Among the Great Masters of Music

the Great Masters of Music, by Walter Rowlands

Project Gutenberg's Among the Great Masters of Music, by Walter Rowlands This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
Title: Among the Great Masters of Music Scenes in the Lives of Famous Musicians
Author: Walter Rowlands
Release Date: April 13, 2007 [EBook #21056]
Language: English
Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK AMONG THE GREAT MASTERS OF MUSIC ***

Produced by Al Haines

[Frontispiece: The Tone Masters. Haydn, Mozart, Handel, Beethoven. From painting by Hans Temple.]

Among the Great
Masters of Music
Scenes in the Lives of Famous Musicians

Thirty-two Reproductions of Famous Paintings
with Text by
Walter Rowlands

London
E. Grant Richards
1906

TO
Miss Jane Rowlands

CONTENTS.
ST. CECILIA PALESTRINA LULLI STRADIVARIUS TARTINI BACH HANDEL GLUCK MOZART LINLEY HAYDN WEBER BEETHOVEN SCHUBERT ROUGET DE LISLE PAGANINI MENDELSSOHN CHOPIN MEYERBEER WAGNER LISZT

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS.
THE TONE MASTERS . . . . . . . . . Frontispiece ST. CECILIA PALESTRINA THE YOUNG LULLI STRADIVARIUS TARTINI'S DREAM BACH'S PRELUDES MORNING DEVOTIONS IN THE FAMILY OF BACH FREDERICK THE GREAT AND BACH THE CHILD HANDEL HANDEL AND GEORGE I. GLUCK AT THE TRIANON MOZART AND HIS SISTER BEFORE MARIA THERESA MOZART AND MADAME DE POMPADOUR MOZART AT THE ORGAN THE LAST DAYS OF MOZART SHERIDAN AT THE LINLEYS' HAYDN CROSSING THE ENGLISH CHANNEL THE "LAST THOUGHTS" OF VON WEBER BEETHOVEN AT BONN BEETHOVEN IN HIS STUDY A SYMPHONY BY BEETHOVEN BEETHOVEN'S DREAM SCHUBERT AT THE PIANO ROUGET DE LISLE SINGING THE MARSEILLAISE PAGANINI IN PRISON SONG WITHOUT WORDS CHOPIN AT PRINCE RADZIWILL'S THE DEATH OF CHOPIN MEYERBEER WAGNER AT HOME A MORNING WITH LISZT

PREFACE.
The compiler's thanks are due to Messrs. Houghton, Mifflin & Co., and to Mrs. Elizabeth Stuart Phelps Ward, for permission to use a selection from "The Silent Partner."

Music is the link between spiritual and sensual life.--Beethoven.
And while we hear The tides of Music's golden sea Setting toward eternity, Uplifted high in heart and hope are we. --Tennyson.
Music in the best sense has little need of novelty, on the contrary, the older it is, the more one is accustomed to it, the greater is the effect it produces.--Goethe.
Music is a kind of inarticulate, unfathomable speech, which leads us to the edge of the infinite, and lets us for moments gaze into that.--Carlyle.

AMONG THE GREAT MASTERS OF MUSIC.
ST. CECILIA.
One of the most ancient legends handed down to us by the early Church is that of St. Cecilia, the patroness of music and musicians. She is known to have been honoured by Christians as far back as the third century, in which she is supposed to have lived.
Doubtless much of fancy has been added, in all the ensuing years, to the facts of Cecilia's life and death. Let us, however, take the legend as it stands. It says that St. Cecilia was a noble Roman lady, who lived in the reign of the Emperor Alexander Severus. Her parents, who secretly professed Christianity, brought her up in their own faith, and from her earliest childhood she was remarkable for her enthusiastic piety: she carried night and day a copy of the Gospel concealed within the folds of her robe; and she made a secret but solemn vow to preserve her chastity, devoting herself to heavenly things, and shunning the pleasures and vanities of the world. As she excelled in music, she turned her good gift to the glory of God, and composed hymns, which she sang herself with such ravishing sweetness, that even the angels descended from heaven to listen to her, or to join their voices with hers. She played on all instruments, but none sufficed to breathe forth that flood of harmony with which her whole soul was filled; therefore she invented the organ, consecrating it to the service of God. When she was about sixteen, her parents married her to a young Roman, virtuous, rich, and of noble birth, named Valerian. He was, however, still in the darkness of the old religion. Cecilia, in obedience to her parents, accepted the husband they had ordained for her; but beneath her bridal robes she put on a coarse garment of penance, and, as she walked to the temple, renewed her vow of chastity, praying to God that she might have strength to keep it. And it so fell out; for, by her fervent eloquence, she not only persuaded her husband, Valerian, to respect her vow, but converted him to the true faith. She told him that she had a guardian angel who watched over her night and day, and would suffer no earthly lover to approach her. And when Valerian desired to see this angel, she sent him to seek the aged St. Urban, who, being