bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Reminiscence and Recall in Three Early Settings of Metastasio's Alessandro nell' Indie
Authors: Cummings Graham
Published: January 2007

Musical reminiscence or recall of the type that became familiar in nineteenth-century opera was not a common feature of the late Baroque opera seria. Any instances of musical recall that do occur seem to fall into one of two categories: firstly, those where a musical motive, with a particular association, is used to link a series of musical ‘numbers’; secondly, those instances where the repetition of a text later in a scene or act prompts a repeat, or partial repeat of the original music. From amongst the vast corpus of eighteenth-century Italian librettos, Metastasio's Alessandro nell' Indie (1729) is one such piece that contains a notable instance of textual repetition used for the purpose of increasing dramatic conflict. I am not the first to comment on the unusual qualities of this libretto. Several notable scholars, including Friedrich Chrysander, Michael Robinson and Winton Dean, have drawn attention to the musical reminiscences that portions of this libretto have engendered, particularly in settings by Leonardo Vinci and G. F. Handel. Yet there has been little attempt to explain this particular phenomenon in musico-dramatic terms, nor to compare the approaches of such diverse composers as Vinci, Handel and Hasse to the problems that the textual recall produces. This, then, is the purpose of my paper.
To Repeat or Not to Repeat?
Authors: Macdonald Hugh
Published: January 2007

All musicians are familiar with the repeat conventions of classical music and most are accustomed to standard responses to them which have been built into the performing practice of our own time. It is, for example, relatively common to hear the first repeats of sonata-form movements observed, much less common – in fact remarkably rare – to hear second-half repeats. The decision whether or not to observe a repeat is shared between current convention and the caprice of the performers. In modern practice, for example, unimportant factors make repeats more likely to be observed. The existence of first- and second-time bars is persuasive, for fear that valuable music under the first-time bar may otherwise be lost, even though the essence of the music is not affected: a first-time bar is, after all, usually the result of small awkwardnesses in the cadence rather than the expression of structural necessity. Similarly, in variations, just one variation having its repeat written out in varied or ornamented form is enough to constrain the players to observe every other repeat in the set when a first instinct might have been to observe none, or first-half repeats only. Then there is the universal habit of scrupulously observing minuet or scherzo repeats on the play-through and scrupulously overlooking them on the da capo, even when, as often happens in Beethoven's scherzos, the first section of the movement is a single eight-bar phrase which makes little sense unless it is repeated. It is odd that the minuet, often the least sophisticated section of a classical work, is heard generally three times while development and recapitulation, of intrinsically higher interest, are usually heard but once.
Towards an Understanding of the Capriccio
Authors: Whitmore Philip
Published: January 2007

An extended, unaccompanied violin passage labelled ‘Capriccio’ occurs towards the end of the first and last movements of each of the 12 solo violin concertos, op. 3, by Pietro Antonio Locatelli (1695–1764). These concertos, all of which observe the three-movement fast-slow-fast layout, were published in 1733 by Le Cène in Amsterdam under the title L'arte del violino, but were probably written in the late 1720s. The capriccios may last up to a few pages, and some are longer than the whole of the rest of the movement to which they belong.
A Salve for Signora Buonafede
Authors: Arnold Denis
Published: January 2007

Galuppi made his fortune in the theatres. He made his living in the churches. From the age of 34 he was continually in the service of one or other of the ecclesiastical organizations of Venice. In 1740 he was director of music at the ospedale of the Mendicanti, which in effect was the post of composer-in-ordinary to its chapel. In 1748 he was appointed vice-maestro di cappella at S. Marco, holding the two posts simultaneously for some four years. He continued at S. Marco for the rest of his life, becoming its maestro in 1762; while he returned to the service of an ospedale in 1762, this time the Incurabili (where he was to serve in the years 1762-5 and 1768-76), again holding the jobs in plurality to the end of his life.
Provincial Concerts in England, 1865–1914: A Case-Study of Bradford
Authors: Russell David
Published: January 2007

It is a commonplace that the nineteenth century witnessed a flowering of provincial musical life, and nowhere was this more pronounced than in the field of concert promotion. However, with a few notable exceptions, such as Michael Kennedy's work on the Hallé, little close scrutiny has been given to the topic. This paper seeks to give the provinces the attention they deserve.
Technological Innovations in Contemporary Music
Authors: Menger Pierre-Michel
Published: January 2007

The subject of my paper is the use of new technologies in serious musical creation. Although I cannot develop the comparison with popular music and its mass market, one will understand implicitly the importance of the fact that ‘all of my story’ is set within the institutions and environment located on the edge of the market. My aim is not to show why diverse technologies that have appeared in the last 40 years have been exploited by composers, but rather how innovations such as electroacoustic and computer music were able to ‘succeed’. I employ the word ‘success’ in the organizational sense: it is the lasting formation of new segments of musical creation and the mobilization of composers, of partners from the scientific world, and of the technical and financial resources for establishing these new segments.
The Keyboard Recital in Oriental Diplomacy, 1520–1620
Authors: Woodfield Ian
Published: January 2007

The giving of gifts or ‘bribes’ in return for official favours was an immutable fact of life in oriental society that Europeans who travelled to the East in the service of religious or commercial interests had no choice but to accept. Permission to open a trading station or a mission would rarely be granted unless the request were accompanied by a present of some substance. The initial gift, moreover, would inevitably inspire many demands for similar treatment by subordinate officials in whose hands lay considerable power to disrupt the ordered patterns of daily life. The choice of suitable objects for presentation was thus an abiding concern of every European organization with interests in the East. There was general agreement that cheap trinkets which might be used to good effect to buy off an African chief would be regarded as an insult in any of the great oriental courts. To appear before the Sultan or the Great Mughal with a feeble or even a mildly inadequate offering was to put at risk the very interests in which the gifts were given. Failure to please could be doubly damaging if a rival European organization were able to make good the disappointment. A balance had therefore to be struck between the need for goods that displayed the best aspects of European artistry, craftsmanship and mechanical ingenuity and the need to keep costs to a reasonable level. The musical gift which most closely matched these requirements was a keyboard instrument of some kind: a harpsichord, for instance, could be painted attractively and displayed as an objet d'art; with its method of sound reproduction, it could also be presented as a mechanical device; it was certain to be regarded as a novelty; and, most important of all, the costs of its manufacture and transportation and the wages of the single musician hired to accompany it would not be prohibitive. For all these reasons, organs, harpsichords and virginals occupy a very significant place in the history of Renaissance oriental diplomacy, especially during the period from c. 1575 to c. 1625 when the old Portuguese empire began its decline in the face of fierce competition from the commercial interests of the Dutch and English nations.
A Case-Study in the Power of the Purse: The Management of the Ducal Cappella in Modena in the Reign of Francesco II d'Este
Authors: Crowther Victor
Published: January 2007

The precious collection of manuscript scores and printed libretti dating from the late seventeenth century and housed today in the Biblioteca Estense at Modena is ample proof that Duke Francesco II d'Este (1660–94) was one of Italy's most generous patrons of music. Indeed his library, which good fortune has preserved almost intact, is an indispensable resource for the study of oratorio, opera and instrumental music in northern Italy in the last quarter of the century. Its contents show him to have been a man of catholic and modern taste, acquiring and promoting works by living composers active in Rome, Florence, Bologna, Ferrara, Venice and, of course, Modena. On the evidence of the Este music collection, historians have been consistent in applauding the cultural achievements of Francesco II's reign and yet, surprisingly, there have been no detailed studies of the way in which the duke exercised his patronage.
Il trionfo del Tempo e del Disinganno: Four Case-Studies in Determining Italian Poetic-Musical Genres
Authors: Gianturco Carolyn
Published: January 2007

Throughout most of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries a three-act structure prevailed in Italian opera. Spoken plays in Renaissance Italy had been in five acts, a structure which was maintained both when music was inserted into them (as in Guarini's Il pastor fido of 1584) and, later, when they were set entirely to music (as was Rinuccini's Orfeo of 1600). Whereas spoken plays generally continued to follow a five-act structure, the favola in musica soon assumed a different, three-act structure (T. de Cupis's Eumelio of 1606 set by Agostino Agazzari and Ottavio Corsini's Aretusa of 1620 set by Filippo Vitali were among the first to be in three acts) and this remained the norm until the 1770s.
Continental and English Foundations of J. S. Dwight's Early American Criticism of Beethoven's Ninth Symphony
Authors: Saloman Ora Frishberg
Published: January 2007

The reception history of Ludwig van Beethoven's symphonies in America offers striking evidence of multiple, previously unidentified, Continental and English connections to the musical thought of John Sullivan Dwight (1813–93), the first American-born critic of art music, and therefore to early American conceptions of the symphony in the 1840s. These direct links illuminate the history and criticism of the first performance in America of Beethoven's Symphony no. 9 in D minor, op. 125, which took place in New York in 1846. From the many sources associated with Dwight's musical learning and aesthetic education, I have chosen in this article to examine Dwight's literary interest in Johann Christoph Friedrich Schiller's poem ‘An die Freude’ and in Thomas Carlyle's biography of Schiller, to document his knowledge of commentary on the symphony by the German critic Adolf Bernhard Marx, and to describe Dwight's response to the initial American performance of the Ninth Symphony.
The Divine Madness of Isabella Andreini
Authors: Macneil Anne
Published: January 2007

Nel giorno, che sublime in bassi mantiIsabella imitava alto furore;Estolta con angelici sembiantiEbbe del senno altrui gloria maggiore;Alhor saggia tra 'I suon, saggia tra i cantiNon mosse piè, che non sorgesse Amore,Né voce aprì, che non creasse amanti,Né riso fè, che non beasse un core.Chi fu quel giorno a rimirar feliceDi tutt'altro quaggiù cesse il desio,Che sua vita per sempre ebbe serena.O di Scena dolcissima Sirena,O de' Teatri Italici Fenice,O tra Coturni insuperabil Clio.Gabriello Chiabrera

In the spring of 1589, the commedia dell'arte company known as the Gelosi travelled to Florence in order to perform for the wedding of Grand Duke Ferdinando de' Medici and Christine of Lorraine. The Gelosi were among the very best commedia dell'arte players of the time, their fame heralded throughout the noble and royal households of western Europe.
Some Thoughts on the Social Appreciation of Music
Authors: Lake Ernest
Published: January 2007

Mr. Chairman, Ladies, and Gentlemen,—I must first of all apologize to you for presenting a paper which has been, I regret to say, very hastily prepared, owing to my recent severe illness, and to consequent pressure upon the time at my disposal. I must next ask you to believe that I approach my subject with great diffidence for two reasons—-firstly, the inability of any one mind to comprehend the various and multitudinous thoughts and ideas that must from time to time possess the soul of every true musician; and secondly, because of my personal inability to give adequate expression—even to my own views upon so difficult and delicate a matter as the consideration of the relative position of our Art-Science to the unenlightened or popular world.
On the Graphic Method of Representing Musical Intervals. With Illustrations of the Construction of the Musical Scale
Authors: Pole William
Published: January 2007

The object of this paper is to explain a method of representing Musical Intervals, which is very useful in the higher class of musical investigations, from the easy and definite manner in which it enables relations, usually considered complex and obscure, to be presented to the mind.
Brief Sketch of the Career of Sir Robert P. Stewart, Kt., Mus. D., Trin. Coll., Dub., Professor of Music in the University of Dublin
Authors: Vignoles O. J.
Published: January 2007

I had hoped that the MS. of the Memoir of Sir R. P. Stewart, which I have been engaged upon for more than two years, would by this time have been published; but for one reason I am glad of the delay, for the statue just erected to Stewart's memory is to receive its inauguration a week hence at the hands of His Excellency the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, on Leinster Lawn, one of the best sites in Dublin, and to which the public there has liberally contributed. This important remembrance seemed rightly to claim the first place as an enduring memorial of the lamented professor, which those “who run can read” at a glance; whilst a memorial in the shape of a book requires some hours of leisure to peruse and some spare cash to procure. But I now hope that the publication of the Memoir of the lamented professor which I have written may not be much further postponed.
Brahms
Authors: Walker Ernest
Published: January 2007

When, on the 5th of April, 1897, Joseph Joachim made his appearance on the platform of St. James's Hall to lead the A minor Quartet of Johannes Brahms, who had died two days before, I think there can have been few persons present who did not feel that in these two names was summed up a particular aspect of music which, whether we like it or not, we cannot disregard. Brahms on the creative, and Joachim on the interpretative side, stand as the representatives of very definite—we might almost say, categorical—musical ideals, and the school of which they in their separate lines have been the leaders is that which, for want of a better name (and indeed the term is but a vague one), has been generally called the classical. If I interpret the signs of the times aright, the great majority of living composers have more or less definitely turned their energies into channels in which there is not much room for the active working of the principles which sufficed for Brahms, and it seems to me that, at the opening of what I personally regard as emphatically an era of decadence, it may not be without interest to try and formulate the ideas which formed the basis of the work of the last, so far as we can see at present, of the great composers.
A Clear Coupler for the Organ
Authors: Warman John W.
Published: January 2007

In bringing this matter before you to-day, I am conscious of two difficulties. The first arises from the fact that only a limited portion of you can be regarded as being especially acquainted with the organ; the second is caused by the comparative certainty that among such organ authonties as are present there must be some who occupy the very first rank. There exist here, therefore, the very strongest reasons both for and against my speaking in a rudimentary or ultra-explanatory way. As a consequence, all I can do is to make these remarks as clear as is possible without their becoming wearisome,—trusting that the experts will excuse my telling them many things which they already know much better than I can myself claim to.
On Musicians' Ears
Authors: Ellis Miriam A.
Published: January 2007

I have been asked to add further details of my observations of musicians' ears, together with some of the statistics I have gathered. It will be best to place these details first, as an introduction to this new subject.
The Balalaïka
Authors: Rose Algernon
Published: January 2007

It may seem impossible, in these times of musical progress and emulation, that a family of instruments possessing unusual musical attributes should be in vogue in a large portion of Europe and yet be unknown to musicians generally. Nevertheless, such is the fact. Outside Russia the peculiar charm of the balalaïka (pronounced bàl-a-like-ka) is unknown. In our standard works on orchestration it is not mentioned, although its claims for association with the modern orchestra for special effects are as great as those of the mandoline, guitar, saxophone, surrusophone, or ophicleide.
On the Sensitiveness of the Ear to Pitch and Change of Pitch in Music
Authors: Ellis Alexander J.
Published: January 2007

The principal aim of the present paper is to bring before the Musical Association some results obtained last autumn from numerous and very careful experiments by Dr. W. Preyer, Professor of Physiology in the University of Jena, because those results are not accessible in an English form, and seem to have a very practical bearing upon tuning and singing. My subordinate purpose is to exhibit a method of representing pitch and intervals, which shall be more consonant to the habits of musicians than that adopted by Dr. Preyer for the statement of his results. For the idea of this method I am indebted to Mr. Bosanquet, though I have worked it out somewhat differently from him.
The Hydraulic Organ of the Ancients
Authors: Warman John W.
Published: January 2007

In this paper on the Ancient Hydraulic Organ, or Hydraulicon, I must first apologize for the unfavourable strictures which I shall have to set down as to some of those persons who have been generally most highly regarded—and very deservedly so—in connection with the Art of Music. And my difficulties are enhanced by the fact that all, or most of, such persons are unfortunately no longer living. Now the axiom “Say nothing but good concerning the dead” is a most beautiful one theoretically; but it is obvious that it cannot always be obeyed in practice. For, although the sound of the departed one's actual voice has been for ever stilled, yet while that larger and more enduring written utterance remains, for good or for evil, so long must that utterance exist as an object of legitimate inquiry and adjudgment—always of course with the remembrance that as the deceased person can never more be present in the flesh, for disputing or denying the truth of any verdict pronounced against him, so must such verdict be always weighed accordingly. It is necessary to add that in any condemnations here made as to statements by these musicians concerning the organ, it is solely the structure of the instrument which is then involved, and even in that is always wholly or chiefly as relating to its physiological considerations.
The English Organ of a Hundred Years Ago
Authors: Pearce Charles W.
Published: January 2007

Perhaps no musical instrument has been subjected to greater constitutional changes during the last hundred years than has the English organ—in the various directions of size, compass of key-boards, character of stops and methods of controlling their use, and last (but not least) its system of tuning. Changes are still being made, even to the extent of affecting the uniformity of those “playing arrangements” which the College of Organists endeavoured to regulate, systematize and settle more than a quarter of a century ago. It is an open question if the organ is being developed at the present time upon logical and really artistic lines, as a musical instrument deserving a separate and individual existence of its own; or whether it is daily becoming a merely servile (and therefore a degraded) mechanical imitation of the orchestra. It may help us to see more clearly in which direction we are now moving if we turn our thoughts back to the English organ of the first decade of the nineteenth century—when it was a comparatively small instrument, but one with a character all its own, and in many ways admirably adapted to fulfil the one great purpose of its existence—the accompaniment of the human voice.
Flute Music: A Brief Survey
Authors: Southgate T. Lea
Published: January 2007

It happened that two sessions ago I was suddenly called upon to supply a Paper for this Association in lieu of one promised, which by accident the writer was unable to give. I thought that some remarks dealing with the evolution of an important member of the modern orchestra—the flute, might be of interest. In this Paper I endeavoured to trace the beginnings of the soft-breathing flute, to show the stages it had passed through, with its variants, until we arrived at the splendid instruments of to-day. Thanks to the ever ready skill of Mr. John Finn, who does not hesitate to put to his lips rude instruments thousands of years old, and who can produce mellifluous sounds from them, I was enabled to let you hear music of many ages. Since the date of that lecture, it has been suggested that it would be well if some further examples of the development of music for the flute could be presented, so that the historical steps could be made more apparent, and the gradual advancement of its music perceived. It is in response to that desire that I stand before you to-day, and shall endeavour to give you some brief account of what, after research, I find has been put forth by composers as component links in the long past chain of special music for the flute.
The Hungarian Folk-Songs
Authors: Korbay F.
Published: January 2007

A Hungarian peasant poet says to his sweetheart : “No mother has born thee; budding 'pon a rose-tree on Whitsunday morn, at dawn wert thou born.” He might have said it as well of the Hungarian folk-song—whose parentage is a mystery, its charm that of Nature, and its fresh vitality that of the dawn.
Music to Stage Plays
Authors: O'Neill Norman
Published: January 2007

In England more than in any other country, music has been constantly associated with the performance of stage plays. There is very early evidence of this. In the Miracle Play (1512) the minstrels are asked “to do their diligence” before the prologue and at the end “To give us a daunce.” Shakespeare relied on music to emphasize certain dramatic situations. No fewer than some three hundred times do his stage directions demand the employment of music. I do not speak of references to music on the part of his characters; these are frequent, always correct, and often jocular, but to actual demand for music,—such as “Music plays “—“Soft music within,” and the like. Dr. Naylor in his interesting little work “Shakespeare and Music” declares that such stage directions as these appear no less than forty-one times, music during speeches seven times, and that eighteen times a march is required. Of songs—catches—dirges—trumpets—hautboys, countless examples are to be found in the plays. Very often Shakespeare makes quite subtle distinctions to suit the situation in his directions for music. In “King Lear” there are some interesting examples of this. The first appearance of Lear in regal state is heralded by a Flourish of Trumpets. Later on, in Scene 4, Horns are directed to be played before his entrance. This is no doubt done with a view to denoting his lessened state. He has also just returned from hunting. This shows, I think, that more than a casual thought was given to the matter. Again, in “Lear,” in Act 4, we find the direction “Soft music playing.” Lear is on a bed asleep. That Shakespeare intended the music to continue through the scene and dialogue is evident, as the doctor refers to it in his lines “Louder the music there.” At this point the dramatist no doubt' felt that the beautiful words of Cordelia, “O my dear father ! Restoration, hang thy medicine on my lips,” would be greatly helped by the musical support. The very next scene opens with drums beating and soldiers marching, music very different in character from the “Soft music playing” of the previous scene This I feel sure was not mere accident, and that Shakespeare well knew the value of this contrast which at the same time connects the two scenes.
Music at the Public Pleasure Gardens of the Eighteenth Century
Authors: Southgate T. Lea
Published: January 2007

May I preface my remarks on the subject announced for the discourse of this afternoon by saying, this Paper is the result of an accident—as are not a few other passing events in our lives.
The Genius of Dunstable
Authors: Van den Borren Ch.
Published: January 2007

The mystery which shrouds the personality of Dunstable will probably never be elucidated. All that is known of him for certain is that he died on the 24th of December, 1453, and that he was an astronomer as well as a musician. For the rest, one may admit as a conjecture that he was older than Dufay and that he passed an important part of his life on the Continent.
Modern Developments in Music
Authors: Goossens Eugene
Published: January 2007

Two years ago I had the privilege of reading a paper on the subject of “Modern Tendencies in Music” at a meeting of the Arts League of Service, in which the general aspects of creative thought of to-day were broadly reviewed, and the relative features of the different European schools discussed by a comparative summary of the work of their chief representatives. Such is the rapidity of musical advancement in these days that in the light of recent experience I have attempted in this present paper to crystallise in a more definite manner certain aspects of the present day idiom (and deductions therefrom) which in the previous paper were necessarily treated in a sketchy and more or less cursory manner. The views expressed in the following paper are, it need hardly be added, a result of my own personal observation, and we must recognise that in a subject of such magnitude it would manifestly be impossible to discuss fully within such limited scope, each and every feature of a development which is without parallel in the history of any other art, by reason of its astonishing rapidity and the constant and almost hourly changes taking place in its internal characteristics. It is also obvious that in a critical estimate of this description anything in the nature of mere rhetoric or fulsome adulation for its own sake would be very much out of place, if only for the reason that an unbiassed outlook is an essential preliminary to any reasoned discussion on the relative value or otherwise of the tenets held by a particular school of thought.
The Alliance of Singers, Composers and Conductors
Authors: Rootham Cyril B.
Published: January 2007

In the Book of Ecclesiastes it is written “There is no new thing under the sun.” Even our word “invent” in its Latin derivation means “find “—not “create.” However, if we can say or write nothing “new,” we can nevertheless ‘take stock’ of our position now and then, question our premises, test our foundations, and see what is transient and what is abiding in the faith that is in us upon any given subject. Some sort of “spring-cleaning” is a good, if an uncomfortable operation, for all of us, particularly at this period of our English year. Let us see if our mental shoots and blossoms are likely to wither or to be fruitful.
Experimental Pianofortes and the Music Written for Them
Authors: Harding Rosamond
Published: January 2007

During the earlier years of the nineteenth century a pianoforte recital without an orchestral accompaniment to at least one of the works, was a rarity and the concerto form was almost always used in all the greater performances. It was not, in fact, until 1837 that Moscheles ventured to introduce pianoforte-evenings without this addition. The great pianists wrote concertos or divertissements for their instrument and in order that these works could be performed by the amateur in his home, where there could be no orchestra, all the tuttis were printed in short score and with the appropriate dynamic marks. Thus a pianist often found himself playing music originally designed for strings, brass or wood wind. In consequence of the desire on the part of these amateurs for two and four hand reduction of operatic and symphonic works, numerous devices were added to the pianoforte for the purpose of giving the illusion of an orchestra. These may be grouped under the following headings:—

(1)

Devices for sustaining the sounds after the note had been struck.

(2)

Octave couplers.

(3)

Characteristic stops such as (a) echo pedal, (b) bassoon stop, (c) Janissary music.

(4)

“Repetition” actions to make it possible to imitate quickly repeated notes of the violins in trills and cadences.
Albert Lortzing
Authors: Naylor Bernard
Published: January 2007

When I was honoured by an invitation from your secretary to read a paper to the Musical Association about Lortzing I was genuinely surprised, because I did not feel that I was anything like an authority on him. I tried to explain this in my reply to Mr. Erlebach's invitation, but without success. Nevertheless, my only justification in standing before you to-day must be that I have had the invaluable opportunity of conducting and of watching Herr Hans Strohbach, of Cologne, produce one of Lortzing's operas. I refer to the Oxford University Opera Club's performances of “Zar und Zimmermann” last year. This first-hand experience should help me to speak more convincingly about my subject, at any rate from the practical standpoint.
The Heritage of Greece in Music
Authors: Perrett Wilfrid
Published: January 2007

The only professor of Greek I have ever known who was also a musician always refused on principle to give me any help with a stiff passage from a Greek author on music. His reply was always the same: “Put that stuff away. Nobody has ever made head or tail of Greek music, and nobody ever will. That way madness lies.” It was in vain I promised to become a harmless lunatic. I respect his opinion, and my own. Among what looks like a heap of lumber two things have taken my fancy and engaged my attention at intervals during a lengthy period consisting mainly of interruptions. One thing is the way the Pythagoreans had of defining musical intervals by ratios. Their methods can be much improved and simplified by means of two tools of British invention: logarithms and tuning-forks. The other thing is the tradition, not altogether vague, of “the genuine and beautiful Greek music,” the lost enharmonic genus. These two in combination promise something of great value for the future of music. I am not going back to what we have already inherited from Greece, to Boethius and medieval music or even to Zarlino and the renaissance. That tale has been told. I am not convinced that there is anything in the heritage of Greece in music now worth troubling about beyond the two things mentioned. This without prejudice to what others may find in that same lumber-room. That a phonetician should meddle with music ought not to occasion surprise. Many of our leading phoneticians have done so:—Wallis, Holder, Thomas Young, Willis, Wheatstone, Ellis. It is in the English tradition. So much by way of apology.
Literature and Music in the Age of Shakespeare
Authors: Pattison Bruce
Published: January 2007

The changed position of music in English life during the present century should profoundly modify accepted views of history. Even conservative historians are placing more and more emphasis on what we may call the progress of civilisation; on the formation and disintegration of cultural traditions. Political history is being dwarfed not only by economic history but by the study of the important aspect of man's mind that is represented by the arts. In this tendency there is still a time-lag from the 19th century in that music has so far played only a minor part. The Victorian period knew little of music and cared less: musicians were specialists who were hardly ever invited to join in any discussions on general culture. We recognise the importance of musical history, but have not yet gone far towards digesting it with other kinds of cultural history. When we have accomplished that process it will probably cast fresh light on the traditions of English culture and on our judgment of its present position.
The Production and Analysis of Tone by Electrical Means
Authors: Richardson E. G.
Published: January 2007

It is unnecessary perhaps at the outset to dwell on the nature of tone quality or timbre. Most musicians nowadays are aware that this elusive characteristic has given up its secret and that what the scientist calls the ‘note’ of a musical instrument can be split up into a number of simple ‘tones’ and that it is the relative number and magnitude of these components that determines timbre; tells us, for example, why a violin and a clarinet or even two violins do not when played severally sound the same when producing a note at the same fundamental pitch. In many cases these component tones are members of the harmonic series, i.e., their frequencies bear simple ratios to the fundamental or component of lowest pitch, but again often other tones—not harmonics—intrude, whose origin is to be traced to the vibrations of the invariant parts of the instrument such as the belly of the violin or the metal tube of the trumpet and which do not alter much when the player passes from one note to another. By means of the apparatus I am about to describe this characteristic ‘formant’ of an instrument can be delineated after precise analysis of the tone quality over the whole range of performance of the instrument. A knowledge of this factor is most important to the instrument maker. By persistent analysis of this type one can, for instance, reduce the difference between a Stradivarius and a Heath Robinson—pardon the mark!—to scientific terminology and then with the co-operation of the maker take steps to improve on a specimen of poor quality, checking the extent of one's improvements as one progresses. Work of this nature on stringed instruments has been carried out by Backhaus in Germany and Saunders in the United States. At Newcastle we have been mainly concerned with organ pipes and hope to deal with the wood-wind next.
On Beauty of Touch and Tone: An Inquiry Into the Physiological and Mechanical Principles Involved in Their Cultivation
Authors: Steed A. Orlando
Published: January 2007

In most instruments the quality and variety of sound is so directly traceable to a difference in the way in which the motive power is applied, that it does seem but natural to suppose that the timbre of the pianoforte is amenable to similar influences. We need but listen to the first attempt of a learner to the violin, for example, to be convinced how entirely the timbre of the instrument is at the mercy of the performer; and although it is remarked commonly enough that beginners on the piano are not nearly so annoying to their hearers as those on most other instruments, still the unsatisfactory result of their first awkward attempts not unnaturally gives some colour to the very general impression that the actual tone of the piano depends upon the way in which the keys are struck. It is my belief, however, that this opinion is false, and that not only because by direct experiment I have myself failed to alter the character of the sound, unaccompanied with a corresponding change in its intensity, by any variety in the mode of striking the key which I could devise, but because a theoretical consideration of the matter must, I think, convince one of its utter impossibility. Thanks to the researches of Helmholtz, we are now provided with all the necessary knowledge of the principles which regulate the quality of the sounds of most musical instruments, and that of the piano has been clearly enough explained by him. I must not occupy your time by detailing the results of his researches—suffice it that every source of difference save one lies entirely within the domain of the manufacturer, and just as completely without that of the performer. The shape, size, weight, and hardness of the hammer; the place at which the string is struck; the density, rigidity, and elasticity of the string—all these are matters over which the player has no control whatever. The only exception to be found lies in length of time during which the hammer remains in contact with the string, in comparison with the periodic time of the prime tone. Helmholtz shows that the upper partial tones increase in intensity according to the rapidity with which the hammer quits the string after impact. He, indeed, gives a table illustrative of this for certain notes, which presents at a glance the relative intensities of the upper partials in cases where the hammer remains touching the string during three-sevenths, three-tenths, three-fourteenths, and three-twentieths of one vibration of the lowest partial, and thence demonstrates that the natural timbre of the instrument varies gradually from the lowest to the highest notes of its compass. He has not adverted to the fact that the quickness of rebound in the hammer must depend upon the force with which the key is struck, nor upon its consequence, that increased richness in the upper partials will therefore be accompanied by an increase in the loudness of the sound.
Pseudo-Science in Musical “Theory.”
Authors: Lloyd Llewelyn S.
Published: January 2007

It was in the nineteenth century that pseudo-scientific speculation about music, described in this quotation, reached its high-water mark. It was then, as Sir Donald Tovey has remarked elsewhere, that “in England Rameau's doctrine raged unchecked by taste or common sense, and culminated in Dr. Day's famous application of homoeopathy to the art of music.” If with the advance of scientific knowledge, and a sounder sense of musical scholarship based on fuller acquaintance with the history of music, these speculations are generally ignored to-day, it is still possible to find traces of them in some modern writing. There has indeed been some recrudescence of them in attempts, by contributors to musical literature, to discover an explanation for some of the changes which composers are now bringing about. I am thinking particularly of “theoretical” discussion of the basis of the twelve-note semitonal technique. It will therefore be my purpose, this afternoon, to probe into this would-be theory, if” only because modern composition must stand or fall by its own musical merits, without the intrusion of “pseudo-scientific speculation.”
The Musical Glasses and Glass Harmonica
Authors: King A. Hyatt
Published: January 2007

In this paper my chief concern is with the place of the musical glasses and glass harmonica in musical and social history, and only incidentally with their technical development. I want to trace some little-known phases in their origins and use, and to try to build up a picture of their continuity in one form or another. The only work in English on the subject is C. F. Pohl's Cursory Notices on the Origin and History of the Glass Harmonica, written for the London Exhibition of 1862. This admirable pamphlet of sixteen pages is now very rare, and so I make no apology for repeating some of its contents. But as it deals almost entirely with Germany, apart from Benjamin Franklin, and does not go back beyond 1677, I shall take the subject farther afield in both time and place.
Electrotonic Music
Authors: Douglas Alan
Published: January 2007

It would not be possible, in the limited time available, to survey the entire field now covered by the term “Electrotonic Music”. Moreover, properly to explain the many diverse ways in which musical sounds can be produced by purely electrical means would involve many technical expressions, and I think it would be better to avoid these technicalities, which are mostly borrowed from the science of communication engineering, and thus difficult to reconcile with musical knowledge.
The Musical Teaching of John Curwen
Authors: Shaw H. Watkins
Published: January 2007

It was in 1842 that John Curwen, a Congregationalist minister aged 26, began his life's work as one of the most notable pioneers of popular musical education. For fully fifty years his was the dominant single influence on music in the state schools of England, Scotland and Wales, and hence upon the large mass of the community. Even today, at the end of a period of more than twenty-five years during which the trend of musical education has tended to discredit his teaching, his figure still broods over the teaching of vocal music, and quantities of school songs continue to be published with the Tonic Sol-fa ‘interpreting’ notation along with the standard Staff notation. Nevertheless, except in Scotland, the true essentials of his teaching are no longer an effective force—a fact which makes possible an attempt at an analytical re-statement of his principles today in a less controversial atmosphere than formerly. Curwen's own writings will be examined in an effort to get behind the numerous adaptations, modifications and dilutions which his method underwent before being discredited.
John Stanley (1713–1786)
Authors: Finzi Gerald
Published: January 2007

Most of us have experienced, in one form or another, the feelings of that Frenchman who read the writings of Seneca a few years before the French revolution and found them to be fantastic and absurd. But reading them again when France was under the terror, and his own head was no more safe than it would have been in the days of Nero, he found them to be reasonable and true.
Some Remarks on Richard Wagner's Music Drama “Tristan und Isolde”
Authors: Frost H. F.
Published: January 2007

It can neither be expected nor desired that unanimity of opinion should prevail among the members of the Musical Association with regard to the novel views and daring procedure of such an exceptional man as Richard Wagner, whose artistic utterances are at this moment exciting so much attention among us. But because these matters are now being discussed with an earnestness from which the unhealthy warmth of partisanship and prejudice is not altogether absent, no apology is needed for directing the attention of this assemblage to the subject of the present paper. It may be as well, however, to explain that when I undertook to lay before you some of the impressions derived from a patient study of Wagner's “Tristan und Isolde,” I was unaware that a still greater work by the same hand would be placed before the London musical public this season. But a little reflection convinced me that the choice I had made would still be the most appropriate. In the first place, the subject of “Der Ring des Nibelungen” is too vast to be dealt with in the scope of a paper of reasonable length. Again, it has already received the most copious treatment by writers of commanding ability, and any additional remarks from me would be scarcely less than an impertinence. And lastly “Tristan und Isolde” is no less representative of its author's genius, presenting the peculiarities of his system in their fullest development, though with greater conciseness and, it may be added, with more undeviating consistency than in the tetralogy. The main features of Wagner's art work are now fairly understood, and it is unnecessary to dilate upon them, at any rate to the present audience. But even now the literary phases of his music-dramas are not fully appreciated, and I may be pardoned for deprecating in advance the kind of criticism which “Tristan und Isolde” is likely to receive in some quarters.
From Rhythmic Pulsation to Classical Outline
Authors: Hiles Henry
Published: January 2007

From time to time such able papers have been read before this Association upon the outlines of those patterns of musical works which have been generally accepted, and deemed worthy of classification and imitation, that I should not have ventured to reintroduce the subject this afternoon, except with a hope that we may be able to trace back those rules of construction which have been diligently sought out and adopted by generations of earnest musicians, until we arrive at some clue to the leading principles, some glimpse of the natural law, which must underlie all satisfactory artistic work. And it will be admitted that the subject is of great importance to all students of music. For now—certainly not less than at any former time—there is a kind of impatient, restless spirit about, which (seeking to escape from the labour of a life-long study of the deeper, less obvious, principles of art; or prompted by a supposition that in its higher flights, such a pure, imaginative, art as ours should be free from all restraint, and absolved from all obedience) makes light of the achievements of bygone musicians, and refuses to profit by the experience gained, and bequeathed to us, by generations of earnest workers. No one would be more reluctant than I should to submit to mere dogmatic restriction. In a modest cautious spirit every student should carefully weigh each proposition submitted to him before he admits it among the articles of his creed.
Tantivy: An Exposition of the ‘Ancient Hunting Notes’
Authors: Halfpenny Eric
Published: January 2007

In 1951 my attention was drawn by the Hon. Mary Parnell, of the Galpin Society, to a MS in the Somerset Record Office, entitled Directyones to Wynde the Home. It consists of a single leaf on which are inscribed sixteen calls for use in the Chase, together with the name of each. The document bears the signature of one Henry Sayer, Honorary Master, and the handwriting appears to date from about the beginning of the seventeenth century. Apart from a transcript printed some seventy years ago by the Commission on Historical Manuscripts, the piece is practically unknown. Its interest lies in the fact that the required sounds are recorded, not in musical notation but in a code whose meaning is no longer clear. As the Commission's Report says, it ‘very much needs a key’. Miss Parnell and I were, however, anxious to try to discover that key, and this paper is mainly a brief account of the attempt.
Purcell's Chamber Music
Authors: Dart Thurston
Published: January 2007

With the forthcoming publication of volume xxxi of Purcell's works, comprising his famous Fantazias and other Instrumental Music, the Purcell Society will at last have completed its edition of all his known chamber music. The Society's scores of the two printed sets of trio-sonatas were issued more than half a century ago, but, like most scholarly editions of the nineteenth century, they do not always accord with our current views of how such editions should be prepared and presented. Indeed, it seems to me that musical scholars would save themselves a great deal of mental anguish if they worked on the assumption that any publication or history of earlier music will at best hold good only for about thirty years after it is first published. This assumption is demonstrably true for the two centuries that have elapsed since Padre Martini wrote the first volume of his Storia della Musica, and I do not think any of us will live to see it change.
Rota and Rondellus in English Medieval Music
Authors: Harrison Frank L L.
Published: January 2007

A Rondellus is a round; a rota is a canon at the unison. The rondellus is much the senior of the two, though in some of its moods it does not at all behave like a venerable relic of the Middle Ages. But that is what it is, and in its early life it had a respectable place in the music of the church. It is true that during some of that time one might have heard rounds sung in every ale-house, but if so nobody bothered to write them down, and the first printed collection is no earlier than 1609.