II
One thing, however, the ‘representative style’ had contributed to song, in common with all other forms of seventeenth century music. This was the unprepared dissonance in harmonic writing. The dissonance, which gave immensely greater freedom to the leading of voices, provided especially a means of poignant emotional expression, wholly lacking in the old church music. And such art-songs as were written in the seventeenth century made a limited use of the dissonance, particularly the dominant seventh, which enabled it to keep mildly abreast of musical progress.
In Germany, in the early part of this century, Hans Leo Hassler (1564-1612) was the chief exponent of song. Hassler had studied in Italy and brought back to his native land something of the Latin lightness of touch, as well as the technical innovations which he had seen in process of development during his student days. At his hands the heavy and earnest German folk-song became lighter and the melody more prominent, especially in his dance songs. About this time many song collections made their appearance, testifying to the growing popularity of solo song. But it was Heinrich Albert (1604-1651) who gave the true national touch to German song and justified the title which later generations have given him, ‘Father of the German Lied.’ Germany, in the early part of the seventeenth century, was suffering from the effects of severe religious wars and was in one of its periodic states of national and cultural depression. Placed as it was in the centre of enemies, disrupted in political adherence and torn by fratricidal quarrels, it was peculiarly liable to lose its indigenous culture and to adopt its manners and art from surrounding nations. This was its estate in the first half of the seventeenth century, when the ‘poet patriots’ sought to revive national spirit in poetry. The group had much in common with that of more than a century later[15] which sought the same renaissance of German national life, but the time was not yet ripe for their full success. Germany was disrupted spiritually as well as politically and for still another century French letters and art dominated the upper classes. But beneath the superficial culture of the aristocracy there was the true national life of the common people, the force which has kept Germany one through darkest days and nights and has in the last fifty years brought to fruition such a glorious era of national culture. And it was to the folk-element in German culture that the ‘poet patriots’ were forced to appeal. Heinrich Albert, in setting to music the poems of this group, chose the German folk-song style, rather than that of the Italian aria. By this choice he made his work count for something in history. He may be called (at least so far as Germany is concerned) the creator of the volkstümliches Lied. This is the song which we meet with continually in the next century and a half—the song which is composed consciously and with a definite artistic effect in mind, but with the materials which are common to the people and capable of being understood by all. The ‘folk-like’ song, in fact, becomes a goodly share of the folk-song treasury of the succeeding generation. At its best it is little below true folk-song in quality. Often it fills a whole gap in the life of the people which true folk-song had neglected to fill. We may get a very fair estimate of the place of Heinrich Albert’s volkstümliches Lied in the life of the people if we recall the work of Stephen Foster in America,—a work which is now the common property of people from one end of the land to the other.
But, as we have said, German national life was not vigorous in the seventeenth century, and the work of the ‘poet patriots’ passed into comparative oblivion. Italian opera quickly became established in all the court centres of Germany, and its ideals, nurtured especially by Reinhard Keiser in Hamburg, dominated the conscious musical life of the nation. French refinement entered in, to the detriment of indigenous art. The songs of the time, written by J. G. Graun (1698-1771), G. P. Telemann (1681-1767), Agricola, and others, were called odes and arias, imitating the French and Italian names as they imitated the French and Italian forms, and the volkstümliches Lied as well as the true art-song was again in disrepute. We should mention, however, the few secular songs of J. S. Bach, which reveal, in spite of their lack of originality in form, a delicate poetic sense, especially in the little love-song, Bist du bei mir. For the true art-song Germany had to wait until it had achieved some amalgamation of the social and cultural life of the nation.
Much the most grateful song literature of the long transition period is to be found in France. There, Gallic taste restrained opera from the worst excesses of the Italian school, while the French sense of grace and proportion produced a multitude of trifles which have by no means lost their charm to this day. Moreover, as the eighteenth century wore to a close there arose a wonderful tradition of patriotic and idealistic songs which outshone the similar songs of Germany in brilliance if not, on the whole, in stark emotional power.
At the end of the sixteenth century the folk-songs of France, like those of England, were still largely in the modal scales. But this was not in imitation of ecclesiastical music. Folk-songs have borrowed very little from church music, in any age, while the debt on the other side is enormous. The modal character of the early folk-songs is proper to them and extends back far into the early morning of music. If church and folk-music were similar in their scales, it is rather because they arose from a common stock. Certainly the songs of early France were thoroughly of their own and not of any borrowed character. But the universal trend toward a standard major scale and a tonic centre was felt in France as in other countries, and by the end of the sixteenth century was well developed. The folk-tunes of the time were vigorous in the extreme, probably as little like the dainty and restrained songs of modern France as the stolid songs of nineteenth century England were like the Elizabethan songs, with their abounding energy. The Lutheran movement in music, which adapted folk-tunes as settings to devotional hymns, found an exact parallel in France as early as 1539, when Marot translated the psalms into metrical form in the vulgar tongue and set them to the songs of the street. The settings instantly became popular. It is said that the court, being fascinated with the freshness of the songs, became thereby more familiar with scripture than it had been for many a year. The strict church party violently disapproved of the practice and issued its own set of rival songs to stem the tide of popularity, but even these, which were obliged to be popular in character, only added to the vogue of the street-tune settings. In the following century the same thing happened in the political field. The Cardinal Mazarin, who was immensely unpopular among the people, was made the butt of endless satires in verse set to tunes which everybody knew. No fewer than four thousand of these ‘Mazarinades’ were later collected and published.
The songs of the late sixteenth century, apart from folk-songs, were largely dance tunes set to lively words and supported with a polyphonic accompaniment. But slowly the polyphony became more simple and in the beginning of the seventeenth century the ‘chord-fornote’ accompaniment was adopted from Italy and came to most charming flower. With the French sense of grace and fitness the French composers made their airs du cour, or ‘court tunes,’ lyric and flowing, keeping the accompaniment in its proper place as a mere support to the melody and rounding off the pieces by means of a subtle and satisfying architecture. The many names under which the French aristocratic songs went are hardly to be distinguished with definiteness. The term airs du cour covered almost any songs of a restrained, polished character. The chanson was nearer the people, sometimes a ballad, very often a dance tune, and not infrequently a gross or indecent piece of little artistic value. The romance, which dates from the Troubadours, was touching and graceful, almost wholly confined to the tender sentiments. The brunette was a simple love song, not very distinct in genre, the very name being a matter of doubt. The bergerette, in which class belong some of the most delightful of French songs, was a lyric of pretended pastoral nature, in which lovers carried on their romances in the guise of shepherds and shepherdesses. The musette was written in supposed imitation of a street organ, invariably over a ‘drone bass,’ usually in fifths. The vaudeville, less distinguished in character than any of the others, was a mere adaptation of current street tunes (whence the name, voix de ville). These types of song found their way in great abundance into later French opera, especially that admirable achievement of the French, the opéra comique, and many of the best French songs of the eighteenth century are to be found in opera scores. But in the operas of Lully, the chief French dramatic composer of the seventeenth century, the lightness of touch which distinguishes the French had not yet come into its own and the somewhat ponderous classic tradition still dominated. Songs during this period were usually written independently, but they grew in popularity so steadily that the composers of light opera in the following century were forced to include one or more romances, brunettes, or bergerettes in their works to insure their popularity.
III
In Elizabethan England in the sixteenth century the strolling minstrels and ballad singers had already largely adopted the Ionian or major mode for their songs. This mode was in high disfavor among the educated musicians of the time, who called it il modo lascivio, the ‘lascivious mode.’ It is interesting to recall that the Greeks, including Plato, brought the same charge against their Lydian mode, which was the one of the four original modes which was most predominantly major in its feeling. In the England of Elizabeth and James the madrigal had nearly as much vogue as in Italy and the madrigal writers, chief among whom was Orlando Gibbons (1583-1625), were highly regarded. Not a few of the solo songs from this period have continued in favor to this day, but the more familiar ones were in most cases the work of educated composers writing in the popular style. In fact, the pure English folk-song was so inhospitably received among its own folk during the Commonwealth and after, that, until recently, it was popularly supposed that England had no folk-song of consequence. But the folk-songs were there and have continued from generation to generation through the centuries, to be discovered of late years by conscientious investigators. Though they are dying out in modern industrial England, they still exist in such numbers and of such distinctive beauty that they prove, more than all records can, the genuine musical quality of the England that existed before the great Rebellion. From among the ‘folk-like’ songs of this period we have, preserved in full popularity, a number, notably the ‘Carman’s Whistle,’ ‘The British Grenadiers,’ ‘The Bailiff’s Daughter of Islington,’ the ‘Willow’ song which Shakespeare introduced into ‘Othello,’ and ‘The Friar of Orders Gray.’
During the Commonwealth secular music flourished, but chiefly on the Royalist side, since the Puritans, in their idle moments, were largely engaged in singing hymn tunes. From this period we have the stirring song ‘When the King Enjoys His Own Again.’ With the return of the Stuarts and the reign of Charles II the influence of France, where Charles had spent his years of exile, became dominant. The dance, not the dance of the people but the stately dance of the court, asserted its sway over song, and the flesh and blood, which had throbbed so richly in Elizabethan England, all but dropped out of the later English product. The songs which are preserved from the period occurred chiefly in the masques which were performed at court, which were French to the core. The chief song writer of the time, and of that just preceding, was Henry Lawes (1595-1662), who wrote the music to Milton’s immortal masque of ‘Comus.’ Lawes was a true musician, though not a great one, and he did much for English song in making the music respect the poetry. He loosened formal bonds and introduced something of the Italian recitative style. Along with the Restoration we have semi-folk-songs of a light character, though without the freshness of preceding decades. We may mention two of the most popular, ‘Come, Lasses and Lads,’ and ‘Barbara Allen.’ Pelham Humphrey (1647-74), whom Charles II sent to France to study under Lully, brought back to England with him the French grace and refinement and helped to set the keynote for English song for the next half century. This much the returned Stuart dynasty did for English music, in bringing French traditions across the Channel, but the more stolid English disposition of the time never hospitably absorbed the new influence. And in 1688 the Stuarts were ushered out to the strains of a most remarkable tune, ‘Lilliburlero.’ Of this song it has truly been said that it ‘drove King James II out of England.’ It was not a patriotic or warlike song, however, but merely a satire. The ribald words may seem the worst of doggerel to us now, but their rough satire awakened all England when the impudence of the Stuarts had become unbearable and the energetic melody carried them in a flash from one end of the country to the other. The upheaval of 1688 was the ‘bloodless revolution.’ King James succumbed to laughter.