Page:A Dictionary of Music and Musicians vol 4.djvu/484

468 of Napoleon military bands made rapid strides, both with regard to the augmentation of their numbers and to their executive capacity, and were admitted to be the best then in existence. It seems that between the years 1805 and 1808 the addition of bass-drum, cymbals and triangle was made; and also into the Prussian bands that most useless of toys, the crescent, found its way.

England having in no way contributed to improve or even influence the progress of wind instrumental music, we have of necessity to pursue its course on the continent, from whence any important advance was simply adopted. It is difficult to trace the introduction of military bands into the English service. In 1783 the Coldstream Guards had a band of eight musicians—two oboes, two clarinets, two horns and two bassoons. The Duke of York, wishing to improve the musical service, imported from Germany what probably was the first 'full band' of twenty-four men, who, besides the above-named instruments, brought flute, trumpets, trombones and serpent. To these were added three negroes with tambourines and crescent. A fuller description of the circumstances attending this introduction of a foreign band may be found in Parke's 'Musical Memoirs,' vol. ii. p. 239 (London, 1830).

In the beginning of the present century various inventions were introduced to improve the imperfect state of trumpets and French horns and render them capable of producing a complete scale. A similar slide to that of the trombone was added both to trumpets and horns, but its manipulation was so difficult that it did not gain ground. A more important addition was that of keys to the bugle. Although the tone was thereby rendered unequal, yet this defect was compensated for by the gain of a complete chromatic scale, and the key-bugle became a much-used favourite instrument in most military and brass-bands of the time. [See, vol. i. p. 280.] The greatest event however for all brass instruments was the invention of the. [See vol. iv. p. 215.] Emanating from two obscure musicians in Prussia, it at first did not meet with the approval of the musical profession, who thought that the 'good old' character of the brass instruments was thereby deteriorated.

Valve-trumpets were introduced here and there, but without creating a favourable impression. Thus it went on till two men came to the front—one as a reformer of military music, the other as the inventor of scientifically-constructed brass instruments—Wieprecht and Sax. The former had an anomalous position, for being a civilian his propositions for reforming a purely military establishment were received but coolly by the military authorities. However, persevering in his endeavours, he at last succeeded so far as to be allowed (at the expense of the commanding officer) to introduce his instrumentation in a cavalry brass-band. It consisted of two high trumpets in B♭ (cornettinos), two key-bugles in B♭, two alto-trumpets in E♭ (cornettos), eight trumpets in E♭, two tenor-horns in B♭, one bass-horn in B♭, and three trombones in B♭, the former all having two or three valves, the latter being slide-trombones. The great advantage of this innovation was so apparent that Wieprecht was requested to introduce it into the bands of the Prussian Life Guards, and he went so far as to give the members of these bands personal lessons, to be assured of a proper perception of his ideas. In 1838 he was appointed director of all the Guards' bands, and in this influential position he successfully dealt with the formation and style of playing of the military bands throughout Germany. The first grand effort of combining many bands for a monster performance, at which he officiated, was at a fête given at Berlin on May 12, 1838, to the Emperor Nicolaus of Russia, who was on a visit to the King of Prussia, when Wieprecht conducted a performance of sixteen infantry and sixteen cavalry bands, consisting of 1000 wind-instruments, besides 200 side-drummers. He directed this great mass of musicians, all dressed in brilliant uniforms, in plain civilian garb, and it is said that the Emperor was so struck with the incongruity of the thing that Wieprecht was hurriedly put into uniform to conduct a second performance before the crowned beads four days after. Without following in detail the many results of his well-directed efforts, we will only give the instrumentation of the first military (reed) band, as reformed by him.

For the cavalry he organised the bands thus (trumpet-bands):—

And for the light infantry (Jäger) the instrumentation was called 'horn-music,' consisting of,

The regulation instrumentation of the Austrian bands at the same period differed from the above in so far that it regarded less the artistic completeness than the production of greater