Music Talks with Children Part 6

On any important music subject Schumann has something to say. So with this:

"Learn betimes the fundamental principles of harmony." "Do not be afraid of the words theory, thorough-ba.s.s, and the like, they will meet you as friends if you will meet them so."

We now begin to feel how definitely these rules treat everything. They pick out the important subjects and tell the simplest truth about them. The meaning of these two rules is this: From the beginning we must try to understand the grammar of music. Some of the great composers could in childhood write down music with the greatest fluency. Handel, even as a boy, wrote a new church composition for every Sunday. Mozart began to write music when less than five years old, and when he was yet a boy, in Rome, he wrote down a composition,[44] sung by the choir of the Sistine Chapel, which was forbidden to the public.

Harmony and counterpoint stand to music very much as spelling and grammar stand to language. They are the fundamentals of good writing and of good--that is, of correct--thinking in music. Harmony is the art of putting tones together so as correctly to make chords.

Counterpoint has to do with composing and joining together simple melodies. A modern writer[45] on counterpoint has said: "The essence of true counterpoint lies in the equal interest which should belong to ever part." By examining a few pieces of good counterpoint you will readily see just what this means. The composer has not tried to get merely a correct chord succession, such as we find in a choral. Let us play a choral; any good one of a German master will do.[46] We notice that the soprano is the princ.i.p.al part, and that the other voices, while somewhat melodic, tend rather to support and follow the melody than to be independent. If, now, we play a piece of counterpoint like the G-Minor Prelude by Bach,[47] we shall have quite a good piece of counterpoint, as far as separate melodies being combined is concerned.

Let us play the voice-parts separately. We shall find equal melodic interest in each. The chords grow out of the music. Comparing this with the choral, the main difference between harmony and counterpoint should be clear to us. We shall observe that the three voices do _not_ proceed in the same way. If one part moves quickly, as in the ba.s.s of the first two measures, the other parts are quieter; if the ba.s.s ceases to move rapidly some other voice will take up the motion, as we see in the third and following measures. As a general thing no two voices in contrapuntal writing move in the same way, each voice-part being contrasted with different note-values. This gives greater interest and makes each voice stand forth independently.

At first contrapuntal music may not seem interesting to us. If that is so, it is because we are not in the least degree conscious of the wonderful interest which has been put into every part. The truth is, that in the beginning we cannot fully understand the thought that has been put into the music, but by perseverance it will come to us little by little. This is what makes great music lasting. It is so deftly made, yet so delicately, that we have to go patiently in search of it.

We must remember that gems have to be cut and polished from a bit of rock.

In this case the gem is the rich mind-picture which comes to us if we faithfully seek the under-thought. And the seeking is polishing the gem.

Music written entirely by the rules of counterpoint is called contrapuntal music; that written otherwise is known as free harmonic music. In the one case the composer desired to have a beautiful weaving of the parts--clear as the lines in a line-engraving. In the other, the intention is to get effects from tones united into chords, such as is obtained from ma.s.ses of color in a painting. Neither form may be said to be the superior of the other. Each is valuable in its place, and each has possibilities peculiarly its own, which the other could not give. Pure counterpoint could not give us such a charming effect as Chopin obtains in the first study of Opus 10; nor could the plainer and more free harmonic style give us such delicate bits of tracery as Bach has in his fugues.

If now you will take the trouble to learn two long words, later in your study of music they will be of use to you. The first is Polyphonic; the other is Monophonic. Both, like many other words in our language, are made up of two shorter words, and come from another language--Greek. In both we have "phonic," evidently meaning the same in each case, limited or modified by the preceding part--_poly_ and _mono_. Phonic is the Anglicized Greek for _sound_. We use it in the English word _telephonic_. Now if we define mono and poly we shall understand these two long words.

Mono means one, poly means many. We say _mono_tone, meaning one tone; also _poly_gon, meaning many sides.

In the musical reference monophonic music means music of one voice, rather than of one tone, and polyphonic music is that _for many voices_. Simple melodies with or without accompanying chords are monophonic; many melodies woven together, as in the Bach piece which we have looked over, are polyphonic.

In the history of music two men surpa.s.sed all others in what they accomplished in counterpoint--that is, in polyphonic writing. The one was Palestrina, an Italian; the other was Bach, a German. Palestrina lived at a time when the music of the church was very poor, so poor, indeed, that the clergy could no longer endure it. Palestrina, however, devoted himself earnestly to composing music strictly adapted to the church use. The parts were all melodic, and woven together with such great skill that they yet remain masterpieces of contrapuntal writing. Later Bach developed counterpoint very much more in the modern way. He did with polyphony for the piano and organ much the same as Palestrina did for the voice. There have never lived greater masters than these in the art of polyphonic music.

There is still another form of writing which is neither strictly harmonic, nor strictly contrapuntal,--it is a combination of both.

There is not the plain unadorned harmonic progress as in the simple choral, nor is there the strict voice progression as in the works of Bach. This form of writing which partakes of the beauties of both the others has been called the free harmonic style. It has been followed by all the great masters since the time of Bach,[48] even before, indeed. If you can imagine a beautiful song-melody with an artistic accompaniment, so arranged that all can be played upon the piano, you will understand what the third style is. It is wonderfully free, surely; sometimes proceeding in full free chords, as in the opening measures of the B flat Sonata of Beethoven,[49] again running away from all freedom back to the old style, until the picture looks as old as a monkish costume among modern dress.

All of the great sonatas and symphonies are of this wonderfully varied form of writing. How full it can be of expressiveness you know from the Songs without Words by Mendelssohn, and the Nocturnes of Chopin; how full of flickering humor you hear in the Scherzo of a Beethoven symphony; how full of deep solemnity and grief one feels in the funeral marches.[50]

This school of composition has been followed by both the greater and the lesser masters. Every part is made to say something as naturally and interestingly as possible, being neither too restricted nor too free. Then, in playing, both hands must be equally intelligent, for each has an important part a.s.signed to it.

The great good of study in harmony and counterpoint is that it increases one's appreciation. As soon as we begin to understand the spirit of good writing we begin to play better, _because we see more_.

We begin, perhaps in a small way, to become real music-thinkers. By all these means we learn to understand better and better what the meaning of true writing is. It will be clear to us that a composer is one who thinks pure thoughts in tone, and not one who is a weaver of deceits.

CHAPTER XV.

MUSIC AND READING.

"Truly it has been said, a loving heart is the beginning of all knowledge."--_Thomas Carlyle._

A beautiful thing in life is the friendship for books. Every one who loves books pays some day a tribute to them, expressing thankfulness for the joy and comfort they have given. There are in them, for everybody who will seek, wise words, good counsel, companies of great people, fairies, friends for every day, besides wonders we never see nor dream of in daily life.

Some of the great men have told us about their love for books; how they have saved penny by penny slowly to buy one, or how after the day's labor a good book and the firelight were prized above anything else. All tell us how much they owe to books and what a blessing books are. Imagine the number of heart-thoughts there must be in a shelf full of good books! Thoughts in tones or thoughts in words may be of the heart or not. But it is only when they are of the heart that they are worthy of our time.

You will not only love books, but gain from them something of the thoughts they contain. We might, had we time, talk of cla.s.sic books, but as we have already talked of cla.s.sic music we know what the princ.i.p.al thing is. It is that good thought, out of the heart, be expressed in a scholarly way--"Great thought needs great expression."[51] This teaches us the necessity for choosing good books for our instruction and for our entertainment. They present beautiful pictures to us truthfully, or they present truth to us beautifully.

And these are the first test of a written thought--its truth and its beauty.

If you read good books you will have in every volume you get something well worth owning. You should bestow upon it as much care as you would want any other good friend to receive. And if it has contributed help or pleasure to you it is surely worth an abiding place. A fine pleasure will come from a good book even after we are quite done with it. As we see it in years after it has been read there comes back to one a remembrance of all the old pleasures, and with it a sense of thankfulness for so pleasant a friendship. Hence any book that has given us joy or peace or comfort is well worth not only good care, but a place _for always_; as a worthy bit of property.

In the early days of your music study, it will be a pleasure to you to know that there are many and delightful books _about_ music written, sometimes by music-lovers, sometimes by the composers. The written word-thoughts of the composers are often full of great interest. They not only reveal to us many secrets of the tone-art, but teach us much about the kinds of things and of thoughts which lived in the minds of the composers. We learn definitely not only the music-interests of the composers, but the life-interest as well. It really seems as if we were looking into their houses, seeing the way they lived and worked, and listening to their words. Never afterward do we regard the great names in music as uninteresting. The most charming and attractive pictures cl.u.s.ter about them and it all gives us a new inspiration to be true to music, loyal to the truth of music, and willing to do as we see others have done, and to learn by doing. The lesson we get from the life of every man is, that he must _do_ if he would learn.

I am sure you will spend many delightful minutes with the Letters of a great composer. Every one is like a talk with the writer. They are so friendly, and so full of the heart, and yet so filled with the man himself. Especially the Letters of Mendelssohn and Schumann will please you. In truth the Letters of all the composers are among the most valuable music writings we have. In some way they seem to explain the music itself: and the composer at once becomes a close friend. But besides these read the biographies. Then it is as if we were personally invited home to the composer and shown all his ways and his life. And besides these, there are some friendly books full of the very best advice as to making us thoughtful musicians; many and many again are the writers who have so loved art--not the art of tone alone, but all other arts as well--that they have told us of it in good and earnest books which are friendly, because they are written from the right place; and that you must know by this time is the heart.

You will soon see when you have read about the composers that true music comes out of true life. Then you will begin to love true life, to be useful, and to help others. But all these things do not come at once. Yet, as we go along step by step, we learn that art is unselfish, and we must be so to enjoy it; art is truthful--we must be so to express it; art is full of life--we must know and live truth in order to appreciate it. And the study of pure thoughts in music, in books, and in our own life will help to all this.

CHAPTER XVI.

THE HANDS.

"The skill of their hands still lingers."--_John Ruskin._[52]

In one of our Talks, speaking about the thoughts in our hearts, we said that they crept from the heart into our arms and hands, into the music we play, and off to those who hear us, causing in them the thoughts by which they judge us. Thus we see, that as Ja.n.u.s stands sentinel at the doorway of the year, so the hands stand between the secret world of thought within and the questioning world of curiosity without.

If we were not in such a hurry usually, we might stop to think that every one, all over the world, is training the hands for some purpose.

And such a variety of purposes! One strives to get skill with tools, another is a conjurer, another spends his life among beautiful and delicate plants, another reads with his fingers.[53] In any one of these or of the countless other ways that the hands may be used, no one may truly be said to have skill until delicacy has been gained.

Even in a forcible use of the hands there must be the greatest delicacy in the guidance. You can readily see that when the hands are working at the command of the heart they must be ever ready to make evident the meaning of the heart, and that is expressed in truthful delicacy. Not only are all the people in the world training their hands, but they are, as we have already said, training them in countless different ways.

Have you ever stopped to think of another matter: that all things about us, except the things that live, have been made by hands? And of the things that live very many are cared for by the hands. These thoughts will suggest something to us. Those things which are good and beautiful suggest n.o.ble use of the hands; while those which are of no service, harmful and destructive, show an ign.o.ble use. But n.o.ble and ign.o.ble use of the hands is only another evidence of thought. Thought that is pure in the heart guides the hands to beautiful ends. And if the heart is impure in its thoughts, of course you know what follows.

I have always been impressed in reading the books of John Ruskin to note how many times he speaks about the hands. Very truly, indeed, does he recognize that back of all hand work there is heart-thought, commanding, directing, actually building. It shows everywhere. The building of a wall with the stones rightly placed demands _honor_. The builder may be rude, but if his hands place the stones faithfully one upon another, there is surely honor in his heart. If it were not so his hands could not work faithfully.

If the work is finer, like that work in gold which many have learned eagerly in former times, in Rome and Florence, still the spirit must be the same. So we see, that be the work coa.r.s.e or fine, it is in either case prompted by the same kind of heart-thought.

Many times in these Talks I have spoken of Ruskin's words to you; for two reasons: first, his words are always full of meaning, because he was so full of thought when he wrote them; and second, I would have you, from the first days, know something of him and elect him to your friendship. Many times he will speak to you in short, rude words, impatiently too, but never mind that, his heart is warm and full of good.

Now from what was said a moment ago about the stone work and the gold work we can understand these words:

"No distinction exists between artist and artisan, except that of higher genius or better conduct."

Learn from this then, be the work of our hands what it may, its first quality and the first things for which it shall be judged are its honor, its faithfulness, and its sincerity.

Of themselves the hands are absolutely without power. They cannot move, they cannot do good things nor bad things, they can do nothing until we command them. And how shall this be done? Surely I can understand it if you have wearied of this Talk a little. But I have said all the things just for the sake of answering this question, so that you should understand it. How do we command? not the hands alone but all we do and say?

By our THOUGHTS.

Without them there is no power whatever. Until they have commanded, the hands cannot make a motion; the feet must have direction ordered to them, the tongue must be bidden to speak, and without the command there is nothing.

Of course, all these Talks are about thoughts. But we shall need a little time to speak of them particularly. And little by little it will be clear to us all why the hands need to act thoughtfully. Now the harm of the world is done by two forces,--by evil thought and by thoughtlessness. Then it is no wonder that Ruskin speaks much about the hands, for it is thought that gives them guidance. Can you wonder, that when he says, "the idle and loud of tongue" he a.s.sociates the "_useless hand_."[54] These things go together, and together they come either from evil thought or from lack of thought. The moment Ruskin speaks of one who uses his hands with honor, his words glow. So he speaks of the laborer, describing him as "silent, serviceable, honorable, keeping faith, untouched by change, to his country and to Heaven."

Thus, when we are earnestly asked to do something worthy with the hands every day, we can understand why. I do not mean one worthy thing, but some one particular worthy act, especially thought out by us. To do that daily with forethought will purify the heart. It will teach us to devote the hands to that which is worthy. Then another old truth that every one knows will be clear to us: "As a man--or a child, for that matter--thinketh in his heart, _so he is_."