Walter Raymond Spalding Quotes

Chabrier (1841–1894) is noted for a bold exuberance and vividness of expression, for a sense of humor and for a power of orchestral color and brilliance which have not been duplicated. … Born in the South of France, the hot blood of that magic land seems to throb in his music.

One of the peculiar characteristics of music is that it is both the most natural and least artificial of the arts, and as well the most complicated and subtle.

It speaks to our feelings and imaginations, as it were by suggestion; reaching for this very reason depths of our being quite beyond the power of mere words.

The Development, beginning in measure 132, is a striking example of how difficult it was—even for an exponent of freedom in musical expression like Schumann—to break loose from the shackles of arbitrary form.

A glance at the score shows how sadly the pedagogue might go astray in judgment of the work, without a hearing of it, and furthermore, the imagination of the hearer must be in sympathy with the imagination of the composer, if he would know full enjoyment: for this symphonic poem provokes swooning thoughts, such as come to the partakers of leaves and flowers of hemp; there are the stupefying perfumes of charred frankincense and grated sandal-root.

[T]he firmness of structure inherent in the canonic form is perfectly compatible with genuine freedom and poetry of inspiration.

The G minor Symphony is universally acknowledged to be the highest achievement of 18th century instrumental music and is also premonitory of that subjective spirit peculiar to the 19th century. It will remain immortal so long as human beings are capable of being touched by sincere revelation of emotion combined with a perfection of utterance which seems fairly Divine. This delicate treatment and this exquisite finish are two prominent characteristics of Mozart's style. Truly the Symphony is the quintessence of Mozart in terms of sound and rhythm, and we need but to listen to his message and receive it with grateful appreciation. ... The first movement begins at once with a gracefully poised theme sung by the violins, a theme which may be likened in its outlines to the purity of a Greek statue. The entrancing effect of this melody cannot be realized except on the orchestra, for it seems to float on the gently pulsating chords of the violas like a beautiful flower.

The Introductory chords dissolve the dream which the music has evoked, and we are back once more in the world of reality.

The significant development of the Harvard Band is chiefly attributable to the artistic skill and enterprise of Leroy Anderson. Anderson has a remarkable inborn sense of rhythm and magnetic authority as a conductor. While in college he was a ranking student in the Department of Music and has no small skill as a composer, as may be seen from his exciting potpourri Wintergreen for President, including tunes by Gershwin and some of his own.

Thus a very etherial, magical quality of tone is produced, especially in the upper ranges of the instrument.

Music is of such power and glory that we should be ready to devote to its study as much time as to a foreign language.

Just as poetry and prose are a series of stanzas or sentence, so a musical composition is a succession of definitely organized portions of thought and emotion, in terms of rhythm and sound. In the heart of a composition, to be sure, we often find a great freedom in the phraseology, comparible to blank verse or to a rhapsodic kind of prose.

In general, Chopin's style is homophonic—wondrous lyric melodies which seem to float on waves of richly colored sound. But there is also much subtly used polyphony, i. e., delightful phrases in inner voices and imitative effects between the different parts.

In Schubert we do not look for the development of a complicated plot but give ourselves up unreservedly to the enjoyment of pure melodic line, couched in terms of sensuously delightful tone-color. The transitional passage of the Recapitulation (measures 231–253) illustrates Schubert's fondness for modulation just for its own sake; we care not what the objective point of the music may be—enthralled, as we are, by the magical shifts of scene.