the Emanuel Bach method, in which he instructed me); he himself
could barely span a tenth. He made frequent use of the pedal, much
more frequently than is indicated in his compositions. His reading
of the scores of Handel and Gluck and the fugues of Bach was
unique, inasmuch as he put a polyphony and spirit into the former
which gave the works a new form."

In his later years the deaf master could no longer hear his own
playing which therefore came to have a pitifully painful effect.
Concerning his manner of conducting, Seyfried says: "It would no
wise do to make our master a model in conducting, and the
orchestra had to take great care lest it be led astray by its
mentor; for he had an eye only for his composition and strove
unceasingly by means of manifold gesticulations to bring out the
expression which he desired. Often when he reached a forte he
gave a violent down beat even if the note were an unaccented one.
He was in the habit of marking a diminuendo by crouching down
lower and lower, and at a pianissimo he almost crept under the
stand. With a crescendo he, too, grew, rising as if out of a
stage trap, and with the entrance of a fortissimo he stood on his
toes and seemed to take on gigantic proportions, while he waved
his arms about as if trying to soar upwards to the clouds.
Everything about him was in activity; not a part of his
organization remained idle, and the whole man seemed like a
perpetuum mobile. Concerning expression, the little nuances, the
equable division of light and shade, as also an effective tempo
rubato, he was extremely exact and gladly discussed them with the
individual members of the orchestra without showing vexation or
anger."