literature in the form of an original system of notation which was to abolish that at present in general use. Of this work he was very proud. But unhappily his method-which he applied to one or two classical compositions has been no more fortunate than that of Rousseau or than the curious shorthand of Beethoven himself. It revealed the true Strindberg, for it was personal and revolutionary. The music was written, if I mistake not, in figures.

This love of music makes itself felt in his works. In one of his best poems, 'The journey to town,' he introduces an elaborate description ofthe Appassionata' Sonata, which he deems Beethoven's greatest. He reads into it wonderful things; a depiction of the world and its travail, of the chaos which must precede the dawn of universal bliss. In the autobiographical 'Inferno' allusion is made to Schumann's 'Aufschwung.' A rustic organist is the central figure of one of the novels, and now and again there is much explanation of the structure of the organ and of the technical side of music. In the fine play 'Rausch' he obtains the right atmosphere by introducing a performance of Beethoven's Sonata in D minor (Op. 31, No. 3), and giving directions as to how it must be played. Later in the play the music breaks off, and only a few bars of the Finale are heard as though they were a fragment. It is the practising of a 'night bird.' A somewhat similar use is made of a Bach toccata in 'The Dream Play,' where it has to wage war with a popular waltz. In addition to these there are passing references, to the Entry of the Boyards,' for example, and such macabre titles as 'The Dance of Death' and 'The Spook Sonata' the latter a modern Trillo del Diavolo for aught I know.

One feels with Strindberg that he related music to life, that he saw in it something of the cosmic harmony which he sought so vigorously, and which somehow always eluded him. That one who had suffered so much and had been vouchsafed more than a glimpse into the abyss of the inferno received infinite solace by this means must remain a cause for rejoicing. And it is, perhaps, appropriate that the last impression which we have of the fighter who had weathered so many storms is an entirely peaceful one, and in it we see him surrounded by the things he loved best-his children, his flowers, and his music. D. C. PARKER.

ON LISTENING TO MUSIC: ANOTHFR
POINT OF VIEW.

BY C. EGERTON LOWE.

As a firm believer in the considerable musical and educational advantages to be gained from properlyconducted Musical Appreciation Classes, I should like to make a few remarks on the subject, apropos the article On Listening to Music,' by H. P. S., in the July number of the Musical Times.

worthiness as a work of art, be it even miniature in
its form, as, e.g., a Grieg song or lyric? It must
combine melody and rhythm with harmony and form;
and, if of any pretensions as regards length, it must
contain the more intellectual art-work of development.
Of these five component parts the average untrained
listener usually only appreciates two, viz., melody
and rhythm. But even here the beauty of 'balance'
in the rhythmic phrases which constitute or 'build up'
a perfect theme, the development perhaps of a tiny
figure or motive, and many another feature of interest
to the musician, are overlooked or disregarded by
those who have not been taught and trained how
to observe at the same time that they listen.
I know that I may be met by the argument that
the mere fact that a beautiful, simple tune appeals
with instantaneous effect to an untrained multitude
proves there is no necessity for analysing it or 'picking
it to pieces'; let us revel in the sheer ecstasy of
delight, let us, as I believe Mr. Stewart Macpherson
has put it, ""bask" in the sound in a merely passive
state of sensuous gratification.' But even in the case
of a simple tune much that is good and useful can
be taught in a class by contrasting the exquisite
melodic outlines of gems such as the folk-songs,
All through the night,' 'The bailiff's daughter,' and
hundreds of other national treasures, with the vulgar
banalities of trashy ballads and music-hall songs.
Musical appreciation, rightly understood, is practically
the only rational method of helping us to sift the
chaff from the wheat in music.

Melody on the old-fashioned lines is rapidly disappearing ; one can easily prove this by comparing the salon-music of to-day with that of the mid-Victorian age, or a modern ballad with those of some twenty years ago. With the great works, operas, symphonies, symphonic-poems, concertos, and such like, the difference is still more remarkable.

Assuredly an understanding of modern music is made much more possible and interesting to our students if we lead them on 'not only to appreciate the beauty of a symphony purely in its sound,' but, by analysing, 'further to value the constructive facts necessary for the composition of its beautiful sound.'

As Mr. H. E. Krehbiel states in his delightful work, 'How to Listen to Music'-a book which should be found in every music-lover's library: 'The capacity properly to listen to music is better proof of musical talent in the listener than skill to play upon an instrument or ability to sing acceptably when unaccompanied by that capacity.' Why then, may I ask, should the training of this musical talent be reserved solely for the professional musician? Wherein lies the difference between the professional and the amateur? By the mere taking or non-taking of fees? Of course not; some amateurs are far better musicians than many professionals. Just as every note in music can be placed as belonging to one of It may be that the author has not held any such two species-harmony notes and ornamental notesclasses himself, invited the opinions of teachers so also can every listener at a musical performance who have, or of students who have attended be relegated to one of two classes-musicians and them; for had he done so he would surely have ornamental listeners. The musician 'sees with his approached his subject from a different point of ears' the music which is being unfolded in his view. Speaking from a fairly considerable personal presence, not only its melody and rhythm, but its experience, I can safely assert that Musical harmony, structure, and development; in rare cases Appreciation Classes, as so enthusiastically advocated by a natural gift, more often by reason of right by Mr. Stewart Macpherson, inter alia, and Musical training. The average hearer only follows the tune Lectures in connection with the 'Home Music Study' and the lilt of the rhythm. and other Musical Unions, are creating an entirely new interest for the art; and if musical education is to advance in this country as it should do, it must continue on some such lines.

'H. P. S.' does not believe in educating the listener by leading him through the easy to the difficult, but would sooner see him 'plunged straight away into musical depths where the reason must drown and What are the chief elements of a great musical only the fancy float'! This strikes one as the most work-not necessarily great in length, but in amazing educational maxim ever perpetrated. When

to

should the education of the listener begin? When, 'does not benefit the promenade enthusiast to be able except with the very first lesson? The whole basis of to chatter glibly about second subjects, recapitulations, modern musical teaching lies in training the ear before developments, codas, and so forth.' Certainly, let it rather than after the eyes and fingers. Thousands be admitted, the enthusiast has not advanced far in are happily beginning to realise that the art of his subject if he places the recapitulation before listening is of even greater value than the art of playing the development! But with no knowledge of such or singing. The one, properly cultivated, lasts for a matters can the listener fully appreciate the beauty and lifetime; the other fails, more or less, with cessation genius displayed in the contrast of first and second of practice and advancing years. subjects-e.g., the masculine virility of the C minor Let me take a few of countless cases where Symphony first subject with the feminine tenderness knowledge, easily acquired, must serve to enhance of its second subject? Can he value at its true worth appreciation. Is it not somewhat of a reflection on the ingenuity the great Emperor-composer displays in past training methods that a large majority of those his marvellous powers of rhythmic development, the who attend church regularly cannot so much as delightful changes appearing in his recapitulations, and define the cadences or outline the forms of the simple the grandeur and nobility of his 'summing up' of the chants and hymn-tunes they hear every week? And previously-heard themes in his priceless codas? The yet nearly every girl, in the middle and upper classes untrained hearer might be likened, in most cases, to at least, is 'taught music' for a period averaging some a foreigner listening to the impassioned oration of a ten to fifteen years, and devotes more time daily great speaker, of which he could only understand a that particular practice than to any other few words here and there. He who listens to music single subject ! But how is she usually taught? with a musically untrained intellect, and without an Just to play; instead of being shown how and what appreciation or knowledge of the laws of construction, to observe, and how to listen intelligently. As a progression, and form, can gather no more information, beginning, let all young music-students write cadences, can reap no higher result than is gained by a child chants and hymn-tunes for themselves the melodies peeping into a kaleidoscope,' writes Sir John Stainer. only at first, and then harmonize them by degrees In the early days of sonata- or symphony-form it at the key-board; a new interest is almost invariably must undoubtedly have been taken for granted that invoked, which will not be satisfied until bigger things the hearer would intellectually follow the construction are attempted. The themes of dance-rhythms, gavottes, of the movement. For this reason the exposition was bourrées, sarabandes, valses, &c., can next be taken in invariably repeated, so that the two subjects should a similar manner. What a lesson, for instance, can become better known before the development began. be taught by comparing such a hymn - tune as As another instance, we find Mozart almost always O Sacred Head' (A. & M., No. III.) set to Bach's concluding his 'connecting episode' with a little immortal Passion Chorale, with its beautiful harmony, flourish of trumpets,' so as to prepare the listener variety of cadence, and modulation, with some of for the entry of the second subject. the more popular, sugary-sweet, monotonous doggerel tunes 'appreciated' unthinkingly by the million! How many ordinary listeners understand or are able to follow a fugue? Yet they go in their thousands to Handel Festivals and hear his glorious fugal choruses. It is unthinkable that those who are able to follow their construction do not derive more intense delight from hearing them, or taking part in them, than those to whom the word 'fugue' is a mere meaningless name. One hour devoted at a Musical Appreciation Class to a simple explanation of a fugue is of more lasting benefit than a whole term's music-lessons where nothing but the mere shallow display of performance is aimed at.

Take, again, the modern cadence, wherein harmonic change is perhaps more clearly perceptible than in any other one special form. Let a student be taught through all stages, the easiest to the advanced, to listen to cadences (in chants, hymn-tunes, songs, small pieces, and so on); to notice how these 'points of rest' serve to punctuate the phrase-rhythms; how, further, one phrase 'balances' another; how a phrase is here artistically elongated, and here unexpectedly curtailed; how the actual development of the cadence itself has proceeded from the well-nigh eternal V.-I., IV.—I., I.—V., V.-VI. formulæ of earlier days to its present often complicated but nevertheless very striking and original construction. With such guidance a student will revel in the wonderful beauty of a cadence such as, eg, that of Grieg's 'An den Frühling,' Op. 43 ('a thing of beauty and a joy for ever'), as much as does the most cultured musician. It is idle to dispute the fact that, as Holmes-Forbes has put it, 'Sentiment becomes more profound in proportion as it becomes more thoroughly pervaded by intellectual comprehension.'

We are told that it is 'better criticism' to compare a Beethoven work (presumably a sonata) with a cathedral' than to point out that 'the A flat Sonata (Op. 26) is not a sonata at all'; and again, that it

Not long ago at a Symphony Concert I heard a lady solemnly assure a friend by her side at the close of the first movement of a Beethoven Symphony that that was the end of the Symphony; and when the second movement began she was equally emphatic that that was the next item on the programme-which happened to be one of Elgar's 'Bavarian Dances'! She was very concerned because the promised interval was being omitted; but perhaps the lady pictured the Symphony as a church instead of a cathedral, and consequently mentally reduced its dimensions!

It must not be overlooked that when beholding 'the beauty of the Parthenon' one has the necessary time to take in and absorb its noble form and structure, and a mental picture is left indelibly impressed on the mind; even here, however, he who knows the history of this great ruin, who is able somehow to reconstruct in his mind's eye how it stood and dazzled in its glories two thousand years and more ago, has the advantage over him who merely looks upon it as an interesting pile of stones simpley because he knows nothing more about it. But, really, seeing and hearing are two things hardly admitting of comparison. Music moves on so quickly that where there is no acquaintanceship with form (in the very widest sense of the word) only a sensuous, as apart from an intellectual enjoyment can possibly be experienced. If we are listening, say, to Elgar's Symphony in A flat without any analysis, explanation or score, the music may give us an hour's delight from an æsthetic standpoint; but anything approaching complete appreciation of its great worth can only be attained by patient study of its detail and the interplay of its ideas.

In conclusion, surely it is a libel on a British audience to state that they do not care two straws' for the critic's attempt to explain to them the composer's work. If this be true, then indeed have we sunk low, and deserve to be stigmatised as a decadent, unmusical nation.

have an animated section all to themselves; and a big illustrations-in our next number. Many concertbroad passage to the words:

The diatonic character of the movement is maintained until it merges into an animated connecting passage in triple time, which leads to a resumption of the original theme of the opening, for some time mostly in unison and with a fuller and richer accompaniment, the striking tread of the pedal bass being again a feature of great interest. Later, the music softens down, and a passage low in pitch and in unison for all voices seems to be couching for a spring. It expands to a few bars of massive structure, which culminate in anff Amen of four bars, and bring the work to an impressive conclusion.

It will be seen that except so far as the beginning and end of the Anthem are related by the use of a theme, there is nothing very formal in the construction of the work, and there are few devices that can be described as contrapuntal, the music always faithfully and simply heightening and reflecting the moods of the verbal text.

This Anthem, it may be presumed, will form a welcome addition to ecclesiastical music. Its elaborateness compared with ordinary anthems is perhaps one of its chief recommendations, because there are not many compositions of the kind in modern musical idiom available for use on important occasions. Viewed relatively to much modern music the vocal parts cannot be said to be difficult, and the fact that the accompaniment is written for the organ only increases the possibility of the utility of the work.

THE EARLY HARMONIZED CHANTS OF
THE CHURCH OF ENGLAND.

BY S. ROYLE SHORE.

Museum, and the Rev. Dr. Jebb's monumental collection of Choral Uses should have at least put authors upon inquiry. Two partial exceptions, however, have been brought to the writer's notice. Mr. John Heywood, in his valuable manual on the 'Art of Chanting' (William Clowes & Sons, Limited, 1893), has a chapter on chants, according to the Reformation or early harmonized use, 1552-1645.' In this he sets out in full the three psalm settings by Tallis (d. 1585) in five-part harmony, as printed in Barnard. They are harmonized forms, as regards two, of the 1st Gregorian Psalm-Tone; and, as regards the third, of the 7th, with the melodies in the tenor. A footnote on page 15 refers to the existence of other chants of the period in Dr. Jebb's collection, but does not enlarge on the subject. It was hardly necessary for the purposes of the Manual to do this. Mr. Robert Bridges, in two very interesting articles contributed to the 'Musical Antiquary' (Henry Frowde) of April, 1911, and January, 1912, which are re-echoed under the heading of Chant, Anglican' in the recently-published 'Prayer Book Dictionary' has also a reference, with examples, to one of the Tallis chants already referred to, and another chant by Byrd (d. 1623), also printed by Barnard, but no mention is made of any other generally accessible chants of the period.

Those who would like to hear the best that can be said on both sides of the vexed question of the treatment of the concluding portion of the Anglican chant, could not do better than study the respective publications of these two well-equipped protagonists. It is only on this point that they are at issue, as both authors agree in advocating the release of the chant from its iron-bound rhythm. This, however, is somewhat of a digression.

Putting aside these two writers, and taking the two Dictionaries referred to as representing, as they fairly do, the normal and generally received tradition on the subject, the sole fons et origo of the Anglican chant is considered to be the 'Christ Church Tune,' and one or two other chants of the same kind as given by the Rev. John Clifford, at the Restoration, in his Brief Directions of 1663,' as follows:

a harmonized setting of the Sarum form of the 1st Gregorian Psalm-Tone, the melody being in the tenor on the well-known lines of Tallis's Responses. It is more familiar to us in its inverted form, given by Boyce, with a modification of the third chord from the end, the melody being transferred to the treble :

It is surprising, with the antiquarian energy which has been devoted of late to the discovery, part In the sense of being one of the immediate parents transcription, but, it is feared, very moderate of the Anglican chant, the tradition is a sound one. publication, of the ecclesiastical music of England of On page 7 of his Manual, Mr. Heywood traces the 16th and the early part of the 17th centuries, that the gradual evolution of the chant through Aldrich no adequate attempt has apparently been made to (d. 1710) and others, and Boyce's collection (1760) to The Christ Church chant is merely inform our minds on the subject of the harmonized the present day. psalm and canticle chants which were in use in our cathedral and collegiate churches during this period. The existence of such chants for the Psalms, as a supplement to the Gregorian tones which were taken over from the Latin offices, is sometimes admitted in text-books, musical dictionaries, and the like, but the authors clearly know very little about the subject, or at least give no evidence of knowledge. The notable inadequacy in this respect of the articles on 'Chant' in 'Grove,' and 'Stainer and Barrett' is not atoned for in the new editions of either of these important works. The new edition of the former contains, however, a reference to the Manual mentioned below. Silence on the point is the more remarkable because, without any

Ex 2.

C.F.

TALLIS's alleged chant according to BOYCE, 1760.

tedious research amongst ancient Following probably a corrupt tradition, this was manuscripts, such well-known works as John Bishop's wrongly assigned by Boyce to Tallis, who ever score of the Barnard (1641) part-books in the British since has had to endure the comparative odium of