intervals--is a most important thing. And following his idea
of stimulating the pupil's self-development, the Professor encouraged us
to find what we needed ourselves. I remember that once--we were standing
in a corridor of the Conservatory--when I asked him, 'What should I
practice in the way of studies?' he answered: 'Take the difficult
passages from the great concertos. You cannot improve on them, for they
are as good, if not better, as any studies written.' As regards
technical work we were also encouraged to think out our own exercises.
And this I still do. When I feel that my thirds and sixths need
attention I practice scales and original figurations in these intervals.
But genuine, resultful practice is something that should never be
counted by 'hours.' Sometimes I do not touch my violin all day long; and
one hour with head work is worth any number of days without it. At the
most I never practice more than three hours a day. And when my thoughts
are fixed on other things it would be time lost to try to practice
seriously. Without technical control a violinist could not be a great
artist; for he could not express himself. Yet a great artist can give
even a technical study, say a Rode _etude_, a quality all its own in
playing it. That technic, however, is a means, not an end, Professor
Auer never allowed his pupils to forget. He is a wonderful master of
interpretation. I studied the great concertos with him--Beethoven,
Bruch, Mendelssohn, Tschaikovsky, Dvorak*, the Brahms concerto (which I
prefer to any other); the Vieuxtemps Fifth and Lalo (both of which I
have heard Ysaye, that supreme artist who possesses all that an artist
should have, play in Berlin); the Elgar concerto (a fine work which I
once heard Kreisler, an artist as great as he is modest, play
wonderfully in Petrograd), as well as other concertos of the standard
repertory. And Professor Auer always sought to have us play as
individuals; and while he never allowed us to overstep the boundaries of
the musically esthetic, he gave our individuality free play within its
limits. He never insisted on a pupil accepting his own _nuances_ of
interpretation because they were his. I know that when playing for him,
if I came to a passage which demanded an especially beautiful _legato_
rendering, he would say: 'Now show how you can sing!' The exquisite
_legato_ he taught was all a matter of perfect bowing, and as he often
said: 'There must be no such thing as strings