Chapter 171: Paganini Etudes

Chapter 170 – Paganini Etude

Inside the ballroom, the guests pushed their glasses around and gossiped enthusiastically about various topics of interest.

Several ladies looked at the London Philharmonic Society musicians who were tuning their instruments, and couldn’t help but gush enviously at Mrs. Codrington beside them.

“I can’t believe that you have even invited Mr. Moscheles here today, I wonder which piece he intends to play for the opening today? Is it his own composition, the Alexander Variations, Homage to Handel? Or the ones by Mr. Bach, or perhaps Mr. Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony?”

Mrs. Codrington couldn’t help feeling smug in her heart, but on her face she merely said modestly, “That depends on Mr. Moscheles’ own arrangements; I’ve never been a proponent of interfering with a musician’s creativity.”

But, although she said so, Mrs. Codrington was as curious as several other ladies about what Moscheles would play tonight.

Suddenly, she saw that Moscheles had actually yielded his place at the piano to Arthur, who had stepped aside, while he himself took out the white gloves in his pocket and put them back on.

Mrs. Codrington, who knew quite a bit about music, quivered her eyebrows at this turn of events, and she hurriedly nodded her farewells to her several friends, and then, carrying her skirts in her hands, quickly stepped forward and inquired towards Moscheles.

“Mr. Moscheles, what are you doing? Are you unwell?”

Moscheles looked at Mrs. Codrington and spoke with an apologetic face, “I’m sorry, ma’am, there’s nothing physically wrong with me, but I do feel a bit uncomfortable emotionally. As to exactly why, you can ask Mr. Hastings later. For now, however, please return to the stage and enjoy ‘La Campanella’ as performed by him.”

“La Campanella?” Mrs. Codrington could not help but be startled at the name.

Of course she knew whose tune it was, as she herself was a new and avid fan of Paganini, the author of the original piece.

The 27 recitals that Paganini gave in London this year could be considered a Paganini mania in Britain.

Although Paganini’s recital fees are twice as high as other concerts, and front row tickets for concerts are four or five times as high on the black market, even that doesn’t stop his fans from flocking to the 3,300-seat recital hall at the Theatre Royal.

And it’s not just music lovers, even businessmen who know very little about music also smelled the business opportunities from Paganini, they have launched many canes, jewelry boxes, umbrellas and other derivatives with Paganini’s head and name printed on them.

The restaurants near the Theater Royal also had the cheek to add Paganini pies, Paganini coffee and other puzzling names to their menus.

Although this practice is quite nonsensical, but the gentlemen as well as ladies and gentlemen are willing to pay for this kind of thing, as long as the addition of the name of Paganini means a best seller.

And as a self-proclaimed ‘Paganini loyal fan’, Mrs. Codrington had bought quite a lot of this kind of stuff, to the point that when she attended the banquet tonight, she was wearing a silver bracelet engraved with Paganini’s name.

Not only that, she also bought her husband a hat embroidered with Paganini’s name.

General Codrington, however, appeared to be very resistant to wearing the hat, preferring to go out with the original Mediterranean look on his head rather than have Paganini’s name written on the top of his head.

Mrs. Codrington looked at Arthur, who was sitting at the piano adjusting his breathing, and said, with a touch of incredulity in her surprise, “Can Mr. Hastings really play that La Campanella?”

“Not play it, play it.” Moscheles was a little unsure of his current mood, and didn’t know whether to feel ridiculous or angry, “Mr. Hastings told me that he had adapted the piece for the piano. And, of course, to top it all off, he told me that he was only just getting into the piano.”

“My God!” Mrs. Codrington held her forehead slightly, “You are not joking with me, are you? Why don’t you persuade him?”

Moscheles shrugged his shoulders, “Madam, of course I persuaded him, but Mr. Hastings wouldn’t listen. More than that, he told me that his nickname is ‘Paganini of Scotland Yard’. In that case, I think you’d better sit down and listen in peace. If he really is the ‘Paganini of Scotland Yard’, then I don’t think this piece should be a problem for him.

Because Mr. Paganini told me that he had never practiced the violin since he was eleven years old, but that didn’t affect him in the least from becoming the greatest violinist in history. There is always no lack of genius in the world of music, and perhaps it is possible that Mr. Hastings is equally such a genius.”

At the end of his speech, Moscheles also ceased to continue his conversation with Mrs. Codrington, and drew out the baton at his waist and pressed his hands down slightly.

When the accompanying musicians saw his movement, a silence fell upon them; they knew that Mr. Moscheles was about to make a real move.

And Arthur also felt the change in the surrounding atmosphere, he took a deep breath, and both hands hung slightly above the keys of the piano.

He understood that when he played the first note, it was tantamount to giving an order to all the members of the orchestra.

Suddenly, the breathing in the air jerked to a halt as Arthur’s fingertips tapped the keys.

As the light and beautiful melody rang out, the exchanges among the guests in the hall diminished.

After the first brief opening solo on the piano, Moscheles’ powerful arms snapped open and the accompanying musicians soon followed the baton raised in his hands to harmonize with the sound of the piano.

As the performance moved into the upper register, some Paganini fans on stage already noticed something was amiss.

“La Campanella?”

“A piano piece?”

“It seems that Mr. Moscheles and the London Philharmonic Society didn’t accompany Paganini for nothing, they still learned a lot from the recital.”

“Moscheles? It was Hastings who played!”

“Huh? You’re not mistaken, are you?”

“Shhh! Keep your voice down.”

The lights dimmed, and amidst the whispers, the guests’ eyes were all focused on Arthur’s hands, which were beating rapidly on the keys as if they had sprouted wings. Perhaps not all the ladies and gentlemen present knew science, but it was certain that every one of them knew the piano.

Arthur’s hands were agilely jumping between sixteenth notes, and what was even more incredible was that even though the method of playing was right in front of them, they still couldn’t understand how Arthur could accomplish a series of consecutive vibrato notes without disrupting the melody with only one left hand.

The pair of fingertips that moved like butterflies and the arms that leapt back and forth on the keys formed an incredible picture, and the black eyes drifted out strands of red aura, which sprinkled down on Arthur’s knuckles, causing them to diffuse and grow like the steel wires and red threads that only appeared on string puppets. Let a person take a look at only feel as if he had a kind of hallucination of stepping into a dream world.

In the eyes of the guests, it was as if the person sitting on the stage was not a brilliant young scientist, nor an upright Scotland Yard superintendent, but a devil with bat wings and a mouth full of malice towards the world.

As the piano music came to a close, a lady, her forehead sweating, seemed to see, in her viewpoint, the slow-growing horns on the top of Arthur’s head.

Only to hear the piano stop, the lady suddenly pointed at Arthur and shouted out in a delirious voice, “Devil!”

Immediately afterward, her body went limp and she fell to the ground like a floating piece of gauze.

Within the hall, there was silence as Arthur slowly rose to his feet with a toss of the back hem of his tuxedo.

Beads of sweat also covered his forehead behind his straggly, broken hair, and underneath his slightly tired look, he managed a small smile.

“An adaptation of Mr. Paganini’s practice piece, ‘The Bells,’ dedicated to the ladies and gentlemen who are here today.”

After a brief moment of silence, the guests in the ballroom awoke as if from a dream, and the sparse applause soon merged into a bursting flame that exploded through the ballroom.

The guests were busy assisting the lady who had collapsed to the ground due to her physical weakness, while also shouting as if in an uproar, “Devil!!!”

“Paganini is the devil, and so is Hastings!”

“One is the violin devil of the Apennines, the other the piano devil of Britain.”

Amidst loud applause and cheers, Moscheles put down his baton and walked over to Arthur.

In this moment, the semblance of distrust could no longer be seen on his face, and was replaced by a smile that could not be stopped.

“Mr. Hastings, you really gave me a big surprise! I really didn’t expect that you are not only proficient in science, but also in piano. To be able to play this piece to such an extent, are you really a beginner? My God! I really don’t know how many other things you are hiding from the big guys!”

Arthur was slightly relieved as he smiled and pointed to the baton that Moscheles had placed beside him, “Mr. Moscheles, truth be told, I actually know how to play the baton thing.”

“You also know how to conduct?” Moscheles said in surprise, “I knew it, you’re definitely not a guy who just came into contact with instrument playing, you’re a veteran, am I right?”

Arthur waved his hands repeatedly, “No, no, no, you misunderstand. I don’t know how to conduct an orchestra, I used to usually conduct traffic with a baton. In case you didn’t know, I’m a Scotland Yard policeman.”

“A policeman?!” Moscheles sniffed and took Arthur’s hands in a shocked grip, “Wow! Mr. Hastings, God gave you such perfect, 14-degree hands, and you’re actually telling me that you usually touch knives and guns with those hands?”

Arthur spoke up in embarrassment, “Mr. Moscheles, it’s no big deal, and I’ve touched worse things with it than knives and guns.”

Arthur’s words have just been exported, ladies and young ladies have red face, and originally sat not far from the stage to eat Elder, can not help but hand shaking, the result is choked by the food in the throat, Fitzroy rushed to hand him a glass of wine, which did not cause his untimely death of the tragedy.

Elder cursed in a loud voice, “Arthur, can you not talk about this kind of stuff while I’m eating, I was almost fucking sent to God by you.”

Arthur sniffed and just glanced at him, “Elder, I’m talking about the goats and fish on the Beagle, what did you think it was?”

As soon as he said this, a few gentlemen from the Royal Navy tensed up again.

Only Admiral Cochran said in a fake and serious manner, “Mr. Hastings, you are right, it is true that the critters are all not very clean. But it can’t be helped, we have to keep those things on board in order to ensure that we have plenty of fresh supplies. We’d be willing to go the whole hog on the clean ones, too, if the sailors had a choice.”

Arthur also nodded his head in agreement with apologies, “That’s right, Admiral Cochran, that’s something I’ve been remiss in considering.”

On the other hand, Moscheles also rushed to cherish his talent and asked, “Mr. Hastings, if you don’t mind, could you give me a copy of the sheet music for this piece later?”

“Of course there is no problem.” Arthur smiled and said, “I believe that with your talent, it definitely won’t take long for you to become proficient in this piece, it’s not as difficult as you think. Even if you don’t have to play it on the piano, you can still present it.”

Just after Arthur said this, Moscheles, who had just built up a favorable impression of Arthur, frowned again.

“What do you mean by that?”

Arthur didn’t answer either, he just smiled and took out the phonograph he had prepared long ago from behind the piano stand.

He only saw him resting the needle on top of the turntable, and immediately afterward, as he twisted the mechanical clockwork of the phonograph, the familiar melody soon resounded in the corner of the ballroom again.

Although the sound was not as crisp and pleasant as the one played by Arthur, and was even mixed with some unnecessary murmurs, the melodious and pleasant music with a very high degree of similarity was still able to allow the crowd to recognize its name.

Moscheles looked at the strange machine assembled from copper horns and square boxes in front of him, and froze dumbfounded on the spot.

“What …… is this?”

(End of chapter)