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<tbody><tr><td valign="top" width="1%"></td><td align="left" valign="top" width="150"><b>Title: </b></td><td align="left" valign="top"><b>Musical Instruments and Players in J.-A.-C. Charles's "Acousitique" (Paris, c. 1787-1802) and Other French Technical Sources</b></td></tr>
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<tr><td valign="top" width="1%"></td><td align="left" valign="top" width="150"><script>if (bNoAuthorYet) { document.write("<B>Author: </B>"); bNoAuthorYet = false; }</script><b>Author: </b></td><td align="left" valign="top">Barbieri, Patrizio</td></tr>
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<tr><td valign="top" width="1%"></td><td align="left" valign="top" width="150"><b>Reference: </b></td><td align="left" valign="top"><a href="http://micro189.lib3.hawaii.edu:3171/cgi/toc?source=bconfig.cfg&ACTION=EXPANDID&ID=00051596&LEVEL=1&FILE=./session/1163571327_7709"><b>Journal of the American Musical Instrument Society</b></a> <a href="http://micro189.lib3.hawaii.edu:3171/cgi/toc?source=bconfig.cfg&ACTION=EXPANDID&ID=00051596&LEVEL=2&FILE=./session/1163571327_7709#SCROLL">
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<b>23 [1997]</b></a>
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<b>p. 94-120</b></td></tr>
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<tr><td valign="top" width="1%"></td><td align="left" valign="top" width="150"><b>IIMP Citation Number: </b></td><td align="left" valign="top">00051596</td></tr>
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<tr>
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<td></td><td colspan="2"><img src="Barbieri_files/citation.gif" alt="Full Citation"> <a href="http://micro189.lib3.hawaii.edu:3171/cgi/full_rec?action=BYID&ID=00051596">Full Citation</a></td>
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<td colspan="3"><hr></td>
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<basefont size="3"><p>
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<font size="-1"><b>Ppatrizio Barbieri</b></font><br></p>
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<p>T<small>HE PRESENT STUDY</small>
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is based mainly on historical data drawn from a manuscript containing a
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series of lessons on musical acoustics given in Paris by
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Jacques-Alexandre-C<>sar Charles (1746-1823). Though dated 1802, the
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manuscript--which critically examines all the musical instruments then
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in use--seems to have been compiled over a five-year period
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(1797-1802), and even includes references dating at least as far back
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as 1787.<sup>1.</sup>
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</p>
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<p>In Paris, Charles was
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professor of experimental physics at the Conservatoire des Arts et
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M<EFBFBD>tiers, president of the class of experimental physics at the Academy
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of Sciences, and a member of several commissions reporting on newly
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invented (or improved) musical instruments.<sup>2.</sup> In the course
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of his public lectures, which were well attended, he successfully
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carried out experiments in various areas of physics, including
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acoustics. Of the lectures Benjamin Franklin was to say: ''Nature
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refuses him nothing, it seems to obey him.''<sup>3.</sup>
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He was also a great lover of music and a fairly good flute player.<sup>4.</sup>
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</p>
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<p>In
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the course of these activities Charles came into contact with a series
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of musical personages, on whom he furnishes hitherto unpublished <br clear="all"><font size="-1"><p><font size="-1">
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<sup><b>1.</b></sup> Paris, Biblioth<74>que de I'Institut, MS 2104, Pi<50>ces 17-18: ''Cours de physique.
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Par Charles, de I'Institut N.<sup>al</sup> an 11. 1802. En 60 le<6C>ons''
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(hereafter Charles, <i>Acoustique;</i> abbreviates citations to this
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manuscript in the main text will be given by means of page numbers within
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square brackets). Lessons 57-60, dedicated to the <i>Acoustique</i>, are
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contained in <i>Pi<EFBFBD>ce 17</i>. They appear to have been transcribed by a
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pupil, which may explain the misspelling of a few surnames.
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</font></p>
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<p><font size="-1">
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<sup><b>2.</b></sup> See Jerry B. Gough, ''Charles, Jacques, Alexandre-C<>sar,'' in <i>Dictionary of
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Scientific Biography</i>, ed. Charles Coulston Gillispie (New York:
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Scribner's Sons, 1971), 3:207-08.
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||
</font></p>
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<p><font size="-1">
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<sup><b>3.</b></sup> See Charles Brainne, ''Jacques-Alexandre-C<>sar Charles,'' in Charles Brainne
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et al., <i>Les hommes illustres de l'Orl<72>anais</i> [...] (Orl<72>ans: Gatineau,
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1851), 1:314-17.
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</font></p>
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<p><font size="-1">
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<sup><b>4.</b></sup> See Richard Shepherd Rockstro, <i>A Treatise on the Construction, the History
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and the Practice of the Flute</i> [...] (reprint of the 1st ed. of 1890,
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London: Musica Rata, 1967), 343. Moreover, despite his wide-ranging
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involvement in science and art over the years, he also found time for the
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romantic sphere, for in 1804, at the age of fifty-eight, he married the
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twenty-two-ear-old Julie-Fran<61>oise Bouchaus des Herettes, a creole girl from
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Santo Domingo later to be known above all for her intimate friendship with
|
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Lamartine: see Anatole France, <i>L'Elvire de Lamartine. Notes sur Monsieur
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et Madame Charles</i> (Paris: Champion, 1893).
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</font></p>
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</font>
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<br></p><center><p>p.94</p></center>
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<hr><br>information.
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Included are Gluck, Viotti, Baillot, Duport, Jarnowick, Pagin, and
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Madame Brillon deJouy, as well as the luthier Socquet. On the subject
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of instrument-making his manuscript also includes information on the
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diffusion in France of Stradivari violins and on the last violin of the
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Amati family, apparently made by Girolamo II in 1739-40 at the age of
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ninety. As Charles's delivery and style is throughout both lively and
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forthright, in the course of the present article we shall allow him--as
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much as possible--to speak in his own words. <p></p>
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<p>Apart from the Charles manuscript, this study will
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also draw on information of a technical nature from manuscripts
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preserved in the archives of other French scientific institutions.
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These include an anticipation of the double bass tuning gear mechanism
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as well as new proposals--with illustrations--for a more rational
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arrangement of the tone holes on the flute and clarinet. </p>
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The ''Tartinistes'' and the Last Violin of the Amatis
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<p>In his public demonstrations Charles stresses the important role that the metronome [<i>chronom<EFBFBD>tre</i>]could
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play in transmitting for posterity the tempos composers prescribed for
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their works. His words also confirm that there was a considerable
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increase in tempos towards the end of the eighteenth century:
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</p><blockquote><font size="2">
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<p>I saw Gluck noting with
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astonishment that after five or six years all his intentions had
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already been lost. We realize how much the music of Lully's day must
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have been changed. We learn that those operas for which the performance
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duration in the last century is known lasted three quarters of an hour
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or an hour longer. If Lully had been able to avail himself of the
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||
readings of the metronome, he would have preserved something precious:
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the duration of each measure.<sup>5.</sup>
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</p>
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</font></blockquote>
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<p></p>
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<p> Of
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the pendulum metronomes he used, he also mentions one perfected by
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Breguet, costing as much as a thousand <i><EFBFBD>cus</i>.<sup>6.</sup>
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In the course of his practical experiments he discovered that:
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<br clear="all"><font size="-1"><p><font size="-1">
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<sup><b>5.</b></sup> Charles, <i>Acoustique</i>, 282: ''J'ai vu Gluck s'<27>tonner au bout de 5 <20> 6
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ans de trouver qu'on avait d<>j<EFBFBD> perdu toutes ses intentions. Nous concevons
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combien on a du varier la musique qui est du tems de Lully: on s'est apper<65>u
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que tel op<6F>ra dont la dur<75>e pendant la r<>pr<70>sentation dans le si<73>cle dernier
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<20>tait connue, durait 3/4; d'heure ou une heure de plus. Si Lully avait pu se
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servir des d<>terminations du chronom<6F>tre, il nous aurait conserv<72> une chose
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pr<70>cieuse, le tems de la dur<75>e de chaque mesure.''
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</font></p>
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<p><font size="-1">
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<sup><b>6.</b></sup> Charles, <i>Acoustique</i>, 283. A ''vieux chronometre pour la musique''
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||
appears, for example, as no. 513 of the <i>Inventaire des instrumens de
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physique, optique, g<>ometrie, astronomie &c du Cabinet de lacy devant
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||
Acad<61>mie des Sciences de Paris</i>, dated 1793 and signed by Charles himself
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(Paris, Biblioth<74>que de l'Institut, MS 1986-I).
|
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</font></p>
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</font>
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<br></p><center><p>p.95</p></center>
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<hr><br>
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<blockquote><font size="2">
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<p>there is not a single musician who
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plays in time. Four years ago I had here Viotti, Duport, Jarnowich and
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||
the most skilled artists. They made the attempt and failed in the test.
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||
[...] Whenever I wish to put a musician to the test with this
|
||
instrument, I do not ask him for an easy rhythm such as 6/8 in which
|
||
all the notes are equal: [there] he would very easily keep time. I take
|
||
a Siciliana, the most passionate and unequal melody. It is interspersed
|
||
with a mass of secondary notes involving a greater variety of notes
|
||
within the same rhythm; with such a melody it is impossible to keep
|
||
time.<sup>7.</sup>
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|
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</p>
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||
</font></blockquote>
|
||
<p></p>
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<p> He
|
||
adds, however, that the only one to pass the test
|
||
was--paradoxically--''one who is not much in the habit of playing in
|
||
time, as she has often played with Pagin: Madame Brion.''<sup>8.</sup>
|
||
The violinist Andr<64>-Noel Pagin was in fact a pupil of Tartini's school,
|
||
of whom there were quite a number in Paris and about whom Charles had
|
||
this to say:
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</p><blockquote><font size="2">
|
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<p>The ''Tartinistes'' had a method
|
||
that was utterly different from all others: they never played in time.
|
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The school came to an end with Pagin. Nordani <i>[sic]</i> is still alive, but he was obliged to part company with the school so as to make something of himself.<sup>9.</sup>
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In his old age Tartini would say: ''Go and hear Pagin, for you will
|
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still hear me.'' Between them, however, there is the same difference
|
||
that always exists between the copy and the original. [...] [Tartini]
|
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died playing the violin at the age of 78; he kept his violin in his
|
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bed, just as Euler died calculating the elevation of the air balloon.<sup>10.</sup>
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|
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</p>
|
||
</font></blockquote>
|
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<p></p>
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||
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<br clear="all"><font size="-1"><p><font size="-1">
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<sup><b>7.</b></sup> Charles, <i>Acoustique</i>, 282-83: ''il n'y a pas un seul musicien qui aille
|
||
de mesure. J'ai tenu ici Viotti, Duport, Jarnowich et les artistes les plus
|
||
habiles, il y a 4 ans. Ils l'ont essay<61>, et n'ont pu en venir <20> bout. [...]
|
||
Quand je veux avec cet instrument pousser un musicien <20> bout, je ne lui
|
||
demande pas une mesure facile comme le 6/8 dont tousles sons se trouvent
|
||
<20>gaux: il irait tr<74>s bien de mesure. Je prends la Sicilienne, qui est le
|
||
chant le plus passionn<6E> et le plus in<69>gal. Il est intercall<6C> d'une foule de
|
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notes accessoires qui comportent une vari<72>t<EFBFBD> plus grande de notes dans les
|
||
m<>mes mesures; avec un pareil air il est impossible d'aller en mesure.''
|
||
</font></p>
|
||
<p><font size="-1">
|
||
<sup><b>8.</b></sup> Charles, <i>Acoustique</i>, 283: ''une personne qui n'a pas beaucoup
|
||
l'habitude d'aller de mesure, puis qu'elle a jou<6F> souvent avec Pagin, c'est
|
||
madame Brion.'' Anne-Louise Brillon de Jouy was considered by Burney (in
|
||
1770) to be ''one of the best harpsichordists of the age''; her <i>salon de
|
||
musique</i> was famed among the Parisian aristocracy and assiduously
|
||
frequented by, among others, Benjamin Franklin: see Lionel de La Laurencie,
|
||
<i>L'<27>cole fran<61>aise de violon de Lully <20> Viotti</i> [...] (Paris: Delagrave,
|
||
1922-24), 1:181-82.
|
||
</font></p>
|
||
<p><font size="-1">
|
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<sup><b>9.</b></sup> ''Nordani'' is evidently a misspelling of [Pietro] Nardini, Tartini's best
|
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pupil, who died in 1793. Until now it was not known that he abandoned his
|
||
teacher's school.
|
||
</font></p>
|
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<p><font size="-1">
|
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<sup><b>10.</b></sup> Charles, <i>Acoustique</i>, 299: ''Les Tartinistes avaient une m<>thode toute
|
||
differente des autres; ils n'allaient jamais de mesure. L'<27>cole a fini par
|
||
Pagin. Il existe encore Nordani [<i>sic</i>]: il a <20>t<EFBFBD> oblig<69> de s'<27>carter de
|
||
l'<27>cole pour devenir quelque chose. Quand Tartini <20>tait dans sa vieillesse il
|
||
disait: allez entendre Pagin, vous m'entendrez encore. Il y a cependant
|
||
entr'eux la difference qu'il y a toujours entre la copie et l'original. [...]
|
||
[Tartini] est mort en jouant du violon, <20> l'age de 78 ans; il tenait un
|
||
violon dans son lit, comme Euler est mort en calculant les <20>l<EFBFBD>vations du
|
||
globe a<>rostatique.''
|
||
</font></p>
|
||
</font>
|
||
<br><center><p>p.96</p></center>
|
||
<hr><br><p> The
|
||
comment that the ''Tartinistes'' did not play in time is, to date,
|
||
otherwise undocumented and indeed contradicts what Rousseau claimed in
|
||
1768: that Italian music--unlike French music--was rigidly subject to
|
||
the metronome.<sup>11.</sup> What the above quote only vaguely hints at
|
||
is the hostility with which the ''Tartinistes'' were received by the
|
||
general Parisian public, a situation that soon forced Pagin to limit
|
||
his concert appearances to the salons of the aristocracy.<sup>12.</sup>
|
||
|
||
</p>
|
||
|
||
<p>Referring to Pagin, Charles also relates the following:
|
||
</p><blockquote><font size="2">
|
||
<p>Amati, at the age of ninety, made
|
||
a violin at Tartini's request. This violin is the one owned by the
|
||
celebrated Pagin. He left France at the age of twenty and was one of
|
||
France's best violinists. A pupil of Gaviniez, he made a trip to Italy
|
||
to hear Tartini: he was so startled by Tartini's playing that he joined
|
||
his school. Tartini kept him playing scales for six months. Pagin had
|
||
the modesty and good sense to join the school. He came out of it as the
|
||
only true copy of Tartini in existence. He died three years ago and
|
||
with him ended Tartini's school. It is a school that cannot be revived
|
||
because the kind of music we have adopted is unsuited to it. </p>
|
||
</font></blockquote>
|
||
|
||
<blockquote><font size="2">
|
||
<p>Anyway, Tartini begged Amati to make
|
||
him a violin for a young man he had adopted. Amati said: I must get my
|
||
spectacles. Inside the instrument he wrote that he made it at the age
|
||
of ninety. This violin is one the best instruments in existence.<sup>13.</sup>
|
||
|
||
|
||
</p>
|
||
</font></blockquote>
|
||
|
||
<p></p>
|
||
<p> From
|
||
the above passage we may deduce that the luthier in question is clearly
|
||
Girolamo II Amati (26 February 1649-21 February 1740), the very last
|
||
representative of the family. Pagin's violin (1739-40) can thus be
|
||
considered as the last to be made by an Amati. (Philip J. Kass kindly
|
||
informs me that this instrument must be considered lost, unless perhaps
|
||
it survives with another luthier's label, most likely either Nicolo
|
||
Amati or Giovanni Battista Rogeri.) Girolamo II was the son of the <br clear="all"><font size="-1"></font></p><p><font size="-1"><font size="-1">
|
||
<sup><b>11.</b></sup> Jean-Jacques Rousseau, <i>Dictionnaire de Musique</i> (Paris: Duchesne, 1768),
|
||
99-100.
|
||
</font></font></p>
|
||
<font size="-1"> </font><p><font size="-1"><font size="-1">
|
||
<sup><b>12.</b></sup> See La Laurencie, <i>L'<27>cole fran<61>aise de violon</i>, 1:179-83.
|
||
</font></font></p>
|
||
<font size="-1"> </font><p><font size="-1"><font size="-1">
|
||
<sup><b>13.</b></sup> Charles, <i>Acoustique</i>, 297-98: ''Le sieur Amati <20> 90 ans a fait un violon
|
||
<20> la pri<72>re de Tartini. Ce violon est celui que poss<73>dait le cel<65>bre Pagin;
|
||
sorti de France <20> l'age de 20 ans, ce fut un des premiers violons de France.
|
||
Eleve de Gaviniez, il fut faire un tour en Italie pour entendre Tartini: il
|
||
fut si effray<61> dujeu de Tartini, qu'il se reit <20> son <20>cole. Tartini le tint
|
||
pendant 6 mois <20> faire des gammes. Pagin eut la modestie et le bon sens de se
|
||
mettre <20> l'<27>cole. Il en est parti la seule et vraie copie de Tartini qui ait
|
||
exist<73>. Il est mort il y a 3 ans, et avec lui l'<27>cole de Tartini a fini.
|
||
C'est une <20>cole qui ne pourra pas rena<6E>tre, parce que le genre de musique que
|
||
nous avons adopt<70> ne se pr<70>te pas <20> cela.
|
||
</font></font></p>
|
||
<font size="-1"> </font><p><font size="-1"><font size="-1">
|
||
<sup><b>13.</b></sup> ''Tartini pria donc Amati de lui faire un violon pour un jeune homme qu'il
|
||
avait adopt<70>. Amati dit: il faut que je prenne mes lunettes. Il a <20>crit dans
|
||
l'interieur qu'il a fait cet instrument 5 l'age de 90 ans. Ce violon est un
|
||
des meilleurs instrumens qui existent.''
|
||
</font></font></p>
|
||
<font size="-1"> </font>
|
||
<br><center><p>p.97</p></center>
|
||
<hr><br>famous Nicolo Amati (1596-1684),<sup>14.</sup>
|
||
whose best pupil was Antonio Stradivari (1644-1737). Stradivari made
|
||
his last three violins in 1736 and 1737, adding on their (printed)
|
||
labels in his own hand that in those years he had reached the ages of
|
||
92 and 93 respectively.<sup>15.</sup>
|
||
It is understandable, therefore, why the less prolific, and much less
|
||
famous, Girolamo wished to demonstrate, with a rather late outburst of
|
||
pride, that he was equal to the same feat. Little appreciated in the
|
||
past, today the work of Girolamo II is being reassessed,<sup>16.</sup>
|
||
and Charles's high opinion of him is being confirmed. From the context
|
||
we may further deduce that Pagin was born c. 1720, and that his date of
|
||
death, still unknown, must be no later than 1799. (Pierre Gavini<6E>s, his
|
||
teacher and also a celebrated ''Tartiniste,'' died in 1800.)<p></p>
|
||
|
||
<p>As
|
||
regards the diffusion of Stradivari violins in France, Charles points
|
||
out that ''the Stradivari have more power, the Amati a more pleasant
|
||
sound; those who play in quartets or duets prefer the Stradivari.''<sup>17.</sup>
|
||
This contradicts Gallay's statement (made in 1869) that--as far as
|
||
chamber music was concerned--the preference was for Amati instruments
|
||
until 1810.<sup>18.</sup>
|
||
|
||
|
||
</p>
|
||
|
||
<p>Charles
|
||
turns out to be the first French writer interested in the techniques
|
||
employed by the Cremonese luthiers. Much of this information appears to
|
||
have been provided by the luthier [Louis] Socquet, with whom Charles
|
||
says he spent much time discussing technical matters.<sup>19.</sup>
|
||
|
||
|
||
Socquet had also dismantled and accurately copied a Stradivari
|
||
|
||
<br clear="all"><font size="-1"><p><font size="-1">
|
||
<sup><b>14.</b></sup> It is worth mentioning here that one of Tartini's violins was made by Nicolo
|
||
Amati, at least according to the label inside the instrument: see <i>Mostra
|
||
di cimeli di Giuseppe Tartini voluta dal comune di Trieste</i> [...]
|
||
(Trieste: Tipografia Moderna, 1971), 17. Tartini also had a violin by the
|
||
Paduan [Pietro?] Bagatella: see <i>Esposizione internazionale di musica in
|
||
Bologna. Catalogo ufficiale</i> (Parma: Battei, 1888), 34.
|
||
</font></p>
|
||
<p><font size="-1">
|
||
<sup><b>15.</b></sup> See W. Henry Hill et al., <i>Antonio Stradivari: His Life and Work
|
||
(1644-1737)</i> (London: William E. Hill and Sons, 1902; reprint New York:
|
||
Dover Publications 1963), plate facing p. 217, reproducing the original
|
||
labels.
|
||
</font></p>
|
||
<p><font size="-1">
|
||
<sup><b>16.</b></sup> A start was made by Hill, <i>Antonio Stradivari</i>, 31-32. Umberto Azzolina,
|
||
<i>Liuteria italiana inedita. Unpublished instruments of known Italian
|
||
makers</i> (Cremona: Turris, 1991), 29, publishes a photograph of a 1697
|
||
violin by Girolamo II Amati characterised by ''fine workmanship'' and ''a
|
||
beautifully clear and powerful sound, rarely found in other violins made by
|
||
the same family.''
|
||
</font></p>
|
||
<p><font size="-1">
|
||
<sup><b>17.</b></sup> Charles, <i>Acoustique</i>, 296: ''Les Stradivarius ont plus de force, les
|
||
Amati ont un son plus agr<67>able; les personnes qui jouent des quatuors, des
|
||
duos, pr<70>ferent des Stradivarius.''
|
||
</font></p>
|
||
<p><font size="-1">
|
||
<sup><b>18.</b></sup> Jules Gallay, <i>Les luthiers italiens aux XVII<sup>e</sup> et
|
||
XVIII<sup>e</sup> si<73>cles</i> (Paris: Acad<61>mie des Bibliophiles, 1869), 175.
|
||
</font></p>
|
||
<p><font size="-1">
|
||
<sup><b>19.</b></sup> Charles, <i>Acoustique</i>, 297-98. Louis Socquet worked in Paris between 1750
|
||
and 1775: see Ren<65> Vannes, <i>Dictionnaire universel des luthiers</i>, 2nd
|
||
ed. (Brussels: Les amis de la musique, 1951), 337. His date of death is
|
||
unknown, though he must have died by 1802, for in our manuscript Charles says
|
||
(p. 297) ''for a long time we had a certain Socquet, a highly skilled man who
|
||
was also very learned.''
|
||
</font></p>
|
||
</font>
|
||
<br></p><center><p>p.98</p></center>
|
||
<hr><br>cello, managing however to obtain only a mediocre [<i>assez ordinaire</i>]
|
||
instrument [p. 298]. The reasons for the decadence of late
|
||
eighteenth-century violin making are summarized by Charles as follows:
|
||
poor choice of wood (he says the Cremonese used prized woods, and only
|
||
the part of the trunk exposed to the south), oven drying (instead of
|
||
natural seasoning), and the use of spirit varnishes (instead of
|
||
oil-based ones). He also refers to a constructional modification of
|
||
great interest today: after saying that the shape of the violin had
|
||
long remained unchanged, he goes on to specify that ''only certain
|
||
alterations to the fingerboard have been made, in order to facilitate
|
||
the movement of the fingers: [previously] we did not have the fast and
|
||
brilliant motions that we have today.''<sup>20.</sup>
|
||
|
||
|
||
Recent research, however, has shown that in Italy such an adjustment is already documented at least as early as c. 1760.<sup>21.</sup>
|
||
|
||
|
||
<p></p>
|
||
Viotti and Baillot, Violins and Double Basses
|
||
<p>Charles
|
||
puts the violin ''at the head of all instruments,'' thanks to the
|
||
exactness and flexibility of its intonation [p. 299]. His research on
|
||
this point led him to collaborate with the greatest violinists in the
|
||
city at the time. One of the first to play an active part in his public
|
||
lectures was Giambattista Viotti, during his first Parisian stay (from
|
||
late 1781 to 1792). Viotti's close relations with the scientific world
|
||
are incidentally confirmed by the fact that he arrived in the French
|
||
capital bearing a letter of introduction--addressed to d'Alembert--from
|
||
Giuseppe Luigi Lagrange, the celebrated mathematician and a
|
||
fellow-citizen of Turin.<sup>22.</sup>
|
||
|
||
|
||
It is interesting to note what Charles reports on Viotti and his ''vibrato'':
|
||
|
||
<br clear="all"><font size="-1"><p><font size="-1">
|
||
<sup><b>20.</b></sup> Charles, <i>Acoustique</i>, 297: ''on a seulement modifi<66> quelques
|
||
dispositions de la touche, pour rendre plus facile la marche des doigts: on
|
||
n'avait pas la marche rapide et brillante qu'on a actuellement.''
|
||
</font></p>
|
||
<p><font size="-1">
|
||
<sup><b>21.</b></sup> See Pierluigi Ferrari, <i>Interventi per l'ammodernamento degli strumenti ad
|
||
arco della collezione mediceolorenese, 1733-1765</i>, paper presented to the
|
||
Conference on ''Strumenti-Musica-Ricerca'' organized by the Ente Triennale
|
||
internazionale degli strumenti ad arco, Cremona, 28-29 October 1994.
|
||
</font></p>
|
||
<p><font size="-1">
|
||
<sup><b>22.</b></sup> See <i>Oeuvres de Lagrange publi<6C>s par les soins de Joseph-Alfred Serret</i>
|
||
(Paris: Gaulthier-Villars, 1882), 13:371-73: letter from Lagrange to
|
||
d'Alembert, dated Berlin, 7 December 1781. D'Alembert was to reply on 1 March
|
||
1782, informing him that Viotti had come to see him as many as three times
|
||
(though not finding him at home on the first two occasions).
|
||
</font></p>
|
||
</font>
|
||
<br></p><center><p>p.99</p></center>
|
||
<hr><br>
|
||
<blockquote><font size="2">
|
||
<p>You know the way artists provide
|
||
expression on the violin: the finger falls slightly below [the pitch]
|
||
resulting in a very slight detuning. It is one of the things that
|
||
tormented Viotti most. One day I showed him that in order to be
|
||
expressive he played out of tune; I surprised him at a moment in which
|
||
he made a sideways movement; I showed him that that meant changing the
|
||
length of the string and consequently playing out of tune. One must
|
||
disturb the ear without it being able to detect the error--therein lies
|
||
expression. It produces an emotional sound resulting from this slight
|
||
vacillating uncertainty.<sup>23.</sup>
|
||
|
||
|
||
</p>
|
||
</font></blockquote>
|
||
|
||
<p></p>
|
||
|
||
<p>After
|
||
Viotti had left Paris, Charles made use of Pierre Baillot to show
|
||
that--even at the Paris Conservatoire--the violinists of the time
|
||
employed a particular kind of just intonation called ''<i>gamme Europ<6F>enne</i>.''<sup>24.</sup>
|
||
When necessary they could also resort to tempered intonation, because
|
||
''at a concert the violin is like a man of wit at a party: being unable
|
||
to elevate the others to his own level, he descends to theirs.''<sup>25.</sup>
|
||
These public demonstrations by Charles on violin intonation were to be
|
||
remembered later, in 1823, during a course of acoustics given--again in
|
||
Paris--by the physicist Jean-Baptiste Biot.<sup>26.</sup>
|
||
|
||
|
||
</p>
|
||
|
||
<p>Charles
|
||
also took an interest--though only marginally--in the lower-pitched
|
||
instruments of the violin family, concerning which he observed: <br clear="all"><font size="-1"></font></p><p><font size="-1"><font size="-1">
|
||
<sup><b>23.</b></sup> Charles, <i>Acoustique</i>, 291: ''Vous savez la mani<6E>re dont les artistes
|
||
d<>terminent l'expression dans un violon: le doigt se rejette un peu au
|
||
dessons: il en r<>sulte une d<>tonation tr<74>s legere. C'est une des choses qui
|
||
ale plus tourment<6E> Viotti. Un jour je lui d<>montrai que pour avoir de
|
||
l'expression il jouait faux; je le surpris dans le moment ou il faisait un
|
||
mouvement de c<>t<EFBFBD>: je lui d<>montrai que c'<27>tait changer la longueur de la
|
||
corde, et cons<6E>quemment jouer faux. Il faut inqui<75>ter l'oreille sans qu'elle
|
||
puisse d<>couvrir l'erreur, telle est l'expression. Elle produit un son
|
||
sentimental resultant de cette petite incertitude vacillante.'' Charles does
|
||
not tell us how frequently Viotti used vibrato, an ornament on which the
|
||
major contemporary treatises express strongly conflicting opinions. Francesco
|
||
Geminiani, <i>The art of playing on the violin</i> [...] (London: Johnson,
|
||
1751), Ex. XVIII-14, recommends its use also ''on short notes'' and ''as
|
||
often as possible,'' given that it ''contributes to make their sound more
|
||
agreable.'' On the other hand, Leopold Mozart, <i>Gr<EFBFBD>ndliche Violinschub</i>
|
||
[... ] (3rd ed., Augsburg: Lotter und Sohn, 1787), 243-44, counsels sparing
|
||
use, and only on very long notes (advice that appears already in the first
|
||
edition of the treatise, dating back to 1756).
|
||
</font></font></p>
|
||
<font size="-1"> </font><p><font size="-1"><font size="-1">
|
||
<sup><b>24.</b></sup> See Patrizio Barbieri, ''Violin Intonation: A Historical Survey,'' <i>Early
|
||
Music</i> 19 (1991): 71-72.
|
||
</font></font></p>
|
||
<font size="-1"> </font><p><font size="-1"><font size="-1">
|
||
<sup><b>25.</b></sup> Charles, <i>Acoustique</i>, 317: ''Le violon est dans un concert ce qu'est un
|
||
homme d'esprit dans une compagnie: ne pourant mettre les autres <20> sa hauteur,
|
||
il descend <20> leur port<72>e.''
|
||
</font></font></p>
|
||
<font size="-1"> </font><p><font size="-1"><font size="-1">
|
||
<sup><b>26.</b></sup> Paris, Biblioth<74>que du Conservatoire des Arts et M<>tiers, MS 8<>.C.4: <i>Le<EFBFBD>ons
|
||
de physique sur l'acoustique, par J. B. Blot, recueillies par Baudot</i>, p.
|
||
82 (on the Pythagorean comma).
|
||
</font></font></p>
|
||
<font size="-1"> </font>
|
||
<br><center><p>p.100</p></center>
|
||
<hr><br>
|
||
<blockquote><font size="2">
|
||
<p>there are some very low sounds that we
|
||
cannot distinguish well except by long habit, or when we compare such a
|
||
sound with another, higher pitched than itself. For example, even the
|
||
most skilled artists, used to playing a high-pitched instrument, such
|
||
as the violin, have great trouble tuning a double bass. I have heard
|
||
that said by Jarnowich, Viotti, and several others. One has to live, as
|
||
it were, with low sounds in order to have a very pure perception of
|
||
them.<sup>27.</sup>
|
||
|
||
|
||
</p>
|
||
</font></blockquote>
|
||
|
||
<p></p>
|
||
|
||
<p>On
|
||
the subject of the double bass, let us digress briefly from Charles's
|
||
manuscript in order to draw attention to an anticipation of the modern
|
||
tuning mechanism based on worm-screws, presented in France as early as
|
||
1758. The source is a hitherto unknown handwritten memorandum from the
|
||
archive of the Academy of Sciences in Metz, in which the invention is
|
||
attributed to a certain Cor<6F>, a watch-maker of that city ( ).<sup>28.</sup> His proposal substantially modified a similar
|
||
previous attempt made by Jean-Baptiste Domenjoud in 1757, who used not
|
||
worm-screws--as Cor<6F> proposed--but plain screws, like those used today
|
||
for the fine-tuning of a violin top string.<sup>29.</sup>
|
||
|
||
|
||
The invention of the worm-screw
|
||
|
||
<br clear="all"><font size="-1"><p><font size="-1">
|
||
<sup><b>27.</b></sup> Charles, <i>Acoustique,</i> 269-70: ''il y a des sons tr<74>s graves que nous ne
|
||
pouvons bien discerner que par une grande habitude, ou lorsque nons comparons
|
||
ce son avec un autre, <20> l'aigu de celui l<>. Par exemple, les artistes m<>mes
|
||
tr<74>s habiles qui ont l'habitude de jouer d'un instrument de dessus, comme du
|
||
violon, ont assez de peine <20> accorder une contrebasse. Je l'ai entendu dire <20>
|
||
Jarnowich, <20> Viotti, et <20> quelques autres. Il faut vivre, pour ainsi dire,
|
||
avec les sons graves, pour en avoir une sensation tr<74>s pure.''
|
||
</font></p>
|
||
<p><font size="-1">
|
||
<sup><b>28.</b></sup> Biblioth<74>que-M<>diath<74>que Municipale de Metz, MS 1337, pp. 229-41: <i>Memoire
|
||
[lu] <20> l'Assembl<62>e du Mardy 17 Janvier 1758, en luy pr<70>sentant une cheville
|
||
pour accorder avec precision les instrumens de musique <20> cordes, invent<6E>e
|
||
[par] le S.r Cor<6F>, horloger de cette ville</i> [...]. The manuscript
|
||
specifies that one complete turn of the worm-screw <i>D-E</i> made the peg
|
||
<i>B-b</i> rotate by one fortieth of a turn; on p. 237 we also read that for
|
||
a preliminary, approximate tuning (to speed up operations when mounting a new
|
||
string), one could turn peg directly, ''without doing the slightest damage to
|
||
the worm-screw''--which seems frankly impossible, at least on the evidence of
|
||
the drawing. The French text of the legend, visible in
|
||
|
||
|
||
, is as follows: ''A. Manche du Violon, ou Basse, tel qu'il est ordinairement.
|
||
/ <i>B.b.</i> Cheville ordinaire, except<70> qu'elle est de cuivre, et qu'elle
|
||
est bris<69>e. / <i>C</i>. Roue dentel<65>e pour l'engrenage d'une vis sans fin. /
|
||
<i>D</i>. Vis sans fin, m<>e par le bouton <i>E,</i> fix<69> par les supports
|
||
<i>F.[F.]</i> engrainant dans la roue <i>C</i>. / <i>G</i>. Vis d'arr<72>t de la
|
||
cheville <i>B.b.</i> separ<61>e du bois du manche par [la] rosette <i>H,</i> qui
|
||
fait point d'arret au cilindre <i>b</i> de la cheville, et qui empeche en
|
||
m<>me tems que la t<>te de la vis ne mange le bois du m[anche].''
|
||
</font></p>
|
||
<p><font size="-1">
|
||
<sup><b>29.</b></sup> Domenjoud's invention was put into practice first by Fran<61>ois Gavini<6E>s, a
|
||
luthier working in Paris and father of Pierre, the famous violinist
|
||
(mentioned above); the handles of Gavini<6E>s' screws were made of ivory and
|
||
projected from the neck very conspicuously. The same manuscript tells us that
|
||
later another luthier managed to preserve the neck's traditional appearance
|
||
and weight by inserting Domenjoud's screws inside the neck, making them out
|
||
of iron and reducing their thread: see <i>Memoire,</i> 234-45. The first
|
||
version of this mechanism is described by Jean-Baptiste Domenjoud himself in
|
||
<i>De la pr<70>f<EFBFBD>rence des vis aux chevilles pour les instruments de musique</i>
|
||
[...] (Paris: Thiboust, 1757).
|
||
</font></p>
|
||
</font>
|
||
<br></p><center><p>p.101</p></center>
|
||
<hr><br>
|
||
|
||
<br clear="all"><font size="-1"></font>
|
||
<br><center><p>p.102</p></center>
|
||
<hr><br>tuning
|
||
mechanism, today normally used only on the double bass and guitar, has
|
||
hitherto been attributed to the German luthier Anton Bachmann (1778),<sup>30.</sup>
|
||
|
||
|
||
even though similar mechanisms may have been developed before then.<sup>31.</sup>
|
||
|
||
|
||
|
||
<br clear="all"><p></p>figure
|
||
1. tuning gear mechanism invented by cor<6F>, 1758
|
||
(biblioth<74>que-m<>diath<74>que municipale de metz, ms 1337, pp. 240-41). a.
|
||
pegbox of the violin or [double] bass, as it usually is. / <i>b-b</i>. ordinary peg, except that it is of brass, and open-carved. / <i>c</i>. gear wheel which engages with a worm-screw. <i>d</i>. worm-screw, activated by the knob <i>e</i>, fastened [to the peg box] by brackets <i>f-f</i> and engaging with the gear wheel <i>c</i>. / <i>g</i>. set-screw for the peg <i>b-b</i>, separated from the wood of the peg box by the washer <i>h</i>, which stops the cylinder <i>b</i> of the peg, and which at the same time prevents the head of the set-screw from eating [away] the wood of the pegbox.
|
||
|
||
|
||
|
||
<p></p>
|
||
<a href="#Hit2"><img src="Barbieri_files/iimpft_prevhit.gif" alt="<-" border="0"></a><a name="Hit3"><img src="Barbieri_files/iimpft_hit.gif" alt="[H]" border="0"></a><a href="#Hit4"><img src="Barbieri_files/iimpft_nexthit.gif" alt="->" border="0"></a>Glass <a href="#Hit3"><img src="Barbieri_files/iimpft_prevhit.gif" alt="<-" border="0"></a><a name="Hit4"><img src="Barbieri_files/iimpft_hit.gif" alt="[H]" border="0"></a><a href="#Hit5"><img src="Barbieri_files/iimpft_nexthit.gif" alt="->" border="0"></a>Harmonica, Harp, Organ, and Piano
|
||
<p>Apart from stringed instruments, Charles also concerned himself with many other instruments, above all the <a href="#Hit4"><img src="Barbieri_files/iimpft_prevhit.gif" alt="<-" border="0"></a><a name="Hit5"><img src="Barbieri_files/iimpft_hit.gif" alt="[H]" border="0"></a><a href="#Hit6"><img src="Barbieri_files/iimpft_nexthit.gif" alt="->" border="0"></a>glass <a href="#Hit5"><img src="Barbieri_files/iimpft_prevhit.gif" alt="<-" border="0"></a><a name="Hit6"><img src="Barbieri_files/iimpft_hit.gif" alt="[H]" border="0"></a><a href="#Hit7"><img src="Barbieri_files/iimpft_nexthit.gif" alt="->" border="0"></a>harmonica, at the time much in vogue in Paris.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p> Glass <a href="#Hit6"><img src="Barbieri_files/iimpft_prevhit.gif" alt="<-" border="0"></a><a name="Hit7"><img src="Barbieri_files/iimpft_hit.gif" alt="[H]" border="0"></a><a href="#Hit8"><img src="Barbieri_files/iimpft_nexthit.gif" alt="->" border="0"></a>harmonica. Charles first examined the type he refers to as <i><a href="#Hit7"><img src="Barbieri_files/iimpft_prevhit.gif" alt="<-" border="0"></a><a name="Hit8"><img src="Barbieri_files/iimpft_hit.gif" alt="[H]" border="0"></a><a href="#Hit9"><img src="Barbieri_files/iimpft_nexthit.gif" alt="->" border="0"></a>harmonica <20> vases,</i> in other words one consisting of a series of <a href="#Hit8"><img src="Barbieri_files/iimpft_prevhit.gif" alt="<-" border="0"></a><a name="Hit9"><img src="Barbieri_files/iimpft_hit.gif" alt="[H]" border="0"></a><a href="#Hit10"><img src="Barbieri_files/iimpft_nexthit.gif" alt="->" border="0"></a>glass
|
||
bowls filled with water in quantities varying according to the note to
|
||
which each was tuned. The performer set the glasses into vibration by
|
||
directly rubbing the rims with his fingers, previously moistened with
|
||
water and vinegar so as to roughen the skin of the fingertips and
|
||
thereby increase their grip on the smooth surface [p. 288]. On this
|
||
subject, Charles added that:
|
||
</p><blockquote><font size="2">
|
||
<p>quite commonly the glasses are
|
||
covered with a damp cloth. The finger is pressed down on the cloth, the
|
||
cloth presses down on the glasses and makes them resonate, in such a
|
||
way that all the fingers produce sounds of the same character. Those
|
||
who have practiced, and not very oily, fingers prefer to use their
|
||
fingers.<sup>32.</sup>
|
||
|
||
|
||
</p>
|
||
</font></blockquote>
|
||
<p></p>
|
||
<p> The instrument is characterised by a ''singular and melancholy sound, that seems to arrive from space.''<sup>33.</sup>
|
||
|
||
|
||
Charles is perhaps the only writer to describe the strange effect of this timbre on audiences:
|
||
|
||
<br clear="all"><font size="-1"><p><font size="-1">
|
||
<sup><b>30.</b></sup> See, for example, Vannes, <i>Dictionnaire universel des luthiers,</i> 15.
|
||
</font></p>
|
||
<p><font size="-1">
|
||
<sup><b>31.</b></sup> See Isaia Bill<6C>, <i>Gli strumenti ad arco e i loro cultori</i> [...] (Rome:
|
||
Ausonia, 1928), 45. Duane Rosengard, <i>Contrabassi cremonesi. Cremonese
|
||
double basses</i> (Cremona: Turris, 1992), 77 and 113, describes a double
|
||
bass by Nicola Bergonzi, 1777, whose head ''bears three unaltered peg holes,
|
||
two of which retain somewhat roughly hand wrought tuning gears'' (perhaps
|
||
also by Bergonzi?).
|
||
</font></p>
|
||
<p><font size="-1">
|
||
<sup><b>32.</b></sup> Charles, <i>Acoustique,</i> 294: ''assez ordinairement on couvre les vases
|
||
d'un drap mouill<6C>. Le doigt est appuy<75> sur le drap, le drap mouill<6C> appuye
|
||
sur les coupes et les fait r<>sonner, de sorte que tous les doigts produisent
|
||
des sons du m<>me charact<63>re. Aussi les personnes qui ont leur doigt exerc<72>,
|
||
et qui ne l'ont pas tr<74>s onctueux, aiment mieux se servir de leur doigt.''
|
||
</font></p>
|
||
<p><font size="-1">
|
||
<sup><b>33.</b></sup> Charles, <i>Acoustique,</i> 288: ''[un] son singulier et m<>ancolique, qui
|
||
semble sortir de l'espace.''
|
||
</font></p>
|
||
</font>
|
||
<br></p><center><p>p.103</p></center>
|
||
<hr><br>
|
||
<blockquote><font size="2">
|
||
<p>It attacks the organs of the delicate
|
||
and even those of the more robust. I have seen many people faint when
|
||
this instrument was being played; another, vigorous person ardently
|
||
protested at those being taken into the antechamber, [but] within a
|
||
minute, she herself was among them. They are peculiar feelings that
|
||
affect us. We are moved without the melody contributing to the effect.<sup>34.</sup>
|
||
|
||
|
||
</p>
|
||
</font></blockquote>
|
||
<p></p>
|
||
|
||
<p>Charles also mentions a type of <a href="#Hit9"><img src="Barbieri_files/iimpft_prevhit.gif" alt="<-" border="0"></a><a name="Hit10"><img src="Barbieri_files/iimpft_hit.gif" alt="[H]" border="0"></a><a href="#Hit11"><img src="Barbieri_files/iimpft_nexthit.gif" alt="->" border="0"></a>harmonica based on that invented by Benjamin Franklin and worked by a keyboard and pedal mechanism [p. 292]. In this model, <a href="#Hit10"><img src="Barbieri_files/iimpft_prevhit.gif" alt="<-" border="0"></a><a name="Hit11"><img src="Barbieri_files/iimpft_hit.gif" alt="[H]" border="0"></a><a href="#Hit12"><img src="Barbieri_files/iimpft_nexthit.gif" alt="->" border="0"></a>glass
|
||
bowls were not tuned by being filled with more or less water, but by
|
||
having different diameters and thicknesses. Tuning was much more
|
||
problematic than on the other model, due to the difficulty of obtaining
|
||
bowls of well-defined and constant thicknesses using the technology of
|
||
the time. To the many instrument builders who turned to him for advice
|
||
on the matter, Charles would reply philosophically that the best
|
||
solution would be ''to own a <a href="#Hit11"><img src="Barbieri_files/iimpft_prevhit.gif" alt="<-" border="0"></a><a name="Hit12"><img src="Barbieri_files/iimpft_hit.gif" alt="[H]" border="0"></a><a href="#Hit13"><img src="Barbieri_files/iimpft_nexthit.gif" alt="->" border="0"></a>glass-works
|
||
or to have free access to one'' so as to be able to choose the right
|
||
sizes. But he also adds that, leaving aside such practical problems,
|
||
''we have a very ingenious and skilled craftsman, Grenier, who has
|
||
given the matter thought and done some interesting research. He has
|
||
calculated the best curvature and opted for an almost hemispherical
|
||
one.''<sup>35.</sup>
|
||
|
||
|
||
Of Grenier's calculations, however, not a trace has survived and Charles's report is the sole surviving evidence.
|
||
</p>
|
||
|
||
<p>Of the two types of <a href="#Hit12"><img src="Barbieri_files/iimpft_prevhit.gif" alt="<-" border="0"></a><a name="Hit13"><img src="Barbieri_files/iimpft_hit.gif" alt="[H]" border="0"></a><a href="#Hit14"><img src="Barbieri_files/iimpft_nexthit.gif" alt="->" border="0"></a>harmonica
|
||
described, Charles shows a marked preference for that using glasses:
|
||
during performance the undulation of the water in the glasses gave the
|
||
sound an ''<i>accent vocal</i>'' he associates with the vibrato obtainable on the violin [p. 291].
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p> Harp.
|
||
At that time the harp was ''too commonly known'' to merit a detailed
|
||
description from Charles. Nonetheless he judged it disparagingly, owing
|
||
to its many ''serious defects'': appreciable detuning, noticeable <br clear="all"><font size="-1"><p><font size="-1">
|
||
<sup><b>34.</b></sup> Charles, <i>Acoustique,</i> 292: ''Il attaque les organes des personnes
|
||
d<>licates, et m<>me des personnes robustes. J'ai vu plusieurs personnes
|
||
s'evanouir pendant qu'on jouait de cet instrument; une autre tr<74>s vigoureuse
|
||
se plaignait assez intensivement de celles qu'on transportair dans
|
||
l'anti-chambre: au bout d'une minute, elle <20>tait elle m<>me c<>t<EFBFBD>. Ce sont des
|
||
sentimens particuliers qui nous affectent. On est <20>mu sans que la m<>odie y
|
||
ait contribu<62>.''
|
||
</font></p>
|
||
<p><font size="-1">
|
||
<sup><b>35.</b></sup> Charles, <i>Acoustique,</i> 293: ''nous avons un artiste tr<74>s ing<6E>nieux et
|
||
tr<74>s habile qui s'en est occup<75>, eta fait l<>-dessus des recherches
|
||
int<6E>ressantes. C'est Grenier; il a calcul<75> la courbure la plus convertable,
|
||
il a pris presque l'hemisph<70>re.'' The instrument maker, otherwise unspecified
|
||
in the manuscript, may be identified as Gabriel-Joseph Greni<6E> (1756-1837),
|
||
who in 1810-16 patented two models of <i>orgue</i> <i>expressif</i> (see note
|
||
43 below).
|
||
</font></p>
|
||
</font>
|
||
<br></p><center><p>p.104</p></center>
|
||
<hr><br>at
|
||
the moment the player plucks the string; short retention of tuning
|
||
(generally no longer than half an hour); lack of dampers and,
|
||
consequently, an excessive blurring of sounds [p. 301]. Worst of all
|
||
was the lack of sonority in the top notes compared to that of the low
|
||
notes, a defect explaining the instrument's exclusion from the <i>Concert spirituel:</i>
|
||
<blockquote><font size="2">
|
||
</font><p><font size="2">I have always seen that this instrument was absent at the <i>Concert spirituel.</i>
|
||
It was judged unfavourably. I would ask people ''where were you
|
||
seated?'' Those too far away were dissatisfied: they could only hear
|
||
the low notes, [while] the top notes made hardly any effect at all.<sup>36.</sup>
|
||
|
||
|
||
</font></p>
|
||
<font size="2"> </font></blockquote>
|
||
<p></p>
|
||
|
||
<p>In light of this
|
||
statement it is surprising to learn how many of the harp models
|
||
patented in Paris in the early years of the nineteenth century aimed to
|
||
reinforce not the high notes, but the low ones.<sup>37.</sup>
|
||
Jean-Baptiste Krumpholtz himself, in the acclaimed concerts given in
|
||
Paris even before 1790, used a harp that rested on a soundboard fitted
|
||
with extra strings--played by special pedals--to make up a contrabass
|
||
register.<sup>38.</sup>
|
||
|
||
|
||
</p>
|
||
|
||
<p>Despite the above faults, Charles does admit that on the harp one can ''make music that is not only tolerable, but sublime.''<sup>39.</sup>
|
||
|
||
|
||
</p>
|
||
|
||
<p>Organ.
|
||
About this instrument Charles's opinion is even more unfavorable. He
|
||
considers the organ as little more than an ''assemblage'' of disparate
|
||
musical instruments, adding scornfully that ''its moral power is of
|
||
little account.''<sup>40.</sup>
|
||
|
||
|
||
Moreover, he objected that, unlike the piano, the manner of playing the keys does not lead to any difference in musical
|
||
|
||
<br clear="all"><font size="-1"><p><font size="-1">
|
||
<sup><b>36.</b></sup> Charles, <i>Acoustique,</i> 302: ''J'ai toujours vu cet instrument manquer au
|
||
concert spirituel. On le jugeait d<>favorablement. Je demandais aux personnes:
|
||
o<> <20>tiez vous plac<61>? Les personnes qui <20>taient trop loin <20>taient m<>contentes:
|
||
elles n'entendaient que des graves, les aigus ne produisaient presque aucun
|
||
effet.''
|
||
</font></p>
|
||
<p><font size="-1">
|
||
<sup><b>37.</b></sup> See, for example, Archives Nationales, MS F.12.1014/17: Patent no. 514, 9 June
|
||
1809, for a <i>''Harpe harmonico-fort<72>''</i> invented by Keyser de Lisle,
|
||
resident in Paris, Rue du Temple 123. Apart from the usual gut strings, this
|
||
instrument also had strings of brass or copper [<i>cuivre</i>] for the
|
||
contrabass register. See also MS F.12.1024.B/10: <i>Demande d'un br<62>vet
|
||
d'invention,</i> an application made by Andr<64>-Jean-Baptiste Thory,
|
||
''<i>facteur de pianos et de harpes,</i>'' Paris, Rue de Cl<43>ry 64, concerning
|
||
a ''<i>Harpe d'harmonie</i>'' with--among other things--the bass notes
|
||
sounding ''louder and much more harmonious'' (9 August 1815).
|
||
</font></p>
|
||
<p><font size="-1">
|
||
<sup><b>38.</b></sup> See Gaspard-Claire Riche de Prony, <i>Instruction <20>lementaire sur les moyens
|
||
de calculer les intervalles musicaux</i> [...] (Paris: Firmin Didot, 1832),
|
||
104.
|
||
</font></p>
|
||
<p><font size="-1">
|
||
<sup><b>39.</b></sup> Charles, <i>Acoustique,</i> 302: ''faire de la musique, non pas seulement
|
||
tolerable, mais sublime.''
|
||
</font></p>
|
||
<p><font size="-1">
|
||
<sup><b>40.</b></sup> Paris, Biblioth<74>que de l'Institut, MS 2104, Pi<50>ce 18 (60<sup>e</sup> s<>ance,
|
||
no. 22): ''son pouvoir morale est tr<74>s peu de chose.''
|
||
</font></p>
|
||
</font>
|
||
<br></p><center><p>p.105</p></center>
|
||
<hr><br>effect. Undoubtedly Charles's views already bear the clear imprint of the Romantic aesthetic:
|
||
<blockquote><font size="2">
|
||
<p>the least skilled hand extracts
|
||
precisely the same sound as the most practiced artist. The organ thus
|
||
offers no advantage in the quality of sound. It only speaks through the
|
||
nature of the things it has to say, as if a man of wit were to have an
|
||
interpreter repeat what he has to say.<sup>41.</sup>
|
||
|
||
|
||
</p>
|
||
</font></blockquote>
|
||
|
||
<p></p>
|
||
<p> This
|
||
impression is confirmed by a further observation that throws light on
|
||
the fortunes of the instrument during the French Revolution and on the
|
||
attempts to turn it into a ''theater organ'':
|
||
</p><blockquote><font size="2">
|
||
<p>The organ owes much to its
|
||
location, and it stands, as you know, exclusively in places where
|
||
solitude inclines one naturally to meditation. [...] Removed from its
|
||
place, it is worth nothing. About a dozen years ago, all the organs
|
||
were destroyed and someone had the barbarous idea of putting them in
|
||
the theaters. They were in our orchestras. That made no effect
|
||
whatsoever, which is what I remarked, with as much philosophy as was
|
||
possible in those days. I asked myself: to what do we owe the organs'
|
||
lack of effect? It is because they are no longer in their [proper]
|
||
place.<sup>42.</sup>
|
||
|
||
|
||
</p>
|
||
</font></blockquote>
|
||
<p></p>
|
||
<p> The time was clearly ripe for the <i>orgue expressif</i>,
|
||
and already for some time Paris had been witnessing a period of intense
|
||
research culminating in the models patented by Gabriel-Joseph Greni<6E> in
|
||
1810 and 1816.<sup>43.</sup>
|
||
|
||
</p>
|
||
|
||
<p>But to return to the
|
||
traditional organ, in 1802 Charles reminds us that the bellows of the
|
||
old ''wedge'' type had been replaced by lantern reservoirs fed by
|
||
bellows. This modification reduced the bulk of the bellows and ensured
|
||
a more even wind supply. But instead of viewing the greater stability
|
||
of the wind pressure as an advantage, Charles saw <br clear="all"><font size="-1"><p><font size="-1">
|
||
<sup><b>41.</b></sup> Charles, <i>Acoustique</i>, 321: ''la main la moins habile tire absolument le
|
||
m<>me son que l'artiste le plus exerc<72>. L'orgue n'offre donc aucun avantage
|
||
pour la qualit<69> du son. Ce n'est que par la nature des choses qu'il a <20> dire,
|
||
comme si une personne d'esprit faisait r<>p<EFBFBD>ter par un interpr<70>te ce qu'elle a
|
||
<20> dire.''
|
||
</font></p>
|
||
<p><font size="-1">
|
||
<sup><b>42.</b></sup> Charles, <i>Acoustique</i>, 321-22: ''L'orgue doit beaucoup <20> sa place, et il
|
||
est comme vous savez exclusivement dans des lieux dont la solitude m<>ne
|
||
naturellement <20> la m<>ditation. [...] Sorti de sa place, il ne vaut plus den.
|
||
Il y a une douzaine d'ann<6E>es, on avait d<>truit tous les orgues, et on avait
|
||
eu l'id<69>e barbare de les mettre sur le th<74>atre. Ils <20>taient dans nos
|
||
orchestres. Cela ne faisait aucune esp<73>ce d'effet: j'ai remarqu<71> cela avec
|
||
autant de philosophie qu'on en pouvait mettre dans ce tems l<>. Je me disais:
|
||
d'o<> vient le peu d'effet des orgues? C'est qu'ils ne sont plus <20> leur
|
||
place.''
|
||
</font></p>
|
||
<p><font size="-1">
|
||
<sup><b>43.</b></sup> Paris, Archives Nationales, MS F.12.1016/32: Patent no. 583, 23 June 1810,
|
||
relating to an ''<i>Orgue expressif</i>'' invented by ''<i>S.r Greni<6E>
|
||
demeurant <20> Paris rue de la Convention n<>1</i>.'' See also MS F.12.1025/7:
|
||
Patent no. 1014, 22 January 1816 (another ''<i>Orgue expressif</i>'' by
|
||
''<i>Gabriel-Joseph Greni<6E>, rue du Dauphin n<> 1</i>'').
|
||
</font></p>
|
||
</font>
|
||
<br></p><center><p>p.106</p></center>
|
||
<hr><br>it
|
||
as a defect, for it conferred ''a bit too much monotony'' on the
|
||
instrument's sound [p. 324]. On this matter, it is incidentally
|
||
interesting to note that some organ builders today aim to restore the
|
||
''breathing quality'' to the ''lungs'' of their instruments, thereby
|
||
showing themselves to be in perfect agreement--at least on this
|
||
point--with the opinion of our author. <p></p>
|
||
<p> Piano. In his lectures Charles
|
||
largely ignores this instrument, limiting his observations to the stop
|
||
called <i>jeu celeste,</i> a particular type of damper [<i>sourdine</i>]
|
||
that he associates with the mute used on the violin bridge [p. 304].
|
||
Later, however, in a technical report published in 1810, the <i>piano-fort<72></i>
|
||
was to be the subject of more extended treatment. Here he relates that
|
||
''forty years after the pianos banished the harpsichords from our
|
||
concerts they have assumed a position of such prominence that today,
|
||
for many amateurs, the orchestra consists solely of singing voices and
|
||
the piano, which--all alone--replaces all the other instruments.''<sup>44.</sup>
|
||
|
||
</p>
|
||
|
||
<p>He
|
||
attributes its success to the ''sweetness of its timbre'' and to the
|
||
''appeal of this slightly veiled, melancholy voice'' (melancholy being
|
||
a characteristic that has all but disappeared on modern instruments).
|
||
From the technological point of view, however, he observes that, unlike
|
||
the great longevity of violins by Stradivari, Amati, Guarneri, and
|
||
Stainer, and of harpsichords by Ruckers, ''the fate of the pianoforte
|
||
has been very different. Many have utterly deteriorated after 25-30
|
||
years, and we do not know of a single one that has not lost something
|
||
through time and prolonged use.''<sup>45.</sup>
|
||
|
||
|
||
</p>
|
||
Wind Instruments
|
||
<p>Charles
|
||
displays very little interest in instruments such as the mandolin and
|
||
guitar (the latter is indeed almost ridiculed as being a mere <br clear="all"><font size="-1"><p><font size="-1">
|
||
<sup><b>44.</b></sup> <i>Rapport fait <20> Institut de France par MM. le Compte de La C<>pede, Ha<48>y,
|
||
Charles, Gossec, Gr<47>try, M<>hul [...] dans les s<>ances des 24 et 29 D<>cembre
|
||
1810, sur les nouveaux piano de M. Schmidt, rue du Pont-de-Lodi n<> 2 (M.
|
||
Charles, Rapporteur)</i> (Paris: Pillet, n.d.), 1: ''Depuis quarante ans que
|
||
les piano-fort<72> ont banni les clavecins de nos concerts, ils y ont pris un
|
||
tel empire, qu'aujourd'hui, chez beaucoup d'amateurs, l'orchestre se compose
|
||
unique-ment de voix r<>citantes et du piano-fort<72>, qui remplace <20> lui seul
|
||
tous les autres instrumens.''
|
||
</font></p>
|
||
<p><font size="-1">
|
||
<sup><b>45.</b></sup> <i>Rapport</i>, 2: ''Le sort du piano-fort<72> a <20>t<EFBFBD> bien different. Plusieurs
|
||
ont totalement d<>p<EFBFBD>ri depuis 25 <20> 30 ans, et nous n'en connoissons point <20>
|
||
qui le tems et un long travail n'ait fait perdre quelque chose.''
|
||
</font></p>
|
||
</font>
|
||
<br></p><center><p>p.107</p></center>
|
||
<hr><br>''diminutive
|
||
of the harp''). In contrast, he stresses the leading role played by
|
||
wind instruments within the orchestral ensembles of his day:
|
||
<blockquote><font size="2">
|
||
<p>In the last century, concerts
|
||
included a number of parasitical instruments, such as theorbos,
|
||
guitars, etc; [otherwise] nothing but violins were used. Later came the
|
||
wind instruments, which took possession of the scene and now occupy a
|
||
prominent position.<sup>46.</sup>
|
||
|
||
|
||
</p>
|
||
</font></blockquote>
|
||
|
||
<p></p>
|
||
<p> He
|
||
then goes on to devote a few pages to the wind instruments. Concerning
|
||
the brass, it is worth noting his reference to a performing expedient
|
||
adopted by the famous Bohemian horn-player Jan V<>clav S[caron ]tich
|
||
(1746-1803), here referred to by the Italianized version of his name,
|
||
Giovanni Punto:
|
||
</p><blockquote><font size="2">
|
||
<p>Fifteen or sixteen years ago,
|
||
Viotti was present at a lesson I was giving on acoustics, at which I
|
||
was explaining the theory of the hunting horn. He recollected something
|
||
extremely difficult, which was that he heard Punto at a concert reach a
|
||
very high note after having sounded a low note.<sup>47.</sup> I said to
|
||
him: if that is true, then there is no longer any theory. This bothered
|
||
him greatly; that evening he came back like Archimedes, saying: I have
|
||
found out how, it is a trick. </p>
|
||
</font></blockquote>
|
||
|
||
<blockquote><font size="2">
|
||
<p>This is what Punto did: even while
|
||
blowing into the hunting horn one can sing at the same time. I have
|
||
seen people play the transverse flute and sing as well; the same can be
|
||
done on a hunting horn: one emits a sound a just third above the
|
||
original sound, but it is only a trick. In no way does it discredit the
|
||
theory of acoustics, because the thing is simply impossible.<sup>48.</sup>
|
||
|
||
|
||
</p>
|
||
</font></blockquote>
|
||
<p></p>
|
||
|
||
<br clear="all"><font size="-1"><p><font size="-1">
|
||
<sup><b>46.</b></sup> Charles, <i>Acoustique</i>, 301: ''Dans le si<73>cle dernier il y avait dans les
|
||
concerts beau-coup d'instrumens parasites, tels que des th<74>orbes, des
|
||
guitarres, &c.; on n'a plus employ<6F> que des violons. Apr<70>s cela sont venus
|
||
les instrumens <20> vent, qui se sont empar<61>s de la sc<73>ne et qui occupent une
|
||
place eminente.''
|
||
</font></p>
|
||
<p><font size="-1">
|
||
<sup><b>47.</b></sup> It seems likely that Charles's pupil who transcribed this lesson was mistaken
|
||
in writing <i>apr<EFBFBD>s avoir entonn<6E></i>, ''after having sounded''; the context
|
||
suggests that the correct meaning must instead be ''while simultaneously
|
||
sounding.''
|
||
</font></p>
|
||
<p><font size="-1">
|
||
<sup><b>48.</b></sup> Charles, <i>Acoustique</i>, 319-20:''Il y a 15 <20> 16 ans, Viotti <20>tait <20> un
|
||
cours d'Acoustique que je faisais, et o<> j'exposois la th<74>orie du cor de
|
||
chasse. Il lui vint en pens<6E>e une difficult<6C>: extr<74>me, ce fut d'avoir entendu
|
||
Punto dans un concert arriver <20> un son tr<74>s aigu apr<70>s avoir entonn<6E>
|
||
[<i>sic</i>] un son grave. Je dis: si cela est, il n'y a plus de th<74>orie.
|
||
Cela le tourmenta beaucoup; il vint le soir comme Archimede, en disant: je
|
||
l'ai trouv<75>, c'est une charlatanerie.
|
||
</font></p>
|
||
<p><font size="-1">
|
||
<sup><b>48.</b></sup> ''Voici ce qu'avait fait Punto: on peut tout en souffiant dans un cor de
|
||
chasse, chanter en m<>me tems. J'ai vu des personnes qui jouent de la trite
|
||
traversi<73>re en chantant; on peut faire la m<>me chose dans le cor de chasse:
|
||
on produit un son <20> la tierce juste du son primitif, mais ce n'est qu'une
|
||
charlatanerie. Cela ne detruit rien <20> la th<74>orie de l'acoustique, car la
|
||
chose est impossible.''
|
||
</font></p>
|
||
<p><font size="-1">
|
||
<sup><b>48.</b></sup> Charles also mentions the trumpet, saying that ''it is normally in D.'' In
|
||
presenting a <a href="#Hit13"><img src="Barbieri_files/iimpft_prevhit.gif" alt="<-" border="0"></a><a name="Hit14"><img src="Barbieri_files/iimpft_hit.gif" alt="[H]" border="0"></a><a href="#Hit15"><img src="Barbieri_files/iimpft_nexthit.gif" alt="->" border="0"></a>glass trumpet to his pupils, he adds that it should come as no
|
||
surprise that its quality of sound should be equal to that of the brass
|
||
trumpet: in fact, ''the material of which wind instruments are composed does
|
||
not affect their timbre except in the greater or lesser ease with which the
|
||
air flows along their walls'' (''La mati<74>re dont les instruments <20> vent sont
|
||
compos<6F>s n'influe sur leur timbre que pour la facilit<69> plus ou moins grande
|
||
avec laquelle l'air glisse sur leurs parois'' [<i>Acoustique</i>, pp.
|
||
320-21]).
|
||
</font></p>
|
||
</font>
|
||
<br><center><p>p.108</p></center>
|
||
<hr><br>
|
||
<p>In
|
||
a subsequent comparison between the oboe and the transverse flute he is
|
||
somewhat critical of the flute's intonation. As for contemporary
|
||
oboists, he singles out for special praise an otherwise unspecified
|
||
member of the famous Besozzi dynasty (probably Gaetano), while pointing
|
||
out that the intonation of Fran<61>ois Sallentin--professor at the
|
||
Conservatoire from 1795 to 1816--was not always impeccable:
|
||
</p><blockquote><font size="2">
|
||
<p>I do not know of a single flute
|
||
that plays in tune. If we think of accurate intonation as a straight
|
||
line, the flute moves in an undulating manner, it is sinuous. I have
|
||
never in my life heard a false note from Besozzi, the greatest of all
|
||
living oboists; there are certain oboists around of whom one cannot say
|
||
the same, such as Sallentin. On the flute nobody plays in tune. There
|
||
are plenty of things to be said about that: I have studied the
|
||
instrument sufficiently to say all the bad things I say about it?<sup>49.</sup>
|
||
|
||
|
||
</p>
|
||
</font></blockquote>
|
||
|
||
<p></p>
|
||
<p> Regarding
|
||
the last comment, a document of 1838 confirms--as mentioned above--that
|
||
Charles was ''a great lover of music and a fairly good flute-player,''
|
||
and that he ''very much regretted having studied the flute rather than
|
||
the violin,'' precisely because of the flute's poor intonation.<sup>50.</sup>
|
||
After stating that the oboe--insofar as it is fitted with a
|
||
reed--offers ''a great advantage'' over the flute, Charles continues as
|
||
follows:
|
||
</p><blockquote><font size="2">
|
||
<p>The natural scale of the flute is
|
||
D [major]; that of the oboe is C. The oboe plays very well in the keys
|
||
of C, F and E flat; it is extremely difficult in the sharp keys; and
|
||
practically impossible in the key of E major. On the flute the key of F
|
||
is weak because the tonic of F is extremely weak and that causes the
|
||
falseness of the key.<sup>51.</sup>
|
||
|
||
|
||
</p>
|
||
</font></blockquote>
|
||
<p></p>
|
||
|
||
<br clear="all"><font size="-1"></font><p><font size="-1"><font size="-1">
|
||
<sup><b>49.</b></sup> Charles, <i>Acoustique</i>, 315: ''Je ne connais pas de trite qui joue juste.
|
||
En regardant la justesse comme une ligne horizontale, la fl<66>te marche d'une
|
||
mani<6E>re ondoyante, elle est sinueuse. Ja n'ai jamais entendu de ma vie faire
|
||
un faux ton <20> Besozzi, le premier hautbois qui existe; il y a quelques
|
||
hautbois dont on ne peut pas dire la m<>me chose, comme Sallentin. Personne ne
|
||
joue juste de la fl<66>te traversi<73>re. Il y a bien des choses en dire: j'ai
|
||
assez <20>tudi<64> cet instrument pour en dire tout le mal que j'en dis.''
|
||
</font></font></p>
|
||
<font size="-1"> </font><p><font size="-1"><font size="-1">
|
||
<sup><b>50.</b></sup> Institute of France, Royal Academy of the Fine-Arts, Minutes of the Meeting of
|
||
Saturday, March 24th, 1838, quoted in Rockstro, <i>A Treatise</i>, 343.
|
||
</font></font></p>
|
||
<font size="-1"> </font><p><font size="-1"><font size="-1">
|
||
<sup><b>51.</b></sup> Charles, <i>Acoustique</i>, 316:'' La gamme naturelie de la trite est
|
||
<i>r<EFBFBD>;</i> celle du hautbois est <i>ut</i>. Le hautboisjoue tr<74>s bien les
|
||
tons de <i>ut</i>, de <i>fa</i>, de <i>mi</i> b<>mol; il est extr<74>mement
|
||
difficile dans les tons de di<64>ze; il est presque impossible dans le ton de
|
||
<i>mi</i> di<64>ze. Dans la fl<66>te le ton de <i>fa</i> est foible parce que la
|
||
tonique de <i>fa</i> est extr<74>mement foible, et cela emporte l'infidelit<69> du
|
||
ton.'' By 1838--following the addition of extra keys--these limitations could
|
||
be said to have been completely overcome in the flute, but only partially in
|
||
the oboe: see Alexandre-<2D>tienne Choron and Juste-Adrien-L. de La Fage,
|
||
<i>Nouveau manuel complet de musique vocale et instrumentale</i> (Paris:
|
||
Roret, 1838), Part III, pp. 25-26, 31.
|
||
</font></font></p>
|
||
<font size="-1"> </font>
|
||
<br><center><p>p.109</p></center>
|
||
<hr><br>
|
||
<p>Although Charles does not specify the model of flute he is discussing,
|
||
|
||
|
||
shows a four-key instrument of the type still widely used in Paris during the early years of the nineteenth century.<sup>52.</sup>
|
||
The validity of his last criticism is confirmed by a new model of flute
|
||
patented in 1807, whose inventor goes out of his way to emphasize the
|
||
improvements to both the F and F-sharp of the first two octaves?<sup>53.</sup>
|
||
|
||
|
||
Still on the subject of the flute, Charles gives the following advice to composers:
|
||
</p><blockquote><font size="2">
|
||
<p>The only way to control this
|
||
instrument is to give it little to do, to make it play things that are
|
||
very fast and easy. Most of the composers who have made it do things
|
||
beyond its capacity have made it sound detestable. You never have heard
|
||
the performer of a flute concerto land on a D [and play it] in tune.
|
||
The note is nearly always out of tune.<sup>54.</sup>
|
||
|
||
|
||
</p>
|
||
</font></blockquote>
|
||
|
||
<p></p>
|
||
<p> We
|
||
deduce, therefore, that the flute was not always satisfactory even in
|
||
the key in which it was built, namely D major.</p>
|
||
|
||
<p>Among the
|
||
other woodwind instruments, the French physicist strangely does not
|
||
seem to have noticed the increasing importance of the clarinet, despite
|
||
a comment on its ''duck-like sound'' [p. 318]. He also appears to be
|
||
skeptical about the possibility of adding contrabass instruments to the
|
||
woodwind family, such as the contrabassoon. Consulted on this matter by
|
||
the Conservatoire, he says that he replied as <br clear="all"><font size="-1"><p><font size="-1">
|
||
<sup><b>52.</b></sup> Paris, Archives Nationales, MS F.12.1008/19, Patent no. 382, 21 November 1806:
|
||
<a href="#Hit14"><img src="Barbieri_files/iimpft_prevhit.gif" alt="<-" border="0"></a><a name="Hit15"><img src="Barbieri_files/iimpft_hit.gif" alt="[H]" border="0"></a><a href="#Hit16"><img src="Barbieri_files/iimpft_nexthit.gif" alt="->" border="0"></a>glass flute invented by [Claude] Laurent, ''clockmaker'' with his business at
|
||
Quai de Gevres 34, Paris. The document points out that Laurent had already
|
||
made ''many'' instruments of this kind, adding that ''the shape of these
|
||
flutes differs in no way from that established by the best instrument
|
||
makers.''
|
||
</font></p>
|
||
<p><font size="-1">
|
||
<sup><b>53.</b></sup> Paris, Archives Nationales, MS F.12.1010/2: Patent no. 393, 3 January 1807,
|
||
for a ''<i>Flute traversi<73>re perfectionn<6E>e</i>'' by [Jean-Jacques]
|
||
Holtzapffel, an instrument maker from Strasbourg, but resident in Paris, Rue
|
||
St. Honor<6F> 215. In a letter dated 27 November 1806, Holtzapffel states that
|
||
''this new flute is approved'' [<i>cette nouvelle flute est approuv<75>e</i>]
|
||
by, among others, ''<i>[Henri] Besozzi, artiste de la musique de l'Empereur
|
||
et Roi et premi<6D>re flute du Theatre de l'Opera Comique</i>'' and ''<i>Felix
|
||
Rault, ci derant premier flute de la musique du Roi et de l'Opera,
|
||
Pensionnaire du Gouvernement</i>'' (from which we can infer that Rault was
|
||
still alive in 1806).
|
||
</font></p>
|
||
<p><font size="-1">
|
||
<sup><b>54.</b></sup> Charles, <i>Acoustique</i>, 316-17: ''Le seul moyen de contenir cet
|
||
instrument, c'est de lui donner peu de chose <20> faire, de lui faire ex<65>cuter
|
||
des choses tr<74>s rapides et tr<74>s faciles. La plupart des compositeurs qui lui
|
||
ont donn<6E> <20> faire des choses au dessus de ses forces l'ont rendue d<>testable.
|
||
Vous n'avez jamais entendu, dans un concerto de fl<66>te, l'artiste
|
||
retomberjuste sur le <i>r<EFBFBD></i>. Presque toujours le son est faux.''
|
||
</font></p>
|
||
</font>
|
||
<br></p><center><p>p.110</p></center>
|
||
<hr><br>follows:
|
||
''look for some Goliaths or Gargantuas to play them, because it is
|
||
impossible for [ordinary] men to expend such a large quantity of air.''<sup>55.</sup>
|
||
|
||
|
||
Soon after, however, he was to change his mind, for in 1811-together with Gossec, Gr<47>try and M<>hul--he approved Dumas's ''<i>Contre-basse Guerri<72>re</i>,''
|
||
a double bass clarinet designed for military bands. In the pertinent
|
||
technical report presented to the Institut de France this instrument
|
||
appears to have been chosen on account of its timbre (the bassoon is in
|
||
fact considered as ''plaintive and melancholy,'' while the trombone
|
||
''is very penetrating but has little brilliance'').<sup>56.</sup> From
|
||
the same report we also learn that ''with Mont<6E>clair's introduction of
|
||
the double bass [of the string family] at the Op<4F>ra in 1732 and
|
||
Gossec's of the trombone in 1773, the power of these deep sounds was
|
||
recognized in France.''<sup>57.</sup>
|
||
|
||
|
||
|
||
<br clear="all"><p></p>figure 2.
|
||
drawing of <a href="#Hit15"><img src="Barbieri_files/iimpft_prevhit.gif" alt="<-" border="0"></a><a name="Hit16"><img src="Barbieri_files/iimpft_hit.gif" alt="[H]" border="0"></a><a href="#Hit17"><img src="Barbieri_files/iimpft_nexthit.gif" alt="->" border="0"></a>glass flute invented by [claude] laurent. paris, archives nationales, ms f.12.1008/19, patent no. 382, 21 november 1806.
|
||
|
||
|
||
|
||
<p></p>
|
||
|
||
<br clear="all"><font size="-1"><p><font size="-1">
|
||
<sup><b>55.</b></sup> Charles, <i>Acoustique</i>, 323: ''cherchez des Goliaths, ou des Gargantuas
|
||
pour en jouer, il est impossible que des hommes fassent une telle d<>pense
|
||
d'air.'' The same negative judgement is given of the contrabass trombone:
|
||
''Many years ago I was consuited by the Conservatoire, which wished to dream
|
||
up some special instruments: I said that they would also have to dream up the
|
||
men to play them. We already have trombones that expend a large amount of
|
||
air, and they wanted to make contrabass trombones!''
|
||
</font></p>
|
||
<p><font size="-1">
|
||
<sup><b>56.</b></sup> See <i>Rapport fait par MM. Gossec, Gr<47>try, M<>hul, membres de la Classe des
|
||
beaux-arts, et MM. Ha<48>y et Charles, membres de la Classe des sciences
|
||
physiques et math<74>matiques, dans les s<>ances des 6 et 8 Avril 1811</i>
|
||
[<i>sur la basse et contrebasse guerri<72>res de M. Dumas</i>] (Paris: Institut
|
||
de France, 1811), 4-6. The <i>contrebasse</i> was pitched an octave below the
|
||
<i>basse</i>.
|
||
</font></p>
|
||
<p><font size="-1">
|
||
<sup><b>57.</b></sup> As far as the double bass is concerned, we now know that its first appearance
|
||
at the Paris Op<4F>ra dates from at least as early as 1703. It was introduced by
|
||
Mont<6E>clair and Giuseppe Fedeli, apparently in an attempt to get closer to the
|
||
composition of the Italian opera orchestra, which had strong basses: see
|
||
James R. Anthony, ''Mont<6E>clair, Michel Pignolet de,'' in <i>The New Grove
|
||
Dictionary of Music and Musicians</i> (London: Macmillan, 1980), 12:508.
|
||
</font></p>
|
||
</font>
|
||
<br><center><p>p.111</p></center>
|
||
<hr><br>Some Unpublished Proposals by Guerre for Rationalizing the Tone Hole Positions of Wind Instruments
|
||
<p>The
|
||
intonation problems discussed above are also the subject of a brief
|
||
manuscript study by Georges Guerre, a woodwind instrument maker about
|
||
whom we know only that he worked in Paris between 1825 and 1853. His
|
||
study is dated 1826 and thus immediately precedes the years in which
|
||
Theobald Boehm was to embark on the same type of investigation.<sup>58.</sup>
|
||
|
||
|
||
The manuscript opens with a clear statement of intent:
|
||
</p><blockquote><font size="2">
|
||
<p>The construction of wind
|
||
instruments was still a long way behind string instruments--in the
|
||
justness and equality of the sounds--even though the theory of physics
|
||
tells us that an aerial string must be the same as an animal string.
|
||
All the experiments made until then were unable to prove it and there
|
||
remained such a great difference in justness that it utterly removed
|
||
the hope of obtaining the same result on an aerial string as on an
|
||
animal one, [when] divided into aliquot parts.<sup>59.</sup>
|
||
|
||
|
||
</p>
|
||
</font></blockquote>
|
||
|
||
<p></p>
|
||
<p> This
|
||
statement is not, however, followed by any mention of how Guerre
|
||
proposed to solve the problem of how to subdivide an ''aerial string''
|
||
(i.e., a cylindrical column of air) using the same ratios as those for
|
||
an ''animal string'' (i.e., a gut string). He merely adds a few
|
||
drawings of contemporary wind instruments, in which he draws attention
|
||
to the way the positioning of the tone holes noticeably differs--even
|
||
when the bore is cylindrical--from the geometric progression of a
|
||
monochord subdivided according to equal temperament (which in Paris in
|
||
those very years was in the process of definitively superseding the
|
||
unequal temperaments used until that time).<sup>60.</sup>
|
||
|
||
|
||
Given their historical interest, the drawings are reproduced in
|
||
|
||
|
||
-
|
||
|
||
|
||
along with their original captions.<sup>61.</sup>
|
||
|
||
</p>
|
||
|
||
<br clear="all"><font size="-1"><p><font size="-1">
|
||
<sup><b>58.</b></sup> Paris, Biblioth<74>que de l'<27>cole des ponts et chauss<73>es, MS 713: ''Guerre,
|
||
<i>Recherches sur les instruments <20> vent</i>, 1826'' (the date is given in
|
||
the library catalogue). On the activity of Guerre, see William Waterhouse,
|
||
<i>The New Langwill Index: A Dictionary of Musical Wind-Instrument Makers and
|
||
Inventors</i> (London: Tony Bingham, 1993), 150.
|
||
</font></p>
|
||
<p><font size="-1">
|
||
<sup><b>59.</b></sup> Guerre, <i>Recherches</i>, 1: ''La construction des instruments <20> vent <20>tait
|
||
encore tr<74>s <20>loign<67>e--de justesse et d'<27>galit<69> de sons--de ceux <20> corde,
|
||
quoique la th<74>orie physique donne connaissance qu'une corde a<>rienne doit
|
||
<20>tre la m<>me qu'une corde animal. Toutes les exp<78>riences que l'on a fait
|
||
jusqu'alors ne l'ont pu prouver et il se pr<70>sentait une si grande difference
|
||
de justesse, que cela d<>truisait totalement l'espoir d'obtenir d'une corde
|
||
a<>rienne le m<>me r<>sultat que de celle animal, divis<69>e en parties alicotes.''
|
||
</font></p>
|
||
<p><font size="-1">
|
||
<sup><b>60.</b></sup> See Patrizio Barbieri, <i>Acustica accordatura e temperamento nell'
|
||
Illuminismo veneto</i> (Roma: Torre d'Orfeo, 1987), 232.
|
||
</font></p>
|
||
<p><font size="-1">
|
||
<sup><b>61.</b></sup> The original French texts of these captions read as follows: for the present
|
||
|
||
|
||
, ''<i>Planche 1,</i>
|
||
|
||
|
||
. Presente le chalumeau ou l'origine de la clarinette. /
|
||
|
||
|
||
. Repr<70>sente une clarinette dont nous devons l'invention de la sixi<78>me clef F
|
||
au cel<65>bre Lef<65>vre Xavier. Cet instrument n'entre pas du tout en rapport avec
|
||
le monochorde.'' For the present
|
||
|
||
|
||
, ''<i>Planche 2,</i>
|
||
|
||
|
||
. Repr<70>sente une clarinette perfectionn<6E>e par le c<>l<EFBFBD>bre Muller, <20> qui on doit
|
||
l'application des 13 clefs. J'ai ensuite fait l'application de la corde
|
||
animal divis<69>e par les math<74>matiques pour prouver <20>videmment qu'il n'y a pas
|
||
de rapport entre les ouvertures lath<74>rales et les parties alicotes de la
|
||
corde; cela nous aurait laiss<73> tr<74>s long-temps dans la croyance qu'une corde
|
||
a<>rienne ne pouvait <20>tre la m<>me qu'une corde animal sous tousles rapports,
|
||
quoique y manquait un intervalle. /
|
||
|
||
|
||
. Repr<70>sente la corde a<>rienne, en rapport imm<6D>diat, pour lajustesse et
|
||
l'<27>galit<69> des sons, de la corde animal, ou monocorde, en y ajoutant une clef
|
||
de fa di<64>ze pour remplir les intervalles musicaux.'' For the present
|
||
|
||
|
||
, ''<i>Planche 3,</i>
|
||
|
||
|
||
. Je repr<70>sente cet instrument comme ayant <20>t<EFBFBD> consid<69>r<EFBFBD> juste; mais on s'est
|
||
convaincu qu'il <20>tait faux quoiqu'il alt 13 clefs et que l'on ne pourra
|
||
jamais jouer juste avec un instrument mal construit et avec lequel on ne peut
|
||
atteindre lajustesse qu'au d<>triment de la sonorit<69>. Ces sons se rangent au
|
||
nombre de ceux envisag<61>s comme bruit par la physique. /
|
||
|
||
|
||
. Pr<50>sente une corde a<>rienne ou monocorde a<>rien.'' For the present
|
||
|
||
|
||
, ''<i>Planche 4,</i>
|
||
|
||
|
||
. Repr<70>sente une flute perfectlonn<6E>e quoiqu'il manque un intervalle musical. /
|
||
<i>fig. 8</i>. Repr<70>sente une corde conique <20> laquelle j'ai ajout<75> une clef
|
||
de fa di<64>ze.'' For the present
|
||
|
||
|
||
, [left]: ''Partition de M. Guerre''; [center]: ''Partition ancienne'';
|
||
[right]: ''Division du monocorde applicable <20> la corde a<>rienne.''
|
||
</font></p>
|
||
</font>
|
||
<br><center><p>p.112</p></center>
|
||
<hr><br>
|
||
<p>As
|
||
for the problem raised by Guerre, today we may observe that in the
|
||
calculation of the vibrating lengths of an ''aerial string'' we must
|
||
also account for something called ''end correction,'' a factor whose
|
||
importance was at the time insufficiently appreciated. Let us now see
|
||
how this applies to the two following practical cases.
|
||
</p><ul type="none"><li style="">
|
||
<p>1. <i>Cylindrical bore and tone holes of constant diameter</i>.
|
||
When comparing the distances between the individual tone holes and the
|
||
mouth hole with the corresponding lengths on the monochord, we find
|
||
them to be shorter by a quantity equal to the end correction. And as
|
||
the shortening is not directly proportional to the previously mentioned
|
||
monochord lengths, the actual succession of holes will not follow a
|
||
strictly geometric proportion. This explains, for example, why the
|
||
Pythagorean 2:1 ratio no longer applies to two bore lengths
|
||
corresponding to an octave.<sup>62.</sup>
|
||
|
||
|
||
</p>
|
||
</li>
|
||
<li style="">
|
||
<p>2. <i>Cylindrical bore and tone holes of variable diameter</i>.
|
||
In Guerre's proposed plans for the clarinet ( , right), the higher the
|
||
pitch of the hole, the smaller its diameter: by closely regulating the
|
||
amount of reduction, the interhole spacing could effectively be
|
||
restored to strict geometrical progession (in this case, the end
|
||
correction would turn out to be independent of the frequency, and thus
|
||
equal for all notes).<sup>63.</sup>
|
||
|
||
|
||
But not even by this expedient was a perfect correspondence with the monochord
|
||
|
||
<br clear="all"><font size="-1"><p><font size="-1">
|
||
<sup><b>62.</b></sup> See, for example, Rockstro, <i>A Treatise</i>, 171-75.
|
||
</font></p>
|
||
<p><font size="-1">
|
||
<sup><b>63.</b></sup> See Arthur H. Benade, ''On the Mathematical Theory of Woodwind Finger Holes,''
|
||
<i>Journal of the Acoustical Society of America</i> 32 (1960): 1602.
|
||
</font></p>
|
||
</font>
|
||
<br></p><center><p>p.113</p></center>
|
||
<hr><br>lengths
|
||
possible, for Guerre's plan would need correcting by shifting all the
|
||
tone holes upwards by the same amount; and though the interhole spacing
|
||
would remain unchanged, this operation would also lead--again in
|
||
relation to the lengths measured on the body of the instrument--to a
|
||
stretching of all the harmonic intervals, including that of the octave.
|
||
<p></p>
|
||
</li>
|
||
</ul>
|
||
|
||
<p></p>
|
||
Summary
|
||
<p>Because of their
|
||
miscellaneous character it is difficult to draw comprehensive
|
||
conclusions from this review of Charles's remarks and related materials
|
||
by other writers. But it is worth summarizing some of the new and often
|
||
surprising information they provide on a broad range of topics,
|
||
including famous musicians and luthiers, technological innovations in
|
||
instrument building, and aesthetic judgements of various instruments.
|
||
</p><ul type="none"><li style="">
|
||
<p>1. Skilled performers like
|
||
Viotti, Duport, and Jarnowick were unable to play in time with a
|
||
metronome, while Pagin and the other ''Tartinistes'' active in Paris
|
||
played with such freedom that, according to Charles, ''they never
|
||
played in time.'' </p>
|
||
</li>
|
||
<li style="">
|
||
<p>2. Girolamo II Amati was on
|
||
friendly terms with Tartini, and as late as 1740 produced, for
|
||
Tartini's pupil Pagin, the last violin made by any member of that
|
||
celebrated dynasty. Charles's praise of it as ''one of the best
|
||
instruments in existence'' will certainly assist in the reassessment of
|
||
Girolamo II's work, which in the past has been little appreciated. </p>
|
||
</li>
|
||
<li style="">
|
||
<p>3. The first proposal for a
|
||
tuning mechanism based on the worm-screw, such as that used today on
|
||
the double bass and guitar, turns out to be the one by a watch-maker of
|
||
Metz by the name of Cor<6F>, dating from as early as 1758, fully twenty
|
||
years earlier than the proposal by Anton Bachmann, to whom the
|
||
invention of such a device has hitherto been attributed. </p>
|
||
</li>
|
||
<li style="">
|
||
<p>4. Passing comments about
|
||
certain instruments reveal attitudes radically different from the ideas
|
||
we have of them today. The ''singular and melancholy sound'' of the <a href="#Hit16"><img src="Barbieri_files/iimpft_prevhit.gif" alt="<-" border="0"></a><a name="Hit17"><img src="Barbieri_files/iimpft_hit.gif" alt="[H]" border="0"></a><a href="#Hit18"><img src="Barbieri_files/iimpft_nexthit.gif" alt="->" border="0"></a>glass <a href="#Hit17"><img src="Barbieri_files/iimpft_prevhit.gif" alt="<-" border="0"></a><a name="Hit18"><img src="Barbieri_files/iimpft_hit.gif" alt="[H]" border="0"></a>harmonica
|
||
evidently caused ''many people [to] faint when this instrument was
|
||
being played,'' but the weakness of the harp's upper range was
|
||
considered a drawback so severe as to cause its exclusion from the
|
||
Concert spirituel. The organ, according to Charles, lost what little
|
||
value it possessed when removed from ''places where solitude inclines
|
||
one naturally to meditation,'' and attempts to make use of it in
|
||
theater orchestras were a complete failure. On the other <br clear="all"><font size="-1"></font>
|
||
<br></p><center><p>p.114</p></center>
|
||
<hr><br>hand,
|
||
he attributes the tremendous success of the fortepiano in the decades
|
||
prior to 1810 to its sweet and ''slightly veiled, melancholy voice,''
|
||
whereas in comparison to the modern piano, or indeed to early
|
||
nineteenth-century models, pianos from the period to which Charles
|
||
refers are usually thought of today as having a much brighter, even if
|
||
less powerful, sound. Finally, as a flutist himself Charles asserts
|
||
that ''on the flute nobody plays in tune,'' even though by the time he
|
||
gave his lectures, at the turn of the century, keys to correct the
|
||
intonation of that instrument's cross-fingered notes had been in use
|
||
for several decades. Guerre's manuscript confirms this need to improve
|
||
the intonation of woodwind instruments and to rationalize the placement
|
||
of their tone holes. <p></p>
|
||
</li>
|
||
</ul>
|
||
|
||
<p></p>
|
||
<p> Translated by Hugh Ward-Perkins
|
||
|
||
<br clear="all"><font size="-1"></font>
|
||
<br></p><center><p>p.115</p></center>
|
||
<hr><br>
|
||
|
||
<br clear="all"><p></p>figure 3.
|
||
paris, biblioth<74>que de l'<27>cole des ponts et chauss<73>es, ms 713: original tables and captions by guerre, 1826. <i>plate 1,</i>
|
||
. shows the chalumeau or the origin of the clarinet. / . shows a
|
||
clarinet for which we owe the invention of the sixth key [marked with
|
||
the letter] f to the celebrated lef<65>vre xavier. this instrument does
|
||
not at all correspond [in ratio] with the monochord.'' <br clear="all"><font size="-1"></font>
|
||
<br><center><p>p.116</p></center>
|
||
<hr><br>
|
||
|
||
<br clear="all"><p></p>figure 4.
|
||
ibid. <i>plate 2,</i>
|
||
. shows a clarinet perfected by the celebrated muller, to whom we owe
|
||
the application of the 13 keys. i have also added the animal string
|
||
divided by mathematics to demonstrate clearly that there is no
|
||
correspondence between the side openings and the aliquot parts of the
|
||
string; that would have allowed us to go on believing that an aerial
|
||
string could not be the same as an animal string in all its ratios,
|
||
even if [in this division] an interval [f[sharp ]] was missing. / .
|
||
shows the aerial string in immediate correspondence--as regards
|
||
justness and equality of the pitches--with the animal string or
|
||
monochord, by adding an f-sharp key to fill in the musical intervals. <br clear="all"><font size="-1"></font>
|
||
<br><center><p>p.117</p></center>
|
||
<hr><br>
|
||
|
||
<br clear="all"><p></p>figure 5.
|
||
ibid. <i>plate 3,</i>
|
||
. i show this instrument as having been considered in tune; but it is
|
||
clear that it is out of tune even though it has 13 keys and that one
|
||
could never play in tune on an instrument that is badly made and on
|
||
which one could not achieve correct intonation except by harming the
|
||
sonority. these sounds are counted among those regarded as noise by
|
||
physics. / . shows an aerial string or aerial monochord. <br clear="all"><font size="-1"></font>
|
||
<br><center><p>p.118</p></center>
|
||
<hr><br>
|
||
|
||
<br clear="all"><p></p>figure 6.
|
||
ibid. <i>plate 4,</i>
|
||
|
||
|
||
. shows an improved flute although a musical interval is missing. / <i>fig. 8</i>. shows a conical string to which i have added an f-sharp key.
|
||
|
||
|
||
|
||
|
||
<br clear="all"><font size="-1"></font>
|
||
<br><center><p>p.119</p></center>
|
||
<hr><br>
|
||
|
||
<br clear="all"><p></p>figure 7.
|
||
ibid., unnumbered plate (top right: <i>m. guerre, rue de b<>thisy n<>10)</i>. [<i>left:</i>] division by <i>m. guerre;</i> [<i>center</i>:] former division; [<i>right</i>:] division of the monochord applicable to the aerial string.
|
||
|
||
|
||
<p></p>
|
||
|
||
|
||
<br clear="all"><font size="-1"></font>
|
||
<br><center><p>p.120</p></center>
|
||
<hr><br>
|
||
<br><center><h3>END</h3><a href="#top">Top of Page</a> </center><hr><center><font size="2"><em><EFBFBD>Copyright 1997 by the American Musical Instrument Society, Inc.</em></font></center>
|
||
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|
||
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|
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|
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