the audience, carried away by the beauty of the composition
   and his excellent, poetic rendering, overwhelmed the young
   virtuoso with loud applause and sincere admiration.

In writing this the biographer had probably in his mind the following passage from Chopin’s letter to Titus Woyciechowski, dated Paris, December 16, 1831:—­” I played [to Kalkbrenner, in Paris] the E minor Concerto, which charmed the people of the Bavarian capital so much.”  The two statements are not synonymous.  What the biographer says may be true, and if it is not, ought to be so; but I am afraid the existing documents do not bear it out in its entirety.  Among the many local and other journals which I have consulted, I have found only one notice of Chopin’s appearance at Munich, and when I expectantly scanned a resume of Munich musical life, from the spring to the end of the year 1831, in the “Allgemeine musikalische Zeitung,” I found mention made of Mendelssohn and Lafont, but not of Chopin.  Thus, unless we assume that Karasowski—­true to his mission as a eulogising biographer, and most vigorous when unfettered by definite data—­indulged in exaggeration, we must seek for a reconciliation of the enthusiasm of the audience with the silence of the reporter in certain characteristics of the Munich public.  Mendelssohn says of it:—­

The people here [in Munich] have an extraordinary receptivity for music, which is much cultivated.  But it appears to me that everything makes an impression and that the impressions do not last.

Speaking of Mendelssohn, it is curious to note how he and Chopin were again and again on the point of meeting, and again and again failed to meet.  In Berlin Chopin was too bashful and modest to address his already famous young brother-artist, who in 1830 left Vienna shortly before Chopin arrived, and in 1831 arrived in Munich shortly after Chopin had left.  The only notice of Chopin’s public appearance in Munich I have been able to discover, I found in No. 87 (August 30, 1831) of the periodical “Flora”, which contains, under the heading “news,” a pretty full account of the “concert of Mr. Chopin of Warsaw.”  From this account we learn that Chopin was assisted by the singers Madame Pellegrini and Messrs. Bayer, Lenz, and Harm, the clarinet-player Barmann, jun., and Capellmeister Stunz.  The singers performed a four-part song, and Barmann took part in a cavatina (sung by Bayer, the first tenor at the opera) with clarinet and pianoforte accompaniment by Schubert (?).  What the writer of the account says about Chopin shall be quoted in full:—­