PREFACE
This book is not, in any sense, technical.
It is an attempt to give a simple and rational, though in a volume of this size, necessarily incomplete, account of events that have led to the complex state of music existing in England at the present time.
Should it offer nothing to the musician or historian, I hope it will be found of interest to the general reader.
The desire to make each chapter as complete, on the subject with which it deals, as space would permit, has necessitated a certain amount of repetition, but I trust that the object will condone the fault.
THE AUTHOR.
CONTENTS
| CHAPTER | PAGE | |
| I. | Music Before and During the Reformation | [1] |
| II. | Music Before and During the Reformation—(continued) | [20] |
| III. | Early English Composers | [47] |
| IV. | The Decline of English Music | [67] |
| V. | Musical Education in England | [93] |
| VI. | Progress of Orchestral Music | [125] |
| VII. | Oratorio in England | [150] |
| VIII. | Opera in England | [176] |
| IX. | Distinguished Musicians in England during the Nineteenth Century | [201] |
| X. | General Survey | [244] |
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
| Henry Purcell | Frontispiece |
| PAGE | |
| Queen Elizabeth | [32] |
| Calvin | [76] |
| G. F. Handel, by Hudson | [154] |
| Sir Arthur Sullivan | [228] |
| Sir Edward Elgar | [246] |