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.
