Page:A Dictionary of Music and Musicians vol 3.djvu/490

478 and Sext, are usually sung immediately before and after High Mass. The Plain Chaunt Music for the various Offices is contained in the Antiphonarium Roman um, and the Directorium Chori. [ W. S. R. ]

SEXTOLET (Fr. Sextolet; Ger. Sextole; Ital. Sestina). A group of six notes of equal length, played in the time of four ordinary notes of the same species. To distinguish them from regular notes of like form the number 6 is placed above or below the group. The true sextolet is formed from a triplet, by dividing each note into two, thus giving six notes, the first of which alone is accented; but there is also a similar group of six notes, far more frequently used than the real sextolet, in which a slight accent is given to the fourth note as well as the first. This group, which really consists of two triplets, is properly known as the Double Triplet, and should be marked with the figure 3 over the second and fifth notes, though it is frequently marked with 6, and called a sextolet. The difference is well shown in the following two extracts from the Largo of Beethoven's Concerto in C, op. 15. [See also .]

[ F. T. ]

SEXTUS (Pars sexta, Sextuplum; Eng. The Sixth Voice, or Part). In the Part-Books of the 15th and 16th centuries, four Voices only were, as a general rule, mentioned by name; the Cantus, Altus, Tenore, and Bassus. When a fifth Voice was needed, it was called Quintus, or Pars Quinta, and corresponded exactly, in compass, with one of the first four. When yet another Voice was added, it was called Sextus, or Pars Sexta; and corresponded in compass with another original Voice-Part. The extra Part, therefore, represented sometimes an additional Treble, sometimes an Alto, sometimes a Tenor, and sometimes a Bass; and always corresponded, in compass, with some other Part of equal importance with itself. [ W. S. R. ]

SEYFRIED,, born Aug. 15, 1776, in Vienna, was originally intended for the law, but his talent for music was so decided, that, encouraged by Peter Winter, he determined to become a professional musician. In this, his intimacy with Mozart and subsequent acquaintance with Beethoven were of much use. His teachers were Kozeluch for the PF. and organ, and Haydn for theory. In 1797 he became joint conductor of Schikaneder's theatre with Henneberg, a post he retained in the new Theater an der Wien, from its opening in 1801 till 1826. The first work he produced there was a setting of Schikaneder's comic opera 'Der Löwenbrunnen' (1797), and the second, a grand opera 'Der Wundermann am Rheinfall' (1799), on which Haydn wrote him a very complimentary letter. These were succeeded by innumerable operas great and small, operettas, singspiele, music for melodramas, plays (including some by Schiller and Grillparzer), ballets, and pantomimes. Specially successful were his biblical dramas, 'Saul, König von Israel' (1810), 'Abraham' (1817), 'Die Maccabaër,' and 'Die Israeliten in der Wüste.' The music to 'Ahasverus' (1823) he arranged from piano pieces of Mozart's, and the favourite singspiel 'Die Ochsenmenuette' (1823) (an adaptation of Hofmann's vaudeville 'Le menuet du bœuf) was a similar pasticcio from Haydn's works. His church music, widely known and partly printed, included many masses and requiems, motets, offertoires, graduales, a 'Libera' for men's voices composed for Beethoven's funeral, etc. Seyfried also contributed articles to Schilling's 'Universal Lexikon der Tonkunst,' Schumann's 'Neue Zeitschrift für Musik,' the 'Leipziger Allg. Zeitung,' and 'Cäcilia,' besides editing Albrechtsberger's complete works—the 'Generalbass-Schule,' 'Compositionslehre,' and a Supplement in 3 vols. on playing from score (Haslinger)—and Beethoven's Studies in Counterpoint. Herr Nottebohm's critical investigations have reduced this last work to its proper value. [See vol. i. 209 and ii. 479.]

Seyfried was elected an honorary or a corresponding member of innumerable musical societies, at home and abroad. His pupils included Louis Schlosser, Karl Krebs, Heinrich Ernst, Skiwa, Baron Joseph Pasqualati, Carl Lewy, Heissler, Kessler, J. Fischhof, Sulzer, Carl Haslinger, Parish-Alvars, R. Mulder, S. Kuhe, Walther von Goethe, Baron Hermann Lowenskiold, F. von Suppé, Köhler, and Basadona.

His closing years were saddened by misfortune, and his death took place Aug. 27, 1841. He rests in the Währinger cemetery (Ortsfriedhof), near Beethoven and Schubert. [ C. F. P. ]

SFOGATO (open, airy), a word used in rare instances by Chopin in certain of those little cadenzas and ornaments that he is so fond of using, to indicate what may be called his own peculiar touch, a delicate and, as it were, ethereal tone, which can only be produced upon the pianoforte, and then only by performers of exceptional skill. 'Exhalation' is the only word that conveys an idea of this tone when it is produced. A 'Soprano sfogato' is a thin, acute, voice. [ J. A. F. M. ]

SFORZANDO, SFORZATO, 'forced'; a direction usually found in its abbreviated form sf. or sfz. referring to single notes or groups of notes which are to be especially emphasized. It is nearly equivalent to the accent, but is less apt