Frederick Bridge

“ One of the most touching testimonies is a beautiful Lament for Six Voices by Thomas Weelkes, himself a distinguished composer, whom we shall consider later. The words are as follows:
A remembrance of my friend Mr. Thomas Morley.
Death hath deprived me of my dearest friend,
My dearest friend is dead and laid in grave,
In grave he rests until the world shall end,
The world shall end, as end must all things have.
All things must have an end that nature wrought
That nature wrought must unto dust be brought. ”

“ This great advance in our music was carried on by the immortal Purcell, who, as a choir-boy under Humfrey, was, no doubt, an eager listener to the "new effects" which his master introduced. The pupil is so great, one is in danger of forgetting the master. At least here we have endeavoured to do some justice to the short-lived genius Pelham Humfrey. ”

“ Lawes is often said to have "introduced the Italian style of music into this kingdom," but this is hardly correct. That he admired and understood the Italian style is quite certain. His studies with Coperario would have influenced him in that direction, and he himself, in one of his numerous Prefaces (and he was a great writer of Prefaces) , speaks of the Italians as being great masters of music, but at the same time he contends "that our own nation has produced as many able musicians as any in Europe." He laughs at the partiality of the age for songs sung in a foreign language. ”

“ The neglect of Deering is certainly extraordinary. He was, as usual, absurdly criticized {53} by Dr Burney, who spoke of his music as "very sober, innocent, psalmodic, dry, and uninteresting," and further he "was never able to discern in any of his works a single stroke of genius, either in his melody or modulation." And Sir Frederick Ouseley actually writes of his style as "severe and correct, but very dry"! These verdicts amaze me! They are absolutely untrue, at least as regards Deering's great works, his Motets. I question if Burney or Ouseley ever heard one of them. ”

“ And we have a somewhat similar example in connection with a celebrated musician, John Jenkins. Born in 1592, he lived until 1678, and wrote, as North expresses it, "horse-loads of music." He was most prolific and most celebrated, and yet until a few years ago, when I revived many of his compositions—Dialogues, Fancies for Strings, and Latin Motets—not a note of his music was heard anywhere, save one little piece. But this was sung in every school where vocal music was taught—it is the charming little round A boat, a boat, haste to the ferry. ”

“ But what patron should my music choose in preference to your lordship? When permitted to relax your mind from military cares, you think no delight, no pleasure greater than music. To music you give the chief place after war, in which none surpass you. ”

“ Most of the time Humfrey spent abroad was passed in Paris with J. B. Lully, an Italian by birth but a Frenchman by adoption, the most celebrated dramatic musical composer of his day. He wrote many Operas in the most varied styles, both grave and gay, was the composer of a good deal of sacred music, and was also a reformer in Opera-writing; he introduced the accompanied recitative in place of the Italian Recitative secco, making many changes in the ballets. ”

“ This present generation is so sated with what's native, that nothing takes their ears but what's sung in a Language which (commonly) they understand as little as they do the music. And to make them a little sensible of this ridiculous humour I took a Table or Index of old Italian Songs (for one, two, and three voyces) , and this Index (which {77} read together made a strange medley of nonsense) I set to a varyed Ayre, and gave out that it came from Italy, whereby it hath passed for a rare Italian song. ”

“ In Henry Lawes we have a subject of particular interest. No musician of the 17th or probably of any century, has been so praised by the poets, and few musicians of reputation have been so disdainfully treated by the old musical historians. I think we shall find Henry Lawes worthy of inclusion amongst the Twelve Good Musicians with whom I am dealing. ”

“ Unfortunately we have only five songs of the original music. There are a great number of places in the Masque for which Milton desires music—and many directions for instrumental movements particularly. What these were we do not know. The merits of Lawes' music have been decried, but having edited the Comus music, after careful correction from Lawes' original MS., which I was fortunate enough to be able to see [2] , I am confident that all who hear it will find the songs full of beauty and expression, and well worthy of the words to which they were so admirably fitted. ”

“ The music of Psyche is so good that there is no ground for saying he could not have written the Macbeth music. He was exceedingly dramatic and also melodious. There is a beautiful Dialogue on the death of Lord Sandwich, the great patron of Samuel Pepys, which is to be found in the Pepys Library of Magdalene College, Cambridge. No doubt this was written at the suggestion of Pepys. And there is a remarkable setting of Hamlet's soliloquy, also in MS., in Pepys' book, which I firmly believe is by Locke. ”

“ An Anthem O Praise the Lord is a good example of the latter tendency. There are two short Bass solos, one to the words Sing praises lustily, which is almost like the song of a jovial sailor! It is in triple time, and is the sort of thing King Charles would certainly have beaten time to with his hand "all along the Anthem," in Pepys' words. The Bass solo in the Anthem he {104} wrote when a boy and before his French training is in a quite different style, and might have been written by any of our good Cathedral writers, such as Locke, or Blow, or even Purcell. ”

“ As his successor at Gresham College, and as I have the honour to be the first Musical Professor in the University of London, I think there is a {2} justification for beginning this course in the University with a consideration of the old Gresham Professor. I must premise that in selecting twelve good men I have by no means exhausted the number of such men available, but I hope to have chosen good representatives of the various Schools and movements in the musical world of England in the 17th century. ”

“ The year 1666, the year of the Fire of London, is rather an important one in the consideration of Locke's life. It introduces us to him in another character, and that of a literary type. As will be seen later, he was a scathing and bitter critic of his detractors, and first gave evidence of this quality in the year now under notice. The cause of this outpouring of his wrath was {88} the treatment a Kyrie of his composition had received at the hands of the Chapel Royal choir. It would appear that he had set the Kyrie in an original way, giving different music to each response ”

“ In the domain of Sacred Music Orlando Gibbons certainly holds the foremost place amongst the English composers of the contrapuntal school. No name is better known in our Cathedrals. In great gatherings of Cathedral Choirs in my young days (alas! we do not now have such gatherings to any great extent) Gibbons' splendid Service in F was always an item to which we looked forward. And he has left us almost as great a collection of anthems as {42} Purcell did in later years. Many of them were composed for special occasions. One was a wedding Anthem "for my Lord Somerset" ”

“ Music makes jocund Peace to know no jars.
Your most obedient servant,
R. Deering.
{63}
VII. JOHN MILTON 1553—1646-7
To many the name of John Milton will hardly suggest a musical composer. And yet I am able to include this name—the name of the father of the poet—among the band of "Good Musicians" whose careers and works I am considering. I have always felt greatly interested in him and desired to find out all I could of his personal history, and particularly of his musical education, for undoubtedly in the elder Milton we have a really accomplished musician. ”

“ In London he shared with his old master, Tallis, the post of Organist of the Royal Chapel and he also enjoyed with him a privilege of a more profitable nature, which was no less than a patent, granted by Queen Elizabeth to print and sell music, English or foreign, and to rule, print and sell music paper for twenty-one years, and all other printers were forbidden to infringe this license under penalty of forty shillings. ”

“ But our new Criticks lodge not the fault in our words only; 'tis the Artist they tax as a man unspirited for forraign delights: which vanity so spreads, that those our productions they please to like must be born beyond the Alpes, and father'd upon Strangers. And this is so notorious, that not long since some young Gentlemen, who were not untravell'd, hearing some Songs I had set to Italian words (publickly sung by excellent voyces) concluded those songs were begotten in Italy, and said (too loud) "they would faine heare such songs to be made by an Englishman." ”

“ Looking over the music in the Chapter Library at Westminster, I found among many fine collections of Madrigals—original copies, mostly published in the 16th and early part of the 17th centuries—two sets of Latin Motets in 5 and 6 parts by {51} Richard Deering. They were bound up in covers made out of an illuminated MS. On looking at the bindings, our late Dean, Dr Armitage Robinson (always interested in the Library, and also, I may add, in my musical researches) found that they were part of the Wedding Service of the fourteenth century. ”

“ A letter from Sale's daughter apologizes for delay, and says "her father does not think it will be worth while to go to any great expense, as he has tried some parts of it (i.e. the music of the Motets) with some who are used to and admire that ancient style of music and they do not form a very high opinion of it!" Curiously enough, a few bars in score of one of the most beautiful Motets was enclosed with a note from a copyist saying that it would take much time and be very expensive. So Deering's Motets were laid to rest again for nearly 100 years. ”

“ The "Alleluia" occurs in the longer MS. and I have included it in my version.
It is fortunate that there are two sets of parts, as neither of them is complete. But having been so fortunate as to find these two sets I have been able to restore the missing part.
The discovery of this Fancy is the reason why I select Weelkes instead of Wilbye, one of his great contemporaries, and I think all lovers of Shakespeare will be glad to make acquaintance with the music of the Cryes of London which saluted the Poet's ears in his daily walks. ”

“ John Bull, was the first to hold anything like a University Professorship in London—or indeed in England. It is true Gresham College has not developed into a University, but its founder, Sir Thomas Gresham, certainly seems to have had such an end in view, and John Bull was the first Gresham Music Lecturer. ”

“ The Deering of this sketch was the son of Henry Deering of Liss, near Petworth, by the Lady Elizabeth Grey. He died in 1630.
It is stated by Anthony Wood that Deering was "bred up in Italy, where he obtained the name of a most admirable musician. After his return he practised his Faculty for some time in England, where his name being highly cried up, became after many entreaties, Organist to the English Nuns living at Brussels." It is not easy to discover anything about Deering's Italian life or work. ”

“ They are undoubtedly somewhat dull when placed by the side of Fancies by Byrd and others. No doubt the veneration for Gibbons and the rightful appreciation of his fine Cathedral music made the members of the old and valuable Musical Antiquarian Society more ready to edit his Fancies than to select from less eminent Church writers. But one cannot have much respect for Burney's judgment when he pronounces Orlando Gibbons to have been "utterly contemptible in his productions for instruments." He must be judged alongside of other 16th century composers ”

“ From Pelham Humphry, whose Church Music is so excellent, I own I expected to find originality, or merit of some kind or other; but his songs are quite on a level with the rest."
Burney's remarks are not only spiteful, but untrue. To mention only one song, Humfrey's setting of Where the Bee Sucks, which he wrote for Dryden and Davenant's altered version of The Tempest (the oldest setting but one which we possess) , is charming, both as regards melody and harmony. The first part is in the minor key, for which Humfrey seems—like Purcell—to have a weakness. ”

“ The whole Fancy is full of life, and shows Deering to be both dramatic and humourous. This work (and a similar one on Country Cryes) were written before he left England for Brussels, as the copy in the British Museum was made 1616.
There are a few Anthems scattered about in various Libraries, but as a Catholic his contributions to English Cathedral music would, no doubt, be few. Some are to be found in Durham Cathedral Library. On the marriage of Charles I, he was appointed Organist to the Queen Henrietta Maria. ”

“ Therefore let my child go forth with you for its patron. If you are the first to smile upon it as it takes its first modest steps, you will give it wonderful courage, for greater things. Live, flourish and conquer. ”

“ Jubal who was Founder of Musick was the eighth man from Adam; and this went down as current as my songs came from Italy. I beg your pardon for instancing such particulars. But there are knowing persons, who have been long bred in those worthily admired parts of Europe, who ascribe more to us than we to ourselves; and able Musicians returning from Travaill doe wonder to see us so thirsty after Forraigners.
For they can tell us (if we knew it not) that Musick is the same in England as in Italy ”

“ A Thesis for a Doctor's degree in the University of Paris (in 1912) was on the subject of Captain Cooke's Choir Boys, and it was a clever yet concise account of the work done by these three pupils of Cooke—Humfrey, Blow, and Purcell. English music seems to be looking up when we find a period of our musical history and three of our past great musicians taken as the subject for a thesis in a foreign University! ”

“ It is the only way to know where Nature hath bestowed the benefit of a good voice, which gift is so rare, as there is not one among a thousand that hath it, and in many that excellent gift is lost, because they want Art to express Nature.
7. There is not any Musicke of Instruments whatsoever comparable to that which is made of the voices of Men, where the voices are good and the same well sorted and ordered. ”