A word about Romantics

The last paragraph in jacket notes provided by Dr. William B. Ober for a Vox Turnabout album of Boccherini quintets contains this:

<< The A Minor quintet is distinguished by its elegant expression of tender sentiment that never becomes sentimental. It was at this precise point that the romantic composers used to muck it up. >>

'sentiment' -> >-> 'sentimental'. That was the crucial error?

It would seem that the Hon. Dr. William B. Ober was not empowered to write compelling prose...

Yep, that's it (except in the case of Dvorak, where sentimental becomes sublime, but he was the only Romantic who managed that trick).

That was Dr. Ober's lack of scholarization