V

From these contemporaries we shall select only a few as essential links in the chain of development. Three men stand out as intermediaries between Stamitz and the Haydn-Mozart epoch: Johann Schobert, chiefly in the field of piano music; Luigi Boccherini, especially for stringed chamber-music; and Carl Ditters von Dittersdorf, for the symphony. These signalize the ‘cosmopolization’ of the new art; representing, as it were, its French, Italian, and South German outposts.

Schobert is especially important because of the influence which he and his colleague Eckard exercised upon Mozart at a very early age.[32] These two men were the two favorite pianists of Paris salons about the middle of the century. Chamber music with piano obbligato found in Schobert one of its first exponents. A composer of agreeable originality, solid in musicianship, and an unequivocal follower of the Mannheim school, he must be reckoned as a valiant supporter of the German sonata as opposed to its lighter Italian sister, though French characteristics are not by any means lacking in his work.

As one in whom these characteristics predominate we should mention François Joseph Gossec, familiar to us as the writer of opéras comiques, but also important as a composer of trio-sonatas (of the usual kind), some for orchestral performance (like those of Stamitz, ad lib.), and several real symphonies, all of which are clearly influenced in manner by Stamitz and the Mannheimers. Gossec was, in a way, the centre of Paris musical life, for he conducted successively the private concerts given under the patronage of La Pouplinière, those of Prince Conti in Chantilly, the Concert des amateurs, which he founded in 1770, and, eventually, the Concerts spirituels, reorganized by him. The Mercure de France, in an article on Rameau’s Castor et Pollux, calls Gossec France’s representative musician among the pioneers of the new style. Contrasting his work with Rameau’s the critic refers to the latter as being d’une teneur (of one tenor), while Gossec’s is full of nuance and contrast. This slight digression will dispose of the ‘Paris school’ for the present; we shall now proceed to the chief Italian representative of Mannheim principles.

In placing Boccherini before Haydn in our account of the string quartet we may lay ourselves open to criticism, for Haydn is universally considered the originator of that form. But, as in almost every case, the fixing of a new form cannot be ascribed to the efforts of a single man. Although Haydn’s priority seems established, Boccherini may more aptly be taken as the starting point, for, while Haydn represents a more advanced state of development, Boccherini at the outset displays a far more finished routine.

In principle, the string quartet has existed since the sixteenth century, when madrigals[33] and frottole written in vocal polyphony and for vocal execution were adapted to instruments. The greater part of the polyphonic works of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries was written in four parts, and so were the German lieder, French chansons, and Italian canzonette, as well as the dance pieces of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. In instrumental music four-part writing has never been superseded, despite the quondam preference for many voices, and the one hundred and fifty years’ reign of Figured Bass. But a strictly four-part execution was adhered to less and less, as orchestral scoring came more and more into vogue for suite and sonata. Hence the string quartet, when it reappeared, was as much of a novelty in its way as the accompanied solo song seemed to be in 1600. Quartetti, sonate a quattro and sinfonie a quattro are, indeed, common titles in the early seventeenth century, but their character is distinctly different from our chamber music; they are orchestral, depending on harmonic thickening and massed chordal effects, while the peculiar charm of the string quartet depends on purity and integrity of line in every part, and while, at the same time, each part is at all times necessary to the harmonic texture. Thus the string quartet represents a more perfect fusion of the polyphonic and harmonic ideals than any other type. The exact point of division between ‘orchestral’ and true quartets cannot, of course, be determined, though the distinction becomes evident in works of Stamitz and Gossec, when, in one opus, we find trios or quartets, some of which are expressly determined for orchestral treatment while others are not.

It is Stamitz’s reform again which ‘loosened the tongue of subjective expression,’ and, by turning away from fugal treatment, prepared the way for the true string quartet. Boccherini’s first quartets are still in reality symphonies; and in Haydn’s early works, too, the distinction between the two is not clear. Boccherini’s, however, are so surprisingly full of new forms of figuration, so sophisticated in dynamic nuances, and so strikingly modern in style that, without the previous appearance of Stamitz, Boccherini would have to be considered a true pioneer.

Luigi Boccherini was born in 1743 in Lucca. After appearing in Paris as ‘cellist he was made court virtuoso to Luiz, infanta of Spain, and accordingly he settled in Madrid. Frederick William II of Prussia acknowledged the dedication of a work by conferring the title of court composer on Boccherini, who then continued to write much for the king and was rewarded generously, like Haydn and Mozart after him. The death of his royal patron in 1797 and the loss of his Spanish post reduced the composer to poverty at an old age (he died 1805). He has to his credit no less than 91 string quartets, 125 string quintets, 54 string trios and a host of other works, including twenty symphonies, also cantatas and oratorios. To-day he is neglected, perhaps unjustly, but in this he shares the fate of all the musicians of his period who abandoned themselves to the lighter, more elegant genre of composition.

The relation of Carl Ditters von Dittersdorf to the Mannheim school is, in the symphonic field, relatively the same as that of Schobert in regard to the piano, and Boccherini in connection with the string quartet. Again we must guard against the criticism of detracting from the glory of Haydn. Both Haydn and Dittersdorf were pioneers in developing the symphony according to the Mannheim principles, but, of course, Haydn in his later works represents a more advanced stage, and will, therefore, more properly receive full treatment in the next chapter. Ditters probably composed his first orchestral works between 1761 and 1765, while kapellmeister to the bishop of Grosswardein in Hungary, where he succeeded Michael Haydn (of whom presently). Though Joseph Haydn’s first symphony (in D-major) had already appeared in 1759, it had as yet none of the ear-marks of the new style.