Scan 10
Musical Courier 1902-08-27: Vol 45 Iss 1170, 1902
59 lines. Read by computer on 22 September 2026, twice; the two readings disagreed in places. Printed page 11. See the scan on archive.org.
1her to write to His Majesty will be quick to sympathize with the noble, womanly sentiment. The King himself doubtless appreciated the thoughtful attention from the gentlewoman to whose sweet singing he had listened many times. As some readers of THE MUSICAL COURIER will recall, Miss Howson sang in concert with Sims Reeves. She comes of a family distinguished in the musical life of England for several generations. Miss Howson was named after her aunt, the famous Emma Howson-Albertazzi. The first Emma Howson, born in 1814, married an Italian count. She was a mezzo soprano, a contemporary of Grisi and Mario, and a great favorite of the late Queen Victoria. The present Emma Howson's father was a good musician and a man of varied accomplishments. Her brother has been associated with Sir Henry Irving's company.
3Miss Howson owns an interesting collection of souvenirs and mementos, and among these she greatly prizes a ring presented to her after her year's engagement at the Strand by the management and Sir Arthur Sullivan. The ring has the name "Josephine" set in diamonds.
5As a teacher here in New York Miss Howson has been most successful, bringing to her work the benefits of her wide experience in opera and concert and of her travels and association with many famous and notable people.
7CARL GOING TO ALASKA.
9AFTER touring through the towns on the extreme Western coast, William C. Carl, the distinguished organist, left last Wednesday, August 20, for British Columbia. He will be back in Seattle, Wash., in time to sail to Alaska on August 31. He will leave on the steamer Garonne, and go as far north as Juneau, visiting Skagway, Sitka, Muia Glacier and the famous White Pass. When he returns to Washington, Mr. Carl will give a series of recitals. He is announced for a concert at the First Presbyterian Church in Tacoma, on September 17. The daily papers in the Far West are devoting columns to Mr. Carl's visit, and he is receiving much attention from leading citizens.
11Mr. Carl expects to reach New York the end of September, in time to resume his duties at the "Old First" Church, and fill his engagements with the Duss Band. The Guilman Organ School, of which Mr. Carl is the director, reopens October 14, with an increased enrollment of students.
13During the week beginning October 6 Mr. Carl will be in Buffalo as soloist with the Duss Band, and he will also give a series of organ recitals in the city on Lake Erie. His programs for two of the recitals follow:
15Toccata in F…………………………………………..Bach
16Andante in E major………………………………….Wesley
17Allegro Maestoso (Sonata, D minor)………………Mailli
18Spring Song…………………………………………..Mendelssohn
19Fanfare (Douce Pieces d'Orgue)……………………..Deshays
20Le Vendredi-Saint (Good Friday)…………………….de la Tombelle
21The Darkness. The Earthquake. The Angelic Choir one of two readings
22The Darkness. The Earthquake. The Angelic Choir. one of two readings
23Allegro from the Sixth Organ Symphony…………….Widor
24Gavotte (Sonata XII)………………………………..Martini
25Waldwehen (Forest Music) Siegfried…………………Wagner
26Marche de la Symphonie, Ariane……………………..Guilmant
28Sonata in the Style of Handel……………………….Wostenholme
29Allegro con fuoco (Sonata VI)……………………..Guilmant
30Sicilienne in G minor……………………………….Bach
31Toccata in E minor…………………………………..Callaerts
32Intermezzo (new)……………………………………Dubois
33Pastorale……………………………………………..Lemmens
34Air with Variations…………………………………Noble
35Funeral March (Die Götterdämmerung)………………Wagner
36Finale, from F minor Sonata………………………..Mendelssohn
38FRANCIS FISCHER POWERS INJURED.—Francis Fischer Powers, the New York baritone and singing teacher, was injured in a cable train collision in Kansas City, Mo., last Friday night.
40ANTONIO STRADIVARI.
42[From the London Standard, August 13, 1902.]
44BOOKS concerning the violin may usually be classed under three categories—advertisements, compilations and the eccentricities of the crank. It is pleasant to be able to chronicle the publication of an important work which is entirely devoid of the attributes of either group, a book which says, not only the last word upon the greatest violin maker that the world has known, and upon the Cremonese School, of which he was the head, but also the first, ex cathedra—the works of Lombardini, Fétis, Sacchi, and other more recent authors notwithstanding. The brothers Hill have succeeded to the position, once held by the elder Hart (the friend of Charles Reade), of being the leading experts in Cremonese instruments, and the channel through which nearly all the most celebrated violins of Stradivari have changed hands during the last twenty years. The symmetry of their book is, if not destroyed, appreciably compromised by a review of itself in the form of an "Introductory Note," written by a lady, which is patronizing, impertinent and unnecessary. The irritation naturally caused by this literary effort wears off, however, under the honest charm of the book. We well remember the modest flourish with which it was announced for "immediate publication" in 1890. It speaks more than well for the value of the work that twelve years have elapsed before the brothers have, with many signs of lingering reluctance, at last fulfilled the promise of its emission. The authors are indebted to Signor Mandelli for a very remarkable genealogy of Stradivari and his family, the outcome of researches which must have been untiring for a very protracted period.
46Born in 1644, Stradivari commenced work in 1656 as a pupil of Nicolas Amati, with whom he worked until 1684, a period that would seem to us of unlikely duration (seeing that in 1684 he had been married for seventeen years and had occupied a house of his own for four) were it not for the fact that between 1660 and 1665 he had had printed, and had used, a label of his own, and might be looked upon almost as an independent maker. The brothers Hill properly divide the labors of Stradivari into four periods, having somewhat elastic boundaries, and wonderfully complete catalogues are given of the extant and known instruments of each period, accompanied by critical remarks and precise information as to their present whereabouts. The yellow Amatisé instruments are typical of the first division; they developed about 1660 into what is known as the Long Strad, in which we find the deeper varnish and the purfling "across the corners," which distinguishes the Tuscan Strad (finely figured in the book), and the instruments of the second or "Golden" period, which began in 1700, attained its zenith in 1705-1710, and reached its limit in 1720. It may be noted, however, that the Betts Strad of 1704 has the purfling centred to the corners, and not carried across in the bewitching manner of its time. This period produced the Boissier (1713), the Dolphin (1714), the Gillot (1715) and the Messie or Salabue Strad (1716)—an instrument so perfectly preserved that, when the great Parisian maker Vuillaume saw it first, in the hands of Tarisio—the Italian to whom France and England owe the importation of the finest Stradivari violins—he exclaimed, "This is what we have all been waiting for—the Messiah!" by which name the instrument is known to this day. In 1720 the master was seventy-six years old, and from that date the first signs of decadence are foreshadowed rather than apparent. From 1700 to 1720 one is struck by the magnificence of the wood of which he carved his backs, the sides and heads of his instruments being usually of plainer and less handsome material. Some very remarkable fiddles, however, date from the period 1720-1730, notably the instrument always used by Sarasate (1724) and Wilhelmi's solo violin (of 1725), which is now the property of an American, Mr. Kupferschmid. The minute care and detail with which the pedigrees of all Stradivari's most noteworthy instruments are recorded, from their earliest appearance to the present day, is one of the not least notable features of this invaluable work. With the same loving care is traced the progress of the master in his last period, from 1730, when he was eighty-six, to December, 1737, when he died at the age of ninety-three, as George Eliot has said in her poem, "Stradivari":
48That plain, white aproned man, who stood at work
49Patient and accurate, full fourscore years,
50Contrasting with him the painter, Naldo, who
51Knowing all tricks of style at thirty-one,
52And weary of them; while Antonio
53At sixty-nine wrought placidly his best.
55Having traced the history of all these great violins, the brothers Hill devote a chapter to the ten known violas of Stradivari, including the one dated 1731, which belonged to Paganini, and for which Berlioz composed the solo known as "Les derniers instants de Marie Stuart." In like manner the violoncellos of Stradivari have a chapter to themselves. It is probable that he made none earlier than 1680, and the first authentically dated instrument from his hand bears the date 1684. The finest example of this early period is the Servais 'cello of 1701, but his "grand" period for this instrument was from 1707 to 1730, between which dates he produced twenty instruments which are celebrated today. We find in these pages the histories and pedigrees of the Duport 'cello (1711), the Eatta (1714) and the amazing instrument (of 1720) which Piatti saw first in 1844, which was given to him by Colonel Oliver in 1867, and upon which he played to the day of his death. It was Stradivari who gave to us the violoncello as we know it today, the perfect type evolved from the earlier violas. "All the pupils of the Amatis contributed more or less to that progress, but to Stradivari must be awarded the credit of having created the most perfect form of violoncello in existence; in fact, it was he, and he alone, who raised it to that state beyond which no further progress has been made."
57When the brothers leave the historical portion of their work and enter upon the theory and construction of the instruments of the violin family, they attack a subject upon which they must be listened to with reverence, for, unlike their predecessors in the field, they approach it with perfect knowledge. Especially lucid is the manner in which they treat of the increased tonality of the instrument, coming with increased difficulties for the performer in consequence of the longer "stopping" intervals brought about by the increased size of the violin. "It must have been an attempt on Stradivari's part to combine in one violin the remarkable sonority and fullness of the Maggini with the brightness and easier speaking qualities of the Amati." The outcome is the "ringing" tone noticeable in the playing of Joachim and Lady Hallé, as opposed to the "loudness" brought forth by more "orchestral" players. The authors lay stress upon the fact that it was Viotti who first brought to light the sonority and charm of the Stradivari violins as solo instruments, and they give an account of his fiddle which they state was sent to Paris and sold by auction after his death. Here we do not follow them, for we know that Viotti bequeathed this violin to his faithful friend Mrs. Chinnery, and that it remained in this country for many years. He was, however, something of a dealer in instruments (like many a modern "professor"), and had owned more than one "Strad." His celebrated pupils, Baillet, Lafont, Kreutzer, Rode and Habenc, played upon Stradivari violins, whereas the earlier soloists used the instruments of Amati, Stainer and even Klotz. The great "tonal" period of Stradivari is 1704 to 1720, not forgetting, of course, Sarasate's instrument of 1724. It is interesting and significant to note that, while that master was making his instruments, which were to open new worlds of chamber music to humanity, his one of two readings
58When the brothers leave the historical portion of their work and enter upon the theory and construction of the instruments of the violin family, they attack a subject upon which they must be listened to with reverence, for, unlike their predecessors in the field, they approach it with perfect knowledge. Especially lucid is the manner in which they treat of the increased tonality of the instrument, coming with increased difficulties for the performer in consequence of the longer "stopping" intervals brought about by the increased size of the violin. "It must have been an attempt on Stradivari's part to combine in one violin the remarkable sonority and fullness of the Maggini with the brightness and easier speaking qualities of the Amati." The outcome is the "ringing" tone noticeable in the playing of Joachim and Lady Hallé, as opposed to the "loudness" brought forth by more "orchestral" players. The authors lay stress upon the fact that it was Viotti who first brought to light the sonority and charm of the Stradivari violins as solo instruments, and they give an account of his fiddle which they state was sent to Paris and sold by auction after his death. Here we do not follow them, for we know that Viotti bequeathed this violin to his faithful friend Mrs. Chinnery, and that it remained in this country for many years. He was, however, something of a dealer in instruments (like many a modern "professor"), and had owned more than one "Strad." His celebrated pupils, Baillet, Lafont, Kreutzer, Rode and Habeneck, played upon Stradivari violins, whereas the earlier soloists used the instruments of Amati, Stainer and even Klotz. The great "tonal" period of Stradivari is 1704 to 1720, not forgetting, of course, Sarasate's instrument of 1724. It is interesting and significant to note that, while that master was making his instruments, which were to open new worlds of chamber music to humanity, his one of two readings
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