The orchestra & orchestral music E-Book

W. J. Henderson

• Herausgeber: Librorium Editions
• Kategorie: Geisteswissenschaft
• Sprache: Englisch

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2023

Beschreibung

The modern orchestra is a musical instrument upon which a performer, known as a conductor, plays compositions written especially for it. It is true that an orchestra is a collection of instruments, but these are intended to be so distributed and operated that the result shall be homogeneous, the effect that of one grand organ of sound. Within itself the orchestra embraces a wide variety of tone-qualities and many grades of power and brilliancy, and these are due to the presence of several different families of instruments, each having general qualities, with special traits in the individuals. It is by causing these different families to work together or separately that the composer achieves the expression of his thought, and it is by governing wisely the operations of the individual members and the families that the conductor conveys the composer’s design to the hearer.

Leseprobe

The Music

BEETHOVEN.

The Orchestra And Orchestral Music

By W. J. Henderson

Author of “What Is Good Music?” Etc.

With Portraits

© 2023 Librorium Editions

ISBN : 9782385743048

The Orchestra And Orchestral Music

Preface

PART I

I Instruments Played with the Bow

II Wind-Instruments of Wood

III Wind-Instruments of Brass

IV Other Instruments

V The Orchestral Score

PART II

VI General Principles

VII The Strings

VIII The Wood-Wind

IX The Brass and the “Battery”

X Qualities of Good Orchestration

XI Qualities of Orchestral Performance

PART III

XII Development of the Conductor

XIII Functions of the Conductor

PART IV

XIV From Peri to Handel

XV From Haydn to Wagner

PART V

XVI From Bach to Haydn

XVII From Beethoven to Richard Strauss

INDEX

Preface

T

his

is not a text-book. It is not a treatise on instrumentation. It is not written for musicians, nor primarily for students of music, though the latter may find in it information of some value to them. This is simply an attempt to give to music lovers such facts about the modern orchestra as will help them in assuming an intelligent attitude toward the contemporaneous instrumental body and its performances. The author has endeavored to put before the reader a description of each instrument with an illustration which will enable him to identify its tone when next heard in the delivery of the passage quoted. Some account of the distinctive nature and functions of the strings, the wood, the brass, and the percussion instruments has been given. With this account go hand in hand some remarks on the development of methods of scoring. The reader will not find such historical matter in any other book with which the present writer is acquainted. Neither will he find anywhere else a history of the development of the conductor, which is given in this volume. The author has endeavored to make his work complete by describing the duties of the conductor and the requisites of good orchestral playing, and by recounting briefly the story of the growth of the orchestra and the development of its music. All other books on the orchestra which the author has seen are for the professional musician. In making one for the amateur of music the writer hopes to supply a need.

PART I

How the Orchestra is Constituted

I Instruments Played with the Bow

T

he

modern orchestra is a musical instrument upon which a performer, known as a conductor, plays compositions written especially for it. It is true that an orchestra is a collection of instruments, but these are intended to be so distributed and operated that the result shall be homogeneous, the effect that of one grand organ of sound. Within itself the orchestra embraces a wide variety of tone-qualities and many grades of power and brilliancy, and these are due to the presence of several different families of instruments, each having general qualities, with special traits in the individuals. It is by causing these different families to work together or separately that the composer achieves the expression of his thought, and it is by governing wisely the operations of the individual members and the families that the conductor conveys the composer’s design to the hearer.

The orchestra of to-day is the result of a series of interesting developments, of which some considerable account will be given in this volume. But it is necessary before that development can be traced that the reader shall take a bird’s-eye view of the orchestra as it now is. Subsequently we shall examine its constitution in detail, but at present we shall simply glance at its general features. Orchestras are not the same for all compositions. Composers select their instruments in these days according to the purpose of the work in hand. But the orchestra employed by Beethoven and his immediate successors in their symphonies is the typical orchestra for independent performance. Curtailed or extended as it may be for special effects, its general plan remains undisturbed.

The modern orchestra, then, is composed of the following instruments: Flutes, oboes, clarinets, bassoons, horns, trumpets, trombones, drums, and other instruments of percussion, violins, violas, violoncellos, and double-basses. These instruments naturally divide themselves into families. Flutes, oboes, clarinets, and bassoons are instruments of wood, and are caused to sound by the blowing of the breath of the players. They therefore form a single group or family, known as the “wood-wind,” or, more briefly, the wood. Horns, trumpets, and trombones are instruments of brass, and they form a family known as the brass. The percussion instruments (drums, triangles, cymbals, etc.) are sometimes called “the battery.” Violins, violas, violoncellos (usually called ’cellos), and double-basses are all stringed instruments played with a bow, and they form a group known as “the strings.”

At present the reader will not be invited to study the characteristics and possibilities of these groups and their combinations, but will be asked to acquaint himself with the individual instruments composing them. The foundation of an orchestra is its body of strings. Two principal reasons may here be given for this: The strings are capable, when playing alone, of a greater variety of expression than either the wood or the brass, and they never grow tired. Blowers of wind-instruments require frequent periods of rest, but the strings are equal to the demands of an operatic act an hour and a half in length. Because the strings are the foundation of the orchestra we must study them first. The string group is often described as the “quartet.” This was correct in early times when composers wrote the same part for the ’cellos and double-basses, but it is not correct now, because the strings almost invariably play in five real parts. The violins are divided into two bodies, known as first and second violins. First violins are the sopranos of the strings, second violins the altos, violas the tenors, ’cellos the barytones, and double-basses the basses. This is not strictly true, because the compass of the viola and of the ’cello enables those instruments to sing above the violins at times. But the normal distribution of the parts of the strings is that which has been given, and this distribution is disturbed only when special effects are required, as we shall see hereafter.

THE VIOLIN

Let us begin our survey of the individual instruments with a look at the violin, the prima donna of the orchestra. The violin is both a dramatic and a colorature soprano. It can sob with the woes of an Isolde as eloquently as Lilli Lehmann, or it can twitter with the trills and roulades of a Lucia as brightly as a Melba. Its resources in the way of technical agility are great, and its powers of emotional expression are still greater. It is not necessary to expatiate upon the abilities of the violin, because it is so familiar an instrument; but it is well to note that the effect of a solo violin is very different from that of a number of violins playing together in an orchestra. A body of violins is capable of producing a vigorous, masculine, sonorous volume of tone whose character is as different from that of a solo instrument as its amount is.

The violin has four strings, the lowest being tuned to the G below the treble clef. The other three are tuned to D, A, and E, the E being that in the uppermost space of the treble clef. The E is called the first string, and the G the fourth. The compass of the instrument as employed in the orchestra is from the low G, three and a half octaves upward, to the C in the sixth space above the staff. This compass is sometimes increased by the employment of what are called harmonics. These are strangely sweet flute-like sounds, which the Germans call the flageolet tones of the violin. They are nothing more or less than what the scientists describe as overtones, or, better, upper partials. It is a fact of acoustics that every musical tone is composed of several tones, the ear hearing plainly only that which is the fundamental sound of the series. In the case of a vibrating string the lesser tones can be utilized. Professor Zahm, in his “Sound and Music,” says: “A string emitting a musical note rarely, if ever, vibrates as a whole, without, at the same time, vibrating in segments, which are aliquot parts of the whole.” Violinists have discovered that by touching the vibrating string at certain points very lightly with the fingers of the left hand, they can stop the vibrations of the fundamental tone, leaving the upper partial to be heard. These harmonics are very high in pitch and sweet in quality, and cannot be used in loud or vigorous music, but in certain kinds of passages they enable the violin to soar away into realms of ethereal beauty of tone.

The normal tone of a body of violins playing together is clear, penetrating, and rich. As Berlioz has noted in his book on orchestration, a mass of violins playing in the middle and upper registers produces the most brilliant color of the modern orchestra. The opening measures of Mendelssohn’s Italian symphony, the finale of Weber’s “Oberon” overture, the closing measures of the garden scene in Gounod’s “Faust,” or the whole of the prelude to Wagner’s “Lohengrin,” may be instanced as illustrations of pure violin color and power.

The prelude to “Lohengrin” also makes use of harmonics. They are heard in the peculiar, mystic, high tones at the close of the number. It should be noted here that harmonics, or upper partials, need not be used simply to increase the compass of the violin. On the contrary, they can be produced from any of the four strings. Those of the G string, for instance, have a singularly mellow, flute-like quality. Thus, harmonics can be employed in tone-coloring, in which the resources of the modern orchestra are almost inexhaustible.

A great many special effects can be produced from violins. The manner of drawing the bow across the strings has much to do with them. For instance, bowing close to the bridge of the instrument produces a rough, metallic sound, while bowing over the finger-board evokes a soft, veiled tone. There is even a difference in the sound of a tone produced by the pushing of the bow upward and that given out when it is drawn downward. The use of the toe or the heel of the bow also makes a difference. The toe is best employed for a delicate touch, while the heel is used for short, vigorous notes. All possible gradations between a smooth, fluent cantilena and the sharpest staccato are possible to the violin, and can be employed in the orchestra with excellent effect.

Rapid alternating strokes of the bow upward and downward produce the tremolo effect, which is very common in orchestral music. Berlioz notes, with his customary accuracy in regard to instrumental effects, that the tremolo of violins expresses great agitation when played by many violins not far above the middle B flat, while a forte on the middle of the first string is stormy and violent. Wagner’s “Flying Dutchman” overture affords admirable examples of both these effects.

The saltato is sometimes employed. This is a performance of rapid successions of notes by causing the bow to jump on the strings by its own elasticity instead of drawing it smoothly. The direction col legno, sometimes seen in orchestra scores, means that the violinists are to use the backs of their bows instead of the hair. This produces a harsh, grotesque kind of staccato, and it is a method employed only in music with something of grim humor in it. Some of the best instances of its employment are to be found in Wagner’s “Siegfried,” where it is used in the music accompanying Mime’s betrayal of his gleeful expectations of Siegfried’s death.

Pizzicato is a term used to express the plucking of the strings with the fingers. This is a very familiar musical effect. In earlier times it was employed very little, and confined chiefly to the basses. It is very common in modern music, and sometimes whole movements are directed to be played in this manner. The familiar pizzicato movement of Delibes’s “Sylvia” ballet is an excellent example.

Sordines are little contrivances of wood or brass with teeth which can be pressed down over the strings so as to deaden their vibrations. You will often, if you are observant, see the players take them out of their waistcoat-pockets and place them over the strings of their instruments just in front of the bridges. These sordine, or mutes, give the tone of the instrument a veiled sound, which adds to the mournfulness of pathetic music, and to the mystery of anything weird or strange. In the “Queen Mab” scherzo of Berlioz’s “Romeo et Juliette” symphony, for instance, the use of the sordines adds to the suggestion of the supernatural world, while in “Asa’s Death” in Grieg’s “Peer Gynt” suite they deepen the impression of crushing sorrow. For the benefit of those who read orchestral scores it must be added that the direction to use the mutes is con sordini, and the words senza sordini signify that their use is to be discontinued. The use of the bow after a pizzicato passage is directed by the words col arco, or simply arco (the bow).

Violins in the orchestra are divided into two bodies, first and second. A friend once asked me: “What is the difference between a first and a second violin?” The question amused me and I repeated it to my friend, Philip Hale, the brilliant music critic of the Boston Journal. He promptly answered: “There is no difference except in the price.” That is quite true. Violins are all alike, but a first-violin player is sometimes paid more than a second. The reason for dividing the instruments into two bodies is that the middle voices of the harmony may be properly filled out. If there were no second violins, the violas, which we shall presently consider, would have to play continually in their upper register in order to fill what may be called the contralto part of the harmony. Then the ’cellos would have to be pushed up into the tenor register, and there would be a big gap between them and the low-toned double-basses. On the other hand, if the violas were kept down, there would be a gap between them and the violins. But by dividing the violins into two bodies, the second violins are available for the notes of the harmony lying between those sounded by the first violins and those given out by the violas. First and second violins can frequently play the same notes, when the harmonic support is confided to the wind-instruments, and thus a double amount of power is attained. Indeed, it is not uncommon to write a melody for all the violins, violas, and ’cellos to sing together, with wind accompaniment. First and second violins, on the other hand, are often subdivided into four or more parts. So are all the other stringed instruments. This is an effect which we shall consider more in detail when we come to the extended examination of the separate choirs.

THE VIOLA

This adorable instrument always reminds me of Shakespeare’s Viola—“She never told her love, but let concealment, like a worm i’ the bud, prey on her damask cheek.” The viola speaks often enough, but no one recognizes her voice. She is unknown to the average concert-goer. Kept in the background by the position of the players, who sit behind the violins, and by the unskilful employment of the earlier composers, this beautiful and expressive member of the viol family is almost a stranger to lovers of music. The viola is nothing more or less than a larger violin with a deeper compass. The violin is tuned, as we have already seen, thus:

[Listen]

The viola has also four strings, which are tuned thus:

[Listen]

In order to avoid the inconvenience of writing the part of the viola in two clefs, the old custom of writing it on what is known as the alto clef is continued. The peculiarities of clefs will be explained in a separate chapter. The viola is both a tenor and a contralto, though it is usually employed in modern scores to discharge the duties of a tenor. The early composers knew so little about its expressive power that they frequently used it simply to reinforce the basses. The most recent writers have gone to the other extreme. They have been so delighted with the individuality of the viola’s tone that they have shown a tendency to overwork it. The lowest register of the viola has a peculiarly sepulchral tone, which gives it a dark and threatening character, admirably adapted to the demands of tragic music. In its middle register the viola sings with a peculiar pathos which cannot be imitated by any other instrument playing in the same region of pitch, and even in the higher parts of its scale the viola maintains its individuality by a penetrating sweetness and gentleness of tone. Nevertheless, it blends well with other stringed instruments. If a composer desires to write a long scale, exceeding the downward range of violins, he can pass from violins to violas, and so to ’cellos, without any abrupt change of tonal quality. Again, violas can be used to reinforce other stringed instruments, as in the beginning of the andante con moto of Beethoven’s Fifth Symphony, where they play the melody in unison with the ’cellos. Meyerbeer, Berlioz, and Wagner have made excellent use of the characteristic qualities of the viola. The first named gives a good example of his style of treatment in the viola accompaniment to Raoul’s romance, “Plus blanche que la blanche hermine,” in Act I. of “Les Huguenots.” Berlioz employs a solo viola in his “Harold in Italy” symphony to represent Byron’s melancholy wanderer. Wagner takes advantage of the peculiar tone-color of the instrument in many places in his scores. A familiar example is that which begins the bacchanalian passage in the “Tannhäuser” overture:

[Listen]

All that has been said about the methods of bowing, tremolo, pizzicato, harmonics, sordines, etc., applies to the viola as well as to the violin.

THE VIOLONCELLO

This instrument is so well known that it will not be necessary to say much about it. Its tone and its various effects are familiar to all concert-goers. The ’cello is tuned precisely as the viola is, but an octave lower:

[Listen]

The compass usually employed in the orchestra is three and one-half octaves from the low C to the G just above the treble staff. This compass may be increased further by the employment of harmonics. Students of scores will find that three different clefs are used for ’cello music, as explained in the account of clefs.

All that has been said about playing the violin applies also to the ’cello, though, of course, in orchestral music the ’cello is not expected to display so much agility as the violin. It is heard to the best advantage in broad and fluent melody. As Berlioz justly says: “Nothing is more voluptuously melancholy or more suited to the utterance of tender, languishing themes than a mass of violoncellos playing in unison on their first strings.” He might have added that nothing is more expressive of dignity without passion than the lower tones of the ’cello when uttered by several instruments at once. Owing to its great compass the ’cello can be used as the bass of the string quartet, as a solo instrument, or as the singer of the melody with an accompaniment by the other strings.

THE DOUBLE-BASS

The irreverent frequently call the double-bass the “bull fiddle.” It is the foundation of the string choir and the fundamental bass of the whole orchestra. It is tuned thus:

[Listen]

It must be borne in mind, however, that the notes sound an octave lower than written. The instrument is called the double-bass because it was used in early times to double the bass part played by the ’cello. It is only since the beginning of the nineteenth century that it has generally been given an independent bass part. Beethoven extended its powers immensely and revealed capacities which earlier composers did not suspect the instrument of possessing. Indeed, some of Beethoven’s contemporaries looked askance at his innovations. Weber wrote an article on the great man’s Fourth Symphony. In it he depicted himself as hearing in a dream the comments of the instruments of the orchestra. The contra-bass (double-bass) says:

“I have just come from the rehearsal of a symphony by one of our newest composers; and though, as you know, I have a tolerably strong constitution, I could only just hold out, and five minutes more would have shattered my frame and burst the sinews of my life. I have been made to caper about like a wild goat, and to turn myself into a mere fiddle to execute the no-ideas of Mr. Composer.”

The time had not yet come for the famous recitative passage of the basses in the Ninth Symphony. The same methods of bowing, etc., as are applied to the violin are applied to the double-bass, but without any attempt at great agility. Sordines, or mutes, are not used, because an effective mute for a double-bass would weigh about two pounds and would be very inconvenient to carry in the pocket. Harmonics can be produced from the double-bass, but they are strident and loud and have no musical utility.

II Wind-Instruments of Wood

THE FLUTE

N

ext

in importance to the strings is the wood-wind, which is divided into three families—flutes, oboes, and clarinets. To the first family belong the piccolo and the flute; to the second the oboe, English horn, and bassoon, and to the third the clarinet and bass clarinet. In the modern orchestra, flutes, clarinets, oboes, and bassoons are usually employed in pairs, while there is, if needed, one piccolo, one English horn, and one bass clarinet. The flute is the most agile of the wind-instruments, and is employed very freely in the orchestra. Its compass is three octaves upward from the C below the treble clef, but the two uppermost notes are seldom used. The tone is soft and sweet in the medium register, clear and penetrating in the upper, and singularly characteristic in the lower. Rapid passages are readily executed on the flute, but the instrument’s powers of expression are limited, owing partly to its tone-quality and partly to the impossibility of giving a wide crescendo or diminuendo to any passage played upon it.

Nevertheless, it can be employed expressively when used with judgment. Berlioz calls attention to Gluck’s use of it in his “Orfeo” in the scene in the Elysian fields, where it voices the humility and resignation of the bereaved husband. In the upper register rapid sequences for the flute have an air of gayety. Well-known passages which illustrate this are that near the close of the “Leonora” overture No. 3, and that near the close of the finale of the “Eroica” symphony. The piccolo, or octave-flute, is simply a small, shrill-voiced flute, sounding an octave higher than the ordinary instrument. The sounds in its second octave are well adapted to pieces of a joyous character, while its upper register is useful for violent effects, such as a storm or a scene in the infernal regions. In grotesque and supernatural scenes it is also often employed with good results.

THE OBOE

The oboe is a reed instrument with a peculiar pastoral tone, which, when once recognized, can never again be mistaken for that of another instrument. It is not possible to describe this tone, beyond saying that the average hearer thinks of it as the tone of a shepherd’s pipe. The instrument is so well suited to pastoral music that the principal melody is almost always given to it in passages having such a character. Rapid passages, except in rare instances, are not suited to the utterance of the oboe, though when it joins with the whole mass of instruments in a tutti, anything that is not impossible may be written for it. But it is essentially a lyric instrument of tender expression, and it is seldom called upon for either gayety or tragedy. Berlioz says: “Candor, artless grace, soft joy, or the grief of a fragile being, suits the oboe’s accents. It expresses them admirably in its cantabile.” An excellent example of the oboe’s quality as a tender lyric singer is the opening of the slow movement of Schubert’s symphony in C: