During the first ten years of his mastership Purcell composed
much--precisely how much we can only guess. It was not until 1690 that
he began the huge string of incidental theatre sets which were for so
long spoken of as his operas. Mr. Barclay Squire, to whom all who are
interested in Purcell are deeply indebted, has clearly established that
by 1690, though not more than two years earlier, his one opera, _Dido
and Aeneas_, was written. If we take this as belonging to the period
which began in 1690, we have for these first ten years only ten plays to
which he provided music, and of these several are very doubtful, and the
rest not very important. During the remaining six years of his life he
wrote music for forty-two plays. Several sets are of the greatest
importance, amongst them _Dioclesian, King Arthur, The Fairy Queen_ and
_The Tempest_.
We cannot tell how many of the anthems belong to this period. One might
surmise that most of them do, as his activity at the theatre later on
must have occupied most of his time. But if we had no dates for Mozart's
three greater symphonies, we might readily fall into the mistake of
attributing them to another year than that of their composition, and
the mistake would be natural, if not inevitable, when we consider the
enormous amount of music we know Mozart to have written in 1788. In
Purcell we find the same terrific, superhuman energy manifested as the
day of his death drew near, and perhaps we may be wrong in imagining
that the theatre wholly absorbed him. A few of the anthems may with
great probability be ascribed to certain dates because of the royal
events with which they are connected. For example, two ("I was Glad,"
and "My Heart is Inditing") must have been written for the coronation of
James II. in 1685. For "the Queen's pregnancy" in 1688 another ("Blessed
are They that Fear the Lord") was certainly composed. The anthems for
the Queen's funeral--and, as it turned out, for Purcell's own--can also
be dated in the same way, but they fall into a later period.
During these ten years fifteen odes were set, including the notable
_Yorkshire Feast Song_, also the music for "the Lord Mayor's show of
1682," and the _Quickstep_, which afterwards became famous when the
words "Lillibulero" were adapted to it. It was sung as a sort of
war-song against James II. In 1687 Purcell wrote an elegy on John
Playford, the son of the publisher of the same name.
It would be utterly impossible to determine the dates of upwards of 200
songs, duets, trios, and catches, nor does it greatly matter. In a
little book such as this we have little enough space without going into
these questions. The first sonatas in three parts are more important.
They were published in 1683, with a portrait of the composer at the age
of twenty-four. Some pieces for strings in from three to eight parts may
be attributed to 1680. Some of the many harpsichord things may also
belong to this period.
We cannot follow Purcell's development step by step, year by year, as we
can, for instance, Beethoven's. When we come to survey his work as a
whole, we shall be able to compare the three-part sonatas issued in 1683
with the sonatas in four parts published in the year after his death. We
shall learn that towards the end of his life he was a more magnificent
master, than he was when twenty-four years old. That is the most we can
see. We may observe ode after ode, it is true, but with regard to them
we ought to be able to take into account conditions and limitations of
which nothing is recorded nor can be known. This holds, also, with
regard to the theatre music. We can merely guess at what his employers
asked him to provide. We can never know the means they placed at his
disposal. One significant thing must be noted here: the music
itself--its style, spirit, even mannerism--affords us no trustworthy
clue as to when any particular piece may have been written. For ages the
biographical copyists have not ceased to marvel at a boy of fourteen
writing the _Macbeth_ music. It is silly rubbish, with which I believe
Purcell had nothing whatever to do. They marvelled at the immature
power latent in the music to _The Libertine_, which they supposed he
wrote in 1676. Alas! the date is 1692. They marvelled still more over
_Dido and Aeneas_, attributed to 1680. Alas! again its date is much
later--1688 to 1690. The evidence of style counts for little. The truth
is that in Purcell's music there are no marked stages of development, no
great changes in style. Undoubtedly he gradually grew in power, richness
of invention, fecundity of resource; but the change was one of degree,
not of kind. He never, as Beethoven did, went out to "take a new road."
He struck what he knew to be _his_ right road at the very beginning, and
he never left it. His nature and the point in history at which he
appeared forbade that the content of his music should burst the form.
The forms he began with served him to the end.
I shall first deal with such of Purcell's compositions as may fairly be
considered as having been written before 1690. The music for the dramas
is not of an ambitious character. It consists mainly of songs, dances,
and "curtain tunes." In many cases half a dozen items are all that are
attached to one play, and many of the pieces are brief. Therefore that
formidable-looking list of what used to be called Purcell's "operas"
does not represent anything like the quantity of music we might suppose.
Purcell wrote only one opera--_Dido_. The word "opera" had not in his
day acquired a special meaning. Spectacular plays, with songs, duets,
choruses, dances, etc., were called entertainments or operas
indiscriminately. Until a few daring inquirers investigated, the world
supposed Purcell to have collaborated with the playwrights. In a few
later shows it is true that he did, but some of the plays were written
before he was born, some while he was a boy, and others--later ones--are
known to have been first given without the aid of his music. _The Indian
Emperour_ was first played in 1665; Purcell added music in 1692.
_Tyrannic Love_ was produced in 1668 or 1669; the music was added in
1694. _The Indian Queen_ was produced before _The Emperour_; the music
was done in the last year of Purcell's life. If the _Circe_ music is
indeed Purcell's, it cannot have been written until the author,
Davenant, had been in his grave seventeen years. If only the estimable
ladies and gentlemen whose passion for writing about Purcell has wrapped
the real man in a haze of fairy tales had taken the preliminary trouble
of learning a little of the literature and drama of Purcell's day! Nay,
had they only looked at the scores of Purcell's "operas"! Most of these
plays undoubtedly had some music from the beginning. It will be
remembered that during the Puritan, joyless reign of dunderheadedness
the playhouses were closed; but Cromwell, who loved music and gave State
concerts, licensed Davenant to give "entertainments"--plays in which
plot, acting, and everything else were neglected in favour of songs,
dances, and such spectacles as the genius and machinery of the stage
managers enabled them to devise. When the Puritan rule faded, the taste
for these shows still persisted. Dryden took full advantage of this
taste, and after 1668 threw songs wholesale into his plays. Further, it
would seem to have been the custom of theatre managers, when "reviving"
forgotten or half-forgotten plays, to put in new songs and dances and
gorgeous scenes, in the very spirit of Mr. Vincent Crummles, as the
extra attractions. As Purcell's fame spread, his help would be more and
more sought. At first Mr. Crummles would be content with a few simple
things, but later, finding these "a draw," he would rely more on
Purcell's aid. This is pure speculation, but it is fact that the earlier
plays embellished by Purcell have nothing like the quantity of music we
find in the later ones. One venturesome biographer, by the way, not only
insists on Purcell's authorship of the _Macbeth_ music, but suggests
that "probably the recognition of the excellence and effectiveness" of
such dull stuff "induced the managers of theatres to give him further
employment." They were certainly a long time about it, for Lee's
_Theodosius_, the first play for which Purcell is known to have composed
incidental music, was not produced till 1680, eight years after the
latest possible date of the _Macbeth_ music; and, apart from _Dido_,
which is not a play, but an opera, it was eighteen years till these same
astute managers were "induced" by "the excellence and effectiveness" of
the _Macbeth_ or any other music to give Purcell something serious to do
in the theatre. It was in 1690 that _Dioclesian_ appeared, the first and
one of the most important of a long string of works for the stage. The
hypotheses, the "wild surmises" and the daring defiance of mere facts
indulged in by biographers are indeed wonderful, as they strive and
strain to read and to fill in the nearly obliterated, dim and distant
record of Purcell's life. Yet it is risky for a biographer to laugh;
perhaps it is utterly wrong to conjecture that towards the end of his
life Purcell had become indispensable, and was engaged to supply the
music for _all_ the plays as they were given, big or little, as they
came along. Nor do we know how much more music may have been written for
the first plays, nor how much of what has been preserved is genuine
Purcell.
On one point we may be quite certain. It is the greatest pity that
Purcell wasted so much time on these Restoration shows. When the English
people revolted against Puritanism, and gave the incorrigible Stuarts
another chance, Charles the Wanderer returned to find them in a May-Day
humour. They thrust away from them for a little while the ghastly
spiritual hypochondria of which Puritanism was a manifestation, and
determined to make merry. But, heigh-ho! the day of Maypoles was over
and gone. From the beginning the jollity and laughter were forced, and
the new era of perpetual spring festival soon became an era of brainless
indecency. Even the wit of the Restoration was bitter, acid, sardonic
(as Charles's own death-bed apology for being an unconscionable time
a-dying). Generally it was ill-tempered, and employed to inflict pain.
And there was not even wit in most of the plays. It is hard to see what
even the worst age could discover to laugh at in Shadwell's _Libertine_,
the story of Don Juan told in English, and, in a sense, made the most
of.
Because of their nastiness, often combined with stupidity, the
Restoration dramas will never be resurrected. There is another reason.
The glorious Elizabethan era and spirit were gone; the eighteenth
century was coming on fast. Dryden and his fellows had noble rules for
the construction of plays, and nobler ones for the language that might
or might not be used. They derived all their rules, if you please, from
"the ancients." Like Voltaire, they reckoned Shakespeare a barbarian
with native wood-notes wild. They took his plays and "made them into
plays." They improved _The Tempest_, _Timon of Athens_, _The Midsummer
Night's Dream_, and goodness knows how many more. Davenant, in search of
material for entertainments, began it; Dryden continued it; even
Shadwell had his dirty fingers in it. And this matters to us, for some
of Purcell's most glorious songs, choruses and instrumental pieces were
composed for these desecrations, and can never again be listened to
under the conditions he had in his mind.
According to some authorities ("The Dictionary of National Biography"
amongst them), the first play handled by Purcell was Lee's _Sophonisba;
or, The Overthrow of Hannibal_; according to others, the first was
_Theodosius; or, The Force of Love_. Both, however, date not later than
1685, which is near enough for either when there is nothing like
conclusive evidence as to which had the priority. The music for the
first plays is in no way bound up with the plays. It consists of
instrumental pieces and songs literally interpolated. It is likely
enough that tunes written for one play were often enough used for
another. The pieces were brief, but the unmistakable Purcellian mingling
of strength and sweetness is to be found even in such trifles. In 1690
and later Purcell took full advantage of masques which were inserted,
the interpolations being sometimes as long as the rest of the play, and
artistically of infinitely greater value. For the present he confined
himself to less imposing forms, which was certainly what he was engaged
to do.
The finest example of the odes of the period is the so-called _Yorkshire
Feast Song_ (1689). Many of the others are not, for Purcell,
extraordinary. They were written for such special occasions, for
instance, as the King's return all the way to London from Windsor, or
even Newmarket, or the birthday of a Queen, and in one case the birthday
of a six-year-old Duke. They consist of overtures, songs, choruses,
etc. With one or two exceptions, the structure is Purcell's ordinary.
What that structure was we shall see (once for all) in examining some of
the later compositions, the only difference observable in the later
works being, on the whole, an increased richness and greater breadth of
scheme. They are nearly always brilliant, often incisive; there are most
lovely melodies; and there are numerous specimens of Purcell's power of
writing music, endless in its variety of outline and colour and changing
sentiment, on a ground-bass--_i.e._, a bass passage repeated over and
over again until the piece is finished. The instrumentation must have
been largely dictated by the instruments placed at his disposal, though
we must remember that in days when it was an everyday occurrence for,
say, an oboist to play from the violin part save in certain passages,
even an apparently complete score is no secure guide as to what the
composer meant, and as to how the piece was given under his direction.
This remark applies to the scoring of much of the theatre music. The
_Theatre Ayres_ contain only string parts, and it is nonsense to suppose
that in the theatre of that time Purcell had only strings to write for.
Purcell wrote in all twenty-two sonatas--twelve in three parts, ten in
four. So far as the number of parts is concerned, there is little real
difference. In the three-part works one stave serves for both the string
bass-player and the harpsichordist; in the four-part ones there are two
separate staves, with trifling variations in the two parts. The twelve
three-part sonatas were issued, as has been said, in 1683. They are
pure, self-sustaining music, detached from words and scenic
arrangements; nothing approaching them had been written by an
Englishman, nor anything so fine by an Italian. Indeed, in their own
particular way they are matched only by the composer's own four-part
sonatas published after his death. We must not look for anything like
form in the sense that word conveys nowadays; there is no unalterable
scheme of movements such as there is in the Haydn symphony, and within
each movement there is no first subject, second subject, development and
recapitulation. All that had to be worked out nearly a century later.
The set forms of Purcell's day were the dances. The principle of
Purcell's sonata form is alternate fast and slow movements. Nothing more
can be perceived; there is nothing more to perceive. Sometimes he
commences with a quick piece; then we have an adagio or some slow dance;
then another quick piece. In other cases the order is reversed: a slow
movement may be followed by a slower movement. He makes great use of
fugue, more or less free, and of imitation, and, of course, he employs
ground-basses. The masculine strength and energy, the harsh clashing
discords, are not less remarkable than the constant sweetness; and if
there is rollicking spring jollity, there are also moments of deepest
pathos. There is scarcely such a thing as a dry page. It is true that
Purcell avowed that he copied the best Italian masters, but the most the
copying amounts to is taking suggestions for the external scheme of his
sonatas and for the manner of writing for strings. He poured copiously
his streams of fresh and strong melody into forms which, in the hands of
those he professed to imitate, were barren, lifeless things. Many of
these sonatas might almost be called rhapsodies; certainly a great many
movements are rhapsodical. In set forms one has learnt from experience
what to expect. In the dance measures and fugues, after a few bars, one
has a premonition (begotten of oft-repeated and sometimes wearisome
experience) of what is coming, of the kind of thing that is coming; just
as in a Haydn or Mozart sonata one knows so well what to expect that one
often expects a surprise, and may be surprised if there is nothing to
surprise one. But in many of Purcell's largos, for example, the music
flows out from him shaped and directed by no precedent, no rule; it
flows and wanders on, but is never aimlessly errant; there is a quality
in it that holds passage to passage, gives the whole coherence and a
satisfying order. Emerson speaks of Swedenborg's faculties working with
astronomic punctuality, and this would apply to Purcell's musical
faculties. Take a scrappy composer, a short-breathed one such as Grieg:
he wrote within concise and very definite forms; yet the order of many
passages might be reversed, and no one--not knowing the original--would
be a penny the wiser or the worse. There is no development. With Purcell
there is always development, though the laws of it lie too deep for us.
Hence his rhapsodies, whether choral or instrumental, are satisfying,
knit together by some inner force of cohesion.
* * * * *
During these ten years several children were born to Purcell. He had six
children altogether. Four died while still babies; two, Edward and
Frances, survived him. Edward lived till 1740, leaving a son; Frances
married one Welsted, or Welstead, and died in 1724. Her daughter died
two years later. Before the end of the eighteenth century the line of
Purcell's descendants seems to have terminated. In 1682 Purcell became
an organist of the Chapel Royal, whilst remaining organist of
Westminster Abbey. As has already been said, the musicians of this age
were pluralists--they had to be in order to earn a decent living, for
the salaries were anything but large, and punctuality in payment was not
a feature. In 1684 there was a competition at the Temple Church, not
between organists, but between organ-builders. The authorities got two
builders to set up each an organ, and decided which was the better by
the simple plan of hearing them played by different organists and
deciding which sounded the better. To any but a legal mind the affair
would seem to have resolved itself mainly into a competition between
organ-players; but we know how absolutely lost to all sense of justice,
fairness, reason and common sense the legal mind is. So Purcell played
for Father Smith, and inevitably the organ built by Father Smith was
thought the finer. This easy way of solving a difficult problem, though
it has so much to recommend it to the legal mind, has fallen into
desuetude, and is abandoned nowadays, even in that home of absurdities,
the Temple. For the coronation of James II., Purcell superintended the
setting-up of an extra or special organ in the Abbey; and for this he
was granted £34 12s. out of the secret-service money. In 1689, at the
coronation of the lucky gentleman who superseded James, no such
allowance appears to have been made; and Purcell admitted the curious to
the organ-loft, making a charge and putting it in his pocket. This was
too much for the clergy. They regarded the money as theirs, and as Mr.
Gladstone, that stout Churchman, said, the Church will give up rather
its faith than its money. The Abbey authorities never thought of giving
up either, but they threatened Purcell with terrible penalties unless he
gave up the money. Almost with a pistol at his head they asked him to
give up his money or his post. How the squabble ended no man knows; the
conjecture that he 'refunded' the money--_i.e._, gave it to those it did
not belong to--is unsupported.
These are the only scraps of veracious history that come down to us; the
other choice bits I take to be exercises in prosaic romance.