Complete Encyclopaedia of Music/A/Art of music

Art of music. The Greeks, who were fond of claiming to themselves the invention of every art and science, have not scrupled to assign the origin of music, and to name the inventor. To Mercury they ascribe the honor of inventing the lyre, the first of musical instruments. The shell of a tortoise, they say, (having been ex-posed on the shore, till the flesh was entirely dried up, and nothing but the sinews remained, stretched over the cavity,) was observed by Mercury, when breathed upon by the wind, to emit musical sounds ; and it was this that suggested to him the construction of the lyre, which was first formed of tortoise shell, with cords stretched across it. In music, the fittest subjects for imitation are all those particulars which are eminently characterized by motion and sound. Motion may he either slow or quick, even or uneven, broken or continuous. Sound may be either soft or loud, high or low, i.e., acute or grave. Wherever, therefore, any of these species of motion, or sound, may be found in an eminent degree, there is room for musical imitation. Thus, in the inanimate world, music may imitate the gliding, murmuring, or roaring of water, as perceived in fountains, cataracts, rivers, seas, &c. ; the noise of thunder, and of winds, as well the stormy as the gentle. In the animal world, it may imitate the voices of certain animals, but chiefly those of singing birds ; and it may also faintly copy some of their motions. In the human species, it can also imitate some motions and sounds ; and of sounds, those most perfectly which are expressive of grief and anguish ; for grief naturally expresses itself by sounds which are not unlike to lengthened notes in the chromatic, system. Music, as the practice of it is of more easy acquisition than that of either of the other fine arts, as it is more indiscriminately ad-dressed to all, of every age and condition, from youth to age, from the daily laborer to the prince, and as it is in fact more universally practised, may more unhesitatingly be treated of by those but moderately initiated, without fear of the charge of presumption. The right of music to be enumerated among the fine arts has never been disputed, although its relative place in point of dignity has often been matter of controversy. Without touching this question, as being one of very little interest and less importance, we shall be satisfied with vindicating its utility and its just claims to the respectful notice and diligent cultivation of every civilized community. If we needed to appeal to the authority of names in support of this position, we could easily summon a formidable array. One, however, shall suffice ; but that one, for strength of intellect and purity of moral character, is equivalent to a host of ordinary names. I allude to Dr. Samuel John-son. Were not the fact well known and fully acknowledged, that he was the author of the passage I am about to quote, its peculiarity of style would indicate its origin with an almost absolute certainty. In the dedication to Burney's great work on the "General History of Music," we find this striking passage : "The science of musical sounds, though it may have been depreciated, as appealing only to the ear, and affording nothing more than a momentary and fugitive delight, may with justice be considered as the art that unites corporal with intellectual pleasures, by a species of enjoyment which gratifies sense without weakening reason; and which, therefore, the great may cultivate without debasement, and the good enjoy without depravation Those who have most diligently contemplated the state of man have found it beset with vexations, which can neither be repelled by splendor, nor eluded by obscurity ; to the necessity of combating these intrusions of discontent, the ministers of pleasure were indebted for that kind reception, which they have, perhaps, too indiscriminately obtained. Pleasure and innocence ought never to be separated ; yet we seldom rind them otherwise than at variance, except when music brings them together." To the truth of the last remark of the great moralist, that pleasure and innocence are generally at variance, except when music brings them together, we may surely demur ; and certainly a moderate experience in the ways of the world would excite in the mind of every serious person the earnest wish that no other associations than such as are characterized by pleasure in combination with innocence were ever occasioned or encouraged by this delightful art. But the assertion that music unites corporal with intellectual pleasure, and gratifies sense without weakening reason, and therefore that the great may cultivate it with-out debasement, and the good enjoy it without depravation, is as true as it is forcible. An opposite conclusion would be at war with our convictions of the wisdom and benevolence of the Deity, who made the hearing ear and formed the melodious voice, and strung the soul of man with chords ever responsive to the influence of sweet sounds. Music is as truly the voice of nature as speech ; that is, it is as natural for man to convey and to receive the movements of sentiment by the influence of sweet sounds as by the use of words. And when I say it is natural, I mean to ascribe this arrangement directly to the wise ordinance of the Great Being who framed us as we are. It was he who, while he gave us the element of air to breathe, gave it also the 'peculiar qualities by which it convoys the vibrations of sound ; and while he made the ear to receive the impulses of the articulate voice, rendered it susceptible to musical intonations ; and while he made the wonderful mechanism by which words are uttered, enabled it also to produce effects sweeter than the song of birds. The philosophical theory of musical sounds is very remarkable, and gives the clearest evidence that their employment, for the benefit and pleasure of man, was originally designed by the Almighty. In illustration of this position, I will instance a few of those laws or principles of sound which have been discovered by experiment and proved by demonstration. In music there is no such thing as a simple sound ; that is, no tone of a musical character can be produced which is, strictly speaking, one and indivisible. It is capable of separation into distinct constituent parts. As the rays of light are the result of the combination of the seven primary colors, which can he separated by the prismatic glass, so musical sounds are themselves combinations of other sounds. Every tone which proceeds from a stringed instrument, as a violin, a harp, a piano-forte, or from a pipe, as a flute, or an organ, or from a bell, gives out at the same time other sounds which are not the same, but yet unite so as to form one whole in their effect. In a large bell this can easily be perceived when it is tolled slowly ; the note sounds, and immediately after we hear others, more particularly the twelfth, fifteenth, and seventeenth. A delicate ear will perceive the same in a piano-forte; for a string sounded in its whole length, the parts of it also sound in certain exact sections or divisions which bear a definite proportion to the whole. Now, in the greater of these divisions, as the twelfth and fifteenth above mentioned, which are most easily perceived, the combination is harmonious ; but in the lesser and intermediate parts, the vibrations run into discords, and are not readily distinguishable by the ear. Were they so, there could be no such effect produced as music, be-cause discord would be as frequent and as prominent as concord. This law of sound has been adduced by an eminent ecclesiastical writer to show the wisdom and goodness of God in this correspondence between the physical nature of man and the constitution of the material world "There is another providential circumstance," says he, "in the theory of sounds, that if a pipe is blown to give its proper note, a stronger blast will raise it to its octave, eight notes higher This is done by an instantaneous leap, which, if it were done by procession from the one to the other, as bodies in motion rise or fall, not music, but a noise, would be the consequence, most disagreeable to the ear; to which nothing is more offensive than a sound rising or falling by the way of the whole intermediate space, and not by first intervals ; for that is a principle of noises as they differ from notes. We find music as a work of God in the constitution of the air, which is made capable of proportionate vibrations to de light us ; and in such degree and manner as to save the ear from offence and interruption. Music may be further traced as the work of God in the nature of man ; for God hath undoubtedly made man to sing as well as to speak. The gift of speech we cannot but derive from the Creator ; and the gift of singing is from the same Author. The faculty by which the voice forms musical sounds is as wonderful as the flexures of the organs of speech in the articulation of words. The human pipe is of a small diameter, and very short, when compared with the pipes of an organ; yet it will distinctly give the same note with the pipe of an organ eight feet in lunge The movable parts which are around the pipe of the human throat have but a very small range. Yet with the contraction and expansion of which the whole is capable, the voice can utter a scale of seventeen degrees, and sometimes more, and divide each whole tone into many parts. But, more than this, man is an instrument of God in his whole frame ; besides the powers of the voice in forming, and of the ear in distinguishing, musical sounds, there is a general sense, or sympathetic feeling, in the fibres and membranes of the body, which renders the whole frame susceptible of musical emotion. Every person strongly touched with music must be assured that its effect is not confined to the ear, but is felt all over the frame, and to the inmost affections of the heart ; disposing us to joy and thankfulness on the one hand, and to penitence and devotion on the other. It is a very well-known experiment in music, that when one stringed instrument is struck, and another, in tune with it, is held in the hand, it will be felt to tremble in all its solid parts, and one instrument being sounded, another will respond the same note, if in tune with it ; thus doth the frame of man feel and answer to instruments of music, as one instrument answers to another. Man, then, is, as it were, a musical instrument of God's own formation ; he has music in his voice, his ear, his whole frame." And the thought is beautifully expressed and enlarged by the poet Cowper: "There is in souls a sympathy with sounds, and as the mind is pitched, the ear is pleased with melting airs or martial, brisk, or grave ; some chord in unison

with what we hear is touched within us, and the heart replies. As music, then, has its origin in the nature of man, and in the constitution of the material world, which has been assigned as the place of his temporary habitation, we may expect to find evidences of its practice wherever the human. voice has been heard. We hear of no people, however wild and savage in other respects, who have not music of some kind or other with which we must suppose them to be greatly delighted by their constant use of it upon occasions the most opposite ; in the temple and the theatre, at funerals and weddings, to give dignity and solemnity to festivals, and to excite mirth, and cheerfulness, and activity in the dance. Music, indeed, like vegetation, flourishes differently in different climates, and in proportion to the culture and encouragement it receives ; yet to love such music as our ears are accustomed to is an instinct so generally subsisting in our nature, that it is not wonderful it should have been held in high estimation at all times." From what has been said concerning the origin of music, it will be seen that we could not for a moment assent to that theory which would consider this noble art as having had its beginnings in the imitation of birds or other animals, or of any of the ordinary sounds of nature. This we should consider as an hypothesis very degrading to him who was made lord of this lower creation. It is reasonable to suppose, indeed, that his natural love of imitation, and the delight he took in listening to the sweet songstress of the forest, prompted him to attempt both with his own voice, and by the help of mechanical appliances, sounds which had j so often given him pleasure. And it is possible that the idea of the shepherd's pipe may have been suggested by the whistling of the wind among the dry reeds, and that the lyre, one of the most ancient instruments, may have had its origin in the accident that Hermes, wandering on the shore, struck his foot upon a tortoise shell, the inner parts of which had decayed, except a tendon, which, being more firm, had remained stretched across it, and thus gave the hint for the formation of a stringed instrument. But the first music, we believe, proceeded from the first and most perfect of instruments, the human voice divine; and its earliest effort was not to imitate the vocal powers of the irrational creation, but to emulate the harmony of heaven, when, at the glorious spectacle of the new-created world, the morning stars sang together, and all the sons of God shouted for joy. The great poet of our language has represented, in his immortal work, our first parent as having heard this anthem of the celestial choir, and we see no reason for regarding it merely as poetical fiction. The angel Raphael, in the seventh book of "Paradise Lost," is describing to Adam the work of creation : when the six days' work were ended, the Almighty Creator returned up to the House of Heaven, his high abode. These are the words which the poet gives to the angel when ad-dressing Adam : -

"Up he rode,

Followed with acclamation and the sound Symphonious of ten thousand harps, that tuned Angelic harmonies ; the earth, the air

Resounded, (thou remember'st, for thou heard'st) The heavens and all the constellations rung. The planets in their station listening stood, While the bright pomp ascended jubilant. Open, ye everlasting gates, they sung; Open ye heavens, your living doors; let in The Great Creator, from his work returned, So sung the, ; and the empyrean rung With hallelujahs."

Now, while to the subsidiaries of this gorgeous description we ascribe no higher authority than the imagination of the poet, and therefore read his words only as those of sacred fiction, we need not suppose it improbable, although we make it not an article of faith, that our first parent learned the use of vocal sounds from angelic choirs ; and hence we may say with the poet, but with the sentiment of uttering almost historic truth, -

"From heaven, from heaven, the sacred song begun."

If thus derived from heaven we esteem this noble art to be, should not its highest employment be the service and worship of God? and should not w e deem it a wretched and criminal degradation, when its powers and capacities are made to minister, as they too often are, to worldly and sensual purposes?