Introduction

You may like to begin by listening to four movements from a Handel Organ Concerto performed on a restored eighteenth-century barrel organ pinned within a few decades of Handel's death, work believed to have been supervised by John Christopher Smith [born Johann Christoph Schmidt] (1712-1795), the son of Johann Christoph Schmidt (John Christopher Smith) (died 1763), Handel's principal copyist and later his amanuensis. The son had a few lessons from Handel and Pepusch but studied mostly with Thomas Roseingrave. His first opera was the Italian-style Ulysses (1733); later ones included two written for Garrick and based on Shakespeare - The Fairies (1755), after A Midsummer Night's Dream, and The Tempest (1756) - and a successful afterpiece, The Enchanter (1760). Several others remained unperformed. In 1759-68 he directed the annual performances of Messiah at the Foundling Hospital, where he was organist. Of his own oratorios, mostly written in the 1760s, Paradise Lost (1760) was the greatest success; three later ones were largely adaptations of Handel. Among his other works are five volumes of harpsichord music (1732-63) and a funeral service (1772) for the dowager Princess of Wales, who was his harpsichord pupil. He retired to Bath in the 1770s.

Reference:

John Christopher Smith [Johann Christoph Schmidt] from which this information has been taken

To those familiar with these movements, the barrel organ interpretations may come as something of a shock! The profusion of graces and other ornaments might even lead us to sympathise with Joseph Engramelle (1727-1805), writing in 1775, that 'Lulli, Corelli, Couprin and Rameau himself would be appalled if they could hear the way their music is performed today.'

Arnold Dolmetsch, the author of Interpretation of Music of the Seventeenth and Eighteenth Centuries (1915), was one of the first to explain how a performer was expected to employ ornamentation in the performance of what today we call "early music". Ornamentation was essential to that performance and to miss it out made as much sense as leaving out any of the written notes. Indeed, a study of original sources indicates to what degree performers were expected to 'expand upon' what was written, either through careful preparation or 'on the spur of the moment'.

In Musical Borrowings, edited by J. Peter Burkholder, Andreas Giger, and David C. Birchler, we learn a little about the sixteenth-century approach to ornamentation.

embellishment in sixteenth-century Italian intabulations ranged from the more sparing use of ornaments by mid-century lutenists to a much heavier and consistent use of ornamentation in the 1580s and 1590s. A comparison of several intabulations from the mid-century reveals a similar procedure of applying embellishments to obscure points of imitation and repeated sections of the vocal model. The lack of concern for bringing out the structure of the model and the freedom with which ornaments were applied shows how mid-century lutenists prized variety more than structural clarity. In the intabulations of Francesco da Milano and Francesco Spinacino, original vocal models are transformed into idiomatic pieces through a more motivic use of graces and through recomposition of certain passages. While the practice of free embellishment through idiomatic figuration continued throughout the sixteenth century as a special technique of virtuoso soloists, the systematic exploitation of stereotyped graces led to diverse figuration patterns and a rich network of motives used in intabulations as well as variation sets in the second half of the century.

In his Versuch über die wahre Art das Clavier zu spielen (Berlin, 1753), Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach (1714-1788) writes:

It is not likely that anybody could question the necessity of ornaments. They are found everywhere in music, and are not only useful, but indispensable. They connect the notes; they give them life. They emphasise them, and besides giving accent and meaning they render them grateful; they illustrate the sentiments, be they sad or merry, and take an important part in the general effect. They give to the player an opportunity to show off his technical skill and powers of expression. A mediocre composition can be made attractive by their aid, and the best melody without them may seem obscure and meaningless.

Starting with Chambonnières' print of 1670, almost all French composers included tables of ornaments in their printed editions, to illustrate 'the manner of playing.' Jean-Henri d'Anglebert (1635-1691) included a very thorough table of ornaments, perhaps the most complete of all. His symbols and types of ornaments provide both melodic embellishments and elaborate chordal figurations. D'Anglebert's system, like all French ornament systems, is combinatorial: a small number of simple gestures can be combined in a multitude of ways to produce a very rich set of ornamental figures. Since D'Anglebert uses exactly the same set of ornaments in one of his figured-bass examples, his entire oeuvre is a rich source of ideas for accompaniment in the French style. His table served as the basis for many similar tables published later. Monsieur de Saint Lambert makes frequent reference to it in his influential Les principes du clavecin of 1702; and J. S. Bach, C.P.E.'s father, used it as the basis for the ornament table he provided for Wilhelm Friedemann's Clavier-Büchlein in 1720, which is applicable to much of his, that is J.S.'s own music.

Reference:

Accidentals and Ornamentation

Before we examine each ornament in detail we should consider an important question. Of which notes are ornaments generally formed. If, in an eighteenth-century work, a trill mark is placed over, say, an A and one is to follow the standard eighteenth-century convention of beginning the trill on an auxiliary one note above the written note, will that initial auxiliary be a B sharp, a B natural or a B flat?

The general rule is that, in the absence of any accidental above or below the ornament sign, all the auxiliary notes in the ornament should be taken from the major key appropriate to the key signature. So using the example above, if the key signature of the piece is G major (one sharp), the trill will begin on an B natural. However, if the key signature of the piece is F major (one flat), the trill will begin on a B flat.

However, if any of the auxiliary notes in an ornament include accidentals, for example a C sharp in the key of G major, this will be shown by writing an accidental, in this case a sharp sign, above or below the ornament sign. In the case of an F natural in the key of G major, the appropriate sign would be a natural.

The convention is that if the inflection applies to a note lying above the principal note then the accidental is written above the sign for the ornament, but if the inflected auxiliary note lies below the principal note, the accidental sign is placed below the sign for the ornament. (The example below comes from the second movement of Chopin's Nocture in E flat major Op. 9 : for a performance go here: Chopin Nocturne in E-flat Op.9 no.2 - Joaquin Achucarro)

Obviously, if the principal note is itself inflected then the accidental is placed to the immediate left of the principal note head and not with the sign for the ornament.

Note however, that although the inflection persists for any repeat in the ornamental figure of the principal note in the same bar, all the other auxiliary note or notes continue to be drawn from the major key of the key signature unless accidentals are placed above or below the ornament sign.

Grace Notes

petites notes (French), kürzer Vorschläge (German), appoggiature (Italian) In the seventeenth century the word 'grace' was applied to a number of 'ornaments' including the appoggiatura (from an Italian word meaning 'to lean') and the acciaccatura (from an Italian verb acciaccare meaning 'to crush'). The acciaccatura is very short (literally 'crushed'), is played on the beat together with, or imperceptably before, the principal note before being released. It is generally, although not always, written as a small quaver (eighth note) with a stroke through its stem and lies in front of the principal note. The appoggiatura is usually written without a stroke through the note's stem. In both cases, the notation of the grace note is symbolic - the grace note (with or without a stroke through its stem) is not included in the time value count for the bar.

As a form of appoggiatura, the 'grace note' is played either just before the beat resolving speedily to the principal note which is itself on the beat (indeed, sometime in the nineteenth century, this form was referred to as a durchgehender Vorschlag), or is played on the beat but resolves speedily to the principal note which is accented. This is an example of a very short appoggiatura, called in German kurzer Vorschlag. In all cases the 'grace note' is short.

We give three examples below.

Some authors include a number of other note patterns under the heading of grace notes; for instance, a sequence of two or more notes played very quickly as a link from one principal note to the next. Apart from the requirement to play them as quickly as possible, there was no 'hard and fast' rule as to whether these 'passing' grace note sequences were to be played on or before the beat. Sometimes composers make their intentions clear with written instructions or supplementary marks (this is particularly true once we start looking at music of the twentieth century) but the performer should be aware that in any area 'taste' is as good a guide as 'evidence'.

Georg Muffat, a German who had been one of Lully's musicians, insisted on the "importance of using with good judgment of the nice manners and proper grace notes which make the harmony brilliant as so many precious stones ... (and) that from them depends a peculiar sweetness, vigour and beauty." After which he tells about the current mistakes, which are the omission, the impropriety, the excess and the unskillfulness, adding, "for which one ought to be so assiduous in the making of these precious ornaments of music."

Mozart would often write an acciaccatura when he wanted a normal, as opposed to a very short appoggiatura.

Before the nineteenth century, there was considerable freedom in how these matters could be notated or, in practice, how the performer might realise them. Many composers supplemented editions of their music with a 'table of ornaments' but this might only be applicable to that particular edition. In eighteenth-century France, the composers were invariably brilliant performers and the pieces were expected to display this. The decoration that a performer applied freely in performance could be very difficult to notate accurately on the page.

Appoggiaturas

Single appoggiatura

ports de voix or notes d'agrément (French), langer Vorschläge or veränderlicher Vorschläge (German), appoggiature (Italian), apoyadura or apoyatura (Spanish) The variable or long appoggiatura was widely used in 'early music'. We have met the very short form (which can be distinguished by a stroke through the note's flag) when discussing grace notes above. In this section, we concentrate on the rules, set out by C.P.E. Bach, which cover the majority of occasions when the variable or long appoggiatura is required

We give below two examples of the standard appoggiatura.

It is common to see a small slur linking the appoggiatura symbol to the principal note that follows it. Whether or not one actually slurs the two notes in performance is determined by the style you want. In other words, the slur is symbolic and not mandatory.

In his treatise Versuch einer Anweisung, die Flöte traversière zu spielen (1751), Quantz wrote:

Edward Randolph Reilly (1929-2004), the American translator of the English version of Quantz's treatise, concludes that Quantz's statement regarding the French style of playing to which these appoggiaturas owe their origin strongly suggests that pre-beat placement in this rhythmic figure was not uncommon, at least in the school of eighteenth-century flute performance:

Willard Palmer in Chopin: An Introduction to His Piano works writes:

By the mid-19th century, it appears that appoggiaturas coming before the beat is the rule rather than the exception. (see: Appoggiatura of the Nineteenth Century)

In the music of Mozart, the appoggiatura takes on the role of a musical 'sigh'. This is examined further in Mozart's musical language in The Marriage of Figaro.

Double Appoggiatura

apoyatura doble (Spanish), appoggiatura doppia (Italian), appoggiature double (French), doppelter Vorschlag (German), Doppelvorschlag (German)

the term can have three distinct meanings: where two notes of a chord, that are initially dissonant, both resolve by step, in other words, two simultaneous appoggiaturas. The best example of a double appoggiatura is the cadential six-four. Unlike accented and unaccented passing notes, the appoggiatura is not approached by step, but by leap. Although it still resolves by step, the dissonance is more prominent as a result (see example above);

a coulé, slide or conjunct double appoggiatura, an ornament consisting of two short notes rising by step to the main note. It may be indicated by a sign or by small notes;

the Anschlag or disjunct double appoggiatura, so-called from the last half of the eighteenth century, C P. E. Bach's name for a pair of grace notes, the first of which is to be played on the beat and may be any distance from the principal note but second of which is only one degree removed from it.

Appoggiatura of the Nineteenth Century

For a more detailed examination of the notation of the appoggiatura in the nineteenth century, please refer to the three examples below.

Note that the second example illustrates that the appoggiatura and acciaccatura symbols were often interchanged in meaning.

This reference is taken from Ornamentation Practice of Late 19th and Early 20th-Century Brass Performance by Dr. Jeffrey Cottrell (reference title has been abbreviated). Dr. Cottrell identifies the first as being similar to the eighteenth-century form but the second and third are quite unlike anything seen in earlier times. We commend Dr. Jeffrey's article where these matters are discussed more fully.

Reference:

Nachslag

There is one exception to the rule that the appoggiatura is always placed on the beat, and that is the passing appoggiatura or Nachslag. When a passage descending by thirds contains appoggiatura signs (hooks or small notes), the appoggiaturas may be used to fill in the interval of the third. According to the context, the appoggiatura may be placed to produce a run of notes of equal time value, see example (1) below, or kept close to the principal note (that is played quickly), see example (2) below.

Although C.P.E. Bach did not favour the Nachslag, other writers, including Quantz, disagreed with him and explained them to their readers in some detail.

Turns

brisé, groupe, doublé (French), Doppelschlag (German), gruppetto (Italian) The general shape of the turn is a sequence of four notes, the note above, the note itself, the note below, then the note itself again. However, see also accidentals and ornamentation

The two examples below are a good guide to how the turn is normally played. The rhythmic shape of the sequence, whether all the notes have the same time value or some are extended or shortened, and its overall duration depends on the context in which the ornament is being used. See various examples below:

The second two examples are drawn from ITEA Journal Volume 32 Number 1 Fall 2004, and particularly an article entitled I.H. Odell's 1899 The Imperial Method for the Cornet: an Examination in Regard to Ornamentation Practice of Late Nineteenth and Early Twentieth-Century Brass Performance By Dr. Jeffrey Cottrell. Cottrell's comments are particularly useful because they compare and contrast the notation of ornaments in the late nineteenth century with that several centuries earlier. In particular, the two examples immediately above are termed 'direct turn' (on the left) and 'full turn' or gruppetto (on the right) respectively. This terminology is not found earlier than the late nineteenth century.

In his Versuch über die wahre Art das Clavier zu spielen (Berlin, 1753), C.P.E. Bach spends twelve pages discussing the turn, and gives seventy examples not included in those twelve pages. Suffice it to say, this is a 'free' ornament; the shape of the note sequence is followed, but all else is up to the performer and the occasion.

Inverted Turn, Vertical Turn & Half Mordent

		Inverted Turn The turn may be inverted as in the preparation of an ascending trill when the note sequence becomes the note below, the note itself, the note above, then the note itself again. However, see also accidentals and ornamentation
		Vertical Turn Bach sometimes wrote his turn signs vertically and this symbol is found in some editions of his work.
		The vertical turn sign appears also in 'I.H. Odell’s 1899 The Imperial Method for the Cornet' (see reference above) where is it called an 'inverted turn' and is described thus: Note that this nineteenth-century ornament should not be confused with the inverted turn described earlier.
		Half-mordent The 'turn-with-a-line-through-it' is a mystery ornament that occurs in Haydn's piano music, which he called a "half mordent" but for which he offered no explanation as to how it should be played. The confusion is made greater by the fact that his use of the symbol was inconsistent. In similar places he sometimes substitutes the normal turn as a symbol or even writes the turn out. Today, pianists play a normal turn or a mordent since, in his use of the ornament, it is generally indistinguishable from a mordent. This strange ornament is discussed in the preface to the Weiner Urtext Edition of Haydn's Piano Sonatas. Sonja Gerlach, in the Preface to the Henle edition of the Violoncello Concerto in D major (Hob. V11b:2), writes "Haydn’s “half mordent” Q should usually be regarded as a quick turn performed on the beat, though it may also be intended as an inverted mordent. However, see also accidentals and ornamentation

Reference:

Trills

tremblement (French), Triller (German), trillo (Italian) , trino (Spanish) Fewer ornaments give performers more problems than trills. Maybe this is because there are many different kinds of trill, each right for a particular situation

A trill may have anything up to three parts: a preparation (sometime called a prefix), a shake and a termination.

	the preparation may be a long or short appoggiatura which is always played on the beat;
	if the preparation consists of two notes ascending stepwise to the written note, or the trill is marked with either of the signs shown to the left, the first of the two notes in placed on the beat, the two notes and those of the trill have the same time value, and the trill is called an ascending trill;
	if the preparation consists of two notes descending stepwise to the written note, or the trill is marked with either of the signs shown to the left, the first of the two notes in placed on the beat, the two notes and those of the trill have the same time value, and the trill is called a descending trill;
	in early music, the appoggiatura is always the note above the written note (in which case it is called the auxiliary note);
	in modern music, the appoggiatura is generally the written note (called the principal note);
	a short appoggiatura is as long as the individual notes in the shake, in which case the shake is often said to be unprepared;
	a long appoggiatura is one half of an undotted principal, two thirds of a dotted principal, in which case the shake is often said to be prepared;
	the appoggiatura is slurred to the shake which follows;
	the preparation may be a normal or inverted turn played at the same note speed as those of the shake, for example, in a descending or ascending trill;
	the shake begins on the note above the written note and finishes on the written note;
	if a , or is placed above the trill symbol, this indicates a chromatic inflection of the auxiliary note
	the notes of a shake should be as short as is comfortable for the player;
	if the termination is a turn, it is slurred to the shake;
	if the termination is a single note, it is separated from the shake;
	cadential trills, those at the end of sections, normally have long appoggiaturas;
	see also accidentals and ornamentation.

In the context of trills, some theory books mention the term after-beat, and define it as being the ending of a trill which consists of the lower auxiliary and the principal note. In such cases, the discussion is about a modern trill, one that starts on the principal note and where the auxiliary note is lower than the principal note.

The trill may be reduced to a shake alone or it may have no termination. We give some examples below.

Very rarely, the appoggiatura of a trill is actually written into the melodic line as a separate note (as, for example, in the Pralltriller - see section below). This becomes clear when one examines the harmonic progression in the accompanying parts. If the harmony indicates that the previous note, although the same pitch as the appoggiatura, is not the appoggiatura of the trill following, then the player has to repeat the note when playing the appoggiatura to avoid starting the trill on the wrong note. We give such an example below in which the second line is what is written, the top line is what is understood by what is written and the third line is what is actually played

The examples discussed above, illustrate a point raised by Tony Pay, performer on early clarinets, who, writing on The Clarinet BBoard, explains:

The relationship between the form of a particular trill and the harmony that supports it is mentioned by the reviewer of Jerome Carrington's Trills in the Bach Cello Suites published in Early Music Review No. 130 May 2009. We summarise the reviewer comments:

The instrumental trill, which is what we have discussed above, should not be confused with the vocal trill which, even during the period we are considering here, was an altogether more ornate 'creature'. Neil Howlett, in his excellent article The Trill (from which we have quoted), tells us that:

The vocal trill is derived from the trillo which before about 1680 indicated another vocal ornament: accelerating pulsations of breath on a single note. When this decoration became old fashioned and fell into disuse, it seems that the term was reapplied to increasing reverberations of two adjacent notes instead. The English word for the trill in the seventeenth and eighteenth century was the very descriptive ‘shake’. For the singer, his or her crowning glory was the ribattuta, a steadily accelerating shake between two notes either a semitone or a tone apart performed using the method called a laryngeal shake.

When did the convention change to starting the trill on the lower note? Here is a recent summary about this written by Clive Brown: [Grove Music Online, Oxford University Press, 2004, acc. 11/29/04]

Note

The term 'trill' is also used in phonetics. A phonetic trill is a consonant produced with one articulator held close to another so that a flow of air sets up a regular vibration. E.g. the 'rr' of Spanish burro, meaning 'donkey', is a lingual trill, with vibration of the tip of the tongue, or specifically a dental trill, articulated in the dental position of articulation. Uvular trills, with vibration of the uvula against the back of the tongue, are possible, though not usual, for example the 'r' in French. In such cases the pitch of the sound is constant, unlike the trill in music.

References:

Pralltriller

Also called the 'half trill', the Pralltriller is discussed by C.P.E. Bach, by J.F. Agricola (one of J.S. Bach's students), and by F.W. Marpurg, in his book on clavier playing. It may occur only after a descending second. The note that is ornamented with the trill must be preceded by the note one diatonic step higher. The Pralltriller is played like an extremely rapid trill. It contains only four notes, the first of which is tied to the preceding note. C.P.E. Bach says that it "joins the preceding note to the decorated one, and therefore never appears over detached notes." From the mid eighteenth century, the Schneller, the inverted mordent, gradually replaced the Pralltriller

Mordents

mordant, pincé (French), Mordent (German), mordente (Italian, Spanish, Portuguese) The name mordent is derived from the Latin verb mordere meaning 'to bite'.

The symbol for the shake is sometimes confused with the symbol for the mordent, the latter first appearing in Chambonnières' "1st Book of Pieces" (1670). It should be pointed out that although some commentators suggest the ornament is basically a French invention, ornamentation identical to the mordent is referred to earlier by Playford, Thomas Mace and Christopher Simpson in England and by Nicolaus Ammerbach, in his "Orgel - oder Instrument - Tablatur" (1571).

In music written before the nineteenth century, the mordent (written as a shake sign crossed by a vertical line) is a sequence of three notes (the written note, the note below and returning to the written note). This is sometimes called a 'lower' mordent to distinguish it from the nineteenth-century ornament (written as a shake sign) called the 'upper' mordent or Schneller, also a sequence of three notes (the written note, the note above and back to the written note). These are both illustrated below.

The term 'inverted mordent' is one that causes much confusion. Depending on the period when the term is being used it can mean either of the two mordent forms we have illustrated above. The 'lower' mordent is the original mordent form and so the term 'inverted' should really be used to describe the 'upper mordent'. Unfortunately, from the nineteenth century, when the 'upper mordent' had become the more common form, the term 'inverted mordent' was more commonly used to describe the older, original form.

The long or double mordent was an extended mordent, a sequence of five notes, the written note, the note below, the written note, the note below and returning to the written note.

See also accidentals and ornamentation

For information on Haydn's 'half-mordent' see the section on Turns.

Vibrato

We have chosen to include vibrato in this section because, in modern day performances of 'early music', vibrato seems to cause performers so many problems. It is clear from instruction books of the period that there were mechanical 'vibrato-like' ornaments such as flattement, battement and bebung. On the transverse flute, martellement and Schwebungen, ébranler (which involves the horizontal shaking of the flute), jaw- and chest-vibratos are described in methods written in the 18th and 19th centuries (see, for example, "Sweetenings" and "Babylonish Gabble" : Flute Vibrato and Articulation of Fast Passages in the 18th and 19th centuries by Maria Bania). Stops on some early organs included a 'vibrato effect' which is this case suggests that the 'effect' might be extended, maybe even lasting throughout a whole movement.

Patrice Connelly, in his article entitled Vibrato: some historical notes for string players, tells us that for the earliest documents to talk about vibrato in string playing, we must turn to the sources on viola da gamba.

In an interview with F. Marincola, the pioneering lutenist Diana Poulton also comments on vibrato on the lute:

Sarah Urwin Jones, in her article Picking up bad vibrations with Sir Roger Norrington at the Proms, confirms that the Baroque violinist Leclair talked about vibrato filling out the sound, and his peer Geminiani tried to use it as much as possible but Leopold Mozart, the father of the composer, was one of many down the centuries who warned against its overuse, for fear one might appear to have the palsy.

'Vibrato' is the slight and quick wavering of pitch about a mean, which many of us use probably without thinking, whether playing or singing, to add lustre to our tone. If the pitch change is small and its frequency great enough, the ear no longer perceives a series of different notes, but only a change in timbre or tone-colour. There are, according to Robert Donington, good acoustic as well as historical reasons for including vibrato in proper moderation.

Dr. Valerie Flook writing in The Recorder Magazine (Winter 2002) comments:

Today we use vibrato primarily because it is prevalent in the music to which we listen. Using vibrato well requires that it be taught properly as an important aspect of modern instrumental and vocal technique.

Another important reason why vibrato is perceptible as a constant in the vocal tone of modern singing is because of the greater air pressure used. When there is a change in air pressure or in the size of the air stream, the larynx will automatically respond differently. Using a lower pressure (compared to modern operatic singing) avoids the need to control vibrato through mechanical suppression in the vocal tract. Seventeenth-century singing -- whether French or Italian -- is not achieved by taking a modern production and "straightening" the sound. If you try to suppress vibrato without changing the air pressure, you will have to use some kind of constriction in the vocal tract. Such constriction can lead to unnecessary tension and fatigue. This can understandably alarm voice teachers when their students start "straightening" their sounds for singing early music. Using a laryngeal set-up that is unconstricted, with a breath pressure that will allow for vibrato to be used at the singer's discretion, is a common denominator between Italian and French singing in the seventeenth century; what differs is the variable versus steady state air stream. Vibrato would have been consciously added by the singer when desired and was not a natural by-product of the voice production.

There are two different ways of producing vibrato, one produced with breath pressure (also called 'chest vibrato') and the other produced in the throat. Both types of vibrato mechanism were used during the seventeenth century. The different mechanisms produce a difference in sound for these two types of vibrato but the difference is somewhat subtle. The French would most likely have used a throat-produced vibrato, a mechanism very similar to their trill technique, in order not to disturb their steady air stream. The Italians most likely used a breath-produced vibrato as their norm, since they were using a variable air stream already, with throat vibrato reserved perhaps for more special effects. No seventeenth-century source addresses this issue, although Johann Adam Hiller in the late eighteenth century regarded throat vibrato as the more difficult of the two types of vibrato. This suggests that the eighteenth-century Italo-Germanic School used throat vibrato less often than breath vibrato.

In the 1960s, and despite a lot of contrary evidence, many influential early music specialists believed that vibrato was never used except as an occasional ornament. The period when this approach might be adopted has been extended, over the last decade or so, to include what we call the 'mid-romantic', the music of Brahms and early Mahler, for instance. Some have pointed to Fritz Kreizler as the populariser of a wider more continuous string vibrato in part because of his association with Viennese 'cafe-music' but Roger Norrington suggests that German orchestras eschewed the use of vibrato until the early 1930s, although admitting that soloists, whether instrumentalist or singer, used vibrato in the eighteenth and nineteenth century.

Many modern commentators like to point out that vibrato is rarely if ever used on either the clarinet or the French horn, but what is the evidence that this is now or indeed has always been true?

In Notes on vibrato, along with the physical properties of the clarinet by Jonathan Cohler and Conrad Josias, there is a relevant observation about the playing style of the famous Meiningen clarinettist Richard Muhlfeld (1856-1907) for whom Brahms wrote some of his finest music.

According to John Cipolla in his Historical Perspectives of Excellence for the Clarinetist

On the French horn, too, there are fine players who advocate its use. Consider this excerpt from Denis Brain's article About the French Horn:

And a contributor to hornplayer.net Information archive wrote:

Indeed, even in the twentieth century, vibrato in horn playing is the distinguishing feature between the French technique (where it is used continuously) and the so-called 'anglo-saxon' technique, found in England, Germany and the USA, where its use is quite rare.

And so, one might ask, why do so many now believe that vibrato is unacceptable on the clarinet?

One possible explanation is advanced in the article entitled Music Preview: PSO clarinetist votes 'no' on vibrato for classical works:

It should be noted that many, if not all, of those critical of the use of vibrato were pointing to its overuse rather than advocating that it should not be used at all. It would appear, taking a broad reading of evidence drawn from many centuries, that there were periods when and places where vibrato was acceptable, as well as periods when and places where the reaction to it was negative, sometimes violently so.

However, this point does not appear to inform many of those now engaged in performing what we call 'early music'. For many decades there was an almost total rejection of the use of vibrato in modern performances of 'early music', except as a very occasional ornament, which contributed to many dry, and sometimes rather dull, performances that found an audience that 'felt' it was 'early' because it is not what they believed to be 'modern'. The fatal circularity in this argument should be obvious.

We have provided below links to several web sites in which vibrato is discussed and which show that this is a question on which there remains no unanimity.

The German philosopher Thomas W. Adorno (1903-1969), writing in A Composer's World, comments:

However, there is a 'sting' in the tail:

Arguments like this have led a number of modern commentators to question the whole philosophy underpinning what we call 'early musical performance' and you are recommended to read their works, the best of which, Text and Act, is by Richard Taruskin.

References:

Arpeggiation

arpègement (French), Brechung, Arpeggio (German), arpeggio (Italian)

In a previous lesson we discussed broken and spread chords. Accompanists, whether performing on keyboard, plucked stringed or certain bowed stringed instruments, would take the formal chord structure and extemporise series of arpeggios - played in a 'harp-like manner'. This technique later became common in music written for the piano for which a special symbol was introduced. The chord to be arpeggiated might lie on one stave or across both staves and occasionally the arpeggiation should be played from the top of the chord to the bass, in which case a downward pointing arrow would be placed beside the special symbol, a vertical wavy line. Note, if a single arpeggio sign extends across both staves then the two hands play successively.

When playing an arpeggio with both hands on a keyboard instrument a distinction is made between chords where from the bottom of the left hand chord to the top of the right hand chord no note is missing and those where one or more chord notes are missing.

The first example shows where no note is missing between the two chords, in which case the two chords is treated as a single arpeggio and both chords are played in sequence.

The second example shows where a number of notes are missing between the two chords, in which case the two arpeggios are played simultaneously.

We thank Steven Otto for spotting an earlier error which has now been corrected.

Divisions

The musical form, Theme and Variations, has its origins in a musical form known as 'Divisions' or in Spanish Diferencias, which can be translated as "differences". Some of earliest examples come from the sixteenth century, e.g. by Luis de Narváez. A simple theme would be extended through formal ornamentation and free extemporisation becoming melodically more convoluted and extended. In earlier times, these variations would be written down only in teaching methods. Divisioning was in music of the fifteenth and sixteenth century what we hear in modern jazz - variation for the purpose of developing or displaying technical or musical prowess.

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