He seemed to
have mastered the secrets of the old composers, to be continuing their
work, developing their thought and style. He excelled in the control of
what appeared to be the technicalities of composition. Had he not, in
his "Contributions to the Theory of Harmony," proposed one hundred
examples of cadences modulating from the common chord of C-major through
every possible key and transpository sequence? Had he not written two
books of canons displaying the most amazing technical ingenuities; found
it simple, as in his "Sinfonietta," to keep five or six strands of
counterpoint going? And so, believing that he was about to do for the
music of the post-Wagnerian period what Brahms had done for that of the
romantic period, the musical conservatives and traditionalists rallied
to him. He was acclaimed by a large public lineal successor of the three
great "B's" of music. Quite in the manner that they had once opposed
Brahms to the composer of "Parsifal," the partisans of musical
absolutism elevated Reger as a sort of anti-pope to Richard Strauss.
Whole numbers of musical reviews were devoted to the study and
discussion of his art in all its ramifications. Reger seemed on the
verge of gaining a place among the immortals. And his publishers placed
on the covers of his compositions the design that symbolized the great
things they thought the man achieving, and the high heavens for which
they believed him bound.
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