Music_, p. 419.]

[Footnote 172: This passage is to be found in the Life in Grove's
Dictionary.]

CHAPTER XII

THE ROMANTIC COMPOSERS. SCHUBERT AND WEBER

During the latter part of Beethoven's life--he died in 1827--new
currents were setting in, which were to influence profoundly the trend
of modern music. Two important, though in some respects unconscious,
representatives of these tendencies were actually working
contemporaneously with Beethoven, von Weber (1786-1826) and Schubert
(1797-1828). Beethoven himself is felt to be a dual personality in
that he summed up and ratified all that was best in his predecessors,
and pointed the way for most of the tendencies operative since his
time. For the designation of these two contrasting, though not
exclusive, ideals, the currently accepted terms are Classic and
Romantic. So many shades of meaning have unfortunately been associated
with the word Romantic that confusion of thought has arisen. It is
also true that the so-called Romanticists, including poets and
painters as well as musicians, in their endeavors to break loose from
the formality of the Classic period, have indulged in many irritating
idiosyncracies. We are beginning to see clearly that a too violent
expression of individuality destroys a most vital factor in
music--universality of appeal. Yet the Romantic School cannot be
ignored. To its representatives we owe many of our finest works, and
they were the prime movers in those strivings toward freedom and
ideality which have made the modern world what it is. The term
Romantic is perfectly clear in its application to literature, from
which music borrowed it. It refers to the movement begun about the
year 1796 among such German poets as Tieck, the two Schlegels and
Novalis, to restore the poetic legends of the middle ages, written in
the Romance dialects, and to embody in their own works the fantastic
spirit of this medieval poetry.[173] In reference to music, however,
the terms Classic and Romantic are often vague and misleading, and
have had extreme interpretations put upon them.[174] Thus, to many,
"romantic" implies ultra-sentimental, mawkish or grotesque, while
everything "classic" is dry, uninspired and academic. How often we
hear the expression, "I am not up to classic music; let me hear
something modern and romantic." Many scholars show little respect for
the terms and some would abolish them altogether. Everything, however,
hinges upon a reas