Scan 148
Musical instruments, historic, rare and unique;, 1921
6 lines. Read by computer on 3 September 2026. No printed page number was found. See the scan on archive.org.
1made it very harmonious; of this sort of Viols I have seen many, but Time and Disuse have set them aside." This description may have referred to the Viola Bastarda, with the invention of which Praetorius credits England. A great authority on this subject, Mr. E. J. Payne, writing in Sir George Grove's Dictionary of Music and Musicians (article Violin), says the principle of sympathetic vibration was applied to several Viols, even the little Sordino. The Viola Bastarda was the Viola da Gamba with wire strings added. In the same way the Tenor Viol became the usual Viola d'Amore. But the latter has varied in construction, the name being applied by Mattheson (1713) to a Viol with four metal strings and one of catgut, which he said bore "the beautiful name of Viola d'Amore (Viole d'Amour), in fact, for it expresses much languishment and tenderness." This must have been similar to the Viola d'Amore "of 5 wyre strings plaied on with a bow," described by Evelyn in 1679 as "above all for its sweetnesse and novelty."
3The tuning of the Viola d'Amore was at first the ordinary viol way of fourths and a third, but later the major common chord tuning was given to it known as "Harp-way Sharp" (on account of the facile arpeggio and major third). This tuning was adopted by Meyerbeer for his graceful obbligato. Whether Bach wrote for a true viola d'amore is doubtful; the compass employed in the Johannis-Passion suggests an ordinary viola which might have been partly strung with steel or brass. Berlioz, in his Treatise on Instrumentation, writes of the Love Viol with sympathetic strings, "The quality of the Viole d'Amour is faint and sweet; there is something seraphic in its partaking at once of the viola and the harmonics of the violin. It is peculiarly suitable to the legato style, to dreamy melodies, and to the expression of aesthetic or religious feeling." It will, I think, be conceded that when an instrument which has gone out of fashion possesses some special quality, such as is found in this fascinating viol, there is sufficient justification for bringing it back into use.
5The Viola d'Amore and other instruments in this work, that belong to the Music Class Room of Edinburgh University, have been drawn by permission of Professor Sir Herbert Oakeley, Mus. Doc., and composer to her Majesty the Queen for Scotland.
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