In 1881 Busoni toured Italy and was made a member of the Reale Accademia
Filharmonica at Bologna. In 1886 he went to reside at Leipsic. Two years
later he became teacher of pianoforte at the Helsingfors Conservatory in
the Finnish capital. In 1890 he captured the famous Rubinstein prizes
for both pianoforte and composition. In the same year he became
Professor of pianoforte playing at the Moscow Imperial Conservatory. The
next year he accepted a similar position in the New England Conservatory
at Boston,--returning to Europe for another tour in 1893. After many
successful tours he accepted the position of director of the
Meisterschule at the Imperial Conservatory in Vienna. His compositions
include over one hundred published opus numbers, the most pretentious
probably being his _Choral Concerto_. His editions of Bach are
masterpieces of technical and artistic erudition.

(The following Conference was conducted in English.)

[Illustration: FERRUCCIO B. BUSONI]

VII

IMPORTANT DETAILS IN PIANO STUDY

FERRUCCIO BENVENUTO BUSONI

THE SIGNIFICANCE OF THE DETAIL

"Some years ago I met a very famous artist whose celebrity rested upon
the wonderful colored glass windows that he had produced. He was
considered by most of his contemporaries the greatest of all makers of
high-art windows. His fame had extended throughout the artistic circles
of all Europe. A little remark he made to me illustrates the importance
of detail better than anything of which I can think at present.

"He said, 'If a truly great work of art in the form of a stained glass
window should be accidentally shattered to little bits, one should be
able to estimate the greatness of the whole window by examining one of
the fragments even though all the other pieces were missing.'

"In fine piano playing all of the details are important. I do not mean
to say that if one were in another room that one could invariably tell
the ability of an artist by hearing him strike one note, but if the note
is heard in relation to the other notes in a composition, its
proportionate value should be so delicately and artistically estimated
by the highly trained performer, that it forms part of the artistic
whole.

"For instance, it is quite easy to conceive of compositions demanding a
very smooth running performance in which one jarring or harsh note
indicating faulty artistic calculation upon the part of the player would
ruin the entire interpretation. As exa