Brown's lines of criticism seem to be drawn from nature as exempli, fied in the passions and sentiments of men. So far as they go, they are immutable, and are therefore applicable to all times and to all countries. I shall be most happy if this abstract should elicit any relation of the further progress of science in later days.

I am, Sir, your's,

UN DILETTANTE,

SIR,

TO THE EDITOR.

THE character of a nation has been thought to be influenced in no small degree by its amusements. In the present age, when music ranks next to literature itself among the national pursuits, and when SINGING is so prominent a feature among the pleasures of domestic life, it appears to be an object worthy of the science, to aim at the conservation of the great foundations of our national taste, and to establish, if practicable, upon something approaching to philosophical principles, a SCHOOL OF OUR own. For a long period English music, properly so called, has almost disappeared. At this time it would be difficult to describe the compositions of our countrymen.— For although the simple grandeur, the pure and nervous cast of sentiment which appear to me to constitute the original characteristics of English writing and of English execution, are not absolutely obliterated, they are lapsing fast into the fascinating languor and delightful facility of Italian art. I cannot help thinking we are arrived at a pitch of acquirement that enables us to compare and class the materials we have been so long amassing. We ought at least to begin the work of arrangement, to support by our natural strength the delicacy of our exotic elegance, and to diversify and adorn with the collected graces of foreign study, the severer virtues of native growth. We have no other defence against the arts of Italy, who is now alluring our musicians into an alliance which can hardly fail to terminate in the extinction of the name of English music, and in our annexation to the musical conquests of that

It

country, which enslaves, as her Capua did the army of the Carthaginian, by voluptuous insinuation. A friend of mine was conversing upon the subject with **** *****, a public singer of great eminence, and he happened to say that he believed the philosophy of singing was very little understood; the phrase seemed so perfectly unintelligible and so perfectly ridiculous, that good breeding alone restrained this really accomplished woman from laughing in his face. I have, however, long conceived that something like an essay towards founding a school of English singing might be successfully made. The fact of the pleasure which singing affords being entirely effected by means of tone, and a notion that language could not possibly convey any distinct idea of tone, for a long time deterred me from prosecuting the attempt. This, though a difficulty of apparent magnitude, will not be found so important as it seems. is indeed true that the effects of singing depend much upon tone.But it does not follow that tone is of but one kind. Nor is it necessary to discuss the question further than to instruct the student to obtain it pure, No other definition is required for a work of this kind. Nature and the master (without whom let no one hope to become a singer) and an attentive remembrance and imitation of those tones of every individual voice that produce good effects, must do the rest. Amongst all the private singers I have heard, I do not remember one, who did not obviously study upon a model. Such a course indeed is to be expected. But commonly, the ear is seduced by the striking and prominent parts of what we hear, and these are too often the defects of a public singer. A combination of nothing but defects may sometimes be found in one imitator if he happens to possess the talent in a great degree. For errors of this description there is at present no remedy, because there are no principles. The art is purely mimetic. It may perhaps be asserted that there exist at this moment an English school and an Italian school in this country. There is I grant much talk about both; but I have rarely heard or conversed with a public singer or master who could do more than produce an effect; the cause is always variously attributed. If this be true there is no school; the elements of instruction are incomplete and almost confined to the mechanical formation of the voice, and the system of progression is uncertain. Consequently there is no school. There is indeed a jargon of terms, a mixture of Italian and English methods, but after all, these go little further than the tech

nical parts of the art. "When you can do that" said a celebrated and I believe a very honest teacher of public singers, as he presented a single page of Solfeggi, "I can teach you no more." But how, Sir, will this teach me to sing songs? "Hearing the best singers must do that for you," was the answer.

I do not mean to assert, that a singer may be made by reading. Every one who is acquainted with works of criticism and taste is however sufficiently aware of their utility. They open the student's eyes. They point out to him the sources of beauty, they are digests of the principles of art. In a word, they teach us to think. I may shelter myself under the weighty authority of Dr. Burney, when I say that the class of persons to whom I allude are much in want of such a stimulus. The members of the profession commonly speaking are too intensely employed in the mechanical exercise of their art, and not unfrequently too remissly educated to be able to draw rules from observation, to extract a system from the works of artists, or to distinguish and arrange the emotions and sentiments of the mind that so greatly contribute to vocal excellence, and constitute the immutable principles of the science. Amateurs are almost to a man the followers of a master. Hence a name is the customary apology for a defect, and it is sometimes no easy matter to outweigh such an authority. Errors are stamped at the mint of prescription and become current. And what can counterbalance the opinion of Mr. A. or Mr. B. or Mr. C. "who has stood the test of public approbation as the first singer of the metropolis for years?" In two words, established principles; what this "test of public approbation" really is, an anecdote will, perhaps, help to elucidate. I was standing by a friend in the aisle of a church where Bartleman was singing "Shall I in Mamre's fertile plains."-A gentleman upon whose judgment universal deference awaited, came up ;-" he sings very finely," said my friend!"O! Tears such as tender fathers shed," replied the critic with authority, "nobody, Sir, can sing it like him," and on he passed to enlighten the next circle he condescended to join. The truth is, that the higher classes who very much support the public concerts in London, may be said not to think at all upon the subject. It is "all divine or all execrable" as their musical connections (principally the master by whom they are taught or who directs their private music) may dictate. From this tribunal there is now scarcely any chance of successful appeal.

HANDEL, though not strictly speaking an English composer* has always been the first and most continual object of English admiration. It is impossible that his works should absolutely cease to be performed in England. But his popularity is fast ebbing away and the higher classes are almost universally devoted to Italian music.— The reasons appear intimately connected with the subject of this essay. Handel was a composer of great majesty aud strength; even his elegance partakes of sublimity. His style is the great, and is simple in the degree which contributes most to this end. From a singer he requires more legitimate and genuine expression than any other master. In the hands of a common performer Handel's best pieces are heavy and fatiguing; when we hear them from one who is alive to his subject and whose expression is at all equal to the task, they awaken the noblest and best feelings of humanity. They produce in us a reverential awe for the power which they celebrate while they elevate the soul into adoration and thanksgiving. But, alas ! these sensations are now hardly ever felt; that dignified simplicity of manner and that pure elocution that "spoke so sweetly and so well," the finest accordance of sentiment and of sound are almost gone. Let us endeavour to ascertain the causes. It is admitted universally that one of the strongest impulses to pleasure is novelty. To this feeling perhaps may be traced the mental preparation which is now leading or has led to an entire change of musical opinion in this country. The managers of public music used not to be sufficiently attentive to variety in selection; not content with confining the bill of fare to Handel, they kept to particular songs, and I think I am warranted in saying, that while certain portions of his works have been performed night after night, much of very glorious composition is almost unknown. Satiety palled the appetite. Education has advanced hand-in-hand with the fine arts; the modern languages are now every where taught and understood. In every family

* He not only laid the foundation (said a writer about 50 years ago) but lived long enough to complete it. So that the English music may with justness be called Handel's music, and every musician the son of Handel, for whatever delicacies or improvements have been made by them, they are all owing to and took their rise from a perusal of his works. What had we to 'boast of before he settled in England and new modelled our music? Nothing but some good church music. He has joined the fullness and majesty of the German music, the delicacy and elegance of the Italian, to the solidity of the English, constituting in the end a style of magnificence superior to any other nation.-Potter on Music, &c.

of tolerable breeding Italian is thought indispensible; there is no longer that bar to Italian music-the ignorance of the language. Not to understand Italian and not to sing Italian music are now something allied to the disgrace of a defective education. Pride is therefore become a powerful advocate for the foreigner. The power of escaping the nice observation of English critics upon pronunciation, which the Italian language affords to professional singers, must not be overlooked; there is no judgment for them to dread in this respect, since, even at the opera, the performers are often known to use a provincial dialect without censure and almost without discovery. It also happens that the expression of Italian singing is not required by the English themselves to be so precise and absolute as the expression of their own words. It may be very easily imagined that the vocal expression of a passage may be agreeable in a language with which we are not thoroughly conversant, although we do not perceive that it is not the genuine and exact expression, which we should not fail to do were it in our own tongue. Hence Italian singing does not ask for an English audience, the same nice finish which in English singing we cannot dispense with. We are apt too to consider what we do not entirely comprehend to be idiomatic and peculiar. And we are certainly much more easily satisfied with Italian than with English expression. Though these causes may appear somewhat subtle and remote, they have, I am persuaded, a very powerful operation; I shall now proceed to others which arise more immediately from the nature of the compositions of our English favorite and of Italian music.

A certain portion of terror frequently mixes itself with emotions of the sublime. In music this is principally effected by association When we hear and feel "I know that my Redeemer liveth," "the trumpet shall sound," or any song of a like cast, the ideas of death, resurrection and judgment fill all the mind. We cannot dwell without strong emotion upon such subjects; the sensation produced is too sublime and too awful, and when it is passed away, we are not solicitous to recal it, but at certain and solemn occasions. Such are the genuine effects of Handel; I have already remarked that even his lighter compositions partake of grandeur. In his Acis and Galatea, in despite of music so exquisitely beautiful, descriptive, original, and impassioned, the mind is strained beyond its common pitch, and we are not affected by the tenderness of the lovers, in the same