Page:A Dictionary of Music and Musicians vol 3.djvu/711

STEFFANI. These are generally found in the MS. collections of the time. The fourth piece was the great Stabat Mater, composed for S.S.A.T.T.B., accompanied by 2 violins, 3 altos, cello and organo, and undoubtedly one of the finest works of any composer of the period immediately preceding that of the giants Bach and Handel. His great contemporaries Alessandro Scarlatti and Purcell produced nothing finer. No exact dates can be assigned to these four works, but they all belong to his later manner. In Steffani is to be found the perfection of counterpoint without stiffness, and with that real sign of genius, exhaustless variety. As in Bach, there is marvellous freedom in the movement of the parts, and no hesitation at a good clashing dissonance produced by this freedom. He was an adept too at writing the charming minuets and gavottes which were then so fashionable, and with which his operas abound. At the British Museum there is likewise a glorious 'Confitebor' for 3 voices with violins and bass in E minor, said to be of the year 1709, with a splendid bass solo ('Sanctum et terribile') a species of accompanied recitative; the whole work being full of exquisite beauties. No notice of this piece has yet appeared in any life of Steffani's. In the Sacred Harmonic Society's library there is a book of 'XII Motteta par celeberrimum Abbatem Stephanum' for 3 voices with solos and recitatives, but it is only a vocal score, without the symphonies and accompaniments which all undoubtedly had. In another book in the same library however we find two of them complete. In their mutilated form it is not always easy to judge of the value of these motets, but some movements are certainly very fine, especially the last of no. 3, the first of the 5th, and the last Fugue of no. 8, which is very broad and quite Handelian. The movement 'Pro Christo' in this motet was introduced at the end of a collection of glees published by Hindle some 60 or 80 years since, and inserted 'by desire,' showing that the work was then popular. Hawkins mentions that Dr. Cooke had a book of 12 Motets for three voices, 'among them two that are exquisitely fine.' This is no doubt the book referred to.

Early in 1729 Steffani was once more and for the last time in Italy; and Handel met him at Rome in March, where he was living at the Palace of Cardinal Ottoboni. This latter enthusiast still kept up his Monday performances of music, at which Steffani, now 74 years old, occasionally sang. Handel tells us (through Hawkins) that 'he was just loud enough to be heard, but that this defect in his voice was amply recompensed by his manner, in the chasteness and elegance of which he had few equals.' From Handel we also learn that 'as to his person he was less than the ordinary size of men, of a tender constitution of body, which he had not a little impaired by intense study and application. His deportment is said to have been grave, but tempered with a sweetness and affability that rendered his conversation very engaging; he was perfectly skilled in all the external forms of polite behaviour, and, which is somewhat unusual, continued to observe and practise them at the age of fourscore.' He was back in Hanover in a short time, and the next year, going to Frankfort on some public business, died there after a short illness.

The last word has not yet been said about this remarkable musician, and it is to be hoped that some of his duets, and perhaps his glorious Stabat Mater and Confitebor may still be heard in the concert-room. His career was certainly one of the most extraordinary in musical history. Born of obscure parents, he raised himself by his talents and industry from the position of a poor choir boy, not only to be one of the foremost musicians of his age, but likewise the trusted confidant of princes and the friend of such a man as Leibnitz. The only other instance of an artist having become an ambassador is to be found in the painter Rubens. The materials for this notice have been chiefly gathered from Rudhardt, Hawkins, and Chrysander, the latter having obliged me with some important information hitherto unpublished.[ W. G. C. ]

STEFFKINS,, or , was a foreign professor of the lute and viol, who resided in London in the latter half of the 17th century. He is much commended in Thomas Salmon's 'Essay to the Advancement of Music,' 1672. His brother,, was one of the band of Charles I. in 1641, and his two sons, and , were famous performers on the viol. They were members of the King's band in 1694, and Christian was living in 1711.[ W. H. H. ]

STEGGALL,, Mus. Doc. born in, London, June 3, 1826, was educated in the Royal Academy of Music, principally by Sterndale Bennett. In 1847 he became organist of Christ Church Chapel, Maida Hill; in 1851 a professor at the Royal Academy of Music, and in 1852 accumulated the degrees of Mus. Bac. and Mus. Doc. at Cambridge. In 1855 he was appointed organist of Christ Church, Paddington, and in 1864 organist of Lincoln's Inn Chapel. He has composed anthems and other church music, and has lectured upon music in the metropolis and elsewhere. [ W. H. H. ]

STEIBELT,, a musician now almost entirely forgotten, but in his own day so celebrated as a pianoforte-player and composer that many regarded him as the rival of Beethoven, was a native of Berlin, where his father was a maker of harpsichords and pianofortes of considerable skill and repute. The date of his birth is quite uncertain. Most of his biographers state that he was born in 1755 or 1756, but Fétis declares from personal knowledge that he was only about thirty-six years of age in 1801, which would place his birth some eight to ten years later. The details of his early life are as much involved in doubt as the time of his birth. It is, however, certain that his aptitude for music was early manifest and that it in some way attracted the attention of the Crown Prince of