Frederick Corder

Name: A Dictionary of Music and Musicians
Author: Frederick Corder

A Dictionary of Music and Musicians (1900)

Summary

“A Dictionary of Music and Musicians”, published in 1900, is a work by Frederick Corder. It explores elements such as rhythm, bar and accent.

Quotes from A Dictionary of Music and Musicians (Frederick Corder)

Frederick Corder, A Dictionary of Music and Musicians (1900)

“ Every one, as we have already said, can understand a song or piece where a half-close occurs at each fourth and a whole close at each eighth bar, where it is expected; but when an uneducated ear is continually being disappointed and surprised by unexpected prolongations and alterations of rhythm, it soon grows confused and unable to follow the sense of the music. Quick music naturally allows—indeed demands—more variety of rhythm than slow, and we can scarcely turn to any Scherzo or Finale of the great composers where such varieties are not made use of. ”

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Source: Wikisource

Frederick Corder, A Dictionary of Music and Musicians (1900)

“ Where the accent of a piece is strictly binary throughout, composers, even to this day, appear to be often in doubt about the rhythm, time, and barring of their music. The simple and unmistakable rule for the latter is this: the last strong accent will occur on the first of a bar, and you have only to reckon backwards. If the piece falls naturally into groups of four accents it is four in a bar, but if there is an odd two anywhere it should all be barred as two in a bar. ”

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Source: Wikisource

Frederick Corder, A Dictionary of Music and Musicians (1900)

“ In many musical tempests, especially the older ones, an agitated movement with plenty of tremolos and semiquaver passages is deemed sufficient to convey the idea, but many composers have sought accurately to imitate the sounds and even the aspect of nature during a storm, with varying success. ”

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Source: Wikisource

Frederick Corder, A Dictionary of Music and Musicians (1900)

“ The great paucity of instrumental septets is probably owing to the fact that wind instruments are too full and powerful in tone to sound well with single strings, or even the piano. A striking instance of this incompatibility is accorded by Saint-Saëns' recently produced Septet for Piano, Strings and Trumpet; but, truth to say, whenever we hear even Beethoven's Septet or Schubert's Octet, we hare the impression of an exceedingly feeble orchestra, and yearn for the proper fulness of string power, albeit these works are not in the least orchestral. ”

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Source: Wikisource

Frederick Corder, A Dictionary of Music and Musicians (1900)

“ Not so freely as we may combine the different forms of accent, for the longer divisions are less clearly perceptible; indeed the modern complexity of rhythm, especially in German music, is one of the chief obstacles to its ready appreciation. ”

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Source: Wikisource

Frederick Corder, A Dictionary of Music and Musicians (1900)

“ One grave absurdity should here be alluded to; namely, the imitating, by the appearance of a written passage on paper, the form of soundless objects! It is quite admissible to represent the howling of the wind by rising and falling chromatic scales, but to imitate a flash of lightning by a zigzag passage on the piccolo, as is done by Haydn (Seasons) and Wagner (Die Walküre) ”

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Source: Wikisource

Frederick Corder, A Dictionary of Music and Musicians (1900)

“ In barbarous music and plain-chant this is because the notes exist only with reference to the words, which are chiefly metre-less: in polyphonic music it is because the termination of one musical phrase (foot, or group of accents) is always coincident with and hidden by the commencement of another. ”

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Source: Wikisource

Frederick Corder, A Dictionary of Music and Musicians (1900)

“ On analysing any piece of music it will be found that whether the ultimate distribution of the accents be binary or ternary, the larger divisions nearly always run in twos, the rhythms of three, four, or seven being merely occasionally used to break the monotony. ”

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Source: Wikisource

Frederick Corder, A Dictionary of Music and Musicians (1900)

“ One consequence of this is that he has written the most tumultuously emotional opera extant;, but another is that the work is a mere chaos to the hearer until it is closely studied. Actual popularity and general appreciation for such music is out of all question for some generations to come. ”

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Source: Wikisource

Frederick Corder, A Dictionary of Music and Musicians (1900)

“ A very quaint effect is produced by the unusual rhythm of seven. An impression is conveyed that the eighth bar—a weak one—has got left out through inaccurate sense of rhythm, as so often happens with street-singers and the like. ”

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Source: Wikisource

Frederick Corder, A Dictionary of Music and Musicians (1900)

“ Three-bar rhythm, if in a slow time, conveys a very uncomfortable lop-sided sensation to the uncultivated ear. The writer remembers an instance when the band could hardly be brought to play a section of an Andante in 9–8 time and rhythm of three bars. The combination of 3 x 3 x 3 was one which their sense of accent refused to acknowledge. Beethoven has taken the trouble in the Scherzo of his 9th Symphony to mark 'Ritmo di tre battute,' although in such quick time it is hardly necessary ”

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Source: Wikisource

Frederick Corder, A Dictionary of Music and Musicians (1900)

“ The most original treatment, perhaps, of a storm is in the prelude to 'Die Walküre.' Throughout this drama the weather is very bad, and there are various kinds of storms, but the first is a magnificent one. The tremolo D held by the violins and violas for nearly 70 bars against the rushing wind of the basses,
is surprisingly effective, and were it not for the comical lightning effect
the artistic value of the movement would be much greater. In Act 2 a theatrical 'thunder machine' is used to enhance the effect, but this cannot be said to belong to the score, though it stands there. ”

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Source: Wikisource

Frederick Corder, A Dictionary of Music and Musicians (1900)

“ Great as are the varieties afforded by the diverse positions and combinations of strong and weak accents, the equal length of bars, and consequently of musical phrases, would cause monotony were it not that we are allowed to combine sets of two, three, and four bars. ”

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Source: Wikisource

Frederick Corder, A Dictionary of Music and Musicians (1900)

“ It was not however always sufficient for Beethoven's requirements, as may be seen from a well-known place in the Scherzo of the Eroica, where he first gives a passage in syncopation—
and then repeats it in common time, which in this instance may be taken as an extreme form of syncopation.
Schumann was fonder of syncopation than any other composer. His works supply many instances of whole short movements so syncopated throughout that the ear loses its reckoning, and the impression of contra-tempo is lost: e.g. Kinderscenen, No. 10; Faschingsschwank, No. ”

Frederick Corder

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