Chapter XIV: Musicke in Merrie England

You will recall how far away England was in the 16th century from Rome, the Pope, and the other nations. Not that it has been pushed any nearer now, but the radio, the aeroplane and the steamship have made it seem closer. In the 16th century it took a long time to reach the people of the continent, and for this reason England seemed to many to have little musical influence, but in reality it had much for it was forced to develop what it found at home.

About 1420, John Dunstable wrote beautiful motets, canzonas and other secular music in the contrapuntal style of his period. He is supposed to have held a post in the Chapel Royal, founded during the reign of Henry IV, and to have taken part in the musical services held to celebrate Henry’s victories in France.

Then came the War of the Roses between the Houses of York and Lancaster, and musical composition in England was checked for the sake of war-making. Yet, the Chapel Royal was maintained and the universities gave degrees to students of music. Judging from the number of singing guilds and cathedral choirs, and from the amount of singing and organ playing, music, even in spite of war, seemed to have its innings.

In the 16th century England made such strides forward that she holds a high place in the growth of music. England loved the keyboard instruments such as the virginal, and in this century, developed her own way of making a delightful combination of polyphony and harmony with the new music for the Protestant Church service.

BLUFF PRINCE HAL

Right here came the Reformation of the English Church under Henry VIII of the six wives. In 1535 he wanted to divorce his first wife, Catherine of Aragon, to marry Anne Boleyn, her lady in waiting, which the Pope would not permit him to do, as the Roman Catholic Church prohibits divorce. So, like Germany and Switzerland, England cut herself off from the Pope and founded the English or Anglican Church with the King as its head. You can imagine the excitement this caused, can’t you? People lost their heads in very truth, for what they thought right and religious, some of the rulers called sacrilegious and heretical.

Breaking away from the Church of Rome gave English music a great push forward, for, the Mass (the musical setting of the main part of the service), the motet (the particular lines of the particular day) and the plain song (which ministers intoned), were discontinued, and for these were substituted, after Henry VIII’s reign, the Church “Services” founded on the Elizabethan Prayer book. On this book, still in use, the new music was written and included such compositions as would fit this Liturgy (prayers), the Litany, Creed, Psalms, Canticles (line verses), and the Communion, the Plain Song, Versicles and Responses. Then, too, came hymn tunes and anthems. Among the composers of these in the Elizabethan reign were John Shepherd, John Marbeck, Robert Whyte, Richard Farrant, William Byrd and John Bull.

But let us go back to Bluff Prince Hal (Henry VIII), who was good to music. Not only did he love it, but he played and composed himself. One of his pieces is called _The King’s Balade_, or _Passetyme with Goode Companie_ and the pastimes of this monarch were many. Read this list, set down by one who knew him: “He spent his time in shooting, singing, dancing, wrestling, casting of the bar, playing at the recorders (a reed instrument), flute, virginals (the English spinet) in setting songs and making ballads.” So with eating and sleeping and attending to affairs of state and to his many wives as they came along, he must have had plenty to do! How many kings and governors today write music as a “passetyme”?

In 1526 he had a band of players, says Edmundstoune Duncan in his _Story of Minstrelsy_, “composed of fifteen trumpets, three lutes, three rebecks, one harp, two viols, ten sackbuts, a fife, and four drumslades”; a few years later a trumpet, a lute, three minstrels, and a player of the virginals were added. (A rebeck is an early form of violin; a sackbut is a reed instrument with a sliding piece such as we have today in the trombone; the drumslade is an old word for drum.)

Anne Boleyn, second of King Henry’s many wives, loved music and dancing, and she too tried her hand at composing, to which fact her _O death, rocke me on slepe_ is proof. It is said that “she doated on the compositions of Josquin and Mouton,” and that she made collections of them for herself and her companions.

Up to this time there was no English Bible and only Latin and Greek versions were used. The Church did not consider it proper for the common people to read the Scriptures. The Priests wanted to read and interpret it to them instead. You remember, too, one of the reasons that the Reformation took place in Germany was because Luther wanted to let the people think for themselves, read their Bible, and choose their own ways of worshipping and interpreting it. The same feeling crept into England, and William Tyndale made the first English Translation of the New Testament (1538). Soon the Psalms were translated and set to music to any air from a jig to a French dance tune! The gayer the air the more popular the Psalm!

CHAINED LIBRARIES

Because the Protestants did not want anything left that had been part of the old religion in England, a rather dreadful thing happened. The monasteries were either destroyed or their libraries and organizations were discontinued. On account of this, many fine manuscripts of music and poetry were lost, for as you know, the monks copied out, with much effort, the literature of their day, and these painstaking glorious bits of hand work were kept in the monasteries.

There are today four chained libraries in England, two of which are at Hereford, the old city that holds yearly musical festivals of the “Three Choirs.” The books are on the old chains and may be taken down and read on the desk below the shelves, as they were hundreds of years ago! Here they are, in the cloisters, a great collection of treasures beyond price, just as the medieval scholars read them in days when books were the costliest of luxuries, three hundred volumes dating back to the 12th century. The earliest manuscript is the _Anglo Saxon Gospels_ which was written about 800 A.D. One of the greatest treasures is a Breviary (prayer book) with music (1280)—the plain-song notation as clear and as easy to read as modern print.

As something had to take the place of monasteries, the universities became the centers for study and the cultivation of music. As far back as 866, King Alfred founded the first chair of music at Oxford! Do you remember that this was the time of the bards and minstrels? We do not seem very old in America, when we think of a college with a chair of music eleven hundred years ago!

Before the printers were expelled from England, Wynken de Worde, printed the first song book (1530) which contained pieces by men important at the time: Cornyshe, Pygot, Gwinneth, Robert Jones, Dr. Cooper, and Fayrfax.

MUSIC FOR THE NEW CHURCH

As the kingdom changed its king at the death of each monarch, the country swayed from Catholicism to Protestantism and back again, and many a poet and musician lost his head or was burnt at the stake because he wrote for the Protestant Church. In the case of Marbeck who had made music for the _Book of Common Prayer_, he just escaped death for the crime of writing a _Bible_ concordance (an index)!

Before Wynken de Worde’s song book came out, William Caxton, the great printer, published a book called _Polychronicon_ by Higden. In this, was an account of Pythagoras and his discovery of tone relations (Chapter IV); this proves the great interest in England for the science, as well as the art, of music.

In Frederick J. Crowest’s book, _The Story of the Art of Music_, he tells very simply the state of music in England at this time:

“When the adventurous Henry VIII plunged into and consummated (completed) the reformation scheme, it was at the expense of considerable inconvenience to musicians obliged, perforce, to change their musical manners as well as their faith. In double quick time the old ecclesiastical (church) music had to be cast aside, and new church music substituted.... This meant pangs and hardships to the musicians, possibly not too industrious, accustomed to the old state of things. Simplicity, too, was the order, a change that must have made musicians shudder when they, like others before them, from the time of Okeghem, had regarded the Mass as the natural and orthodox (correct) vehicle for the display of the contrapuntal miracles they wrought.”

Now the Mass became the “Service,” and the motet was turned into the “Anthem,” which we still use in our churches. Most of the famous composers of the 16th and 17th centuries in England wrote for the new Anglican or Protestant Church, and made the new music lovely indeed. Many of them were organists or singers in the Chapel Royal, so they had been well prepared for their work.

To make this new music different from the old, the writers were ordered to fit every syllable with a chord (in the harmonic style). In the old counterpoint, of course, the words were somewhat blurred. These experiments with chords did much to free music for all time.

One of the earliest of the church composers is Thomas Tallis (about 1520–1585), a “Gentleman of the Chapel Royal” and father of English cathedral music. Through his long career, Tallis followed the different religions of the rulers from Henry VIII to Elizabeth, writing Catholic music or Protestant as was needed. You see he liked his head, so he changed his music with each new monarch. He, like some of the composers of the Netherlands school, wrote a motet for forty voices.

He shared with his pupil, William Byrd, the post of organist of the Chapel Royal, and together they opened a shop “to print and sell music, also to rule, print and sell music paper for twenty-one years” under a patent granted by Queen Elizabeth to them only. How successful the two composers were in the publishing business is not stated, but at least they could publish as many of their own works as they cared to! After Tallis’ death, in 1585, for a while Byrd ran the shop alone, and published a collection of _Psalms, Sonets, and Songs of Sadness and Pietie_. In this was written “Eight reasons briefly set down by the Author (Byrd) to persuade every one to learn to sing” to which he added:

Since singing is so goode a thing
I wish all men would learne to sing.

FAMOUS OLD MUSIC COLLECTIONS

England was the land of famous music collections in the 16th and 17th centuries. The first of these by Byrd was a book of Italian Madrigals with English words, _Musica Transalpina_, (Music from across the Alps). The entire title was (Don’t laugh!): “_Musica Transalpina_; Madrigals translated of foure, five, and sixe parts, chosen out of diuers excellent Authors, with the first and second part of _La Virginella_, made by Maister Byrd vpon two Stanz’s of Ariosto and brought to speak English with the rest. Published by N. Yonge, in fauer of such as take pleasure in Musick of voices. Imprinted at London by Thomas Easy, the assigne of William Byrd, 1588. _Cum Privilegio Regise Maiestatis_ (With permission of her Royal Majesty).” A long title and one that would not make a book a “bestseller” today! Do notice how they mixed u’s and v’s and put in e’s where you least expect them!

There were fifty-seven madrigals in the long titled collection including the two by “Maister Byrd”; the others were by the Italian and Netherland madrigal writers, such as Palestrina, Orlandus Lassus and Ferabosco, a composer of masques and madrigals, who lived for years in England.

Byrd’s compositions in this work mark the beginning of the great English school of madrigals, which were so lovely that this period (1560 to 1650) was called the “Golden Age.”

THE GOLDEN AGE OF MADRIGALS

Now the madrigal becomes the great English contribution to music. It was a part-song in free contrapuntal style and the music was made to fit the words. For the first time, secular music was held in great honor, and prepared the way for arias, dramatic solos and original melodies.

After Byrd and Edwards, came other madrigal writers: Thomas Morley, John Dowland, George Kirby, Thomas Ford, Thomas Ravenscroft, Orlando Gibbons and others.

While the madrigal was being written in England and elsewhere, the part-song was being written in Germany. It was the companion of the chorale, as the madrigal was the secular partner of the motet. The chorale was written for part singing, had a continuous melody and the same air was used for all stanzas. In this the church modes were never used, yet, it is baffling sometimes to tell a madrigal from a part-song.

In Italy the _villanella_, or _villota_ is a part-song. In France it was the _chanson_, in England it was the madrigal or the _glee_.

“THE TRIUMPHS OF ORIANA”

Monarchs, besides ruling the country, inspired poets and composers from earliest times, and Queen Elizabeth was no exception. _The Triumphs of Oriana_ is a collection of madrigals by many English composers in praise of Queen Elizabeth, made by Thomas Morley. Because William Byrd does not appear in it, it looks as if this collection had been published to show Byrd that the English could write good madrigals, too. Anyhow, it definitely proves that the English madrigals are as charming as the French, Italian or Flemish. There is a copy of the original edition in the British Museum.

MAISTER BYRD GIVES ADVICE

In 1611, an important work of Byrd’s appeared called _Psalms, Songs and Sonets: some solemne, others joyfull, framed to the life of the words: Fit for Voyces or Viols_. In the dedication, the composer gives this good advice: “Onely this I desire; that you will be but as carefull to heare them well expressed, as I have beene both in the composing and correcting of them. Otherwise the best Song that euer was made will seeme harsh and vnpleasant.... Besides a song that is well and artificially made cannot be well perceived nor vnderstood at the first hearing, but the oftner you shall heare it, the better cause of liking it you will discouer; and commonly the Song is best esteemed with which our eares are best acquainted.”

Over the door of the music hall in Oxford University, is a canon (or round) for three voices, said to have been written by William Byrd. Some day, if you have not already seen it, you will have the thrilling experience of visiting the venerable college, and you may remember to look for this canon.

LADIES OF THE REALM PLAY VIRGINALS

As today we consider no home complete without a piano (or pianoforte which is its real name), so in the 16th and 17th centuries we would have found a little key board instrument so small that it could easily be swallowed whole by one of our grand pianos, and you would never know where it had disappeared! It was known by several names,—spinet, clavecin, and virginal or virginals. Another instrument belonging to the same family and period is the harpsichord, which is more like our grand piano in shape. But later we will tell you more of the pianoforte’s family tree, and of its tiny but important grand-parent.

It was quite the proper thing for all the ladies of the realm to play the virginals, and the Queens, Mary, Elizabeth, and Mary, Queen of Scots, were excellent performers.

The very first music printed for the virginals in England was called _Parthenia_ (from the Greek word Parthenos, meaning unmarried woman or virgin). The printed title also tells us that it was “composed by three famous masters, William Byrd, Dr. John Bull and Orlando Gibbons Gentilmen of his Majesties most illustrious Chappell.” There are twenty-one pieces from the old dances which formed the Suites, of which you will soon hear,—Preludiums, Pavanes, Galiardes, a Fantasia, and one _The Queene’s Command_. It was published in 1611, on staves of six lines, instead of five, as we use, and it was the first musical work engraved on copper plates!

MORE FAMOUS COLLECTIONS

Another most valuable collection was for many years called _Queen Elizabeth’s Virginal Book_, but is now the _Fitzwilliam Virginal Book_, and the original manuscript is in the Fitzwilliam museum at Cambridge. It was supposed to have been “Good Queen Bess’” book, but it was not, as some of its compositions were composed after her death. It is not known who copied 220 pages of music, but it may have been a wealthy Roman Catholic, Francis Tregian, who spent twenty-four years in prison on account of his religious faith. This name, abbreviated or in initials, is found in several places in the manuscript. An edition in our notation has been made by J. A. Fuller Maitland and W. Barclay Squire. Many of the old songs of English minstrelsy are found among the numbers, and they were arranged for the instrument by the famous composers of that day. There are also original compositions as well as “ayres” and variations. Among the composers we find Dr. John Bull, Thomas Morley, William Byrd, Orlando Gibbons, Giles Farnaby, Richard Farnaby, Thomas Tallis, Jan Sweelinck, the Dutch organist, and many others. Here are some of the quaint titles: _St. Thomas’ Wake_, _King’s Hunt_, _The Carman’s Whistle_, _The Hunt’s Up_, _Sellonger’s Round_, _Fortune My Foe_, _Pawles Warfe_, _Go from My Window_, _Bonny Sweet Robin_, besides many Pavanes, Galiardes, Fantasias, and Preludiums.

There is also a collection of Byrd’s virginal music called _My Lady Nevell’s Booke_. Lady Nevell may have been a pupil of Byrd. There are two collections of this same kind at Buckingham Palace, the home of the King of England,—_Will Forster’s Virginal Book_ and _Benjamin Cosyn’s Virginal Book_. In the index of the latter, we read: “A table of these Lessons following made and sett forth by Ben Cos.” In all, he copied more than 90 compositions!

Later came John Playford, music publisher, whose first musical publication, _The English Dancing-Master_ (1650), contains almost a hundred old folk tunes. _Select Musical Ayres_ appeared three years later, and is a typical 17th century song collection of first-class poems by Jonson, Dryden and others set to music by well-known composers. His book on the theory of music, used for almost a century, contained “lessons” for the viol, the cithern and flageolet. His _Dancing Master_, a collection of airs for violin for country dances, has brought to us many popular ballad tunes and dance airs of the period.

In these collections we often find the names _Fancies_, _Fantazia_, or _Fantasies_, a type of composition that grew out of the madrigal and led to the sonata. It was the name given to the first compositions for instruments alone like the _ricercari_ of the Italians, which were original compositions and not written on a given subject (called in England “ground”), or on a folk song. The _Fancies_ were sometimes written for the virginal, and sometimes for groups of instruments such as a “chest of viols” or even five cornets(!).

THE CHEST OF VIOLS

“Chest of Viols” may sound queer to you, but it isn’t! It was the custom in England at that time for people to have collections of instruments in or out of chests. So, when callers came they could play the viol, instead, probably of bridge! You can read about these interesting old days in Samuel Pepys’ _Diary_. He played the lute, the viol, the theorbo, the flageolet, the recorder (a kind of flute) and the virginal, and he was the proud owner of a chest of viols. He always carried his little flageolet with him in his pocket, and he says that while he was waiting in a tavern for a dish of poached eggs, he played his flageolet, also that he remained in the garden late playing the flageolet in the moonlight. (Poetic Pepys!)

Thomas Morley, Byrd’s pupil, who was made a partner in the publishing house after Tallis’s death, wrote his madrigals for virginal, and a collection called _First Book of Consort Lessons for Six Instruments, Lute, Pandora, Cittern_ (an old English form of guitar), _Bass Viol, Flute, and Treble Viol_, and much sacred music. He also wrote a _Plaine and Easie Introduction to Practical Musick_, a book of great value and interest to musicians for the last three centuries, for it is a mirror of his time and of his fellow composers.

He tells of a gentleman, who, after dinner, was asked by his hostess to sing from the music she gave him. It was the custom in England to bring out the music books after dinner and for the guests to play and sing, as we wind up our graphophones and switch on the radio. The gentleman stammeringly declared that he could not sing at sight and “everyone began to wonder; yea, some whispered to others, demanding how he was brought up.” He was so ashamed of his ignorance that he immediately took music lessons to remedy his woeful lack of culture. This proves that musical education was not looked upon as a luxury but a necessity in the 17th century.

Truly, it was a musical era, this time of Morley and Byrd! Fancy playing, while waiting for the barber, the viol, flute, lute, cittern, or virginal left for that purpose. Yet what would our dentist do today if he had to listen to a saxophone and jazz chorus from his waiting room? In those days, too, there was always a bass viol left in a drawing-room for the guest, to pass the time, waiting for the host to appear. Think of all the practising you could do waiting for the busy dentist or eternally late hostess!

The children of people who were poor, were taught music to make them fit to be “servants, apprentices or husbandmen.” Laneham, a groom who had been brought up in the royal stable, was advanced to the post of guarding the door of the council chamber and this is how he described his qualifications for the job: “Sometimes I foot it with dancing; now with my gittern, and else my cittern, then at the virginals (ye know nothing comes amiss to me); then carol I up a song withal; that by-and-by they come flocking about me like bees to honey; and ever they cry, ‘Another, good Laneham, another!’” (From _The Story of Minstrelsy_ by Edmundstoune Duncan.)

SHAKESPEARE AND MUSIC

This was the day in which Shakespeare lived, and from his plays we get a very good idea of the popular music of his time, for he used bits of folk songs and old ballads. _It was a Lover and his Lass_ from _As You Like It_ was set to music by Thomas Morley, and is one of the few songs written to Shakespeare’s words in his own day that has come down to us. In _Twelfth Night_ there is _O Mistress Mine_, _Hold thy Peace_, _Peg-a-Ramsey_, _O, London is a Fine Town_, _Three Merry Men be We_, and the Clown’s song:

Hey! Robin, jolly Robin,
Tell me how thy lady does, etc.

In the _Winter’s Tale_, _As You Like It_, _The Tempest_, _Merchant of Venice_, _Hamlet_, _Othello_ are folk songs that are very well known and loved. Two songs from _The Tempest_, _Where the Bee Sucks_ and _Full Fathoms Five_, were set to music by a composer, Robert Johnson, who lived at the same time as Shakespeare, but was not as famous as Morley, who also lived then. _O, Willow, Willow_, sung by Desdemona in _Othello_ is one of the most beautiful and saddest folk songs we know.

One Shakespeare song has been made famous by the beautiful music which the great German song writer, Schubert, wrote to it. It is from _Two Gentlemen of Verona_ and is called _Who is Sylvia?_

Many of the English composers of the 17th and 18th centuries such as Henry Purcell and Dr. Arne made music for the Shakespeare songs because they were so lovely and so well written that they almost sang themselves; this we call lyric verse.

Thomas Weelkes (1575?–1623) whose madrigals were included in _The Triumphs of Oriana_, also wrote many _Fancies for Strings_ which were the ancestors of the string quartets, the highest type of music.

CRYES OF LONDON

Several composers of this period, Thomas Weelkes, Orlando Gibbons (1583–1625) and Richard Deering (1580?–1630) wrote pieces using the old “Cryes of London” as their themes. Each trade had its own song, and the street pedlars used these tunes just as the fruit vendors, old-clothes men, and flower vendors cry their wares in our streets today. There is this difference, however; the street cries of today are mere noise, while the old “Cryes of London” were interesting and usually beautiful songs. _Cherry Ripe_ is one of them, and Campion used it in 1617 in his famous old song, _There is a Garden in Her Face_. Some of the composers made rounds and catches based on the “Cryes,” and Weelkes in his _Humorous Fancy_ used the songs of the chimney-sweep, the bellows-mender, and the vendors of fruit, fish and vegetables. In telling about this “fancy,” Frederick Bridge, a British composer and professor of music in Gresham College, says: “The Fancy at one point leaves its regular course, and for a few bars a delightful dance tune is introduced, to the words, whatever they mean, ‘Twincledowne Tavye.’ It is as if the vendors of fish, fruit and vegetables met in the street and had a bit of a frolic together.” Bridge also says that he thinks all lovers of Shakespeare will be glad to make the acquaintance of the music of the “Cryes of London” which saluted the poet’s ears in his daily walk.

Orlando Gibbons called his composition on the “cryes,” a _Burlesque Madrigal_, and beside the cries, he has used in one of the inner parts for viol, an old plain-song melody, a form used very often by the Italian madrigalists of the 16th century. Richard Deering’s _Humorous Fancy_, _The Cryes of London_, is the most elaborate of the three we have mentioned, having among many other tradesmen’s songs, those of the rat-catcher (this makes us think of Browning’s _Pied Piper of Hamelin_), the tooth-drawer, and the vendor of garlic.

SOME FAMOUS COMPOSERS

Orlando Gibbons was one of the composers of _Parthenia_. But he is famous as a composer of sacred music, in fact, he is looked upon as the greatest composer of the English contrapuntal school. His anthems are still sung in the English Cathedrals, and one of them made for James I, was sung, in part, at the coronations of both Edward VII and George V, and is now called the _Abbey Amen_.

Gibbons, Byrd and Bull were very fine organists. Gibbons was organist of Westminster Abbey, and we are told by a writer of his own day that “the organ was touched by the best finger of that age, Mr. Orlando Gibbons.”

Dr. John Bull (1563–1628) was brought up, as were many of the young English musicians, as one of the “Children of the Chapel Royal Choir.” Later he became organist and player to King James I. Bull left England, entered the service of a Belgian archduke, was organist at the Antwerp Cathedral, and when he died in 1628, he was buried there. In the University of Oxford, where Bull took his degree as Doctor of Music, is his portrait around which is written:

The Bull by force in field doth rayne
But Bull by skill good-will doth gaine.

John Milton, father of the great poet, was an important composer of this period. It is well known that his famous son was very fond of music, was a good musician himself, and had many friends among these composers and musicians.

The music for Milton’s famous Masque, _Comus_, was written by Henry Lawes (1595–1662) and was first produced in 1635. Lawes studied with an English composer named John Cooper who lived for so many years in Italy, that his name was translated into Giovanni Coperario. He turned the thoughts of his pupil to composing music for the stage, instead of church music. It looks as if Milton had been a pupil of Lawes, and had written _Comus_ specially for him.

Lawes played a very amusing joke upon the concert-goers. At that time, as now, many thought that the music of other countries, and songs in foreign languages were better than their own. While Lawes himself knew the Italian music very well, he was eager to compose music that should be truly English. In the preface to his _Book of Ayres_ he confessed: “This present generation is so sated with what’s native, that nothing takes their ears but what’s sung in a language which (commonly) they understand as little as they do the music. And to make them a little sensible of this ridiculous humor, I took a Table or Index of old Italian Songs and this _Index_ (_which read together made a strange medley of nonsense_) _I set to a varyed Ayre, and gave out that it came from Italy, whereby it has passed for a rare Italian song_.” (Quoted from Bridge’s _Twelve Good Musicians_.)

Lawes helped to compose a work that is looked upon as the first English opera, _The Siege of Rhodes_. This was played during the time of Oliver Cromwell and the Commonwealth, and in this piece for the first time in England, women appeared upon the stage.

A year after the Commonwealth was overthrown, Henry Lawes died and was buried in Westminster Abbey, but the spot where his body lies is not known.

From 1641 to 1660, music must have had a hard time for this was the period of the Commonwealth, when the country was going through all the horrors of civil war, and Cromwell’s soldiers destroyed many things of great artistic value, that could never be replaced. Among them were the works of art found in the wonderful old English cathedrals, including organs and musical manuscripts. At Westminster Abbey, the Roundheads (the name given to Oliver Cromwell’s soldiers) “brake down the organs for pots of ale.”

Matthew Locke (1630?–1677) is looked upon as the “Father of English Opera.” He wrote the music for _Psyche_ and _The Tempest_ (1673). Another Shakespeare play to which Locke wrote the music was _Macbeth_.

CAPTAIN COOKE’S CHOIR BOYS

Immediately after the Restoration, the Chapel Royal Choir was reorganized. For centuries it had been the great school of music for the sons of both rich and poor, and had produced nearly all the English musicians. Captain Henry Cooke, the first chapel master of the new choir, seems to have picked out unusually gifted children, some of whom wrote anthems while they were still in the Choir, and afterwards became very famous composers, among them John Blow, Pelham Humphrey and the great Henry Purcell. The Captain evidently knew how to train his boys!

Pelham Humphrey, having attracted the attention of the King, was sent to Paris to study with the famous opera composer, Lully. The effect of this study was felt in English music, as Humphrey was Purcell’s master at the Chapel Royal, after the death of the good Captain Cooke, and he introduced his new ideas to his talented little choir boys and musical friends. Samuel Pepys says that the visit to Paris made a snob of “little” Pelham Humphrey: “He is an absolute _Monsieur_, full of form and confidence and vanity, and disparages everything and everybody’s skill but his own. But to hear how he laughs at all the King’s Musick here, ... that they cannot keep time nor tune nor understand anything.”

Dr. John Blow (1648–1708) composed Anthems while still a choir boy, and at twenty-one was organist of Westminster Abbey. In 1674 he was Master of the Children of the Chapel Royal, and became its organist as well, without giving up his post at Westminster. During part of the time Purcell was at Westminster, and Blow was Almoner and Master of the choristers in St. Paul’s Cathedral. Think of filling three of the greatest positions in musical London at the same time! He wrote an Anthem, _I was Glad_, for the opening of St. Paul’s Cathedral in 1697.

He wrote many church compositions, masques, and pieces for harpsichord.

Purcell called him “one of the greatest masters in the world.” Like Monteverde, he tried out new effects in harmony and made new combinations which have since been called “crude,” but were signs of a musical daring and understanding that belong only to very gifted musicians.

He died in 1708 and is buried in Westminster Abbey.

MAISTER PURCELL

The last of the great 17th century English composers, and the greatest of them all, is Henry Purcell (1658–1695). His father was a well-known musician, and the uncle, who brought him up, was also a musician, so the young boy heard much music in his own home, and no doubt knew many composers.

Sir Frederick Bridge in _Twelve Good Musicians_ tells us that the Purcell family came from Tipperary in Ireland and that Henry’s father and uncle were Gentlemen in the Chapel Royal in London. Henry began his music studies at the age of six, for he, too, was one of “Captain Cooke’s boys,” and when he was twelve years old, “Maister Purcell” wrote a composition in honor of “His Majestie’s Birthday.”

The young Purcell, sometimes called the “English Mozart,” gained much from Pelham Humphrey who told him of Lully in France. After Humphrey’s early death (he was only twenty-seven), Purcell studied with Dr. Blow, and the two musicians were devoted comrades. Their tombs lie close together near the old entrance of the organ loft, where they must have spent many hours of their lives.

Matthew Locke was also a friend of Purcell’s, and probably did much to interest the young composer in the drama, for in spite of his early church training, Purcell’s greatest offering to English music was his opera writing. While Purcell’s are not operas in our sense of the word, they are the nearest thing to them that England had, before the Italians came with theirs in the 18th century. He wrote music to masques and plays, several of which were even called operas, yet only one really was an opera. Purcell’s music “was so far in advance of anything of the sort known in any part of Europe in his day, in point of dramatic and musical freedom and scenic quality, that one can only regret his early death’s preventing his taking to opera writing on a larger scale.” (W. F. Apthorp.) Among the things he put to music were the plays of Dryden and of Beaumont and Fletcher.

Purcell was one of the first English composers to use Italian musical terms, like _adagio_, _presto_, _largo_, etc. He was also one of the first composers to write compositions of three or four movements for two violins, ’cello and basso continuo, a part written for harpsichord or sometimes organ as an accompaniment to the other instruments. The name of this style of composition also came from the Italian, and was called _Sonata_. The first sonatas were composed by Italians. The word Sonata comes from an Italian word _suonare_ which means to sound, and was first given to works for instruments. Another form of composition is the Cantata, from _cantare_ which means to sing. It is a vocal composition with accompaniment of instruments, a direct descendant of the motet and madrigal, and of the early oratorios.

The Toccata, too, comes from the Italian _toccare_, meaning to touch, and was originally a work for instruments with keyboards. The Italian language gave us our musical names and terms, because Italian music was the model of what good music should be, and England, France and Germany copied Italian ways of composing. Everyone uses the Italian terms for musical expressions so that all nationalities can understand them.

When Purcell was only 17 years old, he composed an opera to be played by young ladies in a boarding school. This was _Dido and Æneas_, and it is so good that few writers on musical subjects believe that it was written in his youth.

In every branch of composition in which Purcell wrote, he excelled. His church music is the finest of his day, his chamber music and his operas are looked upon as works of genius. In fact, he is still considered the most gifted of all English composers.

He was only 37 when he died, and was a very great loss to the growth of English music.

Music Comes of Age