Here the musician has given a language to silence itself; and the imagination fills up the void which the absence of sound has created.* The pause should be but sparingly used; a too frequent repetition of it tortures and destroys the melody. In the Eagle Song of the Creation, Haydn has introduced it not less than ten times, which renders the performance of that beautiful piece uneven and disjointed. The writer once witnessed the powerful effects of the pause, in the performance of the Overture to Der Freischütz, when conducted * If we could dare to picture the abode of the Deity by anything earthly, we should place his habitation in the Alps, amid those icy palaces and everlasting snows. A writer observes that the ocean is 'the fittest emblem, and conveys the deepest impression, of God's im'mensity and eternity: the Alps of his unapproachable power and 'everlasting unchangeableness. In the sea, wave succeeds wave, for ' ever and for ever; billows swell upon billow, and you see no end 'thereof: but in the Alps, man's work enters not there. In the vast 'wild he sees no trace of man, and dwells among scenery stamped 'only with its Creator's immutability and power. Nature is always 'interesting. Elsewhere she is lovely and beautiful: here she is aw'ful and sublime. Elsewhere she shrouds all things into a temporary ' repose, again to clothe them with supassing beauty and verdure; but 'here there is no change such as the first winter beheld them after they sprang from the hands of their great Architect, such they still ' remain-like himself, unchangeable and unapproachable. The voice ' of man cannot reach that upper air, to disturb "the sacred calm that 'breathes around," that stilly silence which holds for ever, save where 'the lauwine wakes it with a voice of thunder! In scenes like these, 'the soul is roused to a more worthy contemplation of the Almighty 'Author of Creation. Languages were formed in plains, and they 'have no words adequate to represent the sensations which are felt ' amid these icy pinnacles and towering Alps, clothed with the spotless 'mantle of everlasting snow.' by Weber himself.* Near the conclusion of that masterly composition, and just before the movement bursts into the major key, there occurs a pause, which would have been prematurely broken,† had not the great composer turned round upon his troops, and stayed their fierce impetuosity. The band breaking loose from this bondage and unexpected restraint, produced a rush of harmony nearly too much for the senses to bear. After the movement of Tu ch' accendi, in which Madame Pasta exerts such powers of mind and voice, she does not immediately proceed, as others have done before her, but suddenly stops. This dead silence, for a few seconds, greatly enhances the beauty of the glittering air which follows. When many voices and instruments are to act in concert, it is better that the duration of the pause should be expressed by rests than in the usual indefinite way. Turn to Haydn's magnificent chorus of Great and Glorious God of Israel. the bar's rest for all the parts ensures a recommencement of the strain by a single blow-a crash of harmony that is not to be obtained by other means. Here In a full orchestra, where the pause is * On Weber's entrance, the audience rose, and the applause was immense. He acknowledged the compliment by repeated bows, and, standing in the front of the singers on the stage, directed the whole of the first part.-Parke's Memoirs. †The suspense was carried to the length of four bars of the slow time. Page 420 of the Sacred Melodies, vol. iv. upon the note, it is incumbent upon the voices to retain the sound rather longer than the instruments; and as the sounds retire, the female voices should be the last to quit the ear. A sudden and dead silence, in the midst of a rush of piercing sounds, obliterates the previous effects. We meet with this in the Twelfth Grand Sinfonia of Haydn, where all the parts are silenced for two bars: during this cessation, the sounds fade away, and the composer falls upon the full chord of a new key, without the aid of modulation. In Beethoven's Quintet, Op. 20, a pause note is held for the space of a minute while the violin performs a Cadenza of 131 notes. This expedient effaces from the mind the beautiful morceau, Gracious Father,* without which the return of the subject would have appeared but flat and uninteresting. ACCENT. By accent, we commonly mean that stress or force put upon a word or sound which renders it more conspicuous than others, by which a particular sense or rhythm is given to the musical phrase or sentence; as in the case of Godwin, Earl of Kent, who said to the Archbishop of Canterbury, 'Give me Boesham;' the prelate, at a loss to comprehend his meaning, hesitating, replied,—'I give you Boesham! The artful Earl immediately took posses* Vide Chapter on Composition. sion of the estate, and supported his claim by repeating the Archbishop's reply before the King, corroborated by his attendants, who were placed within hearing. In the following strain, the character and meaning of the music will entirely depend upon which note the stress or accent falls. By being placed upon the first of every four, the movement is thrown into common time; but when placed upon the first of every three, into triple; although the notes are precisely the same. 3 04 The ear takes no pleasure in listening to a succession of unaccented or monotonous sounds so far from stimulating its attention, it tires and grows weary with the uniformity. From the peculiar structure of the ear, we learn that the different degrees of loud and soft constitute one of its greatest pleasures, and that it is unfitted to receive two sounds of equal force in succession. An accented sound invariably robs the following one of its energy; and this is natural,—for after the weight of voice has been thrown upon the accented note, the fol lowing is uttered under a degree of exhaustion, and consequently is rendered weaker. When the accent is removed from the first note of the bar to the second or fourth, it is called a false accent. This, by disturbing the rhythm, imparts a peculiar movement to the strain, upon which depend its leading features and character, as instanced in national airs, the polonaise, and the waltz, &c. Haydn, by this means, will convert a few bars of triple time into common, in the middle of a movement, with a capricious effect. It has been observed that the walking pace of a man is in common time, and that armies are always moved in this measure. But in Venice, where the people are constantly moving upon the water, the motion of the boat suggests the flowing ease of triple time, in which all their celebrated airs and barcarolles are written.* Rousseau informs us, that these airs are composed and sung by the gondoliers, and have so much melody and an accent so pleasing, that there is no musician in Italy but piques himself on knowing and singing them. The liberty that the gondoliers have of visiting all the theatres gratis, gives them an opportunity of form *Witness the beautiful barcarolle in Auber's Masaniello. In rowing a boat, the oars are thrown into the movement of triple time, which is speedily communicated to the wave. A beautiful illustration is to be found in Mr. Moore's words and music 'Row, brothers, row, the stream runs fast; |