Lassus, who was born in Belgium, educated at Antwerp, spent some time
in Italy, and finally settled at Munich, where he lived for about
forty years, as musical director and composer. The compositions of
this great man fill many volumes. He distinguished himself in every
province of music, being equally at home in secular madrigals--quite a
number of which are heard even at the present day with satisfaction--masses
and other heavy church compositions, and instrumental works. He was a
cultivated man of the world who held an honored position at court and
made a great mark in the community. He founded the school at Munich
which, with rare good fortune, has occupied a distinguished position
ever since, and has been, and still is, one of the most important
musical centers in Europe, as all who are acquainted with the history
of Richard Wagner, or the reputation of the present incumbent, the
Master Rheinberger, will readily see. In Lassus we begin to have the
spontaneity of the modern composer. The quaintness of the Middle Ages
still lingers to some extent, and learning he had in plenty when it
suited him to use it, but he was also capable of very simple and
direct melodic expression and quaint and very fascinating harmony.
While the tonality is still vague, like that of the church modes, the
music itself is thoroughly chordal in character, and evidently planned
with reference to the direct expression of the text. A large number of
madrigals have come down to us from this great master; among them is
the one called "Matona, Lovely Maiden," which is one of the most
beautiful part songs in existence. The life of Lassus was full of
dignity and honor. He was extremely popular in Munich and in all other
parts of Europe. He is to be considered the first great genius in the
art of music.
[Illustration: Fig. 30.
ORLANDO DE LASSUS.
(From a contemporary print by the French engraver Amelingue.)]
CHAPTER XIV.
POLYPHONIC SCHOOLS OF ITALY.
PALESTRINA.
Italy in the fifteenth century was in a highly prosperous condition.
The great commercial cities had a profitable commerce with all parts
of the then known world, and great public works had been under way for
more than two centuries. The beginning of the Renaissance was marked
by the great cathedrals, of which St. Mark's at Venice was a little
earlier than Pisa, Siena, Florence and Milan. All these were built
before 1300. Vast public works were undertaken in all parts of the
country, such as the canal that supplied Milan with water, and
irrigated a large part of the plain of Lombardy; the great sea wall of
Genoa; roads, bridges, municipal buildings, fortresses and the like.
By the beginning of the sixteenth century the art of painting had
reached a very high eminence; the master Raphael was already at work,
as was also that remarkable genius, Leonardo da Vinci--the most
universally gifted artist who ever appeared. Michael Angelo was at
work in the Sistine Chapel, and his plans for St. Peter's were partly
being carried out. It was in this time that Johannes Tinctor, the
Netherlandish composer, founded a music school at Naples. The school
itself was short-lived, but it was presently succeeded by four others
of a different kind which eventually produced a large number of
eminent musicians, several of whom will occupy our attention later.
Tinctor's music school appears to have been a private affair. Those
which followed it were charitable institutions, taking poor boys from
the streets, furnishing them with a living, the rudiments of an
education, and musical training enough to make them available in the
service of the Church. The founding of these schools took place some
time later than the period under immediate discussion. _Santa Maria di
Loreto_ was founded in 1535, by a poor artisan of the name of
Francisco, who received in his house orphans of both sexes, and caused
them to be fed and clothed and instructed in music. He was assisted by
donations from the rich, and presently a priest named Giovanni da
Tappia undertook to raise a permanent endowment by begging alms from
house to house. At the end of nine years he had accomplished his task.
The building was called the Conservatorio, and in 1536 received
certain government allowances. The pupils reached the number of 800,
and among the illustrious musicians produced by this school were
Alessandro Scarlatti, Durante, Porpora, Trajetta, Sacchini, Gugliemi
and many more. The second school of this kind organized was that of
_San Onofrio a Capuana_, in 1576. It received 120 orphans, who were
instructed in religion and music. In 1797 the pupils of this school
were transferred to _Santa Maria_. The third school of this kind was
that of _De Poveri di Gesu Cristo_, established in 1589, for
foundlings. In 1744 this conservatory was made into a diocesan
seminary. The fourth of these schools was that of _Della Pieta di
Turchini_, which originated about 1584. Quite a number of eminent
composers were produced in this school. All of these conservatories
were consolidated in 1808 as the _Reale Collegio di Musica_ (Royal
College of Music). The example of Naples was followed with more or
less rapidity in the other principal Italian cities. The most
important musical center of Italy during this time was Venice, where
Adrian Willaert became musical director in the cathedral of St.
Mark's, in 1527. Here he remained until 1562. The church of St. Mark's
had already held a prominent position as a musical center at least two
centuries of the four which it had been in existence. The recently
published history of the music in St. Mark's extends back to 1380,
from which time to the beginning of the present century there has been
a succession of eminent musicians as organists and musical directors.
There were two organs in this church, standing in galleries on
opposite sides of the chancel. This circumstance had an important
influence on the development of music in the cathedral, as will
hereafter be seen. It was in this church, according to Italian
tradition, that pedals were first applied to the organ. It is probable
that these appliances were very rude at first, and few in number, but
they served to supplement the resources of the hands of the organist,
and enabled him to produce effects not otherwise obtainable. The
existence of the two choirs and two organs, and no doubt the habit of
antiphonal singing in the Plain Song of the Church, led Willaert to
invent double choruses, and finally to divide his choir into three or
more parts. Willaert is regarded by many as the founder of the
madrigal, of which there is more to be said presently. He was also the
teacher of two very eminent musicians who succeeded him in his
position at St. Mark's--Zarlino and Cyprians de Rore. To go on with
the story of St. Mark's from this point, the most important successor
of Willaert was Gioseffo Zarlino, who spent his youth in studying for
the Church, and was admitted to minor orders in 1539, and ordained
deacon in 1541. He was a proficient scholar in Greek and Hebrew, in
mathematics, astronomy and chemistry. After studying for some years
with Willaert he was elected in 1555 first _Maestro di Capella_ at St.
Mark's. In this position his services were required not alone as
director of music in the church, but also as a servant of the
republic, and it was his duty to compose or arrange music for all of
the public festivals. After the battle of Lepanto, October 7, 1571,
Zarlino was appointed to celebrate the victory with appropriate music.
When Henry III visited Venice, in 1574, he was greeted by music by
Zarlino. This same composer is also credited with having composed a
dramatic piece called _Orpheo_, which was performed with great
splendor in the larger council chamber. Again, in 1577, Zarlino was
commissioned to compose a mass for the commemoration of the terrible
plague which devastated Italy and carried off Titian, among other
great men. His ecclesiastical standing was so good that in 1583 he was
elected bishop, but his accession to the see was so strongly opposed
by the doge and the senate that he consented to retain the appointment
of St. Mark's, where he remained until his death in 1590. Zarlino was
very famous as a composer, in his own day, but few of his works have
come down to us. He is best known by certain works of his on harmony
and the theory of music, of which the most important was the
_Institutioni Armoniche_ (Venice, 1558), and his _Demonstrationi
Armoniche_ (Venice, 1571). Zarlino's distinction rests upon his
having restored the true tuning of the tetrachord to that of 8:9,
9:10, 15:16, as opposed to the Pythagorean tuning of 9:8, 9:8,
256:243. He was the most important scientific authority in the music
of the new epoch. His discoveries in harmony were afterward
supplemented by those of Tartini, almost two centuries later. Among
other strong points of Zarlino was his demonstration of equal
temperament, which came into general use about 100 years later.
Cypriano de Rore, whose name was mentioned above in connection with
St. Mark's, held a position as master in that eminent cathedral only
one year, his tenure of office falling between the death of Willaert
and the appointment of Zarlino. He was a very prolific composer of
motettes and madrigals, and after resigning his position at St. Mark's
went to the Court of Parma, where he died at the age of forty-nine.
The later eminent masters holding positions in this church will come
into view in the next book, in connection with the opera, for
Monteverde was director of the music here during the greater part of
his career as a dramatic composer.
The most eminent development of the polyphonic school, and at the same
time the dawn of a better era in church music, took place in Rome,
where the influence of the Netherlandish composer is noticeable.
Claude Goudimel, whose name appears in the table of the Netherlandish
school in the preceding chapter, opened a music school in Rome in the
early part of the sixteenth century, and among his pupils was the name
of Palestrina. Goudimel's residence in Rome was not very long. He
afterward returned to Paris, and in some way was connected with Calvin
in preparing psalm books for the Calvinists. He was killed finally at
Lyons in the massacre of St. Bartholomew, August 24, 1572.
The culmination of the contrapuntal school and the dawn of the new era
in church music came about through the labors of the pupil of
Goudimel, the great Palestrina. This master, whose name was Giovanni
Pierluigi (English, John Peter Lewis), was born of humble parents at
Palestrina, a small town in the vicinity of Rome. The date is
uncertain, but it was probably about 1520. As early as 1540 he came to
Rome to study music, where he made so good progress that in 1551 he
was appointed musical director at the Julian chapel in the Vatican. He
then commenced the publication of a series of remarkable musical
works, the first of which were in the style prevalent in his day.
There was much learning of every sort; all the devices of polyphony
were freely and luxuriantly employed, but along with them were other
passages of true expression. The dedication of some of these books to
the pope secured for him certain small preferments, which, in his most
profitable condition, aggregated about thirty _scudi_ a month (perhaps
equal to $20 of our money). On this miserable pittance he supported
his wife and four children. In 1556 he was discharged from his place
as a pontifical singer, on account of his marriage, a fact which had
been ignored by the pope who appointed him. He then held the post of
chapel master at the Lateran. In 1561 he was transferred to _Santa
Maria Maggiore_, where he remained ten years at a monthly salary of
sixteen _scudi_, until 1571, when he was once more elected to his old
office of master at the Vatican. It would take us too long to speak of
his various works in detail, although his numerous publications during
this period demonstrate his claim to mastership of the first order.
The best of his pieces had already been adopted in the apostolic
chapel, and his reputation was now greater in Italy than that of any
other musician. But the taste for elaboration in church music had
reached a point where reform was imperatively demanded. Not content
with having secular melodies employed as _canti fermi_ in the music
sung to the words of the mass, the words of these secular songs
themselves were often written in and sung by a majority of the singers
in the choir, only those in the front rows singing the solemn words of
the ecclesiastical office. The Council of Trent (1545-1563) commented
upon this state of things with great severity, and appointed a
commission to inquire into the abuse and decide upon a remedy. It was
contemplated to entirely do away with elaborate music in the Church,
and sing only the Gregorian songs. A few of the music-loving cardinals
succeeded in preventing so sweeping an order, and a commission was
appointed to take the matter in hand. Two of the most active of these
were Cardinals Borromeo and Vitellozzi. The former reported of the
singing in the pontifical chapel, to the following effect: "These
singers," said he, "count it for their principal glory that when one
sings _sanctus_, another sings _Sabbaoth_ and another _gloria tua_,
and the whole effect of the music is little more than a confused
whirring and snarling, more resembling the performance of cats in
January than the beautiful flowers of May." At the same time
Palestrina was desired to write a mass in a style suitable for the
sacred office. Too modest to rest the case upon one work, he wrote
three, which were performed with great care at the house of Cardinal
Vitellozzi, and all were much admired, but the third, known as the
mass "_Papæ Marcelli_," in memory of the pope who had appointed
Palestrina to one of his positions, was recognized as of transcendent
excellence. It was copied in the collection of the Vatican, and the
pope ordered a special performance of it in the Apostolic chapel. At
the end of it he declared that it must have been some such music as
this that the apostles of the Apocalypse heard sung by the triumphant
hosts of angels in the New Jerusalem. Palestrina continued to write
masses, motettes and other works during the remainder of his life, but
during the entire time lived in the extremely limited condition
already mentioned, and was subject to much enmity from jealous singers
and composers. The most pleasing incident of his later life happened
in 1575, when fifteen hundred singers from his native town came to
Rome in two confraternities of the Crucifix and the Sacrament, making
a solemn entry into the city, singing the music of their great
townsman, who conducted at their head. The long and active life of
this great master came to an end January 22, 1594. Among his greater
works are ninety-three masses, a very large number of motettes,
forty-five hymns for the whole year, sixty-eight offertories, and a
large number of litanies, magnificats and madrigals.
It is not unlikely that reform in Catholic Church music had been very
largely influenced by the Protestant music of Germany. Martin Luther
(1483-1546) in arranging music for the Protestant Church, invented the
chorale and added to the best melodies from the Plain Song some
wonderfully fine ones of his own, such as "_Eine Feste Burg_," and
caused many others to be written by the best composers of the
Netherlandish school. The chorale was the exact opposite of the
motette of the Netherlands. In the chorale all of the voices moved
together. The same music was invariably sung to the same words,
whereby an association was created, intensifying the effect of the
music and the words respectively.
As examples of Palestrina's music are not common I have thought best
to allow space for the following from his music for Holy Week. The
pieces will produce a much better effect if sung by good voices than
when played upon an instrument. They are written for the voice.
[Music illustration: "TENEBRÆ FACTÆ SUNT," BY GIOVANNI PIERLUIGI DA
PALESTRINA.
Te-ne-brae fac-tae sunt, dum cru-ci-fi-xis-sent Je-sum Ju-dae-i.
Et cir-ca ho-ram no-nam ex--cla-ma-vit Je-sus vo-ce mag-na:
De-us me-us, ut-quid me de-re-li-qui-sti.
Ex-cla-mans Je-sus vo-ce mag-na a-it:
in ma-nus tu-as, Do-mi-ne, com-men-do spi-ri-tum me-um.
Et in-cli-na-to ca-pi-te e-mi-sit spi-ri-tum.]
CHAPTER XV.
THE CHANGES IN MUSICAL NOTATION.
The entire movement of musical thought since three or four tones began
to be put together into scales, melodies and unities of various kinds,
has been in the direction of classification. This is shown very
conclusively in the history of musical notation, which, at the end of
the period just now under consideration, had reached a form nearly the
same as we now have it. The early notation regarded tones as
individual, and wholly without classification of any kind. The first
musical notation of which we have any authentic knowledge was that of
the Greeks already noted in chapter III. Their scale consisted of two
octaves and one note, their so-called "greater perfect system," and
the tones were named by the first fifteen letters of the Greek
alphabet. This, however, was only a beginning of their system, for the
variety of pitches required in their enharmonic and chromatic scales,
and in the various transposition scales was so great that they
required sixty-seven characters for representing them. These
characters were written above the words to which they applied, and
they had additional marks for duration, especially in the later
periods of Greek music. Besides this they had an entirely different
set of characters for the same tones played upon the cithara, so that
a word to be sung without accompaniment had one mark above it for the
pitch of the note, while if accompanied even by the same tone upon the
instrument, a second character was written for the instrumental part.
The system was wholly without classification, except that the letters
were applied from the lowest notes upward, the same as we now have
them. There was nothing to assist the eye in forming an idea of the
movement of the melody, and as the forms of the letters were very
similar in some cases there is no doubt that mistakes of copyists were
numerous. This, however, is a matter of little concern to us, since no
authentic melodies of the classical period have come down to us. The
example of Greek characters given on p. 69, in connection with the Ode
of Pindar, sufficiently illustrates the nature of this notation,
although the interposition of the staff between the musical notes and
the words deprives the illustration of a part of its value.
The Romans had also a notation consisting of letters written above the
words to which they applied; they made use of the first fifteen
letters of the alphabet in the same manner as the Greeks, but we do
not know whether they employed the same characters for the instruments
and the voices, or had different ones. The only example we possess of
the Roman notation from classical times, or in close tradition from
classical times, is that in "Boethius' Consolations of Philosophy."
From the fact of this being the only place where the Roman notation is
illustrated, certain writers have concluded that Boethius invented
it--a supposition which is utterly improbable. Boethius mentions the
Roman notation, and employs it, as also does Hucbald in certain of his
examples, but neither one of them explains it or gives any account of
its origin. We have simply to take it for granted that the Romans
transferred the letter notation of approximate pitch to their own
characters instead of using Greek letters. The following example from
Guido's book illustrates the appearance of the Roman notation as he
uses it:
[Music illustration: Fig. 31.
LETTER NOTATION OF GUIDO OF AREZZO, WITH DECIPHERING.
Qui tol-lis pec-ca-ta.]
The most curious notation of which we have a record was that of the
neumæ, or neumes, which were employed by the ecclesiastical writers
mostly from about the sixth century to the twelfth. This writing, as
will be seen from the examples hereafter given, very much resembled
the curves and hooks of the modern shorthand. The learned Fétis thinks
that the characters were derived from the Coptic notation, and these
again from the hieratic notation of the ancient Egyptians. The neumes
signified mostly intonations, upward or downward slides of the voice,
and not absolute pitch.
[Illustration: Fig. 32.
NEUME NOTATION OF THE TENTH CENTURY.]
There are no clefs or other indications of the key, and it is little
better than sheer guesswork to attempt to decipher one of them, for
want of some one single base mark to reckon from. Accordingly, the
various commentators have rendered the old pieces in a variety of
ways. It is probable that the imperfections of this notation were
helped out, when it was in current use, by tradition, which
appropriated certain keys to each of the principal hymns of the
Church; this being understood, the singer found himself able to make
something intelligible out of a notation which, without the help of
traditions, would have been meaningless. From about the eleventh
century the supposed meanings of the various signs of the neumes are
easily to be ascertained, because tables are given by a number of
writers of that period; but the earlier examples are practically
undecipherable. This notation came into use partly through
ecclesiastical influence, and partly owing to its being easy to write,
while at the same time it occupied little space upon the page. The
earlier examples, as already said, were without clefs or any means of
ascertaining the key note. After a while we find them with one line
representing do or fa, and the signs arranged above, below, or upon
the line, at intervals approximately representing the pitch intended.
Still later we find a colored line for fa, a thumb nail line traced on
the parchment, but not colored, for re, and a different one for la.
[Music illustration: Fig. 33.
NEUME NOTATION OF THE ELEVENTH CENTURY, DECIPHERED BY MARTINI IN
"GREGORIAN" NOTATION.
Po-pu-le me-us quid fe-ci aut]
Still later four lines were used. There were many varieties of forms
of the neumes employed by the different copyists and by different
nationalities, the heaviest marks of this kind being those of the
Lombard-Gothic represented in Fig. 35. These marks were afterward
written upon a four-line staff, and the note heads were derived from
them.
[Illustration: Fig. 34.
NEUME NOTATION OF GUIDO OF AREZZO.]
There were no marks whatever for duration or measure in the neumes
notation, and its persistence through so long a time signifies very
plainly that it was not in the line of the musical life of the world,
but was a special hieratic notation made to answer for ecclesiastical
purposes by the help of carefully transmitted traditions.
[Music illustration: Fig. 35.
DECIPHERED NEUME NOTATION OF THE LATEST PERIOD.
Co-ro-nat re-gem om-ni-um]
One of the oldest forms of this notation is that of the lament for the
death of Charlemagne, an extract from which is here presented,
together with its translation as given by Naumann.
Incidentally this illustration gives a fair specimen of mediæval
melody of the earlier period. It dates from the tenth century.
[Music illustration: "LAMENT FOR CHARLEMAGNE."
A so-lis or-tu us-que ad oc-ci-du-a
Lit-to-ra ma-ris planctus pulsat pec-to-ra.
Ul-tra ma-ri-na ag-mi-na tris-ti-ti-a
Te-ti-git in-gens cum er-ro-re ni-mi-o.
Heu! me do-lens, plan-go!
Fran-ci, Ro-ma-ni at-que cunc-ti cre-du-li,
Luc-tu pun-gun-tur et mag-na mo-les-ti-a,
in-fan-tes, se-nes, glo-ri-o-si prin-ci-pes,
Nam clangit or-bis de-tri-men-tum Ka-ro-li.
Heu! mi-hi mi-se-ro!]
The earliest suggestion of the staff that we have is that in the work
of Hucbald already mentioned, in which he proposed to print the words
in the spaces of the staff of eleven lines, placing each syllable
according to its pitch (p. 141). The staff, in connection with neumes,
as given above in Fig. 34, probably came into use about the same time
as that when Hucbald's book was written, but it was not until the days
of Guido of Arezzo that the staff was employed in anything like its
modern form, nor is it certain that Guido had anything to do with
introducing it. In one of the manuscripts of his book letters are
written upon the lines and spaces, and in another the neumes are
given. The note head was not invented until some little time after his
death, probably about fifty years.
[Illustration: Fig. 36.
NOTATION OF THE FRENCH TROUVÈRES.]
By the time of Franco of Cologne, the four-lined staff with square
notes had come into use, the notes having the value already assigned
them in the chapter upon Franco of Cologne. (See p. 145.) The place of
fa was marked by a clef, and with some few exceptions all the musical
notation from this time forward is susceptible of approximate
translation. The term approximate is used above by reason of the fact
that no sharps or flats were written until long after this period, but
it is thought that they were occasionally interpolated by the singers
quite a long time before it became customary to put them into the
notation. In this way, for example, a piece of music beginning and
ending on the degree appropriate to fa might be brought within the
limits of the key of F by the singer changing B natural to B flat
wherever it occurred. Our information in regard to this practice is
extremely limited, and, in fact, rests upon two or three detached
hints. The signature was not employed until some centuries later.
As already mentioned in chapter XI, there was no measure notation for
a long time after Franco's death. The data are uncertain concerning
the exact time when the bar began to be used to mark the measure. Its
earliest use was that of marking the end of the music belonging to a
line of poetry. This is the same use as now made of the double bar in
vocal music. In fact, everything points to the progressive development
of music in all respects, and the development of what we might call
self-consciousness in musicians, whereby each succeeding generation
sought to place upon record a greater number of particulars concerning
their music, and to leave less and less to accident or tradition. This
progress has gone on until the present time, when two particulars of
our music are exactly recorded--the pitch and the rhythm. The exact
relation of every tone to the key note is ascertainable from our
musical notation, and the precise degree of rhythmic importance
appertaining to each tone according to its place in measure and in the
larger rhythms. We are still lame in the matter of expression, and in
pianoforte music also in regard to the application of the pedals. Here
our notation affords only a few detached suggestions. If the master
works of the modern school could be noted for expression as completely
as for pitch and rhythm, the labor of acquiring musical knowledge
would be very greatly diminished.
The four-line staff has remained in use in the Catholic Church until
the present time, and with it the square notes. It is generally called
Gregorian, and by many is supposed to have been invented by Gregory
the Great; but as a matter of fact, about six centuries elapsed after
his death before this square-note notation came into use. The
five-line staff came into use about 1500. Information is wanting as to
the causes which led to its adoption in preference to the four-line
notation so long in use. The clef for do (C clef) remained in use
until very lately, and is still used by many strict theorists, being
written upon the first line for the soprano, the fourth line for the
tenor, the third line for the alto. The G clef, also, when first
introduced, was often written upon the third or the first line; the F
clef, moreover, was not definitely established on the fourth line
until toward 1700. In the scores of Palestrina's work, now published
in complete form, there are pieces written with the soprano in the G
clef upon the first line, the alto in the C clef upon the second line,
the tenor in the C clef upon the fourth line, and the bass in the F
clef upon the third line. This, while affording the eye two familiar
clefs, the treble and the bass, places them in such a way as to
practically make it necessary for the modern reader to transpose every
note of the composition in all the parts, and, in fact, to effect a
transposition for each part upon principles peculiar to itself.
The progress of classification is distinctly seen in the use of seven
letters instead of fifteen, affording a tacit recognition of the most
essential underlying facts of harmony--_the equivalence of octaves_.
The staff, however, affords the eye no assistance at this point, since
the octaves of notes occupy relatively entirely different positions
upon it, the octave of a space being invariably a line, and the octave
of a line a space. Moreover, the octave of a bass line is always very
differently located when it falls upon the treble staff, and, _vice
versa_, the octave of a treble note falling in the bass is very
differently placed. If a notation had to be made anew it would no
doubt facilitate matters to make use of a staff so planned as to bring
out the equivalence of octaves more perfectly. A recent American
designer, Mrs. Wheeler, has proposed a double staff of six lines,
divided into two groups of three, for the treble and bass, thus
presenting for the piano score four groups of three lines each,
separated by smaller or larger intervals. Upon such a staff every tone
would fall in the same place upon the three lines in every octave, the
octave of the first line of the lower three would be the first line of
the second three, and so on.
This, however, is to anticipate. The smaller rhythmic divisions of the
measure were very little used in the old music which, if not sung in
slow time, was at least written in long notes, and the smaller
varieties of notes are the invention of a period perhaps rather later
than that at which we have now arrived. They belong to the elaborate
rhythmic construction of the music of Händel, Bach, Scarlatti and
Haydn.
CHAPTER XVI.
MUSICAL INSTRUMENTS. THE VIOLIN, ORGAN, ETC.
I.
During the entire period covered by the division of the story with
which we have been now for some time dealing, the influences operating
upon the tonal sense in the direction of harmonic perception had also
been highly stimulative to the sense of melody. All the devices of
counterpoint, with their two, three and four tones of the moving voice
against one of the _cantus fermus_, were so many incitations in the
direction of melodic cleverness. This influence was still further
strengthened by the constant effort of the composer to impart to each
voice as characteristic an individuality of movement as possible.
Hence there is a distinct gain in smoothness of melody, and there are
occasional appearances of truly expressive quality in this part of the
music, even in the most elaborate of the contrapuntal compositions.
Meanwhile the various forms of popular minstrelsy, whose general
course we have already traced, were powerfully appealing to this part
of the musical endowment of the hearers. But the great means of
cultivating an ear for melody, both in players and hearers, was the
violin, which, contemporaneously with the present point of our story,
had reached its mature form and nearly all of its tonal powers. In
fact, the tonal education of the mediæval musicians had been carried
forward in several directions by the instruments in use. The harp and
its influence upon the development of chord perceptions have already
received attention, but there was another instrument which, during the
period subsequent to about 1400, exerted even a more powerful
influence--I mean the lute. The lute and the violin appear in crude
forms at nearly the same time in Europe. The violin was the instrument
of the north, the lute of the south. Later they move together
geographically, sharing the popular suffrages. By the time of
Palestrina the lute had come to its full powers and most complete
form. Within twenty years after the death of Palestrina orchestral
music started upon the career which has never since stopped, the
violin at the head of the forces, thanks to the insight of the great
musical genius, Monteverde.
The lute belongs to the same class of instruments as the guitar,
differing from that, however, in important details of construction. It
has a pear-shaped body, composed of narrow pieces of bent wood glued
together; the sounding board is flat, and of fir. The neck is longer
or shorter, according to the variety of lute. It was strung with from
eight to eleven strings, which in the east were of silk, but in Europe
were catgut down to the end of the seventeenth century, when spun
strings were substituted for the bass. The finger board was marked by
frets, indicating the places at which the strings should be stopped.
There were four or more of the longest strings which were not upon the
finger board, and were never stopped. They were used for basses.
Melodically the instrument had little power, although its tone was
gentle and sweet. Its influence, like that of the guitar of the
present time, was in the direction of simple harmony, mainly
restricted to the nearest chords of the key. The essential point in
which the construction of the lute differed from that of the guitar,
was in the back, which in the latter is flat, so that ribs are
indispensable for preserving the rigidity of the body against the pull
of the strings. The lute body is very solid, from the mode of its
construction involving an application of the principle of the arch.
The standard appearance of the lute was the following:
[Illustration: Fig. 37.
THE LUTE IN ITS STANDARD FORM.
(From Grove's Dictionary.)]
The stringing and tuning varied much in different periods. According
to Prætorius, the lute had four open strings tuned according to the
scale in _a_ below. Later, a G was added above and below, and the
tuning was that at _b_.
[Music illustration]
Another authority--Baron--gives a tuning for an "eleven-course" lute,
as follows:
[Music illustration]
The F below the bass staff had ten frets, G eleven, and each of the
highest six strings twelve frets. The instrument thus had a compass of
three octaves and a half from the C below the bass. All the strings
were in pairs, two to each unison, excepting the upper two, which were
single. The instrument was a very troublesome one to keep in order.
Mattheson, who wrote in the latter part of the eighteenth century,
when the lute was still cultivated, said that a lutist of eighty years
must have spent nearly sixty in tuning his instrument. The pull of the
strings broke down the sounding board or belly, which had therefore to
be taken off and righted once in every two or three years. The lute
was derived from an Arabian or Persian instrument, of which the Arab
eoud, Fig. 24 (p. 113), was the latest representative.
The problem of locating the frets accurately upon the finger board was
one of the causes which led to close investigation into the
mathematical relation of the tones in the scale; and the directions
given for placing them by various Arab and other writers afford
precise and valuable information concerning their views of
intonation. The lute was made in a great variety of sizes, the largest
being what was called the arch lute, which was more than four feet
long from bottom to the end of the neck. This was employed by Corelli
for the basses of his violin sonatas, and Händel made similar use of
it. A diminutive lute has come down to our own days under the name of
Mandolin. It is strung with metal strings, however, and played with a
plectrum, whereas the mediæval lute was played with the fingers.
Monteverde employed still another variety of the lute in his
orchestra, called the Chitarrone, whence our word guitar. This was a
very large lute, with many strings, which were wire, and played,
therefore, with a plectrum. The chitarrone in the collection at South
Kensington has twelve strings upon the finger board, and eight bass
strings tuned by the pegs at the top of the long neck. It was used
mainly for basses. The guitar, of which a figure is omitted on account
of the familiarity of the instrument, was the Spanish form of the
lute, or the Spanish form which the Moorish lute took in that country.
The essential feature of the violin is the incitation of the vibration
by means of the bow. We do not know when or where this art was
discovered, but it is supposed to have been in the remote east, at a
very early period. The argument of Fétis, that since the Sanskrit has
four terms for bow, according to the material of which it was made,
therefore the art of the bow must have been known before the Sanskrit
ceased to be a spoken language, has little weight. For while it is
true that Sanskrit was not a spoken, or, more properly, a living,
language in ordinary life after about 1500 B.C., it is true, on the
other hand, that it remained in use as a language of religion and of
the learned down to times very recent. In that case there would
necessarily be additions made to it from time to time, as new concepts
came up for expression, in the same manner as additions were made to
Latin during the Middle Ages, and even in modern times. Still, all the
nations around Hindostan have the tradition that the art of playing
music by means of a bow is very old, the Ceylonese attributing the
invention to one of their kings who reigned about 5000 B.C. Their
ravanastron is very crude. (See page 72.) A similarly simple
instrument is in use to the present day in many parts of the east. The
Arab form of it, known as the rebec, is represented on p. 113, Fig.
23. It has two strings of silk, and is played with the point downward,
like a 'cello. It is not possible after this lapse of time to
determine which was the original form of the violin in Europe. Very
early we find the crwth in the hands of the Celtic players, as noticed
in chapter VI. The form given in Fig. 22 (p. 107) is rather late, most
likely, and somewhat of a degradation, since many of the elements of
the violin are wanting in it. The clumsy resonance body is of the same
width all the way, preventing the depression of one end of the bow in
order to avoid sounding adjacent strings. As the bridge of the crwth
was nearly flat, the adjacent strings were octaves, or related in such
a way that when sounding together chords were produced. Many have
supposed that all the strings were sounded together at each drawing of
the bow. This is not impossible, for in one of the sculptures on a
capital in the old church at Boscherville in Normandy a stringed
instrument is represented in which the tone is produced by a revolving
bow, on the principle of the hurdy-gurdy, whereby chords must have
been produced continually. (See p. 208.) The same carving has two
stringed instruments of the violin family, one held like a violin (No.
6), the other bass downward, like a 'cello (No. 1). These two figures
are fragments of the same carving. They are supposed to date from
about the eleventh century. Many similar representations occur, such
as the following from old manuscripts.
[Illustration: Fig. 38.]
These oval instruments had the same deficiency as the crwth, in
respect to indentations at the side of the instrument, for permitting
the depression of the bow. The oldest type of this instrument in use
appears to have been the form known as the rebec, the Arab form, which
came into Europe in the time of the crusades. According to certain
authorities this was the primitive type from which our violin was
derived. The form is better shown in the cut on page 196, which is
from an Italian painting of the thirteenth century.
The body of the rebec was pear-shaped. It was contemporaneous with
many other forms partaking of the shape of the guitar. From this came
the family of viols, which were very popular in England during the
fifteenth and sixteenth centuries.
The viol differed from the violin family proper in having a flat back
like a guitar, and rounded corners. The only individual of the viol
family which attained to artistic development was the viol da Gamba,
or bass viol, which was tuned like a lute, having six strings. This
instrument was a favorite with many amateurs until late in the
eighteenth century. (See p. 197.)
[Illustration: Fig. 39.
ANGEL PLAYING A REBEC.
(From an Italian painting of the thirteenth century.)]
Still more curious was the form of viol known as the barytone, which,
in addition to an outfit of six catgut strings upon the finger board,
was furnished with twenty-four wire strings, stretched close under the
sounding board, where they sounded by sympathetic vibration. This was
the instrument which Prince Esterhazy, Haydn's patron, so much
admired, and for which Haydn wrote more than 150 compositions. Its
form is shown in Fig. 41.
[Illustration: Fig. 40.
VIOL DA GAMBA.
(From Reissman's "History of German Music.")]
[Illustration: Fig. 41.
THE BARYTONE.]
It is not easy within present limits to apportion the various steps by
which the violin reached its present form. The first eminent master
of violins, as distinguished from small viols, was the celebrated
Gaspar da Salo, who lived and worked at Brescia during the latter part
of the sixteenth century. The model varies, and the sound holes are
straight and flat. His violins are small and weak of tone, but his
tenors and basses are much sought for. His model was followed some
time later by Guarnerius. The real mastership in violin making was
attained at Cremona, in Lombardy, where were many religious houses
with elaborate services, and a surrounding population of wealth and
artistic instinct afforded the mechanic an appreciative public. It
was here early in the sixteenth century that we first find the Amati
family in the person of the oldest known violin maker, Andrea, from
whom Fétis quotes two instruments dated 1546 and 1551. One of them is
a rebec with three strings; the other is a small violin. They are a
distinct advance over the violins of the western school, but they stop
very far short of the modern instrument. The tone of his instruments
is clear and silvery, but not very powerful. The most eminent of the
Amatis was Nicolo, 1596-1684, a son of Geronimo and grandson of
Andrea. The outline is more graceful, the varnish deeper and richer,
and the proportions of his instruments better calculated. His
instruments have greater power and intensity of tone, and his tenors
and 'cellos are very famous. But the Cremona school came to a
culmination in the works of the pupil of Nicolo Amati--Antonio
Stradivari, 1649-1737. This great master of the violin pursued the
principles of the Amati construction down to about 1700, having then
been making violins for upwards of thirty-three years. After 1700 he
changed his principles of construction somewhat, and developed the
grand style distinguishing his later works. He marks the culminating
point of the art of violin making. It was he who perfected the model
of the violin and its fittings. The bridge in its present form, and
the sound holes, are cut exactly as he planned them, and no artist has
discovered a possibility of improving them. His main improvements
consisted (1) in lowering the height of the model--that is, the arch
of the belly; (2) in making the four corner blocks more massive, and
in giving greater curvature to the middle ribs; (3) in altering the
setting of the sound holes, giving them a decided inclination to each
other at the top; (4) in making the scroll more massive and permanent.
Every violin of Stradivari was a special study, modified in various
details according to the nature of the wood which he happened to have,
sometimes a trifle smaller, a trifle thicker in this place or the
other, or some other slight change accounted for not by
pre-established theory, but by adaptation to the peculiarities of the
wood in hand. According to Fétis, his wood was always selected with
reference to its tone-producing qualities--the fir of the belly always
giving a certain note, and the maple of the back a certain other note.
These peculiarities are not regarded as fully established. The tone of
the Stradivarius violin is full, musical and high-spirited. The small
number now in existence are held at extremely high prices. The usual
pattern is that represented in the following figure.
[Illustration: Fig. 42.
THE STRADIVARIUS VIOLIN.
(From Grove.)]
Stradivari established his own factory about 1680, and continued to
make instruments up to 1730. The violin of 1708 weighs three-quarters
of a pound. Besides making violins, this eminent artist also made
guitars, lutes, 'cellos and tenors. It is wholly uncertain to what
extent the peculiarities of the Stradivari instruments were matters of
deduction and how far accidental. But there can be no question that
the average excellence of his instruments, judging from the specimens
still in existence, was much greater than that of any other violin
maker.
Many other eminent artists made good violins in the century and a half
from the time of Andrea Amati and Gaspar da Salo to Stradivari, among
the most eminent being Maggini, of Brescia, whose violins are very
highly esteemed. Still, inasmuch as the finishing touches were put to
the instrument by Stradivarius, we need not linger to discuss the
minor makers.
II.
Before 1600 the organ had attained its maturity, and had become
furnished with its distinctive characteristics as we have it at the
present time. As this instrument, from the nature of its tone
qualities and its peculiar limitation to serious music of grave
rhythm, is naturally suited to the service of the Church, it has
remained till the present day in the province where it had already
firmly established itself at the time now under consideration. The
origin of the organ is very difficult to ascertain. There are traces
of some sort of wind instrument before the Christian era. The
so-called hydraulic organ was probably one in which water was used to
perfect the air-holding qualities of the wind chest, in the same
manner as now in gas holders. One of the earliest mediæval references
to organs is to that sent King Pepin, of France, father of
Charlemagne, in 742 by Constantine, emperor of Byzantium at that time.
This instrument, says the old chronicler, had brass pipes, blown with
bellows bags; it was struck with the hands and feet. It was the first
of this kind seen in France.
Prætorius says that the organ which Vitellianus set in church 300
years before Pepin, must have been the small instrument of fifteen
pipes, for which the wind was collected in twelve bellows bags.
According to Julianus, a Spanish bishop who flourished in 450, the
organ was in common use in churches at that time. In 822 an organ was
sent to Charlemagne by the Caliph Haroun Alraschid, made by an Arabian
maker. This instrument was placed in a church at Aix-la-Chapelle.
There were good organ builders in Venice as early as 822, and before
900 there was an organ in the cathedral at Munich. In the ninth
century organs had become common in England, and in the tenth the
English prelate, St. Dunstan, erected one in Malmesbury Abbey, of
which the pipes were of brass. The instruments of that time were
extremely crude.
[Illustration: Fig. 43.
(From Franchinus Gaffurius, "_Theorica Musica_," Milan, 1492.)]
From this time on there are many authentic remains in the way of
treatises on organ building and description of organs. The essential
elements of this instrument consist of pipes for producing sound, of
which a complete set, one pipe for each key of the keyboard, is called
a stop; bellows and wind chest for holding the wind, sliders or valves
for admitting it to the pipes, and keys for controlling the valves.
In his studies for a history of musical notation, Dr. Hugo Riemann
quotes an extract from an anonymous manuscript of the tenth century,
in which the author gives directions for a set of organ pipes. "Take
first," he says, "ten pipes of a proper dimension and of equal length
and size. Divide the first pipe into nine parts; eight of these will
be the length of the second. Dividing the length of this again into
nine parts, eight of these will be the proper length of the third;
dividing the first pipe into four parts, three of them will be the
length of the fourth; taking the first pipe as three parts, two of
them will be the length of the fifth; eight-ninths of this again will
give the proper length of the sixth; eight-ninths of this, the length
of the seventh; one-half the first, the length of the eighth, or
octave." This gives a major scale, with the Pythagorean third,
consisting of two great steps, which was too sharp to be consonant.
The semitone between the third and the fourth is too small, as is also
that between the seventh and eighth. The modern way of making the
pipes of smaller diameter as they become shorter, had evidently not
been thought of. Nevertheless, these directions are very important,
since they throw positive light upon the tuning of the various
intervals, the pipe lengths and proportions affording accurate
determinations of the musical relations intended.
[Illustration: Fig. 44.
PORTABLE ORGAN FROM THE PROCESSION IN HONOR OF MAXIMILIAN I.
(From Prætorius' "_Syntagma Musica_," about 1500 A.D.)]
The early organs were furnished with slides which the organist pulled
out when he wished to make a pipe speak, and pushed back to check its
utterance. The date of the invention of the valve is uncertain, but it
must have been about as soon as the power of the instrument was
increased by the addition of the second or third stop. Before this,
however, and perhaps for some little time after, there were many
organs in use, which were committed to the diaphony of Hucbald, having
in place of the diapason three ranks of pipes, speaking an octave and
the fifth between. Each of these combined sounds was treated in the
same way as simple ones are on other instruments, and if chords were
attempted upon them the effect must have been hideous indeed; but it
is probable that at this time the notes were played singly, and not in
chords, or at most in octaves. We do not know the date at which this
style of organ building ceased, but it is probably before the
thirteenth century. There is a manuscript of the fourteenth century in
the Royal Library at Madrid, stating that the clavier at that epoch
comprised as many as thirty-one keys, and that the larger pipes were
placed on one side, and small pipes in the center, the same as now.
The earliest chromatic keyboards known are those in the organ erected
at Halberstadt cathedral in 1361. This instrument had twenty-two keys,
fourteen diatonics and eight chromatics, extending from B natural up
to A; and twenty bellows blown by ten men. Its larger pipe B stood in
front, and was thirty-one Brunswick feet in length and three and a
half feet in circumference. This note would now be marked as a
semitone below the C of thirty-two feet. In this organ for the first
time a provision was made for using the soft stop independently of the
loud one. This result was obtained by means of three keyboards. The
keys were very wide, those of the upper and middle keyboards measuring
four inches from center to center. The sharps and flats were about two
and a half inches above the diatonic keys, and had a fall of about one
and a quarter inches. The mechanical features of the organ were very
greatly improved during the next century, but it was not until the old
organ in the Church of St. Ægidien in Brunswick that the sharps and
naturals were combined in one keyboard in the same manner as at
present. The keys were still very large, the naturals of the great
manual being about one and three-quarters inches in width. It was to
the organ at Halberstadt that pedals were added in 1495, but no pipes
were assigned to them. They merely pulled down the lower keys of the
manual.
[Illustration: Fig. 45.
BELLOWS BAGS IN THE ORGAN AT HALBERSTADT, AND METHOD OF BLOWING.
(Prætorius.)]
Some time before the beginning of the seventeenth century the organ
had acquired nearly the entire variety of tone that it has ever had.
The mechanism was rude, no doubt, and the voicing perhaps imperfect.
The tuning was by the unequal system, throwing the discords into
remote keys as much as possible. In Michael Prætorius' "_Syntagma
Musica_," the great source of information upon this part of the
history (published at Wolfenbüttel, 1618), he describes a number of
large organs. Among them he mentions the organ in the Church of St.
Mary at Danzig, built in 1585, having three manuals and pedal; there
were fifty-five stops. The balance must have been very bad, since
there were in the great organ three stops of sixteen feet, and only
three of eight feet. There was a mixture having twenty-four pipes to
each key, besides a "zimbel" in the same manual, having three ranks.
Prætorius also gives many other specifications of large organs of
three manuals, some with dates, some without. They belong mostly to
the beginning of the seventeenth century, and the number indicates
unmistakably the interest awakened in this part of the musical
furnishing of the large churches. Many points in these organs were
imperfect, but the foundation had been laid, and the general character
of the subsequent building settled. There was also a beginning of
virtuosity upon the organ, but this will come up for consideration at
a later point in the narrative.
[Illustration]
[Illustration: Fig. 46.
SCULPTURED HEAD OF COLUMN, FOUND IN THE RUINS OF THE ABBEY OF ST.
GEORGE, AT BOSCHERVILLE, IN NORMANDY. ELEVENTH CENTURY.
(1) Three-stringed viol or rebec. (2) Two persons playing the
organistrum, a stringed instrument vibrated by means of a circular bow
or wheel, like the hurdy-gurdy. (3) Pandean pipes. (4) Apparently a
small harp. (5) Psaltery. (6) Rotta or crwth. (7) Acrobat. (8) Harp.
(9), (10) Instruments of percussion, perhaps bells.]
Book Third.
THE
Dawn of Modern Music.
THE BEGINNING OF FREE EXPRESSION IN SONG, OPERA, ORATORIO AND FREE
INSTRUMENTAL MUSIC.
CHAPTER XVII.
CONDITION OF MUSIC AT THE BEGINNING OF THE SEVENTEENTH CENTURY.
In justification of the name "apprentice period" for that part of the
history of music ending with Palestrina as the representative of the
finished art of the Netherlands (helped out, we may well enough admit,
with no small measure of the original insight and genius of his own),
a general view of the condition of music in all European countries at
the beginning of the seventeenth century may well be taken. The
fullness with which the details have already been treated renders it
unnecessary to repeat them here, but it will be enough to recapitulate
the principal features of the art thus far attained, adding thereto a
number of incidents omitted. Upon the side of musical phraseology,
then, we find in the north the attainment of a simple and expressive
form of melody almost or quite up to the standard of modern taste. In
the direction of the musically elaborative element we have the schools
of the Netherlands and of Italy, in which absolutely everything of
this kind was realized which modern art can show, saving perhaps the
fugue, which involved questions of tonality belonging to a grade of
taste and harmonic perception more advanced and refined than that as
yet attained. It took nearly another century before the
ecclesiastical keys were thoroughly disenchanted in the estimation of
classical musicians. It was Bach who finally made true tonality the
rule rather than the exception.
In the line of instruments the harp had had its day, its never ending
tuning having been one of the most operative forces in the development
of the ear. Its successor, the lute, equally weak in tenacity of
intonation, but with greater artistic resources, had been fully tested
in every direction. The organ had attained a very respectable size,
even when measured according to modern ideas, and its influence in the
direction of harmonic education had been well begun. The keyed
instrument, of which our pianoforte is the living representative, had
found its keyboard and a practical method of eliciting tones, which,
whatever their weakness, were at least better than those of the lute,
the chitarrone, the psaltery or harp. Best of all, the violin had
found master hands able to shape it into a model graceful to the eye,
and sonorous beyond anything else which the art of music can show.
True, it was not until about sixty years later that the powers of this
instrument in the direction of solos were fully recognized, or,
indeed, brought before the public. This was the work of Corelli, whose
sonatas were published in the third quarter of the century with which
we are now dealing. The viol, the weaker predecessor of the violin,
had made great headway, and Monteverde put himself on record in 1607,
much to his credit, by placing it at the head of his orchestra.
Moreover, not only were the instruments of music in a condition
creditable even in the light of modern ideas, but the popular taste
for music was more lively and far-reaching than ever before.
Everywhere in the civilized world the practice of music was the
universal attribute of a gentleman. In Italy we shall find a circle
composed of some of the best minds of the nation engaged in the
regular study of classical learning, and in discussions having for
their object the re-discovery of the art of ancient music, which the
seekers wrongfully imagined to have been as far superior to the music
then in vogue as the sculpture of the ancients had been superior to
that of mediæval Italy. In no country was the art of music more highly
esteemed, or, we may add, in a more advanced state than in England.
Richard Braithwaite, a writer of the reign of Elizabeth, formulated
certain rules for the government of the house of an earl, in which the
earl was "to keep five musicians, skillful in that commendable sweet
science"; and they were required to teach "the earl's children to sing
and to play upon the bass viol, the virginals, the lute, the bandour
or cittern." When he gave great feasts, the musicians were "to play
whilst the service was going to the table, upon sackbuts, cornets,
shawms and such other instruments going with wind, and upon viols,
violins or other broken music during repast." In barber shops they had
lutes and virginals wherewith the gentlemen might amuse themselves
while awaiting their turn. It was the same in reception rooms; musical
instruments were provided as the surest method of enabling waiting
guests to amuse themselves.
If it be asked why it was that in spite of this high esteem for music
so little came out of its cultivation in England that was creditable
upon the highest plane, according to the scales in which we are
accustomed to weigh the music of Italy and Germany, the answer is not
hard to find. It was in consequence of the little attention paid to
musical learning in the highest sense, as compared with the learning
and training in musicianship on the continent. English music died out,
or grew small, for want of depth of earth. High ideals and thorough
training in the technique are two prime conditions of a successful
development of an art. Besides, the art of music suffered irreparable
damage in England at the hands of the Puritans. The protectorate
lasted long enough to put the art under an eclipse from which it did
not fully emerge until nearly our own time.
A similar fondness for this form of art pervaded all European
countries. In Italy music was the delight of the common people and the
favorite pursuit of the great. In Germany the Reformation and the
influence of Luther had set the people singing. The organ had attained
an advanced state there, and other instruments of every sort were
cultivated. It was the same in France. The love for music was
universal. Hence the times were ripe for a great advance in art. There
was concentrated upon music an attention which it has rarely enjoyed
at any other period of its history, and the advances now to be
mentioned were correspondingly abundant and striking.
The contrapuntal schools had done more to educate harmonic perception
than is commonly supposed. All the devices of counterpoint, as we have
them to-day, were invented by the various schools of this period, and
brought to a high degree of perfection. But the learning had somewhat
overshot its mark. The multiplicity of parts in the compositions of
Willaert, and the other masters of the polyphonic schools, served for
the cultivation of chord perception just as surely as if they had
intentionally written chord successions without troubling themselves
with imitative canon in any degree. For, when there were so many voice
parts as ten, fifteen or twenty within the limits of the compass of
the human organ, that is to say, mainly within the limits of two
octaves and a half, the parts had no recourse but to cross
continually, and since there was no aid afforded the ear by
differences in tone color between one voice part and another, it
necessarily followed that they fell upon the ear with the effect not
of voice parts, in which the melody of each could be followed
independently of the others, but rather as chord masses, in which here
and there a prominent melodic phrase occasionally emerged, only to be
lost the next moment by the prominence of a bit of the melody of some
other voice. The effect of a composition of this kind was no other
than that of a succession of chords, and the ear was as thoroughly
educated to chord perception by this class of music as if the composer
had intended only to write successions of chords. Still the training
of these schools, while incidentally affording education to the ear
upon the harmonic side, was thoroughly contrapuntal, and the study of
every composer was to make something more elaborate than anything that
had been written by his predecessors.
Nevertheless there was an influence in another direction. An art form
was invented, which by the end of this period had established itself
as the type of a musical form whenever the composer would arrive at
something more spontaneous than could conveniently be attained by the
way of a motette or conduit. That form was the madrigal. The meaning
of the name is unknown. Some have derived it from Mary, and point to
the sacred madrigals, many of which were composed by all the
contrapuntal writers. Others have assigned a different origin for it,
and it is not possible now to decide which is the true one. Enough if
we find this form emerging from obscurity by the middle of the
fifteenth century. The first writer of compositions under this title
whose name is known to us was Busnois, and in the same collection are
compositions of the same class by many other composers of the
Netherlandish schools. A madrigal was a secular composition, generally
devoted to love, but in polyphonic style, and in one of the
ecclesiastical modes. They were always vocal down to the seventeenth
century, but from that time forward they were generally marked for
voices and instruments. One of the best composers of madrigals was
Arkadelt, of the Netherlandish school. The success of the great
Orlando Lassus in this school has already been mentioned, together
with the name of one of the best known of his compositions in this
line (p. 167).
The strange modulations, like that from F to E flat in one of
Arkadelt's madrigals, are current incidents of the ecclesiastical mode
in which they are written. Many of the secular works of this class are
hardly to be distinguished from those intended for the Church, and
some are to be met with, having two sets of words, one secular,
occasionally almost profane; the other sacred, some hymn or other from
the offices of divine service.
In England this school had a great currency, and the madrigals of the
British writers of the seventeenth century are every whit as free and
melodious as the best of those of the Italian school. The number of
writers of this class of works was innumerable, so much so that we
might well class it as the ruling art form of the century, just as the
dramatic song was in the eighteenth century, the fugue in the last
half of it, and the sonata in the beginning of the nineteenth.
Everybody wrote madrigals who ever wrote music at all. According to
the dates of collections published, the English followed the Italian
composers. The earliest Italian compositions of this class are
contained in three collections printed by Ottaviano di Petrucci, the
inventor of the process of printing music from movable type. These
collections were published in Venice, 1501-1503, and copies are still
retained in the library at Bologna and at Vienna. The English
cultivation of this form of composition became general toward the last
of this century, and in the first part of the next ensuing, and it is
but just to say that the English composers finally surpassed the
continental in this school, and developed out of it a beautiful art
genre of their own, the glee. Toward the latter part of the sixteenth
century certain attempts were made in Italy at something resembling
our opera, but in place of solo pieces by any of the performers there
were madrigals. When Juliet, for example, would soliloquize upon the
balcony, she did so in a madrigal, the remaining four parts being
carried by chambermaids inside. When Romeo climbed the balcony and
breathed his sweet vows to Juliet, one or two of his friends around
the corner carried the missing melodies in which he sought to
improvise his warm affection. The absurdity of the proceeding was
manifest, but it needed yet another point of emphasis. There was a
grand wedding in Venice in 1595, at which the music consisted of
madrigals, all in slow time and minor key. The contradiction between
the doleful music and the festive occasion was too plain to be
ignored, and led, presently, to the invention of a totally different
style of song of which later there is much to say.
The seventeenth century was one of the most memorable in the history
of music, not so much, however, for what it fully accomplished as for
the new ideas brought out and in part developed. The specific part of
the general development of music which this century accomplished was
_the development of free melodic expression_. While, as already
noticed, the musical productions of the preceding centuries had
manifested an increasing melodic force and propriety, the secret of
genuine melodic expression had yet to be found. In the madrigal and
motette the conditions were wholly unsuited to the development of this
part of music. Instead of one prominent voice, in which the main
interest of the production centered itself, the composer of that
period had a certain number of equally important voice parts, all
taking part in the development of the one leading idea of his piece.
Melodically speaking, the standpoint was wrong and the situation
false. Melody means individuality, individualism; the free
representation of a personality in its own self-determined motion. At
the point of the year 1600, speaking with sufficient exactness for
ordinary purposes, the ruling standpoint of musical production
changed, in the effort to rediscover the lost vocal forms of the Greek
drama. The new problem was that of finding, for every moment and every
speech of the drama, a form of utterance suitable to the sentiment and
the occasion. Thus entered into music, through the ministry of
self-forgetfulness, the most important principle which has actuated
its later progress, the principle namely, of dramatic expression--in
other words, the _representative_ principle, the effort to represent
in music something which until now had been outside of music. Out of
this principle, co-operating with that other idea of two centuries
later, the inherent interest of the individual, has grown the richness
and manifold luxuriance of modern romantic music, together with the
entire province of opera and oratorio. We have now to trace the steps
which led to this great transformation in the art of music; and to
illustrate the application of the new principles to the province of
instrumental music, which had no beginning of genuine art value before
this period. When examined with reference to the matured productions
of the century next ensuing, those of the seventeenth appear quite as
much like apprentice efforts as those of the latter part of the period
covered in the preceding book of our story; but they have in them,
however, the seeds of the later development, and stand to us,
therefore, in the character of first fruits. To state it still more
unmistakably, we have to trace in the operations of the seventeenth
century the _origin of dramatic song_, the beginnings of _free
instrumental music_, the discovery of the _art of voice training_ and
the formation of what is called the "old Italian school of singing,"
and the operation of the representative element in music, together
with the new forms created through its entrance into art.
The musical movement of this century in its entirety was a part of the
general operation of mind, which was now of great amplitude and
spontaneity. The fervor of the Renaissance indeed had passed, having
resulted in the creation of masterpieces of architecture, sculpture,
painting and poetry during the previous two centuries. Music came to
expression last of the forms of art, and when mental movement was less
intense. For this reason the Italian mind failed to rule in it after
the early beginnings in the new direction had been made. The
representative element entered the art of music in Italy; but the
mastery of its application, and the development of new forms fully
completing the representation, were carried on by other nationalities
where the mental movement still retained the pristine vigor of new
impulses and rich vitality.
The city of Florence was the center where the drama and song-like
melody found its beginning. Almost immediately, however, Venice became
the home of music, and fostered the growth of dramatic song for more
than half a century. At this time, as for a century previous, Venice
was the most active intellectual center of Europe. Perhaps nothing
gives so clear a realization of this supremacy as the statistics of
books printed in the leading centers of Europe from 1470 to 1500. The
largest centers were Strassburg, with 526; Basle, 320; Leipsic, 351;
Nuremburg, 382; Cologne, 530; Paris, 751; Rome, 925; Bologna, 298;
Milan, 625, while Venice heads the list with 2,835. Toward the end of
the century, the appearance of the genius, Alexander Scarlatti,
effected the transference of the musical supremacy of Italy to Naples.
[Illustration]
CHAPTER XVIII.
FIRST CENTURY OF ITALIAN OPERA AND DRAMATIC SONG.
During the last decade of the sixteenth century a company of
Florentine gentlemen were in the habit of meeting at the house of
Count Bardi for the study of ancient literature. Their attention had
concentrated itself upon the drama of the Greeks, and the one thing
which they sought to discover was the music of ancient tragedy, the
stately and measured intonation to which the great periods of
Æschylus, Euripides and Sophocles had been uttered. The alleged
fragments of Pindar's music since discovered by Athanasius Kircher (p.
69) were not yet known, and they had nothing whatever to guide their
researches beyond the mathematical computations of Ptolemy and the
other Greek writers. At length, one evening, Vincenzo Galilei, father
of the astronomer Galileo, presented himself with a monody. Taking a
scene from Dante's "_Purgatorio_" (the episode of Ugolini), he sang or
chanted it to music of his own production, with the accompaniment of
the viola played by himself. The assembly was in raptures. "Surely,"
they said, "_this_ must have been the style of the music of the famous
drama of Athens." Thereupon others set themselves to composing
monodies, which, as yet, were not arias, but something between a
recitative and an aria, having measure and a certain regularity of
tune, but in general the freedom of the chant. Among the number at
Count Bardi's was the poet Rinuccini, who prepared a drama called
"Dafne." The music of this was composed in part by an amateur named
Caccini, and in part by Jacopo Peri, all being members of this
studious circle meeting at the house of Count Bardi. "Dafne" was
performed in 1597 at the house of Count Corsi, with great success, but
the music has been lost, and nothing more definite is known about it.
This beginning of opera, for so it was, was also the beginning of
opera in Germany, as we shall presently see, for about twenty years
later a copy of "Dafne" was carried to Dresden for production there
before the court, but when the libretto had been translated into
German, it was found unsuited to the music of the Italian copy,
whereupon the Dresden director, Heinrich Schütz, wrote new music for
it, and thus became the composer of the first German opera ever
written. In 1600 the marriage of Catherine de Medici with Henry IV of
France was celebrated at Florence with great pomp, and Peri was
commissioned to undertake a new opera, for which Rinuccini composed
the text "Eurydice." The work was given with great _éclat_, and was
shortly after printed. Only one copy of the first edition is now known
to be in existence, and that, by a curious accident, is in the
Newberry Library at Chicago. The British Museum has a copy of the
second edition of 1608. The opera of "Eurydice" is short, the printed
copy containing only fifty-eight pages, and the music is almost
entirely recitative. There are two or three short choruses; there is
one orchestral interlude for three flutes, extending to about twenty
measures in all, but there is nothing like a finale or ensemble
piece. Nevertheless, this is the beginning, out of which afterward
grew the entire flower of Italian opera. On page 225 is an extract.
The new style thus invented was known to the Italians as _il stilo
rappresentivo_, or the representative style, that is to say, the
dramatic style, and there is some dispute as to the real author of the
invention. About the same time with the production of "Eurydice," a
Florentine musician, Emilio del Cavaliere, wrote the music to a sacred
drama, of which the text had been composed for him by Laura
Guidiccioni, the title being "_La Rappresentazione del Anima e del
Corpo_." The piece was an allegorical one, very elaborate in its
structure, and written throughout in the representative style, of
which Cavaliere claimed to be the inventor. This oratorio, which was
the first ever written, was produced at the oratory of St. Maria in
Vallicella, in the month of February, ten months before the appearance
of "Eurydice" at Florence. It is evident, therefore, that if the style
had been in any manner derived from the Florentine experiments already
noted, it must have been from the earlier opera "Dafne" and not from
"Eurydice." The principal characters were "_Il Tempo_" (time), "_La
Vita_" (life), "_Il Mondo_" (the world), etc. The orchestra consisted
of one lira doppia, one clavicembalo, one chitarrone and two flutes.
No part is written for violin. At one part of the performance there
was a ballet. The whole was performed in church, as already noticed,
as a part of religious service.
Seven years later we enter upon the second period of the opera, when,
on the occasion of the marriage of Francesco Gongeaza with Margherita,
Infanta of Savoy, Rinuccini prepared the libretti for two operas,
entitled "Dafne" and "Arianna," the second of which was set to music
by Claudio Monteverde, the ducal musical director, a man of
extraordinary genius. The first of these operas has long since been
forgotten, but Monteverde made a prodigious effect with his. The scene
where Ariadne bewails the departure of her faithless lover affected
the audience to tears. Monteverde was immediately commissioned to
write another opera, for which he took the subject of "_Orfeo_," and,
being himself an accomplished violinist, he made an important addition
to the orchestral appointments previously attempted in opera. The
instruments used were the following:
2 Gravicembani.
2 Contrabassi de viola.
10 Viole da brazzo.
1 Arpa doppio.
2 Violini piccolo alla Francese.
2 Chitaroni.
2 Organi de Legno.
2 Bassa da Gamba.
4 Tromboni.
1 Regale.
2 Cornetti.
1 Flautino alla vigesima secunda.
1 Clarino, con 3 trombi sordine.
[Music illustration: FLUTE TRIO AND SCENE.
(From the first opera, "Eurydice" (1600). Jacopo Peri.)
Nel pur' ar-dor del-la più bel-la stel-la
au-rea sa-cel-la di bel foc' accen-di
E qui dis-cen-di su l'au-ra-te plu-me, etc.]
A very decided attempt is made in this work at orchestra coloring,
each character being furnished with a combination of instruments
appropriate to his place in the drama. These works were not given in
public, but only in palaces for the great, and it was not for more
than twenty years that a public opera house was erected in Venice. In
1624 Monteverde at the instance of Girolamo Mocenigo composed an
intermezzo, "_Il Combatimento di Tancredi e Clorinda_," in which he
introduced for the first time two important orchestral effects: The
_pizzicati_ (plucking the strings with the fingers) and the
_tremolo_. These occur in the scene where Clorinda, disguised as a
knight, fights a duel with her lover Tancredi, who, not knowing his
opponent, gives her a fatal wound. The strokes of the sword are
accompanied by the _pizzicati_ of the violins, and the suspense when
Clorinda falls is characterized by the tremolo--two devices universal
in melodrama to the present day.
Monteverde had already for some time been a resident in Venice as
director of the music at St. Mark's, where his salary had originally
been established at 300 ducats per annum, and a house in the canon's
close. In 1616 his salary was raised to 500 ducats, and he gave
himself up entirely to the service of the republic. The first opera
house was erected in 1637 and was followed within a few years by two
other opera houses in Venice. In these places Monteverde's subsequent
works were produced. The greater number of his manuscripts are
hopelessly lost. We possess only eight books of madrigals, a volume of
canzonettes, the complete edition of "Orpheus," and a quantity of
church music.
The new path opened by this great composer was followed assiduously by
a multitude of Italian musicians. Among these the more distinguished
names are those of Cavalli, who wrote thirty-four operas for Venice
alone, Legrenzi and Cesti. The latter wrote six operas, some of which
were very successful. By 1699 there were eleven theaters in Venice at
which operas were habitually given; at Rome there were three; in
Bologna one; and in Naples one. It would take us too far to discuss in
detail the successive steps in the history during this century, since
in the nature of the case, an individual work like an opera can with
difficulty rise above the popular musical phraseology of the day, the
object being immediate success with a public largely uncultivated.
Hence, popular operas for the most part are short-lived, rarely
retaining their popularity more than thirty years.
The greatest genius in opera in this century after Monteverde was
Alessandro Scarlatti, of Naples, the principal of the conservatory
there, and, we might say, the inventor of the Italian art of
singing--_bel canto_. For as there had been no monody, so there had
been no solo singing, and as the operas of the first three-quarters of
this century, in spite of the improvements of Monteverde, consisted
mostly of recitative, there was still no singing in the modern
acceptation of the term. Scarlatti introduced new forms. To the
_recitativo secco_, or unaccompanied recitative, which until now had
been the principal dependence for the movement of the drama, he added
the _recitativo stromentato_, or accompanied recitative, in which the
instruments afforded a dramatic coloring for the text of the singer.
To these, again, he added a third element, the aria. The first he
employed for the ordinary business of the stage; the second for the
expression of deep pathos; the third for strongly individualized
soliloquy. These three types of vocal delivery remain valid, and are
still used by composers in the same way as by Scarlatti. His first
opera was produced in Rome at the palace of Christina, ex-queen of
Sweden, in 1680. This was followed by 108 others, the most of which
were produced in Naples. The most celebrated of these were "_Pompei_"
(Naples, 1684), "_La Theodora_" (Rome, 1693), "_Il Triompho de la
Liberta_" (Venice, 1707) and, most celebrated of all, "_La Principessa
Fidele_." In addition to this he wrote a large number of cantatas,
more or less dramatic in character. Scarlatti not only created the
aria, calling for sustained and impassioned singing, but also
invented or discovered methods of training singers to perform these
numbers successfully. He was the founder of the Italian school of
singing, and the external model upon which it was based undoubtedly
was furnished by the violin which, having been perfected by the Amati,
as already noted in the previous chapter, and its solo capacities
having been brought out by Archangelo Corelli, whose first violin
sonatas were published a few years before Scarlatti's first opera, had
now established a standard of melodic phrasing and impassioned
delivery superior to anything which had previously been known. It was
a pupil of Scarlatti, Nicolo Porpora (1686-1766), who carried forward
the work begun by his master. Porpora was even a greater teacher of
singing than Scarlatti himself, and his pupils became the leading
singers in Europe during the first quarter of the eighteenth century.
The progress of vocal cultivation was remarkably helped by the fact
that at this time women were not permitted to appear upon the stage,
all the female parts being taken by male sopranos, _castrati_. These
artificial sopranos, having no other career before them than that of
operatic singing, devoted themselves vigorously to the technique of
their art, and were efficient agents in awakening a taste for florid
singing impossible for ordinary or untrained voices. Women did not
appear upon the stage in opera until toward the middle of this
century. Händel, in London, had male sopranos such as Farinelli,
Senesimo, and the earlier of the female sopranos, of whom the vicious
Cuzzoni was a shining example. The artistic merits of Porpora have
been greatly exaggerated by certain writers, notably by Mme. George
Sand in her "_Consuelo_," where he figures as one of the greatest and
most devoted of artists. Her work, however, has the excellence of
affording a very good representation of the artistic end proposed by
the Italian masters of singing in their best moments. Porpora spent
the early part of his life in Naples, but afterward he resided for
some time in Dresden, Vienna, Rome and Venice, being principal of a
conservatory in the latter place. In the latter years of his life
(1736) he was invited to London to compose operas in competition with
Händel, in which calling he but poorly succeeded. Porpora represents
the ideal which has ruled Italian opera from his time to the present,
the ideal, namely, of the pleasing, the well sounding, and the vocally
agreeable. He is responsible for the fanciful roulades, the long arias
and the many features of this part of dramatic music which please the
unthinking, but mark such a wide departure from the severe and noble,
if narrow, ideal of the original inventors of this form of art.
It is to be regretted that the limits of the present work do not
permit the introduction of selections of music sufficiently extended
for illustrating the finer modifications of style effected by the
successive masters named in the text. The brief extracts following are
taken from the excellent lectures of the late John Hullah upon
"Transitional Periods in Musical History." The same valuable and
suggestive work contains a number of more extended selections from
these and other little known masters of the period, for which reason
the book forms a useful addition to the library of teachers, schools,
etc. Other illustrations will be found in Gevaert's "_Les Gloires
d'Italie_" ("The Glories of Italy"). There are sixty arias in this
collection, all well edited, and chosen for their effectiveness for
public performance at the present day.
[Music illustration: ARIA PARLANTE.--"LASCIATE MI MORIR."
(From the opera "Ariadne," 1607. Monteverde.)
La-scia-te mi mo-ri-re,
La-scia-te mi mo-ri-re,
E che vo-le-te voi che mi con-for-ti in co-sì du-re sor-te, in co-sì
gran mar-ti-re?
La-scia-te mi mo-ri-re,
La-scia-te mi mo-ri-re.]
[Music illustration: EXTRACT FROM SONG, "VAGHE STELLE."
(From the opera "Erismena," 1655. Francesco Cavalli.)
Va-ghe stel-le, Lu-ci-bel-le,
Non dor-mi-te, non dor-mi-te.
Va-ghe stel-le, Lu-ci-bel-le,
Non dor-mi-te, non dor-mi-te.]
[Music illustration: ARIA.--"LASCIAMI PIANGERE."
(From a cantata. Alessandro Scarlatti.)
La-scia-mi, la-scia-mi pian-ge-re ch'io sò per-chè io sò, io sò, io sò
per-chè.
La-scia-mi pian-ge-re, la-scia-mi pian-ge-re ch'io sò per-chè,
per-chè, ch'io sò perchè,
La-scia-mi pian-ge-re ch'io sò per-chè, io sò, io sò, io sò per-chè.
Del-le mie la-gri-me
La sor-te per-fi-da
Sa-zia non è, sa-zia non è.
Del-le mie la-gri-me
La sor-te per-fi-da
Sa-zia non è,
Del-le mie la-gri-me
La sor-te per-fi-da
Sa-zia non è nò, nò, nò, nò, nò, sa-zia non è.
_Da capo._ La-scia-mi....]
CHAPTER XIX.
BEGINNINGS OF OPERA IN FRANCE AND GERMANY.
I.
From Florence the art of dramatic song spread to all other parts of
the world, yet not so rapidly as would have been supposed. For it was
not until nearly half of the century had already elapsed that opera
made a beginning in France, the country where ruled the unfortunate
princess for whose nuptials the first opera had been written. French
opera grew out of the ballet. This term, which at present is
restricted to entertainments in which dancing is the principal
feature, and the story is entirely told in pantomime, had formerly a
more extended signification. It was equivalent to the English term
"Mask," a play in which dancing, songs and even dialogue found place.
This light and sprightly form of drama has been favored in France from
a remote period. As early as the first quarter of the seventeenth
century Antoine Boesset (1585-1643) composed ballets for the
entertainments of the king, Louis XIII. His son succeeded him at the
court of Louis XIV. Some of the ballets of the elder Boesset were
produced in 1635, and in these we must find the beginnings of French
opera, if indeed we do not go back still farther, and find it in the
play of "Robin and Marian," written by Adam de la Halle. In fact,
dramatic entertainment has been indigenous in France from an early
date, and it is by no means easy to say that at any particular moment
the line was crossed where modern opera begins. The ballets of Boesset
were, no doubt, slight upon the dramatic side, having even less of
serious intention in the music than the lightest of comic opera of the
present day.
The impulse to grand opera came from a different quarter. A sagacious
cleric, the Abbé Perrin, heard, either at Florence or in Paris, from
the company of Italian singers brought over in 1645, Peri's
"Eurydice," which made a great impression upon him, and he suggested
to a musician of his acquaintance, Robert Cambert, the production of
another work in similar style. Several things in this account appear
strange, but strangest of all, the total ignorance that prevailed in
Paris of the vast development that had been made in Italian opera by
Monteverde and the other Italians, during the forty years since Peri's
experiment had been first composed. With the leisurely movement of the
times, the new work of the French composers was produced in 1659. This
was "_La Pastorale_," performed with the greatest applause at the
chateau of Issy. This was followed by several other works in similar
style, "Ariane," "Adonis" and the like, and in 1669 Perrin secured a
patent giving him a monopoly of operatic performances in France for a
period of years.
Meanwhile a certain ambitious and unscrupulous youngster was feeling
his way to a position where he might make himself recognized. It was
the youthful violinist, Jean Baptiste Lulli, the illegitimate son of a
Florentine gentleman, his dates being about 1633-1687. Lulli had been
taught the rudiments of knowledge, including that of the violin, by a
kind-hearted priest of his native city, and, when yet a mere lad, made
his way to Paris in the suite of the duke of Guise. Once in Paris his
way was open. Gifted with a quick wit, a total absence of principle or
honor, but of insatiable ambition, he made his way from one position
to another, and at length had been so prominent as a composer of dance
music, and leader of the king's violins, as to have opportunity to
distinguish himself by composing the music for the ballet of
"_Alcidiane_," and others, in which Louis XIV himself danced. Lulli's
ambition was still farther stimulated and his style influenced by the
study of the music of Cavalli, for several of whose operas he composed
ballets, upon the occasion of their production in France.
Within thirteen years he produced no less than thirty ballets. In
these he himself took part with considerable success as dancer and
comic actor. The success of Cambert and Perrin's operas of "_Pomone_"
and "The Pains and Pleasures of Love" (1671) awakened in him the
desire of supplanting them in the regard of the king. After intrigues
creditable neither to himself nor to the powers influenced by them, he
succeeded in this same year in having the patent of Perrin set aside,
and a new one issued, giving him the sole right of producing operas in
France for a period of years. Then ensued a career of operatic
productivity most creditable and influential from every point of view.
In the space of fourteen years Lulli produced twenty operas, or
_divertissements_, of which the best, perhaps, were "_Alceste_," 1674,
"_Thesée_," 1675, "_Amadis de Gaule_," 1684, and "Roland," 1685. Lulli
made certain improvements upon the Italian models, which he
originally followed, making the recitative more stately, and employing
the accompanying orchestra for purposes of dramatic coloration. He was
a great master of the stage, and introduced his effects with
consummate judgment. His declamation of the text was most excellent,
and in this respect his operas have served as models in the traditions
of the French stage from that time until now. As a musician, however,
he was clever rather than deep, and the music is often monotonous and
rather stilted. Nevertheless, his operas held the stage for many years
after the death of their author, and occasional revivals have taken
place at intervals, even after the advance in taste and musical
knowledge had effectually quenched their ability to please a popular
audience. His "Roland" was performed as an incident in the regular
season at Paris as late as 1778, when Gluck's "Orpheus" had already
been heard. The example of Lulli's music given on pages 240 and 241 is
from this work. The melody is vigorous and appropriate.
The most commendable feature of this beginning of opera in France was
the attention given to the musical treatment of the vernacular of the
country. The principle once recognized, that opera not in the
vernacular of the country can never have more than an incidental and
adventitious importance, has always been maintained in France. The
_Académie de Musique_, for which the patent was granted to Perrin, and
transferred to Lulli, has been maintained with few interruptions ever
since, and has been the home of a native French opera, constantly
increasing in vigor, originality and interest. Italian opera has been
fashionable in Paris for brief periods, and as the amusement of the
fashionable world, but the native opera has nearly always held the
place of honor in the affections of the people, and the foreign works
produced there have been translated into the French language.
[Music illustration: SONG.--"ROLAND, COUREZ AUX ARMES."
(From the opera "Roland," 1685. J.B. Lulli.)
Ro-land, cou-rez aux ar-mes, aux ar-mes, cou-rez aux ar-mes,
Que la gloi-re a de charm-es, Que la gloi-re a de charm-es;
L'a-mour de ses di-vins ap-pas, Fait vi-vreau de-là du tré-pas,
L'a-mour de ses di-vins ap-pas, Fait vi-vreau de-là du tré-pas.
Ro-land, cou-rez aux ar-mes, aux ar-mes, cou-rez aux ar-mes,
Que la gloi-re a de charm-es, Que la gloi-re a de charm-es.]
II.
In Germany the contrary was the case for more than a century later.
The first operatic performance, indeed, was given in the German
language. A copy of Peri's "Dafne" was sent to Dresden and as a
preparation for performance the text was translated, but it was found
impossible to adapt the German words to the Italian recitative, owing
to the different structure of the German sentences, bringing the
emphasis in totally different places. In this stress the local master,
Heinrich Schütz, was called upon to compose new music, which he did,
and the work was given in 1627. This beginning of German opera,
however, was totally accidental. All that was intended was the
repetition of the famous Italian work. Nor did the persons concerned
appear to recognize the importance and high significance of the act in
which they had co-operated, for no other German operas were given
there or elsewhere until much later. Schütz, moreover, did not pursue
the career of an operatic composer, but turned his attention mainly to
church music and oratorio, in which department he highly distinguished
himself, as we will presently have occasion to examine farther.
It was not until the beginning of the century next ensuing, that
German opera began to take root and grow. The beginning was made in
the free city of Hamburg, which was at that time the richest and most
independent city of Germany, and, being remote from the centers of
political disturbance, it suffered less from the thirty years' war
than most other parts of the country. The prime mover here was
Reinhard Keiser (1673-1739), born at Weissenfels, near Leipsic, and
educated at the Thomas School. His attention had been directed to
dramatic music early, and at the age of nineteen he was commissioned
to write a pastoral, "_Ismene_," for the court of Brunswick. The
success of this gained him another libretto, "_Basilius_," also
composed with success. He removed to Hamburg in 1694, and for forty
years remained a favorite with the public, composing for that theater
no less than 116 operas, of which the first, "Irene," was produced in
1697. In 1700 he opened a series of popular concerts, the prototypes
of the star combinations of the present day. In these entertainments
the greatest virtuosi were heard, the most popular and best singers,
and the newest and best music. His direction of the opera did not
begin until 1703; here also he proved himself a master. The place of
this composer in the history of art is mainly an adventitious one,
depending upon the chronological circumstance of his preceding others
in the same field, rather than upon the more important reason of his
having set a style, or established an ideal, for later masters. His
operas subsided into farce, the serious element being almost wholly
lacking, and, according to Riemann, the last of them shows no
improvement over the first. Their only merit is that they are not
imitations of the Italian nor upon mythological subjects, but from
common life. In his later life he devoted himself to the composition
of church music, in which department he accomplished notable, if
somewhat conventional, success. The Hamburg theater furnished a field
for another somewhat famous figure in musical history, that of Johann
Mattheson, a singularly versatile and gifted man, a native of that
city (1681-1764). After a liberal education, in which his musical
taste and talent became distinguished at an early age, he appeared on
the stage as singer, and in one of his own operas, after singing his
rôle upon the stage, came back into the orchestra in order to conduct
from the harpsichord the performance, until his rôle required him
again upon the stage. Indeed, it was this eccentricity which
occasioned a quarrel between him and Händel, who resented the
implication that he himself was incapable of carrying on the
performance. Mattheson composed a large number of works, including
many church cantatas of the style made more celebrated in the works of
Sebastian Bach, later, the intention of these works having been to
render the church services more interesting by affording the
congregation a practical place in the exercises. Mattheson is best
known at the present time by his "Complete Orchestral Director," a
compilation of musical knowledge and notions, intended for the
instruction of those intending to act in this capacity.
[Illustration]
CHAPTER XX.
THE PROGRESS OF ORATORIO.
I.
As already noticed in the previous chapter, the oratorio had its
origin at the same time as opera, both being phases of the _stilo
rappresentativo_, or the effort to afford musical utterance to
dramatic poetry--at first merely a solemn and impressive utterance,
later, as the possibilities of the new phase of art unfolded
themselves, a descriptive utterance, in which the music colored and
emphasized the moods of the text and the situation. The idea of
oratorio was not new. All through the Middle Ages they seem to have
had miracle plays in the Church, as accessories of the less solemn
services, and as means of instruction in biblical history. The
mediæval plays had very plain music, which followed entirely the
cadences of the plain song, and made no attempt at representing the
dramatic situation or the feelings growing out of it. All that the
music sought to do was to afford a decorous utterance, having in it,
from association with the cadence of the music of the Church,
something impressive, yet not in any manner growing out of the drama
to which it was set. The Florentine music drama was something entirely
different from this, or soon became so, and in oratorio this was just
as apparent as in opera, although the opportunities of vocal display
were not made so much of.
The modern oratorio exists in two types: The dramatic cantata, of
which the form and general idea were established by Carissimi; and the
church cantata, which differed from the Italian type chiefly in being
of a more exclusively religious character, and of having occasional
opportunities for the congregation to join in a chorale. The former of
these types was established by Giacomo Carissimi (1604-1674), who was
born near Rome, and held his first musical position as director at
Assisi, but presently obtained the directorship at the Church of St.
Apollinaris in Rome, where he served all the remainder of his long and
active life. Without having been a genius of the first order, it was
Carissimi's good fortune to exercise an important influence upon the
course of musical progress, particularly in the direction of oratorio,
in which all the more attractive elements came from his innovations.
Carissimi was a prolific composer, having constant occasion for new
and pleasing attractions for the musical service of the rich and
important Jesuit church, where he held his appointment. These
compositions are of every sort, but cantatas form the larger portion,
consisting of passages of Scripture set in consecutive form, with due
alternation of solo and chorus, in a style at once pleasing and
dramatically appropriate. The majority of his compositions have been
lost, many of them going to the waste paper baskets when the Jesuits
were suppressed. Enough remain, however, to indicate the interest and
importance of his work. Moreover, there, is another curious commentary
upon the value of his music, in the fact that Händel took twelve
measures well nigh bodily out of one of the choruses in Carissimi's
"Jephthah," and incorporated them in "Hear Jacob's God" in his own
"Samson." Mr. Hullah gives an excellent aria from this work, but it
is too long for insertion here. The more important of Carissimi's
innovations were in the direction of pleasing qualities in the
accompaniments, and agreeable rhythms. He was teacher of several of
the most important Italian musicians of the following generation,
among them being Bassani, Cesti, Buononcini and Alessandro Scarlatti.
[Illustration: Fig. 47.
HEINRICH SCHÜTZ.]
II.
The other type of oratorio received important assistance toward full
realization in Germany, at the hands of Mattheson, as already noticed,
and from those of Heinrich Schütz (1585-1672), who, after preliminary
studies in Italy, where he acquired the Italian representative style
from Gabrieli in Venice, in 1609, three years later returned to
Germany, and in 1615 was appointed chapel master to the elector of
Saxony, a position which he held with slight interruptions until his
death, at the advanced age already indicated. Notice has already been
taken in a former chapter of his appearance in the field of opera
composition, in setting new music to Rinuccini's "Dafne," on account
of the German words being incapable of adaptation to the music of
Peri. But before this he had demonstrated his versatility and talent
in the production of certain settings of the psalms of David, in the
form of motettes for eight and more voices. In his second work, an
oratorio upon the "Resurrection," he shows the same striving after a
freer dramatic expression. His great work "_Symphoniæ Sacræ_,"
consists of cantatas for voices, with instrumental accompaniments, in
which the instrumental part shows serious effort after dramatic
coloration. The first of his works in this style was the "Last Seven
Words" (1645), which contained the distinguishing marks of all the
later Passion music. It consisted of a narrative, reflections,
chorales, and the words of the Lord Himself. Many years later he
produced his great Passions (1665-1666), and in these he accomplishes
as much of the dramatic expression as possible by means of choruses,
which are highly dramatic in style and very spirited. The voluminous
works of this master have now been reprinted, and some of them possess
a degree of interest warranting their occasional presentation. Schütz
occupies an intermediate position between the masters of the old
school, with whom the traditions of ecclesiastical modes governed
everything, and those who have passed entirely beyond them and
polyphony, into modern monody. The music of Schütz is always
polyphonic, but there is much of dramatic feeling in it, nevertheless.
He was one of those clear-headed, practical masters, who, without
being geniuses in the intuitive sense, nevertheless contrive to
impress themselves upon the subsequent activity in their province,
chiefly through their sagacity in seizing new forms and bringing them
into practicable perfection. Into the forms of the Passion, as Schütz
created it, Bach poured the wealth of his devotion and his
inspiration; so later Beethoven put into the symphony form, created to
his hand by the somewhat mechanical Haydn, the amplitude of his
musical imagination, which, but for this preparatory work of the
lesser master, would have been driven to the creation of entirely new
forms for his thoughts, not only hampering the composer, but--which
would have been equally unfavorable to his success--depriving him of
an audience prepared to appreciate the greatness of the new genius
through their previous training in the same general style.
[Illustration]
CHAPTER XXI.
BEGINNINGS OF INSTRUMENTAL MUSIC.
The beginning of instrumental music, apart from vocal, is to be found
in the latter part of the sixteenth century, but the main advances
toward freedom of style and spontaneous expression were made during
the seventeenth, and, as we might expect, originally in Italy, where
the art of music was more prosperous, and incitations to advance were
more numerous and diversified. Upon all accounts the honor of the
first place in the account of this part of the development of modern
music is to be given to Andreas Gabrieli (1510-1586), who from a
singing boy in the choir of St. Mark's, under the direction of Adrian
Willaert, succeeded in 1566 to the position of second organist, where
his fame attracted many pupils. Among the numberless compositions
emanating from his pen were masses, madrigals, and a considerable
variety of pieces for organ alone, bearing the names of "_Canzone_,"
"_Ricerari_," "_Concerte_," and five-voiced _Sonatas_, the latter
printed in 1586, being perhaps the earliest application of this now
celebrated name to instrumental compositions. The pieces of Gabrieli
were mostly imitations of compositions for the voice, fugal in style,
and with never among them a melody fully carried out. Among the pupils
of Andreas Gabrieli were Hans Leo Hassler, the celebrated Dresden
composer, and Swelinck, the equally celebrated Netherlandish organist,
of whom there is more to be said.
The beginning of organ composition, and the higher art of organ
playing, made by Andreas Gabrieli, was carried much farther by his
nephew and pupil, Giovanni Gabrieli (1557-1612), who, born and trained
at Venice, early entered the service of its great cathedral, and in
1585 succeeded Claudio Merulo as first organist of the same. As a
composer Giovanni Gabrieli continued the double-chorus effects which
had been such a feature of the St. Mark's liturgy since the time of
Willaert, but especially he distinguished himself in improving the
style of organ playing, and in giving it a freedom and almost secular
character somewhat surprising for the times. A large number of his
compositions of all sorts are in print, very many "for voices or
instruments." The alternative affords a good idea of the subordinate
position still occupied by instrumental music, but a beginning had
been made, which later was to lead to great things.
[Illustration: Fig. 48.
JEAN PIETERS SWELINCK.]