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wages of piano-makers are five francs per day; in London, ten shillings; in New York, four dollars and thirty-three cents. The cream of the business, in Paris, is divided among three makers, — Erard, Hertz, and Pleyel, — each of whom has a concert-hall of his own, to give éclat to his establishment. We presume Messrs. Steinway added "Steinway Hall" to the attractions of New York from the example of their Paris friends, and soon the metropolis will boast a "Chickering Hall" as well. This is an exceedingly expensive form of advertisement. Steinway Hall cost two hundred thousand dollars, and has not yet paid the cost of warming, cleaning, and lighting it. This, however, is partly owing to the good-nature of the proprietors, who find it hard to exact the rent from a poor artist after a losing concert, and who have a constitutional difficulty about saying No, when the use of the hall is asked for a charitable object.

In Germany there are no manufactories of pianos on the scale of England, France, and the United States. A business of five pianos a week excites astonishment in a German state, and it is not uncommon there for one man to construct every part of a piano,

a work of three or four months. Mr. Steinway the elder has frequently done this in his native place, and could now do it. A great number of excellent instruments are made in Germany in the slow, patient, thorough manner of the Germans; but in the fashionable houses of Berlin and Vienna no German name is so much valued as those of the celebrated makers of Paris. In the London exhibition of 1851, Russian pianos competed for the medals, some of which attracted much attention from the excellence of their construction. Messrs. Chickering assert, that the Russians were the first to employ successfully the device of "overstringing," as it is called, by which the bass strings are stretched over the others.

The piano, then, one hundred and fifty-seven years after its invention, in spite of its great cost, has become the

leading musical instrument of Christendom. England produces thirty thousand every year; the United States, twenty-five thousand; France, fifteen thousand; Germany, perhaps ten thousand; and all other countries, ten thousand; making a total of ninety thousand, or four hundred and twentytwo for every working-day. It is computed, that an average piano is the result of one hundred and twenty days' work; and, consequently, there must be at least fifty thousand men employed in the business. And it is only within a few years that the making of these noble instruments has been done on anything like the present scale. -Messrs. Broadwood, of London, who have made in all one hundred and twenty-nine thousand pianos, only begin to count at the year 1780; and in the United States there were scarcely fifty pianos a year made fifty years ago.

We need scarcely say that the production of music for the piano has kept pace with the advance of the instrument. Dr. Burney mentions, in his History of Music (Vol. IV. p. 664), that when he came to London in 1744, "Handel's Harpsichord Lessons and Organ Concertos, and the two First Books of Scarletti's Lessons, were all the good music for keyed instruments at that time in the nation." We have at this moment before us the catalogue of music sold by one house in Boston, Oliver Ditson & Co. It is a closely printed volume of three hundred and sixty pages, and contains the titles of about thirty-three thousand pieces of music, designed to be performed, wholly or partly, on the piano. By far the greater number are piano music pure and simple. It is not a very rare occurrence for a new piece to have a sale of one hundred thousand copies in the United States. A composer who can produce the kind of music that pleases the greatest number, may derive a revenue from his art ten times greater than Mozart or Beethoven enjoyed in their most prosperous time. There are trifling waltzes and songs upon the list of Messrs. Ditson, which

have yielded more profit than Mozart received for "Don Giovanni" and "The Magic Flute" together. We learn from the catalogue just mentioned, that the composers of music have an advantage over the authors of books, in being always able to secure a publisher for their productions. Messrs. Ditson announce that they are ready and willing to publish any piece of music by any composer on the following easy conditions: "Three dollars per page for engraving; two dollars and a half per hundred sheets of paper; and one dollar and a quarter per hundred pages for printing." At the same time they frankly notify ambitious teachers, that "not one piece in ten pays the cost of getting up, and not one in fifty proves a success."

The piano, though its recent develop ment has been so rapid, is the growth of ages, and we can, for three thousand years or more, dimly and imperfectly trace its growth. The instrument, indeed, has found an historian, — Dr. Rimbault of London, who has gathered the scattered notices of its progress into a handsome quarto, now accessible in some of our public libraries. It is far from our desire to make a display of cheap erudition; yet perhaps ladies who love their piano may care to spend a minute or two in learning how it came to be the splendid triumph of human ingenuity, the precious addition to the happiness of existence, which they now find it to be. "I have had my share of trouble," we heard a lady say the other day, "but my piano has kept me happy." All ladies who have had the virtue to subdue this noble instrument to their will, can say something similar of the solace and joy they daily derive from it. The Greek legend that the twang of Diana's bow suggested to Apollo the invention of the lyre, was not a mere fancy; for the first stringed instrument of which we have any trace in ancient sculpture differed from an ordinary bow only in having more than one string. A twostringed bow was, perhaps, the first step towards the grand piano of to

day. Additional strings involved the strengthening of the bow that held them; and, accordingly, we find the Egyptian harps, discovered in the catacombs by Wilkinson, very thick and massive in the lower part of the frame, which terminated sometimes in a large and solid female head. From the twostringed bow to these huge twelvestringed Egyptian harps, six feet high and beautifully finished with veneer, inlaid with ivory and mother-of-pearl, no one can say how many centuries elapsed. The catgut strings of the harps of three thousand years ago are still capable of giving a musical sound. The best workmen of the present time, we are assured, could not finish a harp more exquisitely than these are finished; yet they have no mechanism for tightening or loosening the strings, and no strings except such as were furnished by the harmless, necessary cat. The Egyptian harp, with all its splendor of decoration, was a rude and barbaric instrument.

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It has not been shown that Greece or Rome added one essential improvement to the stringed instruments which they derived from older nations. Chickerings, Steinways, Erards, and Broadwoods of our day cannot lay a finger upon any part of a piano, and say that they owe it to the Greeks or to the Romans.

The Cithara of the Middle Ages was a poor thing enough, in the form of a large P, with ten strings in the oval part; but it had movable pegs, and could be easily tuned. It was, therefore, a step toward the piano of the French Exposition of 1867.

But the Psaltery was a great stride forward. This instrument was an arrangement of strings on a box. Here we have the principle of the soundingboard, a thing of vital moment to the piano, and one upon which the utmost care is bestowed by all the great makers. Whoever first thought of stretching strings on a box may also be said to have half invented the guitar and the violin. No single subsequent thought has been so fruitful of consequences as

this in the improvement of stringed instruments. The reader, of course, will not confound the psaltery of the Middle Ages with the psaltery of the Hebrews, respecting which nothing is known. The translators of the Old Testament assigned the names with which they were familiar to the musical instruments of the Jews.

About the year 1200 we arrive at the Dulcimer, which was an immense psaltery, with improvements. Upon a harpshaped box, eighteen to thirty-six feet long, fifty strings were stretched, which the player struck with a stick or a longhandled hammer. This instrument was a signal advance toward the grand piano. It was a piano, without its machinery.

The next thing, obviously, must have been to contrive a method of striking the strings with certainty and evenness; and, accordingly, we find indications of a keyed instrument after the year 1300, called the Clavicytherium, or keyed cithara. The invention of keys permitted the strings to be covered over, and therefore the strings of the clavicytherium were enclosed in a box, instead of being stretched on a box. The first keys were merely long levers with a nub at the end of them, mounted on a pivot, which the player canted up at the strings on the see-saw principle. It has required four hundred years to bring the mechanism of the piano key to its present admirable perfection. The clavicytherium was usually a very small instrument, an oblong box, three or four feet in length, that could be lifted by a girl of fourteen. The clavichord and manichord, which we read of in Mozart's letters, were only improved and better-made clavicytheria. How affecting the thought, that the divine Mozart had nothing better on which to try the ravishing airs of "The Magic Flute" than a wretched box of brass wires, twanged with pieces of quill! So it is always, and in all branches of art. Shakespeare's plays, Titian's pictures, the great cathedrals, Newton's discov eries. Mozart's and Handel's music, were executed while the implements of art and science were still very rude.

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Queen Elizabeth's instrument, the Virginals, was a box of strings, with improved keys, and mounted on four legs. In other words, it was a small and very bad piano. The excellent Pepys, in his account of the great fire of London of 1666, says: "River full of lighters and boats taking in goods, and good goods swimming in the water; and only I observed that hardly one lighter or boat in three that had the goods of a house in it, but there were a pair of virginalls in it." Why "a pair"? For the same reason that induces many persons to say “a pair of stairs," and "a pair of compasses," that is, no reason at all.

It is plain that the virginals, or virgin's clavichord, was very far from holding the rank among musical instruments which the piano now possesses.

If any of our readers should ever come upon a thin folio entitled "Musick's Monument," (London, 1676,) we advise him to clutch it, retire from the haunts of men, and abandon himself to the delight of reading the Izaak Walton of music. It is a most quaint and curious treatise upon "the Noble Lute, the best of instruments," with a chapter upon "the generous Viol," by Thomas Mace, "one of the clerks of Trinity College in the University of Cambridge." Master Mace deigns not to mention keyed instruments, probably regarding keys as old sailors regard the lubber's hole, fit only for greenhorns. The "Noble Lute," of which Thomas Mace discourses, was a large, heavy, potbellied guitar with many strings. We learn from this enthusiastic author, that the noble lute had been calumniated by some ignorant persons; and it is in refuting their calumnious imputations that he pours out a torrent of knowledge upon his beloved instrument, and upon the state of music in England in 1675. In reply to the charge, that the noble lute was a very hard instrument to play upon, he gives posterity a piece of history. That the lute was hard once, he confesses, but asserts that "it is now easie, and very familiar."

"The First and Chief Reason that it

was Hard in former Times, was, Because they had to their Lutes but Few Strings; viz. to some 10, some 12, and some 14 Strings, which in the beginning of my Time were almost altogether in use; (and is this present Year 1675. Fifty four years since I first began to undertake That Instrument). But soon after, they began to adde more Strings unto Their Lutes, so that we had Lutes of 16, 18, and 20 Strings; which they finding to be so Great a Convenience, stayed not long till they added more, to the Number of 24, where we now rest satisfied; only upon my Theorboes I put 26 Strings, for some Good Reasons I shall be able to give in due Time and Place."

Another aspersion upon the noble lute was, that it was "a Woman's Instrument." Master Mace gallantly observes, that if this were true, he cannot understand why it should suffer any disparagement on that account, "but rather that it should have the more Reputation and Honour."

There are passages in this ancient book which take us back so agreeably to the concert-rooms and parlors of two hundred years ago, and give us such an insight into the musical resources of our forefathers, that we shall venture to copy two or three of them. The following brief discourse upon Pegs is very amusing:

"And you must know, that from the Badness of the Pegs, arise several Inconveniences; The first I have named, viz. the Loss of Labour. The 2d. is, the Loss of Time; for I have known some so extreme long in Tuning their Lutes and Viols, by reason only of Bad Pegs, that They have wearied out their Auditors before they began to Play. A 3d. Inconvenience is, that oftentimes, if a High-stretch'd small String happen to slip down, t is in great danger to break at the next winding up, especially in wet moist weather, and that It have been long slack. The 4th. is, that when a String hath been slipt back, it will not stand in Tune, under many Amendments; for it is continually in stretching itself, till it come to

Its highest stretch. A 5th. is, that in the midst of a Consort, All the Company must leave off, because of some Eminent String slipping. A 6th. is, that sometimes ye shall have such a Rap upon the Knuckles, by a sharpedg'd Peg, and a stiff strong String, that the very Skin will be taken off. And 7thly. It is oftentimes an occasion of the Thrusting off the Treble-PegNut, and sometime of the Upper Long Head; And I have seen the Neck of an Old Viol, thrust off into two pieces, by reason of the Badness of the Pegs, meerly with the Anger and hasty Choller of Him that has been Tuning. Now I say that These are very Great Inconveniences, and do adde much to the Trouble and Hardness of the Instrument. I shall therefore inform you how ye may Help All These with Ease; viz. Thus. When you perceive any Peg to be troubled with the slippery Disease, assure your self he will never grow better of Himself, without some of Your Care; Therefore take Him out, and examine the Cause."

He gives advice with regard to the preservation of the Lute in the moist English climate:

"And that you may know how to shelter your Lute, in the worst of Ill weathers (which is moist) you shall do well, ever when you Lay it by in the day-time, to put It into a Bed, that is constantly used, between the Rug and Blanket; but never between the Sheets, because they may be moist with Sweat, &c.

"This is the most absolute and best place to keep It in always, by which doing, you will find many Great Conveniencies, which I shall here set down. . . . .

"Therefore, a Bed will secure from all These Inconveniences, and keep your Glew so Hard as Glass, and All safe and sure; only to be excepted, That no Person be so inconsiderate, as to Tumble down upon the Bed, whilst the Lute is There; For I have known several Good Lutes spoil'd with such a Trick."

We may infer from Master Mace his work, that the trivial virginals were

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"I cannot understand, how Arts and Sciences should be subject unto any such Phantastical, Giddy, or Inconsiderate Toyish Conceits, as ever to be said to be in Fashion, or out of Fashion. I remember there was a Fashion, not many years since, for Women in their Apparel to be so Pent up by the Straitness, and Stiffness of their GownShoulder-Sleeves, that They could not so much as Scratch Their Heads, for the Necessary Remove of a Biting Louse; nor Elevate their Arms scarcely to feed themselves Handsomly; nor Carve a Dish of Meat at a Table, but their whole Body must needs Bend towards the Dish. This must needs be concluded by Reason, a most Vnreasonable, and Inconvenient Fashion; and They as Vnreasonably Inconsiderate, who would be so Abus'd, and Bound up. I Confess It was a very Good Fashion, for some such Viragoes, who were us'd to Scratch their Husbands Faces or Eyes, and to pull them down by the Coxcombes. And I am subject to think, It was a meer Rogery in the Combination, or Club-council of the Taylors, to Abuse the Women in That Fashion, in Revenge of some of the Curst Dames their Wives."

Some lute-makers, this author informs us, were so famous in Europe, that he had seen lutes of their making, "pittifull, old, batter'd, crack'd things," that were valued at a hundred pounds sterling each; and he had often seen lutes of three or four pounds' value "far more illustrious and taking to a Common eye." In refuting the "aspersion that one had as good keep a horse (for cost) as a Lute," he declares, that he never in his life "took more than five shillings the quarter to maintain a Lute with strings, only for the first stringing I ever took ten shillings." He says, however: "I do confess Those who will be Prodigal and Extraor

dinary Curious, may spend as much as may maintain two or three Horses, and Men to ride upon them too, if they please. But 20s. per ann. is an Ordinary Charge; and much more they need not spend, to practise very hard."

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Keyed instruments, despite the remonstrances of the lutists, continued to advance toward their present supremacy. As often as an important improvement was introduced, the instrument changed its name, just as in our day the melodeon was improved into the harmonium, then into the organ-harmonium, and finally into the cabinet organ. The virginals of 1600 became the spinet of 1700,- so called because the pieces of quill employed in twanging the strings resembled thorns, and spina, in Latin, means thorn. Any lady who will take the trouble to mount to the fourth story of the Messrs. Chickering's piano store in the city of New York, may see such a spinet as Mrs. Washington, Mrs. Adams, and Mrs. Hamilton played upon when they were little girls. It is a small, harp-shaped instrument on legs, exceedingly coarse and clumsy in its construction, the case rough and unpolished, the legs like those of a kitchen table, with wooden castors such as were formerly used in the construction of cheap bedsteads of the "trundle" variety. The keys, however, are much like those now in use, though they are fewer in number, and the ivory is yellow with age. If the reader would know the tone of this ancient instrument, he has but to stretch a brass wire across a box between two nails, and twang them with a short pointed piece of quill. And if the reader would know how much better the year 1867 is than the year 1700, he may first hear this spinet played upon in Messrs. Chickering's dusty garret, and then descend to one of the floors below, and listen to the round, full, brilliant singing of a Chickering grand, of the present illustrious year. much as that grand piano is better than that poor little spinet, by so much is the present time better than the days when Louis XIV. was king.

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