Complete Encyclopaedia of Music/Preface

THE value of undertakings in the way of reference, and for the rapid acquirement of leading particulars concerning men more or less eminent for genius, skill, and science, being now universally acknowledged, little apology will be deemed necessary for extending the benefit to a department so interesting as that of Music. The utility of individual effort for the purpose of collecting and preserving whatever remains of the history of music cannot be questioned ; for

"Tradition is a meteor, which, if it once falls, can never be rekindled."

Mankind are generally interested in the feelings and pursuits of man in different ages ; hence arises a fondness for even those details which singly may be unworthy of regard, but which, in the aggregate, form the most valuable sources from which to learn the exact condition of a people. The author's motive in undertaking the drudgery of preparing the work now offered to the public was, that such a publication seemed to him very much needed by all persons in any way concerned in the practice of music, either vocally or upon instruments, as well as by all students of music and those who may be engaged in teaching. However prevalent the acquirement of the French, Italian, and German languages, among musical professors, artists, and amateurs, it is by no means universal ; consequently a faithful conveyance of the most interesting information from foreign sources of the best authority, it is believed, will be welcome to many of those, to say nothing of readers and inquirers in general. The material from which this first volume has been compiled was gathered by much labor and expense : the labor has been almost incredible : such a vast amount of matter could not be collected in a day or a year: the gathering of it together has consumed the patient industry of many years. Much of the information was difficult to obtain and slow to collect, and, when obtained, had to be, at great expense, translated and rewritten. The reader will notice that a very large amount of information, not to be found in foreign compilations, in other languages, is here collected and methodized, not only from the formal works of Dr. Burney and Sir John Hawkins, but from all the lighter and more fugitive notices of French, German, English, and American musical progress which have been scattered abroad for many years past. Productions which are the result of labor more than of genius generally lie under two great disadvantages : the pleasure of composing is incomparably less, and the composition itself is held in far less estimation ; and it is more than probable that, if the author of this volume had not possessed an earnest desire to become familiar with some of the hidden treasures of an art always most dear to him, he would have shrunk from the task of collecting and arranging such a vast amount of historical and other matter as will here be found, and which will render these pages valuable hereafter as a book of reference.

In preparing the COMPLETE ENCYCLOPÆDIA OF MUSIC, I have endeavored, by examples selected from the best foreign authorities and the introduction of musical characters, to render the instructions familiar and easy to be comprehended ; and I only regret that, in many instances, they could not be made more extensive, particularly the instructions for musical instruments. Limited as they are, however, it is confidently believed that no other work ever published can be found containing so much that is desirable to be known by every student of music. I have compressed the language generally ; and yet I have retained all the important intelligence. Whatever regards melody and harmony, either vocal or instrumental ; the invention, formation, powers, and characters of musical instruments ; the nature of composition and performance in general ; or of the music of particular ages and countries, Elementary, Technical, Historical, Biographical, Vocal, and Instrumental,—I have endeavored to define and elucidate : and should this volume of a work, executed on so comprehensive a plan, be found not wholly without omissions or entirely free from defects, the candid reader will, I trust, make due allowances for the difficulties inseparable from such an undertaking ; and I am confident that the various and important subjects treated of will be an excuse for any small inaccuracies which may be noticed by those who are conversant with the subject. The elementary portions of the Encyclopaedia will be found very fully explained and exemplified ; the various mu- sical terms are defined in such a manner as to appear plain to all. It has been so long the custom to use Italian and French words, indeed, whole phrases of the former, and Latin and German words, when describing or indicating the style, time, and occasional characteristics of a piece of music, that it would be a vain undertaking at this day to at-tempt any innovation on a system which has received the sanction of conventionalism, not only in this country, but all over the civilized world. I have in this work, however, as will be noticed, endeavored to make their order as lucid as possible and their meanings perfectly intelligible. It would require a tedious circumlocution of translation, were it attempted, to displace these old terms for vernacular ones. I have retained them in their original ; for, their signification being once understood, their brevity will always be found to be convenient. In my collection of words and terms, as well as the various instruction in the different departments, without confining myself to the theory and practice of any time, I have endeavored to include whatever might be necessary to the reading of the treatises of the old masters, and even to the understanding of the systems and practice of the ancient as well as the later and more modern schools of music. There will be found here collected and alphabetically arranged a large amount of historical matter, be-sides a summary of the general history of music from the earliest ages, never before published in this country. I have, at great expense, caused to be translated important portions of many foreign musical publications, and have also succeeded in enriching the work by the introduction of a large number of ORIGINAL MEMOIRS of eminent living musicians. The treatises upon Harmony, Thorough Bass, and Wind and Stringed In- struments are full and comprehensive ; and I have given scales for many, and descriptions of every known musical instrument, with concise directions for the practice of such as are in common use. I have personally devoted more than seventeen years to the one object of making this work complete, during which time every attainable authority has been consulted. I have availed myself of extracts from the works of Gerber, Choron, Fayolle, Orloff, Burney, Hawkins, Hogarth, Calcott, Gardiner, Busby, Hamilton, Schil- ling, Fétis, and other distinguished authors. I had, in addition, much assistance from the late Professor Henry E. Moore, and have been materially aided by John S. Dwight, Esq., editor of Dwight's Musical Journal, and by Richard Storrs Willis, Esq., editor of the New York Musical Times, from whose valuable journals I have gained much information not elsewhere to be found. I am therefore confident that this Encyclopædia will be found to be as perfect and reliable as the materials I have been so many years gathering and my own patient industry can make it.

The COMPLETE ENCYCLOPÆDIA OF Music, now offered to the public, enters an unoccupied field, no such work having been compiled before either in this country or in England, and nothing like it existing in the English language excepting a small Lexicon published by the author of this work in 1845. In all the foreign musical works which have come to my knowledge there is a neglect and almost supercilious disregard of modern musical pretensions, which have led me to believe that'a correct and modest record of them (in this, and another similar volume which is to follow at a future day) may assist to preserve much historical and biographical information which but for this effort might be forever lost.

The better music is known and understood, the more it will be valued and esteemed ; and a love of the higher schools of musical composition is one of the surest tests of a re-fined and elegant state of society. The reading and study of music and the use of musical instruments have become so general among all classes of people in this country that books treating of the subject begin to have a ready sale. Musical progress in the United States, since 1850, has been very extraordinary, and has more than kept pace with the other arts and sciences. Music propagates itself with great rapidity : from the pleasure it gives, and from the facilities afforded in our day for acquiring a knowledge of it in a country so prosperous as ours, a country the great mass of whose people can afford to hear the performances of the greatest musical artists of the age and can afford the best musical education for their families, the rapid extension of the art may be anticipated. The great European vocalists and artists who have followed each other to this country in quick succession have produced a remarkable effect in raising the standard of musical taste and spreading the science and practice of music over the land. Critics talk of the want of a national music in America : a national music is the spontaneous growth of ages of insulated life and feeling. It is impossible that American music can do more than reproduce the music of other ages and nations. We are too open to the world, too receptive of all influences from abroad, too much a nation made up of others to possess a music of our own. We are for a long time yet to remain in the position of learners ; let us pot, then, fear the charge of imitation ; it is too stale a charge to be pungent. We must imitate while we continue in a state of pupilage.

Man, distinguished from the inferior parts of creation by the divine gift of reason, exhibits no greater evidence of that faculty than by the seeds of science which the Creator has implanted in his nature and the power which he possesses to cultivate and bring them to perfection ; but of all the various arts and sciences which he is qualified to pros cute, no one appears more congenial to, no one more intimately interwoven with, the constitution of his frame than that of music. Vocal music, indeed, seems to have been coeval with human nature itself. The invention of musical instruments must, consequently, have taken place at a very early period of the world ; though the different epochs of their introduction and improvement, as well as the gradation by which the harmonic laws arrived at their first systematic order and regulation, cannot perhaps be accurately ascertained by modern inquiry. It is more than probable that he who first tuned his voice to song little thought of the marvels of music or dreamed to what perfection the rules of sound would one day be brought. He used the power which God had given him, nor stopped to inquire into the nature or construction of the tones which he almost involun- tarily produced, and which lightened his labor while they made glad his heart. Music is the finest expression of life, from its lowest actual up to its highest ideal phases. It is the most central, universal mode of utterance which art can attain ; it is vague, because the thoughts and feelings it aims to express partake of the infinite. It represents nothing with the graphic outline of the pencil, because it strives to paint what no outlines can take in : it is the heart's prayer, which cannot imbody itself so fully as in the language of tones and harmonies : it seems like the soul's effort to speak its mother tongue in a strange land, a yearning for a completer fulfilment of its destiny, an attempt to paint on the blank canvas of the present, with color-like melodies and tint-like harmonies, its ideal, Claude-like reminiscences of the scenery of its native clime. Never do such visions of perfect life come to us as when listening to the highest musical compositions. These point to a real spiritual fountain of which they are the streams.

In December, 1852, I addressed a circular letter to a large number of American as well as foreign musicians, requesting answers to certain questions therein propounded. I took that method of reaching such as I could not personally visit, because I was desirous of extending my work so as to cover the whole ground, not only in relation to de-ceased merit, but to enrich it by obtaining original notices of all the most eminent living professors. But modesty on the part of those addressed, and other obstacles incident to the nature of the autobiographic portion of the publication, rendered this part of my plan both critical and difficult. Some consented at once to answer the few questions I had taken the liberty of asking; and the information thus obtained can scarcely fail of being of historical importance as well as grateful to the intelligent part of the public. But of the many addressed, comparatively few have as yet given me the information in regard to themselves desired, and this will consequently be considered a sufficient apology to any and all who may look in vain for some notice of themselves or their works in these pages; though, under the head of Psalmody, mention is made of nearly all American musicians with whose history I have been made familiar. In another volume, wherein I propose to take up many subjects but slightly treated of in this, (owing to the want of space,) an effort will be made to collect sketches of such musicians as I have been unable to obtain as yet.

Those who examine this volume will find it presents a view of the whole subject of mu-sic, Elementary, Technical, Historical, Biographical, Vocal, and Instrumental, each article being arranged under appropriate heads in alphabetical order. It will be found as complete as any work of its size could be made. The elements of music, I believe, are sufficiently explained and exemplified. I have given definitions and explanations of more than five thousand technical terms, in connection with much historical and valuable in-formation. I have given a complete and full, though not elaborate, history of the science of music from the earliest time to the present ; a very full and comprehensive musical biography, embracing a succinct memoir of more than four thousand distinguished musical celebrities and composers, bringing many of the notices down to 1854. I have endeavored to present all the necessary information which may be required by those who wish to arrive at eminence as vocalists or musicians ; and I have given a description of, or directions how to use, all the known musical instruments, with more than two hundred short yet important essays upon various subjects connected with the art and science of music, among which will be found treatises upon harmony, thorough bass, modulation, counterpoint, composition, writing for an orchestra, writing for wind and stringed instruments, and almost every subject to which the attention of the musical student should be directed.

In all ages, ancient and modern, music has had its inspired votaries. But it is only within the last few centuries, as we all know, that it has attained to any thing like perfec- tion as a science and an art. How the plant, which for so many ages looked so dry, and dead, and unpromising, at length bloomed out in such fragrant and brilliant completeness, is alike known to all. It is a privilege of priceless value that we live in an age through which are transmitted the inspirations of Palestrina, Bach, Handel, Haydn, Mozart, Beethoven, Weber, Schubert, Mendelssohn, Rossini, Meyerbeer, Auber, and the long line of masters. It is a great thing to live after these men—men whose lives were all one burning feeling, one overmastering idea, one deep yearning after a perfect expression of the beautiful, one long series of grand, unclassified psychological facts. In their still world of dreams, what miracles did the power of art work out from their intense conceptions what skilful choice and marshalling of means for producing their intended effects ! and what patient and intense labor at composition !

The lives of these men are like insulated points in history, only to be well comprehended by those who are somewhat similarly organized. But their influence is wider than we can imagine. A great musical composer is a central power, who radiates a finer sense of beauty, by little and little, into the outmost and least-delicately organized souls. He is but a poet, whose language is more interior and universal than those who sing in articulate words. Where we stop short on the threshold of the holy of holies and are unable to penetrate by reason of the imperfection of human speech, the high priest of harmony enters and utters to the world's ear the deep, soul-entrancing oracles of God. The curse of Babel falls not on him. He speaks and writes in the native tongue of the angels, and the music is caught up and repeated with joy and acclamation in the isles beyond the sea. His style becomes the style of his age. We sing variations — imitations of his themes. These in turn are caught up and repeated, and in other forms of melody and combinations of harmony they again burst forth upon the ear. And thus they go circling through lands, flashing from soul to soul : the air is pervaded by a musical spirit, the ear is more delicately tuned, the soul more enlarged and spiritualized ; and beauty, which is God's primal benediction to his children, is celebrated with pious joy and reverence.

Nature, through all her depths, is full of music — varied in its tones and rich in its melody. There is a music in the stillness of the twilight hour ; in the voices of the balmy breeze, as it sighs amid the stirring leaves of the starlit grove or sleeps upon the calm bosom of the reposing waters ; in the bubbling of the inland fountain and the thunderings of the foaming cataract ; in the ripplings of the mountain rill and the majestic voice of the storm-stirred sea. There is music in the glad symphonies of the joyous songsters of the grove beneath and the mutterings of the pealing thunders above ; in heaven, on earth ; in the outspread skies and the invisible air ; in the solitary dell and on the mountain's cloud-veiled top, where human footsteps have never left an echo ; in the deepest cells of the passion-stirred heart and the inanimate depths of the material world ; in the dim rays of earth and the beams of those celestial lights which gem the high firmament and light the angels to their evening orisons ; in the tones of woman's voice on earth and the devotions of the pure spirits of a better land ; in all, through all, and over all, and forever vibrating the rich music of universal harmony and the deep tones of undying melody. Thousands of invisible harps are pouring their united melody through the depths of air and earth ; millions of archangels touch their heaven-strung lyres and send celestial harmony through the vast halls of the temple of the living God up to the throne of the dread eternal One. It is the air of earth ; it is the atmosphere of heav- en. The unbounded universe is one sleepless lyre, whose chords of love, and hope, and purity, and peace are fanned into a dreamy and mystic melody by the breath of the invisible God.

If this volume of the Complete Encyclopædia of Music shall conduce to the diffusion of musical knowledge ; if it shall serve to make known the history of the stars which have appeared and lighted the musical hemisphere ; if it shall animate any to copy the virtues and reject the vices of those who have gone before us, — I shall receive the most gratifying reward for the days and years of laborious toil which I have devoted to this one undertaking.

JOHN W. MOORE.

BALLOWS FALLS, Vermont, 1864.