvious to the initiated that another great player was about to be launched on his career.  The following year the young artist tried his hand at composition, for he published variations on themes from Weber’s “Euryanthe,” which were well received.  Thalberg in after-years spoke of all his youthful productions with disdain, but his early works displayed not a little of the brilliant style of treatment which subsequently gave his fantasias a special place among compositions for the piano-forte.

It was not till 1830 that young Thalberg fairly began his career as a traveling player.  The cities of Germany received him with the most eclatant admiration, and his feats of skill as a performer were trumpeted by the newspapers and musical journals as something unprecedented in the art of pianism.  From Germany Thalberg proceeded to France and England, and his audiences were no less pronounced in their recognition.  Liszt had already been before him in Paris, and Chopin arrived about the same time.  Kalkbrenner, Ferdinand Hiller, and Field were playing, but the splendid, calm beauty of Thalberg’s style instantly captivated the public, and elicited the most extravagant and delighted applause not only from the public, but from enlightened connoisseurs.

To follow the course of Thalberg’s pianoforte achievements in his musical travels through Europe would be merely to repeat a record of uninterrupted successes.  He disarmed envy and criticism everywhere, and even those disposed to withhold a frank and generous acknowledgment of his greatness did not dare to question powers of execution which seemed without a technical flaw.  During his travels Thalberg composed a concerto for piano and orchestra, to play at his concerts.  But this species of composition was so obviously unsuited to his abilities that he quickly forsook it, and thenceforward devoted his efforts exclusively to the instrument of which he was such an eminent master.  A more extensive ambition had been rebuked in more ways than one.  He composed two operas, “Fiorinda” and “Christine,” and of course easily yielded to the entreaties of his admirers to have them produced.  But it was clearly evident that his musical idiosyncrasy, though magnificent of its kind, was limited in range, and after the failure of his operas and attempts at orchestral writing Thalberg calmly accepted the situation.