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ae be aleTHE FLUTE AND FLUTISTS IN THE
FRENCH ART OF THE SEVENTEENTH
AND EIGHTEENTH CENTURIES

By LOUIS FLEURY

HOSE who visit the National Gallery in London have’an
opportunity of admiring an important French painting, in
all respects worthy of the celebrated institution which har-

bors it, whose subject is one calculated to claim the attention of
the historian as well as of the art lover. The work which we have
in mind is the great quintuple picture by Hyacinthe Rigaud, which
the author of the catalogue describes in the following terms:

ASCRIBED TO RIGAUD

2081. Lully and the Musicians of the French Court.
A ’cellist in grey, seated, left, full figure, looking
toward Lully who stands, right centre, in a brown per-
ruque, turning a leaf of the score—on each side of him
a flutist, seated, in blue, drab and tabac—to the left
stands a fourth musician, in slate color, etc.

We shall not quarrel with the cataloguer with regard to his
caution in merely attributing the picture to Rigaud, although the
excellence of workmanship and the style of this canvas favor the
theory that Rigaud painted it. The art is not our own, yet we
would have appreciated the exercise of greater caution in the de-
scription of the personages represented, for the one given is full of
mistakes. We are asked to accept the portrait as one of Lully
flanked by two flutists. Now this person who is standing, turning
over the pages of a score with his right hand and holding a species
of baton in his left, is a third flutist. It is quite beyond dispute
that it is a flute which rests upon the table, and not the baton of an
orchestral conductor. It might be remarked, incidentally, that
Lully never used a baton for conducting, but a large cane and it
was while insistently beating time with this cane on the floor that
he wounded his foot in such wise that blood-poisoning set in, of
which he died. ore

The portion of a title which may be seen on the score reads:
“Trio by M. Lab. .. Sonates pour fifite,” and the date of the

515516 The Musical Quarterly

costumes worn by the personages of the picture leads to the sup-
ding flutist may be Michel de la Barre

osition that the stan
= shile the two others who are seated may be either the brothers

Hotteterre or the brothers Piesche (the latter supposition having
been advanced by M. de la Laurencie, of whose notable researches
I have often availed myself in writing this study). An examin-
ation of the Picard engraving which serves as a frontispiece to
Hotteterre’s “Treatise,” and which undoubtedly represents Jacques
Hotteterre, inclines us to accept M. de la Laurencie’s hypothesis.
As to the violinist—for the instrument is unmistakably a viola
da gamba and not a violoncello—it is generally admitted that he is
the famous Antoine Forqueray (Senior). We refuse to believe,
as certain commentators contend, that the person standing behind
him is his son. It is positive that the latter, born in 1700, was
still a mere child, an adolescent, at the time when this picture was
painted.

Yet, aside from these considerations, this picture contains an
element still more surprising for the music-lover of this day: and
that is the make-up of the ‘nstrumental ensemble represented.
The musicians have evidently gathered to give a concert. Now,
are not three flutes out of proportion ina quintet? To the modern
music-lover this is an unheard-ot proportion. Three flutes—it is
exactly that number of Aute-stands which complete an orchestra
of eighty musicians. And three flutes in chamber music are
never heard in our day. When a composer introduces a novel
element in a chamber music composition (which 1s easily enough
discovered, for the case is rare), he usually does so with wise
discretion.

Now this abundance of flutists in the orchestra was some-
thing altogether natural in Lully’s time, and even in the times of
Hyacinthe Rigaud, who survived Lully by a matter of some fiity-
six years. The orchestra, much smaller and much less varied
than our own, comprised a large proportion of wind instruments,
and the flutes played an important part in it. In chamber music
we find flute sonatas for two, three and four parts common, and
until well into the eighteenth century the flute was employed
much more often than the violin. Now, from the end of the
eighteenth to the beginning of the nineteenth century, the flute
above all others was the noble instrument, the instrument pre-
ferred by music-lovers, especially among the aristocracy, and
even by princes. The virtués6 flutists of the day occupied a posi-
tion equal if not superior to tlftat*éi the contemporary clavecinists
and, especially, the violinists. The reasons for this superiorityFlute and Flutists in French Art 517

are numerous; and the most interesting, from our point of view,
is the special literature of the instrument. By reason of its abun-
dance and particularly because of its quality, flute music held a
leading position, immediately after that of the clavecin, in the
instrumental music of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries.
It is on a par with that of the violin, and exceeds that of the viola da
gamba in importance; if it has so long been consigned to oblivion,
the responsibility must rest mainly on the virtuoso flutists of the
nineteenth century who, owing to an inexplicable aberration,
deliberately neglected the magnificent repertoire bequeathed them
by their predecessors. It is difficult to imagine why the violinists
should have left so much less, in the course of two centuries, during
the days of Tartini and Corelli, in the libraries. Nevertheless,
such is the case, for the works of La Barre, Blavet, Naudot and
other musicians of equal standing, engraved during their lifetime
(approximately between the years 1705 and 1750) were never
republished and, probably, never reappeared on concert pro-
grammes for a period of a century and a half.

This unjust neglect was due to two reasons which, ultimately,
we will endeavor to define. At the present moment, within the
limited space of this article, we will only try to show the influence of
the flute in French art and in French society during the last years
of the seventeenth century and toward the end of the eighteenth.

This influence has been a notable one: it is evinced every-
where and in every way. Whenever music is in question we see
the flute appear. Visit a palace in the time of Louis XIV or Louis
XV: every music room, as arule, is adorned with musical subjects,
painted on or carved in the paneling. The cases in which a flute is
not included in the fascies of instruments represented, are rare.
Visit our museums: Eustache Le Sueur wishes to present three of
the Muses:' in accordance with the ancient tradition he places a
flute in Euterpe’s hands, a long transverse flute. Watteau paints
a pastoral scene:? a shepherd, leaning tenderly over a young
maiden, is playing the flute in the shade of a bosky dell. The
sculptors people the parks of the period with flute-playing fauns.
Yet these fauns, imitations of the antique, usually hold in their
hands an instrument identical with that played in the orchestras
of the day. Engravings, books, art objects, as soon as their
subjects are of a musical nature, almost invariably represent a
flute or a flutist.

‘Museum of the Louvre: Hall of the French Eighteenth Century.
Museum of the Louvre: the Lacaze Hall.The Musical Quarterly

Literature offers us examples of this exaggerated admiration,
especially in the eighteenth century, the age of pastorals, of shep-
herds and shepherdesses. Allusions to the flute-playing shepherd
arelegion. Poems even, entirely devoted to the flute, are written,
and though the majority of these productions do not deserve to be
rescued from oblivion, the fact that the musical instrument 1n
question is their reason for existence gives us an idea of the place
which it occupied in the artistic and social life of the epoch.

518

* *

PA

That this extraordinary success was anything more than the
result of a fashion, of a purely mundane predilection, it would be
puerile to deny. Without in any wise lessening the merit of the
‘nstrument under discussion, we cannot credit it with enjoying such
an excessive vogue without the aid of a little of what to-day we
would term “snobbishness.” However, as we have already men-
tioned, the flute, during the whole of the eighteenth century, was
the instrument of princes and great lords. Such an example in
high places was bound to find many imitators. In that epoch, a
gentleman would have felt that he was lowering himself to play
the violin; and there was little credit to be gained by taking up
the clavier. But to breathe tender airs through an elegant tube
of wood or of ivory, to play the shepherd with devoted and languor-
ous attitudes, was, for the gentlemen of the court, showing the
best of good form. ‘This, incidentally, was the case not only in
France. In Prussia, Frederick Il furnished the example of a
monarch who played flute like a genuine professional.” In Eng-
land a large number of gentlemen cultivated the same hobby. A
certain P. Walston, of Bath, had his portrait painted by Gains-
borough? in a magnificent costume of red and blue, holding his
flute in his hand.

In France, the famous farmer-general La Poupliniére, a patron
of the arts and of artists, whose concerts, given in his Chateau de
la Muette, ranked as events, was himself painted by Van Loo in a
house dress, playing the flute. And is it not characteristic that in
a portrait (published with this article) attributed to David, that
worthy bourgeois had himself surrounded by the attributes of his

1The long poem entitled Syrinz, for example, by Denesle (1739).

21t may have been for him that J. 5S. Bach wrote the six admirable Sonatas which
are numbered among his masterpieces, and it was for him that he wrote a fine Trio for
flute, violin and bass, Das musikalische Opfer.
3It is in the collection of Mr. F. J. Wythes, London.oo : : 7 ee eee re Eee i aio eee Pe San ist ar : ~
Portrait (David?) of an Amateur Flutist.
(From the collection of M. Capdevielle, Paris.)
(Flute and Flutists in French Art 519

profession—several fat tomes of law books—and of his particular
pleasure, two flutes?

The majority of compositions for flute, especially for two flutes
without bass, were dedicated by their composers to rich and pow-
erful pupils, members of the aristocracy. It is music well caleu-
lated for intimate performance, meant to be played by master and
pupil in the seclusion of the latter’s cabinet. It was a practical
means of allowing the amateur to keep in touch with what was
currently played in concert and at the Opéra. All that which in
our own day is read at the piano, in a four-hand arrangement, was
at that epoch played on two modest wooden flutes. From this
dated the custom, in the collections of vocal brunettes published,
of having each individual song followed by a little transcription
for two ensemble flutes. We also have numerous collections of
airs from operas, ballets and oratorios, transcribed for flute solo,
for flute and bass, and, above all, for two flutes without bass.
There existed a whole literature to which we will return in the
course of the present article, one which included an imposing
number of musical works.

And all this music was easily and currently sold. There was
a public to purchase it. In our own day a publisher very reluc-
tantly consents to issue compositions for wind instruments. If
he does so, it is very timidly. His argument is that these things
“do not sell,”’ that those who cultivate this music are compara-
tively rare. Nine times out of ten, if he finally decides to make so
great a sacrifice, he demands that the composer make a special
arrangement, so that the piece may be put forth for flute or
violin.

It is amusing to find that during the eighteenth century the
exact opposite was the case. The publishers of that time were no
less careful of their interests than those of to-day, and neglected
no opportunity to increase their sales. They also published
works written for the flute as equally playable on the violin, and
this was the more convenient because of the more extended range
of the string instrument, which, incidentally, made it possible to
play all music written for the flute on the violin with ease. Violin
compositions, on the other hand, could only in rare cases be
played on the flute, which could neither descend as low nor rise as
high, nor play double-stops, etc., etc. So the publisher’s first pre-
caution, where the composer was concerned, was to make sure that
his work, especially if it were an original violin piece, was equally

1It has been claimed, though I have been unable to verify the assertion, that the
whole score of the ‘‘Messiah” existed arranged for two flutes without bass.The Musical Quarterly
Aubert (1723-1781), the vio-

520

playable on the transverse flute. C :
linist, published symphonic concerts for violins, flutes and oboes;

Barthélemon (1731-1808), a violinist, published sonatas for two
violins or two flutes; Mangean 1756) and Marais (1656—
1728), also violinists, did the same. The greatest among them,
Jean-Marie Leclair, Senior (1697-17 64), when he published his col-
lection of sonatas, was also careful to observe this precaution. His
second book of sonatas, for example, was written for violin and
for the transverse flute, with a basso continuo. Now, a cursory
examination of these sonatas—which, by the way, are admirable—
proves that in the majority of cases they are unquestionably violin
music, and that it argued great complaisance on the part of Le-
clair to be willing to make them playable on another instrument.
He must have retouched them somewhat, and it is plain that, a
slave to fashion, he was unable to avoid so doing.

Nor does the great Rameau escape. His clavecin pieces,
reédited and published as concert pieces, were manifestly written,
as the composer conceived them, for violin and viola. Notwith-
standing, he entitled them ‘Pieces for clavecin,” in concert with
a violin (or a flute),* for a viol (or second violin). He was obliged
to take the taste of the public into account, probably aiter the

composition was written.

Francois Couperin, the Great—by whom, alas, no original

composition for flute exists!—nevertheless adds the following
naive note to his delightful Rossignol et Amour: “This Nightingale
produces an effect which cannot be bettered when played on the
transverse flute.” And to the entire galaxy of clavecinists, organ-
‘sts and orchestral leaders who were busy under the protecting
wing of the Court, we owe an important contribution to flute

literature. Nor is it in some simple little piece, written once in a
lifetime to please an amateur, that they manifest their activity.
It is in whole books, each containing from six to a dozen sonatas,

that these lesser masters compose for the fashionable instrument.

1He does not make this concession without giving detailed directions: ‘“Notice
for the flute substituted for the violin: When chords are encountered, the best singing
note should be sought, which is usually the highest. With regard to the notes which
exceed the range of the flute, I have been compelled to use various signs to take their
place without confusing the music. An 8, for instance, indicates that all the music from
8 to the letter U (which stands for the unison) should be raised an octave. In a rapid
passage of several notes, it will be enough to substitute for those which descend too low,
adjacent notes belonging to the same harmony, to repeat such as may be considered
proper, except when, in these cases, two small note-heads are found among the others, no
larger than pin-points, which exactly mark out those which the flute can play. The sign
= indicates that the flute is not to begin before the note bearing the sign is reached.
A note which descends too far below the fourth or fifth, may be carried to the octave
above.” (Author’s Note, edition of 1741.) :a ial aR mee

Flute and Flutists in French Art 521

Thus they yield to the pressure of necessity—there are patrons
who must be satisfied, publishers who must be supplied; or they
are largely moved by the certainty that their works will be largely
purchased by the public. In this way Boismortier (1691-1765),
Michel Corrette, Dollé, Dornel (1695-1765), Galliard (1687-1749),
le Chevalier d’Herbin, Caix d’Hervelois, Mondonville (1711-1773),
Montéclair (1666-1737), who were not flutists, have given us, in
notable quantities, works in solo, duo or trio form in which the
flute plays the leading part.

This fashionable tyranny, incidentally, has given us numerous
masterpieces. If we may take the liberty of deviating somewhat
from our line of progress, we might note the fact that Mozart, who
did not care for the flute, was obliged to write, to order, two concertos
for flute and orchestra, a concerto for flute and harp,! an Andante
for flute and orchestra,? and three quartets for flute, violin, viola
and ’cello. Mozart’s delightful gifts did not suffice to create a
masterpiece in a work written to make a little money while com-
plying with an amateur’s whim. In this connection, a recent
discovery made by M. de Saint-Foix reveals a curious detail: the
Trio of the Minuet in the Quartet in A is evidently a develop ment,
in three-four time, of the first Air populaire,

Ah, il a des bottes, il a des bottes, Bastien,

later vulgarized in the fifth figure of that famous dance, ““The
Lancers.” As to the finale of the same quartet, sparkling with
brightness, it is simply an arrangement of an air from Paisiello’s
opera Schiavi per amore.

The taste for the flute extending well into the nineteenth
century, Beethoven (who in 1792 had written a little duo for two
flutes without bass, which long remained in MS.) also had occasion
to write some flute compositions to order. It was thus that in
1819 the six Thémes variés, for piano solo or with accompaniment
of flute or violin ad libitum, Op. 105, as well as the ten Thémes variés
(nationaux), with accompaniment of flute or violin ad libitum, Op.
107, came to be written.

Hitherto we have spoken of the flute only as a solo instru-
ment, the flute of virtuosos and men of fashion. When we exam-
ine the orchestral scores of all the operas, however, from Lully to
Gluck, we find that the flute plays an important part in them.

1 Written in 1778, in Paris, for the Duke of Guines and his daughter.

*Kiochel hesitates between Paris and Mannheim as the birthplace of this Andante,
composed in 1778. The fact that the MS. is to be found in the library of the Paris Con-
servatoire, inclines us to accept the former hypothesis.522 The Musical Quarterly

This, no doubt, is due to the meagre resources which the or-
chestrations of the period offered with regard to variety, and the
slight importance which the musicians attached to diversity of
timbre. Their orchestration progressed mainly in masses, 1m
“bundles.” On a string-quartet foundation there were imposed,
to reinforce sonority, at times oboes, at others flutes or bassoons,
or again horns or trumpets. Lully, however, utilized a combin-
ation which had existed long before him, that of the “‘flute con-
certo” in which we find, beside the transverse flute, flutes of larger
size, such as the flute in G, which supplied the bass and which, in
certain concerts, was figured in such wise that it could be doubled
by the continuo. The most famous example of these flute concertos
‘5 that which follows the Prélude de ? Amour in Lully’s Triomphe de
Amour (1681). Itisa species of melancholy plaint, executed by
four flutes, without other accompaniment. Lully has very skall-
fully utilized the tone of the transverse flute, at once tender and

Later, Gluck, in the famous scene of the Elysian fields, in

poetic.
fection the sweet and

Orphée, carried to the highest degree of per

expressive power of the instrument.
For that which characterizes the use of the flute in the century

of its glory is the composers’ knowledge and tactfulness to see to it
that they do not ask more of the instrument than it can supply.
We find the following reflections in Ancelet’s Observations sur la

musique:

It will be admitted that the flute does not embrace all kinds and
species of music, such as the airs of demons, of furies, of warriors, of
tempests, of sailors and several others in which, at any rate, it is not used
as a principal. It is better placed in tender and pathetic pieces and the
accompaniments of the little airs and brunettes in the sonatas and con-
certos written by the best masters, who themselves, however, should not

overdo it.

Honest Ancelet thus set down the part which the flute should
play, and wished to confine the instrument well-nigh exclusively
to the accompaniment of little salon or cabaret airs. He barely
tolerated it in the sonata or concerto, for to do so robbed it of its
best means of expression. Yet he foresaw, perhaps, that there
would come a day when this pastoral instrument would be called
upon to express sublime and agitated emotions, and that in the
effort it would lose all its charm. From that day on, in fact, when
skillful virtuosos such as Drouet, Tulou and Nicholson composed
duos in a grand, inflated style for the instrument (which they
themselves performed with indisputable mastery), the great
composers of the age lost interest in the flute, which had been pro-a
eR

Flute and Flutists in French Art 523

jected outside its natural frame. Yet this fact itself suggests that,
without losing too much time in the process, we investigate how
and why the flute obtained so great a vogue in France.

* *
*

; It seems probable that this vogue coincides withthe appearance,
in the French orchestra, of the transverse or cross-flute, formerly
known as the German flute.

Vain efforts have been made to fix positively the date at
which the German flute made its appearance in France. It is
certain that it was known to the French long before it was cur-
rently used in the orchestras. We find the German flute alluded
to in Rabelais.!

The sweet or direct flute, on the contrary, was provided with
an interior level or whistle.2 The modern instrument which cor-
responds to the direct flute is the flageolet, a popular instrument
which the village musicians still play in certain French provinces
at the peasant dances.

Be that as it may, this very imperfect instrument still flour-
ished in France toward the end of the seventeenth century, and one
finds its trace in the majority of the music published at the time.
It must have been largely used in the orchestras to the exclusion of
every other flute. Father Mersenne, in his Harmonie unwerselle,
gives us a proof altogether convincing of this fact in the very
minute description he offers of the two instruments; the direct
flutes are given first place. The plates presenting them show well-
built instruments, whose type still may be seen in excellent speci-
mens in the Instrumental Museum of the Paris Conservatoire.
The description he gives of the transverse flute, on the contrary,
for all that it is a detailed one, only shows us a very imperfect
instrument, of which we find no trace elsewhere and which appears
as an exotic type, an object of curiosity, not at all in current use.

‘At that time, however (the middle of the sixteenth century), flute players, above
all, used the “‘sweet”’ or direct flute. This instrument, to-day entirely obsolete, was
quite improperly included among the members of the flute family, “by extension,” so to
speak, if we may usethe phrase. It is not our intention to introduce in the course of this
article a study on the manufacture and character of musical instruments. We will
merely remark that a flute characteristic is the absence of any interior mechanism. A
tube pierced with holes, or a grouped series of such tubes, as in the case of the Pan-pipes,
such was the flute of the ancients. To-day, the keys, a modern invention, have made
no change in the principle which entrusts the lips of the flutist alone with the production
of the sound. With regard to the flute in Rabelais, Gargantua learns to play the flute,
the spinet, the harp, the German flute with nine holes, the viola and the sackbut (Gar-
gantua, Chap. XXIII, 1535).

2To be exact, “‘the whistle.”524 The Musical Quarterly

e describes it so minutely

This is true to such a degree that though h
¢ we may say so, has

we believe that good Father Mersenne,
“shown off” a bit in this case.

Ii is not until the year 1707 that we find evidence that the

transverse flute is regularly employed. It was the French flutist
Hotteterre, known as the “Roman,” who established its first
principles in his 7’ raité de la Flite traversiere.”

In spite of Father Mersenne, this author, whom we cannot
ignore, probably for practical reasons, devotes the briefest notice by
far to the direct flute, still in use in his day. “The direct flute

having its initiates and partisans,” he writes with some disdain,

“as well as the transverse flute, T have found it not altogether use-
in this place.” This is

less to devote to it a short special treatise 1
a complete reversal of the réles in favor of the other instrument.

It is clear that the few pages he devotes to the “sweet” flute are
no more than a concession to a fashion which has passed. His
real instrument is the transverse flute, and it 1s really on behali
of the transverse flute that he has written the 34 pages otf detailed
‘ndications which make up his treatise. And, whether Hotteterre
gave a new impulse to the study of the German flute, or merely

followed the line of least resistance and took advantage of the

newly-born mode to launch his work, from this time dates the

definite acceptance of the transverse flute by French musicians.
This is proven by the extent of the musical literature of the instru-
ment, which continues to develop in proportion as we advance into
the eighteenth century.

It must not be taken for granted, however, that the new in-
strument achieved its supremacy at once, and that it immediately
drove its senior from the orchestra. For some time, as was the
case with the viola da gamba which, little by little, yielded place to
the violin, but which certainly was used contemporaneously with
its rival, the transverse flute and the direct flute were used to-
gether. The illustration reproduced with this article shows two
flutists taking part in the same concert, one playing a direct, the
other a transverse flute.

In numerous scores we find the notice “for the transverse flute
or the direct flute,’? yet this duality does not continue for long.
It would be impossible for us to find an instance of a musician
acquiring a reputation as a player of the direct flute. On the

\Hotteterre, Principes de la Flite Traversiére, ou flite d’
1 ‘ s de ta ; tite d’ Allemagne, de la flite a
bec ou flute douce, et du hautbois, divisés par Traités par le sieur Cee
naire de la musique du Roy. Paris, chez Ballard, 1707.

2The scor Ss i i ith indicati
ae res of J: S. Bach, especially those of his cantatas, swarm with indications=o
Bins Fi

eS
Sia

 

Concert champétre.

(With Flute a bec and Flute traversiére. )

 

‘ ek le ee Scie Sek AY)
RPMO Las Rona oe COREL AE E:Flute and Flutists in French Art 525

have made the tour of Europe, playing in foreign courts, and for
good measure have left important works for their instrument.

The older instrument, by the way, was incapable of rivaling
the newer one. The Straight flute is abidingly impersonal.
Though the tone be obtained without effort, it is always ready-
made, monotonous, without color or expression. Whoever blows
into a direct flute at once obtains a tone, but one and the same
tone 1s obtained by everyone. In the case of the transverse flute,
on the contrary, the personality of the player is everything. It is
the lips which form the bevels or levers which direct the breath in
a specific manner, and make the interior air current vibrate di-
versely. The result is that merely owing to the different forma-
tion of their lips, two flutists, playing the same instrument,
produce sounds differing in quality, and that, Art aiding them,
they are able to perfect their tone and acquire a marked personal-
ity. At that, these flutists had at their disposal only a very imper-
fect instrument, while at the same time the violinists and ’cellists
possessed admirable instruments which our modern makers are
glad to copy. The flutists never reached this model perfection,
seeing that they used tubes whose holes were pierced in well-nigh
haphazard fashion, lacking those exactly calculated proportions
without which it is almost impossible to play absolutely in tune,
unless by reason of exceptional talent. Hence, every flutist was
doubled by a seeker, an inventor, who developed ingenious
improvements for his personal use. In 1707, at the time when
Hotteterre’s Traité appeared, the flute had but one key (that
which serves to produce E flat). A century later, owing to succes-
sive additions, it counted five, and, by degrees, there was developed
the conception of the modern flute realized by the Bavarian Th.
Bohm.

During the whole of the eighteenth century, however, the
transverse flute was a tube of wood or ivory, pierced by seven
holes, one of which was provided with a key. The sharps and flats
were produced by means of complicated fingerings, the obstruc-
tion of half of a hole, etc. When we realize that works as difficult
as the sonatas by Blavet and Naudot, the Mozart concertos, the
Bach sonatas or cantatas, were played in a manner which com-
pelled the admiration of connoisseurs by the virtuosos of that
time on instruments so rudimentary, we cannot help but feel
a retrospective admiration for artists capable of such feats of

skill.

Hey ee Bae
So E SS ae  eThe Musical Quarterly

Thus we arrive naturally at a consideration of the great vir-
tuoso flutists who, during the last three reigns of the old order,
charmed the ears of their contemporaries. First of all there are
the two ancestors of the transverse flute, Philibert Riville and
Francois Pignon, called Descoteaux. The personalities of these
two interesting artists were long shrouded in shadow. Even Fétis
made them a single individual. Since then, however, their lives
have been revealed, notably owing to the efforts of the late J.
Ficorcheville, in an article on the Grande-Ecurie du Roy (“The
King’s Stable Music’’) in a Bulletin of the I. M. G. of 1903, and,
more recently, in a charming article in the Revue des Deux Mondes
(July, 1920), signed ‘“fdouard Pilon.” Philibert was a member
of the king’s band between 1670 and 1715. Descoteaux, born in
1644, was also a member of the Grande Bande des Ecuries. In 1704
he played every day at the concerts given in Madame de Mainte-
In 1716 he was given, as a position on which
harge of usher at the Royal Ballet. Never-
laim to fame is not of a musical nature, and
ork written for his instrument, his name is
still associated with a creation even more enduring than the most
charming sonata. A great amateur gardener, he was the original
of La Bruyére’s “The Tulip-Lover.””* Matthieu Marais, advocate
at the Paris parliament, in his memoirs on the Regency and the
reign of Louis XV, gives a delightful account of a visit he paid
Descoteaux in 1723, in Luxembourg. There the worthy man
cultivated a little garden, at the same time cultivating philosophy
and grammar as applied to song.

At about the same time flourished Pierre Gaultier of Mar-
seilles, whom his biographers do not represent as a flutist. He is
even credited with being a skillful clavecinist. Gaultier was first
of all an ambulant impresario-musician. His life, full of action,
and his tragic death have been told at length by Titon du Tillet.
A producer of spectacles +n Marseilles and Montpellier, he per-
ished at sea with his entire company during a tempest, in 1697.
We may presume, however, that he had some knowledge of the
flute, for the only works by him which have survived are two duos
or trios for flutes (or violins).

This romantic personage appears to have hit upon the idea of
a kind of programmatic music in which he could give free rein to
the emotions of his heart and narrate his life’s adventures. Ina

Book of Trios, published by Ballard aiter his death, we find a

526

non’s apartments.
he could retire, the c
theless, his greatest c
though he has left no w

1La Bruyére, Caractéres (de la mode, 2).Flute and Flutists in French Art 527

number entitled Les Embarras de Paris (“The Embarrassments of
Paris’’), which, In a way, gives an idea of what he meant to express
Another Is entitled Les Carillons (“The Chimes”). Yet the most
characteristic is assuredly that named Les Prisons. Gaultier com-
posed it while incarcerated in the prison of Avignon. It is the
second suite of a collection of three, of which the first bears the title
Les H eures heureuz (“Happy Hours”), and the third that of Ten-
dresse ( Tenderness”). Without a doubt this tryptich essayed in
some sort to represent the composer’s life, and the Avignon prison
must have been an austere one, for the beginning of the number
breathes sadness and anguish. Yet we may also take for granted
that Gaultier, with his happy meridional nature, quickly over-
came this mood, for the sinister suite closes with a Marche des
Barbets (“March of the Spaniels’’) full of spirit.

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In contrast to Gaultier, whose short life was full of disappoint-
ments, Jacques Hotteterre, called le Romain, enjoyed a decidedly
privileged official position as a member of that Hotteterre dynasty
which, from father to son, made and played wind instruments.
His surname, “‘the Roman,” came from a stay made in Rome
before assuming his post at Court as royal chamber flutist.

Hotteterre’s reputation is above all that of a theoretician. His
‘Treatise,’ of which we already have spoken, remained the bestThe Musical Quarterly

528

and this is proved by the fact
veral editions, was largely ;mitated and much

plagiarized. Hotteterre, however, composed a certain number of
pieces which are not negligible for the flute: two books of com-
positions for flute and bass; two suites for flute without bass; a
book of sonatas; and a book of trio sonatas for transverse flutes.
His Op. 2 (published by Ballard, in Paris, 1708) is embellished
with a handsome frontispiece by the older Le Sueur, and is dedi-
cated to the king. It seems worth while to reproduce here the
text of this dedication, *n which we are given a glimpse of the
musical predilections of the reign of Louis XIV, and repeated
witness is borne to the important part played by the flute in

that epoch.
TO THE KING
deigned to accord me

The favorable attention which Your Majesty
our presence, to-day

when I had the honor of playing these pieces in y
inspires me with the daring to present them to you. What greater meed
of success could I hope for them than that of filling a few of those mo-

ments which the greatest monarch of the world may at times abstract
from his more glorious occupations! It is an advantage, Sire, which I
owe only to Your Majesty’s extreme kindness, and it is in order to show
my most humble gratitude that I take the liberty of dedicating these
Pieces to Your Majesty, flattering myself that you will not repulse my
homage nor my assurance that my life long I am, with the most ardent

and profound respect,

work of its kind for a whole century,

that it went into se

Sire,
Your Majesty’s
very obedient and very faithful servant

very humble,
and subject,

HotrrETERRE.

To be frank, Hotteterre’s music, for all it may have had the
honor of pleasing Louis XIV, does not distinguish itself in our
eyes by any special qualities. Hotteterre, as we see him, is more
pedagogue than composer. His pedagogic leanings even influence
his composition. Contrary to the majority of his brother flutists,
yet in this respect following the example of the clavecinists of his
time, he is lavish with recommendations for execution, notably
as regards the manner of playing ornaments.

As a composer he is far outdistanced by his emulator and
contemporary, Michel de la Barre, whose considerable output
for the flute reveals a born musician, original and robust, one who
as we see him, is the most perfect representative of the Ereneh
Aute music of the seventeenth century (we mean the seventeenth
century in the larger sense of the term, that is to say, to the year

1715, the date of Louis XIV’s death).eine : m8

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ES RE a ee EO aeons et See pe ge Pibsiudeer Pre rs. A eS
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Flute and Flutists in French Art 529

Born in Paris, in 1675, he died there in 1743, after having been
a member of the royal chamber orchestra and that of the Opéra.
He was first of all a flutist, “‘an excellent player of the flute at the
Académie de musique,” according to the brothers Parfait; yet his
activities were not confined to interpretation, for, besides his
instrumental compositions, he was the author of a work, Le Tri-
omphe des Arts, performed in 1700, and a dramatic intermezzo, La
Vénétienne, performed in 1703. We only, however, will consider
his instrumental output in this article.

It was considerable and comprised at least seventeen books of
various pieces, of which we may still find, among the possessions
of the National Library in Paris alone:

Two books of pieces for flute and bass. -
Seven books of pieces for two flutes, without bass.
One book of pieces for two flutes and bass.
: Three books of pieces in trio form, for violins, flutes and oboes, with
ass.

La Barre’s style is essentially broad and decorative, with that
somewhat solemn pathos which characterizes his epoch. He evi-
dently reacted to the powerful impress of Lully’s genius, like the
majority of the French musicians who, even long after Lully’s
death, acknowledged the Florentine’s ascendency. We find again
in La Barre’s suites those slowly moving Preludes, those rather
pompous Allemandes, those pathetic Sarabandes, in which Lully
excelled. La Barre modified their solemnity by the frequent intro-
duction of the ornaments with which he embellished his scores.
It may be said that without exception his works rise above the
ordinary, and that he lends the simple combination of one or two
flutes with basso continuo more than might be expected.

As a player he was especially fond of slow and pompous move-
ments. ‘The fact is proved in one of the suites for transverse flutes
written by the organist-composer, Dornel (1695-1765), which bears
the name of Héronville,’ and contains a series of pieces entitled
La Chauvet,? La Descoteaux, La Hotteterre, etc. That one among
the numbers which takes the form of a broad and noble Prelude is
entitled, ‘““M. de La Barre’s favorite.”’

Were it not for the fact that we are limited in this article to
the French flutists, we would have found a place for the Flemish
flutist, J.-B. Loeillet, whose name, by the by, is essentially French.
Born in Gand, during the second half of the seventeenth century,

1Somewhat later Blavet gave one of his Sonatas the same sub-title.
2The patron of de La Barre.530 The Musical Quarterly

he lived in Paris from 1702 to 1705, where he had several books of
‘sonatas engraved. The larger and more fruitful part of his career
was spent in London, however, where he died, very wealthy, in
728.
La Barre is the last great flutist of the reign of Louis XIV.
With the Regency begins an epoch still more brilliant for the flute
virtuoso. .

Hitherto the fame of the flutists had hardly penetrated out-
side the limits of the Court. Whether they performed in the
apartments of Versailles or in those of a few great lords, their con-
certs were invariably private affairs, to which only the privileged
few had access. With the establishment of the Concerts spirituels
by Philidor, in 1725, the artists and the great public came into
direct contact, and the taste for instrumental music (what we call
“pure” or “absolute” music in these days) spread through a world
which until then had heard no music save that of the Opéra.

It is, in fact, to a flute composition that belongs the honor of
introducing this innovation. Anne Danican-Philidor, member of a
prolific family of musicians, had hitherto distinguished. himself
only by the publication of a “Book of Pieces for the Flute” (1712)
when, in 1725, he conceived the idea of giving concerts of “church
music” in Paris, on those days when the observance of religious
festivals closed the doors of the Opéra. For an entire year the
repertoire was composed only of motets and suites for the violin,
but in 1726, when Rebel and Francoeur made their appearance as
virtuosos in violin duos, the custom arose of having solo players
take part in the programme, and Philidor accordingly produced a
virtuoso flutist whose début was a striking triumph: this was
Michel Blavet.

In fact, so great was the success he scored that thenceforward
the flute acquired “civic rights’? in the Concerts spirituels, and
formed an indispensable element in all similar enterprises. Since
the concert of 1726, when Blavet charmed the audience by his
virtuosity and the impeccable clarity and correctness of his intona-
tion (something well-nigh incredible when we remember that he
held in his hands one of the flutes of that epoch), an uninterrupted
succession of flute virtuosos appeared at the Concerts spirituels and
elsewhere. First of all came Blavet, who was heard at every or
nearly every séance either in duos or as a solo flutist; and then
those others whose names we continually meet with in Michel
Brenet’s valuable work, Les Concerts en France sous l’ Ancien
Régime: Buffardin, appearing several times, notably after a sojourn
in Saxony; the German Graef, who played in 1739; Rostenne,Piso Le LEE road eee

Flute and Flutists in French Art 531

who presented himself as a sort of a wind-acrobat, playing a direct
double flute; M. Taillart, who played a sonata in N ovember, 1725;
another Taillart (probably the brother of the first), who played at
the reopening of the Concerts sprrituels in 1748, and who returned to
them in 1751 when, in addition, he was a member of the orchestra
of the Opéra. During the same year of 1751, we meet Wendling,
precursor of a genre which later created a furore in both hemi-
spheres, who played a flute obbligato part for his wife, a singer.
Voice and flute evidently formed a successful combination, for the
Florentine flutist Angelo Vestris, coming from Italy with his
sister, Madame Viola de Vestris, played a flute obbligato part for
her in 1752. At the same time the German Goetz] is heard, then
the Roman Rutgi, who also scored successes as a composer with
a descriptive symphony entitled “Tempest Followed by a Calm.”

Sallentin, the younger, member of a large family of oboists
and flutists, was heard at the same concerts in 1758. In 1773
Rault—also a flutist at the Opéra and probably the creator of the
immortal solo in the scene of the Elysian Fields in Orpheus, a solo
which Gluck wrote expressly for the Paris performances—was
listened to in 1778, and Wendling was again heard, and also Wun-
derlich; in 1780 Mademoiselle Mudrich won applause with her
agility. In 1781 Devienne, later celebrated as a virtuoso, the
author of a standard method and an opera composer, appeared.
In 1786 the brothers Thurner were heard in duos for two flutes.

Besides the Concerts spirituels we find the programmes of
individual concerts given by flutists: that of Hartmann, at the
Hotel de Bouillon, in 1781; and that of Schutzmann, in 1783.
Nor have we as yet mentioned the names of Lucas, who must have
played in the Concerts spirituels, and of J acques-Christophe
Naudot, who may have played in them, for one of his trios formed
part of the repertoire in the inventory made in 17 82; of Lavaux, of
Leclerc, and others, whose names are revealed in various sources.

In so long a list one is obliged to make a choice. Hence we
will consider in detail no more than five or six of these artists, who
stand out among the others, either by reason of the accounts of
their virtuoso successes which have come down to us, or because
of their works. Yet before we discuss them, we will take the lib-
erty of quoting the first stanzas of a long poem entitled Syrinz, ou
Uorigine de la flite (“Syrinx, or the Origin of the F lute’), pub-
lished in 1739 by the Sieur Denesle, and dedicated to Messieurs
Naudot, Blavet and Lucas. It will be remarked to what lyric
fervor (somewhat expansive, in truth, and richer in enthusiasm
than in ideas) an admirer of the transverse flute could rise:

: OT ee a aes
a eae532

 

The Musical Quarterly

Mattres si vantés dans un Art
Auquel les Dieux et le Hazard
Donnérent autrefois naissance,
Par une juste préférence

Que le Gotit ne peut démentir

Je veux aujourd’hui vous ofirir
Les doux passe-temps d'une Muse
Qui Apollon, si je ne m’abuse,
Quelquefois daigne caresser.
Puis-je, en effet, mieux adresser
Et l’aventure et l’origine

De la fifite, toute divine,

Qu’a ceux dont le rare talent
Nous rend ce bois plus éloquent
Que ne fit le dieu Pan lui-méme,
Lorsque dans son ardeur extréme
Ses doigts ravirent autrefois
Toutes les Déités des Bois?

On sait assez que votre gloire
Pour se transmettre a la mémoire
N’a pas besoin de cette encens.

O que, tant que le Goat, en France
Sous ses pieds foulant Ignorance,
Sur ce monstre dominera
Toujours votre renom VIVES eo ucts
(Famed masters, who an Art adorn,
That of the Gods and Chance was born
In times that long have sped,

By a just preference led,

Which Taste cannot gainsay,

I offer you this day

A pastime sweet, a Muse’s bliss,

One Pheebus, if I’m not amiss,

At times deigns to caress.

Whom could more fitly I address,

And origin and tale outline

Of the flute, instrument divine,

Than those whose talents rare dispense
The gift of its wood’s eloquence

Beyond Pan’s art to do as much,

As when, with fervor’s frenzied touch
His fingers straying, knew to please

The ravished Woodland Deities?

So great your glory that in vain,

Lest memory it not retain,

This tribute seeks it to enhance.

Ah, may, while Good Taste still in France
Tread underfoot blind Ignorance,

And o’er the monster lordship claim,
Ever endure and live your fame!)

oe a aeFlute and Flutists in French Art 533

Even when making allowance for the custom of the time, and
the exaggeration of the verse-makers of that day, such hyperbolic
praise could only have been addressed to eminent artists,

Nothing is known of one among them, Lucas, and to our
knowledge he has left not a single composition for his j
Regarding another, to whom Denesle gives the first place, Naudot,
we have but little more information. We do not know when he
was born, and it was not until quite lately that J.-G. Prod’homme
has managed to find a document touching on his decease. J acques-
Christophe Naudot died in Paris, November 25, 1762. If we
are to credit certain dedications in his works, he was the protégé
of the Count d’Egmont, Duke de Gueldre. Our recent discovery
of one of his trios in the repertoire of the Concerts spirituels, and
the fact that his extravagant admirer Denesle was for a time a
co-director of these concerts, leads us to suppose that he played
at them. He was undoubtedly an excellent musician, and
Quantz speaks of him with much approval in his autobiography,
alter his sojourn in Paris. Yet his true claim to fame lies in his
compositions, notably many and varied, and which surely place
him in the first rank of the lesser masters of the instrumental
composition of his epoch.

His output included no less than 20 books of sonatas or divers
pieces, among which 17 were listed in Ballard’s catalogue during
the composer’s lifetime, and have been integrally set down. To
these should be added three complementary duos not mentioned in
Ballard’s catalogue. In all we have:

6 books of six sonatas for flute and bass.

4 books of six pieces in trio form for flutes and bass.

2 books of six sonatas for two flutes without bass.

1 book of six rustic pieces for musettes, viols, flutes, violins and
oboes, with bass.

1 book of six babioles for two viols or two musettes, direct flutes,
transverse flutes, oboes or violins, without bass.

1 book of six sonatas for viol and bass.

1 book of six concertos (in seven parts) for one transverse flute,
three violins, one alto, one bassoon and bass.

1 rustic divertissement in trio form for musette or viol, flute and
violin.

1 book comprising various pieces for two hunting-horns, trumpets,

transverse flute or oboe.
Finally, twenty-five menuets for two hunting-horns, trumpets,

transverse flute, oboe, violin and viola da gamba.

We have intentionally given this complete list of Naudot’s
works to emphasize the incredible neglect shown this fecund com-
poser. And he has been unjustly neglected because, in spite ofThe Musical Quarterly

534

ion, Naudot is never guilty of
are charming; those
and in his seven-part
ti grossi which a few

nee of his product
negligence. His sonatas for flute and bass
for two flutes without bass highly ingenious;
Naudot anticipates those concer
to abound in French music.
Michel Blavet, on the other hand, there is
plenty of information. Contrary to Naudot, who shunned official
positions, Blavet, from his youth on, filled in turn the most
brilliant offices. Born in Besancon, in 1700, of an artisan family,
he showed notable aptitude for music at an early age. Blavet
went to Paris when quite young, “1 1723, at the urging of the Duke
de Lévis, governor of the province. He had cultivated various
‘nstruments, notably the bassoon, yet it was the flute which was
to give him the fame that endured throughout his career. The
tale of his striking success at the Concerts spirituels has already
been told. At the time he was only twenty-six, and was attached
to the household of the Prince de Carignan. Once his fame had
been established others disputed the honor of securing him, and
he entered the service of the Count de Clermont, Louis de Bour-
bon-Condé, great-grandson of the great Condé. This nobleman
made him superintendent of his musical establishment. He
divided his time between his employer’s estate in Berny and the
Abbey of Saint-Germain des Prés, which did not prevent his
playing at the homes of various highly placed personages, such as
the Prince d’Ardore and the Marquise de Lauragiiais, nor joining
the orchestra of the Opéra, where he was active from 1740 to
1760. Blavet, whose talent was not limited to the flute, had a
work, Le Jaloux corrigé, performed at the Opéra, the premiére
occurring March 1, 1753.

From time to time Blavet travelled, no doubt taking advan-
tage of the liberty given him by his patron, the Count de Cler-
mont. The details of his journeys have not been revealed. It is
claimed that Blavet played at Potsdam before Frederick the
Great.’ It is even supposed that he visited Russia. The fact
remains that information regarding Blavet’s concert-tours is very
vague. The MS. of a concerto composed by him is preserved in
the Carlsruhe library, and may be accepted as a proof that he
stopped in that city. This concerto, which the author of the pres-
ent article has played on various occasions, is a charming work,
worthy of the master’s pen, for Blavet was a composer of rare

merit.

the superabunda

concertos,
years later were
With regard to

1Trans. Note: Riemann states definitel i
: y that Blavet played for Frederick th
Great in the castle of Rheinsberg, when the latter was still Crent Prince of Prussia. ‘‘|

STO PLES ee
CSL e eee a bi Se A Bd

Flute and Flutists in French Art 535

Ii his output is not as important as that of Naudot, yet it is
not inferior to his in quality. It comprises, in particular, three
books of six sonatas for flute and bass, which appeared, respec-
tively, in 1728, 1732 and 1740 ; and three “Collections of Pieces,
Little Airs, Brunettes, Menuets, etc., Arranged for Transverse
Flutes (2 Flutes without Bass).”’

These last collections contain, above all, arrangements of all
the melodies which were fashionable at the time; but also include
some of the composer’s original preludes or pieces. In these
Blavet does not show himself at his best; but rather in his sonatas
for flute and bass, which rank with the best musical productions
of the eighteenth century. ‘They are, as a rule, gracious in style
and well conceived (as is evident), in order to display the player’s
virtuosity. In their brilliant passages and in their more expres-
sive ones, however, they invariably show balance and perfect good
taste. It goes without saying that Blavet was well aware of the
limitations of resource of the transverse flute, and that he never
wrote anything which exceeded its possibilities.

Another merit of Blavet’s was that he did not cast all his
sonatas in the same mold. He was not afraid of dropping the
obligatory introductory Adagios and the inevitable rapid finale
movements for pieces of a less conventional character.

Thus, in the first of the “Six Sonatas” which we edited a few
years ago, we find, instead of an andante, a double aria (major and
minor), a species of rondo in G, entitled l’ Henriette (surname of the
Duchess de Bouillon, mistress of the Count de Clermont, to whom
the sonata was inscribed). The second sonata, called La Vibray,
contains a gavotte entitled Les Caquets, which is actually an
amusing bit of musical chit-chat. In the third sonata (La @ Héron-
ville), a rondo, L’Insinuante, appears to have been borrowed from
apopularsong. The andante of the fourth sonata is a “Sicilienne”
which, as Mr. Fuller-Maitland has remarked in The Times, “‘is
worthy to rank with the most famous Siciliennes of the great
eighteenth century masters.”

A kind of hunting air called Le Mare Antoine, and a melan-
choly gavotte entitled Les Regrets, supply the element of surprise
in the fifth sonata; while in the sixth, under the title of Les tendres
Badinages, appears a delightful rondo. I have purposely laid
stress on these details. Among the reproaches often made the
lesser eighteenth-century masters by their contemporaries, we
find accusations of monotony, of the abuse of formulas. There is
nothing, however, less monotonous than the ensemble of Blavet’s
compositions.The Musical Quarterly

This king of the flutists of his age died in 1768, in the fine
adjunct of Saint-Germain Abbey, still existing at this day. His
colleague Buffardin was laid away in the tomb a few months earlier.

Buffardin, born 1690 in Marseilles, had a far more active career

than the majority of his colleagues. In 1715 we find him in Con-
stantinople, where, in the suite of the French ambassador, he meets
ian, who was there as

Johann Jacob Bach, older brother of Sebast vas t
an oboist in the train of Charles XII of Sweden. Passing into the
service of Friedrich August I, Elector of Saxony, he was the
teacher of Joachim Quantz, who later was to win fame as the
teacher of Frederick the Great. a

He lived in Saxony until 1750, but made some brilliant ap-
pearances in Paris, the first in 1726, the year in which Blavet
made his début; the second in 1737. He scored noteworthy suc-
cesses on both occasions. He died in January, 1768, in Paris,
whither he had returned in 1750, exhausted by a long illness and in
a state of extreme destitution. Like many of the flutists of his
day, he manufactured transverse flutes, yet neither his skill as a
flute-maker nor his virtuoso talent sufficed to save him from

wretchedness.
So great a virtuoso necessarily obeyed the law which demanded

that he compose for his instrument, and Buffardin did not fail

to do so, for Leclerc’s catalogue of 1742 lists a book of sonatas for
flute and bass. Most unfortunately, these sonatas thus far have
not been rediscovered—at any rate, not in French libraries.

We should by all means conclude this long enumeration of the
eighteenth-century flutists by conforming to the tradition which
demands that this epoch come to an end with the downfall of the
old régime; yet we must at least mention the amiable Devienne,
whose début as a virtuoso appears to hark back to 1781, and who
marks the transition from the brillant eighteenth-century school
to that, no less brilliant, yet musically much less valuable, of the
nineteenth-century flutists. Devienne was born in 1759 in Join-
ville (Haute-Marne), and his first appearances in musical life were
divided between flute and bassoon. It is as a flutist, however,
that he won virtuoso fame. A wonderful portrait by David’s
brush, at present preserved in the Brussels Museum, presents
him (a three-quarter view) about to play the flute. Appointed
professor at the Conservatoire, the author of a method still in use
to-day (largely rewritten at various times, a task which involved
considerable labor), he died a maniac in the Charenton Asylum in
1803. His compositions are numbered by the hundred. He
essayed all the forms, and wrote for all instruments and for every

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Flute and Flutists in French Art 537

kind of combination. The day may come when his instrumental
compositions will be revived, when the passing of time will have
ranged him among those musicians who challenge the interest of
the musical archeologist. For the time being his works slumber
forgotten. Devienne also composed several operas, the most
celebrated among them being Les Visitandines, a charming work
which long kept its place in the repertoire and which, only a few
years ago, was still given in Paris. This graceful opera was per-

formed in Paris at the height of the Terror and had the greatest
success.

* *
*

With Devienne, as we have already stated, the brilliant
galaxy of the flutists who lent their splendor to three reigns, up to
the outbreak of the Revolution, came to an end. The flute still
remains a modish instrument, but the “loud and noisy’’ style of
music cultivated by the virtuosos of the beginning of the nineteenth
century deflects the interest of the great musicians from the
instrument. While, from Bach to Beethoven, all the great classics
had contributed more or less to enrich the flute repertoire, none
of the great composers of the first half of the nineteenth century
deigned to write a single piece for the instrument. We need only
mention Mendelssohn, Schumann and Brahms to show how tangi-
ble this assertion is. A happy reaction, most fortunately, has
occurred in this respect during the past few years, and we need not
despair of a revival, due to the collaboration of composers and
virtuosos, of the brilliant days of the century before the last.

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