The ingenious author of “A Ramble among the Musicians of Germany” has considered the Violin School of that country, at present, to be inferior, not only to the French—which there is no contesting—but also to that of England. In this latter notion I cannot help thinking him mistaken—and I would appeal to his own declaration, that although in Germany “one may find no band equal to that of the Philharmonic Society, fifty may be found, only inferior to it.” This fact supposes of necessity a very large body of good sound violin-players, whose united merits render it scarcely possible to regard the state of the art in their country as inferior to what it is in ours.
The Germans have, after all admitted drawbacks, a high renown in connection with that leading instrument which it is the business of these pages to celebrate. They have the renown that justly attaches to the production of the greatest writers of all for the Violin Family. Their compositions for the instrument, in its single state, are perhaps over-laboured, over-full of chromatic passages, and wanting in the broad, simple, vocal character of the Italian music of the same class;—they have been content, individually, to talk with the violin, whilst the Italians have sung with it;—but—they have tasked their own genius to find scope for its powers in the aggregate—to develop its resources in combination with those instruments that are its immediate relatives; and, in this collective character, they have given new triumphs to it. The names of Haydn, Mozart and Beethoven, at once suggest themselves, and assert for their country, under this view, a superiority which the world does not seek to dispute. In the quartetts, and other instrumental pieces, up to symphonies inclusive, which have been produced by these great men, all the higher capabilities of bowed instruments are consulted and brought forward, with a nicety of discernment, and a richness, variety, and grandeur of effect, which excite equally our surprise and gratification.—Let us now consider, in their order, the principal German masters whose eminence relates particularly to the violin.
It is hardly necessary to enumerate all the early performers mentioned with commendation by Walther in his Dictionary, since their fame and influence do not appear to have travelled beyond their own country. We will therefore commence with David Funk, originally a singer at Reichenbach, where he was born in the early part of the seventeenth century. He was an excellent musician, and a capital performer on the violin and the viol-da-gamba, besides displaying talent on the harpsichord and the guitar. He was, moreover, a general scholar, and one of the most elegant versifiers in Germany. Independently of his excellence as a practical musician, he obtained credit as a composer, in a variety of styles; and his compositions for the church and the chamber were much admired. His talents, brilliant and diversified as they were, suffered some tarnish from his immoral conduct. It was in 1670 that he began to shine as a composer, by the publication of a collection of pieces for the viol-da-gamba. He was under the patronage of the Princess of Ostfrise, during seven years. That Princess, however, dying in 1689, Funk, then more than sixty years old, returning to the place of his nativity, succeeded in obtaining several appointments; but these he had scarcely retained for a year, when the extreme irregularity of his life deprived him of them, and reduced him to the necessity of quitting the town as hastily as possible. It was in the depth of winter; and in his flight, through frost and snow, he arrived at the gate of the castle of Schleitz. The sordid state of his habiliments made so repulsive an impression on the porter, that he refused him admittance; but his good fortune, prevailing, brought to the spot the chapel-master, Liebich, who, acquainted with his merit, though previously a stranger to his person, expressed his desire for the honor of his friendship, and, in the name of the lord of the castle, whose favour and protection he himself enjoyed, invited the fugitive to his patron’s table. The Count was so delighted with his musical talents and various knowledge, that he retained him as his friend and companion, till letters arrived from Wohnsiedel, claiming him as a moral delinquent, to answer for some part of his past conduct. The Count, disposed to favour him as much as the nature of the case would admit, advised him to depart secretly, and afforded him every assistance for his journey. Funk, once more a wanderer, with out knowing whither to go, was, a few days afterwards, found dead, behind a hedge, in a field near Arnstadt!
It is doubtful whether any of the violin compositions of this master are extant; but, among his sacred instrumental pieces, there is one which has received the encomium of all real judges of music: it is a drama passionale, the words of which, as well as the music, were his own.
Thomas Baltzar, born at Lubeck about 1630, was esteemed the finest performer on the violin of his time. He came to England in 1658, at which time the instrument had not yet been enabled to manifest its real powers among us, nor to emerge (as it shortly afterwards did) from the low estimation in which it was held. Baltzar may be considered as having helped in no small degree to prepare the way for its rescue from humility in this country. He lived, for about two years after his arrival here, in the house of Sir Anthony Cope, of Hanwell, in Oxfordshire. He is said to have first taught the English the practice of shifting (that is to say, of what is termed the whole-shift), and the use of the upper part of the finger-board—in like manner as Geminiani is believed to have been our first instructor in the half-shift.[51] It is certain that the power of execution and command of the instrument, exhibited by Baltzar, were matter of novelty among us, although we had a native performer, of no mean abilities at that period, in the person of Davis Mell, who, in delicacy of tone and manner, seems even to have exceeded the more potent and renowned German. Baltzar was of a Bacchanalian turn in his habits, and was believed to have brought his end somewhat the nearer thereby. His remains obtained the honor of a place in Westminster Abbey, in the year 1663. Dr. Burney has characterized his compositions as discovering “genius and a strong hand.”
Henry John Francis Biber, vice-chapel-master to the Bishop of Salzburg, seems to have been one of the best violin-players of his time; and his solos, which he published in 1681 (with a bass), are stated by Dr. Burney to comprise more of fancy, as well as of difficulty, than any music of the same period. One of the pieces is written on three staves, as a score for two violins and bass, but is designed to be played (as regards the violin) in double stops. Others are played in different tunings of fourths and fifths, as for a treble viol.
Godfrey Finger, a Silesian, was a voluminous composer for the violin; in a style of less power than that of Baltzar, but of more polish, and approaching somewhat to the Italians, Bassani and Torelli. He was some years resident in England, having received, in 1685, the appointment of chapel-master to King James II. On returning to Germany, he became chamber-musician to the Queen of Prussia in 1702, and, in 1717, chapel-master to the Court of Gotha.
John Gottlieb Graun, brother of the celebrated chapel-master of that name, and born about the year 1700, was an excellent performer on the violin, and a respectable composer, of the old school. He was concert-master to the King of Prussia, and there are extant of his writings, several overtures, symphonies, concertos, a “Salve Regina,” and some masses. He transmitted, through several good pupils, the serviceable solidity of his talent.
Francis Benda, usually commemorated as the originator of a distinct style of violin-performance in Germany, was a native of Bohemia, and born in the year 1709. At the age of seven, he commenced vocal studies, and, two years afterwards, became a sopranist in the choir of St. Nicholas, at Prague. He soon afterwards went to Dresden, where he was immediately received among the élèves of the Chapelle Royale, in which situation he continued eighteen months. About this period he began to practise the violin, and had no other resource than that of engaging himself with a company of itinerant musicians, who attended fêtes and fairs. While thus situated, he formed an acquaintance with a blind Jew, of the name of Loebel, a virtuoso of no mean order, who became his master and his model. At length, tired of this wandering life, he returned to Prague, and took lessons of Kouyezek, an excellent violinist of that town. He was now eighteen; and, eager in the pursuit of professional excellence, resolved to visit Vienna, where he soon found an opportunity of profiting by the example of the then celebrated Franciscello. After a residence of two years in that city, he went to Warsaw, where he was nominated Chapel-Master. In 1732, at the recommendation of Quantz, the Prince Royal of Prussia (afterwards Frederic II) received him into his band. Anxious for further improvement in his art, he became the pupil of Graun, for the violin; then studied harmony under his brother; and afterwards learned composition of Quantz himself. In 1732, he replaced Graun as the King’s Concert-Master, which situation he held till his death, at Potsdam, 1786.
Of the peculiar qualities of Benda, as a violinist, Dr. Burney, in his Travels, thus speaks:—“His manner was neither that of Tartini, nor of Veracini, nor that of any other leader; it was purely his own, though founded on the several models of the greatest masters:”—and Hillar, in his Biography, tells us “that his tones were of the finest description, the clearest and most euphonious that can be imagined. The rapidity of his execution, and the mellow sweetness of his altissimo notes, were unequalled. With him, the violin had no difficulties. He was master of all its powers, and knew when to use them.”