Chapter 25

It may be said that the Violin made its appearance about the middle of the sixteenth century. There are instances where reference is made to Violins and Violin-playing in connection with times prior to that above-named, but no reliance can be placed on the statements. Leonardo da Vinci, who died in 1523, is spoken of as having been a celebrated performer on the Violin. The instrument he used is described as having had a neck of silver, with the singular addition of a carved horse's head.[1] This description, however, is sufficiently anomalous to make one rather sceptical, as to whether the instrument denoted possessed any particular affinity to the present Violin. Reference is made to the picture of the "Marriage at Cana," by Paolo Veronese, as furnishing evidence of the form of instruments used in Italy in the 16th century, and a description is given of the musical part of the subject as follows: "In the foreground, in the vacant space of the semicircle formed by the table, at which the guests of the marriage at Cana are seated, Titian is playing on the Double-Bass, Paolo Veronese and Tintoretto on the Violoncello; a man with a cross on his breast is playing on the Violin, Bassano is blowing the Flute, and a Turkish slave the Sackbut."

[Footnote 1: "Lives of Haydn and Mozart," translated from the French by L. A. C. Bombet. 1818.]

The naming of the performers is presumably correct, and greatly heightens our interest in the group musically. It is clear, however, that the nomenclature of the instruments is erroneous. In the engraved section of the famous picture here given, Paolo Veronese is represented taking part in the performance of a Madrigal, wearing an expression of countenance indicative of rapt pleasure, engendered by the mingling of the tones of his Tenor Viol in the harmonies. Behind Paolo Veronese is seated Tintoretto, playing an instrument identical with that in the hands of the painter of the picture. On the opposite side of the table is Titian, with the point of his bow almost touching the dog, playing the fundamental tones on the Violono. He apparently displays an amount of real relish for his task, which bespeaks a knowledge of the responsibility belonging to the post of Basso. The ecclesiastic seated next to Titian, wearing the chain with crucifix, is performing on a Soprano Viol. The instruments, in short, are Italian Viols, the Tenors of which were strung with six strings, and the Violono, or Bass, with six or seven. It is this order of Viols to which reference is made in the work of Ganassi del Fontego, and they are, therefore, distinct from the four-stringed Viols made at Brescia and Mantua.

The earliest player on the Violin of whom we have any account worthy of attention was Baltazarini, a native of Piedmont. He removed to France in the year 1577, whither he was sent by Marshal de Brissac to superintend the music of Catherine de Medici. He was probably the introducer of Italian dances into Paris, and he delighted the Court as much by his skill on the Violin as by his writing of ballet music.

During the last half of the sixteenth century a new species of music made way in Italy which exercised a marked effect on the progress of the Violin, namely, that of the concert orchestra. It was chiefly cultivated at Venice and Ferrara. At the latter place the Duke of Ferrara maintained a great number of musicians in his service. At this period there were no concerts of a public character; they were given in the palaces of the wealthy, and the performers were chiefly those belonging to their private bands.

The opera, in which instruments were used to accompany the voice, began to be put upon the stage of the public theatres in Italy about the year 1600. The opera "Orfeo," by Claudio Monteverde, a Cremonese, famous both as a composer and Violist, was represented in 1608. The opera in those times differed essentially from that of modern days. Particular instruments were selected to accompany each character; for instance, ten Treble Viols to accompany Eurydice, two Bass Viols to Orpheus, and so on. No mention is made of Violins further than that two small Violins (duoi Violini piccoli alla Francese) are to accompany the character of Hope, from which it is inferred that a band of Violins was in use not much later.

It is to the introduction of the Sonata that the rapid progress in the cultivation of Violin-playing is due. Dr. Burney tells us the earliest Sonatas or Trios for two Violins and a Bass he discovered were published by Francesco Turini, organist of the Duomo, at Brescia, under the following title: "Madrigali a una, due, e tre voci, con alcune Sonate a due e a tre, Venezia, 1624." He says: "I was instigated by this early date to score one of these Sonatas, which consisted of only a single movement in figure and imitation throughout, in which so little use was made of the power of the bow in varying the expression of the same notes, that each part might have been as well played on one instrument as another."

In this branch of composition Corelli shone forth with considerable lustre, and gave great impetus to the culture of the Violin. It was at Rome that his first twelve Sonatas were published, in 1683. In 1685 the second set appeared, entitled "Balletti da Camera"; four years later the third set was published. The genius of Corelli may be said to have revolutionised Violin-playing. He had followers in the chief cities of Italy. There was Vitali at Modena, Visconti at Cremona (who, it is said, tendered his advice to Stradivari upon the construction of his instruments--advice, I think, little needed); Veracini at Bologna, and a host of others. Dibdin, the Tyrtaeus of the British navy, said: "I had always delighted in Corelli, whose harmonies are an assemblage of melodies. I, therefore, got his Concertos in single parts, and put them into score, by which means I saw all the workings of his mind at the time he composed them; I so managed that I not only comprehended in what manner the parts had been worked, but how, in every way, they might have been worked. From this severe but profitable exercise, I drew all the best properties of harmony, and among the rest I learnt the valuable secret, that men of strong minds may violate to advantage many of those rules of composition which are dogmatically imposed."

We must now retrace our steps somewhat, in order to allude to another Violinist, who influenced the progress of the leading instrument out of Italy, viz., Jean Baptiste Lulli. The son of a Tuscan peasant, born in the year 1633, Lulli's name is so much associated with the romantic in the history of Violin-playing that he has been deprived in a great measure of the merits justly his due for the part he took in the advancement of the instrument. The story of Lulli and the stew-pans[2] bristles with interest for juvenile musicians, but the hero is often overlooked by graver people, on account of his culinary associations. When Lulli was admitted to the Violin band of Louis XIV., he found the members very incompetent; they could not play at sight, and their style was of the worst description. The king derived much pleasure from listening to Lulli's music, and established a new band on purpose for the composer, namely, "Les petits Violons," to distinguish it from the band of twenty-four. He composed much music for the Court ballets in which the king danced.

[Footnote 2: Lulli having shown a disposition for music, received some instructions on the rudiments of the art from a priest. The Chevalier de Guise, when on his travels in Italy, had been requested by Mademoiselle de Montpensier, niece of Louis XIV., to procure for her an Italian boy as page, and happening to see Lulli in Florence, he chose him for that purpose, on account of his wit and vivacity, and his skill in playing on the guitar. The lady, however, not liking his appearance, sent him into her kitchen, where he was made an under scullion, and amused himself by arranging the stew-pans in tones and semitones, upon which he would play various airs, to the utter dismay of the cook.]

Lulli contributed greatly to the improvement of French music. He wrote several operas, and many compositions for the Church, all of which served to raise the standard of musical taste in France. To him also belongs the credit of having founded the French national opera.

We will now endeavour to trace the progress of the Violin in England. It is gratifying to learn that, even in the primitive age of Violin-playing, we were not without our national composers for the instrument. Dr. Benjamin Rogers wrote airs in four parts for Violins so early as 1653 (the year Corelli was born). John Jenkins wrote twelve sonatas for two Violins and a Bass, printed in London in 1660, which were the first sonatas written by an Englishman. About this date Charles II. established his band of twenty-four Violins. During his residence on the Continent he had frequent opportunities of hearing the leading instrument, and seems to have been so much impressed with its beauties that he set up for himself a similar band to that belonging to the French Court. The leader was Thomas Baltzar, who was regarded as the best player of his time. Anthony Wood met Baltzar at Oxford, and says he "saw him run up his fingers to the end of the finger-board of the Violin, and run them back insensibly, and all in alacrity and in very good time, which he nor any one in England saw the like before." Wood tells us that Baltzar "was buried in the cloister belonging to St. Peter's Church in Westminster." The emoluments attached to the Royal band, according to Samuel Pepys, appear to have been somewhat irregular. In the Diary, December 19, 1666, we read: "Talked of the King's family with Mr. Kingston, the organist. He says many of the musique are ready to starve, they being five years behindhand for their wages; nay, Evens, the famous man upon the Harp, having not his equal in the world, did the other day die for mere want, and was fain to be buried at the alms of the parish, and carried to his grave in the dark at night without one linke, but that Mr. Kingston met it by chance, and did give 12d. to buy two or three links."

The state of the Merry Monarch's exchequer in 1662, according to an extract from the Emoluments of the Audit Office, seems to have been singularly prosperous. An order runs as follows: "These are to require you to pay, or cause to be paid, to John Bannister, one of His Majesty's musicians in ordinary, the sum of forty pounds for two Cremona Violins, by him bought and delivered for His Majesty's service, as may appear by the bill annexed; and also ten pounds for strings for two years ending 24th June, 1662."

The King's band was led in 1663 by the above-named John Bannister, who was an excellent Violinist. His name is associated with the earliest concerts in England, namely, those held at "four of the clock in the afternoon" at the George Tavern, in Whitefriars. Roger North informs us the shopkeepers and others went to sing and "enjoy ale and tobacco," and the charge was one shilling and "call for what you please."

In the year 1683, Henry Purcell, organist of the Chapel Royal, published twelve sonatas for two Violins and a Bass. These famous instrumental compositions were written, the author tells us, in "just imitation of the most famed Italian masters, principally to bring the seriousness and gravity of that sort of musick into vogue." Purcell, in conformity with an age of dedications, thus addressed the Merry Monarch:--

"May it please your Majesty, I had not assum'd the confidence of laying ye following compositions at your sacred feet, but that, as they are the immediate results of your Majestie's Royal favour and benignity to me (which have made me what I am), so I am constrained to hope I may presume amongst others of your Majestie's over-obliged and altogether undeserving subjects that your Majesty will, with your accustomed clemency, vouchsafe to pardon the best endeavours of your Majestie's

"Most humble and obedient subject and servant, "H. PURCELL."

Charles II. is said to have understood his notes, and to sing in (in the words of one who had sung with him) a plump bass, but that he only looked upon music as an incentive to mirth, not caring for any that he could not "stamp the time to." The endeavour of his accomplished and gifted young organist to lead the King and his people to admire what he terms "the seriousness and gravity" of Italian music, and "to loathe the levity and balladry of our neighbours," was indeed worthy of England's greatest musician.

In the year 1678, Thomas Britton, known as the "musical small-coal man," gave concerts in this country, and a long series it was, extending over a period of forty-six years. The shape the movement took was that of a musical club, which was maintained at Britton's expense.

The concert-room of Tom Britton was over his coal-shop in Aylesbury Street, leading from Clerkenwell Green to St. John Street. From the year 1678 to the time of his death, in 1714, the concerts of Britton were attended by persons of all ranks.

"Tho' mean thy rank, yet in thy humble cell, Did gentle peace and arts unpurchased dwell. Well pleased, Apollo thither led his train, And Music warbled in her sweetest strain. Cyllenius too, so fables tell, and Jove Came willing guests to poor Philemon's grove. Let useless pomp behold, and blush to find So low a station, such a liberal mind."[3]

[Footnote 3: These verses were written by Mr. John Hughes, who was a frequent performer on the Violin at Britton's concerts. (Hawkins.)]

Thus the first germ of the great musical societies gave a marked impulse to the culture of stringed music in England. Attention was turned to the subject; its humanising effects were recognised, and parties met in several places for the practice of chamber music. Our progress in Violin-playing at this date was clearly satisfactory. We had a Violinist named John Henry Eccles, belonging to a clever family of musicians. He became a member of the band of Louis XIV., and was regarded as an excellent player and musician. He published in Paris some solos for the Violin in 1720. His brother Thomas was also a good Violinist. Fortune, however, did not smile upon him. He is described as being one of those itinerant musicians--perhaps the last of them--who in winter evenings went to taverns, and for a slender subsistence bore the insults of those disinclined to listen to their performance. This order of itinerant musicians may be described as having descended from the Fiddling minstrels, whom the wealthy in earlier times often retained in their houses, giving them coats and badges bearing the family arms. These musicians, in place of amusing the nobility, ultimately attended wakes and fairs. They were sometimes retained at the large inns, where the guest while eating, an old English writer says, was "offered music, which he may freely take or refuse, and if he be solitary the musicians will give him the good day, with music in the morning." In Puritan times this class of musician was thought to have so much increased as to need a special act for their suppression, which gave rise to Butler's creation, the "Champion Crowdero." Returning to our subject with Thomas Eccles, we have the following interesting account of the unfortunate Violinist, by a musician: "It was about the month of November, 1753, that I, with some friends, were met to spend the evening at a tavern in the City, when this man, in a mean but decent garb, was introduced to us by the waiter; immediately upon opening the door I heard the twang of one of his strings from under his coat, which was accompanied by the question, 'Gentlemen, will you please to hear my music?' Our curiosity, and the modesty of the man's deportment, inclined us to say yes, and music he gave us, such as I had never heard before, nor shall again under the same circumstances. With as fine and delicate a hand as I ever heard, he played the whole fifth and ninth solos of Corelli, and two songs of Mr. Handel; in short, his performance was such as would command the attention of the nicest ear, and left us his auditors much at a loss to guess what it was that constrained him to seek his living in a way so disreputable. He made no secret of his name; he said he was the youngest of three brothers, and that Henry, the middle one, had been his master, and was then in the service of the King of France. He lodged in the Butcher Row, near Temple Bar, and was well known to the musicians of his time, who thought themselves disgraced by this practice of his, for which they have a term of reproach not very intelligible; they call it _going a-busking_."[4]

[Footnote 4: The term "busker" is still applied to musicians who perform outside public-houses, on steamboats, and elsewhere.]

I have now to mention a Violinist whose talents raised the instrument greatly, particularly in England, viz., Francesco Geminiani. He was instructed by Corelli, and imbibed much of his master's breadth of style. He came to England in the year 1714. In 1716 he published a set of twelve sonatas, which attracted some notice at the time from their novelty. In these he plunged into difficulties deemed then very unusual, but withal his compositions were elegantly written. He afterwards wrote and published solos and concertos, besides a "Treatise on Good Taste," and the "Art of Playing on the Violin," the latter being the first instruction book for the instrument deserving of the name. The instrumental music at this period was composed for four Violins, Tenor, Violoncello, and Double-Bass, and was called the Concerto Grosso.

Having lightly sketched the progress of the Violin in England down to about the year 1750, it will, perhaps, be better to take the thread of the instrument's progress in Italy, which we brought to the days of Corelli.

The first half of the 18th century was rich in Italian Violinists and writers for the instrument, of whom the chief was Giuseppe Tartini, born 1692. Dr. Burney says of his compositions: "Though he made Corelli his model in the purity of his harmony and simplicity of his modulation, he greatly surpassed that composer in the fertility and originality of his invention; not only in the subjects of his melodies, but in the truly _cantabile_ manner of treating them. Many of his _adagios_ want nothing but _words_ to be excellent pathetic opera songs. His _allegros_ are sometimes difficult; but the passages fairly belong to the instrument for which they were composed, and were suggested by his consummate knowledge of the finger-board and the powers of the bow. As a harmonist he was, perhaps, more truly scientific than any other composer of his time, in the clearness, character, and precision of his Basses, which were never casual, or the effect of habit or auricular prejudice and expectation, but learned, judicious, and certain." It would be difficult to add to this judgment of the compositions of Tartini. The truth of Burney's remarks is better understood at this moment than when penned. During the space of nearly a century the sonatas of Tartini lay dormant, and only within recent years have their beauties been again recognised. Such works as Tartini's are all-important links in the chain of musical progress.

Pietro Locatelli, a pupil of Corelli, introduced a style of playing quite in advance of his time. His compositions abound with novel combinations; double stops, harmonics, and arpeggios are displayed with wonderful results. Burney says that "Locatelli had more hand, caprice, and fancy than any Violinist of his time."

The immediate follower of the style of Locatelli was Lolli, born 1728, who wrote pleasing airs and used novel effects, but failed to go further. It was one of his feats to play on one string--a performance very properly held in contempt in our day, having neither sense nor grace to recommend it.

Felice Giardini was another musician of the style of Locatelli.[5] He was born at Turin, in the year 1716. His performance at Naples and Berlin excited considerable notice. In 1742 he visited England, and created some sensation, his style being new to the British public.

[Footnote 5: In "Les Maitres Classiques," edited by M. Alard, and the "Hohe Schule," edited by Ferdinand David, will be found some of the best examples of this composer, as well as of many others noticed here.]

Boccherini probably did more towards furthering the cultivation of stringed instrument music than any composer of his day, with the exception of Haydn. There are in his compositions movements of varied styles, well written for their respective instruments. His quintettes are among his chief productions, and their elegance and brilliancy are remarkable. The part allotted to his own instrument, the Violoncello, often bristles with difficulties, and hence it is that these compositions are so seldom heard. Boccherini was the first composer who wrote quintettes with two Violoncello parts.

We now reach a stage in the history of the progress of the Violin the importance of which cannot be over-estimated; I refer to the influence which the compositions of Giovanni Battista Viotti exerted upon the cultivation of our instrument. With the famous Viotti sprang up a school of Violin-playing as marked in style as that introduced by Corelli. Viotti was a pupil of Pugnani, and owed his success to the rare teaching of that master. The sensation that Viotti created in Paris was great. His varied style, his rich tone and elegance in playing, were far beyond anything that the Parisian public had previously experienced. With Viotti was ushered in a new era in solo playing. His concertos exhibit the capabilities of the instrument in elegantly constructed passages, such as none but a master of the Violin could pen. He wrote upwards of twenty concertos, those in A minor, in G, in D, and in E minor being the favourites, and to this day highly esteemed by Violinists of every school. His duos and trios are pleasing and effective, and, though long since superseded by works of greater erudition, they form a landmark in the history of the progress of the instrument.

Campagnoli, born in 1751, was a composer of rare ability. Had he written nothing but the "Studies on the Seven Positions of the Violin" he would have left enough to mark the character of his genius. Happily he has bequeathed to us many other writings. The "Fantasias and Cadences," forming a book of upwards of 100 pages, is a work full of interest to the Violinist. His modulations are singularly effective. He has also written some Studies for the Tenor, and, lastly, a "Violin School." I cannot but think that Campagnoli's educational compositions do not receive the attention which they merit, and are too often laid aside as old-fashioned. There is a certain quaintness in his writings, but this much may be said of many other compositions whose beauties are not neglected on that account. It would be difficult to find material more solid than that afforded by the writings of Campagnoli, if the foundation of Violin-playing of the highest character is to be laid.