Books › The violin : some account of that leading instrument and its most eminent professors, from its earliest date to the present time : with hints to amateurs, anecdotes, etc., 1852 › scan 249
Scan 249
The violin : some account of that leading instrument and its most eminent professors, from its earliest date to the present time : with hints to amateurs, anecdotes, etc., 1852
6 lines. Read by computer on 3 September 2026. Printed page 233. See the scan on archive.org.
1in Germany sufficient patronage to induce his remaining in that country, his claims were admitted there by all real judges of executive talent; and in England he was esteemed the first violinist of his time. It used to be asserted of him that he joined the emphatical expression of Benda with the brilliancy of Lolli. The decision and spirit which characterized his playing, gave him great advantage as a leader.—The latter days of Cramer were somewhat clouded. The emoluments arising to him from the Opera House, and from his employment as a private teacher of the violin, had been considerable during many years; but talent is too frequently a bad economist, and his was one of the cases in which it proved so. The embarrassment he sustained in his affairs, and the transfer of the post of leader of the Opera-band to the greater Viotti, combined to exercise an injurious effect on his health and spirits. His death occurred in October 1799. Cramer was twice married, and had two sons by his first wife—John-Baptist the great Pianiste, and François, of whom presently.*
3John Peter Salomon was born at Bonn, in 1745. Director, purveyor, composer and performer, he was one of those whom the musical historian must delight to honour. He was educated for the law; but the voice of music was too powerful within him to be restrained. While very young, he became a performer in the Electoral Chapel at Bonn. In 1781 he went to Paris, with
5* Of Tassenberg, a fine player, who came over to England with William Cramer, little can be said. As he fell speedily into obscurity, I place him here below in a note. With capacity for achieving a position, but with no prudence for its retention, he endured much misery through his own reckless follies. To some one who was once enquiring where he lived, the reply was, "In and about the brick-kilns at Tothill-Fields."
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