Music Books

1640-1750 The Annals of Music in America during the first hundred years contain very little that would seem to be of any importance to the musicians of today. Nevertheless it is as interesting to note the beginnings of music in this newly settled country as to watch the appearance of the baby's first tooth. The first settlement at Plymouth took place in 1620, and we find that in 1640 the colonists... more...

INTRODUCTION My friend the publisher has asked me to tell you what I know about Old Fogy, whose letters aroused much curiosity and comment when they appeared from time to time in the columns of The Etude. I confess I do this rather unwillingly. When I attempted to assemble my memories of the eccentric and irascible musician I found that, despite his enormous volubility and surface-frankness, the old... more...

Memories of My ChildhoodIn bygone days I was often told that I had two mothers, and, as a matter of fact, I did have two—the mother who gave me life and my maternal great-aunt, Charlotte Masson. The latter came from an old family of lawyers named Gayard and this relationship makes me a descendant of General Delcambre, one of the heroes of the retreat from Russia. His granddaughter married Count... more...

FOREWORDS When Harrison Ainsworth, in his preface to Rookwood, claimed tobe "the first to write a purely flash song" he was very wide of themark. As a matter of fact, "Nix my doll, pals, fake away!" had beenanticipated, in its treatment of canting phraseology, by nearly three centuries, and subsequently, by authors whose names stand high, in other respects, in English literature. The... more...

The cultivation of the Ear is of the greatest importance.—Endeavour early to distinguish each several tone and key. Find out the exact notes sounded by the bell, the glass, the cuckoo, etc. Practise frequently the scale and other finger exercises; but this alone is not sufficient. There are many people who think to obtain grand results in this way, and who up to a mature age spend many hours daily in... more...

CHAPTER I THE TRAINING OF THE MUSIC TEACHER Let us consider the case of a young girl who has finished her school education, and has supplemented this by a special course of technical work in music, which has ended in her taking a musical diploma. She now wishes to teach. What are the chief problems which she will have to face? She must first of all make up her mind whether she wishes to confine her... more...

By Sir John Burtonhead. [Listen]   LL Christians and Lay-Elders too,For Shame amend your Lives;I’ll tell you of a Dog-trick now,Which much concerns you Wives:An Elder’s Maid near Temple-Bar,(Ah! what a Quean was she?)Did take an ugly Mastiff Cur,Where Christians use to be.Help House of Commons, House of Peers,Oh now or never help!Th’ Assembly hath not sat Four Years,Yet hath brought forth a... more...

I. When we try to picture to ourselves the intellectual and moral state of Europe in the Middle Ages, some fixed and almost stereotyped ideas immediately suggest themselves. We think of the nations immersed in a gross mental lethargy; passively witnessing the gradual extinction of arts and sciences which Greece and Rome had splendidly inaugurated; allowing libraries and monuments of antique... more...

It is a remark of St. Philip Neri's latest biographer that, "Our Saint was profoundly convinced that there is in music and in song a mysterious and a mighty power to stir the heart with high and noble emotion, and an especial fitness to raise it above sense to the love of heavenly things." In like manner the Saint's illustrious son, Cardinal Newman, has spoken of "the emotion... more...

INTRODUCTION BY THE EDITOR. Recitation with dramatic energy by men whose business it was to travel from one great house to another and delight the people by the way, was usual among us from the first. The scop invented and the glee-man recited heroic legends and other tales to our Anglo-Saxon forefathers. These were followed by the minstrels and other tellers of tales written for the people. They... more...