Books › The violin and its music, 1881 › scan 59
Scan 59
The violin and its music, 1881
6 lines. Read by computer on 10 September 2026. Printed page 39. See the scan on archive.org.
1sufficient, the voices were supplemented by the nasal sounds of the Viol, secular melodies were introduced of a florid character, with their secular words sung by the chief voice, whilst the other voices were heard singing to the words of the mass. The words, sacred or secular, were not considered, notes alone were esteemed as tending to increase that display which had been gradually developed during two centuries; but the time was at hand when this singularly free mode of conducting the service of the Church was to be abandoned. The school of Church music which arose and flourished in the Netherlands, crumbled and fell, and a portion of its ruins served Palestrina in the construction of his glorious work.*
3It is hardly possible to imagine that the music of the Church in the Netherlands could have been developed in the manner described without affecting that of the chamber; indeed it is certain that the domestic music of the low countries received similar scientific treatment to that bestowed on sacred music, if such florid writings may be described as sacred. It is also generally admitted that it was the first domestic music allied to musical learning, which
5* J. R. S. Bennett, in one of his admirable contributions to Grove's "Dictionary of Musicians," remarks, "The simplicity of Lassus, Church music as early as 1565, shows that the story of the causes of Palestrina's revolution must not be accepted too literally," and again, "the simple Church music did not indeed take the place of the older and more elaborate forms of the Josquin period at a few strokes of Palestrina's pen."
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