CHAPTER I.
THE BEGINNINGS OF CHAMBER MUSIC.
How Chamber Music began — Early Chamber Music compositions — Musical position of England — Purcell — J.S. Bach — Great violin makers — Haydn and Mozart — Corelli and the compass of the violin — William Shield and 5/4 time.
“In the time of the Frankish kings,” says Mr. H.E. Krehbiel,[3] “the word chamber was applied to the room in the royal palace in which the monarch’s private property was kept, and in which he looked after his private affairs. When royalty took up the cultivation of music it was as a private, not as a court function, and the concerts given for the entertainment of the royal family took place in the king’s chamber or private room. The musicians were nothing more nor less than servants in the royal household. This relationship endured into the present century. Haydn was a Haus-officier of Prince Esterhazy. As vice-chapelmaster he had to appear every morning in the prince’s ante-room to receive orders concerning the dinner music and other entertainments of the day.”
How Chamber Music began
This may be taken as one explanation of the origin of chamber music. Another is that near the end of the fifteenth century, madrigals and other pieces which no doubt were originally intended for singing began to be described as “madrigali et arie per sonare et cantare,” or, in the plain English of the time, “apt for voices and instruments,” by which is meant that the instruments joined with the voices probably at first to support them, both performing the same music.
About the same period and earlier it became customary to introduce instrumental music at the banquets of the wealthier classes, and what may be regarded as chamber music was used as a stimulus and a cover for conversation, a practice not even yet quite obsolete.
Early Chamber Music Compositions
From some such sources it seems likely that this form of music made a beginning. Composers then began to turn their attention to the growing requirements of such performers, and we find that many works were issued chiefly in the form of Courantes, Sarabandes, Gavottes, Gigues, and other dance forms. Music called Fancies, and sets of Ayres, and other pieces for lutes (a kind of guitar), and viols (the predecessor of the violin), also incidental music for masques, were much in vogue in England about this time, composed, among others, by Morley, Gibbons, John Dowland, Mace, Sympson, Jenkins, Lawes, and Locke. Hugh Aston, an instrumental composer of distinction, may also be mentioned. He left, among other works, a hornpipe which is remarkable. There is also a virginal book in the library at Cambridge that contains two or three hundred pieces for virginals, which instrument was a kind of harpsichord. In 1611 a collection of music for the same instrument was issued, the compositions of Byrd, Bull, and Gibbons. It was called “Parthenia.” Byrd’s “Variations on the Carman’s Whistle,” and Sellinger’s “Round,” are noteworthy works. John Jenkins published sonatas for two violins and a bass, with thorough bass for the organ and theorbo.
This was the great period of English music. Our position as compared with other nations was one of artistic supremacy, and we ought not to forget this as Continental writers are apt to do to-day.[4]
Musical Position of England
Later on compositions such as we have mentioned were followed both in England and on the Continent by works of a more highly organised character, and to some of them the titles Sonata and Concerto were applied. These must not, however, be confused with the music of like name of our day, for they were much simpler in construction, and contained little or nothing of what we call development.
Purcell
Thus we find, to name but a few examples, that Reinken (1623-1722), a pupil of the celebrated Amsterdam composer, Sweelinck, wrote a notable Quartett, or Suite, for two violins, viola, and bass, which he called “Hortus Musicus.” Our own Henry Purcell (1658-95), whose compositions in many styles are so justly held in high esteem, left among others the so-called Golden Sonata, one of a fine set for stringed instruments. Corelli (1653-1713) too, a distinguished violinist and composer, of Italian origin, published in 1685 (the year J.S. Bach was born), twelve chamber sonatas for two violins, ’cello, and harpsichord.
J.S. Bach
John Sebastian Bach (1685-1750), whose mighty influence pervades the art of music of our day, and seems likely to increase in the future, wrote in all styles, even that of the Humorous Cantata. We need, however, here only mention his clavier music, which alone extends to four goodly-sized volumes; his compositions for clavier and strings, and flute; and, especially as belonging more particularly to chamber music, the Sonata in C major for two violins and clavier; another in G major for flute, violin, and clavier; and also that in C minor for the same instruments, from the so-called “Musical Offering,” which was written for the Emperor Frederick the Great of Prussia, on a theme given to Bach by that monarch himself.
Among those more or less distinguished composers who contributed to the store of chamber music about this time, may be named Geminiani (1680-1762), Tartini (1692-1770), Giardini (1716-96), Pugnani (1731-98), and Philipp Emanuel Bach (1714-88), a son of John Sebastian. These lead up to, among others, Dittersdorf (1739-99), Boccherini (1743-1805), and Haydn (1732-1809), whose first String Quartett was published in 1755.
Great Violin Makers
It may not, however, be overlooked that the influence of the great violin makers, the families Amati, Guarneri, and Stradivari (1535-1745), contributed not a little to the advancement of chamber music, for these men were no mere artisans engaged in the manufacture of instruments from a commercial point of view. Rather were they true artists, and the product of their labours furnished both performers and composers the highest means of artistic expression. During the period in which they worked, the old viol was gradually changed into the violin, viola, and ’cello of our time, a change which has had a most important and far-reaching effect on the entire art of music.
Haydn and Mozart
Corelli and the Compass of the Violin
With Joseph Haydn (1732-1809) we enter a new era, for before the time of this master and of Mozart, says a high authority,[5] “such a form (the string quartett) hardly existed, and their work with it was such as almost to complete its artistic maturity in the course of one generation.” The same writer also states that prior to the time of these two great masters “the pleasure of the player was more studied than that of the auditor,” by composers of chamber music. In this connection, technically considered, it is interesting to note that Corelli, who has already been mentioned as a distinguished performer on the violin as well as a composer, regarded the note D
as the upward limit of the violin’s compass, and he refused to entertain, on the ground that it was impossible, any passage written higher than this note.[6] Yet in Haydn’s Quartett op. 76, No. 5, which was written not so very long after the time referred to, there is a violin passage that reaches the note F♯ one octave and two notes higher than Corelli’s limit; also in the finale of the same composer’s Quartett op. 77, No. 2, a passage reaching an octave higher, and in other of his quartetts, the adjacent high notes C and B♭ are frequently written. Thus we see that along with the growth of musical ideas there was a corresponding expansion of technical means.
William Shield and 5/4 Time
As regards the music of this particular period, even in features which are generally supposed to belong exclusively to modern music, it is interesting to find that the older composers have really set the pattern. For example, the popular idea is that the 5/4 movement in Tschaïkovsky’s Pathetique Symphony is a rhythmic novelty. Yet in a set of six chamber trios published in 1790 by William Shield (1748-1829), Musician-in-Ordinary to his Majesty, may be found such a movement, and this is all the more curious seeing that it is marked “Alla Sclavonia,” thereby betokening some connection between Russian music and this unusual kind of time. Shield was a prolific writer of works both practical and theoretic. Some forty, now forgotten, operas are credited to him, but his songs remain among the best which England has produced, such for instance as “The Wolf,” “Old Towler,” “Arethusa,” and “The Thorn.”
We quote a portion of the String Trio which has been mentioned:—
Giuoco: Alla sclavonia tempo straniere con variazione.
The 2nd variation has a syncopated figure in the first violin part.
The 3rd variation gives the solo part to the violoncello, and this leads to a coda concluding the movement with a repetition of the original theme.