CONTENTS
Chap. I.
Purpose and scope of this book—Not written for professional musicians, but for untaught lovers of the art—neither for careless seekers after diversion unless they be willing to accept a higher conception of what "entertainment" means—The capacity properly to listen to music as a touchstone of musical talent—It is rarely found in popular concert-rooms—Travellers who do not see and listeners who do not hear—Music is of all the arts that which is practised most and thought about least—Popular ignorance of the art caused by the lack of an object for comparison—How simple terms are confounded by literary men—Blunders by Tennyson, Lamb, Coleridge, Mrs. Harriet Beecher Stowe, F. Hopkinson Smith, Brander Matthews, and others—A warning against pedants and rhapsodists. [Page 3]
Chap. II.
[Recognition of Musical Elements]
The dual nature of music—Sense-perception, fancy, and imagination—Recognition of Design as Form in its primary stages—The crude materials of music—The co-ordination of tones—Rudimentary analysis of Form—Comparison, as in other arts, not possible—Recognition of the fundamental elements—Melody, Harmony, and Rhythm—The value of memory—The need of an intermediary—Familiar music best liked—Interrelation of the elements—Repetition the fundamental principle of Form—Motives, Phrases, and Periods—A Creole folk-tune analyzed—Repetition at the base of poetic forms—Refrain and Parallelism—Key-relationship as a bond of union—Symphonic unity illustrated in examples from Beethoven—The C minor symphony and "Appassionata" sonata—The Concerto in G major—The Seventh and Ninth symphonies. [Page 15]
Chap. III.