Frederic Louis Ritter’s Lectures on the History of Music: 4th

“Professor Ritter delivers to-night the fourth of his excellent lectures on the history of music at Weber’s Rooms, the special subject on this occasion being ‘The Oratorio,’ including the passion, miracle and mystery plays from the twelfth century to the death of Schumann in 1854. Professor Ritter’s lectures have already done not a little good, and, as they become better known, will do much more.”

“Mr. F. L. Ritter’s fourth lecture on the History of Music will be given this evening at Weber’s Rooms. The subject will be the oratorio.”

The ‘Oratorio’ was the theme of Professor Fred. L. Ritter’s fourth lecture of the course on the ‘History of Music,’ at Weber’s rooms, Fifth-avenue and Sixteenth-street, last evening. Included in this lecture was a synoptical history of the old passion, mystery and miracle plays; but the main part of the Professor’s discourse was confined to a portrayal of the rise and progress of oratorio from the twelfth century down to the death of Schumann in 1854.” Continues with a summary of the lecture.

[Reprinted from the Weekly Review] “In his lecture on the Oratorio, given last Tuesday evening, Mr. Ritter traced the origin of that musical form from the old miracle plays, and gave a long, detailed account of them, relating many interesting incidents connected with their authors and performers, as also the reason why the term oratorio has been applied to the modern sacred dramatic form. Cavaliere's rules for the performance of one of the first oratorios are curious, as is also the fact that the sacred music was enlivened by dancing in his time. The efforts of this composer, as well as of Animuccia, the friend of St. Philip Neri; of Carissimi, Stradella, Scarlatti and others, were described, and the infancy and development of that form known as the ‘Passion Oratorio,’ the first specimen of which, by a Protestant composer, was written three hundred years ago, though such Passions were enacted in Catholic churches long before. We then had an account of the works of Schuetz, who wrote, Mr. Ritter says, ‘great and powerful choruses, in which the Handelian spirit already breathes, though Handel was not yet born when Schuetz died.’ Sebastiani and Keiser were also alluded to. In following the progress of oratorio to its present modern perfection, Mr. Ritter gave much interesting information in regard to Luther's labors as a musician in the service of the reformed church, and also of the composers who were associated with him. It is not so well known as it should be that Luther ranked the profession of music as next below that of divinity. He attached the greatest importance to music as a moral agent in education, ‘as it renders the mind intellectual,’ and declared that he could never respect a schoolmaster who did not know how to sing. After naming those of Luther's hymns which are really authentic, and passing in review the Protestant Church composers up to the end of the seventeenth century, Mr. Ritter devoted the second part of his lecture principally to a sketch, as full as his limits would allow, of the life and works of John Sebastian Bach and Handel, as composers of sacred Protestant music. In speaking of Bach, Mr. Ritter gave an especially fine analysis of the St. Matthew's Passion Oratorio, and drew an able parallel between Bach and Palestrina, and their relations to the church music of their several creeds. Of Handel's efforts in oratorio we had also a full account; those gigantic works, written after he had passed his fifty-third year. Reference was made to the oratorios of Italianized German composers, such as Hasse, Graun, Telemann, and those, now forgotten, of the English Arne, Arnold and others, as also to Pagolus' beautiful works in this form, and to Mendelssohn's charming “St. Paul” and ‘Elijah.’ Nor was Schumann's great secular oratorio forgotten. In summing up the merits, aim and influence of the oratorio form and its composer's claims, Mr. Ritter said, finely and truly, that ‘only through a return to a deep, earnest and faithful study of the immortal works of Handel can a new art foundation be gained. Were not Haydn and Mendelssohn inspired by Handel? Yet, though they created noble works, they did not reach, far less surpass, their glorious model. Then let us go back to that inexhaustible mine of inspiration—not in the spirit of mere imitators and superficial transcribers, but in that of the best minds of our own times—to strengthen, intensify and enlarge our views through the ennobling influence of perfect models. No age has yet produced fine works independent of those that preceded it; and no age will fulfil an artistic mission in its full significance by wilfully ignoring or depreciating the great and the beau tiful which ages before it have already accomplished.”