Page:The story of the flute (IA storyofflute1914fitz).djvu/135

 for no less than four hundred, but he has been beaten by a German, W. Popp (a pupil of Drouet), who probably has written more than any flute composer, ancient or modern; his works exceed five hundred opus numbers.

Happily, however, numerous compositions of a higher class exist. These works are somewhat in the nature of original fantasias; and, all things considered, are perhaps the best calculated to show off the beauties of the flute. R. S. Pratten, the famous English player, may be said to have inaugurated this description of piece in his famous Concertstück, in which he substitutes elaborate counterpoint for variations. F. Doppler has written several extremely effective, though difficult, solos of this class. All his pieces are very florid and abound in cadenzas for the flute; their chief defect is the thinness of the pianoforte accompaniments. This fault, however, cannot be found with the majority of the solos of Adolf Terschakthe most prolific and also the favourite composer of pieces of this description; he has written over two hundred of them. They vary considerably in excellence, many being, as Böhm said, "like Terschak himself, much ado about nothing," and some of his later efforts are more like studies or finger exercises than solos. But many of his earlier compositions (such as Bahillard and La Siréne) are full of ear-haunting melody, and have rarely been equalled. Not only are they admirably written for, and extremely playable on the flute, but also the accompaniments are full and