ways laboured, will pardon this my preface... › Catherine Vadé, Curious extracts from Mr. Rouffeau's 2799 letter on French mufic, On the language most proper for music, basnow firft tranflated. IT is easy to conceive that fome languages are more proper for mufic than others, and that there may be fome languages totally improper for any. Of the latter kind would be a language compofed of mixt founds, of mute, furd and nafal fyllables, of few fonorous vowels, and a great many confo nants and articulations; and which might want fome of thofe effential conditions which I fhall fpeak of under the article of meafure. For the fake of curiofity, let us enquire what would be the confequence of applying mufic to fuch a language. In the first place, the want of force in the found of the vowels would oblige the compofer to give a good deal to the notes, and because the language would be furd, the mufic would be noify. In the fecond place, the hardness and frequency of the confonants would oblige him to exclude a great num. ber of words, to proceed on others only by elementary tones, fo that the mufic would be infipid and monotonous. For the fame reafon, it would be flow and tiresome, and when the movement fhould be ever fo little accelerated, its hafte would refemble that of a hard and angular body rolling along on the pavement. As fuch a mufic would be deftitute of all agreeable melody, the compofer would endeavour to fup. ply its place, by factitious and unnatural beauties; it would be charged with frequent and regular modulations; but cold, graceless, and inexpreffive. Recourfe would be had to trills, ftops, shakes, and other falfe graces; which would ferve only to render the fong more. ridiculous, without rendering it lefs infipid. A mufic attended with fuch fu.: perfluous ornament will be always faint and inexpreffive; while its images, deftitute of all force and energy, defcribe but a few objects in a great number of notes, exactly like Gothic writing, the lines of which are full of strokes and characters, yet contain only two or three words, and but a very small quantity of meaning in a great fpace of paper. The impoffibility of inventing agreeable fongs would oblige the compofers to turn all their thoughts to the fide of harmony; and for want of natural beauties to introduce thofe of arbitrary fashion, which have no other merit than lies in the delicacy of the execu tion. Thus, inftead of compefing. good mafic, they would compofe difficult mufic; and to fupply the want of fimple melody, would mul tiply their accompaniments. It would cost them much less trou ble to lay a great many bad things one upon another, than to invent one good one. In order to remove the infipidi.. ty, they would increase the confu fion; they would imagine, they were making mufic when they were only making a noife. Another effect which would re fult from this defect of melody, is, that the muficians, having only a falle falfe idea of it, would invent a melody of their own. Having nothing of true mufic, they would find no difficulty in multiplying its parts; because they would give that name to what was not fo; even to the thorough bafs; to the unifon of which they would make no fcruple to recite the counter-tenour, under cover of a fort of accompaniment, whofe pretended melody would have no manner of relation to the vocal part of the fong. Wherever! they faw notes they would find a tune, although in effect their tune would be nothing but a fucceffion" ps of notes. Voces prætereaque nibil. 2. Let us proceed now to the meafore, in the difpofition of which confifts the greater part of the beauty and expreffion of the fong. now the different meafures of vocal · mufic could arife only from the different methods of fcanning a difcourfe, and placing the long and fhort fyllables with regard to each other. This is very evident in the Greek mufic, whofe meafures were only fo many formula of the rythmi furnished by the arrangements of long or fhort fyllables, and of thofe feet of which the language and its poetry were fufceptible. So that, although one may very well diftinguith in the mufical ryth mus the measure of the profody, the measure of the verfe, and the meafare of the tune, it cannot be doubted that the most agreeable mufic, or at least that of the most complete cadence, would be tht in which the three measures should concur as perfectly as poffible. Measure is to melody nearly what fyntax is to difcourfe it is After thefe eclairciffements, I' that which connects the words, dif- return to my hypothefis, and fup▲ tinguishes the phrafes, and gives pofe that the language I have been fenfe and confiftency to the whole. fpeaking of fhould have a defec All mufic whofe measure is not per- tive profody, indiftinct, inexact, ceived, if the fault lie in the perfon and without precifion; that its long who executes it, refembles writing and thort fyllables fhould have no in cypher, which requires one to fimple relations with regard to have a key to explain it; but if time or number, fo as to render its the mufic have no fenfible meafure rythmus agreeable, exact, and rein itself, it is only a confufed colgular; that its long fyllables fhould lection of words taken at hazard, be fome thorter and others longer land written without connexion," than others; that its fhort ones! in which the reader finds no fenfe, fhould in like manner be more or because the author gave them, one. I have faid that every national mufic takes its principal character from the language which is peculiar to it and I fhould have added, that it is the profody of that language which principally conftitutes its character. As vocal mufic long preceded the inftrumental, the latter hath always received from the former both its tune and time less fhort, that it should have many neither short nor long; and that the difference between the one and the other fhould be indeterminate and almoft incommenfurable. It is clear that the national music, be ing obliged to receive into its meafure the irregularities of the profody, would have fuch measure of courfe vague, unequal, and hardly perceptible; that its recitative would in particular partake of this O 2 irre irregularity; that it would be very difficult to make the force of the notes and fyllables agree; that the measure would be obliged to be perpetually changed, and that the verfes never could be fet to an exact and flowing measure; that even in the measured airs, the movements would be all unnatural and void of precifion; that if to this defect be added ever fo little delay in time, the very idea of its inequality would be entirely loft both in the finger and the auditor; and that, in fine, the meafure not being perceived, nor its returns equal, it could be fubject only to the ca price of the musician, who might hurry or retard it as he pleafed fo that it would be impoffible to keep up a concert without fomebody to mark the time to all, according to the fancy or convenience of fome leader. Hence it is that fingers contract fuch an habit of altering the time, that they frequently do it defignedly even in thofe pieces,, where the compofer has happily rendered it perceptible. To mark the time would be thought a fault in compofition, and to follow it would be another in the tale of finging; thus defects would pafs for beauties, and beauties for defects: errors would be established as rules; and to compofe mufic to the tafte of the nation, it would be neceffary to apply carefully to thofe things which would difplease every other people in the world. Thus, whatever art might be fed to hide the defects of fuch mufic, it would be impoflible it fhould be pleafing to any other ears than thofe of the natives of the country where it fhould be in vogue. By dint of fuffering con ftant reproaches against their bad tafte, and by hearing real music in a language more favourable to it, they would at length endeavour to make their own resemble it in doing which, however, they would only deprive it of its real character, and the little accordance it might have with the language for which it was conftructed. If they should thus endeavour to unnaturalize their finging, they would render it harsh, rough, and almost unutterable: if they contented themselves with ornamenting it with anyother than foch accompaniments as were peculiarly adapted to it, theywould only betray its infipidity by an inevitable contraft: they would deprive their mufic of the only beauty it was fufceptible of, in taking from all its parts that uniformity of character by which it was conftituted; and by accuftoming their ears to difdain the finging only to liften to the fymphony, they would in time reduce the voices only to a mere accompaniment of the ac companiments. Thus we fee by what means the mufic of fuch a nation would be divided into vocal and inftrumental; and thus we see how by giving each different characters to the two fpecies of it, they make a monftrous compound of them when united. The fymphony would keep time; and the finging would-fuffer no reftraint; fo that the fingers and the ymphonists in the orchestra would be perpetually at variance, and putting one another out. This uncertainty, and the mixture of the two characters, would introduce in the manner of accompani ment, fuch a tamenefs and infipidity that the fymphonifts would get fuch a habit, that they would not be able even to execute the best mufic with fpirit and energy. In playing that like their own, they would totally enervate it; they would play the foft ftrong, and the ftrong foft, nor would they know one of the varieties of thefe two terms. As to the others rinforzando, dalce, rifoluto, con gufto, spiritofo, foftenuto, con brio, they would have no words for them in their language, and that of expreffion would be totally void of meaning. They would fubftitute a number of trifing, cold, and flovenly ornaments, in the place of the masterly stroke of the bow: and however numerous their orchestra, it would have no effect, or none but what was very difagreeable. As the execution would be always fluggish, and the fymphonists are ever more folicitous to play finely, than to play in time, they would be hardly ever together; they would never be able to give an exact and just note, nor to execute any thing in that character. Foreigners would be almoft all of them aftonished to find an orchestra, boafted of as the firft in Europe, hardly worthy to play at a booth in a fairt. It would be naturally expected that fuch muficians fhould get an averfion to that mafic which thus difgraced their own; and that adding ill will to bad tafte, they would put in execution the dengn of decrying it, with as ill fuccefs as it was abfurd. ly premeditated. On a contrary fuppofition to the foregoing, I might eafily deduce all the qualities of a real mufic, formed to move, to imitate, to pleafe, and to convey to the heart the most delicate impreffions of harmony: but as this would lead me too far from my prefent fubject, and particularly from our generally received notions of things; I fhall confine myfelf to a few obfervations on the Italian mufic; which may enable us to form a better judgment of our own. If it be asked what language will admit of the best grammar, I anfwer that of the people who reafon beft; and if it be asked what nation fhould have the best mufic, I should anfwer that whofe language is beft adapted to mufic. This is what I have already established, and shall have farther occafion to confirm it during the courfe of this letter. Now, if there be in Europe a lan. guage adapted to mufic, it is certainly the Italian; for that language is foft, fonorous, harmonious, and more accented than any other; which four qualities are precifely thofe which are most proper for finging. The Italians pretend, that our [the French] melody is flat and void of tune; all other nations alfo unanimoufly confirm their judgment in this particular. On our part There is not, perhaps, four French fymphonists in Paris who know the difference between piano and dolce; and indeed it would be unneceffary for them fo to do; for which of them would be capable of executing it? + Not that there are not fome very good violin-players in the ocheftra at the opera: on the contrary, they are almost all fuch, taken feparately, and when they do not pretend to play in concert. There was a time, fays my lord Shaftesbury, when the cuftom of fpeaking French had brought French mufic alfo into fashion among us [the English]. But 0 3 the Part, we accufe theirs of being capricious and barbarous. I had much rather believe that one or the other were mistaken, than be reduced to the neceffity of faying, that, in a country where arts and fciences in general are arrived to an high degree of perfection, that of mufic is as yet unknown.. The least partial among ust contented themfelves with faying, that, both the Italian and French mufic were good, in their kind, and in their own language: but, befides that other nations did not subscribe to this comparifon, it ftill remained to determine which of the two languages was the beft adapted to mufic in itfelf. This is a queftion which was much agitated in France, but will never be fo elfewhere; a queftion, which can only be decided by an ear that is perfectly neuter, and which, of courfe, becomes daily more difficult of folution in the only country where the object of it can be problematical. I have made fome experiments on this fubject, which every one may repeat after me, and which appear to ferve as a folution of it, at leaft, with regard to me. The first and most difficult of all, is to be impartial and equitable in your choice and judgment. The fecond is, that in order to make the Italian, exibiting fomething more agreeable to nature, prefently disgusted us with the other, and made us perceive it to be as heavy, flat, and infipid, as it is in fact. * It seems these reproaches are much less violent fince the Italian music hath been heard among us. Thus it is that this admirable mufic need only thew itself what it is, to justify itself againit every thing that is advanced against + Many perfons condemn the total exclufion which the connoiffeurs in music give, without hesitation, to the French mufic. Thefe conciliating moderators would have no exclufive tafte, juft as if the love of what is good muft neceffar..y work fome regard for what is bad. This method was very much in favour of the French mufic for the und notes in the Italian are no lefs effential to the melody, than thofe which ar written down. The point is lefs what is written, than what ought to be sung ; and indeed this manner of writing notes ought to pass for a kind of abbreviation, whereas the cadences and trills in the French mufic are requisite, if you will, to the tafte, but are by no means effential to the melody they are a kind of paint, which ferves to hide its deformity, without removing it, and which ferves only to render it the more ridiculous to the cars of good judges. alihi! but stu |