TRUE, my friend, musicians do commit strange absurdities by way of expression—but fanciful people make them commit others which they never thought of.

The most common mistake of composers is to express words and not ideas. This is generally the case with Purcel, and frequently with Handel. I believe there is not a single piece existing of the former, if it has a word to be played upon, but will prove my assertion: and the latter, if the impetuosity of the musical subject will give him leave, will at any time quit it for a pun. There is no trap so likely to catch composers as the words high and low, down and up. “By G— (as Quin says) they must bite.” In what raptures was Purcel when he set “They that go down to the sea in ships.” How lucky a circumstance, that there was a singer at that time, who could go down to DD, and go up two Octaves above? for there is in other parts of the anthem a going up as well as down. The whole is a constellation of beauties of this kind. Handel had leisure, at the conclusion of an excellent movement, to endeavour at an imitation of the rocking of a cradle (See the end of the anthem “My heart is inditing”), and has his ups and downs too in plenty. If many examples of this may be found in these great geniuses, it would be endless to enumerate the instances in those of the lower order. Let it suffice to observe, that all operas without exception, the greatest part of church-music, and particularly Marcello’s psalms, abound in this ridiculous imitative expression.

This is trifling with the words and neglecting the sentiment; but the fault is much increased when a word is expressed in contradiction to the sentiment. A most flagrant instance of this is in Boyce’s Solomon, in the song of “Arise my Fair One come away.”—The hero of the piece is inviting his mistress to come to him, and to tempt her the more, in describing the beauty of the spring, he tells her that

but it is come in the music—the unlucky words of winter, frost, and rain, made the composer set the lover a shivering, when he was full of the feelings of the “genial ray!”

But sometimes expression of the sentiment is blameable, if such expression is improper for the general subject of the piece. Religious solemnity should not appear at the theatre, nor theatrical levity at the church. In the Stabat Mater of Pergolesi, and in the Messiah of Handel, there is an expression of whipping attempted, which, if it is understood at all, conveys either a ludicrous or prophane idea, according to the disposition of the hearer. Permit me to suspend my subject a moment just to observe, that there is sometimes mention made in plays, of providence, God, and other subjects, which are as incompatible with a place of public entertainment, as the common sentiments of plays are with the church. If we are disgusted at a theatrical preacher, we are not less offended when an actor heightens all these ill-placed sentiments—forcing them upon your notice by an affectation of a deep sense of religion, and most solemnly preaching the sermon which the poet so improperly wrote.

All these, and many more, are faults which musicians really commit; but a connoisseur will make them guilty of others, by way of compliment, which the composers never dreamt of. The introduction of the Coronation anthem, Zadok the Priest, is an arpeggio, which Handel probably took from his own performance at the harpsichord; but a great judge says, it is to express the murmurs of the people assembled in the abbey. “All we like sheep are gone astray” in the Messiah is considered as most excellently expressing the breaking out of sheep from a field.—— But out of pity to the connoisseurs, virtuosi, and the most respectable Conoscenti, I will not increase my instances—God forbid I should rob any man of his criticism!

Lest I should encroach upon your premises, I will quit such dangerous ground, and leave you with more celerity than ceremony.