Books › The violin and its music, 1881 › scan 49
Scan 49
The violin and its music, 1881
4 lines. Read by computer on 10 September 2026. Printed page 29. See the scan on archive.org.
1If we examine into the condition of Music among the Netherlanders about the same period, we shall find that much of that which the Van Eycks achieved for their Art, Okeghem, and in a higher degree, Josquin Després, accomplished for theirs. Although Music had been cultivated for more than a century by the people of the Low Countries before the advent of these remarkable Musicians, to an extent which left other nations far behind, yet that which then passed for the Science of Music was in reality a system crippled and cramped with meaningless dogmas, bearing apparently about the same relation to Music as Alchemy to Chemistry. With the appearance of Okeghem and his pupil Josquin, the haze which had so long enveloped the Art was at length dispelled. What these Musicians accomplished amounted to little else than a re-creation. The Science and Poetry of the Art were joined.
3The fame of the Musicians of the Netherlands was European, but particularly that of Josquin Després. Louis XII. of France, Lorenzo di Medici, and the Emperor of Germany, were among his princely patrons. Luther said of him, "other Musicians do what they can with notes, Josquin does what he likes with them;" in short, some years before the close of the fifteenth century he was looked upon as the greatest Musician of any time or nation. That a people should have had such men as the brothers Van Eyck, Okeghem, and Josquin in
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