The orchestra and its instruments

Now that we have become acquainted with all the instruments in the Orchestra, we must turn our attention to the Orchestra itself.

We must consider the Orchestra as one great instrument on which the conductor plays.

The Orchestra is made up of all these varied instruments, which, as we have seen, have been brought to perfection during centuries of use and experiment,—instruments of long ancestry and historical interest, instruments that have figured in song and story and romance.

The Orchestra is, therefore, a very unique instrument itself.

It holds within itself nearly every kind of tone from the deepest rumble of the bass tuba and growl of the double-bass to the cool, flowing notes of the clarinet and bassoon and to the penetrating call of the flute, the cry of the violin and scream of the piccolo. It holds within itself every kind of vibration from bowed, or plucked, strings, and air blown upon quivering reeds, or through pipes, or tubes, or horns; it has every kind of thump on tightly-stretched skin; it has every kind of rattle, clang and clash; and every kind of sharp blow, from the heavy stroke on the steel rod to the silvery notes of bells, or the brilliant, fiery sparks from the triangle.

But there is one thing more that we have not yet taken into consideration,—and that is the human element.

What would these instruments be if there were no musicians to play them?

Is there anything more melancholy than a case full of musical instruments hanging lifeless and silent in a museum?

We recall the striking illustration Shakespeare makes of unused instruments in his Richard the Second, where the Duke of Norfolk, being banished, breaks forth with:

In addition to the rich and varied instrumental material, we have ninety personalities possessed of brains, emotions and artistic ideals and aspirations.

We call the Orchestra an instrument, or even a machine; but let us think for a moment of these intelligent personalities behind their instruments, or merged into their instruments, and we shall realize what a sensitive organization a Symphony Orchestra is.

The Orchestra is a corporate body that is ruled by the Conductor. His is the power that holds all these forces together; he it is who guides these ninety men through the mazes of the vast musical composition, or fabric of woven melodies and harmonies, the patterns and colors of which he will place before our auditory nerves, which will carry to and impress upon our brains the musical forms and figures that also charm our senses; and to do this the Conductor must understand the technique of his Orchestra every bit as thoroughly as each man knows the technique of his instrument.

The Orchestra began to be an instrument just about the time that Gasparo di Salò (see page 21) fixed the form of the violin.

Let us look for a moment at the instruments that were in use at the beginning of the Sixteenth Century—the instruments that formed an Orchestra in Shakespeare’s time—the Orchestra of the Renaissance. Whether in Italy, France, or England, it was the same.

“We are in a small square chamber, panelled and floored with oak. It has a table with two silver candle-sticks, a couple of chairs and a few dozen books arranged on a sort of dresser. In the window is a settle, and on it a jumbled heap of music. We turn it over and see that it is almost all manuscript—single-line parts of madrigals, ballets and canzonets. But there are one or two printed books, such as Mr. Anthony Munday’s Banquet of Dainty Conceits, published in 1588, and some later things, such as Mr. Peter Philips’s Madrigals that came out four years ago. Here is even a proof-copy of Mr. Morley’s new five-part Ballets. Clearly the owner of this room is an advanced thinker. That locked case opposite, of stamped Spanish leather, evidently contains his favorite gamba.[29]

“However, we must not loiter any longer in this room. We had better make our way into the corridor, go down the staircase, and walk through the great gallery that runs the whole length of the building. We are now in the East Wing, where apparently the musicians have their quarters. In the main room the logs are blazing; and on the table are scraps of lute-tablature altered and re-altered, with odds and ends of minnikins—the thin top-strings of the lute. There has evidently been a rehearsal here.

“Near the fireplace are the lutenists’ boxes. We notice on them French and Italian, as well as English, names. If we open any of the boxes we shall find inside them some very lovely instruments. Their vaulted bodies are built up of strips of pine and cedar, and there are exquisite purflings and ornaments of ebony, ivory and silver. In front is at least one beautifully carved and inlaid ‘rose’; while the necks are all ‘fretted,’ semitone by semitone. Each lute has twelve strings of catgut tuned in six unison-pairs. But if we touch two or three lutes in succession, we shall see that all players do not adopt the same tuning. The average lutenist seems to prefer for his six pairs of strings a system of fourths joined by a third in the middle.

“The instruments are made in three chief sizes, but the tenor-lute, or theorbo, from Padua,[30] appears to be a favorite. If we take up one of these lutes and pass our hands across its strings, we shall become aware of a deliciously tender harmony. The instrument has no strength—only a sort of melancholy quietude. And this is due, in some measure, to the length of the strings. For much tension is out of the question in an instrument whose bridge is merely glued to the belly.

“Here is a tall lute case in the corner, reaching almost to the ceiling. From its appearance it has travelled far, over rough roads. Its owner’s name suggests Italy. Let us take it out very gingerly. It is the latest thing in lutes—a big Roman Chitarone,[31] or archlute, or bass-lute, with seventeen strings—practically two instruments in one. For besides the usual pairs-of-strings that run up to the lower ‘nut,’ there is a second series of single-strings stretched to a second nut at the lute head. These are the newly invented diapasons, a set of bass-strings which hang free of the fingerboard and can therefore only be plucked to give the one note of their full vibrating length. This addition is naturally a great advantage in consort, or ensemble, playing; for it extends the compass diatonically downwards.

“Before we leave the rehearsal room for Lord Strange’s performance in the Hall we shall make free to open the huge oak cupboard that runs across the upper part of the room. This is a boarded chest, as they call it; and we know very well that we shall find inside a set of six viols. They are heavy and cumbersome instruments and they run downwards like a Noah’s Ark procession from No. 1, the big Double-Bass, to No. 6, the High Treble. The favorite is No. 2, the Bass Viol, or Gamba. That is viola da gamba (leg-viol). The Italians also used the names da spalla (the shoulder) and da braccio (arm) for the next two smaller viols. It is doubtless a choice specimen of this instrument which was under lock and key in the other room. It may have been made by Gasparo di Salò.[32] For the Italians are rapidly coming to the fore as viol-makers; and a new man, Andreas Amati,[33] is manufacturing a very small instrument, which he calls a violino, or violin. But the Queen’s violists probably regard this as a rather cheap and not quite worthy attempt.

“The tone of the viols is sombre and somewhat nasal. It lacks brightness altogether. Excellent for arpeggios and quiet vocal passages, the instruments are apt to sulk unless continually coaxed by the bow. And the bow unfortunately has to be used with considerable caution. For the true viols have no fewer than six strings apiece. And in their tuning they follow the irregularities of the lutes by using a series of fourths joined together by a third. But the makers are beginning to see the necessity of reducing the number throughout the whole Viol Family; for the difficulties of bowing are very great. Accordingly they are just introducing a modified type of instrument with five strings. They call these quintons; and those players who use them are adopting a tuning which gives them perfect fifths, at any rate, in the lower part of their compass. This is interesting. For it shows that some change is in the air. We should like to have ten minutes’ private conversation on the subject with Signor Amati. If we did, he would first warn us that what he was about to say must not on any account be repeated to his best customers, the violists. Then he would probably give it as his opinion that his new violino with its simple regular tuning in fifths and its lovely caressing tone-quality is worth all the viols that have ever been made; and that all the talk about ‘vulgarizing’ and ‘popularizing’ is nothing more than professional stupidity.”[34]

Orchestral music begins in Italy. It also begins with the dawn of the Opera. We must first remember that the Italians always cared more for solo-singing than for chorus-singing. It was just the same with their instrumental music. Instruments playing solo, or holding a dialogue together, with brilliant improvisations, occupied a much higher place in the Italian taste than harmonies produced by a number of instruments playing together. In other words, the Italians preferred monodic music to polyphonic music. So we find in the first operas, or plays interspersed with music, that the only instruments that were welcomed were the clavecin, the organ, the chitarone, and the lyre.

Now that combination is not as thin, nor as simple, as we might think. The clavecin and organ could supply both bass and treble. The chitarone, as we have just seen on page 137, was a big bass-lute known also as the archlute, with two sets of strings: one reaching all the way down the enormously long neck; the other, and shorter, reaching only about a third the way down. Each set of strings had separate pegs.

The lyre was very complicated. It was a kind of viol with twelve, or fourteen, strings, tuned either in fourths or fifths, alternately ascending and descending. This very singular way of tuning permitted the performer to find all kinds of chords in all kinds of positions beneath his fingers.

The composer carried his melodies, however, on a very simple bass. If the opera had “symphonies,” that is to say instrumental interludes, and ballet-music, the composer would often indicate in his score “at this place the instruments can play”; and the musicians selected what they pleased. As time wore on, if the composer indicated a place for one or two violins to play, he would give them a little theme; and the players worked it up and elaborated it to suit their fancy and according to their skill. Very often, indeed, they added a brilliant musical divertissement. The scores of the earliest Italian operas have very little accompaniment save two or three violins above a bass played on the theorbo, or clavecin.

At the beginning of the Seventeenth Century a change took place in music. A great many of the old kinds of wind instruments and the grave old viols began to disappear. They were too old-fashioned for the New Art of the time. The famous opera of Orfeo by Monteverde (1607) is, perhaps, the last of the great operas of that period that contained all that was considered in those days the rich voices of the Orchestra. Orfeo is a landmark in musical history for many reasons. We shall presently see that it is also the starting-point of our modern Orchestra.

And who was this Monteverde to whom we look back through three hundred years of musical history? One of the most interesting facts about him is that he was born in Cremona, that famous “violin town,”[35] where music was literally in the air, although the Amatis and Stradivaris were not yet working.

Claudio Monteverde was born in 1567. He was a contemporary of Gasparo di Salò and Maggini.[36] At an early age he was an expert violist and was taken into the service of the Duke of Mantua. The Duke’s Court was the centre of every luxury and elegance in Lombardy and music had long been one of the arts beloved there.[37] The Mantuan collection of instruments was famous; and the Duke, like all other noble princes of the time, had his own band of private musicians. At their head for his Maestro di Capella, he had a very learned musician named Marc Antonio Ingegneri; and young Monteverde was put under him at once to finish and perfect his musical education.

Ingegneri, however, was unusually fond of counterpoint and of writing fugues and Monteverde cared very little about polyphonic music. And we can imagine, therefore, that when at the age of sixteen he burst forth with a beautiful Book of Madrigals—madrigals were all the rage in those days—his artistic nature sought relief from studies that he thought horribly dry and tiresome, but which undoubtedly did him a lot of good. This set of madrigals was so well received that he followed it with four more books of this lovely, lyrical form. Then in 1603 Ingegneri died and Monteverde was chosen to succeed him. He had been superintending the music at the Court of Mantua for four years and providing brilliant entertainments and concerts of all kinds when the Duke’s son, Francesco di Gonzaga, married Margharita, Infanta of Savoy. It was a brilliant alliance; and the Duke of Mantua, wishing to celebrate it in royal style, charged Monteverde to write the most splendid opera possible and to stage it in the most magnificent manner. So Monteverde composed Orfeo. This was one of the most popular of all subjects. It seems as if every Italian composer had to write the search of Orpheus for his beloved Eurydice. Ever since Dante had drawn his fantastic scenes of the Inferno, Italian audiences had thrilled to stage pictures of the lower regions for three hundred years! But it was strange that Monteverde should have picked out this subject; for while he was writing his opera his own lovely wife died and he was in bitter grief for her. So, perhaps, one reason that Monteverde’s Orfeo is so vital a work lies in the fact that the composer was singing of his own despair.

We often see in histories of music that Monteverde astonished the musical world with a novel Orchestra in Orfeo and that he introduced a great many new instruments into his score.

Nothing of the kind! What Monteverde called for in his Orchestra of Orfeo was exactly what the Court of Mantua had been accustomed to see and to hear. There was not a single new instrument of any kind whatsoever!

Now this is what he had: an Orchestra of forty instruments. As instruments of the piano class he had two clavicembali, two organi di legno (little organs with flute tones) and a regale (little organ). As instruments of sustaining bass—bass continuo—he had two double-bass viols, three violas da gamba and two chitaroni (deep lutes). As instruments for string ensemble he had two little violins à la française, or pochettes, ten violas da braccio (soprano, alto, tenor and bass), and ordinary violins (such as Gasparo di Salò and Maggini were making). As wind instruments he had a clarino (shrill trumpet) (see page 110); three trompettes with sordini; four trumpets and two cornets à bouquin; flutes, both shrill and deep; and two oboes. He also had an arpa doppia (double harp).

First of all, as was usual in those days, the trumpets gave a fanfare, or “flourish,” to announce the beginning of the drama. Then came the introduction. Though called a “Toccata,” it was very nearly a real overture. It had to be repeated three times before the rising of the curtain. The organ, clavecin and chitaroni seem always to have accompanied the singers; the ritournellas, which marked the entrance of the singers, were usually played by two solo instruments—the little tiny “French violins,” or the little flutes, on a continued bass from some of the bass instruments; and in the “symphonies” two groups of instruments were used—first, a group of violins in five parts, viole di brazzo (ten in number) supported by the bass of double-bass viols, clavecins, or chitaroni. Then a group of seven instruments (five trombones and two cornets). The “symphonies” were very short—just an air played through once; but they are very sweetly harmonized and resemble dance-tunes.

The groups of instruments were intended to express, accompany and even symbolize each personage in the drama. Orfeo was, therefore, not an innovation; it was the highest expression of the end of a period—the crowning-point of the music of the Italian Renaissance.

There were several new ideas in Orfeo, however, even if the instruments of the Orchestra were just those of the Italian Renaissance. In one place, for instance, two violins were allowed to play independently of the viols; and that was absolutely novel. The fact is Monteverde was new, if his Orchestra was not; and his originality was going to express itself more fully in after years as we shall presently see.

Let us run through the arrangement of Act III. The curtain rises on the Infernal Regions with scenery painted in the magnificent style of the Italian painters of the period—Titian, Tintoret, Correggio—any of the great masters we may like to think of—and with many ingenious mechanical devices; for these brilliant Italians were very well accustomed to getting up pageants and festas. The trombone, cornet and organ play large and sombre chords to evoke the idea of Hades. Orpheus enters and tries to conquer the Powers of Darkness with all the resources of his art. The first couplet of his song is accompanied by the organo di legno (organ with the flute tones) and the chitaroni; and when Orpheus begins to sing, the two violins play. At the second couplet, after a ritournella by the violins, two cornets take their places and play; and at the third couplet, when Orpheus sings “Where Eurydice is, is paradise for me,” the double harp plays graceful arpeggios. Then Orpheus sings some very elaborate vocalizations accompanied by two violins and a basso da braccio (a deep violin). When Orpheus bids Charon, the ferryman, let him pass over the river Styx, the string-quartet plays chords; and, finally, when Orpheus is triumphant, the whole Orchestra bursts forth in one grand finale.

Orfeo was a truly wonderful work. It was startling in many ways; but its Orchestra was conservative. The instruments played together in families. There was no attempt to mingle all their voices together, nor to combine instruments except at the very end when the curtain was falling.

It is not Orfeo, therefore, that marks the beginning of our modern Orchestra, but an opera that Monteverde brought out twenty years later called Il Combattimento di Tancrede e Clorinda.

In the Combat of Tancred and Clorinda, to give the opera its English name, Monteverde used a very different Orchestra from the one he had used in Orfeo. Here he has two violins, two viols (tenor and bass) and the contrabasso da gamba. At this very moment—the year 1627—the violin took root in the Orchestra. In ten years’ time it became the leading instrument.[38] By 1639 there were no more players on the viol in Italy that amounted to anything. From 1634 the violoncello was also established as an orchestral instrument.

Truly, a great change had taken place! Monteverde’s Orchestra—we can now call it so—had become one in which the violins and the instruments of the piano class—the clavecin, etc.—form the new body of the Orchestra.

When Monteverde wanted certain effects, he now used special timbres, or kinds of voices: trumpets and drums for triumphal scenes; cornets and trombones for fantastic scenes; and flutes for pastoral scenes. Such was the Orchestra that Monteverde used in his celebrated opera, the Incoronazione di Poppea, which he brought out in 1642, at the end of his life, and which the Orchestras of Venice followed for years.

Another thing that Monteverde did that was new in the Coronation of Poppea was to make his violins describe the excitement of the combat by a long tremolo, using the passage exactly as we do to-day. It was so novel that the violinists refused to play it. But they had to!

Monteverde also did not hesitate to introduce an instrumental intermezzo in the midst of a tragic scene.

Monteverde was a painter of life. His music was vital and vivid and in spirit much like that of the great Italian portrait-painters who were his contemporaries. He saw his characters and he explained them in musical language; and he made his Orchestra help him to do so. And he did this, moreover, in such an artistic way that Wagner thought him worthy of copying nearly three hundred years later.

Monteverde stands forever as one of the greatest figures in musical history.

After the representation of Orfeo, Monteverde continued to compose; and in 1608 he brought out an opera called Adrianna, which aroused the whole of Italy to enthusiasm. Then he produced a number of ballets and comedies. In 1612 he went to Venice, for he had been appointed maestro di capella in the beautiful church of St. Mark’s. The people went wild over him. He was honored in every way; and his music travelled into Germany, Holland, France, and England and was studied by all the leading musicians.

After the terrible epidemic of the Plague in 1630, which carried off fifty thousand persons in sixteen months in Italy alone, Monteverde entered the Church; but this did not prevent him from composing dramatic works and madrigals (which he still loved to write) on love and war. He saw the first public opera-house opened in Venice in 1637, which was an important musical event, and he died in 1643, at the age of seventy-six.

After Orfeo, Monteverde gave up his “noisy Orchestra,” as it was considered. He now simplified it. He weeded out the old instruments whose tones did not harmonize with the new instruments—for the Brescian and Cremonese-makers were very busy in these days turning out new models; and, as he lived in the region of the great violin-makers, Monteverde saw every new model as it left the hands of Maggini or Amati.[39] The idea had dawned upon him of mixing his instruments—our modern Orchestra was beginning!

We must not imagine, however, that Monteverde was the only great musician of the day, though he was the most popular composer in Europe.

Florence, Venice and Rome, to say nothing of all the smaller cities, had their operas, ballets and musical-contests. Rome was very active. And, moreover, there was a great musical educator in Rome, whose name was Vergilio Mazzocchi (1593-1646), who was one of Monteverde’s contemporaries. He was maestro di capella in St. John Lateran’s and in St. Peter’s. It will give us an idea of how seriously music was studied in those days if we remember what Mazzocchi required and what extraordinarily proficient pupils he sent out from his school. They could sing, play instruments, compose and write musical dramas and ballets; they could read music at sight and copy it; and they were also well trained in literature. Few of us would care for a day like this:—

In the morning—“an hour to singing difficult exercises; an hour to the study of literature; an hour to practise singing before a mirror so as not to make disgraceful faces. In the evening—half an hour to theory; half an hour to the study of counterpoint; an hour to composition; and an hour to literature.” The rest of the day was devoted to practice on the clavecin, to composing for pleasure, and taking a walk in the open air. Pupils were also sent to the theatre and concerts, so that they could hear and study celebrated singers and performers; and they had to write an account of their impressions! Poor young things! A busy schedule for work and pleasure!

About this time an opera by Stefano Landi was produced in Rome (1632). It was called S. Alessio; and the libretto was written by Giulio Rospigliosi, from the Golden Legend. This work is very important in musical history, not only because it has a double chorus and a double Orchestra, but because the second act opens with a real overture in three movements. It begins with a rapid Fugato in 4-time; then comes a majestic Adagio in 3-time; and then another rapid Fugato in 4-time. The “sinfonia,” or “symphony,” introducing Act I, is in five movements,—a theme treated in fugue and counterpoint; a little piece described as an “echo”; a short, slow number in 3-time; and a rapid Fugato. The orchestral score is written in five instrumental parts: (1)-(3) violins; (4) harps, lutes, theorbos, violoncello and bass viol; and (5), clavicembali.

Music in Rome was kept almost exclusively for the wealthy and aristocratic circles. At the Barberini Theatre, which could easily seat 3,500 persons, only guests were admitted who had invitations. The public was not allowed to see one of these fine operas! Woe betide anyone who tried to get admittance! On one occasion in 1639 the Cardinal Antonio Barberini chased out of the opera-house with his stick a nice-looking and well-dressed young man, because he had not sufficient rank to come there!

In Venice matters were different. The public was not only allowed to attend, but the director of the opera-house would even permit gondoliers to sit in the boxes when the owners were absent. Consequently, the Venetians were very well educated in artistic music. Many beautiful works were given there. And the Venetian Orchestras were of the very best.

Mr. Goldschmidt, who examined the scores of 112 of these old operas in the Library of St. Mark’s, found that the main support of the Orchestra was the clavecin, which usually accompanied the singers; that the violins were in general charge of the ritournelles and the entr’actes; that the trumpets played in the overtures and marches and often with the voices; that the cornets, trombones and bassoons were used for fantastic effects; that horns, drums, and other instruments of percussion were used; and that flutes were not as popular as they were in France.

Can we not see in these old Venetian Orchestras of three hundred years ago some ideas gradually approaching towards our own?

Let us turn to Vienna, which was the great centre of the Central Empire. One work will suffice to show that there was splendid music in that brilliant capital. In 1666 Antonio Cesti, one of the members of the Papal Choir in Rome and then maestro di capella for the Emperor Ferdinand III, in Vienna, wrote for the Emperor’s wedding festivities an opera called Il Pomo d’oro. It was described as a “dramatic festa.” The theatre seated 5000 persons. The Orchestra was separated from the last row of chairs by a wide space and the conductor, who was the composer of the work, sat at the cembalo, with his thirty musicians around him. His Orchestra consisted of six violins; twelve alto violas; tenor; bass; contrabass; two flutes; trumpets; two cornets; three trombones; a bassoon; and a little organ.

The strings seem to have played most of the accompaniments to the voices; the flutes were used for the pastoral scenes; the trumpets for the great choral scenes; and the cornets and trombones for the infernal regions,—of course, they had to have infernal regions!

An overture preceded each act. The opera was a magnificent spectacle. By turns heaven and hell were represented; there were tempests on the sea; there were battles on the land; towns were besieged with armed elephants; and there were gardens and lovely landscapes and superb costumes. And the Orchestra had to be worthy to accompany all this stupendous stage-setting.

An idea of the Orchestras of the Renaissance may be had by looking at the three pictures facing pages 148, 150 and 152, representing the Triumph of Maximilian by Albrecht Dürer.

The Emperor Maximilian, who stood at the head of the old Roman Empire and the German nation, took a childish delight in the glorification of his own person. Instead of having a Triumphal Arch in marble erected, he engaged Dürer in 1512 to make a record of his fame in engravings. There was to be a Triumphal Arch and a Triumphal Procession followed by a Triumphal Car in which the Emperor and his whole family were to appear. Maximilian died in 1518. Dürer, to honor his memory, brought out the Triumphal Procession in eight large plates, three of which are represented in this book. They show exactly the kinds of instruments that were used in the Orchestras in Rome, Florence, Venice and Vienna, of which we have been talking; but they give the Spirit of the Renaissance as interpreted by the German mind.

Cardinal Mazarin, who brought so many Italian tastes into France when he became Prime Minister to the Queen Mother, Anne of Austria, also introduced the Italian Opera. In 1643 he sent to Rome for musicians.

It is very interesting to note the growing taste in France for “Strings.” Like Italy, France had lost all pleasure in the big, bass woodwind instruments; and as for brass instruments, they were not tolerated. All had gone. Germany and Spain kept wind instruments in their Orchestras; but in France and Italy the bowed strings were growing in favor every day. Sometimes in church the cornet was played to mingle with the voices, but nowhere else.

The only instruments that French ears cared to listen to were Strings (including the whole Violin Family), oboes and flutes. France always loved the flute, which was comparatively little cared for in Italy, where it was chiefly used in operas, as we have observed, for pastoral scenes.

The violin was becoming more and more popular every day. In every kind of music it took the lead. It had been so much used for dance-music that it had developed into a supple and graceful instrument and one that gave itself most willingly to many delicate shades of expression in the hands of a good player. The violin was often combined with the clavecin and theorbo.

The combination was delicate and charming, rich and beautiful.

The old author of the Comparison of Italian with French Music says: “I beg to remark that with its four or five strings, the violin makes you feel certain passions in the most striking manner, for it expresses them in a way peculiar to itself. It really does not matter if it has four strings, or five strings. The Italians tune their five strings in fourths, we tune our four strings in fifths; and it comes to the same thing. The violin mounted in either way is always the perfection of music.”[40]

About this time the first real French Orchestra came into existence. We may almost consider it as an ancestor of our own, as we shall presently see. This was the famous “Twenty-Four Violins of the King.” Although it originated in the days of Louis XIII, it is more identified with the reign of his successor, Louis XIV.

The “Twenty-Four Violins” were the best performers of the period and they are constantly spoken of in the Memoirs and Journals of the day. One of them, for instance, Jacques Cordier, called Bocan, was dancing-master at the Court of France, as well as violinist, and followed Henrietta Maria, the King’s daughter, to England when she married Charles I. When the Revolution broke out and Charles was beheaded, Bocan returned to France and to the King’s household. He was one of the best violinists of his day.

“The sound of his violin is ravishing,” writes Mersenne (who wrote a book about the instruments of his time); “he plays perfectly, just as sweetly as he wishes; and he makes use of a kind of trembling sound, which charms our spirits.”

This was evidently the vibrato, which is produced by oscillating the finger rapidly upon a note without allowing it to leave the string; and it does produce “a kind of trembling sound.” The old writer described it exactly.

Bocan played on that memorable evening when the Cardinal de Richelieu danced a Sarabande for the Queen Mother, Anne of Austria. At this moment the great Prime Minister of France was taking part in all the momentous affairs of Europe; and we get a glimpse of him in a play hour that few of his contemporaries had. The Comte de Brienne wrote of it in his Memoirs:

“Richelieu,” he says, “was dressed in trousers of green velvet. On his garters were silver bells and he had castanets in his hands. He danced a Sarabande, which Bocan played. The violinist and a few spectators were hidden behind a screen where we could see the antics of the dancer. We nearly split our sides laughing; and I declare that now, even after fifty years, I nearly die laughing when I think of it.”

When Louis XIV ascended the throne the “Twenty-Four Violins” became the finest and most celebrated Orchestra in Europe. Though founded, as we have said, in the former reign, the “Twenty-Four Violins” is particularly the Orchestra of Louis XIV, the magnificent “Sun-King.” In the superb palaces of Versailles and Marly Louis XIV blazed with all the glory that is possible to mortals. Magnificent furniture, magnificent paintings, magnificent gardens, magnificent fountains, magnificent costumes, magnificent ladies, magnificent gentlemen, magnificent feasts and magnificent operas, plays and concerts!

Everything “the Grand Monarch” had was the very best that could be found; for in his reign France was the leading Power in Europe. So, of course, he had the finest Orchestra.

The “Twenty-Four Violins” surpassed everything of the kind that had been known up to that time. They represented the greatest heights to which brilliancy and sonority could attain.

The “Twenty-Four Violins” played in the Court entertainments; they played in the churches; they played in the gardens; they played on the lawns; and they played for the King and his Court to dance. They also frequently took part in the Court Ballets, when they were dressed in peculiar costumes with masques worn hind part before, so that they gave the ludicrous appearance of playing behind their backs. They played in the gilded and tapestry-hung galleries and Salons of Versailles and Marly and at the banquets of the King. And whenever they appeared they excited the greatest admiration.

Although they were called the Twenty-Four Violins, the whole violin family was represented. There were violins, altos, tenors, basses and double-bass viols; and they played in four-part, or five-part harmony.

“All these parts sounding together,” wrote Mersenne, “make a symphony so precise and agreeable that whoever hears the ‘Twenty-Four Violins’ of the King play all kinds of airs and dances, confesses willingly that he never heard such suave and delicious harmonies before.”

Mersenne also remarked that the deeper instruments, particularly the basses, were much more sonorous and stronger in tone than the violins.

We know of some of their names. There was Constantin; there was Lazarin; there was Bocan;[41] there was Foucard; and there was Léger.

“What could be more elegant than Constantin’s playing?” cries Mersenne. “What could be warmer and more fiery than Bocan’s style? What could be more ingenious and delicate than the diminutions of Lazarin and Foucard? And if you add Léger’s bass above Constantin’s part, you will hear the most perfect harmony.”