Music history

“ And so in the nineteenth century men came to feel that beautiful music cannot be merely contemplated and admired, but must be lived with and felt. Accordingly composers of this period emphasized continually the sensuous in their music, developing orchestral colors, dazzling masses of tone, intense harmonies and biting dissonances, delicate half-lights of modulation, and the [Pg 221] deep magic of human song. The change in attitude from music as a thing to be admired to music as a thing to be felt is perhaps the chief musical fact of the early nineteenth century. ”

“ Lastly we shall note the touch of two great forces upon music, two forces mysteriously intertwined, the French Revolution and the Romantic Movement. Music will break from the control of rich nobles and make itself dear to the hearts of the common people who inherit the earth. It will learn to speak of intimate mysteries and intensely personal emotion. Composers will rebel from dependence upon a patronizing class and seek judgment and reward from a free public. ”

“ Without this aid from the ancients, then, it might reasonably be expected that music would be neglected or would certainly be in abeyance, but this is not the case. There is a great period of musical history, not perhaps so significant as the progress in other departments of aesthetics, but containing within itself {135} a magnificent achievement and the germ of all our modern music. ”

“ For our present purpose may it suffice to convey to the reader that here for the first time music has attained the dignity of an art, with all its æsthetic, emotional and moral significance, with its complicated theory, its sophisticated technique, consciously employed to give pleasure and to uplift the mind of man. Mechanical limitations and peculiar conditions prevented the development of this art in the modern sense, but its theory has without doubt given a definite direction to modern music. ”

“ A complete history of music would be a history of the world, so intimately is it found connected with the language, habits, poetry, religion, and life of the various nations. Our form of the art is alone adapted to our wants; and when we consider its enhanced powers, its modern counterpoint and harmony, we are at a loss to understand how Oriental music, with its greater limitations, could exercise so powerful a sway over its hearers. ”

“ Purpose of the Study of the History of Music.—The purpose of the study of the history of music is to trace the development of the many phases which make up modern music which we cannot but regard as a great social force, an intellectual, an uplifting force. ”

“ What is to be Brought Forward.—The history of Music is, then, a recital of facts bearing upon the development of modern music and we [Pg 20] shall lay stress on such facts as show a permanent impress and a solid contribution to progress in one or more of the lines marked out: Form, Expression, Melody, Rhythm, Harmony and Instrumental Color. In the study of a composer, the facts essential to the history of music are critical rather than biographical; not a life chronicle so much as a clear statement of what he specially contributed to forward the art. ”

“ The history of any art in such a stage of reformation is necessarily complicated, and the history of music is in no way exceptional. A thousand new influences shaped it, hundreds of composers and of virtuosi came for a while to the front. ”

“ 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 history of the art of music is divisible into two great epochs—the first dating from its birth about three centuries ago under the impelling influences of the Renaissance, to the end of the eighteenth century, when pseudo-classicism had given all it had to give ”

“ When carefully scrutinized, the progress of music during the present century has been governed by certain leading principles which are not contradictory, although at first glance they might appear so. Since the time of the Netherlandish contrapuntists, the pri [Pg 499] mary impulse in musical creation has been the musical ideal—the creation of tonal fancies, novel, inspiring, musical, satisfactory. Out of this desire has arisen the entire fabric of fugue, sonata, symphony and the whole world of free music. ”

“ It is with hypnotic power that these methods and their effects have possessed the musical consciousness of the succeeding generation and, becoming the very essence of modernity, insinuated themselves into the pages of all modern music. ”

“ It entails a change in the position of musical art which took place in the painting art centuries earlier, and shows what a modern thing music is. Men no longer expect music to be the expression of noble and exalted thoughts only, but accept it as the expression of all kinds of moods, emotions, feelings and aspirations, whether they be little and intimate, satyric and strange, wildly extravagant, genially humorous, pugnacious, pacific, pastoral, even uproariously domestic. ”

“ Let him study the history of music, not only as a record of the work of individual composers, but as an account of what has transpired in the various periods or epochs of musical art, so that he may become intelligent concerning the ideals, the styles, and the forms of these various periods. ”

“ After examining the general course of musical history, ascertaining some fundamental principles, and applying these principles to our special judgments, we shall be able to perceive the greatest musicians of our day in their relations, and to get a perspective view of modern music in which they shall take their proper places. ”

“ Whatever theory of the origin of music may finally prevail, there can be no question that music in its primitive condition is more directly the outcome of clearly realized feeling than it is when developed into a free, intellectualized, and heterogeneous [17] art form. ”

“ On the contrary, music of some kind or other has, doubtless, been a source of solace as well as amusement for untold years.
For antiquity, vocal music stands pre-eminent. Ages must have passed before instrumental music came to any position of efficacy at all correlative with it.
It must be remembered that music as we know it, is the gift that the ancient Church gave [Pg 21] us centuries ago, and that the pangs of its birth were suffered in days of which all sense of record is lost. ”

“ The most important contributions of the eighteenth century to the history of music—the establishment of harmony and the new tonalities, the technical growth of the various forms, especially of the sonata and the development of opera—have been treated in preceding chapters ”

“ If now we set out to glance over the circumstances which have eventually brought about the present condition of music in America, we find that this history, taken in its largest outlines, has a threefold aspect, the features of which may be roughly termed appreciation, creation, and administration. The degree in which the new world has grasped and understood the facts of musical development in the old must constitute a chief factor in any consideration of its musical evolution, and this subject will naturally include a reference to musical culture in America. ”

“ Just as the introductory essay tries to sketch the general musical environment, as determined by basic principles and developed in history, in relation to which alone the individuals discussed can be understood, so the epilogue seeks to suggest that still larger environment of human feeling and activity on which music, like everything else, depends for its vitality. The first essay considers music as a medium for men, the last considers life as a medium for music. ”

“ Add to these influences, already sufficiently diversified, that of a succession of brilliant virtuosi upon the leading instruments, whereby the resources of all the effective musical apparatuses were more fully explored and illustrated, with the final result of affording the poetic composer additional means of bringing his ideas to a more effective expression [Pg 262] —and we have the general features of a period in music so luxuriant that in it we might easily lose ourselves; nor can we easily form a clear idea of the entire movement as the expression of a single underlying spiritual impulse. ”

“ From that time forward, history makes mention of many persons who labored worthily, now more and now less, to create a theory of music, seeking to found a system of harmony upon that rude beginning, and by degrees to improve it. ”

“ Meanwhile there has been created another stratum of music of the future, which may be expected to occupy the attention of the generation next ensuing, to whom in turn it will become the music of the present. ”

“ Wherever there has been vigorous movement of mind and material prosperity (and they have always been associated) there has been an art of music, the richness of which, however, has always [Pg 20] been limited by the state of the musical ears of the people or generation, and the perfection of their musical instruments. ”

“ These principles, universally recognized as governing in the other fine arts, are equally valid in music. As will be seen later, all musical progress has been toward their more complete attainment and their due co-ordination into a single satisfactory whole. Every musical form that has ever been created is an effort to solve this problem ”

“ Volumes V to IX, inclusive, deal with the practical side of the art—what is sometimes called ‘applied music’—and in describing the chief media by which it is produced, such as the voice, the organ, the piano, the string quartet, the orchestra, provide general notions of what is appropriate to each. ”

“ Music, to quote John Addington Symonds, ‘is the essentially modern art.’ Nevertheless, even in default of any more specific evidence, we could safely assume that musical culture among the ancient civilized nations had advanced considerably beyond the stage reached by primitive peoples. ”

“ The explanation of this apparent anomaly probably lies, first, in the fact that music in antiquity was not a free independent art, and that when the philosophers speak of music they think of it in its associations with poetry, religious and patriotic observances, moral and legal precepts, historic relations, etc. ”

“ In reading the lives of these great musical composers, we can trace the gradual development of music from its earliest days as an art and as a science. Unlike the other arts which have flourished, decayed, and had rebirth, music, as we now understand it, sprang into being out of the ferment of the Renaissance, and therefore is the youngest of the arts—a modern growth belonging particularly to the later phases of civilisation. ”

“ But there is, I claim, a deeper interest and a higher pleasure to be derived from seeking, beneath the smoothly flowing harmonies and graceful, rippling embellishment, for the allegorical significance or suggestion mirrored in their clear depths, as scenes and faces are reflected in the tranquil stream, and which are rarely, if ever, wanting in the true art work.
The “theme and variations” in music, which owes its origin to the first crude attempts of early composers to elongate and develop a musical idea into a symmetrical art form, corresponds to a very early phase of another art. ”

“ We shall shortly examine some typical folk-songs in order to see how this design gradually became larger and more various, and how, through this process, the foundations were laid for the masterpieces of modern instrumental music. We shall see that this advance has accompanied an advance in civilization; that as men's lives have become better ordered, as higher standards of living and thinking have appeared, the sense of beauty has grown until, finally, this steady progress has resulted in the creation of certain permanent types. ”

“ During those eleven Christian centuries, from the latter part of the fourth century, when the corner-stone for our musical system was laid, until the wonderful exploration period of the fifteenth was well advanced, the masters of music were absorbed in controlling the elements of their art. Since then event has crowded upon event with rapidly increasing ratio. During the past two centuries the progress of the art has been like a tale in fairyland. ”

“ Moreover, the discipline of music is diffused through all the acts of our life. For when we keep the commandments of God, and observe His law, it is certain that our words and acts are associated by musical rhythm with the virtues of harmony. ”

“ The leading feature in the development of the 17th century is the rise of instrumental music,—the struggle of the modern scales with the old ecclesiastical modes, the development of homophony with its melodious character, and its richness of harmony, in contra-distinction to the old strict polyphony. ”

“ To the lawgivers, the signs themselves are the most important matter, and are continually growing in their estimation; the new art of music is derived from the old signs—and these now stand for musical art itself. ”

“ At the same time, there is reason to believe that much of the ancient theory and science of music has been lost. It is certain that a custom existed of collecting popular ballads for purposes of government record. ”