^JV.
MUSICOGRAPHY.
CHAPTER I.
ORIGIN AND IMPORTANCE OF ANCIENT MUSIC.
As we have stated in our Introduction, Music is
the first language ever spoken by man, and its
origin cannot be attributed to human invention
any more than speaking itself, or dancing, or any
other spontaneous exercise of our innate faculties.
But by music we generally understand various
successions and combinations of vibrated sounds,
classed according to fixed rules and a standard
scale agreed upon amongst certain communities ;
and in this sense, although the gradation and rela-
tive proportions of the sounds are generally taken
from nature itself, yet the necessity of conform-
ing ourselves to the said fixed rules, in order to
be understood by others, has made it a science;
and a very intricate one it has become.
Music seems to have been one of the first arts
practised on earth, and we find it connected with
the most ancient monuments of mankind. It is
probable, also, that vocal music long preceded the
158 ORIGIN AND IMPORTANCE
instrumental, if ever there have been amongst the
antients a music really instrumental ; that is to
say, composed entirely and solely for instruments.
Men, long before they contrived instruments,
must have observed the different tones of their
voices ; they must have learned, from the con-
certs of the birds, to modify their accents, in
order to render them agreeable and melodious :
afterwards wind instruments were probably the
first used, in imitation of the whistling of the
wind amongst the rushes, or other vegetable
tubes. Such was the opinion of Diodorus, and
other authors, as expressed in the following
verses of Lucretius :
" At liqiiidas avium voces imitarier ore
Ante fuit multo, quain levia carmina cantu
Concelebrare homines possmt, aureis-qiie juvare;
Et zephyri cave per calamorum Sibila primum
Agrestes docuere cavas inflare cicutas."
As to other instruments, sonorous strings are so
common, that men must have soon remarked their
different tones, and composed tunes with them.
Drums, and such like instruments, might have
been constructed in imitation of the hollow trunks
of trees and other concave objects, which were
noticed to produce a deep sound when struck.
Besides these natural suppositions, nothing can
be advanced with any degree of certainty with
OF ANCIENT MUSIC. 159
regard to music itself as an art. Many attribute
its invention to Mercury, who is said also to have
invented the lyre ; others assert that Cadmus, in
running away from the court of the king of Phoe-
nicia, brought with him into Greece the musician
Hermione, or harmony. In Plutarch's Dialogues
on Music we find, in one part, that Lysas attributes
the invention of music to Amphion ; in another,
that Solericus names Apollo as the inventor ; and
in a third, that Olympus has the credit of it. We
have little means, and perhaps less interest still,
to investigate the rights of the three claimants.
To these first inventors succeeded Chiron, Demo-
docus, Hermes, and Orpheus, who is also repre-
sented as inventor of the lyre ; afterwards Phoe-
nicus, and Therpander, who lived in the time of
Lycurgus, and gave rules to music ; then Thales
and Thausiris.
Most of these great musicians lived before
Homer. Amongst the more modern ones we
may mention Lasus Hermionicus, who is said to
have written the first treaty on this art, Diodorus,
who perfected the flute by adding new holes to it,
and Timotheus, who was fined by the Lacede-
monians for having added a string to the lyre.
The antients, extremely obscure and confused
with respect to the inventors of musical instru-
ments, are not more clear or intelligible with
160
ORIGIN AND IMPORTANCE
regard to the instruments themselves, of which
we know little more than the names. They differ
much, also, among themselves as to the nature,
object, power, and constitution of music. In
general, they gave to this word a far wider sense
than we do at the present age, classing under that
name not only dance, pantomime, and poetry, but
also the assemblage of all the other sciences. He-
sychius tells us that the Athenians gave the deno-
mination of music to all the arts and sciences ;
and Hermes defines music the knowledge of the
order of all things. This was also the doctrine of
Pythagoras and Plato, who maintained that all in
nature was music, and taught morals through its
means. The Pythagoricians, believing the soul
to be formed of the most harmonious proportions,
sought to re-establish, by means of a terrestrial
one, the intellectual and primeval harmony of
its component parts ; that harmony which exist-
ed in its perfection when the soul inhabited the
heavens, previous to its animating our frames.
With regard to music itself, in the modern
sense of the word, then inseparably linked with
poetry, it was highly esteemed amongst the an-
tients, and particularly the Greeks, who attri-
buted to this art the most wonderful effects and
an unlimited power, believing it to be practised
even by their gods. Plato and Aristotle, gene-
OF ANCIENT MUSIC. l6l
rally at variance with each other on all political
questions, agree nevertheless in giving the great-
est influence to music on the morals of the peo-
ple. Polybius tells us that music was necessary to
soften the dispositions of people inhabiting cold
and dreary countries ; and that the Cyneta^, who
neglected music, surpassed in cruelty all the other
Greeks, there being no people among whom so
many crimes were ever committed. Athenaius
asserts that in former times the laws both divine
and human, the exhortations to virtue, the history
of the gods, heroes, and illustrious men, were all
written in verse, and publicly sung in choruses
accompanied with instruments.
This union of music with poetry in the cele-
bration of all that is destined to exalt the mind,
may perhaps partly explain to us those wonderful
effects of which our modern music can give no
example or idea. Indeed, nothing in our present
combinations of musical sounds can be compared to
the music of the Greeks ; for the simple reason that
theirs rested entirely upon the various succes-
sions of four notes, forming their musical system,
or tetrachord ; whilst ours is based upon the va-
rious successions and combinations of eight notes,
forming our musical gamut, or octave. They cer-
tainly had on their instruments, when tuned in the
diatonic gender, the same succession of sounds as
M
162 ORIGIN AND IMPORTANCE
we would find on a modern harp by striking six-
teen successive strings, (a number equal to their
complete scale,) but little or no notice was taken
of the relation of the octave ; the combination of
four sounds, or a tetrachord, forming in their sys-
tem a whole as perfect to their ear, as that of
eight, or an octave, to ours.
This musical scale in its most complete state
consisted of sixteen notes or strings, divided into
four tetrachords conjoint, in the same manner as
our octaves are ; viz. by the highest note of the
first tetrachord being the lowest of the second
above. There was, however, a disjunction from
the second to the third, or from the third to the
fourth, according to certain rules useless to re-
late here ; this variation caused the third tetra-
chord to have two names, as shown in Plate I.,
fig. 1, in which we have noted in modern charac-
ters the whole Greek scale in the diatonic and in
the chromatic genders.
They had also a third gender, called the en-
harmonic, in which, according to Aristoxenes, the
three first strings were placed at a quarter of a
tone from each other; or, according to Pythagoras,
they were tuned at unequal distances, giving a
minor half-tone between the first and second, and
a major half-tone between the first and third ; so
that there was only the difference from the major
OF ANCIENT MUSIC. l63
to the minor half-tone between the second and
third : a difference which modern ears cannot ap-
preciate. It will be further remarked, as another
similitude with our octave, that the two extreme
notes of each tetrachord were fixed and unalter-
able ; and that the intermediary ones alone suffered
those various alterations necessitated by the gen-
ders, modes, &c. &c.
The word harmony had with them a sense
entirely different to that which it has acquired
amongst the moderns ; being applied only to the
successions of the notes and not to their combina-
tions, since they never played in their accompani-
ments any other note but the unison, or at most
the octave. As to time and measure, they were
entirely governed by the rhythm and metre of
the verses, for which they had the most rigid
rules.
With regard to their musical characters, or
notes, they were taken from the letters of their
alphabet, written in different positions according
to the various modes and genders, and which
have been explained in all their details by their
authors.
It is generally and erroneously believed, that
if the ancient music is entirely lost to us, it is
in consequence of its characters being totally
unintelligible. I hope that the short account I
M 2
164 OF ANCIENT MUSIC.
have just given of the music of the Greeks will
be sufficient to prove, that we could now decipher
their notes as well, perhaps, as the Greeks them-
selves might have done ; but to understand, to
execute, to feel those melodies, these are the dif-
ficulties which will never be surmounted ; for, in
music, as well as in other languages, it is a dif-
ferent thing to read and to understand, and the
ancient music is a dead language, of which the
vocabulary is lost. Those who might feel a
deeper interest in the subject may consult the
works of Aristoxenes, disciple of Aristotle, chief
of the sect opposed to Pythagoras, and the most
ancient author whose works have been preserved;
then Euclide of Alexandria, Aristides, who wrote
in the time of Cicero ; afterwards Alypius, then
Gaudentius, Nicoraachus, and Bacchius; Plutarch
also, whose Dialogue on Music we have had occa-
sion to mention ; the mathematician Ptolemy, who
wrote the principles of harmony about the time
of the Roman emperor Antoninus, and tried to
combine in his system the advantages of the two
schools that divided the musical world ; and last-
ly, amongst the Greeks, Briennius. In Latin we
have also, Boecius, Martianus Cassiodorus, and
Saint Augustin.
CHAPTER II.
ORIGIN AND PROGRESSIVE FORMATION OF
MODERN MUSIC.
Music from the Greeks was transmitted to the
Romans, at a time when the degenerated charac-
ter of the latter rendered them unfit to feel and
encourage it in its higher branches ; and, at the
downfal of the Roman empire, music of all the fine
arts the most brilliant, because the most delicate
and subtle, would have entirely disappeared under
the oppression of the northern invaders, had it
not been rescued by the first Christians, who
had associated it with their imposing ceremonies.
However, at the time when the latter began
to have churches and to sing psalms, music had
already lost the greatest part of its energy and
beauty ; and the Christians deprived it of most
of its remaining power, viz. that of rhythm and
measure, when from verse, to which it had always
been applied, they transposed it to the prose of
holy writ, or to some barbarous poetry worse still
for music than prose itself.
Nevertheless, the plain Chant, or church music,
preserved by the priests of Rome in its primitive
character, as all other external ceremonies of the
166 ORIGIN AND FORMATION
church, offers still some precious remains of the
ancient melody of the Greeks in the diatonic
scale and its various modes, as much as it can
be felt without measure or rhythm. For, as early
as 370, St. Ambrosius, archbishop of Milan, had
established certain rules for church music. These
rules, modified afterwards by the Pope Gregory,
were ultimately introduced in France by the Em-
peror Charlemagne, who brought from Rome for
that purpose Theodore and Benedict, two great
musicians, who had been taught by Pope Gre-
gory himself. This music, called the Gregorian
Chant, is the same now in practice in the Catholic
churches on the Continent.
In the year 1024, an Italian Benedictine named
Guy d'Arezzo, having according to the common
opinion added to the Greek scale three notes in
the treble and one in the bass, or, according
to Meibomius, having by these additions restored
this scale to its perfect state, marked his lower
note with a Greek G, or gamma ; and as it was
the first on the ascending scale, he gave its
name to the whole system, which he called also
gamma-ut, or gamm'ut, from the two names given
by him to this first note ; viz. the one gamma, as
the lowest note on the scale, and the second id, as
the first note of his hexametric division of the
same scale.
OF MODERN MUSIC. 167
But we must not confound this gamut with
our present one. As we have stated, the Greeks
had written their music w'ith the letters of their
alphabet, and the Romans adopted corresponding
letters for their musical sounds. Besides these
letters, the Greeks had also four syllables corre-
sponding to the four notes of their tetrachord,
which they used to pronounce in studying their
intonations ; and Guy, having substituted the divi-
sion of six to that of four previously in use, gave
to his hexachord the denominations o^ ut, re^ mif
fa^ sol, la ; these six syllables being the first ones
of six verses of a hymn to St. John the Baptist'
in which they were observed to fall in succession
Upon the six first notes of his scale. ( Plate I.,
fig. 2). Thus, in running up the twenty notes
constituting the full range of sounds then practised
in music, the six syllables were repeated every
hexachord, in the same manner as the four syl-
lables te, ta, the, tho, had been repeated, every
tetrachord in succession, by the Greek students.
(See Plate I., fig. 1).
It was not till a long time afterwards that the re-
lation of the octave, being principally attended to,*
* We are aware that the common opinion attributes
to the Pope Gregory the discovery of the relation of the
octave, and subsequently the fovmdation of the modern
system of music or gamut ; probably from the fact of his
168 ORIGIN AND FORMATION
gave rise to a third system or division by eight,
which to our ears is the only natural and perfect
one. In the last gamut the six first notes pre-
served the six names chosen by Guy, and the
seventh had no other designation than its alpha-
betical letter. This caused great difficulties in
the study of music until the latter part of the
seventeenth century, when a French musician,
named Lemaire, adopted the syllable si, which
was subsequently introduced into Italy and other
countries.
Thus every note had two names : the first its
alphabetical letter, showing its fixed degree on
the scale ; the second its syllahle, showing its re-
lation with the fundamental note of the music
having reduced the musical alphabet to seven letters, re-
peated in different type every successive octave. But it is
easy to demonstrate the error of both suppositions.
Firstly, with regard to the properties of the octave : the
very fact of the Greeks playing at the octave of the voices
those accompaniments which they called harmonies or anti-
phonies, proved that they knew as well as Pope Gregory
himself the relation of the octave, named by them diapa-
son, and that if they did not repeat the same seven letters
every successive diapason or octave, it was probably because
their melody, not being submitted to that octametric divi-
sion of sounds, gave to every note a distinct character,
which called forth a distinct representative sign. Indeed it
is highly probable that their first instruments, and conse-
quently their first music, had been based upon the very
OF MODERN MUSIC. l69
executed ; which fundamental was for that purpose
always called ut. For these seven syllables were
only invented to facilitate the study of music
through a transposition which is practised even
to the present day by those masters who, re-
gardless of their own interests, desire their pupils
to acquire rapidly a thorough knowledge of the
twelve various keys.
There was besides a third manner of writing
instrumental music, called in French tahlaturej
and which consisted in tracing as many lines as
there were strings on the instrument, and figur-
ating, by small marks on these lines, the notes
which were to be sounded. From this Guy
d'Arrezzo formed his stave, consisting of four
system of which the invention is attributed to the learned
Father ; as both Nicomachus and Boecius assert that Mer-
cury's tetrachord, the first instrument invented, was com-
posed of four strings, of which the two extreme ones sounded
the octave, and the two intermediate ones, the fourth and
fifth, as c, F, G, c, (the very notes of our fundamental bass);
and, if we take into account the various alterations which
were occasionally made to the two intermediate strings,
according to the various modes in which the instrument
was tuned, we must come to the conclusion that the suc-
cession of sounds given by these four strings was very
similar to our modern gamut.
The Greeks subsequently extended the range of their in-
struments to two octaves, and adopted for the subdivision
of these a system entirely new, and perhaps purposely
170 ORIGIN AND FORMATION
lines only, which is still in use for church music ;
and in 1338, Jean de Muris, a canon of Paris,
having added a line to these four, gave to the
notes all the distinctions necessary to express
their relative duration. Thus was established
the system, which is now become almost the uni-
versal written language for music.
Nevertheless, it was not before the end of the
fifteenth century that this noble art began to
emerge from the barbarism into which it had
fallen, when the organists of Germany gave to
sacred music that deep and majestic character for
which they have retained their superiority to the
present day. Italy soon followed, and, favoured
by the harmony of its tongue, which assimilated it
calculated to counterbalance the powerful effect of the
octave. Whatever might have been their motives, we can-
not certainly accuse them of ignorance on this score.
As to the second point, viz. that of having established
the modern musical system, it has no better foundation than
the first, since the plain chant, as he established it, and as
it has been preserved in some of the ant'ifplionies sung to
the present day in Catholic churches, has little or no rela-
tion with modern music. Even three centuries after him,
when Guy d'Arezzo substituted his hexachord for the tetra-
chord of the Greeks, and gave to its six notes six distinct
syllables, destined to facilitate the study of vocal music, the
melody was still limited to six sounds, as is proved to us by
the hymn itself, which furnished that musician with his six
intonation syllables, (see Plate I. fig. 2 ;) by these six syllables
OF MODERN MUSIC. I7l
in a great measure to the ancient languages, gave
birth to a kind of music entirely new ; viz. the
Opera, of which the first one, composed by
Vincent Galilvea, upon the stirring history of
Ugolin, had immediately an immense success.
Yet the science of music remained still very
limited, the whole harmony known consisting
of a few simple chords, until the year 1590,
when a Venetian, named Monteverde, invented
the natural discords, and thereby opened the field
allotted to the composer. But from the seven-
teenth century only did harmony begin to receive
the wide and firm basis which has multiplied its
power and resources, and made it a science. At
that time various French mathematicians directed
being deemed sufficient then to read all the modulations of
music, and by a similar gamut of six syllables being prac-
tised in France at the same time that Guy gave his to Italy ;
as Jean de Muris found it still in use in Paris in the four-
teeth century, and of which the syllables were pro^ to, do,
no, tu, a.
A very remarkable feature of this hexametric division of
the musical sound is, that where the major gamut ends the
minor begins ; as, major gamut, c, D, E, f, g, a ; minor
gamut, A, B, c, n, e, f; and by playing successively these
two gamuts, we lose entirely for the moment all sentiment
of the octave. The latter effect will prove that the chant
of that time was much more analogous to the Greek, than to
the modern music.
172 ORILIIN AND FORMATION
their investigations toward the analysis of sound,
its generation and properties. Sauveur and the
Rev. Dr. Mersenne first discovered the principle
of the perfect chord in the vibrations of a single
string ; viz. the tendency of every sound to gene-
rate its own third and fifth. Upon this Rameau
built his Treaty of Harmony ^ published in Paris
in 1722, of which the most important part is his
system of fundamental bass, which had great
success, probably from his having been the first
to ascertain that all chords are susceptible of cer-
tain modifications, called in French renversement ;
that is to say, of having any one of their component
notes written in the bass without ceasing to be
harmonically the same. About the same time an
eminent violin player, named Tartini, published
another treaty of harmony entirely opposed to the
one above mentioned, inasmuch as he directed all
the bass to be engendered from the treble, whilst
Rameau had done the reverse ; the one drawing
harmony from melody, the other melody from har-
mony ; each by an opposite road coming to conclu-
sions nearly similar, as to the combination and suc-
cession of chords. This sort of invention became
almost a mania, particularly in France, where each
new system had its followers, who arrayed them-
selves earnestly under the banner of its inventor.
OF MODERN MUSIC. 173
Meanwhile Germany and Italy had been fast
progressing in the practical part of this new
science, and the French musicians were still gro-
velling in their petty quarrels whilst these two
countries had produced many first-rate composers ;
for it is but within the last century that France,
and afterwards England, have begun to possess
a music of their own, and native composers of
real merit.
In all the fine arts examples have generally
preceded rules, but in modern music it has been
the reverse : mathematicians have laid the foun-
dations upon which men of genius have raised
their admirable monuments. This progress, so
directly opposed to all that we know, is perhaps
the strongest proof we can adduce that music, as
we understand it in the present era, is a creation
entirely new, and that no relation or even com-
parison can be established between the antients
and the moderns on that subject.
We cannot wonder much at the severity of the
Lacedemonians towards Timothseus for having
added one string to the lyre, when we consider
that the addition of a single note* to our gamut
has created in us such an estrangement from the
Greeks on this subject, that, although we still
continue to hold them as our masters in every
* See Note, page 167.
174 ORIGIN AND FORMATION
other branch of the fine arts, yet in this one, the
most highly honoured and deeply cultivated a-
monsrst them, we cannot even form an idea of
what they understood or practised, and that (like
all those allowed to decide in their own cause) we
have not hesitated to attribute to ourselves an
immense superiority, doubting almost whether
they ever had any real knowledge of music.
But before we condemn the Greeks as barba-
rians upon this score, it is proper that we should
pause a little, and reflect if it be really music that
we have invented.
" When we think," says J. J. Rousseau, " that
among all the nations of the earth, who have every
one had a music and a melody, the Europeans are
the only people who ever had a harmony or chords,
and who find this mixture agreeable ; when we re-
flect that the world has existed so many centuries
without, of all the nations who cultivated the fine
arts, a single one having ever known that har-
mony; that no animal, no bird, no being in nature
ever produced any chord but unison, or music but
melody; that the languages of the East, so sono-
rous, so musical, that the Greek ear so subtle, so
refined, and exercised with so much art, have never
guided those voluptuous and passionate people
towards our harmony ; that without it their music
had such wonderful effects, whilst with it ours
OF MODERN MUSIC. 175
has such poor ones ; that, at last, it was reserved
for the nations of the North, whose dull and coarse
organs are affected more by noise and strength
of sound, than by sweetness of tone and melody of
inflexion, to make this grand discovery, and to
give it as an ever-ruling principle of the art ;
when, I say, we notice all this ; it is very difficult
not to suspect that all our harmony is but a gothic
and barbarous invention, which we never would
have thought of, had we been more sensible to the
beauties of the art and to true natural music."
Without adopting the opinion of the eccentric
French author, who was nevertheless himself a
perfect harmonist and an ingenious composer, we
may say that the distinctive features of modern
music is harmony, whilst that of ancient music
was melody; and this at least will be placing both
parties on even ground.
It is incontestable that, by extending the mo-
dern gamut to the complete octave, we have
limited our melody to the divers successions of
seven sounds, whilst the antients gave it no other
bounds but that of the two extremities of their
whole scale. Impressed with so strong a senti-
ment of the octave that he could never hear after
seven notes but the repetition of the same sounds,
the modern musician was naturally drawn to seek
variety in the different combinations of these
seven notes blended in chords of two, three, or
176 ORIGIN AND FORMATION
four sounds ; and harmony was created. Modern
music is all harmony, nothing but harmony ; and
when we consider that on almost every instru-
ment we hear, and principally the piano, that
modern orchestra in miniature, from which the
young beginner receives his first notions of the
divine art, and over which the learned composer
tries the effects of his scientific combinations, no
exact interval can be given except the octave,
(which even is not with us admitted as an inter-
val,) we may safely assert that where there is no
harmony there can be no music. For no note
can completely satisfy the exquisite feeling of our
soul, unless it be accompanied by its natural
chord, which, by blending with it its rich harmo-
nies, and shading it as it were with its transparent
and mysterious waves, give to the ear an inward
feeling of the pure sound it cannot hear.*
* The young lady, therefore, who, learning by herself a
new song, spells with one finger, note by note, on her newly
tuned instrument the difficult passages of the sweet melody^
does certainly the thing best calculated to destroy in her
every natural sentiment of music, and to make her sing false
notes. But let her first practise the accompaniment; then,
playing the full, sonorous chords, let her try the air, and she
will find almost by inspiration the pure vibrating intona-
tions. But, perchance, she may not be able to derive any
advantage from this, and the one note, of which every chord
is but the relieving gro^md, may still remain unknown, un-
felt : in this case, let her return to her first method ; there
cannot be the least danger for her musical organs.
OF MODERN MUSIC. 177
But whilst our instruments are tuned in accord-
ance to a temperament, or regulated deviation
from the true proportions of the octave, the
Greeks had theirs tuned with the most strict
accuracy, whether that they obeyed the precepts
of Pythagoras, and took all their intervals from
the mathematical divisions of the monochord; or
that they abided by those of Aristoxenes, and ad-
mitted no rule but the acute judgment of their
well-exercised ear. Hence it follows, that all the
notes they formed were sounded with such pre-
ciseness and delicacy, that all chords or mixture
of sounds, instead of adding to their effect, would
only have altered their exquisite purity, and of-
fended the fastidious ear of the listeners. The
soul of their music was melody, unfettered, unre-
strained, unbounded melody ; and whilst the mo-
dern composer encircles his audience with a triple
and endless chain of chords, the ancient one car-
ried his in the wide open space. Whether he
were to follow the lively notes of the lark or the
deep roaring of the tiger, on that one strain he
would direct the whole might of his choruses ; and
with him an orchestra of a thousand instruments
were but a thousand voices, still joining, still
pouring in one sound, still echoing the thrilling
or thundering- note.
CHAPTEK III.
ON MUSICAL CHARACTERS.
ANCIENT AND MODERN CHARACTERS FOR MUSIC.
The Greeks, as we have seen, had for musical
characters the letters of their alphabet, which
being also their numerical figures, conveyed to
the mind in the same signs both the idea of the
notes and the ratio of their different vibrations.
The Romans, who learned their music from the
Greeks, wrote it also with corresponding alpha-
betical signs, which nevertheless, having no rela-
tion with their numerical system, were in conse-
quence but a very indifferent translation of the
Greek written notes.
The moderns, having adopted the Roman alpha-
betical scale, (which the Pope Gregory had re-
duced to seven letters only, repeated in different
type for every different octave,) soon remarked
the imperfections of that system, and contrived
various improved characters, of which the two
most universally adopted were, and are still
now, the staff, and the arithmetical figures. The
latter, however, although by far the most clear
ON MUSICAL CHARACTERS. 179
and easy of the two, has never been used but
for the writing of basses, and is now no more
seen in printed music.
We will examine successively these two cha-
racters, which, like all other written languages,
require to be particularly clear, simple, and ex-
peditious, both to read and to write.
The Staff.
The staff, invented a thousand years ago, has
been rendered gradually more and more com-
plicated, without having ever undergone a tho-
rough judicious reform or radical improvement.
Thus, although all our musical system is based
on the octave, although in whatever way we
trace our musical characters we can never repre-
sent but the seven notes of our gamut combined
in various ways, or the same combinations trans-
posed in various keys ; yet in our written music
no advantage is taken of, no relation is established
with these well-ascertained truths. Thus, whilst
a staff of three horizontal lines, affording seven
distinct positions, would have been sufficient to
write all modern combinations of sounds, (with
a few additional signs designating the octave to
be played,) we have five fixed lines and twelve or
fifteen additional ones, making a total of eighteen
or twenty lines, and above forty positions !
N 2
180 ON MISICAL CHARACTERS.
With regard to time, that vital part of music,
one single remark is sufficient to demonstrate the
absurdity of the means employed ; viz. that the
more rapidly the music is to be played, the more
confused are the characters, the more time is
spent in writing them, and the more space they
occupy on tlic paper.
Without enterinoj into the minute details of
this defective system, we will limit ourselves to
the simple observation, that it overloads the me-
mory of the beginner in such a manner, that his
ear is formed, and his organs have acquired the
necessary pliability and ease, long before he is
able to read at first sight ; and that consequently,
all his attention and energies are spent in attend-
ing to the rules, instead of being centered in the
sentiment and execution of the music. Hence
it follows, that many people play better without
than with notes, and that professors have the
greatest difficulty to keep their pupils to them.
Musicians, it is true, do not see all this, for
habit renders every thing easy. Music for them
is not the science of sounds, but that of semi-
breves, crotchets, quavers, and semiquavers; when
these figures do not strike their sight, they cannot
see music. Besides, what they have learned with
so much hardship, why should they make it easy
for others ? It is not, therefore, to the musician
ON MLSICAL CHARACTERS. 181
that we must appeal here ; but to the man who
knows music, and who has reflected on that art.
There are not two opinions among the latter
class of people upon the numerous defects of our
characters; but these defects are more easy to
expose than to correct, and the many useless
attempts that have been made, have only cor-
roborated the well-known fact, that the public,
without investiffatinof the merits of a new system
presented to it, keeps generally to what it finds
established ; prefering a bad way of knowing, to a
better one of learning.
The last observation, borrowed from J. J. Rous-
seau, brings us naturally to the system which he
tried in vain to introduce into general practice;
viz.
The Arithmetical Figures.
This system of writing music, which consists
in representing the seven notes of our gamut
with the seven first figures of arithmetic, was ge-
nerally used, previously to the present century, for
writing basses and accompaniments ; but as such
a character necessitated in the player certain
preliminary notions of harmony, which, however
simple they be, are nevertheless considered as
a burden by the modern finger ers^ arithmetical
fio-ures have been in all cases replaced bv the
182 ON MUSICAL CHARACTERS.
present notes, and it is useless for us to enter into
more minute details.
The system proposed by Rousseau, and relat-
ing to which he published in 1743 a volume,
entitled Dissertation on Modern Music, cannot
however be passed entirely without notice.
In this system the figures 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7,
represent the natural gamut c, d, e,f, g, a, b, and
are all written upon one line : the octave above
is written above the line, and the octave below
under the line. Thus one line is sufficient to
write three octaves, and with the occasional addi-
tion of one line above or below, the composer has
a range of seven full octaves.
The sharps or flats introduced in the modula-
tions are marked upon the figures themselves, by
a line slanting upwards or downwards.
The key-note given in the margin is entirely
relative to the instruments upon which each per-
former forms his own gamut, (by transposition, if
necessary,) the music being itself always written
in natural keys, in order to preserve in all cases
the same characters to the same intervals. Thus 5,
which is g in the key of C, will be played a in the
key of D ; and consequently always represent the
dominant or fifth note from the fundamental.
The time is expressed by dividing the line
ON MUSICAL CHARACTERS. 183
into bars, and each bar into two, three, or more
sub-divisions, as required by the style of the
music, or the multiplicity of the characters.
It is impossible not to be struck with the sim-
plicity of this system ; and, had the author suc-
ceeded in bringing it into general use, we would
not perhaps have ventured to introduce ours to
the public, since the principal advantages of the
first constitute no indifferent part of the second.
But yet we still hope that the reader will find in
the latter some genuine merit ; and also peculiar
advantages which could not have been derived
from previous publications.
CHAPTER IV.
REFORMED CHARACTERS, OR MUSICOGRAPHY.
The musical characters have to fulfil the double
object of representing sounds ; firstly, according
to their intervals, which constitute melody and
harmony ; secondly, according to their duration,
which constitutes measure and time.
With regard to the first point: In whatever
manner we turn or combine our musical signs,
we can never represent with them more than the
seven notes of our gamut, based upon various de-
grees and raised at various octaves ; consequently
a scale of seven signs will always be sufficient to
trace these seven notes in all their various situ-
ations and combinations, provided a means be
taken of fixing the starting note or fundamental
sound of each gamut, as well as the relative situ-
ation of each octave.
The second point is perhaps the most important
of the two, since time regulates and entirely charac-
terizes melody ; and even of itself constitutes the
sole music of many instruments of very powerful
effects, such as drums, bells, castanets, cymbals,
RETORMED (HARACTEUS. 185
triangles, &c. In our opinion, the only really intel-
ligible manner to attain this second object, is to
establish such precise relation between the length
of the sign on the paper and the duration of the
note in the time, that both begin and terminate
together in the same instants. By this we do not
mean a relation entirely conventional, as that esta-
blished on the staff, and which necessitates numer-
ous and complicated operations of the mind ; but
a simple self-evident one, based on correct geo-
metrical proportions : such a relation, in a w^ord, as
we observe between the division of a dial and the
hours of the day ; or better, between the charac-
ters raised on the barrel, and the notes played
through the pipes of an organ.*
* It is a subject of wonder to us, that the above-mentioned
iuatiument never led, by its simple construction, to an ana-
logous modification of the present musical characters ; for
our reader probably is aware, that the organ-builder traces
across his barrels, previously to his fixing the notes a number
of parallel lines corresponding to those of the staff, which
he also divides, with respect to time, by perpendicular lines
iu a corresponding number of bars. Consequently, if the
musician, suppressing all additional signs attached to the
notes in order to express the duration of their sounds, had
replaced the round dots with horizontal lines equal in their
length to the length of the notes represented by them, he
would have had by these few alterations a musical character
at once clear and simple, which character would have been
a very near imitation of the notes fixed on organ-barrels.
(See an example of Uiis. Plate VIT. fig. 3.)
186 REFORMED CHARACTERS,
On these two principles we have based our
characters, as follows :
Explanation of the Characters.*
Firstly, with respect to intervals :
Having our paper previously ruled as for com-
mon writing, we find that each line affords us
three distinct positions ; viz. the first upon, the
second above, and the third under the line ; and
that the same character, repeated in each position,
may be made to express three diff'erent notes.
Consequently, beginning with the three notes of
the perfect chord, we will represent them with an
horizontal straight stroke of the pen, drawn in
the three positions above mentioned, as follows :
viz. the fundamental or first note, upon ; the me-
diant or third note, above ; and the dominant or
fifth note, under the line. Afterwards proceeding
with the four remaining notes, all more or less
subservient in the melody to the three first, we
will express the second, fourth, and sixth with
a horizontal curve rounded at the top, and traced
in the same position as the first, third, and fifth
sounded immediately below them ; and the seventh
or leading note, with a character peculiar to itself;
viz. a horizontal curve rounded downwards, traced
on the line. These seven signs representing in
* All the examples quoted in the following pages are
traced in Plate VIII., in the same succession as followed in
their explanation.
OR MUSICOGRAPHY. 187
succession the seven sounds, g, a, b, c, d, e^f,
Ex. No. 4.
Sharps and flats are expressed by means of
slanting lines traced in the following manner ;
viz. C sharp, or D flat, with the character of C na-
tural raised towards the right; D sharp, or E flat,
with the character of E natural lowered towards
the right ; and G sharp, or A flat, with the character
of G natural raised tow^ards the right. Ex. No. 5.
Exceptions : F sharp and B flat, modifications
of a very frequent occurrence, are expressed, the
first by inverting the curve ascribed toy natural,
and giving it the form of the leading note, (of
which its sound assumes for a time the character,
the fifth note having become suddenly funda-
mental, or first note of the temporary melody) ;
the second, by tracing the character ascribed to
B natural, not on the line, its position as leading
note, but under the line, and on a level with the
fifth ; (the fundamental or first note to which it
leads having suddenly become dominant, or fifth
note of the temporary melody). Ex. No. 6.
Having thus expressed the seven sounds of
our gamut, and the twelve diatonic degrees of
modern music, nothing remains but to fix by dis-
tinct marks the octave of each note. For this,
it being once admitted that the characters above
described represent in succession the seven notes
written in example No. 4, when we have to write
188 REFORMED CHARACTERS,
sounds at the octave above or below these, we
join a small dot over or under our characters.
This mark, once added, influences all the subse-
quent characters, which continue to be read in the
octave indicated by it until a new mark is intro-
duced, to raise or lower the melody one octave.
Two dots indicate a double octave ; above or
below, according to the position of the said marks.
Ex. No. 7.
When notes are to be played in two octaves at
once, the characters should be accompanied with
a short cross line ; in which case the character
written expresses the bass sound, and the cross
perpendicular line, the octave above. Should the
interval be of two octaves, two lines must be
traced across the character. Ex. No. 8.
Secondly, with respect to duration :
The duration of the notes in our system is not
expressed through the medium of additional signs,
but given in the characters themselves, which
have as much length on the paper as their sounds
have duration in the time. For this purpose, the
line on which we write our music is livided
into a certain number of bars, all of a strictly
equal length, without any regard to the various
numbers of notes to be written in them ; each
bar is afterwards mentally subdivided into two or
three equal parts, according to the time in which
OR MUSICOGRAPFIV. 189
the music is to be played ; * and the characters
representing the notes follow each other closely,
leaving no horizontal distance between them,
but what is strictly necessary to keep the notes
distinct from one another ; unless there be a rest
in the music. In the latter case, the vacant space
left on the horizontal line is always proportioned
to the duration of the silence. We need no spe-
cial characters for rests : where there is nothing
written, there can be nothing to read. Yet, in
order to add more preciseness still ; whenever
rests occur, we mark by small perpendicular lines
* There are but two sorts of times, the double and the
triple. The ancient musician considered the triple time as
the perfect one ; we, on the contrary, regard the double as
the simple and perfect time. The latter opinion may be exact
with relation to our mode of timing our characters ; but
if we consider them in themselves and with respect to their
effect, we cannot but acknowledge that the first is by far the
most easily felt, the most exciting, the most powerful. In
ancient music we find that the characters corresponded exactly
in their subdivisions to each time : thus the breve or square
note was equal to three semibreves or round notes in the
triple time, and to two semibreves in the double time. We
have both times in our music ; but, by a strange oversight,
we have only preserved the subdivision by two, although
the first was as necessary as the second. In consequence of
this, when we have to divide a space of time in three equal
parts the characters are wanting, and we have recourse to
the figure 3, or to other conventional signs equally com-
plicated.
190 REFORMED CHARACTERS,
the natural subdivisions of the bar in which they
are contained, and express their duration at the
same time by small dots joined to the perpendi-
cular lines in various positions. Ex. No. 9-
Whenever notes are found which do not agree
with the regular subdivision of. time followed
in the piece, the bar in which they occur should be
divided by small perpendicular lines, in order to
demonstrate clearly that they have not been writ-
ten thus by mistake. Ex. No. 10.
It is evident, that the number and respective
lengths of the notes in each bar will always indi-
cate to the eye, as well as their sounds do to the
ear, the time in which the music is played ; yet,
in order to render the style of the music intel-
ligible at first sight, we express, by means of the
figure 2 or 3 written in the margin, whether the
piece be in double or triple time. See Ex. No. 9-
Remark. All the various sig^ns used in the
common staff, such as a pause, a repeat, &c., &c.
may be employed likewise with our characters.
By the above explained system all modifica-
tions of sounds are expressed clearly and correctly.
Thus, the octaves having always the same charac-
ters, the chords are easily brought to their funda-
mentals. Thus, the distinctive feature given to
the three notes of the perfect chords by opposi-
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OR MUSICOGRAPHY. 191
tion to the other four, will cause the style of the
music to be intelligible to the eye independently
of the sounds : for most consonant intervals being
composed of similar signs, and all dissonant ones
of dissimilar signs, a simple harmony will be
distinguishable by the concordance of its various
characters with each other; whilst a scientific
composition, a complicated harmony containing a
greater number of discords, will always be charac-
terized to the eye by the contrary forms of its
representative signs. Last of all, unless in minor
keys, the various periods in the melody, as well
as the whole piece, will always terminate with
the straight horizontal bar, affected to the funda-
mental note, or tonic, and its harmonics.
It is obvious, that if we were to adopt the usual
method of writing in the different keys, we should
lose many of the above-enumerated advantages ;
but we see no reason to bring such a confusion into
our system. Since there are but two modes in
music, a major and a minor, there can be but two
gamuts corresponding. What is it to play or sing
in D major, but to transpose the gamut of C a
degree higher, and to establish it upon the note D
as its fundamental sound ; when all the properties
which belonged to C as key-note are given to D,
which is substituted to it in all respects ? It is only
to explain this substitution that the various clefs
19*2 REFORMED CHARACTERS
and keys have been introduced; and this multipli-
city of confused signs, which cost much time to
the student to learn, and which has no other ad-
vantage but to point out mechanically the notes on
the instruments, has greatly contributed to de-
stroy the natural sentiment of music, by subject-
ing the performer to the instrument, instead of
the instrument to the performer. Not so with
our system : whichever note be our fundamental,
is written as such, with all its harmonies and
relations to the other notes, which are every one
more or less subservient to it. We write the
musical, not the instrumental proportions. If the
performer is forced to strike A sharp on the same
key as B flat, giving to this intermediary sound,
in its two occurrences, denominations and charac-
ters belonging to two notes with which it has no
relation whatever, it is because his instrument is
imperfect and his classification incorrect; but a
good singer, or violinist, knows the difference and
can express it. Therefore we say to the musi-
cian : whatever instrument you may happen to
play, write the notes perfectly ; you will at least
please the eye, if you do not satisfy the ear. The
only difficulty is, that you will have sometimes to
transpose ; but that cannot be of any great consi-
deration, since a little girl six years of age, who
begins the piano, does a much more arduous thing
OR MUSICOGRAPHY. MY^
without feeling- greatly inconvenienced by it: we
mean, reading" with two different clefs siraultane-
ously, thereby always transposing with one hand
or the other.*
The various clefs have been invented in order
to save to the composer the trouble of writing so
many additional or ledger lines, by keeping as
much as possible the music within the compass of
the staff; whilst the various sharps and flats, form-
ing what are called the different keys, have been
introduced, in order to make the written notes
correspond exactly to the fixed sounds of our
instruments. The latter object being the only
one that requires our consideration, we establish
the relation of our characters with the notes of
the instruments in the following manner.
In the key of C natural, (which we express w^ith
the letter C written in the margin,) our funda-
mental note (or horizontal bar traced on the line)
represents, as we have stated, the C which is writ-
ten in the treble clef on the third space of the
staff. All the other notes follow .in succession
at their respective distances.
Suppose we wish to raise our music one chro-
* However, those who might prefer writing for the instru-
ments with all the various keys, which have cost them so
much trouble to acquire, are quite at liberty so to do with
our signs, and need not find fault with the system under that
pretence. For the others only we continue our explanation.
O
194 REFORMED CHARACTERS,
matic degree, or half a tone, we shall be then,
with relation to the instrument, in C sharp or D
flat, and we should have to write on the stave
7 sharp, or 5 flat, to express this pitch of our
gamut. But with our system we do not trouble
ourselves with these details, and still write the
notes in a natural key; simply indicating, by a
line drawn across our key-letter, (in the margin,)
that the said note is to be raised one half of a
tone. In D natural, we substitute this letter for
the C in the margin ; in D sharp or E flat, we
cross the key-letter D with a small line ; and so
on for every one of the eight remaining chromatic
degrees of our musical scale, which may succes-
sively be taken as fundamentals of a natural
gamut, proceeding in the same succession of
sounds as the first. Ex. No. 11.
The vocalist will read as easily in the one as in
the other of those keys, which, whatever may be
their technical denomination, are all equally na-
tural to his voice, and the instrumentist alone
will have to find, among the sharps or flats of his
scale, those sounds which are not in the natural
gamut of his instrument. The difficulty being
wholly instrumental, has nothing to do with the
music itself; and whatever be our fundamental
note, this note we express with the same horizon-
tal bar ascribed to it, as first of the scale.
But the fundamental note, which is the tonic
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OR MUSICOGRAPHY. li)')
in major modes, is only the mediant in minor ones ;
the tonic then being placed a third minor below.
This difference is marked with a small line drawn
under our alphabetical or key-letter, which, by its
means, indicates the minor mode relative to the
said major key. Ex. No. 12.
The Plate VIII., which contains applications
of all the above rules, will be sufficient to give
the reader an idea of our system applied to
INSTRUMENTAL MUSIC ; and with respect to vocal
MUSIC, we need not compose a plate on purpose
to demonstrate the usefulness of our characters,
since their simplicity and conciseness will allow
us to print them with the common letter-press.
The three first lines of the national anthem,
which we give here as an example, will show how
one might, by their means, trace with a pencil
between the lines of any book the music to which
the verses were set.
God save our gracious queen
God save our noble queen
I
God save the queen.
O I
CHAPTER V.
*
SHORT-HAND OF MUSICOGRAPHY.*
In the second, as well as in the first book of the
present publication ; viz. in the writing of music
as well as in that of speech, we have made it our
principal care to render the characters as concise
as it was possible to do, without endangering their
perspicuity; and it is not to be expected that they
would admit of many further contractions or sim-
plification. In fact, they will admit of none of
those practised in logography, under the common
denomination of short-hand, and which consist
in suppressing certain intermediary sounds, left
to be supplied afterwards either by memory or
* Whilst our work was in the press, we have been favoured
with a pamphlet published at Antwerp in 1834, under the
title of Musikalische ^tenograplue Von Hypolyte Pre-
vost. We certainly had never heard of this Belgian pro-
duction when we claimed for ourselves in our Preface the
priority of the application of short-hand to music ; and
we beg to assert that, beyond the analogies of their titles,
there are no points of comparison whatever between the two
works. Not that we wish to depreciate in any way the
system of M. Prevost ; but since it is based upon a new appli-
cation of the common staff, to which are added four more
MUSICOGRAPHV. 197
judgment; for in music, where so much more li-
berty is given to the imagination than in speech,
we can leave nothing to be guessed at by the
reader.
But if we cannot entirely suppress any second-
ary note, however insignificant it be, yet the vari-
ous properties of sound, and the mysterious rela-
tions of the musical degrees with one another, have
been so thoroughly investigated and establish-
ed on principles so regular and simple, that the
greatest facilities are given to the musician to
represent, by a few allegorical signs, all those se-
condary or subservient notes, which are only used,
either in melody or harmony, as leading to, or
enforcing the power of, the principal ones. *
Consequently, our principal abbreviations con-
sist in a selection of allegorical figures, repre-
senting- certain musical o-radations or combina-
tions, and added to the notes written in a manner
lines, whilst ours consists chiefly in the suppression of all
the ruled lines but one, the difference between the two
is obviously as great as it is possible to be. We grant
that M. Prevost's system may present great advantages
to its author, or to those wlio might have succeeded in ren-
dering themselves complete masters of its intricate combi-
nations ; but yet, after having minutely examined it with
the previous determination of presenting a translation of it
to our readers, should we find it preferable to our own,
we have returned with renewed confidence to the latter ;
as explained in the following pages.
198 SHORT-HAND OF
analogous to that in which the sounds alluded to
are added to those represented by the notes them-
selves. They are of two kinds ; viz. those in the
melody, consisting of runs either chromatic, dia-
tonic, or harmonic ; and those in the harmony,
consisting of chords or symphonies, either con-
cordant or discordant.
With respect to the first, all runs composed of
more than three sounds following one another by
a regular uniform progression, are expressed by
joining their first and last notes in the three fol-
lowing ways ; viz. for a chromatic progression
by means of an oblong loop, for a diatoiiic pro-
gression by means of a round loop, and for a har-
monic progression by means of a double loop.
Ex. No. 1.*
With respect to the second, all harmonies
formed of more than two sounds struck together,
are naturally classed in two distinct categories ;
viz. the concordant ones, which can be no other
than the perfect chord, (in the simplest form two
consecutive thirds,) and the discordant ones,
which can all easily be classed under the head of
seventh, (in the simplest form three consecutive
tl birds.)
Every degree of the scale can be made the
base of a harmony, composed of two or three con-
* All the examples given in this chapter refer to Plate
IX., which is placed at p, 204.
MUSICOGRAPHY, 199
secutive thirds; or, in other words, every note can
be in its turn the first either of a perfect chord,
or of a discord, according to various changes
introduced in the modulation, and governed by
certain rules based on the properties of musical
sounds.
Among these combinations of sounds some
are of very frequent use, others are seldom intro-
duced, and a few have been completely discarded.
Nevertheless, in our allegorical representations
we have not thought it worth while to suppress
any of them, since they do not amount altogether
to more than twenty-two; viz. six perfect chords
and sixteen discords. For, with respect to the
first six, all perfect chords being formed by the
concurrence of three sounds, having between them
in succession two of the three following intervals :
— minor third, major third, and fourth ; these three
intervals are susceptible of but six combinations:
and with reg-ard to the sixteen remaining, all dis-
cords (except the augmented fifth) being formed
by the concurrence of four sounds, having be-
tween them, in succession or repetition, three
of the following intervals : — major second, minor
third, and major tliird ; these intervals are sus-
ceptible of but fifteen combinations.*
* llestricted as they are by the necessity of not exceeding
ten semitones or a minor seventh between their two extreme
notes, as also of avoiding two consecutive seconds, either
played together, or left understood in the octave.
200
SHORT-HAND OF
The following Table will give the reader a sy-
noptical view of all the above chords, classed in
their natural order. See Ex. 3 and 4.
>^
1
00
N3
1-^
^
3
3
^
~i
tA
U
H-k
o
o
fa
O
P5
g
o
g
O
a^
5
o
p-
vn
3
g
3 3 3
3.
3 3
3.
3 3
3
3 3.
to
5_
to
£.£. 3'
5"
tS